Sermon preached August 14, 2011
Text: Matthew 15:21-28
Think of a time in your life when you were surprised in a really unexpected way. Maybe you found something interesting that you never expected to find. I remember a friend telling me about how he came to love opera. It had not been a part of his background, but when he heard his first one it sent chills up his spine and he has loved it since. Maybe it was a book you began to read because you were in a book group, and you thought it wasn’t going to be very good, but it surprised you by its power. Maybe it was an event you reluctantly attended and it turned out to be a grand time. Are you thinking about this – about being surprised in some really unexpected way?
I will never forget the day a few weeks ago when our son David told me he was going to be a father this December. I promise not to bring this up in every sermon between now and Christmas! He was home for the weekend and we were in the dining room and he just sort of dropped this bombshell on me, and this is the part I won’t forget. From this red book, a directory of all the state legislators in Minnesota he pulled a picture of an ultra sound.
But something else happened with this news this week. I was in Nashville for a denominational meeting. Wednesday, Julie and Sarah were going with David and the mother of his baby to the doctor – another ultra sound. During my meeting I received a text message just before the morning break. When the break came I checked it out - from David. It read simply, “You’re having a granddaughter.” What surprised me in a really unexpected way is how quickly my thoughts and emotions began to shift. I have been pretty worried about this situation, and there is still a lot to be anxious about. My anxiety has not simply disappeared. Yet with that text message I found myself shifting from a problem to a person, a little girl who is coming into this world and will need love and support and care, as will her mother and father. At times I could almost feel myself carrying her, like I have had the wonderful privilege of carrying some of our church babies during baptisms. I was completely and unexpectedly surprised.
We don’t often think of Jesus as being surprised by something unexpected. When we affirm that in Jesus the very character of God was present in a unique and powerful way, we might wonder if surprising Jesus was not an impossibility. Yet the Christian tradition has consistently affirmed that in whatever way we want to talk about Jesus as divine, it must be consistent with the full humanity of Jesus. Today’s story shows that humanity in a powerful way, for Jesus is surprised here.
Jesus travels take him to the region of Tyre and Sidon, a Gentile area where he encounters a Canaanite woman. If you remember your Bible history, Canaanite would mean a non-Jewish person, a descendent of those who were in the land before it became the kingdom of Israel. These people were considered religiously impure by the Jews of Jesus day. The woman has a daughter who is suffering – tormented by a demon. She does what mothers have done for centuries, when your children are hurting you seek out help. She seeks out Jesus. But Jesus is pretty cool to the idea of helping this woman. Her initial shouts are greeted with silence, and when she persists, Jesus says he is focused on helping his own people. When she still does not give up, as most good mothers do not, Jesus gets a little petulant. “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” This mother is not only persistent, but she is religiously deep and intellectually bright. “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the masters’ table.” She catches Jesus off guard by her intelligence, wit and deep faith. Healing happens.
This story about Jesus provides us with a powerful reason for openness and inclusivity – for inclusivity in our community of faith, for openness in our own thinking. The story tells us that you never know from whom you will learn. The story tells us that you never know where faith might be found. The story tells us that you never know what might expand your mind, enlarge your heart, enrich your soul.
This week, as mentioned, I was in Nashville for a meeting of the United Methodist General Board of Higher Education and Ministry. I chair the legislative committee of that board and we worked very hard this week getting legislation ready for next year’s General Conference – that every four year meeting where the policies for our denomination are determined. I will be a delegate to that meeting next April and May. Our work this week focused on legislation in the area of education for ministry. You know that there will also be debates about social issues, including sexuality.
Currently The United Methodist Church prohibits their clergy from officiating at services celebrating same-sex unions, no matter the legal status of such unions. I will be working to change that policy, and recently I was given yet another reason for doing so.
I don’t attend many weddings where I am not officiating. Our families are not at that stage so much right now. However on July 30, I attending a wedding here in town. It was a service for a couple, no longer so young. The couple had designed the service and it reflected their maturity. It also reflected their deep faith and spirituality. Among the vows they pledged to each other was a vow to help each other in their spiritual disciplines. The language was refreshing and surprising. Another part of the wedding that may be surprising, the couple shared the same first name – Gary.
Gary and Gary’s wedding is not legally recognized in Minnesota. It is not a wedding I could have officiated at given our current denominational policies. Yet there was faith there, deep faith. There are a host of reasons for being more open and inclusive as a church community. Being able to be surprised by the faith of others is as important a reason as any. We are challenged by this story of Jesus to make more room for others, to give others a place at the table.
Yet inclusivity is not only an important value for our life together as a faith community. It is also an important value and practice for our individual lives. What are we open to in our inner life as we seek to be followers of Jesus Christ, as we seek to grow in faith, hope and love?
A few years ago, I attended a funeral for a man whose wife was a member of our church. Afterwards I went to the church basement for the luncheon. There I met a man who told me he had been a member here at First UMC one time, but he left when a previous pastor preached that we might be surprised in heaven when we encounter people of other religious traditions, including Muslims. He did not believe that was biblical. In his view, only believers in Jesus Christ will survive the judgment of God.
I felt kind of bad that this person felt he needed to leave our church because of that. I don’t like to see people leave – it always pains me some. Yet there are times when such fundamental understandings of the bible may be sufficient reason for such a change. If it hadn’t happened back then, it might have now. In our own lives, we have things to learn from people of other religious traditions. If Jesus can learn from a Canaanite woman, if he can say of her, “Woman, great is your faith,” what justification do we have for closing ourselves of from people of other faith traditions, from the writings of other faith traditions?
Adam Hamilton is a United Methodist pastor, and he is the senior pastor of The Church of the Resurrection, one of the largest and fastest growing United Methodist churches in the country. I have had the pleasure of working with Adam a bit, though we are not close friends. Anyway, Adam once decided to preach a series of sermons on other religious traditions – Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism and Islam. He read their some of their Scriptures. He interviewed people. Adam says that some people left his church because they felt threatened by these sermons, though more joined because of them. As for his own faith Adam writes: Surprisingly, I found my own Christian faith deepened by this study…. My study of Islam led me to spend more time in prayer and to a deeper desire to give to the poor. The Hindu philosophy of non-injury helped me see love in new ways. (When Christians Get It Wrong, 42-43)
Openness to persons of other faith traditions, and openness to those traditions themselves help us build better understanding so we can work with others toward common goods. They also enrich our own spiritual journeys. Other religious traditions deserve a place at the table in our inner lives. When we are more open to them, we may be surprised at the faith we find there.
Such openness in our inner lives should extend beyond other religious traditions to learning from people and perspectives that are not religiously based at all. Miroslav Volf is a Christian theologian who teaches at Yale Divinity School. In the most recent issue of The Christian Century (August 9, 2011) Volf writes: My Christian convictions run deep…. At the same time I am a fan of Friedrich Nietzsche. Arguably, there are very few thinkers more anti-Christian than Nietzsche…. His philosophy is as far from the way of Jesus Christ as Dionysus, the god of libidinal revelry, is from the Crucified, the God of sacrificial love. And yet I respect not just Nietzsche as a person (with all his warts) but his philosophy as well. Moreover I do so while completely disagreeing with him…. His thinking is imaginative and stringent, his writing is rhetorically powerful; some of his insights are deep, and his overall position is seductively compelling. Even non-religious thinker can have a place at the table of our inner life, paradoxically helping us deepen our own faith in conversation with their non-faith perspectives.
As Christians we need to be deeply grounded in the Bible and especially its stories about Jesus. Yet this very story about Jesus presses us also to be more open and inclusive in our community of faith of people who may be overlooked or traditionally excluded, more open and inclusive in our inner life. With Jesus, there should be a place at the table in the community of faith for all. God’s grace is for all. With Jesus, we need to be open in the table of our soul to learning from a variety of perspectives, knowing that we will be surprised by faith in unexpected places. In recent years I can testify that my own faith has been enriched and my heart enlarged by getting to know gay and lesbian people of faith. I can testify that my faith has been deepened by my inner conversation with the Buddhist tradition. I can testify that my mind has been expanded and my soul enriched by my inner conversation with non-religious psycho-analytic thinkers.
Jesus left that place and went away to the district of Tyre and Sidon. Where will travels with Jesus go next? Who knows, but without openness, without creating more places at the table in our community of faith and in our inner life possibilities for holy surprises diminish. Amen.
Monday, August 15, 2011
Friday, August 12, 2011
No Atheists in Foxholes
Sermon preached August 7, 2011
Text: Matthew 14:22-33
In Thursday’s newspaper, Hagar the Horrible visits a woman with a crystal ball. She tells him, “I see a period of great joy and happiness for you, followed by two weeks of terrible, dark depression and utter despair.” Hagar surmises that she is referring to a two week visit from his mother-in-law.
Hagar’s fortune teller is on to something more than Hagar’s family dynamics. She is on to life. Life can be periods of great joy and happiness, followed by difficult days that leave one feeling down. Life has its ups and downs, twists and turns, joys and sorrows. It has its crises, large and small.
Friday, July 29 was a beautiful day in southern Wisconsin. Julie, Sarah and I had gone there for a couple of days of my vacation, staying in Sauk City, a pretty, small town on the banks of the Wisconsin River. We had, the previous day toured part of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesen estate and the House on the Rock. While our picnic lunches had not been that great the previous days due to rain, we had enjoyed our brief time away and we now headed home. We stopped along the way to buy fresh corn and peaches. We walked through Wisconsin Dells because we had never been there before, and now we were headed home by way of I-90/94. Suddenly the tire indicator light on the car was shining. We got off the highway, and filled the low tire with air. Within about 15 miles, the light came on again. More would need to be done. We pulled into a station in a small town just north and west of Tomah and asked where we might find someone to repair a tire. We had to go back to Tomah, which we did after filling the tire with air. It was now about 1 pm. Firestone in Tomah could not even look at the tire until 4:30, but referred us to Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart got us in immediately, but it was bad news. Whatever punctured the tire had left a hole in a place where the tire could not be repaired. We would need a new tire. Further, they did not have a tire of that size. The crew at Wal-Mart was extraordinarily gracious. They began making phone calls. No tire in all of Tomah for a Honda Fit. We would probably need to go to a dealer. They called the dealership in Eau Claire. Yes, they had a tire, but they closed at 5 p.m. This was now about 3 p.m. By the way, we had our worst picnic of the trip in the waiting area for Wal-Mart auto!
We had Wal-Mart put the temporary spare tire on and we headed up the road. These temporary spares are meant to be temporary. We had 75 miles to go, and the tire recommends going no faster than 50 mph. So there we were on I-94 on a Friday afternoon going 50 mph. By this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. We arrived at the dealership in time to purchase the tire, but not to get it put on. We had to go to yet another place for that. We got home about 9 p.m.
Life has its crises, large and small. In the scheme of things, this was not too large a crisis. Crises are not very enjoyable, yet most crises also bring opportunity for learning, growth and change. In one of the books I began reading on vacation, Love and Will by Rollo May, he writes: It is only in the critical situation of emotional and spiritual suffering… that people will endure the pain and anxiety of uncovering the profound roots of their problems (18). O.k., maybe not the lightest vacation reading, but the point is well taken. Crises can lead to growth. I know I grew in my appreciation of small acts of kindness. Sometimes there are things we don’t explore until we are in a crisis.
Crises happen, and they can be opportunities for learning and growth. Sometimes people come to see Christian faith and relationship to God in Jesus Christ as something only for times of crisis, difficulty, pain. Maybe you’ve heard the saying, “there are no atheists in foxholes.” Apparently whoever coined that phrase thought of God and faith in God as something for times of great stress and crisis.
There is a modicum of truth here. Faith is meant to be there for us in times of stress, distress, and crisis. Jesus is there for us when the waters of life are battering our boats and the winds are against us. Faith is a resource for us in times of emotional and spiritual suffering. God is there to comfort the afflicted, and to inspire us to reach out and help the hurting. Faith is a resource in light of the tragedies in Norway, Somolia, and even here where we have seen too many lose their lives in the water. God cares and inspires us to care.
Faith is meant to be there for us in times of stress, distress and crisis. Jesus walks through the turbulent waters to say, “Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.” However, how we nurture and tend our faith in the ordinary times is vitally important. Faith that is saved only for crises will not be the rich resource it could be. If the garden of faith is not tended, it is sure to be overgrown with weeds. If we have not dug the well of faith deep enough, it will be a bit dry.
I am not saying that God is not present in crisis. I am not saying Jesus will be missing in action. What I am saying is that our ability to tune into God will not be as strong as it could be if we do not nurture our faith in the ordinary days and times of our lives. Our ability to hear Jesus say, “Take heart, do not be afraid” will be stymied some if we have not engaged in practices that help us listen to that voice when the seas of life are calmer.
Look at the story again. Peter’s first words to Jesus in this story are, “Lord if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” Jesus replies, “come.” There is a relationship here between Jesus and Peter. It is not a relationship without questions. “Lord, if it is you…” Faith and questions can coincide, and for many of us our faith grows as we ask our questions. The opposite of faith is not doubt, it is apathy – failing to bring our deepest selves, our most profound questions, to our faith relationship with God. I think this relationship between Peter and Jesus provides the groundwork for his later cry, as he calls out frightened, “Lord, save me!” When the crisis hits, Peter has a relationship with Jesus to build on.
Given what I have already said about faith and doubt, I cannot leave the final words of Jesus untouched, for they seem to contrast faith and doubt. Jesus pulls Peter back up, then says, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?” Is there a certain playfulness here, now that the crisis is over, an opportunity for learning and growth. Peter’s little faith led him out of the boat in the first place, and that is commendable. If you want to walk on water you have to get out of the boat. Jesus may be inviting Peter to ask himself, “What made you think that this relationship we have would not carry you through this tough time?” In the end, Peter’s faith remains, though a work in progress. He cries out to Jesus for help.
The main point here is this, don’t wait for a crisis, don’t wait for a foxhole to tend your faith, to nurture your relationship with God in Jesus. That faith, that relationship is there for our ordinary days, making them a little different, a little better, and when we have tended our faith in the ordinary days, it is a better resource for when the storms of life blow. We have worship every Sunday to cultivate our faith on the ordinary days. There are daily practices of prayer and Scripture reading which help us cultivate our faith on the ordinary days. There are practices of attentiveness and thoughtfulness and kindness which help us cultivate our faith on the ordinary days. Don’t wait for the foxhole.
Our family is embarking on a voyage into some uncharted waters for us, and the seas are a little choppy along the way. Our son David, 28, is going to be a father this winter. He and the mother of his child are not married – and by the way, I have his permission to share this story. David is currently looking for full-time work. I am glad that I am not praying for the first time as I pray about this. I am glad that I have a faith that I have been working on, and that has been working on me for a long time. There are resources in my relationship with God in Jesus Christ that will help me continue to be a good father to my son and to be a good grandfather to his child.
Faith is there for foxholes, but it is better if we carry it with us into the foxhole than if we try to start it there. Amen.
Text: Matthew 14:22-33
In Thursday’s newspaper, Hagar the Horrible visits a woman with a crystal ball. She tells him, “I see a period of great joy and happiness for you, followed by two weeks of terrible, dark depression and utter despair.” Hagar surmises that she is referring to a two week visit from his mother-in-law.
Hagar’s fortune teller is on to something more than Hagar’s family dynamics. She is on to life. Life can be periods of great joy and happiness, followed by difficult days that leave one feeling down. Life has its ups and downs, twists and turns, joys and sorrows. It has its crises, large and small.
Friday, July 29 was a beautiful day in southern Wisconsin. Julie, Sarah and I had gone there for a couple of days of my vacation, staying in Sauk City, a pretty, small town on the banks of the Wisconsin River. We had, the previous day toured part of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesen estate and the House on the Rock. While our picnic lunches had not been that great the previous days due to rain, we had enjoyed our brief time away and we now headed home. We stopped along the way to buy fresh corn and peaches. We walked through Wisconsin Dells because we had never been there before, and now we were headed home by way of I-90/94. Suddenly the tire indicator light on the car was shining. We got off the highway, and filled the low tire with air. Within about 15 miles, the light came on again. More would need to be done. We pulled into a station in a small town just north and west of Tomah and asked where we might find someone to repair a tire. We had to go back to Tomah, which we did after filling the tire with air. It was now about 1 pm. Firestone in Tomah could not even look at the tire until 4:30, but referred us to Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart got us in immediately, but it was bad news. Whatever punctured the tire had left a hole in a place where the tire could not be repaired. We would need a new tire. Further, they did not have a tire of that size. The crew at Wal-Mart was extraordinarily gracious. They began making phone calls. No tire in all of Tomah for a Honda Fit. We would probably need to go to a dealer. They called the dealership in Eau Claire. Yes, they had a tire, but they closed at 5 p.m. This was now about 3 p.m. By the way, we had our worst picnic of the trip in the waiting area for Wal-Mart auto!
We had Wal-Mart put the temporary spare tire on and we headed up the road. These temporary spares are meant to be temporary. We had 75 miles to go, and the tire recommends going no faster than 50 mph. So there we were on I-94 on a Friday afternoon going 50 mph. By this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. We arrived at the dealership in time to purchase the tire, but not to get it put on. We had to go to yet another place for that. We got home about 9 p.m.
Life has its crises, large and small. In the scheme of things, this was not too large a crisis. Crises are not very enjoyable, yet most crises also bring opportunity for learning, growth and change. In one of the books I began reading on vacation, Love and Will by Rollo May, he writes: It is only in the critical situation of emotional and spiritual suffering… that people will endure the pain and anxiety of uncovering the profound roots of their problems (18). O.k., maybe not the lightest vacation reading, but the point is well taken. Crises can lead to growth. I know I grew in my appreciation of small acts of kindness. Sometimes there are things we don’t explore until we are in a crisis.
Crises happen, and they can be opportunities for learning and growth. Sometimes people come to see Christian faith and relationship to God in Jesus Christ as something only for times of crisis, difficulty, pain. Maybe you’ve heard the saying, “there are no atheists in foxholes.” Apparently whoever coined that phrase thought of God and faith in God as something for times of great stress and crisis.
There is a modicum of truth here. Faith is meant to be there for us in times of stress, distress, and crisis. Jesus is there for us when the waters of life are battering our boats and the winds are against us. Faith is a resource for us in times of emotional and spiritual suffering. God is there to comfort the afflicted, and to inspire us to reach out and help the hurting. Faith is a resource in light of the tragedies in Norway, Somolia, and even here where we have seen too many lose their lives in the water. God cares and inspires us to care.
Faith is meant to be there for us in times of stress, distress and crisis. Jesus walks through the turbulent waters to say, “Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.” However, how we nurture and tend our faith in the ordinary times is vitally important. Faith that is saved only for crises will not be the rich resource it could be. If the garden of faith is not tended, it is sure to be overgrown with weeds. If we have not dug the well of faith deep enough, it will be a bit dry.
I am not saying that God is not present in crisis. I am not saying Jesus will be missing in action. What I am saying is that our ability to tune into God will not be as strong as it could be if we do not nurture our faith in the ordinary days and times of our lives. Our ability to hear Jesus say, “Take heart, do not be afraid” will be stymied some if we have not engaged in practices that help us listen to that voice when the seas of life are calmer.
Look at the story again. Peter’s first words to Jesus in this story are, “Lord if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” Jesus replies, “come.” There is a relationship here between Jesus and Peter. It is not a relationship without questions. “Lord, if it is you…” Faith and questions can coincide, and for many of us our faith grows as we ask our questions. The opposite of faith is not doubt, it is apathy – failing to bring our deepest selves, our most profound questions, to our faith relationship with God. I think this relationship between Peter and Jesus provides the groundwork for his later cry, as he calls out frightened, “Lord, save me!” When the crisis hits, Peter has a relationship with Jesus to build on.
Given what I have already said about faith and doubt, I cannot leave the final words of Jesus untouched, for they seem to contrast faith and doubt. Jesus pulls Peter back up, then says, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?” Is there a certain playfulness here, now that the crisis is over, an opportunity for learning and growth. Peter’s little faith led him out of the boat in the first place, and that is commendable. If you want to walk on water you have to get out of the boat. Jesus may be inviting Peter to ask himself, “What made you think that this relationship we have would not carry you through this tough time?” In the end, Peter’s faith remains, though a work in progress. He cries out to Jesus for help.
The main point here is this, don’t wait for a crisis, don’t wait for a foxhole to tend your faith, to nurture your relationship with God in Jesus. That faith, that relationship is there for our ordinary days, making them a little different, a little better, and when we have tended our faith in the ordinary days, it is a better resource for when the storms of life blow. We have worship every Sunday to cultivate our faith on the ordinary days. There are daily practices of prayer and Scripture reading which help us cultivate our faith on the ordinary days. There are practices of attentiveness and thoughtfulness and kindness which help us cultivate our faith on the ordinary days. Don’t wait for the foxhole.
Our family is embarking on a voyage into some uncharted waters for us, and the seas are a little choppy along the way. Our son David, 28, is going to be a father this winter. He and the mother of his child are not married – and by the way, I have his permission to share this story. David is currently looking for full-time work. I am glad that I am not praying for the first time as I pray about this. I am glad that I have a faith that I have been working on, and that has been working on me for a long time. There are resources in my relationship with God in Jesus Christ that will help me continue to be a good father to my son and to be a good grandfather to his child.
Faith is there for foxholes, but it is better if we carry it with us into the foxhole than if we try to start it there. Amen.
Sunday, July 24, 2011
It's All Small Stuff
Sermon preached July 24, 2011
Text: Matthew 13:31-33, 44-46
A few years ago, driving in the car, I heard a woman named Loretta LaRouche being interviewed. Loretta LaRouche is an author and speaker, and when I heard her, she was talking about our remarkable ability as human beings to “awfulize” and “catastrophize” - - - and as she spoke I knew just what she was talking about.
I don’t like to be late, though like most people I am sometimes. There are those times, however, when a relatively minor event becomes like some kind of state dinner with the President, when my anxiety about being late gets overblown and I am less than gracious with my family in hurrying them along. Being five minutes late to a picnic probably does not deserve the reaction I have given it.
My golf game is a great venue for awfulizing and catastrophizing. In two holes I can go from: “maybe I can get better at this game” to “I wonder how much these clubs would fetch at a garage sale?”
Human beings are particularly good at awfulizing and catastrophizing in their relationships. When I work with couples preparing for marriage I tell them that two words should be avoided in a disagreement – “always” and “never.” You never put the your laundry in the hamper. You always squeeze the toothpaste tube in the middle even though you know it bothers me. You never put a new roll on the spool.
This week on Facebook, I read a wonderful example of awfulizing. “Playing musical chairs with my multiple personalities today. Not much fun because I keep taunting myself when I lose, the music is horrible, and I’m short a couple of chairs.” This was posted by a relative of mine who does not have any diagnosable mental illnesses.
We can be wonderfully adept at awfulizing, catastrophizing, sweating the small stuff, making mountains out of molehills.
Because of this ability we are often told: “don’t sweat the small stuff” or “don’t make a mountain out of a molehill.” When you look at a picture, you can clearly see the difference.
There is wisdom in this advice. Richard Carlson was the author who made a franchise out of “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff” : Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff- at work, with your family, about money, with love, for men, for teens. The initial book was simply: Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff: and its all small stuff. There is wisdom in this advice. When we awfulize and catastrophize we are forgetting that many of this things we get worked up about are small stuff.
There is wisdom in this advice, but like much wisdom it has its limits. Richard Carlson later would write a book called What About the Big Stuff. So I guess it is not all small stuff. Tragically for Richard Carlson’s family, he died in 2006 at the age of 45. Big stuff. Wisdom tells us that it is not all small stuff.
But we need to go even further, sometimes the seemingly small stuff is big, is important, matters. Here is someone to whom a molehill matters:
Molehills matter if you are a mole.
The parables of Jesus often communicate this same wisdom – that it’s not all small stuff, even more that sometimes the small stuff is big stuff. What’s the kingdom of heaven, or the kingdom of God like? What’s it like when God is at work in the world? Where do we look for God? You might expect Jesus to answer with images of pomp and power. Kingdom’s are represented by parades and glorious military conquests. Did any of you watch the royal wedding - William and Kate? Now that’s kingdom stuff, isn’t it? Instead Jesus offers up different images. The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed. The kingdom of God is like yeast, like leaven. The kingdom of God is like something hidden, a buried treasure, or a pearl to someone enamored with pearls. O.k., so the treasure and pearl images are more exotic, but the story never tells us whether the treasure is worth more than the purchase price of the land, only that the person who found it was filled with joy. The parable of the pearl says it was of great value, but remember that it is a person searching for pearls who judges it so.
The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is like ordinary things – mustard seeds and yeast. The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is like things hidden and found, looked for and discovered – and in the finding and discovery there is joy. The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is like little things that create change, ripple effects – the tiny mustard seed that grows, the yeast the leavens the loaf. The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is like the joy in finding something you had been looking for. When I hear that last parable I think of the eleven year old boy I was, buying baseball cards a dime a pack, searching for the Tony Oliva or Rod Carew or Harmon Killebrew, and the joy in finding them.
These parables of Jesus tell us that small stuff can matter, that God’s way with and in the world is often quiet, a little hidden, a little mysterious, but having effects that ripple widely. The philosopher Alfred North Whitehead argued that Christianity got confused when it took the imperial images of the Roman Caesars into its theology, its thinking about God. He argues that there is this other strand in our faith tradition which “dwells upon the tender elements in the world, which slowly and in quietness operate by love” (Process and Reality, Part V, ch. 2). For Whitehead God is “the poet of the world, with tender patience leading it by [God’s] vision of truth, beauty, and goodness” (Process and Reality, Part V, ch. 2). God’s way in and with the world is like a mustard seed or yeast.
Jesus tells us that the small stuff matters because God is often at work in the small stuff. He tells us this not so we will sweat the small stuff. There is still a lot of small stuff that should not be sweated. He doesn’t tell us this so we will ignore the big stuff – birth, marriage, love, illness, catastrophe, death. He tells us this so we will be more attentive, pay attention to the quiet, the small, the hidden.
Jesus parables pose this question to each of us: “If God touches our lives in small ways, where might God be touching my life?” What is rippling in your life that might have the touch of God in it? Where are you finding some unexpected joy? I admit to you that I am a little uncomfortable with language that unequivocally identifies God with some moment in my life. I don’t want God to be blamed for something that was more the result of a bad burrito. But Jesus is telling us that God is at work in our lives and in the world. Jesus encourages us to pay attention and ask the question. For me, I can say, “I think maybe God….” Then I continue to pay attention, to ask questions, to discern.
Jesus parables also pose another question to us. If God often touches the world in small, quiet ways, how might I be part of God’s quiet, tender, loving touch in the world? There are mountain issues out there – big stuff. Somalia is experiencing an enormous hunger crisis. We have managed in our country to paint ourselves into rhetorical corners that make working together and compromising for the common good politically difficult. Wars drag on. Hatreds simmer, as we see in this week’s horrific bombing/shootings in Norway. Mistreatment of the planet continues. What are we to do? Maybe we cannot take it all on at once, and certainly no one of us can solve all these issues, but Jesus wants to remind us of the power of a simple prayer, the ripple effect of a kind word or smile, the leaven of a small gift, the importance of the single act of compassion.
A favorite story of mine takes place on a beach. Once upon a time, there was a wise man, who used to go to the ocean to do his writing. He had a habit of walking on the beach before he began his work. One day he was walking along the shore. As he looked down the beach, he saw a human figure moving like a dancer. He smiled to himself to think of someone who would dance to the day. So he began to walk faster to catch up. As he got closer, he saw that it was a young man and the young man wasn't dancing, but instead he was reaching down to the shore, picking up something and very gently throwing it into the ocean. As he got closer, he called out, "Good morning! What are you doing?" The young man paused, looked up and replied "Throwing starfish into the ocean." "I guess I should have asked, Why are you throwing starfish into the ocean?" "The sun is up and the tide is going out. And if I don't throw them in they'll die." "But young man, don't you realize that there are miles and miles of beach and starfish all along it. You can't possibly make a difference!" The young man listened politely. Then bent down, picked up another starfish and threw it into the sea, past the breaking waves. "It made a difference for that one!" (Joel Barker, adapted from Loren Eisley, “The Star Thrower” in The Star Thrower)
The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is often in the small stuff. Don’t sweat the small stuff, but pay attention to it, and foster kindness in all kinds of ways. Throw stars into the ocean and bury small treasures of kindness that others can discover with joy. Amen.
Text: Matthew 13:31-33, 44-46
A few years ago, driving in the car, I heard a woman named Loretta LaRouche being interviewed. Loretta LaRouche is an author and speaker, and when I heard her, she was talking about our remarkable ability as human beings to “awfulize” and “catastrophize” - - - and as she spoke I knew just what she was talking about.
I don’t like to be late, though like most people I am sometimes. There are those times, however, when a relatively minor event becomes like some kind of state dinner with the President, when my anxiety about being late gets overblown and I am less than gracious with my family in hurrying them along. Being five minutes late to a picnic probably does not deserve the reaction I have given it.
My golf game is a great venue for awfulizing and catastrophizing. In two holes I can go from: “maybe I can get better at this game” to “I wonder how much these clubs would fetch at a garage sale?”
Human beings are particularly good at awfulizing and catastrophizing in their relationships. When I work with couples preparing for marriage I tell them that two words should be avoided in a disagreement – “always” and “never.” You never put the your laundry in the hamper. You always squeeze the toothpaste tube in the middle even though you know it bothers me. You never put a new roll on the spool.
This week on Facebook, I read a wonderful example of awfulizing. “Playing musical chairs with my multiple personalities today. Not much fun because I keep taunting myself when I lose, the music is horrible, and I’m short a couple of chairs.” This was posted by a relative of mine who does not have any diagnosable mental illnesses.
We can be wonderfully adept at awfulizing, catastrophizing, sweating the small stuff, making mountains out of molehills.
Because of this ability we are often told: “don’t sweat the small stuff” or “don’t make a mountain out of a molehill.” When you look at a picture, you can clearly see the difference.
There is wisdom in this advice. Richard Carlson was the author who made a franchise out of “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff” : Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff- at work, with your family, about money, with love, for men, for teens. The initial book was simply: Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff: and its all small stuff. There is wisdom in this advice. When we awfulize and catastrophize we are forgetting that many of this things we get worked up about are small stuff.
There is wisdom in this advice, but like much wisdom it has its limits. Richard Carlson later would write a book called What About the Big Stuff. So I guess it is not all small stuff. Tragically for Richard Carlson’s family, he died in 2006 at the age of 45. Big stuff. Wisdom tells us that it is not all small stuff.
But we need to go even further, sometimes the seemingly small stuff is big, is important, matters. Here is someone to whom a molehill matters:
Molehills matter if you are a mole.
The parables of Jesus often communicate this same wisdom – that it’s not all small stuff, even more that sometimes the small stuff is big stuff. What’s the kingdom of heaven, or the kingdom of God like? What’s it like when God is at work in the world? Where do we look for God? You might expect Jesus to answer with images of pomp and power. Kingdom’s are represented by parades and glorious military conquests. Did any of you watch the royal wedding - William and Kate? Now that’s kingdom stuff, isn’t it? Instead Jesus offers up different images. The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed. The kingdom of God is like yeast, like leaven. The kingdom of God is like something hidden, a buried treasure, or a pearl to someone enamored with pearls. O.k., so the treasure and pearl images are more exotic, but the story never tells us whether the treasure is worth more than the purchase price of the land, only that the person who found it was filled with joy. The parable of the pearl says it was of great value, but remember that it is a person searching for pearls who judges it so.
The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is like ordinary things – mustard seeds and yeast. The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is like things hidden and found, looked for and discovered – and in the finding and discovery there is joy. The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is like little things that create change, ripple effects – the tiny mustard seed that grows, the yeast the leavens the loaf. The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is like the joy in finding something you had been looking for. When I hear that last parable I think of the eleven year old boy I was, buying baseball cards a dime a pack, searching for the Tony Oliva or Rod Carew or Harmon Killebrew, and the joy in finding them.
These parables of Jesus tell us that small stuff can matter, that God’s way with and in the world is often quiet, a little hidden, a little mysterious, but having effects that ripple widely. The philosopher Alfred North Whitehead argued that Christianity got confused when it took the imperial images of the Roman Caesars into its theology, its thinking about God. He argues that there is this other strand in our faith tradition which “dwells upon the tender elements in the world, which slowly and in quietness operate by love” (Process and Reality, Part V, ch. 2). For Whitehead God is “the poet of the world, with tender patience leading it by [God’s] vision of truth, beauty, and goodness” (Process and Reality, Part V, ch. 2). God’s way in and with the world is like a mustard seed or yeast.
Jesus tells us that the small stuff matters because God is often at work in the small stuff. He tells us this not so we will sweat the small stuff. There is still a lot of small stuff that should not be sweated. He doesn’t tell us this so we will ignore the big stuff – birth, marriage, love, illness, catastrophe, death. He tells us this so we will be more attentive, pay attention to the quiet, the small, the hidden.
Jesus parables pose this question to each of us: “If God touches our lives in small ways, where might God be touching my life?” What is rippling in your life that might have the touch of God in it? Where are you finding some unexpected joy? I admit to you that I am a little uncomfortable with language that unequivocally identifies God with some moment in my life. I don’t want God to be blamed for something that was more the result of a bad burrito. But Jesus is telling us that God is at work in our lives and in the world. Jesus encourages us to pay attention and ask the question. For me, I can say, “I think maybe God….” Then I continue to pay attention, to ask questions, to discern.
Jesus parables also pose another question to us. If God often touches the world in small, quiet ways, how might I be part of God’s quiet, tender, loving touch in the world? There are mountain issues out there – big stuff. Somalia is experiencing an enormous hunger crisis. We have managed in our country to paint ourselves into rhetorical corners that make working together and compromising for the common good politically difficult. Wars drag on. Hatreds simmer, as we see in this week’s horrific bombing/shootings in Norway. Mistreatment of the planet continues. What are we to do? Maybe we cannot take it all on at once, and certainly no one of us can solve all these issues, but Jesus wants to remind us of the power of a simple prayer, the ripple effect of a kind word or smile, the leaven of a small gift, the importance of the single act of compassion.
A favorite story of mine takes place on a beach. Once upon a time, there was a wise man, who used to go to the ocean to do his writing. He had a habit of walking on the beach before he began his work. One day he was walking along the shore. As he looked down the beach, he saw a human figure moving like a dancer. He smiled to himself to think of someone who would dance to the day. So he began to walk faster to catch up. As he got closer, he saw that it was a young man and the young man wasn't dancing, but instead he was reaching down to the shore, picking up something and very gently throwing it into the ocean. As he got closer, he called out, "Good morning! What are you doing?" The young man paused, looked up and replied "Throwing starfish into the ocean." "I guess I should have asked, Why are you throwing starfish into the ocean?" "The sun is up and the tide is going out. And if I don't throw them in they'll die." "But young man, don't you realize that there are miles and miles of beach and starfish all along it. You can't possibly make a difference!" The young man listened politely. Then bent down, picked up another starfish and threw it into the sea, past the breaking waves. "It made a difference for that one!" (Joel Barker, adapted from Loren Eisley, “The Star Thrower” in The Star Thrower)
The kingdom of God, God’s way in and with the world is often in the small stuff. Don’t sweat the small stuff, but pay attention to it, and foster kindness in all kinds of ways. Throw stars into the ocean and bury small treasures of kindness that others can discover with joy. Amen.
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Gifted or Grifted
Sermon preached July 10, 2011
Text: Genesis 25:19-34
A good story bears repeating. So here goes. When the founder of Hasidic Judaism, the great Rabbi Israel Shem Tov, saw misfortune threatening the Jews, it was his custom to go into a certain part of the forest to meditate. There he would light a fire, say a special prayer, and the miracle would be accomplished and the misfortune averted. Later, when his disciple, Maggid of Mezritch, had occasion, for the same reason, to intercede, he would go to the same place in the forest and say: “Master of the Universe, listen! I do not know how to light the fire, but I am still able to say the prayer,” and again the miracle would be accomplished. Still later, Rabbi Moshe-leib of Sasov, in order to save his people once more, would go into the forest and say, “I do not know how to light the fire. I do not know the prayer, but I know the place and this must be sufficient.” It was sufficient and the miracle was accomplished. Then it fell to Rabbi Israel of Rizhin to overcome misfortune. Sitting in his armchair, his head in his hands, he spoke to God: “I am unable to light the fire, and I do not know the prayer, and I cannot even find the place in the forest. All I can do is tell the story, and this must be sufficient.” And it was sufficient. For God created humans because God loves stories. (The Spirituality of Imperfection, Kurtz and Ketcham, 7-8)
That story is itself one of my favorites. I enjoy stories for the way they engage and entertain. Stories do more than entertain however. They shape our lives. Psychoanalyst Stephen Mitchell writes: We are our stories, our accounts of what has happened to us…. No stories, no self. (Can Love Last?, 145) As Christians, the stories that are intended to shape our understanding of ourselves and our world most are the stories in the Scriptures, particularly the stories of Jesus.
Today we have before us a story from the Scriptures – a wonderful, wild and strange story. How might this story, or these stories, shape our lives? What can we learn? How can our hearts be engaged, shaped, changed?
Let’s begin by admitting that these are a rather strange series of events. There is less here of classical piety than of the afternoon soap opera – an uncomfortable pregnancy, brothers who are very different, parental favoritism, sibling rivalry and trickery, human short-sightedness. It is all very entertaining. So what is here for us? Plenty.
Are you Jacob or Esau? I don’t mean to ask whether you are a hunter, a person of the field, like Esau, or whether you are hairy like Esau. Nor do I mean to ask whether you are like Jacob, a quiet person. The Hebrew can mean quiet, mild-mannered, even innocent and upright. There may be a bit of irony here as neither Jacob nor Esau seems to be completely pure. Jacob holds his brother’s hunger against him. Esau cannot see beyond his hunger pangs. He willingly gives up his important position as the first born son for some bread and stew. While Jacob may not seem completely upright, the story clearly favors him, but why?
Maybe this. Jacob understands and uses the gifts and abilities he has been given. He is not the man’s man his brother is, the wild, hairy hunter. He is quieter, more settled. In the story we see him preparing a stew. He carefully cultivates his skills and talents. Esau, on the other hand, falls short in using his abilities. A good hunter knows how to fix the food he takes. Not to know how to do that is to starve. Esau is depicted as inarticulate. “Let me eat some of this red stuff.” He is in a rush – “He ate and drank, and rose and went his way.” The Hebrew strongly suggests his inability to develop a modicum of human communication. It also suggests that his eating and rushing off is not befitting his status. (Robert Alter, The Five Books of Moses). In short, he despised his birthright. A commentator in a Bill Moyers led panel discussion on this story says that Esau “participates in the squandering of himself” (Moyers, Genesis, 259).
Maybe that’s key. Esau participates in the squandering of himself. Jacob understands his gifts, understands that he is gifted. Esau squanders himself, he is grifted by his own action as much as by anything his brother does. Gifted or grifted?
There are countless ways we squander ourselves. One common and insidious way is that we accept partial explanations for our lives – we are consumers, we are the economic human seeking only to maximize our own good, we are bodily creatures seeking physical pleasure, we are really spiritual beings whose bodies are incidental to who we are, we are our DNA, we are our family history. Buying into any of these partial viewpoints as the whole truth about our lives squanders something important and valuable about who we are and the gifts we have to share with others and with the world. We are really the synthesis of our biology, our history – including family history, our choices – including our economic choices, our spirituality, and the stories that help us bring all these together. Esau could not see beyond the red, red stuff. He could not feel beyond his stomach, he could not imagine tomorrow. He squandered himself, despised some important part of who he was.
Maybe that’s enough for one story, but the beauty of stories is that as you live with them, they share new angles, offer new lessons. Are we Jacob or Esau is one great question to ask in this story, but as I have read and re-read and pondered and imagined this story this week, another character came to the foreground, and she offers insights for our lives as well.
Rebekah. Rebekah has within her two struggling children. The struggle is so intense at times that she wonders if this is what life is about, why? Robert Alter translates the passage this way: And the children clashed together within her, and she said, “Then why me?” Life can be a painful struggle within our hearts and bellies – those deep places inside. The struggle may be so intense that we ask why and/or why me?
Rebekah inquires of God and is told she has warring factions within. Not much help, or is it? Sometimes just to be told that life can be difficult, can be a struggle helps us with the struggle. One of the things I have not appreciated about certain religious broadcasts – radio or television, is the stories they tell which seem to say that once you find Jesus, everything is just great. Once you find Jesus, addictions cease. Once you find Jesus, weight loss is a breeze. Once you find Jesus, debt disappears – money finds its way into your mailbox. Now please understand me. I believe Jesus helps. I believe sometimes a powerful encounter with the Spirit of God in Jesus does help someone overcome a powerful addiction. I believe Jesus helps us live better. But I also know that for many of us, in at least some areas of our lives, the struggles continue. Our faith gives us strength and hope to move forward, but struggles don’t just disappear.
Maybe the choice posed in the story is not simply Jacob or Esau, but perhaps like Rebekah, we have both inside of us, and we struggle to let the gifter inside of us – that which helps us recognize and use our gifts well, overcome the grifter inside of us – that in us which would squander who we are.
On-going struggle is not the most hopeful word, and I believe the stories of the Scriptures are ultimately hopeful stories, because the God of the Bible is a God of hope. Is there any here? What gives us hope, even when we struggle?
This - - - God is with us in the struggle and God works in and through our very human lives even amidst the struggle. One commentator on this Genesis passage said that the set-up of the story, where one parent, Isaac, favors one child, Esau, while the other parent, Rebekah, favors the other child, Jacob - - - well that speaks “dysfunction” (New Interpreter’s One Volume Commentary). This family set-up would provide fodder for hours of counseling. Psychoanalytic case studies could be written. Family favoritism. Parental disagreement. Brother taking advantage of brother. It’s all there. Yet the message is that God remains at work in this mixed up family. God is with us in the struggle always at work to help the gifter inside of us get the better of the grifter inside of us. In fact, if we are waiting for some magic time in our lives to be a little more loving, to pray a little bit more, to care more about our neighbor, if we are waiting until such time as we have worked through every last issue we have, well we are squandering our lives. God is with us to work with us even now. We steal from ourselves, we sell our selves short, if we wait for some other time for God to be with us and to work in and through us.
God loves stories and so do we. God speaks through stories to form us in the image of the Christ. One good story deserves another. This is an abbreviated version of a story from Martin Bell’s The Way of the Wolf.
The story takes place in a forest. Joggi is a near-sighted porcupine, an exceedingly cautious creature.
Joggi stood before the mystery of his own life much as any other porcupine might have. That is to say, he was exceedingly cautious in the face of it…. Joggi lived and loved, laughed and cried – tentatively.
Joggi was cautious in the face of the mystery. So cautious, in fact, that almost nobody knew his name. Most of the animals in the forest has seen the near-sighted porcupine moving slowly about…. Few had spoken to him…. When asked what his name was, he would answer, “It doesn’t matter! It doesn’t matter what my name is! Can’t you see? What difference does it make? I won’t tell you what my name is, because it doesn’t matter!”… The result was almost always the same: the other animals avoided him.
Joggi makes one friend however, Gamiel, the raccoon.
Gamiel had only to look at himself in the quiet waters of the forest pond to recognize why no one would come near him anymore. Everything had changed. He did not even look like a raccoon. The whole left side of his head was missing, he had no fur at all around his eyes where one the elegant mask had been, and he could barely pull himself along with his right front leg. Joggi found Gamiel about two days after the pain had stopped, and approximately three hours after the raccoon had given up all hope.
Joggi and Gamiel strike up a conversation. Joggi surmises that Gamiel has been shot, and the conversation continues.
Joggi’s heart beat faster. “Yes, I’m here. I was just wondering what to do now.”
“Oh, you don’t have to do anything! Honestly, I mean that! You don’t have to do anything at all. Just stay with me for a little while. Just be there. Just don’t go away. Please. You don’t have to do anything! Just stay with me. I’m afraid. You won’t go away, will you?”
Joggi swallowed hard. “No… I won’t go away.”….
Joggi was with Gamiel for one full year before the injured raccoon finally died…. “You know, I’ve been expecting this for quite some time now,” Joggi said to the raccoon who lay there on the ground, no longer able to hear him. “I am surprised that you managed to stay alive as long as you did. I knew the day that I found you it couldn’t last. Not for long. You’d been hurt too badly. I never expected you to live this long. And yet… well, I hoped that it might have been a little longer. Do you know what I mean? You see, I never knew anybody very well before. Not that we ever talked much, or anything like that. But I felt like I knew you anyway. Even without talking. I have a really hard time talking to anybody, or getting to know anybody. And nobody ever wants to get very close to me because of all these spines that I have sticking out of me. I don’t suppose you ever knew that I had spines sticking out all over me, did you?... I hope you don’t mind my talking so much. I really don’t know why I’m talking to you now. I suppose it’s just that I had a little more to tell you before you died; I have been wanting to say this for almost a year and never quite found the right time to do it. It’s too late now, I realize, but I’ve been wanting to tell you that it has been an honor to meet you, and that you are indeed a very handsome raccoon, and that I would like to consider you my friend…. Oh, and by the way, I’d like to tell you what my name is. It’s a funny name I suppose. But I’d like you to know what it is…. It’s Joggi.” Without another word, the tiny porcupine turned away from Gamiel’s lifeless form and began to cry.
We all have gifts, prickly as we may be sometimes, conflicted inside as we may be sometimes. When we are unable to recognize and develop our potential and share our gifts, we are self-grifters – stealing from ourselves the joy of life. Failing to recognize and share our gifts we short change others who may just need a friend. We fail to recognize that God works in and through us even now.
God tells a different story about us. We are God’s own people created for love, for doing good, for creating beauty, for relationship, for friendship. Quite a story. Amen.
Text: Genesis 25:19-34
A good story bears repeating. So here goes. When the founder of Hasidic Judaism, the great Rabbi Israel Shem Tov, saw misfortune threatening the Jews, it was his custom to go into a certain part of the forest to meditate. There he would light a fire, say a special prayer, and the miracle would be accomplished and the misfortune averted. Later, when his disciple, Maggid of Mezritch, had occasion, for the same reason, to intercede, he would go to the same place in the forest and say: “Master of the Universe, listen! I do not know how to light the fire, but I am still able to say the prayer,” and again the miracle would be accomplished. Still later, Rabbi Moshe-leib of Sasov, in order to save his people once more, would go into the forest and say, “I do not know how to light the fire. I do not know the prayer, but I know the place and this must be sufficient.” It was sufficient and the miracle was accomplished. Then it fell to Rabbi Israel of Rizhin to overcome misfortune. Sitting in his armchair, his head in his hands, he spoke to God: “I am unable to light the fire, and I do not know the prayer, and I cannot even find the place in the forest. All I can do is tell the story, and this must be sufficient.” And it was sufficient. For God created humans because God loves stories. (The Spirituality of Imperfection, Kurtz and Ketcham, 7-8)
That story is itself one of my favorites. I enjoy stories for the way they engage and entertain. Stories do more than entertain however. They shape our lives. Psychoanalyst Stephen Mitchell writes: We are our stories, our accounts of what has happened to us…. No stories, no self. (Can Love Last?, 145) As Christians, the stories that are intended to shape our understanding of ourselves and our world most are the stories in the Scriptures, particularly the stories of Jesus.
Today we have before us a story from the Scriptures – a wonderful, wild and strange story. How might this story, or these stories, shape our lives? What can we learn? How can our hearts be engaged, shaped, changed?
Let’s begin by admitting that these are a rather strange series of events. There is less here of classical piety than of the afternoon soap opera – an uncomfortable pregnancy, brothers who are very different, parental favoritism, sibling rivalry and trickery, human short-sightedness. It is all very entertaining. So what is here for us? Plenty.
Are you Jacob or Esau? I don’t mean to ask whether you are a hunter, a person of the field, like Esau, or whether you are hairy like Esau. Nor do I mean to ask whether you are like Jacob, a quiet person. The Hebrew can mean quiet, mild-mannered, even innocent and upright. There may be a bit of irony here as neither Jacob nor Esau seems to be completely pure. Jacob holds his brother’s hunger against him. Esau cannot see beyond his hunger pangs. He willingly gives up his important position as the first born son for some bread and stew. While Jacob may not seem completely upright, the story clearly favors him, but why?
Maybe this. Jacob understands and uses the gifts and abilities he has been given. He is not the man’s man his brother is, the wild, hairy hunter. He is quieter, more settled. In the story we see him preparing a stew. He carefully cultivates his skills and talents. Esau, on the other hand, falls short in using his abilities. A good hunter knows how to fix the food he takes. Not to know how to do that is to starve. Esau is depicted as inarticulate. “Let me eat some of this red stuff.” He is in a rush – “He ate and drank, and rose and went his way.” The Hebrew strongly suggests his inability to develop a modicum of human communication. It also suggests that his eating and rushing off is not befitting his status. (Robert Alter, The Five Books of Moses). In short, he despised his birthright. A commentator in a Bill Moyers led panel discussion on this story says that Esau “participates in the squandering of himself” (Moyers, Genesis, 259).
Maybe that’s key. Esau participates in the squandering of himself. Jacob understands his gifts, understands that he is gifted. Esau squanders himself, he is grifted by his own action as much as by anything his brother does. Gifted or grifted?
There are countless ways we squander ourselves. One common and insidious way is that we accept partial explanations for our lives – we are consumers, we are the economic human seeking only to maximize our own good, we are bodily creatures seeking physical pleasure, we are really spiritual beings whose bodies are incidental to who we are, we are our DNA, we are our family history. Buying into any of these partial viewpoints as the whole truth about our lives squanders something important and valuable about who we are and the gifts we have to share with others and with the world. We are really the synthesis of our biology, our history – including family history, our choices – including our economic choices, our spirituality, and the stories that help us bring all these together. Esau could not see beyond the red, red stuff. He could not feel beyond his stomach, he could not imagine tomorrow. He squandered himself, despised some important part of who he was.
Maybe that’s enough for one story, but the beauty of stories is that as you live with them, they share new angles, offer new lessons. Are we Jacob or Esau is one great question to ask in this story, but as I have read and re-read and pondered and imagined this story this week, another character came to the foreground, and she offers insights for our lives as well.
Rebekah. Rebekah has within her two struggling children. The struggle is so intense at times that she wonders if this is what life is about, why? Robert Alter translates the passage this way: And the children clashed together within her, and she said, “Then why me?” Life can be a painful struggle within our hearts and bellies – those deep places inside. The struggle may be so intense that we ask why and/or why me?
Rebekah inquires of God and is told she has warring factions within. Not much help, or is it? Sometimes just to be told that life can be difficult, can be a struggle helps us with the struggle. One of the things I have not appreciated about certain religious broadcasts – radio or television, is the stories they tell which seem to say that once you find Jesus, everything is just great. Once you find Jesus, addictions cease. Once you find Jesus, weight loss is a breeze. Once you find Jesus, debt disappears – money finds its way into your mailbox. Now please understand me. I believe Jesus helps. I believe sometimes a powerful encounter with the Spirit of God in Jesus does help someone overcome a powerful addiction. I believe Jesus helps us live better. But I also know that for many of us, in at least some areas of our lives, the struggles continue. Our faith gives us strength and hope to move forward, but struggles don’t just disappear.
Maybe the choice posed in the story is not simply Jacob or Esau, but perhaps like Rebekah, we have both inside of us, and we struggle to let the gifter inside of us – that which helps us recognize and use our gifts well, overcome the grifter inside of us – that in us which would squander who we are.
On-going struggle is not the most hopeful word, and I believe the stories of the Scriptures are ultimately hopeful stories, because the God of the Bible is a God of hope. Is there any here? What gives us hope, even when we struggle?
This - - - God is with us in the struggle and God works in and through our very human lives even amidst the struggle. One commentator on this Genesis passage said that the set-up of the story, where one parent, Isaac, favors one child, Esau, while the other parent, Rebekah, favors the other child, Jacob - - - well that speaks “dysfunction” (New Interpreter’s One Volume Commentary). This family set-up would provide fodder for hours of counseling. Psychoanalytic case studies could be written. Family favoritism. Parental disagreement. Brother taking advantage of brother. It’s all there. Yet the message is that God remains at work in this mixed up family. God is with us in the struggle always at work to help the gifter inside of us get the better of the grifter inside of us. In fact, if we are waiting for some magic time in our lives to be a little more loving, to pray a little bit more, to care more about our neighbor, if we are waiting until such time as we have worked through every last issue we have, well we are squandering our lives. God is with us to work with us even now. We steal from ourselves, we sell our selves short, if we wait for some other time for God to be with us and to work in and through us.
God loves stories and so do we. God speaks through stories to form us in the image of the Christ. One good story deserves another. This is an abbreviated version of a story from Martin Bell’s The Way of the Wolf.
The story takes place in a forest. Joggi is a near-sighted porcupine, an exceedingly cautious creature.
Joggi stood before the mystery of his own life much as any other porcupine might have. That is to say, he was exceedingly cautious in the face of it…. Joggi lived and loved, laughed and cried – tentatively.
Joggi was cautious in the face of the mystery. So cautious, in fact, that almost nobody knew his name. Most of the animals in the forest has seen the near-sighted porcupine moving slowly about…. Few had spoken to him…. When asked what his name was, he would answer, “It doesn’t matter! It doesn’t matter what my name is! Can’t you see? What difference does it make? I won’t tell you what my name is, because it doesn’t matter!”… The result was almost always the same: the other animals avoided him.
Joggi makes one friend however, Gamiel, the raccoon.
Gamiel had only to look at himself in the quiet waters of the forest pond to recognize why no one would come near him anymore. Everything had changed. He did not even look like a raccoon. The whole left side of his head was missing, he had no fur at all around his eyes where one the elegant mask had been, and he could barely pull himself along with his right front leg. Joggi found Gamiel about two days after the pain had stopped, and approximately three hours after the raccoon had given up all hope.
Joggi and Gamiel strike up a conversation. Joggi surmises that Gamiel has been shot, and the conversation continues.
Joggi’s heart beat faster. “Yes, I’m here. I was just wondering what to do now.”
“Oh, you don’t have to do anything! Honestly, I mean that! You don’t have to do anything at all. Just stay with me for a little while. Just be there. Just don’t go away. Please. You don’t have to do anything! Just stay with me. I’m afraid. You won’t go away, will you?”
Joggi swallowed hard. “No… I won’t go away.”….
Joggi was with Gamiel for one full year before the injured raccoon finally died…. “You know, I’ve been expecting this for quite some time now,” Joggi said to the raccoon who lay there on the ground, no longer able to hear him. “I am surprised that you managed to stay alive as long as you did. I knew the day that I found you it couldn’t last. Not for long. You’d been hurt too badly. I never expected you to live this long. And yet… well, I hoped that it might have been a little longer. Do you know what I mean? You see, I never knew anybody very well before. Not that we ever talked much, or anything like that. But I felt like I knew you anyway. Even without talking. I have a really hard time talking to anybody, or getting to know anybody. And nobody ever wants to get very close to me because of all these spines that I have sticking out of me. I don’t suppose you ever knew that I had spines sticking out all over me, did you?... I hope you don’t mind my talking so much. I really don’t know why I’m talking to you now. I suppose it’s just that I had a little more to tell you before you died; I have been wanting to say this for almost a year and never quite found the right time to do it. It’s too late now, I realize, but I’ve been wanting to tell you that it has been an honor to meet you, and that you are indeed a very handsome raccoon, and that I would like to consider you my friend…. Oh, and by the way, I’d like to tell you what my name is. It’s a funny name I suppose. But I’d like you to know what it is…. It’s Joggi.” Without another word, the tiny porcupine turned away from Gamiel’s lifeless form and began to cry.
We all have gifts, prickly as we may be sometimes, conflicted inside as we may be sometimes. When we are unable to recognize and develop our potential and share our gifts, we are self-grifters – stealing from ourselves the joy of life. Failing to recognize and share our gifts we short change others who may just need a friend. We fail to recognize that God works in and through us even now.
God tells a different story about us. We are God’s own people created for love, for doing good, for creating beauty, for relationship, for friendship. Quite a story. Amen.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Restful Restlessness
Sermon preached July 3, 2011
Text: Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
In a celebrated 1936 essay entitled “The Crack Up,” Minnesota-born author F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote: The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise. (The Best American Essays of the Century, ed. Joyce Carol Oates, p. 139).
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function. I really liked that quote when I first read it as a younger man. I have to say that the intervening years have made me wonder about it a bit. There are days when trying to keep one idea in my head and still be able to function is a task! One of my insights from playing softball on our church team this summer, the first time in twenty years that I have played organized ball, is that as we get to that stage in life when our minds start to forget things more often, our muscles retain a great memory. The day after a game, my muscles remember every stretch and strain of the night before, and they remind me of just what I had done!
Today’s gospel reading suggests that the way of wisdom is something like Fitzgerald’s idea of a first-rate intelligence. The way of wisdom is a paradoxical way, a way of combining ideas, thoughts, actions together when they it seems like perhaps they cannot be combined, a way of functioning with two ideas in our minds, a way of both-and.
Wisdom is vindicated by her deeds, Jesus tells us. Wisdom fits actions and circumstances. Wisdom understands that when there is music, dancing is appropriate. When there is hurt, mourning is appropriate. And because life has both moments of music and moments of pain, we need to be able both to dance and to mourn. Sometimes fasting is appropriate for the spiritual life, as with John. Sometimes feasting is appropriate, as with the disciples of Jesus. Our spiritual lives are enhanced both by disciplined action and joyous action. Wisdom is vindicated by her deeds. Wisdom knows when to be restrained and when to be exuberant.
The beautiful words that end this passage are also filled with the paradox of wisdom. Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. I deeply appreciate Eugene Peterson’s rendering in The Message: Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me, and work with me – watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.
So where’s the paradox here? Isn’t this a beautiful invitation to let go and let Jesus, an invitation to rest and relax? Paradoxically yes and no. Jesus promises rest to the weary, but also invites work. We hear in this an invitation to refreshing work, to restful restlessness.
There are all kinds of places where I have encountered contemporary confirmation of this insight of Jesus that the way of wisdom, the way of the Spirit, is the way of paradox. In his book Leaders Make the Future: Bob Johansen says that one crucial skill for leaders in the future is “dilemma flipping.” “Dilemma flipping is reframing an unsolvable challenge as an opportunity, or perhaps as both a threat and an opportunity” (44). Both/and - - - the paradoxical way of wisdom.
Barry Johnson works in the field of organizational development. One of the insights he has developed is a distinction between a problem to be solved and a polarity to be managed. “Polarities are interdependent pairs of truths that are a natural and integral part of our daily lives” (Oswald and Johnson, Managing Polarities in Congregations, 19). Two common polarities we manage all the time are inhale/exhale and rest/activity. Both are necessary, but at different times. Both/and - - - the paradoxical way of wisdom.
Parker Palmer has become a well-known teacher and author. His very first book, newly re-issued a couple of years ago, was entitled The Promise of Paradox: a celebration of contradictions in the Christian life. Palmer roots his understanding of paradox in this statement: “The opposite of a profound truth may be another profound truth” (Neils Bohr, quoted in The Promise of Paradox 2008, p. xxix). “The promise of paradox,” Palmer writes, “ is the promise that apparent opposites – like order and disorder – can cohere in our lives, the promise that if we replace either-or with both-and, our lives will become larger and more filled with light” (xxix). “The capacity to embrace true paradoxes… is a life skill for holding complex experiences” (xxx). The paradoxical way of wisdom.
So the way of wisdom, the way of the Spirit may be the way of paradox, at least often. But here is part of the reality of our lives, we struggle with paradox. Either/or seems to make more sense than both/and; it seems easier for us. So here’s another paradox – Jesus invites us to the way of wisdom, which seems difficult to grab hold of, yet the promise is that this is less ill-fitting for us.
All of this has perhaps been a little abstract. There is value in that – the big picture, the overview, but we also need the concrete, the specific to see if our ideas make any difference. Our concrete experience then shapes our abstract ideas - - - both/and!
The paradoxical way of wisdom is to be lived in our individual lives. At the heart of the Christian faith is the message that we are loved by God in Jesus the Christ. We are loved as we are, valued as we are, given grace just as we are. “Just As I Am” the hymn goes. God loves you and there is nothing you can do about it. “Come to me,” Jesus says, “come to me all you who are weary.” The message of grace is that we do nothing to earn God’s love. The calculus of grace is outside the language of earning and deserving. We are loved. At the same time, to know in the depths of our hearts and souls that we are loved should move us to live differently, to live lovingly, to cultivate our best selves and to give the gift of our love to the world. That is the yoke of Jesus. It is work, but it is meant to flow from the depth of who we are. It is not wearying because it fits us. It is dancing to the unforced rhythms of grace. The Christian life is both faith, trusting that we are loved, and works, living this new way in practices that share love and justice and help us cultivate our best selves. The paradoxical way of wisdom.
Here is a slightly different angle on this same paradox in our lives. While we are loved just as we are, we are also sometimes painfully aware that we need to change some things in our lives. In a delightful and insightful book entitled What To Do Between Birth and Death, psychoanalyst Charles Spezzano writes, “Habits form and stick even when they are maladaptive and life-robbing” (148). We do things over and over, and they become habits and we stick with them even when they no longer enhance our lives. Change is needed sometimes. So where to begin, with disgust with ourselves, with the sense that we are unlovable as we are? The gospel insight is that we begin knowing we are deeply loved as we are, loved enough to be worth the effort to change those things that need changing in our lives. Paradoxically, when we feel lousy about ourselves we tend to turn to our familiar habits of behavior to numb the feeling, even when those habits are maladaptive and life-robbing.
The paradoxical way of wisdom is to be lived in our life together as church, as Jesus community. As a congregation we need to celebrate who we are, the good we do, the things we have accomplished that promote the kingdom of God. Sometimes such celebration is not our best thing. We are Northerners, after all, and really worried that we might become too big for our britches. But celebration is vitally important. We do some awesome things here for God and Christ: we help feed people, we are a part of CHUM, we give so others have, we reach into the world through our denomination, we teach children and give them a safe and nurturing space, we cultivate friendships, we sing, we play music, we think together, we are there for each other in joy and grief, we work to overcome barriers. Sometimes we are truly amazing. And there is always more, and we need to be asking, “what’s next, God?” In our life together, there should be a restful restlessness. The paradoxical way of wisdom.
And here is a paradox we have lived with and will continue to live with in our church, the ability to hold well-thought opinions with passion and discuss opposing ideas with respect and care. In the upcoming newsletter I write an article in which I let us know that as a reconciling congregation we need to have times for discussion of the marriage amendment that will be on the ballot in 2012 in Minnesota, that is if the government is up and running by then. I also let you all know that I will be voting against it and working for its defeat. My pledge is this – I will work with you to provide for caring and respectful conversations, even as I have some strong views.
And on this July 4 weekend, I would be remiss if I did not say a word about the paradoxical way of wisdom in our national life. Many of us have heard the phrase, “my country, right or wrong.” Not much paradox there. Do you know the story of Carl Schurz? Schurz was born in Germany, and when Missouri elected him to the U. S. Senate in 1869, he was the first German-American in the Senate. Before moving to Missouri, Schurz spent significant time living in Wisconsin, where he was deeply involved in the anti-slavery movement. Schurz served in the Union Army during the Civil War and after the Senate went on to serve as Interior Secretary. Quite a resume, a July 4 resume! Carl Schurz, in an 1872 speech claimed that the watchword of true patriotism should not be simply “my country, right or wrong,” but rather should be: “My country, right or wrong; if right to be kept right; and if wrong to be set right.” Wise words that I wish we might hear even now in our national life. The paradoxical way of wisdom.
Jesus came eating and drinking, and they said about him, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!” Those who said this failed to attend to the paradoxical way of wisdom taught by this same Jesus – the way of love which is both self-acceptance and change, celebration and commitment to growth, love of country and a desire for it to be better, restful restlessness. The flute of wisdom plays. Time to dance to the unforced rhythms of grace. Amen.
Text: Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
In a celebrated 1936 essay entitled “The Crack Up,” Minnesota-born author F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote: The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise. (The Best American Essays of the Century, ed. Joyce Carol Oates, p. 139).
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function. I really liked that quote when I first read it as a younger man. I have to say that the intervening years have made me wonder about it a bit. There are days when trying to keep one idea in my head and still be able to function is a task! One of my insights from playing softball on our church team this summer, the first time in twenty years that I have played organized ball, is that as we get to that stage in life when our minds start to forget things more often, our muscles retain a great memory. The day after a game, my muscles remember every stretch and strain of the night before, and they remind me of just what I had done!
Today’s gospel reading suggests that the way of wisdom is something like Fitzgerald’s idea of a first-rate intelligence. The way of wisdom is a paradoxical way, a way of combining ideas, thoughts, actions together when they it seems like perhaps they cannot be combined, a way of functioning with two ideas in our minds, a way of both-and.
Wisdom is vindicated by her deeds, Jesus tells us. Wisdom fits actions and circumstances. Wisdom understands that when there is music, dancing is appropriate. When there is hurt, mourning is appropriate. And because life has both moments of music and moments of pain, we need to be able both to dance and to mourn. Sometimes fasting is appropriate for the spiritual life, as with John. Sometimes feasting is appropriate, as with the disciples of Jesus. Our spiritual lives are enhanced both by disciplined action and joyous action. Wisdom is vindicated by her deeds. Wisdom knows when to be restrained and when to be exuberant.
The beautiful words that end this passage are also filled with the paradox of wisdom. Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. I deeply appreciate Eugene Peterson’s rendering in The Message: Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me, and work with me – watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.
So where’s the paradox here? Isn’t this a beautiful invitation to let go and let Jesus, an invitation to rest and relax? Paradoxically yes and no. Jesus promises rest to the weary, but also invites work. We hear in this an invitation to refreshing work, to restful restlessness.
There are all kinds of places where I have encountered contemporary confirmation of this insight of Jesus that the way of wisdom, the way of the Spirit, is the way of paradox. In his book Leaders Make the Future: Bob Johansen says that one crucial skill for leaders in the future is “dilemma flipping.” “Dilemma flipping is reframing an unsolvable challenge as an opportunity, or perhaps as both a threat and an opportunity” (44). Both/and - - - the paradoxical way of wisdom.
Barry Johnson works in the field of organizational development. One of the insights he has developed is a distinction between a problem to be solved and a polarity to be managed. “Polarities are interdependent pairs of truths that are a natural and integral part of our daily lives” (Oswald and Johnson, Managing Polarities in Congregations, 19). Two common polarities we manage all the time are inhale/exhale and rest/activity. Both are necessary, but at different times. Both/and - - - the paradoxical way of wisdom.
Parker Palmer has become a well-known teacher and author. His very first book, newly re-issued a couple of years ago, was entitled The Promise of Paradox: a celebration of contradictions in the Christian life. Palmer roots his understanding of paradox in this statement: “The opposite of a profound truth may be another profound truth” (Neils Bohr, quoted in The Promise of Paradox 2008, p. xxix). “The promise of paradox,” Palmer writes, “ is the promise that apparent opposites – like order and disorder – can cohere in our lives, the promise that if we replace either-or with both-and, our lives will become larger and more filled with light” (xxix). “The capacity to embrace true paradoxes… is a life skill for holding complex experiences” (xxx). The paradoxical way of wisdom.
So the way of wisdom, the way of the Spirit may be the way of paradox, at least often. But here is part of the reality of our lives, we struggle with paradox. Either/or seems to make more sense than both/and; it seems easier for us. So here’s another paradox – Jesus invites us to the way of wisdom, which seems difficult to grab hold of, yet the promise is that this is less ill-fitting for us.
All of this has perhaps been a little abstract. There is value in that – the big picture, the overview, but we also need the concrete, the specific to see if our ideas make any difference. Our concrete experience then shapes our abstract ideas - - - both/and!
The paradoxical way of wisdom is to be lived in our individual lives. At the heart of the Christian faith is the message that we are loved by God in Jesus the Christ. We are loved as we are, valued as we are, given grace just as we are. “Just As I Am” the hymn goes. God loves you and there is nothing you can do about it. “Come to me,” Jesus says, “come to me all you who are weary.” The message of grace is that we do nothing to earn God’s love. The calculus of grace is outside the language of earning and deserving. We are loved. At the same time, to know in the depths of our hearts and souls that we are loved should move us to live differently, to live lovingly, to cultivate our best selves and to give the gift of our love to the world. That is the yoke of Jesus. It is work, but it is meant to flow from the depth of who we are. It is not wearying because it fits us. It is dancing to the unforced rhythms of grace. The Christian life is both faith, trusting that we are loved, and works, living this new way in practices that share love and justice and help us cultivate our best selves. The paradoxical way of wisdom.
Here is a slightly different angle on this same paradox in our lives. While we are loved just as we are, we are also sometimes painfully aware that we need to change some things in our lives. In a delightful and insightful book entitled What To Do Between Birth and Death, psychoanalyst Charles Spezzano writes, “Habits form and stick even when they are maladaptive and life-robbing” (148). We do things over and over, and they become habits and we stick with them even when they no longer enhance our lives. Change is needed sometimes. So where to begin, with disgust with ourselves, with the sense that we are unlovable as we are? The gospel insight is that we begin knowing we are deeply loved as we are, loved enough to be worth the effort to change those things that need changing in our lives. Paradoxically, when we feel lousy about ourselves we tend to turn to our familiar habits of behavior to numb the feeling, even when those habits are maladaptive and life-robbing.
The paradoxical way of wisdom is to be lived in our life together as church, as Jesus community. As a congregation we need to celebrate who we are, the good we do, the things we have accomplished that promote the kingdom of God. Sometimes such celebration is not our best thing. We are Northerners, after all, and really worried that we might become too big for our britches. But celebration is vitally important. We do some awesome things here for God and Christ: we help feed people, we are a part of CHUM, we give so others have, we reach into the world through our denomination, we teach children and give them a safe and nurturing space, we cultivate friendships, we sing, we play music, we think together, we are there for each other in joy and grief, we work to overcome barriers. Sometimes we are truly amazing. And there is always more, and we need to be asking, “what’s next, God?” In our life together, there should be a restful restlessness. The paradoxical way of wisdom.
And here is a paradox we have lived with and will continue to live with in our church, the ability to hold well-thought opinions with passion and discuss opposing ideas with respect and care. In the upcoming newsletter I write an article in which I let us know that as a reconciling congregation we need to have times for discussion of the marriage amendment that will be on the ballot in 2012 in Minnesota, that is if the government is up and running by then. I also let you all know that I will be voting against it and working for its defeat. My pledge is this – I will work with you to provide for caring and respectful conversations, even as I have some strong views.
And on this July 4 weekend, I would be remiss if I did not say a word about the paradoxical way of wisdom in our national life. Many of us have heard the phrase, “my country, right or wrong.” Not much paradox there. Do you know the story of Carl Schurz? Schurz was born in Germany, and when Missouri elected him to the U. S. Senate in 1869, he was the first German-American in the Senate. Before moving to Missouri, Schurz spent significant time living in Wisconsin, where he was deeply involved in the anti-slavery movement. Schurz served in the Union Army during the Civil War and after the Senate went on to serve as Interior Secretary. Quite a resume, a July 4 resume! Carl Schurz, in an 1872 speech claimed that the watchword of true patriotism should not be simply “my country, right or wrong,” but rather should be: “My country, right or wrong; if right to be kept right; and if wrong to be set right.” Wise words that I wish we might hear even now in our national life. The paradoxical way of wisdom.
Jesus came eating and drinking, and they said about him, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!” Those who said this failed to attend to the paradoxical way of wisdom taught by this same Jesus – the way of love which is both self-acceptance and change, celebration and commitment to growth, love of country and a desire for it to be better, restful restlessness. The flute of wisdom plays. Time to dance to the unforced rhythms of grace. Amen.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Even Higher
Sermon preached June 26, 2011
Texts: Matthew 10:40-42
Don and Janet, my dad’s uncle and aunt, were among my favorite relatives growing up. They owned a modest home in Rice Lake, Wisconsin. Don worked in the maintenance department at the high school, Janet was a school cook. Whenever my family visited, they always had a place for us, were always glad to see us. When I was old enough to drive myself there, I went frequently. There was always food to share and a place to sleep. They were deeply welcoming. When I think about hospitality, I often think of Janet and Don.
I also know what it is to experience something like “unwelcome.” Last month I traveled to Indiana as a part of a denominational team assessing two non-United Methodist seminaries for their work in educating United Methodist clergy candidates. At one seminary, a faculty member who teaches some of the required courses in Methodist studies brought some copies of his books to give away. I knew of the person and had used one of his texts as a resource when I taught a seminary class on United Methodist history and organization. Anyway, he brought a copy of his latest book, and when no one else on the team picked it up, I expressed interest. You need to know that in sharing introductions I said I was a pastor in Minnesota and that I had also done doctoral work at Southern Methodist University. He said something like, “Well, this is a very academic work, but I guess you have done some of that work so you may like the book.” I smiled and said “thank you,” but inside knew I had been treated inhospitably and was rather angry about that.
“Welcome.” The word comes from words that mean a welcomed guest, one gladly received, something pleasurable. We find the word welcome all over our Scripture reading for this morning. Whoever welcomes you, welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me. Whoever welcomes a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward; and whoever welcomes a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive the reward of the righteous. Somehow our capacity for welcoming has something to do with our capacity for connecting with God through Jesus. And lest we think that welcoming is something ethereal or abstract, there is an illustration. And whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple – truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward.
A related word that is often used in speaking about Christian faith and practice is the word “hospitality.” Hospitality merited a chapter in Diana Butler Bass’ Christianity For the Rest of Us which many of us read last fall. “Hospitality” comes from words meaning guest, and it has to do with the gracious and generous reception of guests.
Playing with words a little here, hospitality is also related to the word hospital. We have a sense of caring for those in need here - helping them get well, perhaps like the “well” in welcome! Hospitality and welcome are part of a healthy Christian faith and healthy Christian community.
We have already noted how important welcome and hospitality are in today’s reading from the Gospel of Matthew. A couple of contemporary sources add an “amen” to the importance of hospitality and welcome. Diana Butler Bass in Christianity for the Rest of Us defines hospitality as “welcoming strangers into community” (79). She goes on to assert that “the Christian practice of hospitality has reemerged as foundational to the spiritual life” (79).
Henri Nouwen, in his book Reaching Out: the three movements of the spiritual life describes hospitality as “the creation of a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend…. Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place” (51). He argues that the need for such hospitality is great in our world today. In our world full of strangers, estranged from their own past, culture and country, from their neighbors, friends and family, from their deepest self and their God, we witness a painful search for a hospitable place where life can be lived without fear and where community can be found (46).
Welcome and hospitality have always been important to Christian faith. In our day and time, when our busyness can make us strangers to ourselves and where our fear can put distance between us and those who seem different from us, welcome and hospitality may be as important to our faith as ever if our faith is to be a source of healing in our lives and in our world. In the remaining few minutes of this sermon, I want to discuss a few dimensions of Christian welcome.
All of our welcoming, all of our hospitality is rooted in our being welcomed by God. “Christians welcome strangers as we ourselves have been welcomed into God through the love of Jesus Christ” (Diana Butler Bass, Christianity For the Rest of Us, 82). Earlier in the tenth chapter of Matthew, we read, “So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.” Jesus is talking about the deep love of God for us. God welcomes us in Jesus. God’s love creates space for change in our lives. We welcome because we have already been welcomed by none other than God, through the love of Jesus.
Knowing God’s welcome, one dimension of Christian hospitality is welcoming ourselves. That may sound strange to you, but see if these descriptions of the human condition resonate.
We are also separated from ourselves…. Man is split within himself…. It is that mixture of selfishness and self-hate that permanently pursues us, that prevents us from loving others, and that prohibits us from losing ourselves in the love with which we are loved eternally (Paul Tillich, The Shaking of the Foundations, 158).
Selfishness and excessive self-concern really come from an inner self-hatred…. The person who inwardly feels worthless is the one who must build himself up by selfish aggrandizement (Rollo May, Man’s Search For Himself, 101)
The most dangerous traitor of all is the one every man has in his own breast (Soren Kierkegaard, Anthology, ed. Bretall, 290)
There is a great deal of psychological work which suggests that we often don’t feel very good about ourselves, or at least some part of ourselves. There are times when we may even hate some things about our lives, and we believe that if only we despise this enough we will change. Positive change, however, is more likely to come from a realistic acceptance of who we are and where we are, along with enough of a positive sense that we are worth the effort to change. In light of God’s loving welcome of us, we can learn to welcome all of who we are, even as we work to change some aspects of ourselves. The Danish theologian Soren Kierkegaard put it well, I think: This was the commandment, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,” but when the commandment is rightly understood it also says the converse, “Thou shalt love thyself in the right way.” (Kierkegaard, A Kierkegaard Anthology, ed. Bretall, 289). Welcome and hospitality need to include welcoming ourselves.
Hospitality toward oneself is a necessary, but insufficient movement in the Christian spirituality of welcoming. We are moved to welcome others, to create space for them to grow, change, flourish, become a part of community. We desire to create here, in this church a place of genuine welcome and hospitality. Simple acts like greeting someone we have not met before, along with long-time friends, is a part of our hospitality. Praying with and for others is a part of creating community.
Recently I had a wonderful experience of church as welcoming community in another setting. I was asked by the directors at Camp Amnicon if I would help lead their summer staff commissioning service. We have used Camp Amincon frequently as a congregation, and so I said “yes.” When I arrived for lunch, it was pretty clear that this staff group, who had been in training together for about ten days, was a close knit community. I appreciated that. What amazed me is how wonderful they were in making me feel, in such a short time, like a part of their community, their family. It was simple things – warm smiles, showing genuine interest, table etiquette, making sure I knew the song, sharing the camp stole with me as I led worship. During a few moments of reflection I told them that the best way to share faith comes beyond words. It comes in action, in relationships, and I said if they could welcome their campers as well as they welcomed me, those campers might find the space to be welcomed in a new way by the God of Jesus Christ. We can do that, here, too. And we do, as with offering hospitality this week to the family of Tim Bearheart in their time of grief and need.
But our welcoming is not confined to our faith community, but pushes into the world community. Christian hospitality has a broader social dimension to it. We seek to create community where society has erected barriers. One way our congregation has chosen to live this dimension of welcoming and hospitality is through the “Drop the i-word” campaign. Our church council endorsed this on Monday night. The drop the i-word campaign is simply an attempt to make us aware of how language can be hurtful and dehumanizing. The focus of the campaign is on the i-word – “illegal” or “illegals” used as nouns. Because of significant issues around undocumented workers, the language of illegals has found our way into our vocabulary. Groups of people are labeled illegals, and it becomes a broad stereotype used against persons. When I have spoken with some people about this, they are a little confused. They don’t hear the word used that way much. I was in Denver this week, and while on a treadmill after my meeting, I say a news story scroll across the tv screen. A new ordinance related to impounded cars was aimed at “illegals.”
Immigration issues are a real concern. The presence of millions of undocumented persons in our country is a significant issue. The issues are not made clearer by the use of a phrase like “illegals” for a group of people. There will be more about this in the upcoming newsletter, but I see our action at church council as a way we are trying to live out Christian hospitality and welcome, offering the cool water of more healing language to an often parched conversation.
A Jewish congregation was mystified and intrigued when their rabbi disappeared each week on the eve of the Sabbath. They suspected he was secretly meeting with the Almighty, so they sent one of their members to follow the rabbi. Spying on the rabbi, this is what the man observed: the rabbi disguised himself in peasant clothes and served a paralyzed Gentile woman in her cottage, cleaning out her room and preparing a Sabbath meal for her.
When the spy got back, the congregation asked, “Where did the rabbi go? Did he ascend into heaven?”
“No,” the spy replied, “he went even higher.” (DeMillo, Taking Flight, 162; see also p. 161 story about recognizing a brother)
Welcoming that takes us even higher. Hospitality brings a little heaven to earth. Amen.
Texts: Matthew 10:40-42
Don and Janet, my dad’s uncle and aunt, were among my favorite relatives growing up. They owned a modest home in Rice Lake, Wisconsin. Don worked in the maintenance department at the high school, Janet was a school cook. Whenever my family visited, they always had a place for us, were always glad to see us. When I was old enough to drive myself there, I went frequently. There was always food to share and a place to sleep. They were deeply welcoming. When I think about hospitality, I often think of Janet and Don.
I also know what it is to experience something like “unwelcome.” Last month I traveled to Indiana as a part of a denominational team assessing two non-United Methodist seminaries for their work in educating United Methodist clergy candidates. At one seminary, a faculty member who teaches some of the required courses in Methodist studies brought some copies of his books to give away. I knew of the person and had used one of his texts as a resource when I taught a seminary class on United Methodist history and organization. Anyway, he brought a copy of his latest book, and when no one else on the team picked it up, I expressed interest. You need to know that in sharing introductions I said I was a pastor in Minnesota and that I had also done doctoral work at Southern Methodist University. He said something like, “Well, this is a very academic work, but I guess you have done some of that work so you may like the book.” I smiled and said “thank you,” but inside knew I had been treated inhospitably and was rather angry about that.
“Welcome.” The word comes from words that mean a welcomed guest, one gladly received, something pleasurable. We find the word welcome all over our Scripture reading for this morning. Whoever welcomes you, welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me. Whoever welcomes a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward; and whoever welcomes a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive the reward of the righteous. Somehow our capacity for welcoming has something to do with our capacity for connecting with God through Jesus. And lest we think that welcoming is something ethereal or abstract, there is an illustration. And whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple – truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward.
A related word that is often used in speaking about Christian faith and practice is the word “hospitality.” Hospitality merited a chapter in Diana Butler Bass’ Christianity For the Rest of Us which many of us read last fall. “Hospitality” comes from words meaning guest, and it has to do with the gracious and generous reception of guests.
Playing with words a little here, hospitality is also related to the word hospital. We have a sense of caring for those in need here - helping them get well, perhaps like the “well” in welcome! Hospitality and welcome are part of a healthy Christian faith and healthy Christian community.
We have already noted how important welcome and hospitality are in today’s reading from the Gospel of Matthew. A couple of contemporary sources add an “amen” to the importance of hospitality and welcome. Diana Butler Bass in Christianity for the Rest of Us defines hospitality as “welcoming strangers into community” (79). She goes on to assert that “the Christian practice of hospitality has reemerged as foundational to the spiritual life” (79).
Henri Nouwen, in his book Reaching Out: the three movements of the spiritual life describes hospitality as “the creation of a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend…. Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place” (51). He argues that the need for such hospitality is great in our world today. In our world full of strangers, estranged from their own past, culture and country, from their neighbors, friends and family, from their deepest self and their God, we witness a painful search for a hospitable place where life can be lived without fear and where community can be found (46).
Welcome and hospitality have always been important to Christian faith. In our day and time, when our busyness can make us strangers to ourselves and where our fear can put distance between us and those who seem different from us, welcome and hospitality may be as important to our faith as ever if our faith is to be a source of healing in our lives and in our world. In the remaining few minutes of this sermon, I want to discuss a few dimensions of Christian welcome.
All of our welcoming, all of our hospitality is rooted in our being welcomed by God. “Christians welcome strangers as we ourselves have been welcomed into God through the love of Jesus Christ” (Diana Butler Bass, Christianity For the Rest of Us, 82). Earlier in the tenth chapter of Matthew, we read, “So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.” Jesus is talking about the deep love of God for us. God welcomes us in Jesus. God’s love creates space for change in our lives. We welcome because we have already been welcomed by none other than God, through the love of Jesus.
Knowing God’s welcome, one dimension of Christian hospitality is welcoming ourselves. That may sound strange to you, but see if these descriptions of the human condition resonate.
We are also separated from ourselves…. Man is split within himself…. It is that mixture of selfishness and self-hate that permanently pursues us, that prevents us from loving others, and that prohibits us from losing ourselves in the love with which we are loved eternally (Paul Tillich, The Shaking of the Foundations, 158).
Selfishness and excessive self-concern really come from an inner self-hatred…. The person who inwardly feels worthless is the one who must build himself up by selfish aggrandizement (Rollo May, Man’s Search For Himself, 101)
The most dangerous traitor of all is the one every man has in his own breast (Soren Kierkegaard, Anthology, ed. Bretall, 290)
There is a great deal of psychological work which suggests that we often don’t feel very good about ourselves, or at least some part of ourselves. There are times when we may even hate some things about our lives, and we believe that if only we despise this enough we will change. Positive change, however, is more likely to come from a realistic acceptance of who we are and where we are, along with enough of a positive sense that we are worth the effort to change. In light of God’s loving welcome of us, we can learn to welcome all of who we are, even as we work to change some aspects of ourselves. The Danish theologian Soren Kierkegaard put it well, I think: This was the commandment, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,” but when the commandment is rightly understood it also says the converse, “Thou shalt love thyself in the right way.” (Kierkegaard, A Kierkegaard Anthology, ed. Bretall, 289). Welcome and hospitality need to include welcoming ourselves.
Hospitality toward oneself is a necessary, but insufficient movement in the Christian spirituality of welcoming. We are moved to welcome others, to create space for them to grow, change, flourish, become a part of community. We desire to create here, in this church a place of genuine welcome and hospitality. Simple acts like greeting someone we have not met before, along with long-time friends, is a part of our hospitality. Praying with and for others is a part of creating community.
Recently I had a wonderful experience of church as welcoming community in another setting. I was asked by the directors at Camp Amnicon if I would help lead their summer staff commissioning service. We have used Camp Amincon frequently as a congregation, and so I said “yes.” When I arrived for lunch, it was pretty clear that this staff group, who had been in training together for about ten days, was a close knit community. I appreciated that. What amazed me is how wonderful they were in making me feel, in such a short time, like a part of their community, their family. It was simple things – warm smiles, showing genuine interest, table etiquette, making sure I knew the song, sharing the camp stole with me as I led worship. During a few moments of reflection I told them that the best way to share faith comes beyond words. It comes in action, in relationships, and I said if they could welcome their campers as well as they welcomed me, those campers might find the space to be welcomed in a new way by the God of Jesus Christ. We can do that, here, too. And we do, as with offering hospitality this week to the family of Tim Bearheart in their time of grief and need.
But our welcoming is not confined to our faith community, but pushes into the world community. Christian hospitality has a broader social dimension to it. We seek to create community where society has erected barriers. One way our congregation has chosen to live this dimension of welcoming and hospitality is through the “Drop the i-word” campaign. Our church council endorsed this on Monday night. The drop the i-word campaign is simply an attempt to make us aware of how language can be hurtful and dehumanizing. The focus of the campaign is on the i-word – “illegal” or “illegals” used as nouns. Because of significant issues around undocumented workers, the language of illegals has found our way into our vocabulary. Groups of people are labeled illegals, and it becomes a broad stereotype used against persons. When I have spoken with some people about this, they are a little confused. They don’t hear the word used that way much. I was in Denver this week, and while on a treadmill after my meeting, I say a news story scroll across the tv screen. A new ordinance related to impounded cars was aimed at “illegals.”
Immigration issues are a real concern. The presence of millions of undocumented persons in our country is a significant issue. The issues are not made clearer by the use of a phrase like “illegals” for a group of people. There will be more about this in the upcoming newsletter, but I see our action at church council as a way we are trying to live out Christian hospitality and welcome, offering the cool water of more healing language to an often parched conversation.
A Jewish congregation was mystified and intrigued when their rabbi disappeared each week on the eve of the Sabbath. They suspected he was secretly meeting with the Almighty, so they sent one of their members to follow the rabbi. Spying on the rabbi, this is what the man observed: the rabbi disguised himself in peasant clothes and served a paralyzed Gentile woman in her cottage, cleaning out her room and preparing a Sabbath meal for her.
When the spy got back, the congregation asked, “Where did the rabbi go? Did he ascend into heaven?”
“No,” the spy replied, “he went even higher.” (DeMillo, Taking Flight, 162; see also p. 161 story about recognizing a brother)
Welcoming that takes us even higher. Hospitality brings a little heaven to earth. Amen.
Friday, June 24, 2011
Dance With Me
Sermon preached June 19, 2011
Texts: Genesis 1:1-5, 26-31; 2:1-4; Matthew 28:16-20
Dance With Me, Orleans, 1975
So… How did I get from Genesis 1 and Matthew 28 to a song from 1975 stuck in the jukebox in my brain? We may not have sufficient time this morning to solve that mystery, but I am going to make a connection.
Genesis 1. It is important to remember that Genesis 1 is neither biology nor geology. The controversies that have swirled around this passage are most often based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the kind of literature we are reading here, and many of those misunderstandings have come from the church side of things. I recall awhile back hearing a radio preacher, in a radio preacher voice tell, his listeners that if the first chapter of Genesis were not literally true, that if God did not literally create the world in seven days, the whole Christian faith crumbles. Hogwash. Genesis 1 is not biology or geology it is theology. It makes claims in the language of poetry about God’s creativity and God’s relationship with that which God creates.
But if we sometimes miss that this is theology, we also misunderstand what it may mean to claim that God is creator and creative. We misunderstand the theology.
The God of Genesis 1, and of the Bible, is a creating and creative God. Artistic language is often appropriate when trying to understand God – the language of painting, poetry, dance. Reading Genesis 1 you have a sense of God painting the skies, sculpting the earth. The creation of human beings has the feel of a dance. “Let us make humankind in our image.” Who is the us? And then humankind comes out male and female – multiple - - - the dance of creativity. The very beautiful poetic writing of the author of Genesis 1 is a reflection of the image of God in him.
So where do we misunderstand the theology? We often make two mistakes in thinking about God as creator. The first mistake is that we think of God as having created once, setting everything in motion, and then sort of walking away and letting us figure it all out from there. It is the image of God as the clock maker. God created the world, much like a clock, and it keeps ticking according to the pattern God established. Our job is to figure out the pattern and make choices that fit it. God can be caring, but God is distant – the man upstairs who never comes downstairs, so to speak.
The other theological mistake that we make in considering God as creator is that God is constantly involved in all that happens in creation so that nothing happens that God does not ultimately cause or allow to happen. The concept of a God who is all-powerful, causing all that happens leaves no room for human choice and freedom, yet we experience ourselves as having choice and freedom. Is this sheer illusion? Perhaps God steps back and gives us some freedom while retaining the right to overturn any of our decisions? This, too, is problematic. Why doesn’t God stop the drunken driver from killing the young child? Why doesn’t God hide the weapon from the inebriated person who in a blur of alcohol sees no purpose for his life? Why doesn’t God limit the reproductivity of the human race which threatens the planet?
The vision of God as creator and creating is neither the clock-maker God who winds things up and leaves them to their own devices, nor is it a vision of God the the absolute ruler, the emperor of the universe. The vision of God most compatible with the theological poetry of Genesis 1 is of a God whose purpose is on-going creative transformation and who is always at work in our lives and in the world through persuasive love. I like the way the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead put it when he wrote that God is “the poet of the world, with tender patience leading it by his vision of truth, beauty and goodness” (Process and Reality).
The creative God is, then, always inviting our own creativity. The painting God invites our brushstrokes. The poet God invites us to share our verses. The dancing God invites us – dance with me. I bet you were wondering when I would get back to the song. “Dance With Me” is not simply a pop song from 1975, it is one way to consider the voice of God in our lives. Dance with me. God, in love, invites us to match God’s creativity with our own to make our lives better, to make the world better. God is always working with the world as it is – creating and re-creating – to move it to a better place.
This vision of God works well as we try and connect Genesis 1 with Matthew 28. God does not create the world and walk away. God does not have all the power there is. God creates, and continues in an on-going relationship with that which God creates. God is always at work, the work of creative transformation, by way of persuasive love. When the time required it, God touched the world in a unique way in Jesus. In our baptismal liturgy, in the prayer over the water we will pray: “And in the fullness of time, you sent Jesus, nurtured in the water of a womb.” Jesus invites us to dance with God in a new way. If Jesus is our vision of God, God is neither a disengaged clock maker nor an imperial ruler. Jesus engaged with the range of humanity, and was especially concerned to reach out with God’s love to those often considered unlovable. Caesar was in Rome. Jesus was born in Bethlehem and raised in Nazareth.
God is creative, persuasive love and our task in life is to be open and responsive to God’s creative love. Being a disciple of Jesus Christ is to seek to dance with the God of Jesus in God’s work of love, justice, reconciliation, peace, compassion. The creative God who created us in God’s own image invites us to be creative artists in our own lives.
We work creatively with God as we shape who we are. Each of us is born in a certain place and time, with certain parents. We cannot change any of that. I am taller than both my parents. Both my grandfathers were fairly bald. I was born in Duluth in 1959. My parents divorced when I was in my early 20s. God invites me to use my creativity to develop kindness, care, concern – but these qualities of character will be unique in me, as they will be in you. God invites us all to weave together our experiences in such a way that we become loving, caring persons, persons with sensitive hearts and generous spirits. God invites us to dance in this work of developing who we are.
We work creatively with God as we shape what kind of life we will lead. Qualities of character need to be embodied in the decisions we make about our lives – decisions about things like career and relationships. Perhaps some career choices are less helpful to our own development and to the good of the world. Choices about marriage and children need to be made wisely and well, and God is always persuading us toward choices that strengthen persons and families and that provide good environments for children.
We work creatively with God as we answer the question, “how will we contribute to the world?” Frederick Buechner, writer and theologian, says that what we most need to do in the world is find that place where our deep joy meets some deep need in the world. Finding that place is a creative act and finding out how best to match our joy and the world’s need is a creative act.
Today is Father’s Day, and what I am saying about God’s creative love and our response to it helps me understand the image of God as father. Father should not be our only image of God, but it is a helpful image of God if we think of fathers as providing love, encouragement, and teaching, but in their loving teaching and encouragement wanting their children to be able to dance on their own. Yes, father’s will be there when there is a fall – to pick a child up, to encourage them to try again. A father’s great joy is seeing his children become their creative best. There is something of the God of Genesis 1 and Matthew 28 in this picture.
A final image. In one of his poems, Walt Whitman ponders what life can mean in the face of difficulty and struggle: O me! O life!... who more foolish than I… What good amid these, O me, O life? And his poem ends with an answer:
That you are here – that life exists and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you may
contribute a verse.
God’s creativity surpasses ours, and it stretches through eternity. The powerful play of God’s creative love will continue on. We each have a verse to contribute. And the next time you hear “dance with me” may it not be just on the oldies station, but deep in your heart whispered by the Spirit of God. Amen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-IXJLgRnvs
Texts: Genesis 1:1-5, 26-31; 2:1-4; Matthew 28:16-20
Dance With Me, Orleans, 1975
So… How did I get from Genesis 1 and Matthew 28 to a song from 1975 stuck in the jukebox in my brain? We may not have sufficient time this morning to solve that mystery, but I am going to make a connection.
Genesis 1. It is important to remember that Genesis 1 is neither biology nor geology. The controversies that have swirled around this passage are most often based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the kind of literature we are reading here, and many of those misunderstandings have come from the church side of things. I recall awhile back hearing a radio preacher, in a radio preacher voice tell, his listeners that if the first chapter of Genesis were not literally true, that if God did not literally create the world in seven days, the whole Christian faith crumbles. Hogwash. Genesis 1 is not biology or geology it is theology. It makes claims in the language of poetry about God’s creativity and God’s relationship with that which God creates.
But if we sometimes miss that this is theology, we also misunderstand what it may mean to claim that God is creator and creative. We misunderstand the theology.
The God of Genesis 1, and of the Bible, is a creating and creative God. Artistic language is often appropriate when trying to understand God – the language of painting, poetry, dance. Reading Genesis 1 you have a sense of God painting the skies, sculpting the earth. The creation of human beings has the feel of a dance. “Let us make humankind in our image.” Who is the us? And then humankind comes out male and female – multiple - - - the dance of creativity. The very beautiful poetic writing of the author of Genesis 1 is a reflection of the image of God in him.
So where do we misunderstand the theology? We often make two mistakes in thinking about God as creator. The first mistake is that we think of God as having created once, setting everything in motion, and then sort of walking away and letting us figure it all out from there. It is the image of God as the clock maker. God created the world, much like a clock, and it keeps ticking according to the pattern God established. Our job is to figure out the pattern and make choices that fit it. God can be caring, but God is distant – the man upstairs who never comes downstairs, so to speak.
The other theological mistake that we make in considering God as creator is that God is constantly involved in all that happens in creation so that nothing happens that God does not ultimately cause or allow to happen. The concept of a God who is all-powerful, causing all that happens leaves no room for human choice and freedom, yet we experience ourselves as having choice and freedom. Is this sheer illusion? Perhaps God steps back and gives us some freedom while retaining the right to overturn any of our decisions? This, too, is problematic. Why doesn’t God stop the drunken driver from killing the young child? Why doesn’t God hide the weapon from the inebriated person who in a blur of alcohol sees no purpose for his life? Why doesn’t God limit the reproductivity of the human race which threatens the planet?
The vision of God as creator and creating is neither the clock-maker God who winds things up and leaves them to their own devices, nor is it a vision of God the the absolute ruler, the emperor of the universe. The vision of God most compatible with the theological poetry of Genesis 1 is of a God whose purpose is on-going creative transformation and who is always at work in our lives and in the world through persuasive love. I like the way the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead put it when he wrote that God is “the poet of the world, with tender patience leading it by his vision of truth, beauty and goodness” (Process and Reality).
The creative God is, then, always inviting our own creativity. The painting God invites our brushstrokes. The poet God invites us to share our verses. The dancing God invites us – dance with me. I bet you were wondering when I would get back to the song. “Dance With Me” is not simply a pop song from 1975, it is one way to consider the voice of God in our lives. Dance with me. God, in love, invites us to match God’s creativity with our own to make our lives better, to make the world better. God is always working with the world as it is – creating and re-creating – to move it to a better place.
This vision of God works well as we try and connect Genesis 1 with Matthew 28. God does not create the world and walk away. God does not have all the power there is. God creates, and continues in an on-going relationship with that which God creates. God is always at work, the work of creative transformation, by way of persuasive love. When the time required it, God touched the world in a unique way in Jesus. In our baptismal liturgy, in the prayer over the water we will pray: “And in the fullness of time, you sent Jesus, nurtured in the water of a womb.” Jesus invites us to dance with God in a new way. If Jesus is our vision of God, God is neither a disengaged clock maker nor an imperial ruler. Jesus engaged with the range of humanity, and was especially concerned to reach out with God’s love to those often considered unlovable. Caesar was in Rome. Jesus was born in Bethlehem and raised in Nazareth.
God is creative, persuasive love and our task in life is to be open and responsive to God’s creative love. Being a disciple of Jesus Christ is to seek to dance with the God of Jesus in God’s work of love, justice, reconciliation, peace, compassion. The creative God who created us in God’s own image invites us to be creative artists in our own lives.
We work creatively with God as we shape who we are. Each of us is born in a certain place and time, with certain parents. We cannot change any of that. I am taller than both my parents. Both my grandfathers were fairly bald. I was born in Duluth in 1959. My parents divorced when I was in my early 20s. God invites me to use my creativity to develop kindness, care, concern – but these qualities of character will be unique in me, as they will be in you. God invites us all to weave together our experiences in such a way that we become loving, caring persons, persons with sensitive hearts and generous spirits. God invites us to dance in this work of developing who we are.
We work creatively with God as we shape what kind of life we will lead. Qualities of character need to be embodied in the decisions we make about our lives – decisions about things like career and relationships. Perhaps some career choices are less helpful to our own development and to the good of the world. Choices about marriage and children need to be made wisely and well, and God is always persuading us toward choices that strengthen persons and families and that provide good environments for children.
We work creatively with God as we answer the question, “how will we contribute to the world?” Frederick Buechner, writer and theologian, says that what we most need to do in the world is find that place where our deep joy meets some deep need in the world. Finding that place is a creative act and finding out how best to match our joy and the world’s need is a creative act.
Today is Father’s Day, and what I am saying about God’s creative love and our response to it helps me understand the image of God as father. Father should not be our only image of God, but it is a helpful image of God if we think of fathers as providing love, encouragement, and teaching, but in their loving teaching and encouragement wanting their children to be able to dance on their own. Yes, father’s will be there when there is a fall – to pick a child up, to encourage them to try again. A father’s great joy is seeing his children become their creative best. There is something of the God of Genesis 1 and Matthew 28 in this picture.
A final image. In one of his poems, Walt Whitman ponders what life can mean in the face of difficulty and struggle: O me! O life!... who more foolish than I… What good amid these, O me, O life? And his poem ends with an answer:
That you are here – that life exists and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you may
contribute a verse.
God’s creativity surpasses ours, and it stretches through eternity. The powerful play of God’s creative love will continue on. We each have a verse to contribute. And the next time you hear “dance with me” may it not be just on the oldies station, but deep in your heart whispered by the Spirit of God. Amen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-IXJLgRnvs
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