Epiphany/Annual Meeting
Neh. 8:1-3, 5-6,8-10, ICor. 12:12-31a, Luke 4:14-21
Not often do I get to preach from the book of Nehemiah. It's not one of the more honored books of the Bible. Tapping into Paul's metaphor "though weaker it is still an indispensable part of the body that is the Bible. Ezra and Nehemiah contain practically all we know about the people of Israel in the time period 538 to 432B.C. Now you may be wondering why do we even care if we know anything about the people of Israel from 538 to432 I hope to share with you some significant parallels between those folks, way back there and our current situation.
First, the story of those people. In 586 Babylon finally lost total patience with Judah and destroyed the city of Jerusalem and the temple. The military rounded up the leaders and the best minds and the most skillful craftspeople and carted them off to Babylon to work. There the Israelites mourned for their lost lives and their homeland. They began to wonder if God still cared about them and continued to love them. The prophets Ezekiel and Daniel worked hard to assure the people that God had not forgotten them and maintain the hope and faith that had sustained them throughout their tumultuous history. The prophets worked hard to reframe their understanding of a God who would allow them to be humiliated and broken.
After a while Babylon became home to the exiles. Though they initially lived apart from the culture they gradually came to find life in Babylon not so bad. Fathers and Grandfathers who told the stories of their traditions and their homeland began to die off and the stories even if remembered held no sacred power for them. The mothers and grandmothers who kept the forms of their past life vital slipped away and pretty soon those forms were replaced with Babylonian forms and traditions.
Lo and behold comes a day when Cyrus of Persia takes over Babylon and lets the exiles go home. Some stay but many do go home and what they find on their return is more disheartening than even their leaving had been. The land is desolate. The comforts that they had learned to enjoy in their other life were no where here to be found. Ezra a priest and Nehemiah a governor attempt to unify the people and rebuild the temple, the walls and the tradition. And that's where we pick up our story in our lesson today. Somewhere Ezra comes up with a scroll--the law, the word of God. The people gather in the square and Ezra reads from The Word from early morning until midday and the people were attentive and when he was done they bowed their heads and worshipped. And Ezra told the people to go home and celebrate for this day was holy.
An ancient story, an obscure text and yet it may powerfully speak to us today.
Last week in a press release from the ELCA our church secretary Louis Almen released the statistics that this past year the church lost 80,000 members. He attributed this dramatic decline to the closing of 31 congregations, the cleaning of membership roles and the failure of our congregations to sustain younger members and to bring in new members. Indeed we could see this as a failure of our ELCA congregations but the scenario is being repeated for most Christian denominations. It seems we have in our midst a lot of modern exiles--people estranged from the very things that would give them strength and hope.
Wally Fletcher, who is a pastor and a psychotherapist has recognized a rootlessness and longing and need in his clients that might well be addressed by a Word from the Lord. He says,
"Many of these seekers do not have ready language, symbols, or communities through which to pursue their spiritual questions. They have not grown up steeped in a narrative or ritual tradition like their grandparents. Indeed, they are more like the Jews of Ezra's day who were born and raised in exile. They know the ways of their host culture better than they know the traditions of their forebears. They are more familiar with certain television personalities than they are with Biblical characters. They have tacitly assimilated the values and mores of a modernist culture that until lately placed its trust uncritically in material, technological, and individual achievement.
Thus, the so-called "post-modern" soul is a post-exilic soul: hungry, eager, alternately suggestible and skeptical, but without tested pathways of exploration and expression.
He continues, "As I listen to these souls as well as to my own, I hear four longings to which the church must respond if it wishes to meet modern soul-searchers at their point of need."
Now I think his four longings are right on target. Though I enumerate them here they are really topics for more in depth and studied consideration. It seems appropriate, on this our annual meeting Sunday when we take stock of the work that we are doing and rededicate ourselves to the work to which we are called, that we take a look at the big picture. As our mission statement calls us "to proclaim the Gospel" we are challenged to do just that. We believe that the gospel that we are called to proclaim is not just one voice among many voices. This gospel proclamation is not just another tool in our arsenal of good living. We believe this gospel is the very ground of our being. This gospel is the source and meaning of life itself. So this gospel has a message of life to the exiles, dare we keep it to ourselves?
Dr. Fletcher says the first longing is for a depth dimension in life. Many are finding that modern life can seem so superficial. How we look, what we buy, how many toys we have can be so shallow. Modern exiles are asking, "What is it that gives more meaning and substance to our lives?" Why are we here, what difference do I make? Is there more to existence than just sputtering around on the planet for 100 years? Our faith has something to say to that. We are called and claimed with a purpose.
The second longing is for centeredness. No one will doubt that our culture fosters the feeling of being pulled in all directions. The expectation is that we will be all things to all people. We need to have seen it all, done it all and lived it all. There are work and play and family obligations, there's body, house and car maintenance, continuing education and good citizenship. Where in all of this is there that peace that passes understanding? Where is it that we can feel whole and cherished as a child of God?
We've all know people who cannot or will not receive help. Out third longing is for a healthy sense of dependence. The strong message of our culture is that we are to take care of ourselves. We are autonomous independent beings. And yet that promotes the sense that the whole world rests on our shoulders. The gospel message is that we have a God we can depend on and that we are not lost, lone creatures of the universe but that we are called on to care for one another--to develop a healthy interdepence on each other. Paul's words from our lesson today could not be more to the point--where would the body be if we were all hands or all eyes or all feet.
Paul's metaphor speaks to our fourth longing as well. Our culture pushes us to a rigid homogeneity. We segregate ourselves by age, economics, and interests. Our mobility separates us from family and roots and traditions. So finally our modern day exiles long for community, for a sense of connection. As Paul says, "If one member suffers, all suffer together with it, if one member is honored all rejoice together with it." We as church are the gospel message of community.
We are like those returning exiles. We continue to hear the strong message of a culture that threatens to co-opt us, that leaves us weak and unfulfilled.
The good news is that God has a word for us, a healing, message of purpose and hope. God has a word for us that became flesh. We have heard that word. Now the question for us--dare we keep it to ourselves.
Amen