If
you came to church this morning grieving and hoping for a “let’s get rid of the
Second Amendment” fiery sermon as evidence of my personal salvation, you will
be sorely disappointed. Like all of us,
I share in the disbelief and sadness at unnecessary loss of life. Unlike some of you, I know some folks now at
ground zero of that tragedy. The rector
of St. Luke’s Launion is a chaplain to the police on the other side of that
mountain in the television pictures we see, the rector’s wife is a dispatcher
for EMT’s, and our brothers and sisters of the parish live and work and
socialize in El Paso and with folks in EL Paso.
I’m sure for them, this will be more like 1 degree or zero degrees of
separation, rather than the normal six, for this tragedy.
I am also
convinced that the problem is not immigration or guns or anything but sin, sin
which leads to hate, which leads to the ability for one human being so to
dehumanize another human being or group of human beings, and violently take
their lives. If only God had called a
group of people to love and serve Him with everything they have. If only God had called a group of people to
love and serve others as they love themselves.
If only God had called a group of people to remember that everyone,
every single person we meet in life, is created in His image. No matter their language, no matter their
color, no matter their affiliations, no matter smell, no matter their
intelligence or stupidity, every single person is created in God’s image. To be a bit more blunt, if the Church were
more serious about being the Church, and growing God’s kingdom on earth, maybe,
just maybe, some of these tragic events would decline.
It is, in
the end, my job, my calling, to teach you how to live in right relationship with
God. I cannot white knuckle you to
righteousness. I can, however, share the
Gospel of Jesus Christ, that you might know you are deeply loved by God, as is
all those whom you encounter in your daily life and work. It is that understanding of being loved, of
being shown grace, that we begin to undertake to work to change ourselves, or
rather allow God through the Holy Spirit to begin to work in us. It is my calling to teach you and to equip
you so that, in your life and work, you help others begin to see that they are
loved deeply by God as well, and might choose Him over these tragic solutions
that, in the end, do not accomplish their goals. Early reports seem to indicate the shooter
wanted to scare undocumented immigrants from taking jobs from Americans. He seems to have been really upset with
robots, too. He chose to act out his
sick plan in a community that really does not have much violence (5 murders a
year on average), that explained to me over and over again that the border was
a fluid thing for most of them for all their lives—Mexican citizens come over
the border to shop at specific stores just as American citizens cross the
border to shop at specific Mexican stores without any headlines or tensions--,
that was not his community nearly 10-12 hours to the north and east, and ended
up targeting and wounding more citizens than the undocumented people he so
despised. And does anyone really think
his act will change things? Do those who
think undocumented aliens are the greatest threat to our sovereignty really
think this attack will stop the flow? Do
those of you who hate guns and think they should be outlawed really hold out
hope that this event will be the tipping point in those discussions and
legislative efforts? And do any of us
really believe we can legislate away hate?
Racism? Sin?
So, how do
we engage the world in these discussions?
Thankfully, our readings this week speak against the simplicity which we
want to believe but that experience teaches us is simply not true. For those who pay attention to such things,
this is the only time every six years that we get to read from a small portion
of Ecclesiastes. Some churches, those
that do not alternate between Track 1 and Track II every three years will never
read from this wonderful book. And what
a shame! Because the questions that are
dominating social media about this attack, and being discussed on the airwaves,
reflect the truth observed by Qoheleth.
Before
launching into that truth, I should place the book in context. Those of you who attended the Bible Project
this summer can peruse the historical documents rather than listen to me. We had just done Job when Tina asked if the
wisdom literature in Scripture could be our focus this summer. Now she knows why I excitedly agreed! Ecclesiastes is part of the wisdom canon of
Scripture. It is often grouped with
Proverbs, Job, and Song of Songs as an explanation of God’s wisdom, and rightly
so. The book is somewhat challenging for
us to read because it is more akin to one of Plato’s dialogues than our modern
textbooks. Qoheleth is a character in
the book; he is not the author. The
author wants us to hear the observations of the Teacher and then point us
toward God’s wisdom, much as Plato may have used Socrates’ words to criticize
leadership in his own city-state of Athens.
Proverbs,
you know the book with all your favorite pithy statements that may not even
really exist in the Bible, is like elementary school wisdom teaching. Do what God says and you will be blessed. Do what God says you should not do, and you
will be cursed. I see the nods. Is Proverbs correct?
I see some
uncomfortable shifting in the pews.
Don’t tell me y’all have observed that God’s people sometimes seem to
experience health concerns? Financial
concerns? Relationship issues? Death?
That does not happen to us, right?
OK, will at
least the corollary in untrue. We never
see evil folks getting ahead, right? I
mean, the folks who disobey God always walk around with a curse cloud over
their heads, right? They never get
fame? They never get fortunes? The never seem to be healthy? The don’t get the promotions or the Norman
Rockwell families, do they?
I’m
guessing by the chuckling and murmuring, you have noticed the wisdom of
Qoheleth. Good for you for paying
attention. But think of how we present
life to those outside the community of faith.
Choose Jesus and He will take care of all your problems! Right?
We make those ridiculous claims, those unbiblical claims, and then we
wonder why people fall away so easily.
We are not alone. Qoheleth, which
means one who gathers the people of God to teach them about God-like the best
Sunday School Teacher you ever had-, notices that the pithy statements of
Proverbs do not seem to be an accurate portrayal of the cause and effect
relationship of faith in God and God’s treatment of His people. Know any good Christians who suffer from
disease? Know any good Christians who
suffer privation? Know any good
Christians who suffer broken relationships?
How about any Christians who suffer from depression? Loneliness?
I see the nods. I likely touched
on one or more of your own Achilles Heels this morning. Heck, suffering Christians are so ubiquitous
that we pray specifically today in our Prayers of the People for those
suffering in our midst, reminding them and us that God uses redemptive
suffering to reach human beings.
And I
specifically mentioned Good Christians rather than just Christians. We think it understandable if CEO Christians
suffer, right? I mean, that’s just God
trying to get their attention that He is not a priority in their lives. That’s our rationalization, at least. The same goes for Christians who do not
adhere to our identical values. If only
they were “better” Christians. If only
they understood God as well as we do.
Right?
We hold it
axiomatic that those whom God loves He blesses, and those whom He hates He
curses. We reduce God to some sort of
cause and effect relationship even though Scripture teaches us that God is far,
far above that kind of relationship.
Qoheleth rightly observes that the wisdom espoused in Proverbs is not
entirely accurate. God’s people, the
righteous ones, suffer all kinds of evil.
What’s worse, those who rebel against God experience all kinds of
blessings. Those who are evil can stab
us in the back to climb the corporate ladder faster, and God seems not to
notice. Those wealthy and evil can mock
justice through the expense of a great lawyer, and God seems not to mind. Those that reject God can do the exact
opposite of what God taught in the torah and instructs us in the New Testament,
and God seems not to notice or care. And
so the author reminds us that all is hevel. And this is where Ecclesiastes becomes more
like high school or college for us, compared to the elementary teaching of
Proverbs.
Hevel is
one of those Hebrew words that we should simply know by its name, much as many
of you now accept hesed, God’s love, in your own vocabularies. How do we translate hevel? Our translators today chose vanities. Some of your Bibles at home will use
meaningless. Neither of those are
particularly good translations. They are
fair, to be sure, in that they capture an aspect of hevel, a definition, but
the author of Ecclesiastes does not want us to feel that all things are vain or
meaningless. There is more going on. We might say hevel is more a concept than a
simple aspect.
As the
teachers in the Bible Project point out, hevel has a wispish or fleeting shape
form. Think of a cloud. If you looked up in the sky, say a perfect
dinosaur or other animal and reached out to grab it, what would happen? Ok, if you had big enough hands and long
enough arms to grab a cloud you saw, what would happen to the cloud? Right, your grasping would disturb its
figure. Right, it might break up into
multiple little clouds. You are doing
great. Was the shape there before you
grasped it? It was, right? You recognized the shape. What caused you to recognize the shape? Ah, that’s a stumper, right? How do you or I know what whales or dinosaurs
or other figures look like? Who said
that? Right, we are taught how things
are. To use the language of the Greek
philosophers, we study whales to learn to identify the essences of
whaleness. We study dinosaur bones to
learn the essence of what it is to be a dinosaur.
Here’s the
fun question of the day: Why do we study the Scripture? Too hard?
To use my above language, Whose essence do we study when we read the
Scriptures? Right, certainly we learn
about human essence. Against Whose
essence is human essence contrasted?
Right, God’s. Scripture teaches
us about God. Scripture teaches us what
God loves and what God hates, right?
Scripture also teaches us God promises and what we must do to become
inheritors of those promises, right?
Believe in Jesus—great answer.
God also teaches us about challenging aspects of God’s character we would
probably rather avoid. Who here loves it
that God is so patient? His patience
played a role in our own salvation but how much do we wish He would act quickly
or come again sooner when it comes to the affect other sinners have on us? Unfair?
Who here identifies too often with the ungrateful older brother when the
loving father embraces the prodigal son?
To use the
language of the Apostles and early Church Fathers, we see but through a dark
glass, right? Yes, we know a lot about
God, more even than Qoheleth or the author of Ecclesiastes, but still we cannot
see all of God’s inscrutable essence or actions. To use the language of the graduate school
book, Job, we cannot begin to fathom the power and might and wisdom that plays
with leviathan and behemoth like little fish or puppy, who created all the
stars and set their courses and gave them their songs, or who decided to create
humankind in His image, or to know what is really going on when God seems not
to be paying attention to His creation or to us.
The author
of the book, of course, will let us hear Qoheleth out. Then, as we near the end of the book, the
author will remind us of our choice. I
commend this book to you all, especially when your doubts or cynicism seem to
be getting the best of you as you observe the world around you. What follows, as several commentators pointed
out, is a biblical carpe diem of sorts.
The problem, of course, is that the commentators mostly mistranslated
carpe diem. What’s more, the carpe diem
is the attitude of Qoheleth and not the author of the book. Carpe can mean seize, just as hevel can mean
empty or vain. Those are legit word
choices. But is that what is meant in
that Latin phrase that captures much of Qoheleth’s teaching? Of course not.
Carpe diem
is an idiom. To be quick about it, the
idiom literally says pluck the day.
Think of it in terms of flowers.
Those of us who love flowers, do we ever seize them? Of course not. Seizing affects violence on something we
perceive as beautiful. If we seize a
flower, we risk tearing the stalk, knocking petals loose, dislodging the
pistols and stamen from which we get the beautiful smells. We pluck flowers to make it possible to
preserve them as long as possible. We
like to enjoy their beauty, the vibrant colors, and their smells. Seizing them puts our enjoyment of them at
risk.
Similarly,
seizing a day suggests we can control or shape our day to serve us, that the
day is somehow subject to our whims. How
often have you laid in bed on a cold wet day, seized it, and made it so,
incurring no consequences from family or bosses or friends? Not too often. How many times have you seized the day to get
rid of the humidity or warm temperatures or snow or cold? I’m guessing, like me, you’ve had to suffer
the day’s weather.
Days, like
flowers, are meant to be enjoyed, savored, and lived as if they are a gift from
God. And there is a huge
difference. You or I may hate snow, but
who cannot appreciate the beauty, if one does not have to leave the house. We may not like rain, but we sure like the
flora and fauna that depend on rainfall for survival. Our list could go on and on and on. There are many things in the day which we
might not choose ourselves, if we had the power to seize it. But, in the end, we recognize that each and
every day is a gift from God. Were He
not thinking of us, each of us, were He not so willing each of us to be, we
would cease to exist. Period. And we trust that this world, this universe, will
end the way He intends. Better still,
thanks to His revelation in Scripture, we trust that even when things are
broken or running amok, He is redeeming all those things that have gone wrong,
nudging and steering them back to His purposes.
In the end,
of course, Qoheleth’s observations and wisdom fall flat, and the author reminds
us it is God whom we are called to trust.
But in that trust, our mindset shifts.
We begin to trust that whatever we experience is either good or full of
redemptive value for God. We give thanks
to God for each day, no matter the weather, no matter the challenges, no matter
how many times people ridicule or mock us, no matter our health, no matter our
possessions, because we know the evil things are not from our loving Father and
that our loving Father in heaven has promised He will redeem us, He will
vindicate us, His Will will be done in the end.
The
wonderful advantage that you and I have on Qoheleth and the author of
Ecclesiastes, naturally, is the work and person of Jesus Christ. How can we trust that God can redeem all the
suffering that we face? How can we
believe that God has the power to overcome the weather, to overcome privation
in our life, to overcome all that seems to have run amok? How can we trust that God will see that
vengeance is served, that justice is executed, and that His love of us triumphs
in the end? Heck, how can we trust that
God is always paying attention to us?
The answer, which was unavailable to the author and to Qoheleth, was that
amazing mystery we call the Incarnation, the Death and Resurrection and Ascension
of Jesus, and all the other attendant works of power.
Unlike the
author and Teacher in this book, you and I sit on the other side of that Empty
Tomb. We sit on the other side of Jesus’
teachings. And because of His
Resurrection, we learn His words are true and that God has all the power
necessary to accomplish His will for each and every one of us! And so we can face these circumstances which
seem to fly in the face of proverbial wisdom.
We can face disease, trusting that, even if it leads ultimately to our
deaths, God will redeem our death and use our suffering to glorify Himself in
the eyes of others. We can face
privations, certain that, at the last day, we will share in that double portion
of inheritance described by the prophets and Apostles and that, when we begin
to experience that for eternity, our privations for this brief existence will
cause not even a tear to be shed. Our
list could go on and on and on. Each day
we face is a gift. Either it is a joyful
day where we recognize God’s sovereign’s hand at work in our lives, or we
recognize that He must be at work in our lives working to redeem the suffering
we are experience. Such is the promise
of the covenant made at our baptisms!
And so we face the day knowing the gift of the day, and knowing that God
is using us for His inscrutable purposes in the redemption of the world and
those in it with us. And knowing that,
trusting that He is a God of His word, we can face the vicissitudes of life certain
that, in the end, all of God’s promises will be true for each and every one of
us who claim Him as Lord.
The
observation of Qoheleth is that all is hevel.
Neither hard work nor intelligence nor reputation nor anything else of
human construct is true and lasting.
Some of those things we do rightly point to God, but none of them are
truly lasting. Qoheleth is right. Few would have been surprised by his
observations and pronouncements, just as few would be shocked by his cynicism
today. They might be shocked by the
inclusion of his observations in Scripture, but not by his observations. Yet, for those of us who study the Scripture,
who work our way faithfully week in and week out, the inclusion ought not surprise
us. Even the great Temple of Jerusalem,
for all its magnificence and glory and seeming permanence, was a mere copy of
the eternal one in the heavens. And like
all human copies of the things divine, even it proved to be hevel, fleeting as
a cloud or wisp of smoke.
Ah, but the
things of God—those are the permanent, the eternal things for which and to
which we strive. And we gain access to
them, are promised them ultimately, through our Lord Christ! Fame, fortune, health, reputation—all are
hevel. Only Christ is eternal, only
Christ is solid. And when we trust in
faith that our Father will reveal Him in our lives, then we can be assured that
one day we will be raised with Him in glory, to share in those wonderful blessings
described in Proverbs not just for a lifetime, but for eternity!
In Christ’s Peace,
Brian†
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