My Dad Definitely Doesn't Hate You - Part III
Dad's sermon from last Sunday. It's worth taking the time to read and I'm not saying that just because I'm the proud son. Oh, it helps to read this post first.
Sermon, November 9, 2008
Pentecost 26
Grace Episcopal Church, Bakersfield
Rev’d Vern Hill
I am a fairly slow reader and throughout almost all of school (even grad school), I only read what was required (motivation through fear of pain and suffering). I suppose I could blame this on TV.
The good news is that I finally discovered books when I found books which spoke a truth I connected with. There was John Jerome’s little book “Truck” about rebuilding a worn-out pickup truck and exploring technology (I still think its better than the more well known “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance”). Other writers included Theodore Roszak, Robert Raines, Huub Oosterhuis, Malcolm Boyd, Harvey Cox (especially “On Not Leaving It to the Snake”), Wallace Stegner, Annie Dillard (the pilgrim life), John Steinbeck, Loren Eiseley, Edward Abbey (“welcome to Utah, set your watch back 50 years”) and Kathleen Norris, to mention a few.
However in my discovery of books I never connected with science fiction, so it was with considerable skepticism several years ago that I accepted the loan of a book which, according to the loaner, “I just had to read”. As the loanee, I was not so sure. Level 7 was written in the 1950s in the midst of the threat of thermonuclear war between the Soviet Union and the United States. In an arms race perfect security was offered by a balance of offensive and defensive weapons. Create peace by making the outcome of war so horrible it would be unthinkable - a cold war rather than a hot one - no winners and no losers.
Level 7 violated this balance by giving one side the advantage - belief that a remnant people could survive that kind of holocaust. Level 7 visioned a massive underground silo of 7 levels, the 7th and most secure was 4400 feet below the surface and was made to be self-sufficient for at least 500 years. The 7th level could be completely sealed off from the other levels and surface - resulting in perfected immortality.
The holocaust begins - And the “elect”, the critical few who will continue the human race after all others have perished are allowed the protection of Level 7. In 2 ½ hours the face of the earth is obliterated, the wind carrying massive doses of radiation everywhere.
After some weeks pass for the guests at Level 7, it becomes alarmingly obvious that life is ceasing in the levels above - imperfections in the perfect defense. A reactor leak is contaminating their safe nest. Even Level 7 is not immune. Here people begin to show signs of radiation poisoning. In the end the last two persons, in their sickness, resolve to return to the earth’s surface to spend their final moments in the open air and sunlight.
I most remember this story for the serenity of the ending scene - the book calmly - as calmly as one blows out a candle - simply describes the disappearance of humanity from the face of the earth, a breeze blowing, the sun shinning. Silent earth.
The simple message was stunning - We humans are not essential. If we choose badly enough it is possible for us to cease to exist.
This sobering message reminds me of the truth which is embedded in God’s covenant in creation and with the Hebrews. Earthlings were told to cultivate and care for the earth. Later to the Hebrews, God said, “You shall be my people and I will be your God. I shall bring you to a fertile land, a land that has rivers and springs, a land that produces wheat and barley and grapes and you will not go hungry.” However - “make certain you do not forsake the Lord your God - if you do, this day I warn you, you shall be destroyed.”
Accountability is built into the act creation. We are accountable for how we use what is given to us (better - loaned to us) and we are expected to use our wisdom (we were not made stupid, weak or helpless). Pay particular attention to those final words - “I warn you, you shall be destroyed.”
In a common held and mistaken Biblical view, “you shall be destroyed” means God shall destroy us in much the same way it is misunderstood that God sends sickness and misery as the curse of individual disobedience. That is a mistake of divine proportions. “You shall be destroyed” needs to be understood in the context of “consequences” which Matthew has been leading us through these past many weeks. At a certain point there is a finality. It is possible to create empty - the void of pre-creation.
In today’s Gospel this covenant takes the form of the wise and foolish virgins and a wedding. A Jewish wedding was the end of a lengthy process beginning with an engagement arranged by the fathers and followed by an official ceremony of Betrothal where the couple would come together before friends and family to make binding vows. The betrothal period - up to one year - gave the man and opportunity to prepare a home for his wife to be. At the end of the betrothal period, the bridegroom would take his bride to live with him. The wedding celebration started when the bridegroom came to the bride's house. The bride and all the bridesmaids would be there waiting for him. Then they would all go through the village at night with torches in a celebration of singing and dancing. This is where today’s parable begins.
Matthew is struggling with a critical problem for early Christians - the Return of Christ to bring in the Kingdom, a cornerstone of the faith for Matthew’s readers. As you listened to the second reading from Paul, you heard him express his expectation that he would be among those still alive when Christ came again. Matthew, writing after Paul, encourages his readers to remain faithful and prepared in their waiting for the Return of Christ as the five wise virgins - in Greek phronimos [thoughtful, sensible, prudent] - so that when Christ comes they will be welcomed inside the Kingdom. Those who fall away, represented by the five foolish - in Greek moros [moron, stupid] - will find the door closed. Time has run out for the unprepared when the bridegroom after some delay comes at the least expected time of midnight.
What we have here is the recasting of their expectations of Jesus’ Return. It isn’t just a matter of waiting. We have the wrong time! There are two kinds of time in Greek - there is chronos, wristwatch time. These are the life counting minutes that the parable seems to be talking about. But there is another time - kairos, decisive time. If you are a trapeze artist and you have just completed a triple spin in mid-air, you are not concerned whether it is 8:12 or 8:15pm. You just know that it is time to be caught! Decisive Time!
Decisive time is about consequences and accountability. It is about the choice between thoughtfulness and stupidity - not in intelligence - but in commitment, intention, action, life choices.
For the metaphorical virgins who are prepared, who maintain the oil of blessing, of justice and peace, who spread generosity and kindness, who are faithful, they are members of the Community of God, the Kingdom; they are the blessed. These are the ones who are transparent to the gifts God has given each of us through his grace. These are the Saints of God. Johann Sebastian Bach celebrates their faithfulness - their preparedness - in Cantata 140 written for our Gospel reading. If you are a baritone or bass you may have noticed that wonderful recurring base passage in our Gospel hymn, the chorale from the Cantata - the marching notes under verse 1 -
Midnight’s peace, their cry has broken
Their urgent summons clearly spoken.
- Bach’s signature statement of faithfulness.
For the metaphorical moron virgins, unprepared, without the oil of blessing, absent of justice and peace, unfaithful in the life God created them to live, comes the closed door, shut outside of God’s presence not by God but by their lack of caring, their blindness to their true vocation.
Decisive Time! There is accountability, the effects of reality. How we choose and what we choose matters. And in the end everything could end as quietly as one blows out a candle.
The People of Christ as a part of God’s holy people on earth have an awesome task that has been set before us from the beginning of our time. Each generation should be haunted by the question - Is this, what we are doing now, the epitome of life as it should be? Obama’s question Tuesday night about 100 years from now is not simply curiosity. What we do now will shape those lives 100 years from now. Do we have that gumption, the courage, the humility to vision and generate a better world together?
We are not powerless. The empowerment that God has given us through the life of Christ over evil and darkness is staggering. Yes, we are sinners. Stupidity is alive and well in us - the moron gene is always at work, but so is the mighty grace of God. By that grace each of us can boldly carry the Gospel into our piece of the world - our families, our friends, our faith community, our neighbors and beyond.
Jesus says to us “You shall be my witnesses to the ends of the earth.” This has nothing to do with praying, praising, talking or proselytizing. It has to do with living the goodly gestures of the Gospel, not as raving evangelists signing up people for Jesus as if he cares, not in fear mongers excluding people from the Table of his love, but as People of the Garden of Creation who embrace and welcome the power to transform and change that comes in the vocation of gentleness, kindness, purposefulness, and directed love.
Annie Dillard in her book Pilgrim at Tinker Creek reminded me of this vocational call - she writes that one of our purposes in life is to “assist God” in the work of redemption by hallowing creation (its biology, its geology and its humanity). The devout person frees the divine sparks that have become trapped and nearly lost.
Quakers rightly believe “that which is of God” exists in every person. True this divine spark can nearly be lost at our very worst times. But how much harder would it be for the war mongers, the seekers of vengeance and the terrorists if in killing, the voices of the People of Faith would rise up in one voiced verdict, that in any killing, a part of God, of Yahweh, of Allah dies? How much harder would it be if in one voice we cried out that in bringing pain and suffering to the least of any of these - the weak, the poor, the marginalized, is to bring pain and suffering to God, to Yahweh, to Allah?
God has made his home with us that we might overcome evil with good. This is no insignificant thing.
Could what you do be enough to make a difference? That is not the proper question - That answer is designed to make you impotent. You always make a difference - that’s the point. Our task is to be ready in love, to walk as best we can the way of faith, to redeem the moments that have been set before us. Amen.
Sermon, November 9, 2008
Pentecost 26
Grace Episcopal Church, Bakersfield
Rev’d Vern Hill
I am a fairly slow reader and throughout almost all of school (even grad school), I only read what was required (motivation through fear of pain and suffering). I suppose I could blame this on TV.
The good news is that I finally discovered books when I found books which spoke a truth I connected with. There was John Jerome’s little book “Truck” about rebuilding a worn-out pickup truck and exploring technology (I still think its better than the more well known “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance”). Other writers included Theodore Roszak, Robert Raines, Huub Oosterhuis, Malcolm Boyd, Harvey Cox (especially “On Not Leaving It to the Snake”), Wallace Stegner, Annie Dillard (the pilgrim life), John Steinbeck, Loren Eiseley, Edward Abbey (“welcome to Utah, set your watch back 50 years”) and Kathleen Norris, to mention a few.
However in my discovery of books I never connected with science fiction, so it was with considerable skepticism several years ago that I accepted the loan of a book which, according to the loaner, “I just had to read”. As the loanee, I was not so sure. Level 7 was written in the 1950s in the midst of the threat of thermonuclear war between the Soviet Union and the United States. In an arms race perfect security was offered by a balance of offensive and defensive weapons. Create peace by making the outcome of war so horrible it would be unthinkable - a cold war rather than a hot one - no winners and no losers.
Level 7 violated this balance by giving one side the advantage - belief that a remnant people could survive that kind of holocaust. Level 7 visioned a massive underground silo of 7 levels, the 7th and most secure was 4400 feet below the surface and was made to be self-sufficient for at least 500 years. The 7th level could be completely sealed off from the other levels and surface - resulting in perfected immortality.
The holocaust begins - And the “elect”, the critical few who will continue the human race after all others have perished are allowed the protection of Level 7. In 2 ½ hours the face of the earth is obliterated, the wind carrying massive doses of radiation everywhere.
After some weeks pass for the guests at Level 7, it becomes alarmingly obvious that life is ceasing in the levels above - imperfections in the perfect defense. A reactor leak is contaminating their safe nest. Even Level 7 is not immune. Here people begin to show signs of radiation poisoning. In the end the last two persons, in their sickness, resolve to return to the earth’s surface to spend their final moments in the open air and sunlight.
I most remember this story for the serenity of the ending scene - the book calmly - as calmly as one blows out a candle - simply describes the disappearance of humanity from the face of the earth, a breeze blowing, the sun shinning. Silent earth.
The simple message was stunning - We humans are not essential. If we choose badly enough it is possible for us to cease to exist.
This sobering message reminds me of the truth which is embedded in God’s covenant in creation and with the Hebrews. Earthlings were told to cultivate and care for the earth. Later to the Hebrews, God said, “You shall be my people and I will be your God. I shall bring you to a fertile land, a land that has rivers and springs, a land that produces wheat and barley and grapes and you will not go hungry.” However - “make certain you do not forsake the Lord your God - if you do, this day I warn you, you shall be destroyed.”
Accountability is built into the act creation. We are accountable for how we use what is given to us (better - loaned to us) and we are expected to use our wisdom (we were not made stupid, weak or helpless). Pay particular attention to those final words - “I warn you, you shall be destroyed.”
In a common held and mistaken Biblical view, “you shall be destroyed” means God shall destroy us in much the same way it is misunderstood that God sends sickness and misery as the curse of individual disobedience. That is a mistake of divine proportions. “You shall be destroyed” needs to be understood in the context of “consequences” which Matthew has been leading us through these past many weeks. At a certain point there is a finality. It is possible to create empty - the void of pre-creation.
In today’s Gospel this covenant takes the form of the wise and foolish virgins and a wedding. A Jewish wedding was the end of a lengthy process beginning with an engagement arranged by the fathers and followed by an official ceremony of Betrothal where the couple would come together before friends and family to make binding vows. The betrothal period - up to one year - gave the man and opportunity to prepare a home for his wife to be. At the end of the betrothal period, the bridegroom would take his bride to live with him. The wedding celebration started when the bridegroom came to the bride's house. The bride and all the bridesmaids would be there waiting for him. Then they would all go through the village at night with torches in a celebration of singing and dancing. This is where today’s parable begins.
Matthew is struggling with a critical problem for early Christians - the Return of Christ to bring in the Kingdom, a cornerstone of the faith for Matthew’s readers. As you listened to the second reading from Paul, you heard him express his expectation that he would be among those still alive when Christ came again. Matthew, writing after Paul, encourages his readers to remain faithful and prepared in their waiting for the Return of Christ as the five wise virgins - in Greek phronimos [thoughtful, sensible, prudent] - so that when Christ comes they will be welcomed inside the Kingdom. Those who fall away, represented by the five foolish - in Greek moros [moron, stupid] - will find the door closed. Time has run out for the unprepared when the bridegroom after some delay comes at the least expected time of midnight.
What we have here is the recasting of their expectations of Jesus’ Return. It isn’t just a matter of waiting. We have the wrong time! There are two kinds of time in Greek - there is chronos, wristwatch time. These are the life counting minutes that the parable seems to be talking about. But there is another time - kairos, decisive time. If you are a trapeze artist and you have just completed a triple spin in mid-air, you are not concerned whether it is 8:12 or 8:15pm. You just know that it is time to be caught! Decisive Time!
Decisive time is about consequences and accountability. It is about the choice between thoughtfulness and stupidity - not in intelligence - but in commitment, intention, action, life choices.
For the metaphorical virgins who are prepared, who maintain the oil of blessing, of justice and peace, who spread generosity and kindness, who are faithful, they are members of the Community of God, the Kingdom; they are the blessed. These are the ones who are transparent to the gifts God has given each of us through his grace. These are the Saints of God. Johann Sebastian Bach celebrates their faithfulness - their preparedness - in Cantata 140 written for our Gospel reading. If you are a baritone or bass you may have noticed that wonderful recurring base passage in our Gospel hymn, the chorale from the Cantata - the marching notes under verse 1 -
Midnight’s peace, their cry has broken
Their urgent summons clearly spoken.
- Bach’s signature statement of faithfulness.
For the metaphorical moron virgins, unprepared, without the oil of blessing, absent of justice and peace, unfaithful in the life God created them to live, comes the closed door, shut outside of God’s presence not by God but by their lack of caring, their blindness to their true vocation.
Decisive Time! There is accountability, the effects of reality. How we choose and what we choose matters. And in the end everything could end as quietly as one blows out a candle.
The People of Christ as a part of God’s holy people on earth have an awesome task that has been set before us from the beginning of our time. Each generation should be haunted by the question - Is this, what we are doing now, the epitome of life as it should be? Obama’s question Tuesday night about 100 years from now is not simply curiosity. What we do now will shape those lives 100 years from now. Do we have that gumption, the courage, the humility to vision and generate a better world together?
We are not powerless. The empowerment that God has given us through the life of Christ over evil and darkness is staggering. Yes, we are sinners. Stupidity is alive and well in us - the moron gene is always at work, but so is the mighty grace of God. By that grace each of us can boldly carry the Gospel into our piece of the world - our families, our friends, our faith community, our neighbors and beyond.
Jesus says to us “You shall be my witnesses to the ends of the earth.” This has nothing to do with praying, praising, talking or proselytizing. It has to do with living the goodly gestures of the Gospel, not as raving evangelists signing up people for Jesus as if he cares, not in fear mongers excluding people from the Table of his love, but as People of the Garden of Creation who embrace and welcome the power to transform and change that comes in the vocation of gentleness, kindness, purposefulness, and directed love.
Annie Dillard in her book Pilgrim at Tinker Creek reminded me of this vocational call - she writes that one of our purposes in life is to “assist God” in the work of redemption by hallowing creation (its biology, its geology and its humanity). The devout person frees the divine sparks that have become trapped and nearly lost.
Quakers rightly believe “that which is of God” exists in every person. True this divine spark can nearly be lost at our very worst times. But how much harder would it be for the war mongers, the seekers of vengeance and the terrorists if in killing, the voices of the People of Faith would rise up in one voiced verdict, that in any killing, a part of God, of Yahweh, of Allah dies? How much harder would it be if in one voice we cried out that in bringing pain and suffering to the least of any of these - the weak, the poor, the marginalized, is to bring pain and suffering to God, to Yahweh, to Allah?
God has made his home with us that we might overcome evil with good. This is no insignificant thing.
Could what you do be enough to make a difference? That is not the proper question - That answer is designed to make you impotent. You always make a difference - that’s the point. Our task is to be ready in love, to walk as best we can the way of faith, to redeem the moments that have been set before us. Amen.