Nov 13, 2016
Texts: There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. [Luke 21:25-26]
The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like the ox; but the serpent--its food shall be dust! They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the LORD. [Isa 65:25]
What a rude shock it was to wake up on Wednesday morning and find out that we had elected Donald Trump to be our next President. All over this country, children went to bed that night frightened about what would happen to their refugee parents, their Muslim friends, their gay or disabled classmates. Our children have watched and listened to the angry rhetoric, and they have picked up the current of fear that is loose in the land. An adopted Guatemalan child in our community anxiously asked his mother if he would be deported too. “No,” she replied, “you are safe right here with us.” But his fear was real.
More shocking to me than the fact that Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, but Donald Trump won more electoral votes, is the fact that nearly half of all eligible voters did not vote! That means our new president was selected by just 25% of our voting population. When I remember how hard black people fought for the right to vote in the 60s, I am appalled!
What this election has exposed for all the world to see is the selfishness and rancor that runs just beneath the surface of our political and economic systems. We aren’t so exceptional after all, although we have made enormous strides toward decency and diversity in my lifetime and yours, but racism is still rampant and women still fight for equal access.
In a strange way, the sermon texts assigned for today have helped me grapple with the stunning results of our presidential election. Luke’s apocalyptic message was probably meant to encourage believers around the time when the Romans were destroying the Second Temple and expelling all Jews from Jerusalem. When Luke says “not one stone will be left upon another, all will be thrown down…” picture the war in Syria, scenes of carnage in Aleppo today, and you will have a picture of the world Luke was writing to. TV and Internet news provide these catastrophic images to our unconscious brains every day, and it makes us fertile ground for false gods who promise to save us from tragedy or discomfort.
These terrible things will happen, Luke writes, but don’t lose hope.
And what hope is he talking about? Their hope would have come from the Hebrew prophets, Isaiah and Jeremiah. Lodged in the memory and ritual of their Jewish tradition, Luke’s audience would be reminded of God’s promise that is our text for today [read Isa 65:17-25]
Here, Jerusalem is an image of peaceful prosperity, a city of blessing and long-life, what Martin Luther King Jr. called “the beloved community.” Here, predator and prey lie down together.
This is not some homogenized heavenly oasis where the natural instincts of wild and tame differences have been obliterated. It IS a vision of God’s love in action, where “the wolf and the lamb will feed together” and the lion eats straw instead of flesh. Where, in Luke’s narrative, Jesus invites those at the edge of the crowd and those in the centers of power to break bread and share the cup together. Not to ignore their differences, but to celebrate them. That’s the biblical vision for life on this earth. It’s the peaceable kingdom.
And the work of the church today is to BE that alternative vision, to BE a place where people of different stations in life can treat each other with love and respect rather than disdain and anger. Where the lion and the lamb can recognize their different gifts and different needs, and work to make this a safe place for both.
We must not fool ourselves into thinking that we live in a Christian nation, because we don’t. But we do live in a secular state where laws are supposed to protect the innocent and provide basic services for all. The freedom to practice any religion OR NOT is guaranteed by the First Amendment, BUT we flawed and fickle humans have to put those ideals into practice.
For sure, we will fail that legal standard of perfection again and again, and church is the place where we can acknowledge that--confess our faults, see where we have failed to love those who are not like ourselves, and be intentional about forgiveness, about choosing a different path. Seen in this light, the church is a hospital for humanity and a home for our souls--a place where we can really practice Jesus’ command to “love one another as I have loved you.”
The church is also a place where we can face reality and let go of our illusions--discover love with teeth, so to speak. Parker Palmer talks about the value of dis-illusionment--letting go of our illusions about who and what we are AND who and what God is. Each time that happens, a new discovery is possible. As we peel away the illusions that an election feeds, we can perhaps see more clearly what idols WE have put in the place of God.
This will be a time to dig deeper into our spiritual disciplines: to practice daily gratitude when we don’t easily see what to be grateful for; to greet one another with respect instead of labels and derision; to walk humbly with God into places we haven’t imagined before; AND to hold fast to God’s vision of a peaceable kingdom where the lion can lie down with the lamb without smacking his lips in anticipation. It will be a time to bear witness and invite dialogue, to repair the breech and restore hope for those in despair--not with wishful thinking, but an astute assessment of reality. Trusting that the “long arc of history” does indeed bend toward justice, today we can focus on doing the next right thing, and then the next, and the next.
As you know, my experience of Church of the Saviour has largely been through Seekers. Like 8th Day, we have not been defined by a single mission. Our call, like yours, is to BE CHURCH.
As the next generation of Church of the Saviour, we are more than the missions spawned by the first generation. Our scattered church can be a heartbeat of hope in our city, for residents who are being displaced by gentrification AND for younger people who are moving in. While our missions provide needed services for those at the margins, our churches connect that work to God’s vision for a peaceable kingdom. We come to be reminded what we are here for and why. We come to practice our commitments and strengthen our souls. We come to be fed with hope for another week of work to make this place a city of hope, a New Jerusalem.
Here are a couple of examples from Seekers, where I find my spiritual home. We practice a Ministry of Place and last year, we hosted more than 700 non-Seekers events in our building.
We host 14 faith communities, four 12-step groups and several summer language and music camps for kids. The sliding scale fees go a long way toward covering the costs of the building, and we feel positive about our stewardship of strengthening community and creativity in that space without controlling the outcome. Each quarter, we host a gathering for these different ministries to tell what they’re doing in the building and build relationships so they will share a sense of ownership with each other.
Last week, the Eyes to See Mission Group sponsored a benefit concert for the Palestinian People’s Museum Project. As such, it was a Seekers event. The place was full of young people in their 20s and 30s, singing along with the Palestinian artist, Huda Asfour, who will also be performing at our monthly coffee-house, the Carroll Café, in December. The couple sitting next to me were full of questions about Seekers. I learned that she is part of a Catholic base community patterned after Dorothy Day’s neighborhood house; his family still lives in Palestine, behind the wall, and they both work for an international aid organization. Next to them was a Jewish man wearing a yarmulke, humming along, too. I felt the lion lie down with the lamb--at least for a short while.
It’s true that the political shift will mean that a lot of our sacred cows are about to be slaughtered. We will see some of the good work accomplished in the past few years gutted or strangled by budget cuts. But we are not left without spiritual resources. Consider this… Advent is coming. Listen for a deeper swell of God’s story. Watch for new birth.
Turn off your TV set! Fast from your Facebook page, and set aside time for daily thanksgiving as we prepare ourselves for the weeks and months ahead. Practice resurrection. Speak up when you see something good. Remember who you are. As the poet David Whyte says, “People are hungry, and one good word is bread for a thousand.”
I want to close with a benediction that my friend, Steve Hyde, shares with his congregation at Ravensworth Baptist Church every Sunday:
As you go now, it is so important to remember who you are. You are the beloved daughters and sons of God. You are friends and disciples of Christ Jesus. And the love and the power, the joy and the justice, the goodness and the mercy, the hope and the healing of God’s Spirit are at loose in the world through your lives. So go to be who you already are, and the grace and peace of Jesus be with you, now and forever. Amen.