Lent 3B

Readings can be found here

To Know By Heart

What do you know by heart?

1x1=1; 1x2=2; 1x3=3…so on and so forth.

A bit of Blake, “Tiger, Tiger, Burning Bright, in the forests of the night…”

The “Our Father who art in heaven…”

What do you know by heart?

The muscle memory of a pirouette.

The smell of camellia flowers.

The colors of the rainbow.

What do you know by heart?

Psalm 23.

The Sound of Music

The love that endures all things.

What do you know by heart?

What verses have been committed to memory?

What graces, roll of the tongue?

What prayers are given breath without thinking?

What do you know by heart? Consider this for a moment…

Silence

I will never forget one of the first pastoral visits I ever made, standing alongside a clergy friend and mentor, at the bedside of a dying man.

His breath was shallow, his eyes closed.

And, as we prayed the Our Father, he took his breath and formed the words.

He knew them by heart.

They defined who he was in a way that gave him strength and assurance in his final days.

And, it struck me, how important it is to know some things by heart.

And this, this is one of the principal reasons I bring my children to church.

I want them to know these things by heart. To know the standing up and the sitting down, the words we say together, and what silence feels like when we pray.

I want them to know prayers that will anchor them to God and to each other, and to me. So that long after I am gone, the things they know by heart will hold them close and help them to remember.

To remember.

To remember God. To remember that they are beloved. To remember that they are part of something beyond themselves.

So, today, as we gather with prayer and with silence, I give thanks for the many things this community called the church will teach my children by heart.

Now the idea of learning “by heart” is not new and could even be considered foundational to our faith. In the early Rabbinic tradition, the act of memorizing the text was likened to housing the text in the “belly, bones or rooms of the heart”.  A memorized text became part of the body, part of a person’s intrinsic identity, and instruction in the oral Torah commonly began in early childhood.

Jesus himself, an observant Jew, would have been subject to this teaching. In fact, he is known to have spoken with authority amongst the Jewish religious authorities, which indicates his command of what is called the “oral Torah”.

One of the earliest pieces of the tradition that would have been conveyed to him was the transmission of the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai—an event which marks the beginning of the authoritative oral tradition in Judaism. God spoke to Moses, who spoke to the people, who were instructed to teach their children…so on and so forth.

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery…”

And, as the words were spoken, again and again and again, they accrued power and authority that helped to shape the communities understanding of what it meant to actually be Jewish.

As a child, Jesus would have been expected to learn these commandments by heart. Because, to be an observant Jew required adherence to the law—the law which told the Jewish people who they were and to whom they belonged.

They were the people who had been freed.

And belonged to God, the God who had liberated them.

But, God did not liberate the people in order to set them adrift in the wilderness without any guidance—and the Commandments continue to outline a structure by which the people can be supported in community and in faith. A structure in which the people of God cannot just survive, but thrive.

A structure in which respect, compassion, and dignity are given precedence. A structure in which exploitation of others is condemned. A structure in which all of creation is given the opportunity for rest. A structure grounded in God’s care for God’s people.

And, in this love becomes law.

To deepen our understanding of the love conveyed by the law, I look to today’s psalm which describes the law of the Lord as perfect and notes that it has the ability to revive the soul.  

And, in considering this, I wonder if our souls are revived when we commit the words of God to heart? I wonder if the internalization of the liberating law allows us to differentiate between laws which liberate and laws which oppress…

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery…”

Jesus knew these words…he knew them by heart.

And so, as he entered the temple grounds, he did so as an observant Jew well versed in the Torah and all of its teachings.

The temple was the center of religious life in Jerusalem. It was a place where religious authorities were charged with upholding the doctrine and discipline of their faith—a doctrine and discipline that included not just the ten commandments but 100s of laws intended to serve as guidelines for how to live an observant religious life. The temple authorities provided an essential service to those seeking to follow the law as they understood it.

Because, according to these laws, you NEEDED unblemished animals for sacrifice and the Roman coinage with images of Caesar couldn’t be offered in the temple because those coins represented worship of Caesar and not God.  So, if you were going to worship in the Temple and live out the precepts of your faith you NEEDED these services—adherents couldn’t participate in worship without these services. 

Jesus would have known this, but he would have also known the law as writ upon his heart. And, so what he saw with the law writ upon his heart, was a system that cloaked exploitation with the veil of religious purity.

The law that liberates. The law that oppresses. The law that gives life. The law that takes life.

To know by heart can allow us to know the difference.

To know by heart can empower us to stand firm when confronted with systems that destroy.

To know by heart is to know God—it is to integrate into our very bones the law that is love.

So now, a challenge.

What will you learn by heart?

Lent 1B

Readings can be found here

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In the Beginning it is Always Dark

During my Ash Wednesday sermon this past week, I connected the closing words of one of my favorite Mary Oliver poems, The Summer Day, with the words of the prophet Isaiah. “What will you do with your one wild and precious life?” the poet inquires, while the prophet gives word to God’s depiction of us as the “repairers of the breach, restorer of streets to live on”.

For me, in juxtaposing these two texts, I wanted us to begin our Lenten observance by framing our lives as a gift that is to be used for a purpose—God’s purpose. God’s purpose of liberation. God’s purpose of reconciliation. God’s purpose of restoration. And, in God’s purpose we become the means to an end—an end that is a new beginning.

Lent stands as a reminder that as Christians we are called to share in God’s purpose and work towards the vision of wholeness established at creation.

And, that is what I said, before I knew.

Before I knew that our country had once again sacrificed children to the false god of personal freedom. Personal freedom taken at the expense of God’s creation, at the expense of God’s beloved children.  This is not the fast I choose declaims the prophet Isaiah on behalf of God--

The fast that God chooses is “to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke”.

And, I wondered what I would have preached if I had known. What I would have said or offered as words of comfort or hope…

And, I am glad I didn’t know. Because there are times when I have nothing to offer. Nothing to say in response to the brokenness, the sinfulness, the hurt and the cruelty that is pursued by those who have forgotten, or never knew, the love of the God who first loved us.

Which brings me to the scripture we heard today. The aftermath of flood, a passing mention of Jesus’ temptation in the desert.

The scripture in which God declares, “never again” …and yet, here we are, once again.

And, so as I consider these scripture, I find myself mired in the flood waters and fully aware of the presence of evil all around.

When I was in early elementary school my grade school showed the movie “The Never Ending Story” on the last day of school before the winter break. The movie made a huge impact and I remember weeping as I watched the hero Atreyu lose his beloved horse Artax in the Swamp of Sadness.

I recognize the feeling of despair I feel now, as kin to the feeling I felt then.

Which is not to minimize the pain of the now—but to connect it to something outside of myself, to connect it to the mythic so that I can look upon the now with some hope.

Now, I imagine most of you have not seen this film—so a quick re-cap. The protagonist is on a quest to save the world of Fantasia from an evil force called “The Nothing”. A force that seeks to devour everything in its path.

The movie is filled with desperation and despair. And, then…

The protagonist fails.

And, The Nothing wins.

I wept then, and I weep now.

And, it makes me wonder…what kind of elementary school picks that movie for the last day of school?!

However, that said, that movie gave to me an understanding that there is hope even when all seems lost. That there is hope even when we think we have failed. That there is hope that, even at the end, there will be a new beginning.

Because, as the final stones of the empire of Fantasia fall, the boy Bastian finds himself surrounded by darkness. He asks, “Why is it so dark?”. She responds, “In the beginning it is always dark.”

It is dark. And it is the beginning.

Both are true—and ring true with our own Christian hope that it is not the end, unless it is the beginning and that it is not the beginning unless it is the end.

Which brings us to the last moments of the movie in which the child, Bastian, finds himself holding a grain of sand--the last bit of the world that remains. And, from that grain he discovers that he has the power to restore the land. He only needs a grain and the ability to imagine into being the world anew…and with that he becomes the repairer and restorer of the world entire. 

Perhaps I have found something to offer…because, this is where I want to pick up the story of the ark today.

A story in which the world has been destroyed and Noah and his efforts are akin to that grain of sand. The small hope that will recreate the world. As Paul describes it,

“God waited patiently in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water.”

A few, a few were enough.

Those few had to be brave, those few had to endure tragedy and horror, those few had to be resilient. But, they were enough.

But, they were not enough alone.

God and each other. These texts point to the centrality of God and the interdependence out of which we begin anew. God’s new covenant of never again. God’ declaration of belovedness.

It is notable that Lent begins, not with images of destruction, but with images of restoration.

And, while evil is present, evil does not prevail.

And, so today’s readings center themselves not on destruction but on a new creation.

These passages center themselves upon our belovedness and not our brokenness.

Strength, resilience, love and courage.

And, as I consider these qualities in the face of evil. I consider today’s Gospel. Jesus knew he was beloved. He knew who he was and to whom he belonged as the beloved child of God. In his belovedness, Jesus could see evil for what it was and reject it. In his belovedness, Jesus had the strength to withstand temptation in the desert. In his belovedness, Jesus had the resilience to wake up each day and face down evil once again. In his belovedness, Jesus had the courage to step back into the world of men and humble himself unto the cross.

And, it is in Jesus’ belovedness that we know our own belovedness. And so, as we walk in our own deserts, I pray that we will live into our identity as the beloved children of God. And, that in knowing this as our truth, we too will have the strength, resilience and courage to show up in those places where evil dwells and stand fast to the love of God.

So, when the darkness surrounds, stand fast and know that the answer to the question, “Why is it so dark?” is “in the beginning it is always dark”.

Amen.