| Date | Speaker | Passage | Printable Version |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19 Aug 2007 - 00:00 | Dan Plasman | Hebrews 12:32-12:3; Luke 12:49-56 | Not Available |
On this date in 1951, in the midst of the major league baseball season, the St. Louis Browns, as they were called back then, introduced the most startling player ever to come to bat in a major league game. Eddie Gaedel was his name, and in his only major league batting appearance he walked on four pitches, which is exactly what the manager of the St. Louis Brown’s expected. Eddie was vertically challenged. Standing on his tiptoes, he measured four feet tall. Soon after his only plate appearance, the league changed the rules; they rewrote a section of the rulebook so that such loopholes would be filled, thus preventing the likes of an Eddie Gaedel from wearing a major league uniform.
Laws and rulebooks and constitutions all share something in common. They are living documents which over time get re-interpreted, amended, and changed as necessary. I suggest to you this morning something that might disturb you. I suggest that’s exactly how we should understand the Bible – a living, breathing, organic, inspired, sacred document which over time should be re-interpreted, re-applied, re-understood as necessary.
The direction of my sermon was actually prompted by a bumper sticker I saw last week, that quite frankly for a moment made me cringe, and then for a time caused me to ponder. Publicized on the vehicle’s rear end were these words in capital letters: THE BIBLE SAYS IT. I BELIEVE IT. THAT SETTLES IT. Disregarding the bumper sticker, it was an otherwise desirable automobile, a high-end one at that. I’ve been giving some thought as to why that bumper sticker make me cringe and why it touched a theological nerve. I appreciate a person’s search for certainty and truth. I applaud anyone’s regard for the sacred writings of the Hebrew and Christian scriptures. I’ve spent my adult life studying them. It is a worthy pursuit to seek out those places where faith is shaped and minds are expanded and behavior is informed by ethical and moral instruction. My problem with the sentiment -- THE BIBLE SAYS IT. I BELIEVE IT. THAT SETTLES IT – is that it doesn’t open one’s mind as much as close it; it doesn’t widen ones perspective, it narrows it. There are many things the Bible says that we should believe no longer. That should not surprise or trouble you. There are, for example, dozens of passages that sanction the slavery of human beings. Do you think the abolitionists 140 years ago got it wrong, and the biblical literalists who opposed them got it right. According to the text and letter of scripture there is wide evidence and support for the subjugation of races and groups of people. Even the tenth commandment warns against coveting the “male or female slave” of one’s neighbor. Nothing there about freeing a slave. There’s not an enlightened person here who would suggest we reverse the thirteenth amendment to the U.S. Constitution and shackle again those whom Lincoln freed, using as a rationale the fact that the authors of the Bible had no qualms about such dehumanization. THE BIBLE SAYS IT? I BELIEVE IT? THAT SETTLES IT? Maybe one should think again before slapping that on a bumper. If this morning time permitted, I would also prove for you, based on a literal reading of scripture that polygamy is God’s will; that in times of war one should destroy and then dismember every man, woman, child, nursing mother, wild and domesticated animal of the opposition because God commanded it. THE BIBLE SAYS IT? I BELIEVE IT? THAT SETTLES IT? At the very least, one need exercise a fair amount of caution about what verses or passages or sections of the Bible one chooses to exalt above all others. Perhaps the point worth making is that whether we realize it or not, any religion system based on perceived sacred writings can be a dangerous thing, whether those sacred writings be the Bible or the Koran or the Book of Mormon or Mary Baker Eddy’s, Science and Health and the Key to the Scriptures. I’m reminded of the observation of the late William Sloane Coffin who said sometimes people use the Bible as a drunk uses a lamppost; for support, not for illumination; for support of their unexamined assumptions, not for illumination of their minds.Absorb with me for a moment the impact of Jesus’ words: “Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!”Did we get it wrong last Christmas when we read from Luke’s second chapter the announcement of Jesus’ birth by angels who broke out in a heavenly chorus: “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among those whom God’s favor rests?” Did we get it wrong on Easter when we read from John’s gospel of the appearance of Jesus to his disciples in the upper room, greeting them with the words: “Peace be with you”? Did we get it wrong on Pentecost Sunday when the divisions of languages and ethnic groups were wondrously transcended by the unifying power of the Spirit’s outpouring? Why, then, in the middle of Luke’s gospel, does Jesus say, “Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! Father against son, son against father, mother against daughter, daughter against mother, and all the in-laws too.” How can that be good news?
Jesus is journeying toward Jerusalem. To his back are the green serene hills of Galilee, in front of him lies the opposition that will bring about his arrest, his trial, his suffering, his death.Yes, Jesus had been anointed to a Godly mission, but as often was the case with those anointed by God, such vocational callings made their lives less comfortable not more, more threatened not less. When Moses was called by God, all his troubles began. There would be the Pharaoh, then the Egyptian army, then the Red Sea, and then the 40-year excursion in the desert. Nothing peaceable about that life. When David was plunked by God from the coat tails of his father Jesse, all his troubles began. King Saul would try to drive a spear through him, his own son, Absalom, would lead a revolt against him.That’s one reason why the writer of Hebrews goes to the trouble of mentioning so many figures of the Bible. Yes, they all had faith in God’s promises, but because of that faith their well being was constantly threatened. Some were tortured, others mocked, others flogged until their backs resembled bloody roadmaps. Some were stoned to death, sawn in two, and dismembered because they, like Jesus, clung to a tenacious faith in the God who made promises.
And any time we make a decision to live more like him, in the manner that he lived, treating the marginalized and the stigmatized, the weak ones and the lost ones with the compassion that he did, you can count on this: we will feel the force of the world’s displeasure, and feel – at least figuratively – the sharp edge of drawn swords. Some people will accuse you of being too forgiving, too generous, too inclusive, too critical of a foreign policy, unpatriotic, sticking your nose where you have no business sticking it. “Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!”
Jim Loney was a Christian peace activist, one who tried to walk the path walked by Jesus. Along with three others, he was captured by Iraqi militants in Baghdad in November 2005. One of the four was shot. For nearly four months Jim Loney and the remaining two hostages were handcuffed and chained in a 10-by-12-foot room. This is the story he tells.
One day, our captors treated us to some Pepsi. We were very excited — more about the bottle than about the Pepsi, because it meant we could now relieve ourselves in urgent circumstances. As you might expect, it's not easy to relieve yourself in urgent circumstances when your right and left hands are handcuffed to someone else's right and left hands. Sometimes, despite our most careful efforts, we ended up with an unfortunate mess.On a later day, after bringing us a particularly greasy lunch . . . the captor we called Uncle needed to clean his greasy fingers. He saw a rag hanging on the back of a chair and used it to wipe his hands. He did not know that it was our Unfortunate Mess Rag, and that it had been used earlier that morning. In that moment I saw how everything we do, even the things that seem most insignificant — cleaning up a mess or wiping our hands — affects everything and everyone else. Uncle thought he was simply rubbing some grease off his fingers, but in reality he was soiling himself in the squalor and degradation of our captivity — without him knowing it, or us intending it. Uncle was one of our guards. With keys in one hand and gun in the other, his power over us seemed absolute, but he was not free . . .I believe there are many ways we can hold one another captive. It might be with a gun, an army, a holy book, a law, an invisible free-market hand. It doesn't matter how we do it, who we do it to, or why. There is no escaping it: We ourselves become captives whenever we hold another in captivity. Whenever we soil someone else with violence, whether through a war, poverty, racism or neglect, we invariably soil ourselves. It is only when we turn away from dominating others that we can begin to discover what the Christian scriptures call "the glorious freedom of the children of God." [from This I Believe, National Public Radio]
So my friends, may we run as best as we are able with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer, the perfecter, the trailblazer of our faith. May we live well the week that is set before us.