Believe: Another Answer to The Great Question Lent 2 - Psalm 121; Romans 4.1-5.13-17; John 3.1-21

Rev. Tiare L. Mathison, Pastor & Soul-Tender

What is the great ? You are to answer this Lenten Season?

  Lenten Pilgrimage - to go on a journey to prepare for Easter Morning.

Songs of Ascent define Psalms 120-134, which means ‘going up to’ a pilgrimage collection.  Sometimes described as a psalm before going to battle, they are known to be the vocal of the people as they make their way up to the sanctuary in Jerusalem, for a particular festival. They are performed in  a call and response fashion. To this day, NEXT YEAR IN JERUSALEM is shouted at the end of the Passover Seder. Each year, Jews look back to the Exodus from Egypt and experience its liberation as their very own, through the taste of the egg, the bitter herb, the wine., “Why is this night different than any other night?” They ask.  They look forward to complete spiritual redemption for the whole world. Next year in Jerusalem. For Jerusalem is both the physical place and the mystical arena where the Shekinah, the glory of God, dwells.  

  Yireh, the first phrase of the compound, Jerusalem, means the place where God dwells. As he built the funeral pyre for his son, Isaac, Abraham,  is the frame to hear this question, “From whence does my help come?”

  Assurance does not come in a vacuum.  There must be an anxiety. One Jewish scholar suggests that Abraham recited Psalm 121.1 as he raised his knife to the throat of Isaac.  It is only in this extreme cry for genuine help, that the liminality of the God we worship and adore is both seen and not seen, in the light and in the dark.  You stand in the doorway of loss and hope, looking backward with grief in the shadow of death, as the dim glimmer of something new rises before you. It might be years before you take a step.

  Where does your help come from?  What are your anxieties today?  

We know Michael & Vicki’s about Lily.  We know there are other children who suffer with  anxiety, and depression, as parents lament in fear and longing.  There is serious anxiety in the political arena, with deep questions of where the United States is headed as a country.  

We know about so many elderly people who are deeply afraid of the Covid virus that might be the thing that finally takes them down. 

We know people in Nashville Tennessee who cannot even hear these magnificent words:  “The Lord is your keeper, the sun will not strike you nor the moon.” But what about the unexpected, most powerful ever tornadoes?  

  It is this deep and ultimate recognition that we are not in control, we do not have the power to generate life on our own.  In the moments of deepest challenge, Our Keeper asks us to let our guard down, to open our clenched fists, to see, to really see, and to believe, to really believe, this, this foolish promise, ‘I will keep you for ever.’ Is true.  We are not throwaways, we are not to be discarded. This keeping is for eternity. As Wendell Berry, a beautiful farmer poet writes:

  Eternity is not infinity.

  It is not a long time.

  It does not begin at the end of time.

  It does not run parallel to time.

  In its entirety it always was.

  In its entirety it will always be.

  It is entirely present always.

BELIEVE: ANOTHER ANSWER TO THE GREAT QUESTION  

  So its the argument from Abraham to Jesus.  This trajectory of faith. Genesis 12 begins it; Genesis 15:6 declares it; Its written all over the stories of the Patriarchs & Matriarchs; the Prophets announce it.  Paul says it again here in Romans 4.  

  To make sense of the particular claims, you have to know the larger context of Romans 3--works do not reveal God's righteousness.  You can work your self to the bone to try and please God. Earn God's favor. It won't do you any good. You have to be like Abraham and Sarah, who believed.  You want to be righteous? You gotta believe.

  What Paul does here is a rhetorical masterpiece.  He takes Abraham, the exclusive patriarch of the Jews, uses ethnic reasoning to first claim Abraham for the Jews and then makes him the father of all who believe, first the Jew, then the Gentile and most challenging for us :whom else?.  All who believe, is Paul's measure.

  He turns Abraham into the paradigmatic figure to demonstrate the inclusive nature of the gospel.  Its truly amazing to follow Paul's logic: The unyielding love of God and God's righteousness as he writes so beautifully in chapter 8:38:  For I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

  Paul's vision here is compelling for our 21st century.  Abraham is the arch-ancestor for Jews, Gentiles, and for all of humanity, all who believe.  Faith is an inclusive, organic, fellowship, free of ethnic, class and gender, sexual identity distinctions.  Our binaries and barriers don't matter in God's economy, for the free gift of grace is faith to us and for us, through Jesus' death for our trespasses and His resurrection for our justification. Again, we are not throwaways, not to be discarded.  All the work of righteousness has been done on our behalf. Believe it?

  John 3:16 is known the world over.  You see it at football games, on highway signs, bumper stickers that hint at taking a gamble, hipster cool.  Even the inside bottom rim of an IN/OUT Burger cup or even a tattoo. It signals a certain level of religious fervor that believers and non-believers both speak about.  If you are ‘in’ then you know the exact date and time you were saved. If you are ‘out’ you think these people are wacky, ‘who cares what the bottom of a soda cup says anyway?‘  What then, does it mean to believe?

“So, Rabbi,,,”  Nicodemus honors Jesus as a religious teacher in the Jewish tradition.  He admits Jesus comes from God. Look at the signs! Yet he stumbles over the literal words “born from above”.  “How can I be born again, crawl back in my mom’s womb, what?” Jesus surprises Nic with this metaphor of birth. It is irrational, we know that.  Can’t happen. Nic echoes Mary, Jesus’ mom; ‘How can these things be?’ But unlike her, he is not ready to go deeper, to say “Let it be done to me according to your will.”   Not yet anyway. He compartmentalizes his faith questions in the privacy of darkness and doesn’t show up again until John 19:38-42, after the crucifixion. He has a 100 pounds of spices to cover Jesus’ body.   A generous act of faith carried to the graveside in the dimmed light of the cross.

   Jesus responds with a kind of ironic ? back to him.  “What, you a teacher of Israel and you can’t make sense of this?”  Jesus follows the pattern of John’s gospel: sign, dialogue, discourse.  Jesus turns toward his audience.  

  Who is His audience at this point?  (pause) Us. The Readers. Its the second person plural ‘you’.  “Very truly I tell you...” We stand in the same spot as Nic. An encounter with Jesus.  God loves the world and wants to speak to you directly about this great love, for you. And you.  And you. 

  To be born again.  To travel through the spiritual birth canal brought to life by our mother God who works so hard on our behalf.  This God gives birth, offers nurture, nudges us toward deeper faith. This God wants to shine Her beautiful light in all the closets and attics and basements inside us.  There is no darkness that can overcome the light. This is one of the fundamental promises of the gospel of Jesus Christ. There is no darkness that can overcome His light.  We should make that a song!

  Nic teaches us one more thing.  Faith is not a noun. It is not a value we hold, it is not intellectual ascent alone, it is not something we can conjure up on our own.  Belief as it is practiced in John’s gospel and Nic’s life is a verb, an action. It is subject to all the ?’s, doubts, ambiguities, uncertainties, and indecision us humans bring to the task of being followers of Jesus.  This kind of faith is a gift from God through the Holy Spirit. Its deep and rich and full and comprehensive. It encompasses our doubt and our failures. It allows us to laugh at ourselves. Nic has already asked all the funny questions.  Like the absurdity of putting a Bible verse on the bottom of a cup or under your eyes in a football game. Foolish, maybe. Not our style, for sure. I can’t imagine any of you getting a tattoo with John 3:16. (pause)

 But it might not hurt for us to push ourselves a little deeper into our faith, asking the Holy Spirit to come alive in us one more time, so we can be born again.

BELIEVE: ANOTHER ANSWER TO THE GREAT QUESTION

Amen

Restraint: Another Answer to The Great Question

Genesis 3; Matthew 4.1-11 - Lent 1- March 1, 2020

RESTRAINT!

Rev. Tiare L. Mathison, Pastor & Soul-Tender

Tell me, what is the great ? You are to answer this Lenten Season?

 A shadow of doubt.  “If”.  If you are who you were named in your baptism, ‘Beloved Son’, then... make bread out of these stones, feed your stomach.  Throw yourself off this ledge, scripture says the angels will lift you up.  Bow down to my dominion.  That’s all.  Then all of this is yours.  A single act.  Satan whispers.

  A crafty question:  “Did God really say ‘you shouldn’t eat from ANY tree in the garden?  There’s 2 trees you know, at least.  The tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  Come on, you won’t die—your eyes will be opened!  You’ll be like God—you will know good from evil.”  Who wouldn’t want that?

 lets just stop here for a minute.  Let’s ask these questions straight up:

#1) Why?  God places this tree in the middle of Eden.  Why?

#2 What is this ‘knowing of good and evil’ about anyway?

#3 What is God’s reasons for restricting this learning?

#4 How come the first humans don’t die when they eat the fruit?

  These might be our questions.  But they are not the questions this text answers.

It is this deep willfulness toward all things ‘me’ that defines our original condition, sin, and the Tempter understands. He cleverly whispers the right words in Eve and then Adams' ears:  'you will be like God!'  Who wouldn't be tempted, at least in our own little universe? 10 centuries before Christ, there is an enemy of God recorded in Scripture; defeated certainly but still defiant until the final days. Its his job to split you off at the root from your baptism, just like he tries to do with Jesus.

This is not a scientific answer to the question of the problem of evil, based in measurable, material means.   But a religious one.  It is not the ‘little red suited guy running around with a pitchfork in his hand’ from the 19th century romantic period.  Rather it is a fundamental recognition that the whole of existence is marred in an unnatural way.  Let me say that again.

Sin is not God’s way nor God’s intention for humanity.  The original creation was designed to serve and protect - Hebrew, abad - the garden, Eden.  Humans are fashioned with some part of God’s mind, we often say, made in the image of God.  It is what gives each and everyone of us human dignity and human worth.  We were made for a purpose.  This is what we forgot.

  It is our worst selves, how we dehumanize each other, and ultimately, be anti-life.  The language of ‘The Tempter’ or ‘demons’ or ‘evil personified’ are our metaphors of truth, if we live with a Christian world view.  The word itself is drawn from the Greek - Dia and ballo - to throw across.  In Matthew's gospel, the noun means to attack, mislead, deceive.  We see The Devil  mislead Eve and Adam away from their blessed state of intimate companionship.  We see The Devil mislead Jesus away from His core commitments and the purpose God has for him.  We make our confession every week for the ways we cooperate with evil and renege on our fundamental relationships with God, with one another and this marred creation.   Let’s be very clear about one thing here:  temptation is not co-equal to testing.  Temptation destroys faith!  Testing builds faith.  We must remain vigilant and clear-minded about the difference. 

Restraint.  One answer to the great question.

  Don’t get me wrong.  It is very tempting.  40 days and nights with no food or water in the desert leaves one delirious, crazy in the head, as the gut caves in on itself to survive.  Jesus was out there a long time - not necessarily our 24 hour days, rather, the number 40, be it days or years, symbolizes a long sojourn in Scripture.

 the  Prestige being offered  is a beautiful thing, domination could be used for good. 

"  Nooooooooooo", Jesus Cries Out.  Bread alone is not enough.  Who are we to play God?  There is only the Holy One to worship.  Away with you.  Until the next time, the last time, with arms pinned by nails wide on the cross, the taunt comes again.  “You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself!  “If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.  (Matthew 27:40)

  These are not our temptations, the spectacle, the miraculous, the power grab.  The Tempter whispers different words in our head.  More like Eve and Adam.  “Ah come on, take a bite.  Its not that big a deal.  You don’t really even believe in me so whats the problem?”  The talking snake couldn’t be real right?  Silky tones draw us away to our own self focused desires.

We don’t want to dominate the whole world, just our little universe.  “If they would only do it my way...”  “How can she be so stupid?”  “Whats the matter with him any way?  He’s such a goody.”          The bile of envy rises in our throats.  “How come they get to have all that, go on that trip, drive that car?”

  Lent is the season for tuning our ears, to discern the texture and quality of our own demons.  We are to rend our hearts, that is, repent with our whole selves and return to God.  We don’t need to be led into temptation, let’s be honest.  We find ourselves there a lot of the time.  Pride, self-sufficiency, apathy, even insecurity is the arena where the voices start their seductive cadence.     “You can have it all and it can be all about you.” 

Crafty snake exegesis is intended to make God look bad—arbitrary, demanding, unreasonable.  The serpent introduces suspicion into this created, generative relationship between God and humanity and one another.    As we turn from Him and one another, we bring on all the ruin of the world.

  But the luscious voice in your head says “its okay, you can do what you want.  Love yourself, that’s a good thing.  Jesus even said, love your neighbor as yourself.”  The Tempter speaks in tones that feeds your desires for what you want, even if it means breaking relationship with God and with others.  Cultural pressures line up with the demonic in your head.  Wealth, sex and power are the common ones.  Especially for men.  For women its often more about vanity, based in deep insecurity--am I prettier than her, more sexy, smarter? A constant yardstick, 24/7. The body positive movement is only for the younger women.

It is this deep willfulness toward disobedience that sends us careening off course, looking for love in all the wrong places.    As Paul says in Romans 5:17:  “If, because of one person’s trespass, death exercised dominion through them...

The only thing that will heal our disfigured will is love, the right kind.

Restraint.  One answer to the great question.

    Doubt is the wedge that has existed since the Fall.  Humanity has resisted God, hid from God, distrusted God and still does.  The first thing Eve and Adam did after they  take a bite of that juicy, sensuous, bright red apple?  They hid themselves, their nakedness now exposed to each other and to God.  The beauty of Eden now marred.  It is this broken harmony, as God cries out, ‘where are you?  Why are you not here?  You were with Me.  You left your place of repose, creation.  Now you are with the snake.’  God’s last act of grace is to sew clothes for Eve and Adam. (Pause) 

  The right answer is we don’t live by bread only, alone, or just bread.  We too live by the Word pouring out of God’s mouth, still.  This is an active voice of a God who seeks to be in conversation with us.  Even about our doubts, our fears, our darkest cravings, our deepest desires, our shame, our guilt, our questions.  Grace is a free gift, as Paul says in Romans 5:16.  Love  stands beside us, faces down our demons with us, one by one, speaks in tones of clarity and forgiveness, verified by the community of faith. 

  If there is seduction going on it is toward the good--the love of God and the love of one another and the healthy love of self.  It is this Word we must know.  It is why clarion calls at the beginning of Lent always ask us to meditate on Scripture in preparation for our stance, our strong stance, against evil.  

The taunts don’t stop, they get louder in this season, until that final moment when Jesus says, “It is finished.”  The curtain is rent, the sky goes dark, the Host of Heaven and the angels rage and weep.  “If you are the Son of God, will you rise from the dead?” 

  Deliverance comes as the angels set the table in the wilderness. Amen

Restraint.  One answer to the great question.