Sunday, June 18, 2017

Sermon for June 18



The readings

Psalm 13

How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?
 How long must I bear pain in my soul, and have sorrow in my heart all day long? How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?
Consider and answer me, O Lord my God! Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep the sleep of death,
and my enemy will say, "I have prevailed"; my foes will rejoice because I am shaken.
But I trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
 I will sing to the Lord, because he has dealt bountifully with me.

John 6:35-40

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and anyone who comes to me I will never drive away; for I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. This is indeed the will of my Father, that all who see the Son and believe in him may have eternal life; and I will raise them up on the last day.”

The message

Many people have turned to the words of the Psalms to express their religious feelings of frustration, joy and hope (especially when they struggle to or cannot find their own words).   During his life, Martin Luther often turned to the Psalms. In his 1528 preface to a commentary on the Psalms Luther wrote “It could well be called a “little Bible” since it contains, set out in the briefest and most beautiful form, all that’s to be found in the whole Bible” 

The Psalms cover a great range of human experiences and history with honesty and faith.   Around one third of the Psalms are laments.  Those typically follow a pattern: calling on or invoking the name of God, a complaint that describes a particular distress or suffering, an appeal to God for help and a declaration of trust.  Another significant portion of the Book of Psalms are hymns. They offer praise to God and celebrate God’s presence in the world, with a focus on creation and redeeming.  The pslams can be individual, the protests and begging for help of one individual struggling to see God in the world and remain faithful in suffering, or they can be communal, an invitation for all to worship, one person’s celebration of joy at God’s grace or giving voice to an entire community’s mourning a loss in battle.  During our time with the Psalms we will meet after church each week for a bible study where we will focus on what the psalmist is saying and rewriting the day’s reading for here and now.  

Over the next weeks, we will alternate between hymns and laments.  This is the same way we experience the ups and downs of life. The psalms speak to the frustrations that come when everything seems fine and things are finally going well (For instance, after finally finishing several months of updating paperwork for our city preschool contract, we had a few weeks off and then got a brand new issue to deal with). The Psalms also speak to the unexpected help or relief that comes when it seems like everything is falling apart and there is just nothing we can do about it. (For instance, I was trying to figure out how to run the food pantry over the summer months as we waited for the new grant money to be processed how to stretch out the food we had and buy the rest.  One of our volunteers offered to help with a food drive at her school and suggested I give in and do a go fund me campaign.  I did the campaign and we had to shut down in a few hours since we raised several hundred more than we needed. There are lots of other good schools, churches and community groups that could use support. A few days later, we were given extra money from the United Way).  Instead of worrying about paying for Summer, we will actually be able to open extra days.       

 Today, we have our first psalm of Lament.  In this case, it is an individual lament, one person’s expression of their anger, frustration and disappointment. It follows the standard format for a lament.  God is called on with “O Lord” but there is something more going on.  The Hebrew for Lord here is yhwh, this was the name of God, except it’s not really a word.  During periods of time in the Old Testament, God’s name was considered so holy and sacred, it could not be written or spoken.  Instead, they used these 4 Hebrew consonants as a substitute or space filler. The letters contained no vowels which meant the word could not be said (try pronouncing zmym correctly).  When seeing yhwh, the reader would simply say Lord or the name.  This is to help us see the awe of the singer, that one could stand before and petition a God so powerful and complex, the name cannot be said.

The complaint of the psalm writer today is that God is ignoring him.  He feels like God is not listening to him because enemies are being exaulted over him, bad people are succeeding, winning and taking things from him, while he struggles to be faithful.  Then there is the appeal for help “Consider and answer me, O Lord my God! Give light to my eyes”, and the statement of faith or trust “But I trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation, I will sing to the Lord, because he has dealt bountifully with me.”

Let’s be clear here, as easy as it is to show how this psalm fits that standard outline of a lament, It is not easy to get from “God why are you ignoring me ” to “I will sing to the Lord”,  from “God, how long will you hide your face from me” to “I trusted in your steadfast love”;  from “how long must I bear pain in my soul” to “my heart shall rejoice in your salvation”, but that is a journey we have to take all the time. 

We take that journey as we see bad things happen to good people, we take this journey as those we pray to recover, do not, as those we pray to be safe, are not.  We take this journey from why “God, are you ignoring me” to “my heart rejoices in your salvation” every time we have to say “Thy will be done” after a tragic loss, when we see the persecution of Christians around the world (and even here in the US as a group of Caldenain Christians in Detroit were recently taken into custody by ICE agents and are being deported back to Iraq where they will almost certainly face persecution, torture and death)  We ask why doesn’t God protect God’s people, why don’t our prayers change things.  Some people internalize these things, perhaps I’m not good enough, I didn’t pray right, I was bad and am being punished.   That ain’t from Jesus teachings and none of that is true. 

For me, today is a tough day or a good day, to think about these things.  As many people celebrate Father’s Day, I have nothing to really do.  My father passed away about 20 years ago. My father passing away was probably the first time I remember really having to go from “God, why did this terrible thing happen to me” to “My heart shall rejoice in your salvation”.  I wish I had the secret formula for taking that journey and I could share it with all of you, that would make a great sermon, book and viral hit on the internet. Of course, there is no secret way to do this. Instead, we worship and are loved by a God who promises to walk with us as we take that journey.  As our church, we commit to take that trip together, to support, pray for and care for each other.  We remind each other that we are not in this alone.  God’s word is real, God’s promises are true, God listens and God is with us.   Those are the things that lead us to say, My heart shall rejoice in your salvation

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