ReMember: God Remembers

The Lord saw that humanity had become thoroughly evil on the earth and that every idea their minds thought up was always completely evil. The Lord regretted making human beings on the earth, and he was heartbroken. So the Lord said, “I will wipe off of the land the human race that I’ve created: from human beings to livestock to the crawling things to the birds in the skies, because I regret I ever made them.” But as for Noah, the Lord approved of him.

These are Noah’s descendants. In his generation, Noah was a moral and exemplary man; he walked with God. Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. In God’s sight, the earth had become corrupt and was filled with violence. God saw that the earth was corrupt, because all creatures behaved corruptly on the earth.

God said to Noah, “The end has come for all creatures, since they have filled the earth with violence. I am now about to destroy them along with the earth, so make a wooden ark. Make the ark with nesting places and cover it inside and out with tar. This is how you should make it: four hundred fifty feet long, seventy-five feet wide, and forty-five feet high. Make a roof for the ark and complete it one foot from the top. Put a door in its side. In the hold below, make the second and third decks.

“I am now bringing the floodwaters over the earth to destroy everything under the sky that breathes. Everything on earth is about to take its last breath. But I will set up my covenant with you. You will go into the ark together with your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives. From all living things—from all creatures—you are to bring a pair, male and female, into the ark with you to keep them alive. From each kind of bird, from each kind of livestock, and from each kind of everything that crawls on the ground—a pair from each will go in with you to stay alive. Take some from every kind of food and stow it as food for you and for the animals.”

Noah did everything exactly as God commanded him.

After forty days, Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made. He sent out a raven, and it flew back and forth until the waters over the entire earth had dried up. Then he sent out a dove to see if the waters on all of the fertile land had subsided, but the dove found no place to set its foot. It returned to him in the ark since waters still covered the entire earth. Noah stretched out his hand, took it, and brought it back into the ark. He waited seven more days and sent the dove out from the ark again. The dove came back to him in the evening, grasping a torn olive leaf in its beak. Then Noah knew that the waters were subsiding from the earth. He waited seven more days and sent out the dove, but it didn’t come back to him again.

God said to Noah and to his sons with him, “I am now setting up my covenant with you, with your descendants, and with every living being with you—with the birds, with the large animals, and with all the animals of the earth, leaving the ark with you. I will set up my covenant with you so that never again will all life be cut off by floodwaters. There will never again be a flood to destroy the earth.”

God said, “This is the symbol of the covenant that I am drawing up between me and you and every living thing with you, on behalf of every future generation. I have placed my bow in the clouds; it will be the symbol of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow appears in the clouds, I will remember the covenant between me and you and every living being among all the creatures. Floodwaters will never again destroy all creatures. The bow will be in the clouds, and upon seeing it I will remember the enduring covenant between God and every living being of all the earth’s creatures.” God said to Noah, “This is the symbol of the covenant that I have set up between me and all creatures on earth.” --Genesis 6:5-22, 8:6-12, 9:8-17 (CEB)

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God, our Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer. Amen.

Holy moly! Isn’t it a little crazy that so many people - some of us likely included - have decided that the events of Noah and the flood are appropriate with which to decorate nurseries. Seriously. This story is terrifying.

Welcome to the beginning of the lectionary year. In the Narrative Lectionary, it is customary that on the first Sunday of the lectionary year, we hear a story from what is called the primordial history. This primordial (or primeval) history consists of the first eleven chapters of Genesis. These are the mythic stories of faith - stories that speak to us in universal truths. They describe not only how things came to be for us as people of faith, but why things are the way they are. 

Usually, we begin with one of the two creation stories in Genesis 1 or 2. But, once every four years, we hear this story. Of God. Of God’s regret. And, then, of Noah and the flood. In some respects it’s a story of creation. But, really, it's more a story of un-creating than it is creating. Do you notice, especially, when we hear the language describing the creatures as they are loaded onto Noah’s ark - the language and its cadence - that it sounds remarkably similar to many of the lines of Genesis 1? This account of God un-creating the world borrows and echoes words and phrases from the first story. Even the sequence moves backwards from humanity, to land animals, to birds, then to food plants.

But, before we get too far into the story, I want to back up to the very beginning. In its opening lines, we hear the depth of God’s emotion. The heartbreak. And, perhaps most troubling, the regret that God felt at having created humanity. God is grieved “to the heart” and twice “sorry” about having spoken creation into being in the first place. God intended a world that behaved and believed very differently from the one that developed. That God was facing in this story. Perhaps, even, the one that God is facing in our world today.

I don’t know about you, but, as a parent, I get it. There were many times when I just wanted to walk away. Tired and exhausted and dealing with one more challenge with my son, I understand, even in some very minute way, how God was feeling. 

It was an evil place, this time of Noah. Wickedness abounds, both in the imagination of the heart and also in societies these humans have created. God is ready to call it quits. One Jewish theologian to whom I frequently listen put it this way. “Have you ever started a project with all excitement and energy, but then come to a realization that things are a mess. That this is not going to work. And that it's time to just shut it down." That’s where God is, she suggests. Ready to “blot out” every living thing from the face of the earth. The Hebrew word meaning to “rub away” as one might rub ink off old parchment. To un-remember. And simply forget it ever happened. Some theologians have suggested that God’s uncreating in this story is less a kid kicking his sandcastle apart at the beach and more a simple turning away. And without God’s sustaining and creative presence, things fall apart. 

But. That’s how chapter 8 begins. It’s in the word “but” where we hear the good news. “But God remembered Noah and all of the beasts and cattle that were with him in the ark.” God can’t quite go all the way, apparently. As God responded to the disobedience of Eve and Adam in the story in Eden and as we will see time after time in the stories that follow, God’s deadly wrath is overcome by our Creator’s more powerful inclination toward salvation. At the heart of this story, setting every challenging aspect aside for just a moment, is a God who, no matter how grieved and angry, is in love with the universe and its creatures, particularly those of us of the two-legged variety who somehow share that same mysterious image of God.

We’re reminded of this in the words of Isaiah 49, “Can a woman forget her nursing baby, that she should have no compassion on the child of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. Behold, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands.”

God remembers that last good remaining speck of creation and turns again toward it. Notice the movement of God from distant to intimate. From the broader view of humanity to Noah. God sees Noah and moves toward him. To a personal relationship with him.  To save him. God’s remembering of Noah leads to God’s salvation of Noah. And a promise - a covenant - to Noah to never again abandon creation to chaos, but to stay in relationship. To stay in the sustaining relationship with creation that makes life possible. A promise marked by a sign. A rainbow. Not so much to help us remember, but to help God remember. 

It is here, in this primordial story, in this teachable moment for God, that God opts in for the sacrificial, messier, more inefficient, more vulnerable route of real relationship. With Noah. And with you. And with me. And God promises, in Christ, to remember us. Forever and ever.

Amen.

Preached September 11, 2022, at Grace & Glory Lutheran, Prospect/Goshen, KY, with Third Lutheran, Louisville, KY.

14th Sunday after Pentecost

Reading: Genesis 6:5-22, 8:6-12, 9:8-17

Promises Made, Promises Broken: God's House

Over these past many weeks, we have been moving through the Hebrew scriptures under the theme, Promises Made, Promises Broken. We have learned about the great promises that God has made to humanity. And ways in which humankind has made and often broken promises, both to God and to one another. 

This idea of promise - or covenant - is one of the most important themes in the Bible. The covenants in scripture are the background upon which the entire narrative of God and of God’s story of redemption are built. They’re like the backbone of the Bible. 

From Genesis on, God enters into a series of formal, covenanted relationships, one after another, in order to rescue God’s world. Understanding these divine-human relationship stories are central to our understanding who Jesus is. That for us, is pretty important, isn’t it? So, we’re going to remember, for just a few minutes, these key biblical covenants. 

We began the fall at the beginning. Creation. God made this beautiful world and placed humankind in it to care for it and to partner with God to bring more good out of it. But the humans don’t want to partner with God. They rebel and try to create a world on their own terms. It’s this broken partnership that the Bible gives as an explanation for why we’re stuck in a world of corruption and injustice and death. So God selects a small group of people and makes a new partnership with them. God’s purpose is to use this covenant relationship to renew God’s partnership with all humanity.

There are four central covenants in the Hebrew scripture through which God is forming a covenant family into which all the world will be invited. In the first covenant with Noah, God promises him, his family and all living creatures that God will never again destroy earth. No matter how evil it becomes.

In the second covenant with Abraham, God enters into a partnership with him. And promises Abraham a huge family that will inherit a promised piece of land in Canaan. And that through Abraham and his family, all humanity will be blessed. 

The third covenant is with this huge family that eventually became the nation of Israel. God rescued Israel from bondage in Egypt and promised to make them God’s treasured possession. A holy nation. Set apart. And with whom God would personally dwell in their midst and bring into the land originally promised to Abraham. God would be their God. And they would be God’s people - a kingdom of priests that would show God’s goodness and glory to all the nations. 

Today, we come to the fourth covenant. Beginning last week and continuing today, we find that Israel has entered Canaan, the promised land. Eventually, to be like the surrounding nations, they demanded a king. God appointed Saul. Yet, he fails to obey God. And so, God chooses another king for Israel. David. Son of Jesse. From the tribe of Judah. King David becomes a successful leader, overcoming Israel’s enemies. Uniting the tribes. And establishing Jerusalem as the political center of Israel, where he builds his palace - a “house of cedar.” Then, in the chapter before today’s reading, David restores the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. Making it, not only the political center of Israel, but it’s religious center, as well. It is here where our story begins. In 2nd Samuel, chapter 7.  

Now when the king was settled in his house, and the Lord had given him rest from all his enemies around him, the king said to the prophet Nathan, “See now, I am living in a house of cedar, but the ark of God stays in a tent.” Nathan said to the king, “Go, do all that you have in mind; for the Lord is with you.”

But that same night the word of the Lord came to Nathan: Go and tell my servant David: Thus says the Lord: Are you the one to build me a house to live in? I have not lived in a house since the day I brought up the people of Israel from Egypt to this day, but I have been moving about in a tent and a tabernacle. Wherever I have moved about among all the people of Israel, did I ever speak a word with any of the tribal leaders of Israel, whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel, saying, “Why have you not built me a house of cedar?” Now therefore thus you shall say to my servant David: Thus says the Lord of hosts: I took you from the pasture, from following the sheep to be prince over my people Israel; and I have been with you wherever you went, and have cut off all your enemies from before you; and I will make for you a great name, like the name of the great ones of the earth. And I will appoint a place for my people Israel and will plant them, so that they may live in their own place, and be disturbed no more; and evildoers shall afflict them no more, as formerly, from the time that I appointed judges over my people Israel; and I will give you rest from all your enemies. Moreover the Lord declares to you that the Lord will make you a house. When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come forth from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me. When he commits iniquity, I will punish him with a rod such as mortals use, with blows inflicted by human beings. But I will not take my steadfast love from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away from before you. Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me; your throne shall be established forever. In accordance with all these words and with all this vision, Nathan spoke to David. (2 Samuel 7:1-17 NRSV)

One of the first things we notice in this story is that the narrator does not refer to David by name. Instead, he is always called “the king.” This is to underscore that David - and not Saul - is now king. It also underscores his role as the leader of the nation Israel. Yet, when God speaks, beginning in verse 5, God always refers to him as, “my servant, David.” God knows him by name. 

It isn’t long before David gets a grand idea. He has a house to live in. It’s time to build a house for God. Something stable. And permanent. And secure. 

Now it’s not entirely clear here what his motivation is. Was he simply coming from a place of gratitude for all that God had done for him and for Israel? Or maybe this was a way to stay in God’s good graces? Or maybe, just maybe, it was a way for this earthly monarch to attempt to contain the heavenly monarch. To put God in a box. To control God.  

But, whatever David’s motivation is here, it is clear that he does not fully understand the nature of God’s grace. Whatever God has already done for David, God will continue to do more. To make for David a great name. To give him rest from all his enemies. And, for Israel, to plant them so they may live in their own place, secure. Where they will no longer be disturbed or afflicted by evildoers. 

But, the promises don’t stop there. It is in the next verses where God pivots on David's use of the word, “house.” Promising unconditionally to make a new kind of “house” for David. Not a dwelling place of cedar, but a dynasty. And from this dynasty, from this royal line, will come a descendant. A Messiah who will rule God’s kingdom. Forever. And ever. And ever.

As we hear this story, I’m struck by its similarities to the Reformation. One of the main catalysts for action at the time of the Reformation was the desire of the church to build a bigger and better house. It was the selling of indulgences to collect funds for this newer, bigger cathedral that set the Reformation in motion. As if God can be contained in a building. 

The story of King David. The story of the Reformation. All of these are stories of God’s great reversals. God recentering the direction of the action, putting God’s promises once again, front and center. And driving the question, “What is God doing?”

In this year 2020 with all the terrible things that have happened and the chaos that seems to surround us. As we have been pushed beyond the walls of our churches into this virtual place is this perhaps, another of God’s great reversals? God recentering us, once again, to ask the question, “What is God doing?” And, as God is once more being placed at the center, how might our own imaginations be reshaped for how we are, in fact, seeking to live out God’s will in our world today? 

What we do know, though, from the stories we have heard this fall is that God keeps God’s promises. It is this that we, as God’s people, cling to today. God keeps God’s promises. And God will find a way - a surprising new way - to be faithful. And, as with David, to shower us with grace upon grace upon grace. 

And so I end this now, where we began this morning. In Psalm 46.

God is our refuge and strength,

    a very present help in trouble.

Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change,

    though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea;

though its waters roar and foam,

    though the mountains tremble with its tumult.

“Be still, and know that I am God!

    I am exalted among the nations,

    I am exalted in the earth.”

The Lord of hosts is with us;

    the God of Jacob is our refuge. Amen.

Preached October 25, 2020, online at Grace & Glory Lutheran Church, Goshen, KY.

Reformation Sunday

Readings: 2 Samuel 7:1-17; Luke 1:30-33

Rekindling Our Faith, Rekindling Our Imagination - Part 5

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Indeed, by faith our ancestors received approval. By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible.

By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain’s. Through this he received approval as righteous, God himself giving approval to his gifts; he died, but through his faith he still speaks. By faith Enoch was taken so that he did not experience death; and “he was not found, because God had taken him.” For it was attested before he was taken away that “he had pleased God.” And without faith it is impossible to please God, for whoever would approach him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. By faith Noah, warned by God about events as yet unseen, respected the warning and built an ark to save his household; by this he condemned the world and became an heir to the righteousness that is in accordance with faith.

By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to set out for a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; and he set out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he stayed for a time in the land he had been promised, as in a foreign land, living in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God. By faith he received power of procreation, even though he was too old—and Sarah herself was barren—because he considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one person, and this one as good as dead, descendants were born, “as many as the stars of heaven and as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.”

All of these died in faith without having received the promises, but from a distance they saw and greeted them. They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; indeed, he has prepared a city for them.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God. --Hebrews 11:1-16, 12:1-2 (NRSV)


Grace and peace to you from God, our Creator, and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Why do you have faith? Has anyone ever asked you that question? Have you ever asked yourself that question? Why do you have faith?

I mean, come on, after all, it’s not really the “in” thing anymore in our culture, is it? To have faith in God? Sure, people say they believe in God, but do they really? Church attendance is declining. Younger people are moving away from the church. Many churches - both mainline and evangelical - are struggling. Let’s be honest. We struggle, too.

So, why should we have faith? Why should you have faith?

Over these past five weeks, we’ve been immersing ourselves in the letter to the Hebrews. It’s a challenging book in scripture, full of doctrinal statements and rhetorical arguments to back up those statements. It’s a book full of images - trying the spark the imagination and faith of a congregation of mostly Hellenistic Jews. Living abroad, away from Israel. Influenced, particularly, by Greek culture. A culture that, very much like our culture, looked down on faith, viewing it as an inferior form of understanding. “Mere belief” as one Greek philosopher called it. The congregation had lost heart.  Whether it was because of persecution. Or the long wait for Jesus’ promised return. Or just the general fatigue and doubt that any community experiences over time, this congregation had lost heart. The writer assumes that unbelief has become their baseline. And asks the question, “Why should they have faith at all?” 

And in the process of asking that question, the author works to spark their imagination. To rekindle it. To help them remember why they first believed. Why they should continue to believe. Trying to not only rekindle their imagination, but to rekindle their faith. 

So, today, we come to the last of our Hebrews texts. And, likely, the most familiar to you. We often call this the “roll call of saints.” It includes the ancestors of faith whose stories we have likely heard from childhood. The saints who believed when there was no reason to believe. 

Let's take Noah, for example. Noah was called into action before the flood came. He had no weather forecasts to prove the coming rains to anyone. Called to build an ark the length of 1-½ football fields. Imagine if we began to build an ark on our property. What do you think our neighbors would say? Or think? Oh, those Lutherans! There they go again! Yet, Noah believed even when he couldn’t see the future. Even when the world was mocking him. Even when no one else believed. Noah believed. And he took steps to move into the future.

And then there’s Abraham and Sarah. If they’d lived today, they would already have been on Social Security for over 25 years. Both of them, by the time they received the child they had longed for their entire lives. Sarah, barren. Abraham, well our text says he was “good as dead.” Both of them, living into God’s promises. And, then, when they were nearing the age of 100, finally, having the child they had longed for their entire lives. And, then trusting that, from this one son, God would create a people that would number more than the stars in the sky or the grains of sand on the seashore. Were they crazy? Yet, they believed. Even when they couldn’t see the future, God summoned them forward into it. And they had faith. 

Who's on your “roll call of saints”? Who are those ancestors of faith for you - those who believed even when they couldn’t see the future? Who trusted even when they didn’t know what was to come next? Who held onto God’s promise for a future?

Just as your ancestors were called into an unseen future. Into an uncertain future. Unsure of what it would hold. Yet, trusting that God had a future for them. In the same way, throughout the letter to the Hebrews, the writer is calling the community out of despair and into hope. To trust in God’s promises. To have faith.

The Hebrews’ vision of the Christian life is like that of a race. Not a sprint, but a long distance race. More like a cross-country race. A journey of transformation moving toward a communal completion. As we run this race together, as we journey, we are cheered on. Looking up in the stands of the stadium, we see all of the ancestors of our faith who have gone before. Abel, Noah, Abraham and Sarah, Moses, Aaron, Gideon, Peter, John, Mary. My ancestors. Your ancestors. All of our ancestors in faith. 

As Hebrews describes to us, through faith, all of these ancestors conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Were tortured. Mocked and flogged. Chained and imprisoned. Stoned to death, sawn in two. Destitute. Persecuted. Tormented. All of them for whom the world was not worthy. Though they were commended for their faith, they did not receive what was promised. 

As we run the race of faith, all of these ancestors of faith cheer us on. Because living by faith is not a concept. Living by faith is a way of life. This is what it means to have faith. To be claimed by the Word of God. To move into a future. Perhaps unseen. Perhaps uncertain. Not sure of where we will end up. But, moving forward, all the same. Into a future that we know by virtue of promise rather than by what our eyes have seen.

Because we have Jesus. Our pioneer - the one who has gone before us. Our perfector - who has shown us the way. Our great high priest - who in his “once and for all” act of sacrifice forever altered the relationship between all humanity and God. This Jesus: God’s participation, God’s own self-offering, God’s own self-giving act. God, who through this Jesus, this Word, now invites us into God’s presence, to go where only the high priest was privileged to go. And who calls us into the future. Into a life of promise. Into a life of hope. 

This is why we should have faith. Because, even though we may have experiences that may challenge our faith, that might call our faith into question, the only other option for us is despair. A life without hope. And that, sisters and brothers in Christ, is no life. 

So, take the promise. And run with it! 

Amen.

Preached September 1, 2019, at Grace & Glory Lutheran Church, Goshen, KY.
Pentecost 12
Readings: Matthew 8:5-10; Hebrews 11:1-16, 12:1-2.

God's Promises Bring Hope: Our Promise-Keeper

Hasn’t this past week felt a little unsettling? With everything in the news, with concern about what’s happening in Washington, or with the hurricane in the Gulf coast area, doesn’t it sometimes seem like the world is a really scary and bad place?

Well, that’s how the story of Noah begins--when the world was a scary and bad place, just as for us today. And, yet, the story ends when God places a rainbow in the clouds as a symbol of promise and as a sign of the covenant between God and all living creatures.

This story can feel difficult for hear when we are living in a world like today--where extreme events seem to be a regular occurance. We might find ourselves asking in these times--in natural disasters or disasters that are human made--we might ask, “Where is God in this event?”

Who of you remembers Mister Rogers? Mister Rogers used to share that, in times of crisis, his grandmother and his parents would tell him to “look for the helpers.” That, if you looked on the edges of the event, you could often see helpers there, quietly at work, caring for others and for God’s creation. You see, the “helpers” are the ones who take part in God’s covenant promise to care for creation. Let’s watch Mister Rogers!

Think about those people who are the "helpers" in difficult situations. Make a list of how you can be a helper for someone who is scared, how you might be able to help care for God's creation.

Prayer: God, sometimes the world can be a scary place. But we know that you are always with us. In the Bible we read over and over about your promise to save us. We remember your promise every time we see a rainbow. Thank you for being stronger than the scary things of this world. We pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

The story of Noah and the ark is a well-known story. Some of us have likely heard it many times in our lives. As we hear it today, I want you to think about these questions: What bothers you about this text? What does this text tell you about God? What does this story have to do with the way you live your life?

The Lord saw that humanity had become thoroughly evil on the earth and that every idea their minds thought up was always completely evil. The Lord regretted making human beings on the earth, and he was heartbroken. So the Lord said, “I will wipe off of the land the human race that I’ve created: from human beings to livestock to the crawling things to the birds in the skies, because I regret I ever made them.” But as for Noah, the Lord approved of him.

These are Noah’s descendants. In his generation, Noah was a moral and exemplary man; he walked with God. Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. In God’s sight, the earth had become corrupt and was filled with violence. God saw that the earth was corrupt, because all creatures behaved corruptly on the earth.

God said to Noah, “The end has come for all creatures, since they have filled the earth with violence. I am now about to destroy them along with the earth, so make a wooden ark. Make the ark with nesting places and cover it inside and out with tar. This is how you should make it: four hundred fifty feet long, seventy-five feet wide, and forty-five feet high. Make a roof for the ark and complete it one foot from the top. Put a door in its side. In the hold below, make the second and third decks.

“I am now bringing the floodwaters over the earth to destroy everything under the sky that breathes. Everything on earth is about to take its last breath. But I will set up my covenant with you. You will go into the ark together with your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives. From all living things—from all creatures—you are to bring a pair, male and female, into the ark with you to keep them alive.  From each kind of bird, from each kind of livestock, and from each kind of everything that crawls on the ground—a pair from each will go in with you to stay alive.  Take some from every kind of food and stow it as food for you and for the animals.”

Noah did everything exactly as God commanded him.

After forty days, Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made.  He sent out a raven, and it flew back and forth until the waters over the entire earth had dried up.  Then he sent out a dove to see if the waters on all of the fertile land had subsided, but the dove found no place to set its foot. It returned to him in the ark since waters still covered the entire earth. Noah stretched out his hand, took it, and brought it back into the ark.  He waited seven more days and sent the dove out from the ark again. The dove came back to him in the evening, grasping a torn olive leaf in its beak. Then Noah knew that the waters were subsiding from the earth. He waited seven more days and sent out the dove, but it didn’t come back to him again.

God said to Noah and to his sons with him, “I am now setting up my covenant with you, with your descendants, and with every living being with you—with the birds, with the large animals, and with all the animals of the earth, leaving the ark with you. I will set up my covenant with you so that never again will all life be cut off by floodwaters. There will never again be a flood to destroy the earth.”

God said, “This is the symbol of the covenant that I am drawing up between me and you and every living thing with you, on behalf of every future generation. I have placed my bow in the clouds; it will be the symbol of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow appears in the clouds, I will remember the covenant between me and you and every living being among all the creatures. Floodwaters will never again destroy all creatures. The bow will be in the clouds, and upon seeing it I will remember the enduring covenant between God and every living being of all the earth’s creatures.” God said to Noah, “This is the symbol of the covenant that I have set up between me and all creatures on earth.”  Genesis 6:5-22, 8:6-12, 9:8-17 (CEB)

It’s important for us to understand that, in the ancient world, people told stories about floods. The Sumerians, the Africans, the Babylonians--all of these people told stories about floods. In particular, they told stories about water and its power to destroy towns and cities, and even whole civilizations. There were also stories--in these times--of people who built boats to survive these floods.

Floods were often believed to be divine judgment by angry gods. Gods who were angry with people for messing everything up. So, through floods, the angry gods “cleared the deck” to start all over again.

So, it’s not really unusual that, when we come to Genesis 6, we hear a flood story. This story--with Noah, and his ark, and his family and the animals--is like all the other flood stories because, of course, this god is like the other gods. Angry. Fed up with an evil humanity. Evil in every way--in thoughts and in actions. 

So, this god--like all those others--decides once again to unleash divine wrath on the world through a flood.

But, then, something strange happens with this story. It ends with a promise from this god that this will never happen again. What? God literally says to Noah, “I will place my ‘bow’ in the clouds as a sign of this promise.” A bow--like an archer’s bow. God puts up God’s weapon and says, “No more!” This God will be different from the other gods. This God will commit to living with people in a new way--a way in which life is not destroyed, but is preserved and respected. 

So, why was this story told? Why did it matter? And why did it endure throughout the ages?

Well, imagine what it was like to live in this time--no weather reports, no Google earth images, no airplanes or weather satellites. You’d likely never have travelled more than a few miles from where you were born. Then, imagine what a massive flood must have felt like--coming at you out of nowhere. Wiping out your house and your crops and your animals and your family members. Gone. 

What would that do to your psyche? How would you respond to such an event?

You would do exactly what we do when we suffer. We look for reasons. For causes. To understand why this is happening to me. To us. So, in the ancient world, it was generally believed that the causes of these floods were gods who were angry. That’s how people made sense in stories of the world and of floods.

But, this tale, in Genesis was different. Even though it began with the same old story--of divine judgment and a flood--there’s a huge twist at the end. Everybody doesn’t die, as in the other stories. A family is spared. And, then, a promise is made to them--a promise with a sign. The sign of the rainbow.

Because this flood story is the story of a God who wants to relate to us. Who grieves deeply when we push God away from us. Because God is a God who wants to save. A God who wants to be in covenant with us. 

This flood story is a story about a new view of God. Not a God who wants to destroy humanity, but a God who wants to be in relationship with us. And who promises to stay with us, even in the midst of our messy and chaotic world.

God sent a rainbow as a sign that God would never again destroy the earth. And, then, God set out to write a new story--a story about love and salvation. About God keeping God’s promises. Our God is a promise-keeper. And, because we know this, we can trust God’s word.

Sometimes, though, isn’t it hard to trust that promise? We need to be honest about that with ourselves and with others, too. 

When is it hard for you to trust the promises of God? Perhaps it's in times of challenge or loneliness? Or maybe in times of fear and frustration.

Think about that. Then, remember that, regardless of our fears, God sets the rainbow in the sky as a promise that God will never forsake us. That God will always be with us. This is God’s promise. And God is our promise-keeper. Amen.

Preached Sunday, September 9, 2018, at Grace & Glory Lutheran Church, Goshen, KY.

Pentecost 16

Reading: Genesis 6:5-22, 8:6-12, 9:8-17

*The concept of the flood story utilized is done so with much gratitude to that given by Rob Bell in his book, What Is the Bible? How an Ancient Library of Poems, Letters, and Stories Can Transform the Way You Think and Feel About Everything.

Persist

Now a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. He said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are more numerous and more powerful than we. Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, or they will increase and, in the event of war, join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land.” Therefore they set taskmasters over them to oppress them with forced labor. They built supply cities, Pithom and Rameses, for Pharaoh. But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread, so that the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites. The Egyptians became ruthless in imposing tasks on the Israelites, and made their lives bitter with hard service in mortar and brick and in every kind of field labor. They were ruthless in all the tasks that they imposed on them.

The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah, “When you act as midwives to the Hebrew women, and see them on the birthstool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, she shall live.” But the midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live. So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this, and allowed the boys to live?” The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.” So God dealt well with the midwives; and the people multiplied and became very strong. And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families. Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, “Every boy that is born to the Hebrews you shall throw into the Nile, but you shall let every girl live.”

Now a man from the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman. The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw that he was a fine baby, she hid him three months. When she could hide him no longer she got a papyrus basket for him, and plastered it with bitumen and pitch; she put the child in it and placed it among the reeds on the bank of the river. His sister stood at a distance, to see what would happen to him.

The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river, while her attendants walked beside the river. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her maid to bring it. When she opened it, she saw the child. He was crying, and she took pity on him. “This must be one of the Hebrews’ children,” she said. Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?” Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Yes.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother. Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give you your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed it. When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and she took him as her son. She named him Moses, “because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.” --Exodus 1:8-2:10 (NRSV)

Grace and peace to you from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

As our Genesis reading left off last week, Joseph, son of Jacob (or Israel, as we now know him), grandson of Isaac, great-grandson of Abraham, had, after decades, been reconciled with his brothers in Egypt. All of them, including their father Israel, were now in Egypt. Because of the deep famine in Canaan, Joseph had sought land for them from the pharaoh, who had given his permission for them to live in Goshen. A border province.  In Genesis 47, Goshen is described as “the best part of the land.” That certainly still rings true today, doesn’t it?

As time passed, the famine continued and grew even deeper. People from other lands came to Egypt, seeking out Joseph to trade their land for food. Scripture tells us that Joseph bought all of the land of Egypt for Pharaoh. Through his brilliant administrative skills, Joseph made the Pharaoh one of the richest and most powerful rulers in the entire area.  

At the same time, Israel became more and more settled in Egypt in that region of Goshen. The family gained possessions there and, our story tells us, they were “fruitful and multiplied exceedingly.”

Seventeen years passed. Israel’s death drew near. On his deathbed, Israel extracted a promise from Joseph--that Joseph would not bury his father in Egypt, but would take his body back to Canaan. That the Cave of Machpelah would be his final resting place. The burial home of Abraham and Sarah, of Isaac and Rebekah, of Leah.

Joseph also brought his two sons to be blessed by Israel. And, as we have seen so many times before in earlier stories, this blessing was anything but ordinary. Joseph had placed each of his two sons on either side of Israel’s bed, with the oldest and firstborn--Manasseh--on Israel’s right side. And with the youngest--Ephraim--on Israel’s left. As Israel raised his hands to bless his grandsons, he crossed his arms and gave the blessing not to the first born, but instead to Ephraim, the youngest. 

Once again, in God's world, tradition and convention or turned upside down. The unexpected happens and things are anything but ordinary.

And, then, it is time for Israel’s generation to end. The last verse of chapter 49 tells us that Jacob breathed his last, and was gathered to his people. Soon, it was time for Joseph’s generation to end. In the very next chapter, we read that Joseph made the Israelites (who had now grown in size)...Joseph made them swear that they would carry his bones back to Canaan. Just like his father. Then, Joseph, too, died. 

From generation to generation. Over these weeks and through the centuries, we have followed the ancestral family of Abraham to this point. Abraham and Sarah. And their descendents. Persisting. All of them living into the promise that God would make of them a great nation. And that God would bless them so that they could be a blessing. Trusting. Believing it. And persisting.

And then there are these women in today’s story. Persisting. Beginning with the midwives. Women whose work it is to support life who are told to take it. By a new king, a new regime, a new dynasty who has forgotten. A pharaoh who has forgotten or never known the story of Joseph and Joseph’s God. Forgotten or never known how Joseph helped enrich and empower the previous pharaoh. A leader who seeks to have “power over” the Israelites and who creates a false narrative. A false story about the “enemy within.”  Those Israelites, those immigrants who are going to grow and grow and eventually seek to overcome “us.”

It is an old, convenient political narrative that we still hear today. Be afraid of the immigrant. Be afraid of the foreigner. Be afraid of the other. It is a false narrative that is designed to divide people and to keep people apart. And to keep the rich and powerful in power.

But, these women. These midwives. This sister. This mother. This princess. All resist this false narrative in their own ways. All resist this evil.

When Pharaoh comes to the midwives and tells them to kill babies instead of keep them alive, they know. They know that God desires life. And so they refuse. And when he asks why, they play into his own stereotypes and immigrants and their breeding habits. “You know these Hebrew women aren’t like Egyptian women. They are vigorous and they give birth even before we get to them,” they say to the Pharaoh. Even though, they know this isn’t true.

Then, Pharaoh moves onto the people and tells all of them to throw baby boys into the Nile. The resistance doesn’t end with the midwives, but extends into the population. To the mother of Moses and his sister. 

The language in these verses is incredible. It is language that is reminiscent of new beginnings. Of new eras. For example, in verse 2 of Exodus 2, when we read that a Levite woman conceived and bore a son, our text says that she saw “that he was a fine baby.” In the original Hebrew, this is the same language used about creation in Genesis 1. That it was “good.” 

And, then, in verse 3, we read how this mother could no longer hide this baby, this “good” baby. And so she found a papyrus basket for him. To save him.

Here the original word for “basket” is the same word used for “ark” in Noah’s story. 

So, in just two words, the writer of Exodus has connected up the story of the creation of the world into the story of the creation of the Israelites as a people. They are no longer just a family or a clan. But they have become a nation. About to embark upon a new era. 

Through it all, the women continue to persist. To persist against evil. Against strategies that are designed to divide people. And to persist against forces that seek death instead of life. That seek division instead of unity. Forces that run contrary to God’s desire for life. And for God’s desire that all people might be unified. Not identical to each other. But unified in their diversity. In the beautifully diverse ways in which God has created us.

We know the rest of the story. How against the odds, God ensured the safety of this young Moses. How God worked through these persistent women to ensure an upbringing for Moses in God’s ways. How God eventually brought Moses up to be that leader who would lead his own people to freedom. In the same way that Christ has led us to freedom.

And, so, like the women in our story, we, too, are called to persist. To push back against those forces that seek to divide people instead of uniting them. To persist against forces that seek death, those forces that are contrary to God’s desire for life. And that are contrary to God’s desire for all creation.

God’s ways. They are not ordinary, are they? We have heard over and over how God upsets the status quo. The powers that be. How God breaks into the false narratives that are used to divide people. God’s ways are not ordinary. In fact, they are anything, but ordinary.

May be remember this as we leave from here and go into the world and into our own lives. As we persist and seek to live out our lives in ways that, like God, bring life. For us and for all those we meet. May God grant it.

Amen.

Preached August 27, 2017, at Grace & Glory Lutheran Church, Goshen, KY.
12th Sunday after Pentecost
Readings: Exodus 1:8-2:10; Psalm 124; Romans 12:1-8, Matthew 16:13-20.