This morning’s readings are
bookends to the very familiar story of Noah’s ark and the great flood. They are
a perfect new beginnings text for a September day when school has started,
Sunday School and Confirmation are in short order, and we are all beginning to
settle back into the familiar rhythm that the summer seems to take away. We all
know the story: People were bad, God sent lots of rain (maybe this hits too
close to home), the world floods, and then the water recedes. What’s left is
just Noah and family, the creatures on the ark, and God’s promise to Noah,
signified by the rainbow, that he would never again destroy the world—at least by
means of a flood. This is a story about a promise, and it’s a more wide-reaching
promise than we often consider. This is the only covenant God makes anywhere in
the Bible that is with not only human beings but also with every living
creature that lives and breathes and moves on this earth, above, and below it.
Every
time I read this story, especially with young people, there’s always that one
kid who looks at you skeptically, because this is a story that elicits many,
many questions. For goodness sake, when Noah gets off the ark the first thing
he does is sacrifice a handful of birds. After 40 days on a boat, you can
imagine what the birds were thinking, “Oh boy! We made it!” …
Then there’s the
matter of the people who appear on the scene after the Noah story. Who are they
and where did they come from?
And
then there’s the question that’s more on the subject I want to talk about
today, which is the one you get from the smart kid who knows a bit about earth
science, and asks: “Where did all the water come from?” This is about when I
long for the glory days when pastors just told kids like these to shut up. The
problem is that this is a great
question, because if you understand nature a bit you know that water doesn’t
just appear from space. We have evaporation and precipitation. Sometimes water
is in the ground, or in the air, or in glaciers, but water doesn’t just appear.
So, how do you flood the whole world?
I’m not going to tackle this question scientifically or logically, because I don't think the flood is meant to be read that way. Instead, I am going to talk about water and what it means for us
and our relationship with God. If you’re a farmer (or know a farmer) it
probably won’t surprise you that water has quite a lot to do with these things.
As an aside, part of the reason why water is on my mind this week may be
because I spilled Nalgenes full of water on not just one but both of our
laptops at home, so if you’re ever wondering where inspiration comes for
sermons the answer is sometimes from the place that is causing the pastor the
most angst at the moment.
Anyway,
I said earlier that this is the only example in the Bible of God making a
covenant with all of creation—not just with one human being or even with all
human beings but a promise to birds and worms and even fish. Yes, even to fish
God promises not to flood the world, as if they care. But, actually, they should. You see, God could have theoretically used all sorts of methods to
destroy the world: fire, meteors, Sharknadoes, you name it, but God chose
water. Why? Well, one reason could very well be that water is so central to
life. Farmers know this. You need rain for things to grow; you get too much rain
and it all floods or rots and the top soil washes away. Anglers also know this.
You need rain to have lakes and rivers to catch fish; you get too much rain and
the water levels rise and finding fish becomes much, much more difficult. With
rain you also get more run-off in the lakes and streams and the water quality
drops, and algae blooms, and all sorts of bad things can happen.
Water
provides for a lot of needs and impacts many of our activities, but it also
goes well beyond us. A flood affects entire ecosystems. Every drop of water
changes things. So even while the world floods, other things are set in motion so
that life will come again, which is why God’s promise to all of creation is so vivid. That rainbow in the sky means not only that we are safe from
a world-encompassing flood but also that life will always persevere; even in
the face of death.
Noah’s
story is the earliest story we have of death and resurrection.
I
just finished reading a book by an Augustana professor of mine, Dave O’Hara,
called Downstream: Reflections on Brook Trout, Fly Fishing, and the Waters of Appalachia.
Throughout, Dave and his co-author, Matthew Dickerson, reflect on the changing
nature of streams and rivers and the effects of life downstream from various
ecological impacts. But woven through that narrative is the sense that there
are countless examples—no matter where we go—of death and resurrection, and
water is a great place to start looking.
We
try to contain water for more effective human use. We build dams and levees; we
dig wells and divert rivers. But all of our controls have effects on the
ecosystems that water supports. Life is resilient, but it also changes and it’s
fragile. The impact we have is complicated every time we make the subtlest
change to the waters of our world, because water is something all of us
need—not just occasionally but daily, minute-by-minute. Fire may help bring
about new life, but we are not made of fire. We are made of water; we drink it
up and it is part of us. Occasionally, it turns around and kills us.
This is part of
why this flood story is so universal and so powerful. It connects us to all of
creation. You can’t be a separate creature in this world. You live in a
community of human beings, but also a community of plants and animals and
bacteria and diseases, and you are not as distinct from those other things as
you think. When Noah and his family come off the ark, the first thing that God
says is this, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.” OK, might be a
little awkward with only one family, but… check. Then God continues, “The fear
and dread of you shall rest on every animal of the earth, and on every bird of
the air, on everything creeps on the ground, and on all the fish of the sea;
into your hand they are delivered. Every moving thing that lives shall be food
for you; and just as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything.”
That’s right, before Noah it seems that everybody was a vegetarian. This is the
first allowance for meat-eating in the Bible. It’s also a reminder that
whatever we fear in the natural world is insignificant compared to the “fear
and dread” that rests on the animals of the earth.
It’s
important where this is placed, because after the flood we have our first sense
of an ecosystem that might resemble what we see today. We are intimately related
to the plants and animals we eat, because they become, quite literally, a part
of us. It makes for messiness. Many people don’t want to see where their food
comes from; many don’t want to know. But, in spite of this messiness, this is
part and parcel of the promise that God makes not just to us but to all of
creation: we are God’s creatures, and though we may die safe, life will come
from it. That is the astounding promise that does not make sense until Jesus
shows up and dies on the cross. Even then we have trouble believing it.
It
all comes back to water. When I baptize Anniston
today we make this promise with the same element that we need to live and that
can, and perhaps will, take our lives and our livelihoods away. We are all
downstream of one another, intimately tied to all other creatures by a common
need to eat and drink to survive. You see, the flood doesn’t just tell us about
what happened once and will never happen again; it also tells us about the
wonderful, delicate creatures that we are, and it offers us this promise made
real finally in the God we know in Jesus Christ: Even though you may die, yet you
will live.
Thanks be to God.
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