"Joseph: Sold Into Slavery" August 7, 2011

Joseph:  Sold Into Slavery

Rev. Lee Ann Bryce

Community Christian Church

August 7, 2011

                                                                                                     Text:  Genesis 37

Our lectionary text for today begins the story of Joseph and his brothers.  As Barbara Brown Taylor says, it may be the most satisfying tale in all of Hebrew scripture.  “With a plot worthy of Shakespeare, it has everything in it:  passion, foreign intrigue, reversal, revenge.”  (Taylor).  In fact, it’s such a good story that we’re going to spend at least two weeks on it, maybe even three.  And for those visual learners out there, we’ll begin with a film clip from the Broadway show, “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat,” to provide a quick recap of the part of the story which is our focus today (and the words go by fast, so the lyrics are provided in your bulletin.)  “Poor, Poor Joseph” tells the story of the golden boy, Joseph (played by Donny Osmond!)  Joseph is the favorite of his father, Jacob, and therefore the object of resentment from his brothers.  Our scripture for today and the film clip is of Joseph being sold into slavery by his brothers.  [clip]

Maybe you can’t remember how the story of Joseph turns out.  Let me just say -spoiler alert! - that through all the adversity Joseph faces, he blossoms like some ancient Cinderella.  Sold into slavery by his jealous half-brothers, he winds up ruler of Egypt.  But we’ll get to all that soon enough.

As I said, the words to “Poor, Poor Joseph” went by fast and as good as the lyrics are, they’re no substitute for the Bible, so let’s go back and look at this story a bit closer.  We begin reading in Genesis chapter 37.  We’ll be looking at the entire chapter, though we won’t read every single verse.  I’ll summarize portions as we go along.

The chapter begins with telling the story of Jacob, Joseph’s father.  It is within the story of Jacob that the story of Joseph unfolds.  Joseph is a teenager, a shepherd helping his four older brothers out in the field.  We begin reading in v. 3:

Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his children,

Jacob is also known as Israel, so this is saying that of all his sons, Jacob had a favorite, Joseph.  Joseph is the baby of the family and Jacob loves him the most.  Back to verse 3:

Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his children, because he was the son of his old age; and he had made him a long robe with sleeves. 

Jacob’s favoritism was no secret.  He even made him a coat.  Our version describes it, not as a coat of many colors, but as a “long robe with sleeves.”  (Maybe it had many colors, too!)  This coat, we are told, had “long sleeves.”  That is meant to describe a tunic that extends to the wrists and the ankles, as opposed to a shorter one.  The point is that this was not what a working man wore.  It was a garment of privilege and status.  Verse 4:

⁴But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him, and could not speak peaceably to him.

I’ve known some families in which one child is favored above all the others and, in my experience, shall we say it doesn’t go well.  Jacob’s family is no different.  Jacob’s favoritism of Joseph is an obvious source of conflict in the family.  And honestly, Joseph doesn’t handle his role with much humility.  Back to verse 5:

Once Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him even more.  ⁶He said to them, “Listen to this dream that I dreamed. ⁷There we were, binding sheaves in the field. Suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright; then your sheaves gathered around it, and bowed down to my sheaf.  ”⁸His brothers said to him, “Are you indeed to reign over us? Are you indeed to have dominion over us?” So they hated him even more because of his dreams and his words.

At best, Joseph shows a lack of tact here.  “I had a dream that you will all bow down to me!”  Really, Joseph?  It’s also significant that this dream involves sheaves of wheat.  Later in the story, wheat comes back into play.  In verses 9-11, Joseph has another dream that he tells to his brothers.  Suffice to say that it’s more of the same.  Joseph seems to be afflicted with the sort of pride often apparent among the favored.  He is so focused on how great his dreams are for him, he doesn’t begin to consider how the dreams will sound to others.  We’ll pick up reading in v. 12:

Now his brothers went to pasture their father’s flock near Shechem.  ¹³And Israel said to Joseph, “Are not your brothers pasturing the flock at Shechem?  Come, I will send you to them.” He answered, “Here I am.”  ¹⁴So he said to him, “Go now, see if it is well with your brothers and with the flock; and bring word back to me.” So he sent him from the valley of Hebron.

Honestly, does Jacob violate every rule of good parenting?  Not only does he favor one son and make no secret about it, but then he sends the favored baby brother out to check up on his big brothers.  Really Jacob?  And it turns out, for all Joseph’s self-confidence and dreams of lording it over everyone else, Joe is not great with directions and he gets lost.  We’ll pick it up right before v. 15:

He came to Shechem, ¹⁵and a man found him wandering in the fields; the man asked him, “What are you seeking?”  ¹⁶“I am seeking my brothers,” he said; “tell me, please, where they are pasturing the flock.”  ¹⁷The man said, “They have gone away, for I heard them say, ‘Let us go to Dothan.’“ So Joseph went after his brothers, and found them at Dothan.¹⁸

So Joseph wanders lost until this stranger has mercy on him and helps him find his way.  And that’s the last good thing that will happen to Joseph for quite a while.  I’ll summarize the next few verses.  The brothers see Joseph coming from a distance and they say, “Here comes the dreamer!” (and it’s not a complement.  Maybe it wasn’t so wise for Joseph to share his dreams so freely.)  They decide to let him know what they think of his dreams by killing him. 

One of the brothers, Rueben, doesn’t like the way things are going, so he persuades them not to kill Joseph, but to throw him in a pit instead.  Then later, Reuben can return Joseph to his father.  While this sounds great, wouldn’t it have been better if Reuben had said, “This is wrong!  Let’s not do this!”  Instead he plays along enough that the plan continues to toss Joseph into the pit.  Let’s pick up the reading in v. 23:

So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe, the long robe with sleeves that he wore; ²⁴and they took him and threw him into a pit. The pit was empty; there was no water in it.  ²⁵Then they sat down to eat;

The heartless character of the brothers is so apparent here.  They’ve just taken a boy and thrown him in a pit to die and they could then sit down nearby and eat a meal.  They could sit down and enjoy food while their hearts were bent on murdering their brother.  Back to v. 25:

and looking up they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, with their camels carrying gum, balm, and resin, on their way to carry it down to Egypt.  ²⁶Then Judah said to his brothers, “What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood?  ²⁷Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and not lay our hands on him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.” And his brothers agreed.  ²⁸When some Midianite traders passed by, they drew Joseph up, lifting him out of the pit, and sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver.  And they took Joseph to Egypt.  

Should we think more highly of Joseph’s brothers because they decided to spare his life or less highly of them because they figured they could get rid of him and make a few bucks at the same time?  Historically, there was a lively slave trade between Canaan and Egypt and the brothers decide to cash in and sell Joseph into slavery.  Back to verse 29:

²⁹When Reuben returned to the pit and saw that Joseph was not in the pit, he tore his clothes.  ³⁰He returned to his brothers, and said, “The boy is gone; and I, where can I turn?”

Reuben tore his clothes as an expression of utter horror and mourning.  Things had not gone as Rueben planned.  His weak stand for doing the right thing accomplished nothing.  Joseph may as well be dead, because his father who loved him so would never see him again.  Continuing with verse 31:

³¹Then they took Joseph’s robe, slaughtered a goat, and dipped the robe in the blood.  ³²They had the long robe with sleeves taken to their father, and they said, “This we have found; see now whether it is your son’s robe or not.”  ³³He recognized it, and said, “It is my son’s robe! A wild animal has devoured him; Joseph is without doubt torn to pieces.” 

These brothers, the sons of Israel, are cruel men.  Their resentment is apparently not only directed at the favored son, Joseph, but also at the father who favored him.  This was a heartless way to bring the news to their father, as well as an unconscionable lie.  Verse 34: 

³⁴Then Jacob tore his garments, and put sackcloth on his loins, and mourned for his son many days.  ³⁵All his sons and all his daughters sought to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted, and said, “No, I shall go down to Sheol to my son, mourning.” Thus his father bewailed him. 

This is a powerful illustration of the principle that if we believe something to be so, then it might as well be.  Joseph was not dead, but as long as Jacob believed he was, then as far as Jacob is concerned, Joseph is dead.  And Jacob responds with understandable grief.  (Reader seated)

Though our lectionary passage ends here, it is difficult to stop here and sit with this part of the story.  There is real betrayal.  Real human jeopardy.  Real weeping.  And did you notice that not a single time in this entire narrative is God mentioned.  Amidst the injustice done to Joseph – God is silent.  And we don’t have to go back thousands of years to know what that feels like.   We might feel like Joseph in the pit, alone, betrayed by those who should have loved us.  Or perhaps we can uncomfortably admit to understanding some of the brother’s resentment toward a tattletale brat who thinks he’s better than the rest of the family.  Jacob’s family quarrel seems to live in every age.

Our story ends for today with Joseph sold into slavery, on his way to Egypt.  And in the context of that family’s struggles and Joseph’s suffering, the question of “why?” arises, not just for Joseph, but for us, for our struggles and our suffering, too.  Today’s ending, which leaves us on that frightening journey to Egypt, alone and with no hope in sight, leaves us too with the questions of meaning and of God’s presence, of God’s intention amid betrayal and despair, not just for Joseph, but for us all. 

And so we wait until next week for the story to continue.  Perhaps all appears to be lost, but for

Joseph and for us, there is so much more to the story.

Amen.

"Making Miracles" July 31, 2011

Making Miracles

Rev. Lee Ann Bryce

Community Christian Church

July 31, 2011

                                                                                    Text:  Matthew 14:13-21

^13"Now when Jesus heard this,"

As this passage begins, Jesus has just heard some devastating news.  Someone very close to Jesus has been violently killed – John the Baptist, the prophet, the man who had baptized Jesus, the man who had devoted his entire life to preparing the way for Jesus.  This passage does not provide the details of John’s death, but elsewhere we learn that John had been beheaded at the whim of a dancing girl, a senseless and sad murder.

"Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself.  But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns."

It is not only Jesus who is devastated.  John’s death is a vivid reminder to Jesus and everyone else that God’s prophets were not immune to death, and if anything, they were more likely to die violently than quietly, sooner rather than later.  You can imagine the sorrow and fear they felt.  And just as we sometimes do when we are frightened or sad, Jesus withdraws and the crowd who loves Jesus, follows.

¹⁴"When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them and cured their sick." 

Jesus may have needed some alone time, but the crowd had needs of their own.  Many were sick and they reached out to Jesus in hope. And Jesus put his own needs aside and responded to them.  His heart went out to them and he spent the afternoon walking among them, laying his hands on them and saying the things they needed to hear.

¹⁵"When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.”

The disciples mean no harm.  They’re not insensitive jerks.  They are simply being practical.  Night was falling, they were out in the middle of nowhere and their stomachs were beginning to growl.  It was time to call it a day; time to build a campfire and eat the little bit of food they had brought with them.  It was time to take care of themselves for a change and suggest that everyone else do the same.

¹⁶"Jesus said to them, 'They need not go away;'"

Jesus has a better idea.  “Don’t send them away.”  Maybe he knows that what the crowd needs more than a hot meal is simply to stay together; the nourishment they will receive from each other’s company being more important than the meager meal they might be able to find elsewhere.  Sometimes after very bad news, it doesn’t matter what you eat as long as you eat it with someone.

¹⁶"Jesus said to them, 'They need not go away; you give them something to eat.'  ¹⁷They replied, 'We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.'” 

Can’t you just picture the looks on their faces when they heard Jesus say, “You give them something to eat.”  Us?  You are in charge here, you’re the boss.  All the food we have is hardly enough for a snack for twelve hungry men, never mind five thousand people out there.  No disrespect intended, but you’re nuts. 

¹⁸"And he said, 'Bring the loaves and fish here to me.'  ¹⁹Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds.  ²⁰And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full.  ²¹And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children."

(Reader seated.)

Before we get started, let me just say that that last part about the women and children not even being counted in the total number irritates me, but that’s a sermon for another day!

Each one of the gospel writers – Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John – records the life of Jesus differently.  Decades after Jesus’ death, each one picked and chose from all the stories that circulated about Jesus and decided which to include, and what to emphasize when they told the story.  Only Matthew and Luke write anything at all about Jesus’ birth.  Mark and John don’t mention it. 

But one story that all four gospel writers included in their Gospels is this story about the miraculous feeding of the five thousand.  (This is one of only three stories that can be found in all four gospels.)  For whatever reason, this story was too important to the early church to leave out.  We can speculate about what made it so important to the early church.  It certainly carries echoes of Old Testament stories that the Jews who followed Jesus held dear, such as God providing manna in the desert to the wandering Israelites.  Bread was an important symbol to them, a reminder of God’s constant provision.  And in the early church, after Jesus had been killed and was no longer tangibly present to them, you can understand why they held onto this story about Jesus’ ability to miraculously provide for their needs.

So this morning’s miracle story is one in a series of bread miracles in the Bible, and an impressive one if we take it at face value.  Feeding five thousand men (plus women and children – let’s hope they gave them something to eat too!) with five loaves and two fish is pretty amazing.  And some believe that’s exactly what happened – that when someone tore off a bit of bread, the loaf magically grew to compensate or that suddenly new loaves appeared; that Jesus pulled the two little fish out of the bag and tossed it to the ground and when he looked back down suddenly there was a whole pile of fish where the empty bag used to be. 

Others understand this story not literally, but metaphorically.  In other words, Jesus didn’t do a supernatural magic trick like pulling a rabbit out of a hat.  Rather, that this was a beloved story that early followers of Jesus told to one another to reinforce their belief that Jesus would always provide. 

Maybe you are someone who believes that Jesus performed supernatural miracles, acts that do not conform to the laws of science as we understand them.  Or maybe Jesus’ miracles have scientific explanations that the gospel writers just didn’t understand.  Or maybe you’re someone who is completely skeptical about such things.  Sure, you’d like to believe, but all these stories of Jesus’ miracles sound like a bunch of hooey to you. 

No matter where you fall on that continuum of understanding, I believe profound truth is found in this story.  And that truth is not dependent on its literal interpretation.  It is our loss if we discount the power of this story just because we don’t believe in miracles. 

Consider this possibility:  When Jesus told the disciples to feed the masses five loaves and two fish, could he have had a sense of the situation that went beyond the disciples’ common sense?  They were, after all, operating out of a sense of scarcity.  They looked at the crowd, saw no picnic baskets or backpacks, and assumed that no one had anything to eat.  They looked at their own meager resources and assumed that it was not enough to go around their own circle, much less to feed the whole crowd. 

But Jesus operated on a different set of assumptions.  If the disciples operated out of a sense of scarcity, Jesus embodied a sense of plenty.  He looked at the same things the disciples looked at, but where they saw not enough, he saw plenty:  plenty of time, plenty of food, and plenty of possibilities with the resources at hand.  Not that he knew how it was all going to work out exactly, but what Jesus knew beyond a shadow of a doubt was that wherever there was plenty of God, there would be plenty of everything needed.

And though it seemed like Jesus was promising so much with so little, the bewildered disciples handed over all they had, touched by Jesus’ simple confidence that it would be enough.  And after they’d laid out the loaves and fish, they remembered the bits of food they carried in their pockets.  You know they had something, had tucked away a bit of food before they left on their journey to a lonely place, apart.  They knew they would need to eat at some point, and so isn’t it likely that they brought a few raisins, a chunk of bread left over from breakfast, that little piece of goat jerky.  Wouldn’t you have done that?  It wouldn’t have been enough for everyone, so you’d keep it hidden in your pocket. 

Perhaps the disciples did just that.  And as the basket of bread came by, wanting, as they did for the people to be fed, instead of taking something out, they laid their food in the basket.  And seeing the disciples emptying their pockets, the crowd followed suit and offered what they had, so that the meal grew and grew. 

But that’s not a miracle!  Is that what you’re thinking?  That’s just people being generous, sharing what they have, even when it’s not much, even when it’s not enough to go around.  That’s not a miracle.  That’s just a whole crowd of people moving from a sense of scarcity to a sense of plenty – overcoming their fear of going hungry, giving up their need to protect themselves.  That’s not a miracle.  That’s just people refusing to play the age old game of what-is-mine-is –mine and what’s-your-is-yours, people turning their pockets inside out for one another without worrying about what’s in it for them.  That’s not a miracle!  Or is it?

As Barbara Brown Taylor says, the problem with miracles is that we tend to get mesmerized by God’s part of things and forget about our own.  Miracles let us off the hook.  They become Bible stories that we’ve heard but we don’t really believe anymore.  They appeal to the part of us that is all too happy to let God feed the crowd, save the world, do it all.  We can’t do it, after all.  We don’t have what it takes, the small things we can offer are not enough to make any difference at all.  So we sit back and wait for a miracle, looking after our own needs and looking at God to help those who cannot help themselves.  All those needy people?  Send them away so they can take care of themselves!

“They need not go away,” Jesus says.  “You give them something to eat.”  Not me, but you.  Not my bread but yours.  Not sometime or somewhere else, but right here, right now.  Stop looking for someone else to solve your problem and solve it yourself.  Stop waiting for a miracle and participate in one instead.

And that challenge continues through the ages from Jesus to us.  However much you have, just bring it and trust that it is enough to begin with, enough to start a trend.  Be the first in the crowd to turn your pockets inside out.  Be the first to start a miracle.

Amen.  So-be-it.

Barbara Brown Taylor’s sermon “The Problem with Miracles” was used as a resource for this sermon. 

"The Crazy Farmer" July 10, 2011

The Parable of the Sower

Rev. Lee Ann Bryce

Community Christian Church

July 10, 2011

                                                                                                                                                Matthew 13:1-9

We remember Jesus as a great teacher, but how did he communicate his message?  Think about it, he rarely preached sermons.  He didn’t teach Bible studies.  No structured classes for his listeners.  Much of the time, he told stories, he told parables.  His parables were little fictional stories whose characters were in situations that were familiar to his listeners.  He told parables about farmers, or people who were concerned with money, or family member interacting with one another. 

Something else characterized his parables – they always had a surprising twist to them.  They might start out predictable enough, but at some point they’d veer off into some strange, often shocking direction.  This was a technique he used.  It made his stories memorable because they were surprising to his audience. 

Often we read the parables and they become familiar to us so we don’t really listen to them anymore.  They become these nice little stories and we end up completely missing the edge.  Also, because we are in such a different context than his original listeners, we may not really get what the story says.  We’ve never seen a mustard seed or tended sheep or been so concerned with a lost coin that we’d turn the house upside down looking for it.

The parable of the sower would have been a surprising story to those who heard it from his mouth.  Jesus told this story (along with several other short little parables in the 13^th chapter of Matthew) in order to put forth a picture of the kingdom of God.  That’s what Jesus taught about – the kingdom of God.  He was concerned with a different reality than they knew and almost everything he did was in order to put forth an idea of the kind of world that God wanted, God’s kingdom, on earth as it is in heaven. 

What was shocking about the parable of the sower?  I don’t believe many of us are farmers, however, I know we have a fair amount of gardeners among us, people who understand the principles of seed and ideal conditions and working toward an orderly and abundant harvest.  Let’s say you have some vegetables in your garden, even a few tomatoes or peppers, maybe some herbs.  When you went to put your garden in, did you go about it in the same way as the sower in Jesus’ parable did?  Did you just go outside with a handful of seed and start throwing it everywhere?  On the sidewalk, over in the weed patch, maybe a little bit in the street just for good measure? 

I doubt it.  If you started from seed at all, it was probably carefully sewn in tiny pots with perfect soil, started inside, maybe under artificial light, so that the little seedlings would be protected from the cold until they were hearty enough to thrive outside.  It’s probably more likely you started with small plants, and before you put them in the ground, you carefully considered where would be the perfect spot, where they’d get the right amount of sun and water, where the dog wouldn’t stomp all over them.  These are the things that sensible, responsible gardeners (and farmers) do.  Seed is precious and you don’t want to waste it where it won’t do well, right? 

We’re different from Jesus’ listeners.  We do gardening for a hobby.  We enjoy beautiful flowers or it appeals to us to add some cherry tomatoes or strawberries fresh from our garden into our meals.  Our lives don’t depend upon a good crop.  Remember Jesus’ followers were peasants, many of them farmers whose very lives depended on a good harvest.  What would their response have been to this story?  This story in which the crazy, irresponsible farmer just threw the seed everywhere?  Seed was like gold!  It was treated with utmost care, never squandered. 

In Jesus’ story, the seed falls everywhere.  Sometimes it gets snatched away.  Sometimes it dies in shallow soil or gets choked out by thorns.  Sometimes it grows, and when it does, the harvest is more plentiful than anyone could imagine. 

Listen to what Jesus does not say.  Never once does he mention soil analysis.  His farmer is not concerned with viability.  There is not the faintest hint that the sower considers the nature of the soil as he flings the seed, letting it fly scattershot in every direction. 

Beneath this story of the crazy farmer is an assumption of abundance that must have been so foreign to Jesus’ listeners, just as it is foreign to us.  In the Parable of the Sower, there is seed enough to lose.  Grace is flung and wasted everywhere.  Is this story an invitation to carelessness?  Or might Jesus be saying something about the kingdom of God is about a radical trust in the abundance that God provides?  That the joyful farmer is free to sow and share, trusting that the harvest is assured?

Our job may be simply to scatter the seeds we have in our hands, those seeds entrusted to us as our gifts, letting go of our desire to control the outcome, without carefully judging whether the result will be favorable or not. 

For me, a minister, it means bringing my best to my work, day after day, despite the times it’s difficult for me to see if my work really makes any difference.  For teachers, it means caring about investing in those students who don’t seem like they care or are getting it.  For parents, it’s about the realization that your words and actions make a difference to your kids even if it appears they’re not paying attention. 

The kingdom of God is a place where all of us keep doing our little piece of what we do in the world to continue the work of Christ.  We keep flinging that seed even if it seems that the harvest won’t ever get here.  The harvest, the result of our effort isn’t up to us at all.  Jesus has put before us the kingdom of God.   A kingdom of abundance and radical trust.  God has invited each of us to be partners in bringing about this kingdom. 

What seeds do you hold in your hand?  How is God calling you to sow them? 

(Responsive Psalm 65)

Soil Analysis

I am not a knowledgeable gardener, like many here.  But there’s one thing I have learned – things go better when I have invested time in preparing the soil, turning it over, adding some material to loosen and nourish it. 

As we prepare our hearts to gather around the table of Christ, to offer ourselves and to share in the bread and cup, the sustenance that Christ offers us, take a moment to reflect on yourself.  How open are you to the presence of God?  As the seeds of God’s unconditional love and acceptance and hope and peace are cast toward you, how will you receive them? 

We hunger today for truth, for authenticity, for the deeper meaning of life.  We move toward these things as we tend to your connection with God.  Just as the gardener prepares the soil, so we do well to take time to examine ourselves, to prepare our hearts to receive all that God offers to us.  No matter the circumstances of our lives, we may trust that seeds of wellbeing and love and peace are always headed our way. 

"Reflections on Freedom" July 3, 2011

Reflections on Freedom

Rev. Lee Ann Bryce

Community Christian Church

July 3, 2011

For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.  ¹³For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another.  ¹⁴For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”  - Galatians 5:1, 13-14

(Show clip from The Shawshank Redemption) 

What is freedom?  Is it bestowed on your from an outside force?  Is freedom something you claim for yourself?  Is the feeling for freedom (as they said in the film clip) “something so beautiful that it can’t be expressed in words, and it makes your heart ache because of it? 

On Independence Day we celebrate our country, the freedom we enjoy and we honor the heritage that has provided this freedom to us.  Certainly we consider the recent vote for marriage equality in our state to be an extension of freedom.  Though Lisa and I would not have traded our Connecticut marriage for anything in the world, no longer will same sex couples be required to travel out-of-state for the freedom to marry.  And since our congregation was active in the campaign for marriage equality, we celebrate that freedom today.

Freedom is an American value, though Americans don’t hold a corner on the freedom market.  Central to the faith of Jews and Christians is the enslavement of the ancient Hebrew people and how God raised up a man named Moses to lead the Israelites from slavery to freedom.  “Let my people go!” Moses told Pharaoh, and eventually they were given liberty.

Jesus talked about freedom too. In John Jesus’ words are recorded, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” Jesus modeled for us a life lived freely and completely before God.

Even in our free country, there have been times when we have fallen short of the ideal of freedom we proclaim.  Africans were brought against their will to our so-called “free country” and sold into slavery.  And ironically, astoundingly, what kept many of those slaves going was their Christian faith in a liberating God, a God who would break down the barriers set up by their white (often Christian) owners.

Paul writes in Galatians, “For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery” (Gal 5:1).

Freedom is a tricky concept in the Christian tradition.  Martin Luther wrote:  “A Christian is a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none. [and at the same time] A Christian is a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all.”  Both perfectly free, subject to none and perfectly dutiful, servant of all?  Yes.

Let’s look closer at this passage from Galatians.  Some context – the church in Galatia is troubled. Factions are fighting over this and that, but the main question seems to be this: do the Gentiles, the non-Jews, who have come to believe in Jesus Christ, do these Gentiles have to become Jews to follow God…or can they just be Jesus-believing Gentiles?  If they had to become Jews, then they would have to be circumcised and follow all the Jewish laws and practices. 

Paul is pretty clear about his position: Gentiles do not need to submit themselves to more rules and regulations, he says. By Christ you are made free. Don’t be a slave to the law.  By Christ you are called to freedom!  (Was this a purely theological position for Paul?  Or did Paul, the guru of church growth, realize pretty quickly that requiring circumcision for adult male converts would not exactly be an enticement to join the church?)

Paul goes on to describe the nature of this freedom in Christ that he proclaims.  Sometimes when we think of freedom we think of no limits whatsoever, a blank slate where anything goes.  “I am free to do anything I want to do.”  I read this week about man whose parents followed the advice of an psychologist who advocated that the best way to raise children was to give them complete freedom. You were to never tell your child “no.”  You could explain why a decision might not be a smart one — “Timmy, I don’t think you would like touching that stove right now because it is very hot and the nerves in your skin would cause a painful feeling if you touched the hot stove” — but this parenting philosophy said you could never say “no” to your child. Your children were to have complete freedom in their decisions.

The man who was reflecting what it had been like to be raised in this way, seemed amazingly well-adjusted given his parents’ philosophy. He said his parents were almost completely consistent and supportive of the philosophy until the day his brother made some cardboard wings and climbed up on the roof ready to fly.  His mother couldn’t say he wasn’t allowed to try to fly by jumping off roof.  He had the freedom to attempt it.  But, after a very short flight, and on the way to the hospital, his mother started really doubting this completely free approach to parenting.

The freedom Paul proclaims is not a no-holds-barred, open-ended freedom, but one grounded in love. “Don’t use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence,” Paul writes, “but through love become slaves to one another.  For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”

The freedom of which Paul speaks isn’t really about personal freedom.  Freedom in Christ is always about how we live in community, how we love one another, how we act peacefully with self-control towards each other. Reinhold Niebuhr put it this way, “Basically love means…being responsible, responsible to our family, toward our civilization, and now by the pressures of history, toward the universe of humankind.”

We’re beginning to see what Martin Luther meant when he said we are both perfectly free, subject to none and perfectly dutiful, servant of all.   Christian freedom doesn’t let us off the hook.  It is freedom for love, service, the glory of God.

The same general concept is true, I think, of our freedom as American citizens. Some of our greatest rights and privileges in this powerful nation is our freedom to act, to organize, to keep making our country a better place to live and work — not just for us as individuals, but for the whole community.  We squander that freedom when we rest on our laurels because our lives are easy enough, or our freedoms are safe enough.

We always ought to be working, as Christians and as Americans, for a country that is concerned for the least of these, caring for each and every one of our neighbors; fruitful not only for the rich and powerful, but for the poor and lowly.

We’ve heard preachers who talk about America as a “chosen people,” but isn’t it a higher ideal to think of ourselves as a servant people, bringing good news to the oppressed, modeling justice, proclaiming liberty to the captives?

A servant people — both free, and slave to all.  A servant people — both grateful for what has been given to us, and deeply aware that our nation is nowhere close to perfection. A servant people — free to serve, free to live for one another, free to love God and neighbor with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength.  Free to be Christ’s servant, now and forever. Amen.

¹⁵

"The Power of Breath" June 19, 2011

The Power of Breath

Rev. Lee Ann Bryce

Community Christian Church

June 19, 2011

Last week was Pentecost Sunday and you’ll remember hearing the text from Acts where the Spirit comes to the crowd gathered in Jerusalem, evidenced by the wind and tongues of fire and many different languages.  That’s the story most people remember about the arrival of the Spirit.

But the gospel of John, our text for today, tells quite a different story about the coming of the spirit.  In Acts, the Spirit comes fifty days after Easter, some 7 weeks after Jesus had been crucified, when everyone is gathered in Jerusalem for the festival of Pentecost.  The way John tells the story, Jesus’ followers didn’t have to wait 50 days.  In fact, the Spirit came to them on the very night of that first resurrection morning, the morning when Mary Magdalene had gone to the tomb and seen the stone rolled away.  Hear these words from John, chapter 20, verses 19-23. 

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week,

meaning that very first Easter day.

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews,

The author is good at building suspense.  He notes that the huddled group is afraid and so they’ve locked all the doors in the house so that no one can get in.  Or so they think….

Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” 

And so despite the closed and locked doors, Jesus appears before them.  Like all the descriptions of Jesus’ resurrection sightings, his appearance is not really bodily.  We’re not talking about the resuscitated corpse of Jesus that appears before them.  Rather he’s described as being some form that can materialize in their midst despite the locked doors.  And his form is such that they do not initially even recognize that it is Jesus.

Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.”  After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. 

Isn’t it powerful that Jesus identifies himself initially, not by saying, “Hey, it’s me!” but by showing his wounds, his body which has been broken.  And it is only then that they come to recognize him.

Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.  Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you.  As God has sent me so I send you.”  When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.  ²³

Isn’t that interesting?  Jesus delivered the Holy Spirit to them by breathing on the.  The verb that is used here “to breathe” occurs only this one time in the New Testament and it clearly is intended to reference at least two stories from the Jewish tradition.  First, it references the creation story when God formed the first mortal and “breathed the breath of life” into the mortal’s nostrils, as the creation myth goes.  And second story referenced by this verb comes from Ezekiel 37, one of my favorite stories in the Hebrew scriptures where God leads Ezekiel into the desolate valley filled with dry bones.  And God says, do you think these bones can live?  And Ezekiel says, only God knows!  And at God’s urging, Ezekiel prophesies the “Word of the Lord” and the bones start rattling, then they come together with flesh and muscle, but still no breath until Ezekiel prophesies, come from the four winds, breathe on these slain bones that they may live again.  And we all know what happened because the song tells us, ‘dem bones, ‘dem bones, gonna walk around.   

And so the use of this particular verb in our text today to describe Jesus’ breathing the Holy Spirit on his disciples, would have called these other stories to the minds of the original hearers of John’s gospel.  They would have understood that Jesus’ very breath is something very, very special and that when he breathed on them, the result was a brand new creation.  The Holy Spirit is the breath that sustains that new life. 

When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.  ²³If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

And this passage concludes with Jesus telling the community that their work from now on is the forgiveness of sins.  Forgiveness is understood as the Spirit-empowered mission of continuing Jesus’ work in the world.  In short, the community, then and now, is to continue what God sent Jesus to do.

There’s much that we could explore in this text, this memorable story of Jesus’ appearance and his gift of the spirit to his followers.  Today we’re going to focus on v. 22, “When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’”  Sure, last week’s story of the spirit coming accompanied by the excitement of wind and flames is impressive and perhaps there are times in our lives when we experience God in dramatic fashion. 

But if you’re like me, we more often know God without such fanfare.  How powerful it is to experience God as close as our very breath.  You can go for a month without food without any major health problems.  You can last for a few days without water before severe dehydration sets in.  But you can only last about 10 minutes without breathing before creeping very close to death’s door. 

The bodily benefits of deep breathing are well documented.  Deep breathing reduces fatigue, improves circulation, eases the strain on the heart, aids in digestion, reduces congestion, even gives your skin a healthy glow.  The medical benefits are quite remarkable.  The power of breath is known through many world religions.  Whether you call it an awareness of the spirit or deep breathing depends on your tradition.

Practitioners of yoga and Buddhist meditation will tell you that simply taking a deep breath is cleansing and restorative.  I know many of us have experience with this spiritual practice of meditation and deep breathing.  Deep breathing is a part of almost any spiritual reflection group we have at church, from the pre-Lenten mindful meditation morning to the sacred space gathering last week.

In this text Jesus demonstrates that mindful breathing is a powerful thing.  We know God through our breath.  When we encounter anxiety or stress or conflict, those things that keep us from feeling peace, deep breathing can return us to a place of calm.  Think of a stressful situation you encountered recently and how you handled it.  How would things have been different if you had stopped to relax your body and take a few deep breaths? 

Lisa and I live on Park Ave.  We love our neighborhood, but some of the neighbors are partiers and in the summer when the weather is nice, it is often noisy.  And if you’re trying to sleep, it’s a problem.  Lest you think I always handle stress beautifully with mindful breathing, think again.  I recently found myself standing on the sidewalk outside a neighbor’s house, screaming through the open window at him to turn his music down.  (Turns out, he wasn’t even home.  That explains why he didn’t answer my banging on his front door.)  After I gave up on getting anywhere, I went back home.  His radio blared on for awhile and then at some point it went off. 

But you know what?  While I was standing on that sidewalk, my whole body was tense, my heart was racing, and I was ready to throttle that guy.  I know for a fact that deep breathing would have helped to keep me calm and would have helped me handle myself better.  Deep breathing helps us live more peacefully in the world.  And isn’t that exactly what Jesus said, “Peace be with you.”  And then he breathed the spirit into them.

We’re going to take a little time to practice breathing in the spirit, breathing in the very breath that Christ blows into each of us.  We’ll begin by getting in a comfortable position, both feet on the floor.  Close your eyes if you’re comfortable and begin to notice the pace of your breath.  Relax your head, shoulders, arms, hips, legs, feet, and simply breathe. 

Imagine that with every breath, Jesus is saying, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”  This is the spirit that has sustained you for your entire life journey, through the difficulties and the triumphs, the success and failures, the heartbreaks and the joys of your life.  And Jesus is available to you always, nearer than you could ever know.  You are never alone for the breath of the spirit sustains you.  (Silence).

As we continue with deep breathing, please join in singing this simple song from the Buddhist tradition:

Breathing in, breathing out

Breathing in, breathing out

I am blooming as a flower

I am fresh as the dew

I am solid as a mountain

I am firm as the earth

I am free.

Breathing in, breathing out

Breathing in, breathing out

I am water, reflecting

What is real, what is true

And I feel there is space

Deep inside of me

I am free, I am free, I am free

"Reversing Babel" June 12, 2011

Reversing Babel

Rev. Lee Ann Bryce

Community Christian Church

June 12, 2011

                                                                                                                                Acts 2:1-21

Seven weeks after Easter each year, Christians celebrate Pentecost.  Though Easter and Christmas tend to have a lot more visibility, for me, Pentecost is the coolest Sunday of the year.  Most folks associate Pentecost with the coming of the Holy Spirit and that’s certainly accurate – for Christians.  What many might not realize is that before it marked the coming of the spirit, Pentecost was (and still is) a Jewish festival.  After all, Acts 2:1 says, “When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place,” meaning that Jews had gathered in Jerusalem, making their pilgrimage for the festival  of Pentecost, more commonly known as the “Feast of Weeks.”  The past few months we’ve been examining how the Jewish identity of the early followers of Jesus impacted the developing tradition of what would become Christianity.  Pentecost takes place very early in the Christian story and we essentially have a group of Jews, mourning the death of Jesus, telling one another the stories of Jesus’ mysterious post-Easter appearances, and gathering in Jerusalem for the Jewish festival of Pentecost.

And then, the Christian story of Pentecost takes place.   And it is quite a story, with fire and wind and lots of unexplained babbling in different languages.  As the story goes, the Spirit came upon the community with the sound of a “rushing wind” and with “tongues of fire” resting on each of them.  These are Jews, so they are going to understand the story in terms of symbols they hold dear.  In the Hebrew scriptures, “wind” and “fire” are both associated with the presence of God.  In the creation story in Genesis, the divine wind moved over the face of the waters.  And famously, Moses speaks with God through the bush that burned and was not consumed.   And so now, Acts is telling us, through the lens of Jewish story, that God is again at work, evidenced by wind and fire. 

And then in v. 4, “All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.”  And lo and behold, the Jews who had gathered from all over the world, speaking many different languages, could understand the babble because the followers of Jesus spoke in all different languages.  Miraculously, they could understand in their own tongue exactly what was being said.  They marveled, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans?  And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language?”  Rather than unintelligible babble, they heard clearly intelligible testimony.

And here the author of Acts is alluding to another story from the Jewish tradition, the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11.  If you’re a little foggy on the Tower of Babel, let me refresh your memory.  According to this story, the people of the earth once spoke one common language.  But as a result of a prideful attempt to build a tower so tall that its top would go all the way to the heavens, the Israelite people were scattered into many different linguistic groups.  Indeed the English word “babble,” come from the name “Babel.”  The Tower of Babel is the ancient story, the myth, of how people became splintered into different groups.  And as the fragmentation of humanity occurred, hostility between the groups arose.  A way of being commenced in which people no longer understood each other or got along very well.

And so Acts, with its story of Pentecost is really about reversing Babel.  At the tower of Babel, people were separated, divided.  The Holy Spirit signifies people coming back together.  For the author of Acts (who is also the author of Luke so he’s commonly referred to as Luke); for Luke, this is the significance of Jesus and the continuation of Jesus’ presence found in the power of the Spirit.  This passage from Acts announces the inauguration of a new age in which the fragmentation of humanity was overcome. 

In his epistle to the church in Ephesus, the apostle Paul put it like this, “For Christ is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us.  He has abolished the law, with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace…”

And so on Pentecost Sunday we consider what it means to us to reverse Babel; to move from separation to wholeness; from division to unity.  Many, many years have passed since this story of Pentecost was first told.  Though Christ came, though the Spirit was sent with the promise of unity and wholeness, we continue to fall short.  Still, there are these moments, these glimpses of the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven.  These glimpses keep us going. 

I hope you’ve seen evidence of the peace of Christ in your life and in the world.  Though sometimes we get discouraged and disheartened in the face of war and conflict, here’s a reminder of what universal community might look like.   Think of this video clip as just one more little way we’re still reversing Babel.

(“Stand By Me” from Playing for Change:  Songs Around the World)