1
Lent; Yr. C, February 17, 2013
Deuteronomy
26:1-11; Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16; Romans 10:8b-13; Luke 4:1-13
Sermon
preached at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church
James
Allison, a contemporary theologian, wrote a reflection in The Christian Century
on today’s
readings. In it he points out that “Jesus learns to be the precarious one
in the desert. [But] where Moses
reassured his listeners with the little word when, as in ‘when
you come into the land,’
the devil comes to Jesus and thrice tempts him with the little word if.”[1] When and if.
Two little words that reveal very different views of the future.
When
Moses uses the word “when”, he’s talking about a time in the future
that he believes will come to pass. It’s not up for grabs. It’s
not maybe. It’s not perhaps. It’s
certain. The Israelites WILL come into
the land the Lord has promised them.
They WILL possess it and settle in it.
They WILL make a home there and the land WILL be fruitful. And the people WILL recognize the gift of
land for what it is …
life. The people WILL show their
gratefulness with an offering to God.
Moses is assuring the people of a future … that’s what hope is all about. Hope is made real to us in future stories. We create those stories based on past experience
affirmed in the present and extrapolated into the future.
When
a young woman finds out she’s
pregnant. She goes home and tells her husband. Within hours, they become parents. They begin to create new future stories,
stories that now include a new person.
As the pregnancy continues the stories evolve. The stories become more elaborate, more
integrated into the couple’s
present life. Preparations are made. A
room is painted. Furniture bought. Toys are selected. Clothing acquired. Small washcloths and diapers appear in the
closet. This as yet unborn child has
become part of the family even though she hasn’t arrived on the scene … because WHEN the baby is born life
will change. A baby IS coming. This new person WILL arrive.
When
we’re
employed. When we’re working and enjoying that regular
paycheck, we create future stories based on our past experience of what it’s like to be paid on a regular basis. We envision a future. We dream about vacations we’ll take, places we’ll visit, friends we’ll see. We imagine a new rug in the living room, an
oil change for the car, and food on the table.
We see ourselves going to a Red Wings game, enjoying internet access at
home, buying a new iPhone and eating out.
WHEN I get paid, I’ll
have the money to do all these things.
Payday IS coming.
WHEN
is a word of confidence and trust. WHEN
is a word of hope. WHEN is the word that
Moses used as he gave this last speech to the Israelites. As Alison said, the devil didn’t speak the language of WHEN. He talked in “ifs”.
IF is tentative. IF is
conditional. My daughter learned that
early on. If you don’t clean your room, you will not be
watching TV in the morning. IF is a word
we parents use when the whole idea is to produce a little dis-ease that will
motivate our children to act in a certain way.
IF is a word of fear and anxiety.
What if something happens to the baby?
What if I lose my job? IF tempts
us away from trust. IF makes the future
uncertain and frightening.
Isn’t that what the devil was trying to
do with Jesus, to inject fear? IF you are the Son of God, turn this stone
into bread, the devil sneers. Is God
feeding you? Jesus has been in the
desert 40 days with nothing to eat. IF you worship me, I will give you all the authority I have been given. Is God giving you what you deserve? The desert isn’t much of a kingdom. IF
you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, he teases.
Is God protecting you? The Spirit
actually led you here into this precarious place. This is dangerous territory. If, if, if.
The devil tries to sow seeds of doubt and fear. The devil seeks to replace the WHEN of Moses
with his own IF. But Jesus won’t have any of it.
Jesus
responds to each IF with trust. One does not live by bread alone. God’s
abundance nourishes both body and soul. Worship the Lord your God and serve Him only. Glory is all about revealing God in the world,
and true authority flows from God. Do not put the Lord your God to the test. God’s
love for us is unwavering. These things
you can count on, says Jesus. Don’t go down the road of “ifs”.
The
unfortunate reality, however, is that babies do die, and people do lose
jobs. Faithful and faithless people
suffer tragic losses. Future stories are
dashed to bits, and there is nothing to fill the gap. The days and weeks ahead appear empty, void … at least for a while. That’s
what we call grief.
When
I was working at Strong as a chaplain I was called to the room where a man had
just died. His wife was there sitting in
a chair by his bed watching the sun come up.
She didn’t
say much when I entered the room. We sat
in silence for a little while. Finally
she spoke. “This was my third marriage. All three of my husbands have died.”
She looked toward the bed, and talked about their short time
together. “We’ve only been married a few
years. We were so happy. We had so much we wanted to do together, and
it turned out to be such a short time. I
just don’t
think I can go through this again.” I didn’t
know what to say that would make things any better. She had lost her future. All the stories they had written together had
reached an untimely end. “I just don’t know how I can go on,” she said.
“Tomorrow morning you will wake up in
your bed,”
I said. “And WHEN you open your eyes, you will
remember that your husband has died. And
you will be incredibly sad. But you will
get up. You will get your coffee, and
you will start your day. It won’t feel right. It won’t
even feel good. What makes this so hard
is that you know how painful it’s
going to be. But you will get through,
because you know it can be done. You’ve done it before.”
She had done it before. Grief can
be transformed.
The
past is an anchor that sustains us in the present, and allows us to look
forward to the future in hope. When our
future is wiped out and that palette lays blank and colorless before us, as
people of faith …
we look back to find our hope. We begin
to imagine the future firmly grounded in the truths that have stood the test of
time. Our ancestors knew what it was to
wander in a strange land. They
understood what it was to be lost. They
knew what it was to live as exiles. They
knew about isolation and fear. They knew
what it was to be mistreated and abused.
They’ve
felt anger and despair. And what did
they do in those times? They looked back
on those enduring future stories of faith.
The very truth that Moses re-told in today’s reading.
Our
ancestor was a wandering Aramean who went down into Egypt and lived there as an
alien, few in number. But he became a
great nation, mighty and populous. And when the Egyptians treated them harshly,
God heard our cries. God brought us out
of bondage and gave us the land. God
gave us the means to live. That’s a story of hope. A story that sustained Jesus during his
trials in the wilderness. A story that
was played out with different characters in Jesus’ life, during his own passion and
death. It’s our Christian faith story of God’s redemptive power, firmly rooted in
the Jewish story of liberation. Through
it we reclaim the power to dream. In it … we begin to create new futures for
ourselves after loss. Our foundational future story is one of hope, even in the
face of despair and tragedy. Evil does
not win the day, love does.
During
this Lenten season, let’s
reflect on our lives. Are we living in
WHEN, or IF? Can we imagine a future of
peace and justice, a world of abundance for all in these times? That’s
God’s
reality in us. Through God we have the
power to see riches in poverty, to make peace in the midst of conflict, to
imagine a future in tragedy. We have the
words of hope. They are very near us … on our lips and in our hearts. That story lives in us for the future, ours
and our children’s.
You can count on it.
Amen.
[1] Alison, James. Reflections on the Lectionary: Sunday,
February 17, The Christian Century, Vol. 130, No. 3, p.23.
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