The Hard Stuff

John 6:56-69      

We Presbyterians like to think of ourselves as intellectual Christians. We place a high value on our doctrine, often making reference to what Calvin had to say about this or that. We insist that our pastors be well-educated because we enjoy a good challenging sermon. In fact, the common criticism that you hear of Presbyterians is that we love the Lord our God with our whole mind – and we stop there. Never mind the heart, soul, and body. Hence our nickname, the “frozen chosen.”

And perhaps because of the way we embrace the intellectual things, we often find ourselves in an uncomfortable position with the scriptures. For instance, what in the world do we do with these words Jesus said in this chapter of  John?

Would you like my honest opinion? At the risk of offending you, I will say I think we sometimes are a little bit embarrassed for Jesus. When he says, “Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me.” That’s embarrassing. We don’t do that. We are modern people, educated, well-read. We know science is real, and we don’t believe Welch’s Grape Juice somehow turns into Jesus’ blood. It sounds too much to us like magical thinking. Juice is juice, bread is bread. That is that.

I know there are a lot of Christians who do believe that in some mysterious way the bread becomes Christ’s body and the juice, or wine, becomes his blood. And they would object to the suggestion that this is magical thinking. I think they would tell us what they are doing is embracing the mystery of this holy and ancient tradition. I can accept that. I am simply saying this is not who we are, as Presbyterians.

So what we do with these words is a problem. We might say, “This teaching is difficult. Who can accept it?”

Just like the disciples said.

And many of them left, John writes, because it was just too difficult. Which was a pity. And, I dare say, many still do leave because it is too difficult.

I once had a nice conversation with a philosophy professor about Christianity and he talked about his inability to believe. He seemed wistful. He wanted to believe but regretfully walked away from it because he could not accept much of it. It seemed irrational, illogical. Much to his sorrow, he couldn’t help but think his way out of faith. And, actually, I could sympathize with his position. Thinking people know that some church teachings are difficult to accept.

Last Sunday in the New York Times there was an article by Ross Douthat titled “How to Think Your Way into Religious Belief.” Normally, that is the kind of invitation that I would scoff at. I take an immediate dislike to books that claim to offer “proof” of Christianity or proof that God exists. Because so often the authors are taking what I feel to be an oversimplified approach to faith. The assumptions they work from require you to narrow your vision and shut out many questions you would like to ask. They demand that you close your eyes to scientific reality and honest observations of the world around you and it doesn’t work for me. I find their logic illogical, their assumptions ludicrous. Too often the way to “proof” of faith is to close your eyes to any evidence that challenges your faith.

In spite of all that, I read the Douthat article, and I was amazed. He doesn’t dumb it down. He doesn’t insist that his readers close their eyes to reality and submit to a kind of make-belief. He doesn’t present a black and white, literal interpretation of the scriptures – nor does he twist them into something they are not in order to make “proof.” He suggests, without actually saying it, that maybe the real problem thinking people might have with belief is the same one we often criticize fundamentalism of – taking everything too literally, too concretely, and ignoring everything else. Ignoring the pieces that don’t fit.

Ignoring the fact that people still, in the 21^st century, experience the world as orderly, beautiful, and awesome. And that people still have mystical and numinous experiences. And, when we think about it, it still feels extraordinary to be human, with our human consciousness; we are like other creatures and yet so different…almost as though we were created in the image of our creator.

Douthat sort of shifted the lens a little, so we might look out at the world a bit differently. If we are willing.

And for those of us who sit here every Sunday; those of us who enjoy a challenging and educational sermon; even those of us who might call ourselves thoughtful Christians; I wonder if we are willing.

Are we willing to stay with Jesus right through the difficult teachings? Are we willing to put aside our sense of being offended? Are we willing to accept that any faith we have is purely a gift we have received – not any great thing we have done? Are we willing to say that Jesus sustains life, a life that we very much need? That we need whatever nourishment he has to offer? Are we willing to open ourselves and let Jesus meet all our needs – all of them?

Are we willing to acknowledge our enormous need? the gaping emptiness within us that we have no way to fill except to turn to him?

Are we willing to accept the hard teachings? Are we?

Many have not. Some have turned away.

Jesus turned to Peter and asked, “Are you going to leave me too?” But Peter responded, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

The way to belief? It is to know what is true. We don’t dismiss the weird, hard stuff. But neither do we make it a deal-breaker. Because what it all comes down to is this: I don’t put my faith in doctrine or scripture. I put my faith in Christ, the one who leads me to life. All thanks be to God. 

Photo by Kenrick Mills on Unsplash

QUEST, Part 4: RETURNING HOME

Psalm 36:5-9

John 15:1-17

I have heard that if you want to really get the feel of a place you need to stay there at least three weeks. One or two weeks feels like a vacation away from your real life, but sometime during that third week your perspective shifts. You begin to feel like a resident, a local.

When I was in college I spent a month in Oxford, England and that happened to me. I came home from that month away and looked at everything with new vision. I became a tourist in my hometown. An obnoxious tourist, actually. I was critical of everything, I rolled my eyes at the naivete of my loved ones. I was 19 and insufferable.

I have grown up since then, but still, when I return home from a journey there is always a sense of seeing things differently. I spent three weeks in Cuba a while ago, and coming back I was overwhelmed by all the stuff. We are great consumers in the United States, and we have a surreal number of choices. And not enough music.

Whenever you return home from anywhere else, you bring bits and pieces of it with you. You say, here is a rock I picked up from the beach. Isn’t it beautiful? Here is a vase I bought in the village. It was hand-painted by local artisans; isn’t it beautiful? You bring home keepsakes to remember your trip, but you also might bring home a broader perspective, as Rick Steves says. When you return, you see things differently because you bring home with you a greater sense of understanding other parts of the world. A greater awareness of the interconnectedness of everyone in the world.

You might bring home new friendships, people you keep in touch with by phone or letters. At some point they may come and visit you, to discover a new place for themselves, and you get to see your home through their eyes. The gift of travel is in finding these rich new connections between people and between cultures. The connection we all share because we are all God’s beloved children.

Traveling to a new place, we might look at the people who live there and see them as exquisite human beings, just as special as we are, just as loved as we are. When we travel to a new place we might see what the other branches of this big, beautiful tree of life look like, and sound like, and act like.

The Lord God claims and loves us all. Our God, whose steadfast love extends to the heavens, whose faithfulness extends to the clouds; this God claims us all.

Remember the story I told you about my mother-in-law and Myanmar? She never got to make that trip. But not too long afterward I met a man from Myanmar. He was in the U.S. as part of the Presbyterian Church’s peacemaking initiative. 

He was a guest of our presbytery and I got to meet him when he joined some of us for a weekend youth retreat. It was a gathering of church youth groups from all over the presbytery. The leaders all tried to coordinate to organize things, but I think youth group leadership is inherently disorganized, unfortunately. I arrived at the lodge with my youth group to find about half the people were there. Kids were messing around together, ignoring any adult requests to help. One of the leaders introduced me to our guest from Myanmar. He was standing in the kitchen cooking dinner. 

The kitchen was not much. In one corner of the lodge, it consisted of a very small stove, sink, fridge, and about three square feet of counter space. And there stood our peacemaker, sleeves rolled up, chopping and stirring.

Someone was supposed to bring spaghetti and meat sauce. But they weren’t there yet, and nobody knew when they would arrive. Our guest scrounged up a variety of ingredients and whipped up an amazing dish – it was a miracle on the level of loaves and fishes. 

Later, we all sat in a circle together and he told us a story. His English was not fluent, so we kept thing simple. More than a hundred years ago the American Baptists – the same folks my mother-in-law worked with on the Global Missions Board – came to Myanmar and showed them Jesus. And now, he said, I come to you.

And I thought to myself, thank you, God, for sending him because we need him. Just as the people of Myanmar needed the American Christians who came to them with Jesus in their hearts, we need this man to remind us who we are.

We need to be reminded that Christ is everywhere in the world, our vine-grower God grafting branches onto him. We need to be reminded that because we are in him, we are also a part of one another, each of us bearing fruit, each of us being pruned and cleansed to become ever more fruitful. Knowing we are a part of this may increase our love.

Jesus said, “As the Father has loved me, so I love you; now abide in my love.” To abide in his love is to love in the way he does. That is, to love not only the ones who live with us or share our name, our experiences, our preferences – but to love, also, those who live far away from us. To know that love is an action more than anything.

So many of us don’t travel because fear keeps us at home. We may watch the news and learn that we should be afraid of other countries, other people, big cities. Yet, the scriptures say, “Perfect love casts out fear.” Love seeks understanding and understanding will lessen our fear. 

When we travel, we might see that wherever we go the network of branches is already there, bearing fruit, loving God, living with the same loves and hopes, worries and challenges we do. 

When we travel, we might learn that life is much more than a series of transactions, where we take what we need and give to others what we think is fair. Life in this world God made and loves is full of opportunities to both give and receive amazing gifts – even from those we think have nothing to offer us.

And when we return home, we might hold and cherish these experiences and ponder them in our hearts. 

May we know ourselves and all those around us as part of God’s beloved family. 

May we practice curiosity that comes from a love of God and desire to know God’s vast, colorful, and diverse creation. 

May we seek out friendship with the other branches and increase our fruitfulness for the sake of the glory of God. 

Photo by Ethan Medrano on Unsplash

QUEST, Part 3: REFLECTION

 

Isaiah 65:17-25

Revelations 21: 22-26          

I often hear people complain about the Old Testament. They say that it is full of nothing but violence and ugliness. I just want to point out this beautiful passage from Isaiah is part of the Old Testament.

People, including me, also say that the book of Revelation is chock full of awful stuff. But then you have this exquisite passage from chapter 21.

It is true, in the Old Testament and in Revelation, and perhaps even in the gospels, we wade through a lot of hard stuff, awful stuff – and then we get to this place of breathtaking beauty. Kind of like life, at times. There is a lot of awful and painful stuff in the world, stuff that is hard to look at. Yet, if we remain present, we may get to hope.

These two passages we read today are preceded by accounts of violence and suffering that are hard to read – all the bad stuff you think of when you think of the Old Testament or the book of Revelation. I don’t enjoy reading them. They take us down as low as we can go – into sorrow and fear and pain, until you’re asking yourself why we call this the “good book.” But then we come to this: “For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth,” and we come to this: “And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God is its light, and its lamp is the Lamb.” Picture it. The beauty may bring tears to our eyes.

The promise of a new heaven and earth, the shining joy of God’s glorious light, these are wondrous - but they do not erase the suffering. They do not discount the suffering. But they offer hope. And hope is what we need when we are living in this world.

As people who live in relative comfort, we can easily forget that. We may forget that we need a new heaven and a new earth, because we have arranged this world to our liking. We may forget that we need the light of God in our midst, because we feel like we have plenty of light already. But people who live in extreme poverty are unlikely to forget how much they need a new heaven and earth. People who are oppressed are unlikely to forget how much they need the light of God.

When we travel to different places we have the chance to encounter these people. There are 700 million people in the world living in extreme poverty. We don’t actually have to travel far to see this. We only need to keep our eyes open.

It was very hard for me to keep my eyes open when Kim and I traveled to Mexico City. As we walked the city streets, we encountered women begging and young children selling packs of gum to the tourists. All day long they were out there. At night I discovered these families lived on the streets. They had no place else to go. Coming face to face with this staggering injustice shattered me. I could barely stand it. And the truth is I have had similar encounters traveling in American cities – strolling amidst the grandeur I see clear signs that not all is okay in our nation. People are hungry, people are homeless, people are suffering.

It can be very hard to keep our eyes open when we are facing suffering and injustices. And when we travel, especially if we go to places where there is extreme inequality, we may see more than usual of the hard stuff in the world. Staying present to it is not easy.

Thomas Jefferson once wrote a letter to his nephew saying, “Dear Peter, traveling makes men wiser, but less happy.” And so, he advised, stay home – advice he himself did not follow. Travel can, indeed, have that effect. But many things that are worthwhile do.

We have the opportunity to grow from these jarring experiences if we engage in some reflection. If we stay in the discomfort just long enough to reflect on what we see and hear and feel. To wonder where God is in all of this.

As a campus minister I tried to provide opportunities for students to get out of their comfort zones, to encounter people who were different, whose struggles were different from theirs. As a result I received many requests for help.  

I once got an unusual request. A man called on behalf of an elderly woman who had the opportunity to move out of her apartment into a care facility. But she had a big problem. She hoarded stuff. Every inch of her apartment was crammed full of junk. And she had become helpless in the face of her problem.

I was scheduled to be out of town on the day they needed help. I asked my students if they wanted to do it without me and they said yes. The week after, when I returned, I asked them about it. They told me they completed the job and left the apartment and stood together on the sidewalk outside, not sure what to do next. They asked themselves, “What would Pastor Maggie do?” and so they went somewhere they could have coffee and a donut and reflect on the experience.

They described to me their initial shock and even repulsion at what they saw. Then they told me they saw embarrassment in the woman’s face. They saw her shame. As they talked, I could see then the tenderness of their feelings toward this woman, and their desire to bless her with the chance to make a fresh start.

It was important for them to reflect on their experience. We need to reflect on who are the people we serve, the people whose lives are so different from ours. We need to reflect on the truth that, as different as they may seem, these people are like us, too. These people have the same hopes we do. They are loved by Jesus, as we are.

The messages of hope we read in Isaiah and Revelation are badly needed by so many people in this world. There are so many people who know firsthand about the ugliness the world can offer, that we like to skip over if we can. But turning away from it will only keep us estranged from these brothers and sisters. Perhaps we need to really hear the powerful hope in these words, ourselves, in order for us to really see the people who are suffering. And then truly know that every one of them and every one of us are beloved children of God.

When we experience the world just as the least of these do, then we will hope for God’s new heavens and new earth just as much as they do. May we seek and find our shared humanity with the others and know that God is in that space.

Photo by Marc-Olivier Jodoin on Unsplash 

QUEST, Part 2: THE ENCOUNTER

John 4: 7-40

Many years ago, my mother-in-law was active in the American Baptist Church Global Mission Board. This gave her opportunities to travel. At one point she was offered a chance to go to Burma, which we now know as Myanmar. She was so excited about it, and I couldn’t help wondering why. What on earth was in Burma that she cared about?

Well, actually, I should have known at the time. The reason she wanted to go there, or anywhere, was because there would be new encounters. Conversations to be had, people to meet, places to see, things to learn. This is the kind of person Claire is. Every stranger is a potential friend. How you approach the encounter makes all the difference.

Burma was a very unlikely place for Claire to travel, but a journey to an unlikely place can hold surprising gifts. This is the case in Jesus’ journey to Samaria.

Samaria was an unlikely place for him to be. The Jews and the Samaritans did not get along well. You know the parable of the Good Samaritan? Those who heard Jesus tell the parable did not, in any way, consider the Samaritans to be “good.” The notion of regarding a Samaritan as a neighbor was not a popular notion.

In verse 4 of this chapter, John writes, “He had to go through Samaria.” It was in between Judea, where he had been, and Galilee, where he was going. Actually, it was common for Jews to take long detours to avoid going through Samaria, but Jesus did not. He had to go through Samaria, John says, and I suppose he did. Because there was a conversation awaiting him there.

Whether or not he knew he would encounter a woman at the well, I think Jesus went to Samaria with the intention of having a conversation.

His disciples went off in search of provisions, leaving Jesus to wait by a well, a place they, no doubt, considered safe. It was unlikely that anyone would be at the well then. High noon in the desert. Most women would go in the early morning and the evening, when the heat of the sun was not beating down on them. You would be unusually brave or foolish to venture out at midday.

But, against the odds, this woman came to the well at noon to draw water.

Many have suggested that this particular woman is there at noon because of who she is. She is a five-time divorcee, apparently. This would mean that she has been discarded by five husbands. Five different men have married her and then, for their own reasons, announced, “I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce you.” It was not possible for a woman to divorce a man, but it was that simple for a man to divorce a woman.

One would think that she carried this as a burden of shame. One might assume that she managed her days so that she could avoid the other women of the village because she knew they talked about her, looked down upon her, and probably distrusted her.

But she doesn’t act like a disgraced woman. She doesn’t shuffle around, bent over, head low in shame. She behaves as a woman who is at home in her skin.

Maybe it is Jesus who has this effect on her. She doesn’t appear to be afraid of him. She recognizes him as a Jew. And she knows all the prohibitions that warn her against interacting with this man. Even so, she asks him a question: “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?”

And this one question contains so many:

How is it that you, a man, are speaking to me, a strange woman?

How is it that you, a Jew, are speaking to me, a Samaritan?

How is it that you, a religiously observant son of Israel, are speaking to me, one who is considered by your people to be unclean?

What are you doing here in Samaria? What are you doing at my well?

Just asking. Maybe it’s rude, but she’s just wondering.

Jesus isn’t bothered by her blunt question. It is almost like he was waiting for it.

So he says: Let’s talk about the water that I could give to you. The living water.

And they’re off.

She is a worthy conversation partner for Jesus. She doesn’t back down. She responds to every strange thing he says – at first not understanding him, but staying with him nonetheless. Perhaps one of the best things that can be said about her is this: She is not afraid of what she doesn’t understand, but is willing and able to continue the conversation through the ambiguity.

The Samaritan woman did not come to the well looking for Jesus. She had no idea he would be there. But finding him there she was fully present with him. In the bright midday light, they speak and listen to each other in truth. She has questions: Why do you ask me for water? How would you possibly get this water you are referring to? How can I get this living water that will forever satisfy my thirst? Wait –

Why do you mention my husband? What is that to you?

How do you know me, Jesus? How do you know me?

Jesus has never met this woman before, but he does know her. And he doesn’t shame her or look down on her.

One thing you notice in this story is that both Jesus and this woman have the traveler’s mindset; they are open to seeing things in a way they haven’t before; they are open to learning something new. They are having a real, authentic, and meaningful conversation.

When you have a conversation, there are two sides to it. That is what a conversation is, after all. Each one shares with the other. And you never know, when you enter into a conversation, whether Jesus might be a part of it too.

The prophet Muhammed said, “Don’t tell me how educated you are. Tell me how much you have traveled.” I would modify this to say, “tell me how much you have lived in the world with a traveler’s mindset.”

My mother-in-law, Claire did not get to travel to Burma, because the political situation became too volatile and dangerous; the trip was cancelled. She was deeply disappointed. But she did have other adventures. She traveled to Russia during the Cold War. She traveled to Nicaragua during the revolution. And she had extraordinary, life-changing encounters. But it is also possible to have extraordinary encounters without leaving home, because there are people all around us who have come from all over the world and have lived through extraordinary things.

An encounter with someone different is an invitation to deepen our compassion, to make meaning, to broaden our perspective and our spirit. And it is an opportunity to give the gift of God’s love.

May you open your heart to the encounter, and may you encounter Jesus.

Photo by Vincent Eisfeld on Unsplash

QUEST, Part 1: Leaving Home

 

Exodus 13: 17-21        

Ann Tyler wrote a book called The Accidental Tourist. It is a story about a man who has made a successful career of writing travel books for people who hate travel. His audience is primarily businessmen, for whom travel is a necessary evil in their lives. The books presume that the reader hates leaving the comforts of home just as much as the author does. So he fills the pages with tips on where to find Kentucky Fried Chicken in Stockholm, Taco Bell in Mexico City, and other absurdities. He writes travel guides that let travelers pretend they never left home.

The character, Macon Leary, is quirky and endearing, sort of typical for Ann Tyler’s stories. To say that he is set in his routines is an understatement. He is a man of systems, which he has devised to guard against anything unfamiliar happening to him. He has been living in the same Baltimore neighborhood his entire life; merely venturing into other areas of the city are unnerving to him.

It’s funny that he has found his niche in travel writing. But, of course, it makes for a good story.

One of the most popular real-life travel writers in America is Rick Steves. His Paris guidebook never left my hand during my visit to that city. He guided me through the most famous museums, showing me how to avoid the long lines, and into the most charming, off the beaten path, streets. My trip would have been so much different without his guidance.

You may know him from his TV travel shows on PBS as well. He has a wonderful midwestern accent, folksy style, and a quirky sense of humor that comes across so well.

What you might not know about him is that he is a devout Lutheran. He has spoken often about his faith and how it informs his experience of the world as well as how his experiences in the world inform his faith. For Rick Steves, traveling is an act of spirituality.

That may sound strange. We are accustomed to thinking of travel as having many benefits. It can be restful, getting us away from the daily grind. It can be educational, allowing us to learn about different cultures and lands. It can be profitable, as it was for the businessmen Macon Leary was writing for. Travel can be just fun – as it is for the millions of people who travel every year to Disney World, Broadway shows, Las Vegas casinos, or the Ocean City beach. But is travel something spiritual?

The business of moving from one place to another actually takes up a lot of space in the scriptures. Much of the biblical story takes place on the road. Or in the water. Or, as in the scripture today, in the wilderness. And all these travels we read of in the Bible – were they just necessary evils, like they were for Macon? Or is the journey a part of God’s plan?

The more time you spend with the story of the Exodus, the more you realize that the journey itself was as important as the destination. Maybe even more important.

The people of Israel did not imagine they would be journeying anywhere, anytime. They were stuck in Egypt. They were enslaved by Egyptian rulers and forced into hard labor, building monuments to glorify Pharaoh. The Exodus story tells us they had fallen into this situation sometime after Joseph died, when the rulers of Egypt forgot all that Joseph and the Lord had done for them. And they were consumed by fear of the Israelites, so they did what fearful people often do: they brutalized them.

This went on for hundreds of years, until God lifted up for them a leader – Moses. Moses led them out of Egypt and through the wilderness, toward the land that God promised to them.

The journey was long. Forty years they spent in the wilderness, leaving us to scratch our heads, wondering why. Did the lose their way? Were they having trouble deciding which way to go? What was the reason it took so long?

And the answer I come to again and again is this: it wasn’t about the destination. It was all about the journey. The time spent away from home was time for them to grow spiritually.

It was time for them to learn about the ways of God and draw closer to God. It was time for them to learn how to live in obedience to God; to learn how to worship.

It was a time for them to learn something about who they were, as a people. You see, they didn’t really know who they were. They had only ever been slaves in Egypt. They needed to learn to know themselves as free people in the world.

The Exodus story is one that speaks to many peoples and many times. It certainly spoke strongly to the Black slaves in America before the Civil War. In fact, it was such a powerful story, the white slaveowners made every effort to hide it from them. Special slave Bibles were printed that omitted the Exodus story and various other parts of the Bible that might inspire Black slaves to imagine themselves as free human beings.

That is how powerful the story was.

The Exodus is just as powerful today, and it speaks broadly to all of us. Because there are so many ways to be enslaved – very often enslaved to our own devices.

The character Macon, in Ann Tyler’s book, appears that way to me. He has drawn his life so close, so small, because everything else seems frightening. He becomes a slave to his rigid systems and he knows no way out. When certain things happen that disrupt his systems, Macon finds himself in a kind of wilderness.

What Macon needs is a guide to get him through the wilderness. He finds one. But I won’t spoil the story – you might want to read it.

We all need guides when we set out to explore unfamiliar territory. The Israelites needed Moses to guide them toward taking that first step out of Egypt, leaving what had been for them the only home they had ever known. That first step might be the hardest one of all. Not to say that they didn’t want to turn back many times during the journey. They couldn’t have done it without Moses, and Moses couldn’t have done it without God guiding him.

And where would any of us be if they had not made the journey?

Travel is a spiritual act because it allows us to grow.

When the Israelites left home and ventured into the wilderness, when Macon Leary ventured out of his comfort zone, when we get in a plane or our cars and go out to explore new places, we have the opportunity to learn something new about the world and learn something new about ourselves. Encountering a new place is a gift that allows us to broaden our perspective, and as Rick Steves says, the most beautiful souvenir is a broader perspective.

All kinds of strange and wonderful things happen to us when we venture out into the world. We see that God created people and places that are so different from the people we know and the places we live.

When we go out into the world we learn that we can do more than we ever thought we could. We find, perhaps to our surprise, that there are good and generous and helpful people everywhere. We carry home with us some of our best stories, and we never tire of telling others about the time in Mexico City when we followed a woman onto a subway train, not knowing if something terrible or wonderful would happen. That’s one of my stories. I will tell it to you sometime, if I haven’t already.

When we travel we see the world God created. And in the process, we see God.

During the next few weeks we will spend some time thinking about the things that happen when we travel – the encounters we have, the ways these encounters give us opportunity to reflect on our lives, our beliefs and assumptions, and then be transformed.

After a year and a half of being mostly homebound, some of us are raring to go, while others are still hesitant. And yet others are simply unable to go anywhere. Travel is not available to all of us. But what we might call the traveler’s mindset is something that is available to all of us. Regardless of whether we go anywhere, we all can look at the world with wonder and curiosity, and a willingness to learn and grow.

The people of Israel could not take possession of the promised land unless they sojourned in the wilderness. That is the reality. So it is that we cannot take full possession of our identity as God’s beloved children, until we spend some time sojourning. Whether we hit the road or stay at home, the journey begins with the first step. A willingness to move out of our safe space, our comfort zone, and look at the world with new eyes. To surrender our judgment and preformed opinions. Or, as Rick Steves says, to let the road be our church.

Photo by Mantas Hesthaven on Unsplash

REST

 

Exodus 20:8–11

Let’s take a moment to try something. Think about the last 24 hours of your life. And make a list of three people who were a part of it – in big or small ways. They might even be strangers, whose names you don’t know. Then list three things that you engaged with – things you made, washed, ate, threw away, something you did something with.

Now list three choices that you said yes or no to. Can you see how in each of these things, people, actions you listed you were entering into God’s creative field? How does it feel to think of yourself and your daily life in this way?

The creative process that we have been talking about these past six weeks is really just the natural flow of our lives. When you analyze it, you could break it down into six stages. But we do better to imagine them as waves in a cycle, a cycle that continually plays out – the cycle of God’s creativity.

We began with the dream. Every creation begins with a dream – before the work begins we have to dream up what we want to create. The dream of some possibility that doesn’t already exist. Our ability to dream is essential for us to be able to envision God’s kingdom and then begin the work of bringing it to fruition.

Next is the hovering. God hovered over the waters at the very beginning, and each day God brought some more order to the universe. We too must practice hovering, which I think closely aligns with the incubation stage of creativity. The process of creating is a combination of making something happen and letting something happen, so sometimes we step out of the way and let it happen.

And then, at the right time, we step forward and take a risk, we try something new, not knowing how it will turn out. But if we don’t try it we will never find out.

Then we step back again. We listen. We watch. We pay attention to what happens with the new thing we put into the world. We pay attention to what might be the next step, the next right thing to do.

And then we re-integrate. Everything new must find its place in the world. The old must make way for the new. Every time something changes everything changes. This world is in a constant state of creation.

Constant! And it could be thoroughly exhausting – if we did not include rest.

Rest was an essential part of God’s creation of the world. On the seventh day God rested from all the work that God had done. God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, according to the story of creation in Genesis. And so from this we derive the laws regarding the sabbath day.

We have this text from Exodus, which clearly states that the seventh day, the sabbath day, is for rest, not work. And the law then proceeds to delineate everything that cannot be done on the sabbath day, everything that counts as work.

It can seem to verge on extreme. I thought so when I was in college and shared a dorm suite with a Jewish student. She asked me to leave the bathroom light on from Friday evening through Saturday evening because she was not permitted to turn a light switch. This was considered operating machinery, work, which is forbidden. If I forgot and turned the switch off, she explained to me, she would have to use the bathroom in the dark. To be helpful, she would leave a little note on the switch each week, in case I forgot.

It seemed a little bit silly to me. Although I have come to understand since then that the sabbath restrictions are a way of articulating a rhythm, the rhythm of God’s creation which includes rest. I have grown to appreciate the rhythms of daily life under the law for Jews who live lives of observance.

Still, I think it might feel suffocating at times. Because I think that Jesus felt that. Mark’s gospel tells a story of a time Jesus and his disciples were walking through fields of grain, and as they walked they plucked off some heads of grain. It was the sabbath day. The Pharisees watching them charged them with breaking the law. Plucking grain was forbidden because it was work. But Jesus turns to them and reinterprets the law. He says, “The sabbath was made for humankind, not humankind for the sabbath.” In other words, God does not intend for us to be slaves to the sabbath.

Jesus did all kinds of unlawful things on the sabbath day, like healing people of their afflictions. As he did with so many aspects of the law, Jesus challenged the traditional understanding of it.

Not to say that Jesus was opposed to rest, however. For he also said, “Come to me all you who are weary and carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matthew 11:28-29).

Eugene Peterson, in his translation of the scriptures called The Message, says it this way: Learn the unforced rhythms of grace.

Jesus moves our understanding of sabbath away from a rigid form we force ourselves into, toward a delicate, gentle, rhythm of finding grace.

Perhaps I am treading into a minefield when I say this, but I wonder if we let church become a form we force ourselves into, rather than allowing it to be a gentle rhythm of God’s grace.

I say this out of love for the church and concern for the church’s life. Because too many people have walked away from the church because it felt like this to them – rigid, joyless, something that just didn’t fit. Something lacking that gentle rhythm of grace.

If we allow the church to become just work, we have lost our place in the rhythm of God’s creativity. To the extent that we shut out dreaming, we lose our rhythm. To the extent we shut out play, to the extent we shut out rest, we lose our rhythm – the unforced rhythm of God’s grace.

We give it up for the sake of the artificial rhythms of religion.

We need the holy, creative, playful, loving Spirit now more than ever.

Photo by Agence Olloweb on Unsplash

Photo by Agence Olloweb on Unsplash

RE-INTEGRATE

1 Corinthians 12:12-19

Some years ago my sister gave me a gift of a beautiful hand-made clay pot. It has gingko leaves decorating the surface of it. I loved it immediately. But I didn’t know, immediately, what to do with it. So I set it on the kitchen counter. I spend a lot of time in the kitchen, so I looked at it many times every day. I moved it around as needed while I worked. I wrote my sister a note to thank her for the gift. In the note I told her I was waiting for it to show me how it wants to be used.

And eventually it did. It makes a wonderful napkin holder. To this day it remains in the kitchen (having lived in several kitchens by now), on a shelf, holding the napkins. It is beautiful. I get to look at it every day. And it has a purpose.

What more could you ask for?

The book that I have been reading, called Drawn In, says that everything is created with a purpose. Nothing is created simply for itself. Now this doesn’t mean that everything must be utilitarian, that nothing can be valued just for its beauty. Because, of course, beauty is in itself a purpose. We admire beauty, and find joy from being in its midst. But even beauty wants to be useful, engaged with – that is how beauty becomes a part of our lives. 

When we talk about these things – how a creation is used, how it is valued, it is a question of economy. That might seem like an odd word to use, but economy is essentially about how we manage our stuff. And there are many ways of doing that.

I read something interesting about Native American economy. Before the Europeans came to America, the Native American tribes practiced a kind of gift economy. They gifted pipes to one another. The pipes served as a symbol of how they had interacted with one another, of the generosity they had experienced from one another. For example, the Lakota tribe would give a pipe to the Cherokee tribe. Later when the Apaches met the Cherokees the pipe would be passed to them, and they would give one of their pipes to the Cherokees.

When the Europeans arrived and began to establish friendships with the Native American tribes, the tribes gave them pipes too. But the Europeans were not familiar with this form of gift economy. They would accept the pipe and put it in a trophy case, because it was so cool. They would see the pipe as an acquisition. Much to the dismay of the Natives, their pipes were taken out of circulation. The tribesmen learned in this way that the European men did not see the world and all that is in it the same way they did. 

This idea of gifting and sharing freely the stuff of creation has somehow managed to come up in multiple ways for me recently. Last week several of us got together to have a conversation about the first of our Summer Reads – The Girl Who Smiled Beads. It is a true story about a girl, Clementine, who escaped the Rwandan genocide when she was six years old. She and her older sister then made their way through one refugee camp after another for about six years. Eventually they came to the United States.

Clementine shares a saying that she first learned from her mother, which was repeated by her older sister: Nothing is yours; everything is yours. This is the notion that everything in this world is created by God, created for the use of all God’s people. Everything is yours. But nothing is yours. It is a gift from God and is meant for sharing.

Nothing is yours; everything is yours. This, of course, runs up hard against some sayings we have in our country: like, to the victor goes the spoils. Or, he who dies with the most toys wins.

The morning after our book discussion, I was listening to a podcast that was titled, Why Do We Work So Much? A few decades ago, economists believed that by the time we reached the 21st century, Americans would only need to work about 15 hours a week to meet our needs, that we would be full to overflowing with free time. But what they didn’t anticipate is that our “needs” would continually outrun our ever-increasing abundance. We have more than we have ever had before. But we “need” more than we ever have before.

On this podcast I listened to an anthropologist describe his experience living amongst a tribe in southern Africa, one of the last remaining hunter-gatherer societies. He explains some of the systems this tribe has worked out to prevent any member from acquiring too much more than others – too much stuff, too much success, too much admiration. They understand that the survival of their society depends on being able to maintain a basic equality.

And so if one man has a good combination of skill and luck and manages to hunt down a giraffe, when he brings it home to the tribe, this is what he gets: he is mocked; he is criticized. And he puts up with it. You see, he knows that he has done a great thing, and he knows that the others are aware of it. But he also knows that he doesn’t survive solely by his own skills. He is a part of a society in which they are all dependent on one another for survival. He is willing to tolerate the ribbing for the sake of the whole body.

To know that the whole body is vital – this is key.

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. These are the words Paul writes to the Corinthian church, words they evidently needed to hear for the sake of their own survival. 

The church in Corinth was suffering from an inequality problem. Some of the members of the new church brought some old values in with them and these old values were threatening to destroy the church that had been created. Some of the people were wealthy. And others were poor. Some lived lives of leisure and others were slaves. They brought this hierarchical way of being and seeing into the church.

For example, it seems that there was a great inequality when it came to food. The church would gather for a meal. And the upper-class members, those who didn’t work, came early to the feast. They helped themselves to all they wanted. But the members who were slaves couldn’t get there early. They were late to arrive, and when they got there they might find that the food was already gone. Outrageous. What kind of a system was this, where the ones with the most would have first pick of the bounty? And the ones who had the least would be the last? 

What kind of system was this? It may have been the norm in the Roman Empire. And it may be the norm in the United States of America. But it is not the norm in the kingdom of God. For we know what Jesus said – that the last shall be first and the first shall go to the back of the line. In God’s realm, there is enough for everyone. Everything is yours; nothing is yours.

Paul is concerned about getting this Corinthian church back on track with the gospel, and he begins to teach them with this useful metaphor: that the church is a body – the body of Christ – and every member of the body has value. Every member has a purpose. No member of the body can go it alone. 

The members of the southern African tribe have a way of recognizing this truth and putting it to work. When the hunter comes home with the giraffe, and after he is duly mocked, it comes time to distribute the meat. But who gets to do that? Is it the privilege of the hunter to give out the meat? In fact, no. The tribe has determined that whoever made the arrow that killed the giraffe is the owner of the meat. Whoever made the arrow has the privilege and responsibility of giving out the meat. And there is a very important reason why.

It takes a great deal of physical fitness to be a successful hunter. But arrow-making is different, someone who is old can make an arrow. Someone who is lame or sickly or slow can make an arrow. In fact, they might make the best arrows.

This is what it is to live in community. The first shall be last and the last shall be first, Jesus said. The members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and those members that we think are less honorable we clothe with greater honor, Paul said.

Everything God created has a purpose, has a place. Do we really think we know better? Can we not accept the value God places on everything and everyone God creates?

When we fulfill our role as co-creators with God, we will have to face the questions about what purpose the new thing has, where does the new thing go? How does it fit into the existing creation? And to do this we must be able to see things in a new way – whether it is a new pot or a new relationship or a new recognition of value where we did not recognize value before. We must be able to let go of the things of the past that block the way now, while holding onto the things from the past that will carry us into the future. Always sorting. Always discerning, always adapting.

We cannot insist that the old way is the right way and the new way is wrong. Neither can we insist that the new way is always right and what is old is wrong. Neither of these is true. What is true is this: God has made us for one another. We are co-creators in this work of community. We are the body of Christ stumbling around on this path toward making God’s dream a reality. 

Photo Credit: https://unsplash.com/photos/BELycSEckCc?utm_source=unsplash&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=creditShareLink