God Calls You to "Those" People: Jonah 3:1-5, 10

When I was in seminary, a peer of mine, who later became a dear friend, realized one important truth the first day of Old Testament class. Brad did not know the basic stories of the Bible. He knew little to nothing about Abraham, Moses, the 12 tribes of Israel, King Saul, David and the like.  Brad was so lost in Bible class that on first pop quiz our professor gave us on the Torah-- otherwise known as the first five books the Hebrew scriptures, he got an F.

You may wonder what a guy like this was doing in seminary. We all wondered too. But then later learned that Brad's upbringing came in a open and accepting denomination like our flavor of Baptists. And, growing up in his home church, Brad said, youth group taught him how to plan service projects and how the gospel of Jesus was all about loving people, but never really learned much about the Bible.

As you can imagine, Brad desperately wanted to bring his grade average out of the failing zone. Brad informed our study group that he'd recently purchased, "Bible for Dummies." And, our group protested his use of such a book for a seminary student. We'd be glad to help, especially the lifelong Bible drill Baptists, my friend and I who probably knew more random facts than we really needed to.  

So, operation Bible 101 for Brad began. As a group we gave Brad extra reading assignments every week and sometimes even make up our own quizzes to give him to track his progress. We also found another great teaching tool for our Bible novice-- and this was the series of children's DVDs called the Veggie Tales.

I don't know if you've ever viewed a Veggie Tale movie before but the premise is simple: to make the great stories of the Bible accessible to children through slight modification of the setting. Instead of the characters being played by human characters, the animated actors are all vegetables led by Bob the tomato and Larry the cucumber.

So, Brad began to watch Veggie Tale episodes faithfully as they corresponded with the lessons. One problem arose though when he watched the Jonah movie, which features our lectionary reading for today. However, Brad walked away with the understanding that Jonah, played by a disobedient asparagus,  hated the Ninevehites because they constantly hit one another in the face with fish.  Additionally, Brad also asked us why the members of the ship sailing to Tarshish instead of Nineveh (when Jonah was running away) played the card game of "go fish" to figure out whose live was not right with God and had to get off the ship.

We had to remind our eager and sometimes gullible friend to always actually READ the text.(Because such details in the movies were added simply to keep the young viewers entertained).  

And though such details in the Veggie Tale version of Jonah's tale seem laughable, if we stick closely to the entire book of Jonah, they might as well be included. The entire narrative reads like one of Aesop's fables. We find very few details of Jonah's life or his previous prophetic activity. He just appears out of nowhere. Furthermore, as the story progresses, we are given no details about how in the world it would be possible for him to survive for three days in the mouth of a fish and miraculously be dumped on dry ground when his "punishment" is over to have a second chance at delivering the message.

While Jonah is often referred to as "Jonah and the whale" as a story meant for kids, I propose today that it is not a story for only for the kids, but an adult tale meant to grow our understanding of God and God's plans for us in the salvation stories of our lives. A story that invites each of us to take a second look at our feelings about the bounds of God's love for those we consider to be "those" people.

It is good to first consider the who and what of Nineveh and why God's message to go preach there was completely out of the question for Jonah.

 Nineveh was the capital of Assyria. It was a city with a strong military base, the seat of all things powerful in the ancient world. If you were a small nation, you feared any contact with Assyria.

Furthermore,  Assyria was more than an enemy. This nation was THE enemy to end  all enemies to the nation of Israel that destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel (10 of the 12 tribes) and held the two remaining tribes of Israel, Judah and Benjamin in fear for over 100 years! Years and years of history included brutal treatment, occupation, and taking from Israel their human rights.  Previous prophets were clear about God's judgment on this land which repeatedly mistreated God's beloved people.

But then, a new message came on the scene illuminating a compassionate God. A God who loved even the Assyrians. Yes, there was a time for judgment but there was also a time for love of all the nations, included the much despised.

In Jonah chapter 1, the Lord gets right to the point saying to Jonah in verse two: "Get up and go to that great city of Nineveh! Announce my judgment against it because I have seen how wicked its people are!"

So not only is Jonah going to be asked to go to a faraway place, but to the dreaded enemy! And, Jonah is told when he gets there to give a message of repentance. He doesn't even get to say something nice . . .

It would be like a solider crossing enemy lines not with the white flag of surrender, but saying to those on the other side: "God wants you to repent for you've done really bad things." (Not exactly the words that usher in hospitality from Assyria, wouldn't you agree?).

One commentator defines the situation presented to Jonah as the original mission impossible.  And goes on to write about why this was such a hard thing for Jonah to do saying, "Jonah was from a strip of wilderness that the rest of the world passed through as a way station to somewhere else, kind like 1-95 running through New Jersey. Jonah had no credentials for such an act of international diplomacy. He would get less respect than Ambassador of Palau would get in [here in] Washington D.C. (You get extra credit [for listening to this sermon] if you actually know where Palau is!)." [i]

So, of course with all of this true, Jonah was afraid. Of course, Jonah doubted if this prophetic word was really the Lord who was speaking to him. Of course, Jonah thought it was time to change careers, take a vacation and find his way to the other side of the known world. Because if his previous vocation required speaking for God-- a God who would now send him to Nineveh, then it was time to get a new religion or no religion at all for that matter.

We sympathize rightfully so with Jonah at this juncture, don't we? We could see ourselves in Jonah's shoes will all of the evidence of filing a complaint against God with just cause to do so.  We'd run away too, wouldn't we if God sent us to a place in the world that we hated as much as Nineveh with news bad enough to get us killed?

But what happens if a call of God emerges in our life that no matter what we do to try to run from it, avoid it or pretend we never heart it-- what happens if it doesn't go away? What happens if we are called to be with "those" people and God just won't let us forget? What happens if we find ourselves in the shoes of Jonah?

Around this time last January, Kevin and I sat on a bus heading from West Jerusalem into East Jerusalem in the area of the country known as the "West Bank." We traveled alongside an American Imam, an American evangelical pastor, a Palestinian guide, an Israelite guide and an Jewish Rabbi-- from the United States too, but who had spent extensive time living and studying in and about Israel. 

Though every day of this 10 day Interfaith adventure held new challenges, it was the sixth day of our journey which stretched each of our understandings of Jewish/ Muslim relations within this compact geographic region the most.

Rob, the Rabbi, with us, while having spent time on numerous trips all throughout the region, even some journeys into the West Bank, had never been to the tomb of Yasser Arafat. This sight sat in the Palestinian "capital" city of Ramallah. As we walked around the plaza area and viewed the memorial, our group was asked to take a picture beside the mosque on the property with couple of the guards. I was watching my friend Rob become increasingly more and more uncomfortable.

Years and years of politics, persecution and distasteful words shared between the people of Israel and those of the Palestinian territories  and in particular by Arafat brought great caution to his presence here. It wasn't about this one man: it was about thousands of years of history.

Rob didn't want to be in the group picture with the rest of us. And, in retrospect, I understood why and respected my new friend's authenticity.

He later wrote on the group blog: "Yet somehow I must confess: as a Jew I am scared, not just of the possibility of what can happen to a Jew in Ramallah, but for what can happen inside this Jew in Ramallah. I feel a chill down my back. And I’m ready to board the bus as quickly as time will allow." Rob knew, you see, cost of either the hatred or the love-- whichever path he chose-- in this place. If this change of love sipped into him for this place, his faith he lived out in a community of other Jews like himself might have to shift. If he hated in this place, his heart might grow hard in the great cost of bitterness.

As we continued our journey in the West Bank, our schedule allowed a trip to the University of Berzit. I was still learning about all of the history, but to Rob, this stop was a place that continued to challenge him. I could see it all over his face.  "Jews just don't come to Berzit, we learned," from one of our guides. "We are told that it is a breeding ground for terrorism education." 

But Rob and our Israelite guide bravely, along with the rest of us, began our tour at the university regardless. And to all our surprise we found Muslim and Christian students eager to meet us and share experiences. Who knows what a terrorist looks like at school, but these kids looked as normal as they could be. Two of the girls we chatted with briefly on the steps of a lecture hall told us that "they'd never met a Jew before." To which Rob chimed in quickly and said, "Now you have." Rob was moved to reconsider again what he'd always thought about Berzit and the people of the West Bank.

Rabbi Rob, along with the rest of our group that day, received God's challenge to us there. Even if we think we know "those" people and centuries upon centuries of ill has been done-- God remains steadfast in love for all the nations. All people.  All people we like. All the people we don't. And because this is true, God calls us to lay down the walls of "us" and "them" which inhibit us from relationship.

Rabbi Rob went on to write about his transformative experience that day saying, "I am humbled as I admit: I am praying for peace for Israel and all nations of the world. . . . Still I pray: may the maker of peace in the heavens cause peace to descend on us, on all Israel and all who dwell on the earth, Amen."[ii]

And, like the Rabbi if we are going to take our call seriously to see all people of all nations of the world, then we too are going to find ourselves in positions as unique as being a Jewish Rabbi at the tomb of Arafat.

Consider this: our public policy and our leadership in policy as a nation, has a long way to go in support of all of our neighbors of the world. What are we going to do about it? How are we going to use OUR voice?

We, as socially conscious people of faith, have a great calling to see those hated neighbors among us, just as God sees them, in the eyes of love and to just the power of our voice to bring our nation's leaders accountable to peace making  . . .

To ask our President to think carefully about the new global policy inanities he makes and to consider all people in the nation of Israel.

To ask our Virginia governor and legislators to consider who our social service and social laws are leaving out-- and ask them to include all of God's children in key decisions when it comes to issues of marriage, healthcare, and opportunities for employment.

To ask the leadership in Fairfax County about our tax structure and why there is not more being done in one of the wealthiest counties in America, to deal with the systemic problems of homelessness and poverty.  And this is only the tip of what could be asked of us.

But, even more personal than this-- I am sure that you like me have your fill in the blank when it comes to who "those" people are in your life. You have someone at work, someone in your neighborhood, or even someone in this community that really just pushes all of your buttons and you feel like if this person or persons simply opens their mouth, you'd explode. Whoever is on your list of "those people" I invite you to reconsider the journey of Jonah. To come and get to know this God you have chosen to follow all over again and realize that yes, those people are included in God's family too. And yes, you and I have a lot to learn from even them . . .  

It's a hard edge to sit with this morning. It's a hard, hard edge that may make you and I question everything we thought we knew about what is true about justice, war, and foreign policy, but the way of relationship, the way of community building IS the way of our God.

Today God calls you. God calls you to all people. Let us get to loving in word and deed.

Amen

There is Always Hope

Luke 1:5-20

If you were among the millions who did any shopping out and about or simply breathed this weekend, there's no mistaking in  our culture, what is coming. For the anticipation has been building for weeks now. . . .

 Walk into Starbucks (as I seem to do a couple of times a day with Kevin) and what do you see and hear? Festive music and large signs inviting you to try out a gingerbread latte with whipped cream on top.

Do some grocery shopping at Traders Joes and what do you see at the checkout? Pre-packaged gifts of chocolate for children in the shape of candy canes and Mrs. Claus.

Drive around your neighborhood and what do you see? Lights, wreaths and lawn animals beginning to adorn the walkways.

Hit the scan button on your radio dial and what do you hear? Pop and rock stations seeking to outdo one another with how hours and how commercial free their holiday music selection goes on in a given day.  (With such going on since nearly Halloween, you'd think that the climaxing event was this week!)

What is coming of course is Christmas. There is no mistaking this. And, so even though we haven't officially even turned the calendar to December yet, we begin our pre-Christmas festivities here at church this morning. We do so not as a church that is taking our cues from the hyper obsessed "All I want for Christmas (you fill in the blanks)" culture. We do so not so that we can get our fill of Christmas spirit here this morning and rush out from the sanctuary and sing, "This is the Most Wonderful Time of the Year." We do so not as a church who is trying to hit over the head our neighbors of other faiths, seeking to say, "We've got the market on 'Jesus is the reason for the season'  so you'd better listen to us."

Rather, we claim this Sunday as the beginning of our celebrations as a community in anticipation of what is to come on Christmas Eve because we know we've got some work to do before we're really ready to receive.  We call this coming Advent.

And, in celebration of Advent, we take our cues from the heart of what Advent is about-- waiting, anticipating, and readying our hearts to believe again that something amazing is coming. We go about the conspiracy of setting our hearts on the stuff that money can't buy and can't be ruined by the most dreadful of family dinners awaiting us a couple of weeks and that comes in gift boxes we will remember receiving 10, 20 or 30 years from now. For what is coming is actually going to fill our souls . . .

This morning, we began this journey by lighting the candle of hope. And seems appropriate doesn't it to begin such a journey of Advent, doesn't? For isn't this how most physical journeys you and I start, begin with hope.

When becoming a teenager, we can hope to receive our driver's license and thus our freedom soon. When we start college, we can hope to finish in 4 years. When we get our first job, we hope we won't get fired on the first day. When we find ourselves in mid-life, we can hope I'll make it to retirement with our  sanity intact. And, the list of "hopes" can go on and on.

Rarely to do you and I start something that we don't hope we can finish. And, finish well.

When we consider our gospel lesson for this morning, a story essential to the Christmas narrative, but often overlooked for it never appears in the lectionary (I just had to add it in on this day), what we find is an elderly married couple who we can assume began the story of their lives together with hope as well. They dreamed of having a productive life. They hoped and expected children. They hoped to grow old happily together. But, what we quickly uncover as we read this tale, is that their dream of "there is always hope" had seemingly passed them by: they found themselves well on in years with not exactly the life they'd planned for themselves.

Scripture tells us that Zechariah was of the priestly line of the order of the priests of Abijah. It was the kind of guy who had his life together and had tried really hard throughout to do the right thing and usually did. Not only was he a priest, as his family lineage had asked of him, but he married good girl, Elizabeth. Elizabeth was the daughter of a priest and of lineage of Aaron-- the first priest ever and brother sidekick of Moses.  Look with me in verse six to hear the narration about them: "[Zechariah and Elizabeth] were righteous before God, living blamelessly according to all the commandments and regulations of the Lord."

(And, isn't our assumption that if we do the "right" things in life and don't offend God too much that we can find our way into "living a good life" category?)

Well, in this case, the Zechariah and Elizabeth were known to have a good life-- a really good life, except one thing: they couldn't have the son or any child for that matter that would ensure their lineage for generations to come. Long before the idea became popular in modern times that a woman or man's worth was not determined by their childbearing status, in this time and place, having a child was everything. Absolutely everything to "success" in life as a Jew, where the growth of the nation had everything to do with Jewish families birthing more Jews.

And it is to this state of affairs, we find ourselves at the moment when it was Zechariah's turn to offer the incense offerings on behalf of the rest of the community-- a privileged honor that only happened once in one's lifetime--  that a visitation occurs with an angel. And, not just any angel: Gabriel.

As the hopes Zechariah and Elizabeth had of passing on the good thing they had going on to a child, were already long past (verse 18, tells us that Elizabeth was long past childbearing years), Zechariah hears the proclamation of hope.

Look with me in verse 13. The angel says:  "Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son and you will name him John."  Consider this, the name John, that the baby to be would be asked to take, meant in fact, "Yahweh has shown favor."

And, it was true after all of these years that Zechariah and Elizabeth were going to be biological parents!

Though today as we hear this story and the ones to come about Joseph, Mary and the shepherds, our natural response is to feel all warm and fuzzy inside. However, what we might not realize at first glance is that truly it was a LONG road of feeling as though God had forgotten this family and pure hopelessness for YEARS and YEARS to get to this moment. Though it is easy to focus on the "happy ending" saying, yes, everyone finally got what they really wanted-- life, as we know it too, often spends more times on the process than it does with the "happy" solutions. There's always a process to get to the end-- and often the process can be quite dark and quite painful.

Consider this: while we read our Bible from cover to cover and see a seamless transition between Old and New Testament-- a transition for us that is as speedy as the time it takes to turn the page-- in actually the transition to the good news of the New Testament was not that fast.

Did you know that there was 400 years of silence, as far as prophetic words of the Lord went between the time the acts of the first testament ended and the second testament began? 400 years. If you consider our nation as only been an independent entity for 237 years,  with pages and pages of history books telling what happens in this nation in this story period of time, can you consider 400 years of nothing from God? Nothing new? Nothing.

With this true, I wouldn't have blamed them for thinking that God had forgotten them, would you? After such a rich history of prophets and leaders to guide them at every step and from generation to generation in the bad times and the good, to go SO long without as much as a word from God, would be the epitome of life without hope.

Yet, sometimes it takes a really long wilderness of despair to position us for what is next in this sin sick, broken world of ours. We just can't avoid the pain, no matter how good we are.

But, if we consider the meaning of Zechariah's name, "Jehovah remembers," we understand that he was the right guy to hear the news of promises of what was to come next. For, as this gospel opened: there would be a new calling for the entire community. No longer were they to go about business as usual. Now was the time to know that there is always hope. For if angels were now appearing to ordinary priests and older women, long past childbearing time were conceiving, and if grown men went mute in awe of the word of the Lord, then, reason to hope could be alive and well.

Though I really want to take issue with the Lord on this one-- "400 years, really, what did you expect them to do if you were truly quiet this long? and "Why, why, why?"-- what was coming was in fact so good that it was long worth the wait.

Though in the context, hearing that a barren couple was going to have a baby was not that big of deal, was it? It was just one couple, right? Though I am sure it was a painful life for the two of them, what really was the point for the community gathered around this story then and for those like us gathered around the story now?

As is the case with any blessing of God-- blessings are not meant for self only. We are given much so that others can receive much as well. Sure, it was going to bring Elizabeth and Zechariah a lot of joy to finally have the child they thought they'd never enjoy (which I'm sure God wanted to overflow in them), but this son of theirs would play a much larger role in salvation history.

John, the cousin-to-be of Jesus, would be full of the Spirit and would be used by God at this crucial time in history to bring about the coming of God's favor: a favor for all people in manner unprecedented before or since.

So, not only would Elizabeth and Zechariah receiving blessing from cuddling and showing off their miracle baby, but God would use their offspring to send a message to the entire world of: get ready, I'm about to remind you that there is always hope.

But, why?

Hope, as concept is one of the hardest things to lose when life's seas get rough, isn't it?  Sure, we might keep going, but it is so easy in your life and mine for bitterness to seep in when we find ourselves  with nothing but broken pieces in our hands.

Yet, the "why" of this great hopeful message comes in claiming and seeing ourselves in the particularities of the characters of the story.

Though it might be easy to say, "I'm old" and if life really needed me to do anything important "it would have happened years ago" the example of Zechariah and Elizabeth reminds us that if we are still breathing then there is always hope. So I ask you today, are you still breathing? Check your neighbor to the right and see if they are still breathing. If so, tell them: "In your life there is always hope."

Though it might be easy to say, "I'm broken" as Elizabeth must have felt-- her body was broken and couldn't seem to do what came to every other woman so naturally, this story reminds us that God's time-table does not take cues from the untruths we think of ourselves. For no matter how broken we feel in our bodies, our spirits or even how broken talents are, there is not a single one of us that is too messed up for God to give us our particular part to shine in. Look at your neighbor to the left and say, "No matter how broken you may feel, there is always hope.

And, though your life story might tell a tale of being sight unseen in a crowd, being the one who was left out in your childhood family when plans were made, being the one whose birthday gets forgotten year after year, or the one who just feels as if though no one has understood you in years, find kinship with Zechariah and Elizabeth and their soon to be outlaw preacher son, John. Though from humble and as ordinary as they come beginnings, God saw them and God used them to be the catalyst in God's great plan to bring hope to the world again. So, turn behind you to someone different and say to them too, "I see you and there's always hope."

Author Emily Dickerson describes hope like this: "Hope is that thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops... at all." So, though we may walk through many dark nights and cold shadows to get to the place where you and I are to go, we keep singing. For there is always hope.

This, my friends, is the good news of the first Sunday of Advent. No matter who we think we are. No matter who we think we aren't. No matter where we have been. No matter how old, washed up or how many broken pieces there are around us, today we lit the candle of hope to remind us as we prepare our hearts for Christ's coming that what? "There's Always Hope!"

AMEN

Intentional Vision

Exodus 17:1-7

When you were a child what were your dreams for your life? What did you want to be when you grew up? What did you imagine your life would look like?

Did you dream of being a doctor, a lawyer or a firefighter? Or a grand supreme winner on Star Search (as I did at age 6)? Did you hope you'd one day get married? Did you wish you'd one day have children that were as beautiful as Barbie and Ken and living happily ever after in Barbie's pink house? Did you draw pictures of the home you'd believed you'd raise your own children in one day with a red door and shutters that open and closed with ease?

But the reality is that as much as each of us had dreams and hopes for what the days of our life would hold, in actuality all of our lives in some way or the other has not worked out as we planned.

It's true as it is said, that no child grows up and says to their parent or caregiver, "I want to be an addict when I grow up." "I want to
get a divorced after a long custody battle with the woman I thought I'd love forever when I grow up." Or, "I want the house I bought with my life savings to go into foreclosure when I grow up."

The reality is: sometimes we don't even make it to the Star Search stage outside the makeshift one in our own living room. Sometimes, we find ourselves in mid-life living out of our car and not the house with that red door. Sometimes, our children grow up not to look or act like Ken and Barbie and drive us completely nuts.

Some of these situations, of course, stems from moments when we've lacked willingness to make good choices, but a lot of it comes from life just being life, in this broken world of ours that seems to become more broken all of the time. And, as a result, there are moments-- and you may have had one of them week-- when you want to throw your hands up in the air and say, "This is not the life I planned for myself." Or, "This is not the life I really want to be living. Ahhh!"

For as much as we've had good intentions and good desires for our lives-- to own a home that can be a blessing to our family and others, to be in long-term partnership with someone in whom we can love unconditionally and who loves us back, to be a parent who sees our children having children, life doesn't give us what we always want. It is often even our purest and deepest desires that just don't seem to pan out. No matter how hard we worry, pray and hope for the best and as much as we watch others being blessed, it seems that our hands come up empty time and time again.

If this is the situation that you find yourself in this morning-- wishing for things in your life that you don't have, then you are in great company as we examine our Old Testament reading for this morning among the Israelites. For they too, had a good desire, a need in their lives that they longed to be fulfilled yet simply was not. They were thirsty. I mean, really, really thirsty without a drop of water left.

I don't know the last time you were thirsty.  I can't remember when this was for me. It's rare in our water bottle and water fountain on every corner culture that we "die of thirst" literally or metaphorically in this neck of the woods very often if at all. Water  is something we have enough of, almost always, unless of course a tropical storm threatens to come through and our neighbors hoard the bottles of water off the shelves at Safeway and Giant leaving nothing for the rest of us . . .

But, in the wilderness where the whole congregation of Israelites found themselves on this journey from Egypt to the undefined and yet undiscovered Promise Land was, the resource of water was everything.

To find water was to find life and either you had it or you didn't: their search for water would be uniquely tied to who they were as a people. For example, just three days after crossing the Red Sea-- the big and dramatic-- experience of faith, the group was short on the provisions of water and the Lord had provided and God directed them to some springs. But again, they were without saying to Moses in verse 2, "Give us water to drink."

And, such was a good, normal, everyday, essential need, right?

H2O, we know, is critical to our very existence: the definition of a need. Most medical professionals will say that a human being, in reasonable to good health can only live between 3-5 days without water before suffering from extreme dehydration and shock leading to death.

So, while, we read Exodus 17 with thoughts in our head like "here they go again complaining," simply the Israelites sought to express a deep need when they told Moses, their spiritual and administrative leader, "We must have water now!" This "following God" and "making a new life" for themselves plan was not working out.

In the meantime, however, what were they to do? How were they to wait? How were they to respond to an unmet need that they were powerless to fix? Did it mean that their need was not really a need? Did it mean that God had abandoned them and truly wanted them to die as they feared?  It sure felt that way . . .

It's easy to kick the dog when you are down right? And, so, went the days of the lives of the Israelites and their relationship to Moses. As they perceived God not giving them the life they wanted, they took out their pain on the easiest next best thing: Moses. Voicing their frustration to the point that we hear Moses fearing for his life in verse 4-- believing that in their extreme thirst the crowd might stone him if they didn't get a drink and fast.

Moses' natural response to the crisis as a leader was fearful of the crowd's response, but tempered. We hear in the words of this text, Moses wanting the crowds to simmer down, stop bothering him and simply trust that God could provide-- as this was God's job to meet their needs.

I can imagine, if I were a member of the crowd, I would have found Moses' calm as a cucumber leadership style really annoying.

Trust that God would provide? "Oh, Moses," I would have said, "It's so much harder than that. When, tell me, when God is going to get God's act together and find us some water."

For, secretly they hoped that in Moses' bag of superpower, bring on the 10 plagues kind of tricks, he could lead them by another spring and they'd worry about water no more. But, such was just not going to happen.

A friend of mine shared with me this week a similar frustration with the world and with God. After being out of work for the past nine months due to a company downsizing in these difficult economic times, she is currently at the end of her rope. After sending out over 500 resumes, doing everything she can to do what experts say to do when you are looking for work: networking, staying on a schedule everyday and trying not to get down on herself even as the funds in the bank account slowly begin to run down, she feels the best parts of her life are dying more every day.

After interview after interview, rejection letter after rejection letter, and sleepless nights and pleas to any religiously minded person she knows for prayer, my friend shared she was beginning to think that God had forgotten her. No one in her life seemed to care that she was out of work and without a job coming her way soon, she might lose everything she's worked so hard for including her modest home. Life was not certainly turning out as she wanted.

But in the spirit of these same frustrations, the Israelites were asked, beginning with Moses, to be active in their faith of God and to begin to see beyond their circumstances in a way they'd never seen before.

These were Moses' instructions from God: "Go on ahead of the people, and take some of the elders of Israel with you; take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile and go. . . . Strike the rock" God said, "and water will come out of it."

I can imagine that laughter erupted from the crowd and anxiety of what might be next (if this didn't work) consumed Moses' thoughts. This God they were serving was just getting crazier and crazier all the time . . .

Professor Amy Erickson puts it like this, "It strikes me (pun intended!) that God choose to bring water-- and the life it symbolizes and will impart-- out of something that appears to be lifeless. . . . Out of Egypt and out of the wilderness, God will find ways to make life flow in the unexpected ways."

Even with all the pre-rock striking anxiety, when it does work, the provision of water is NOTHING like they expected.

The water came not from a spring (as it did before) nor from going back to Egypt (as they had suggested). The provision was resurrection before their eyes! That out of something that seemed life-less and certainly not life-giving, out flowed streaming of living water: a big ole rock!

Which begs us as a congregation, as seekers of this same God to wonder: where is our water? Where is our rock to turn to? Where is our spring? Where can all the hurting hearts among these pews this morning find hope once again? Where is the spring where we can know life can be and will be better than this?

Using our text for a guide this morning, our answers come in thinking for a minute about the quandary of the "My life didn't or isn't turning out the way I wanted" situation altogether. Let me ask you the same question of you in a different way.

Does scripture tell us that in life, we should expect to receive the dream we dreamed for ourselves when we were a child? Does scripture tell us in life that we should expect, as we follow God, that our lives will look exactly like everyone else around us?

I hate to burst your bubble this morning, but the answer to both of these questions is no.

Never does God promise us that in this life we'd get everything we want or that we can be confident that our lives will fall in the patterns just like our those around us.

But, if our unmet desires, are desires of lasting value, that are in line with the people who God has created us in all of our uniqueness to be-- then, we'd better watch out. God is going to be showing up in our lives in unexpected places, just as God did for Israel.

Showing up in places in our lives that we thought were long dead-- dead friendships, dead partnerships, dead vocational aspirations, or dead paths we'd traveled down our lives before-- and pouring from them water once again.

Not only so that we can receive what we've longed for, but so that the community around us can be reconciled and blessed by God too. Notice in this provision of water, not only is water given, but reconciliation. Moses, once distraught that the congregation would stone him, recognizes the Lord was among them and they all experienced God's provision together.

And, indeed our lives still might not turn out as would have liked them too (such may never change), but if we are open to God's direction, God's rocks of blessing, then I dare say our lives might turn out better than we'd ever dreamed from our days of playing with Barbies and Gi-Joes.

If you've noticed this morning the title of the sermon, "The Intention of Vision" you might be thinking, that all of this is nice but has nothing to do with casting or setting a vision. Yet, such could be farther from the truth, even if I haven't made such a point explicit for you this morning.

For when we are intentional about seeing our life as God see it-- not as worthless, not as used up and wasted and most certain not dead-- then, we begin to have vision for what is up head.

Vision, if you and I want to see the world from God's perspective . . . for ourselves, for our families, and for our church, begins with laying down the ideas we have about "What we wanted to be when we grew up" so that we as children of God, can help us see "what our Heavenly Parent wants us to be when we grow up." Which is what the month of stewardship every October is indeed all about-- re-centering our lives on God's vision for us, instead of just our own.

This morning, when you came into worship this morning, you were given a stone. It's yours to keep or throw away (as long as you aren't going to throw them at your pastor anyone else). But, if you feel so led, I'd invite you to have this stone be for you this week and in the weeks ahead a tangible symbol of your intention to align your life with God's vision for you and for us collectively as a church. I invite you to simply hold it in your hand as we sing our hymn of commitment in a few minutes.

May it be a reminder of the one who can bring forth water from the largest or oldest or most regrettable stones that surround your life-- remembering every time you touch its smooth texture that indeed the Lord is with us. And, will never leave us to face our perils of the journey alone.

AMEN

What does it look like to move toward hope?

I have to thank our music director, Ken for this quote that is now one of my favorites, "When they tell you that when God closes a door, he always opens a window, they don't tell you that it is hell in the hallway to get there."

In the same manner, the movie Shawshank Redeemption is one of my favorites. I tune in every time it is endless played on one of those cable networks even though I'm seen it 100+ times now. I watch it, again and again because as I do, new insights emerge.

Recently, while watching I was mesmerized by the scene shown for you below. It's near the end of the movie and contains one of the most hopeful scenes within this film. But I had never noticed before how long and how gross and horrifying really it was for Andy to get to the moment of freedom. I guess, previously, I'd just been so caught up in the emotions of his successful escape, that I forgot the journey it took him to get there (which is often what we do in real life isn't it?). But, wow, what determination, patience and courage Andy showed and freedom finally came. Finally.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SheaMMd8H5g]

Though we like to talk a lot in religious settings, about this word, hope with smiles on our faces, I have to think that it is messier than we think. Fear, doubt, abadonment are all words that are cousins of hope as much as faith and freedom are.

Sometimes living with hope means crawling through tunnels of uncertainty with the odor of the past making us want to throw up. Sometimes, we wonder where in the world hope lives, for it doesn't live at our address. Sometimes, we think our moment of freedom will never come for we've been chipping away at the same old same old for so long. Sometimes, as in the case with Andy, hope means literally making your way through 5 football fields worth of shit, the real stuff.

But, just as Andy modeled in this film, we have to keep crawling with hope that when we get to the other side, whenever and wherever this might be that something better will await us. Or, best stated by this film, "You better get busy living or get busy dying." This is the choice that moving in hope offers us.

When I've been around denominational meetings and big picture think-tank type settings lately, I've left such gatherings sad more than anything.  Sad not because the food was bad or the company was boring or even because I'd rather be somewhere else, but because it seemed the church (universal) is more divided than ever, focused on things that don't seem to matter to anyone other than those who are on the inside, and focused more on saving traditions than fulfilling its mission.

It's painful to be a part of and observe and I'm usually not one to bring such a topic up because I like to focus on what is working not what is failing. Yet, the truth remains: there's no mistake that the mainline church is in transition, if you want to use positive language, and dying if you want to be negative.

 In my tradition, the Baptist church, attention and participation in associational meetings is down, especially by anyone under 65. (It's hard enough to get people to come and participate in a local church activity much less an associational event). No one really cares, as much as they did back in 1950, and often those with the time to attend programing meetings reflect the perspective of a generation long past.

I know that such a statement is nothing revolutionary to those of us who have committed our lives to the church and care about it in vocational and personal ways: we experience this tension every Sunday. I know such a statement is what best-seller books in the world of Christian publishing are all about. Leaders who can articulate a clear vision of what the future might hold or how to spin the situation in hopeful ways are authors that we all know about: Brian McLaren, Diana Butler Bass, Adam Hamilton, to just name a few.

But, as a friend of mine who doesn't attend my church, but occasionally attends hers, sat in my living room today and said to me: "You know attending church is really old news. It's just not something people think of doing first on Sundays anymore" I actually agreed with her.

Because this is true, we, as church leaders need to pay attention. We need to stop spinning our wheels on denominational reports that just file data in some tall office building somewhere, Bible studies that don't speak to the questions where most are, and worship services that don't speak a fresh word of God every time they begin. (If we refuse to change, I really wonder why some of our churches wouldn't be better off closing their doors and giving the money they make from selling their property to a good cause rather than just doing business as usual).

To begin a discussion like this is also dangerous, I know, because it assumes I have answers as to what is next; while I'm the first to admit, I'm still trying to figure things out myself.

But, what I do know is that I simply am not interested in activities that take up my time anymore that are based on expectations of keeping the same old conversations going.

Conversations like supporting women in ministry-- we are here, we are as good at our jobs as our male colleagues, and it really shouldn't be an issue anymore.  

Conversations like can gay and lesbian members be welcomed in the church-- yes, they can, churches like Washington Plaza say, come home and worship with us any Sunday at 11 am.

Conversations like why do young people not like to come to our church-- they'll come if you invite them regardless of their marital or the childbearing status and seek to meet their needs the same as you would a middle-aged parent with children or a shut-in.

Conversations like why are ministers leaving the church-- they are leaving the church, especially, the young ones, because they are frustrated with having to live out their spirituality in dead communities when they can find the non-stifling presence of the Spirit of God alive and well outside of the church's four walls.

I love to be a part of imaginative conversations with hard-working, passionate leaders who take their faith seriously and who are willing to see the church as a relevant place of community and service-- not just another institution to maintain. I love to try new ideas in my local ministry context, even if they aren't approved or supported by my denominational offices.   I'm loving trying to figure out how to be a pastor in a unique community in Reston where there is absolutely NO WAY that the same old, same old would ever work.

Want to keep talking about these things? Know you have a conversation partner with this pastor. My hope for the next year is to continue to meet more of you out there who are thinking similar things with the hope that something new is coming soon and its an exciting time to be a part of ushering it in!