Beloved, Flawed, and Called: A Stewardship Sermon on 1 Samuel 16:1-13

Scripture can be found here...

Whether we know it or not, we are in the midst of a mini-series… I’ll name it, the Rise and Fall of the Monarchy! It began last week with the call of the prophet Samuel, the same Samuel we have in our text today, and it ends November 3, with God’s self-revelation to the prophet Elijah. Hmmmm… Stories of kings bookended with the words of prophets. That fact in itself tells us much of what God’s idea of kingship looks like.

Samuel is all grown up now, a man whose first encounter with God took place as a boy, while he served God alongside the priest Eli. In the intervening years, God has relented—that’s the only possibly way of seeing it—God has given in to the persistent desire of the covenant people to have a king. Samuel is the man standing as the mediator between heaven and earth, and he apparently takes it pretty hard, because God sees fit to console Samuel, and to give him some advice: “Listen to the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them.” God goes on, “Now then, listen to their voice; only—you shall solemnly warn them, and show them the ways of the king who shall reign over them.” (1 Samuel 8:7, 9). And, oh, Samuel does.

We’ve talked before about God’s laundry list of the things the kings will do. Things like, taking the people’s sons for his armies and daughters for his harems. Taking their crops and their workers and their money, too. Taking, even, their freedom—turning the people into slaves. (1 Samuel 8:11-18)

Not just some kings. Not just bad kings. All kings. “Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.” That is how one 19^th century historian put it.[i] Today psychologists might call it “Acquired Situational Narcissism,” often used to make sense of the bizarre behavior of certain celebrities. God created us, after all, and God is well aware of our flaws.

By the time of our passage, there has already been one king—Saul, chosen by God, and anointed by Samuel, and who, in the end, lost God’s favor and anointing. Samuel is grieving over this. The prophet functioned, not only as the one to lift up and anoint the king and affirm God’s blessing on the king, but also as the most trusted advisor—maybe something like the Chief of Staff, or the First Lady. For you “Scandal” fans: think Olivia Pope, without the tawdry affair.

So once again, God is consoling Samuel. Or, really, telling Samuel to get a move on, get over it, because now there is a vacuum, and another king is required to fill it.

God sends Samuel to Bethlehem, to the house of Jesse, where God promises to name a king from among Jesse’s sons. God also helps Samuel with the anxieties that naturally arise when God is naming another king, but the previous king has not yet gotten the memo. Listen to me, God says, and I will tell you.

Then, notice what happens? The sons of Jesse start their walk down the runway, and Samuel looks at the first one, and in his heart he starts singing, “There he is….!” Only God, keeps speaking. “Not so fast, Sparky.” “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for the Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart” (1 Samuel 16:7).

And one by one they all pass by, and Samuel keeps on looking, and God keeps on whispering in Samuel’s ear, “Not yet.”

Samuel keeps looking. God wants Samuel to keep listening.

Many of you are aware that I spent eight days last week in the hill country of Texas, about 80 miles northwest of San Antonio, taking part in something called “Presbyterian Credo.” Here’s the Credo Mission:

To provide opportunities for clergy to examine significant areas of their lives and to discern prayerfully the future direction of their vocation as they respond to God's call in a lifelong process of practice and transformation.

The Presbyterian Board of Pensions got the idea for Credo from the Episcopalians: to seek out clergy mid-career, and do a kind of intervention. After we’ve been in the parish a little while, sometimes it helps to take a step back, not only so that we can look; but also so that we can listen—to our hearts, to others who are seeking to serve God in the church, and, of course, to God.

So, for eight days I was one of thirty ministers at Mo Ranch (a Presbyterian conference center), all of us between the ages of 34 and 50, and all of whom have been in the parish at least five years. We had seven faculty members—all Presbyterian, many ministers, all experts in some aspect of four basic areas: Spiritual Health, Physical Health, Vocational Health, and Financial Health.

When my plane took off from Syracuse-Hancock Airport early on October 7, I thought I knew what was in store for me at Mo Ranch. I thought it was going to be all about my physical health. I have struggled all my life with my weight, and you have all had a front row seat to that particular struggle for the last 6 years. I hoped that my time at Mo Ranch would enable me to find the energy and passion to make the changes I need to make to achieve a permanent improvement of my overall health.

But Credo surprised me. Credo did so much more. If I had to describe the heart of what I heard God whispering last week, it all comes down to one word: Stewardship. Stewardship across all the areas of life. Stewardship is a word that means, according to the dictionary, “overseeing and protecting.” Another way of thinking about that is, “taking care.”

At Mo Ranch I heard God affirm my hopes for better stewardship of my health with a loud, “Yes!” by means of the presence of a terrific doctor on our faculty, who talked with me, and walked with me, and helped me understand what I’m capable of in terms of exercise and increased fitness. It was also affirmed by a terrain in which, somehow, every single building seemed to be uphill from every other building. I swear I walked uphill all week! It was all a part of a wonderful eight days of more physical activity than I’d had in a long time, and it felt great to move. Stewardship of the body God gave me is the first part of my plan of action as I go forward.

Then, to my surprise, my heart was captivated by my concern for the stewardship of this congregation, and our witness of over 190 years here in the Union district of Endicott. This is our stewardship season, of course. Each week we are hearing from members of UPC, telling us how they found themselves at home here, and, either implicitly or explicitly, encouraging you to join in our campaign of giving towards our annual budget. And I want to say a big “Yes!” and “Amen” to all of that!

But the concern that was awakened in me was, not only for this stewardship campaign, in this calendar year, but for our ongoing care of the gifts we have been given for the future.

By now you have all received the beautiful letter sent out by our Finance, Endowment, and Stewardship Committee. That letter contained information about the state of our endowments; more specifically, on the future of our endowments, if our spending patterns don’t change. As our fund manager from Pittsburgh told us at our meeting on Thursday, we are drawing too much from these funds. Well, what’s the harm in that, you might ask. It’s a great question. Isn’t money meant to be spent? Yes, absolutely—and hoarding is no virtue, as the story of the manna revealed to us. But these funds were never intended to be spent down supporting our annual budget. They are rainy day funds, and funds for building maintenance. And, over the past several years, it has rained like crazy, both literally and metaphorically, and we are blessed, blessed, to have been able to lean on the gifts of our predecessors. But it’s time for us to take a fresh look at our spending—thoughtfully, deliberately, prayerfully, and keeping our mission statement ever in the forefront of that effort. It is time for us to begin.

This afternoon, the Presbytery of Susquehanna Valley will install me as your pastor, and I can’t tell you how happy that makes me. I have been grinning ear to ear for months. And it was an incredible gift to me, at Credo, to hear in my heart a prompting that I am pretty sure came from God to look forward with you: forward to many, many happy, and challenging, and busy years together, yes! And also, to look forward to the time beyond my pastorate here, when I will finally have to hang up my spurs at, oh, age 90 or something like that. I want UPC to be here. I want the loving, serving, welcoming witness of this church to the love of God in the world to go beyond my tenure here. I want it to be here for our children, and our grandchildren, and our great-grandchildren; I want it to be here for the strangers, the wanderers and the wayfarers of generations to come; I want UPC to be here.

God whispered in Samuel’s ear that David was the one—David, who, as it turns out, was a pretty good-looking guy after all. David went from herding sheep to being a shepherd for God’s covenant people, and he had a good long tenure as king—40 years! David was God’s beloved, but he was not perfect. David was God’s beloved, flawed, and called servant, and despite his foibles, his missteps, his sins and his crimes, he remains the most celebrated king of the Hebrew Scriptures.

We too, are God’s beloved, flawed, and called servants. We are called to stewardship in every area of our lives—to care for the bodies God gave us, to care for our spiritual growth by listening for God’s whispers in our hearts, to care for the work God has called us to do, and to care for our own finances and those of the organizations we love. I am so glad to be here. I am committed to working with you to ensure that UPC will be here. I pray that the Spirit of God might come mightily upon us, just as it did upon David, to give us strength and joy for our work together. Thanks be to God! Amen.

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[i] John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton, first Baron Acton (1834–1902).

Bread for the World: A World Communion Sunday Sermon on Exodus 16:1-18

Scripture can be found here...

Look at it from God’s perspective.

These people are a bunch of whiners.

God, over the many chapters we have skipped to get here, has responded to the groaning of the people in slavery with as great a display of power as anyone could imagine—no, greater.

·      The appointment of the nobody/royal insider Moses as their leader. (Remember, Moses was raised by the daughter of a Pharaoh.)

·      The empowering of Moses and his brother Aaron to present themselves to the Pharaoh, at the risk of their lives, with their bold entreaty: Let my people go.

·      The demonstration of God’s fearsome (and persuasive) power by means of the plagues.

·      The parting of the sea so that God’s people could escape Pharoah’s armies, and then, the releasing of that sea, so that Pharoah’s warriors and charioteers could be drowned and God’s power even more mightily displayed.

I’m not going to lie to you—some of those items include a God I don’t much like to ponder, a God who is willing to kill some to demonstrate power, a God I have a hard time getting my head around. But ponder these words, from one of the scholars I’ve read this week:

This is a revolutionary act. Slaves are ignored and irrelevant in the course of history. Gods do not act for slaves, but for kings and empires. This [God] has turned the world and its rules upside down.[i]

Look at it from God’s perspective: These people are a bunch of ungrateful whiners. God has turned history upside down by being the God of the least powerful. And these people are longing for the fleshpots of Egypt.

Now, look at it from the people’s perspective.

They are hungry.

Not in the way we feel when we walk into a bakery—or coffee hour!—and take a whiff of the aromas of delectable foods. Not in the way we feel when lunch is a little late, or when we skip a meal and come to the next one with cranky stomachs. Not even in the way we feel after a couple of hours spent exercising, or a morning spent stripping wallpaper and painting a room. This is real hunger. This is what is known as “food insecurity.” The US Department of Agriculture, which is shut down this week, describes a family as being very food insecure when, “at times during the year, eating patterns of one or more household members [are] disrupted and food intake reduced because the household lack[s] money and other resources for food.” When you are in this state, your stomach is empty, and you are weak from hunger. You don’t have a clue when you will eat next, or how you will legally get that food, for yourself and for your loved ones.

Look at it from the people’s perspective.  They are hungry. And the memory of the fleshpots of Egypt—which is a fabulous word that means, basically, pots of stew with plenty of meat—the memory of them suddenly seems to mock the former slaves’ newfound freedom. Even the memory of something inextricably wrapped up with the memories of oppression starts to sound good, it makes it seem like it wasn’t all that bad, really. That’s what hunger will do to you.

And, of course, hunger is not a problem unique to the ancient world. The hungry are with us still. I know you know that. Sometimes hunger comes to a family during a recession; someone is laid off, and before you know it, someone—sometimes just the adults, sometimes the whole family—has to skip a meal, or even a whole day’s worth of meals. Sometimes food insecurity comes to families as a result of even more sinister economic forces. In Cameroon, the country that gave birth to the wonderful anthem that was our introit this morning, wealthy merchants hoard crops and speculate on their prices, which means that chronic hunger exists in large segments of the population.

But look at it from God’s perspective. This is all about trust.

When God gave the hungry Israelites the gift of the manna, it came with strict instructions. Gather enough for today. On the day before the Sabbath, gather enough for two days, and no more. God’s response to the hungry people was to answer their cries—again—but also to try to coax them into a more intimate and trusting relationship. And just to put a nice, fine point on it, when the people did gather more than they should, when they didn’t trust that the manna would be there the next day… it grew worms. It started to smell bad.

This is all about trust.

It is not easy to trust, apparently, not even to trust a God who has given vivid displays of power. The Israelites wavered in their trust, as food supplies dwindled and disappeared in the harsh, unforgiving climate of the wilderness. And still God continued to demonstrate the divine intention that everyone should have enough, even these wilderness wanderers. As for the rest of us, God has created a world in which there is enough. There is enough farmable land to grow our crops. There are enough seeds to be planted. Most years, there is enough water to help the crops grow. But we know that the food is not necessarily getting into the hands of those who need it. This is where we come in.

To help the people in Cameroon, the Presbyterian Hunger Program, which is supported by our Peacemaking Offering, establishes community-run grain banks, so that the monopoly on grain is broken, and the people can eat. To help the people of the Southern Tier, the Broome County Council of Churches collects food and money to assist those who are food insecure in our midst. In 2012, 22% of the children in the United States were food insecure. That translates to 2900 children in Endicott, 3292 children in Johnson City, 6021 in Vestal, and about 10241 in Binghamton. Twenty thousand children within a few miles of this sanctuary. That is a lot of hunger. That is a lot of need. That is a lot of opportunity for us to make a difference in people’s lives.

Look at it from God’s perspective. God has given enough food for the world. We who already have enough are invited into the holy work of God’s creation and re-creation, as we learn ways to help that food get where it needs to go. It’s like that wonderful song by Saint Susan Werner, in which she sings:

I got plenty and then some… what do I do?

I got plenty and then some… what do I do?

I got plenty and then some… what do I do now?

I go out and help somebody get plenty and then some too.

If I’ve got ‘plenty and then some…’ why wouldn’t I want to help somebody else to have the same?

In a few moments we gather around this table, to be fed bread from all around the world and the fruit of the vine. We did nothing to earn our place at this table. None of us is here because we are good. We are here because God is good. The gift of this table is pure grace, just like the gift of manna to the whining Israelites. We can trust: there is enough. There is enough for us here, and there is enough for God’s vision of plenty to be realized throughout the world. This is where we are nurtured and strengthened for that work. This is where we are fed, so that all God’s people might be fed. Thanks be to God. Amen.

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[i] Beth Tanner, “Commentary on Exodus 16:1-18, Narrative Lectionary/ WorkingPreacher.com, http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=1811.

On Moses and the Jersey Shore

In this morning's service at Union Presbyterian Church, our mission team reports back from our week in July at the Jersey Shore, rebuilding homes in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. This brief meditation was followed by that presentation.

Scripture can be found here...

Today our passage tells us about people in pain, people in distress, calling out to God for help.

The descendants of Jacob have been living in Egypt.  They came as immigrants fleeing a place of want for a land of plenty. They stayed in hopes of finding a better life. For a time, that is what they found.

But eventually, these immigrants seemed threatening to the Egyptian Pharaoh. The people who had come as guests were taken into slavery.

The government treated them as unwanted vermin, even trying to exterminate them at birth.

“The Israelites groaned under their slavery, and cried out. Out of the slavery their cry for help rose up to God. God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” [Exodus 2:23b-24]

Now, to say “God remembered” in Hebrew writing does not mean that God had forgotten. God had not lost track of the Israelites over the past 400 years. God does not lose track, then or now.

To say, “God remembered,” is to mean, “God acted.” To say, “God took notice,” is to mean, “God had a plan.”

That plan included Moses, a man who felt entirely unfit for the task. “Who am I?” he asked.

“I will be with you,” God answered.

God’s continue to be in pain and distress, today. In 2012, Hurricane (aka “Superstorm”) Sandy became the deadliest and costliest hurricane of that season, and the second costliest in history. 286 people were killed by the storm. $68 billion in damage was done to countless homes, businesses, and other structures.

And again, God had a plan. God still calls people to help one another. God remembers, and God places it in people’s hearts to answer the call.

Like Moses, many of us wonder, “Who am I to do this enormous task?” And as God replied to Moses, God replies to us: “I will be with you.”

A Real Human Being: Sermon on Genesis 27:1-4, 15-23; 28:10-17

"The Dream of Jacob" by He Qi

Scripture can be found here...
 

There are two sides to every story.

 

Take Jacob, that ne’er-do-well, the one whom Hebrew Biblical scholar Renita Weems called “the first real human being” in the book of Genesis. Today we see him at his worst and also perhaps at his best. But which moment is which? Is he at his worst when stealing his brother’s blessing or his best? Is he flying high when he receives his angelic and godly dream-visitation or is he at his lowest?

Perhaps beginning at the beginning of Jacob’s story would be helpful. Readers of Genesis first meet Jacob while he is still in the womb—in chapter 25, the pregnant Rebekah is at her wit’s end because there is such a battle raging inside her. She prays, and has the distinction of being answered, very clearly and directly.  God tells her, “Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples born of you shall be divided; the one shall be stronger than the other, the elder shall serve the younger” (Genesis 25:23). Congratulations, Rebekah! You and Isaac will be the proud parents of twins! And… they’re not going to get along so well.

The boys make their entrance into the world with the second-born one gripping the heel of the firstborn, and that second-born is Jacob, a name that means “heel-puller.” That’s a Hebrew euphemism for “scoundrel.” We are also given the helpful information that the firstborn, Esau, is remarkably hairy, and also that he will grow up to be a good hunter. The reader also learns that the parents do not hesitate to play favorites. “Isaac loved Esau, because he was fond of game; but Rebekah loved Jacob” (25:28).

And we’re off. In our passage today, we enter the story just as Isaac, described now as old and practically blind, sends his firstborn Esau to hunt up some of his favorite food for a kind of final celebratory meal before he expires (27:1-4). Then we skip over some verses and come to a scene between Jacob and his mother Rebekah. She is dressing him in Esau’s best clothes and even fitting his hands and neck out with animal pelts, preparing him to go into his father disguised as his older brother.

We witness the deception. Jacob pretends to be Esau. Isaac senses something amiss, touches the young man and talks to him, and knows it’s Jacob’s voice he hears. Still, the animal pelts on the hands do their trick: It may be Jacob’s voice, but it seems to be Esau’s unmistakably hair hands that have brought him the savory food he loves. Isaac gives his son his blessing. The wrong son.

There are two sides to every story. In one sense, this is Jacob’s moment of triumph! This is the moment in which the oracle spoken by God to his mother has come true: the elder shall serve the younger. The blessing is his!

What exactly is this blessing, though? It’s a good question. In our day, we use words of blessing almost casually, often superstitiously—“God bless you!” we say, whether we mean those words as a hopeful commendation of someone into God’s care, or simply responding to the fact that they’ve just sneezed. God bless you!

In the biblical era, a blessing was not casual, nor was it superstitious. A blessing was potent. It was efficacious, closer to our understanding of a sacrament, even bordering on an incantation. Words of blessing helped to both create and recognize a deep reality, a reality with all the power and authority of God at its center. If we read the words of the blessing Isaac confers on Jacob (our passage skips that part too) we realize exactly what the blessing does: This blessing settles once and for all the issue of succession; it gives Jacob all the rights and privileges of the firstborn son, including the inheritance of the covenant promises first given by God to Abraham. The blessing functions as a last will and testament.

And so, after skipping some more verses, when we find Jacob settled on his stone pillow dreaming of angels and stairways to heaven, and we find God confirming, re-iterating the covenant promise to him—it is a glorious moment, isn’t it? We spoke of it at the session meeting the other night. We imagined the night sky in the desert, a thousand years or so before Christ—no noise pollution, Jacob seeing what we know as the Milky Way but calling it by its Hebrew name, Nehar di-nur, the Fire-Stream; and then that stunning dreamed visitation from none other than God, the Shekinah, the Divine Presence. “Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it!” Just imagining the scene makes your heart race. What a glorious moment, in what Jacob calls “the house of God, the gate of heaven.”

There are two sides to every story.

We can hear the other side of the story by listening to the skipped verses.

We enter the story just as old and blind Isaac sends his firstborn Esau to hunt up some of his favorite food. The verses we skip give us vital information: “Now, Rebekah was listening when Isaac spoke to his son Esau…” (25:5a). In the skipped parts we learn, is not the dreamer Jacob who conjured up the deception against his father and brother—it is his mother and champion, Rebekah. There’s a lady who’s sure all that glitters is gold, and she is buying her son a stairway to heaven. Rebekah speaks to her son—no, commands him—to obey her words down to the smallest detail: he is to bring his father food, disguised as his brother, Rebekah says, “…so that he may bless you before he dies” (25:10). Remember, that potent blessing, that blessing that will ensure Jacob receives all the inheritance promised to the firstborn. Jacob objects. He points out the obvious problem with the plan—Esau is a big, hairy guy. But then he reveals his real fear: “Perhaps my father will feel me, and I shall seem to be mocking him…” (25:12).

And now we see Jacob, not as a one-dimensional character, someone we can just file away under “scoundrel.” Now we see Jacob for what he is: a real human being. One whose life is suffused with the presence of God, to be sure. But one who knows moments of doubt as well as fearlessness. One who knows humility as well as jealousy. One who is anguished by the thought that his father might think ill of him.

A real human being. Like you, like me.

He goes through with it, of course. We witness his success, obtaining that potent blessing. What we don’t see—because we skipped those verses—is his brother’s reaction, as well as his father’s, when they both come to understand what has happened. His father’s violent trembling (27:33).  Esau’s “exceedingly great and bitter cry… ‘Bless me also, Father!’” (27:34). And then his heartbreaking last-ditch question, “Have you only one blessing father?” And then more loud, anguished weeping. And finally, a steely resolve. “I will kill my brother Jacob” (27:38, 41).

There are two sides to every story. After the triumph of winning the blessing, Jacob learns from his mother that Esau wants his hide, and so he runs. He runs away from the mother with whom he has been allied in this family drama, as well as the father who unwittingly blessed him. He runs. In twenty years, he will manage to see his father one last time shortly before he dies. He will never see his mother again.

And so we find him on his stony pillow. I have been on that stony pillow. Have you? Have you found yourself lying awake, in the desert of your own anxiety? Thinking things will never be right again. Thinking, oh no. Thinking, what now? But then, a dream. A ladder has been set up, and its base is set on the earth—the dry desert ground where there is nothing but a rock for a pillow, and nothing but tears for food. And yet, somehow, impossibly, the ladder reaches to heaven, too, and the angels coming and going, rising and falling, climbing and descending, testify: Heaven and earth are connected. And the words of God testify too: “Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you” (28:15).

“Surely God was in this place, and I didn’t know it.”

It is easy to imagine God’s presence beneath a glorious array of stars on a brilliant desert night. It is much harder to imagine God’s presence in a barren landscape of fear, and sorrow, and loss. Jacob has won the blessing, but so far, the cold, hard fact is, all he has to show for it is the knowledge that his brother wants to kill him, and the truth that he faces a long and lonely exile.

And yet he rises from the dream to declare:

“Surely God was in this place.”

God was in the place of fear. God was in the place of sorrow. God was in the place of loss. He never imagined it, we never imagine it. But it’s true.

In the Presbyterian Daily Prayer book, you can find a Friday prayer of thanksgiving that pulls me up short, each and every time I encounter it. In it, we give thanks for “the presence of Christ in our weakness and suffering.” The first time I saw it, I actually laughed. It sounded absurd. But the more I pray it, the more I know it is true.

Surely, God is in this place, and I didn’t know it.

God is in the last place we would expect. God is there in our joys, in our triumphs, of course. God is present in things that are beautiful and true, and moments that make our hearts sing. And that’s what we expect.

What we don’t expect is for God to be present in our worst humiliations, our hours of sadness, our moments of utter confusion. In our betrayals, given and received. In our weakness. In our suffering. But God is there. We just didn’t know it.

Know it now. God is here. In every hour. In every moment. Working the divine purpose out, with and without our assistance, using likely and unlikely real human beings. Like you. Like me. When the sun shines, when the stars twinkle, when the clouds mirror our mood, when the rain rushes into the basement. God is here, in this place. Know it, real human beings. Know it.

Thanks be to God. Amen.

The Binding: A Sermon on Genesis 21:1-3 and 22:1-14

"Abraham and Isaac Before the Sacrifice," Jan Victors, 1642

The Lord dealt with Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah as he had promised. Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age, at the time of which God had spoken to him. Abraham gave the name Isaac to his son whom Sarah bore him.

~ Genesis 21:1-3

It’s like running into a high school friend in the grocery store after twenty years have passed. How do we even begin to fill in the gaps? The joys and sorrows and unexpected twists and turns of an entire life… in five minutes next to the artichokes.

Nineteen chapters of Genesis have flown by in the week since we last opened this book in community, and we are trying to catch up next to the metaphorical artichokes. The stories of creation made way for stories of human misbehavior, from the childish—eating a piece of fruit you weren’t supposed to touch—to the deadly—killing your own brother. The world suffered a punishing flood that the Creator very much regretted, and human misbehavior and self-discovery continued. And over the course of those chapters, the story narrowed. What began as the story of the whole cosmos has focused tightly in to become the story of one family, a family in whom God has taken a particular interest.

In chapter 12 God invites Abraham and his wife Sarah to get up and “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you…” ~Genesis 12:1

This elderly couple is invited into a covenant relationship with God… a relationship based on promises.

God promises to make Abraham and Sarah a “great nation”… to give them children, and children for their children, children forevermore.

God promises to give Abraham and Sarah land, a place of plenty, where they will never know want.

God promises to make Abraham’s name a blessing… promises that all the earth will bless itself in his name.

All Abraham and Sarah have to do is get up and go… and leave the past and family ties behind.

Maybe we should have seen this coming. Once again, God tells Abraham to get up and go… and this time, to leave his future behind.

After these things God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I shall show you.”

~Genesis 22:1-2

There’s something else that happened in the intervening chapters that I should have mentioned right away. It took Abraham and Sarah a really long time to have their son. Abraham, whose name means, “Father of a multitude,” is 75, and his wife Sarah is 65 when they receive the promise of children. Sarah finally gives birth to their son Isaac twenty-five years later.  Isaac, in case you were wondering, means “laughter.”

So in Hebrew our passage actually reads, “God tested Father-of-a-multitude. Take your son… Laughter… to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering…” Which casts a somewhat different light on this story. The names involved seem to me to suggest the distinct possibility that we are being set up for some kind of elaborate (though sadistic) practical joke.  

So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac; he cut the wood for the burnt offering, and set out and went to the place in the distance that God had shown him. On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place far away. Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; the boy and I will go over there; we will worship, and then we will come back to you.” Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. So the two of them walked on together.

~Genesis 22:3-6

Now it’s like we’re watching a terrible movie, an awful, cruel parody of taking your children to church. The child Isaac is made to bear the wood—the same wood that will, in a little while, bear him. It’s too much.

At the same time, the story offers glimmers of hope, and perhaps more evidence that Abraham knows there is something else going on. Notice what he says to his attendants: “We will worship, and then we will come back to you.” WE will come back to you. Even in the midst of this, is there some part of Abraham that knows—simply knows, deep inside, that his God will not require him to do this?

Isaac said to his father Abraham, “Father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” He said, “The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So the two of them walked on together. When they came to the place that God had shown him, Abraham built an altar there and laid the wood in order. He bound his son Isaac, and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to kill his son.

~Genesis 22:7-10

I read an article a couple of weeks ago, titled: “The Five Most Terrifying Words in the Bible.”

“But where is the lamb?”

No matter what the author of the story is trying to signal to us, no matter the possibility of an elaborate practical joke, or even a guaranteed positive outcome, we still have at the heart of this story what one writer has called, “a nightmare place where the Imagination conceives its ultimate ordeal”[i]: the father coerced to kill his child, a child made to bear the transformation of his father into that willing killer.

Does it help to know that perhaps this may well be one of those “just-so” stories we find every so often in the bible, like the story of the Tower of Babel, that tells us how languages came to be? Does it help that this may well be the just-so story of “How God let us know that human sacrifice is bad”?

Does it help to hear Abraham’s words, “God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son”? Does it sound like Abraham is confident that God will provide? Or is Isaac the lamb?

Does it help to know that, while Christians call this story “The Sacrifice of Isaac,” Jews call it “The Akedah,” or “The Binding,” because Abraham binds Isaac with rope in preparation for the sacrifice? Could it also be called “The Binding,” do you suppose, because Abraham himself is bound by this terrible test, in which he is asked to relinquish all claims to the future God has promised?

Does it help to know that the Qu’ran tells the same story, only in Muslim tradition, it is Abraham’s older son, Ishmael, as the child who is almost sacrificed?

Does it help to know that the whole tradition of biblical interpretation, going back two thousand years at least, has struggled with this story, wrestled with it, trying to get a blessing from it? Does it help to know that Abraham, in Jewish tradition, doesn’t simply, silently agree, but questions God, challenges God. Here’s what the rabbis believed about how the conversation really went:

God: Take your son….

Abraham: I have two sons…

God: … your only son…

Abraham: Each son is the only son of his mother…

God: … the one whom you love…

Abraham: A father’s love for his children knows no bounds; I love both my sons…

God: … Isaac.

Does it help to imagine Abraham dodging and weaving, doing everything he can to stave off the inevitable, dreadful command to kill the son named “Laughter”, trying like crazy to say “no”?

But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven, and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.”  He said, “Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.”  And Abraham looked up and saw a ram, caught in a thicket by its horns. Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called that place “The Lord will provide”; as it is said to this day, “On the mount of the Lord it shall be provided.” ~Genesis 22:11-14

Like a great novel or TV show, the story of God’s covenant is told in a way that keeps us engaged. God makes a promise, and then, instantly, the promise is in jeopardy. The promise takes years and years to materialize. And after it does materialize, it is jeopardized all over again.

Let’s not forget: in the end, God does NOT want Abraham to sacrifice his son.

And let’s not forget: in the end, God does not allow the life of one person to be sacrificed on the altar of the religious convictions of another.[ii]

In the end, God is faithful. In the end, God keeps God’s promises. In the end, God is on the side of life… the same life we saw God creating life with such joyful abandon last week, life as seen in bird and butterfly and buffalo, as well as in Abraham and Sarah and Isaac. God is on the side of life, and God is going to be a different kind of God for that reason.

In the end, God is going to be a different kind of God than the world has ever known. God is going to invite people into relationships based on love and not coercion. God is going to use Abraham, and Sarah, and Isaac, all kinds of unlikely people, to be God’s presence in the world and to share God’s blessings. God is going to be known, not only as Creator, but as re-Creator, the one who brings life out of situations that seem hopeless. And God is going to do all this faithfully, intimately, a God who wants us, not to be bound, but to be free.

The story of this different kind of God is our story as well. God invites us into relationship based on love and not coercion. God uses us—every one of us, whether we feel up to it or not—to be God’s presence and blessing in a world in pain. And God invites us into a partnership in which we, too, can help to create joy where there was sorrow, peace where there was conflict, and freedom from all that binds us. Thanks be to God. Amen.

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[i] Peter Pitzele, Our Father’s Wells: A Personal Encounter with the Myths of Genesis (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1995).

[ii] Rev. Stephanie Boardman Anthony.

It is Good: Sermon on Genesis 1:1-2:4a

Scripture can be found here...

And the people gathered in the sanctuary at Union Presbyterian Church, and they experienced worship as a kind of liturgical “Pop-up Video”…

Remember that? It was good.

VH1, noon, weekdays…

Pop-Up Video: Video playing while bubbles popping,

Bubbles, to tell you interesting or weird facts

about the artist,

or the song,

or the process of making the video.

Liturgical Pop-Up Video:

Worship going on while bubbles popping,

telling us interesting,

or maybe weird,

facts about worship.

And hopefully, it was good.

And it was time for the sermon,

that time when the preacher shares thoughts or insights

but always, hopefully something relevant to the faith journey,

hopefully, something God-breathed,

hopefully, something that opens the minds and hearts of the people

to the action of God in the world and in their lives.

And the preacher hoped and prayed with all her heart that it was good.

And one of the ways the preacher hoped to help it to be good

was by using the Narrative Lectionary.

The Narrative Lectionary—

a set readings that will take us through the bible,

beginning at the beginning….

the story of Creation,

and then the stories about God’s covenant with the people of Israel,

and then the stories of slavery and freedom in the Exodus,

and then the rise—and fall—of kings,

and then the time of exile and prophets.

And then—oh then!—Jesus.

Jesus, this year, as he is known in the Gospel of John.

And then the story of the early church…

And oh I hope and pray and trust in my heart,

It will be good.

In the beginning…it was good.

The story of God and God’s people begins in mysterious darkness…

there is water,

and there is a wind from God,

Spirit of God, breath of God.

God is an artist, and artists need light…

So God spoke and there was light.

And it was good.

And one by one the days… or maybe it was millennia… of creation unfolded.

And God saw God’s good creation unfolding, or maybe evolving…

And God’s creation, God’s artistry, was good, so very good.

All of it, God-breathed:

Every leaf

Every blade of grass

Every luscious blueberry

Every dewy-eyed cow

Every color, fragrance, temperature, elevation

Heights of mountains, depths of ocean,

Sparkle of stars…

All of it, every thing, too many zillions of things and places and specificities:

All of it, the God-breathed, the Word of God, the breath of God creating:

And it was good, so very, very good.

And God created people,

people to be co-creators with God.

That’s what sets us apart.

An amoeba can find food.

A human being can plant and grow food for the specific purpose of giving it away.

A deer can find a cool stream.

A human being can help to bring safe water to parts of the world 

where people are dying for lack of it.

A sparrow can create a nest, a shelter.

Human beings can figure out how to shelter one another.

A pride of lions can hunt a herd of gazelles.

Human beings can find ways to live together peacefully.

This is what sets us apart. God the Creator has given us creative capacity.

We are God-breathed creations, and very specific creations at that:

God created humankind in the Divine image,

in the image of God we were created;

male and female we were created.

We were created to be creative:

We are co-creators with God.

We are called to think creatively, to act creatively,

To solve problems creatively.

That is our gift.

And it is, it can be, so very, very good.

When we use it.

So let us be who we were created to be:

Living images of the Creator.

Let us know that the tomato from the vine is, indeed, good,

And it is better when we give it away.

Let us know that we are God-breathed for dominion, not domination,

And “dominion” is tender care.

Let us know that we are called to use our God-breathed hearts, souls, minds, and strength,

All in the loving service of the one who gave us breath,

and in service of all the God-breathed creation.

And it is all very, very good.

All praise and thanks be to God our Creator.

Amen.