The Music of Our Lives

1 Chronicles 16:8-13 

So much of the music of our faith comes from King David. I think primarily of the Psalms, which were written as worship songs, prayers, even sometimes including instructions for the musicians. We have David to thank for many of the Psalms.

David was a fascinating man. I imagine that the people around him, men and women alike, were captivated by him. Some may have mightily resented him, such as King Saul, but they probably found him irresistible, in spite of themselves. 

According to the scriptures, David was a warrior with a sensitive soul. The story of Goliath tells us that, even as a child, he would stand up to any enemy, no matter the size. So great was his confidence in his God – and in himself as God’s instrument. But he also enjoyed dancing and singing and playing the lyre.

He used his musical gifts diplomatically. When he was young, King Saul employed David in his court. But he seemed conflicted in his feelings about David being in his court. Perhaps he found David threatening – he certainly had reason to find David threatening. But David knew his music would soothe Saul’s troubled spirit, so he played for him. And it almost always did soothe him. Music can have such a powerful affect on our bodies, our minds, our spirits.

Most of what we know of David is from the books of Samuel and Kings, and these stories portray David in all his humanity. We see his extraordinary gifts along with his deep flaws; everything about David, it seems, was king-sized. His ambitions were enormous.

Becoming king over Israel was the achievement of one great ambition, but it was not the end of David’s ambition. He wanted more – so much more. He wanted his kingdom to grow, and so he needed a well-placed fortress of a capital city. Jerusalem was perfect. High on a hill with terrific views all around, it would be hard to sneak up on this city. As Frederick Buechner says, a blind man and a cripple could hold it against the US Marines. No one could capture this city, the Jebusites said. But David did. He took possession and he renamed it The City of David. In the city of David, Israel would grow powerful.

But David was not only ambitious, he was also wise, and he knew it would take more than geography and his personal charisma to accomplish what he wanted. It would take the help of God. He needed to know that God was with him; the people of Israel needed to know that God was with them. and so as soon as he had the city secured, he went after the ark of the covenant.

The ark was a wooden box as old as Moses. Literally. When Moses led Israel out of the bondage of Egypt, they set up camp in the wilderness. They built a tent of worship that was the center of their life for those forty years. The tent was a holy place, and in the center of the tent was the holy of holies: the inner sanctuary.

And in the sanctuary sat this wooden box, the ark, overlaid with gold. On top of the ark there were two cherubim, facing each other with their wings outstretched toward each other – they protected the ark and its contents. The box had rings on each corner and through the rings would fit long poles – this way the ark could be carried from place to place without human hands touching it. Inside the box, the Lord tells Moses, you shall put the covenant that I will give you.

The covenant is, of course, God’s promises to Israel; the covenant is the foundation of the relationship between Israel and the Lord. It is everything God will do and be for them and everything God expects from them. It is said that the box held the stone tablets that Moses brought down from the mountaintop, with the Ten Commandments engraved on them. It is also said that the ark may have contained some worship implements, but no one really knows what was in the ark. We don’t know what was in it, but we do know how important it was. In Exodus, the Lord says to Moses, build this according to my instructions – and there I shall meet you.

By the time David conquered the city of Jerusalem, the ark had fallen on hard times. It was captured by the Philistines at one point, according to Samuel, but it seemed to be bad luck for them and they returned it to Israel, along with apology gifts. Once back in Israel’s possession, it sat in storage for 20 years. But David felt the ark should be in Jerusalem, so that Israel would know that God was with them.

So David put together a crew of men who would go out to retrieve the ark and carry it to its new home – Jerusalem, the City of David. They knew the rules for transporting it. They took the long poles and inserted them in the rings, then four men lifted the poles over their shoulders. They took the ark and placed it on a cart pulled by oxen, and they began the long journey back to Jerusalem.

But something happened. One of the oxen stumbled. Uzzah, who was driving the oxen, reached out a hand to steady the ark, only meaning to protect it from harm. But Uzzah had done what was prohibited – he touched the ark – and he was struck dead on the spot.

Not surprisingly, this struck a chord of alarm in David. So, he changed his plans. He wasn’t sure he wanted to be too close to the ark. Thus, the ark of the covenant was taken to the house of some guy named Obed-edom. I can’t tell you much about Obed-edom except that he fared well – no lives were lost while the ark was in his house.

David must have had the nagging feeling that this reflected poorly on him, though, to be afraid of the ark, so within a few months they went out and retrieved it, once again with the plan of bringing it to Jerusalem.

This time they took even more care than the first time. And when they came into the city of Jerusalem, there was great rejoicing. There was shouting and cheering and the sound of trumpets. David kicked up his legs and danced before the Lord with all his might, the scriptures say. And he sang this song:

O give thanks to the Lord, call on his name, make known his deeds among the peoples. Sing to him, sing praises to him, tell of all his wonderful works. Glory in his holy name; let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice. Seek the Lord and his strength, seek his presence continually. Remember the wonderful works he has done, his miracles, and the judgments he uttered, O offspring of his servant Israel, children of Jacob, his chosen ones.

David was a great man. But in his best moments, he merely pointed the people toward their even greater God. And David, perhaps, did it best of all because he did it with song, one of the sweetest of God’s gifts to the world.

So much of the music of our lives comes to us from David. Songs of praise and thanksgiving, but also songs of lament and even anger. There is no human feeling that cannot be expressed in song. And, somehow, after we sing about it, we feel better.

All thanks and praise be to God, the giver of song.

  

Walking Alongside

Psalm 23   

John 10:11-18     

The novelist Annie Proulx wrote a book called Accordion Crimes, in which the main character is an accordion. Really. The story follows the travels of the accordion over a hundred years and three continents. The people in the story come and go, and one of the characters, who has a very small role in the story, is a Basque shepherd in Montana, Javier. Javier is very briefly the owner of the accordion, and he cleans it, repairs it, and makes lovely heartfelt music with it for his sheep, until he dies of a snakebite. In Accordion Crimes, most of the humans die unfortunate deaths.

The shepherd lasts for only a few pages in the story, but he managed to make a strong impression on me – so much that, having read this book 20 years ago, I remembered him more than any other characters.

I have never known a shepherd, but I have heard that they tend to be unusual individuals. It probably takes a certain type of person to live such a solitary life, solely devoted to the sheep. Traditionally, the shepherd would have no family ties, no property of his own – essentially no life outside of tending the sheep. His sole purpose in life is to care for the sheep.

Annie Proulx portrays the Basque shepherd, Javier, as a man who loves the solitude of the pasture, the company of the sheep as opposed to the company of other humans. She makes it clear that the shepherd is anxious for other humans to leave so he can return to his comfort zone. It struck me reading this, how content he seemed to be, happy even, amongst the sheep. 

In just a few pages, we get that this man has become a bit of an oddball. For so long has he been living the life of a nomad, high in the mountains, isolated from society with only the sheep for company, that he is uneasy in the company of people. Perhaps it wasn’t always this way, but after so long it has become the case, that he is more at ease with the sheep than he is with other people. The shepherd is an outlier in the world.

So, thinking about the oddness of shepherds, I find myself wondering in what sense God is like the shepherd. In what sense is Jesus like the shepherd? In what sense should you and I, possibly, be like the shepherd?

Is it God’s desire for us to be oddballs?

Everyone knows, when we read the passages of scripture that speak of God as the good shepherd, that it is a metaphor. There are plenty of Bible passages that are hotly debated about whether they should be understood in a literal or a metaphorical sense, but not these. There is no one arguing that God is a literal shepherd, and we are literal sheep. I am sure I don’t need to convince you of this.

Nor do I need to convince you that this is a useful metaphor. We are in well-trod territory, and I don’t need to spend a lot of effort on the comparison. We need God’s care and guidance and protection – period. God cares for us, guides us, and protects us – period. And it is worthwhile today, as it is every day, to contemplate the many ways we experience God’s care, guidance, and protection in our lives. It is good to recall, as David does in the psalm, all the ways God has been a constant presence in our lives. How and when has God provided for your wants and needs? How and when has God led you beside still waters, given you rest and restoration? How and when has God led you in righteous paths and guarded you from evil?

And, as David says, surely this goodness and mercy shall be with me all throughout my life, thanks be to God.

And the image of the shepherd, as Jesus takes it up and develops it further, celebrates the intimacy between the shepherd and the sheep. I know my own and my own know me, says the good shepherd. They know one another, the sheep and the shepherd, the sound of their voices are familiar to one another, and the sheep trust the shepherd. What’s more, lest we, the sheep, ever feel like we are an elite and exclusive flock; that we are somehow superior to other sheep; Jesus adds these important words: I have other sheep, outside of this fold, and I must bring them too. 

Such assurances of God’s love are enormously comforting. It is good to remember how loved and cared for we are. But I can’t help but think that is not all there is to it. As great as this is, it is not all there is to it.

The times in our lives when we feel the need most strongly for a shepherd are the times when we feel the lowest. When we feel out of our depth, drowning, lost. When we are feeling the grief of loss, we need the comfort of the good shepherd. When we feel the pain of sickness, we need the comfort of the good shepherd. When we feel hopeless and without direction, we need the comfort of the good shepherd. Anyone does – even those who don’t know they need it; even those who don’t know the good shepherd.

Even those who don’t know these extraordinary words of scripture sometimes need the good shepherd. Even those who don’t have a relationship with the God we know sometimes need the good shepherd. But how do they find this good shepherd and receive these comforts?

In our Tuesday Bible study last week, we discussed the words of the Great Commission from Matthew 28: Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” Around the table, we talked about whether these words are still relevant to us, the church of today. Was Jesus actually talking to us when he said these words? Did he mean for us, you and me, to evangelize?

Before you get your hopes up, I should tell you I’m not going to let you off the hook. Because I think he was talking to us when he said these words. When you decide to follow Jesus, following his commands, including telling the good news, is part of the package. But I also think the more fruitful conversation is about how– not if– we should take these words to heart.

I think about the remark that is famously attributed to St Francis of Assisi: Preach the gospel at all times; when necessary, use words. I wonder what this particular image of God, the good shepherd, says to us about preaching the gospel – without words.

Do you remember the song Show Me from My Fair Lady? A young man is hopelessly in love with Eliza and when he has a moment with her he tries to woo her with words of love, and she says:

Words! Words! Words! I’m so sick of words! I get words all day through; first from him, now from you! Is that all you blighters can do? Don’t talk of stars burning above; if you’re in love, show me!

When it comes to love, words are not enough to convince. God knows, this is true.

So when it comes to that person who is all alone with her sadness, her grief, very much in need of a good shepherd, how do we tell her? Do we use words? or might we better show her?

When my daughter Willa was in preschool she had a friend named Emily. Emily suffered from a chronic illness that often caused her a lot of discomfort. Some days Emily came to school feeling miserable. One morning when I brought Willa in, there Emily sat at the table with her head in her hands and tears on her face. The teacher, Miss Dawn, greeted us then looked at Willa and said, your friend needs you. And without a single word, Willa put down her things and sat next to Emily at the table. 

They just sat together silently. All the other children were playing with toys, talking to each other, while Willa and Emily sat silently. I must have had a question on my face, because Miss Dawn explained to me, “It makes Emily feel better. Willa just has a way of being with her that gives her comfort.”

It is something we call a ministry of presence. Willa’s comfort with being beside Emily gave Emily the comfort she needed. The ministry of presence – it is something we are all qualified to do. 

When you read the 23^rdpsalm, look at the ways it describes God’s presence. God doesn’t tell us God is our good shepherd who loves us; God shows us. and God shows us most of all in God’s gift to us of Jesus, who walked alongside us, laid down his life for us, and promises to be with us always. 

Perhaps today we might consider the ministry of presence for ourselves, the ministry of walking alongside those who very much need to know about the good shepherd and his extravagant love. Perhaps today we might consider practicing this ministry.

It doesn’t require that you take a course of study. It doesn’t require ordination. It only requires a willingness to sometimes, yes, be a bit of an oddball.

The world moves away from pain, but the shepherd walks alongside those who are in pain. The world strives to be faster than others, stronger than others, richer than others – but the shepherd walks alongside those others. The world runs and hides from fear and shame, but the shepherd walks alongside those who suffer fear or shame.

The world has little to offer those who need care, guidance, protection. It takes a shepherd – a good shepherd.

May you follow in his paths.

Photo: By 3268zauber - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5074986

What Happens When We Assume?

Mark 11:1-11    

Something kind of funny happened this week. At the sermon roundtable we shared our thoughts about this passage. And in the discussion, it came up how surprised we were that after the big procession into the city with all the pomp and circumstance, when Jesus entered the temple, all he did was look around and leave. Because it was getting late. And this was surprising to us. Is that what he came for?

So there was that – and then later in the week I was looking at some notes from a few years ago when we last looked at this particular passage. And this is the funny thing: three years ago, we had the exact same reaction. We were so surprised that after the big parade, all Jesus did was look around the temple and then leave. Because it was late. And we thought, what was the point of that? Is that what he came for?

I guess consistency is a good thing. But isn’t it funny that it continues to surprise us? especially when we know the story already? Where do these expectations come from? Why do we assume something different will happen?

Not only do we assume something different will happen, but I think Jesus’ disciples who were with him that day also assumed something different would happen – something different than what did happen. Entering the royal city in a royal procession suggests strongly that something else will happen.

Some people expected him to begin the overthrow of the Roman Empire in Palestine. Rome was extraordinarily powerful and threatening and oppressive. Rome was going to be especially threatening this week.

They were entering Jerusalem at the time of the Passover, when tensions would run very high. Think about it: the Passover is the remembrance of the time when God freed the Israelites from slavery in Egypt, and led them to the promised land, a land which they would call their own, this same land that Rome now occupied, where Roman soldiers made an intimidating presence, threatening death by crucifixion for anything that they considered a threat to their power.

The Roman governor of the region, Pontius Pilate, traveled to Jerusalem every year for the Passover week, just to keep an eye on things. He didn’t seem to be particularly fond of Jerusalem. Pilate preferred to stay in Caesarea, because the seaside town was more pleasant for him. But during the Passover his job required him to be in Jerusalem, where he stayed at Herod’s Palace.

And so, we need to recognize the possibility that on that very day when Jesus was leading a procession into the city of Jerusalem from the East, there was another procession coming in from the West – an imperial procession with Pilate at the head, followed by a column of Roman soldiers in armor with weapons.

The contrast would have been striking. The tension would have been great. And it would have been natural for the people to desperately want the kind of savior who would overthrow the bullies from Rome.

Rome ruled by violence. Their strategy was to overwhelm and intimidate. They strove to maintain what they called the Pax Romana, the Roman Peace. But the peace of Rome was nothing other than keeping the inhabitants of the land cowed by an unrelenting threat of violence. And they tried to balance this threat with just enough goodies to keep the populace somewhat content. Bread and circuses.

The film I watched this past week was Gladiator, to get the sense of the violent power of the Roman Empire. Gladiator takes place more than a hundred years after Jesus rode into Jerusalem, but things had not changed all that much. Rome was still dominating a huge chunk of the world. Their army was still projecting power as they rode through the streets, and they were still crucifying anyone who appeared to be a threat to their supremacy.

During our midweek Lent study last week, someone raised a very interesting question. Is it possible that the more violence we are exposed to, the greater becomes our taste for violence? I thought about that while I was watching Gladiator. Because among the great entertainments of the Roman empire were the gladiatorial games, where slaves were sent into the arena to fight and die a gruesome death – just for spectacle.

There is a scene in the film when this group of new gladiators are getting ready for their first time in the arena. The man who bought them and trained them, Proximo, gives them a sort of pep talk.

Proximo tells them: We are all dead men, ultimately. There is no choice about if or how we die. But we do get to choose how we meet our ends and how we will be remembered. In this world of the gladiators, clearly, the preferred choice is to go violently.

The expectation of violence is an interesting thing. As long as we are presented only with violent alternatives, it seems like it’s hard for us to imagine any other kind of alternative. Because, we think, isn’t this just the way the world is?

And wasn’t Jesus addressing that expectation directly when he arrived in Jerusalem that day? In his choices, wasn’t he addressing these expectations?

The choice to ride in on a donkey.

The choice to go directly to the temple – and then walk away from it.

It was a time of high tension in Jerusalem in those days. Consider all the assumptions that were in play: The Roman Empire assumed that there would be violent rebellion, and they intended to quash it. The Jewish zealots assumed that Jesus would lead just such a rebellion, and they intended to be a part of it. The Pharisees and Sadducees assumed he wanted to strip them of their authority, and they intended to prevent it.

I imagine that the crowds who greeted him and followed him into the city assumed he would go into the temple and take his rightful place as the head of this earthly kingdom. And they would have embraced that. But all these assumptions were wrong.

What did Jesus come for? He came to usher in a new kind of kingdom. He came to bring forth a new kind of covenant – a covenant that found its strength not by rule of law, not by rewards and punishments, but by service, by generosity, by sacrifice. And, of course, this covenant was powered by love. This is God’s covenant of grace.

We will see, as the events of the week unfold, just what this entailed for Jesus. This covenant would require great sacrifice from him and the power of that sacrifice to transform people – both friend and enemy – was something no one, apparently, had assumed.

Proximo said, We all die; there is no choice about that. But we do get to choose how we meet our ends and how we will be remembered. Think about what Jesus chose. Think about how he chose to be remembered. Think about what message it holds for us.

As we reach the end of our Lenten examination of God’s covenant, can we perhaps begin to see it in a new way? Can we allow ourselves to imagine that God’s covenant with us, with the world, is different from the world’s ways? And can we imagine that God’s way, a way of love and grace and peace, is an alternative to the world’s way of brutality and violence?

Can we imagine that God is at work in the world, and is calling us to be God’s partners?

What happens when we assume all this is true?

 Photo: Gladiators from the Zilten mosaic, c. 200AD

Marriage Vows

Jeremiah 31:31-34

For this whole season of Lent we have been talking about covenants. It’s a good biblical word, a theological word. But it is not a common, everyday word. We rarely use the word covenant in our daily life. We talk about contracts. We understand contracts much better than we understand covenants. You might say that the language of contract is a language we understand, while covenant language is a different kind of language.

The only exception that comes to mind is marriage. In the church, at least, marriage is spoken of as a covenant between two individuals in the presence of God. Where a contract might be easily nullified if one party breaks it, a covenant involves love and forgiveness. It is not as easy to break a covenant as it is to break a contract. It is not as easy to break a marriage as it is to break a simple contract.

Although we all know it is much easier to be divorced now than it used to be. We talked about this at the roundtable. We felt that it is so different now than it was when we were younger. There is less social stigma attached to it. It is easier for a woman than it was in the old days when she was, in a sense helpless and defenseless without a husband. And, just from a legal perspective, divorce is “no-fault” now, meaning you don’t have to establish that one party was somehow at fault. Usually you only need one of the parties to want a divorce to make it happen.

The laws of divorce differ from state to state, but there are a few states that stand apart in one particular way. They offer a distinct kind of marriage called covenant marriage, where the couple voluntarily put certain restrictions on their future rights to divorce, such as mandatory counseling, a waiting period, or establishment of certain facts. A couple who enters into a covenant marriage is, you might say, making a decision to go against the grain of the culture. They are asking the state to help them handle their marriage in the best way possible. I don’t know how well it works, but I have read that there are very few couples who avail themselves of this option.

Whatever else you might say, I think we can probably agree that marriage is complicated. It is often hard. When marriages last, it is not because it was easy. And when marriages end, they rarely end easily. And it is interesting that God so often compares God’s relationship with Israel to a marriage.

In the book of Jeremiah, it seems at first that there will be a divorce. And this is not a modern no-fault divorce. The word of the Lord comes to the young prophet Jeremiah, laying out the case against Israel – the faithless wife. As a faithless wife leaves her husband, so you have been faithless to me.

At first, the Lord urges the faithless wife to return. Return; I will not look on you with anger, I will not be angry forever. Only acknowledge your guilt. God wants to reconcile.

But soon the tone changes. A few chapters later: How can I pardon you? asks the Lord. You have committed adultery.

And then: I am full of the wrath of the Lord, says Jeremiah, and I am weary of holding it in. For the Lord says, ‘I will stretch out my hand against the inhabitants of the land.’

It is looking more and more like God will, indeed, divorce Israel. And, I imagine it was feeling more and more like that to Israel. Jeremiah was prophesying during a very difficult time in the life of Israel. The kingdom had long ago been divided in two – a kind of divorce in itself – so there was the kingdom of Israel in the north and the kingdom of Judah in the south. Both kingdoms suffered the sieges of other kingdoms – Assyria, the superpower nation, came down from the north and annihilated the kingdom of Israel. Watching Israel go down, Judah desperately tried to avoid that same fate by entering into a relationship with the Assyrians to appease them. Then along comes Babylon from the east, to overpower Assyria and then come knocking on Judah’s door. Judah turns to Egypt in the south, hoping for some protection, but of course Egypt had designs of her own, which didn’t really involve the welfare of Judah. Things were not going well for Judah. Most certainly, Judah – the people of Israel – felt as if the Lord was finally abandoning them.

And Jeremiah wants them to know: it is because you have broken every covenant the Lord has made with you. You have been faithless. And now you will know what it is like to be a woman without a husband; defenseless, without the protection of the Lord.

Thinking about marriage, both literal and metaphorical, the film I watched this past week was The End of the Affair. It’s based on a novel by Graham Greene. It is about a marriage between Sarah and Henry that seems to be a marriage in name only. There is no real love between them, but it is merely habit, convenience. And Sarah falls in love with another man, Maurice. And so there is a sort of love triangle filled with jealousy and resentment and regret.

You realize that Sarah and Henry want to remain faithful to their marriage vows but they don’t seem to know how to work this legal arrangement into their hearts. Each of them wants to do well, to do right by the other, but they cannot seem to. Henry turns to his work, and Sarah turns to Maurice.

It is during the Second World War. And the bombs are falling all over London, it seems. One day while Sarah is with Maurice they are rocked by an explosion and Maurice is blown across the room and falls down a flight of stairs. Sarah goes to him as he lies on the floor covered in blood. She tries to revive him but he appears to be dead. She then does something unusual for her: she falls on her knees in prayer, begging God to bring him back. She promises that she will stop seeing him if God will let him live. Then she hears Maurice call her name and she knows God has heard her prayer – and her promise.

She stops seeing Maurice, never explaining why because he wouldn’t understand. A couple of years later Maurice learns the story of what had happened. He tries to see her again, but she is resistant. There is a scene where he is literally chasing her from one place to another. When he finally chases her into a church Sarah sits beside him in a pew and tries to explain everything to him.

“I have made two promises in my life – to marry Henry and to stop seeing you – and I am too weak to keep either of them,” Sarah tells Maurice. She speaks a sort of universal truth here. We make and break promises so often because our hearts are seeking something that we aren’t quite sure how to find. We make and break promises because we are afraid of losing something we might not have ever really had. We make and break promises because we never let them be written on our hearts.

And I wonder: does Sarah think that if she breaks this promise she made, God will abandon her?

I know that the people of Israel had to have felt that God abandoned them. The Northern Kingdom had been obliterated and now the Southern Kingdom was on the verge of destruction as well. The people were dying or being dragged away from their home. The temple was destroyed. The life they knew so well was being taken from them.

Everything they had been promised was being taken from them, or so it seemed.

Then the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah. The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will be different from the old covenant, for this time it will not be written on tablets of stone. It will be written on their hearts. And I will remember their sin no more.

So. Do we get this? It isn’t especially easy. I think we get this when we understand how completely forgiven we are. We get this when we know how fully and unconditionally God loves us. We get this when we realize that God wants to be intimately involved in every part of our lives. When we really and truly let God into our hearts, let God engrave his promises on our hearts. Then we get it. All thanks be to God.