The Rev. Jerrod H. Hugenot
It can be unsettling to watch the 11 PM newscast, with the stories of Haiti’s struggle to deal with the after-effects of its recent earthquake. The images flicker across the screen, drawing the world into age-old questions of suffering, the randomness of the world’s chaotic nature. For some faith traditions, persons ponder questions of divine presence or absence when a major disaster strikes.
While we wrestle with the “why?” questions, the international efforts to coordinate disaster relief and humanitarian aid speak volumes to the good humanity can bring about in troubling times. The same newscasts now turn to the stories of supplies and personnel being sent to coordinate care, admittedly with the inevitable concerns that not enough is getting where it is most critically needed. Email and social networking sites bring stories otherwise unreported, sometimes of a loved one’s whereabouts, sometimes vignettes of the struggle at hand to find adequate food, medical help, and shelter. The global village is pitching in right now, though I hear Newsweek editor Jon Meacham’s lament the U.S. has tended to care about Haiti, one of the world’s most economically challenged nations not that faraway from our mainland, only when “something really, really miserable happens there.”
Locally, the stories of Haiti relief are remarkable. The Banner has covered a number of wonderful efforts by individuals and organizations in town. A Haitian living in the area remarked to me that the efforts are inspiring, a reflection of the human spirit at its best.
For local congregations, the Haitian earthquake has created a variety of responses. I contacted fellow representatives of the Greater Bennington Area Interfaith Council to learn how their faith communities have gotten involved in the efforts. For some congregations, Haiti is home to established programs and personnel underwritten by denominational and ecumenical agencies. For others, this might be the first direct connection a local congregation has made with short or long-term aid and support efforts.
Rabbi Joshua Boettiger notes Congregation Beth El is providing assistance through the American Jewish World Service (www.ajws.org). The organization has established a Haiti Earthquake Relief Fund. Direct donations to AJWS can be made online.
Congregants of the First Baptist Church (ABC/USA) and the Second Congregational Church (UCC), both of Bennington, are sending funds through “One Great Hour of Sharing”, an ecumenical effort to support humanitarian aid, administered through their respective denominational offices and the ecumenical Church World Service.
The Rev. Mary Lee-Clark also notes the public is invited to help with creating “health and hygiene kits” for distribution by the Church World Service (www.churchworldservice.org). The kits are simple to create. In an one-gallon Ziploc bag, place one wide tooth comb, a hand towel, a washcloth, six band-aids, a toothbrush still in its packaging, a pair of nail clippers, and $2 for processing. Persons can also donate money for kits. Make any financial donations to “Second Congregational Church” with “Haiti relief” or “CWS Kit Postage” in the memo lines.
The Rev. Dr. Anita Schell-Lambert, rector of St. Peter's Episcopal Church, notes her parish, “has adopted a twofold response to the crisis in Haiti. First, PRAY: Hold all of the people of Haiti, and all those with friends and loved ones in Haiti, in your prayers and secondly, GIVE: The most immediate thing Americans can do is give to the relief effort.”
Dr. Schell-Lambert notes, “Episcopal Relief & Development has disbursed emergency funding to the Diocese of Haiti to help meet critical needs such as food, water and shelter for those affected, and stands ready to support the country's ongoing recovery and rebuilding efforts in the days to come. For more information and ways to respond financially, including through the Episcopal Relief & Development, go to St.Peter's website, www.stpetersbennigntonvt.org and go to “Haiti suffers devastating earthquake.”
Many denominations receive donations throughout the year, creating a pool of money for domestic and international crisis situations. The Bennington Friends Meeting (Quakers) notes the American Friends Service Committee has sent $100,000 already. The Meeting’s representative Bain Davis notes the AFSC is already working on plans to help with long-term rebuilding initiatives. Likewise, the American Baptist Churches/USA has distributed $65,000 out of its reserve funds for emergency humanitarian aid.
Haiti is a place where U.S. religious organizations have had long established partnerships. (For example, American Baptists have worked in Haiti since 1823!) The presence of dedicated personnel and cooperative U.S./Haitian partnerships has been quite helpful in this time of critical need. Four long-term American Baptist missionaries assigned to Haiti for medical and educational work are coordinating medical care and humanitarian work in coordination with the Haitian Baptist Convention. Likewise, the United Church of Christ maintains ongoing efforts with Church World Service, the National Spiritual Council of Churches of Haiti, and the House of Hope. Haitian churches across the United States, including the First French Speaking/Haitian Baptist Church of Manchester, NH, are becoming key places for Haitians to coordinate care.
The Bennington Unitarian Universalist Fellowship will be offering a Haitian dinner fundraiser. The idea started with the UU Fellowship’s board wondering what they could do to make a difference. On Saturday, February 6, the UU Fellowship will host the dinner, featuring a variety of Haitian foods ($15/at the door). The proceeds will benefit Haiti Relief. Call the UU Meetinghouse at (802) 440-9816 to reserve tickets. A Haitian Peace Quilt, handmade by a Haitian women's cooperative is also being raffled ($5/ticket) to raise additional funds. The drawing for the Peace Quilt will be held on June 15. Funds raised from the raffle will benefit both Haitian relief and UUFB social action work.
If you would like to help with donating funds or supplies via an area faith community, please do so! You will find religious organizations are often at their best when engaged in such important work. The generosity of local religious communities is well known through the common work of the Food & Fuel Fund and the support of the Bennington Free Clinic. Likewise, when it comes to the rest of the world, our local interfaith community shares its love of neighbor with those near and far alike.
The Rev. Jerrod H. Hugenot serves as coordinating minister of the First Baptist Church of Bennington, Vermont. To correspond: fbpastor@sover.net
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The passage from Luke is called often the first “sermon” of Jesus. Jesus is back in the town that raised him. Indeed, in the Greek text, Luke describes Nazareth as the place that nourished him. Here Jesus came into his own, growing up in the midst of the people, and now they are eager to welcome him into this new calling. As he enters the synagogue, he is welcomed as a teacher respected enough to be invited to read and interpret sacred text in the midst of the assembly. Perhaps one can imagine the assembly filled with persons beaming with pride. This is a great day, welcoming one of our own!
Jesus reads the text and then gives what is the briefest of sermons. The response moves from silence, to puzzlement, to grumbling, to rage. For readers familiar with the gospels, the way the story ends is well known. Those who nourished him and raised him up will try to toss him off a cliff. (Come to think of it, my first sermon didn’t go so bad after all….)
The crux of this story revolves around the ways one responds to Jesus’ teaching. Jesus reads the text from Isaiah and claims the prophet’s word has been fulfilled. The comment is made, “Is this not the son of Joseph?”
Sometimes, going home is the hardest journey one makes. Sometimes you feel like persons see you still as that young child, chasing after butterflies in the backyard or buzzing by on a bike on a hot summer day. People can treat you like you’re forever the kid, the daughter or son of the folks at the end of the street, failing to recognize you or give you credit for being who you are today. Going home sometimes feels great. Other times, you wonder why you put yourself through it all, feeling treated as the juvenile version of yourself at best, and at worst, realizing the “you” who you have become might as well be invisible.
The Harvard chaplain Peter Gomes recounts an experience when serving as a resident scholar at Emmanuel College in Cambridge, England. He found the faculty reserved at first, however, he began to enjoy collegial friendship, though he notes he was “the only person of color on the premises”. At the end of the term, he remembers one of the college staff saying, “Well, Gomes, considering your background you’ve done well here.” Gomes notes, “Never have grace and malice been more subtly mixed and administered as they were then” (A Scandalous Gospel, p. 39). Years later, Gomes claims empathy with Jesus when the crowd mutters, “Is this not Joseph’s son?” (i.e. the subtext of “who do you think you are?”)
When Jesus came to speak to the hometown crowd, I would argue that he gave his teaching not seeking to cause controversy. Admittedly, this can happen. Sometimes people show back up in town with a chip on the shoulder, ready to set those folks straight. Garrison Keillor recounts in his novel Lake Wobegon Days of a longtime town resident nailing 95 theses to the door of the Lutheran Church. This list included just about every aggravation he had with his fellow churchgoers and town in general. He did not get them affixed to the church door that night, as the church was hosting the Luther League’s Halloween pizza party, and he didn’t want to be caught with list and hammer in hand. Instead, he waited, and sent it in for the local paper to publish. Thankfully the local editor always found some other story to cover in the newspaper…. (Cf. Keillor, p. 251ff.)
Three of the four gospels tell variants of this story of Jesus before the Nazareth assembly. Luke places this story up front in his gospel. The “first sermon” is part of the introduction to Jesus and his ministry, a foretaste of what will be unfolding in the rest of the story. Reading Luke, I suggest this passage needs to be bookmarked, to refer back as you read of Jesus’ parables, ministry, miracles, and engagements with disciples and opponents alike. If you want to understand Luke’s gospel, this text is a good touchstone to learn how to “read” Luke and understand the Jesus he proclaims. In preaching Isaiah, Jesus establishes himself in the tradition of what has gone before him especially the prophetic tradition’s affirmation God will not forget the marginalized or those who are otherwise written off.
To side with the poor, the captive, the blind and the oppressed will not win you the victory parade through the streets of Jerusalem or Rome. He gets into the gritty part of human existence, dealing with the hard questions of people getting exploited and those enduring hardship. Most important, he stands upon the traditions of the sacred text, which call the faithful to look out for the most vulnerable. The gospel Jesus proclaims is one of inclusive hope. His gospel goes against the grain of the worldview of the villagers, the powerful within the religious establishment, and the prevailing ethos of Rome. His gospel fits within the ancient witness of the prophets before him, and like the prophets, Jesus is learning he is not welcome among his own people. The violence of the crowd demonstrates the costliness that can come with such effort.
The controversy revolves around Jesus’ commentary after his first remarks. Not only does he claim his ministry will be to those otherwise forgotten, he cites scriptural narrative where even the Gentiles will be included. Even the complete outsider shall be part of “the fulfillment” Jesus claims to have brought about. It becomes an unsettling word to consider. The question of “who’s in” and “who’s out” challenges us to be clear about our beliefs and practices. When we say of our ministry that “all are welcome”, do we live it out? These are questions people of faith do well to answer, though admittedly, such self-examination can go neglected or discouraged.
A few months ago, the town of Americus, Georgia, held a ceremony celebrating local persons who made a difference in their town. Of interest was a very posthumous recognition for a man who died in 1969. The Baptist leader Clarence Jordan was remembered for his civil rights leadership by the town leaders, an odd turn of events, considering town officials back in Clarence’s day tried to talk him into leaving town. They didn’t want his controversial beliefs in integration and civil rights disturbing the peace. Forty years later, the same town that rejected Clarence Jordan gave thanks for his work. It is a remarkable testament how times change and the determination and clarity of vision it takes to be a prophet in your own hometown.
“Today the scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
Reading Luke’s story of the “first sermon”, the faithful reader is challenged to ponder what effect Jesus would have if he were the guest preacher in your own congregation. Would he be thanked at the door or tossed out of it? Jesus presents an ambitious vision of the gospel, the same gospel we are called to carry out. To care for those who are vulnerable, to engage in efforts to meet basic human needs, these are signs of the gospel coming to life.
A couple of weeks ago, I was at the end of a very long day. I had been behind the computer screen working on administrative matters for so long, I lost track of time. I looked outside and thought it was looking fairly overcast. Actually, it was nighttime. I got up from my desk to head for home. (The dog doesn’t walk herself. She does, however, take me for walks.)
By this time of day, the free clinic had set up its waiting room space, which crowded with patients, mostly young adults hoping to see a doctor. Just around the corner, in the fellowship hall, the church choir was in the midst of rehearsal.
As I walked through the hallway and into the fellowship, moving from the murmur of patients shooting the breeze to pass the time to the choir working on the Sunday morning anthem, I felt a bit of joy rise up above the fatigue of wading through paperwork. Some days, it seems a bit up in the air, this effort to be a missional church engaged in the community while keeping up with all of the necessary elements of congregational life. Moments like these help me make sense of “the big picture” of ministry here at First Baptist.
As the choir sang, the patients waited for a nurse to say “Next!” I could swear I heard another voice in the mix.
“Today the scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
]]>Despite assurances to the contrary, the water was COLD!
My family started attending church services when I was in elementary school. I was baptized in 1984 on the same day my father was baptized. At the appropriate time in the service, we stepped out of service and headed to change for the baptism. We didn’t have white robes in the little Kansas church that baptized me. They said to bring along an extra set of clothes and change in the men’s bathroom in the fellowship hall.
We stood there, taking off our dress clothes. I was a bit nervous, taking my clothing off fairly quickly. My father said, “Slow down, son. They don’t baptize you naked!”
Years later in seminary, I read that some early Christians practiced baptizing persons naked and greeting the person as they rose out of the pool with new clothes, symbolizing the new life found in Christ. I thought to myself, “Well, I guess I was technically correct….”
Over our four centuries, while keeping to a theology of baptism by immersion, Baptists have varied the ways in which such a baptism could take place. For most of our 400 years, the idea of an “indoor” baptism is newer than we think. Early Baptists in Philadelphia baptized persons using rocks out in the river as a place to stand. Locally, First Baptist used Barber’s Pond until they decided baptism, even in the dead of winter, ought to be indoors. (Talk about your “penguin plunge”!) Baptists in the South might have used the sandbar out in the river as a place to have the baptismal candidates gather with the pastor. As for the Baptists of Moline, Kansas, they put me on a cinder block, used only for baptizing children, so they could be seen a bit better by the congregation. They used a heating coil to warm the waters, but as I said earlier, that water was cold!
Baptism…. We opt to drown sinners good in the Baptist church. Baptism by immersion distinguishes the Anabaptist tradition among the Protestant movements. Baptists, Mennonites, and a few others insist that baptism involves a high water bill. In fact, in Amsterdam last summer, the Baptist World Alliance met at a Mennonite church for our 400th anniversary celebration of the Baptist tradition’s origins in 1609. The street sign said, “Doopsgezinden”, an old term, originally meant to be derogatory toward Mennonites. If you want to understand us, call us “baptism minded” folks.
Despite the historical differences in the theology and ritual around baptism, the Church universal agrees baptism is part of being a Christian. To follow Christ is to be caught up in the divine story of God and humanity, the brokenness brought about by human sin, and the strong desire of God to bring about humanity’s redemption. We Baptists celebrate baptism as a personal act, as the individual affirms his or her belief in Christ as Lord and Savior.
In our more ecumenically minded present day, most Baptist churches are welcoming of persons who were baptized otherwise. Nonetheless, when you ask a Baptist about core beliefs, we will affirm who we are: baptism by immersion, gathering around the table for communion, sparingly in comparison to the more Eucharistic traditions of the Church, and of course, we know how to throw a good potluck.
Each week, we gather together as the baptized people, celebrating and looking for signs of new life. Though this particular day we have no persons to baptize, we display one of our baptismal robes as a reminder of our core belief in baptism by immersion. We will be on a journey through the winter and spring, learning more about our Baptist beliefs and heritage. Most importantly, the older elementary students will be exploring Baptist beliefs through their religious education. It is time to share with our children this story of our belief, now as they begin to reach the age where such decisions can be explored and made. Such sharing is part of our calling: to speak of our lives shaped by Christ.
Remembering the day of my baptism, I recollect the congregation had a practice of singing a number of hymns right after the baptisms took place. Practically, this extended time of singing gave the minister a chance to get likewise out of the wet clothing and change. I remember back to that day, and I believe this to be a good practice. What better for a church to do than to sing of the faith gathering us together?
<WE SING>
Tomorrow, our nation gives thanks for the witness of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther, Jr. Of the civic holidays, the King Holiday is becoming a time to celebrate King’s life and work, and many persons use the day not for “play” but for engaging in community service opportunities. We’ll gather Monday evening at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship for the interfaith community King Celebration. (They’ll have a potluck, so don’t worry, you’ll feel right at home!)
Given the connections of today’s focus on baptism and the civic holiday celebrating a 20th-century Baptist, I thought it appropriate to look for any stories related to King’s own baptism. From Taylor Branch’s massive three volume biography of King’s life, I found a brief mention of King’s baptism, recalling:
In 1934, when a guest minister at Ebenezer [Baptist Church in Atlanta, GA] made a strong pitch for the salvation of young souls, [King] watched his [older] sister [Christine] rise to make the first profession of faith. Impulsively, as he later confessed, “I decided that I would not let her get ahead of me, so I was the next.” He wryly observed that he had no idea of what was going on during his subsequent baptism. He knew the feeling of being special, and the intense pressure of churchly expectation, long before he had the slightest grasp of religion. (Parting the Waters, America in the King Years, 1954-1963, p. 48).
The story chastens those looking for a bright beginning to King’s storied career and faith journey. King did not blossom without the upbringing in the context of a church community that embraced and helped him claim a sense of identity and voice. That King became a national figure for Civil Rights and an enduring symbol for America at its best is well worth celebrating, but we cannot forget the formative influence of those waiting for him as he rose up in church and professed his belief or helped him towel off and change into fresh clothes when the day of his baptism occurred. As King began his religious life a bit unsure and uncertain of what he was promising in his confession and baptism, it was the gathered people called “church” that helped him along his journey.
Along the way, our Baptist tradition has emphasized baptism as an individual and personal decision. We have given less reflection to the communal implications. We come to Christ each of our own choosing, however, it is the presence of other believers who help us grow in the faith. The old proverb claims it takes a village to raise a child. In the Christian life, it takes a church to shape a believer.
After the waters of baptism, there is much work to do in shaping persons to grow in Christ. You see this in other traditions when catechism is offered. Baptists likewise need a robust sense of religious education, and we are reclaiming this as we adjust our religious education to match our children as they are growing into middle school age. We have to work hard to retain them as they become youth and demonstrate to them that the life of faith will help them as they grow up to be the next generation. Who knows? Perhaps we have a future King in our midst.
In turn, the role of religious education for adults becomes important. I am grateful we have restarted adult education at First Baptist, as we need to keep providing opportunities for believers to wrestle with the intersections of life and faith. This month, the adult forum reflects on Jewish/Christian relations with Rabbi Cohen. Beginning next month, we explore what it means to be a Baptist, and it ought to be a lively dialogue about our faith and the fruitfulness of exploring our heritage. You’ll find it lively as the Baptist way is one of diversity. In case you haven’t heard, Baptists don’t all think all alike! Yet, we are all one in Christ.
The journey of faith begins with that decision which leads you to the pool of water. What happens next is likewise up to you. In Baptist history, much has been made what is meant by the Greek word for baptism, yet I am a bit curious by that word right beside it. In the gospel of Luke, John preaches a baptism of metanoia, the Greek word typically translates as “repentance”. More accurately, the word “literally means changing one’s mind or outlook” (Luke Timothy Johnson, The Gospel of Luke, Sacra Pagina, p. 64). The change is not meant to be one-time. Our baptism inaugurates an ongoing process of growth, adjustment and challenge. We do not just “get saved”, as some Baptists traditionally say. We are on a journey that begins with our yes and continues each time we keep saying “yes” to life in Christ.
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In John’s gospel, as the gospel writer is seeking a way to introduce the story of Jesus, he harkens back to one of the earliest stories: the creation narrative of Genesis. This gospel begins with “In the beginning was the Word”, meaning before creation, before there was a concept of “before”, the Word “was”. The story of Jesus, the good news about his life, death, and resurrection, is interwoven into the story of the One who brought all of Creation into existence. John’s gospel develops the story further, speaking of how the Word became “flesh”, bringing God into the midst of the world. In this story of John’s gospel, we will behold the very power of the universe, voluntarily taking the form of humanity, coming down to dwell among us. Something familiar yet powerfully new is taking place in this gospel story.
Words.... When I’m on the road, sometimes, people ask what I do. Sometimes I just want to be “off the clock”, so I say, “My trade is in words.” Oh really? They say. What do you write? Then I sheepishly have to say, “Sermons.”
Words…. Each week, I chase after dozens of words, trying to coral and cajole a few together to make a point, honing them into sentences and paragraphs. Sometimes, late at night, I have been known to plead with them to make it onto the page sitting there blank before me. Some weeks, I find the words just show up, moving from mind to keyboard to printed page to pulpit. Other weeks, I feel like that hapless babysitter in The Incredibles film: no matter what I do, the unruly child called “just the right word I was looking for” just keeps getting more and more difficult to get a handle on it. A book written by clergywomen on the art of preaching has likened writing the sermon as similar to birthing.
Words…. Words can bear a much needed moment of truth and grace. Words can be used as blunt instruments, spoken in moments of frustration or rage. However we use words, they are best used with due care and consideration. Words well used create all manner of good.
A few years back, the Benedictine monks of St. John’s Abbey in Minnesota commissioned a Bible to be designed and lettered by hand, a fascinating “old school” approach to creating a Bible. The “St John’s Bible” is laden with beautiful illustrations, including a frontispiece for each gospel. The St John’s Bible introduces John’s gospel with the image of a human form emerging from a swirl of the DNA helix and Greek and Hebrew letters, the languages of the Christian canon of scripture. It is an artistic way of communicating the story, reveling in the generative power of John’s language. In this passage of scripture, the strands of humanity’s encounters with God, our sins and God’s tireless effort to redeem us, weave together anew. In this story, the story of Jesus, we learn of the Word that came down and dwelled among us.
As I read John’s gospel, I often find myself stopping in the midst of the rich language of the opening chapter and just reveling in the words. I recall the fond memory of Christmas Eve services from my own upbringing when the minister read the Prologue of John as the candles were lit around the sanctuary. (You will note this tradition made an impression on myself, as I carry it on in my own worship planning.) The reading builds up from the ethereal language to a highpoint in verse 14:
And the Word became flesh and lived among us,
And we have seen his glory,
The glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.
A few notes on the Greek text of John help at this point: The imagery is not merely Jesus becoming a man. The text is more fulsome, claiming the Word became part of what it means to be human. Jesus did not excuse himself from the grace nor the grit of human life, a body prone to aches and pain, capable of such much less. The Word becomes fragile flesh and does not live above but among, in the midst, of us, the whole lot of humanity.
The Greek text also uses a phrase that few English translations pick up: the Word became flesh, and (the Greek says) pitched his tent. It is such an interesting image: the great God above becomes a common person, somebody who lives as neighbor and fellow journeyer along life’s path. From time to time, you will spot bulletin cover art provided by a Brazilian Catholic artist who provides free art for churches based on the weekly gospel readings. (Ah! The global church enriches us! Vermont Baptists benefit from the art of a Brazilian Catholic!) This particular week’s image is quite interesting: Jesus is imaged in the midst of a field of tents, sitting on the ground side by side with another person, having what appears to be a heart-to-heart type conversation. As the Word, God has the power to create all we know. As the Word made flesh, Jesus shares life with the created.
As John’s gospel unfolds, we see the prologue’s lament that the Word came to the world yet the world did not know him. He moves among us, yet he is more often rejected, notably by the religious leaders of the day. Jesus chooses a less expected path, in the midst of the common people, offering his teachings and performing his signs and miracles in veritable obscurity. Jesus seeks not fame and recognition. The glory of God shines in the least likely of places, yet in those places, the gospel writer claims the shadows overtaking the world are cast away by the light of Jesus.
Words…. Christians use quite a few terms to describe Jesus: “Savior”, “the second Person of the Trinity”, “son of God”, Emmanuel, King, Servant, Messiah, and the list goes on. The terms are spoken out of religious devotion and explored by biblical and theological scholars. Our words for God are our ways as Christians to identify who we are and the ways we believe.
Words…. Jesus gave us words to live by, found in gospel narratives in the form of parables, sayings, and the conversations he engaged in with disciples, the crowds, the marginalized, the authorities. In these words called “gospel”, we are given words that guide us through life, help us know ourselves better by reading them and taking these words to heart (sometimes in the process engaging in a struggle of conscience to sort them out in the context of our own life and times).
Words…. Amazingly, God did not choose to remain aloof or silent up in the heavens above. Such texts as the prologue to John serve as a counter-witness to those times of despair and doubt when we believe God does not hear us, remember us, or stay with us. In our present day with a rising number within society self-identifying as “no religious identity” or “not religious or spiritual”, being able to share these sort of texts becomes that much more important.
Words…. Our texts form us to be a people who believe with heart and mind God is with this world. We believe God became flesh and dwelled among us. In turn, we cannot live aloof from the world or refrain from being in the midst of the crosswalks of life. To follow Christ means to follow him into the midst of the world and dwell there especially in those places we would not go.
Words…. Christ comes among us, speaking the words of life abundant. Can we stop and listen, hearing the word in our lives? Can we welcome the Word into our midst?
]]>Kids grow up. We joke a bit about it. “Oughta put a brick on his head,” we say of a child as he starts going through clothes and shoes at seemingly overnight pace. In some households, you find curious scratches on the doorpost of a kitchen door, marking the growth of each child. Or somewhere in the attic or a storage closet, a “baby book” and every single school yearbook is kept safe. Or with today’s kids, parents hope the computer hard drive crash didn’t wipe out the pictures of Junior’s third birthday party.
We love keeping track of the kids and marveling at their achievements, great and small. I’m sure you have started thinking a bit about your own ways of keeping the kids. I’m curious to hear a quick memory or two from the crowd. What have you done to keep track of your kids’ growth over the years? [Comments from the congregation.]
The gospel story today might seem a bit of a surprise. We just finished Advent and Christmas Eve, and here we are just two days later, and Jesus himself has grown up while we weren’t looking! We put him in the manger the other night, and we sang songs to him. And now he has grown up on us! Heavens!
The lectionary reading from Luke today moves us away from Bethlehem, and we hear of the only gospel account of Jesus as a child. And what pray tell is the young Jesus up to? As far as his family is concerned: mischief!
Raised an observant Jew, Jesus is on the annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The family has caravanned their way to the holy city, made their religious observances, enjoyed their time, and then they started for home. In the hubbub of an entire clan of people going out, it is highly likely that Mary and Joseph just kept thinking, “Oh, he’s back there playing with friends”. When enough time passed and still no child to be seen, that is when Joseph and Mary realized he was not with them.
Have you noticed how children can disappear? Nowadays, parents have a variety of ways to keep track of their kids, including those leashes that you strap to the kid’s back. I saw a child so tethered to a parent in New York City a few weeks back. I kept marveling the family was able to walk through the busy streets and the kid didn’t “clothesline” another pedestrian.
Of course, parents struggle with keeping track of the kids. I remember the time I discovered elevators. Being a farm family, we rarely traveled that far, so being in a store with an elevator was quite the experience. As a five year old, I was fascinated by these doors that would open and close, and what child does not automatically reach up and hit every single button?
My fascination grew to the point that as soon as my mother and grandmother were distracted, I wandered off to the elevator door. I got on, and the elevator doors closed.
I enjoyed riding it for a few minutes, as the doors opened and closed. Then I realized I forgot which floor my family was on. I started asking adults to help me find my family. One adult asked me, “Did you get on at housewares?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “What’s a houseware?”
Mary and Joseph found Jesus in the Temple, where he is engaging the wise religious leaders. The momentary parental anxiety is met with an interesting response. “Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” (I tried that line on my parents. It didn’t work….).
Here, we get a glimpse of Christian theology. Christianity confesses Jesus as “fully human/fully divine”. Jesus is in the Temple, even at an early age, engaging the Temple elders in conversation, speaking with an authority far beyond his years. Can we also read this text with a bit of wonder at Jesus, the one who grew up just like us? The authority, the power, and the divinity is in tandem with birth, growing up, and becoming an adult. Jesus did not exempt himself from life, showing up as the babe in Bethlehem and enduring the passage of years. The one confessed as “very God of Very God” is made known in the gawkiness of humanity.
Jesus offers himself in the fullness of human experience, as one who struggled to walk those first steps, who fussed a bit when told to go to bed. He cried and laughed. Jesus lived the mundane realities of human existence. Luke alone records a story of Jesus’ younger years, and arguably, he tells the story to fit into the themes of his gospel. Hearing this story on the Sunday just after Christmas, the text serves as a friendly word to enjoy the season upon us and avoid the mistake of thinking of Jesus only in the contexts of manger and cross. There is a long journey Jesus takes, the one called “being human”. This text illumines the fullness of Jesus as Son of God as well as the firstborn of Mary.
I wonder if we could think a bit about the influence of Mary and Joseph on this young child. Jesus was raised up in the midst of a household, woven into the fabric of a family’s life. The gospels do not dwell extensively on Jesus’ upbringing (Mary appears in the gospels later in Jesus’ life and Joseph’s story begins and ends with the nativity narratives), yet Jesus surely must have benefitted from the raising up he received in that little off-the-beaten path town of Nazareth, son of a carpenter. In short, Christ was indeed “Immanuel”, “God with us”.
In celebrating Christmas, can we also marvel at the part “family” plays in our faith? We are blessed with upwards of a dozen children active in our congregation. I take delight in them. Ivy will run into my office and jump up into my arms. I believe Tea finds me a bit magical. Calvin once told his grandmother (“ammu”), “Hey, it’s the church man!” when I came to their home. Each child we have in our midst is a blessing and part of what makes us “First Baptist”.
I believe each member of the congregation should have a vested interest in each and every child in our midst. We may not have the dozens of children common in church decades ago, but we have “our dozen”, a group of delightful kids who could benefit from the larger family of faith. May I challenge us to make this coming year a time for growing our ministry with children? It would be delightful to welcome more children, and we will work on that. I would likewise challenge us to be working just as diligently on the nurturing of the children as well.
Would you consider this task as holy work? Jesus grew up in the midst of a web of family around him. Could we see ourselves as that holy caravan on pilgrimage? Could we see ourselves as the wise old elders welcoming the child into our midst and marveling at their contributions to the ongoing dialogue?
I may not have children of my own, but when I come to this place, I have a dozen kids that need my love, care, mentoring, and presence. I would suggest this way of thinking is limited only to clergy or religious education instructors. Each one of us needs to be “family” to these kids. It is indeed holy work. Will you join in this effort?
]]>Thus, when I plan worship, I hold this hymn back for Christmas Eve or the Sunday just after Christmas. It is good to have a crowd to join together voices on this hymn. So, after these words of proclamation are given, I invite you to rise and sing our hymn in praise of Christ.
Whether walking down the street, humming it to yourself, or stuck in an elevator somewhere with the Muzak version playing faintly overhead, you know this song. (And you quietly give thanks that there is no muzak playing overhead right now.) Tonight, we sing this hymn in its intended place: the church at worship.
Most people associate this hymn with the manger, perhaps a lullaby, though boisterous, of the Babe born in Bethlehem. “Joy to the World!” is drawn more the good parts of the book of Revelation rather than a retracing of the gospels’ nativity stories. The hymn’s writer Isaac Watts has a different intention, offering these words in celebration of Christ’s return. Watts looks up at the heavens above than down in a lowly cattle stall. “Joy to the World!” is less about what happened in Bethlehem and more about the return of Christ to the world at a time yet to come.
Contrary to the veritable cottage industry of books on “the End Times” or those doom-loving preachers on the AM dial, the end vision is not fire and brimstone raining down. Isaac Watts stresses “the End” as something good for us all. This hymn captures the true vision of the biblical witness: a world long suffering shall be endued with Christ’s truth and grace.
In the words of this hymn, Isaac Watts gifts us with this shimmering vision of a world that shall be transformed, not by any single nation or ideology of the day. In the end, Christ shall return and make all things well. “Joy to the world!” is a declaration of radical hope: Christ shall bring to accountability the evil of this world and give the world long-yearned justice and peace.
I have seen a glimmer, a foretaste of this vision. For the past three summers, I have traveled to annual meetings of the Baptist World Alliance, a global gathering of the many and diverse Baptist denominations. Around the table (where, if you do not know, you will always find Baptists around the table), I have spoken with Baptist leaders from countries dealing with great hardship and challenge. You spend time talking with a young man whose home country is considered one of the most politically unstable countries in Africa. You have a cup of coffee with a woman from India who works with women and children caught up in prostitution or victim of other forms of global human trafficking. You find yourself roommates with a young pastor from an Eastern European country, still recovering from years under a repressive communist government. In turn, I tell your story, a small congregation working in a rural community where the economic recession is experienced in the form of food and fuel crises, employment challenges, a high incidence of domestic violence per capita, and the list of what’s not right around these parts goes on.
These stories start adding up, all signs of the world’s pressing needs and the great difficulty the peoples of the world face. What astonishes, and admittedly humbles me as well, is the resolute commitment of these varied folks from around the world. Somehow, despite all of the differences and disparities, there is a deep trust in the Christian faith. What these folk have in common transcends the political, cultural, and economic barriers through which we typically see and order the world. Arising above the pain, yet not numbed to it, I see a thread of hope interweaving through the stories around the global table: wonderful, abundant, life affirming hope that empowers and enables people to stand up in the midst of the world’s chaos and pain and be conduits of great mercy and strength. This common thread of hope is grounded in Christ Jesus.
In a time where a new generation of best-sellers decry the validity of religion, in a time where the church in North America myopically dwells more on why these pews tonight are not “standing room only” and less on the mission field just outside their front door, Christians around the world testify mightily to the faith that Jesus taught, the essentials of discipleship grounded in a different ethic: a deep love of God and neighbor, a commitment to personal and communal wellbeing, and a belief in peacemaking and reconciliation, which goes against the grain of conventional wisdom claiming partisanship and might are the only tools to effect change.
Our faith calls us to be Christ’s hands and feet in the world, part of the reseeding of the world where, in Watts’ words, “thorns and sorrows grow”. The church at worship sings this hymn “Joy to the World” not as a happy little carol meant for a passing warm feeling of yuletide joy. This sort of hymn should thunder with the people of God claiming a core belief: Christ is coming again! We are waiting with expectation. Yet, as a people who wait, we also put our backs into the needs of the here and now. Discipleship in Christ Jesus is not about passive waiting. The world is not right, and we want to see it changed, not just down the road, but also in the here and now.
“Joy to the world!” becomes our reminder that we live in-between times of the “not yet” and “yet to come” as a people who nonetheless live with hearts and minds engaged in this world’s problems and yearn to be part of healing the world, in our little corner and around the world, in ways great and small, temporary and long-lasting. First Baptist is learning this anew, as we close a year of continuing transformation, becoming a church serving as “a place for healing, community involvement, and spiritual grounding”. We end 2009 with “a full house”, our facilities now providing previously under-utilized space for community non-profits providing critical services: medical care access for the uninsured, disability advocacy and support, help to families affected by domestic violence or other crises, a place where persons dealing with personal or economic challenges can find help and support, especially through initiatives our congregants have taken on, such as the sewing class or the cooking skills class, donating faithfully to local food pantries and social service outreach organizations.
Indeed, look back to where we have been and where we are today in our efforts to provide a credible witness to the gospel to this hurting community and world, and indeed, sing “joy” to the Christ who is coming!
So it is “with truth and grace” that Isaac Watts envisions Christ coming back. This Christ shall arrive with the resounding joy of a world welcoming back the One who shall make all things well, who shall take to task recalcitrant nations, who shall bring about a commonweal more glorious than any vision for the world humanity could come up with on its own.
May we be the church at worship and sing “Joy to the world!”
]]>The Corn Palace advertises every few miles with these whimsical signs, declaring inviting you to be a-maize-d at the sight. It is a grand sight, all that corn adorning the side of the building. The Corn Palace attracts tourists (and birds!) year round. Nonetheless, you wonder why you’re out here in the middle of nowhere. The Corn Palace is an amusing oddity, sort of like back home in Kansas where they claim Cawker City possesses the world’s largest ball of twine. It smells of rot and mildew, but it is the tourist attraction that some people plan their vacations around.
If you believe that’s just the Midwest (and surely odd things and people come only from the Midwest), travel down to Cheshire, Massachusetts, as I plan to do sometime this spring or summer. I recently learned of a memorial to a noteworthy Baptist. In the midst of town, you will find a monument dedicated to the early Baptist John Leland. The monument’s plaque hails Leland as “[an] eloquent preacher, beloved pastor, [and] influential patriot”. The monument recalls Leland’s strong support of Thomas Jefferson’s presidential campaign, and Leland’s subsequent travels to present Jefferson a gift from the local community.
The monument records Leland traveled to Washington, DC, and “presented to [President Jefferson] on January 1, 1802, in the presence of foreign diplomats, Supreme Court judges, and the Congress” a 1200 pound block of cheese. The monument remembers Leland’s legacy by placing his image on the front of a monument shaped like the large cheese press used to make “the Big Cheshire Cheese”. In true Baptist fashion, leave it to a Baptist to turn anything into an excuse for a potluck!
In these little out of the way places, you find the most remarkable oddities and revelations. People pass through, snap a few photos with the big ball of twine, or perhaps feel strangely hungry after reading of an now obscure Baptist’s adventures with cheese, but then they get back in the car and off they go, in search of the next leg of the journey. Small towns like Cawker City grow quiet again as the tourists leave, settling back into the sleepy way of life.
The same could be said of Bethlehem. As Christian readers of this text, we often approach Micah’s prophecies around Bethlehem, hearing the familiar strains of “O Little Town of Bethlehem” faintly in the background. In Micah’s day, and even in the day of the New Testament, persons would have been quite perplexed. What’s the big deal about Bethlehem? It doesn’t look like much, just sort of there on the map, even today not necessarily a place of great importance, outside of the tourist trade.
Bethlehem was of little strategic or political importance, just a humble village off the beaten path. Of little consequence, this little town will bring about one who shall be known as “great to the ends of the earth”. Christian readers hear the gospel nativity story coming alive in this text. For the people of Micah’s day, they heard a strong word of hope, placing God’s favor on the lowly and vulnerable.
Micah’s prophecy weaves through parts of the Hebrew Scriptures’ narratives of David’s family tree. Bethlehem was a place where David’s forebears lived, persons seemingly insignificant as David himself would have appeared when he was first brought before the prophet Samuel. Jesus’ detractors were known to ask what good could come out of Nazareth? The same could be said for David, the little shepherd boy, thought to be the least likely candidate when Jesse was told to bring his sons before the prophet. The pipsqueak kid would become the symbol for Israel’s monarchy and his name synonymous with Israel’s good fortune.
Bethlehem becomes in-speak for Israel’s hope. When Micah served as a prophet, Jerusalem was under constant threat. Few persons believed any good could be left for the Israelite people. The neo-Assyrian empire had taken most of the northern kingdom lands, and of late has turned its attention to the remaining southern kingdom. In Bethlehem, one shall come forth as one as if the David of old and be even more powerful. Out of the lesser of kinship clans, out of the least likely place of influence shall rise up the true strength of God made known.
Also in more signage inclined states, you will find small towns in the Midwest put up signs willy-nilly to honor locals, celebrating the proverbial “local boy/girl made good” types. For example, back home in Kansas, you will spot a guitar-shaped sign noting Leavenworth, Kansas as the birthplace of rocker Melissa Etheridge or on a town’s outskirts a sign decorated with an airplane notes aviator Amelia Earhart was born right here in Atchison, KS. In my hometown of Sedan, a sign and even a small museum hail the town as the birthplace of circus clown Emmett Kelly. Indeed, each year, we gather along Main Street and sing, “For unto us, a clown is born.”
Favored sons and daughters become part of the lore of a community. They provide a witness to a community of how people you used to know when they were “this tall” or remember when they served as a waitress at the local diner can go on to be the next Nobel Prize winning physicist, next year’s Oscar winner, and tomorrow’s generation of leadership. Little towns can be the birthplace of many good folks who heal the world.
Bethlehem reminds us that Jesus grew up in the midst of humanity. He entered into this world as we did, though he was born in lowly circumstance and part of the world in its delights and difficulties. In his humble birth, Jesus knows what it means to be human. He did not exempt himself from this life, and in his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus offers a different sort of powerful hope for the world. As Micah railed against power’s temptations, so did the one born in Bethlehem. As Micah hailed the peaceable world he believed God intended, Jesus likewise taught an ethic embracing enemies as friends, modeling forgiveness of one another, and an inclusive vision of marginalized and mighty being equal in the Reign he preached.
Bethlehem becomes the Christian response to the world’s woes. Out of an obscure place, Jesus beckons his followers to go to the forgotten places, the places where persons are considered of little consequence. Bethlehem becomes a sign and symbol of a beloved ruler like the positive element to the Davidic story. Jesus is the one who rules with “truth and grace” as the old carol extols. Jesus is the good shepherd, tending the many, never leaving even the most wayward sheep behind. Out of Bethlehem would indeed come one who brought hope to a broken world.
As I noted earlier, the Micah reading inescapably has a soundtrack. We cannot read this passage without humming a certain tune. The hymn “O Little Town of Bethlehem” recalls this text and the Christian interpretation of the passage. The hymn comes to us thanks to a 19th century leading Episcopal priest of his day, the Rev. Dr. Phillips Brooks.
Brooks wrote this hymn for a children’s choir, thanks to a pilgrimage experience he had earlier in life visiting Bethlehem on Christmas Eve. When you read the carol’s words, Brooks’ reverence for this memory shines through his poetry. Brooks captured a certain tenderness of a small town, out away from the more urbanized areas of Jerusalem, made more notable due to a favored Son whose life reshaped the world.
I recalled another memory of Phillips Brooks. Years after he wrote the carol, Brooks became the rector of Trinity Church in downtown Boston. Outside the church today stands a statue of Brooks, commemorating his ministry and career. Brooks’ statue might not catch the eye of the modern day Bostonian, passing by the church on the way to work or at play on the green space around the church. In fact, the day we visited Trinity Church, Brooks was covered with pigeons.
As we looked around Trinity Church’s green space, many people were out enjoying the summer day. (Only a minister would go inside and look at a church on a nice summer day.) People were out sunning themselves on blankets. Office workers enjoyed eating their lunches on park benches. Children gleefully ignored the prim “no swimming” sign over the public fountain and waded in. The Rev. Dr. Brooks surveyed the scene from his pedestal over by the church.
We were in search primarily for the Boston Public Library. (Only a librarian like Kerry would go inside and look at a library on a nice summer day.) We spotted the library across the green space. As we made our way there, I noticed the further we walked along the path away from the street, the more the crowd became primarily the homeless. They were hunkered down on park benches, leaning on trees and making small talk, and some sleeping the daytime away, perhaps enjoying the relative safety of a very public area. As we walked past one person sleeping on the ground, I did a double take. The blanket he slept on had a familiar, though well faded image of Church World Service.
A few weeks before, First Baptist completed its annual donation to Church World Service’s blanket fund, providing money for these durable blankets to be sent around the world. And here, rather close to home than the “far off mission field” we often associate with CWS projects, was evidence of the support of First Baptist and other Christians providing help to a person in need.
Thinking back, I wonder what Brooks would have made of this scene unfolding outside his old parish church. I imagine he would have been delighted to see this quiet witness to the faith of Jesus, the one born in Bethlehem.
O Holy Child of Bethlehem/
Descend on us, we pray/
Cast out our sin and enter in/
Be born in us today.
]]>On behalf of the Greater Bennington Area Interfaith Council, blessings on this sacred occasion!
In the midst of a holy season, celebrated down the centuries, and this year, celebrating the passage of a century of your witness, it is a time to give thanks and remember your holy story of the Divine’s faithfulness and the tenacity and determination of your congregants, past and present, to bring Beth El through the past century.
Joshua notes the Torah portion for the evening tells of the stories of Joseph, whose dreams were not understood at first by others. These stories are befitting an occasion such as this night, as you celebrate a past and commit to a future. To dream is to open oneself to imagination and to make malleable our otherwise callused worldviews.
This night, as you celebrate the wonder of yet another night of plenty when the odds said it should be otherwise, it is a good night to tell stories of the many Jews who made their livelihoods and spiritual home here in Bennington. It is a good night to recall the witness of rabbis past and present, especially emeritus and incumbent here in this room, two faith leaders who have led the many faiths of Bennington to be more engaged in social justice initiatives. It is a good night to dance with the Torah, recalling these same floorboards that have creaked under the feet of now nearly four generations. It is a good night to pray, to listen, and then to eat together, sharing this sacred moment before journeying onwards into a second century.
It is a good night to dream.
]]>The prophet Zephaniah serves as one of the “minor” prophets, the prophets whose writings are shorter in length compared to the “major” prophets like Isaiah or Jeremiah, but by no means are the minor prophets to be considered “lesser” than the others. They may have written less, but these “minor” prophets still carry the edgy vocation of prophet, bring a word that challenges and a life that moves against the grain of the world. Just as last week’s readings from Malachi, the readings from Zephaniah appear in the midst of our anticipation of Christmas, the grumpy street preacher out in the cold on the corner as people bustle by, in search of presents, his message sounding an odd note.
Zephaniah spends much of its time railing against the excesses of the nation. The king Josiah reigned, yet Zephaniah’s prophetic work happened in the years before Josiah enacted religious reforms as one of Israel’s last “good” kings. At this point, no one, from crown on down, had faced up to its breach of covenant loyalty with God. Zephaniah’s critique of the politics, society, and religion of the day would have been vindicated only after the fact.
The book of Zephaniah is structured around nine long teachings, or oracles. Eight of the nine oracles are laden with talk of divine judgment for the people’s neglect of covenant commitments to God and the excesses of the day. The book offers a fairly firm word that such behavior has not gone unnoticed by the Divine, and quite frankly, there will be a reckoning that no one will be escape, from the guy on the street all the way up to the royal court.
The ninth oracle is astonishing in its content. During the last section the prophet’s tone changes. He speaks of God saving those who listen to the prophet and take it to heart. I find it quite remarkable to find this section at the end of the prophetic roar, this tender appeal to join voices together and sing of the great hope that God has in store for the faithful. Suddenly fierce Zephaniah softens, just like a “tough as nails” old Vermonter getting to hold that first grandchild.
The dominant image of the prophetic utterances moves from the earth under divine judgment to a gathering of the faithful, singing of their faith at the top of their voices. The people are called to sing of a faith that shall endure the world’s hardships and foresee the future as God brings about a reign of justice and peace, not just for some or a chosen few, but for all peoples of the world.
At first glance, you might be skeptical: what good does this call to song really do? The world is no less fractured as it was in the day of Zephaniah’s prophetic work. One of the college students taking the comparative religions course I helped instruct this fall noted the disparity. At the final class session this past week, the question was asked: After learning of various religious traditions this semester (beliefs, rituals, theological reflection on contemporary issues), what questions do you still have? The student earnestly shared, “Each week, people go to religious places of worship, yet the headlines really never change.” He noted wars, disasters, economic and social disparities still abound. I appreciate the student’s observations. It can seem a bit impossible. The bright visions of a better world seem a bit detached from reality. What good can a bunch of people at worship really do in this messed up world?
The song of Zephaniah is yet another reflection of how the season of Advent helps us live in the “now” and the “now yet”. The Advent texts tell of people living faithfully in times of great challenge, not as those who believe in some sort of wishy-washy “pie in the sky” but rather as those who know you have got to keep your eye on the prize. To sing Zephaniah’s song, you do not find the imagery of a life lived in pursuit of the afterlife. Instead, this song imagines a different take on the world, where the nations shall be gathered together, where all persons will be given dignity, where the lost shall be found.
Such a song, invoked in the midst of the praise of God, maps out a different way of looking at the world. We hear the disparities of a people who claim to be the chosen, the exceptional, yet they kept some folks invisible or at the margins. Zephaniah is the counter witness to the official script of the day: the nation was getting a little stronger under Josiah, regaining some international alliances, making a few strides toward new economic stability, yet some folks were kept second class citizens. The vision of the prophets (major or minor) imagines a people not separated by status or privilege. (A people holy and devout do not leave anyone out.)
Reading the full text of Zephaniah, you experience the full and necessary indictment of a society that tried its best to be the city set on a hill yet never gave full account for its misdeeds and myopias. Yet, and I love that word “yet”, as it seems to be the necessary word for describing the prophets: The people have sinned mightily against God, yet God shall bring about a different End, one of love, justice, and peace. Accordingly, Zephaniah moves from indignant to tender in his prophecies. The last section claims you can indeed sing a different tune and become the beloved community of God. This song of Zephaniah presents where God will bring all things in the end, and singing this song inspires you to be part of the effort to bring the world more into line closer to what God intends.
A few months ago, Baptists from around the world gathered for the 400th anniversary celebration of the first “Baptist” congregation forming in Amsterdam in 1609. The service ended with the gathered people singing “We Are Marching in the Light of God”. The song is also known as “Siyahamba”, reflecting the song’s origins in South Africa. Originally, the song arose among Christians living in the long entrenched apartheid era. The tune is quite easy to pick up, the words easy to remember. Getting a few hundred Baptists singing it at the end of a celebratory worship service, well, that church was rocking. Better said, when the rest of the world joins in the song, even us relatively staid U.S. Baptists, who have mixed feelings about even clapping in church, find ourselves dancing.
The song “Siyahamba/We Are Marching in the Light of God” is not just “idle words” set to a catchy tune. The song mirrors the faith of a people who look to God for their strength and encouragement. For people living under an oppressive government, dealing with hunger, poverty, and other forms of blatant disregard for people based on the color of their skin, this song pointed to a path through this world. Michael Hawn, a leading proponent of sacred global music, notes the power of this hymn, “Singing "Siyahamba" says that liturgy is not hermetically sealed from daily life, but is a place to mend the wounds of oppression, and to receive a blessing to return to the streets in hope for freedom.” (C. Michael Hawn, http://www.yale.edu/ism/colloq_journal/vol2/hawn4.html ) Not only for Sunday, this song provided a vision for the lives of people working to change a society.
The band came to a stop, as the BWA president came to the pulpit to give the benediction. The crowd at the Baptist World Alliance meetings could not stop singing. The president smiled and just waved his hand, conducting the crowd as we sang the song one more time.
I thought back to that summer day in Amsterdam as I read Zephaniah. The BWA singing together reminded me of the prophet’s vision of the nations of the world being gathered together, with no partiality given, gathered to sing of God’s just future coming about. Siyahamba brought the people to worship and prepared them to return home to places where difficulties abound. I stood alongside persons who would return to countries where poverty abounds and clean water is in short supply, where human trafficking (the 21st century version of slavery) is a critical problem, where the world’s resources are scarce because the West, particularly this country, over consumes. These folks sang “We Are Marching in the Light of God” with the same conviction as those who composed it while living in difficult times. Admittedly, I have sang “We Are Marching in the Light of God” at a few church services and ecumenical gatherings over the years, but this is the first time I felt the words and the tune work down into my soul.
What did that song say to me? How does a Baptist serving in Vermont, serving in a country of veritable privilege, feel able to join in that song? I sang with conviction, as I thought of where we are going as a congregation seeking the missional pathway. We are moving into God’s future, admittedly knowing the next leg of our journey will look decidedly less like where we have been before. We are making some bold “next steps” in our journey, moving our building into missional service, providing needed services to those in our community who need help, advocacy, and access to services, and becoming a people willing to be “hands on” with the missional service needs right here in our own community.
In response to the student’s pondering whether or not worshipping people can make a difference in the world, I would say we are becoming the best answer to that question, as First Baptist is investing its energies in discipleship far beyond just what happens on a Sunday morning. We are learning to sing a new song that harkens back to the prophets of God, who saw the dysfunctional present yet could foresee the bright future God alone holds for the world.
]]>Often, the nativity set features the Magi, traditionally three kings wearing turbans and bathrobes and carrying gift boxes. (Of course, most kids don’t get gold. They would settle for Wii gaming consoles. And if you think they dislike socks and sweaters, just look at their faces when they open the myrrh.) Oddly enough, while we add the shepherds and the Magi, nativity sets forget to add some important folks: the prophets.
Read the gospels, and the texts cite the prophetic writings regularly. In fact, the book of Isaiah is sometimes called the “fifth” gospel as Jesus and the gospel writers alike connect Jesus’ ministry with the prophetic word. Christian interpretation has claimed Jesus’ birth, his messianic identity, his humble servanthood, and his suffering for our redemption, referencing the prophetic texts. So, if there are any “extra” guests at the Nativity, why not the prophets? They are the ones who proclaim the One who is to come. Christians confess the messiah to be Jesus of Nazareth, and especially recall prophetic texts at times like Christmas and Easter as we celebrate Christ’s birth, death, and resurrection.
In seminary, our studies of the “Old Testament”, or Hebrew Scriptures, were given over the course of two semesters. Half of the “502” course explored the prophets, and students sometimes grumbled at the requirement to spend half a semester just on the prophets. Why spend so much time on these texts?
For starters, if you wish to understand the Bible, you have to spend time with the prophets, whose writings comprise a significant portion of the Bible. The God of the Old Testament is not the angry caricature sometimes perpetuated in some popular Christian thought (i.e. the God of the Old Testament was angry and the New Testament speaks of a God of love). Including the messianic hope, the prophetic books interweave that hope with commentary on the relationship between God and God’s people, the challenge of a broken world and the hope the prophets see God providing even in the most difficult of circumstances. The prophets are passionate, declaring God’s decisive word and radical vision for a people gone astray but forever beloved.
For example, take the prophet Malachi. Look the book of the Bible up on a biblical history timeline, and you’ll find the prophetic book is thought to be written seventy years after a very traumatic period in ancient Israel’s history. Seventy years prior, the people returned to Jerusalem after a long exile, captive by the Babylonian empire. The city was in ruins, the religious and political power built up during the years of monarchies gone. The book of Isaiah begins the story of a people trying to get back on their feet. The book of Malachi is further down this timeline, when the people have gotten a chance to rebuild, to find a fresh start. And where do we find the people of ancient Israel two generations later after the veritable miracle and grace of being allowed to return home after years away in the Exile?
Still in need of being saved from themselves!
By the era of Malachi, the nation is under the control of the Persian Empire, considered at best a backwater imperial holding, of little consequence. The city has been rebuilt, yet the people themselves are in bad shape. The prophet Malachi moves among a people who have lost their way yet again, falling back into the same self-destructive ways, going down pathways seemingly attractive. The economic and the religious life of the people crumbled away. Despite being given a second chance, the people have lost their way yet again.
The prophet Malachi rails against the people’s failings, yet do you hear the great hope offered by the prophet? The prophets are often remembered for their sharp words of criticism and indictment against the sin of the people, yet such texts as the Malachi reading need to be recalled as the counter-balance. In the beginning and the end, God never gives up. The prophets speak of the anger of God, the disappointment God has in our failings, and the accountability to which God holds us. The imagery of Malachi 3 is one of incredible splendor. God shall work and rework this sinful, broken people until they shine like refined gold or silver.
The prophetic tradition sees each and every person as worth God’s tenaciously hanging onto, the God who shall working tirelessly to redeem, restore, and reconcile. The incredible word of this recurs throughout the prophetic texts, envisioning with the prophetic imagination, the future that only God can bring. Human history is cluttered with many failed attempts by nations, ideologies, and worldviews that claimed to be that next great vision that would bring about a world deemed “better”. In the prophetic tradition of the Bible, God alone has the last word, not the kings, the empires, or the leading conventional wisdom of the day. In the end, God shall redeem, restore, and reconcile.
In the gospels, John the Baptist is traditionally hailed as “the last of the prophets”, connecting John with these prophetic writers and claiming that his short ministry and death bring to an end, or a culmination, the long standing prophetic line. Just as Malachi and the others, John the Baptist stands in the midst of a society and culture that has lost its way. He preaches a baptism rooted in repentance, calling the people away from the world’s vanities and temptations. His gruff demeanor and dress underscore how at odds with the world this prophet intends to be. Luke’s gospel begins the third chapter with a description of the rulers of the day, noting who could be counted among the powerful and influential. Then, we hear John’s voice, perhaps a bit hoarse from his shouting to the crowds, cutting through the narration with his prophetic word. Luke cites this odd figure as fulfillment of the hope found in the prophetic words of Isaiah: a man who looks like he has left his fashion sense and probably most other senses behind when he went out into the desert to begin his contrary ministry, preaching of the excesses of the Temple and the people, claiming authority that few would believe he had.
Earlier this morning, the choir sang a hymn recalling John’s prophetic ministry. The hymn text, written by 20th century hymnist Carl Daw, is powerful:
“Wild and lone the prophet’s voice echoes through the desert still,
calling us to make a choice, bidding us to do God’s will.
So we dare to journey on, led by faith through ways untrod,
Till we come at last like John – to behold the Lamb of God.”
So, back to the fireplace mantle, where the shepherds, the angel of the Lord, the kings, the animals, and even Mary and Joseph gather around this little wailing child, a newborn in a corn crib, born so lowly yet as Christians confess, is very God of very God. I wonder if we should start adding a figure to the nativity set, one of a prophet. Perhaps John the Baptist would suffice. He probably would be the one character a bit sheepish to be getting so much attention. (The sheep would be sheepish, no matter what they thought of being there with the shepherds.) I imagine old John perhaps peering around the corner of the stable, that glint in his eyes perhaps softened a bit in the way old “hard as nails” men tend to be when seeing a newborn child. He stands there, trying not to draw much attention to himself, yet he points one long, bony finger to the Christ child.
Indeed, the prophet would be just as welcome in the midst of this manger scene. Kings seek him, humble shepherds proclaim him, and the prophet adds to the joyful proclamation,
Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low,
and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth;
and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.
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