A Friend in Low Places

Psalm 46

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.  

Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change, though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea; though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble with its tumult.

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High.

God is in the midst of the city; it shall not be moved; God will help it when the morning dawns.  The nations are in an uproar, the kingdoms totter; he utters his voice, the earth melts.

The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge.

Come, behold the works of the Lord; see what desolations he has brought on the earth.  He makes wars cease to the end of the earth; he breaks the bow, and shatters the spear; he burns the shields with fire.

“Be still, and know that I am God! I am exalted among the nations, I am exalted in the earth.”

The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge.

Very little feels like solid ground these days.  Rock solid things have been shaken right down to their roots.  The usual ebb and flow of good times and hard times, now seems stuck in relentless-raging-storm mode.  Black masked secret police are in our streets.  People think about the Ann Frank House, not as a historical place to visit in Amsterdam, but as model for remodeling their basement here in Sheffield.  I can’t remember a time where more people felt so tossed and battered by the world.  The storms are deadly.  They feel unending.  The earth changes, the mountains in the seas shake, the chaos of the sea rages and the solid earth that you thought you could always count on is shaking.  But today’s Psalm contains a promise from God for times such as these:  The God of Jacob (that’s the God that wrestled with Jacob in the river and gave Jacob the new name of Israel) THAT God, is with us, through it all.    

Julian of Norwich, a nun back in the 1300’s was tormented by the raging storms in her world.  Why was there sin, brokenness, tumult, and all the horrors rampaging though the world?  In a vision, Jesus spoke to her saying:  "It was necessary that there should be sin; but all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well".  This was Jesus reminding Julian of the truth of today’s Psalm, that there is no storm… no amount of unbelievable brokenness… up to and including even death itself that will keep us from ending up right where God wants us to end up… in joy and peace, light and life.  

The hard part is remembering to keep your eye, not on the storm, but on Christ.  I have trouble with that, but to be fair, even the disciples had trouble with that!  Do you remember the story of Peter wanting to walk on water?  He wanted to walk to Jesus across the water, so Jesus told him to come on!  The chaos of the sea was kept firmly under Peter’s feet when he kept his eye on Jesus.  But when his focus moved onto the chaos… when the storm became his focus, rather than Jesus… that’s when he was sunk.  

We’re living in a time where people work very hard to move our focus onto the chaos.  Media these days is built and finely tuned for the purpose of turning our focus onto the chaos… to sink our heads in the raging storm.  We try to simply to stay informed but end up doom scrolling in worry, hate, and vitriol.  Inevitably, like Peter, we end up drowning in it.  Which is one more reason why we ALL need reminding that the shaking mountains, raging seas, and even drowning in the sea is NOT the end of the story!  Even after Peter sank into the chaos of the ocean, he got pulled out.  The Lord of Hosts was with him.  The God of Jacob was his refuge.  Jesus pulled him out… Jesus ALWAYS pulls us out, no matter how deep into the world’s STUFF we might have sunk.  So, as Julian was reminded by Jesus, all will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well.

All WILL be well… BUT… there’s always a but, isn't there?  Even though all WILL be well… and it really WILL be well… that doesn’t mean the raging seas and the shaking mountains are set to all magically disappear.  Jesus didn’t dry up the ocean with magic to rescue Peter.  He reached right INTO the depths of it and pulled him out THROUGH it!  All WILL be well.  That is true.  The God of Jacob IS with us.  That is true.  But it is also true that the noise of the shaking mountains and raging storms in our world is not going to magically disappear over night.  

Julian of Norwich, after her vision of Jesus reminding her that all will be well, had another vision.  It was a vision of the devil attacking her… trying to take away the hope she saw in Christ.  I know, I’m not a big fan of a personified devil either, BUT sometimes, giving a NAME to hard-to-pin-down things like, chaos, fear, doubt, and insecurity can be a very powerful way to fight against those shadowy forces.  The finite name of “The Devil” can remind us that everything that brings darkness, chaos, and storms into our lives is finite as well!  All of it has limits.  All of it has an end…  and no matter how the chaos and darkness rages, the God of Jacob IS our refuge AND all will be well, AND all will be well AND all manner of things will be well. 

Martin Luther’s own struggles with the storms that raged around him in his world plagued by chaos inspired him to set this same Psalm to the tune of a popular beer drinking song.  He knew his people needed an easy way to remember that the God of Jacob was their refuge.  I wonder every year at this time what beer drinking song of our time I should set this Psalm to so that we might be easily reminded of that very same thing.  Tom T. Hall’s “I Like Beer” or maybe Garth Brooks’ “Friends in Low Places”…  can you imagine?  But honestly, if it would help us remember the truth… that no matter how much the world rages, God’s got me.  God's got you.  God's got US…  If it would help us remember that all WILL be well, and all will be well and all manner of things will be well!  That the Lord of hosts is with us.  That the God of Jacob IS our refuge.  If it helped us remember THAT… well, a new tune for Psalm 46 might just be in order.  Amen.

God's Low Blow

Luke 18:1-8

Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.  He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people.  In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my accuser.’  For a while he refused, but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone,  yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’ ”  And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says.  And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them?  I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”

This week Jesus isn’t doing a “Jesus living a story” sort of parable.  This week we’re back to the more usual, “Jesus telling a story” sort of parable.  But again, regardless of the sort, all parables are meant to tell us something about the way God works.  Parables are also often a softer… sometimes even a tricksier… way Jesus uses to tell us something about how God works that we might have trouble swallowing if Jesus just gave it to us straight.   

This week’s parable is one of those.  The news, that as a judge, God is a complete and total failure might have been really hard for the people to hear if it had been given to them straight.  It’s just hard to hear that God’s a failure at anything, isn’t it?  But that’s where this parable ends up!  That’s also why Jesus (unlike me) didn’t give away that ending at the beginning of the story!    

So, let's go back to the beginning.  God, in this parable is the unjust judge.  It’s a judge’s job to hear a case and decide the case fairly, regardless of how people beg or plead or pester.  Right?  It’s a judges duty to give out fair and impartial verdicts and judgments without regard to feelings, emotions, or anything else.  But in this parable, the only thing this judge is concerned with is whether or not he’s going to keep being bothered by this pesky widow.  In the end this judge decides to completely flush all jurisprudence down the toilet, chuck fair and honest judgment in the bin, and instead just give this annoying woman what she wants... just so she’ll get off his back… for crying out loud! 

In doing that, the judge in the parable has become a complete and total failure as a judge.  He wasn’t giving a fair and impartial hearing of the case.  He no longer ruled in favor of the side that the law and precedent directed him toward.  He no longer paid attention to the facts.  In short, the judge just stopped judging!   

But this strange and uncomfortable parable is here to tell us something about the way God works, right?  What this parable is telling us is that God too has stopped judging.  God too, no longer gives an impartial hearing of our failings and shortcomings.  God too, it seems, is no longer judging each of us by our actions or by the way we live our lives.  In short, Jesus tells us, God has become a complete and total failure when it comes to judging us as well.

I don’t know what you want to say about God becoming a complete and total failure as a judge, but what I have to say about it is… Thank God!  I mean, think about it.  Where would we be if God gave us exactly what we deserved?  What if God treated that "break one commandment and you’ve broken all of them" thing as an originalist?  How would your case turn out if God was to judge you strictly by the letter of the law?  What would happen to you if God was the most impartial and unswerving deliverer of Justice?  I don't know about you, but I’d be doomed even before the opening arguments! 

The Good News from this parable is that God has decided to become a complete FAILURE at being a judge.  The Good News is that God has fixed it so there is no way we could ever possibly expect a fair trial from the Divine.  Thanks be to God!  But even with that Good News, Jesus knew this parable would be a hard sell.  He knew people much more easily wrap their minds around a God of judgement than a God of love.

That’s where Jacob was in the first lesson for today.  Jacob could not imagine his brother as someone who erred on the side of love and grace.  He could, however, easily imagine his brother’s judgement.  His brother was big.  REALLY BIG!  And Jacob had been a tricky, manipulative, jerk.  A REALLY BIG tricky, manipulative jerk!  God insisted that things would be okay, but Jacob insisted they would be anything BUT okay! So there in the middle of the river, Jacob fought with God for an entire night, trying to get God to understand how his brother and the world really worked!  Grace and love was NOT how the world worked, Jacob insisted.  Judgement and punishment was the way of the world.  Jacob insisted for a whole night that God had NO idea how the world worked and finally, when God saw that Jacob would not let go of his insistence on judgement… when God saw that Jacob would not stop fighting no matter what, God kicked him right in the “hip-socket” and yes, Virginia, it was not the “hip-socket”… It was indeed the “HIP-SOCKET”!  And then strangely enough after that, Jacob stopped fighting God… go figure!  

This parable and that story about Jacob tell us something about the way God works.  They tell us that when it comes to fair and impartial judgement… God is simply not interested.  Whether that is because judgement is too much work, or because God is just DONE fighting with us, or simply because God enjoys doing grace and love way more than doing judgement and punishment, I don’t know.  But I’ll take it! 

What I do know is that you and I are the bless-ed recipients of that Divine decision to step down from the bench.  You and I are the beneficiaries of the Divine judge’s judgement to permanently retire from the job of judging and just go with grace and love across the board.  To THAT I say… Thanks be to God.  Amen. 

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Luke 17:11-19

11 On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. 12 As he entered a village, ten men with a skin disease approached him. Keeping their distance, 13 they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” 14 When he saw them, he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were made clean. 15 Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. 16 He prostrated himself at Jesus’s feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. 17 Then Jesus asked, “Were not ten made clean? So where are the other nine? 18 Did none of them return to give glory to God except this foreigner?” 19 Then he said to him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”

This is not a “Jesus telling a story” sort of parable, but a “Jesus living a story” sort of parable.  Regardless, all parables are meant to tell us something about the way God works.  In this one, ten lepers yell at Jesus from across the street.  They weren’t being rude.  By law they couldn’t get any closer.  Jesus hears their shouts and tells them to go and show themselves to the priests.  Sounds odd, but back then priests doubled as dermatologists and only they could decide if you were clean or not.  As the lepers walked away they were healed and in that instant Jesus shows us something about the way God works.  God works in unconditional, indiscriminate, reckless, and radical Grace.  Notice, Jesus doesn’t ask where they’re from.  Doesn’t know who they are or what wonderful or awful things they may have done in their lives.  Doesn’t care if they believe the right things or the wrong things or nothing at all.  God’s Grace makes them whole, simply because BEING WHOLE is what they needed.  None of them got themselves right with Jesus first.  They were all made whole simply because MAKING CREATION WHOLE is the way God works!

As they all noticed what had happened to them, one turned around and came back praising God and thanking Jesus.  Mind you, this was NOT what Jesus told them to do.  Jesus told them to go show themselves to the priest.  This guy though… a foreigner from the shit hole country of Samaria didn’t listen to Jesus and instead came back to say thank you.  This little piece of this story is here to swing the sledgehammer of total, unconditional, unlimited, indiscriminate, reckless, and radical Grace a second time in the hopes that God’s Grace might actually break through our thick human skull condition.  Samaritans were outcasts because of where they were born.  Leprosy could be healed.  Being a Samaritan was terminal.  YET here we are taught something else about how God works.  God’s Grace is given even to those who don’t follow directions and even to those the world labels as “terminally other.”  

The label the world had slapped on him was “Samaritan”.  What label has the world has slapped on you?  I know.  There’s more than one.  Same.  But let’s deal with the biggest one first.  We’ll deal with the others after that.  What we’re going to do is to take that line: “And they were a Samaritan”! and each of us is going to stick the label the world has slapped on US into that “Samaritan” slot.  So, I’m going to say “And they were a…” and together we’re all going to each say out loud the biggest label the world has stuck on each of us.  Ready?  “And they were a ___________ !”  Got the next label the world has slapped on you ready?  Okay, here we go.  And they were a  _________ !  (repeat as many times as needed)

For people who have had each of those labels stuck to them in this life… this parable INSISTS that we hear that God’s Grace is ABSOLUTELY AND WITHOUT QUESTION,  PRECISELY for people with THAT label!  This parable is demanding that we hear that God’s Grace is ABSOLUTELY AND WITHOUT QUESTION PRECISELY… for YOU!

That fact is ten thousand percent true, AND also ten thousand percent difficult for us to hear, accept, and embody.  This was Naaman’s difficulty in the first lesson.  He was told by Elisha that God’s Grace was for him, but look at all he had to go through before he could even begin to hear that truth, let alone accept that truth, let alone finally embody that truth.  He went through denial that this could possibly work.  Anger that Elisha would not see him in person.  Bargaining over which rivers were better.  Depression that he had foolishly dared to have hope.  Then finally… with the help of the people around him (point at all the people in the congregation)… the people who stuck with him through thick and thin AND who kept encouraging him to keep stepping toward a new life AND I’m sure encouraged him to not give up after immersing himself just once… or twice… or three times but to keep going even if it took seven whole times… even if it took seventy times seven times.  Only then did Naaman finally arrive at a place where he could accept himself as a recipient of God’s gift of Grace.  

“But Pastor Erik” you say, “those are the stages of grief.  Why would we need to grieve the loss of these horrible labels the world has maliciously slapped onto us?”  Why?  Because we’ve all grown very used to those labels over these past 30… 60… 90 years.  They are not kind labels… but they are very, very, VERY familiar.  Often so familiar we have no idea who we might be without them.  So to be rid of them means they must die and when anything that close to us dies, it means we must do the very hard work of grief and loss.  That work isn’t easy.  That work doesn’t go in a straight line.  That work is done for as long as that work needs to be done… but it must be done, because new life can only happen when the old life has died.  (A different parable… the parable of the cross… teaches us that hard lesson.  But that’s another sermon.)  

For today the take home message is that you are NOT the label the world has slapped on you, familiar though it may be.  YOU are worthy of God’s unconditional, unlimited, reckless, and radical Grace… and you have been GIVEN God’s unconditional, unlimited, reckless, and radical Grace… not for anything YOU have done or not done… but simply because giving unconditional, unlimited, reckless, and radical Grace is how God works.  May you and those around you here do that hard work together.  Supporting and encouraging one another to let the harmful labels the world has slapped on you finally die… familiar though they are…  and get to a place where you too can accept who and Whose you genuinely are… Because what you genuinely are is nothing less than a beloved and wonder-filled child of God.  Amen.