Where Are We Going, Jesus?

(Uriel Presbyterian Church )

Sermon

“Where are we going, Jesus?”

23 January, 2011

Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, A

It’s hull may be battered and bent, 

but the Old Ship of Zion is the best vessel you could sign on with.

Text: Isaiah 9:1-4

1 But there will be no gloom for those who were in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he will make glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.*  2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness on them light has shined.  3 You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as people exult when dividing plunder.  4 For the yoke of their burden, and the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian.

Text: Matthew 4.12-23

12 Now when Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee.  13 He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali,  14 so that what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:  15 "Land of Zebulun, land of Naphtali, on the road by the sea, across the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles  16 the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region and shadow of death light has dawned."  17 From that time Jesus began to proclaim, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near."  18 As he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea for they were fishermen.  19 And he said to them, "Follow me, and I will make you fish for people."  20 Immediately they left their nets and followed him.  21 As he went from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John, in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets, and he called them.  22 Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.  23 Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people.

(Begin by playing the music video “Is It The Old Ship of Zion?” 

words and music by Conrad Cook (1936-2004); recorded 1995 by Vocal Union, 

video created 2011 by Fred Powell.) 

Like so many gospel songs, this song just works. I don’t really know how it works, or why it does, but it works. It makes  you feel the impact of the word;  and listening to these  singers it seems their every breath breathes out this longing for God,  for something they call Zion, and for this ship that is going to get them there. The ancient tradition of picturing the church as a ship is compelling idea, even today. The ship is an image both of vulnerability and of safety. 

Today’s gospel reading is also a pastiche of vulnerability and longing for safety.  At the beginning, it’s certainly not smooth sailing for Jesus. 

The opening of the passage finds Jesus after he has come back from 40 days in the wilderness wrestling with his demons to find that John the Baptist has been arrested and John’s disciples scattered and gone.  Jesus emerges triumphant from the desert, to find that the foundations have suddenly been knocked way, and in terms of human companions, he is left completely alone. Instead of going back home to Nazareth, he  decides that it would much safer to move deeper into Galilee and further from the reach of Herod Antipas, the King who has jailed John, so he moves to a house in Capernaum which is on this inland lake called the sea of Galilee, between the towns of Chorazin and Bethesda.  Living there would’ve been much safer than in Southern Galilee.

We’re not really sure how long all this took, but it takes a good long while to get your life in order, to work through things. We all know that; it takes time when we loose a parent or a spouse, it takes time when we loose our job or recover from a devastating illness. There is this time when we feel completely at sea, where our life tilts at alarming angles and the horizon sort of runs together and nothing seems to be the same. Perhaps this is what was happening to Jesus too.  In any case, he runs to this place called “the Galilee of the Nations”, a name which Isaiah uses to mean a place where all the different ethnicities and nationalities of the whole subcontinent were mixed in one spot. Greeks, Persians, Romans, fire worshipers from Turkey,  treacherous Samaritans , forest people from the mountain passes of Lebanon. Sort of like the  melting pot of the Mediterranean. It was a place despised by observant Jews for being disorderly, unclean and ignorant of Jewish wisdom and faith. 

Isaiah  talks about this no man’s land, too; this land of Zebulun and Naphtali that was at the very northern edge of the promised land, a place that was beyond the pale of civilization. But he promises that the gloom of this land will lift and oppression will be broken and burdens will be lifted. And in our gospel, we read about the maiden voyage of the Old Ship of Zion that goes forth ironically from this  very land of gloom, this place that is called Galilee, the unlikely place beside the sea where Jesus the Messiah calls the first crew members together. 

It’s these crazy Galileans who build the old ship of Zion, not the  pharisees who actually lived in Jerusalem within sight of the real zZion. I mentioned already that this ship idea is both a thing of vulnerability and of safety. What I mean by that is the Ship of Zion provides shelter to those in the storm, yet the very fact that the ship  itself is exposed on that turbulent sea, and not riding out the storm in a safe harbour, speaks of the vulnerability of this cockleshell of an idea barely keeping afloat by faith and hard work. Just as the church is to be “in the world but not of the world.”  so the Ship of Zion is called to be ‘on the sea, but not in the sea’  “On the sea” --rescuing  those drowning in deep waters, but “not in the sea” because a sinking ship catches no fish!

That protecting imagery of the ship of God is even with us in our architecture. Even today in churches and cathedrals, the central part of the church where the congregation sits is called the nave, which is Latin for ship. And in fact, with its arched wooden roof, it really does sort of look like an ark turned upside down, protecting those beneath it. But this boat is not where we live our lives as Christians. 

As Maximus of Turin noted in the 4th century:

“Ordinarily people are not given to living on a boat but are in the process of being transported to where life is happening. Nor do they look to be cosseted on a vessel but are more anxious about its continued journey.  For this is the vessel that  gives life to those borne along by the storms of this world as if by waves. But instead of a little boat holding dying fish that have been brought up from the deep, instead the vessel gives life to human beings who have been freed from tumult of the waves, giving life to those  half-dead, as it were”

Jesus doesn’t seem to have a firm idea in the beginning of what he’s to do in Galilee. I see him spending weeks, maybe months trying to figure out where to go from here and what to do. His whole life has been turned upside down by his baptism, and the arrest of his cousin John the Baptist and his ordinary life has been disrupted. Maybe he makes a few chairs, some days maybe he just sits in the sun beside the sea and talks to all the local characters...maybe he even eats a pork chop or two at the Syrian restaurant down the street.  

However much Isaiah despises the Galilee, Jesus definitely finds what he needs; a place of beauty, people of comfort, a time of renewal.  Matthew intimates to us that he doesn’t  yet have his own message, so he picks up the message that John the Baptist has temporarily laid down: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” But as he passes near the sea of Galilee though, suddenly his message is transformed by the odd sheltering place where he finds himself.  He calls to two fishermen in a boat, whom John the gospel writer tells us are also disciples of John; Simon Peter and his brother  Andrew. To them, he gives a NEW message;  “Follow ME, and I will make you fishers for people”. They immediately come. They didn’t ask: “Where are we going, Jesus?” The same thing happens with James and John.  In other words, “let’s get in the boat, people and GO.” The ship of Zion is not a place to live, it is a means of transportation. Yes,  a place that keeps the water out of your boots and rocks the chaos out of your soul, but it will finally deliver you from the watery muck you make of your life to where you are supposed to be.

 When we are at the impasses of our lives, the place where things look so bleak and frightening, these are  the places where the ship of Zion, the church of God,  passes to gather you up while you get your life in order, while you work through things, while you struggle with those addictions and problems. On board that ship though you’re not alone. There are plenty of others that are struggling too; hypocrites, liars, gossipers....even murderers and thieves, sometimes! It is a ship worthy of Noah;  launched by a deluge to sail as its destination, not to some ordinary harbor, but to a mountaintop. It’s a ship that has a crew of taxmen, yokels and fishermen who decide in a howling storm to make a small sleeping carpenter their captain. It is indeed a ship of holy fools. It’s hull may be battered and bent, but the Old Ship of Zion is the best vessel you could sign on with because it is a place of life. It is a place with an idea as fixed as a guiding star, the idea of Zion.

Zion represents so many things in the Bible; an ancient place of temple worship (thoucgh recent stcholarship places temple mount on Mt Moriah a short distance away); a symbolic mountaintop where all the nations stream to the temple of God. It is a rock of refuge, but it is also a place that perseveres, as the book of Revelation reminds us (Revelation 7 and 14)  a place where all the faithful find their deepest longing.  When we joined the church, it is what we are ultimately hoping for, even if we didn’t realize it at the time.

There are times here at Uriel when things get crazy; too much BBQ, or Christmas, or roof repair; too little patience and too little compassion. People get mad because, just like on a ship, we live in close quarters, boundaries are pushed and elbows end up where they shouldn’t, feelings are hurt and our foibles get on other people’s nerves. This is a part of life together, but it’s not focus of life...it’s not even the important thing in life, because as the Old Ship of Zion, Zion is our guiding star, not the budget or the repairs or which hymnbook to use. 

The gospel passage for today ends with “Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people.” As always, we take our cue from the master of the ship. Jesus had his times of doubt and uncertainty, times where he felt stuck and insecure, times where he felt he might fail, but he had the good news and he proclaimed it to the disciples and they proclaimed it to us. Now we are called to proclaim it to others, not only through our strength, but also through our weakness, our uniqueness and our struggles.

Like the singers of the old gospel song, let your every breath breathe out a longing for God and for Zion, your goal, and get on board this ship that is going to get you there.  

Amen.

What are You Looking For?

(Uriel Presbyterian Church )

Sermon

“What are You Looking For?”

16 January, 2011

Second Sunday in Ordinary Time, A

“The answer is always Jesus” 

Text: Isaiah 49:1-7

1 Listen to me, O coastlands, 

pay attention, you peoples from far away! 

The LORD called me before I was born, 

while I was in my mother's womb he named me.

2 He made my mouth like a sharp sword, in the shadow of his hand he hid me; 

he made me a polished arrow, in his quiver he hid me away.

3 And he said to me, "You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified."

4 But I said, "I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity; yet surely my cause is with the LORD, and my reward with my God." 5 And now the LORD says, (who formed me in the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him, and that Israel might be gathered to him, for I am honored in the sight of the LORD, and my God has become my strength)

6 he says, "It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth."

7 Thus says the LORD, the Redeemer of Israel and his Holy One, to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nations, the slave of rulers, "Kings shall see and stand up, princes, and they shall prostrate themselves, because of the LORD, who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you."

Text: John 1.29-42

29 The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and declared, "Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! 30 This is he of whom I said, 'After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.' 31 I myself did not know him; but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel." 32 And John testified, "I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. 33 I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, 'He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.' 34 And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God." 

35 The next day John again was standing with two of his disciples, 36 and as he watched Jesus walk by, he exclaimed, "Look, here is the Lamb of God!" 37 The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. 38 When Jesus turned and saw them following, he said to them, "What are you looking for?" They said to him, "Rabbi" (which translated means Teacher), "where are you staying?" 39 He said to them, "Come and see." They came and saw where he was staying, and they remained with him that day. It was about four o'clock in the afternoon. 40 One of the two who heard John speak and followed him was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother. 41 He first found his brother Simon and said to him, "We have found the Messiah" (which is translated Anointed). 42 He brought Simon to Jesus, who looked at him and said, "You are Simon, son of John. You are to be called Cephas" (which is translated Peter).

Most of us at some point have had our refrigerators decorated with children's drawings, and on the door of my office I proudly display drawings that our children have done and presented to me over the years.  I cherish all the pictures that have been given to me: the ones where sun is shining; Jesus, or momma and daddy are twice as big as the trees and the five legged dog  has a great big smile on her face. 

Another thing about children's drawings is that they can be very powerful statements about a child's identity. When I was teaching elementary school, and later on when I went through counseling and christian education classes at divinity school, I discovered just how  deep those pictures can go. One week I was working with a team that worked with families in an alcoholism treatment programme. The head social worker asked a little boy  to draw a picture of his family. The boy's father was half way through a 30 day residential treatment program. In the picture, it was raining.  Mom was taller than the house and dad was shorter than both mom and the house.  A brother was holding mom's hand.  There were no smiles on the faces.  And it seemed the boy was missing from the picture all together.

The social worker said, "This is a very nice picture Todd.  I see mom and dad and brother, but I don't see you.  Why isn’t there a Todd in the picture?"

The boy pointed to a small black scribble in the corner of the drawing and said, "There I am!"

All of us (the social worker, the psychologist and myself) winced. It hurt to see this little boy through his own eyes as nothing but a formless, black series of scratches. It struck me at that point that the issue of identity for this child in this family didn’t happen over night and it was going be a life long struggle for him. Can you imagine what it’s like feeling like nothing but a small black scribble in the wider picture of your life? *

As a matter of fact, many of us can relate.   Our struggle may not be quite so visible as that little boy’s, but no one escapes the inner question; "Who am I -- really?"  Even at age 65 it crops up:  "Here I am getting ready to retire and I still don't really know what I want to be when I grow up!"  

Our scripture this morning is a very strong statement about identity. It is perhaps the clearest statement about Jesus’ identity in all the gospels. All four gospels feature the meeting of Jesus with John the Baptist, but in Matthew, Mark and Luke, immediately after Jesus’ identity as the Son of God is made known, he goes off into the wilderness to grapple with his own self awareness. In John’s gospel, the 40 days in the wilderness appears to be of such negligible importance that John doesn’t even mention it. What IS important to this writer is that John the Baptist repeatedly points out who Jesus is is several different ways: lamb of God, Son of God, Messiah, outpourer of the Holy Spirit. John’s Gospel is SURE who Jesus is. 

And that intrigues two of John’s followers, so much so that they immediately start following Jesus down the road. Jesus turns and gets right to the point: “What are you looking for?”

These two disciples don’t even know what to say, but they approach Jesus and use the technique that Jesus will use over and over again in the Gospels, answering a question with a question. They ask Jesus seemingly completely irrelevant question: ‘Where are you staying?" Jesus replies, "Come and see," and then they spend the whole rest of the day together, discovering who Jesus is. Around about  dusk Andrew rushes to find his brother Simon. It is such a simple story, but John seems to wants us to see something significant. At the risk of getting all Psychological on you, in discovering Jesus identity, they are beginning to place themselves in the picture. It’s exactly like a child drawing her family; placing the most important people in first and then drawing themselves in to the relationship. In those hours with Jesus, they are beginning to form a new identity, an identity based on the testimony of John the Baptist and what they are hearing from Jesus’ own lips. 

It’s an identity that is going to be radically different from John the Baptist’s followers. John’s identity was bound up in ritual purity . He was  deeply antagonistic to the world around him because it didn’t live up to the standards of the temple  and the Hebrew ideal of religious life. Therefore in protest, he dressed differently from others, he ate differently from others, and he had no tolerance for those who were not fanatically focused on being washed clean of sin in a very narrow Jewish way. And John was convinced that the wrath of God was the way to salvation. In short, a lot of black squiggles on a fire-coloured picture.

Contrast this with the way that the disciples are going to learn to see through Jesus eyes. We don’t know precisely what Jesus and Andrew and the other disciple talked about or how the two disciples were convinced of the rightness of Jesus’ approach, but by dusk they were filled with excitement and a new understanding of who they were called to be. From the testimony across the breadth of the gospels Jesus paints a very different picture of who God’s people are. 

Instead of seeing evil in the world that an angry GOD was going to do something violent about, Jesus was about a world in which WE  do something about the evil in the world in partnership THROUGH God--peacefully. No awkward black squiggles, but whole people delineated beautifully in relationship to each other. It’s all there, in Jesus parables, in his healings, in the example of his life lived in relation to evil and good. It’s there in the way he laid aside his divinity to be human with us, dying on the cross to be restore our brokenness. The difference between John’s identity and Jesus’ is the difference between us waiting impatiently for God’s wrath on others and the realization that God is waiting patiently for us. Our evangelism is simply a reflection of this truth. 

Our gospel passage concludes with another person finding their identity in Jesus. Simon, Andrew’s brother meets Jesus. the words that signal the beginning of the Christian church "You are Simon son of John. You are to be called the Rock." The gospel writer, the beloved disciple, John wants us to see that finding who we are is as crucial to the life of redemption as  proclamations of faith. This is how the church begins.

Jesus invites them to "Come and see." Christ invites us to enter into a shared life with this Gracious Host. From this point on, the way to truth will be constituted by personal encounters.

Everyone in today’s reading was shaped by their identity. Does that hold true for us, today? After all, I'm no John the Baptist or Simon Peter and I live in a different world. What do these long dead people have to do with discovering who I am today?

Yet we can re-discover ourselves in the presence of Christ. If I ask the question, "Who ARE you?" What would be your immediate reflexive response?  (Pausing for a moment to listen for answers)

Did you think of your name?  Your occupation?  The answer we need to find within ourselves is ,"I am a child of God!" That is our baptismal identity, that is the identity that will never change, whether you’re a corporate executive or an alzheimer’s patient. 

“I am a child of God” is stronger than  “I am an alcoholic”, “I am an abused spouse”, “I am unsure who I am”. No one can say “I am worthless” who has an identity as God’s child.  As with John, Andrew and Peter, we will discover most fully who we are in relationship with the God who made us.

Our job is to spread the good news that each of us is a child of God. to show young people....and not so young people: "You are a child of God."   Instead of, "You’re a little black scribble."  When we set ourselves in God’s picture, in relationship with the One who made the universe, you find the courage to disregard the identity other people want to hang on you.

Todd didn't become a scribble by himself.  A lot of hard and awful work went into crippling his life.  Todd needed love and care and help to find a new identity, and there are so many like him all around us.  I remember a couple of years ago after my children’s sermon, Hunter K---- pulled on my sleeve and whispered “You know how I know the answer to the question you asked? The secret is...the answer is always Jesus.”  Momentarily I thought... “hmmm then maybe I need to vary the questions some.”.. but then I thought: “No, ‘out of the mouth of babes’... let the answer always be Jesus”. And let us rediscover who we are in the arms of the Lamb of God, in the presence of the Son of God, the outpourer of the Spirit.

I pray that you too, by the grace of God, will help others discover who they are in Christ!

Amen

*Thank you to my friend, Dr. John Lorance, Art Therapist, for reminding me of Todd.

Jesus Buddy or Saviour?

(Uriel Presbyterian Churches )

Sermon

“Jesus-buddy? Saviour?” 

Christ the King/Reign of Christ

November 21, 2010

Thumbs-Up Jesus or Saviour of the Angry Eye?

Hebrew Text: Jeremiah 23:1-6 

NRSV1 Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says the LORD. 2 Therefore thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who shepherd my people: It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. So I will attend to you for your evil doings, says the LORD. 3 Then I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the lands where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. 4 I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall not fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the LORD. 5 The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. 6 In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. And this is the name by which he will be called: "The LORD is our righteousness."

Gospel Text  Luke 1:68-79 

68 "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has looked favorably on his people and redeemed them. 69 He has raised up a mighty savior for us in the house of his servant David, 70 as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, 71 that we would be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us. 72 Thus he has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors, and has remembered his holy covenant, 73 the oath that he swore to our ancestor Abraham, to grant us 74 that we, being rescued from the hands of our enemies, might serve him without fear, 75 in holiness and righteousness before him all our days. 76 And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, 77 to give knowledge of salvation to his people by the forgiveness of their sins. 78 By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, 79 to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace."

We all have our own ideas of what royalty is; some think of medieval Tyrants, other people think of glamor personified in diamonds and cloth of silver, still others see, a Complete waste of money and still other’s wish they had such unlimited power and resources. 

I’ve got two personal understandings of Royalty. The first happened when I was about eight and the queen visited the town in the south of England where I lived--she even passed right past our backyard. Thousands of people packed into the parking lot to watch her open our new American elementary school and children sang and presented her with flowers, bowing politely instead of curtseying because we were Americans.  But even though we were American,  I came away with a certain connection and regard for Queen Elizabeth that I have never forgotten. There was something personal about her to me, she was THE queen; a special, perfect person who liked children, and I saw her shining face every day on all the coins in my pocket and in the blue, green, red or orange stamps on every letter that came into our house. If I say "king" to an American and ask for a definition, most folks reply, "male ruler," whereas a British person nearly always answers, "monarch." The difference lies in experience—for Britons, they have a particular 2000 year experience of being ruled by a single person set over them by God. 

“[s]he has looked favorably on [the] people and redeemed them.” “[s]he has shown  mercy... and has remembered [the] holy covenant”

“By the tender mercy of our God... to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow[s]; to guide our feet into the ways of peace."”

On the other hand, I have an opposite personal understanding of Royalty. A few years ago on a cold snowy Sunday in Moscow, I trudged under the blood red brick arch of the Saviour’s Gate into the very heart of the Russian Kremlin. Many people don’t realize it, but the Kremlin is filled with churches, at least 13 churches and tiny cathedrals lie within the walls of this small fortress, even during the communist era. That Sunday morning , I had no way to find an English speaking church, so I decided to go pray in the oldest of the Kremlin churches, the squat, square building called the Cathedral of the Dormition. I opened the massive door of the church and found that though the enormous chandeliers were lit, no one was there in that empty space. But in one sense I was not in the least alone. the walls and massive columns were all covered from floor to ceiling; painted with row upon row of life-sized biblical figures and saints jostling each other for space. It was very confusing, The only furniture in the whole church was this enormous wooden box whose pillars supported  a carved roof like a pyramid. It was the throne of Tsar Ivan the Terrible, and had been used by every Tsar since 1551 when attending worship in this place. But something struck me as odd. Instead of being placed directly in the middle of the church facing the center of the altar doors, it had been placed way off to the right, strangely close to the front wall, with a pillar blocking the view of the main part of the church. 

I stood there in front of this throne with my little English-Russian prayerbook in hand and tried to imagine what it would be like to be the Tsar of all the Russias, snug and warm in mink fur crown seated under that wooden canopy praying to God, surrounded by the clouds of incense and the choir chanting and moving behind the screen. 

Then I looked up from my book and saw him. 

He was directly in front of me and there was no escape. He was unmistakably a Tsar, solemn and inflexible; powerful, condemning, and furious, and his eyes fixed mine under terrifyingly deep hooded lids. This look he gave me saw right through my pretensions and silliness. And though this man had no crown upon his head, not a single fur to keep his painted body warm, he was alive with a blazing light that emanated from the very core of his being, pouring out from his very skin, so that the shadows were only deeper pools of stern glory.  

I had come face to face with the 14th century  icon that the Russians call  “Spas qroe oko” (Spas  yaroë  oko), “The Saviour of the Angry Eye”.  I became aware of my own fallenness, of the sins I had committed, the people I had harmed, the promises I had betrayed. The eye glared at these iniquities with blazing hot judgment, so terrifying in its intensity as to make my knees buckle at the horror of my past.

At that point, I could no longer contain myself. I could no longer keep these transgressions hidden away in the pockets of my soul. I had to confess them to God in sorrow.

And so I did. 

Suddenly I understood why this throne was placed in this odd place. It was the one place in the entire world where the Tsar had to come face to face with the truth that no one dared tell him. That he was accountable. Ivan the Terrible needed to know what this Saviour could tell him; that no matter how many people he killed, no matter how much he turned Russia upside down. That God was not mocked, and that God was coming with justice to exact a price for sin.  The scoffer, Peter the Great,  Elizabeth, Catherine, Alexander and Nicholas, all of them were called to account in that place. Almost 500 years later, in the winter of 1941, when the enemy had already reached the threshold of Moscow, Joseph Stalin secretly ordered a service to be held in the Dormition Cathedral to pray for the country's salvation from the invading German Armies. Did he stand there in the place of the Tsars? Could he have had the same experience I had? To hear the Tsar of all the Universe say “It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. So I will attend to you for your evil doings”,“I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall not fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing”

People are very comfortable with Queen Elizabeth. When she visited Washington our first lady even had  a tendency to put an arm around her as if she were her grandmother. We are not comfortable with the all powerful Tsar of all the Universe come in judgment. 

We also have our own ideas expectation about who Jesus is too. And we have this same, warm,  personal feeling about our Saviour. We are human, and being human we are by our very nature, idol makers. We have this deep urge to cast Jesus in our own image., sort of like a buddy Jesus who’s got our back no matter what. Buddy Jesus who likes the the same things we do and who will drop kick us through the goalposts of heaven when we die.

But then there are other, older views of Jesus too. There’ is this ‘Saviour of the Angry Eye Jesus  who gets merged with the old testament idea of Jehovah who is seen as a God of wrath and vengeance. The great and terrible day of the Lord is a fiery apocalyptic truth that is found not only in the book of Revelation, but also in all 4 of the gospels. 

In fact, none of our ideas reflect God’s concept of kingship (human or divine) completely. In today’s readings from the bible we have two very different views of who Jesus is. In Luke we heard Jesus’es kinsman, Zachariah talking about the wonderful things that Jesus was going to do, and how excited he was that his own son, John was going to  help. 

We are not alone in this. In Jeremiah’s time the people’s understanding of kingship was tainted by human kings who had led them to the point of imminent destruction and deportation. God spoke of the kings as shepherds who had failed to care for their people. Would a nation scattered and destroyed, left uncared for and afraid, even want God to raise up another shepherd or king for it? Could the people welcome a righteous king?

When we come to Christ the King Sunday, we have to acknowledge that we bring cultural baggage with us. But what happens if we lay our preconceptions to one side and let the readings tell us what a king is?

God’s promise to the people was a king who is righteous, deals wisely, executes justice and righteousness in the land, and enables the people to live securely. In Jesus, God has fulfilled that promise. Justice and righteousness, themes that will recur as we move next week into the contemplation of Christ’s indwelling incarnation in  Advent, are the hallmarks of God’s king. In the story of Jesus, kingship is recast. The miracle lies in the fact that God shares our potential hopelessness  that is part of the human situation, but he also does so as king, as the source of our hope and life. Jesus took his wounds to heaven, and there is a place in heaven for our wounds because our king bears his in glory.

Where ever we may be in our spiritual pilgrimage, where ever we may be with the struggles going on in our world, the Spirit of Christ stands before us, bidding us each to look him in the eyes, to see both his humanity as well as his majesty and divinity. Only in this way will our own discipleship deepen. Only in this way will we be able to take out any beams from our own eyes in order to see clearly enough to remove the speck from our neighbor’s. 

To the only God be that same power and glory, forever and ever. Amen

Suffering Servants

(Uriel Presbyterian Church )

Sermon

“Suffering Servants”

9 January, 2011

Baptism of Christ , A

If you are suffering without succeeding, then someone will succeed after you; 

if you are succeeding without suffering, then someone suffered before you. 

Gospel Text:Matthew 3.13-17

NRSV 13 Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him. 14 John would have prevented him, saying, "I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?" 15 But Jesus answered him, "Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness." Then he consented. 16 And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. 17 And a voice from heaven said, "This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased."

Text: Isaiah 42.1-9

NRSV 1 Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights; I have put my spirit upon him; he will bring forth justice to the nations. 2 He will not cry or lift up his voice, or make it heard in the street; 3 a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not quench; he will faithfully bring forth justice. 4 He will not grow faint or be crushed until he has established justice in the earth; and the coastlands wait for his teaching. 

5 Thus says God, the LORD, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and what comes from it, who gives breath to the people upon it and spirit to those who walk in it: 6 I am the LORD, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, 7 to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness. 8 I am the LORD, that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to idols. 9 See, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare; before they spring forth, I tell you of them.

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There’s an old saying that it’s always darkest before the dawn, but sometimes there is darkness that just gets blacker. Take today for instance, January 9th. At the approach to Charleston Harbour, just before midnight, an unarmed merchant vessel from New York, christened the Star of the West, silently moved into place far beyond the lights of the city, waiting for daybreak to begin her final, dangerous run to a coastal island, right smack in front of her in the middle of the harbour. 

All this happened, not this morning, but  exactly 150 years ago today. Forewarned by a telegraph from up North that the Star of the West was on its way, student cadets from the Citadel in Charleston out on Morris Island opened fire on the ship creeping towards Fort Sumter just as the first red clouds poured out along the horizion. As the Star came about, guns on the opposite side of the harbour at Fort Moultrie began hurling cannon shot towards the ship as well. Stuck on the island in the middle, US Maj. Robert Anderson decided not to defend the ship since we were firing at the ship and not actually  at Fort Sumter. From the walls of the island fort the trapped and hungry U. S. Army watched as the ship carrying its supplies and munitions turn around and returned to New York.  Today was a beginning. Those red sky in the morning was certainly a warning: ominously , this was the first time Americans had ever made war on each other marking today as the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War.

Historical sticklers might argue that it really started  four months from now in April 1861, when South Carolina militias attacked Fort Sumter; and just as Rome wasn’t built in a day, the country wasn’t split with a single shot, yet as we celebrate the Baptism of Christ, the waters of Charleston remind us of a baptism of fire, when the reality of war was brought to our very doorsteps.

As Isaiah puts it:  “See, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare” (Isaiah 42.9a)

Already before Christmas 2010 in Charleston, period balls were being given, naïve parties and festivities were thrown to mark this 150th anniversary. As far as I am concerned, they are dancing blithly away just as their forefathers did. As we look back on the start of this time that not only changed our country, but changed our families and our own understanding of who were are forever, the truth is that we are still struggling with the issues and the aftermath in so many subtle ways even 150 years later.  So let’s consider what this conflict can teach us. One remarkable thing about the Civil War was that both the North and the South assumed God was on their side, and that God was going to make the other side suffer greatly for their presumption. Both sides felt the Lord was speaking when we heard the words of Isaiah: “Here is my servant, whom I uphold; my chosen, in whom my soul delights. I have put my spirit upon him” (42:1).

This verse begins the so called “Suffering Servant” passages in Isaiah. On the surface, the reading seems to be alluding to a righteous servant who is called upon to endure pain and hardship in order to be true to God. At the beginning of the war, there were many who saw themselves in this model.

The South, in particular, was very comfortable with the idea of servants. For years powerful and persuasive preachers used the good book to defend the “biblical” institution of slavery and white priviledge. Using the Bible literally, we preached that humans had no business questioning the Word of God when it said, “Slaves, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling” (Ephesians 6:5); “Let all who are under the yoke of slavery regard their masters as worthy of all honor” (1 Timothy 6:1); “Tell slaves to be submissive to their masters and to give satisfaction in every respect” (Titus 2:9); and “Slaves, accept the authority of your masters with all deference, not only those who are kind and gentle but also those who are harsh” (1 Peter 2:18).

We found it easy to stick to the slogan, “The Bible says it. I believe it. That settles it.” So the people of the South believed God was on their side.

The preachers of the North were just as creative in their biblical interpretation, and they, too, found a way to use the bible. Some emphasized that the Union had to be preserved because without it the advance of the gospel around the world would be slowed or even stopped. They equated America with God: “If America is lost, the world is lost,” said one preacher from his pulpit.

Some Northern ministers looked to the book of Revelation to primly suggest that a victory over the South might prepare the way for the coming of God’s kingdom on earth. Still others preached that God would allow the North to win if it took decisive steps to end slavery.  The North was convinced that its zeal was the stamp of approval of God. Actually, both sides were convinced they were acting as the Lord’s servant, with God right beside them. Perhaps Abraham Lincoln got closest to the truth: “My concern is not whether God is on our side,” he said. “My greatest concern is to be on God’s side.” That’s the question we’re left with today, in the middle of our contemporary civil and not-so-civil wars: Are we on God’s side?

Traditional Hebrew wisdom understands the servant to be Israel, the community of God personified.  To serve the God of Israel is to bring, as a people, righteousness and justice to the world through service to other people. The audacity of such a claim was breathtaking in its context. This is not God’s conquering lieutenant who, though bloodied, wins the battle-- this is a bruised reed that still writes, a smouldering wick that still gives light, a still, small voice that still creates hope and through its very lowliness becomes the tool God can powerully use.

We can embody Isaiah’s tool, the one who “will not cry or lift up his voice” but instead “will faithfully bring forth justice” (vv. 2-3). Those who serve the Lord have a mission to be “a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon” (vv. 6-7). Christians who do these things will always find themselves right where they need to be: on the side of God.

Our servanthood doesn’t lead us to take a particular stand but to  be a particular kind of person.  The rightness of North or South is beside the point, as are fights between Right-Left, Blue-Gray, Gay-Straight, Republican-Democratic. Wherever we find ourselves on the cultural-theological-political spectrum, we are challenged — when shots are being fired — to be the Lord’s servant.

Jesus was caught up in the civil wars of his time too. As he stood there on the banks of the Jordan, the people in Jerusalem were taking sides. Some were sharpening knives to go join the Essene community who were preparing to slaughter Romans, some were supporting the rebuilding of the temple that the rich economy of the Pax Romana had brought to the region. Both groups claimed to be following God.  Surely Jesus was struggling with these conflicting sides. His plan was  not to take a particular stand but to  be a particular kind of person. So when Jesus walked into the waters of the Jordan, he came out the other side changed; he had crossed a frontier, accepted a calling, claimed a birthright.

 As we celebrate the beginning of Christ’s ministry, inaugurated in the Jordan River, those who are hearing this scripture for the first time, might well  wonder “who IS this person?” “Who is this person with whom God is well pleased? What sort of character is this that the voice of God speaks to in the wilderness?”

And every time we come to the waters of Baptism we are looking for something. We are trying to figure out who Christ is and what we have to do to be with him. The answer is in today’s readings. Each time a person is baptized, infant or adult; every year as we renew the promises made for us at our baptisms,  the people  of God are given another chance to nurture God’s love and justice; to be a particular kind of person.

And here is where the suffering part from Isaiah crosses Jesus’ Baptism as a servant. Because we know where Jesus’ baptism and service ultimately brought him...to the cross. Jesus is still the suffering servant and so are we. A hundred and fifty years ago, those college freshmen firing cannons on a boat in the harbour had no inkling what was in store for them. Like with Jesus, there is no guarantee about what will happen in this year, but we are still called to, stand fast and find out. A century ago, Jessie Penn-Lewis observed that God intends to refine believers,  to make us closer to the  likeness of Christ: She also reminded disciples not to be discouraged if things don’t seem to be working. She wrote: “If you are suffering without succeeding, then someone will succeed after you;  if you are succeeding without suffering, then someone suffered before you. ”

We stand here today with the benefit of hindsight. We know that the events of 1861 were dreadful, and misguided. We are intimately related to the trials and sufferings of our ancestors 150 years ago. Many of us, black and white, have stories and traditions of what it was like to be plunged into the War Between the States and the grim years since then. Their bitterness and hardship inspired our great grandparents to make sure that our lives were much different as possible; they sacrificed, and to the best of their abilities made sure that we would not suffer the same agonies and in ways large and small gave us the gift of a stable future.  Each succeeding generation is faced with the same dilemma in different scenario. We are products of our decisions, but if we are wise and attentive we also place ourselves in the hands of God not to lead, but to be led, to serve others rather than to be served.

In a few minutes we will be renewing our baptismal vows, mentally walking down into the Jordan river just as Christ did. We are making a decision to leave ourselves behind.   We are making a decision to “be called  in righteousness, to be taken by the hand and kept; to be given as a covenant to the peoples, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, and from the prison those who sit in darkness” (vv. 6-7).  

To that God who does all these things and so much more, be glory and power and dominion now and forever.  Amen

On the Way to Salvation...

(Uriel and Carmel Presbyterian Churches )

Communion Meditation

“On the Way to Salvation...”

27th Sunday in Ordinary Time

World Communion Sunday

3 October, 2010

Passionate faith teaches us that God’s truth 

and God’s way will always prevail 

Text:  Luke 24.13-17, 28-34a

NRSV  13 Now on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, 14and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. 15While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, 16but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. 17And he said to them, ‘What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?’ They stood still, looking sad.

28 As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. 29But they urged him strongly, saying, ‘Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.’ So he went in to stay with them. 30When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. 31Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. 32They said to each other, ‘Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?’ 33That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. 34They were saying, ‘The Lord has risen indeed ...”

Habakkuk 1:1-4; 2:1-4

NRSV 1 The oracle that the prophet Habakkuk saw. 2 O LORD, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen? Or cry to you "Violence!" and you will not save? 3 Why do you make me see wrong-doing and look at trouble? Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. 4 So the law becomes slack and justice never prevails. The wicked surround the righteous-- therefore judgment comes forth perverted.

1 I will stand at my watchpost, and station myself on the rampart; I will keep watch to see what he will say to me, and what he will answer concerning my complaint.

2 Then the LORD answered me and said: Write the vision; make it plain on tablets, so that a runner may read it.

3 For there is still a vision for the appointed time; it speaks of the end, and does not lie. If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not delay.

4 Look at the proud! Their spirit is not right in them, but the righteous live by their faith.

If this were a stand up comedy act,  I might begin my schtick with “a funny thing happened on the way to salvation this morning...” and then proceed to tell something so brilliantly hilarious  it would make you fall out of your pews, rolling on the ground with laughter. 

And that might concieveably happen if we were focusing on the gospel reading from Luke, and the wonderful story of walking with the resurrected Jesus on a sabbath afternoon in Spring. But unfortunately for you, my sisters and brothers, I’m neither that funny or that brilliant, and the walk that Habbakuk is making  is neither so comforting or so smile-making that such a light tone would be appropriate.  It’s a really hard text to hear on this Sunday when we are celebrated the unity of Christian faith across the world through shared communion and fellowship. But while we’re in here celebrating and eating and drinking, out there there are deep challenges and problems, and so we’re stuck here with Habbakuk in the end of the 7th century BCE. We’re not sure if Habbakuk is a real person or a literary creation, some Jewish traditions even assert that he was the son of the shunamite woman, the boy who was raised from the dead by Elisha. but whoever he is,  his name in Hebrew is very interesting because it means “the one embraced”.

And the Hebrew people certainly needed to be embraced. Sort of like Belgium in the 1940s, they were caught between two north/south superpowers; the Assyrians and Egyptians who were stomping each other into the ground across the length and breadth of Israel. But the needed embrace from God just wasn’t happening. If anything, it was more of a deathlock, because the King of Judah doublecrossed both of the armies, and the people of Isreal are now waiting to be crushed. 

The anguish of living, whether it is a community living in the past, or we ourselves living our own lives, is that so much seems unchangeable or beyond our ability to change. Sometimes we just seemed overwhelmed by the injustice of it all, and we scream “VIOLENCE”...but find no one there to hear us or save us. 

I’m especially thinking of the drive by shootings in Chester last week, and the drug and alcohol related assaults and deaths that we hear of regularly  in our neighborhoods. These deaths and beatings and woundings are killing and ripping us in emotionally and socially in ways that we can’t even fully comprehend yet.

When Habbakuk screams “violence” I’m also thinking as well of the intellectual violence that we are seeing in the civil affairs of this country where we are caught between clashing armies of political opponents and attack ads and disinformation as we approach election time.  Who cares  about the damage that is being done to the infrastructure and atmosphere of trust and rationality in this nation and this state just as long as one side or the other can claim a victory?

With Habakkuk I cry:

“Why do you make me see wrong-doing and look at trouble? Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. So the law becomes slack and justice never prevails. The wicked surround the righteous-- therefore judgment comes forth perverted.”

There is injustice in the way that jobs seem to bleed from our county despite the fine people who are ready and willing to work. There is injustice in the way that our students are struggling to get an education in our starving school system. There is injustice in the way that taxes rise yet things don’t seem to get better.  There is injustice in the way that big health insurance companies are finagling to make sure that their profits are protected, no matter what happens to their customers in the health care system.

Yet in the midst of all this Habakkuk is saying that we are on the way to  Salvation. Habakkuk can’t see it yet, in fact he has to climb up a watchtower to even begin to hope for a breath of a change in the prevailing evil wind, but from that vantage point the prophet is positioned to hear God’s answer, which is “it is coming...wait for it!”.

How many of you here have been asked by an evangelical friend “Brother, Sister, are you saved?”  (note hands)  That is  a slippery slick question. The apostle Paul would answer that question by saying:  “No, I’m not saved-- yet, but I’m on the way to salvation--God is not done with me yet. I’m still a work in progress, and that work won’t be finished until Christ comes again in glory to perfect the entire world. It’s what all of us are striving for, yearning for. This is what the apostle Paul teaches all the way through his writings; that we are already justified by our faith in Christ NOW,--that is,--we are made right with God through our faith in Him,  and Paul famously notes that Jesus is the pioneer and perfector of that faith, and that pioneering and perfecting has yet to be accomplished.

I hope that today is an Emmaus-like revelation to us, a sign that is written so large that we can read it as we run by on the salvation road. And what should we find written?

The tablet should read “On the way to salvation, nothing matters except that we remain steadfast in God’s way and God’s love”. We do what we can to promote justice and honesty and fairness; caring for the hungry, healing the sick, proclaiming the kindom of God, BUT in our broken hours, in our tiredness... even if our witness and our mission should seem to fail... we must tell each other that God is surely coming and encourage each other to keep on keeping on, finding hope and stronger faith on our journey. 

And so, we stop here on our way, to rest by this table, to find food for the road in the bread and the cup and fellowship of faith, not only with each other, but with our family in Sudan, and Mexico, our mothers and brothers in India and Pakistan and Guatemala, Christians in Iran and Afghanistan, and everywhere in the world where the stories of Jesus are told and celebrated. 

To God be the power and glory, forever and ever. Amen