Through thick and thin

Sermon for Transfiguration Sunday, Feb. 10, 2013 (Luke 9:28-43a) with Ex. 34:29-35 in bg

Do you ever listen -  even to the people you love the very most? I'm not talking about only the words or their meaning,  but to the intent behind them, to the hopes, fears and dreams that our loved ones are attempting to convey by speaking to us with words. To so listen – we need to slow down ourselves, to seek to quieten our beings, to turn off all the dialogues that are going on around us and within us: what we are going to do next, how we agree or disagree with what we are "hearing". Such quietness isn't easy.

 

But there are thin places - places where somehow it seems like we can be closer to each other and even to God. These are places where the gaps or gulf among and between we human beings and God are somehow less than humungous. For the people of Israel one such significant "thin" place was a mountain. Maybe it has to do with the thin air there – or fewer distractive noises, or even the different perspective of the smallness of things that we have temporarily left behind to climb that mountain. Such "things" often preoccupy us. Whatever the case, some of the most significant interaction between God and the people of Israel happens on mountains. Moses receives the Ten Commandments on a mountain. Today we witness Jesus' transfiguration occurring on a mountain.

 

Yet it all seems so removed from us. Have you ever thought, if I could just have one such "direct" experience of God, then I could "truly believe"? Then I would know God beyond the shadow of a doubt. Such thinking or feeling isn't unusual, absurd or even illogical for 21^st century people. We "belong" to a culture and time that attempts to drill into us that is something is real we must be able to see it, taste it, touch it or in some way explain it. We try so very hard to explain everything. Some of this drive to seek understanding is very good. In that struggle we have been led to many discoveries that have furthered, prolonged and blessed life. THANKS BE TO GOD!

 

But there is also much that matters which we can't explain, that we don't understand – wonderful and difficult, awe inspiring and gut wrenching. Why is a baby born to us and for us? Why can't some people who so desperately want a baby, conceive one (especially those who very likely would make wonderful parents)? How can God love us so much that God's only Son is born only to be betrayed and crucified by we human beings, the very ones God so loves? In the midst of God's love for us, why do babies suffer and die, too often even before they are born? Why indeed are so many children born into abject poverty, disease and abuse?

 

You see in addition to "thin" places  there are also "thick" places where it is very difficult  to glimpse any of God's power, beauty or redeeming love. There what we often primarily feel is pain, emptiness, a loss that literally threatens to consume us. Such "places" can crop up at almost any time:  as our phone rings or someone texts us. I received one yesterday. My 93 year old aunt phoned to tell me that my 62 year old cousin has just been diagnosed with inoperable cancer. While seeking to make any sense of this my aunt asked, "Why couldn't it be me, Tim?".... and then in her very next breath added, "Will you pray for us?"

 

Such "thick" places irrupt too often. But our experiences there can also lead us or drive us towards "thin" places where we are somehow better able to listen and vision beyond ourselves – to God!  

 

So it is, Jesus leads James, Peter and John up a mountain. They had been following Jesus around – witnessing his healing and teaching. He had already told them that he soon must go to Jerusalem to be rejected, suffer and die. Could anyone blame them for not being able to "hear" that?   

 

But once up on the mountain Jesus' face begins to glow. Even his clothes dazzle. Peter, James and John are exhausted. Nevertheless they are enabled to glimpse Moses and Elijah, both long since dead and gone, standing there with Jesus. Moses is the bringer of the law from God to the people. In some ways Elijah was the quintessential PROPHET, whom some claimed would show up before God's Messiah, the Chosen One, could appear. Now Peter, James and John hear Moses and Elijah talking with Jesus. It is something about Jesus' departure, Jesus' accomplishing his exodus!

 

Peter wants to stay there – to build booths reminiscent of that first Exodus when God miraculously delivered the people out of slavery in Egypt. But as Peter begins to speak a cloud overshadows them, interrupting him and terrifying all 3 disciples.  Together they hear a voice telling them that Jesus is God's CHOSEN. They are to LISTEN TO HIM!

 

So, I wonder. Do you ever listen to yourself, to what's really going on in and around you? There is so much. Lots of it, points us beyond ourselves. As we actually hear what's going on we begin to realize our ongoing need for God's help, not to escape this world, or even to cling to an otherworldly glory. Instead we need God's help to realize that we are not alone, to experience God's love and care for us and for the world and to be enabled to trust and hope that God is working to lead us through whatever may come - to new beginnings. Nor is this work of God only for us. It is  for this whole crazy, amazing and sometimes nasty world.

 

On our own it's impossible – to so believe and hope. To quote a former confirmation student, "faith is believing without having proof. Sometimes, it can be hard to have faith in yourself, in others and even faith in God." How right she is. Hard – even impossible.

 

But then, miraculously, even this moment, this place, can become a "thin" place for us. We are by God's help gathered into Christ, achieving not only his "exodus" but also ours. We can be dragged along by Him to "Jerusalem", to the Mount of Olives, to Gethsemane and even to Calvary. The worst in the world have their way with him. It is so dark, so horribly hard. All feels so LOST!

 

Christ absolutely refuses to use any violence, hatred or might to quell the violence, hatred and might directed towards him. How those forces conspire and rage against him, sometimes against us and so many others! Be in a room where the decision must be made to remove life support of one you love. Or, listen in a court room when a decision is made that to all appearances and experience of ours is totally unjust. Or, weep beside the grave of one you love and so desperately miss. Such forces can rage and foment. . .

 

But also know this: the darkness, the injustice, the grief, as real as they are, as interminable as they feel, ARE NOT ETERNAL. By Christ's exodus there comes a third day. And, on that third day, somehow, some way this One who has died accomplishes his exodus for you and for me. His "exodus" is intended for all who will ever live. He invites us to come towards that thin place of his suffering and death where we begin to glimpse and experience His amazing irregular power, back with him into the muck and muddle of life. He calls us to dare to be with and for each other – in all the experiences of life and death, of weeping and laughing, of crying and singing, dancing and kneeling - through thick and thin. For this One, this Jesus is God's chosen. We must, we can, together LISTEN TO HIM. Yes, by God's grace we can  follow this CHOSEN ONE. Amen. 

Words in our Mouths?

4^th Sunday after Epiphany, Feb. 3, 2013

Jeremiah 1:4-10 with I Cors. 13 and Luke 4:21-30 b.g.

Words are powerful. We are capable of speaking words that build up, construct, excite, create new life: "I love you. Will you marry me?" "I'd like to have a child. Do you want to have a child?" "I will never leave you." "How can I help you?"

 

But we are also capable of speaking words that hurt, destroy, demean, debase. "I hate you. You are stupid. You are dumb. I don't care. You are UGLY!"

 

There are also other words, cuss words, profane words that so often are used to express hurtful feelings that their original meanings have been lost. When these words are directed to us we are hurt.  We know such words all too well.  On occasion they have been aimed at us. We may have yelled them out loud or thought them in our minds towards others out of our frustration, anger, lashing out at perceived wrong doing to ourselves... Such are the power of  WORDS.

 

But words never stand in isolation. They are uttered and received in a context – from one person to another, from one group to another. Words are never just "out there" – disembodied, neutral or meaningless.  

 

This is also true of God's communication with us. God sent prophets, of whom Jeremiah was one, to speak on God's behalf to us. But we human beings often prove to be less than receptive to God's prophets. At a particular point of history God decides upon a more direct approach. The Gospel of John tells us, And the WORD became FLESH and dwelt (lived) among us – full of grace and truth. That WORD from God to us is JESUS of Nazareth. We have somehow been joined to him- in our baptism. Even now, we are privileged to hear God speaking to us via Scripture and the Sacrament of Holy Communion. As God becomes this Word, God is, to use a poker term, ALL IN. It's not like the chicken who for a long time graciously just gives us eggs. It's more like the turkey on our plates at Thanksgiving Time.

 

God is ALL IN FOR US AND FOR THE WORLD!  How can we not know that – as we celebrate Christmas, mark Holy Week, especially Good Friday? How can we not be grasped and embraced by God's love as we gather regularly under the reality of the cross? How can we not be captured by God's love for us as we breathe, think, eat, love, laugh and cry? Whom do we think gives us all these capacities, including the people who love us, who have forgiven and do forgive us, who made sacrifices so that we can be here, who even now pray for us? Could we ever deserve any of this?    All these are gifts sent from the loving, merciful and just God.

 

On this confirmation day I want to ask an important question? Would this God who humbles Him/Herself to become flesh in order to speak directly to us, ever put words in our mouths? Would that God ever expect or hope that our lives would speak some of God's "word" to others – to individuals, to groups, maybe even to a large group or a nation?

 

Could God, would God expect anything of you – of Miranda, of Cassandra, of Kara, or of any of us who are older, perhaps more jaded or more "experienced"?

 

Jeremiah was only, in his words, a "boy" when God touched his mouth. The Hebrew word here doesn't necessarily mean touch gently, but can be rendered "shocked" or "jolted". Maybe there was a mark or a sore spot left after God had "touched" him. Jeremiah isn't originally thrilled about this. Would you be? The Lord God says that the words given to Jeremiah are to be addressed to NATIONS and KINGDOMS (not just friends or neighbors) – to pluck up and pull down, to destroy and to overthrow. Only after such honest confrontation will the words God gives to Jeremiah function to build and plant. Is it any wonder that Jeremiah comes up with an excuse not to answer God's call: he is too young! It's what we might do if somebody asked us to do something that's really overwhelming – even if it's our congregation's nominating committee.

           

o you notice what God does next? God addresses Jeremiah's excuse directly – "Do not say, 'I am only a boy'; for shall you go to all to whom I send you, and you shall speak whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you!"

 

Jeremiah does go – continually to listen for God and then to speak God's Word into the middle of his living situation. Jeremiah does this both with words, but also, just as importantly, with the way he lives his life. This is anything but easy for him. Jeremiah often struggles. But He obeys anyway. Then, eventually as he is listening to God Jeremiah is enabled to share with his people and now us the reality that God is doing a new thing. God is writing a promise upon the hearts of people that cannot and will not be destroyed!

 

Kara, Miranda and Cassandra – I cannot and do not know where your life's journeys will take you. Your journeys will at times be both exciting and frightening. I am convinced that God has words to place in your mouths – in the very center of your lives. The most important Word for all of us is Jesus. He is born, lives, suffers, dies and is raised so that we and all the world may realize that death, evil, our own shortcomings – even those drives within us that sometimes are so less than beautiful are not to be the controlling or defining parts of our lives. Instead God can direct us and even transform our thoughts dreams through Jesus Christ. We like Jeremiah can listen for God. This God can bring us, others and this world new life – not in some sentimental easy fashion – but through the very giving first of Christ's life and love for all. In  we are enabled to compassionately share our lives with others. That is God's call upon all of us in our baptism: to bear God's creative and redeeming word to all the world. What challenge! What privilege! What a frightening and exciting responsibility!

 

May we also know this. We might only be boys or girls, young or old men or women,  highly educated or have little no formal education. But the One who chooses us, this God of the universe, this One who becomes the Word in flesh to us and for the world also wills to be with us in order to equip us for the privilege, the responsibility of speaking and living out the words God places in our lives. For God - Father, Son and Holy spirit will not abandon us. On that we can depend and so live and speak. Hold this promising reality close to your hearts and minds, now and forever. And then: dance and sing, play and cry, dream, question and think. For Christ's sake, all of this will be amazing. Amen.