sermon by Torin Eikler
Luke 12:22-34, Philippians 4:11-13
Heritage Series 4: Simplicity
Throughout their history, both the Mennonite Church and the Church of the Brethren have held simplicity as one of their goals – no more than a goal … perhaps ideal is a better world. It has been a theme running through the lives of our spiritual ancestors and it grows from the teachings of Christ in the verses we have heard today as well as others. Its touch can be seen in many areas of their lives and the traditions that have been passed down to us.
But, what is simplicity?
The first thing that comes to my mind whenever I begin to dwell on the idea of simplicity is the hymn “Simple Gifts.” Somehow, that hymn has not made it into our hymnal or any of the three supplements that have been published between the two denominations. But, I remember singing it a church camp, and it was a favorite among the Quakers Bethany’s sister seminary in Richmond. You all heard the choir sing a version of this hymn earlier in the service, but I want to repeat the words so you can hear them on their own…
Tis a gift to be simple.
Tis a gift to be free.
Tis a gift to come down where we aught to be.
And when we find ourselves in the place that’s right,
it will be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gained;
to bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed,
to turn, turn will be our delight …
till by turning, turning we come ‘round right.
It’s a beautiful hymn, and its poetic lines and lovely imagery speak very eloquently – if very unclearly – about the joy of the simple life of discipleship. But, it doesn’t offer much insight as to the nature of simplicity and how it applies to daily life. So … what does it mean to live simply?
At one time, we believed that to live simply meant to dress simply, and so we wore “plain clothes” and avoided conforming to social styles. That is to say, we wore modest clothing that we made out of sturdy, dark cloth with buttons and ties. Women wore their hair in buns or braids which they kept covered, and men sported bowl cuts parted in the middle with long beards and no mustaches. We shunned worldly things like zippers, neckties, and showy hats.
Some – in both traditions - still keep these traditions alive, but most of us have moved on for better or worse. For myself, I find it hard to believe that a suit of “plain clothes” (which would cost about $200 these days) is a particularly simple addition to any wardrobe. It seems much more appropriate to wear a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. That would only run about $70 – less if you got them from a thrift store.
Is that what it’s all about then? Is simple living about spending money or having fewer things? That’s certainly what I was taught as I grew up. And it makes sense. Spending a lot on clothes or technology or cars or houses – keeping up with the Jones – certainly doesn’t qualify for simple living. And didn’t Jesus say, “Why worry about what you will wear… If God so clothes the grass of the field …, how much more will he clothe you…?”
Yet, as I grew older and learned more about what is going on the world today, I realized – as many before me – that jeans and t-shirts, TVs and radios come cheap for a reason. The cost of my righteous simple living was born by thousands of people around the world. They spent long hours in factories with bad conditions, forced birth control, and horribly low wages in order to bring pants to the shelves and then to my wardrobe at the low, low price of $20. Low-cost electronics, too, come with a price - not only to the people who make them, but also to the environment. Hazardous waste, chemical spills, open pit strip mining that leaves radioactive tailing behind to seep into ground water and ruin farmland and forests are just the beginning of the damage to the creation we are called to care for. … Sweat shops, environmental destruction, and who knows how many other dangerous, unhealthy, and maybe even unholy things - where is the justice in that?
I don’t think Christ would have us serve the ideal of simplicity at the cost of compassion and love for our neighbors or good stewardship of the natural world that supports and sustains the lilies of the field and the birds of the air.
So, where do we go from there? Is environmentalism the answer? Is it paying attention to the justice issues behind everything we buy or use? Should we return to the example of our Amish, Mennonite, and Old Order Brethren brothers and sisters – avoiding technology and conforming not to the society around us as we work toward self-sufficiency within our own communities? Do we give up entirely? As our Simplicity Circle study group has been discovering – and as anyone who has spent much time thinking about simple living knows – these questions spin outward into a wide and sticky web that quickly becomes too complex to understand. (And there is a rueful irony there.)
There is a story, a parable of sorts, about a young man – probably about my age, I’d guess. The man had lived a successful life. He had a good job that kept him busy and brought in a good pay check. He had many friends and he enjoyed the time he spent hiking and skiing and doing everything else that he did.
Then one day, he heard the story of an ancient temple in the east. The temple had been resplendent, made of marble with beautiful carvings and a thousand bells tuned perfectly so that when they all rang anyone who heard them reached a higher level of consciousness. Many people made pilgrimages to the temple to find answers to their deepest questions.
Hundreds of years ago, the temple – which was built on pilings just off the coast – sank into the water during an earthquake. But, people still made pilgrimages to the spot. And, it was said that in the right conditions, a person sitting on the shore could still hear the bells ring as they moved with the ebb and flow of the tide.
The story intrigued the young man, and the more he thought about it, the more he realized that while his life was a good one, something was missing. So, he decided that he would make a pilgrimage of sorts himself in search of a deeper meaning to his life. If, he thought, he could just listen to the bells, perhaps he would find the answer to all the questions that had been growing in his mind since he heard the legend.
So, he arranged to take all the vacation time he could and travel to the remote coast where the temple had been (… still was). He packed everything he would need for his stay, and when he arrived, he went to stand at the water’s edge, listening with all the concentration he could muster.
He heard nothing the first day or the second, but he was a tenacious man and undeterred. For a week and then two weeks he went every day to listen and heard nothing. He tried standing and sitting, lying down with his ear to the sand and walking back and forth. He faced the seaward and landward and even stood in the water. He was there for sunrises and sunsets and even spent a few nights standing on the sand. He stood there on calm, brilliant days. He sat through lashing wind and rain. So intent on listening was he that all of it passed by him unnoticed, and he became something of a legend himself among other pilgrims who came for just a day or two.
Finally, after a month of unsuccessful visits to the beach, the day came for him to leave. He was deeply disappointed, but he reasoned with himself that he had done his best. Maybe it was just the wrong time of year. Besides, he thought, his life was a good one, and the legend was probably just that. Who ever heard of magic bells that brought enlightenment anyway?
With a chuckle at his own foolishness, he packed his bags and prepared to go. Then, he decided to visit the beach just to see the place he had spent so many days and nights one last time.
He stepped onto the sand and looked around, really seeing for the first time. It was a beautiful place, he decided, and he went to sit in the shade under a tree and enjoy the last hour of his vacation. As he sat there, with the warmth and the susurrating slide of surf on sand relaxing his body, he leaned his head back against the trunk and closed his eyes…. And soon he realized that he heard something different - musical. He heard bells, and as the realization hit him, he jumped to his feet and ran to the water’s edge and stood listening for some time. Then, with a smile, he turned, collected his bags and went home.
If we let ourselves, we can get caught up in all the complexities and all the questions the swirl around the topic of simplicity and the ideal of simple living. We can try to focus all our concentration on each detail, finding a way to arrange each part of our lives and moving on to another in an endless struggle to reach perfection. And, perhaps the answer does lie within some or all of the possibilities we discover along the way, but it seems to me that the teachings of Jesus point toward a simplicity somehow deeper and more obvious that any of those things – a bigger picture that we miss if we don’t sit back, look around us, and listen for guidance.
When we hear the familiar verses from Luke, we are drawn to the imagery within in – the birds of the air, the lilies of the field. And we sometimes get stuck in the ideas they illustrate because they are foreign to our experience, just as they would have been foreign to the crowds Jesus was teaching. Of course we need to think about what we will eat and what we will wear. We simply cannot live on insects like the birds, and we can’t really survive without something to wear when it gets too cold or too hot. But, those are the details that all too often leave us on the beach straining for something that is already there all around us.
“Do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear. For life is more that food, and the body is more than clothing… Instead, strive for [the kingdom].” Or – as Matthew puts it – “seek first the Kingdom of God and its righteousness.”
Maybe that’s the key to simple living. Maybe all our rules about plain clothes, accumulation of wealth and things, environmental stewardship, and social justice - have grown from that search. Maybe our ideas about simplicity have drawn our gaze from the simple ideal of focusing on God – of listening for God’s guiding voice, of seeking God’s way and its righteousness.
If we can let go of all the particulars we try to legislate and step back into the calm center of the whirling world – into the embrace of God, then we might find that life becomes simpler and more fulfilling. We might find that our values shift to embrace those things that are essential to life in the world and life in Christ while our fascination with other things falls away. Perhaps we will find ourselves able to echo Paul’s words, “I have learned to be content with whatever I have [for] I can do all things through him who strengthens me.”
May it be so.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Sunday, June 22, 2008
A Peculiar People
sermon by Carrie Eikler
Matthew 18:10-20
Heritage Series week 3: Community
My first encounter with Mennonites happened as a result of one of my family’s mid-summer rituals as a child. When the summer was at its cruelest, and the day at its hottest, my brother, mother, and I would retreat inside turn on all the fans, and watch our summer blockbuster. That blockbuster was always the same, year in and year out. It was the epic mini-series adaptation of James A. Michener’s novel Centennial. This story told of the creation of a town in Colorado, named Centennial, tracing it’s roots back to the native Americans who inhabited the land for millennia, through the trappers and ranchers who established a new economy, all the way through the present day (present, being around 1980 or so). Now this mini series had probably 20 installments, and since we watched one installment a day, it kept us occupied nicely for about a month.
I lived in a part of Illinois that had few Brethren and even fewer Mennonites, so through the Centennial movie, I was introduced to my first Mennonite. Mennonite character, at least. His name was Levi Zendt, a young Lancaster Mennonite man sometime in the mid- to late- 19th century. Levi would later become one of the founding fathers of the Colorado town Centennial and what drove him West was a powerful act of his Mennonite community. Back in Lancaster, after driving a young, non-Mennonite woman home from helping him with some of his family’s deliveries, he is seen by the woman’s caretaker expressing his affection for her through some innocent kissing. Well it didn’t seem so innocent to the onlooker, who was obvious not pleased with this young woman cavorting with Mennonites. Levi is subsequently accused of a higher level of indiscretion than simply public display of affection, and the charges against him heighten.
At the peak of the accusations, Levi is cornered in his family’s barn by relatives and members of the Mennonite community. They tell him how he has shamed them all, how he has fallen away. And then they lay upon him the most severe punishment of their community. “Levi Zendt…” one man says. “You will be shunned!” All these years later I remember the sound of the word-- “shunned.”
So what else is a Lancaster Mennonite young man to do after he is shunned? Well, buy a rifle, get a wife and a Conastoga wagon and move to Colorado, of course. OK, this is simply a story, and who knows how much James Michener really knew of the practice of discipline among Mennonites and Brethren communities in the 19th century. But I think it paints a widely held picture of community held by these “peculiar people,” as Mennonites and Brethren were often referred to.
And we were peculiar, and perhaps we are still peculiar, in the eyes of the rest of society. Our community was defined by similar simple dress, men with beards and no mustaches, women with prayer coverings, we resisted the new fangled and the worldly, we resisted military conscription, we had many voices preaching during worship, not just one, and no paid clergy. We valued shared life-style over shared doctrine. And we had discipline. Discipline that was found in Matthew 18, today’s scripture lesson. If a brother or sister offended another, the offended should go to that person and tell them how they have been hurt. If they do not listen, they are to take another member of the church and go to them and bring the accusation. If they still don’t listen, the offended party should take the matter to the church, and if they still don’t listen, then the ultimate penalty…cast them aside, throw them out of the community. Brethren didn’t use the word “shun,” but they did use the word “ban” or “avoidance.” Members would be banned from the community for the perceived larger good of the community. But as E.F. Roop reflects in the Brethren Encyclopedia, the practice of the ban, or avoidance, or shunning, proved quite problematic. What sins were greater? What level of avoidance should they be convicted to? Should they be banned from all church activity or just certain things? And what about family life? Should offending members be banned from the dinner table?
But the focus on maintaining a strict code of community, finding ways to kick people out of our church, or to give a measuring rod to see if individuals are uniform with who we are is focusing too narrowly on the scripture. It’s not about who is in and who is out, but looking at the question, how can we live together? It’s not a check list to go through so the uncooperative, or marginal members can be rightfully kicked out. Rather, it takes many measures to ensure that relationships are healed, and people are reconciled. I can read through this entire passage and reflect on what it means for community procedure, and how people should change to get in line. But perhaps it is where the passage ends that our journey as a community is to begin, and in reality, is where it began when we became a new church all those years ago. It doesn’t begin in some process or checklist. It begins where our passage in Matthew 18 ends, “For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”
This concept, this belief that God was present in the gathering of the body, of those seeking God’s truth was a major component for the Brethren. Early in our history we would have to gather in secret, in barns, under bridges, in back store rooms, even on boats in the middle of lakes to worship. No priest was needed. No sacraments. Not even particular scripture readings. What was important was that we believed, we trusted Christ’s words that God’s presence rests with the people who gather. That trusted we that we had God incarnate within us, and by joining together, that God is made even more evident to one another.
Have you ever gone into a conversation about God or politics or anything, so sure of your convictions, so steadfast in your position? And in conversing with another, they give a bit of their selves, you give a bit of your self, and before you know it, your position is not necessarily changed, but your understanding is enriched. I like to think of this as a barn-raising, a notable image from our Anabaptist roots, primarily with the Amish. We each hold up pieces, and while they may not be close to one another, in fact, they may be completely opposite from one another on the foundation, they are all necessary for the building up of the one house.
But isn’t it hard to see God working, or at least think someone else in the church is helping us come closer to God, when we get down to the nitty gritty of community making? Especially when something seems to be so annoying, or so aggressive, or so passive! When it seems like people don’t listen or don’t want to share. It is a rare case, I’m sure when we actually feel God’s spirit moving during a board meeting for example. So it seems sort of naïve to say that just get a couple folks together and *bam* it will feel just lovely, a space powerfully infused with the Holy Spirit. The word community, if you think about it, is quite vague and we throw it around so much that I don’t know if we really know what we’re talking about.
For example, during our prayer for community, we try to pray for ourselves, our church, our neighborhood and town, our country and world. We talk about community spirit, or community development. And while the church community shares elements with all these types of communities, the community of faith, that community that was formed not just 300 years ago, but thousands of years ago, has a unique and powerful characteristic. I’m reminded of the words of Abraham Joshua Heschel: we are people who gather in humility and listen to God as best we can and do God's work in the world as best we can along with others who likewise feel compelled to do God's work in the world.
Matthew 18 seems to be filled with humility, of restoring relationships, or recognizing what is at the heart of our faith lives together: communication between each other, strengthened in the presence of God. But between the part of Matthew 18 that talks about restoring relationship and the part where we are told God will be among us perhaps lies the most difficult part of our community: “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
Binding and loosing. Could it be that’s the bridge between God’s presence and the building up of the community of faith? To return to Heschel’s idea, could it be that the problem lies in a dynamic where there are many different people doing what they each think is best alongside others who are trying to do what they think is best, feeling compelled to do what each one of them thinks of as the most important work in the world? Maybe that’s the invitation of the scripture for us today, inviting us into a process of binding and loosening.
Are we kept stuck because of what we bind to ourselves? When we bind ourselves with our self interests rather than binding to ourselves the spiritual-interests of grace, mercy, compassion and love, that bridge between God’s presence and relationships that help each of us grow spiritually and emotionally, erodes more and more.
Or do we too easily loosen from ourselves the difficult spiritual disciples? Are we quick to release ourselves from the call for patience, to contemplate the other, the necessity for prayer and waiting on the spirit, and instead bind to ourselves time management and process, positions, and politics.
The bridge isn’t based on whether binding is bad or loosing is bad, but rather what is it that we bind, and what is it that we loosen. What do we keep close to protect ourselves? What do we neglect that keeps us from promoting a fuller life in the spirit with our brothers and sisters?
If we think about it, many of us have been guilty of neglecting many life-promoting actions in order to protect ourselves. Imagine with me that this bowl represents the structure of the congregation, and we, the members are the fruit. If we put each member inside, wearing his or her protective skin, the result is not a church but several individuals sharing the same space.
While we are crammed in here together, there is still a lot of space, a lot of barriers binding us up. If this is the way to make a fruit salad, to create community, then the only way members with tough skins can influence one another is to exert enough pressure to bruise others or squeeze someone else into a different shape.
In many ways, we are each like the fruit in this bowl. Something protects each of us, barriers that we work hard to maintain. Now, some of us may be prickly, like this pineapple. Maybe your skin, intended to protect you from painful words and actions of other people, has grown thick through years of careful nurturing. Does this sound like you? Are you a pineapple? [Carrie sets pineapple down, walks down with bowl of fruit]
Now if I was one of these fruits, I’d probably be one of these exotic pears wrapped in a foam covering. Not that I think I’m all that exotic…but they have such thin skin, anything could pierce them or bruise them. Their thin skin has to be protected from the outside elements. I’m a lot like one of these super sensitive fruits. I try to protect myself from disappointment with as many devices as I can. (hand fruit to Marge)
Or maybe you are like one in a bunch of grapes. I think we all can resonate with this one. We cling to the rest of the group that is like us. We hold fast to the stem that unifies us. Maybe we cling to those who think about God the way we do, or see politics the way we do, or maybe we don’t want venture to know the long-term, older members, or the newer, younger attendees because they aren’t like us. I think there is probably a bit of grape in each of us. (hand fruit to Linda/Del?)
Now a banana. Favorite fruit of marathon runners and toddlers, so I understand. A banana puts forth an impression through its skin that is far different from what we find inside, because when we peel away the sturdy, thick skin, a soft, sweet fruit is revealed. (hand fruit to Will?)
(Carrie walks back to the front, places bowl on table)
We each have our protective skin, or packaging, or strong stems holding us close. Jesus calls us to relinquish it. We are called to loosen those things that keep us from welcoming God in our space, our church community. This requires that we surrender the very skin intended for our protection, not because God wants us to be hurt by others but because the skin actually imprisons us rather than protects us.
Individuals become a church the same way pieces of fruit become a salad, by allowing the removal of their protective coverings [Carrie peels an orange as I speak and cut it in half. Others come forward to cut fruit up and place in bowl] and exposing their hearts to God. Although this condition appears risky, making us vulnerable to the slings and arrows of others, it is in this state of powerlessness that we receive God’s power. It is in loosing our protective skins that we bind up the essence of another’s faith to our own journey. It means we can yield the skins that isolate us and allows us to join together to absorb each other’s flavors. It doesn’t mean we give up who we are, or we must relinquish the essence of ourselves. But it does require some difficult, and faithful, work of exposing our hearts and vulnerabilities and each other. [Fruit cutters can sit down when they are done with their particular fruit]
As we surrender more and more of our self-interests, we are able to give ourselves to God’s work of promoting life. Where two or three are gathered God is there. Our community, our fruit salad our church. We are like the individual pieces of fruit in the fruit salad. But the peculiar thing about it, is that if we loosen, we can bind. If we relinquish, we can be blessed. AMEN
(Lorele Yager, adapted)
Matthew 18:10-20
Heritage Series week 3: Community
My first encounter with Mennonites happened as a result of one of my family’s mid-summer rituals as a child. When the summer was at its cruelest, and the day at its hottest, my brother, mother, and I would retreat inside turn on all the fans, and watch our summer blockbuster. That blockbuster was always the same, year in and year out. It was the epic mini-series adaptation of James A. Michener’s novel Centennial. This story told of the creation of a town in Colorado, named Centennial, tracing it’s roots back to the native Americans who inhabited the land for millennia, through the trappers and ranchers who established a new economy, all the way through the present day (present, being around 1980 or so). Now this mini series had probably 20 installments, and since we watched one installment a day, it kept us occupied nicely for about a month.
I lived in a part of Illinois that had few Brethren and even fewer Mennonites, so through the Centennial movie, I was introduced to my first Mennonite. Mennonite character, at least. His name was Levi Zendt, a young Lancaster Mennonite man sometime in the mid- to late- 19th century. Levi would later become one of the founding fathers of the Colorado town Centennial and what drove him West was a powerful act of his Mennonite community. Back in Lancaster, after driving a young, non-Mennonite woman home from helping him with some of his family’s deliveries, he is seen by the woman’s caretaker expressing his affection for her through some innocent kissing. Well it didn’t seem so innocent to the onlooker, who was obvious not pleased with this young woman cavorting with Mennonites. Levi is subsequently accused of a higher level of indiscretion than simply public display of affection, and the charges against him heighten.
At the peak of the accusations, Levi is cornered in his family’s barn by relatives and members of the Mennonite community. They tell him how he has shamed them all, how he has fallen away. And then they lay upon him the most severe punishment of their community. “Levi Zendt…” one man says. “You will be shunned!” All these years later I remember the sound of the word-- “shunned.”
So what else is a Lancaster Mennonite young man to do after he is shunned? Well, buy a rifle, get a wife and a Conastoga wagon and move to Colorado, of course. OK, this is simply a story, and who knows how much James Michener really knew of the practice of discipline among Mennonites and Brethren communities in the 19th century. But I think it paints a widely held picture of community held by these “peculiar people,” as Mennonites and Brethren were often referred to.
And we were peculiar, and perhaps we are still peculiar, in the eyes of the rest of society. Our community was defined by similar simple dress, men with beards and no mustaches, women with prayer coverings, we resisted the new fangled and the worldly, we resisted military conscription, we had many voices preaching during worship, not just one, and no paid clergy. We valued shared life-style over shared doctrine. And we had discipline. Discipline that was found in Matthew 18, today’s scripture lesson. If a brother or sister offended another, the offended should go to that person and tell them how they have been hurt. If they do not listen, they are to take another member of the church and go to them and bring the accusation. If they still don’t listen, the offended party should take the matter to the church, and if they still don’t listen, then the ultimate penalty…cast them aside, throw them out of the community. Brethren didn’t use the word “shun,” but they did use the word “ban” or “avoidance.” Members would be banned from the community for the perceived larger good of the community. But as E.F. Roop reflects in the Brethren Encyclopedia, the practice of the ban, or avoidance, or shunning, proved quite problematic. What sins were greater? What level of avoidance should they be convicted to? Should they be banned from all church activity or just certain things? And what about family life? Should offending members be banned from the dinner table?
But the focus on maintaining a strict code of community, finding ways to kick people out of our church, or to give a measuring rod to see if individuals are uniform with who we are is focusing too narrowly on the scripture. It’s not about who is in and who is out, but looking at the question, how can we live together? It’s not a check list to go through so the uncooperative, or marginal members can be rightfully kicked out. Rather, it takes many measures to ensure that relationships are healed, and people are reconciled. I can read through this entire passage and reflect on what it means for community procedure, and how people should change to get in line. But perhaps it is where the passage ends that our journey as a community is to begin, and in reality, is where it began when we became a new church all those years ago. It doesn’t begin in some process or checklist. It begins where our passage in Matthew 18 ends, “For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”
This concept, this belief that God was present in the gathering of the body, of those seeking God’s truth was a major component for the Brethren. Early in our history we would have to gather in secret, in barns, under bridges, in back store rooms, even on boats in the middle of lakes to worship. No priest was needed. No sacraments. Not even particular scripture readings. What was important was that we believed, we trusted Christ’s words that God’s presence rests with the people who gather. That trusted we that we had God incarnate within us, and by joining together, that God is made even more evident to one another.
Have you ever gone into a conversation about God or politics or anything, so sure of your convictions, so steadfast in your position? And in conversing with another, they give a bit of their selves, you give a bit of your self, and before you know it, your position is not necessarily changed, but your understanding is enriched. I like to think of this as a barn-raising, a notable image from our Anabaptist roots, primarily with the Amish. We each hold up pieces, and while they may not be close to one another, in fact, they may be completely opposite from one another on the foundation, they are all necessary for the building up of the one house.
But isn’t it hard to see God working, or at least think someone else in the church is helping us come closer to God, when we get down to the nitty gritty of community making? Especially when something seems to be so annoying, or so aggressive, or so passive! When it seems like people don’t listen or don’t want to share. It is a rare case, I’m sure when we actually feel God’s spirit moving during a board meeting for example. So it seems sort of naïve to say that just get a couple folks together and *bam* it will feel just lovely, a space powerfully infused with the Holy Spirit. The word community, if you think about it, is quite vague and we throw it around so much that I don’t know if we really know what we’re talking about.
For example, during our prayer for community, we try to pray for ourselves, our church, our neighborhood and town, our country and world. We talk about community spirit, or community development. And while the church community shares elements with all these types of communities, the community of faith, that community that was formed not just 300 years ago, but thousands of years ago, has a unique and powerful characteristic. I’m reminded of the words of Abraham Joshua Heschel: we are people who gather in humility and listen to God as best we can and do God's work in the world as best we can along with others who likewise feel compelled to do God's work in the world.
Matthew 18 seems to be filled with humility, of restoring relationships, or recognizing what is at the heart of our faith lives together: communication between each other, strengthened in the presence of God. But between the part of Matthew 18 that talks about restoring relationship and the part where we are told God will be among us perhaps lies the most difficult part of our community: “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
Binding and loosing. Could it be that’s the bridge between God’s presence and the building up of the community of faith? To return to Heschel’s idea, could it be that the problem lies in a dynamic where there are many different people doing what they each think is best alongside others who are trying to do what they think is best, feeling compelled to do what each one of them thinks of as the most important work in the world? Maybe that’s the invitation of the scripture for us today, inviting us into a process of binding and loosening.
Are we kept stuck because of what we bind to ourselves? When we bind ourselves with our self interests rather than binding to ourselves the spiritual-interests of grace, mercy, compassion and love, that bridge between God’s presence and relationships that help each of us grow spiritually and emotionally, erodes more and more.
Or do we too easily loosen from ourselves the difficult spiritual disciples? Are we quick to release ourselves from the call for patience, to contemplate the other, the necessity for prayer and waiting on the spirit, and instead bind to ourselves time management and process, positions, and politics.
The bridge isn’t based on whether binding is bad or loosing is bad, but rather what is it that we bind, and what is it that we loosen. What do we keep close to protect ourselves? What do we neglect that keeps us from promoting a fuller life in the spirit with our brothers and sisters?
If we think about it, many of us have been guilty of neglecting many life-promoting actions in order to protect ourselves. Imagine with me that this bowl represents the structure of the congregation, and we, the members are the fruit. If we put each member inside, wearing his or her protective skin, the result is not a church but several individuals sharing the same space.
While we are crammed in here together, there is still a lot of space, a lot of barriers binding us up. If this is the way to make a fruit salad, to create community, then the only way members with tough skins can influence one another is to exert enough pressure to bruise others or squeeze someone else into a different shape.
In many ways, we are each like the fruit in this bowl. Something protects each of us, barriers that we work hard to maintain. Now, some of us may be prickly, like this pineapple. Maybe your skin, intended to protect you from painful words and actions of other people, has grown thick through years of careful nurturing. Does this sound like you? Are you a pineapple? [Carrie sets pineapple down, walks down with bowl of fruit]
Now if I was one of these fruits, I’d probably be one of these exotic pears wrapped in a foam covering. Not that I think I’m all that exotic…but they have such thin skin, anything could pierce them or bruise them. Their thin skin has to be protected from the outside elements. I’m a lot like one of these super sensitive fruits. I try to protect myself from disappointment with as many devices as I can. (hand fruit to Marge)
Or maybe you are like one in a bunch of grapes. I think we all can resonate with this one. We cling to the rest of the group that is like us. We hold fast to the stem that unifies us. Maybe we cling to those who think about God the way we do, or see politics the way we do, or maybe we don’t want venture to know the long-term, older members, or the newer, younger attendees because they aren’t like us. I think there is probably a bit of grape in each of us. (hand fruit to Linda/Del?)
Now a banana. Favorite fruit of marathon runners and toddlers, so I understand. A banana puts forth an impression through its skin that is far different from what we find inside, because when we peel away the sturdy, thick skin, a soft, sweet fruit is revealed. (hand fruit to Will?)
(Carrie walks back to the front, places bowl on table)
We each have our protective skin, or packaging, or strong stems holding us close. Jesus calls us to relinquish it. We are called to loosen those things that keep us from welcoming God in our space, our church community. This requires that we surrender the very skin intended for our protection, not because God wants us to be hurt by others but because the skin actually imprisons us rather than protects us.
Individuals become a church the same way pieces of fruit become a salad, by allowing the removal of their protective coverings [Carrie peels an orange as I speak and cut it in half. Others come forward to cut fruit up and place in bowl] and exposing their hearts to God. Although this condition appears risky, making us vulnerable to the slings and arrows of others, it is in this state of powerlessness that we receive God’s power. It is in loosing our protective skins that we bind up the essence of another’s faith to our own journey. It means we can yield the skins that isolate us and allows us to join together to absorb each other’s flavors. It doesn’t mean we give up who we are, or we must relinquish the essence of ourselves. But it does require some difficult, and faithful, work of exposing our hearts and vulnerabilities and each other. [Fruit cutters can sit down when they are done with their particular fruit]
As we surrender more and more of our self-interests, we are able to give ourselves to God’s work of promoting life. Where two or three are gathered God is there. Our community, our fruit salad our church. We are like the individual pieces of fruit in the fruit salad. But the peculiar thing about it, is that if we loosen, we can bind. If we relinquish, we can be blessed. AMEN
(Lorele Yager, adapted)
Sunday, June 15, 2008
The Joy of Discipleship
sermon by Torin Eikler
Luke 14:25-33, Micah 6:1-8
Heritage Series Week 2: Discipleship
“Which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost? Or what king, going out to wage war will not first consider whether he is able to win?”
Anabaptists have taken these words very seriously from their very beginnings over 500 years ago. And why not, their situation was not so different from that of the early church. In the social climate they found themselves in choosing believers’ baptism was tantamount to open rebellion against the state. Inevitably, it made them outlaws who had to live on the run in constant fear of retaliation from the authorities – retaliation ranging from mild harassment to the confiscation of all goods to banishment and even to death. The costs were great and the decision to embark on that journey was not taken lightly.
In the early part of the 16th century, a boy named Dirk Willem was born to a farming family in what is now the Netherlands. Not much is known of his childhood, but like most people of that time, he was baptized into the Catholic Church – which was the state church at the time. During his early life, the region in which he lived changed allegiance a few times according to the political needs of the ruling prince, and each change was accompanied by a change from the Catholic Church to the newly formed Lutheran Church and eventually to the Church of the Netherlands.
Moving back and forth between churches that condemned each other as heresy according to political expediency led Dirk to join others questioning the validity of either church, and he eventually joined the small but growing group of Christians who were called Anabaptists. The decision made him a fugitive from both churches and the state that supported them, and it wasn’t too long before he was arrested and imprisoned for his beliefs along with many others.
But Dirk Willems escaped from the prison tower, in a scene reminiscent of Hollywood fairytales. In the dead of winter, he tied together strips of cloth to make a rope which he used to slide down the prison wall to freedom. But as he set out across the countryside, a guard spotted him, shouted an alarm, and gave chase.
In Dirk's path of escape was an ice-covered pond. With little choice, he took a risk and crossed the thin ice safely. His pursuer, however, was not so lucky. A big man – as guards often are - he broke through the ice and fell into the frigid water where he struggled to stay afloat, calling for help.
Dirk saw this, and where others would have thanked their lucky stars or praised God for deliverance, he heard the cry of someone in need. Believing in Jesus' teaching to love even one's enemies, he turned back and rescued the guard. As a result, he was arrested again and placed in a more secure prison where he remained until he was burned at the stake, in 1569.
If faithful people like Dirk Willems were to choose the path of discipleship as they understood it, they had to consider all that could be required of them first.
For us – today, in this country – things do not seem so dire. We live in a time and place where we are free to live according to whatever faith we may choose. And we have little to fear in the way of retaliation – at least if we choose a Christian church that tends to fit within the accepted social norms. Yet, even for us the requirements of discipleship are significant.
In the middle of the 20th century, a boy named Ted Studebaker was born to a farming family in western Ohio and joined the West Milton Church of the Brethren as a young man. When the time came for Ted to register for the draft, he wrote a letter to the US government explaining that he refused to join the military because he believed that the lives of all people are sacred. The government accepted his statement, and when the Vietnam War began, he was excluded from the draft as a conscientious objector.
But, Ted went to Vietnam all the same. He knew that people were suffering because of the war, and he felt a call to go and help them in whatever way he could. So, he volunteered to spend two years living and working with Montagnard hill farmers, teaching them new agricultural methods to help ease the food shortage brought on by the war. He stayed with them even when the fighting moved close to Di Linh – where he was living – because he believed working with the Vietnamese was the only way to truly bring peace. In a letter to his mother, he explained his decision to stay saying, “Above all, Christ taught me how to love all people, including enemies, and to return good for evil.” Not much later, he was executed in 1971 by Vietnamese soldiers who misunderstood the situation and say any American presence as a threat.
Even now, if we choose the way of active, rich discipleship we are bound to experience some persecution – be it overt and violent or subtle and backhanded, legal or social. It may just come from simple misunderstanding or a sense of disbelief. After all, do you know anyone who would actually invite a homeless stranger to live in their extra room or give their time and money religiously to bring food to the hungry and destitute? Who would seek to save the life of someone who murdered a family member? Who would choose violence and suffering in pursuit of reconciliation instead of fighting back and defending life and country? These things which are so much a part of our faith tradition (and even our own congregation) are absurd in the eyes of the culture we live in.
And yet, all those things and more are part of Christian discipleship. In this passage alone, we are told that we must be prepared to give all that we have to help those in need. We are even warned that we may have to leave behind cherished family members if they stand in opposition to the life of discipleship. Elsewhere, Jesus adds:
* turning the other cheek,
* loving our enemies enough to pray for their well-being,
* showing mercy and compassion to the suffering, the weak, and the outcasts,
* setting aside our own self-righteous sense of judgment to make way for
God’s grace,
* and taking the good news of the life promised in Christ to the ends of the
earth – teaching others to be disciples as we go.
And that only is only the beginning. Count well the cost indeed….
But, which of us can actually understand all that it means to be a disciple?
When I found out that Carrie and I were expecting a child, I was very happy and very nervous. We had done a lot of reading and talking with others about parenting, and I continued to scrabble for information as I tried to get a picture of what would be required of me as a father. But, as the day of Sebastian’s birth came closer and closer, I realized that I could never really understand how my life would change. As all of you who are fathers – and mothers for that matter – know, it just isn’t possible to know what will be required of you when a new child comes into the family until it happens.
And in some sense, it is much the same when we make a commitment to follow Christ. No matter how much time and effort we put in, we can never fully count the costs of discipleship until they come upon us. If we really thought about it, I suspect that none of us would seek baptism if we were intent on a full reckoning before we stepped into the water.
But that’s not really the point of Jesus’ words. He was not asking for a guarantee of complete fidelity and absolute success in advance. He of all people understood how meaningless such promises would be. He was asking his followers to open their eyes. Bearing the cross of discipleship requires deliberate sacrifice and leads us to risk ridicule as we seek to follow Christ. Jesus wanted the people to consider what it actually might mean to become a disciple before making a superficial commitment they would have trouble keeping and soon regret.
And yet, Jesus was not trying to discourage people from following him. It is true that when we consider all that we must do and everything that may be required of us as disciples, we can easily become overwhelmed. But if we focus too much on the details and particulars, we miss the joyful promise of new life brought by Christ. If we stare at the disappointment of the rich young ruler, we miss the delight of the woman at the well – running to tell everyone about the living water she had received. We miss the passion of the Gerasene man proclaiming the gift he received when Jesus freed him from a legion of demons. We miss the tears of grief turned to joy on the face of Mary when she met the resurrected Christ at the tomb.
On the day that Sebastian was born, I experienced the most incredible joy. It mirrored and expanded the joy that I felt when Carrie and I were married and the freedom and renewal I felt at my baptism. I still had no idea what was in store for me as a father, nor was I prepared for how wrong I was about the things that I expected to be part of the process. Still, even in the most frustrating, irritating times, there is an unceasing flood of joy in my heart – joy that flows from the love I have for my son.
Is it so strange that discipleship should be the same? Jesus, after all, summed up the life of discipleship in terms in simple terms. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and strength. And love your neighbor as yourself.” Micah echoed the theme years earlier saying, “What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.”
It all comes down to love:
* love that is strong enough to draw us forward into the lives of others –
lives filled with joy and pain,
* love that breaks down our barriers so that we can become tools of the
Holy Spirit, sharing the promise of new life with others through
simple words and even simpler acts of mercy and kindness,
* love that echoes and responds to the love of God made plain in the
salvation and new life freely offered in Christ.
Sisters and brothers, the life of discipleship can be difficult and filled with sacrifice, but we choose that life in faith because of the great love that we have been shown. And, responding in love, we find joy along the path – and ever-flowing stream of new life refreshing and renewing us as we go into the world in service. Let us, then, renew our commitment to discipleship today and every day. Let us model ourselves after our friend and teacher: the Christ who “for the joy set before him – for the joy set before him, endured hardship and suffering … even death on the cross.”
Luke 14:25-33, Micah 6:1-8
Heritage Series Week 2: Discipleship
“Which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost? Or what king, going out to wage war will not first consider whether he is able to win?”
Anabaptists have taken these words very seriously from their very beginnings over 500 years ago. And why not, their situation was not so different from that of the early church. In the social climate they found themselves in choosing believers’ baptism was tantamount to open rebellion against the state. Inevitably, it made them outlaws who had to live on the run in constant fear of retaliation from the authorities – retaliation ranging from mild harassment to the confiscation of all goods to banishment and even to death. The costs were great and the decision to embark on that journey was not taken lightly.
In the early part of the 16th century, a boy named Dirk Willem was born to a farming family in what is now the Netherlands. Not much is known of his childhood, but like most people of that time, he was baptized into the Catholic Church – which was the state church at the time. During his early life, the region in which he lived changed allegiance a few times according to the political needs of the ruling prince, and each change was accompanied by a change from the Catholic Church to the newly formed Lutheran Church and eventually to the Church of the Netherlands.
Moving back and forth between churches that condemned each other as heresy according to political expediency led Dirk to join others questioning the validity of either church, and he eventually joined the small but growing group of Christians who were called Anabaptists. The decision made him a fugitive from both churches and the state that supported them, and it wasn’t too long before he was arrested and imprisoned for his beliefs along with many others.
But Dirk Willems escaped from the prison tower, in a scene reminiscent of Hollywood fairytales. In the dead of winter, he tied together strips of cloth to make a rope which he used to slide down the prison wall to freedom. But as he set out across the countryside, a guard spotted him, shouted an alarm, and gave chase.
In Dirk's path of escape was an ice-covered pond. With little choice, he took a risk and crossed the thin ice safely. His pursuer, however, was not so lucky. A big man – as guards often are - he broke through the ice and fell into the frigid water where he struggled to stay afloat, calling for help.
Dirk saw this, and where others would have thanked their lucky stars or praised God for deliverance, he heard the cry of someone in need. Believing in Jesus' teaching to love even one's enemies, he turned back and rescued the guard. As a result, he was arrested again and placed in a more secure prison where he remained until he was burned at the stake, in 1569.
If faithful people like Dirk Willems were to choose the path of discipleship as they understood it, they had to consider all that could be required of them first.
For us – today, in this country – things do not seem so dire. We live in a time and place where we are free to live according to whatever faith we may choose. And we have little to fear in the way of retaliation – at least if we choose a Christian church that tends to fit within the accepted social norms. Yet, even for us the requirements of discipleship are significant.
In the middle of the 20th century, a boy named Ted Studebaker was born to a farming family in western Ohio and joined the West Milton Church of the Brethren as a young man. When the time came for Ted to register for the draft, he wrote a letter to the US government explaining that he refused to join the military because he believed that the lives of all people are sacred. The government accepted his statement, and when the Vietnam War began, he was excluded from the draft as a conscientious objector.
But, Ted went to Vietnam all the same. He knew that people were suffering because of the war, and he felt a call to go and help them in whatever way he could. So, he volunteered to spend two years living and working with Montagnard hill farmers, teaching them new agricultural methods to help ease the food shortage brought on by the war. He stayed with them even when the fighting moved close to Di Linh – where he was living – because he believed working with the Vietnamese was the only way to truly bring peace. In a letter to his mother, he explained his decision to stay saying, “Above all, Christ taught me how to love all people, including enemies, and to return good for evil.” Not much later, he was executed in 1971 by Vietnamese soldiers who misunderstood the situation and say any American presence as a threat.
Even now, if we choose the way of active, rich discipleship we are bound to experience some persecution – be it overt and violent or subtle and backhanded, legal or social. It may just come from simple misunderstanding or a sense of disbelief. After all, do you know anyone who would actually invite a homeless stranger to live in their extra room or give their time and money religiously to bring food to the hungry and destitute? Who would seek to save the life of someone who murdered a family member? Who would choose violence and suffering in pursuit of reconciliation instead of fighting back and defending life and country? These things which are so much a part of our faith tradition (and even our own congregation) are absurd in the eyes of the culture we live in.
And yet, all those things and more are part of Christian discipleship. In this passage alone, we are told that we must be prepared to give all that we have to help those in need. We are even warned that we may have to leave behind cherished family members if they stand in opposition to the life of discipleship. Elsewhere, Jesus adds:
* turning the other cheek,
* loving our enemies enough to pray for their well-being,
* showing mercy and compassion to the suffering, the weak, and the outcasts,
* setting aside our own self-righteous sense of judgment to make way for
God’s grace,
* and taking the good news of the life promised in Christ to the ends of the
earth – teaching others to be disciples as we go.
And that only is only the beginning. Count well the cost indeed….
But, which of us can actually understand all that it means to be a disciple?
When I found out that Carrie and I were expecting a child, I was very happy and very nervous. We had done a lot of reading and talking with others about parenting, and I continued to scrabble for information as I tried to get a picture of what would be required of me as a father. But, as the day of Sebastian’s birth came closer and closer, I realized that I could never really understand how my life would change. As all of you who are fathers – and mothers for that matter – know, it just isn’t possible to know what will be required of you when a new child comes into the family until it happens.
And in some sense, it is much the same when we make a commitment to follow Christ. No matter how much time and effort we put in, we can never fully count the costs of discipleship until they come upon us. If we really thought about it, I suspect that none of us would seek baptism if we were intent on a full reckoning before we stepped into the water.
But that’s not really the point of Jesus’ words. He was not asking for a guarantee of complete fidelity and absolute success in advance. He of all people understood how meaningless such promises would be. He was asking his followers to open their eyes. Bearing the cross of discipleship requires deliberate sacrifice and leads us to risk ridicule as we seek to follow Christ. Jesus wanted the people to consider what it actually might mean to become a disciple before making a superficial commitment they would have trouble keeping and soon regret.
And yet, Jesus was not trying to discourage people from following him. It is true that when we consider all that we must do and everything that may be required of us as disciples, we can easily become overwhelmed. But if we focus too much on the details and particulars, we miss the joyful promise of new life brought by Christ. If we stare at the disappointment of the rich young ruler, we miss the delight of the woman at the well – running to tell everyone about the living water she had received. We miss the passion of the Gerasene man proclaiming the gift he received when Jesus freed him from a legion of demons. We miss the tears of grief turned to joy on the face of Mary when she met the resurrected Christ at the tomb.
On the day that Sebastian was born, I experienced the most incredible joy. It mirrored and expanded the joy that I felt when Carrie and I were married and the freedom and renewal I felt at my baptism. I still had no idea what was in store for me as a father, nor was I prepared for how wrong I was about the things that I expected to be part of the process. Still, even in the most frustrating, irritating times, there is an unceasing flood of joy in my heart – joy that flows from the love I have for my son.
Is it so strange that discipleship should be the same? Jesus, after all, summed up the life of discipleship in terms in simple terms. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and strength. And love your neighbor as yourself.” Micah echoed the theme years earlier saying, “What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.”
It all comes down to love:
* love that is strong enough to draw us forward into the lives of others –
lives filled with joy and pain,
* love that breaks down our barriers so that we can become tools of the
Holy Spirit, sharing the promise of new life with others through
simple words and even simpler acts of mercy and kindness,
* love that echoes and responds to the love of God made plain in the
salvation and new life freely offered in Christ.
Sisters and brothers, the life of discipleship can be difficult and filled with sacrifice, but we choose that life in faith because of the great love that we have been shown. And, responding in love, we find joy along the path – and ever-flowing stream of new life refreshing and renewing us as we go into the world in service. Let us, then, renew our commitment to discipleship today and every day. Let us model ourselves after our friend and teacher: the Christ who “for the joy set before him – for the joy set before him, endured hardship and suffering … even death on the cross.”
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Seeing and Believing
sermon by Carrie Eikler
Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26
Heritage Series Week 1: Believer's Church
“What a difference six months make. “At the Detroit auto show in January, General Motors was selling its idea of a greener cleaner Hummer” according to a New York Times article this week. For those of you who don’t know what a Hummer is, it is a boxy SUV that can ford rivers, climb boulders, and churn through mud unlike any other SUV. It is an intimidating, gigantic machine. And…it gets 10.7 miles to the gallon. Now this might not have been a problem back in 2002 when gas cost around $1.35 per gallon. But now…
So what has happened to G.M. in the six months since the unveiling of the greener cleaner Hummer concept? Well, on Tuesday, Rick Wagoner, G.M.’s chief executive, announced that the company was shutting down four truck plants and thinking about unloading Hummer…totally getting rid of it. And you don’t need to be an economist, or an automotive expert to understand why. With gas teetering at the $4/gallon mark it is obvious. What used to be fuel for not only our cars, also powered our insatiable need for mobile independence. And now that fuel has hit record dollar costs, it has forced Americans to reexamine decisions we had once taken for granted. And with a waning economy, the bottoming out of the mortgage market, and costs of everything we buy going up, while the value of our dollar gets weaker and weaker, something is definitely going to change in each of our lives.
When gas first hit $2 a gallon, then $3 a gallon, economists were skeptical that the increase prices would affect driving habits. They speculated that perhaps it might have long term effects—folks might purchase more fuel efficient cars the next time they buy, but they doubted it would have any short term effects, you know, those things that affect our lifestyle, what we do on a daily basis. They didn’t think at $2 or $3 a gallon people would give up driving for walking, or biking, or using public transit, or even driving less. I spoke with a woman named Maria at our own Mountain Line Transit system this week. A survey they conducted some years back revealed that folks in the Morgantown area said that at $2.50 a gallon, they would consider mass transit. At $4.00 a gallon, they would consider carpooling. But at $5.00 a gallon, people definitely would be pursuing either option: rub shoulders with folks on a bus, or other co-workers as they squeeze into shared transport.
Dennis Jacobe, chief economist at the Gallup Organization in Washington D.C., reflects that “as the price of energy rises, the first thing people try to do is maintain their standard of living” and the first thing to sacrifice is the habit of saving, something Americans have never been very good at doing in the first place. As the magic number for fuel flirts with $4, even histting $4.10 this weekend at some places here in Morgantown, it threats to possibly go to $4.50, $5, who knows how high. It looks like the short term changes, those lifestyle changes, what we do on a daily basis, might be going into affect, according to Jacobe. Public transit has seen a dramatic increase in ridership, people are taking fewer weekend trips, some folks are even walking!
With these prices I guess I’m surprised to see as many of you here this morning. We may need to begin a church carpooling system to help with these lifestyle changes!
No doubt, our habits are being changed by what we see happening around us. But what we see isn’t just the dollar amount going up on the signs outside the gas stations. We see our wallets getting thinner, or our bank accounts getting smaller as we pay more for our independence. Hopefully we are also aware of the effects on family and personal sanity due to long commutes, and traffic jams, and green spaces being covered by concrete. We know the costs aren’t just monetary. What we see, what we experience, changes us. And when it gets to the tipping point, those possible long term changes come crashing into our laps, not simply things we will attend to later, but realities that demand to be seen and believed, right now.
The gospels are filled with people who were faced, in very dramatic ways, with the tipping point. The three stories today all show the power of Jesus touching, healing, convincing, inviting, showing a new reality. A paralytic healed. A white collar criminal engaged. A bleeding woman blessed. A dead girl resurrected. The healing—the tipping point—for these people is probably obvious. The focus of the story is on them and Jesus, after all. But I think there is more going on in the scriptures than we may take away at first glance. There are many more people involved: lurking in the shadows, peeking around the corner, hiding at the hem of someone else’s robe.
So who are these other people? Well, to being with, Jesus saw the faith of the friends who brought the paralyzed man, and the scripture implies that on these grounds, because of the friends, Jesus was able to heal. The Pharisees, when confronting Jesus about sitting with tax collectors and sinners, had their first engagement with Jesus in the gospel of Matthew, and coaxed from Jesus words we would be wise to contemplate “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.”
And let’s not forget the crowds. They are part of the story too. After Jesus heals the bleeding woman on his way to tend to the daughter of a synagogue leader, he meets flute players, accompanying a dirge sung by mourners. They didn’t believe it when Jesus said she was only sleeping. But he took her hand, and she got up. We can imagine that the dirge turned into joyful shouts of thanksgiving and awe, and we are told that “the report of this spread throughout that district.” And there are crowds around the man who was paralyzed. After the man stood up, the crowds saw it, they were filled with awe, and they glorified God.”
I love it when crowds are involved in a story because often, that’s where I find myself in the story. This might be the case, because generally when I come in contact with the holy it’s not because I have had a huge miraculous healing take place, or drastic transformation. Rather I often am touched by the Holy by witnessing something that leaves me in awe. That compels me to shout out, turn my dirge into whoops and hollers, to say to others, “Haven’t you seen what I have just seen?”
Could it be that in simply seeing we are changed? Could it be that being witness to death and corruption, and being witness to healing and blessin we too are touched by Christ? I can only imagine that these are ripe moments for the deepening of our faith, for hearing the call to join the one who heals, who turns things upside down, to learn to touch as he touched. Just by seeing, by witnessing, we may reach the tipping point where our lives are changed and our paths take new steps.
One of the most transformative books on my shelves at home, is A People’s History of the United States by the historian Howard Zinn. Zinn takes the well-known concept that official history is written by the winners. But behind the winner’s stories, are the stories and experiences of the many, many people who were the outsiders, or the outcasts, the marginalized, the disempowered. In A People’s History, Zinn unearths these stories, giving us a different take on what may have seemed like dead history. He gives us eyes to see what others had seen, experiences that the dominant story has forgotten. I think this may be one way to think about our foremothers and forefathers of our Mennonite and Brethren traditions. What did they see? What were they witness to that brought them to the tipping point? What was their $4 a gallon incentive to change their life in the church?
The dominant story at the time of our beginning as a church was one of war and persecution, intolerance and corruption, and a time for the misfits and the outcasts to emerge, our own faith ancestors. Europe had been in the throws of religious wars for decades, centuries. Martin Luther had begun what is known as the Reformation ultimately breaking away from the Catholic Church and formed the tradition of what is now known as Lutheranism, the first Protestant denomination. After that, others began breaking away as well, even breaking away from these newly reformed traditions. These different groups were “seeing” differently on certain theological matters such as communion, the power of Rome, and the importance of scripture versus actions. But the one thing these larger movements, in their difference, they did see eye to eye on, was baptism. Baptism continued to be a ritual that was conferred upon infants.
But baptism was more than a ritual of conveying grace on the child, welcoming them into the church family. At that time, in that place, Church and State were one. Baptism into the church also meant induction as a citizen, and all the responsibilities that go along with citizenship. So in the midst of religious wars fought by armies of the state, we can image it took a big step to ask the questions “How am I a Christian and how am I a citizen?” And, the question that still faces us today, “What happens when the values of being a Christian and a citizen clash?” Small groups in Holland and Germany, groups that would later become Mennonites and Brethren, were seeing that what was happening in the world around them, and what they read and believed from the word of Jesus were growing farther and farther apart. The tipping point had come.
So these groups continued reading the Bible, which was a fairly new practice since Bibles before the 16th century were few and far between, generally the possession of the priests, not a household staple for a largely illiterate society. But when you give people the power and the means to think for themselves, to engage the scriptures with their own eyes and hearts, it always seems to be a recipe for trouble…delicious trouble.
People began studying baptism and recognized that in the New Testament, baptism overwhelmingly was intended for adults, those who came to the faith though free will, not something done to the unknowing by consent of their parents. According to the letters of Peter the disciples were to go and baptize. Jesus’ ministry started with his baptism. They came to understand that baptism was something that people had to believe in, that the power of Christ in one’s life had to be experienced before taking on the responsibility not of citizenship, but the difficult responsibility of being a Christian.
So Mennonites in the 16th century and Brethren in the 18th century were vital streams in the movement called Anabaptism, meaning “re-baptized.” (and it should be noted that it is ana-baptism, “ana” meaning “again”, not anti-baptism, as is often misunderstood). Anabaptists rejected their early baptism and in secret, but in large numbers in some places, would enter the icy waters for baptism and defy not just church doctrine, but state control over their lives, and reclaim themselves as believers in Christ—a decision of faith, not just an assumption. And so began the concept of Believer’s Church, a body of people who chose a life of lived faith, not simply professed faith.
I appreciate Sarah Scotti-Einstein for bringing this turn of phrase to me, the tension between a lived faith and a professed faith. She recalled that one of the things that brought her into the Anabaptist tradition was the life of one woman whose faith radiated from her in everything she did, the way she spoke and interacted, the choices she made, the way she walked through life. It was a lived faith, no doubt daily filled with the struggle of responding to what she saw in the world and making choices based on her commitment to Christ. She was so inspired by this woman that she began writing down her life story, trying to compile the essence of this powerful woman’s faith on the page, to help convey that sense of power and commitment to others.
But Sarah found that she was failing miserably at attempting to record this person’s lived faith. She said, “When I tried to write it down, I recognized that it simply became a professed faith, a retelling of someone’s beliefs. The power of her life was not just words, but an active faith, a lived faith.”
That’s what our ancestors were doing. While baptism was the focus and the symbol that they resisted and wanted to reclaim, I think more deeply it was the tipping point of a Church that for too long had simply professed beliefs, and recited creeds, and killed in the name of Jesus. Granted, baptism in the United States isn’t a state necessity, and in fact, in a country where separation of church and state is the norm, it has no function regarding state or military in anyway. Some of the radical nature of adult or believer’s baptism has been lost. And yet, to constantly reclaim ourselves for Christian discipleship, for this to be a daily part of our lives is a sort of radical rebaptism. Because it means that we know that we must change.
Every day we see the world around us. Violence and warfare are parts of our lives, and if it’s not intimate, then we are certainly witness to it. Greed and hatred darken our own hearts, no matter how much we wish to deny it. Christ light shines on those dark parts of our soul, showing us the places that need to be filled, so we can see our own need. We see our tendency to be short with our loved ones, to neglect our spiritual lives, to forget what it means that we are beloved.
This is what we see. This is what we are witness to. Dennis Jacobe, that chief executive of Gallup I referred to earlier, said “When people see high gas prices and then see it rising several cents a gallon each day, …they have the psychological problem of not knowing how high it will go. When that happens, people start to adjust their lifestyle.” The first Anabaptists saw violence and exploitation of the church rising dramatically each day. Likely, they didn’t know when it would stop, how high the destruction would go. They stepped into the waters and said, “Enough. Things must change. I must change.” What do you see in your life that calls you deeper into faith? What are you witness to that brings you to a tipping point, keeps you searching for faithful response?
As we think on these parts of our lives and our world, maybe that’s how we stand in the crowds, perhaps reaching for the hem of some sanity, or playing a dirge because all our hope is lost. And in the midst of this, the voices come from the past, lowered through the ceiling… stepping out of the water, steadying us as we enter into the new day of Christ’s church, and a new life.
Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26
Heritage Series Week 1: Believer's Church
“What a difference six months make. “At the Detroit auto show in January, General Motors was selling its idea of a greener cleaner Hummer” according to a New York Times article this week. For those of you who don’t know what a Hummer is, it is a boxy SUV that can ford rivers, climb boulders, and churn through mud unlike any other SUV. It is an intimidating, gigantic machine. And…it gets 10.7 miles to the gallon. Now this might not have been a problem back in 2002 when gas cost around $1.35 per gallon. But now…
So what has happened to G.M. in the six months since the unveiling of the greener cleaner Hummer concept? Well, on Tuesday, Rick Wagoner, G.M.’s chief executive, announced that the company was shutting down four truck plants and thinking about unloading Hummer…totally getting rid of it. And you don’t need to be an economist, or an automotive expert to understand why. With gas teetering at the $4/gallon mark it is obvious. What used to be fuel for not only our cars, also powered our insatiable need for mobile independence. And now that fuel has hit record dollar costs, it has forced Americans to reexamine decisions we had once taken for granted. And with a waning economy, the bottoming out of the mortgage market, and costs of everything we buy going up, while the value of our dollar gets weaker and weaker, something is definitely going to change in each of our lives.
When gas first hit $2 a gallon, then $3 a gallon, economists were skeptical that the increase prices would affect driving habits. They speculated that perhaps it might have long term effects—folks might purchase more fuel efficient cars the next time they buy, but they doubted it would have any short term effects, you know, those things that affect our lifestyle, what we do on a daily basis. They didn’t think at $2 or $3 a gallon people would give up driving for walking, or biking, or using public transit, or even driving less. I spoke with a woman named Maria at our own Mountain Line Transit system this week. A survey they conducted some years back revealed that folks in the Morgantown area said that at $2.50 a gallon, they would consider mass transit. At $4.00 a gallon, they would consider carpooling. But at $5.00 a gallon, people definitely would be pursuing either option: rub shoulders with folks on a bus, or other co-workers as they squeeze into shared transport.
Dennis Jacobe, chief economist at the Gallup Organization in Washington D.C., reflects that “as the price of energy rises, the first thing people try to do is maintain their standard of living” and the first thing to sacrifice is the habit of saving, something Americans have never been very good at doing in the first place. As the magic number for fuel flirts with $4, even histting $4.10 this weekend at some places here in Morgantown, it threats to possibly go to $4.50, $5, who knows how high. It looks like the short term changes, those lifestyle changes, what we do on a daily basis, might be going into affect, according to Jacobe. Public transit has seen a dramatic increase in ridership, people are taking fewer weekend trips, some folks are even walking!
With these prices I guess I’m surprised to see as many of you here this morning. We may need to begin a church carpooling system to help with these lifestyle changes!
No doubt, our habits are being changed by what we see happening around us. But what we see isn’t just the dollar amount going up on the signs outside the gas stations. We see our wallets getting thinner, or our bank accounts getting smaller as we pay more for our independence. Hopefully we are also aware of the effects on family and personal sanity due to long commutes, and traffic jams, and green spaces being covered by concrete. We know the costs aren’t just monetary. What we see, what we experience, changes us. And when it gets to the tipping point, those possible long term changes come crashing into our laps, not simply things we will attend to later, but realities that demand to be seen and believed, right now.
The gospels are filled with people who were faced, in very dramatic ways, with the tipping point. The three stories today all show the power of Jesus touching, healing, convincing, inviting, showing a new reality. A paralytic healed. A white collar criminal engaged. A bleeding woman blessed. A dead girl resurrected. The healing—the tipping point—for these people is probably obvious. The focus of the story is on them and Jesus, after all. But I think there is more going on in the scriptures than we may take away at first glance. There are many more people involved: lurking in the shadows, peeking around the corner, hiding at the hem of someone else’s robe.
So who are these other people? Well, to being with, Jesus saw the faith of the friends who brought the paralyzed man, and the scripture implies that on these grounds, because of the friends, Jesus was able to heal. The Pharisees, when confronting Jesus about sitting with tax collectors and sinners, had their first engagement with Jesus in the gospel of Matthew, and coaxed from Jesus words we would be wise to contemplate “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.”
And let’s not forget the crowds. They are part of the story too. After Jesus heals the bleeding woman on his way to tend to the daughter of a synagogue leader, he meets flute players, accompanying a dirge sung by mourners. They didn’t believe it when Jesus said she was only sleeping. But he took her hand, and she got up. We can imagine that the dirge turned into joyful shouts of thanksgiving and awe, and we are told that “the report of this spread throughout that district.” And there are crowds around the man who was paralyzed. After the man stood up, the crowds saw it, they were filled with awe, and they glorified God.”
I love it when crowds are involved in a story because often, that’s where I find myself in the story. This might be the case, because generally when I come in contact with the holy it’s not because I have had a huge miraculous healing take place, or drastic transformation. Rather I often am touched by the Holy by witnessing something that leaves me in awe. That compels me to shout out, turn my dirge into whoops and hollers, to say to others, “Haven’t you seen what I have just seen?”
Could it be that in simply seeing we are changed? Could it be that being witness to death and corruption, and being witness to healing and blessin we too are touched by Christ? I can only imagine that these are ripe moments for the deepening of our faith, for hearing the call to join the one who heals, who turns things upside down, to learn to touch as he touched. Just by seeing, by witnessing, we may reach the tipping point where our lives are changed and our paths take new steps.
One of the most transformative books on my shelves at home, is A People’s History of the United States by the historian Howard Zinn. Zinn takes the well-known concept that official history is written by the winners. But behind the winner’s stories, are the stories and experiences of the many, many people who were the outsiders, or the outcasts, the marginalized, the disempowered. In A People’s History, Zinn unearths these stories, giving us a different take on what may have seemed like dead history. He gives us eyes to see what others had seen, experiences that the dominant story has forgotten. I think this may be one way to think about our foremothers and forefathers of our Mennonite and Brethren traditions. What did they see? What were they witness to that brought them to the tipping point? What was their $4 a gallon incentive to change their life in the church?
The dominant story at the time of our beginning as a church was one of war and persecution, intolerance and corruption, and a time for the misfits and the outcasts to emerge, our own faith ancestors. Europe had been in the throws of religious wars for decades, centuries. Martin Luther had begun what is known as the Reformation ultimately breaking away from the Catholic Church and formed the tradition of what is now known as Lutheranism, the first Protestant denomination. After that, others began breaking away as well, even breaking away from these newly reformed traditions. These different groups were “seeing” differently on certain theological matters such as communion, the power of Rome, and the importance of scripture versus actions. But the one thing these larger movements, in their difference, they did see eye to eye on, was baptism. Baptism continued to be a ritual that was conferred upon infants.
But baptism was more than a ritual of conveying grace on the child, welcoming them into the church family. At that time, in that place, Church and State were one. Baptism into the church also meant induction as a citizen, and all the responsibilities that go along with citizenship. So in the midst of religious wars fought by armies of the state, we can image it took a big step to ask the questions “How am I a Christian and how am I a citizen?” And, the question that still faces us today, “What happens when the values of being a Christian and a citizen clash?” Small groups in Holland and Germany, groups that would later become Mennonites and Brethren, were seeing that what was happening in the world around them, and what they read and believed from the word of Jesus were growing farther and farther apart. The tipping point had come.
So these groups continued reading the Bible, which was a fairly new practice since Bibles before the 16th century were few and far between, generally the possession of the priests, not a household staple for a largely illiterate society. But when you give people the power and the means to think for themselves, to engage the scriptures with their own eyes and hearts, it always seems to be a recipe for trouble…delicious trouble.
People began studying baptism and recognized that in the New Testament, baptism overwhelmingly was intended for adults, those who came to the faith though free will, not something done to the unknowing by consent of their parents. According to the letters of Peter the disciples were to go and baptize. Jesus’ ministry started with his baptism. They came to understand that baptism was something that people had to believe in, that the power of Christ in one’s life had to be experienced before taking on the responsibility not of citizenship, but the difficult responsibility of being a Christian.
So Mennonites in the 16th century and Brethren in the 18th century were vital streams in the movement called Anabaptism, meaning “re-baptized.” (and it should be noted that it is ana-baptism, “ana” meaning “again”, not anti-baptism, as is often misunderstood). Anabaptists rejected their early baptism and in secret, but in large numbers in some places, would enter the icy waters for baptism and defy not just church doctrine, but state control over their lives, and reclaim themselves as believers in Christ—a decision of faith, not just an assumption. And so began the concept of Believer’s Church, a body of people who chose a life of lived faith, not simply professed faith.
I appreciate Sarah Scotti-Einstein for bringing this turn of phrase to me, the tension between a lived faith and a professed faith. She recalled that one of the things that brought her into the Anabaptist tradition was the life of one woman whose faith radiated from her in everything she did, the way she spoke and interacted, the choices she made, the way she walked through life. It was a lived faith, no doubt daily filled with the struggle of responding to what she saw in the world and making choices based on her commitment to Christ. She was so inspired by this woman that she began writing down her life story, trying to compile the essence of this powerful woman’s faith on the page, to help convey that sense of power and commitment to others.
But Sarah found that she was failing miserably at attempting to record this person’s lived faith. She said, “When I tried to write it down, I recognized that it simply became a professed faith, a retelling of someone’s beliefs. The power of her life was not just words, but an active faith, a lived faith.”
That’s what our ancestors were doing. While baptism was the focus and the symbol that they resisted and wanted to reclaim, I think more deeply it was the tipping point of a Church that for too long had simply professed beliefs, and recited creeds, and killed in the name of Jesus. Granted, baptism in the United States isn’t a state necessity, and in fact, in a country where separation of church and state is the norm, it has no function regarding state or military in anyway. Some of the radical nature of adult or believer’s baptism has been lost. And yet, to constantly reclaim ourselves for Christian discipleship, for this to be a daily part of our lives is a sort of radical rebaptism. Because it means that we know that we must change.
Every day we see the world around us. Violence and warfare are parts of our lives, and if it’s not intimate, then we are certainly witness to it. Greed and hatred darken our own hearts, no matter how much we wish to deny it. Christ light shines on those dark parts of our soul, showing us the places that need to be filled, so we can see our own need. We see our tendency to be short with our loved ones, to neglect our spiritual lives, to forget what it means that we are beloved.
This is what we see. This is what we are witness to. Dennis Jacobe, that chief executive of Gallup I referred to earlier, said “When people see high gas prices and then see it rising several cents a gallon each day, …they have the psychological problem of not knowing how high it will go. When that happens, people start to adjust their lifestyle.” The first Anabaptists saw violence and exploitation of the church rising dramatically each day. Likely, they didn’t know when it would stop, how high the destruction would go. They stepped into the waters and said, “Enough. Things must change. I must change.” What do you see in your life that calls you deeper into faith? What are you witness to that brings you to a tipping point, keeps you searching for faithful response?
As we think on these parts of our lives and our world, maybe that’s how we stand in the crowds, perhaps reaching for the hem of some sanity, or playing a dirge because all our hope is lost. And in the midst of this, the voices come from the past, lowered through the ceiling… stepping out of the water, steadying us as we enter into the new day of Christ’s church, and a new life.
Sunday, June 1, 2008
The Foundation of Faith
a sermon by Torin Eikler
Romans 4:13-25, Hosea 5:15-6:6
I have been thinking about foundations a lot lately.
As some of you know, Carrie and I are working on expanding the little patio on the back of the parsonage, complete with a trellis and vining plants. We are hoping to make it bigger – and hopefully more inviting – so that we can set out a table and eat there during the warmer part of the year. As is always the case with such projects, our vision of the finished project has been exciting enough to get us started. But, now that we have moved several cubic feet of dirt and laid out the new pavers to make sure that the space is about right, we are faced with the reality of how big the project really is. (I’m even wondering if we’ll get it done in time to use this year at all.)
There is so much to do before we can even set the pavers in place to stay. There is a retaining wall to build – which wouldn’t be so much except that that means digging some more to place “dead men” in order to help hold the wall up, backfilling with gravel and maybe even a drain pipe, and covering it all up with dirt and sod again. Then, we need to fill in the parts where we dug out too much and pound it down so that it’s compact enough, add gravel and leveling sand, level the whole thing out somehow, lay the paving stones in place, and level it again. It’s so much more complex than we thought it would be, and there have been several times when we have considered skipping some of the work to save time, effort, and money. Fortunately, our neighbor – who is a contractor - has popped around a few times and reminded me that it’s important to do it right so that the whole thing doesn’t fall apart with the first year of hard rains.
It is advice that I have taken grudgingly, but I was reminded of how important it is to get the foundation right as I listened to the news coverage about the earthquake in China on NPR. In one of the provinces, several schools collapsed during the quake, killing most of the children inside. And, as reporters talked with the parents and others in those towns, it came to light that the builders cut corners in the construction process. On Thursday, local authorities admitted that they had done just that in an attempt to save money and that if the foundations had been built up to the standards, the schools would probably have withstood the shaking.
I don’t mean to compare the patio on the back of our house to the importance of safety in building schools or to make light of the devastating grief of lost lives – many of them the only children in the family. The tragedy in the lives of these communities is an all too painful reminder that a strong foundation is so very important no matter what size endeavor it supports. And, who knows … we may find Sebastian or some other child hanging on the trellis someday and give thanks for having a strong foundation supporting an unintended jungle gym.
Families, too, need to have strong foundations. As our society has discovered of late, when families are built on shaky ground they tend to fall apart when faced with the stresses of life. Heavy work loads, financial burdens, worries about security or misplaced ambition can all take us down paths that shake commitments to spouses and children in unhealthy, dangerous ways. And, it’s not just families. Friendships, working partnerships, teacher-student groups, and many other relationships are threatened when we build them on weak, incomplete underpinnings. Even, and perhaps especially, our faith is prone to such problems since faith is a short-hand term for our own relationship with the God of our salvation.
In some sense, that is what both Hosea and Paul are talking about in the texts we heard today. God’s chosen people – the children of Abraham – have always had a covenant with God – a covenant based on promises made by both sides. God promised to protect Abraham from all dangers and to make his descendants a blessing to all the nations. Abraham, trusting God, promised to worship only the Lord and to follow the command and guidance given to him. That covenant was sealed again at Mount Sinai when Moses brought the people back to the worship of God and God inscribed the Ten Commandments on tablets of stone.
Seeking to fulfill their part, the Israelites began to elaborate on those commandments and the inspired words of their prophets and priests, building a body of law to help them stay faithful. And yet, there was something missing. In a matter of a few generations – perhaps a hundred years – the people began to fall away from the covenant. They worshiped other gods, and they grew deaf to the voice of God giving guidance. They even twisted the laws they had made to serve their own purposes. As Hosea put it, their faith had become “like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes away early.” Despite the repeated calls of the prophets, the people of God continued to struggle to hold their faith community together, repenting at each call and adding to the religious laws in order to hold more tightly to the letter of the covenant.
During my first year in BVS, I visited Charleston, South Carolina a few times with groups who had come to work on the church we were rebuilding. During one of the tours we took, I learned about an interesting and ingenious building technique that came into use after the Civil War. The cannon fire and general mayhem of battle as well as the fires that swept the city damaged many of the grand old houses with already weakened foundations – damaged but didn’t destroy. Some time later, a small earthquake shook the area and some of those houses gave way. Others, seemed on the point of collapse, but nobody had the money to rebuild them from the ground up. So, one man hit on an inexpensive idea for holding them together. Extending long, iron rods with threads all along their length through the outer walls, people connected large iron plates on opposite sides of the house to hold them together. The result was basically the same, in concept, as a bolt and nut. And, when necessary, residents could tighten the whole set up by turning the rods.
The whole process worked quite well as the temporary fix it was meant to be. In fact, so many of the respectable home-owners used this technique that it became fashionable to hand decorative iron plates on the walls even when houses were structurally sound. Unfortunately, it did nothing to address the underlying problems. And, as people began to forget that there were deeper issues, their homes became dangerously stressed. Eventually some actually fell down due to overzealous tightening of the rods which pulled the walls into the house.
In a similar way, the body of law that grew up during Israel’s history served to hold together the religious community. Yet, prophets continued to call the people to look deeper than the law and renew the foundations of the covenant. To seek, as Hosea puts it, the knowledge of God and to offer steadfast love instead of burnt offerings. In other words, to cling to the one God in trust and to live according to the covenant of God’s love instead of man’s laws.
Paul, too, has the same message. It is not, even as Jesus taught, that the law is bad or wrong, but it is incomplete in and of itself. It is only when it is viewed through the promise of the covenant that it can be fully understood. And, only as it is lived by one rooted in the steadfast love and trust of God and the love of others that it is fulfilled, for these are the two great commandments from which all the law grows.
Love and trust… those are the rocks on which we are to found our faith. When we heed the call of the Spirit spoken through the prophets, the evangelists, and Christ himself, we build lives of faith on this true foundation. And though the rain and the wind beat against us or the ground around us shakes, our faith will keep us whole; protecting and sustaining us.
There it is. It sounds good. It’s true. And, perhaps I should end the sermon with that. Yet, I keep wondering…. “What does that mean?” It’s easy for us to make simple-sounding statements like that about faith. It’s much harder to get into the messy business of trying to figure out what they mean in the day to day of our lives.
What does it mean to build our lives and our faith on steadfast love and trust?
As much as I wish I could answer that question, I don’t think I can. It’s appealing – to me at least – to fall back on the guidance of the church … to trust the judgment of all those who have gone before me and make their teachings a new body of law to guide my life. Those rules, after all, have grown out of the teachings of Christ and the covenant fulfilled by his life, death, and resurrection. Yet, Paul warns against setting up a new law and reminds us that faith, not the law – any law – is what matters. Faith like that of Abraham. Faith that seeks God’s will and follows. Faith built on the foundation of grace offered by the wandering messiah rather than a rooted, cracked tradition of human invention.
I still don’t know what that means for us, but it reminds me of a Huron creation legend. It tells the story of how the world was created between the waters and the sky by dirt piled on the back of Big Turtle who was the only creature broad and strong and steadfast enough to hold it all. The story’s purpose, of course, is to explain the nature of the world as the Huron people knew it and to instill a sense of respect for the life and nature of all creatures. But when I first heard it, I wondered what things really look like from the back of a turtle, seeing what it sees and traveling where it swims. It would be a whole different perspective from my own, and I wonder if that’s the key.
If we build our own lives on faith in God – on the broad shoulders of the Christ who holds us all, send the roots of our spirit and soul into the heart of God, and keep our eyes and ears open, perhaps our perspective will shift. Perhaps we will travel, like Abraham, where God takes us instead of where our own feet wander. Perhaps our hearts will find the love of Christ welling up into us, and we will see what Christ sees as we turn to look where he looks. Perhaps if we trust enough to build on that foundation, we will find the way to live in the covenant fulfilled as we reach out our hands to offer healing and compassion as Christ reaches out – bringing hope and peace as Christ guides our living.
It’s not as easy and straight-forward as a set of rules for living, but the ministry of the one we follow wasn’t neat and tidy. And, if we seek to live in the promise of the covenant as children of God, we must build on the firm foundation offered by that One and follow in the ways he leads. Only then can we become the people God intends – the fulfillment of God’s promise, a blessing to all the nations.
Romans 4:13-25, Hosea 5:15-6:6
I have been thinking about foundations a lot lately.
As some of you know, Carrie and I are working on expanding the little patio on the back of the parsonage, complete with a trellis and vining plants. We are hoping to make it bigger – and hopefully more inviting – so that we can set out a table and eat there during the warmer part of the year. As is always the case with such projects, our vision of the finished project has been exciting enough to get us started. But, now that we have moved several cubic feet of dirt and laid out the new pavers to make sure that the space is about right, we are faced with the reality of how big the project really is. (I’m even wondering if we’ll get it done in time to use this year at all.)
There is so much to do before we can even set the pavers in place to stay. There is a retaining wall to build – which wouldn’t be so much except that that means digging some more to place “dead men” in order to help hold the wall up, backfilling with gravel and maybe even a drain pipe, and covering it all up with dirt and sod again. Then, we need to fill in the parts where we dug out too much and pound it down so that it’s compact enough, add gravel and leveling sand, level the whole thing out somehow, lay the paving stones in place, and level it again. It’s so much more complex than we thought it would be, and there have been several times when we have considered skipping some of the work to save time, effort, and money. Fortunately, our neighbor – who is a contractor - has popped around a few times and reminded me that it’s important to do it right so that the whole thing doesn’t fall apart with the first year of hard rains.
It is advice that I have taken grudgingly, but I was reminded of how important it is to get the foundation right as I listened to the news coverage about the earthquake in China on NPR. In one of the provinces, several schools collapsed during the quake, killing most of the children inside. And, as reporters talked with the parents and others in those towns, it came to light that the builders cut corners in the construction process. On Thursday, local authorities admitted that they had done just that in an attempt to save money and that if the foundations had been built up to the standards, the schools would probably have withstood the shaking.
I don’t mean to compare the patio on the back of our house to the importance of safety in building schools or to make light of the devastating grief of lost lives – many of them the only children in the family. The tragedy in the lives of these communities is an all too painful reminder that a strong foundation is so very important no matter what size endeavor it supports. And, who knows … we may find Sebastian or some other child hanging on the trellis someday and give thanks for having a strong foundation supporting an unintended jungle gym.
Families, too, need to have strong foundations. As our society has discovered of late, when families are built on shaky ground they tend to fall apart when faced with the stresses of life. Heavy work loads, financial burdens, worries about security or misplaced ambition can all take us down paths that shake commitments to spouses and children in unhealthy, dangerous ways. And, it’s not just families. Friendships, working partnerships, teacher-student groups, and many other relationships are threatened when we build them on weak, incomplete underpinnings. Even, and perhaps especially, our faith is prone to such problems since faith is a short-hand term for our own relationship with the God of our salvation.
In some sense, that is what both Hosea and Paul are talking about in the texts we heard today. God’s chosen people – the children of Abraham – have always had a covenant with God – a covenant based on promises made by both sides. God promised to protect Abraham from all dangers and to make his descendants a blessing to all the nations. Abraham, trusting God, promised to worship only the Lord and to follow the command and guidance given to him. That covenant was sealed again at Mount Sinai when Moses brought the people back to the worship of God and God inscribed the Ten Commandments on tablets of stone.
Seeking to fulfill their part, the Israelites began to elaborate on those commandments and the inspired words of their prophets and priests, building a body of law to help them stay faithful. And yet, there was something missing. In a matter of a few generations – perhaps a hundred years – the people began to fall away from the covenant. They worshiped other gods, and they grew deaf to the voice of God giving guidance. They even twisted the laws they had made to serve their own purposes. As Hosea put it, their faith had become “like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes away early.” Despite the repeated calls of the prophets, the people of God continued to struggle to hold their faith community together, repenting at each call and adding to the religious laws in order to hold more tightly to the letter of the covenant.
During my first year in BVS, I visited Charleston, South Carolina a few times with groups who had come to work on the church we were rebuilding. During one of the tours we took, I learned about an interesting and ingenious building technique that came into use after the Civil War. The cannon fire and general mayhem of battle as well as the fires that swept the city damaged many of the grand old houses with already weakened foundations – damaged but didn’t destroy. Some time later, a small earthquake shook the area and some of those houses gave way. Others, seemed on the point of collapse, but nobody had the money to rebuild them from the ground up. So, one man hit on an inexpensive idea for holding them together. Extending long, iron rods with threads all along their length through the outer walls, people connected large iron plates on opposite sides of the house to hold them together. The result was basically the same, in concept, as a bolt and nut. And, when necessary, residents could tighten the whole set up by turning the rods.
The whole process worked quite well as the temporary fix it was meant to be. In fact, so many of the respectable home-owners used this technique that it became fashionable to hand decorative iron plates on the walls even when houses were structurally sound. Unfortunately, it did nothing to address the underlying problems. And, as people began to forget that there were deeper issues, their homes became dangerously stressed. Eventually some actually fell down due to overzealous tightening of the rods which pulled the walls into the house.
In a similar way, the body of law that grew up during Israel’s history served to hold together the religious community. Yet, prophets continued to call the people to look deeper than the law and renew the foundations of the covenant. To seek, as Hosea puts it, the knowledge of God and to offer steadfast love instead of burnt offerings. In other words, to cling to the one God in trust and to live according to the covenant of God’s love instead of man’s laws.
Paul, too, has the same message. It is not, even as Jesus taught, that the law is bad or wrong, but it is incomplete in and of itself. It is only when it is viewed through the promise of the covenant that it can be fully understood. And, only as it is lived by one rooted in the steadfast love and trust of God and the love of others that it is fulfilled, for these are the two great commandments from which all the law grows.
Love and trust… those are the rocks on which we are to found our faith. When we heed the call of the Spirit spoken through the prophets, the evangelists, and Christ himself, we build lives of faith on this true foundation. And though the rain and the wind beat against us or the ground around us shakes, our faith will keep us whole; protecting and sustaining us.
There it is. It sounds good. It’s true. And, perhaps I should end the sermon with that. Yet, I keep wondering…. “What does that mean?” It’s easy for us to make simple-sounding statements like that about faith. It’s much harder to get into the messy business of trying to figure out what they mean in the day to day of our lives.
What does it mean to build our lives and our faith on steadfast love and trust?
As much as I wish I could answer that question, I don’t think I can. It’s appealing – to me at least – to fall back on the guidance of the church … to trust the judgment of all those who have gone before me and make their teachings a new body of law to guide my life. Those rules, after all, have grown out of the teachings of Christ and the covenant fulfilled by his life, death, and resurrection. Yet, Paul warns against setting up a new law and reminds us that faith, not the law – any law – is what matters. Faith like that of Abraham. Faith that seeks God’s will and follows. Faith built on the foundation of grace offered by the wandering messiah rather than a rooted, cracked tradition of human invention.
I still don’t know what that means for us, but it reminds me of a Huron creation legend. It tells the story of how the world was created between the waters and the sky by dirt piled on the back of Big Turtle who was the only creature broad and strong and steadfast enough to hold it all. The story’s purpose, of course, is to explain the nature of the world as the Huron people knew it and to instill a sense of respect for the life and nature of all creatures. But when I first heard it, I wondered what things really look like from the back of a turtle, seeing what it sees and traveling where it swims. It would be a whole different perspective from my own, and I wonder if that’s the key.
If we build our own lives on faith in God – on the broad shoulders of the Christ who holds us all, send the roots of our spirit and soul into the heart of God, and keep our eyes and ears open, perhaps our perspective will shift. Perhaps we will travel, like Abraham, where God takes us instead of where our own feet wander. Perhaps our hearts will find the love of Christ welling up into us, and we will see what Christ sees as we turn to look where he looks. Perhaps if we trust enough to build on that foundation, we will find the way to live in the covenant fulfilled as we reach out our hands to offer healing and compassion as Christ reaches out – bringing hope and peace as Christ guides our living.
It’s not as easy and straight-forward as a set of rules for living, but the ministry of the one we follow wasn’t neat and tidy. And, if we seek to live in the promise of the covenant as children of God, we must build on the firm foundation offered by that One and follow in the ways he leads. Only then can we become the people God intends – the fulfillment of God’s promise, a blessing to all the nations.
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