"Heaven's Joy on Earth" - a sermon for July 15, 2012

A Sermon for the 7^th Sunday after Pentecost (RCL B) 7-15-2012

Offered by Nathan Ferrell for Trinity Episcopal Shared Ministry

Texts:              2 Samuel 6:1-5,12b-19; Psalm 24; Mark 6:14-29

Themes:         the ark, David, dancing and singing before the Lord

Title:               Heaven’s Joy on Earth

It is impossible for most people of my generation to think about the ark of the Lord without bringing to mind one of the epic movies of my youth: “Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark.”

I know it is a great movie, because it is in the Library of Congress as “an item of social and cultural significance”!

You will remember that at the end, the Nazis decide to open the ark, because they are seeking a new source of power against their enemies! Instead, the power of God rises out of the ark and kills all of them, except for Indy and his girlfriend who wisely avert their eyes.

To those wicked Nazis seeking only military victory and political gain, the ark was the source of destruction.

But this is not at all what we see here in this original story of the ark.

Of course, there is danger involved!

You’ll notice that the lectionary jumps over part of the story in verses 6-11. That’s the part where one of the carriers of the ark reached out and touched the ark, in order to steady it, and he died right on the spot!

THAT part is skipped over today! And what we are left with is the celebration when the people bring the ark into Jerusalem for the very first time.

“David and all the house of Israel were dancing before the Lord with all their might, with songs and lyres and harps and tambourines and castanets and cymbals” (1 Samuel 6:5).

Wow! That must have been quite a spectacle.

Now, let’s hone in on that part which is most familiar to us.

No, not dancing before the Lord with all our might! Though, perhaps we ought to give that a try sometime! But, celebrating God together by singing and making music.

At all times, and in all places, when human beings celebrate, they sing! Singing is universal. Singing is ubiquitous in human society. Singing accompanies all human celebrations!

We know that music has been part-and-parcel of human life from the very beginning.

The oldest musical instruments that have been discovered by archeologists are certain flutes made out of animal bones and percussion instruments – ways to keep rhythm and time.

Some of these are dated to be perhaps 75,000 years old!

But far older than any of these is the original musical instrument of all – the human voice!

Singing is one of the most basic elements of every human society.

And yet, in our society today, it is an element that is rapidly disappearing!

Today, there are fewer and fewer opportunities for regular American folk like us to sing together in any kind of natural and normal gathering.

Think about your own experience. Think about the times when you have sung with others in the recent past – not as part of any professional organization, but just as a simple part of celebrating life!

I sent out an e-mail during the week and asked for people to briefly share recent times – outside of a church gathering – when they had sung with others.

Some of these e-mail responses that I received include the following:

·        at a campfire/hayride (Cole),

·        family reunion (mom),

·        baseball game (national anthem and 7^th inning stretch – take me out to the ballgame),

·        happy birthday for family & co-workers (Natalia’s 1^st birthday – Elizabeth, & Megan’s birthday - Alicia), in a community chorus (Dee Phillips),

·        at school programs,

·        Christmas songs at the holidays (Denis & Florence),

·        a little bit of karaoke (for those brave enough to admit it!),

·        at a 9-11 remembrance event (Andy),

·        sometimes in the car when the children sing along with a favorite song (Lori Shelton),

·        at a Broadway show (Helen Baus),

·        at a 4^th of July parade (Dawn),

·        at a wedding (assisted by the spirits, as they say – Erin Megara).  

Now, if you notice, you will see that nearly every one of these opportunities for singing occurred at a celebration! So again, let me say it: When human beings celebrate, they sing together!

And what, my dear friends, do we do when we gather together week by week by week in this place?

It says it right there on the front of your bulletin: Celebrations of the Holy Eucharist!

My sisters and brothers: I want to suggest to you that we, as the church – as the people of God who meet together in this time and place - we have a unique and special role to play in our society as THE primary place where people come together to celebrate and to sing together in harmony.

My friends: God has made us to sing!

Just look at all the singing within the Bible!

Moses and Miriam and the Israelites sang after their crossing of the Red Sea!

Of course, our Psalm appointed for today is devoid of any reference to music – of course!, but you know that nearly every other Psalm speaks of singing to the Lord a new song, praising God with music and song, shouting to God with the voice of praise!

When Jesus and the disciples had finished the Last Supper, they sang a song before going out to the Gethsemane.

Scholars think that many of the oldest texts that we have in the New Testament were songs, or parts of liturgical songs, which were sung by the first gatherings of disciples.

The apostle Paul encourages the believers to “sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, singing and making melody to the Lord in your hearts” (Ephesians 5:19).

The visions of the new Jerusalem in the Revelation to John are chocked full of singing around the throne of God!

And, of course, lest we forget, we have the example of David.

King David: the prophet, the warrior, the poet, the dancer, the musician!

With singing, with shouting, with dancing, David and the people brought up the ark of the LORD into the city of Jerusalem.

David and the Israelites sang together in celebration of God’s presence in their midst, and we are called to do the same.

The community at Taize in France has been on the forefront of creatively reimagining the role of music within Christian worship today. The brothers of Taize say this about the primary importance of the human voice:

“To open the gates of trust in God, nothing can replace the beauty of human voices united in song. This beauty can give us a glimpse of ‘heaven’s joy on earth’” (Prayer for Each Day, p.8, from Taize).

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Now, I know that there are a number of you right now who are saying to yourself, “Yeah, but, I can’t sing.”  

Well, I’m telling you that’s rubbish! Can you talk? Then you can sing!

Can you sing like Sinatra? Like Patti LaBelle? Like Michaal Jackson? I doubt it.

But that’s not the point!

You see, I believe that those among us who do not sing are constrained by what others have told them critically in the past.

But I am telling you that there is a power that liberates, that energizes, when you sing out with all your being – without any care for what the people around you might think!

There is a saying that, when it comes to worship, we sing for an audience of one!

That may be trite, but it’s true! God is the only one who is listening and God loves to hear your voice!

So what if others don’t like it! Who cares?! If God is for your singing, who can be against it!

You see, my friends: we have a particular gift to offer to the world – the gift of human voices singing in harmony, in celebration!

Ordinary people who get together to sing, not because we are particularly good at it, but simply because we love to celebrate the goodness of God and the goodness of life, and we don’t care if we sing perfectly in tune or not! All we care about is celebrating the presence of God in our midst!

This is the true gift of symphony! In the original Greek, symphony means voices joined together.

This is what it means to be the church: to be a symphony of praise and celebration, singing together with abandon, without reservation, with joy and thanks for what God has done.

May we be known by all of those people out there in the world who think that we’re crazy for even coming to church in the first place – may we be known as those people who get together and who sing together, with every voice lifted in celebration. Amen!

GOOD Preaching! From General Convention

Friends - if you like good preaching (like me!), then find 18 minutes to listen to this sermon by Bishop Michael Curry at the General Convention of the Episcopal Church. We need more preaching like this. Praise God for Crazy Christians changing the world in the name of Jesus!

The Lord Was With Him

A Sermon for the 6^th Sunday after Pentecost (RCL B) 7-8-2012

Offered by Nathan Ferrell for Trinity Episcopal Shared Ministry

Texts:              2 Samuel 5:1-5,9-10; Psalm 48; Mark 6:1-13

Themes:         Jerusalem, David, the Temple, seeking control over life’s chaos

Title:               The Lord Was With Him

In honor of this week’s All Star Break for Major League Baseball, I would like us to consider for a moment some of the strangest rituals ever practiced on the baseball diamond.

Baseball players tend to be highly superstitious. You know that, right?!

These superstitions are very often special rituals or special objects – talismans – that are believed to ensure the player’s best possible performance.

On his way into the dugout, it is said that Joe DiMaggio would always run in from the outfield and make sure to touch second base.

It’s said that Wade Boggs would always eat chicken before a game, take exactly 150 ground balls during warm-ups, and then would always draw the Hebrew letters signifying “Chai” or life in the batter’s box before taking any pitches.

Tim Wakefield would always eat one pound of spaghetti before pitching a game.

Perhaps the strangest set of rituals was those of journeyman pitcher, Turk Wendell.

It’s said that Wendell had to wave to the centerfielder AND receive a wave in response before he would pitch. And after each inning in which he pitched, he would chew four sticks of licorice and brush his teeth. And then, whenever the catcher stood up while he was on the mound, he would then crouch down and stay down until the catcher resumed his crouch stance behind the plate. 

Why do baseball players do such strange things? Well, everyone is different, but I bet that all of us can relate to the underlying need of these men. You see, baseball is a strange, unpredictable game.

These little rituals give players some feeling of control in the face of so much uncertainty.

Well, my dear sisters and brothers: life on planet earth is strange and unpredictable.

How many of you struggle to gain some feeling of control in the face of life’s uncertainty, when dealing with so much continual change and variability in life?

To be a human being – to be conscious and alive on this planet – means being susceptible to a wide range of dangers and threats on a regular basis. Life is vulnerable; life is fragile.

This is just as true for human communities and nations as it is for us as individuals.

Just as you and I live every day with no promise, with no certainty, that we will see the sun rise tomorrow, so every human community also faces the real possibility that their community will collapse or disappear or disintegrate.    

This is precisely the dynamic that we see in this ancient history of the tribes of Israel: it is the saga of their on-going attempt to deal with this vulnerability, to gain some sense of control and certainty.

In this saga, it began with the ark. The prehistoric origins of this box called the “ark” are hidden in the mists of time. But it’s clear that this box came to symbolize the presence of God in the midst of the community. And this presence was looked to – with the eyes of faith – as the means by which they would be protected from their enemies.

This was vital to the ancient faith of the early tribes. As long as the ark of the covenant was in their midst, then their God was with them and God would protect them!

But then the Philistines came and defeated the tribes of Israel in battle and took the ark away!

And for years the ark wandered throughout the territory of the Philistines.

So the faith of the tribes was shaken and challenged. It didn’t work! Surely then, something else was needed to protect and safeguard the ark! And thus, to ensure the protecting presence of God among the people!

So the elders of the people decided that what was needed was a king! A king would protect the ark and would maintain the presence of God among the people, and thus ensure the future of their community! And so Saul was anointed as king, but he failed to follow God’s instructions. And he was not strong against their enemies.

David, however, was stronger and more faithful, and so David was chosen to succeed Saul.

This appeared promising to the people at first, but remember that this ancient history was itself edited and put together into its final form during the time of the Babylonian exile.

And why were the people in exile in the first place?

Because the kings failed! Because the House of David failed the nation. That was the consensus at the time.  

And so the faith that was placed in the kings to protect the community, to ensure God’s blessing and protection, that too was shaken and challenged!

Surely, something else then was needed! Ahh, the temple! In the next few weeks, we will hear the story of the building of the temple – the house of God whose primary purpose was to protect and safeguard the ark of the covenant. And thereby – I think you know the drill by now – to ensure God’s blessing and protection over the community of the tribes of Israel.

You can see this view of the Temple in our Psalm appointed for today. Tradition has ascribed the entire Psalter to King David himself, but you can see right here that, of course, this is impossible.

Replica of Second Temple

The Temple did not exist in the days of David! Yet Psalm 48 praises the Temple as the center of the world, the primary spot on earth where the presence of God could be found.

In the words of our Celtic Christian forebears, the Temple was seen as a thin place – or more truly, as the thinnest place of all, where the integration of the earthly and spiritual realms of reality was most complete.

Most of the Psalms that we have today in the Bible were written down during the time of Exile.

The kings had failed, and now the people looked to the Temple – to the rebuilding of the Temple after the Exile – as the one thing that would ensure the protecting presence of God among them.

Do you see the pattern, my friends?

Life is unpredictable. For individuals, for families, for tribes, for nations – in the ancient Near East, life was extremely fragile and vulnerable, more than we can even imagine today.

The desire of the people for a way to gain some control over this chaos is perfectly reasonable.

We all understand that feeling. The problem is that they were misguided.

Our Lord Jesus, of course, teaches us that this is so.

Think for a moment about the utter shock of his students when he explained to them that the entire Temple complex would be torn down and destroyed in just a few years! (cf. Mark 13:1-8).   

For nearly four centuries, the Jews had looked to that Temple as the sign and the promise of God’s abiding presence. Jesus knew that it would be destroyed, and yet he was not a bit bothered by that fact.     

Why not? He knew that no building could hold the presence of God, and that nothing can shield us from the trials of life.

So what do we - as followers of Christ - learn from the perfectly rational and yet misguided attempts of the Hebrew tribes to gain some certainty and some assurance in the various objects and rituals of their faith?

There are two sides to the coin of this teaching.

The truth is, as Christ teaches us by his own example, that there is no short-cut, no easy formula, no special object or ritual which will protect us from the uncertainties of life.

You and I cannot shield ourselves from the native vulnerability of life on earth.

God will not protect us from the difficulties and vagaries of life.

That is the hard truth. But there is also a tremendous gift of hope and freedom contained within it!

In Christ, we know that God is with us, no matter what.

It doesn’t matter how many crucifixes you have in your house. It doesn’t matter if you attend Mass daily or read the Bible daily. It doesn’t matter if you give all of your money to the church! It doesn’t matter if you tell everyone that you’re born again, or if you say “Hallelujah” all the time!

We all are tempted at times to try this kind of strategy, but there is no special formula to secure God’s blessing.

There is no special object that can ensure God’s presence!

Because that Presence, and that Blessing, are given as a free gift of grace.

THAT is the promise. We can’t manufacture that promise, and we cannot manipulate that presence.

We can only receive it as a gift, as a truth – as THE most important truth of our lives!

We can receive that truth, and we can rest in it.  

Now, I do NOT know whether any of the superstitions of baseball players help them in any way – though I doubt it very highly!

But I DO know that no matter what crazy and unpredictable things in life will come our way, God will never leave us nor forsake us, no matter what.

And THAT is a real hope upon which you can build your life. Amen.  

How the Mighty Are Fallen

A Sermon for the 5^th Sunday after Pentecost (RCL B) 7-1-2012

Offered by Nathan Ferrell for Trinity Episcopal Shared Ministry

Texts:                          2 Samuel 1:1,17-27; Psalm 130; Mark 5:21-43

Themes:                     Saul and David, the Declaration of Independence, US politics

Title:                           How the Mighty Are Fallen 

It is reported that once, while visiting with his niece, an elderly gentlemen tragically had a stroke. The niece drove wildly to get him to the emergency room. After what seemed like a very long wait, the E.R. doctor finally appeared, wearing his scrubs and a long face. Sadly, he said to the woman, “I'm afraid that your uncle's brain is no longer working, but his heart is still beating.”

“Oh, dear," cried the woman, her hands clasped against her cheeks with shock, “We've never had a Democrat in the family before!"

I know that this is an awful joke! And my apologies to all of you here this morning with strong allegiance to the Democratic Party.

Rest assured that there are an equal number of jokes out there which lambast the Republicans with equal disdain.

And that disdain, my friends, is precisely the point which we are called upon to consider this morning.

In the midst of this era of shrill voices, name calling, mud-slinging, and all together general ugliness and nastiness within the world of American politics, I am convinced that God has called those of us within the body of Christ to be different: to serve as a voice of compassion and humility and civility. 

As our exemplar in this regard, we have to look no further than the famous King David.

Of course, when he “intoned this lamentation over Saul and his son Jonathan”, he was not yet ruling as King. We have been following his story now over the last few weeks, and you may remember that last week we heard about Saul’s growing animosity toward David. And we began to see how Jonathan and Saul were quite divided in their loyalty toward David.

And yet, here after their deaths on the field of battle, David sings this lament in which he praises Saul, and he sings of how Saul and Jonathan were united as king and prince over the people.

Now, there are a number of ways to interpret the intention behind such a song of praise which honors one who was David’s mortal enemy, and which seems to gloss over the many faults and errors in judgment made by this first king over the people.

Let me suggest to you that this song of praise is offered here in the text by David because it is the right thing to do.

David could have easily gloated and praised God that now all of the impediments to his ascension to the throne have been removed.

Instead, the text reports David singing this song of lament.

Perhaps it was the right thing for David to do in order to not speak ill of the dead.

Perhaps it was the right thing to do because some among the tribes would still be loyal to Saul’s family and David sought to gain their allegiance.

Perhaps it was because David believed it to be right for the people to honor the office of the King, regardless of the personal worth of the one who happens to occupy the throne at any particular moment.

But whatever the reason, we are told that David now had the chance to speak out about all of the wickedness and failures of Saul to the general public without any fear of retribution.

And yet, instead, David chose to sing his praises. David overcame his personal grievances in order to do what was right.

There is another text of great importance for all of us right now which likewise speaks about a flawed king.  This text was completed and published just a few miles away from here on the 4^th of July in 1776.

We are speaking, of course, of the Declaration of Independence signed and published just across the Delaware River in Independence Hall.

The king mentioned in this text is King George the Third of England.  

And you may recall that in THAT text the King is vilified in hearty fashion. His many failures and abuses are catalogued in detail and “submitted to a candid world” for review and judgment.  

Now, just a few weeks ago, we heard in the text of First Samuel the longings of the Hebrew people for a king. They longed to have a king set over them, so that they could be protected from the assaults of the Philistines, and so that they could be like all of the other nations around them. They all had kings, so why not the tribes of Israel?

But you might recall that wise old Samuel had warned them of the dangers of having a king.

A king would do such things as take the best produce of their fields and vineyards.

A king would demand one tenth of their grain. In today’s parlance, this is called a tax!

And what is more, a king would force conscription upon the young Hebrew men and force them to fight in his army!

And once all of this takes place, then the people will cry out to God and ask for justice and redress against the wrongs committed by this king.

BUT, the text says, the Lord will not answer them in that day, because this is the path that they have freely chosen of their own accord.  

In the Declaration of Independence, we can see many of these same themes. The people complain against unfair taxation and conscription. The king takes from what is theirs without due process, without regard for the people’s needs. And now the people are choosing to take a different course “with a firm reliance upon the protection of Divine Providence”.

Now, I am not a proponent of the theory of manifest destiny. And yet, just look at what has transpired over the 236 years since that Declaration was first signed and published!

As the old saying goes, the proof is in the pudding.

It sure seems (does it not?!) that Divine Providence has in fact supported this move toward freedom and liberty and justice for all of the people of this land.

We, of course, have not always been faithful in living in accordance with our stated values. We have denied liberty and justice to many through prejudice, fear and hatred.

And yet, as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. has said, the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. Because God bends toward justice and ALL the earth tilts in accordance with its Creator.

There is a sense in this ancient text of First Samuel that God did not want the people to have a king because God wished for them to be different, because God longed for them to live together under the rule of law without the need for a strong man to keep the peace through fear and intimidation.  

And so it remains with us. My dear sisters and brothers: as the body of Christ in this time and place, we are called to be different, and we have a special role to play in the on-going growth of our nation.

Just as David sang the praises of his long-time enemy, King Saul, at his death, so too we are called to be a voice for civility and kindness, even when we disagree strongly with others.

And let me suggest to you that God does NOT care which way you vote.

But God cares HOW you vote, or more precisely: God cares HOW you make your decisions, HOW you treat those around you, whether you happen to agree with them or not.

There is never any reason to be unkind. We must speak the truth, of course, but never in such a way that we fail to respect the dignity of every human being.

David sang the praises of Saul, even though they were enemies in the realm of politics and power. He sang the praises of Saul, because it was the right thing to do.

Perhaps in the midst of the political nastiness to which we will all be subjected in the next few months – just perhaps you and I might be able to serve as a voice of calm and kindness and respect. Because it is the right thing to do, when you are in a conversation and you hear some particularly nasty rumor or innuendo about some politician, perhaps you can interject as a voice of light and peace and kindness.

Because it is the right thing to do. Amen.