Upheld

What do you do when your life is a mess and you are so angry with God that you could spit in God's face? Too many of us crawl into a hole and refuse to come out until things are better. The book of Psalms offers a better answer, though; and this sermon considers what that is.

Psalm 137 is one powerful psalm! (You might want to take a look at it before you read this sermon. Don't worry -- it's short.) Preachers tend to stay away from it, because they don’t like to face what’s in it – especially not its ending! Oh, it starts innocently enough. It begins with a peaceful image of rivers and trees blowing gently in the wind. But then, that beautiful scene turns into a nightmare. We find that the psalmist has been brutally wrenched away from his homeland, and is a prisoner in a foreign land. As we continue to read, his grief increases. The holy city of Jerusalem is gone, burned down to the bare earth by an invading army. Its inhabitants have been brutally slaughtered. Even little children were not spared. The psalm ends with a cry for revenge: “Babylon, you bully, one of these days the same thing will happen to you! I can’t wait for that day! On that day, you’ll watch your own children being slaughtered, and you’ll know how we feel.”

This psalm is a product of the Babylonian Exile. That exile began in 586 BCE after the armies of Babylon swooped down on the Israelites like a great bird of prey and conquered their nation. The Babylonians overran the city of Jerusalem and destroyed it down to its foundations.  Whoever was not killed was dragged off to Babylon. The only Israelites left in the land of Judah were illiterate peasants who posed no threat to Babylon’s authority. No wonder that Psalm 137 is the very essence of grief, anger, and despair! The exiles had lost everything: their Temple, their city, their homes, their possessions, and their families. Who wouldn’t grieve in a situation like that? Who wouldn’t hate the ones who had done such dreadful deeds, and cry bitterly for revenge? I probably would; and so would you. Those exiles had hit rock bottom.

And we can feel for them! Oh, we may never have been torn away from our homes and our families and sent into exile; but all of us have felt angry and helpless at one time or another. Maybe a loved one died suddenly. Maybe a doctor told us news that we didn’t anticipate. Maybe an opportunity we had yearned for was unfairly snatched away from us. Whatever the reason, we’ve all had the rug pulled out from underneath us. We end up on the floor before we even knew what hit us. I can remember a time in my own life when I suffered so many personal losses that I became numb. I felt anger, grief, despair, and then… nothing at all. I just put one foot in front of the other and tried to get through each day as it came.

Maybe you’ve felt that way, too. Most of us have. Those are the times when we have had so many blows rain down on our heads that we can’t even stand up any more. We’re like the woman in the old TV ad who took a bad fall, pushed her medic alert button, and cried, “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.” We may giggle at that cheesy ad; but the reality is that most of us feel that way every now and then. Of course, we haven’t taken a literal fall. We’ve fallen emotionally and spiritually. Those can be the worst falls of all. How can we get up from those falls? How can we be hopeful when we don’t see any reason for hope? How can we recover when all we see ahead of us is pain?

Psalm 137 doesn’t give us an answer to those questions; but the book of Psalms itself does. What happens if we enlarge our focus from just Psalm 137 and include the psalms that are around it? Psalm 136, the psalm that comes before it, is a litany. Part of it is meant to be read by a leader, while the rest of the psalm are the responses to what that leader says. The leader reminds the people of all that God has done for them in the past: God created all that is; God brought Israel out of Egypt; and God brought them into the Promised Land. Then, after each statement of what God has done, the people respond, “His love endures forever.” 26 times the people respond, “His love endures forever.” It’s pretty tough to miss the point: God’s love is forever, regardless of what happens to us! Following Psalm 137 is a psalm of praise. We used part of it as our call to worship this morning. Psalm 138 begins with the statement: “I will praise you, O Lord, with my whole heart!” and concludes by saying, “The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me. Your love, O Lord, endures forever. Do not abandon the work of your hands!” How can we miss the point? God is faithful to us, even though it may not appear to be the case at the time! The voices of Psalm 136 and Psalm 138 hold up the hopeless, crushed voice of Psalm 137, a voice that has no praises of its own.

I’m convinced that the placement of these psalms isn’t accidental. I believe that the psalmist is telling us something by surrounding a psalm of bitter lament with psalms of praise. Those psalms that remember with gratitude what God has done for us hold up the one between them that cannot lift up its grief-stricken head. And isn’t it the same way with us? When we are crushed by what life throws at us, we need to be upheld by those who are around us. It doesn’t matter whether we have been felled by one gigantic blow, or whether we have been worn down by the drip, drip, drip of daily problems. When our lives are lying flat on the floor and our faces are ground into the dirt, we need help getting up.

It is then that God uses those around us to help us do just that. Sometimes those people are family members or close friends who sympathize, listen to our cries of distress, and encourage us to keep going until we get through our dark place. Sometimes that help comes from people we don’t even know, whose kind words just happen to be what we need to hear in the midst of our grief. And surely that help comes from our own community of faith – here as we worship together. When we cannot worship – when we are, in fact, so angry at God that we never want to darken the doors of the church again – that is when we most need to come to church and worship. When we cannot praise, or sing, or even pray, others around us will do that for us. When our lives are the embodiment of Psalm 137, those around us will take the role of Psalm 136 as they remember God’s faithfulness, and that of Psalm 138 as they offer their praises.

And one day, we will discover that our wounds are beginning to heal. We may not be dancing yet. We may not even be standing up yet. We might only be sitting up gingerly. But we’re off the ground, and we’re looking ahead again. That is the day that we move out of Psalm 137 and look towards Psalm 139. Do you remember what it says? “Where can I go from your Spirit, O God? Where can I go from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there. If I make my bed in the underworld, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the morning and fly to the farthest side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, and your right hand will hold me fast.” When we fall and can’t get up, God is there with skin on – in the people who love us, who encourage us, and who worship for us when we can’t do it ourselves. Thanks be to God, whose love does indeed endure forever!

Spiders and Other Frights

In this season of scary things, the scariest is that some politicians are trying their best to divide us from one another. This sermon is a comment on that -- and an argument that, as Christians, we must not let it happen!

I imagine that many of you have decorated your homes for Halloween by now. October is the season of scary things of all kinds; and many of our homes reflect that. My grandson Tanner has always liked decorating for Halloween. This year, he decided that he wanted to use a spider theme; so, his whole house, inside and out, is full of spider webs – the artificial kind, of course. He was thrilled when I gave him a big, black, hairy, plastic spider to put right in the middle of the biggest web in their front yard! Now, my own tastes run more towards smiling jack o’ lanterns and little ghosts that peer out from behind picture frames on my end tables. (If my ghosts even said “Boo!” they would do so politely, I’m sure.) The scariest that I get is a string of ghost lights that climb up my staircase and shine softly each night until Halloween. But Tanner is a 5-year-old boy; and he wants to do scary – and what’s scarier than a spider?

I recently ran across a poem about a spider. It made me stop and think about my reactions in this season of things that frighten us. The poem is by Nikki Giovanni; it is titled “Allowables.”

I killed a spider

Not a murderous brown recluse

Nor even a black widow

And if the truth were told this

Was only a small

Sort of papery spider

Who should have run

When I picked up the book

But she didn’t

And she scared me

And I smashed her

I don’t think

I’m allowed

To kill something

Because I am

Frightened

Let that sink in for just a moment. “I don’t think I’m allowed to kill something because I am frightened.” Maybe fright isn’t a good enough reason to smash something out of existence. But, sadly, self-control isn’t our first response to something that scares us. When we’re scared, our adrenaline starts to pump, and our “fight or flight” reaction usually takes over. If we can’t run away from what scares us, we try to fight it. Just like lawmen in the wild west, we tend to shoot first and ask questions later. And the things that scare us usually get the worst of it, whether that thing is a spider or a snake or a bat. But this poet is questioning our right to do that. Is it all right to kill something simply because it scares me? The truth is that even things that scare us are part of God’s creation, too. Maybe they deserve our tolerance, if not our respect.

But maybe I’m making a mountain out of a molehill. Who cares if we kill a few spiders, anyway? Well… maybe no one (except the spider, of course). But the attitude that it’s OK to get rid of anything that frightens us can itself become frightening when we start talking about other human beings. People can be scary, too – or so we are told. The last few months, especially, have been filled with all kinds of talk about other people that is intended to scare the pants off us. Whole categories of people have been pictured as scary… threatening… even dangerous. Why, you can’t turn around without hearing someone or other warning us about the threats from whole groups of people. Illegal immigrants from Mexico have been accused of being drug smugglers, murderers, and rapists. Never mind that many of them are very hard-working and ready to do the jobs that we don’t want to do! If they’re in our country illegally, they must be threatening. Refugees from the Middle East are vilified as potential terrorists. Everyone who has a Middle Eastern heritage is under suspicion. Remember the recent comment that compared refugees to Skittles candy? “If you knew that there were three poisoned Skittles in a bowl, would you eat a handful of them?” If we’re not careful, they’ll infiltrate our country and kill all of us! Even some of our police officers who are sworn to protect us (and who do a very good job of that most of the time) have bought into the “shoot first and ask questions later” mentality when their adversary is an African-American. Why? They’re frightened! Maybe all of us are, these days. That’s what happens when someone tries to divide us from one another. We’re told that “those people aren’t like us.” And after we hear that often enough, we start to believe it. They turn into “the Other,” and we start to be suspicious of everything about them. What appears to be a friendly smile from a stranger might mask deadly intentions. Pretty soon, we’re scared of everyone but the people we know personally. And when we’re frightened of something… Well, I think I’ve already covered that. We shoot first and ask questions later.

Can we get past being afraid of one another? If we can’t, we may be doomed to endless cycles of violence born of fear. Christian writer and thinker Thomas Merton asked, “What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we are not able to cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves?” We Christians, of all people, should realize that fear and separation is not the kind of world that God intends for his children. A world of suspicion and mistrust is the exact opposite of the Kingdom of God! So this morning, I have two suggestions that might start to get us out of the bog of fear in which we are sinking. First, let’s reject the “us-them” mentality that some people are trying to shove down our throats. We are all of us children of God; and all of us are infinitely precious and beloved by God. Remember that Jesus hung out with the very people who were considered to be “the Other” in his own society – tax collectors, prostitutes, lepers, even Roman soldiers! Jesus reminded us that those scary people were just as valuable as the pillars of the Jewish community. And maybe we’ll find out that the scary people in our own society today are just as valuable as some of the politicians who are running for office. But there’s a second step; and it’s just as important as the first one: let’s refuse to be afraid. How many times in the Bible do you think that the words “Fear not!” appear? On the basis of a very quick search of the Bible, the answer is 63. 63 separate times God or one of God’s messengers tells someone not to be afraid! On the other hand, how many times does God tell somebody to be afraid? Not once! Maybe there’s a lesson for us there.

This morning’s scripture reading (Psalm 27:1-6) is a great example of someone who takes God at his word that we don’t need to be afraid of anything. The psalmist isn’t afraid of the wicked, or of his enemies, or of an army that is camped around his city, or even of a war! Why? Because he trusts God! Trusting God even in situations that look impossible is what we are called to do. If we trust God, we will do what God asks us to do. And what is that? Why, to love one another! The first letter of John hits the nail on the head when it says, “There is no fear in love. Perfect love drives out fear.” (I John 4:18a) Does that work? Can we really get rid of our fear of other people by loving them? Well, it may not work for spiders and snakes and bats. But we could certainly try loving other people and see what happens. Do you know what I think? I think that if we rejected all the hate speech, and we didn’t listen to people telling us to be afraid of one another, and tried loving everybody, that the world would be a better place. Maybe we should trust God like the psalmist did – and like Jesus did. Who knows what wonderful things might happen!

Grace Abounds

What does grace do for us, really? Is it the source of what we often call our "blessings" -- a fancy car, a nice house, and new clothes? Or is it something else much less tangible but much more important? In this sermon that I preached on World Communion Sunday, I share thoughts on God's grace from around the world. Maybe we have something to learn from out brothers and sisters whose lives are not as easy as ours are...

Today is World Communion Sunday. All over the world, Christians are sitting down at the table of Jesus Christ and sharing in the meal that he provides for us. And all those Christians, wherever they live, will affirm that the bread we share is, in some mysterious way, the body of Christ that was broken for our benefit. That bread is a symbol of the grace that God gives us through Jesus Christ. Grace, after all, is what Holy Communion is all about. We don’t earn our way to this table by doing good works. No matter what we may do (or may not do), God invites us here because God loves us. And although every time we come to this table, we remember the first Communion when Jesus sat down to dinner with his disciples knowing that he was going to die the next day, grace isn’t just a historical event. Grace is available to us every day: right here, right now.

But I can’t help wondering if many of us, especially here in a country that is so well off, really understand what that grace is all about. We are so well off in so many ways that we fall into thinking that “the good life” is evidence of God’s grace. But where does that leave us if a fire or a tornado or a hurricane sweeps away all of our possessions and we suddenly have nothing? What if we are diagnosed with a debilitating disease? And what about those folks among us who don’t have a good life at all: the homeless or the mentally ill? Have they lost God’s grace? Our Christian sisters and brothers in other areas of the world have something to say about that. Many of them don’t have the kind of prosperous lives that we do, yet they can easily point to God’s grace around them. They teach us that God’s grace has very little to do with easy lives and everything to do with God’s presence in even the most difficult circumstances. Let’s listen to what some of them have to say. [These stories are from

http://www.globalministries.org/special_days_wcs_world_communion_sunday_ideas.]

Nomvula lives in South Africa. She is HIV positive, and her disease is terminal. Many of us would look at Nomvula, see a hopeless situation, and wonder what happened to God’s grace. But Nomvula sees it very differently. She believes that she is HIV positive “so the glory of God might be revealed.” Nomvula travels from church to church in her country, defying taboos and the stigma of HIV to provide comfort to those who are suffering. She even counsels people in parking lots who are afraid to seek help. Nomvula hosts a radio talk show and writes a weekly newspaper column. She leads the HIV/AIDS desk of the United Congregational Church of Southern Africa. In a country where it is shameful to be HIV positive, Nomvula refuses to stay silent. She believes that God’s grace is what enables her to continue to speak out. She would tell us that grace abounds!

Or we could listen to what Nima has to say. Nima lives in Nepal; and women in Nepal are second-class citizens. Except in the church. “The church,” Nima says, “is the only place in my country where I, a woman, am truly welcome; where I, rejected by my family for marrying outside my caste, am accepted. This is the only group of people who welcome me in, despite the fact that I have been treated for mental illness. Even untouchables and lepers are allowed in!” And Nima considers receiving Holy Communion to be the greatest experience of all, because it is the evidence of the love and grace that God offers to all of us. “I am a baptized Christian,” she proudly says. “What a great privilege!” She, too, would tell us that grace abounds!

Even in El Salvador where people are executed for their political beliefs, or disappear off the streets never to be seen again – even in that place, men and women affirm God’s grace! Listen to this statement of faith that was written by a peasant woman from in El Salvador:

I believe, Lord, that everything good in the world comes from you. I believe that, because you preached love, freedom, and justice, you were humiliated, tortured, and killed. I believe that you continue to suffer in our people. I believe that you accompany me in the task of transforming this world into a different one where there is no suffering or weeping, a world where there is a gigantic table set with free food where everyone is welcome. I believe that you accompany us in waiting for the dawning of a new day. I believe that you give us strength so that death does not find us without having done enough, and that you will rise in those who have died seeking a different world.

Even in violence-ridden, poverty-stricken El Salvador, grace abounds!

Paul had the very same message for the church in Rome. Christians there lived under the constant threat of persecution from the Roman Emperor. Many of them were slaves and owned nothing. Even their bodies belonged to someone else. Some of them had even died for their faith! Most of them had nothing like the “good life” that we enjoy here and now. But Paul claimed that nothing could separate them from the love of Jesus Christ: not “trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword. [Nothing] in all creation can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:31-39) Easy life or difficult one, wealthy or poverty-stricken, secure or at daily risk of death, God’s love is there. That, my friends, is grace.

In just a moment, we will sit down at the table of grace – the table of Holy Communion. When the bread and cup are shared, we will eat just a little bit of bread and drink just a tiny bit from the cup. And that seems so inadequate, because God has plenty of grace to go around! Take three or four pieces of bread if you like! Take twenty pieces of bread! God doesn’t parcel out grace in little cubes! There’s enough for the whole world ten thousand times over! As we approach God’s table, I hope that you take a moment to thank God for love and for mercy and for generosity. Thank God for the good lives that we lead. (I do every day.) Thank God for all the things that have gone right for you. But most of all, give thanks to God for the grace that abounds in any and all circumstances – for you, for me, and for the whole world.