A failure of creativity

Luke 2:1-20

Human beings tend to have a failure of creativity. It is not remotely the same thing as being too conservative or too liberal, or too young or too old; in fact, part of the issue itself is our tendency to create simple categories for things and for people. No, a failure of creativity is much more significant than that. It’s maybe best illustrated with a few examples.

            The priests and the lawyers who one day met the grown Jesus had a failure of creativity. Hamstrung to their narrow interpretations of the law they were not open to the possibilities that emerged when God came down to earth. Herod also lacked creativity. It was he who ordered the execution of the children of Bethlehem, imagining only one way to be a king, which was to overthrow the kingdoms already established. For the first time with Herod we see what the opposite of creativity is, and that is fear. Fear that manifests itself in prejudice, anger, and hate.

            Creativity is always pitted against fear. This is why, in that most creative of nights when the Son of God entered the world, the angels appear to the shepherds with a word, “Fear not!” Do not be afraid because it is the natural tendency in such times, but rather be open to the presence of God, which will seem scary—very scary, indeed—until you come to understand the depths to which you need this. For Jesus, anything was possible—he was creativity-incarnate; the only time when creator and creation became utterly and indistinguishably one—which is why grace is so utterly astounding. Jesus could have done anything, become anything, achieved anything, and the life he chose above all others was a life directed toward the cross. God chose creativity through death, not apart from it.

God of the dawn break

A varying assortment of thoughts for today's sermon. When I preach without a manuscript this is sometimes the format in which I blog the sermon. While the thoughts are not all connected it hopefully gives some sense of where the Holy Spirit might be speaking through today's scripture.

Luke 1: 5-13, 57-80

*The light shines in the darkness… and the darkness has not overcome it.

*I’m actually going to start by parsing a Greek word that’s not even in our reading today. (Nothing like talking Greek to make everybody sit up straight and listen to the sermon). It’s that word we know as “overcome” which is the Greek word “katalambano,” which is most often translated “catch” but might also be translated “comprehend.” The light shines in the darkness… and the darkness does not comprehend it. I like all these translations, actually, side by side. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it, will not catch it, and cannot comprehend it in all its mystery.

*Even though this scripture is from John 1:5 it has the same themes as our reading from Luke 1. Light and darkness interplay with one another. These are the darkest days of the year. Long days… lots of seasonal affective disorder, depression, anxiety. Lots of drinking. Lots of generally sad things. This is a season of the highest highs and lowest lows.

*Naturally, Jesus comes into the world in the darkest of days. Of course some history-theology geeks—I bet you didn’t know there were such people; they’re the ones in the library with the plaid coats with a clerical underneath—anyway, they’ll tell you that Jesus probably wasn’t actually born in the winter because of the shepherds tending their flocks in that particular way or some nonsense. Whatever. It doesn’t matter what time of the year Jesus was actually born; the point of celebrating Christmas this time of year is to accentuate the darkest darkness (and also to remind ourselves how northern hemisphere-centric we are). In Australia they should probably celebrate Christmas in place of the 4^th of July, which—come to think of it—they don’t celebrate anyway.

*“The night is always darkest just before the dawn.” There’s so much wisdom in that proverb that it’s been quoted in The Alchemist, The Dark Knight, and by theologians for ages. Darkness seems its most complete right about now. Darkness and sin go hand in hand. When we think about sin we tend to think again about darkness… about things done in secret, about parts of ourselves that are hidden away. These are parts of us that we fear coming to light.

*John is coming to prophesy to something world-changing. “To give knowledge of salvation to his people by the forgiveness of sins.” Sins are actually how we come to know about God, or rather the forgiveness of those sins testifies to something we know in our hearts: that we are not the perfect people we could be, and the only way to be perfect is to not die, and the only way to not die is to have some kind of salvation, and the only salvation that lasts is eternal, and the only one offering such a promise is one who takes on sin in death for us. There is no other way. There are no shortcuts.

*The light shines in the darkness and the darkness does not comprehend it, because we believe that this little baby boy was born to die. The darkness does not comprehend it, because the darkness is too busy obsessing over our inward thoughts and all our hang-ups. The darkness does not comprehend it, because the darkness is concerned with judging us for what we have done wrong. The darkness does not comprehend it, because the darkness measures us by how we stack up to being “good” people. The darkness does not comprehend it, because the darkness is too busy with the law. The darkness does not comprehend it, because the darkness is blind to the Christ-child. And the darkness is blind to a baby because it is too small, too insignificant, and too out-of-the-way to matter.

*Jesus was born insignificant, just like the rest of us. We dress him up, surround him with prophesies and wise men bringing gifts, even as we talk about the manger and no room for Mary and Joseph at the inn, but the real story is darker. The wise men were supposed to report back to King Herod. The gifts were burial spices; seen another way this looks sinister. King Herod meant to kill the baby before any of this got underway. The night is darkest just before the dawn. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot even see it.

*Zechariah’s song, sung for John, his son, who came to testify to Jesus, concludes with this line:

“By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” Peace, I bring you. Peace and light. Jesus came and, like the angels with the shepherds, he might as well begin his life with the words, “Fear not.” Do not be afraid. Yes, you have been living in darkness, but it is that darkness that will testify to me, because now you know why you need me, now you comprehend the light that shines in the darkness.

*Our problem is a lack of awareness that that is where we stand. Our problem is that too many people live in darkness and pretend it is the light. But Zechariah’s song lays the framework for what it means to be people of the dawn-break. It means forgiveness; that we acknowledge the darkness is real, but something more powerful is coming. Not power of our hands, not strength or might, but a baby who receives gifts from wise men of burial spices, anointed for death even from birth.

*The darkness does not comprehend the light because the darkness assumes that death wins. Jesus, becoming love incarnate for the world, comes to bring us a promise that darkness is just fleeting. Dawn breaks. Amen.

God chose Cyrus; God chooses anybody

Ezra 1:1-4

If you read the Hebrew Bible, which is what we most often refer to as the Old Testament, you might wonder where it’s all going. I mean, isn’t that question we ask of any good story? What’s the point, in the end? So, it strikes me as odd that I can’t remember anyone ever teaching me about the end of the Old Testament. We know about the New Testament—Revelation and this apocalyptic vision that, though strange, is nonetheless something of a logical progression.

But how does the Old Testament end?

Well, it depends on which Bible you’re reading. I’m not talking about translations, either; I’m talking about how you order the books. The Christian Bible concludes the Old Testament with Malachi, which leaves us with a call for Elijah’s return, but the Hebrew Bible (which came first, by the way) actually ends with 2 Chronicles. I’ll read that scripture for you (and it should probably sound a bit familiar): “In the first year of King Cyrus of Persia, in fulfilment of the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah, the Lord stirred up the spirit of King Cyrus of Persia so that he sent a herald throughout all his kingdom and also declared in a written edict: ‘Thus says King Cyrus of Persia: The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever is among you of all his people, may the Lord his God be with him! Let him go up’” (2 Chronicles 36:22-23).

God's Word, or why "real" preaching matters

Isaiah 40:1-11

There’s a Lake Wobegon-kind-of-story of a pastor who preached his Sunday morning sermon as he did every week, got down from the pulpit, led the rest of the service, shook hands with his parishioners, and then went home only to discover that over the course of the week, much to his surprise, the members from the congregation started doing the things he preached that they should do. He preached about evangelism, so one of the flock went out and started knocking doors in their town telling people about Jesus. The pastor personally thought this was a little pushy, but it did seem to be the gist of what he was talking about. He preached about helping the poor, so one of the flock bought a meal for a local family, and then charged it to the church. So at least he was in the spirit of what the pastor had said even if the practice was somewhat lacking. The pastor preached about how Jesus comes before family and friends, and several members of the church reported back that they took his advice and had kicked their adult children to the curb, who were really just playing video games in their basement, anyway, most of the time.

            At first the pastor rather liked this new congregation of people who listened to him, but as the week wore on and new report after new report reached his ears of congregation members doing outrageous things in pursuit of the ideal he was preaching, he gradually became overwhelmed. So, he got up in the pulpit the next Sunday and begged the people “Please, go back to not listening to me!” he said. Because everybody had taken his advice and things had gotten very complicated. And nobody was taking his advice in the way he imagined they should be doing it. He had expected things to go one way, and it had gone quite another. In the end, he concluded that it was much better when the pastor’s preaching didn’t change a thing.

Treasure hunts: Re-teaching ourselves what is important

2 Kings 22:1-10, 14-20; 23:1-3

There’s this whole genre of TV shows these days about hidden gems from the past lurking in somebody’s basement. You know, American Pickers and Pawn Stars and the like. You go back a little further and there’s Antiques Roadshow on PBS (and it probably says something about my social life that I remember that from my grade school days). There are plenty of other TV shows (many of which happen to be on the History Channel) that are about missing treasure being sought in various places. These are all quasi-non-fiction (though some of them are more than a little conspiracy-laden), but there are also many, many fictional accounts like these as well. Once upon a time it was Indiana Jones, then National Treasure, now The Librarians and the like.

            All of these shows tap into some yearning we have to discover something exceptional that has been forgotten. There is something important about finding buried treasure that goes beyond even wealth. After all, in all these stories (at least the fictional ones) the greedy ones end up succumbing to their greed and those who find the treasure happen to be the ones doing it for the right reason. If you don’t know what Pawn Stars is, however; it’s basically what I just described but backwards. The wealthy greedy ones get the historical artifacts and the ones who bring them go off and waste all their money gambling in Vegas. But that’s another story.

            Anyway, in today’s reading we have an unexpected treasure hunt. Most of the best treasure hunts go down this way. Hilkiah, having been sent by King Josiah to find workers to repair the temple, stumbles upon scrolls from the Torah (specifically a part of the book of Deuteronomy) forgotten in the temple. This has all the making of an Indiana Jones plot minus the melting Nazi faces, except Shaphan doesn’t seem to understand the importance of what he is bringing to Josiah.

            We have to remember that books of the Bible were not just lying around in Josiah’s day. You couldn’t go down to the corner Hebrew book store and find yourself a scroll of the Torah. In all likelihood, this was one of few that existed and it was all-but-forgotten in the dilapidated temple that was supposed to be the center of the faith of the Hebrew people. It’s kind of amazing to consider the temple being in such disrepair, and it is a testimony to how little the faith of the people mattered any longer in those days. If our church gets dust in the corners I get phone calls on Tuesday morning. And we are just a little church in the far edges of creation. The temple is the very heart of the Jewish faith, standing in Jerusalem at the very heart of the world. The fact that the Torah was left behind in the temple is almost unfathomable. The fact that Shaphan, a priest, could bring the book to Josiah with barely a comment, as if he doesn’t seem to care about what it is, is equally astounding.

            The people of Judah had completely forgotten about God’s law.

            How could this happen?

Work. Rest. Two commandments of equal importance.

“Work is the reward of work, just as rest is the reward of rest.” –Aviya Kushner in The Grammar of God.

            As I’ve been reading through this wonderful book on Hebrew grammar and the way it informs how a person reads the Bible I’ve been struck by the ideas of language and how it changes our attitudes, our beliefs, and even how we act. This is evident enough in the politically-charged world we see in the media. Words matter. And half the war is in how they are arranged to paint a certain picture.

            But, ultimately, the way things are portrayed on TV, the radio, and the internet is not the only story. As we enter into Advent and eventually Christmas, now is the perfect time to reflect on all the ways we can paint a different picture of the world around us. Now is a great opportunity to think differently. For me, it starts with the quote at the beginning of this article. Work is the reward of work; rest is the reward of rest. To me, this means that even though there are many things outside of my control—wars and refugees and terrorism and the economy and the political issues du jour—none of that out there offers me any reward. That sounds selfish, but what I mean by this is simply: Doing things is what will leave me fulfilled. This can be work done for me and for my family, and it can also be work done for somebody else who I don’t know as well or at all. It’s the work itself that is the reward, because that’s what we were created to do.

            But there’s also a second part of this that some of us forget: rest is the reward of rest. It’s easy to think that work is where all positive contributions happen, but I think this is not at all the case. I believe there is a very good reason that God commanded rest (Sabbath)—right alongside not killing and not stealing and all of that business. Rest is reward to you and also where we are primed to work again; it’s where we are reset and reminded that work is actually a reward; not tedium, not pointless, but it all serves the good of our fellow friends and neighbors.

A litany of thanks

Today we give thanks for the many things that have blessed us. We do so understanding that not all have received all of these gifts; that each of us has reasons to be thankful as well as needs as yet unrealized. In this world of haves and have-nots we give thanks not by way of comparing ourselves, boasting, or demonstrating our superiority; instead we do so to remind ourselves of God from whom all blessings flow. That one who appears to have little to be thankful for, like the widow with her small offering, may be comparably rich in all that God values. That everything we have is a gift from God, so with praise in our hearts and thanks on our lips, we give thanks to you, O God...

For the life we have been given, for air to breathe and water to drink, for food and family, shelter, a place to sleep at night, and loved ones to share it with. For those who have died--for the memories we cherish--for the temporary and the everlasting. For safety and freedoms. For the sacrifices of those who have gone before and those who still live in our midst. For our military, for our veterans, for our peace-seekers, for our judges and prosecutors and lawyers. For all those who earnestly seek the good of all people.
We give thanks to you, O God...

For the harvest. For soil and fertilizer. For humus. For earthworms and nitrogen. For the wind and the rain, the sun and the snow. For hired hands. For mechanics. For family businesses. For combines and tractors and sprayers and the people who drive them. For the food we eat and the food we share. For organic food; for GMOs. For small-scale farming. For large-scale farming. For livestock and poultry and the gift of animal husbandry. For gardens and lawn mowers. For those who tend to all things living. We give thanks to you, O God...

For the gift of Christ-incarnate. For seeing the face of God in one another. For those who look the same as us and remind us of God's presence in us. For those who look different from us and remind us that God’s face is diverse. For those with whom we agree. For those with whom we disagree. For the freedom to have an opinion. For the freedom to withhold an opinion. For quiet reflection; for loud cheering. For sports teams. For meaning. For perspective. For wins and for losses. For pushing ourselves to become better people. For the assurance that we are enough. We give thanks to you O God...

For the gift of salvation. For grace and for mercy. For forgiveness when we err. For communion. For friends who value honesty and who tell us as it is. For family who does the same. For unconditional love. For a God who became human and ultimately died for us on a cross. For the love of a spouse, a boyfriend or girlfriend; for the love of all friends. For brothers and sisters—blood relatives and those who are adopted and claimed. For those we see often, and those we seldom see any longer. For children and grandchildren. For times when we feel weak and times when we feel strong. We give thanks to you, O God...

For Christ in other people, for strangers who demonstrate love, for random acts of kindness. For technology that makes life easier. For remembering the way work was once done. For medicine, doctors and nurses. For our hospital and nursing home. For teachers and social workers. For our school, for co-ops. For accountants and bankers, highway workers, electricians, farmers and ranchers. For plumbers and cashiers, for homemakers, day care providers, and all parents. For garbage haulers. For police officers, highway patrol, sheriffs and deputies. For border patrol. For firemen and government workers. For mayors, senators, council members, representatives, governors, and presidents. For all those who do good work, who value their occupation and their vocation. We give thanks to you, O God...

For the gift of music. For the gift of worship. For the gift of youth. For the gift of the elderly. For the gift of parents and baptismal sponsors. For the gift of pastors. For the gift of lay staff. For the gift of Sam and Heather and Karen and Frank. For church council members. For Renee and Brian. For Karen. For all choir members and soloists. For sound board and video workers. For altar guild. For women's groups. For M.O.P.S. For quilters. For A.A. For Cornerstone Food Pantry. For Wednesday School teachers. For Confirmation students, facilitators, and parents. For property committee. For personnel. For all those active in the church in their own way. We give thanks to you, O God. We give thanks to you, O God…