SCRIPTURE: Genesis 22:1-14
TEXT: 14b“The Lord will provide”; THEME: God’s embrace in relationship with each other. INTRODUCTION One of the theories, of how the Bible was written, is that portions of it was written about 700 BC, while the nation of Israel was being held in exile, in Babylon. Babylon was the super power of the day, with technological advancements, a written language, astronomical predicted solar eclipse and relocated captive leaders acculturated into Babylonian life. As their captivity lagged on, their children learned Babylonian folklore instead of their oral history. So, the Israelites decided to use this time of captivity, to write down their oral history. They took Babylonian stories and attached Hebrew messages to them. Such as the creation story of Babylon with the message of God creating and resting on the 7th day for relationship building and worship. The Flood story with the message of deliverance and the promise of not destroying the world again. And today’s story about child sacrifice with the message, “Don’t do it.” SCRIPTURE Genesis Chapter 22 begins with; “after all these things”; which means; after Abraham and Sarah have been called by God to leave Haran for a land God would show them. After the promise of having descendants more than the stars in the sky. After twice passing Sarah off as his sister to protect himself in a foreign land. After worrying about producing an heir leads Abraham to sleep with Hagar. After both of them laughed at the prospect of being senior citizen parents. Now God is going to test Abraham to see if he will do what God says? Ridiculous! Abraham and Sarah should have been given credit for all of those pop quizzes they had along the way. God knows about Abraham’s faith, trust and obedience in difficult circumstances. This is my hint that this is not an actual account. Abraham does not need to be tested and we don’t have a God who tests us for the sake of testing. God already knows the content of our hearts. This is actually a borrowed Babylonian story, retold with Hebrew characters, and to be a vehicle for a Hebrew message. The message at the end is not to sacrifice our children to God (or any gods) as a way to win favor, or to ensure goodness for us. God loves already provides for us, so don’t sacrifice your children like other people do. Live bounded to God, as God is bounded to you. APPLICATION Besides, Abraham has already sacrificed his oldest son, Ismael, by sending him and his mother Hagar, out of the household. If God does not desire child sacrifice, why would God sacrifice Jesus for us? If we believe in Original Blessing, over Original Sin, then the Good that God has created in Creation and God’s love for us, being made in the image of God, does not require any kind of sacrifice to pay God, to start loving us again. What God provides, is forgiveness of our sins. God makes the rules, God is not accountable to some cosmic balance of the universe that our sin bends out of whack. God is the universe. Our sin does not require a sacrificial payment, God’s love forgives our sin. Knowing that we are forgiven, for all our wrong doings, by love, how is our approach to God and others shaped? We are not seen as a sinful problem that needs to be fixed, but we are seen as good and dearly loved. This story is also known as the Akendah, which means binding. It is about the binding of Isaac on the altar. But this is also about the binding of God to Abraham, of Abraham to God and the binding of God to Isaac. Another relational way of thinking about being bound together is embraced. I found the lyrics from George and Ira Gershwin’s song, “Embraceable You”. Imagine God, singing this to us: “Embrace me, my sweet embraceable you Embrace me, you irreplaceable you Just one look at you My heart grew tipsy in me You and you alone Bring out the Gypsy in me I love all the many charms about you Above all, I want these arms about you Don't be a naughty baby Come to papa, come to papa do My sweet embraceable you” Binding. Bonded to God. Embraced by God. Loved by God - sacrifice needed. CONCLUSION Original Good, The Visit, God Heard and God Embracing are last four sermons based on stories of how we are interrelated through God’s DNA at creation. About how our staying connected encourages and surprises us. About how God hears all with promise greater than the covenant with Abraham and Sarah. And today’s story of not sacrificing our kids as a way to force God to love us, because God embraces us already, with forgiveness and provides for us, because God has never stopped loving us.
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SCRIPTURE: Genesis 21:1-21
TEXT: 17a And God heard the voice of the boy; THEME: God hears all of our cries. INTRODUCTION When we feel threatened, our fear dictates our actions. We will even be willing to hurt others, to ensure our protection and security. SCRIPTURE Isaac has reached the age when his chances for survival are assured. He has passed all of the perils of his first year of life. So, Abraham celebrated with a one-year old baby luau. A joyous event until, his wife Sarah observed the older half sibling playing with Isaac. She had a dark revelation. Maybe it was just how this older child was so dominate over his younger sibling. Sired by her husband, Hagar’s son is seen as an immediate threat. Egyptian, foreign and entitled to a double portion of Abraham’s inheritance. These two will always be in competition with each other. There will be a constant pull and fight between them. Sarah is motivated by a fear of scarcity. She tells her husband that she wants the slave woman with her son casted out of their household. Abraham is distressed. How could he do such a thing. This was, after all, his son too. He is a life and deserves a chance to live. Abraham is a troubled soul, wanting to take into consideration his wife’s concerns and fears, but at the same time feeling for the wellbeing of his son and Hagar. God speaks to him, “Do not be distressed because of the boy and because of your slave woman; whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for it is through Isaac that that offspring shall be named for you. As for the son of the slave woman, I will make a nation of him also, because he is your offspring.” This story is filled with so many regrets, I shouldn’t have received Hagar into my household, I should have trusted God more and not try to accomplish for God what only God could do, I should not have slept with her and fathered a child. Now I have a child through Sarah and things would be been better without them. But they deserve a chance to life on their own. We can’t live with the “should have’s”. We have to live with the “what is” and trust that God will help us through the complicated messes we find ourselves in. God sees a greater picture than of Abraham’s household and legacy. There are plans and promises far greater than establishing a Nation of God, it is for all people, to be a people with faith in God, for all to be in relationship with God. After all, we all share God’s DNA at creation. We are interconnected, made in the image of God. This makes Abraham feel better. The next morning Abraham takes some bread and a skin of water and gives it to Hagar, along with her son and sends them along their way in the wilderness. Abraham is a nice guy and wants to make everybody happy, but he is not a very detailed oriented person. He could have given Hagar a donkey, with more water, and other supplies, in addition some money and a tent. But he trusts that God promise will take care of them. So, he gives them their freedom and not very much more. After the water runs out, Hagar is ready to die in the desert, but can’t bear to watch her child die. So, she moves away from him, about the length of a football field. She lifts up her voice, “Do not let me look on the death of the child.” and weeps. God heard the voice of the boy. Why is that we ask? Because, although his name is never mentioned in this passage, Ishmael means, “God heard”. It is like a haunting whisper in the passage. And “Ishmael” God heard, the voice of the boy. And angel of God calls out to Hagar and says, “Ishmael” God heard the voice of the boy.” “I will make a great nation of him,” God opens her eyes and she saw a well of water. God was with the boy and he grew up, lived in the wilderness and his mother found him a wife from Egypt. God’s promise is greater than the covenant that he made with Abraham. The covenant with Abraham is to be a people with land that would be a blessing to all people. It is a means, to include all people into an active, relationship with God. The relationship God has with Ishmael is filled with a promise of God. Outside of the covenant with Abraham but within the promise of God, God hears, God heard, Ishmael. APPLICATION Ishmael’s story tells us about God’s care and providence. God’s care is not limited just to Abraham and his family as God’s mercy extends to Hagar and to her son. God hears their cries of abandonment. God hears the cry of the outcast, at the hands of greed. After all, all Sarah was doing was protecting her own self-interest, at the expense of Hagar and her son. Sarah’s actions cause deadly peril to the Egyptian slave and her son, but God does not seem them as foreign, or diminished but as made in the image of God and saves them. We live in a world where our greed and protection of our own self-interest, creates all kinds of evil; people are outcast instead of included, walls are built up instead of relationships, we violently protect what we have instead of share with those who are in need. We discriminate instead of embrace. We enslave instead of respect. God listens to the cries of those suffering injustices, when we also are willing to hear their cries, we can begin to take action. As followers of God, we enter uncomfortable spaces that disrupt our relationships to power and disrupt relationships, even with those closest to us. It has taken us a long time to apply the Gospel of Jesus and challenge slavery in the United States. And now when we hear the cries against gun drawn police and the negative profiling of people of color, our Gospel of Jesus needs to speak to this. We as Christians bring God’s love and justice into the world. In what ways can we can take action for those who are suffering? We can see and listen. Just by being attentive, as we listen to the cries for help, the sobbing in the shadows and the angry protest in the streets, we can listen to the words being spoken, the raw emotions being expressed and pain that has been inflicted. It is distressing. We may even be deeply disturbed but as we turn to God, our concerns are heard. And as God hears, even with our good intension and halfcocked ideas, God will formulate a plan that will lead us to action. It will confront the norms that we have thought as truth. It may lead to a civil war or freedom marches. It may take years to execute or be an uncontrollable wave that we will surf as best we can. Colin Kaepernick has long been criticized because he saw the racial inequity of force and violence by law enforcement against black lives. He used his fame and position to draw attention to this. The power structures in the NFL weren’t willing to admit their role in contributing to this problem. It is only now, in light of George Floyd’s death and the outrage this as created, that we see this incident as another chapter in a long story of racial injustice and this is enough. We see and listen to what God is saying to us about the cries of our nation is for justice. CONCLUSION When God extends care to an Egyptian slave and her son, God is for all people. God’s promises are for all people. God may have a bias for Abraham and Sarah but it is to be an example to reveal to all and not an exclusivity. God reveals God’s self to us in the stories of the Hebrews, through the journey of their parents Abraham and Sarah, and their descendants. Encounters with God are not limited to Sarah and their kids. God speaks to Hagar who blesses Ishmael. God promises us and is revealed in our stories of faith. God is still listening. SCRIPTURE: Genesis 18:1-6,9-15, 21:1,6
TEXT: 6Now Sarah said, “God has brought laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.” THEME: Visiting we each other is important in our relationship with God. INTRODUCTION When I was a boy, my family lived on the Hamakua coast, in a sugar plantation town named Pa’auilo. This was the time of my first memories. One thing my family did, was visit people. I remember driving up roads that led up into the hillside of to an elderly couple’s home, they had a large water tank in their yard. On the spigot was tied, an empty cloth tobacco bag, to hold back the unsavory bits from their water catchment. On another occasion, on another road we drove up the side of the hill, to a home with a large sliding platformed with coffee beans sunbathing in the sun. Near by the owner had built, into the ground, a fallout shelter, just in case of a nuclear bomb. Along the highway was Harry’s TV repair shop. Between the store front and the residence was a workshop area with disassembled TV’s and the most vicious dog I have ever known, held an arm’s length away from the residence by a mangled chain. It was just short enough so you could get up the stairs into the kitchen. And then at the bottom of the hill from where we lived, just before you got to the main road was a gas station. Conversations were served up there, I remember getting balloons with stick on elephant and donkey parts. That was the year Kennedy was elected president. My first baseball mitt came from that garage. On these visits I remember sitting in people’s parlors, being offered something to eat that we were told to politely refuse and fidgeting while we waited for the adults to finish their lazily conversations. To me, these visits had no purpose, other than to say ‘Hello’, enjoy friendship, check in on each other and share a beverage with sweets, routinely seeing each other, and parting with gifts of jam, fruits, and smiles. In the most simplistic way, today’s passage is about God visiting Abraham and Sarah to see how they are doing. SCRIPTURE The title of this story seems to be found in the first verse: ‘The Lord appeared to Abraham’. This is where the story has its beginning, but as with any great story, it will lead you on a winding trail to another the story with laughter, deception, truth, promise and amazement. By the oaks of Mamre, Abraham has pitched his tent, in a long journey to a place where God would show him, with a promise of land, descendants and the birth of a nation. As he looks up from the porch, through the bands of heat, he sees three figures approaching his site. He runs up to greet them and bows at their feet to extend hospitality. Water, a foot bath, rest in the shade, bread, and hospice from their journey. As they take him up on his offer, he goes into the tent to have Sarah bake up three cakes. He has his servant prepare a calf and while he is doing all of this, the Lord asks, “Where is your wife Sarah?” This visit was not just for Abraham, but also included Sarah as the promises of land, descendants and nation is for them both. Then the Lord says, “The next time I will visit your wife Sarah shall have a son.” Is this a gender reveal story? Sarah was just inside the tent’s entrance as they spoke on the porch and overheard everything. She was so surprised by these words, that she couldn’t help but laugh to herself, “After I have grown old, and my husband is old, shall I have pleasure?” As I mapped out this passage. It became evident that Abraham and Sarah are of two different personality types. Not that one is better than the other, but that we are different. Abraham is faithfully doing whatever God wants, going along with whenever and how ever God wants to do things. Sarah on the other is concerned about the details, how is this going to happen, when is this going to happen, doesn’t the Lord know that these women parts are not working any longer. We did that thing with Hagar to help God out already, wasn’t that good enough to check off that box? Let’s move on to the Land and nation thing. “But nooo, God want to do the impossible and let me have the pleasure of giving birth to a son. Lord you have just made fulfilling your promises a whole lot harder than it has to be. Ha!” “Why did Sarah laugh?” If Abraham were smart, he would have said, “Ask her she is right here.” But he does the next best thing and doesn’t say anything. Sarah, hearing from the tent opening, can’t stay silent and denies everything, but the Lord, who knows exactly why Sarah laughed says, “Oh yes you did.” The Lord got his answer of how Abraham and Sarah were doing from this visit. Abraham seems okay, but Sarah is a bit stressed. I think she is an anxious presence, but that’s human and God is okay with our being human. This is all part of being in relationship with God and each other. Visiting is a way that we stay connected, sharing in hospitality, being encouraged, discussing politics, checking in to see how we are doing, and revealing a vision for the future of where all of this is going and what the next steps will be. APPLICATION This is a story of a visit by God. We laugh nervously when we are included in God’s missional plans. In what surprising directions does a visit from God venture us to go? We laugh when something surprises us. In comedy, the punchline is an unexpected result that catches us by surprise. We have an explosive burst of air called laughter. Laughter is part of our relationship with God. We have our own ideas of how something should go, but God, with vast more knowledge and resources often has plans that are seemingly implausible from our limited view point. Surprise causes us to laugh, be it nervously. God sometimes visits us in dreams, visions, with angels, and miracles. But these are rare and I only know of a few people who have had these kinds of experiences. They are profound experiences that shape their lives for God and lead us on paths of faith and service. More likely God will visit us through a Christian friend who arrives at just the right time, through a prayer that has been answered in the way we wanted it to, as an insight of something we are praying about, while we are helping someone and sometimes by being in a place where God feels especially close. God always visits us when we read the Bible, are worshiping, Praying, using spiritual gifts and are in the company of others of faith. These visits from God, say hello, check in with each other, reconnect, foster our relationship, update ourselves on what has been happening and how we are doing, but there is also that encouragement to take the next steps, moving into the future and taking action. There are opportunities for us to have difficult conversations on sex, gender, finance and politics. In the wake of George Floyd’s death at the hands of police brutality, the Black Lives Matters protest, we need to be having conversations on race, bias, prejudice and privilege, even here in Hawaii. We can listen, God may map out an impossible vision of the future that is laughable, with a call for our participation in it. Surprised, we may laugh inappropriately, at what God wants us to do, but find ourselves as part of the mix for a better future. CONCLUSION When I was in High School, I wanted to believe. I believed Jesus existed in the same way I believed the Abraham Lincoln existed. I prayed that if Jesus would visit to me, then I would believe. That never happened. But through the church I met remarkable people of character. At college I met wise people who grew my understanding of God, Christ and the Holy Spirit. In Seminary I learned categories to systematically know what I believed. Serving God as a pastor, the community of the church has been continued source of inspiration. In all of these instances, God visited my tent along my faith journey. I can see how the character of God as relational, funny, seeing us as a work in process and never finished. God is more organic that legal, God is more family oriented than contractual, God is more about the journey than the destination. When God visits, we may be overwhelmed with the details of hospitality. Relax and enjoy God’s company over a beverage and something sweet. God is more interested in visiting with us, touching base with us to see how we are doing and to set us back on track with God’s plans instead of what we think the plans should be. God’s visiting with us is important. Our visiting with others is too. As our community relaxes into more social contact, wear a mask, wash hands, stay home if you are not feeling well, share a bit of God in you with others, engage in difficult conversations, that may be uncomfortable about race, privilege and prejudice. Laugh nervously, in the end, we want everyone who hears to laugh with us. SCRIPTURE: Genesis 1:1-2:4a*(edited)
TEXT: 1In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, THEME: We are all connected by God’s DNA. INTRODUCTION In this season called Ordinary Time, we are going to highlight the stories, that contain examples of faith. The stories reveal truth, and give us examples of how to live through difficulties and celebrations. The first story in the Bible lays a foundation for our relationship with God, creation and each other. It begins with God as the source of everything. Creating the Heavens, creating the earth, creating all things that exist; inanimate and alive. There is no cosmic power greater than God. There is no cosmic force other than God. SCRIPTURE The account of creation by God, is not making a scientific statement of how things came into being. But it is saying that what comes forth is a result of God’s activity, from an impulse of love, and goodness. Richard Rohr, in his daily meditations, took on God’s creating all things. He makes the observation, that If all things are created by God, then all things are created from out of God’s DNA. A beautiful illustration, as it were, as we are connected to all things through God’s creating of us. So instead of using this text as a scientific thesis of how things came into being, we can look at the creation story, as a sociological thesis on how we are all interrelated with each other. God is connected to what God has created. Everything is in relationship to everything else, and God is in relationship with us. We are in relationship with God, with others and with creation. We are interconnected with God, ourselves and creation. As they say in the Lion King, it is a “Circle of Life”. Brother David Steindl-Rast, a Benedictine monk, who teaches and has written on the subject of gratitude. In an On Being interview with Krista Tippett, he weaved interconnectedness with gratitude. He says, “I remember, the grace that Buddhists pray before a meal starts with the words “Innumerable beings brought us this food. We should know how it comes to us.” And when you put that into practice and look at what’s there at your table, on your plate, there is no end to connectedness. In the end, for instance — most people don’t think of it, but in the end, we always eat earth. We eat earth, not in an abstract way; in a very concrete way, this humus is what we eat. Or crystals: when we eat salt, it’s pretty obvious that comes out of the earth. That’s earth, directly. When we eat vegetables, well, the vegetables were nourished by all the nutrients in the earth, and then now we eat them, or the fruits of these plants. If you eat meat or fish, then they were nourished by vegetables, and they were nourished by the earth. Always comes back to earth.” The dominion described in the Genesis Text, is of the fish of the sea, birds of the air, cattle, wild animals, creeping things, is an interconnectedness. We effect, as well as have a responsibility in our relationship with creation. Usury may be on one side, but there is also stewardship and fostering on the other. This extends to our treatment of the earth, with global warming, deforestation, pollution, and burning fossil fuels. Extend this even further and it includes our treatment of each other. APPLICATION We are interconnected by a common Creator, how do we live in relationship with God, creation, each other and ourselves? The events of the past week demonstrate how we do not treat each other with respect, dignity, honor or goodness. For some, but not for all. I’ve been watching Seth Meyers. Last week instead of doing his usual monologue he had his staff writer, Amber Ruffin share stories of her run ins as a young black lady with law enforcement. The disparity of treatment, and rage she has experience is unmerited. When any segment is of our population is seen as the problem, we have a problem. Law enforcement has a problem, our leaders have a problem. More than more violence can squelch. At first, I thought this was all about Eric Garner again, until I realized this was about a similar incident, where another police officer choked a black citizen to death, George Floyd. Then when no arrests were made, despite video evidence, the world was outraged. It has taken mass protest, across our nation and beyond for arrest to be made. This is the time for our United States to begin to writing stories of connectedness, of equality, of justice, of rallying for each other, of collaboration, of community, of love and goodness. The old stories of dominance and scarcity must be left behind for a time of cooperation, pooling our resources to solve a global pandemic, and erasing decisive divisions by enriching our lives with diversity. CONCLUSION If there is anything the creation story tells us, it is that we are all cut from God’s DNA. We are all in the image of God. When I saw the Bible being held up for a photo shoot in front of the church, I thought of Desmond Tutu’s words, he said of the Dutch who brought apartheid to South Africa, ARCHBISHOP TUTU: Discovering the Bible could be such dynamite. I subsequently used to say if these white people had intended keeping us under, they shouldn't have given us the Bible. Because, whoa, I mean, it's almost as if it is written specifically just for your situation. I mean, the many parts of it that were so germane, so utterly to the point for us … ARCHBISHOP TUTU: When you discover that apartheid sought to mislead people into believing that what gave value to human beings was a biological irrelevance, really, skin color or ethnicity, and you saw how the scriptures say it is because we are created in the image of God, that each one of us is a God-carrier. No matter what our physical circumstances may be, no matter how awful, no matter how deprived you could be, it doesn't take away from you this intrinsic worth. One saw just how significant it was. Most of my parishioners were domestic workers, not people who are very well educated….” When they ask who are you, you say, 'Me? I'm a God-carrier. I'm God's partner. I'm created in the image of God.'" And you could see those dear old ladies as they walked out of church on that occasion as if they were on cloud nine. You know, they walked with their backs slightly straighter. And, yeah, it was amazing. Don’t take a creationist theory of how things came into being from Genesis chapter one. Take the story of how all things are connected together, interdependent upon each other, and in relationship with each other. When God rests on the seventh day, the climax of Creation is time. Time to spend with God, and time to spend with other, because the climax of God’s beginning story is relationships. Not domination, but dominion, living in an enriching way with each other. |
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