Our Exodus reading should sound familiar in our ears, though for reasons known only to committee minds, our reading is not quite what the lectionary editors intended when they put together the reading for today. Sometimes, one can tell what the thoughts were of the committee by what was omitted. This was not one of those times. I say that because we should all be familiar with the Ten Commandments or Ten Words, as I will more likely call them today. Many Episcopalians use the Penitential Orders during the season of Lent, and so we spend some intentional time reminding ourselves of God’s Instruction, torah, to His people. Just to make sure we are paying attention in Lent, we read this passage during Sunday worship during the B and C seasons. I forgot to look in season A, so if somebody gets bored, feel free to look for me and let me know afterwards. But we are intentional in our reminder of God’s instruction during the course of our worship in the season of Lent.
Today, of
course, we are still in the Green Season of after Pentecost. Our focus is not on sin in the same way that
it is during Lent, so I think the editors did well in picking this reading
again. I just wish they did the whole
pericope rather than cutting parts out.
Quit looking for the cut parts. I
used the rector’s discretion and had us read and hear the whole section. Y’all should know by now I am not a fan of
cutting up readings. I tend to print the
whole reading, though I admit that sometimes space causes me to go with the
editors’ decisions every now again.
Before we jump
into what I think will be the meat of my sermon today, I need to do a bit of
vocabulary work. I was reminded during
the feast of Francis that some among us are relatively new and have not heard
stories and foundation work. For some of
you, this will be a review. But for
others, it is important. I have for my
time here tried to get Adventers to Anglicize some Hebrew and Greek words. It is ironic that we get Paul’s use of
skubala in his letter to the Church at Philippi today. Our translators render it “rubbish,” but a
lot of Adventers remember that it is a far more earthy word than rubbish. See, some among you are giggling and
elbowing. How fallen are we? We Anglicize and remember the dirty words,
but not the other more important words. For
those newer to the parish, think of a word much closer to the s-word in
English, and that is closer to what Paul is writing about his “fleshy” goods
and why your pew neighbors are giggling like middle schoolers.
Our real word today
I wish we would Anglicize is torah.
Torah is the word that our Hebrew brothers and sister use when
describing what many Americans call law or commandments. Though torah can have the understanding of
law or commandment, there is way more nuance there than many of us like. It means instruction and direction. A great way to describe it according to one
scholar I read a couple decades ago, was to think of healthy parenting. We teach our children do’s and don’t’s, not to
be capricious, but to keep them safe from harm and to help them grow up to be
healthy adults. Are they laws? In some sense, right? There usually a punishment for
disobedience. But they are not just
laws, which we tend to think of as limiting our freedom. By the way, those of you who want to test how
much we like our freedom and hate any limitations, go for a drive on I-65 after
church. Just don’t stay on it long if
you are driving the legal speed limit, please.
We have had more than enough funerals recently.
This
understanding of torah is important because it reminds us that God is the
loving Father in heaven who directs us for our own benefit. All 613 of the instructions in the torah of
the Pentateuch are meant for our good, are meant to help us live like a people
who intend to honor Yahweh in our lives.
We may not understand the purpose of one of the instructions of the
torah, but that is our problem. That is
evidence of our child-like immaturity before our Lord God rather than a problem
with the torah. When we argue with God’s
torah, when we complain He is not fair, or when we doubt whether He has our
best interest at His heart, we are like little children who do not understand
there is a reason one does not grab at boiling pots on the stove or stick
things in outlets or whatever. Everybody
understand now? Good. I intend to call it torah for the rest of
this, but if I slip, you understand it is the culture in which we live that
trips me up.
Back to our
reading in Exodus. As I warned us, our
culture views laws and commandments as limiting, an infringement on our
personal rights, to use the language of our Libertarian friends. We are too far down the Hobbes/Locke
discourse to climb out of this on our own, much like Ancient Israel. The first thing of which we need to remind
ourselves is that Israel asked God what it meant to live in communion with a
holy God. Think back several weeks
ago. God instructed Moses to tell
Pharaoh to let His people come to the holy mountain that they might worship
Him. What followed was a result of
Pharaoh’s rejection of God’s words spoken through Moses. Part of the reason for the Ten Plagues is to
teach Israel, Egypt, and anyone who heard about the plagues, including us, is
that God is truly God. No other god or
power or principality can thwart His will.
The cosmological “battle” that the ANE world thought was happening was
wrong. Yahweh was the Creator of all
that is, seen and unseen. All powers and
nature bow to Yahweh’s will. Human
beings are called by God into relationship with Him.
Now, after the
plagues and after Pharaoh’s decree that Israel leave Egypt, after the crossing
of the sea with a wall of water on their right and on their left, after the
utter destruction of the Egypt’s chariots, after the provision of manna, of
quail, and of water, Israel has come to the mountain to worship God. There they ask God what it means to be His
chosen people, what it means to be in full communion with Him. The resulting answer is the torah. Want to be holy like God? Here’s how.
Want to live a sinless life in full accordance with God’s approval? Here you go.
Notice, though, the words are given to a people already redeemed by a
God who knows they we be unable to keep it.
Heck, we will read next week how they cannot even keep these
instructions while Moses is speaking to God on the mountain. The words are not given as a way to earn
salvation or redemption or escape from oppression. God has already delivered them!
As a result of
their deliverance, the Exodus experience, they know God’s power and will and
love. When they grumbled about food, He
gave them food. When they grumbled about
meat, He gave them quail meat until they were sick of it. When they worried about thirst, He gave them
water from a rock. And don’t forget how
He freed them from any retribution from Egypt.
Israel has no need to worry about Egypt because their best and most
overpowering weapon, their chariots, have been destroyed. Not one Israelite had to risk their life in
battle, so complete was God’s deliverance.
Not a sandal or piece of clothing has been worn out. Heck, even their flocks have made it through
all this. Whatever part of this experience
was most impressive to them, they have seen with their own eyes. And now they ask God what it means to be His
people.
The First
Word, as our Hebrew brothers and sisters, speak to what should be Covenant
loyalty to His awesome power and merciful grace. When they doubted and complained, God still
provided. Whatever they needed, He made
sure they had. What should their
response be? Absolute recognition of the
fact that God is faithful and worthy of worship and praise. They should trust He has their best interest
at heart as He has demonstrated that fact time and time again.
The result of
that experience and understanding ought to cause His people to be loyal to Him,
despite the instruction of the First Word.
But God, knowing the human heart, instructs His people, reminds His
people of how they should behave toward Him, given His covenant faithfulness to
them.
Notice,
though, we are speaking in terms of relationship. Specifically, we are speaking in terms of
covenant relationship. Why highlight
this? Again, God has delivered His
people and they have asked what living in relationship with a holy God is
like. God has not thundered from Sinai
that the world HAS to live like this. He
has thundered from Sinai that this is what living in relationship with Him. Oh, I understand that all of God’s torah is
for our benefit. If all humanity lived
under His instruction and guidance, this world would truly be like the
next.
Back to our
concerns in the world. Some of our
brothers and sisters in Christ get really upset when the world chooses to
remove monuments to or list of the Ten Commandments from courthouses and public
squares. They loudly proclaim this is a
Christian nation and such removal is a sign of our acceptance of Satan or other
nonsense. Good. I see the nods. Why would the world ever want these
instructions, this torah? If they have
no experience of God’s deliverance, if they have no relationship with God, no
understanding of His faithfulness? If
they do not have that relationship, or they do not yet understand that
relationship is possible, how can they ever respond? How can they want to live as a people already
delivered?
As a priest in
Christ’s One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, I am both unsurprised and
not disappointed when the Ten Commandments are removed from the public
sphere. America is NOT God’s covenant
nation. Whatever town we name is not
God’s covenant town. Those who claim Jesus
as Lord, those who have been baptized into Christ’s death and raised into His
Resurrection are those who should be asking God the same question asked at the
foot of Sinai. The members of the Body
of Christ are those who should be seeking how to live in communion with God,
not people who do not know Him.
If you are
shocked or ready to argue, think of the plan of salvation. God chose Abraham and his descendants. There was nothing special about them other
than the fact that God chose them. But
God chose them for His purpose, right?
They were to be a blessing to the world.
How did that play out? As a
redeemed people instructed about God and who experienced God’s deliverance,
they were to live as He taught them at the foot of Sinai. As they were dispersed into the world, they
were to live like redeemed people serving God.
The expectation was that the Gentile nations would see what they had,
their hope or peace or however we want to describe it, and ask how they could
get it, too. The result was that
Gentiles would join God’s people. Sound
familiar?
It
should. What is the job of the
Church? We give thanks and praise to God
for the redeeming work He has done for us in Christ Jesus, the fulfilment of
His promises to Abraham way back in Genesis, and to love and serve others in
His Name. We expect people to be drawn
by our love and service of them into the saving embrace of God, right? We, like our Lord, honor peoples’ choice or
free will. We want them to commit to
Him. We want them to join us. But we should never try and make them. God gives all human beings free will, and we
are always reminded of that truth and gift.
Just because they reject Him today does not mean we keep serving. As we remind ourselves in the parables, God
is always wooing those who do not yet choose to accept His offer. Always.
Loving and serving others is our cross bearing for His glory. When we try to force others to join us or
serve Him, how does it work? Absent that
experience of deliverance from choosing Him, how can one ever expect to
understand the torah and its meaning?
That leads me
to a second discussion about the torah.
I promise you I could bore you all to sleep today discussing the so-call
uses of the law. Theologians have long
argued whether the torah is meant to remind us of our need for a Savior, for
deliverance, or whether the torah is a stick by which we measure our works or
sanctification, or whether the law is meant to restrain evil. As Christians, we would acknowledge that the
torah likely does all that and even more.
But, and this is a huge BUT, with what is God truly concerned? Our hearts.
Can one live the torah and have a hardened heart? I see the chuckles and elbows. Of course one can. Jesus had lots to say about such individuals. Can one make appropriate sacrifices and still
have a hardened heart? Yes. God is concerned with our hearts. Now, understand, in the ANE, the heart was
the seat of the will, not emotion. When
God, or the prophets, or Jesus speak about hearts, we need to hear “will.” God wants people to want to live holy
lives. God wants people to want to be
servants of others. God wants people to
want to glorify Him in their lives.
Can we do
it? Nope. Only Jesus did. But in that want, is the means of reconciliation
with God. When we realize we have
sinned, when we realize that we have not lived as God instructs, what do we
do? We repent. We acknowledge our guilt before God and ask
Him, as members of His Son’s Body, to forgive us. Again, though, we ask ourselves the question,
are we truly sorry, do we truly repent?
If we do, God offers forgiveness through His Son our Lord. And then we are sent back out into the world
as heralds of His love and grace, having experienced yet again, His deliverance
of us, His shattering of those chains that oppress us.
All of that,
of course, is a reminder of just how much we need Jesus. Most of us learn pretty quickly that we
cannot, by force of will, do those things pleasing to God and avoid those
things displeasing to God. Most of us
will not make it through the day without sinning, and none of us will make it
to next week, right? But is God
surprised by our failure? Of course
not. Similarly, was He surprised by
Israel’s inability to keep the torah? Of
course not.
Jesus
addresses this for us, though, when He instructs His Apostles and disciples and
us that everything in Scripture is about Him.
Even the torah points to our need of His saving grace. We spend so much of our time focusing on the
torah during Lent that I think we sometimes view it as limiting or use it to
beat down ourselves and remind us of our unlovable selves before God that I am
thankful we get to pay attention to it from another angle during the “green”
season of after Pentecost. The torah,
just like Christ, is given to a people already redeemed. So great is God’s work for us in His beloved
Son our Lord that all we bring to the relationship is the willingness to commit
to Him. We don’t earn our way in to His
saving grace. There is no score-keeping
which makes some of us more redeemable or more sanctified than others. It is given unconditionally. But as His grace works on our hearts, as we
begin to understand just what God has done for us, we are shaped, molded,
formed as heralds of His mercy and His love, redeemed as princesses and princes
in His incredible household, and sent back out there to tell others of the
saving works He has done in our lives.
Put
differently or perhaps more uncomfortably, you and I are the little “I” images
and little “m” monuments to God’s faithfulness and love of His chosen
people. Living as if we truly believe
it, including repentance, we become those who draw people into God’s saving
embrace and those who help others understand the salvation that He offers.
In His Peace,
Brian†
