God – Salvaged Faith

They Stood Up

Posted on August 7, 2022Leave a comment

Text: Numbers 27:1-11

Friends, can we all admit that this is a very big book and that 99.9% of us don’t know its stories from cover to cover?

We understand the overall arc of scripture… from creation, through the time in Egypt, the exodus and claiming of the promised land.

We know the big picture story of how the tribes of Israel became a nation with a king and then fell apart and were carted off into exile.

And we know about how they returned and how Jesus came to continue the story of God’s redemption and form us into God’s people, sending the Holy Spirit as God’s message exploded across the world.

But every story? Every name?

We fail to dig deep into the nitty gritty of the text and skim over some of the most interesting… but maybe also most disturbing… parts of our past.

What we miss when we do so are the bold and untold stories of ordinary folks who have great lessons to teach us.

We can’t all preach like Peter or pray like Paul or lead like Solomon… but God can use our voices and our actions to make a difference in this world.

Over the next five weeks as we wrap up summer, we will be diving into the details of scripture as these little known people come alive for us.

We start today with the daughters of Zelophehad: Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah.

Their names are so unfamiliar to our tongues today that I find myself stumbling over pronunciation.

And yet, as Wil Gafney notes in her book, Womanist Midrash: a Reintroduction to the women of the Torah and the Throne, “their story is so important that they are mentioned in five different places… Only the prophets Miriam and Moses are mentioned in more books in the Hebrew Bible.” (page 156)

“They Stood” | Lauren Wright Pittman | A Sanctified Art | sanctifiedart.org

The story of Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah is a story about land and inheritance and patriarchy.

We are introduced to them in the middle of a census that is being taken amongst the Israelites to determine who is available to go to war with Midian as they seek to enter the promised land.

They come from the line of Jospeh, through his son Manasseh, and their father Zelophehad had no sons. (Numbers 26: 29-34)

As Gafney notes, Numbers chapter 26 connects the military census with the distribution of land to come. We are told that the first generation of those who left Egypt will not make it out of the wilderness… only their children and grandchildren will.

But how will this new land that they will take be divided?

The census lists the names of those second-generation families… well, the second-generation families headed by men, who were eligible to go to war.

Gaffney writes: “only males were entitled to inherit the inhabited Canaanite land that God had promised the Israelites under this schema… only patriarchal households counted…” (p. 158)

It was an exclusionary practice that was uncommon among other surrounding cultures, but also meant that men who died during the war and left women as the head of their households would be left out of the allocation.

As soon as this detailed census and explanation was read to the people, Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah step forward.

This is described as taking place right outside of the meeting tent – where the ark of the covenant was contained.

In front of Moses, Eleazar the priest, all of the chiefs… the entire community… they challenge the distribution and demand to be given land as well.

They had no rights.

They had no power.

They had no authority.

But they stand up and make their voices heard.

These five women are of the second generation.

Their father, Zelophehad, was among those who left Egypt, but he has died along their journey.

No mention is made of their mother, but Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah have no brothers.

AND, as the narrative will tell us later, they are unmarried.

As they heard the census and the names of all of their cousins and other second generation families that would inherit the promised land, they recognized that the lineage of their father was being excluded.

As Lauren Wright Pittman writes, “The text says the women came forward; they stood, they spoke, they questioned, and they even demanded. Any one of these actions alone is difficult for the unseen and the unheard. All they wanted was the receive the inheritance of their father and to keep his name from fading. I’m sure the pain of their father’s death was potent, but they needed to be recognized, valued, and seen as human beings in order to survive.” (Faces of our Faith Study Journal)

They demanded that their family be given a share, just as their father’s brothers would be given.

Now, this is in direct contradiction to the instructions that God had just handed down to Moses in chapter 26.

They were not just challenging their leaders, but the very word of God.

The entire community had just experienced a devastating plague that was blamed on the men of Israel disobeying God by marrying Moabite and Midianite women, which often led to idolatry and the worship of the gods of these other cultures.

When an Israelite brought a Midianite wife into the camp, the son of the priest Eleazar, Phineas, killed them both and the plague stopped.

But, you know, killing the daughter of a leader of neighboring people has consequences and the war with Midian was a direct result of the initial disobedience and then later death.

So… maybe this wasn’t exactly the time to challenge what God has said…

To his credit, Moses does not immediately dismiss their complaint out of hand.

It would have been completely understandable for him to say, “This is the word of the Lord.”

Or, “I’m sorry, but this is the law.”

Instead, he listened.

And instead of rendering judgment himself, Moses took their case to God.

The Lord replies, “Zelophehad’s daughters are right in what they are saying. By all means, give them property as an inheritance among their father’s brothers.”

And then, God goes on to change the law so that if a man dies without a son, his daughter would receive the inheritance.

When we look deeper into the text and the language here, what we find is surprising.

Wil Gaffney notes that God doesn’t just say they were right. He declares that they are righteous in “a powerful affirmation, without peer in the canon for women or men.” (159)

And if you look at the Hebrew, the words God speaks do not imply a passive response by which these women would now have land.

It demands corrective action on the part of those who would have denied them their inheritance.

As Pittman writes in her artist statement of her piece, “They Stood,”:

God heard the voices of these women. “They are right,” God said. The old law was no longer suitable, so God made a way for change. Though the laws were probably carved into stone, God shows us in this text that the law is living, breathing, adaptable, and changing. This text invites us to come forward, to stand, to speak, to question, and to demand change when we experience injustice.

A couple of things to note here.

First, when we believe we are experiencing an injustice or are troubled by a law or a command that we find within scripture, the example of Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah tells us that it is a good thing to speak up.

Even if our voice trembles.

Even if we are unsure if anyone will listen.

Even if we have no authority or power.

Second, this scripture is one of many places where God makes a way for change.

From the Lord’s declaration after the flood that there would never again be a complete destruction of the earth in Genesis…

to the new vision of the clean and the unclean that comes to Peter in Acts…

and this text…

we find examples of how the cries of people and changing circumstances in the world lead God to act and respond in new ways.

Our God is not distant from us, handing down decrees that are unchanging.

God is with us, listens to us, walks with us, hears our cries, experiences our pain, and knows our hope.

God desires abundant life and chooses to act in new ways to demonstrate love and mercy and to create and recreate possibilities within our midst.

God is in relationship with us… and a relationship is a two-way street.

But the third lesson here is that it is not our job to declare something is right or wrong, unjust or fair.

We also learn from the example of Moses, who took it to the Lord.

So part of our responsibility, either as someone who is experiencing injustice or as someone who is in a position to act, is to notice the places that trouble our souls.

Our job is to listen and to explore and understand the problem.

And part of our responsibility is to pray and search the scriptures and to listen for God.

If the ways of God, the laws of God, the commands of God can change in response to human need and action, then we need to be prepared.

As the Lord cries out in Isaiah 43:19: “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?”

Our job is to look, to listen, to pay attention and be ready to see where and how God is acting in this world.

And then… to figure out how to get on board.

I mentioned that the five daughters of Zelophehad show up not once or twice, but five times in the scriptures of the Hebrew Bible.

And part of this reason for their continued presence in the life of the people was that this new command of God was not immediately followed.

God commands a new law for Moses to implement among the people – that women without brothers shall inherit the land of their father.

Yet when we get to chapter 36 in Numbers, the war with Midian is over and they are preparing to enter Canaan and as the allocated land is being discussed, the daughters come up again.

Only this time, they are not the active participants in their own story.

Their cousins stand up and speak out and are concerned about the distribution of land to these unmarried women, because when they marry, the land will no longer be a part of the tribe of Manasseh.

Moses… without consulting the Lord… modifies what God says in chapter 27 to declare that they are only allowed an inheritance if they marry within their father’s tribe.

Mahlah, Tirzah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Noah act according to these new conditions and marry kin within the tribe of Manasseh.

More time goes on.

The people cross the Jordan River and enter the land of Canaan.

Moses, who we are told disobeyed the Lord but not about what specifically, dies before he is able to enter the promised land and the leadership falls to Joshua.

Here is where the rubber meets the road, as the people now are in possession of the land and parcels are being handed out for each tribe.

When we get to Joshua chapter 17, the land for the tribe of Manasseh is being determined and the text tells us that “an allotment took place for the rest of the clans of Manasseh – for the people of Abiezer, Helek, Asriel, Shechem, Hepher, and Shemida. These were the sons of Manasseh the son of Jospeh, the male descendants by their clans.” (17:2)

Did you hear it?

There is no mention of the daughters of Zelophehad.

And once again, Mahlan, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah stand up and speak out.

Once again, they approach Eleazar the priest, Joshua the leader, and the other clan chiefs.

Once again, they fight for their inheritance.

“The Lord commanded Moses to give us a legacy along with our male relatives,” they declare.

Gaffney notes, “They do not say, ‘Moshe failed to obey God and died.’ There is no need. The implication is clear.” (p. 163).

Joshua acts where Moses did not.

The tribe of Manasseh is granted ten parcels of land, one of which would belong to the daughters of Zelophehad.

And these daughters are later accounted for in the listing of the family lines in the book of Chronicles.

But that was only possible because of their courage.

Their persistence.

Their willingness to stand up and speak out.

In our lives today, we might not always have power or authority.

But we do have a voice.

And when we see something that is unjust or wrong, we too can stand up, stand together, and speak out.

We can let the community know about what is going on so that we can seek God’s direction and act.

And if we do have power and authority, we can choose to listen, to pray, and to respond.

May the bold and too often untold legacy of Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah guide us for the future. Amen.

UMC 101: The Mission of the Church

Posted on February 6, 2022Leave a comment

Text: Isaiah 6:1-8

I think one of the greatest failures of the church today is that we put God into a very small box.

Jesus is our friend and companion.

The Holy Spirit holds our hand and brings us comfort in tough times.

The Father tenderly calls us to do the right thing.

These are all images that are safe and simple and focused on ourselves.

Not only are they woefully inadequate for encountering a world full of problems that are too big to tackle alone, but they can’t begin to capture the fullness of a God who is truly other… truly holy.

The prophet Isaiah begins to have visions.

Over and over he sees images of the failings of his nation and the bloodshed and oppression his own people have caused by relying on their own might to solve the problems they faced.

And then Isaiah has a vision of God.

A holy, living, powerful God.

Not a safe and gentle friend, but a vision of the Lord upon a throne.

God’s presence is so great and beyond comprehension that just the hem of God’s robe fills the temple.

And there are winged creatures, seraphim, flying around shouting at one another:

“Holy! Holy! Holy! Is the Lord of Heavenly Forces! All the earth is filled with God’s glory!” (Isaiah 6:3)

As the room shakes and fills with smoke, Isaiah isn’t comforted and he doesn’t feel safe and secure… he is afraid for his very life.

“Mourn for me; I’m ruined” he cries out.

He sees just how unholy he is compared to God.

He sees just how unworthy his neighbors and his nation are.

And he knows that this wholly other and almighty God sees it all too.

But then this God does something unexpected.

God’s holiness draws close.

A glowing coal touches Isaiah’s lips and his sin and his guilt are gone.

But this isn’t just about Isaiah.

It isn’t just about one person encountering the holiness of God, repenting of their sin, and being forgiven.

The way some of our churches live out this story today, Isaiah would have gone home from this incredible experience, assured of his salvation, stay loosely connected with his faith community, and hold on to this memory when things were tough.

That’s how we too often treat faith, isn’t it?

But that isn’t the end of this story.

The voice of God thunders throughout that space asking… “Whom shall I send? Who will go?”

How will this world be transformed from a place of sin and death?

Who will call people to repentance and carry the message of love and forgiveness?

And forever transformed by his encounter with the holiness of God, Isaiah realizes he has a job to do.

It will be hard and messy and frustrating and full of joy and power and love.

But he takes up the call and allows God to send him back into the world to transform it.

You know, if I were to sum up the core of the gospel message that Jesus proclaims it just might be: God loves you, God forgives you, and God has a job for you.

Every day, in a thousand different ways, God is inviting us to participate in the reign of God’s kingdom.

God is asking, whom shall I send into this world to fulfill my reign and realm in this world?

And the church has stepped up to say, “Send us!”

Our Book of Discipline lays out for us our purpose:

“The mission of the Church is to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world by proclaiming the good news of God’s grace and by exemplifying Jesus’ command to love God and neighbor, thus seeking the fulfillment of God’s reign and realm in the world.” (p. 93)

The text goes on to say that “whenever United Methodism has had a clear sense of mission, God has used our Church to save persons, heal relationships, transform social structures, and spread scriptural holiness, thereby changing the world. In order to be truly alive, we embrace Jesus’ mandate to love God and to love our neighbor and to make disciples of all peoples.” (p.94)

I just love that phrase… in order to truly be alive…

You see, we believe that when we encounter the holy, awesome, expansive, presence of God it changes us.

It transforms us from those who are dead in our sin into those who are alive in the Spirit.

It empowers and emboldens us to head out into the world not as ordinary people, but as servants of Christ.

In order for the church to be alive it needs to be actively engaged in this work as well.

What does this look like, practically speaking?

Well, we good old “methodical” United Methodists are pretty clear about the process for carrying out this mission and making disciples. And we hold one another accountable to this process by tracking and monitoring how well we do each year:

First, we need to proclaim the gospel! And this isn’t just about my sermons on Sunday mornings. It is about how all of us share the good news of Jesus in our daily lives.

It is about how we show the world that we love God and love our neighbors. Or as the Book of Discipline puts it, “the visible church of Christ as a faithful community of persons affirms the worth of all humanity and the value of interrelationship in all of God’s creation.” (¶124, p. 94)

We connect people to one another, we connect issues to our faith, and we connect all of it to God.

Each year in our statistical reports, we take note of how well we are doing in this area by reporting our church demographics and who we are reaching.

It probably isn’t much of a surprise to you, but the professing membership of our congregation is predominantly white and just over 60% female.

About 30% of our participants in Christian formation groups are children or youth and just 3% of our participants are between the ages of 19-30.

These kinds of statistics challenge our local church to think about how we might reach out to younger and more diverse people by building new relationships in our daily lives.

Second, we help our neighbors experience God’s grace as they repent and turn to faith in Jesus. Just as Isaiah confronted his own sin and received forgiveness, we proclaim a need for transformation in hearts and lives. One ofthe primary ways we do this is by sharing the message of God with people in our times of worship.

We talk about the sins and concerns of this world and God’s intentions for all the earth, we hear about the grace of God, and we give people the opportunity to respond.

And so every year, we keep track of how many people are worshipping with our faith community, and how many baptisms, professions of faith, and new members our church has witnessed.

In 2020, before the pandemic, our church had an average worship attendance of about 160. What has been amazing is that even throughout this difficult time, we have grown the number of people who worship with us each week. When you combine our in-person and online attendance, we have been reaching, on average, just over 180 people every Sunday!

In this past year, we welcomed five new people to our faith community, baptized two little ones, and are supporting twelve students as they go through the confirmation process.

The third thing that we believe the church does as we make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world is help people to grow in their own Christian life. This happens in worship, for sure, but also in small groups, conversations, leadership opportunities, and the various places we share our gifts with one another and the world.

One of the biggest ways that we can see that our church is alive and continues to thrive is that even as we suspended some of our opportunities, we adapted and created new ways to grow.

We have studied scripture on Zoom, included younger folks in our brass group, brought in new leaders for Sunday school, continued to include those who moved away in online opportunities, and expanded teams to support and encourage our elders, our teachers, and our college students.

When you add up all of the individuals who have participated in some kind of ministry opportunity in this last year, 229 people have been nurtured in their faith through this church.

Fourth, we give people opportunities to say, “Here I am, send me!” As the Book of Discipline puts it, we “send persons into the world to live lovingly and justly as servants of Christ by healing the sick, feeding the hungry, caring for the stranger, freeing the oppressed, being and becoming and compassionate, caring presence, and working to develop social structures that are consistent with the gospel.” (¶122, p. 94)

Our call is to put faith and love into practice in real and tangible ways that make a difference for our neighbors and transform this world more into God’s realm each day.

As a church, we keep track of the number of folks who serve in mission and community ministries that our church sponsors… from Joppa, to Hawthorne Hill, to CFUM meals, to Trunk or Treat, and more. 131 members of this church actively engaged in this work… and we know so many of you are engaged beyond this church too in service and work of advocacy and justice.

Together, we try to not only see, but respond to the hungers that people experience in their lives… not just for food, but for safety, for healing, and for relationship.

And we do all these things not just once… but over and over again. In our work of putting faith and love into action, our witness continues to make disciples who will transform the world.

You know, I have to be honest.

In this season where the world is talking about the “Great Resignation” and the stretch and strain so many people are feeling, it is hard to get excited about recommitting and increasing our engagement with the church of Jesus.

Not only are we busy, but we are tired. And for all sorts of legitimate reasons.

One of the reasons we put God into that small little box is because we aren’t sure that we really can take on one more responsibility.

It seems easier to hold God at arms length… to focus only on the small differences God makes in your daily life… instead of worrying about anyone else.

But friends, the holy and awesome and terrifying power and presence of God is here!

The whole earth is full of God’s glory!

“Woe is me!” Isaiah cried out.

He was ready to die, give up, give in…

And the holy power of God gave him the ability to say, “Here I am… send me.”

And our church believes that in order to truly be alive… to be energized and empowered… then we have to let that burning coal of God’s love and mercy and grace touch our hearts.

We have to “embrace Jesus’ mandate to love God and to love our neighbor and to make disciples of all peoples.” (p. 94)

Take a moment to rest and rejuvenate your spirit…

But also know that the Holy Spirit is ready to set your heart and your life on fire.

And friends… the good news is that we don’t have to do this work alone.

Each one of us within this Body of Christ called Immanuel has a unique gift and role to play… whether it is praying, or leading, or giving of your resources, or doing the hands on tasks of ministry.

Here at Immanuel, we embrace this vision of discipleship. We believe that we follow Jesus as we connect with one another… as we worship and repent and confess our faith… as we grow in community… and as we go together to the world.

All of us, together, with God’s help… can not only be disciples… but make disciples… and transform this world.

Again & Again, God Loves First

Posted on March 14, 20211 Comment

Text: John 3:14-21

One of my favorite books is “Hope for the Flowers.”

It tells the story of a little caterpillar named Stripe who is looking for something… he just isn’t sure what it is.

He just knows, deep within, that there is something more out there.

One day, he comes across this mound… this heap… this mountain of other caterpillars, all climbing on top of one another trying to get as high as they possibly can.

There are rumors of something wonderful at the top of the pile.

So Stripe joins them. He wants to see and understand and know what is up there, even though he has no idea what it is.

Along the way, he makes some terrible choices. He hurts others. He pushes them out of the way.

He has to stop looking other caterpillars in their eyes so he doesn’t feel so bad about what he is doing.

He was looking for life among things that were sucking the life right out of him.

The story reminds me of my good friend, John.

For years, he worked in the corporate world and successfully built his own company.

He climbed to the top, seeking success and power and telling himself when he got to the top, he could finally enjoy life.

But when he got there, he still had this longing that he just couldn’t fulfill and he couldn’t be sure that anything he had done was worth it.

It also reminds me of Nicodemus.

He was part of the ruling class in Jerusalem and had done everything right.

He was the epitome of power and privilege.

And yet, deep within, he knew that there was something he was missing… a longing he couldn’t quite put his finger on. An empty space in his soul and answers he couldn’t grasp.

Have you ever felt like that?

Have you ever been stumbling your way through life, doing what you thought you were supposed to be doing, and woke up and wondered… what am I missing?

In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul writes that we all do this.

It is the life of sin.

“[we] let the world, which doesn’t know the first thing about living, tell [us] how to live. [We] fill our lungs with polluted unbelief, and then exhale disobedience. We all did it… all of us in the same boat. It’s a wonder God didn’t lose God’s temper and do away with the whole lot of us… “ (Ephesians 2:1-6 MSG, selected)

Actually, pause here for a moment, because if we remember from the first Sunday of Lent, God sure does have the capacity to wipe away humanity and start from scratch…

Only God has chosen not to do it.

God set the bow in the clouds as a reminder of the promise to keep meeting us where we are.

Paul goes on to say, “instead, immense in mercy and with an incredible love, God embraced us. God took our sin-dead lives and made us alive in Christ…. with no help from us!” (Ephesians 2:1-6 MSG, selected)

It is an echo of those words of Christ we read in the gospel this morning.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” (John 3:16, NRSV)

Salvation, life, wholeness… this is what God wants for us.

This is God’s gift to us.

This is God’s plan for our lives.

Our God wants nothing more than to hold us in love and grace and mercy, like we might hold a newborn infant.

Before we can understand it…

Before we deserve it…

God loves first.

In our United Methodist tradition, it is what we call prevenient grace.

From the latin: pre-venient, “before” “to go”

God’s grace, God’s love, comes first.

This week, I learned about some experiments done in the 1970’s by Dr. Benjamin Libet. He was a neuroscientist who wanted to understand what was happening in our brains as we make decisions.

We think that we make a decision… say to flex our fingers… then, our brain initiates the electrical impulses, and then our muscles respond, right?

What he actually discovered is that before we consciously make a decision to do something, our brain has already started the process!

FIRST our brain activity begins.

THEN we make a decision.

Finally, our body responds and our fingers flex.

So, it kind of seems like our decision wasn’t actually the CAUSE of the action.

But he kept working and discovered that we CAN consciously make a decision to stop an action that our brain has already initiated.

He asked people to resist the urge to flex their fingers as soon as they become aware of it.

When we become aware of an urge to act, we can choose to stop.

Libet called this ‘free won’t.”

We can’t choose to DO something… but we can choose to stop.

What does this have to do with grace?

Well, let’s change the outcome we are seeking.

Instead of trying to flex our fingers, what if we are trying to be saved?

Scripture tells us over and over again that there is nothing we can do to earn God’s grace.

There is nothing we can do get salvation for ourselves.

No matter how much we want it, or strive for it, or choose it.

And that is because our conscious decision to love God is like our conscious decision to wiggle our fingers… it is always secondary.

What comes first is God’s love.

God’s prevenient grace.

The very way that God built us for relationship and salvation.

God laid the foundation and the groundwork for us to receive salvation before we could even conceive of the idea to love God back.

We love… because God loves first.

Now… we can consciously reject that love.

We can resist it.

We can try to do our own thing.

Like my friend John… or Stripe the caterpillar… or Nicodemus…

But God’s love and grace is always there, sending out signals and nudges and glimpses of the possibility that awaits us if we stop resisting.

In the book, “Hope for the Flowers,” one day Stripe sees something that makes his heart stop.

He catches a glimpse, a possibility of something he can’t quite comprehend. He sees a butterfly.

He stops climbing, curls up on a branch, and builds a cocoon.

He doesn’t know how he knows to do it, but he does.

That’s what happened to my friend, John.

One Sunday, the Holy Spirit showed up at church and he caught a glimpse of another life that was possible for him.

He went home and put his business up for sale and enrolled in seminary.

John had no clue what was waiting for him, except that everything was about to change.

And Nicodemus?

He may have come to Jesus in the middle of the night, unsure of those nudges with his soul and afraid of what others might think.

But, he, too, is forever changed by the grace of God.

The next time Nicodemus appears in the gospel of John, he has stepped into public view after the crucifixion to ask for the body of Jesus.

It is when Jesus is lifted up on the cross that he fully understands the life that God intended for him.

God loves first.

God holds us and shows us what life, real life, is all about.

And that longing deep within us…?

We want to hold God back.

We want to curl our tiny fingers around God’s and cling to what is possible.

We can get ourselves distracted.

We can resist.

We can say we don’t deserve it because of the things we have done.

But none of that changes the fact that we are held.

That we have always been held.

And that if we just let go of trying to do it all ourselves…

If we stopped saying no…

We would discover that God has already given us the life of salvation we long for.

Amen.

You Have (Are) a Gift

Posted on June 14, 2020Leave a comment

Text: Romans 12:3-8

As we start off this morning, I want you to find a blank piece of paper… or if you are on Zoom or Facebook, type in the comments or chat window.

I want you to think of one thing that you are personally good at.

What is one thing that you know how to do and do fairly well?

Now… if we were together in the sanctuary, I’d have you turn to your neighbor. But, since we aren’t, I want you to share in the comments a few words about how you were able to use that skill or talent recently.

For example: one of my skills is that I can grow things. I set out some of my extra seedlings on the sidewalk in front of our house for our neighbors to take.

Take a minute to share and read one another’s comments!

Thank you all for sharing!

This week on our road trip across the United States, we find ourselves in northwest Washington at Olympic National Park.

With nearly a million acres of land, spanning a huge range of landscapes and precipitation, it contains so many different ecosystems that the largest concentration of life on the planet is found here!

You can explore seventy miles of coastline with whales and puffins and oysters, driftwood from ancient trees, and the ever present ebb and flow of the ocean…

A tree in a forest

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Or make your way inland through old growth rainforests where 12-14 feet of rain fall each year. Centuries old hemlocks, threatened species like the northern spotted owl, mosses and ferns as far as your eyes can see…

Or maybe you want to climb to the top of glacier-capped mountains where golden eagles and Olympic marmots play among the alpine wildflowers…

All in one spectacular park.

But the balance between each of these seemingly separate and distinct elements cannot be ignored.

As the National Park site describes, “Olympic National Park takes an ecosystem approach to management. We believe that the health and survival of individual species depends on the health of entire habitats.” https://www.nps.gov/olym/learn/threatened-and-endangered-species-of-olympic.htm

To put that in our own faith language… the health of any part of the body depends on the whole.

And every unique part of that habitat, or ecosystem, or body of Christ has an important and distinct function.

Each one is necessary.

Each one is valued.

Each one matters.

I want you to think back to that skill or gift that you mentioned earlier.

Maybe it is a skill that you trained long and hard to learn, or maybe it is a gift that came naturally for you.

Whatever it is, it is something you see within yourself.

Hanging on to that gift in your mind, I want you to hear what Paul writes to us from Romans chapter 12.

You see… he continues his message from last week about what it means to be connected to Jesus Christ.

Hear these verses again from the Message translation:

I’m speaking to you out of deep gratitude for all that God has given me, and especially as I have responsibilities in relation to you.

Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God.

No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him.

This gift that you have identified within yourself… it does not represent something that you own or possess or even have control of.

It represents something that God has given to you.

It represents a part of God’s plan for this world.

It represents one way in which the Body of Christ, the church, is called to share the love of God.

Have you ever thought about your gift that way?

Have you ever thought about how your baking or knitting or carpentry was a part of God’s plan for this world?

Or how your mechanical skills or photography or singing could bring the love of God to your neighbors?

Or how your laughter or negotiating skills or sense of direction could be used to share the gospel?

How your mathematical sensibility or your hard work or your ability to listen is an integral and important part of the church?

Or is your first response whenever the call of Jesus Christ comes to look around and say, “who, me?”

When I was in junior high and high school I loved speaking in front of people.

I was always the first with my hand up when it came time to read out loud in class.

I tried out for every play and musical.

I signed up for speech contests.

I competed, I practiced, I simply loved doing it.

Speaking in front of people came easily to me.

It was never something I had to think twice about.

I knew that in whatever field of work I chose, this skill would be useful.

It was something in the background, something I could fall back on, something I never had to think that much about.

But one day in college, I was asked to prepare a sermon for our campus worship.

Easy-peasy… I had written speeches before.

And I had preached before as a part of my youth group.

I didn’t worry too much about it.

In the midst of the preparation however,

in the midst of my wrestling with the text and really trying to find God in the middle, something in me clicked.

I realized that I wasn’t just writing another speech…

I was sharing God’s love with people.

I wasn’t up there acting or putting on a persona…

this was real.

This is what I was made for.

God wanted me to share his good news with people.

God created me to do this!

As Paul tells the people of Rome and by extension us… we are like the parts of a body, parts of a vital ecosystem.

We get our meaning from the body as a whole – our gifts and skills find their purpose only in relation to these other people and parts of God’s family.

Each one of you matters to this body of Christ.

Each one of you has something unique and amazing to offer to the world.

God has created us for this!

I want you to think for just a second about what this church would be like if someone like Rick stopped playing guitar…

or Wendell stopped fixing things…

or Sherrie stopped calling on neighbors…

or Ella stopped serving…

or Becky stopped asking amazing questions…

or Hope stopped reaching out to friends…

What would happen if I decided to keep my gifts to myself, instead of sharing them?

Think long and hard about that gift you claimed earlier.

You have something unique and beautiful and powerful to offer.

You are called by God to do amazing things.

Yes, YOU.

Today, we are welcoming three new people into professing membership of the United Methodist Church.

We are witnessing Becky, Ella, and Hope claim their roles and their gifts as part of this Body of Christ.

Their gifts join together with all of the other ones in our vibrant and rich ecosystem.

Our congregation is filled with teachers and accountants and musicians and creators and parents and builders and leaders and servants…

We are stronger and healthier and more vibrant because each and every one of you are part of us.

As Paul writes:

since we find ourselves fashioned into all these excellently formed and marvelously functioning parts in Christ’s body, lets just go ahead and be what we were made to be.

In everything you do,

in everything that you offer,

from the moment you wake up until the moment your head hits your pillow at night,

ask how God can use you.

Take those gifts you have and share God’s love

through every goodbye you make in the morning

and every meal you deliver to the elderly in our community

and in every car your fix

and in every meeting you have at work.

Share the good news through every post you make on facebook

and every class you have at school

and in every game you play.

Do what you do with integrity, with love, with compassion.

Paul breaks it down like this:

If you help, just help, don’t take over; if you teach, stick to your teaching; if you give encouraging guidance, be careful that you don’t get bossy; if you’re put in charge, don’t manipulate; if you’re called to give aid to people in distress, keep your eyes open and be quick to respond; if you work with the disadvantaged, don’t let yourself get irritated with them or depressed by them. Keep a smile on your face.

We are the body of Christ.

We are his living, breathing, hands and feet in this world.

In everything we do… let God shine through.

A Nap and a Snack

Posted on September 8, 2019Leave a comment

Text: Psalm 42 and 1 Kings 19:1-15a

Blessed are the crazy.
Blessed are those who experience feelings of anxiety and are consumed by worry.
Blessed are those who have suicidal thoughts.
Blessed are those who have survived trauma.
Blessed are those are trapped in cycles of addiction.
Blessed are the crazy.
Blessed.

That isn’t the first word that we often use to talk about mental illness.
In fact, we rarely talk about it in the walls of the church and when we do, it is often sitting around the couches in my office, or whispered to your neighbor at coffee time, rather than out in the open.
And rather than any spirit of blessedness, we share those stories with a sense of shame or confusion or judgement.

The first person I knew with a mental illness was my friend’s mother.
That doesn’t mean there weren’t other people in my life… we just never talked about it.
But there was always this sense of embarrassment from him that she wasn’t like the other moms. And I experienced that myself when we hung out. She would hole up for days at a time and not really talk with anyone. She had no energy to take care of anyone else and so he really learned how to take care of himself.
But she would also get on these kicks and you absolutely had to stay out of her way while she dove into a craft project and took over the house. Everything else got put to the side… including my friend.
Later, we came to understand she was struggling with manic depression and with medication her life has evened out a little bit more.
But at the time, it was hard not to feel resentment for the ways that our lives had to accommodate hers or frustration that she wasn’t “normal.”
We certainly never thought of her as blessed.
And yet, we wouldn’t necessarily call the poor and the hungry, the grieving and the persecuted blessed either.
But Jesus did.
Jesus declares in the Beatitudes of Matthew 5 and Luke 6 an upside-down, counter-intuitive vision of the world.
Sometimes we think of each of those beatitudes as characteristics that we are called to embody: meekness, peacemaking, etc…
But as Alan Brehm notes, that is only a secondary point.
The primary message is that God’s blessing has been poured out on those who expose their vulnerability. They declare that “those whom society has deemed unfortunate are truly blessed in God’s realm. It says that those who have no reason in this world for hope or joy, those who have been deprived of their fair share of goodness and justice – those are the ones for whom God’s kingdom… are incredible gifts.”
So yes, blessed are the crazy… for they shall receive mercy, compassion, and love.

Each week of this series, we are going to dive into scripture and look at how those blessings arrive for people who are struggling with their mental health.

Today’s story focuses on the prophet Elijah.
Depression might not have been a chronic struggle for him, but it was certainly situational.
A new king had arisen in the land, Ahab and his wife Jezebel, and they were no friends of God.
Elijah and other prophets were called to speak God’s word of judgment upon their reign and were persecuted as a result. About a hundred of them went into hiding, but the rest were executed.
Remaining faithful to his calling, Elijah publicly challenged the prophets of Baal and Asherah to a contest, which is described in the chapter just before our reading this morning. God’s power shows up, and Ahab and Jezebel’s prophets are put to shame and killed.

Now, Elijah’s life is really in danger. Furious with her defeat, Jezebel vows to hunt down and kill him.
He is terrified and alone and sinks into a state of severe depression.
Sitting under a bush in the middle of the desert, he wants nothing more than death.
I find his story echoed in the words of Psalm 42 and I invite you to hear selected verses again from the Message translation:

I’m on a diet of tears—
tears for breakfast, tears for supper.
All day long
people knock at my door,
Pestering,
“Where is this God of yours?”
These are the things I go over and over,
emptying out the pockets of my life.
I was always at the head of the worshiping crowd,
right out in front,
Leading them all,
eager to arrive and worship,
Shouting praises, singing thanksgiving—
celebrating, all of us, God’s feast!…
Sometimes I ask God, my rock-solid God,
“Why did you let me down?
Why am I walking around in tears,
harassed by enemies?”
They’re out for the kill, these
tormentors with their obscenities,
Taunting day after day,
“Where is this God of yours?”
Why are you down in the dumps, dear soul?
Why are you crying the blues?
Fix my eyes on God—
soon I’ll be praising again.
He puts a smile on my face.
He’s my God.

Here is a faithful servant of God, who intimately knows God’s power and yet he cannot find the strength to keep going.
In her book, Blessed are the Crazy, Sarah Griffith Lund reminds us,

“Faith is not an anti-depressant. It cannot be swallowed in order to rewire our brains for happiness. Rather, faith allows us to accept the coexistence of God and suffering. We do not have to choose between two realities, because, if we did, God would have to go. There is no way we could deny the existence of suffering. I believe God exists in this messed up world, and, in the moments of greatest pain, God is there to wipe away our tears. After all, we aren’t the only ones crying. God is crying too.”

Wallowing in grief, exhaustion, and depression, Elijah has faith and still can’t take another step.
“It’s more than enough, Lord!” he cries out.

Does God tell him to suck it up?
Does God push him to get over it?
Does God get embarrassed by the weary state of his servant?
Does God resent that this so-called prophet just can’t do it right now?
No.
Blessed are the crazy.
Blessed are the depressed and anxious.
Blessed are those at the end of their rope.

God accepts Elijah right where he is and accompanies him through this time in the wilderness.
God gives him the space he needs to take care of himself and his needs.
And you know what Elijah desperately needs?
He needs a nap.
And so he lies down under that bush and God lets him sleep.
And then God sends a messenger, because sleep is not the only thing we need to take care of our body, mind, and spirit…
A messenger that sends food.
Bread, baking on a stone.
A jar of cool water.
Elijah eats and then sleeps again.
And God is there, watching over him. Caring for him. Accompanying him through this dark night of the soul, this wilderness journey.
And God sends a messenger to nudge him again, encouraging him to eat once again.

God shows up in the midst of Elijah’s depression. God speaks to him… not through earthquake and wind and fire – not through judgment or anger or force… but through the silence.
In the thin and quiet moment God speaks.
God is present.

How then should we show up for one another?
Do we avoid our friends or loved ones who are depressed?
Are we embarrassed by them or urge them to just get over it?
Or do we accompany them?
Do we make sure their needs are cared for?
Do we show up and simply be present with them?

As I have spent time with people who suffer from chronic diseases, including depression, one of the tools that can be really helpful was introduced by Christine Miserandino. It is called Spoon Theory, and it describes the amount of energy certain tasks that we undertake in a day might require for someone who is struggling with their mental or physical health.
If on any given day, we only have 12 spoons worth of energy to spend, we have to make choices about what those things are.
Simply getting out of bed in the morning takes energy. (one spoon)
Getting dressed and taking my medicine takes another spoon each (two spoons).
If it is a work day, I need to shower and eat (four more spoons)
And then work itself, which takes a lot of energy (four spoons).
That right there has spent eleven of the twelve spoons I might have in a day.
Any energy to clean or care for others or exercise is already spent.

The other key component of spoon theory is that sometimes, in order to do something you need to do, you have to borrow spoons from another day. If you have to give extra… it means that the next day you can’t start with twelve new spoons… you start with a deficit.
When I think about the intense experience that Elijah underwent, challenging those prophets of Baal and Asherah and then fleeing for his life, it is no wonder that all he could do the next day was sleep and eat and sleep some more.

And so when we find ourselves in these seasons, we have to learn how to be gentle with ourselves, be wise with our decisions, ask for help when needed.
And we need to have a spirit of compassion and kindness towards those among us who are literally giving all the energy they can muster just to show up or get out of bed in the morning. We can practice the patience of God and we can show up to accompany our loved ones through their wilderness.

There are, of course, other ways that we can build resiliency and strengthen our mental health so that we might come out of that wilderness season.
Just like we can improve our physical health by eating right and exercising, our mental health takes a little bit of work.
At the bottom of your insert you will see a few tools that are really common sense things that it is helpful to be reminded really work.
We can connect…. Stay positive… create joy… care for our spirits… and all of these things will help increase our capacity for mental health.
In fact, something as simple as a smile can make a difference, and so that is why with our pancake breakfast this morning we are encouraging you to dress up your pancake with a smile and to share your face for mental health awareness.

Mental health isn’t a solitary journey. So let us walk it together and let us surround one another in prayer, love and compassion.
For blessed are the crazy.

Sing! Play! Summer! – Here I Am, Lord

Posted on June 2, 2019Leave a comment

Text: 1 Samuel 3: 1-11

Earlier this spring, we invited everyone at Immanuel to share with us some of your favorite hymns and songs. And this summer, we are going to highlight one of those pieces each week during our series: Sing! Play! Summer!
As the pace of activities slows down just a bit, we want to go back to those familiar songs that ground us in our faith.
We want to learn some new songs that will help us continue to grow in our faith.
And just as importantly, we want to have some fun and play and relax and let our spirits be re-energized by God and rest and recreation.
One of the pieces of our Sing! Play! Summer! Series is actually a six-week guide to summer fun and faith that we want to offer you and your families. It has some devotions, lists of related activities, new songs to learn, and ideas for making this the best summer ever!
You don’t have to do all six weeks in a row, but you could! Simply go at your own pace, enjoy this summer with your kids or grandkids or niblings or neighbors, and be sure to check out our church website for audio versions of the songs included!

Our very first song of the summer is actually the number one favorite song of the people of Immanuel: Here I Am, Lord!
This is also one of MY favorite songs and so we thought we’d kick off our summer series with the best of the lot 😊
Here I Am, Lord was written by Dan Schutte in 1981 and he based his work on two different call stories in scripture: Isaiah’s call in chapter 6 and Samuel’s call that we just heard a few minutes ago.
In fact, we were originally going to use the Isaiah story… but we are going to save that one for another Sunday coming up very soon!

The verses of the song remind us that the creator of everything in this world: the snow, the rain, the sea, the skies, the stars… this Creator God is not far removed from us, but hears every cry of God’s people. God feels our pain and weeps with love for us.
And God will not leave us in our despair and our sin, God actively works to save us! He provides bread, light, life itself… but… and most importantly… God does so through people like you and me.
Mr. Schutte comes out of the Jesuit tradition in the Catholic church and actually wrote this hymn for a mass for the ordination of Deacons in the church.
As he described the words of the chorus, he wanted to capture that sense that we as God’s people, aren’t always so sure about answering that call.
He writes: “In all those stories, all of those people God was calling to be prophets have expressed in one way or another their humanness or their self-doubt.”
So he adapted the sure-footed response from the mass to the words that perhaps we all find ourselves speaking:
Here I am, Lord. Is it I, Lord?
Are you actually speaking… to me?

The chorus of this hymn takes us to that call that keeps coming again and again to the young boy Samuel in the middle of the night.
Samuel serves in the temple with the priest Eli and that night is charged with the duty of keeping the lamps burning until dawn in the part of the temple where the ark of the covenant was kept.
As we are reminded each winter when the peace light from Bethlehem comes through, it is not easy to keep a lamp burning over night. You worry the oil will go out or the wick will burn through.
So Samuel is sleeping there on his mat in the temple so that he can get up periodically and check on the lamp.
And there in the night… in the dark… God speaks to him.
We don’t know how old Samuel might be in this part of the story, a boy is all the scriptures say, but he has spent his entire life in the temple. His mother Hannah was barren and prayed with all her might for a child. When her prayer was answered she brought the child before God and left him in the care of Eli, the priest and Samuel grew up in the temple, serving the Lord.

But I think too often we focus on how Samuel heard his call and forget the details of what that call was TO.
You see, Eli had two sons: Hophni and Phinehas, and they were the worst pastor’s kids you have ever met.
When people came to offer sacrifices, some of the meat was always given to the priests for their service. But the boys wouldn’t wait until the sacrifice was over… but they would grab a chunk of the choicest meat right off the fire.
Today, it would be like if the pastor’s kid stopped the offering plates as they were being passed, took out the largest bills they could find for themselves, and then allowed everything to proceed. And they did it with threat of violence.
Not only that, but they also sexually harassed the women who served at the temple.
Samuel would have grown up, seeing the actions of these two young men, and likely would have been troubled in his heart by their example.
Maybe he even cried out himself, asking God to do something about it.
Well, God heard the cries of the people and God promised this injustice would end.
And God called Samuel in the night and gave him a vision of what he was supposed to do in response. Of the kind of leader he was supposed to become.

As a junior in college, I was convinced that I was going to be a meteorologist when I grew up. But I was also in leadership with the Religious Life Council at Simpson and had been involved in ministry through my local church. One afternoon, the chaplain called me into his office and invited me and a few other students to an event called, “Exploration.”
It was a conference for young people who felt like they were hearing a call to ministry – a place to explore what that meant for their lives.
I don’t remember much about that gathering, except for one worship service.
Bishop Minerva Carcaño was preaching… in fact, she might not have even been a bishop at that point… and before her message she read aloud for us the call story that Tony just shared with us in our scripture reading.
Bishop Carcaño is Latina and what I simply can’t get out of my mind is her calling out, over and over again through the scripture and her message that name in her gentle dialect:
“Samuel! Samuel!” (heard phonetically as Sam-well!)
Hearing her say that name in such a different dialect helped me to hear the entire passage in a new way. It was like it struck a new chord and snuck into every corner of my mind.
The entire drive home from that event, I thought about all of the people throughout my life who had been calling me into a certain type of ministry:
First it was my pastor, Bruce Ough, who is now a bishop of the church. He called me into his office after I gave the sermon for the youth sunrise service at my church and told me I was going to be a pastor someday.
Then it was my youth leader, Todd Rogers, who kept lifting me up into leadership and preparing me for a pastoral role, whether I wanted to accept it or not.
That voice of God had come through teachers and fellow students who had been gently encouraging me to consider starting down the path of pastoral ministry even as I ran in the other direction.
I realized that like Samuel, I thought I was simply hearing the voice of my pastor or my teacher.
I had never stopped to consider before that weekend that perhaps it wasn’t just a human voice after all….
Perhaps God was speaking to me and inviting me into a particular role in the world!

The reality is, God doesn’t just speak to people being called into professional ministry or to prophets from the Old Testament.
God speaks to all of us.
God is looking around at this world that you live and move and breathe in and God hears the cries of the people around us:
The fear and anger surrounding gun violence and mass shootings.
The reality of climate change and its impact upon our neighbors… especially farmers and those along rivers in the Midwest right now.
The impact not only of mental illness, but also desperation because of the lack of resources to respond.
The sense of isolation and abandonment experienced by LGBT youth who are turned away from their families.
The physical hunger of our neighbors young and old.
The crisis of desperation that leads some women to seek to have an abortion.
The stress upon the lives of our youngest people that impacts their ability to learn in a classroom.
The realities of addiction that lead so many to end up on the streets or in our prisons.
These are the cries that God hears. These are some of the people for whom God, out of great love is weeping.
And these are all places where I have seen and heard that you as people of Immanuel have heard God calling you to do something.
They are the things keeping you up at night…
Nudging at you…
Tugging at your heartstrings…

And friends… when God starts calling, God doesn’t stop!
I see so many of you answering God’s call through your work and your volunteer time.
You show up faithfully in classrooms and work with kids outside of school.
You are present with vulnerable and hurting folks at hospitals and in prisons and in shelters.
You are organizing with others to make an impact upon this world, to put your prayers into action.
You are present and reach out to that person who most needed to hear that they are loved by God.
I’m so proud of the way that you, the people of Immanuel, have already said,
“Here I am! I will go!”
I think it’s the reason that this song is the top of our list for our favorite songs to sing together.
But I also want to say… we all have fear and doubt and uncertainty about responding to God’s call. Every single one of us has asked that question,
Is it I, Lord?
Do you really mean me?
Why do you think I am capable of this?
if you are feeling that nudge, that calling to do something, and you don’t know quite what comes next… I have two things I want you to remember:
First: the advice from Eli to Samuel – Take it to the Lord. Pray and tell God that you are listening and you are ready to hear. Ask what God wants you to do.
But second: you aren’t in this alone. And just like Samuel had Eli, I’d love to sit down and chat with you and listen so that maybe I can help get you connect with other people who are already engaged in this work as you learn what it might means to say yes.

The Redemption of Scrooge: Facing the Yet to Come

Posted on December 23, 2018Leave a comment

Text: Romans 8:4b-17, Luke 4:18-19

There are a number of personality inventories out there, but one that has captured my imagination lately is the Enneagram. It describes people in one of nine categories, like the reformer, the achiever, the loyalist and the peacemaker (which is me).
Every morning, I get a little sentence or two in my email that has a thought of the day related to my type.
Today’s was an invitation to claim a new affirmation – “I now affirm that I am excited about my future.”

I now affirm that I am excited about my future.

I’m going to be completely honest and admit that I haven’t been very excited about my future lately. Partly because there is so much unknowing in my future. In our future.
There is the unknowing about what will happen with the denomination next February.
There is a whole lot of unknown in the political landscape of the world – nations experiencing unrest, treaties that are fragile, innocent lives caught in the middle.
There is the unknown that comes in our work… in our families… in our health.
Can we do enough to prevent severe climate change?
Will the infection spread in his leg?
How will the economy impact our workplaces?

Where there are unknowns, there are also fears. Fears as we begin to imagine what might happen.
These fears make it very hard to be excited, much less find the joy represented in the fourth candle on our Advent wreath.

What is ironic is that I don’t imagine Ebenezer Scrooge was the type of man who spent much time worrying about the future. His focus seemed to be on the present moment, his present moment, and making every penny count.
He was turned inward, unable to see the hopes and fears of the people around him, and seemed to not really even care about his own future story.
Until the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come arrives with the third chime of the bells.

Oh, what we wouldn’t give for that kind of glimpse into our future!
To know with certainty what the outcome of an election would be.
Or which course of treatment we should choose.
To be able to see the impact of the decisions being made today.

Scrooge is taken into his own future and allowed to see the end of his story. Standing in his own bedroom, the Spirit shows him his own body, “plundered and bereft, unwatched, unwept, uncared for…” (Stave 4).
He is taken to the home of the Cratchit’s and the realization hits him that the son of his employee, Tiny Tim, has died… the death of an innocent that surely would have been preventable with better access to medicine and care and food for strength.
And the man is shaken to his core.
The future that Scrooge discovers is a worst-case scenario.
It is our fears come to fruition.
A life lived without love that makes no impact on the world around it.

And he asks a question that resonates in my heart:
“Are these the shadows of the things that Will be, or are they shadows of the things that May be, only?”

Are these the things that will be?
Or of things that may be only?
Is the future set in stone?
Or can it yet be changed?

And then he cries out, begs the silent Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come to listen:
“Hear me! I am not the man I was. I will not be the man I must have been… Why show me this if I am past all hope?”

In catching a glimpse of his own past, present and future, Scrooge discovers that he doesn’t want to be the same person that he was.
The whole trajectory of his life has changed in this one night.
And the good news, the blessing, the joy of this moment is that he can change. He does change. And he can make change in the world.

The story of our Christian faith is a story of redemption and transformation.
It is the story of the possibility that we can change and that we can make changes in this world.

Often, it is by looking back on the mistakes of our past that we are spurred to repent and make changes in the future.

It is when we look around us at the injustices and inequities of the present moment that we discover ways we can change our way of being in the world.

Sometimes, it is in imagining the worst case scenarios of the future, naming our fears for what might happen, that we discover that there are changes we can make today in order to prevent them from becoming a reality.

I heard recently an interview with outgoing California Governor, Jerry Brown. No matter what you might think of his politics, I found this piece of advice he had for his successor to be profound:
“Imagine what could go wrong, and what could go wrong in the worst possible way. And after you imagine that, then take careful steps to avoid it… You gotta stand back and try to look over the horizon and say, “OK, what are the things that may not go right?” How do we correct that? How do we deal with it ahead of time?”

The very story of Christmas is God’s answer to that question.
What could go wrong?
What could go wrong in the worst possible way?
What can I do to correct it?

You see, God looked out at our future with all of the bad decisions and pain and grief and suffering that we experience, and God saw not a future that would be, but a future that might be.
A future that could be changed.
And so God came down and entered our lives.
God was born among us.
Immanuel.
And our Lord looked around at what had been, our past and history of struggle…
And looked around at what was, the present oppression and yearning of the people…
And Jesus recited the words of the prophets and declared a transformation, a new way of being in the world:
“He has sent me to preach good news to the poor…
To proclaim release to the prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind…
To liberate the oppressed and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

And then that earthly ministry was given to us. The Holy Spirit poured out upon us, empowering us, filling us, transforming us, so that we might head into the world and make change ourselves.

Ebenezer Scrooge had lived a life of selfishness. He saw only his counting book and the success of his business.
But in the middle of the night, that visit from three ghosts turned his world upside down.
It was the transformative power of the Holy Spirit, setting him free from the shackles of what had been and empowering him to live the life that might be.

As Paul tells us in his letter to the Romans, all of us who are born of the Spirit are set free.
We are set free from our past mistakes.
We are set free from our present selfishness.
We are set free from the fears of what might be.
And we are empowered and strengthened to claim a new vision of what might be for the future.

We don’t know what the outcomes of medical tests might be… but we can walk with one another through a journey towards wholeness and offer joy and hope.
We cannot see the end of conflict in this world… but we can speak up for peace and reach out to our own neighbors in love.
The final decisions our denomination might make in a couple of months are still to be determined, but we get to choose how we will continue to love and care and support one another, no matter what those decisions might be.

Wherever we go, whatever we do, in the midst of the mess and the beauty of life, we have been set free to embrace our hopes rather than our fears because we know that we are not alone in the struggle.
You see, the one who breathed life into creation is the same one who cried out from the manger in Bethlehem is the same one who walks with us through the trials and sorrows of today.
And while we cannot control every piece of the future, we do know that God is already there, ready to meet us.
For that reason, we face the future unafraid.
No matter what may come, God is with me… God is with you… and I’m excited about that kind of future.

Mystery: Restored!

Posted on November 25, 2018Leave a comment

Text: Job 42:1-6, 10-17

This morning, I want to tell you a story about little Henry.
Henry walked to school every morning with his grandpa. And along their way, Grandpa would stop at the neighborhood store for a newspaper and a cup of coffee.
At the register, there were bins full of candies and gum and chocolates and every single morning, Henry would ask Grandpa if he could have some.
Every single morning, the answer was no.
Well, after several weeks of watching this, the cashier started to have a soft spot in her heart for the little boy. So one morning, as Grandpa and Henry came up to the register, the cashier said, “Good morning, Henry! How about this morning you reach in and get some of that candy you want… on me!”
Oh, he was SO excited! He reached out his hand to get some candy and then quickly pulled it back.
Instead, he grabbed Grandpa’s hand and shoved it into the bin with all of the sweets.
Grandpa was a bit stunned, and pulled back a whole fist full of candy.

As they kept walking to school, Grandpa was a bit puzzled. “Henry,” he asked, “Every single morning you ask me for candy… this is exactly what you have always wanted… why didn’t you pick out the candy yourself?”
Henry looked back at Grandpa with a grin on his face. “It is, Grandpa… but your hands are so much bigger than mine! My little hand was too small to get everything I wanted!”

There is a sense of Henry’s wisdom in our story of Job.
You and I, we are so small.
Compared with the stars and the oceans and the mountains and the vast diversity of creation, we are tiny specks of dust.
We might want to reach out and grab knowledge and answers and truth and faith… but our little hands are too small to get everything we want.
God’s hands are much bigger.
God’s wisdom is far greater.
God’s power is beyond our comprehension.

Last week, our youth took us through some of the mystery of God’s power and might.
We were reminded through song of just how powerful God is and how through the grace and the love of God, we can walk through the valley of the shadow of death and not be afraid.
When oceans rise, we can rest in God’s embrace.
In our troubled seas, God is our peace and God’s love will lead us through.
When we can’t feel a thing and are falling short, God says that we are loved and that we are held.

These messages of power are so important to the story of Job that we have been following these last few weeks.
At the beginning of November, we began to explore this little morality play in which a perfect, upright man, Job, is tested by God.
The Accuser has this question… will Job continue to be perfect and upright and faithful if things start to go badly for him? Or is he simply a fair-weather friend?
God allows this little experiment to proceed and Job’s flocks and livelihood and children are taken away from him. Even his own bodily health is impacted and he is covered in sores and finds himself in pain all day and night.
But still he refuses to turn his back on God.

The second part of our story involved Job’s friends.
They are convinced that Job must have done something wrong in order to have all of this punishment brought upon him.
They, like Job, firmly believed that good things happen to good people and that bad people get what they deserve. They see God as being the arbiter of retributive justice – where punishment and blessing is given out based upon someone’s faithfulness and goodness.
But for every one of their speeches, Job has one of his own.
He has done nothing wrong. He is innocent. If only he could have his day in court and stand before God, he could make his case and God would have to relent.
Job still believes at this point that God gives people what they deserve… and if he is being punished it is undeserved… and therefore… God is wrong.
Job is actually putting God on trial.

And as Isabel and Olivia reminded us in their message last week… God might be annoyed and a little upset at Job’s whining… maybe even perturbed at Job’s accusations… but the message God speaks out of the chaos and directly to Job’s heart is this: I created this whole world. I made everything in it. I understand how it works and am the very power that sustains it all. And… I love you. I’ve got your back.

For three chapters, God goes on and on and on about “the incomprehensible magnificence and immeasurable power of divine majesty.”
Were you there when I laid the earth’s foundations?
Have death’s gates been revealed to you?
Where’s the road to the place where light dwells?
Can you guide the stars at their proper times?
Do you know when mountain goats give birth?
Did you give strength to the horse?
Is it due to your understanding that the hawk flies?
Can you control the great beasts of the earth like the behemoth and the leviathan?

Job is stunned into silence.
He thought he had God all figured out… that God’s justice was some kind of divine math in which your goodness earned you points and blessings.
It actually reminds me of the television show, The Good Place, a comedy that explores ethics and morality and what we owe each other. The foundation of the afterlife in this universe is that for every good thing you do with selfless intent, you rack up points that allow you to enter “the good place” a place of eternal satisfaction.
But when you cuss, or stiff a waitress, or murder someone, points are deducted and without enough points, you end up in “the bad place.”

Job is living his life in a certain way, following all of the rules, making sacrifices for not only his potential sins but also those of his children, because he thinks that is what faith is about. Trying to earn God’s favor and blessing.

What he didn’t realize is that he already had it.
We all do.
The God who set the stars in motion and who knows about the birth of every mountain goat and how to direct the flight of a hawk also knows you and me intimately.
God knows every hair on our head.
God knows the divine plans in store for each of us.
And God’s justice is not a math equation.
Rather, it is a complicated, holy, grace-filled effort to take every broken, hurting, sinful thing in this world and to redeem and transform it back towards its holy purpose.
Job had only heard about God before… but now Job has seen God.
And God is far bigger, greater, more awesome than he ever imagined and his tiny way of grasping and understanding the world has been torn apart.

I think, if anything, this morality tale we find in the book of Job was an effort by early Jewish theologians to take apart what they believed was a very limited way of seeing God in the world.
So many people think that God is an impersonal judge who tallies right and wrong and who sits on the divine bench handing out punishments and rewards. And with such a calculated understanding of the divine, we can make no sense of that ancient question of why bad things happen to good people or why there is suffering in the lives of innocent people.
But our scriptures of our faith have a vastly different message for us about who God is and how deeply God cares for us.
Our God got down in the dirt and formed the first humans and breathed into them the breath of life.
Our God took imperfect people like Abraham and Noah and Jacob and through them, in spite of them, because of them, set in motion the divine plans for all the people of the world to be blessed.
Our God heard the cries of the people when they were caught in slavery in the land of Egypt and raised up a leader to bring them home.

In the end, what we find in the Book of Job are not easy answers to the question of why there is suffering. In fact, Job gets no answer or explanation for why so much was taken from him.
Instead, Job discovers that we are allowed to cry out when we suffer.
We should protest against injustice.
And we should open our lives and our hearts up to discover the ways that God is far powerful and more holy than we could ever imagine.
Before, Job had only heard about God.
But in the midst of his suffering and his yearning for truth, he encountered the very presence of God.
God reached out to him and in the process, Job found himself having a real, deepened, humble relationship with the Lord.
In our lives, we will face difficulties.
We will encounter diagnosis and questions that we cannot comprehend.
We will find ourselves asking why such awful things are happening in the world.
In these last few weeks, I have heard this very community raising up cries of concern for the death of loved ones, illness, wildfires, mass shootings, war, hunger, and homelessness.
None of these situations are deserved.
Innocent lives are impacted or harmed or taken far too soon.
We want answers and solutions.
And I think what we discover in the Book of Job is that there is no quick fix for the problems of this world. We can’t explain away why these things happen in a few words.
What we find instead is the presence of a God who is with us in the midst of it.
A God who hears every cry.
A God who seeks, in the words of Sharon Lynn Putt, “not to condemn and punish but to reconcile, to redeem, and to restore all of us to each other and to God.”

In the verses that we skipped in our reading for today, God reaches out to Job and invites him to offer up prayers and offerings for those three friends who had such a limited understanding of what was happening in Job’s life.
You see, even in the midst of restoring Job’s possessions, God is also working to redeem those relationships between Job and his friends.
And God is working to help transform and expand their understanding of how this world hangs together, too.

Our task, as we live out the truths of the Book of Job, is to listen to the suffering of others. To listen to our own pain. To not hide it, but hold it up into the light where God can show us that we are loved when we can’t feel a thing. We are strong when we think we are weak. We are held when we think we are falling short. We belong to God even when we think we don’t belong.
In that moment, we, like Job, can relent. We can surrender. We can lay our whole lives at the feet of God… knowing, trusting, believing… that no matter what happens, we are held in the hands of God.
Like Henry, our little hands aren’t big enough to fully grasp and understand the ways of this world. But God’s are.
Thanks be to God. Amen.

illustration adapted from Discipleship Ministry preaching notes