Foolish and hopeful

The task of the preacher is a three-part job. First, it is to take stock of the scripture readings assigned for the week: What do they say? What is at the heart of them? What do we tend to overlook here? How do they connect and relate to the rest of the bible? Second, it is to take stock of the world around us: What is happening out there? What is hopeful? What is shocking? Where is the good and the evil? What is breaking our hearts? And third, it is to take stock of your people- what is happening in the life of your community? What are your people holding individually and collectively? What is breaking their hearts? Where are they finding hope? What feels like too much to bear alone that can be named from the pulpit?

And then you take these things, dice them up finely, saute with onions and garlic and some like dried thyme, add two quarts of water and simmer for four or five days. And you see what kind of sermon you've got.

We have a lot of ingredients for the soup this week, don't we? (So let's go slowly.)

In my mind, there is a certain subset of scripture passages that stand out as representative of the overall message of the rest of scripture. The type of passages where if they were all we had left of the original manuscript, we could more or less piece Christianity back together. And this week, all three of our bible passages feel like those emblematic passages to me.

From the prophet Micah, we have this clarity about God's desire of us, it's not for sacrifices or offerings, for money or rams or oil, but God's desire from us, God's only desire, is to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God. And if that was our only job, we would get like 90% of the way back to Christianity and we would be very, very busy forever.

In the Gospel of Matthew, these beatitudes occur at the very beginning of the sermon on the mount and read like its thesis statement, blessed are the meek, the merciful, the peacemakers, the pure in heart /// for they will inherit the earth, they will receive mercy, they will see God, they will be called children of God. This version of the beatitudes differs from Luke's in that it doesn't contain parallel condemnations, but still we're sort of left to wonder. What is the opposite of meek, merciful, peacemakers? Do the strong lose their inheritance of the earth? Do the vengeful receive vengeance in turn? Are the warmongers not children of God? It kinda sounds like it. But in either case, just like in the Magnificat, just like in Matthew 25, scripture is saying: this is who Jesus is here for; this is who gets God's attention, and it's not who you think it should be.

And then in 1 Corinthians, we have this acknowledgment from Paul that things like Micah 6:8 and the Sermon on the Mount sound crazy and unrealistic and naive in a world like ours. The Gospel, then and now, was not great for PR. But maybe more specifically than that, Paul is saying that if you are the meek "Blessed are the meek" sounds awesome. If you are the strong, "Blessed are the meek" does not sound awesome. If you are the merciful, "Blessed are the merciful" sounds awesome, if you desire to live in a world full of mercy, "Blessed are the merciful" sounds awesome, if strength, vengeance, brutality are all your world-building methods of choice, then the Gospel is not going to sound awesome to you. Paul is saying this thing that feels as true today as it ever has which is that to the Gospel's greatest offenders, the Gospel sounds foolish. And even worse than that, preaching the Gospel is what got Jesus killed.

I feel so acutely aware lately of just how many people and institutions and principalities have chosen -- and keep choosing -- strength and vengeance and brutality as their world-building methods of choice. I'm so heartbroken by this world, and it feels like every single day this month I have been made to look at a video or a picture of something truly awful happening: a bombing, a kidnapping, a child left abandoned, a family torn apart, somebody shot in broad daylight. And if that was not bad enough, we are being made subject to a discourse that would ask us to rationalize why the violence was deserved, as if on some occasion, our turn-the-other-cheek beat-your-swords-into-plowshares blessed-are-the-merciful God would give us an exemption for how we treat one another. And it makes me, feel, crazy.

And in the midst of all of this, there is a two inch thick layer of ice encasing the entire town, school has been cancelled for a week, I have had to plan my trips to the grocery in a way that I haven't since COVID, and you need a chainsaw to shovel the driveway. So if these are the ingredients for the soup that is this sermon, I wonder what kind of sermon you think we've got?

I kept getting tripped over this little bit at the end of 1 Corinthians that says "God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God."

We have a God that loves mercy and blesses the meek and the only thing God asks of us is to do the same. And people got so mad at him for it that they killed him. But his death was not the end of the road for him, and this world that angers us and confounds us because of its cruelty, cruel is not the last thing the world will ever be. If you have been crying your eyes out randomly or scared out of your mind or frozen in disbelief or just absolutely numb and lost for words, if you feel crazy, let me just say, you are not crazy. You are not crazy for believing that a Micah 6:8 world is possible, you are not crazy for believing the words of the Gospel. You are not crazy, but, you are, a little foolish at least by appearance to the world around us.

It is not a savvy business choice, or a shrewd political play to cast your lot with the meek or to choose mercy or to make peace, in fact, it appear quite foolish sometimes.

But if the options are between being resigned and nihilistic or foolish and hopeful, I'm going to choose foolish and hopeful, and I hope that you will choose it with me.

There is a lot that we have to be brave about these days; I wish we had less. But when it comes down to it, I always find it easier to be brave and hopeful when I'm not doing it alone, I always find it easier to do the right thing -- especially when it's the hard thing -- when I'm not doing it alone. We were never meant to endure or hold these things alone, and that's why God called us together in the shape of a church. To which I say thank God for God and thank God for the church, all of us, a bunch of fools for Christ. Amen.

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Micah 6

“With what shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before God on high?

Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings, with calves a year old?

Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with tens of thousands of rivers of oil?

Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?”

He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you

but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

1 Corinthians 1

The message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written,

“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.”

...

Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God.

Matthew 5

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

“Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

“Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.