Does God Get Angry?

Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28; Psalm 14:1-7; 1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10

Friends, last week we talked about how some of the Scriptures we’re reading right now don’t really sound like a gentle, loving kind of God we probably prefer to think of, and we continue to get some of that this week.  So I’d like us to continue to explore what it is that actually might make God angry, as well as perhaps some things which don’t, and what happens afterwards.

When does God get angry?

Jeremiah tells us that God gets angry when people seem to be too good at doing evil and don’t seem to know how to do good.  When God talks about what it’s like when God’s angry--we hear about how the world grows silent and trembles with fear.  After all, the rest of creation knows God and what God is capable of doing.  When I read the description there of just how angry God is--no light, birds fleeing, land waste and void--I’ll admit:I kind of hear that western music that they always play right before the shootout.  God is sort of fantasizing about some really dramatic stuff here, because God is angry.

But even though God is angry, God hasn’t cut God’s people off.  They’re still God’s children, whom God calls, “my people.”  And so to help us understand a little better, let’s talk about parentalisms:  those things which parents say when they are really fed up with their kids.  Such as, “oh, you think this is angry?  You haven’t even seen angry…”  The Jeremiah passage reminds me a lot of that.  Or, can you imagine God, the parent, with the whole world in the back seat, bickering and squabbling and picking on each other and whining, and finally God saying, “Don’t make me pull this car over and come back there!”  

Have you ever asked yourself, as a parent or as a child, what exactly was going to happen if the car did get pulled over?  Did you try to find out?  Or did you just get the picture that it was time to knock it off?

Maybe God isn’t literally going to pull the car over.  However, like any parent knows, there are times when you have got to step in and get the kids’ attention before they really get hurt.  And God knows that if they keep going down the road they are going, they are indeed going to get seriously hurt.

Seriously: Don’t Eat People

So, what exactly makes God angry?  Well, the Psalm tells us God is angry when people become corrupt, that the evildoers are the ones who “eat up my people like they eat bread,” who exploit the poor and vulnerable.  If you’re going to get where you’re going by making life more miserable for those below you, then you should know that God is providing refuge for them, and your plans are in trouble.

I wonder if you’ve heard it said that if you took a knife and literally cut out everything the Bible had to say about something like healthy sexuality, or gay people, you wouldn’t notice the difference.  But if you tried to cut out everything the Bible had to say about our responsibility to care for the poor and vulnerable, the whole thing would fall apart.  Treating those who have less power and material wealth than ourselves with respect and dignity is at the very core of our faith.  So often, the world entices us to do otherwise, and to treat them like a nuisance, or simply forget them.

And wouldn’t that seem easier?  Even with the Gospel story:  If you had 100 sheep, and lost one, a 99% retention rate is still pretty good, like an A+, right?  Even losing just one coin out of ten, that’s still 90%, like an A-, right?  Ah, if only it were so easy, and the stakes weren’t so high.

More Joy In Heaven

The Gospel goes on to say that there is more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents, rather than 99 righteous ones who need no repentance.  There’s a little bit of a sarcastic undercurrent there, since Jesus is responding to people criticizing him for eating with tax collectors and sinners, when a “good” religious person would know how awful they were and wouldn’t associate with them.  In criticizing, they’re demonstrating how very self-righteous they are.  Surely, they themselves don’t need to repent for anything.  But God isn’t that excited about such self-righteous people.  Besides, they’re really rather boring.

Re-calculating...

It’s hard for many of us to admit when we’re lost--literally or figuratively.  Literally speaking, how many of you have a GPS?  How many of you disagree with the GPS and then get irritated when it sits there and says, ‘reCALCulating, reCALCulating….’  How many of you just turn it off?  My mom is one of those people, who has no idea where the thing is taking her and everytime she comes out to visit, she gets within five miles of the house, gets frustrated, and turns it off.  Has no idea where she is or how to describe where she is, and I get to go out in the middle of the night (and it always is, by that point) go find her, and get her back to the house, where the grandkids are eagerly waiting.

When we get lost, when we miss the right turn, God re-calculates.

It’s hard to admit we’re lost in other ways too.  As you may have seen, the local chapter of Al-Anon which met in our building recently disbanded.  In the weeks since, I’ve had so many conversations with families who feel very lost, even helpless and hopeless, as they try to find resources to help their loved one struggling with an addiction.  And certainly part of the difficulty for many of the families as they try to find help, is not wanting anyone else to know--they’re worried what their friends will think, or maybe even worried about their insurance.  I admit I wasn’t equipped with a lot of knowledge about what resources were around and where to direct folks when they started coming to ask for direction.  But I’m learning, along with our other local clergy, and hopefully we can figure out how to offer folks more than a seeming dead-end.

God Understands Loss

There is so much pain in these families that I’ve met over the past few weeks.  And yet it helps to remember, God knows pain.  God even knows losing a child due to all the violence and evil in this world.  When God sees us hurting, or even our children hurting, even if it’s because of our own wrong turns, God hurts with us.  And God does not abandon us to our own devices, even when we are sure we can trust only ourselves.  God’s depth of love and mercy and grace surpasses anything we can imagine.  Indeed, God’s anger lasts for a night, but God’s steadfast love is forever.  [Now that is some pretty Amazing Grace].

A Real Rascal

Some people do get lost, and don’t realize it, until they are found--and that’s what’s going on in the letter to Timothy.  Paul, who is instructing Timothy in Christian life and leadership, admits that he once was a real rascal--a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence.  We might forget that Paul was formerly Saul, a man who was actually lauded for his harsh persecution of the early Christians, including holding everyone’s cloaks as they attacked and stoned Stephen to death.  This is a man with some real blood on his hands.  He is willing to admit he is the foremost of sinners, since he was working so hard to squelch the followers of Jesus--until he had his Damascus Road incident, literally knocked off his donkey by a vision of Jesus speaking to him, became blinded, and repented, and then was given a new role in life, as Paul, who would go on through his letters and teachings to build and support the new Christian movement and take it much further than any other person had before.  

Cause for Celebration

God got angry enough with Paul to stop him in his tracks, but God also didn’t get rid of Paul.  God had a purpose for Paul, and the rest is history.  That is cause for celebration.  When people we’d rather write off as total losers are found, that is cause for celebration.  When we cease our self-righteousness and join the celebration, that is cause for rejoicing.  And when we are found, over and over again, whether we realize when we’ve been lost or not, that too, is cause for rejoicing.  Thanks be to God!

Prayers This Week:

For all who are recovering from surgery

For all who are in hospice care

For all wrestling with chemical dependency, and those who love them

For all affected by flooding

For our Presbytery during this visioning process, grant wisdom and clarity of purpose

For a true peace in Syria

For all who wrestle with hunger and homelessness, that they not be forgotten

Broken, Re-shapen: Counting the Cost

Jeremiah 18:1-11; Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18; Philemon 1-21; Luke 14:25-33

(Look these up at bible.oremus.org)

In the Scriptures today we have the prophet Jeremiah going down to the potter’s house to see how clay can be shaped into one thing, then broken down and re-shaped into another--a metaphor for our own lives; we have the Psalm which reminds us how God has knit us together in the womb and knows much more about ourselves than we ever will; we have the letter to Philemon in which Paul asks for the freedom of the slave Onesimus, in order to return to Paul as a servant of his own free will.  And then we have a Gospel which says we must hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and yes, even life itself, if we are to be Jesus’ disciples.

First of all, I would completely understand anybody who said they didn’t like these passages about Jeremiah and Jesus, or talk about them like everything that’s wrong in the Christian church as we know it.  Neither of these sound like the gentle, loving Jesus or God we might prefer.  So I think it’s worth addressing what these passages might really mean.

To Hate, Or Simply Dismiss?

Let’s start with the Gospel and especially at that word, “hate.”  The root word is probably better understood as to ‘disregard, or dismiss.’  That’s a little more comforting than ‘hate,’ but still, it doesn’t sound all that comforting.  It wasn’t comforting back in the day either, when family was absolutely central to one’s life and livelihood.  People didn’t just go gallivanting off for any reason besides to try to earn a living in times of crisis--certainly not to fulfill individual curiosity.  Even adult children were expected to stay home and work the family business.

What if a situation arose where you had to disregard your family’s wishes, though?  There might be times--what if everyone in your family was racist or homophobic, or what if everyone you knew supported a war that you did not, and you had to say, “I just don’t think that’s right?”  It takes a lot of guts to stand up to the people you love, and Jesus was asking that crowd, which probably included a lot of people from good Jewish families--to probably upset their families quite a bit.  If they did become disciples, their families probably wondered what they did wrong, how their loved one could betray them like this, embarrass them in front of everyone like this, they probably prayed for their mortal souls and hoped that someday they’d finally see the light.

Yes, Jesus had a reason for such hyperbole.  Jesus was not asking them to simply show up once a week for sixty minutes, sing three hymns and listen to a sermon.  Jesus was not even just asking them to help out at a food pantry now and then.  Jesus was asking them to turn their entire lives around, to break down the status quo and social custom, in order to practice barrier-breaking love.  Everybody they knew was probably going to hate them for this.  They might be disowned and lose everything they had.  And they might very well get themselves killed for doing so.  Perhaps the closest thing in recent history we have to compare to this is getting on the bus and heading south to de-segregate lunch counters in the Civil Rights era.

And as was wisely observed by our friend Aaron this week,* Jesus would likely not be welcome in most of our churches today.  He would look funny and possibly smell funny; he would have radical ideas that would disrupt the status quo; Jesus in fact has a history of being kicked out of congregations. He was a radical, counter-cultural prophet.  Discipleship had a high cost, Jesus didn’t want people entering into it lightly--and so you might say if you became a disciple, to turn against your loved ones, pick up your cross, and part with all your possessions, then you, my friend, were about to hit rock bottom.

Well, what would you be willing to give everything for?

When you join the military--that’s a situation where you really go all in: you have to decide that you are willing to part with your life or limbs or health.  Sure, there are folks who never see combat or come out just fine; many others are just not so lucky.  I do sympathize with all the young people who signed up prior to September 11th, 2001, and thought it was just a good way to pay for school.  Many have paid with their lives.

Some people do give everything to take a courageous, even if unpopular stand.

I’ll tell you the story of a man who gave pretty close to everything for what he believed, and many rejected him for it.  Recently, Veterans for Peace held their national gathering in Madison and my husband had a chance to meet S. Brian Willson.  Brian grew up by all accounts as a good son and good citizen who went to serve in the Viet Nam War; when he returned, he joined other veterans who went on to protest nuclear arms and all manner of warfare.  As a trained lawyer, he documented the consequences of U.S. foreign policy throughout Central America and other countries.  In 1987, while sitting on the railroad tracks to protest a Navy train carrying munitions, for which he fully expected to be arrested.  Instead, the train sped up and ran him over.  He lost his legs and a part of his brain.  An ambulance nearby even refused to help, because of the stand he had been taking. Later, he would learn that although he had never used violence against the government, the FBI had labeled him a "terrorist," and the train had been directed not to stop.  However, even after a lengthy recovery, Brian has never stopped protesting war.  Now, when he attends protests, even on prosthetic legs, he dances. You can learn more about the story here:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Willson

Broken Down and Re-Shapen

Let’s go back to talking about Jeremiah for a moment:  the audience was the Israelites: God’s chosen people.  They believed that because they were God’s chosen people, they couldn’t possibly be wrong.  They’d gotten comfortable in ways of exploiting the vulnerable and currying favor with the powerful.     Systems and structures of unjust power were about to be broken down as a natural consequence of their corrupted ways. During the time of Jeremiah, the Israelites would go from complacent prosperity, to the fall of Jerusalem, to being captive to Babylon, to exile in Egypt.  However, like clay, they weren’t simply discarded; God was still with them, even in exile.

There are other ways of being broken down, and re-shapen.  Recently I had the opportunity to see a video, Loving Someone With an Addiction, which talked about the point at which families would realize that they weren’t helping matters by paying the legal bills, the bail, the rent, while their loved one kept spending all their own money on drugs, or kept getting into trouble.  At some point, they realized if their loved one was going to get better, they would have to let them face the natural consequences of their addiction, even though it hurt to see.  It wouldn’t be until they hit their own rock bottom, when the consequences became costly enough, that they might actually be able to be receptive to recovery.

From Useless to Useful

Let’s talk about another guy that was close to rock-bottom.  Back in the Greco-Roman world of Paul, anybody could get into debt or trouble, and be sold as a slave into someone’s household.  Onesimus was a runaway slave, and he was in big trouble; a wanted man.  His owner, Philemon, had the right to punish him severely, including killing the man.  Somehow, Onesimus runs into Paul, who is in prison, and when you were in prison like Paul, you needed helpers to get your messages back and forth, and even to bring you food and clothing and medicine.  And oddly enough, Paul knows Philemon--he’s one of the leaders in the church at Colossae, which “meets in his house.”  Paul didn’t just keep him.  Paul sent this man back to face the potential consequences, but also offered another, more constructive path forward. However, Paul asks that this “useless” person be returned to Paul, since he was indeed ‘useful’ in his employ.  it’s a play on words, as the very name Onesimus means, “useful.”  He becomes quite useful indeed, later on, as we believe he is one of the first bishops of the new Christian movement.  His life and his world of being a slave is broken down, and re-shaped into service for God.

Asking For the Terms of Peace

There’s one more thing I want to talk about, since it comes up in the Gospel text as well as in our current events, as we hear about rulers counting the cost of going to war, and I think it’s a very appropriate question to ask, whether we can truly afford a military solution in Syria.  The heads of churches in Syria and the Middle East, and the heads of churches in this country as well, ask us to pray for peace and to not support the use of such violent means as missile strikes, because they will simply lead to more killing.  I think we may also have to be prepared that if we bomb, others might bomb us back.  I think we have to be prepared that if we use a military solution, even if we say we’re just making a quick strike, that it will become another ten years or more before we’ve seen the end of things.  There are so many options on the spectrum between bombing and doing nothing, and somehow we always manage to overlook them all.  My entire life, we have been tangled up in Afghanistan and Iraq--going back to the 70s and 80s, and we might well be for the rest of my life--we sell weapons to one side and then the other, and we use them ourselves.  It’s brought nothing but grief to us and to them.  Granted, you don’t make a lot of money by not selling weapons to warring countries, or by using weapons ourselves, but the cost of war is so much higher than the price of a real peace, built on truth and reconciliation.

So yes.  As a nation, then or now; or as a people; or even as just our own selves, it is possible to hit rock bottom for any number of reasons.  Everything we thought we knew might come smashing down around us.  And yet, there is good news, even in these painful moments.  As long as we are living, we are never completely destroyed; we may just be knocked down into our bare substance.  No matter what we do or what happens to us, God has known us in our inmost being; God knows our substance; God will even be with us as we take courageous stands; as we struggle to find God’s path for us, to follow in the footsteps of Christ.  By God’s grace, we are being re-shapen into something new.

Thanks be to God!

*Several people have indeed noted this wisely, but most recently this was mentioned by Aaron Bates.  Thanks for the good point!

More on Philemon: http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=1767

More on Jeremiah: http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=1767

Prayers This Week:

All who are struggling with serious or long-term illness in body, mind, or soul

All who wrestle with chemical dependency

For the people of Syria, that true peace may come through truly peaceful means; and that we be moved with compassion to feed, shelter, and welcome the many refugees

For the safety of all participants in our local area “Iron Man” competition this weekend

All who are wrestling with discord in their families and homes.

Beyond Things

Hosea 11:1-11; Psalm 107:1-9; Colossians 3:1-11; Luke 12:13-21

What This Message Is Not About

It would be so easy to preach this week’s Scriptures as a pointed stewardship lesson, that God blesses us with so many things that we should be ready to give everything to God, and by the way, we have a mortgage on the building, so, you know, be generous....right.  Give as you feel led, but that’s not what I’m going to talk about today.

Instead, let me talk a bit about parenting.  After all, the Gospel story starts off with a sibling dispute over the inheritance--something that causes a great deal of pain in families.  And you can definitely hear the parent in God’s voice speaking throughout the passage in Isaiah.

Let’s Talk About The Kids

My family and I went back to our old neighborhood this week, and pretty soon all the parents were hanging out talking about our kids--sharing both the joys and the frustrations.  Many of you know that banter.  And I wonder, what if God talked about us the way we talked about our kids?  How would that sound?  “Oh, you know, Adam and Eve, they were so cute and agreeable at first, but then they made a total mess out of my garden--so I put up a gate to keep them out of there--but then they just went out and made even bigger messes, I can barely keep up with it all!”

Well, God does often talk about us as though we were God’s children, because we are.  And we really hear that today in the reading from Hosea.  We hear how God raised us up like a child, and such vivid imagery:  I taught them to walk, I held them in my arms, I healed their injuries, I lifted them like infants to my cheek, I fed them.  Can’t you just see that?

And yet, that relationship was mired in pain.  For as much as God tended and nurtured the children, they ran away from God, and found themselves increasingly mired in trouble, and wouldn’t turn back and seek help, they put their trust in powers, like powerful political alliances (aka “friends”) that would ultimately betray and destroy them.

Hosea:  The Perfectly Dysfunctional Family

I noticed that several folks commented (but nobody complained!) that some of the usual Bible readings were absent last week while I was away.  Part of the reason for that was they were kind of doozies.  The upshot of the story was that God commanded the prophet Hosea to marry a prostitute, and then have a couple of kids which he was supposed to name, “Not My People” and “No Pity.”  Well, ouch.  God’s point in this was to create a totally dysfunctional family, where there is no love, no mercy, and no fidelity, to serve as a metaphor for what had gone wrong in the relationship between God and God’s people.  Granted, this didn’t go over well: mostly because it was weird, and also, as far as God’s people knew, it was a time of relative prosperity.  Everything was going great, so, what’s the big deal?  In reality, things were about to go horribly wrong in ways even they could see: As the scripture reads, the sword rages in their cities and they are in danger of returning to captivity and repression.

When Things Go Horribly Wrong

I think most of us have known situations where a child has been raised lovingly, and still somehow ends up down a wrong path that leads to their destruction.  Perhaps the most frequent metaphor today would be drug addiction [CBS This Morning 8/5/13 reported on the new heroin epidemic].  But there’s any number of things that could happen, that are truly frightening.  And for those of us who are parents, we may wonder if there is any reason we would ever abandon one of our children, or even kick them out of the house.  Perhaps ultimately, and realistically speaking, if the child was endangering the others who lived there, to protect the rest of the family, we might have to say, “you can’t come home right now.”  Now, I don’t want to ever think about any of that happening to my kids--who are rascals, but they’re also so young and innocent right now--but it might.  I can parent to the best of my ability, but I realize that even as a pastor, my family and my children are not immune to the ills of this world.

And that’s where we hear and understand God speaking through the prophet Hosea in today’s reading.  [Insert your own children’s names here] and you begin to get the picture of God, this brokenhearted parent, worried sick:

“How can I give you up, ____________?  How can I hand you over, ________?  

[Insert your own name here] and you begin to get the picture of God, this brokenhearted parent, worried sick.

Insert the name of anyone whom you love deeply, and you begin to get the picture....yes, I think we can begin to tap into those feelings and relate.

The good news is, even when we have done things to break God’s heart, God doesn’t write us off.  God instead chooses compassion and continues to invite the rebellious child home.

++

It’s Not About the Little Things

Sometimes, our relationships are painful, but nothing huge and tragic has caused it.  Sometimes, things just ‘get in the way’ of our relationships.  Not just material things, like the inheritance dispute between the brothers in the Gospel story, but things, you know, stuff that happens, and builds up, and forms into walls and barriers between us that are so hard to tear down, without tearing each other down in the process.

Granted, it’s easiest not to let those walls get built up in the first place--to handle the issues while they’re small, and not let them blow up into big things.  When those little things get blown up, then we know the relationship is in trouble.  After all, even churches die, not because they ran out of people to invite, but because they got caught up fighting over little things like the carpet and blew all their energy, and pffft, there they went.

Who among us doesn’t have a relationship we wish could be better?  Who among us doesn’t have words or mistakes we wish we could take back?  

All these human divisions, God seeks to break down, bridge, or transform.  We’ve talked in the past few weeks about those walls of animosity between Jews and Samaritans--folks who were really two sides of the same coin; and today Paul speaks to us of Greek and Jew, slave and free, barbarian and Scythian (and who are those guys anyway--we’ve forgotten, because the division didn’t really matter)!  God is inviting us to not let those little things--and they are really little things, that we make into big things--stand in the way of love.

Beyond Things

So let’s talk about that Gospel verse again, but in a non-traditional way.  Maybe it’s not such a bad thing to build bigger barns--or churches, for that matter.  Really it’s hoarding, or at least not sharing, that is the problem.  We have a beautiful new facility, and God does call us to share it--to share our sanctuary, share our classroom space, even our lawn, and not keep it to ourselves.  Things will probably get dinged up a bit in the process, and we’re going to need two things:  a good-sized can of touch-up paint, and a load of graciousness.  After all, it isn’t really our building, but God’s.  When we can overlook the little things, and use wisely the big things we have been given, all of our relationships, and all of us individually, are deeply blessed.  God wants for us far more than we can imagine.  Thanks be to God!

Prayers this Week:

For all who struggle with addictions; mental health concerns; and for all who are facing abuse of any kind.

For those who come to harm when working in far-off places.

For our Sikh brothers and sisters as they remember the shootings in their sacred space one year ago.

For our PCUSA friends who are gathered at the Big Tent conference in Louisville, KY this weekend.

For all who are traveling

For all who are ill or injured

For those who are dying, and for those who are grieving

For peace in our world

Lyrics for the Lectionary:

When reading the Scriptures this week, consider the following:

A Thousand Years, Christina Perri (Hosea)

Somebody That I Used to Know, Gotiye (Hosea)

Paradise, Coldplay (Hosea, Luke)

How To Save A Life, Fray (Hosea)

Feel the Tide, Mumford and Sons (Psalm)

Don’t Look Back...?

June 30, 2013

Psalm 77, 2 Kings 2:1-14, Galatians 5:1, 13-25, Luke 9:51-62

You know what an earworm is?  That song that sticks with you and you can't get it out of your head?  I’ve had one this week, a song which I recently heard, I’ll share the lyrics with you and you can hear it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuJWQzjfU3o

"Hello, My Name Is" by Matthew West

lyrics found here: http://www.klove.com/music/artists/matthew-west/songs/hello,-my-name-is-lyrics.aspx

Hello, my name is regret

I’m pretty sure we have met

Every single day of your life

I’m the whisper inside

That won’t let you forget

Hello, my name is defeat

I know you recognize me

Just when you think you can win

I’ll drag you right back down again

‘Til you’ve lost all belief

These are the voices, these are the lies

And I have believed them, for the very last time

Hello, my name is child of the one true King

I’ve been saved, I’ve been changed, and I have been set free

“Amazing Grace” is the song I sing

Hello, my name is child of the one true King

I am no longer defined

By all the wreckage behind

The one who makes all things new

Has proven it’s true

Just take a look at my life

What love the Father has lavished upon us

That we should be called His children

I am a child of the one true King

There’s a ring of familiarity to these lyrics, which sound a little like introductions in a 12-step group.  However, this is not just a song for people who have been through the nightmare of addictions and recovery.  Really, I think, it’s for all of us.  I believe all of us have known regrets or defeats in life, at least at some point, that still plague us--maybe not for a long time while things are going good, but they can sneak up, heap up, and even bury us at later points in life when we are hurting or down.

And yet we are children of God and heirs with Christ as this song and the scriptures are bold to proclaim today.  And that’s great, except I always feel a little hesitant in proclaiming that.  Perhaps it’s because of a term you may have heard: “Trust-fund babies.”  At the risk of offending anyone for whom the term may apply, it means that if you are born into a fortune which you didn’t earn, you tend not to act in very kind and mature ways.  And perhaps we as Christians, who have not earned our great fortune, could be described this way sometimes as well.

But Paul sets us straight in Galatians this morning, saying that “For freedom we are set free.”  We are not set free to destroy ourselves, but to live abundantly and share that goodness with others. (5:1, 13-25)

You know, we live ‘heaven’ and ‘hell’ here on earth, often enough, sometimes not of our own doing..as with tragedies or being the victim of others’ violence...but also we do so through the choices we make--which in turn make us miserable.  God sets us free for better things.

I also think maybe when a lot of us hear that Galatians passage, we can feel mixed emotions, maybe confusion, especially about the ‘works of the flesh’ checklist:  “fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these.” (5:19-21) Or maybe some of us treat it like a checklist: “no, no, no, yes, no, maybe? no, I dunno, and ‘I think they warned us about that one in confirmation...’”

But really these days, probably most of us here struggle most not with the wilder ones but with the everyday ones:  jealousy, anger, and quarrels, “and things like these.” as Paul writes.  But then it’s hard to imagine it’s the same: “I am warning you, as I warned you before: those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”  Really?  Seriously?  Not inherit the Kingdom of God, just over a little jealousy and anger?  Well, maybe...I have some thoughts about that too...

After all, the fruits of the Spirit are: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (vv.22-23).  And I’d like to think I come close to the mark reasonably often. And the Kingdom of God, as we know, is already and not yet, it’s in this world, and also beyond.  Well, I think, when we are living the fruits of the spirit, we are more likely to feel like Children of God and heirs with Christ.  And likewise, when we’re all wrapped up with anger and quarrels, well, then, it’s pretty hard to feel the Kingdom.

++

Let’s talk about that part where Jesus tells his presumed volunteers, “Don’t look back (9:62).”

Really?  Is the guy really not supposed to bury his own father?  What about meeting family obligations? Or the Ten Commandments? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Commandments

Well here’s the thing:  Dad isn’t dead yet. (Monty Python fans, think of that scene in the Quest for the Holy Grail)  Jewish people bury their dead quickly, usually within 24 hours unless it’s the Sabbath. Dad might even outlive him, given that being a disciple is a dangerous business.  I tend to think he may have stood to inherit the family business.  Anyway, if his father was dead, then he wouldn’t have the time to be hanging out talking to wandering prophets.

Then there’s the guy who says, “Let me say farewell to my family.”  That seems decent, no?  However, I think it’s like when I’m feeling pressured to say yes, but also can’t quite say no.  I say, “Let me check with my husband.”  Now,  I am about as feminist and modern as they come and so is Jorge, but this is my way out when feeling pressured to accept something I don’t want. Likewise, I believe this guy is hoping to be talked out of it while also saving face:  “Oh, about that.  Something came up.  Sorry.”

By contrast, Elijah and Elisha, a mentor and protege deeply devoted to one another, are demonstrating the kind of devotion that is being asked.  Elijah is offering his student numerous opportunities to turn back, since the road ahead will be so difficult and painful.  However, out of love for God and for his teacher, he follows Elijah to the very end--keeping his eyes fixed until he can see no longer. (2 Kings 2:1-14)

Freedom doesn’t mean a lack of adversity ahead, but a path on which we are not alone or abandoned.  Could it be a freedom to fail more?  To go boldly?  Or to walk forward into the future instead of always looking back on the past--we can be proud of where we came from, as individuals or as a church, but we can’t stay there and expect to do any more good.  The future might be painful, but the past is no more.  http://pres-outlook.com/insights-opinions/outpost-blog/18472-making-better-mistakes.html

The Presbyterian Outlook posted an article recently about needing to train pastors for future, in which nothing is certain, rather than training pastors for the church of fifty years ago, where we knew what we were doing, but only in retrospect. To do otherwise, they write, is to guarantee the death of today’s congregations.  http://pres-outlook.org/insights-opinions/faith-matters-by-bill-tammeaus/18486-we-should-close-some-seminaries-and-refocus-the-ones-we-have-left.html

Yes, we can look back for right reasons: to learn from them, to see how far we’ve come.  But not to let our own guilt or regrets cause us harm again and again; we’ve been set free from them, and to clobber ourselves is to commit an act of abuse against a child of God.

For freedom, we have been set free.  Let us be ready to follow Christ, as forgiven and redeemed children of God.  Amen.

-----

Here’s a ‘Fun Fact’ about the ‘Foxes have holes...’ verse, Luke 9:58...it’s a commentary on ethnic/religious tension between Samaritans and Jews--Jesus is headed to Jerusalem (where Jews go to worship God at the Temple), when Samaritans worship God on top a mountain in Nablus.  It’s a poignant point because Jesus (the Son of God) then says he has nowhere to lay his head--not in God’s presumed home of the Jerusalem temple and not on the mountaintop home either.  God is everywhere, and contained by nowhere.  

I also liked this top-40 pop hit for a twist on this week’s scriptures: 'Carry On,' by Fun.

Video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7yCLn-O-Y0

Lyrics here: http://www.lyricsfreak.com/f/fun/carry+on_20989899.html