Proper 14b
August 8, 2021 St. Paul's, Monroe 1
Introduction
It's been an interesting week
Exhausting in many ways for me. Physically. Shifted at mid-week from one chaotic house filled with boxes to another one filled with boxes.
A group of 5 "college hunks" did the heavy lifting to get us here. That's right. We hired a moving company called "College Hunks Hauling Junk." What they left us to do was -- well all the details. We'll probably be working on it for months.
Wednesday
We moved. Well that was a really big deal for us. Big in the sense that it wore us out. Not so big in the sense that both Mary Pat and I have been easily confident that beginning our ministry here in Monroe has been in harmony with God's plan for us.
Friday was an important day
It was one of the major feast days of the year , the Feast of the Transfiguration. I have been drawn from a long ways back in my life the to the narrative of the mystical vision of the three disciples looking on as Jesus himself was mysteriously and gloriously transfigured before them.
It was also Hiroshima Day. I continue to believe that it is a God-thing that the first use of an atomic bomb as a weapon occurred on Transfiguration. It has been an occasion for solemn reflection for me for my entire adult life.
Then there's the anniversary that's not so clearly on other people's minds. Pope Paul VI died on the Feast of the Transfiguration.
I can remember vividly that day because of where I was. I was visiting my cousin in Salem Oregon. I think it was the last time I saw my cousin before he died from cancer some years later. But I remember so vividly picking up the Sunday paper with the huge headline that the pope had died.
I had high hopes in those days that the Catholic Church would lead a widespread renewal in Christianity. I placed many of those hopes on Paul VI's successor, John Paul I. He himself died just 33 days after his election.
It's all a reminder that God is working in ways that are quite beyond our imagining to say nothing of managing.
Another event occurred this past week. I don't know whether it's particularly momentous. But I made my first decision as your interim priest in charge. It's not a decision that most of you will experience as disruptive, but it is I think in the larger scheme of things a potentially important one.
I asked that we follow what is known as Track 1 rather than Track 2 in the lectionary.
Explain Common Lectionary rationale
The OT is as far as I know the only sacred scripture that is sacred to two different religions. That puts a special responsibility on the use and interpretation of this text. It matters that Jesus himself was Jewish and the first Christians were Jewish. And I believe that the Christian complicity in anti-semitic actions through the centuries makes it imperative that we begin to discover new ways to interpret the Old Testament.
Old lectionary model, used in the prayer books that are sitting in your pew in front of you, chose Old Testament readings on the basis of its connection with the Gospel reading of the day. Perhaps it echoed it, perhaps it was an anticipation of it or a pre-figuring.
The new lectionary model, formally adopted by the Episcopal Church in the early 2000's, uses different criteria for choosing the 1st reading from the Old Testament. As a general rule it tries to read the OT "in course". Rather than picking and choosing each reading, it tries to follow particular books in the Old Testament, following the flow of the text for weeks or months at a time.
Let me give an example.
Consider our reading today from John's gospel:
We will be reading from the 6th chapter of John for 4 weeks in August. It is the "Bread of life" chapter. This is the 2nd of those weeks. It's an extended "sermon" if you will that Jesus gives containing an extended metaphor about Jesus as the bread of life. Today we hear:
- I am the bread of life
- Jews complained about him
- Whoever believes has eternal life
That is reading John "in course." Generally speaking we do the same thing with the 2nd reading. In recent weeks we have been working our way through the letter to the Ephesians.
The lectionary model we will be using follows that same pattern of "in course" reading from the Old Testament.
It means there will be an opportunity to hear passages that are not so obviously linked to Jesus's ministry, but are nonetheless well known and important for the overall message of the OT.
There are I believe many and deep reasons that Christians must learn to read the OT on its own terms and not simply in its relationship to the New Testament.
If we at St. Paul's had been following it at the beginning of the summer we would have started with 1 Samuel and would have worked our way up to today. The death of Absalom.
Absalom
Absalom, Absalom the novel
I have wanted to focus on Absalom in a sermon for years, and as far as I know I never have. Not unlike the way in which I have wanted to read Faulkner's novel Absalom, Absalom for many years but haven't yet.
Perhaps with my move to Monroe, NC it is time I did that.
William Faulkner Wikipedia
The title of the novel obviously refers to the Biblical story of Absalom, David's son, who rebelled against his father and was killed by David's general Joab in violation of David's order to deal gently with his son. As we hear today the whole thing caused heartbreak to David.
Like other Faulkner novels, Absalom, Absalom! allegorizes Southern history.
In the novel, the history of Thomas Sutpen mirrors the rise and fall of Southern plantation culture. Sutpen's failures necessarily reflect the weaknesses of an idealistic South. Rigidly committed to his "design", Sutpen proves unwilling to honor his marriage to a part-black woman, setting in motion his own destruction.
Discussing Absalom, Absalom!, Faulkner stated that the curse under which the South labors is slavery, and that Thomas Sutpen's personal curse, or flaw, was his belief that he was too strong to need to be a part of the human family.
... In 2009, a panel of judges called _Absalom, Absalom!_ the best Southern novel of all time.
In the biblical text there are several things that catch my attention.
The first is the simple detail that David wept -- like the proverbial "shortest verse in the Bible" (John's gospel when Jesus hears that his friend Lazarus has died: "Jesus wept.") David's vulnerability and sorrow parallels his larger-than-life characteristics. It makes him someone I can identify with.
It is a story of Fathers and Sons. Partly because I am a father with sons, I have paid attention over the years as to how the father/son relationship is portrayed in media of all kinds. My relationship with my own father has not always been an easy one. I recognize it when I tell people that my oldest son is a lot like me -- which is to say he has invested a lot of energy into not being like his father.
My father has been gone for over 35 years -- yet I am vividly aware of the impact he still has on my life.
David's impact on the church -- almost 3,000 years later is still vividly felt in a similar way.
Today's passage is a little piece of the larger story that is highlighted throughout the books of Samuel and Kings. It all starts with David's son, battling for control of the family Dynasty.
Always, it seems, there are power struggles. It reminds me of my church history teachers' mantra: "Wherever 2 or 3 are gathered together -- there you have politics."
A central part of reading and interpreting the OT is the narrative that traces the emergence of a people -- Israel -- out of Egypt and into Canaan. The development of a nation (like all the other nations of the world) notably unified by David.
We will hear some of the rest of that narrative as a first reading until August 31st when we make a shift to other writings of the OT.
Let me summarize the narrative this way:
- Passover/Exodus from Egypt
- Entry into Canaan
- Becoming a nation
- Being torn apart from within and finally overrun by foreign powers
- Figuring out how to be a people in exile.
In that frame of reference, Absalom is like a symbol of the way in which the son seeks to claim the inheritance of the father. But it inevitably leads to revolt and division.
The Absalom Saga reveals a dynamic that is too common in our lives.
It speaks to the way we live our lives. The same patterns get lived out over and over again -- in spite of our intention to do it differently this time.
I think of a saying I read regularly in my devotions:
Our lives are long enough to learn what we need to learn, but not long enough to change anything. That is our flaw. Each age must learn everything afresh. Such waste! Such waster -- making all the mistakes once and again, each generation making the same mistakes, fumbling in ignorance and darkness. ... (Stephen Lawhead, quoted in Celtic Daily Prayer: Book Two)
Where is the congregation?
These lessons seem to me to be very pertinent to the recent history of this congregation. Changes are coming. There really is no going back to the way things used to be. That can be sad. But it is also an opportunity for us to make good decisions.
It frees us to ask what it is that God wants us to be doing as an Episcopal Church in the city of Monroe North Carolina. We can pay attention to our own particular needs and desires, but keep in mind the perspective that God sees a far bigger picture than we.
Change has been in overdrive these past few years. It's perfectly natural for us to say, enough already. We can resist the change with all our strength and will. That's an option. I suggest a different approach.
Let us accept where we are now, our present circumstances and conditions. And then ask, "What does God want of us? Why is the Episcopal Church important to Monroe, NC? How can I let God be God?" Such questions may help us figure out the next step: "What do we do now?"
It seems perfectly natural to me for all of us to look forward to just making a decision about the choices in front of us. Then we will adjust as we go along.
As we go forward, I want us to keep in mind and heart the vision of the church we hear in the letter to the Ephesians.
Ephesians
Putting away falsehood, let all of us speak the truth to our neighbors, for we are members of one another.
Be angry but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, ... Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up, as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear.
And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with which you were marked with a seal for the day of redemption. Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice,
and be kind to one another,tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.
Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children, and live in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
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