Providence (or "No Bad Deed Goes Unredeemed?")

June 28, 2009
A Sermon preached by Marci Auld Glass
at Southminster Presbyterian

Genesis 44:18 to 45:15

This morning we are dropping into the middle of the story of Joseph.
So let me give you a little context. The story of the family of Jacob begins in Genesis 37. Joseph is Jacob’s second youngest son, and the first-born son of Jacob’s favorite wife, making him Jacob’s favorite son. Joseph is also a dreamer. And his dreams get him in trouble, because he dreams that his older brothers will bow down and honor him. So, what happens to the favorite, snotty younger brother when Jacob sends him to “see about the shalom your brothers?” (37:14)
First they want to kill him, naturally. They are brothers, after all. But then one of the brothers considers that a bit of an over reaction and they decide to leave him in a pit to die on his own. And remember—people look to scripture to support “family values”. Eventually, they sell him to traders, dip his coat in goat’s blood and take it home to dad and say, “gee, dad, we don’t know what happened to him?”

Joseph ends up working for the pharaoh of Egypt—it’s a great story. If you haven’t read it, I invite you to spend some time with it this week. And in the intervening years, a famine comes upon the land. Because of Joseph’s dreams and visions, Egypt is well prepared for the famine. The rest of the family of Jacob are not.

The brothers end up encountering Joseph when they come to Egypt seeking food, but they don’t recognize him. He recognizes them, however. He puts one of them in prison, which is still better than leaving them in a pit or selling them to traders, but tells the others to take grain home to their father and to bring their youngest brother back if they want to save Simeon from prison.

Even though the brothers don’t recognize Joseph, they correctly assume that this development is connected to their earlier actions against Joseph.

They go home and report to Jacob. He rather astutely comments, “I am the one you have bereaved of children. Joseph is no more and Simeon is no more and now you would take Benjamin.”

They run out of grain again, and he tries to send them back. Judah says, “dad, we already told you. We can’t go back unless we take Benjamin. But I promise I’ll take care of him.”
So Judah begins to live into his role as his brother’s keeper.

And then Joseph sets up another plot. This time, he plants a silver cup in Benjamin’s bag and then accuses them of stealing it. And here our text begins, as Judah addresses Joseph.

Jacob had sent Joseph to inquire about the shalom, the well being, of his brothers right before he was sold into slavery. And it is only now, after all these years, that Joseph is able to see to the shalom of his family by saving them from the famine.

But what he can’t quite do is rise above his family system. The dysfunction that led brothers to sell their little brother is still in place. The brothers express their “dismay” when they realize Joseph is still alive. That’s their reaction. If there was joy or celebration, the author doesn’t tell us. Their dismay he noted. And Joseph imprisons Simeon, setting up elaborate plots in order to finally reveal himself to his brothers. And then, when he sends them off to get Jacob, he can’t help but tell them to behave. “Don’t quarrel along the way.” He might just as well have said, (waving) “Have a nice trip! Try not to sell anyone else to slave traders!”

And so, even in a family as dysfunctional as the family of Jacob, God is at work. That is important to remember as you read Joseph. Some commentators want this to be a story about how great Joseph is. But this is a text about how God works through people, even people like Joseph. Because if God can work through the imperfect people who’s lives are chronicled in Scripture, then God can work through you and me.

And Joseph seems to get that too, finally.

“Do not be distressed”, he tells his brothers, “or angry with yourselves. Even if you sold me here, for God sent me here before you to preserve life. God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God.”

Isn’t that impressive? Joseph, who has good reason to be bitter, is not. He sees blessing in his having been sold into slavery by his own brothers. More than that, he sees Divine blessing.
How often are we able to really do that?

I was thinking about the Joseph story on Friday when I spent an unplanned and very long day at the Denver airport while trying to get home from Atlanta. Now I recognize that this illustration is imperfect. Being stuck in an airport is not the same as being sold into slavery, or cancer, or job loss, or war, or whatever it is that really affects people’s lives. I only had an inconvenient day, but I didn’t feel very blessed. I was downright grouchy.

And then I started thinking about Joseph. If he could see God’s hand working for good in the mean and horrible actions of his brothers, surely I could see God working for good in my nasty day at the airport. So I started thinking about my day. Had there been any blessings in it?

And then I realized my blessing that day were the people. I had stood in a customer service line for over an hour, without getting to the front of said line. But in that hour, I talked with a woman who had missed her flight, even though she’d been at the airport on time, because she went to grab breakfast and lost track of time. She was asking us to help her come up with a story she could tell her mother, other than the truth. Another woman suggested she tell her mother she’d gotten sick from eating bad shrimp.

There was a couple who, because of weather, had missed their connecting flight home from a vacation in Mexico. They were trying to come up with some sort of peaceful protest we “customer service line standers” could wage as we waited.

We pass people by all the time, especially at airports. But we rarely find out their stories because we don’t stop and interact with strangers. I had the whole day to spend in the airport and I interacted with all sorts of people. I chatted with the salesman at the airport bookstore. He recommended all sorts of books for me, and seemed to appreciate someone taking the time to listen to his recommendations. When a flight to Billings that was at the gate where I was hanging out was canceled, I had time to help get a Billings bound man who was in a wheelchair from the canceled gate to some gate agents who could help him so he wouldn’t have to go to that infernal customer service line.

And then, when it was finally time to go to the Boise bound gate, I visited with a couple whose travel had been worse then mine. They were trying to get to their daughter’s graduation and had missed all of the Friday activities while waiting in Denver. After we talked for a while, I realized that their daughter was graduating from the residency where my husband, Justin, works. So, in addition to enjoying our visit at the airport, I made some new friends and their daughter gave me a ride home from the airport at 1:00 in the morning, and then I got to visit with them yesterday at the graduation.

All because we had time.

There is beauty in looking for blessings, in looking for God’s hand, even in the worst situations.
And I think it is related to control. Because we can’t control everything that happens to us. Joseph didn’t pick his family and he didn’t choose to be sold into slavery. We can drive safely and still get in car accidents. We can eat healthy and still get diseases. We can show up on time, but can’t control thunderstorms that cripple the air traffic for a day. There are all sorts of things beyond our control.

But one of the few things in our control is how we see things. When we’re sold into slavery, we can grow bitter and plot revenge against our brothers. Or, like Joseph, we can look for God’s hand in our lives. Not as the cause of the difficulty, but as the redemption of our lives in the midst of the difficulty. And we don’t look for God’s hand in our lives so we can just pretend that everything is fine. Joseph’s brothers needed to apologize to him. The fact that God was able to work in the situation didn’t erase the fact that Joseph’s family had some issues.

The story of God’s working through the dysfunction of the family of Jacob is a good illustration of the concept of providence. Providence comes from the Latin, ‘pro videre’, to fore see, to fore ordain.

Now, providence is not fate. God is not a puppet master. We still have the agency to make decisions and take actions that affect our lives and the lives around us. But providence means that through the good and the bad experiences that happen to us, God is at work, creating new ways for us to see blessing.

Providence is related to the idea of God as creator. The God who created us is still at work, in the midst of everything, creating new life.

The word “life” flows through this Joseph story. “Do not be distressed”, he tells his brothers, “or angry with yourselves. Even if you sold me here, for God sent me here before you to preserve life. God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God.”

And listen to these two questions from the Heidelberg Catechism, which was written in the mid 16th century.

Q. 27. What do you understand by the providence of God?
A. The almighty and ever-present power of God whereby he still upholds, as it were by his own hand, heaven and earth together with all creatures, and rules in such a way that leaves and grass, rain and drought, fruitful and unfruitful years, food and drink, health and sickness, riches and poverty, and everything else, come to us not by chance but by his fatherly hand.

Q. 28. What advantage comes from acknowledging God’s creation and providence?
A. We learn that we are to be patient in adversity, grateful in the midst of blessing, and to trust our faithful God and Father for the future, assured that no creature shall separate us from his love, since all creatures are so completely in his hand that without his will they cannot even move.

Was it providential that I spent that unplanned day in the airport? I can’t quite say that yet. Because that’s another thing about providence—it is best seen when you are looking backward at your life. And I’m still recovering from that long day with no rest. But I am able to see some blessings that were in that day.

My favorite scripture passage, the one that has brought me comfort through many difficult times, is Romans 8:28. “And we know that in all things, God is working for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.”

This passage doesn’t mean that only good things happen to Christians. But it means that through it all, there is nothing that can separate us from the love of God.

So, when your life feels like your brothers have just sold you to traders, remember that even then you are being held in the palm of God’s hand.

And as you go back out into the world, remember that your kindnesses and good deeds may be the providential hand of God in someone else’s life.

Amen.

Blessings and Birthrights

Genesis 25:19-34

A Sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian
June 14, 2009

As a mother of sons, not twins, but sons, I confess that this passage gives me pause. My boys are great kids, and I can’t quite imagine Elliott trying to buy Alden’s birthright for a pepperoni pizza, but after doing 12 years of youth ministry, I do know that adolescence can change people. I have known adolescents who have figuratively sold their birthright for less than a pot of lentils.

But you get the sense, after reading this text, that it wasn’t adolescent angst that led to the split between the brothers. These brothers had been struggling against each other before they were even born. You wonder if, in utero, they knew what they were going to be in for as the children of Isaac and Rebekah. One of them would be loved by mom. One by dad. The affection of their parents would be handed out at a cost. They experienced love that was divisive and bred scarcity.

But, before I bad mouth Isaac too much, we should have some sympathy for him. Isaac, we recall, is the son of Abraham, who was promised to be the ancestor of many generations. Abraham was the receiver of the covenant and the promise. And the narrator of this text makes sure we remember Isaac’s connection to Abraham from the beginning: “These are the descendants of Isaac, Abraham’s son. Abraham was the father of Isaac….” But, for all of Abraham’s fame, he did, we should remember, hike Isaac up a mountain, tie him up, and prepare to sacrifice him on an altar. God intervened at the last minute, offering a ram as a substitute. So, perhaps that is why the narrator reminds us of Abraham. Isaac’s difficulty in relating to his own sons, could be directly connected to his relationship as a son to his father Abraham.

And despite what I suspect was also a conflicted relationship with God after that whole sacrifice plan, Isaac and Rebekah both turned to God and prayed for children. Despite the experiences he had in his own life and his own faith, he prayed to God for descendents, so the promise could continue.

Last week, when reading the Psalms, I noticed the Psalmist referred to God as “the God of Jacob”. Since I’d been thinking about this text, I noticed that in a way I hadn’t before. The God of Jacob? Why not the God of Esau, the eldest son who was tricked out of his birthright and blessing? Why the God of Jacob, the trickster born grabbing his brother’s heel?

The notion of primogeniture, the law that allowed the eldest son to inherit the ranch, has a shaky record in the Bible, beginning with he first inheritors of Genesis, Adam and Eve’s children. Cain murdered his younger brother, Abel, leaving brother #3, Seth to carry on. And on it goes. Isaac was, after all, Abraham’s second son, inheriting the promise instead of Ishmael. And it will happen later with Jacob’s children too. Reuben, Simeon, and Levi are passed over in favor of Judah, son #4. And Joseph, Jacob’s 11th child, will be annoyed when Jacob gives a grandfather’s blessing to Joseph’s youngest son instead of his firstborn. When Joseph tries to stop him, to get him to give the blessing to Manasseh instead of Ephraim, Jacob says, “I know, my son. I know; he also shall become a people, and he also shall be great. Nevertheless his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his offspring shall become a multitude of nations.” (Gen 48:19) What God said to Rebekah when she was pregnant, Jacob then repeats to his son.

The right of the firstborn to inherit is described in Deuteronomy—21:15-17 if you are interested—but it is not spelled out as a law there, only explained. This right was so prevalent across the world that it was just assumed. And as we see in these texts this morning, it was assumed as a reality, even by the men who were the beneficiaries of a subverted inheritance. Isaac, the second son of Abraham was planning on handing on his blessing and inheritance to his oldest son, Esau. Did he forget the grace he received as second son? The sons of Joseph, Jacob’s grandchildren from his 11th child, should never have received their grandfather’s blessing. Yet, when they did, Joseph didn’t notice the grace of that unmerited blessing, and tried to restore the societal order, bringing the blessing to the firstborn.

So, what does primogeniture have to do with us? If you think Jacob and Esau are a story of something that happened long ago and far away, consider this article from the news this past year. A 70 year old woman in India gave birth to twins. She was already a mother of two daughters and grandmother to five, but she and her husband spent their life savings and took out a loan for In vitro fertilization because, and I quote, “We already have two girls but we wanted a boy so that he could have taken care of our property.” The father said, “The desire for a male child has always been there, but God did not bless us with a male child. Now, we are very grateful to God, who has answered our prayers". (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7491782.stm)
The article did not report if either of the children was named “Esau” or “Jacob”.

So, what does primogeniture have to do with us?

My husband and I are planning on dividing our assets equally among our children, as I suspect most of you will too. This practice, so prevalent throughout the world, even today, has lost ground in 21st century America, although I’m sure all of the oldest male children in the room might convincingly argue for its return. No, this isn’t a sermon about estate planning.

Rather, let’s consider how we as Christians, Americans, and Southminster-ans are recipients of the blessings of God. Because the other piece that is almost always at play when you read these narratives from Genesis is that while the stories are told about individuals and families, these stories are never just about the individuals. Jacob, we recall is given another name. After wrestling all night for a blessing by the river Jabbok, Jacob will be renamed Israel. The stories of Jacob are the stories of the creation of the people of Israel.

And there is other etymology at work in this text as well. Esau, covered in red hair and famished for red lentils has another name too—Edom, which means “red”. And Edom was also the name of a people. Their territory was south of the Dead Sea, south of the territories of Judah and Moab. Today you would locate Edom in Southern Israel and Southern Jordan. In the New Testament, the region is referred to as Idumea.

Israel, the people, received the favor of God, the inheritance of the promise, at the cost of their brothers and sisters, the Edomites. But like the characters in Genesis, they seem to forget the grace that has gotten them where they are. Here is a reference to Edom in the Psalms: “Moab is my washbasin; on Edom I hurl my shoe…”(Psalm 60:8 and Psalm 108:9)

I’m not surprised a brother would say that to a brother—we see comments like that all the time at our house—but I think we should be aware of our propensity to assume that we are somehow deserving of the unmerited grace we have received.

Christians, as we know, are relatively late comers to the Covenant of God. Yet, as soon as we were received into the Promise, what happened? Anti-semitism. You don’t have to dig deeply in the pages of history to see that sad story played out, and playing out this past week at the Holocaust Museum in DC. We forgot how God had included us in the Promise and began to act as if God’s favor had always been for Christians alone.

And America. As 4th of July weekend approaches, I confess to being conflicted about “God Bless America” signs I see on the bumpers of cars. I love this country. I am thankful for the freedoms we have and for the people who are even today making sacrifices for those freedoms. I am thankful for the opportunities in the US for education, for safe and civil society. Truly, our country has been blessed. All you have to do is watch the news and see people who are being killed in Iran for voting. People are imprisoned or killed for speaking their conscience in many countries. There are Christians in parts of the world who would be arrested if the government found them to be in possession of a Bible. Yes, we are blessed here. Yet, after all of these many years of blessing, do we sometimes hear in our political discourse that assumption that our blessings are somehow our birthright? How many of you made the choice to be born an American instead of a Zimbabwean, Pakistani, or Sudanese? How many of you made the decision, before you were born, to be born into privilege, security, wealth, and comfort?

In response to those God Bless America bumper stickers that would take credit for the blessings we have received for having the fortune to be born here, I would say that God has blessed America—now how are we being a blessing? Because all the way back in Genesis 12, when God first tells Abraham of the Blessing, that is the language. “I will bless you and make your name great so that you will be a blessing.” How are we going to inherit the promise, to receive the blessings we have received and then be a blessing? Unfortunately, I see our society spending more time trying to hoard our blessing. Building walls, both literally and figuratively, to keep people out.

For us to be a blessing, for us to not despise our birthright, we need to find a way to pass on the grace we have received.

The Presbyterian Church has also been blessed. In our history, we have become a church that reaches out to its community, sharing the gospel, and passing on the grace we have received. This past week, we welcomed over 50 kids from the congregation and the community in here for Vacation Bible School. What a fun ministry to the community it was!

And over the years, we have continued to include people when other denominations would say no. As an ordained woman, I am thankful to be a Presbyterian, knowing that my sisters from some other denominations do not have the opportunities to respond to God’s call in their lives as I do. I am thankful that society’s tradition of inheritance has been subverted in the Presbyterian Church to make room for me.

And we are also like Esau and Jacob, brothers wrestling with each other for our inheritance. The General Assembly amendments about ordination standards failed to gain enough votes in the presbyteries. Yet even before GA, the concern about the future has become a part of denominational life. Churches have been leaving the denomination. What if more churches leave?

Have we become like Jacob, worried about taking our future in our own hands, not trusting that God will provide? Or are we also like Esau, worried more about the immediate present, willing to disregard our birthright for a quick fix of today’s anxiety?

I’m not going to presume to know the answer. But, as we as a congregation and a denomination go forward into this future, we need to remember the grace we have received, the reason that God called the Presbyterian Church into being. We are a voice of hope for people without much voice. We are a voice of justice for people who have been silenced. We are a voice of love and grace in a world that can be narrow minded and mean.

As we move forward into our future, we need to not fight over birthrights and blessings. We need to remember the grace of God that has included us in God’s family, the gift that brought us into the promise. While we meet together to discuss the issues that divide us, we need to do so with love and grace. We need to remember that all of us love God and are seeking to serve God more faithfully. We need to let go of our right answers, and listen for what the Spirit is saying to the church.

What we can hold on to is this—the God who created us and called us to be here, to make up the community of Southminster Presbyterian Church, has blessed us to be a blessing. What we can hold on to is our commitment to the Gospel and to the promotion of social justice for all of God’s children and the rest of it will sort itself out.

We gather around this table each month, the ultimate sign and symbol of God’s grace. Where we are invited to a table we have not prepared, to a meal prepared for us in the life and death of God’s own son, Jesus. At this table, God again disrupts the order of inheritance. Even though Jesus should have been the inheritor of God’s blessing, we are the ones who receive the promise. Let us today, like Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Esau, claim our promise. And let us remember that there is room enough for all at this table. There is room enough for all in God’s favor. Amen.

The Diversity of God

A sermon preached on Trinity Sunday at Southminster Presbyterian Church.
June 7, 2009

Today is Trinity Sunday, which is where the lectionary writers punish preachers who had so much fun last week on Pentecost Sunday by foisting upon us today the most complicated and obfuscating texts and expecting us to make the Doctrine of the Trinity clear for each of you.

And, as you notice, the text you heard this morning is neither of the texts I thought I would be preaching from. I confess we won’t be spending much time in Isaiah, but I hope you got a sense of the mystery of God that Isaiah experienced in his call story. You get a sense that even as he was writing it down, he thought, ‘nobody’s going to believe this, but what can I do?’ God is a mystery. God is Holy. God is beyond our comprehension and our control.
And considering the Trinity, the triune nature of God is more mysterious still.

So, before we go much further, let’s frame our discussion so we can all be nearly on the same page.
What is the Trinity?

Let’s look at some images.
Trinity is more than just a character from the Matrix movies. Trinity is the attempt by Christians to understand how God is ONE, as the scriptures testify, (Deut. 6:4) while at the same time explain how Jesus, the Son of God, is also God. You hear Trinitarian formula in worship all the time, Father, Son, Holy Spirit; Creater, Redeemer, Sustainer; Trinitarian language is grounded in Scripture. (2 Cor 13:13 “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.”)

Here is an image of the three persons of the Trinity. Father, Son, Holy Spirit, as played by two white men and a bird. Jesus is the one with the cross, if you were wondering.

This next image is a famous 14th century icon by Andrei Rublev. This comes from Abraham’s experience in Genesis. He encounters three visitors and provides them with hospitality. Because of his hospitality, they pronounce a blessing—that Abraham’s wife Sarah will bear a child in their old age. From the earliest days of the church’s wrestling with this concept of Trinity, they have looked back at this text, of the three holy visitors, bringing blessing to Abraham.

This next slide is contemporary. I like the simplicity of it. And the circular movement. This picture captures the reality that there are not clear boundaries between the three persons of the Trinity. (You can find this image here.)

And the final image is of a Celtic Trinity knot. Similar to the previous picture, the Celtic knot is one, unbroken line connecting the three, with no beginning and no ending. This trinity is surrounded by a circle, symbol of divine eternity.
Before we start considering what the Trinity is, we’re going to look at what the Trinity is not, at how the relationship of the three does not function.
And, as we begin to do that, I’m going to cite the great church father, Augustine, who said, “If you comprehend something, it is not God.” The doctrine of the Trinity is not supposed to be easy or simple. God is a mystery far beyond our ability to understand. So, give yourself permission to be flummoxed. And remember, it took the church four hundred years and many church councils to come up with this, to struggle over this.

We don’t often get to talk about heresies in the Presbyterian Church, but here we go!!! Because most heresies are, at heart, a Trinitarian problem.

So what is the Trinity not?

The first heresy of the day is called SUBORDINATIONISM. In subordinationism, you regard one person of the Trinity as more important than the others. For most people, this involves thinking of God the Father as the “big kahuna” or the boss man of the Trinity, with Jesus and the Holy Spirit as his lesser, subordinated, minions. So, if you don’t see the three persons of the Trinity as equal partners, this would be subordinationism.

You can also, if you so choose, commit this heresy with either the second or third persons of the Trinity. Some Christians, in their language, only speak of Jesus, for example. If a personal relationship with Jesus Christ is the only important part of your faith, you’ve got a case of Second Person Subordinationism. The movement of the Spirit is irrelevant and God the first person of the Trinity is relegated to the history of the Old Testament.

Or you can focus your worship only on God as Spirit, emphasizing private spirituality at the expense of God’s work of creation and salvation.

Subordinationism, then, is seeing one person of the Trinity, or the work of one person of the Trinity, as more important then the work of the others.

Our second heresy of the day is…..drum roll please…..is MODALISM!
In modalism, you focus too much on the oneness of God and see the work of the three persons of the Trinity as one character in three different roles, or modes. Or God wearing three different hats. One problem with viewing the Trinity this way is that Jesus’ humanity becomes a problem. If Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, is really just God wearing a human costume, then was he really human?

The third, and final, heresy of the day, is TRI-THEISM. In this heresy, you don’t worry so much about the “oneness” of God at all. You just have three separate Gods. But God is not a pie. You can’t slice God into three separate pieces.

So, what do we mean when we say God is Triune?

We don’t have Trinity Sunday so you can adhere to correct doctrine. I’m not going to burn any heretics today. The Trinity matters because if we believe that Jesus is God made flesh, we cannot talk about God apart from the revelation of God in the person of Jesus Christ. The relationship in and between God the Creater, Jesus the Christ, and the Holy Spirit are worth pondering. The Trinity matters because it is the theological grammar by which Christians understand the God of scripture.

The Trinity matters because of relationship. The three persons of God are in relationship with each other. Not a relationship of hierarchy. Or of separate divisions of labor. But a relationship of connectedness. Of integral need of and for the other.

To confess that God is triune is to affirm that God exists in communion far deeper than the relationships and partnerships we know in our human experience.

Gregory of Nazianzus, a 4th century Archbishop of Constantinople, said, “I cannot think of one person of the Trinity without being quickly encircled by splendor of the three; nor can I discern the three without being immediately led back to the one.”

This perfect community that is in God’s very being can help us think of how we live in community. Any notion of faith as a private business, uninvolved with the well-being of those around you, is non-Trinitarian. If a person were to say, “I’ve accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior, so I’m going to heaven. If other people choose not to accept Jesus, I don’t have to worry about them. They’ve made their choice.”—if someone were to say that, they would be denying the interconnectedness of all creation. Our faith may be a personal decision—you decide or not to be a follower of Jesus—but it is never a private decision. Once you become a part of the community, the community matters. God exists in community and God made us to exist in community.

The Trinity matters because it also means God exists in diversity. The very nature of God is diverse. Creator. Redeemer. Sustainer. Spirit. Word made flesh. That God exists in unity does not mean that God exists in uniformity. Since God exists in diversity, we are expected to seek out diversity as well.

I’d like you to watch this video about music in worship. This is Richard Twiss, a member of the Rosebud Lakota Sioux tribe. (The video can be seen at www.theworkofthepeople.com. It is called “My Neighbor’s Music).


We’re about to come to the Table. It is not our table. We are just a few of the many guests at God’s Table. And as you come to the Table, and as you go out into the world, come as you are, as God made you. And allow others to come as God made them. And come to the Table knowing that the diversity you see around the Table and around the world might just give us the best chance we have of catching a glimpse of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Pentecost 2009

A Sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian Church
May 31, 2009

Ezekiel 37:1-14
Acts 2:1-21

Pentecost is a Greek word meaning 50. Last week we remembered the ascension that took place 40 days after Easter. And then the disciples waited in Jerusalem for 10 days for the arrival of the Holy Spirit. Pentecost, today, is the day we celebrate this pouring out of the Spirit upon the church.

But it was first the Jewish festival where they, 50 days after Passover, celebrate God’s giving the Law to Moses on Sinai. I like the connection between the two celebrations. We’ve been given the Law and we’ve been given the Spirit—both signs of God’s love and care for us, of God acting for us in love. That’s what Jesus’ followers were doing together—celebrating the Jewish festival of Pentecost. When the most un-Presbyterian of events occurred. The Spirit showed up.

I don’t know what they were expecting, as they sat around waiting for Jesus instructions to play themselves out, but I suspect it wasn’t this:
“When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.”

Let’s not sanitize this story. It is strange. And it is one of those stories that seems so strange it must be true. I have a hard time figuring out why someone would make it up. Rush of a violent wind, tongues as of fire landing on their heads, and then they start speaking.

While I love Pentecost, it also scares the bejeebers out of me.
As you have no doubt discovered, I have some control issues. And the Holy Spirit defies all of those attempts for control. Presbyterians tend to be suspicious of the Holy Spirit. Because she does not do things “decently and in order” and does not seem limited by our Book of Order. Nor does she wait for the Session to vote. The Spirit moves where she will.

When I was in seminary, in my Theology class, on the day we were talking about the Holy Spirit, one of my classmates showed up as the lecture was beginning and he was dressed up like one of the characters from the movie Ghost Busters. He told the professor, “I hear we are talking about Ghosts today, and I came prepared.” The class laughed, but one of the professors said, “isn’t it just like a Presbyterian to try to extinguish the Spirit”.

There are legitimate reasons why we are suspicious of the Spirit. Because people will claim, “I don’t need to listen to you. I’m led by the Spirit”. And then they’ll go off and do something hateful and mean. We are right to use the brains God gave us to observe what people say and do and then discern if we think they are Spirit led…
Like when people claim that the gifts of the Spirit that they’ve received make them better Christians than those people who have not received gifts.

Or when Christians talk to their friends and families who are dealing with job loss, medical concerns, or other problems and say, in all sincerity, “If only you had prayed more, God would have healed you (or gotten you a job or whatever).”

Or when they protest at the funeral of a gay or lesbian who was killed in a hate crime, as they did when Matthew Shepherd was murdered.

Or when they claim that Hurricane Katrina was God’s punishment for either the licentiousness and sin of New Orleans or, as Pat Robertson said on the 700 Club, Katrina was God punishing America for keeping abortion legal.

Not all people who claim to speak in the name of the Spirit, in the name of God, are actually speaking in God’s name.

But there are some things in this text that can help us in our discerning about which activities are the work of the Spirit and which might not be.

When the Spirit shows up in Acts, the gift that the people receive is the gift of understanding. Some people refer to it as the gift of tongues, but it is very different from the practice in some Christian traditions. Rather than people speaking a language that nobody else understands, when the Spirit came upon the assembled folks, people start speaking the languages of everyone else there so that they could understand what was being spoken.

People were there from every nation under heaven. And these Galilean fishermen start speaking Greek, Latin, Ugaritic, Akkadian, Arabic, Spanish, French, German, Korean, Chinese, and Swahili. Maybe even Klingon. This wasn’t a display of the tongue speakers’ spiritual awesomeness that allowed them to do something that you and I can’t do. This was a display of the Holy Spirit working through faithful people so that other people could understand and so that people could come together.

Perhaps, if we prayed for the Spirit to come, we wouldn’t start speaking French, Russian or Pig Latin. Perhaps a liberal would start speaking in ways that a conservative would understand. Perhaps mothers would start speaking in ways that teenage boys can understand. Perhaps we could start speaking in ways that Catholics, Fundamentalists, Jews, Muslims, LDS, and Buddhists could come together in understanding and work for peace.

Consider the Spirit. Peter claims to the crowd that the Spirit of God has come as a fulfillment of Joel’s prophecy. I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh and your sons and daughters shall prophesy and your young women shall dream dreams…and everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.

But it wasn’t just given to a few. It was poured out upon all. Not because of their particular strengths or weaknesses, but because they were there. Sometimes that is how God works. Being in community matters. It is in community that you receive the spirit. While it happened to individuals, this was not a personal event. This was an event of the community.

And the spirit didn’t cause them to all speak one language. They were speaking many languages, but because of the Spirit, they could hear about God’s deeds of power, each in their own language.

So perhaps we need to spend less time trying to get everyone around us to speak our language—literally, or culturally, or theologically, or politically—and spend more time discerning how we hear about God’s deeds of power from people speaking other languages, trusting that the Spirit will allow us to hear. Trusting that the Spirit of God has the power to bring understanding.

Perhaps Pentecost should be more than one liturgical day and should be an entire season in church life. A season that lasts 52 weeks a year or so. Because the reminder to call upon the Spirit should not be a ‘once a year’ sort of thing.

If you remember back to the text we heard this morning from Ezekiel’s prophecy about the dry bones, there is good news in this text that shouldn’t be relegated to one day a year.

Ezekiel describes a gruesome sort of scene, a valley of bones. And there are days when we resemble that picture. Physically, spiritually, communally, personally. But the good news here is that God speaks to us when we are like that. “Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the LORD. Thus says the Lord GOD to these bones: I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. I will lay sinews on you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am the LORD.”

Even when, especially when, we are at our emptiest, our most alone, our most lifeless, God speaks words of hope and of a future. And God breathes the Spirit into us.

If you have your Bibles open to the Ezekiel passage, it is an interesting progression. The bones become bodies again. Sinew, flesh and skin are layered onto the bones, but they were still dead bodies without breath. The New Revised Standard Version translates the Hebrew this way:
Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath: Thus says the Lord GOD: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.”

The Hebrew word for breath is the same word for Spirit and wind. Ruach. Maybe this counts as my speaking in tongues for the day. Ruach.

So this verse could just as easily be translated this way:
Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the Spirit, prophesy, mortal, and say to the Spirit: Thus says the Lord GOD: Come from the four winds, O Spirit, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.”

As God breathed God’s own Spirit into the Nation of Israel in the time of exile in Babylon, so too did God breathe God’s own Spirit into the followers of Jesus 50 days after the crucifixion and resurrection. And the parallels are real. Who might have needed new life more than a group of people whose leader had ascended into the clouds, leaving them to figure out what to do next?

So, God’s breath, God’s ruach, gave new life to people in exile, and to people adrift without their leader and unsure of where to go next. And the rest of the Book of Acts describes what happens to people when they are led by the Spirit.

God says:
I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the LORD, have spoken and will act,” says the LORD.

So, where in our lives do we feel like dry bones or lost disciples? Where do we need God’s breath to enter us, giving us new life and understanding? We’re at the end of another program year in the church. Today we’ve thanked Teachers for their year of service. And next week we’ll be installing new Elders and Deacons, thanking some others for their years of service.

Perhaps it is in our volunteering here at church where you need the Holy Spirit to give you new life and energy. Because the work of the church is too exhausting, and too vast, to rely on ourselves to do. It must be given life by the Spirit.

Perhaps you need God’s breath to give you new life in relationships that have become difficult.

Perhaps God is calling you to new ways to love and serve the church, but you need the Holy Spirit to give you the courage to step forward and serve.

Wherever it is for you that needs new life, ask God to send the Holy Spirit. But remember that she is not yours to control. She may send you places you never planned to go. She may cause you to speak languages you didn’t know you could speak. She may give life where you only saw a valley of dry bones.
May we have the courage to call on the Spirit and the eyes to see the work of the Spirit in our lives and in the lives of others. Amen.

Earthly Good

A Sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian
May 24, 2009

Luke 24:44-53
Acts 1:1-11

This past Wednesday was the day the church celebrates the Ascension, which is the 40th day after Easter, when the church commemorates the Ascension of Christ into Heaven. Since we weren’t together on Wednesday, we are looking at the Ascension texts today.

And I know that we live in a world where people don’t get carted off into the clouds. Or at least I don’t live in that world. I have never seen someone ascending to heaven. But don’t discount these texts because of that fact. The people for whom these texts were written came from a tradition of ascension. Moses ascended Mt Sinai and was gone 40 days, up in the clouds on the mountain, receiving the Law. And Elijah the prophet ascended up into heaven when his time as prophet was over. While these ascension texts don’t fit into our 21st century world view very well, they fit the 1st century world view just fine. These texts connect Jesus with the traditions of Moses and Elijah, reinforcing his authority and his connection to the traditions of Israel.

The Books of Luke and Acts present us with slightly different versions of the same event, which is interesting considering they were written by the same person. In Luke’s account, Jesus departs from them the same day of the resurrection. In Acts, he is with them for 40 days. I’m not going to try to fix that discrepancy. And, as we begin to study scripture together in our Year of the Bible, you will run into other illustrations of things in scripture not always being in agreement. Don’t let that hang you up. God’s word to us sometimes comes with discrepancies, with differences. Rather than trying to explain them away, I invite you to learn to live in the tension of no easy answers.

In any case, let’s look at Luke’s account first.
A few weeks back, I preached from the section immediately preceding this one. A few disciples were on the road to Emmaus and encountered Jesus as a stranger on the road. He later appears to the rest of the gathered disciples. And then Luke’s account of Jesus’ final goodbye follows immediately. The disciples minds are opened to understand the scriptures in new light.
Think about mystery novels you have read, or movies you have seen with complicated plots. Once you know the ending of the story, you can go back—read it or watch it again—and pick up on new things that you understand differently in light of your new knowledge.

That is how I would understand the way he opened their minds to understand the scriptures. Once they experienced him on the other side of Easter, both the things he had told them and the things they had read in the Hebrew scriptures were to be understood differently.

And armed with this new knowledge, they are called to be witnesses of what they have seen and heard and experienced in and with him.

And then he is carried up into heaven. But the Ascension is not so much about the mystery of his being lifted up to heaven. Rather, it is about his “making space so the mission of the church can begin.” (David S. Cunningham in Feasting on the Word, Year B, Vol 2 (WJK, KY 2008) p 522).

Because the followers of Christ have work to do. The church needs creating. They need to do their witnessing to the ends of the earth. But as long as Jesus is there among them, they are going to keep their eyes on him. They will continue to rely on him to guide and direct them. “Jesus ascension makes space for the disciples to turn their gaze upon the world.” (ibid. 522)

We’ve spent the last 40 days in the celebration of Easter. And it is no surprise that we’d like to stay in Easter all year. This is the celebration of the church where we WIN! God conquers death itself! Take that, Roman authorities! Take that, powers of this world that tell us you’re in charge! Take that, death!

So, perhaps the Feast of the Ascension is a reminder to us that while we are Easter people, while we do live in the reality of the resurrection, we are called to do more than stand around doing the Easter dance.

To explore that a little more, let’s switch to the Acts account of the Ascension.
Other than the 40 days discrepancy, the two accounts are similar. But Acts gives us some more details of the conversation. We hear what the disciples asked him—“Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”

It isn’t a ridiculous question. He’s spent 40 days speaking to them about the Kingdom of God and the coming of the Holy Spirit. But his answer makes clear that they’re facing the wrong direction. “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea, and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Stop worrying about that part of the kingdom, he seems to say and start worrying about this part of the kingdom. He then gives them some concentric circles of witnessing. If you aren’t familiar with Holy Land geography, let me translate it into Idaho. “You will be my witnesses in Boise, in all of the United States and to neighboring countries like Canada, and then to all the ends of the earth.”

And when he finishes saying that, he was lifted up and a cloud took him from their sight.

Then the messengers show up.
I don’t think I would have liked these messengers much. At the end of Luke’s gospel, they ask the women, as they’ve arrived at the tomb to anoint Jesus’ dead body, “why are you looking for the living among the dead?”
Well, duh. They weren’t looking for the living. They’d come to the tomb because he was dead. Why should they have been expecting the living? What kind of a question was that?

And here, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward Heaven?”

“Well, mister Angel smarty pants, if you didn’t notice, Jesus just lifted up into the clouds. And while we’ve seen some crazy stuff with him, we haven’t seen this before. That’s why we’re looking up toward Heaven.”

I want to fully support the disciples in their looking up to heaven. Because I’ll tell you right now—if and when any of you, or Jesus, ascend up to heaven in my presence, I will stand there staring until the soles of your feet have gone up into the clouds.

They had already lost Jesus once before, remember. And here he was, leaving them again.

“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward Heaven?”

“ummm…because we’re scared. Because we don’t have a script for how this is supposed to go. Because we don’t know how to do this on our own.”

“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward Heaven?”

“Because it is easier than doing what he called us to do. If we focus on heaven, we don’t have to notice the homeless, the hungry, the hurting who are here in front of our faces.”

We haven’t ever seen someone ascend to heaven, but the angels could ask us the same question.
Whenever Christians place our focus on looking for Jesus up in the clouds rather than doing the work of the church, we should ask ourselves, “people of Southminster, why do you stand looking up toward Heaven?”

For another perspective on what I’m talking about, listen to this song by Johnny Cash.

"No Earthly Good"

Come heed me good brothers come here one and all
Don't brag about standing or you'll surely fall
You're shinin' your light and shine it you should
But you're so heavenly minded and you're no earthly good
No earthly good you are no earthly good
You're so heavenly minded you're no earthly good
You're shinin' your light right and shine it you should
You're so heavenly minded, you're no earthly good


If you're holdin' heaven, then spread it around
There are hungry hands reaching up here from the ground
Move over and share the high ground where you stood
So heavenly minded you're no earthly good
No earthly good, you are no earthly good
You're so heavenly minded you're no earthly good
Move over and share the high ground where you stood
So heavenly minded, you're no earthly good

The gospel ain’t gospel until it is spread
but how can you share it where you’ve got your head?
There’s hands that reach out for a hand if you would
so heavenly minded you’re no earthly good.
No earthly good, you are no earthly good.
You’re so heavenly minded you’re no earthly good.
There’s hands that reach out for a hand if you would,
so heavenly minded you’re no earthly good.

No earthly good you are no earthly good
You're so heavenly minded you're no earthly good
You're shinin' your light right and shine it you should
But you're so heavenly minded, you're no earthly good

So, like the disciples, we’ve been called to stop being so heavenly minded that we’re no earthly good.

“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Previous generations of disciples have been Jesus’ witnesses to the ends of the earth, even to Boise. And we are called, 40 days after Easter, to pick up that mantle ourselves.

Ascension is less about the physics behind getting Jesus up into the clouds and is more about the reminder that we’re to stop looking up and start looking around so we can do some earthly good.

So, how can Southminster do some earthly good? We already provide food and gas vouchers. We support our neighborhood school. We send 10 percent of our yearly budget to support missions near and far in the Presbyterian church. The Presbyterian Women give thousands of dollars away to local charities. This next year, we’re going to be re-imagining how we participate in the local community. We’ll give you opportunities for involvement at the local level and we’re looking for people who want to be a part of our Mission Committee, to dream up new ways to do some earthly good.

Randy is getting the Project Evergreen going, so we can become known in our community as a church that cares about creation, doing some literal earthly good.

The possibilities are really endless, because there are two more pieces of information in these texts to notice. One is that Jesus tells them to wait in Jerusalem until the Spirit comes upon them. We’ll come together next Sunday to celebrate Pentecost—the day the Holy Spirit comes upon the church. The work we do as the church is led, empowered, and directed by the Holy Spirit. So the work we do to be some earthly good doesn’t have to make us weary. It isn’t about us. It is led by the Holy Spirit.

The second piece of information is that at the end of Luke’s account, as Jesus is ascending, he is in the middle of blessing them. Which means his blessing doesn’t stop. The blessing that Jesus is giving his disciples is still being given to us.

Even though we feel as if blessing is the last thing we deserve, it is actually the last thing we receive from Jesus as he ascends to heaven.

So, as we wait for the Holy Spirit to descend next week, live in the knowledge of this blessing. May it empower us to trust the Spirit and to go where she leads us.

Boundaries

A Sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian
May 17, 2009

Acts 10

We live in a world of boundaries. And boundaries can be helpful. Like when they keep the Huns from invading China. Boundaries can mean different things to different people. Israelis argue this wall is to keep people safe. Palestinians argue that this wall keeps them from their jobs, their fields, their families.

And we have our own boundaries in the US.
But some boundaries are more subtle. Boundaries are a part of our identity and help us know who we are in relation to other people. If you see someone wearing this logo, you’ll know that they are not fans of the school represented by this logo, and vice versa.

Some boundaries aren’t immediately apparent. Sometimes you need to understand cultural contexts to spot them—from clothing to the cars we drive to the neighborhoods in which we live—there are all sorts of boundaries that help us figure out who we are and help us figure out how we relate to others.
Some boundaries are natural. Mountains are pretty effective borders. As are rivers and oceans. But some boundaries are just lines in the sand. Literally.

Boundaries are not all bad. They keep us safe. But they are illusory to a degree. We might, for example, feel safer with a big fence running along the length of our border, but the reality is that borders don’t keep everything out. Despite the wall on our Southern border, swine flu made it across.

For Peter and Cornelius, boundaries helped them navigate their world. Each of them came from cultures with clearly defined boundaries and expectations. Peter was a Jewish follower of Jesus, who still kept the traditional Jewish diet and religious practices. Cornelius was a Roman centurion and a God fearer—someone who follows the precepts of Judaism, but has stopped short of circumcision and full conversion.

It appears that the earliest practices of the Jesus followers was to keep the boundaries, the distinctions in place. If you were a Jew who followed Christ, you hung out with other Jews who followed Christ. If you were a gentile, you hung out with other gentile converts.

And really, are we that different today?

We tend to gather with people with whom we can identify.

So, when we think of Peter and Cornelius, don’t think of this as just history. Think of this story as here and now.

As Peter is preaching, the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word. Then, catch the prejudice embedded in the text. “The circumcised believers (translation: jewish Jesus followers) who had come with Peter were astounded that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles.”
How often do we do that? Invite people to join us, but then assume that we are still the only ones with the gifts?

Because they had been preaching the Good News to the Gentiles. They believed Jesus when he said to take his gospel to the whole world. But they seemed to operate as if those new converts had to act exactly like them to receive the gifts of the Spirit.

Back at the turn of the 20th century there was a church in Tucson, Arizona that sent money to the many Native American Reservations in Arizona.. The gospel told them to take care of the poor. So they did. They sent money and clothing and food support. But then people started leaving the Reservation and came to the cities, including Tucson. And where did they go? They went to the church that had so faithfully supported them.

But the white congregation in Tucson wasn’t quite ready for integration. Sending money and support to the Reservation was one thing. Having those people show up to worship was something else entirely. So the Tucson congregation started a new congregation so the Native Americans would have their own place to worship. While that story makes me sad on many levels, it is not all bad news. The Holy Spirit was not to be deterred. This new congregation became Southside Presbyterian Church. It is a beacon for social justice in our denomination, a place where all are welcomed, an active leader in the sanctuary movement, and a reminder that God’s ways are not in our control. Nor will they be held back by our boundaries and walls.
We can see the breaking down of Peter’s boundaries in this text. At the beginning, he has a clear understanding of what is clean and unclean. But Peter moves to see that if the Holy Spirit has visited the Gentiles, there is nothing to separate them anymore.

And Cornelius’ assumptions are changed too. There was no reason that a Roman Centurion, no matter how faithful a man, would feel a need to invite Peter into his home. Yet the angel told him to do it, and so he does.

The Spirit challenges our assumptions. She keeps putting us in situations where we are not comfortable. Imagine having someone come to your house who is from a foreign country. You don’t know their food preferences. You don’t know their cultural traditions or expectations. You want to be a good host, but are aware that you will likely get something wrong. There was a young man from Kenya in a small group I was leading at the Presbyterian Youth Triennium in 1998. He became a friend and the next summer, we hosted him for a few weeks when he was back in the States. He stayed with us and with some other members of the congregation. It was both a great experience and an exhausting one. For all of us. Our food preferences were different. Our life experiences were different. For example, he didn’t understand, no matter how much I tried to explain it to him, why I got in my car and drove to a gym to run on a treadmill. I realized that it defied explanation even to me.

But it was one of those great experiences where we could shed light on each other’s cultures in ways that we couldn’t do by ourselves. Lots of people in America drive to the gym to run on a treadmill. It never occurred to me, before he mentioned it, how ridiculous that is.

So Peter and Cornelius, at the urging of the Holy Spirit, come together, tearing down boundaries and trusting God who brought them together. They were each given visions that allowed them to see the world differently. To see their relationship with each other differently. To see their boundaries differently.

But it isn’t easy for them. Peter winds up in all sorts of trouble in the next chapter. Not for baptizing Cornelius and his friends. But for eating dinner with them.

Listening to the voice of the Spirit is not without risks. It will certainly put you in uncomfortable situations. It will cause you to reconsider It might even get you in trouble. But it will also help you break down the boundaries that either you have built for yourself or your society has built for you.

The question for you is this: where is the Holy Spirit calling you to break down your boundaries? Who is out there in the community, or in this congregation, that might be waiting for an invitation from you before they can cross their own borders and live into what God is dreaming for them?

And, the question for us, as a congregation, is how do we listen for the voice of the Holy Spirit and live into the future God is dreaming for us? Because if we listen to the voice of the Spirit, we need to be ready to be disrupted. We need to be ready to not control the outcome. We need to be ready for things to change and to be different.

And when boundaries seem to hard to overcome, when the walls that divide seem to be too great for us to break down, take heart that God’s Spirit will not be limited by them as we are. God’s Spirit will help us overcome. Some things, like the Holy Spirit, flaunt borders. Lizards can scale a wall without a thought. Butterflies float right over the top, riding on the wind currents. These walls that seem so insurmountable to us are not insurmountable to the Holy Spirit.

One way for us to listen for the voice of the Spirit as a community is to immerse ourselves in Scripture, trusting that the voice of our tradition will speak to us in new ways. On the 1st of June, we will be starting a congregation wide program of reading through the whole Bible in one year. We will be passing out Bibles in worship to kids who are 3rd grade and up and we hope that people of all ages will join in the readings, with parents reading the texts to younger kids.

I hope you will join us after worship on May 31, in 2 weeks, for the kick off celebration. The Parish Life Committee is planning a Pentecost brunch for that morning and we’ll be passing out the participant’s booklets with all of the readings. We will also have some Bibles for sale for adults who need them.

Throughout the year, we’ll have opportunities to get together and discuss the readings. If you would like to help plan the events throughout the year, please talk with me.

In the final verses of our text this morning, the narrator makes an interesting comment. “Then they invited Peter to stay for several more days”. The Spirit brings people together for relationship. I am thankful that the voice of the Spirit brought us together. And I am excited to discern the voice of the Spirit with you in the coming years.
Amen.

Led by the Spirit?

A Sermon Preached at Southminster Presbyterian Church
May 10, 2009

Acts 8:26-40

The Book of Acts is the second half of the Book of Luke, both written by the same author. Where Luke’s gospel ends, Acts begins. And it is a chronicle of the movement of the Spirit through the followers of Jesus, a history of the early church. This is the first time since I’ve been at Southminster that I’ve preached from the Book of Acts.
I’ll confess to you, Acts is not the first book to which I’ll turn when seeking comfort in scripture. I’m not sure why that is.

Perhaps I get a little skeptical when I read of the earnestness, and the success, of Jesus’ followers in the Book of Acts. They turn the world upside down and create the church! They change people’s lives and live boldly and successfully for Christ! They break down barriers and bring the gospel to people who had always been excluded by the powers. It’s all Good News! Why don’t I read it all the time?

Alas, I am far more comfortable among the knuckleheaded disciples of the gospel accounts than I am among the confident and self assured disciples in Acts.
This week, however, I was reading through this story of Phillip and the Ethiopian official, and I was thinking of our graduating seniors, and I saw the Book of Acts in a new way. Because 18 year olds have energy and ideas that the rest of us can only admire from afar. They see things that can be done. We tend to see 100 reasons why they cannot be done. The Book of Acts is a story of what the church looks like when it is led by teenagers, or at least led by people who act with the confidence of teenagers.
Because the Book of Acts is a story told before tradition and experience start limiting and defining what can be done.
I’m very much in favor of tradition. Don’t hear me wrong. But when tradition becomes more important than the movement of the Spirit among the people, we should be aware. So, point one for you graduates, and for the rest of us, is this:
Don’t ever worship tradition at the expense of the experience of the Spirit.

Let’s dig into the story a little.
The angel of the Lord speaks to Phillip and sends him to the Gaza Road. Just as people don’t take that road voluntarily today, so did they stay away from it then. A wilderness road. But Phillip doesn’t let the directions slow him down. He doesn’t say, “I’d rather head to Galilee.” He doesn’t say, “why? What am I supposed to do?” He just gets up and goes, with those rather vague directions. (Perhaps that is also a point for kids—don’t ask too many questions? Just do what your mama tells you to do!)
Also on the road is an Ethiopian, who is the treasurer of the Queen of Ethiopia. He is wealthy enough to be in a chariot. He is educated enough to be reading Greek. He is religious enough to be reading Isaiah. And he is humble enough to ask for help when it is offered. “For a modern parallel, imagine a diplomat in Washington DC inviting a street preacher inviting a street preacher to join him in his late model Lexus for a little Bible study.”(Barbara Brown Taylor in Feasting on the Word, Year B, Vol 2 (WJK, KY, 2008) p. 457).

He is also a eunuch, which would have kept him from worshiping in the Temple and kept him from being ordained to any of the offices of Judaism. Yet, he was returning from worshiping in Jerusalem, which means he was at odds with his tradition on some level. Unable to be a full participant in Judaism because of laws from Deuteronomy (23:1) that make clear no one who is sexually mutilated “shall be admitted to the assembly of the Lord”, he still worships in Jerusalem and still studies scripture.

So the second point for you graduates, and for the rest of us, is this:
Don’t ever let the powers of this world keep you from seeking your own relationship with, and your own answers from, God.
If the Powers of the world or the church tell you to stop reaching out toward God, and if you listen to them, then you lose.

The Spirit sends Phillip over to his chariot, but is still rather vague on instruction. Phillip hears him reading from Isaiah and asks, “Do you understand what you are reading?”
“How can I? Unless someone guides me”.

So, point three is this:
Don’t ever stop asking for help and guidance.

Even when you graduate from Boise State and are rich enough to own your own chariot and you work for the Queen of Ethiopia.

Because this Ethiopian official has uncovered a discrepancy in scripture. Deuteronomy keeps him from worshipping in the temple. Yet, the Book of Isaiah promises that ALL nations, all peoples will worship God together. Specifically, Isaiah says this about eunuchs: “to the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, who choose the things that please me, and hold fast to my covenant, I will give, in my house and within my walls, a monument and a name better than sons and daughters. I will give them an everlasting name that shall not be cut off.” (Isa. 56:4-5). The Ethiopian is reading a prophecy of hope, of freedom, of inclusion, but is unable to square it with what his tradition tells him.

How can I understand unless someone guides me?

Luckily, the Spirit has sent him Phillip. Because he doesn’t just need someone who knows Scripture. He needs someone who knows the God of Scripture. He needs someone who recognizes that God’s movement is ALWAYS toward greater inclusion. The family of God is an ever-expanding one.
Perhaps my corollary to point three is this: Don’t ever stop asking for help and guidance, but seek out people who speak God’s word with love.

We need to be listening to the people who have “felt the embrace of God, who can read the cold ink on the page in the warm light of God’s Spirit.” (Tom Long, ibid. p. 456).

And here is my argument for tradition this morning.
Phillip is able to speak to the Ethiopian of God’s saving love in Jesus Christ precisely because Phillip is well versed in his tradition. He knows the Scriptures. How many times have we had discussions about faith at school or at work with people, people we are quite sure are wrong, but who start throwing Bible verses around left and right?

There are plenty of people who would have encountered the Ethiopian on the road and would have said, “I’m sorry. You are a eunuch. This prophecy from scripture doesn’t apply to you. It says so, right here in Deuteronomy. I’d like to baptize you, but Scripture says no.”

Many Presbyterians have abandoned Scripture. We hear people use it to hurt people and exclude people, and rather than read it and study it, we just put it on the shelf and forget about it.
So, point four is this:
If you want the Spirit to be able to use you to share God’s love and grace with the world, you have to open your Bibles. You need to read and study them.

Had Phillip been a Presbyterian, my fear is that when the Ethiopian said, “about whom, may I ask you, does the prophet say this, about himself or about someone else?”, Phillip would have flipped through his brand new, never been opened Bible and said, “umm…I’m not sure? Maybe George Washington? Elvis?”

If we want to share the Good News of God’s love that expands to include people who have been told that they are excluded, we have to pick up our Bibles and read them. We need to take advantage of opportunities to study them together, so we can understand.

This is where our connection to tradition, our grounding in tradition, will allow us to be led by the Spirit.

On the surface, this text is a story of two characters—Phillip and the Ethiopian official. But there is a very active third character in this story—The Holy Spirit. If not for the Holy Spirit, Phillip would never have been on the Wilderness Road to meet the Ethiopian man. So my final point is this:
Don’t ever stop listening for the voice of the Spirit.
It is not usually a convenient voice. She doesn’t always send us where we wish to go. And she isn’t ours to predict and control. The Spirit sent Phillip down the wilderness road, but after the baptism of the Ethiopian, Phillip was taken away to Azotus, or Ashdod, which was an ancient city of the Philistines. He hadn’t planned on going there either, but proclaimed the good news to all the towns until he made it back home to Caesarea—50 miles or so up the coast.
So, if we’re going to listen to the Holy Spirit, it will require us to let go of some control. She doesn’t send us where we want to go. She doesn’t send us to talk with the people with whom we would choose to talk on our own.

So, whether you are going off to college or are going back to work or to the golf course, live in faith that the voice of the Spirit will guide you into uncomfortable situations where you are uniquely qualified to make a difference in someone’s life. Live into that future with boldness, with confidence, with humility, with love, and with ears open to receive the direction of the Spirit.
Amen.