Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths

Jerusalem:  One City, Three Faiths

            Jerusalem: sacred to all three of the major monotheistic faiths, a site of controversy, violence and abuse of the sacred, a place of contradiction.  Karen Armstrong, in her book, Jerusalem:  One City, Three Faiths, describes thousands of years of history of this city, a history filled with bloodshed.  With good reason, Jesus wept over the city, saying, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you.” (Matthew 23:37a)  Jerusalem has been conquered and reconquered, repeatedly destroyed and rebuilt.  Periods of relative peace have been just that, relative and short lived.

            The city of David and home to Solomon’s Temple, it is holy to Jews.  The place of Jesus’ final days and resurrection, it inspires faith in Christian.  It is also considered holy to Muslims as one of the three holy cities proclaimed by the prophet Mohammad and the site where Mohammad is said to have been transported before his ascension into heaven.  It is the same God, the one God, yet differences in beliefs about this one God have led to on-going controversy and bloodshed.  As is so often the case, people take that which is holy and try to use it for political and monetary gain. This happens repeatedly in Jerusalem.

            The story of Jerusalem is a story of sacred geography, how some places seem closer to God.  As Armstrong explains in her first chapter, “At this date (1800 BCE), all cities were regarded as holy places, an alien concept for us in the modern West, where the city is often experienced as a godforsaken realm in which religion has an increasingly marginal role.  But long before people began to map their world scientifically, they had evolved a sacred geography to define their place in the universe emotionally and spiritually.  Mircea Eliade, who pioneered the study of sacred space, pointed out that reverence for a holy place preceded all other speculation about the nature of the world.  It is to be found in all cultures and was a primordial religious conviction.  The belief that some places were sacred, and hence fit for human habitation, was not based on an intellectual investigation or on any metaphysical speculation into the nature of the cosmos.  Instead, when men and women contemplated the world about them, they were drawn irresistibly to some localities which they experienced as radically different from all others.  This was an experience that was basic to their view of the world, and it went far deeper than the cerebral level of the mind.  Even today our scientific rationalism has not been able to replace the old sacred geography.  As we shall see, ancient conceptions of holy topography still affect the history of Jerusalem and have been espoused by people who would not normally consider themselves religious.” (pp. 7-8)

It is also a story of myths and symbols which can bring meaning to a place.  Jerusalem has been a site of pilgrimage for centuries, from the early Jews going to the Temple to worship, to Christians walking the path that Jesus walked, to Muslims journeying to Haram where Mohammad is said to have ascended to heaven.

            There have been great leaders, David, Solomon, Saladin, as well as mediocre leaders, weak leaders, corrupt leaders and unwise leaders.  Unfortunately, one great leader does not mean those who follow will be equally great.  Site of the brutal killings of the Crusades, it was not the Christian crusaders who exemplified Christian values of mercy but a Muslim, Saladin who showed mercy to those of other faiths.  “Christians in the West were uneasily aware that this Muslim ruler had behaved in a far more ‘Christian’ manner than had their own Crusaders when they conquered Jerusalem.  They evolved legends that made Saladin a sort of honorary Christian.” (p. 294) 

            Armstrong states in her introduction:  “It is not enough to experience the divine or the transcendent; the experience must then be incarnated in our behavior towards others.  All the great religions insist that the test of true spirituality is practical compassion.  The Buddha once said that after experiencing enlightenment, a man must leave the mountaintop and return to the marketplace and there practice compassion for all living beings.  This also applies to the spirituality of a holy place.  Crucial to the cult of Jerusalem from the very first was the importance of practical charity and social justice.  The city cannot be holy unless it is also just and compassionate to the weak and vulnerable.  But sadly, this moral imperative has often been overlooked.  Some of the worst atrocities have occurred when people have put the purity of Jerusalem and the desire to gain access to its great sanctity before the quest for justice and charity.” (p. xxi)  In this area, all three of the faiths making claim to Jerusalem have failed.  

            Armstrong does not speculate about the future of Jerusalem, just takes us through the history to the present day.  In doing so she gives us insights into the differences among the three faiths that inhabit the city and how we have come to our current impasse.  Perhaps someday this city of three faiths under one God, might show us the way to peace, how to live together respecting the beliefs of each faith, recognizing our connection under one God.  Then it truly would live up to its name as being holy.

Copyright June 2012, Robertson

Psalm 27: The Lord is my Light!

July 1, 2012                 Psalm 27:  The Lord is my Light

 2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27               Psalm 27          2 Cor. 8:7-15               Mark 5:21-43

I believe in the sun, even when it’s not shining.

I believe in love, even when I don’t feel it.

I believe in God, even when he is silent.

Some claim this is an Irish saying, others that it had been written on a wall by a Holocaust victim.  Whatever you believe, this is a profound statement of faith, belief that the sun exists, even when I don’t see it, that God is present, even when I don’t feel God's presence or hear his voice.

Our psalm for today is also a statement of faith.  Written in two parts, it begins with a statement of faith, “The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?  The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?” and ends with another statement of faith, “I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living!  Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; yea, wait for the Lord.” (13-14)

The first part is a psalm of thanksgiving and confident trust in the Lord.  The writer thanks God for divine guidance and protection.  God saved him from the wicked (2) so that even if an army were to surround him he would not fear (3).  The writer takes joy in God’s sanctuary where he contemplates the beauty of God and spends time in prayer.  His desire is to do this always (4).  He trust that God will keep him safe (5) so with confidence he will sing God’s praises (6).

Then there is an abrupt shift to a lament.  The writer goes from confident trust to crying for help.  “Hear O Lord,” he cries.  From saying his whole desire is to dwell in the Lord’s house, he shifts to saying I seek your face, do not hide from me (8-9). Even his mother and father have forsaken him (10).  He has no one to turn to but God.  False witnesses have risen against him, threatening him with violence (12).  He prays that God will lead him in right paths in order to be free of his peril (11).  Yet he trusts in the Lord (13-14), that God will prevail.

Why are two such different psalms joined together?  In prayer, it is good to start with praising God and giving thanks for all God has already done, then turn to God in confidence with your request.  Life is a mixture of joy and sorrow.  Times of celebration are tinged with sadness; hope is found in times of trial.  Yet faith remains.

In our reading from second Samuel, we hear David sing an elegy to Saul and Jonathan.  David weeps over the death of Saul who sought to kill him.  The young man who brought the information of Saul’s death, claims that he was the one who finished the king off, at Saul’s beseeching.  Saul was suffering and wanted out of his suffering so what the young man did was a mercy killing.  However, in the account of Saul’s death at the end 1 Samuel, we hear Saul asking his armor bearer to kill him lest he be caught by the Philistines.  His armor bearer refused to do this so Saul fell upon his sword, killing himself.  Perhaps the young man bringing news of Saul’s death expected to be rewarded for the news.  Saul had been David’s enemy.  Now that he was gone the road to being king was clear.  However David did not rejoice at Saul’s death.  The young man was rewarded with his own death.  What some perceived as good news, was received with sorrow by David as he mourned his friend Jonathan, and the king, Saul.  David’s grief is great.  He cries, “How the mighty have fallen!”  How indeed.  David, because of his faith, recognizes the fickleness of earthly power and so doesn’t rejoice in the death of the king.

Our gospel reading holds a story within a story.  While on the way to heal Jairus’ daughter, a woman sick for years with a hemorrhage that made her unclean was healed by touching Jesus’ cloak.  Both are about miraculous healings, but what is more miraculous is the faith of the individuals.  Jesus tells the woman with the hemorrhage, “Daughter, your faith has saved you.”  While on the way to the synagogue leader’s home, he is told that his daughter has already died.  Jesus’ response was, “Do not be afraid; just have faith.”  The message is that those with faith will experience miracles.

Paul, in our reading from 2 Corinthians, is seeking funds to help the Christians in Jerusalem who are in poverty.  It is a request for faith; faith that if they give now out of their abundance, if they are ever in need, they will receive as well.  “Your surplus at the present time should supply their needs, so that their surplus may also supply your needs, that there may be equality.  As it is written: ‘Whoever had much did not have more, and whoever had little did not have less.” (Exodus 16:18)  Paul quotes from Exodus about the distribution of manna each day, a reminder of how God provided for the Israelites in the desert and will provide for the needs of God’s people.  So we are to have confident trust in God to provide.

In The Silver Chair, the fourth book of C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia, the children visit an underground world.  The witch who presides over the world through enchantment tries to lead them to believe that all they knew of the world above was made up, not real.  She says, “you have seen lamps, and so you imagined a bigger and better lamp and called it the sun.  You’ve seen cats, and now you want a bigger and better cat, and it’s to be called a lion. . . and look how you can put nothing into your make-believe without copying it from the real world, this world of mine, which is the only world.” (pp153-4)  In response, Puddleglum, a Narnian, says, “One word.  All you’ve been saying is quite right, I shouldn’t wonder . . .But there’s one thing more to be said, even so.  Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things—trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself.  Suppose we have.  Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. . . I’m on Aslan’s side even if there isn’t any Aslan to lead it.” (p. 155)  Puddleglum chooses to believe.  He makes a leap of faith.  He believes in the sun, even though he doesn’t see it; he believes in God, despite evidence to the contrary. 

The psalmist says - the Lord is my light.  What does that mean?  What does it mean to have God as our light?  The prophet Isaiah tells us, “No longer shall the sun be your light by day, nor the brightness of the moon shine upon you at night; The Lord shall be your light forever, your God shall be your glory.  No longer shall your sun go down or your moon withdraw, for the Lord will be your light forever.” (Is. 60:19-20)

This sun that we see, is but a pale reflection of the light that is God.  In the New Jerusalem, God will be the light, a light that we can’t imagine.  As great as the sun is in comparison to a lamp, so great is our God in comparison to the sun.  And so we are to have faith, follow our God, wherever God may lead.  We are to trust in the Lord.  “I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living,” our psalm tells us.  Not just in the next life, but in this life, we see God.  We see God’s goodness every time we witness an act of kindness, an act of reaching out of ourselves, putting others before ourselves.  We see God’s goodness all around us if we have eyes to see.

The Lord truly is our light, a light that shatters the darkness.  While in this life we have lesser lights to help us see.  We are guided by the sun during the day, the moon and stars at night, artificial lights/lamps as well.  We walk by faith during dark times, but someday we will see God as God truly is and walk in his light.  And so we have confidence to say, I believe in the sun, even when it is not shining.  I believe in love, and I believe in God.

Copyright June 2012, Robertson

Psalm 26: To Walk with Integrity

June 17, 2012                          Psalm 26:  To Walk with Integrity

1 Samuel 15:34-16:13             Psalm 26          2 Cor. 5:6-10, 14-17                Mark 4:26-34

Have you ever been falsely accused? Have you ever been a victim of a mistaken identity or a stolen identity?  Or charged the wrong amount of money, or charged for something you never ordered, or overcharged because of human error or computer error?

Chances are all of us have experienced one of these at some time, especially as we deal with the quagmire which is our health care system, charges, over charges, billing mistakes and insurance errors.  Through no fault of your own, you are forced to repeatedly seek to clear your goon name by clearing up the mistake.

I’ve recently had to deal with a billing error from over a month ago.  It was not my mistake, yet I’ve had to make repeated phone calls to get it straightened out.  For all of our trusts in computers, they have also created problems as well.  Once information is entered, even incorrect information, it can be hard to change it depending on the software.

Ten years ago when my daughter got her first cell phone, she was a minor so it had to be put in my name. The inexperienced salesclerk at Radio Shack entered my name as Patricia Patterson.  I caught the mistake but not before it had been entered into the computer system.  Several years later when doing a routine credit check I saw, aka Patricia Patterson on the form.  I had an alias.

When I ordered a magazine subscription over the phone in February, the person taking my order entered my name as Robinson.  The order went through on my credit card despite the wrong name.

When my car was towed to Extreme Dodge back in March, they entered my name as Patricia Robinson.  I corrected them several times however they could not change it once it was in the system.

So now I have another alias.

Mistaken identity, billing errors are quite common in this computer age of ours.  For one who has been wrongly charged with anything, Psalm 26 is for you.  It’s a simple lament of someone wrongly charged seeking justice.  Not a lament over ill health or other dire straits, not a request for healing but for justice.  It is general so it could be used by any number of individuals who may not have the poetic ability to make up their own prayer.  It could also be used by a group in prayer.

The psalm begins with a plea for help, for vindication for he has been falsely accused.  He states how he has walked in integrity without wavering, following God’s commandments and trusting God.  He asks God to test him, confident in God’s steadfast love and that he has been faithful in following God’s ways. (vs. 1-3)

In verses 4-5 he provides evidence of the sincerity of his faith, how he avoids the company of evil doers.  Verses 6-7 seem out of place as the writer is still in the midst of presenting his case before God.  Chances are verses 6-7 belongs more appropriately at the end of the psalm, expressing the writer’s confidence that his prayers will be heard and giving thanks in advance to God.  However it is possible that the writer is referring to a ritual hand washing as a way of enforcing his innocence.  In verses 8-10 the request is renewed.  He pleads for his life so that he may continue to enjoy his chief delight which is spending time with the Lord in his house.

The psalm concludes by restating his opening petition, how he continues to walk with integrity, not only that, he believes that his present perilous path will become smooth - his foot stands on level ground.  He is firm in his conviction that he has done no wrong and so God will redeem him.

There are no words of humility within the psalm; he doesn’t humbly acknowledge his sin because there is no sin in this situation.  It almost sounds like the words of the Pharisee in prayer at the front of the Temple proclaiming his righteousness while the publican remains on his knees in the back humbly asking for mercy, which raises the question, is the writer righteous or self-righteous?  How do we tell the difference?  There can be a thin line between true righteousness which knows we are in the right,   and self-righteousness that is unable to recognize any wrong-doing.

The self-righteous are unable to acknowledge their sinfulness.  They think they are better than others and so deserving of better treatment.  There can be a danger in praying this psalm that we might fall into self-righteousness.  But there is a time and place for the righteous who are wrongly accused to stand up for themselves, confront the false charges and request redress for the wrongs.  Ours is not a wimpy religion where we never stand up for ourselves.  If we are wrong, we are to admit our failings, but when in the right we need to confront injustice.  Wise are those who know the difference.

Who is the righteous one?  We have already seen in previous psalms and in the prophet Micah, the righteous one is the one who walks humbly with our God.  Is the writer one of these?  The psalm begins and ends with this statement of his faith; that he walks with integrity so that now he knows he is on firm ground where God is concerned.   A person of integrity is one who lives as he believes; there is no conflict between his words and his life.  In the case of the writer, his integrity is rooted in his faith. 

This week we saw a return to tv of the popular nighttime soap, Dallas, with JR Ewing, the man you loved to hate.  I used to watch each week just to hear JR’s great one-liners.  My favorite was:  “once you lose your integrity, everything else is a piece of cake.”  It says so much about integrity and the importance of it.  With it, you lead a righteous, moral life, without it, your morals are gone, you are set down a path of wrong doing and ill-gotten gain, with no thought about the repercussions of your actions, whether they are right or wrong.

In our reading from 1 Samuel, the story continues.  Last week the people had asked for a king so Samuel gave them what they had asked for, anointing Saul as the first king of the Hebrew nation.  But Saul proved to not be up to the requirements of leadership.  God was displeased with him so in our reading today God instructs Samuel to anoint another king, hence enters David, the young shepherd boy.  God’s spirit departs from Saul, leaving him melancholy and enters David.  We know the story, how David kills Goliath gaining favor and reputation and is invited into Saul’s courts where he soothed Saul’s spirit with his music and befriended Saul’s son, Jonathan.  And how Saul became jealous of David and sought to kill him. 

David’s journey was not an easy journey in any sense of the word.  He knew what it was to be falsely accused of wrong doing and persecuted as Saul hunted him down.  He also knew of his own sinfulness and when confronted with his sin, repented and asked for forgiveness.  He may have strayed at times; he was not immune to the temptation to abuse his power, yet overall, in the beginning and the end, he walked with his God.  As long as he stayed on God’s paths his feet were on firm ground and he was righteous before the Lord.

So who is the righteous one?  How shall we know him?  By his fruits we shall know him.  Jesus in Mark today tells two parables about a seed.  In the one the seed is planted and grows, through no power of our own but through the power of God.  In the other the small mustard seed grows into a tree, not a mighty oak or a Cedar of Lebanon, but a mighty tree none-the-less.  The righteous person, the one with integrity who walks with God faithfully, will bear fruit just by being who he is.  He will bear great fruit just by being true to God’s word.

Paul tells us today, we walk by faith, not by sight. We may not know where we are going in this life, many times the path is dark, but this doesn’t mean we crawl out of fear; that we have to be afraid and hesitant.  Rather, in that we walk with the Lord, we walk in confidence even when the way is dark.

This Sunday we celebrate Father’s Day, a good time to remember the righteous men in our lives, men of integrity who were true to themselves, true to their word, who taught us through example how to stand up for what is right in this world, to be strong, yet gentle, to walk humbly with our God.  It is a good time to thank them for their witness to us, for teaching us how to walk with integrity ourselves through their example. 

While in this world, we walk by faith, not by sight, but in that we are walking with our God, we are on firm ground wherever we may go, wherever this life may take us.

Copyright June 2012, Robertson

Psalm 25: Teach Me Your Ways

June 10, 2012              Psalm 25:  Teach Me Your Ways

1 Samuel 8:4-11, 16-20           Psalm 25          2 Cor. 4:13-5:1            Mark 3:2-35

As you sow, so shall you reap.

Beware the yeast of the Pharisees.

Consider the lilies.

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Every valley shall be exalted and every hill laid low.

Fear not.

Give and gifts will be given to you, good measure, packed together, shaken down and overflowing.

Happy are the poor in spirit, the kingdom of heaven is yours.

Into your hands, I commend my spirit.

Justice and peace shall kiss.

Know that I am with you.

Love thy neighbor as thyself.

Many that are first, shall be last.

Now is the kingdom.

Only in God is my soul at rest.

Peace I leave with you, peace that the world cannot give.

Quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.

Rest in the Lord and wait patiently.

Seek ye first the kingdom of God.

Take no thought for tomorrow.

Under his wings you find refuge.

Victory through our Lord, Jesus Christ.

You alone are Lord.

Zeal for your house will consume me.

We are in the midst of graduation season, with ceremonies filled with speakers trying to pass on words of wisdom to help the graduates live their lives from this way forward.  Often speakers will use catch phrases or pithy sayings or quotes.  What you have above is a rough form of an acrostic of Scripture passages, words worth passing on to graduates.  The older I get, the more steeped in Scripture, the more I find these words, written thousands of years before I was born, to be a source of help and inspiration.  Recently, as I listened to accounts of more scandals in the Vatican, in the Catholic Church, I remembered Jesus’ words, “Do everything they (the Pharisees) tell you, but do not act like they do.”  In other words, just because religious leaders do not live up to their teachings, it doesn't mean the teachings are worg.  Timely words, all these years later.  If there was a perfect church out there, I guess I would consider joining, but I’ve yet to find that perfect church so I stick with the imperfect church that we have, following Jesus’ words and actions. 

Our psalm for today is an acrostic lament.  Acrostic poems in Hebrew literature take a variety of forms.  The most common form is to begin each line with a different letter of the Hebrew alphabet.  Some forms might have couplets or three verses each beginning with the same letter of the alphabet then progressing through the alphabet.  Psalm 119 is a masterpiece of acrostic poetry as there are 22 stanzas, within each stanza every line begins with the same letter of the alphabet.

In choosing an acrostic format, the writer is limited in some aspects, as with other forms of poetry.  While the psalm is a lament with a focus on repentance and forgiveness, the verses do not fit tightly together with a unifying theme.  In many ways it is like a collection of wisdom sayings joined loosely together through the acrostic format and under a general theme of repentance and trust in God. 

Another aspect of some acrostic psalms is the addition of an extra verse at the end, beginning with the letter pe, as we see in this psalm.  This way the psalm begins with aleph, in the middle at the 11^th. verse is lamed and ends with pe, creating aleph, another literary device, found in Psalm 34 as well.  However Psalm 25 is not a perfect representation of this form of poetry.  One letter waw, is missing.  Perhaps it was corrupted in translation over the centuries, still it is close enough to warrant the name acrostic.  (if you noted in my “acrostic” I took liberty to leave out X – no words beginning with x in Scripture, following example of this psalm.)

It’s a literary device lost in translation for we have nothing comparable.  If I were to teach a class on Hebrew poetry, I would assign students to write an acrostic using our alphabet, as I attempted.  Acrostics were often used as a teaching device.  Since the written word was not common at that time, Hebrews relied on memorization of verses. This is a mnemonic/memory device making it easier for students to remember.  Often it may be used to connect a variety of wisdom phrases.  While the overall tone of our psalm is a lament, you can see aspects of wisdom material in the passages. The reason for the lament is not evident.  The psalm is more of a general one to be used by anyone in a time of distress seeking God’s help.  It can be divided into three parts:  verses 1-7 speak of the writer’s personal relationship with God; verses 8-15 deals with God’s relationship with people; then in verses 16-21 it reverts back to the individual relationship and his petition.  Verse 22 is inserted to connect the psalm to Israel.

At the heart of the psalm to me is verse 4 – teach me your ways, Lord.  Who is wise?  He who would be led by God, who has the humility to be teachable, to admit he may not always know everything.  Such are the wise.  Unfortunately sometimes before we can know the right path, we first have to see the wrong path.  Our readings for today give us ample examples of wrong paths, of those who think they are wise, but are not.

In our reading for 2 Samuel, Israel is at a critical juncture.  They have been led by judges, appointed by God, but now they want a king.  They go to Samuel and ask him to appoint a king to rule over him.  Samuel is affronted by their request, perhaps because he is worried about his sons continuing after him, or perhaps out of a genuine concern that they are being disrespectful of God.  Samuel is not blameless in this.  Samuel has led well but his sons have not, they have taken bribes and were more concerned about their own personal gain than justice.  The people did not want to be ruled by them, with good reason.  We have already seen in 1 Samuel another example of children not following their father’s example.  Eli’s sons were corrupt; hence Samuel was appointed judge over the people. 

Samuel goes to God and complains about the people’s request.  God tells Samuel to give them what they want, but to let them know what they are in for if they have a king.  Neither Samuel nor the people show themselves to be wise.  The position of judge was not an inherited one; judges were chosen by God to lead.  Samuel gave positions of power to his sons who proved unworthy of his trust.  The fact of being born to a judge did not mean they would be worthy to lead.  Samuel could have learned from the situation with Eli and removed his sons from power, and looked for individuals more worthy to lead, but he didn’t.  The people, for their part, instead of asking for a king whose sons would inherit, could have simply asked God for other judges, but they didn’t.  Instead they looked around at other nations and thought they wanted what these other nations had, a king, instead of appreciating what they did have.  The grass is always greener . . .  Little did they realize what they were asking for.

In our gospel from Mark, we see more lack of wisdom.  Jesus’ own family is unable to recognize who he is or accept him.  He is drawing attention to himself and causing embarrassment to them.  They try to get him back into the fold, calling him crazy, but Jesus, unlike Samuel, doesn’t give into his family, following God’s will first and foremost.  As Jesus, the great Teacher tells us today, “whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”

The scribes, religious leaders, said Jesus was possessed.  They who were steeped in Scripture study, were unable to accept Jesus—all their learning was a liability, keeping them from knowing God.  As one commentator states, “The fact is, when we become ‘at home’ in our religious assumptions, when we become convinced we know who God is and what God is about in this world, we are in danger  of being incapable of fresh perception of God’s new directions in our midst.  Sick religion is worse than no religion at all.” (Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year B, After Pentecost 1, p. 52)

True wisdom is open to how God might be working now in our lives, not in the past.  Knowledge of how God has worked in the past may be helpful but can also get in the way, as it did for the scribes who were incapable of believing anything new, accepting Jesus.

True wisdom recognizes that the things of this world are but transitory, that even though this earthly tent may be destroyed we have a heavenly dwelling that can never be destroyed.  True wisdom is not discouraged even as our body may seem to be wasting away with age, as Paul tells us in Corinthians.

We learn from the past but we live in the present.  True knowledge is always seeking out God’s ways, seeking to follow his path even when it takes you down a road you did not expect, recognizing that “all the paths of the Lord are faithful love.” And so it is good to wait for the Lord, as our psalm instructs, to humbly ask God to be our teacher, leading us in right paths until He leads us home to him.

Copyright June 2012, Robertson

Psalm 29: The Voice of the Lord!

June 3, 2012    Psalm 29:  The Voice of the Lord!

Isaiah 6:18                   Psalm 29          Romans 8:12-17          John 3: 1-17

The voice of the Lord is over the water,

The voice of the Lord is power;

The voice of the Lord is splendor;

The voice of the Lord cracks the cedars;

The voice of the Lord strikes with fiery flame

The voice of the Lord rocks the desert;

The voice of the Lord twists the oaks and strips the forest bare!      

How many of you have been in a tornado?  Most, I would guess.  We don’t live in the tornado belt but we have certainly seen our share of storms.  I remember one summer when my children were small and we were staying at my parents’ cottage in Houghton Lake.  We had gone over to my brother’s cottage, a simple A-Frame on Lake St. James, for the afternoon to swim when a storm approached.  There being no basement, I gathered my three children around me and sat against the middle wall where we could look out the sliding doors and watch the storm.  We watched the dark clouds and the crashing lightning and heard the clash of thunder all around us.  It was a source of wonder.  When the storm finally passed, we packed our car and went back to my parents’ cottage.  On the way we had a chance to see the full damage of the storm.  Even though the radio announcer claimed no tornado had been sighted, still we saw trees torn up by the roots, up-ended, power lines knocked down.  It took almost a week before power was restored.  I was reminded of this event as I reflected on today’s psalm.  The voice of the Lord cracks the mighty cedars, the voice of the Lord up-ends the mighty oaks of Michigan, it twists the maple and the birch leaving them stripped of leaves.  Such is the power of the voice of God.

Psalm 29 is likely to be an early psalm, reflecting on the majesty of God in nature, especially the storm.  It begins with an introduction calling all to worship:  Give to the Lord the glory due his name; it calls to all creation, especially all of the heavenly beings.  Then it expands on the wonders of our God whose voice is so powerful that all say, “Glory.”  The KJV translation says that the voice of the Lord causes the hinds to calf, to give birth out of fear (9) such is its power.  The psalm ends with the reminder that our God is in the heaven, all is right in the world.  Despite the fearsomeness of the storm, God’s people need not fear. 

I imagine this as a dramatic reading with clanging cymbals and drums each time the priest declares “The voice of the Lord.”  The psalms are dramatic words of God’s people.  They are not meant to be read in a lifeless monotone.  While I did not see any indication of such a dramatic acting out of the psalm in the commentaries I read, I don’t think it’s much of a stretch to imagine that David who danced before the Lord, Miriam who danced with timbrel and tambourine, might not act out this reading with great dramatic force as re-enacting the sound of thunder and the storm.  The priest would read with great effect, stirring the people to wonder at our God who commands the wind and the rain and the storm, and yet feeling safe within God’s temple, as I hope my children felt safe within my protecting arms during the storm.  The voice of the Lord is proclaimed seven times.  This is no chance occurrence.  Seven is the perfect number in numerology, representing the perfection of God.  It is a combination of four, the four ends of the earth, and three, the Trinity.

In our reading from Isaiah we see another rendering of God’s glory and majesty, such that Isaiah was only able to catch of glimpse of God’s hem.  Then Isaiah saw angels, seraphims surrounding God.  Our reading is the call of Isaiah, however it follows a different pattern than other calls where God commands and the prophet objects.  In this case, Isaiah overhears a question posed by God and unhesitating, responds, “send me.”  Inspired by the sight he has just seen, Isaiah rushes in and volunteers, a common occurrence during a religious experience.  We are so caught up in the experience that we are ready to give up everything without counting the cost.  It was only later that Isaiah hesitates, asking “How long?” 

In response to the vision Isaiah cries out, “Woe is me, I am doomed!  For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips.” (6:5)  At the sight of God, Isaiah recognizes the state of the world, a state of sinfulness, and his own state of sinfulness before God.  His sinfulness is purged through a glowing ember touched to his lips.  The world is in a state of sin.  We have separated ourselves from our God through original sin in the Garden.  As one commentator states, “But sin in this case is more like the notion of pollution than specific human actions, even though human action might have prompted the pollution in the first place.  The result of our actions is that we and our everyday world are polluted, and, furthermore, we have evolved in such a way that we actually need a polluted environment to maintain our lives.  God, on the other hand, is not polluted and hence is fundamentally separate from us and our world.”  (Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year B after Pentecost 1, p. 21)   God is holy but did not abandon the world, rather God entered back by way of the Temple in Hebrew thought.  But it is dangerous, this mixing of the holy and the unholy; they are not compatible.  “Thus the holiness of God is dangerous for anyone and anything in the profane world, and the Temple with its liturgy is meant to provide a means by which the dangerous presence of God can be channeled safely into our world.” 

Fire is an important theme in this passage.  It is fire that purifies, just as we see fire in our psalm.  But where the passage from Isaiah emphasizes the separateness of God from impure humanity, our psalm looks at the presence of God.  We are to look for God, not in nature, but in worship, in the safety of the Temple.  From the safety of the Temple we can hear God’s word.

Our God is far too awesome for us to imagine.  God is found in nature, in worship, in the wind of the Spirit, in Jesus, God in human form as we are reminded in our gospel for today – for God so loved the world.  Today we focus on the mystery of God as Trinity, three in one.  God as creator whose voice sounds through the storm, God in human flesh, God as Spirit, uniting God and Son, the go-between or middle.  All are reminders of the mystery that is God. 

John Donohue, in his book Beauty:  the Invisible Embrace, finds beauty in music, color, dance, imagination, attraction, even death.  He explores the forms of beauty found in places, things, events and experiences.  In the end he states it is not a question of what is beauty, but “who” is beauty, for God is beauty.  He states, “At the heart of beauty must be huge care and affection for creation, for nowhere is beauty an accidental presence.  Nor is beauty simply its own end.  It is not self-absorbed but points beyond itself to an embrace of belonging that holds everything together.” (p. 193)  Beauty pulls us beyond ourselves; it gladdens our heart yet makes us lonely as we long for that “Other” that is beyond us.  It both is God and points to God.  As Augustine said, “our hearts shall know no rest till they rest in Thee.”

The voice of the Lord is powerful.  His word is a fire that burns, that can destroy or purify, that can bring new life.  His voice is also gentle as a summer breeze bringing healing and comfort; it is the caring words of a father or mother over a child as Paul tells us in Romans. 

The end of the psalm reminds us that God is king, God rules over the world, then there is a blessing prayer:  “May the Lord give strength to his people!  May the Lord bless his people with peace!”  The voice of the Lord strengthens us, but his final word is peace, more powerful than thunder and lightning, a peace the world cannot give, only God can give.  And so we pray for peace, for in the end it is peace that will prevail.  Everything else will pass away but God’s word will not pass away.  May the Lord bless you with his peace.   

Copyright, May 2012, Robertson

Psalm 24: The Earth Is the Lord's

May 27, 2012                          Psalm 24:  The Earth is the Lord’s!

Ezekiel 37:1-14           Psalm 24          Acts 2:1-21                 John 15:26-27, 16:4b-15

“Dem Bones, dem bones, dem dry bones, now hear the word of the Lord!”  In the Ezekiel reading about dry bones, we hear how God will breathe life back into dried out bones, wonderful imagery, a field of skeletons getting up and dancing a macabre dance as God brings them back to life and puts flesh onto their bones. God asks the prophet, “can these bones come to life?” Of course, we all know that dry bones cannot be restored to life, however, the prophet, in true wisdom, put the question back to God, “you alone know that.”  And God proceeds to surprise by doing the impossible and bringing life out of death.

It has only been recently that science has begun to explore the spiritual realm, trying to put “God” under the microscope, study religious phenomena using scientific method.  One area of research has been near death our out of body experiences.  In these experiences individuals are technically dead, brain activity and breathing has ceased, and they leave their body and proceed on a journey until sent back into their bodies.  Science has tried to quantify these experiences, come up with some explanation.  They suggest that what the individual sees and experiences are just the brain shutting down, including a review of their life as the brain waves spark and go out.  However some of these individuals relate what happened around them at the time they were technically dead in great detail, with great accuracy.  In one such case, the person related being out of their body, leaving the operating room and flying above the hospital where she saw a tennis shoe on the roof of the hospital.  Upon returning to her body and relating what had been seen, staff went on the roof and found the shoe.

One aspect of these experiences that I find comforting is that in leaving behind broken bodies, their bodily spirit is whole; the blind could see again, the deaf hear again, the lame walk.  What a wonderful confirmation of what Scripture tells us about life after this life.  Our bodies are restored like new flesh being put back on dry bones, life being brought out of death.

Our psalm for today reminds us that the Earth is the Lord’s, it’s not ours; we are but temporary residents of the earth.  Written in three parts, it is meant for a procession, something that would be very appropriate for the celebration of Pentecost.  Some churches celebrate this day with a procession with red banners and flags, symbolizing the coming of the Spirit upon the apostles.  First section is comprised of the first two verses, reminding the listener of the God of creation who first brought forth life upon the earth when God’s spirit swept over the water and God breathed life into creation.  All creation belongs to God for God is the creator.  He founded the earth and established it. 

It’s not us who created God, contrary to what some may say, but God who created us.  The evidence for God is everywhere.  Some scientists point to discoveries and claim them for their own, but they are only finding what God has planted upon the earth.  As one commentator states, “Science is a sort of treasure hunt, with scientists as the hunters—all honor to them; but the originator of the treasure is God.”  (Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. 4, p. 133)  They would never have been able to discover anything had God not made it.

The second section, verses 3-6, recounts who the true worshipper is.  It asks the questions, who shall ascend the hill of the Lord?  Who shall stand in his holy place? Reminiscent of Psalm 15:1-2ff where the answer to this question is, “He who walks blamelessly and does what is right, and speaks truth from his heart. . .”  The answer here is simpler, “He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false, and does not swear deceitfully.” (vs. 4) Those whose hands are not stained by murder or theft, or taking a bribe or other sins; those who do not sin with their hands or hearts shall enter the Temple.  Such a person will be blessed by God, his cause will prevail.  In a ritual setting, the priest might pose this question about who is worthy of entrance into the Temple, then conclude that those gathered possess these qualities, “such is the generation of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob.” (vs 6)           

The procession moves on to the gates of the Temple where the people call out for the gates to be opened, singing back and forth in an antiphonal song where one side sings one verse and the other the next.  In triumph, at the words “Who is the King of Glory?  The Lord of hosts!”  The gates are lifted so that all may enter.  And what are the gates that need to be lifted?  Perhaps the gates of unbelief.  The procession is complete and all those who are worthy, who believe in God the creator, shall enter in.

In our reading from Acts of the Apostles, the apostles are hidden behind locked door out of fear, their own gates that need to be lifted.  With the coming of the Spirit, the doors are opened.  The Spirit breaks through the locked doors, it can’t be kept out.  Filled with the Spirit the apostles open their doors and Peter begins to preach.  It’s as if a light has been turned on, Peter and the others have been changed in a way that frees them from fear.  They see the world in a vastly different way thanks to God’s Spirit.

Part of the nature of an encounter with God’s spirit is that it changes us.  As Barbara Bradley Haggerty notes in her book, Fingerprints of God, after examining numerous studies of religious experiences: “I began to perceive a theme.  Simply put, when you bump against the spiritual, something changes.  First, your brain begins to operate differently, even at resting state.  Second, your interior life is transformed.  Your priorities and loves, how you choose to spend your time and with whom you choose to spend it—all that changes in blink of an eye.”  (pp. 276-7)

According to scientist Dean Radin, 96% of the universe is “dark matter” or “dark energy.”  We don’t know what it is.  This means that all of our theories and supposed knowledge is based on just 4% of the observed universe.  And yet there are those who claim emphatically that there is no God.  Foolishness.  They think themselves wise when they are not. Myself, I prefer to leave room for mystery, acknowledging that what I do not understand far exceeds what little I do. If there are mysteries to be discovered, it is because our God put them there at the beginning of creation.  Not only is 96% of our universe dark matter, much of our brain is.  We only use a small portion of our brain.  If we used all of our brains, what wonders might we experience. 

Jesus tells the disciples in our reading from John how they cannot understand what he is saying but when the Spirit comes they will understand.  It’s like a light bulb waiting to be plugged into a source of power.  When the Spirit comes, the light goes on and the apostles are changed in ways they couldn’t have imagined before this.  There is still so that we don’t know, don’t understand.  There is so much that is dark matter, so much within our own brains waiting for God to light it up as he did at the first

Pentecost. 

This weekend, besides being the Christian celebration of Pentecost, we remember those who have died that we might have the freedoms we enjoy.  Our readings for today are messages of hope, that there is more to this life than we know, that God can restore our loved ones, if not in this life, then in the next when he will breathe the Spirit back into dry bones.  No-one who lives a life of service and love, whose heart is pure, is lost.  Their sacrifices are not forgotten, were not for nothing.  They have entered the gates of the Temple.  For the rest of us who continue on this procession through life, may God’s healing love keep us on the way that leads to you until that time that we stand at the gate and knock, confident that are God will open to us.

Copyright May 2012, Robertson 

Psalm 21: Queen for a Day

May 13, 2012, Mother’s Day              Psalm 21:  Thou dost set a crown of fine gold

Acts 10:44-48             Psalm 21                      1 John 5:1-6                John 10:9-17

“Would you like to be queen for a day?”  Remember Queen for a Day?  Old tv show, beginning of America’s obsession with big winning game shows.  Four women were selected out of the audience and told their hard luck stories.  One who received most applause won the title along with a dozen roses and many prizes.  Show ended with host saying, “Wishing we could make every woman queen for every single day.” 

Well, what would you say if I told you, you already are queens and kings, not just for one day, but every day?  All of you in retirement with your silver hair and long life!

Psalm for today is another royal psalm.  Psalm 20 was the prayer of a king going into battle.  Psalm 21 is prayer of celebration after the king’s victory.  The two could possibly refer to the same event.  Written in two parts, verses 1-7 addresses the Lord, verses 8-12 are addressed to the king.  The psalm starts with the king rejoicing.  “You have given him his heart’s desire,” the psalm continues.  God gave the king everything he desired; he gave him many blessings, a crown of gold, and long life.  Verse 3 states you met him with goodly blessings – image of returning warrior being greeted by cheering throngs and then having a crown or other symbol of success placed on head.  An old Gaelic saying states that “he is a king who is well.”  The crown could be a symbol of God’s blessing through good health.  As one commentator states, “Morally, health is holiness; to be well is to be ‘good all through.’ That crown of pure gold is within the reach of all of us poor ‘slaves that would be king.’” (Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. 4, p. 113)  The king asked for life (vs. 4) and God gave it to him, length of days.  Each of you, having made it to 80, 90 and beyond, have that length of day.  Even more than that, God makes him most blessed forever, making him glad with the joy of his presence (vs. 6) – the promise of life with God forever in heaven where we will wear a heavenly crown.

At verse 8 the psalm shifts its focus and addresses the king, proclaiming more victories, not only over his enemies but their descendants as well.  The verses are problematic in their violence and vengeance, creating a challenge for the reader.  You won’t find these verses in the common lectionary for such verses are routinely avoided.  Walter Brueggemann, speaking at a conference at Western Theological Seminary encouraged listeners to wrestle with such difficult passages rather than avoid them.  All of Scripture is helpful and thus worthy of our attention.  So how do we deal with such difficult passages? 

For some insight, let’s look at our passage from Acts of the Apostles.  This passage is often referred to as the second Pentecost as the spirit comes to the Gentile community.  In order for this to happen there needed to be some changes.  In verses preceding, there are two visions.  First Cornelius, a devout and God-fearing man, has a vision of an angel who told him to go to Joppa to a man called Peter.  Peter then has a vision of a large sheet filled with all types of animals.  Peter was told to slaughter and eat.  Peter resisted saying he had never eaten anything profane or unclean.  The voice responded, “What God has made clean, you are not to call profane.”  This happened three times.  While Peter was still pondering the vision, the servants Cornelius had sent to find Peter, appeared at the door of his house.  The Spirit instructed Peter to go with them and so Peter journeyed to Cornelius home where he stayed despite Jewish law against Jews associating with Gentiles.  “You know that it is unlawful for a Jewish man to associate with, or visit, a Gentile, but God has shown me that I should not call any person profane or unclean.”  Thus the stage was set for the conversion of the Gentiles.  The issue here is not is about whether food is clean or unclean.  Rather it is about contextualizing the gospel, “and the need for Christians to see the saving activity of God in cultural contexts that are unfamiliar to us.” (Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year B, Lent/Easter, p. 152) 

Why do we resist passages that do not reflect our own worldview?  Because of cognitive dissonance.  Cognitive dissonance is a psychological term that basically addresses the brain’s tendency to dislike contradictory messages.  The brain is a cognitive miser, meaning it likes to conserve energy, doesn’t want to work any harder than it has to.  These contradictory messages means the brain has to work to understand them and may even be forced to change its opinion.  So sometimes, rather than do this, we will simply dismiss information that we don’t like, or, we believe what we want to believe.  It can be hard to break through this resistance.  In the case of Peter in Acts, it took a profound vision from God to get him to be open to possibility that Gentiles can also be saved.  Profound religious experiences have a way of getting us to see reality in a different way, change long held beliefs.

So let’s look at the cultural context of our psalm.  Second portion of psalm could be interpreted in a variety of different ways.  People are praying for the king.  They are praying for a complete conquest, one so complete that the king’s enemies would be wiped off of the face of the earth, it would extend to their children and their children’s children.  Early Hebrew nation had little concept of an afterlife.  They did speak of Sheol as this shadowy place, but for most part, focus is on the here and now, this life.  Immortality for the Hebrew community lies in the community, not in a life after death, which makes Jesus’ resurrection even more profound.  A common Hebrew blessing would be for children and children’s children for countless generations, hence God promised Abraham that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars.  And so, a Hebrew curse would be that there be no generations, thus no immortality for enemies.  While it sounds terribly harsh to us, especially within the context of a prayer, it would not seem that way for the Hebrew community.

Another way to look at it would be in terms of God as the king and the last judgment when the wheat will be separated from the chaff.  God is the one to destroy evil from the face of the earth, wipe out all of the seeds of evil, even to the last generation.  The fiery furnace could be the fires of Gehenna.  In this sense they are praying for God to prevail and wipe out all evil from every generation. 

In a spiritual sense, if we are to free ourselves of sinfulness, we must not only root out the big sins, murder, adultery, theft, but even the smaller ones, the off-spring of sin, thoughts that lead to un-kind and evil actions.   In this sense we pray that God will put all evil thoughts to flight.  Psalm ends with a confirmation of the writer’s belief in the strength of God to do all these things and praise of God.

Our gospel from John picks up where we left off from last week with the vine and the branches.  Jesus tells us to abide in him, or remain in him.  What does it mean to abide in Jesus?  Many of you know my friend Marcy who is currently under Hospice care.  When another friend asked her if she had any new insights as she faces her final journey, especially in light of her years of ministry and being with others during similar times, she said, “I don’t know that I have any great insights.  God’s abiding love is with me.”  What a great gift, to not only know God loves us, but to experience that love, feel it.

How do we experience that love?  Through others and the love we feel for them.  To be loved, to be aware of God’s abiding love, surely that is the greatest gift of all, the greatest crown to wear.

Each of us already has a crown waiting for us in heaven.  It is a crown of love.  In that we have loved and been loved, there is a crown awaiting us.  There are cheering crowds in heaven above, waiting to welcome us home and place this crown on our heads.

Today we celebrate mother’s day.  Our mother’s have an important role to play in making us the people we are, in helping us be open to God’s love.  In that we have been loved well as children, we will be able to love as adults, both receiving and giving and growing in God’s abiding love.  And so, let us wear our crowns well.  Wishing we could make every woman, and every man, queen or king for every single day.  We can!

Robertson, copyright May 2012