Where are you going? Why are you going there?

Last Wednesday, Athabasca’s mayor, Colleen Powell, uttered these two questions as part of her monthly town talk live interview on Facebook.  Now that the radio station has no local voice, and no way to do live community broadcasts, the newspaper has turned to providing Her Worship with a similar platform.  You can message her or watch her in the comfort of your own home.  Mayor Powell has adapted, the Advocate has adapted, and we have adapted too.  But some questions stay the same.

Where are you going? Why are you going there?

Where are you going, Moses?  He thought he was going to the Promised Land.  But he wasn’t.  God showed him where the people would eventually end up, but Moses would not be the one to lead the people home.

That seems like a very cruel fate, almost like God is playing cat and mouse with Moses.  If Moses was so great and so wonderful, why didn’t he, full of vigor and keen eyesight, get to enter the Promised Land? In chapter 32, Yahweh said that both Moses and Aaron ‘both broke faith in the presence of the Israelites and did not uphold God among the Israelites.”  The ancient Hebrew language uses stronger language than this translation, words like ‘acted treacherously’ and ‘did not sanctify God’ in front of the people.  Pretty stark accusations.

In other words, God accused Moses of waffling, of not keeping faith, of failing in his leadership.

Which makes me wonder – if Moses, the paragon, the most courageous leader ever experienced by the Hebrew people, wasn’t able to keep the faith, what chance do normal humans have to be leaders?

Except there was one leader that was greater than Moses.  One who had gone through similar trials, according to the gospel of Matthew.  As an infant, this leader’s life was threatened by a scary king, just like Moses in the bulrushes.  This leader lived in Egypt as a child.  Lived in the wilderness, where there was little food to eat or water to drink, alright, it was 40 days, not 40 years, but still that was a parallel.  A leader that Matthew said would often go up to the top of mountains to have powerful experiences of God.  Who would come down from the mountains and have new powerful teachings to share with his followers.  Who dueled and competed with those who sought to challenge his power just as Moses had dueled with the priests of Pharaoh.  And just like Moses, when he competed with them, his answers were so profound, so deep, so committed to God that his opponents were left speechless.

This new Moses talked of a new kind of law, written not on stone tablets, but on the hearts and minds of followers, who talked about living a sacrificial life.  He was guided by the signposts of love of God and love of neighbor.  This new Moses was unwavering in his commitment to God and to the message of a new community of faith where anyone could have a relationship with God as intimate as the relationship people had with their own parents.  He was so committed to God and to the message God had sent him with, that he was even prepared to die as a witness to that message.  That commitment was unshaken by state-sanctioned torture and execution.

And unlike Moses, his death wasn’t the end of the story.  However we interpret Easter, the truth is that at a profound level, Jesus’ message was not stopped by his death, nor were his followers intimidated into silence by his execution.  Instead, they became emboldened to spread his message near and far, and it continues to inspire and motivate change and growth. 

Jesus is still radical today when his teachings call for people to be treated equally no matter where they are born or what language they speak.  Jesus is still challenging us when his parables point to guaranteed incomes.  Jesus still inspires us today when he showed love and care towards people like tax collectors, lepers, Samaritans and more. 

Moses knew the answers to the two questions Mayor Powell asked in her interview this week.  He knew where he was going.  To the Promised Land.  He knew why he was going there, because it was a land where the people of Israel could live free.  But he didn’t know what Jesus knew, that the Greatest Command, Love God, and the one similar, love your neighbor was the answer to the third question he didn’t know the answer to.  The answer of how will you get there?

There are many debates on how to do something.  We’ve seen that recently with the leaked report on the new Social Studies curriculum for primary school children.  We’ve seen that with the plans to remove Chain Lakes and other parks from protective legislature.  We’ve seen that with the angry debates and name calling around wearing masks.  We’ve seen that with the confrontation between first nations and lobster fishermen in Nova Scotia.  We’ve seen that with campaigns such as Black Lives Matter and Me Too.  We’ve seen that when United Church ministers across Canada are ridiculed for their political commentary on issues of universal healthcare, living wages, accessible childcare, environmental issues and more.  We’ve seem that when we hear stories such as Rev. Paul Walfall who has preached in this very building tell us that he’s tired of being followed around by security guards every time he goes to Walmart because he happens to be shopping while black.

Where are we going?  We are going towards a community of God that protects the vulnerable and respects all people regardless of race, religion, gender, sexual identity, language, country of origin, ability and more.  Why are we going there? Because until we all are free, none of us are truly free, and because God calls us to that journey of freedom.  How are we going?  With a reminder that unless we do everything through the lens of Loving God and Loving our neighbor, we labor in vain.

A wiser United Church minister than me summed it up like this “While Christianity is inherently political; it is a politics from above marked by the persuasive power of love, not the politics of below which is marked by the coercive power of the state.”  Now more than ever we are called to exercise love and resist coercion in whatever form we find it.  Love of God, Love of neighbor in everything we do.  May God bless us as we discern how to do so in these changing times.  Amen

Looking for Loopholes

 

Do you ever wonder how other people seem to have an unshakable faith?  How they seem to have all the answers? How they know with certainty what we wish we could believe in with such certainty too? 

I know I have moments where I wonder if there’s a God and what kind of God there is.  Why the world is the way it is, especially right now, and where is God in the midst of all these changes.

So it’s really refreshing to hear today’s scripture about Moses.  How he had experienced a burning bush and that wasn’t enough to make him sure and certain.  How he had gone back to Egypt despite his fears and certainties and was allowed to talk to the very Pharaoh himself and that wasn’t enough to erase his doubts.  How he had been reunited with his birth family and that wasn’t enough.  How he parted the reed sea and that wasn’t enough.  How his people were fed in the desert and found water in the rocks and that still wasn’t enough.  How he had clouds leading by day and fire by night and that still wasn’t enough.  How he was given a constitution for his community and even that wasn’t enough.  Somehow it seems like maybe he was looking for a loophole.  Looking for an excuse that would weasel him out from having to do the hard work of leading the people.  Of having these difficult conversations on the tops of mountains where he was maybe half-afraid of what God would ask him to do next.  Or maybe he was looking for a guarantee that the difficult things were behind him and with God in his pocket, the future was going to be nothing but sunshine and roses.

The scribes and Pharisees were also looking for loopholes, a way to get rid of Jesus, and a way to duck out of taxes.  Paying the government with money carved with the image of a man and words on the coins declaring that man a God contravened the second commandment about graven images.  Looking for a loophole that meant they could disregard Jesus or discredit him in front of the people he was teaching.

We look for loopholes in our lives too, look for ways to duck taxes or avoid changing our behaviors.  When I hear of people suing schools and restaurants over masks without a doctor’s letter, or wandering around in grocery stores defying the signs clearly posted, or when I listen to store clerks frustrated with customers coming in deliberately putting the clerks in uncomfortable positions, I wonder why they are so determined to look for loopholes.

When it comes to loopholes, Christianity doesn’t make it easy. We are to engage in the present circumstances with an eye to the future, what Jesus called the Kingdom of Heaven, something we work towards while living in the now in all its uncertainty.  On one hand, we pay taxes.  On the other hand we keep vigilance for abusive uses of those same taxes.  We are called to both obey and challenge.  Pay to the Emperor what is the Emperor’s and pay to God what is God’s.  Be clear that the Emperor is not God and be clear on our own loyalties.

We are living in a time when many people don’t think about God.  They may not have a connection with God.  They may have bought the idea that they are God and expect to be treated as such.  No regulations or rules for them!  They are not interested in community or what is best for their neighbors or even their family.  They are interested only in making a comfortable life.  This time in history has profoundly shaken up that ideology. 

We may not be able to change them, but we can look at ourselves.  Like Moses, we can take time to ask God some tough questions.  Where are you God?  How do we know you are with us?  How do we know you will be kind to us?  How do we know you are leading us?  We may need to prepare ourselves to hear some tough questions back.  Are we putting God first in our lives?  What does that look like?  How does that impact what we do and how we do it?  Are we paying taxes to our community in appropriate ways or are we looking for loopholes to dodge our responsibilities to the land we live in?  What belongs to God and what do we need to do to pay it back? 

Thinking about putting God first in my life was a big part of my sabbatical this summer. I spent a lot of time reading and praying about leadership and about this community of faith.  One of the practices I added was a daily moment of self-reflection modelled on Ignatius of Loyola.  He recommended we take some time each day asking ourselves if we have given to God that which is God’s, where we have looked for loopholes and where we have seen God’s face.  Like Moses, we mere humans can’t see more than God’s back side, but if we pay attention, we will see God at work in our lives.  Give it a try this week.  Last thing at night or first thing in the morning, ask for God’s help to understand and appreciate the day.  Look for things to be grateful for.  Review the feelings you had.  Choose one of those feelings (positive or negative) and talk to God about it.  Look toward to the new day and ask that God be with you.  We can use these as prayers or journal prompts.  The practice has brought me a sense of peace and hope that has renewed my commitment to you and to God.  It might not be as dramatic as what Moses experienced on the top of the mountain, but in these difficult times it has certainly helped me remember to give to God that which is God’s, my daily living.  It’s comforting to know that God is with us, nudging us along, and quietly growing and supporting us so that one day we may be able to see God face to face like Moses did.  In life, in death, in life beyond death, God is with us, we are not alone!

No bull for me!

 

Ever wonder if God looks down on us and tears out God’s hair in frustration over the antics of beloved humanity? Ever wonder if God is trying to figure out why we mess up and miss the point so often?

We’re supposed to be stewards of the earth but instead we’re users and abusers.  We’re supposed to be taking care of the weak and the powerless but we’re more concerned about seeming weak and powerless.  We’re supposed to be building community but instead we have lost the ability to come together and listen to each other.  We’re supposed to be cultivating values and yet we admire and elect people who are ruthless egotists.  We’re supposed to co-operate with each other and yet we can’t seem to have civil conversations about important matters without resorting to name calling and insults. 

One pundit asked a pertinent question this week:  “is our very culture in North America going through burn-out?”  I think they might be on to something.  Burn out is, according to Psychology today, “a state of emotional, mental, and often physical exhaustion brought on by prolonged or repeated stress. Symptoms include cynicism, depression, and lethargy that most often occur when a person is not in control of how a job is carried out, at work or at home, or is asked to complete tasks that conflict with their sense of self.” This is made worse if people feel like they have no support or help or hope.

I wonder if that’s what was happening with the people waiting for Moses.  40 days and 40 nights is a number that is often used in the Bible to indicate an important length of time.  Noah endured 40 days and nights of rain falling.  Joseph was mourned for 40 days and nights by all the people of Egypt.  Job had 40 days to get the Ninevites to change their behaviours. Jesus spent 40 days and nights fasting in the desert and 40 days after the resurrection before leaving the Apostles again.  So this is a long time both literally and symbolically. 

The people felt abandoned without their leaders.  They were in a state of not knowing what would happen next.  Our translation says that the people turned to Aaron, brother of Moses, looking for leadership, but a more accurate translation might be ‘turned on’ or even ‘turned against’.  Talk about cynicism and depression!  Their culture was at a crossroads.  It doesn’t help that Moses came down with 10 commandments that they were supposed to obey and then went into a pile of details and amendments and blueprints of how to follow those commandments that were far more detailed. Then he disappeared up the mountain, leaving Aaron and the people to struggle with how to make this new constitution work in real life.  Not easy work.  No wonder the people turned!

They didn’t lose Moses, they lost their connection to the Divine, they lost their connection to a future vision, they lost their connection to hope.  They wanted to see and hear and touch and own the connection to the holiness they craved.  They knew they needed to be thankful but they didn’t know how.  So they broke the very first commandment they had been given and once they did that, the other commandments also fell by the wayside.  They partied hard.  They acted the way other cultures acted, they worshipped in the ways other religions worshipped.  And God, wanting a different vision, craving a different relationship, hoping for a different outcome, in this story anyways, reacted with anger and disappointment.

Jesus too was disappointed.  He healed 10 untouchables who had lived with social distancing practices for most of their lives and only one person figured it out.  10% rate is pretty abysmal, and what made it worse, the people he thought would get it, would understand the significance of the healing, his fellow religious community, totally missed the point.  Only the foreigner understood.  Only the foreigner turned back.  Only the foreigner figured it out.

It would be as if an Egyptian charioteer showed up in the middle of the wilderness and said, oh, this is amazing, I love the 10 commandments, I love the ambiguity of not knowing where we’re going, and I love the idea of no longer depending on Pharaoh and the gods of my childhood.  Wouldn’t that have surprised Aaron and the Israelites!

Who are the Samaritans in Athabasca who get it?  Who know the source of their healing and are grateful?  Who can we be learning from that will surprise us? 

I have been working, again it seems, on the homeless situation in our town.  A few weeks ago, Roy Jacobs died at the skatepark down by the riverfront, and a concerned group of citizens are working to help support a mat program for the winter.  The banks are involved as their lobbies were used as warming centres last year.  We even have the mental health professionals involved.  But we don’t have the homeless at the table.  The leper that came back to Jesus to say thank you was told that his faith had made him well.  When we put ourselves in the place of God or Jesus, trying to fix and heal others, we are tempted into building a Golden Calf to our own talents and skills.  Instead, we need to remember that it’s not about us fixing, or saving or advising or correcting others.  That’s what the residential schools really were about.  Us assuming that we have the answers and can heal the problems of the world.  We jump to quick conclusions and judgements and can burn out in our need to solve other people’s problems.  We can become cynical and angry.  Instead, let us turn to the one who is the source of all healing, and turn with openness and curiosity to those around us who are suffering the isolation of modern forms of leprosy.  Let us listen to them as Jesus listened to the foreigner.  It will be by that kind of empowerment of our neighbors that healing, real lasting healing will come about.  And that will be something we can truly be very thankful for!

What kind of God are you?

 Thou Shalt Not!  Don’t you dare! Don’t even think about it!

When I hear the ten commandments, my first response is a little nervous, I have to confess.  I don’t remember watching Charlton Heston as Moses but there were enough illustrated bibles in every waiting room when I was a child that the intimidating image of the old man carrying stone tablets down the mountain in time to see the Israelites partying hard around the Golden Calf left an indelible image in my mind. 

It has left many with an indelible image of an angry judgmental God throwing laws at us like the bad guys shooting at Tom Cruise Mission Impossible climax, determined to get a bead on us and take us down, squishing us like the worms we are.

So not a healthy theology, or a helpful image, is it?  And yet many folks still wrestle with that as their primary image of God.  Especially folks who may never have engaged with church as an adult other than weddings and funerals.  They don’t know any different, they may not understand what is good about God or our supposed Good News.  Especially when our Gospel reading today (Gospel means good news, by the way) is such a violent, bloodthirsty story of people working in a vineyard they do not own, enjoying the local improvements the landowner has done to the farm, and resenting the requests the landowner makes.

Some days it is easy to slip into resentment.  Whether it’s against Moses and those inflexible laws carved into stone, or paying taxes or rent, and especially now with restrictions and rumors flying around, when even so-called civilized leaders calling people they disagree with clowns, or refusing to let other people take turns in conversations or debates, resentment seems rampant.

Rebellion is in the air, and we can’t even walk into a grocery store in town without seeing people rebelling against the new rules.  Even I have gone the wrong way down an aisle at Buylow on occasion.

Other people like to have rules chiseled in stone.  They like the feeling of security and predictability from knowing what will happen every day or at every event.  It’s the unpredictable that is upsetting and discomforting.  They like the certainty of something that will not change ever.

Neither is helpful when you are wandering around in a time of upheaval that is demanding new responses to the way the world is.  When we have to adapt to too much change too fast, we can respond in many different ways.

We can be caught up in denial.  It’s just a conspiracy by big Pharma or government corporations or some ethnic group or another that has developed an elaborate plot to control the world.  Nothing is trustworthy except my opinion and the opinion of my friends who think the same way.  Facts and figures are not real, all that is real is that I alone have the inside knowledge and the smarts to understand what is really going on.  It’s about no one being able to tell me what to do.  And that I don’t need to have a shred of empathy for anyone but myself.  I can interrupt anyone I want, I can talk over anyone I want, I don’t have to listen to anyone and I don’t need to change a single thing that I’m doing because I know I’m right and everyone else is not worthy of respect.

When we put ourselves at the centre of our belief systems, when we decide that we are the only ones who have the right to etch things in stone, we put ourselves ahead of God.  That is dangerous, and we are seeing that in the debates to the south of us.  When we do not have empathy for anyone but our own lives, we can become like the tenants, sure that they can get away with whatever they want, even murder.  When we rebel against community guidelines, we end up destroying community and destroying communication.  We destroy the opportunity to listen and to learn.

The 10 commandments were not perfect.  They were patriarchal and lumped women in with possessions except the part about honoring both mother and father.  They were very simple and straightforward, about not taking what we don’t own, and having empathy for our neighbors.  They were written for a people in chaos who had lost the structure and authority of overseers and didn’t know how to live in community.  In the wilderness there were no police officers, no rules, no expectations, no whips, no jails, no state executions, no structure.  History shows us that when an enslaved country becomes freed of an oppressor, they look for ways to enslave others.  George Orwell’s Animal Farm told that chilling tale, based on what was happening in Russia after the Tsar was deposed.  The Statue of Liberty was inspired because Charles-Louis Napoléon Bonaparte loved being the President of France so much that rather than allowing a peaceful transition of power to a new president, he declared himself as Emperor Napoleon the Third, and turned his back on democracy.  The French rejected that loss of democracy and built a statue to remind them not to lose it again.

God didn’t want the Israelites to become another Egypt.  God wanted a people that would remember their time as slaves and empathise with others who were enslaved.  God wanted people who would be compassionate and not driven by envy or jealousy.  The 10
commandments were God’s attempt to reshape the people into a caring community who would celebrate freedom and love.

We are called today, more than ever, to hear God’s call to be reshaped in a time of great fear, anxiety, resistance, denial and anger.  To remember that we live in a beautiful vineyard and are asked to respect that vineyard, take care of it, and live with respect in creation with our friends and neighbors who also are worthy of freedom and empathy.  Love God and love our neighbors is the call to freedom that God sends each and everyone of us.  Thanks be to God for that freedom, which is truly Good News!

What are you thirsty for?

I got a phone call Wednesday from an organization that works for the United Church and provides support for ministry personnel.  The nice gentleman on the other end of the line asked me how I was doing, and I said ‘a little stressed, wish the Covid would go away.’ He then proceeded to send me four e-mails, one on managing my weight, one on parenting my kids through school, one on stress, and one on a new app that would help me with whatever I was struggling with.

The new app turned out to be a series of links to Ted Talks and breathing exercises.  Nothing I couldn’t have found for myself.  Every celebrity has their YouTube channel and you can listen to advice from psychologists and psychotherapists on topics from how to have better boundaries to how to deal with a bully at work.

There is a lot of information, advice, data, research and study available that we never had before.  There are con artists and false news fearmongers on it as well.  Just like real life, we have always had good leaders and crime bosses in every time, even when Jesus was alive.  The temple authorities have watched Jesus come into town on a donkey, with cheering crowds making a huge fuss over him, then he came into the Temple itself.  The first day he showed up, Jesus disrupted the economic system by having a temper tantrum and throwing furniture around instead of being respectful and humble and awed by the sanctified building he stood in.  So of course, they would go up to him and ask him who he thought he was, and what gave him the right to do what he did?

They were not looking for information, for a diploma, or a certificate.  They were looking for sheepishness, embarrassment, possibly an apology, and preferably a quick departure.  

What they got was not any of what they wanted or said they wanted, instead they got authority.  That must have really shocked them.  Sadly it was not convincing enough for they were ultimately the ones who organized the kangaroo court that led to his state execution.

The people wandering in the wilderness struggled to survive in a new land; they were city slickers living in tents and cooking on open fires instead of cozy homes that they had abandoned to follow a dream. They were not sure what they were thirsty for.  Some wanted a return to old ways, to job security and a roof over their heads, decent food and access to clean drinking water on a regular basis.  To some authority that would tell them what to do and where to be every single day of their lives.  They thirsted for certainty, security and predictability.

Some wanted constant reassurance that they were doing the right thing, sticking it out in the desert, gathering their manna and quail each day, scrounging for wood for their fires, learning how to sew tents, getting used to a new reality where they were on the move every day, keeping a watch on the kids so they stayed away from snakes and scorpions, and taking care of their elders.

Some thirsted for the promised land that they had never seen, and only knew from stories of their great great grandparents, Abraham, Sarah, Jacob, Rachel and Leah, Joseph and his many brothers.  The land of milk and honey, a place of freedom to raise their families without the threat of infanticide and genocide, a place where they could farm or tend herds instead of making clay bricks for the Pharaoh’s pyramids.

Some wanted a new life right away and got angry at Moses for not providing it upon demand.  They wanted to feel strong so that they would never again have to endure the violence of slavery.  They didn’t realize that they were in danger of becoming as violent as their oppressors in their need for order.

And then there were the leaders, Moses, his brother Aaron and his sister Myriam, struggling to lead, feeling attacked and threatened, wondering if they were leading the people in circles, wondering what God was doing and why the people couldn’t simply be happy to be free!

Moses wanted to complain but God wanted him to remember the authority that he had.  The staff was a reminder of all the things Moses had done in front of the Pharaoh to free his people.  It was the tool God used to help Moses understand that he had the power to liberate, to challenge the authoritarian regime in Egypt.  A simple stick such as anyone might use for a walk in the bush or to lean on while looking after herds of sheep.  No fancy carvings, no gold decorations or embedded jewels like the Pharaoh and his ornate shepherd’s crook that would never be practical for working with a stubborn flock.

A simple and useful stick that reminded Moses of who he worked for and how he had been called.  The stick that had somehow been transformed in the presence of the burning bush into a symbol of God’s liberating power.  The stick that reminded him of the authority he had and who he was accountable to!

What are you thirsty for? Who do you give authority to?  Many today are following authoritarians who promise safety and freedom from dangerous foes, falling for stories of danger and conspiracy.  Many listen to the loudest voices and the angriest leaders to find the security they long for.  

We as followers of Jesus are called to follow the voice of love that provides living waters in the midst of the desert of fear, common sense amidst the chaos, the still small voice that we need to hear when we thirst for hope.  The voice of freedom and justice for all, the voice of authority rather than the voice of authoritarianism, the voice of sense and compassion that leads us to a promised land more beautiful than we can possibly imagine.  May we find that voice in our journey through our wilderness time.  Amen.