Lessons for His family . . .

      Before I get started, I will apologize that the sermon is not as connected to life around Advent as normal.  Those at 8am reassured me it was different, but good, but we all acknowledged it misses some of the normal applicable illustrations.  Those visiting are probably wondering what is going on.  The preacher is telling us his sermon is not as good as normal?  His members criticize his sermons?  I have been on vacation for the last three weeks, well for two weeks it was a vacation.  The place where we stay in Maine has no dependable internet access, and we simply did not bother even to turn on the television.  So when I say I was unplugged, I mean I was tuned out of the world eating seafood and ice cream.

     For my part, my time back has been far more focused on pastoral care.  I’ll talk more about that in announcements, and I promise it will all make sense.  But as they say, my mind, since my return, has been focused on other things.

     Speaking of the two weeks one week, I do bring greeting from the Vestry and people of St. Mark’s Berkeley Springs, WV.  Once Michelle found out I would be in town visiting my dad on the way home, she reached out to see if I would celebrate a Eucharist for them.  This was their first Eucharist this calendar year.  Y’all had two weeks of Morning Prayer, so you can more easily imagine the hunger and thirst for the Eucharist better.  But imagine getting only two Eucharists a year.  Like many rural parishes across our country, it is an unfortunately common experience.  They are very grateful you don’t make me rush home to celebrate another Eucharist.

     Thank you also for allowing Rev. Funmi an opportunity to officiate and preach without too much hazing.  Given the way things worked out timing wise, this was tossing her into the deep end, but everybody seems mostly to have behaved themselves.  So I am thankful to find her still willing to serve today!

     Our reading from the Old Testament is known among our Hebrew friends as the toledot of Isaac.  It is the generations or descendants or offspring of Isaac.  Those who paid attention to my sermon on the birth of Isaac in the age before my recent vacation will remember that Isaac’s name means laughter or laughing, as in Sarai and Abram have a baby at ages 99 and 100, respectively.  To put it in our vernacular, Stuart and Phocian would both have to wait a few more years before they were forced to change diapers and care for an infant.  Do not worry, ladies, I am not stupid enough to try and figure out which of you is closest to Sarai in age.  As far as I am concerned it will be decades for each of you!  Those of you laughing at all this understand why Sarai chose the name for her son.  Can you imagine?  I’m in my mid 50’s and I cringe.  How would one get down on the floor to play with a child?  I guess the real problem would be getting up, right?

     Those who pay attention to the story will notice some similarities to the story of Abram and Sarai.  That brings me to the commercial break.  In Sunday morning Bible study Larry has us watching movies on the patriarchs and matriarchs.  They are well-written, well-acted, and faithful to the Scriptures.  Ted Turner was clearly atoning for something.  If you like watching movies or videos better than reading, and you like learning about the Bible and the ANE, join us.

     Now, back to our programming.  One of the first things you will notice is the fact that God does not bless Isaac and Rachel with a child for a long time.  Remember how Abram and Sarai had to wait 26 years for God’s promise of a child?  Isaac and Rachel have to wait only 20 years.  That means she has had to live with the same whispers as her mother-in-law for nearly two decades.  That means Isaac has had to listen to the same loving counsel to put aside his wife, much like his father heard for 26 years.  Our Sunday morning movie captured that very well.

     We do not know if it took Isaac 20 years to intercede.  Maybe the two of them were trying all the “helpful” advice about conceiving a child from others in their family.  We have a lot of medical folks at Advent, but no fertility specialists.  I am sure, nevertheless, that our doctors and nurses have heard crazy stories from patients.  I have heard nutty thing from fertility doctors over the years, so I know how well-meaning but horribly wrong advice can be sincerely given and tried.  Maybe God was teaching the holy family the value of persistent prayer?  Scripture simply does not tell us why God answers this prayer of Isaac.  It tells us simply that Isaac interceded with God on behalf of his wife.  Isaac’s concern was for Rachel, not himself.  So his prayer, his conversation with God, is a bit different than that of his father.

     As is so often the case, we need to be careful what we pray for.  I guess as Episcopalians we would say that we serve a God who does more than we can ask or imagine.  God blesses Rachel with twins.  Quickly, though, this blessing begins to cause problems.  The twins are never resting.  Rachel complains that they are always wrestling in her womb.  Her discomfort gets so bad that she inquires of God to find out why the twins are so restless. 

     God tells her that two nations are in conflict in her womb.  This revelation will serve for many of God’s people as an instruction as to why the descendants of Esau and the descendants of Jacob are always fighting.  So much of genealogies instruct us that these geo-political conflicts are really family squabbles.  It explains, in part, why they go on and on and on and why they are so bitter.  Can anyone fight better or harder or longer than siblings?  I see a few knowing nods.  God reminds His people, which means us, that we all share common ancestry.  On some level, we are all family.  But in this case, they are much close family.

     Notice, too, God’s declaration about the older serving the younger.  As we work through the story this summer, or some of us watch the movies, we will be uncomfortable at the blatant favoritism shown Jacob by Rachel, the mother of both Esau and Jacob.  We live in a world that values fairness.  We cringe when we see her plotting to help Jacob because in her plotting to help Jacob, she is plotting to hurt Esau.  Before we judge her too quickly, though, how would you respond if God told you He had great plans for one of your children?  Would you not likely not pay closer attention to the one that God has favored?  We would all still love all our kids, I have no doubt, but I bet most of us would pay extra attention to the one singled out by God.

     The boys are born and named Esau and Jacob, for the red hair and grabbing of the heel.  Then, we skip to young adult twins.  Esau comes back from a day out hunting and is starving to death.  Understand, Esau is not literally starving.  His father is the richest man in the area.  As the first born son, Esau is destined to become the richest man upon the death of his father, now Abraham.  Esau has been out hunting and has had no luck.  The text makes it clear he is exaggerating his hunger.  If he ended up not eating this day, he would still live.  But like most of us, he likes to satisfy his desires immediately.  He is hungry.  And Jacob has made some good-looking stew, red stuff.  So he tells his brother to give him some.

     Jacob says not so fast.  He tells Esau he can have the stew if he will give him his birthright.  Esau is famished and does not see any value in a birthright, and so he makes the deal.  From that time forward, Esau will be described in Scripture, and in our reading today, as one who despised his birthright.  It might seem a harsh judgment to our ears, but is it?  Esau has grown up hearing the stories from grandma and grandpa, mom and dad, and others in the holy family.  Like his brother Jacob, he should value his birthright.  He should be the inheritor of the Covenant, but he is willing to trade it for some stew.  As the knight says in Indiana Jones every time I watch it at the grail scene, he chose poorly.

      Our story today contains several important lessons to which I want to draw your attentions.  First, consider the lesson on patience or perseverance.  We live in an age where we get things our way, almost immediately.  Everything from food to major purchases can be done rather quickly.  As a result, we have lost the virtues of patience and perseverance.  We, the people of God, forgot that time is yet another creation of God, that we are called to be stewards of it just like the rest of His creation.  The culture around us beats on us and hammers us with the idea we need always to be in a hurry or rushed.  We cannot afford to eat a sit down meal with family.  We cannot afford to wait too many minutes to receive our food at a restaurant.  Our time is too valuable, and we need to remind the servers of that truth, right?  And heaven forbid you lack money for a weekend trip or major purchase.  Credit cards are there for a reason, right?  Notice in just two easy examples how we, and those around us, become enslaved to our flesh, to use Paul’s words this morning, or enslaved to those who hold our debts.

     God, for His part, has a great reminder for us today.  He is the Creator of all this is, seen and unseen.  He can dd whatever He wants whenever He chooses to do it.  A few minutes ago we were all placing ourselves in Sarai’s and Abram’s places.  Well, we were trying to.  What would it really be like to have a child at their ages?  As the Scripture made clear when we read that story in June, what would it be like to be able to have all the plumbing working to have the possibility of a child?  Quit squirming.  Don’t be prudes.  Sarai names Isaac Isaac in part because she knows people are going to laugh at her and her husband knowingly.  And she shares in that laughter, in that joy.  She, who gave her husband Hagar the handmaid as a solution to God’s inability to keep His promise, learns first hand that nothing, not even old age or faulty plumbing, can thwart God’s will.

     The next lesson I want to point out today is our impotence.  It would be better had you all heard my sermon on Isaiah last week at St. Mark’s, but you should have some understanding of the fact that we are insufficient for far too many things in our lives.  We like to think that hard work or brilliance or any number of other activities or qualities enable us to overcome life’s problems.  Scripture, for its part, is most concerned with our inability to get back to God in the garden because of our sin.  How do we learn to trust God?  How can a sinful human being be restored to a holy God?  Most of us gathered here today understand our need for Jesus’ faith, for His willingness to go to the Cross, for His trust in the Father’s goodness, for us to be restored to God, at least on some level.  But notice how much in life is beyond our power, our intelligence, our hard work, our whatever.  Who can stop wars?  Who can stop droughts?  Who can end slavery?  Who can end infertility?  The list of our insufficiency goes on and on.  But we are reminded today in this story that God can.  More importantly, we are reminded that God has the will or desire to do away with all evil even as He uses evil for His own purposes.  Do any of us think that Sarai had any idea that people in Nashville would be laughing with her at her newborn predicament some 4000 years later?  Do any of us think that Esau had any idea we would be talking about his foolish choices even as we remember his re-embrace of his conartist brother in a couple decades?  But these stories were caused to written by God to instruct us, to reveal to us, these characteristics of God.  In this case, we are taught that His redemptive power is sufficient for all things, even things the world says is impossible.

     Related to that power, though, is another important lesson.  Though we are only starting the third generation of the holy family, we have learned how God works on the margins.  He is always in the business of drawing those on the fringes into His embrace, into the community of His people.  Part of why we invite the food insecure into our midst is because we have learned, we have internally digested if I might make a pun of sorts, the certainty that such is always the work of God.  Those whom society ignores are the very people whom God seeks.  And God often uses the insignificant in society’s eyes to accomplish great things.  The best reminder, of course, is Jesus.  He had nothing remarkable about Him, from the eyes of society.  He was not famously handsome or chiseled.  He was not born into power in a palace.  Heck, He was expected to be a tradesman.  But Scripture is full of other examples of a nobody in the world’s eyes being a somebody in God’s eyes and a glorious example of His redemptive grace in our eyes, beginning with Abram and Sarai and their long trek to the Promised Land.

     Another important lesson is the detail to which God is paying attention.  I will let you all in on a little secret.  When you come into my office complaining about your family, and I tell you to go read something between Genesis 12 and 49 or so, it’s because the holy family experienced your same dysfunction.  Nothing with which you struggle in families is not present in the holy family.  And I can always tell who read the story and who did not.  The Adventer who did not read the story gives me skubala-filled answers about how the lesson was encouraging.  The Adventer who read the story is shocked to learn that the author of Ecclesiastes was right, there truly is nothing new under the sun.  And I usually have to remind the latter Adventer that the story they read was about the holy family, about Jesus’ great-great-great however many times grandfather or uncle or mother or whatever.  God is keenly aware of our dysfunction and is still willing to use us for His glory, if we are willing to let Him.

     There’s one last lesson to which I want to draw your attention.  It might be the most important on this day since we are celebrating the baptism of Mara today.  In celebrating her baptism, though, we should all be reminded of our own baptisms and the consequences of the covenant that God makes with each one of us, despite our insignificance and despite our dysfunctions.  I began this sermon by naming this the generations or descendants of Isaac.  The word was toledot.  Good.  Some of you have not fallen asleep!

     The focus in Scripture shifts from the relationship of God with Abraham to His relationship with the descendants of Isaac.  Being a human family, some in the holy family make some seriously stupid or unwise choices, just like Esau today.  But through this family and despite their dysfunction and horrible choices, God will work His plan of salvation.  We know, of course, that His plan of salvation is fulfilled in the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus, the ultimate Seed of God’s promise to Abraham and to Sarah.  But as is so often the case, the Good News is even better than we first imagine.

     Today, Robyn and Patrick will make a pledge to God in front of us and Him that they will raise Mara to know God, to instruct her in His redeeming love, and to help her turn away from all those things which lead her from God.  It is a weighty promise, to say the least.  She is their firstborn child.  How many mistakes have they already made?  How will they shepherd her through her toddler years, when she seems intent upon giving mom and dad lots of grey hairs?  How will they get her through the willful years we call teenage?  How can they fight social media?  How can they overcome her friends who do not share the same values?  What if there are drunk drivers or speeding drivers?  What if there are natural disasters?  What if they are given another child?  You are laughing, and rightfully so, many of us were too stupid to understand the responsibilities of parenthood when we became parents.  And we got so focused on washing bottles or pacifiers to keep dirt out of our kids’ mouths that we missed the real dangers, those things which caused us to realize the responsibility God had given each of us in the care and instruction of that beloved daughter or son.

     For their part, Donald and Caitlin will vow to do the same.  As Godparents, their job is to support Patrick and Robyn in their efforts to raise Mara to know just how beloved she is of God.  It sounds easy in our ears.  They are the support.  The back up.  How many of us, though, had effective Godparents in our lives?  How many of us were effective Godparents in the lives of our Godchildren?

     We, of course, will all vow to God to do all in our power to support young Mara, and Robyn and Patrick, in their lives in Christ.  We will vow to celebrate with them, mourn with them, struggle with them, pray with and for them, that God’s purposes for young Mara will be fulfilled, and that she will grow into the full stature as a beloved daughter, a princess, of God.

     All these vows, though sincere, as with all things human, will fail.  And it is there that we all will do the truly heaving lifting of discipling and catechesis.  When we fail, we will repent and return to God, modeling to little Mara the true life of a disciple, the life of one who gives thanks to God for the saving faith of Jesus, for His willingness to do the hard work that we could not do to save ourselves or others. 

     It is in that living, day by day, week by week, month by month, year by year, that we will become a testimony and example to Mara of God’s unfailing promises to each of His children.  By virtue of all our baptisms, we are grafted into the descendants of Isaac!  The stories about which we read this week become our stories.  The promises which God makes to these individuals that we read about each week become the same promises that He makes to each one of us.  And that redemptive power about which we read becomes our glorious inheritance.  Because we are part of the holy family, because we know God loves and wills to redeem us, we can depend upon Him to see us through the trials of this life.  And though events in this life may not go the way we would like, we know that one glorious Day, all our struggles, all our failures, all our hurts will be washed away as we sit at the lap of our Father who loves each one of us dearly.

      And as a people generated from Isaac, we become a people of laughter and of joy!  We become a people who know what it is to be loved, to be in community with others who are loved and love, and to know the freedom of having been redeemed.  We become a people who give true joyful thanksgiving.  We become a people who get to invite others to share in that love and freedom, to experience the same joy and wonder as we have known, and to reserve a place at that Marriage Feast where the food, the drink, and the dancing are prepared for those who love Him and accept His calling on their lives!  Perhaps best of all, His story of redemption becomes our story, and our story becomes part of His story.  God takes each one of us who comes to Him in faith in baptism and promises to redeem us and to use us as He woos all in the world to choose Him!  It is a heady promise, to be sure.  It is a weighty responsibility, to be sure.  But because Christ has done the hard and weighty work, we are assured of God’s ability to keep that promise He makes to Mara this day just as He promised to each one of us however long ago!

 

In His Peace!

Brian†

For prisoners of hope, a promise . . .

     It is good to be among you all again today.  If you missed me last year or are surprised by the fact there is a Eucharist today, my name is Brian McVey.  Some of you probably know my father, George, through Trump & Trump.  All of you know my son, Nathan.  On behalf of his family, thank you for that cross you bore welcoming Nathan into your midst!  It’s ok.  Don’t look so shocked.  We love him, but we know him, too!  I am a priest serving as rector of the Church of the Advent in Nashville, TN.  My family has just finished a two-week vacation in Maine, and we are headed off to Nashville Wednesday, after we take a side trip to Philadelphia to help our daughter move tomorrow and a visit to see Nathan in DC.

     I have served on Episcopal Boards of Directors in two dioceses, so I understand the challenges facing congregations on the margins, especially in rural areas.  Nathan and Michelle have told me you only had Eucharist twice last year, once on my visit and once on the bishop’s visit.  I have been known to chew out retired clergy who visit congregations and do not offer Eucharists in place of Morning Prayer in various counsels of the church, so this is a bit of God reminding me of some of my words in the past.  It's ok to laugh ruefully.  I am sure He has done the same to you!  But I also understand that faithful people in such circumstances hunger and thirst for the Eucharist, they yearn to be reminded of God's promises.  So, I am enthusiastically willing to celebrate the Eucharist with you at St. Mark’s, as we give thanks and praise to God for the work He has done for each of us in Christ Jesus.

     Before I launch off on the sermon, though, I want to thank Michelle for her work making this all happen.  Y’all should thank her for fending off Nathan’s demand that we celebrate a high Rite 1 Eucharist.  Had Nathan won that particular battle, we would not be using Rite 2 Prayer A.  We'd be using Rite 1.  Of course, Michelle knows Nathan much like you and likely steeled herself, with a bit of God's grace, to that battle!

     As I shared last year, one of the big challenges for me as a visiting preacher is not knowing the congregation.  Sermons, for me anyway, are far better when the preacher is able to bring God’s Word into daily life and work.  I apologize in advance, if I do not connect God’s word to your life, but that is my failure and not God’s.  And if I do connect them, then we all know it is truly from God, because I have not been working with and counseling you as is usually the case in Episcopal churches.

     I will also tell you ahead of time that I will be preaching the Gospel from the prophet Zechariah this morning.  Some of you may want a sermon about yokes and light burdens, but I am a big fan of preaching the Gospel from the Old Testament.  Jesus, in His instructions to His disciples and Apostles, claimed everything the prophets wrote was about Him.  Because He was raised from the dead, we know His claim is true.  And I have noticed that many Episcopal clergy are loathe to preach on the OT, and many of those who do, preach moralistic sermons.  Be like David, not like Saul.  Be like Jacob, not like Esau.  That does no one any good because none of us can determine to be good, and even those heroes from the OT have some serious sins plaguing their lives.  But about 2/3 of Scripture is Old Testament, so there is a lot we skip when we ignore it.

     Our reading from Zechariah today might have you confused.  Probably 90% of Episcopalians would recognize this passage from the Palm Sunday liturgy.  Good, most of you are nodding.  Each year when we gather to begin Holy Week, we are reminded of this prophesy in our liturgy.  We wave palms and sing All Glory, Laud, and Honor as we process into the sanctuary.  Why, then, are we reading the OT basis on the Sixth Sunday after Pentecost?  Who thought it was a good idea to kind of repeat the reading?

     In truth, you and I are in the green season of after Pentecost.  Nearly half the Church year is spent in this season.  Because its color is green, some clergy like to remind us it is the growing season of faith, where we dive a bit deeper into the consequences of Jesus, birth, life, death, resurrection, and ascension.  Some of us might say it answers the question of What now?  If Christ is truly raised from the dead, as we all proclaim when baptized and when we celebrate the Eucharist, what does such an event mean for us?

     In this case, of course, we are more recently reminded of both Pentecost and of Trinity Sunday.  We kick off this season reminding ourselves that because Jesus has Ascended to the Father, we have been sent the Advocate.  Better still, because such is the will of the Father, because we welcome Christ as Lord of our lives, you and I are drawn into that relationship we describe as the Trinity.  Oh, I know, none of us will ever experience the full benefit of being in that relationship with God until He returns or until He calls us home, but we do get hints.  You and I are called to minister in His name, to represent Him in the world around us, and God promises that we will be glorified in that work that intends to glorify God.  The world thinks we think we will be celebrated and praised and blessed as we do this work in His Name, but because we know our Lord Christ called us to take up our cross and follow Him, we understand the glory, the blessing, might not come until later.

     One of the great challenges for those who follow Jesus is the fact that discipleship is cross-bearing.  How many preachers like to proclaim what we call the prosperity gospel, which is, of course, not good news, let alone great news.  Make no mistake, there are some big gatherings of people who proclaim that God wants them to have a mansion and fancy car and healthy bodies and who knows what else, which is true on a certain level, but then they remind congregants that, if they do not have a particular blessing they want, it is always because of their lack of faith.  Then they ask for more money.

     You are laughing, and that’s good, but I hope they are frustrated laughs.  I hope that you have been shaped by the liturgy we use to understand that the true path to glory is through the Cross, that the true path to blessing is through obedience to God and His instructions to us, that our ability to keep even the least of His commandments, to use the words of our collect today, is due to His work and His grace.  I dearly hope that your hunger and thirst which exists for this Eucharist primarily because you know that in this celebration, we remember His death, we proclaim His Resurrection, and we await His Coming again.  Good, I heard a few murmurs with me there.  Don’t worry, we’ll all say it again in a few minutes.

     Back to Zechariah, though. Zechariah is one of those places in the Old Testament prophets that prophesies the coming of Jesus as the Messiah.  In fact, it is rather overt in its prophesy, we would say, so much so that we use it in our liturgy each and every Palm Sunday.  There is, however, an important teaching in our passage, a passage that helps us see why God’s people were unable to recognize Messiah when He walked and taught and worked among them.  A passage which points us to our own futility and for the need to understand that God’s ways are not our way and that God can even overcome our ways.

     There is a prophesy today that should shock and confuse us.  At the end of our appointed reading, God proclaims through the mouth of the prophet “Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope; today I declare that I will restore to you double.”  I will not ask for a show of hands, but ask yourself which confuses you more, the idea that God’s people can be prisoners of hope or that God will restore us double, especially in light of our scoff at the prosperity gospellers a moment ago?

     In our passage today, I hope you see some of the misunderstandings about Messiah and the root of those misunderstandings.  I am going to hope that you have all heard sermons or read articles how God’s people had a couple different prevailing understandings of how to spot Messiah.  One image was that of a conquering war figure.  Such figure rode war horses and commanded armies.  Our Jewish brothers and sisters craved a hero who would cast off the bonds of oppression belonging to whichever culture was oppressing them at any time.  Some even took this understanding to the supernatural level by insisting that Messiah would have an army of angels at his back.  It makes sense that one would need supernatural help when fighting a super-power.  There were understandings that Elijah would return and either rule in God’s Name or advise the king about questions of rule.  And then there was the lineage question.  How could a son of David rule, when others had claimed the throne?  Please understand, I am oversimplifying for brevity’s sake.  You and I have all been taught about the three-fold nature of Christ’s role in salvation history: He is Prophet, Priest, and King. 

     We forget, or we do not know, that a lot of energy was put to figuring out who Messiah would be and how His reign would come to be.  It was not an academic question to God’s people.  They were oppressed.  They were the inheritors of God’s promises to Abraham.  How can God be in charge if His people are allowed to remain enslaved and oppressed?  Further muddying the waters were the number of men claiming to be messiah to the people.  Part of why it is remarkable that Pilate listens to Jesus is the fact that under Pilate’s reign along, more than 250 false messiahs were put to death.  By the time Pilate meets Jesus of Nazareth, he has already condemned more than 250 men to death.  What makes Jesus special in his eyes?

     I share some of this so that you might begin to understand the prisoner of hope reference.  Israel knew She was God’s chosen people.  Israel knew She would freed from Her oppressors.  Israel knew there were lots of false prophets, teachers, and even messiahs.  How were they to understand God and His plans?  Human beings being human beings, they imagined how they would manage things or how they would accomplish goals and attributed such ideas to God.  Would the Messiah be a war leader?  Would the Messiah be a prophet?  Would the Messiah rule like other kings around us?  Human beings took their experiences and understandings and created a system of what to expect, not unlike how Christians have developed a rather complex, and often disputed, understanding of the eschaton, in spite of Christ’s warning not to worry about the when and God’s instruction that He will do more than we can ask or even imagine.  This system, or cord, if you would allow the word nerd pun, is called tiqvah.

     Tiqvah is a word that is usually translated into English as hope, but, as is so often the case in translating, hope does not fully capture all the nuance of the word.  I told you I made a pun.  I know that none of you understood it.  But the word literally means a cord made up of threads.  Those who sew will understand this nuance better, but the idea of a rope will work.  You should picture a rope made up of many twisting fibers.  All those fibers contribute to the strength and utility of the rope; all those fibers or strands are integral to the function of the rope.  Good, I see nods.  We would do better to realize that our Jewish brothers and sisters had an idea of Messiah that was made up of various strands.  Depending on their need, depending on their experience, and even depending upon their understanding of the Exodus and Exile and of the monarchy, they had an expectation of Messiah.  Those sorely oppressed craved freedom.  Those who wanted to be like the other ANE nations wanted to have a king like other nations.  Many wanted God to take charge because He was the One who promised their ancestors to going with!  The consequence was that they were too caught up in their hopes and expectations, Zechariah would say they were imprisoned, that many missed Messiah when He walked and taught and worked in their midst.

     It drives some in the Church nuts that Jesus does not give a “straight” answer to the disciples of John the Baptizer when they ask, on behalf of John, is He the One, or are they to wait for another.  Jesus answers them straight and clear.  What do they see?  What do they hear?  They saw and heard the same miracles as those around them, the same miracles about which you and I read in Scripture.  The lame walk; the deaf hear; the dead are raised—these are signs of the Messiah given by God through His recognized prophets.  How many, though, miss the signs?  Some complain about Jesus’ pedigree because He was not born in a palace.  Some complain about His teaching because He claims authority rather than building on teachings, the systems, created by those who came before.  Some cannot see the proof because they are blinded by His willingness to speak with, dine with, or acknowledge the marginalized.  They are prisoners of hope, because they cannot see Him when He is among them!

     Lest you think this is a polemic against the Hebrews, they are no different than the rest of humanity throughout time and the world, including ourselves.  What is your best ministry to the world?  It’s ok to speak, I asked the question.  Awesome!  Everyone is using the same ministry.  How does this ministry work?  Cool.  How often do you do this work?  How many do you serve?  Y’all made this too easy for me—I cannot tell you the number of times I have had to speak against this tiqvah.  What is the tiqvah of the world and of many in churches regarding such work?  You are serving 122 people a month a sit down meal.  Ever heard anyone complain that you are making the recipients lazy?  Ever heard anyone complain that you are naïve and being taken advantage of, that you are enabling grifters?  For those of you doing the work faithfully, have you ever met anyone who did not need the help, who thought your cooking was a way to get Michelin Star food for free?  Great, tell me about it.  What I am hearing in your example is that some who are lonely come for the fellowship at that meal?  So maybe the meal is doing more than feeding the food insecure in your midst?

     As I asked questions, though, most of you were nodding.  You have heard those stories.  You have heard that advice and expectation.  How many in the Church are trapped by tiqvah and unable or unwilling to do the work to which God calls them?  How many are prevented by their own wisdom from devoting themselves to the purposes of God?  Part of your work, whether you recognized it before now or not, is to serve as a pattern of discipleship even for them.  So, while you are feeding the food insecure, you accidentally created community and you are serving as witness to your brothers and sisters in the Church.  How about the world?  What do they see month in and month out, year in and year out?  Have you run out of food?  Have you run out of energy?  Hmmm.  It’s almost as if you really believe that God will provide what you need to serve others in His Name.

     I am going to stop there because I am sure some backsides are getting sore.  You are all out of practice of suffering through long sermons and teachings.  We can certainly continue the discussion of your ministry after services.  But I think most of you see how we can be seduced and trapped by human wisdom and power just like our spiritual predecessors.  And we have the advantage of being born AFTER Messiah, AFTER His rejection and betrayal, His suffering, His Cross, His death, His Resurrection, and His Ascension!  We know that He is the Messiah despite the fact that we might wonder at God’s plan of salvation because of our tiqvah!

     Remember when you were a bit confused by the “restore to you double” promise before you understood what it meant to be a prisoner of hope?  That promise of God, to restore to us double, is not just a prosperity promise.  The double portion inheritance belonged to the first born son.  The first born sone received a double portion of inheritance for several reasons.  One, of course, was the expectation that he would become the patriarch of the family.  Another was that the first born son needed the extra portion to care for those for whom he was responsible, be they widowed mothers, extended family members, or even slaves.  God is promising through the words of Zehcariah today that He will make us all firstborn sons, that we will all inherit a double portion.  In one sense it is an amazing promise.  The make of all that is, seen and unseen, promises each and every one of us the opportunity to be treated as a first born son and all that comes with it.  In another sense, it seems impossible.  Mathematicians  would rightly tell us that if we all receive a double-portion, we are all receiving the same amount, no one is receiving double.  Such would be true were we trapped by human understanding.  How can we all be treated like first born sons?  How can we all be treated like princes and princess?  I cannot tell you.  I cannot explain it.  But it is His promise.

     That promise is assured by the events that we remember each Palm Sunday.  Though He rides on a donkey and is praised by the crowds, we are fickle.  Within days the crowds will join the chorus of “Crucify Him!  Crucify Him!”  As we work our way through Good Friday it will appear that God’s plan failed.  His trusted friends abandoned Him!  The women are wracked by grief.  Then comes the full extent of God’s redemption power!  Despite all human wisdom, despite all human knowledge, despite all human effort, God raises Jesus from the dead!  Jesus’ Resurrection reminds us that God’s ways are not our ways and that His power is exponentially beyond our own power!  He accomplishes that which we could not accomplish ourselves.  But even as we wrestle with that miracle, much like you wrestled this morning with the effects of your feeding ministry, so much more is happening!  It is like a gem with glorious facets.  As we turn it in our hands, it continues to sparkle and cause us to marvel and wonder.

     One of those great sparkles is His promise that those who accepted Christ’s work and person will be made first born heirs of His kingdom.  We know that this is not yet His kingdom.  We know that the riches of this world are not what He values and what He esteems, even as we understand we will buy food and drink without money, to paraphrase the words of another prophet.  But we know, we absolutely know, that we are inheritors because we belong to the Messiah, the Christ.  God has promised, and God always keeps His promises, even when things look utterly defeated, even when death seems to be and claims it is the last word.  And comforted by that reminder, and for today at least, nourished by that pledge in His Sacrament, you and I are sent forth to do the work He has given each one of us to do, you in the metropolis called Berkeley Springs and me in Nashville, but each of us assured that One Glorious Day, we will all share in the blessings He intended for each one of His sons and daughters when He first created the heavens and the earth!

 

In Christ’s Peace,

Brian†