Where Are You?

Where Are You?
Jeremiah 8:18-9:1
September 23, 2007
25th Sunday in Ordinary Time

© 2007 by Christopher D. Drew

Sermon Focus: The people are at rock bottom now, and so is their prophet, Jeremiah. The nation faces further loss and famine. It seems that God has not come through, and that all is lost. Jeremiah 8:18-9:1 is one of the most poignant texts of either the Old or New Testaments. This text tells us what it can be like when everything we think God should do does not come to pass.

Sermon Function: To teach listeners that our will for God is not necessary God’s will for us. God, who lives in relationship with his people, hears the lament like any other prayer. This text gives us permission to cry out in frustration in the midst of our unexplained agonies. And the text teaches us that when he hit rock bottom that an earthy remedy won’t help us. Only the love of Christ can heal the brokenness of our hearts. And only Jesus Christ can restore us when we have broken away from God and cannot find the way back ourselves.

[Click to Show/Hide Sermon Text]

Introduction

This is now our fifth week of six in the prophet Jeremiah, can you believe it? We talked about God’s divine prerogative as supreme judge over all, and how we can be assured that God’s judgment is just, merciful, and loving. As Christians, we know, through the testimony of Holy Scripture and the witness of the Holy Spirit, that our Judge will be Jesus Christ, who was himself judged and found worthy of all glory, laud, and honor.

This week, we turn to yet another subject that weighs heavily on the minds of many people. What does it mean when God seems not to respond to the cries of the faithful for relief? What does it mean for us when we hit rock bottom? How do we respond? What does this tell us about God, and what does tell us about our understanding of Him?

Let’s listen now to God’s word.

[Read Scripture - Jeremiah 8:18-9:1]

Opening Remarks

I’m going to get right to the point today: Humans beings, right from the beginning, suffer from a singular temptation: To replace the God who is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, the God who judges us justly and with mercy, the God who out of his boundless love created us, with a different god, the god we want God to be. This is a problem with a long and extensive history. Adam and Eve were not content to live in the glorified reality of new creation. They were tempted by the serpent, who slandered God by claiming that he was withholding something from them that they deserved to have, the knowledge of good and evil, the knowledge of God. They were tempted with all the trappings of God’s office, and because of that illusion, they fell.

We are all prone to this temptation. No one is exempt, because there is this sinfulness in us that persists, even while we still have in us a remnant of God’s divine image in us. With everything we know about God, and about Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit, we are still tempted, when things don’t go our way, to throw out the whole idea of the Triune God in favor of an idol we have better control over. A God created in our image, rather than the other way around.

You and I have stories we can tell to one another, stories about the times when we felt like God was not around, when God was AWOL, when God was absent. Usually, these stories come at the major crisis points of our lives.

Some of us have stories about struggling with disease. Some of us must contend with destructive addictions that control us and prevent us from reaching our full potential. Some of us are placed into the situation where we have to face our own mortality or the mortality of a loved one with whom we cannot bear to be parted.

Our trials our not limited to our individual struggles, either. Our nation has undergone its own cultural struggles. Revolution, civil war, world wars, and now wars in response to terrorism. It has become impolite to talk about some of these things from the pulpit. But I will today. Who cannot say that they wondered where God was when those magnificent, beautiful towers fell down in Manhattan. I had stood on the top of one of those towers, overlooking the hum of the big city as the sun set over the waters. Who could do this kind of thing? Where was God? When those towers were destroyed on September 11, I wasn’t even in the country. Separated from friends and family, I tried checking every internet news website I could think of. Nothing. Internet traffic was out of control. I called my sister in Salt Lake City to see if she had any news from her desk at KUTV, a local network affiliate. I heard sobs and felt her tears over the phone. The nation was experiencing a tragedy of such proportions that all you could feel, besides the anger, the fear, and sadness, was the loss of something profound in our society of individual achievement – we lost of sense that we actually were in control of what was going on in our lives. And it is that loss of control that today’s serpents know how to exploit.

What amazed me about that experience was how, for a time at least, people recognized that the social fabric was critically important. Expressions of faith actually found increase in the weeks and months to come, before the illusion of our control began to reassert itself, as it always does, when the patterns of daily living slowly calm themselves in the standard rhythm, the rhythms that give us that illusion that we can somehow, if we simply will it enough, control our own lives to the point where we don’t have to even acknowledge, on a regular basis, our own individual mortalities. That is for another time, for someone else.

Text Transition

Our faithful prophet Jeremiah is experiencing a crisis. He warned the people of Judah and Jerusalem repeatedly, and in the strongest terms, that their idolatrous view of God would lead them to destruction. He was ignored. The people relied on their status as the elect of God to save them. Having rediscovered the Law of Moses, they now hoped that their blind obedience to legal regulations would save them. But God demands more from us, he demands our love and faithfulness. And now judgment has come to the people, and there is chaos, destruction, and tears of lament, that the jewel of the people, Israel, and its seat of public worship and the presence of God among them, the temple, has been destroyed.

In response, Jeremiah penned these words, some of the most poignant in either the Old or New Testaments:

My joy is gone, grief is upon me, my heart is sick. Hark, the cry of my poor people from far and wide in the land: “Is the LORD not in Zion? Is her King not in her?” (18-19)

Where are you, God? Why have you not intervene to save your people? Why is this happening to us. Are you no longer living with us, in your house, the Temple?

The reason for this is offered by God: “Why have they provoked me to anger with their images, with their foreign idols?” (Jer 8:19 NRSV). The people have turned to their own ways, and have rejected God. How can this path not lead to ruin?

Jeremiah has a sense of foreboding now that the worst is coming. “The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved” (Jer 8:20 NRSV). The harvest is past: Nothing came forth. The summer has ended: None of the expected summer fruits have come forth. The prospect is for famine.

Jeremiah then expresses his profound sympathy for his people. He is a member of the body who is suffering this judgment. “For the hurt of my poor people I am hurt, I mourn, and dismay has taken hold of me” (Jer 8:21 NRSV). The prophet here gives us an example for those of us who are called to help others in the midst of suffering. We are a member of the human family, and when a member suffers, we join in that suffering. We are not called to deliver empty platitudes when someone is experience the worst trials of life. We are called, instead, into solidarity with them. To be present with them as representatives of God’s people.

“Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then has the health of my poor people not been restored?” (Jer 8:22 NRSV). Gilead was incredibly fertile, and produced plants that were used to make highly valued balms for medicinal purposes. The illness of Israel’s sin is, as we see here, beyond the power of earthly remedy.

“O that my head were a spring of water, and my eyes a fountain of tears, so that I might weep day and night for the slain of my poor people!” (Jer 8:23 NRSV). Yes, indeed. A fountain of tears is shed over the loss of what we think we control. I remember when this happened to me, years ago, when I felt totally alone and abandoned by everything and everyone. Tears of despair. Tears of depression. Tears of anger and frustration at what was happening to me. Who has not shed such tears? Even Jesus Christ himself shed tears at the sight of Lazarus’s mourning family. One wonders if perhaps Jesus had this passage from Jeremiah in mind when, he wept over the city of Jerusalem.

And in the face of this tragedy, Jeremiah longs for escape. “O that I had in the desert a traveler’s lodging place, that I might leave my people and go away from them! For they are all adulterers, a band of traitors” (Jer 9:1 NRSV). Get me out of here. Get me away from this faithlessness, and hypocrisy. Give me a way out of this illness that pervades my body, or my mind, or my soul. I want it to stop, but it can’t stop, so I want to escape. Good God, help me to escape this torment in my soul, this tragedy afflicting my people, who have become traitors, blind to your steadfast love and your just judgment.

Good Lord, where are you?

Disillusionment from Our False Idols

Yes, it is during the crises of live that we are sorely tempted just to jettison the whole faith “thing.” Some already have and make try to represent this as a step toward finally achieving psychological normalcy. If you don’t believe me, take a look at the “Religion” section of Barnes and Noble the next time you visit. You’ll find an astonishing variety of titles in the “Religion” section that are about the wonders of atheism, book that preach against that final “illusion” of faith that prevents us from being fully human. This is additional evidence of our temptation to idolize ourselves. It’s so much easier for us to try and kick God out of our lives than to contend with the question of who God is, how God works, and how God loves us. Suffering, which used to be thought of as a sign of an opportunity for displaying spiritual discipline, has now been cast in the role of devil.

But all of this is just further evidence that we need to look deeper, to seek further the God who loves us. Because all of our false idols about God eventually crumble when we discover that they don’t accord with the reality of our lives. And that can make us very angry with God.

This passage from Jeremiah, then, teaches us two significant lessons.

First, Jeremiah shows us that it is okay to lament and complain to God when we are in the midst of suffering. Our relationship with God is infused with Joy when we realize that we can come to God both in thanksgiving for everything we have been given, but also when we realize that we can come to God when we have need to complain and beg for forgiveness and healing. Jesus Christ, the perfect revelation of God, who lived with us and gave us the full measure of what it means to be loved by a God who wants to save us, himself cried out in agony those famous words on the cross, from Psalm 22:1, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” My friends, if Jesus himself could cry out for deliverance, so can we. And we should at all times cry from deliverance, because we need it more than ever, in a culture that encourages idolmaking of the self.

The second thing we are taught is to jettison many of our preconceived notions about God, which we then turn into idols we worship. Barbara Brown Taylor, in her book The Preaching Life, writes about the death of Christianity in Europe and about the rejection of God during the 1960s in the wake of the Kent State and Mai Lai massacres, wrote this about the prevailing environment:

“God was not good. God did not answer prayer… All bets were off. Human beings were free to construct their own realities from any materials at hand and to express themselves any way they pleased. When lightening did not strike, their confidence grew along with their fear: that perhaps they really were alone in the universe after all.”¹

We live in an similar era of disillusionment and spiritual discomfort. But that can be a good thing, because, as Taylor writes, “in the place where all of our notions about God comes to naught – there is still reason to hope, because disillusionment is not so bad.” Why is that? Here’s the reason: “Disillusionment is the loss of illusion – about ourselves, about the world, about God – and while it is almost always painful, it is not a bad thing to lose the lies we have mistaken for truth… Disillusioned, we find out what is not true and are set free to seek what is – if we dare.”²

For us, each time God declines to follow our rules and to yield to our expectations, this is, as Brown writes, yet another of idol that we’ve propped up that now must be set aside. It is a lifelong journey, one that sanctifies us, because we become close to God the more we seek him. But we are unable to go the full distance because of our sinfulness, our tendency to raise up yet other ideas for who God is. The issue is this, God is way above what we can possibly imagine.

And that is why we require a Savior, one who is the full expression of God’s love and desire to be with us. One who Himself, while fully God, yet condescended to live with us, as he does today, right here, and right now, in the exhibition of that love and desire for fellowship that we rehearse and lay open for the world in our worship, in the sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, and in the love we show to one another, when things are going well, and especially when we find ourselves in the midst of suffering.

What encourages this preacher is that I can see you present with those who suffer, witnessing to God’s love in your ministry. You visit the sick. You take care of each other when you need help. You prepare meals for those who cannot. You sit with those who are lonely. You deliver communion to those who cannot be with us. And you pray constantly through the ministry of prayer quilts and in your faithful attendance at worship here in the church. Keep up this sanctifying mission of the church, my friends, because you will find that it will yield within that peace that surpasses all understanding, so that when you are called to bear witness during a time of suffering, you will be able to do it, by the power of the Holy Spirit.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Given at First Presbyterian Church, Portland, Texas.

¹Taylor, Barbara Brown. The Preaching Life. Cowley Publications: Cambridge, 1993, p. 5. ↩
²Ibid., p. 8. ↩

Technorati Tags: Presbyterian Church USA, PCUSA, Sermon, Jeremiah, Year C

Hólmaberg ...

Hólmaberg ...
Originally uploaded by asmundur

Post-summer calming. I love this man's work, and thought you might enjoy it too. Click the photo for more visual deliciousness.

Technorati Tags: Beauty, Photography, HDR, Iceland, Hólmaber, Lighthouse

A Hot Wind

A Hot Wind
Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28
September 16, 2007
24th Sunday in Ordinary Time

© 2007 by Christopher D. Drew

Sermon Focus: The winds of divine judgment are blowing over God’s people, and the result is ruin and destruction. The promise to “pluck up and pull down” (1:10) has come to pass. God has exacted judgment on a disobedient people. God’s decision is sure and final, but hope remains. One might look at our own society and our denomination and wonder if we are reaping the hot wind of which Jeremiah speaks.

Sermon Function: To remind listeners that God’s judgment, a topic we would prefer not to discuss, is nonetheless something sure and certain, and that we have the hope of being judged by Christ, the Judge who was himself judged and found worthy. We also have the hope of Christ’s intercession for us, so that when we fail in our charge to live lives of repentance and obedience, we hope nonetheless remains for forgiveness and everlasting life.

[Click to Show/Hide Sermon Text]

Hesed is the Hebrew word that refers to what we call God’s steadfast love. We are blessed in the church to know about God’s steadfast love, most perfectly exemplified by His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. But text this week refers to God’s supreme prerogative – judgment. The prophet Jeremiah uses some pretty tough metaphorical imagery in this text to describe the aftermath of the Judah’s destruction, and some more tough imagery to describe the rebellious people who have turned away from God’s ways and instead indulge ways of evil.

Listen now to God’s word.

[Read Scripture - Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28]

Cultural Blight

The contemporary church exists in a period of time known in the popular press and in seminary classrooms as “post-Christendom.” What is post-Christendom? This is a term used to describe the fact that the religious faith of Christianity no longer exerts the influence it once did in our popular culture. Let me give you just on example of what I mean:

You may or may not know this, but MTV recently held its annual Video Music Awards program on cable television. One of the major advertising elements promoted heavily in the weeks leading up to the event was the big “comeback” of Britney Spears. Now, I’m not an MTV watcher anymore. I quit watching years ago when the format of the channel changed from music videos to “reality” shows like the “Real World.” The only reason I know about the MTV VMA show was because Britney was, by all accounts, had a disastrous performance. And it was the glee associated with this disaster that was happily picked up by the press. On FoxNews.com, CNN.com, and other places, the major news story of the day was Ms. Spear’s hopelessly lame performance.

Other major stories from the event: Two former husbands of a once-popular Bay Watch superstar got into a fistfight, leaving one badly punched up and the other charged with misdemeanor battery. Also, the talented Kanye West, having been shut out of the five categories for which he had been nominated, complained that the entire VMA show was racist. If anyone actually won anything, I’m not aware of it. Perhaps you can enlighten me after the service.

For many people, these kinds of activities are major news. And all of this is going on in the midst of horrible world, altering events. Terrorism and warfare, incurable disease, yet another massive earthquake in Asia. When one reflects on the state of the world and of our own Western culture in this world of post-Christendom, one might be tempted to wonder if there isn’t some kind of judgment happening, right this very minute.

God Judges, and God Is Just

So what can we learn about God’s prerogative as divine, final judge, as portrayed by our faithful prophet? And how can we respond to this word in our own lives? What does it mean for us to live under a God who, while he loves us, nonetheless judges us?

Well, the first thing we should remember is that God is the final judge. We are not. We are called upon to exercise judgment when making decisions about our lives. But the judgment referred to here is divine judgment. A judgment that is solely the work of God, and one that we know will be filled with justice and righteousness.

The other component of God’s judgment is that it is utterly just. Christians proclaim the truth that God is good, and that goodness is exemplified for us when he exercises his judgment with justice, with complete regard for all of the facts and taking into account everything that is known. God could only render such judgment, because God is good and God is perfect.

And this is something that can be terrifying to us, because it forces us to confront something that we might rather avoid. God’s good judgment is God’s way, not ours. Accordingly, we may witness the administration of God’s judgment and not really understand why this might be good. That is, what we think is good is most certainly not necessarily what God considers good.

And when humans are called upon to exercise of office of judge, we are warned very clearly that our own judgment must be just. In Leviticus 19:15, the people are warned, “You shall not render an unjust judgment; you shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great: with justice you shall judge your neighbor” (Lev 19:15 NRSV). Our need to be just in our dealings with others is a divine commandment. In fact, one of God’s complaints against the people is on precisely this point. In Jeremiah 5:28, we read “They know no limits in deeds of wickedness; they do not judge with justice the cause of the orphan, to make it prosper, and they do not defend the rights of the needy” (Jer 5:28). Justice is necessary because it is part of the glue that holds a society together. God knows this about us, and knows that unjust judgment is an abuse by those who are powerful against those who are weak. That is why justice is of particular concern when it comes to orphans and those in need.

Abandonment and Destruction

Abandoning God’s commands can lead to destruction. I’ve mentioned this fact before in an earlier sermon when I discussed that God’s will for us demands our discipleship and obedience. Sometimes that demand will appear extreme to us, perhaps even unfair or unwarranted. But it is what it is. Judah, the southern kingdom, having lived without having to deal with the chaos that had infected the northern kingdom, has fallen away from God and now faces destruction.

At that time it will be said to this people and to Jerusalem: A hot wind comes from me out of the bare heights in the desert toward my poor people, not to winnow or cleanse— a wind too strong for that. Now it is I who speak in judgment against them. (Jer 4:11-12 NRSV)

That hot wind is not a wind that will cleanse, nor will it help with winnowing the wheat from the chaff at the threshing floor. No, this is a wind of destruction. And it is a wind that will not just bring ruin, but will actually return the earth into its primeval condition of chaos and nothingness.

I looked on the earth, and lo, it was waste and void; and to the heavens, and they had no light. I looked on the mountains, and lo, they were quaking, and all the hills moved to and fro. I looked, and lo, there was no one at all, and all the birds of the air had fled. I looked, and lo, the fruitful land was a desert, and all its cities were laid in ruins before the LORD, before his fierce anger. (Jer 4:23-26 NRSV)

“Waste and void” are, in Hebrew, the exact same words to describe the condition of things prior to creation, in Genesis 1:2, before God said, “Let there be light.”

A disconcerting image for us, isn’t it? The birds have fled, the land is completely unfruitful, and cities laid into ruin. This is God’s wrath, God’s anger, characterized for with this vivid imagery of a mighty natural disaster.

Because of this the earth shall mourn, and the heavens above grow black; for I have spoken, I have purposed; I have not relented nor will I turn back. (Jer 4:28 NRSV)

God’s justice is final in face of his constant pleas for humanity to return to its proper worship of the Almighty.

And Yet, Hope Remains for the Fallen

For us, this text from Jeremiah is yet another all to obedient discipleship. To remember that justice is one of God’s key concerns – true justice, where those in need are fed and clothed, and the orphan finds a home. In light of God’s judgment, we are forced to ask ourselves if we are doing enough, in this Christian community, to address the plight of those in need right here in our own community.

This is also a call to look inward at our own spiritual development, and to take an account of what we believe, because that in turn will define what is truly important to us.

And we are called to remember one particularly painful aspect of our existence, and that is our finitude (the fact that we will die), and our sinfulness. Jeremiah quotes God as saying:

“For my people are foolish, they do not know me; they are stupid children, they have no understanding. They are skilled in doing evil, but do not know how to do good.” (Jer 4:22 NRSV)

This is a restatement of what we know is true about ourselves, that somehow we rebelled and now something just isn’t right. There is heaviness in our heart that, despite all of our attempts to wipe it out, still remains. I suspect that this is one reason our culture has moved into the direction it has. We are, frankly, more satisfied with news about the MTV VMA show than we are about the stories of the bible. Most of us here today, and I definitely include myself in this, spend more time watching popular television programs to than attending to the Word of God as revealed to us in Holy Scripture, and revealed fully to us in the person of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We do this because we’re tempted to find the quick fix. TV is one. So are other substances. We know this. We read about it all the time.

And yet there is hope. And that hope today is acknowledged by God in Jeremiah, “For thus says the LORD: The whole land shall be a desolation; yet I will not make a full end (Jer 4:27 NRSV)”. Even though God is angry with Judah and the people of Jerusalem, and even though those whose disobedience warrants the full measure of God’s righteous judgment, hope still remains for God’s chosen people. “Yet I will not make a full end,” says the Lord.

And God has provided the means of salvation for us, too. So the in spite of our sinfulness, we may be saved from total ruin through God’s mercy. The means of salvation, we know through scripture, is Jesus Christ. In fact, it is through the word of Jesus that final judgment will be administered throughout creation at The End. And that should excite us! For the One who came to give forgiveness of sins took those sins to the cross. Jesus Christ therefore stood in judgment for us, and was judged worthy. “Worthy is the Lamb that was slaughtered to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” (Rev 5:12 NRSV) This was done so that we might all know what it means to be judged justly. And in our fallenness, we see the hope of true righteousness, and the promise of sanctification, until we are fully restored by Christ in His resurrection glory.

In the meantime, we are called to begin working in the kingdom that Jesus has already set in motion on earth. We are called to repentance and obedience, so that we need not fear judgment, but rather anticipate it, with joy, a joy based in the knowledge that the Judge of all things is truly worthy to render righteous judgment over us, a judgment that can begin healing our society and its ills, and renew a creation and social order that reveals a beauty so transcendent that we’ll wonder why we spent so much time watching the MTV Video Music Awards, preoccupied by performance and scandal.

Friends, as we walk this road of faith together, growing together in Christ our Lord, letting God’s Spirit dwell in us as we proclaim the truth of the Gospel to the world, a world that need the gospel now more than ever, we need to become people who, in light of God’s loving, just, judgment, are bold to pray

Scorching wind of God,
Spirit in bread,
Spirit in cup,
Do not slow to winnow:
Burn!

Wither and destroy what displeases,
Let your flesh be poison to my sin,
Your blood acid, not anodyne.
Scour my soul.

Make waste my plenty;
Expose my lies;
Disfigure and destroy my idols
Until all that remains for my heart's attaching
Is you.¹

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Given at First Presbyterian Church, Portland, TX.

¹Worship Planning Helps Copyright © 2007 The General Board of Discipleship of The United Methodist Church, PO Box 340003, Nashville TN 37203-0003. Worship website: www.umcworship.org. Path: Worship – Planning Helps – Lectionary Helps for Sunday – 2007 – September 16, 2007. ↩

Technorati Tags: Presbyterian Church USA, PCUSA, Sermon, Jeremiah, Year C

Manhattan

Manhattan
Originally uploaded by whatnext

I was in Vancouver, British Columbia when the attack happened. Someone casually remarked, as I left the train, that a plane had run into the World Trade Center. I ran to the office building and tried several news websites. No luck - they were jammed with traffic. I called my sister, who manned a news desk in Salt Lake City, Utah. She told me we were under attack.

Someone set up a large screen TV in the conference room. There was a palatable sense of helplessness among all Americans and Canadians in that conference room who watched the second tower fall, live, on CNN.

I remember feeling that I should be back in my country. We were supposed to launch our project that day. Instead, the launch was canceled and the project delayed.

Copyright © 2007 by Christopher D. Drew

Six-Month-O-Versary

Wedding Day Kiss
Originally uploaded by whatnext

Today marks our sixth month of marriage! Sara and I both feel extremely blessed to be married, and we look forward to the next six months, six years, and six decades together! Whoo hoo! Thanks be to God for the blessing of marriage. And thanks, dear Father in Heaven, for the blessing you gave me in Sara, my beloved.

Technorati Tags: Marriage, Celebration, Life, Joy, Love, Jesus Christ

Being Shaped

Being Shaped
Jeremiah 18:1-11
September 9, 2007
23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

© 2007 by Christopher D. Drew

Sermon Focus: God’s sovereignty is absolute and extends into earthly history. Nations may rise or fall as the Creator/Potter sees fit. Israel is no exception to this rule, and all nations are called to repentance so that disaster might be averted. Our Jeremiah pericope also gives us a sense of hope, because the Creator/Potter can, if it His will, restore what has spoiled and give it new life.

Sermon Function: To teach listeners about God’s sovereignty, and how it extends to us even in times of social or personal chaos, or, as with Mother Theresa, when God seems utterly absent from us; and to inform listeners that God’s active grace in our lives doesn’t ipso facto mean we enjoy a wonderful ecstasy of union with God in this lifetime – our faithful discipleship and obedience to Christ are spiritual conditions of new life and commitment, which are themselves “fruits of the Spirit” and grace from God.

[Click to Show/Hide Sermon Text]

Introduction

We are currently in the middle of a series based in Jeremiah, one of the Major Prophets in the Old Testament. So far, we’ve talked about God’s call and the variety of forms that call might take as we seek to be better disciples of Jesus. Last week, we spoke about the dangers of unrepentant sin, and how Jesus Christ is our sole hope for eternal salvation. This week, the subject in question is God’s divine sovereignty. How does God move in the world? How do we relate to his totally “other” God we worship? These are some of the questions posed in our reading of the today’s scripture.

Let’s listen now to God’s word.

[Read Scripture - Jeremiah 18:1-11]

Introductory Illustration

This is a big weekend in four smaller American cities that are gearing up for a big time world premier film event. They are: Waterbury, Connecticut; Mobile, Alabama; Sacramento, California; and tiny Luverne, Minnesota.

Many of you know by now that Luverne is my wife’s hometown. Her parents still live there. And the entire city if revving up for the big event. Sara’s father, Bill, will be singing in the Luverne Men’s Chorus. The city’s classic, old-style Palace movie theater is being cleaned up and renovated. They will be singing a medley of military branch tunes for the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard veterans in the town, and those who will be visiting specifically for this big event. Period automobiles and military equipment will be displayed. The filmmaker will be there, and I suppose one or more of the celebrity types who signed on to this project will likely attend this big premier in the small town of Luverne, Minnesota, home of the beloved red cardinals football team.

The movie in question is a documentary film by Ken Burns called The War. It’s a multiple-episode film produced for PBS, and it will air on most local PBS affiliates on September 23rd, just later this month.

Military veterans will have the opportunity to be the first to see portions of the finished project at the Palace Theater. A few clips are available at the PBS website set up specifically for this project. The War is about World War II. Burns spent time in each of the cities I mentioned, working to get local perspectives on the war and it’s impact on the local communities these men left behind to serve in far away places in Europe and Asia.

My own grandfather was in World War II, and he spoke very infrequently about his experience. I remember sitting with my grandfather to discuss his experience for an interview project I had to complete for class. He spoke somberly and seriously about his time in the pacific theatre. He mentioned specifically watching from his supply ship, the U.S.S. LaPorte, as a kamikaze pilot flew his plane into the ship adjacent to his. I recorded the interview using the now-ancient cassette tape recorder. I have no idea where that tape went.

Having seen just a smattering of the clips available at the PBS website, I’m struck with how much we miss when we don’t share our stories with one another. It is the stories of a place and a country that give life and meaning to what we see today. It is the rich imagery of eyewitnesses to history that tell us what it means to be human creatures, frail, fallen, yet created in the image of the Creator, and love by the creator.

The founders of this nation would speak frequently of the actions of divine providence. There was among most of them a sense that the divine will was playing out right before their eyes. I sense that the men and women who served this nation so ably in World War II shared a similar sensibility – that in the middle of tragedy and death there was also a sense of awe at the magnitude of what the nation was called to do. It wasn’t pretty. War is a horrible thing. But there was some sense of unity, of common purpose, even amidst the human moral failures involved with warfare.

And while all this is going on, nations rise and fall. And amidst social, political, and personal chaos of our lives, God is there. Sometime God’s presence isn’t immediately discerned or understood, and we have to result to history to see His fingerprints on the works of the world, including our own lives. For my own part, I discern that World War II was itself brought about by forces that far and away transcend our own. Disasters occur as a natural extension of what war is. But nations can also rise up from war, and new, just kingdoms are put in place by Almighty God, as He, in his sovereignty, sees fit. And this should give us some cause for hope – that when things are at their worst and when nations fall, we can have the assurance that, even through we may not immediately or instantly understand what his happening, God is in fact present with us.

Jeremiah’s Context – War and the Destruction of Israel and the Temple

In today’s scripture text, Jeremiah is giving us a picture of God’s work in the world amidst the destruction of his own nation, Israel, the expulsion of its best and brightest to faraway Babylon and Egypt, and the annihilation of the Temple.

In the aftermath of all this turmoil in a nation chosen by God to be a beacon of light to all the nations, Jeremiah has a vision of a potter:

The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: “Come, go down to the potter’s house, and there I will let you hear my words.” So I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was working at his wheel. The vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as seemed good to him. (Jer 18:1-4 NRSV)

The Hebrew noun translated as “wheel” in our text has a dual ending, meaning that there is actually two wheels here. One larger wheel would have been found under the worktable, and the potter would spin this wheel with his foot. This larger wheel would propel the smaller wheel upon which the potter would shape his creation by hand.

My brother-in-law, Ken, who many of you met last week, is an accomplished pottery expert. His works have been sold across the country, and I’m proud to say that Sara and I enjoy a few of his pieces in our apartment. I have seen how he is able to transform mere clay into works of extraordinary beauty. Sometimes, however, things get off track and you need to start over. Even expert potters do this at times because sometimes the clay just isn’t cooperative.

One of the reasons we get into trouble in our faith lives is that we’re tempted to take on the roles of both clay and potter. We want to proclaim faith and still cling to the mistaken notion that we should, as a result of our faith, still have some control over how we are ultimately shaped by our creator. There is, in fact, only one potter – Almighty God, and through faith we received the grace of being shaped into something beautiful, something that can bear fruit in the world.

The Problem – We Rebel in the Potter’s Hand

This text speaks to us specifically about God’s sovereignty. And the images used by Jeremiah show us how we ought to be – a people capable of being shaped into something magnificent. But that temptation to take on both roles is persistent, isn’t it? Don’t we believe that we know best how we ought to be shaped, both individually and as a nation? And don’t we sometimes think that God might somehow be mistaken, and that his designed shape for us might be different, maybe even radically different from what we think we’ve been created to be? In fact, this very book of the Bible, Jeremiah, speaks to this condition. When God challenges Jeremiah to speak God’s words to the people of Israel, what does Jeremiah say? He said, “Ah, Lord GOD! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy” (Jer 1:6 NRSV). We can’t really be called to sell our possessions for the benefit of the poor in our community, can we? We can’t really be called to quit a job for the sake of our family or loved one, could we? We can’t really be called into ministry of the church as an officer, could we?

Do you remember what Jesus said to the rich young man in the Gospel of Mark?

“You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions. (Mark 10:21-22 NRSV)

These “can’t bes” are infused into our vocabulary all the time. They are the Great Dodge, the attempt to take on the role of Potter, to shape ourselves into our own image, rather than into the fullness of what we are called to be, which is the imago Dei, the very Image of God.

And our society seems eager to respond to the notion that we are able to control all the aspects of our lives. That is one of the main reasons why we fail to cope well when things don’t go our way. Personal failure and sin, rather than being viewed as an opportunity to be reshaped into something better, is instead looked at as an unredeemable condition. In order to get around that, we develop fancy coping mechanisms to scapegoat the problem, to make it the responsibility and fault of someone else or something else.

God the Potter is Sovereign

But God is sovereign, and God is capable of doing whatever God wants. God says to Jeremiah:

At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it. And at another moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, but if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind about the good that I had intended to do to it. (Jer 18:7-10 NRSV)

For Almighty God, the fate of the nations, entire nations, are as the simple compound of clay that sits before the wheel of the Potter. In this passage, we might be tempted to say that God’s will can be arbitrary, or that world wars, sin, and idolatry point to an uncontrolled chaos. But that really isn’t the case. God’s will for His creation is steadfast and sure. The question is, for us, whether our response to God’s grace is in accordance with His will. And you can be sure that God’s will will prevail. In fact, this text makes it clear: God’s will will prevail, and in his wisdom he already knows, as he knows us in the womb, what we will chose. This is built into the plan, my friends. The clay can prove resistant to the shaping of the potter’s hand. When this happens, the clay is simply mashed up and reset on the wheel, to be shaped into something else the potter finds useful.

There is warning here, brothers and sisters. We are called to be obedient to God’s will. We have rebelled against it. We exist, in fact, in a more or less permanent state of sinful rebellion. And that persistent rebellion and sin can lead, as we discovered last week, to disaster:

Now, therefore, say to the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: Thus says the LORD: Look, I am a potter shaping evil against you and devising a plan against you. Turn now, all of you from your evil way, and amend your ways and your doings. (Jer 18:11 NRSV)

Repent and follow me, says God. This is a message strikingly similar to Jesus’ first sermon in the Gospel of Mark, which goes like this:

Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” (Mark 1:14-15 NRSV)

Christ’s first call to us is to repent, to turn away from our desire to be both potter and clay, to turn away from everything that detracts from the nobility of having been created in the image of the Creator.

Hope for Israel, Hope for Us, Hope for the World

When we do this, we can cling to the hope that God won’t leave the work unfinished.

That hope is reflected in verse four of our text. "The vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as seemed good to him" (Jer 18:4 NRSV).

We are not without hope that God work a wonderful thing in our lives. Jesus Christ is the single best example of that hope. It is a resurrection hope that shines brightly from the work Christ accomplished on the Cross. “’Can I not do with you, O house of Israel, just as this potter has done?’ says the LORD” (Jer 18:6 NRSV). Can I not do with you, O house of First Presbyterian Church, Portland, Texas, just as this potter has done? Can I not do with you, faithful disciple of Jesus Christ, as this potter has done?

The answer is “Yes!” And we can shout out this answer even in our fallen condition, because Jesus Christ makes it possible. We can say “Yes!” by repenting, and turning away from the sins that separate us from God. We can say “Yes!” to the future of this church. We can say “Yes!” to responsibility supporting its mission and it’s search for a new pastor. We can say “Yes!” to the missional responsibilities incumbent upon faithful communities of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And we can say “Yes!” to Jesus’ call to be transformed into a new, magnificent, resurrected creatures, first formed into a human being from the simple dust of the earth, just as the simple clay is transformed by the potter into something beautiful, something that can literally bear fruit, something more than we can possibly imagine, even in the midst of World Wars, and even in the midst of our doubts.

Final Illustration

Mother Theresa wrote a long series of letters to her spiritual director. These letters have recently been compiled for publication, and they reveal that Theresa suffered from decades-long periods of spiritual darkness, times when it seemed God was absent from her life.

Skeptics and our ever-popular atheists like Christopher Hitchens responded in an almost triumphant fashion. Hitchens wrote a lengthy piece to more or less welcome Mother Theresa into the atheist fold.

Isn’t it interesting that the Roman Catholic Church, then, is so incredibly anxious to release these Theresa’s letters to the public? It is interesting, but not very surprising. What these letters reveal is just how human Theresa was. And that is what Catholics look for in a Saint. You see, my friends, the fruits of the spirit are not always what we think they should be. In fact, they usually are not what we expect. The peddlers of religious ecstasy would have you believe otherwise. There must be some feeling we have, some knowledge of spiritual unity, in order for our lives of faith to be real.

But that is not how we will be judged. We are not judged by how authentic our religious feelings are, or by achieving a certain level of spiritual transcendence. We are instead judged on our faithfulness and obedience. The fruits of the Spirit are not linked to individual self-satisfaction, but on faithful discipleship. And the challenge for us today is this: We are called to be like pliant clay, obedient to the will of the Potter, just as Jesus Christ was obedient unto death for the sake of those sinners to whom He ministered.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Given at First Presbyterian Church, Portland, Texas.

Technorati Tags: Presbyterian Church USA, PCUSA, Sermon, Jeremiah, Year C

Repairing the Leak

Repairing the Leak
Jeremiah 2:4-13
September 2, 2007
22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

© 2007 by Christopher D. Drew

Sermon Focus: God accuses all the people of Israel of forsaking Him and turning to “things that do not profit,” like the worship of idols. They turned away from the “fountain of living water” and have constructed cisterns for saving up water themselves. But these cisterns are cracked and can hold no water.

Our lives are cracked cisterns, and we routinely worship other idols. Having just talked about God’s call, how can we stay faithful to that call, and faithful to the God who issues that call?

Sermon Function: To teach listeners that our ability to stay faithful is limited because of our fallen nature. We must look to Jesus Christ as the salve to which we can sustain our call and remain faithful to God.

[Click to Show/Hide Sermon Text]

Introduction

We are in week two of a six-week series on the writings of the prophet Jeremiah. For you trivia buffs out there, Jeremiah is in fact the largest book in the bible. Last week, we dealt specifically with the concept of call, using Jeremiah’s call by God to be a prophet as one example of being called into ministry of Jesus Christ. This week, Jeremiah speaks to the nations, revealing God’s prosecution of Israel for its forgetfulness and idolatry, which includes that false idol where we think we can save ourselves.

Listen now to God’s word.

[Read Scripture - Jeremiah 2:4-13]

Introductory Illustration

I will hazard a guess this morning that almost all of you have heard about the horrible situation of NFL quarterback Michael Vick, who pled guilty this week to federal charges related to his participation in a dog-fighting ring. He pled guilty and was told that he would receive his sentence later this year. After entering his guilty plea, Vick took to the steps of the courthouse and made a statement to the press. I’d like to read portions of this statement to you now, because it’s largely a good statement and because it also contains a link to today’s reading from Jeremiah.

Here is Michael Vick:

"First, I want to apologize … for all the things that - I've done and that I have allowed to happen … I was not honest and forthright in our discussions, and … I was ashamed and totally disappointed in myself to say the least.

“I want to apologize to all the young kids out there for my immature acts and … what I did was very immature so that means I need to grow up.”

“I totally ask for forgiveness and understanding as I move forward to bettering Michael Vick the person, not the football player.”

“I take full responsibility for my actions. … [N]ot for one second will I sit right here and point the finger and try to blame anybody else for my actions or what I've done.”

“I'm totally responsible, and those things just didn't have to happen. I feel like we all make mistakes. It's just I made a mistake in using bad judgment and making bad decisions. And you know, those things … just can't happen.”

“Dog fighting is a terrible thing, and I did reject it.”

“I'm upset with myself, and … through this situation I found Jesus and asked him for forgiveness and turned my life over to God. And I think that's the right thing to do as of right now.”

“Like I said, for this - for this entire situation I never pointed the finger at anybody else, I accepted responsibility for my actions of what I did and now I have to pay the consequences for it. But in a sense, I think it will help … me as a person. I got a lot to think about in the next year or so. I offer my deepest apologies to everybody out in there in the world who was affected by this whole situation. And if I'm more disappointed with myself than anything it's because of all the young people, young kids that I've let down, who look at Michael Vick as a role model. And to have to go through this and put myself in this situation, you know, I hope that every young kid out there in the world watching this interview right now who's been following the case will use me as an example to using better judgment and making better decisions.”

“Once again, I offer my deepest apologies to everyone. And I will redeem myself. I have to.”¹

Now to me, this sounds like a man who is truly contrite, and concerned about something more than just his multimillion dollar salary or superstar fame. I give him the benefit of the doubt, because he admitted guilt in federal court, and because he took personally responsibility for the crime he committed. He also took responsibility for lying to his teammates and friends.

Vick also committed himself to be a better disciple of Jesus Christ, something, frankly, I hope that I might be able to do, along with you. In general, then, I appreciated Vick’s statement. It is my deep hope that his words were sincere.

While I appreciated Vick’s statement, he is not the object of this sermon. God is. And several things in Vick’s statement that ought to draw attention to our own behavior and the nature of human society. We are a broken people. And both kids and adults frequently look to mega-wealthy superstars as “role models.” I don’t want to dwell on Vick himself, but on some of the things his statement highlights about our culture, including making idols of role models and fame, how persistent sinful behavior can lead to embarrassment and destruction. How can we, with our broken cisterns, find redemption?

Idols and “Role Models”

Although many times we don’t even realize we do it, we are constantly making idols out of things and people, “role models,” to whom we pay homage. I saw a program on one of the “home and garden” cable channels devoted to how much money a couple could get for their house. The process of selling a home is, in the wider scheme of things, a somewhat banal process. People buy and sell homes all the time. But this is a program devoted to elevating a real estate transaction into a life altering struggle of biblical proportions because, you see, if the couple in question can’t get the big bucks they expect, then they won’t be able to “move up” to that next mansion they have their eyes on.

We make idols out of what we “own” or think we own, we make idols out of professional athletes, supermodels, cars, food, addictive substances, booze, and we even make idols out of ourselves. We do this when we start believing all the hype about how we are better people than we really are. We begin to get tempted, as some athletes and politicians are tempted, to think that somehow we become exempt from the consequences of our unrepentant sin. To be clear, here, I’m not just picking on Michael Vick – I’m addressing all of us here who profess to be Christian and who might be tempted to lord it over those who struggle with matters of faith. But Vick himself touches on the idolatry of our culture because he senses that people hold in him high regard for no other reason than his stellar athletic abilities.

Jeremiah writes:

“Thus says the LORD: ‘What wrong did your ancestors find in me that they went far from me, and went after worthless things, and became worthless themselves?” (Jer 2:5 NRSV). Going after the worthless things will take us down the road of worthlessness. Goings after what is worthless means that we aren’t good stewards of the precious gift of life we have received from God.

Jeremiah was speaking to “all the families of Israel” in an attempt to refocus their attention to the God that saved them from slavery.

We are called to do the same thing, by rejecting the idols of our culture that keep us from recognizing Almighty God and from hearing how He is calling us into the world He is preparing for the fullness of his coming Kingdom.

Sin and Destruction

I mentioned earlier that we can become wrapped up in our sin to the point where we lose our way. This kind of thing does not just happen to the celebrities in our culture. Frankly, the problem is endemic to our humanity. Sin is a true, multicultural phenomenon. No one is exempt from its temptation. And our refusal to repent and turn away from sin can actually make us, as Jeremiah writes, “worthless.” We know, from the testimony of scripture and the testimony of our own stories that something is awry. In the rebellion of humanity that had is source in Adam and Eve, we are the “people [who] have changed their glory,” their glory, “for something that does not profit” (Jer 2:11 NRSV).

Who does such a crazy thing? We all do. The same temptations that cause one person, for example, to exchange the healthy income and fame associated with extraordinary athletic ability and sell it out to pursue a few extra bucks on the side in cruel sport? Or to risk the wrath of a family in pursuit of cheap, meaningless sexual escapades? Or maybe succumbing to the temptation to cheat “just a little bit” on our income taxes. It seems that human beings have the incessant need to cheapen human life, to commoditize it, to relevatize it in ways that are so seditious that they can become a subtle form of slavery to that which is worthless. It honestly makes no sense, which is one of the reason Paul complained in Romans 7:15, “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.” Jeremiah’s revelation of God’s words, written thousands of years ago, still rings true today. In our text, the Israelites stand accused of turning against God. Prophets were prophesying by Baal, that ancient idol of the Canaanites. What idols we prophesy by? Is it prosperity? Do-it-yourself redemption? So many things that they are difficult to enumerate. We need only reflect on our own lives for a few moments before the truth of the matter becomes uncomfortable.

“Has a nation changed its gods, even though they are no gods? But my people have changed their glory for something that does not profit” (Jer 2:11 NRSV).

Jesus Christ and Redemption

The situation can feel oppressive and hopeless. The situation that Jeremiah addresses in our text, the rebelliousness of Israel, is so severe that all of the heavens are called in as witnesses:

“Be appalled, O heavens, at this, be shocked, be utterly desolate, says the LORD, for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and dug out cisterns for themselves, cracked cisterns that can hold no water” (Jer 2:12-13 NRSV).

Jeremiah’s wording and the imagery are very rich here. Israel has forsaken the Lord, the very fountain of living water. Instead, the people have hewn cisterns out of the rock to try and save life-giving water themselves. I had the privilege of seeing one ancient cistern on the mountaintop fortress of Masada in Israel. As I recall, the cisterns at Masada were designed to hold tens of thousands of gallons of water. The cisterns, coupled with the large from which occupied the largest portion of the Masada stronghold, were designed to make that place impregnable. Despite all of the preparations, however, Masada did ultimately fall. For Israel and for Jeremiah, the cisterns they have dug out are cracked, useless, and can hold no water.

This is a call to return to the Lord, the very fountain of life. We, too, are called by Christ to do the same thing. Do you remember the story of the Samaritan woman at the well? Jesus asks her for a drink of water, and she responds:

“’How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?’ (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans)”

“Jesus answered her, ‘If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water’” (John 4:10 NRSV).

The message of the Gospel this week is very straightforward. We are called to turn away from our dependence on whatever well or cistern we’ve dug for ourselves in which we think we can safely place our trust– maybe it’s that big bank account or 401k, perhaps it’s something else. The reason is this: Eternity is at sake. Faithfulness to God is at stake. The things of this world will pass away. The old maxim “you can’t take it with you” is still in effect!

I am always amused when I read headlines like this one: “Among people who pursue habit or behavior X, the death rate increases by 25%.” What baloney! The last time I checked the death rate, my friends, continues to be 100%. No one is exempt, and that stark fact should inform all of our life decisions, and should heavily influence the degree to which we remain faithful to God’s call to us in Jesus Christ.

Leave those cracked cisterns behind. Don’t fall in the trap of dependence on those earthly things that we leave behind. Cleave to the source of living water – Jesus Christ. Trust in Him, the source of all heavenly treasures.

Conclusion

If I had one bit nit to pick to Michael Vick’s statement, it is this four-word statement: “I will redeem myself.” There’s no need for that, Mr. Vick. Someone already accomplished that task for you and for me and for all of you. The price of Israel’s disobedience at the time Jeremiah was writing, and our own disobedience and idol-mongering, has been paid-in-full. What we need to do is reject sin and cling to the One who calls us into ministry as Head of the Church – the One who calls us to the font of our baptism, and who calls us to eat and drink with him at the table.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Given at First Presbyterian Church, Portland, Texas.

¹Transcription from the Associated Press. ↩

Technorati Tags: Presbyterian Church USA, PCUSA, Sermon, Jeremiah, Year C, Michael Vick