May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight, Oh Risen Christ, our example and liberator.
There is a lot to unpack in the readings this morning, so I’m only going to touch on a bit of it! I want to start though, by explaining the last part of what I just said:
"Oh Risen Christ, our example and liberator.”
The original or usual phrase is “Oh Lord, our Rock and Redeemer.” For me, I like to remind myself that Jesus is the Risen Christ and he is the example of how to live. Liberator is another word for Redeemer and I find that sometimes we say a word so often that we forget the full meaning of that word and using a synonym helps to remind us of that full and deeper meaning.
And now the readings…. My first impression of the readings this morning was that there was a lot of death, destruction and conflict. Where is the Gospel? The Good News?
I found some of it in “A paraphrase of Psalm 149” by Jim Taylor in his book Everyday Psalms, the Psalm we just read. To me it seemed more hopeful and in words with more meaning for these times. See what you think.
Familiar words aren’t enough.
New times call for new ways to praise God.
So dance. Sing.
Show you love God with your bodies as well as your words.
Use every means you have
--your music, your work, your social systems--
to demonstrate your love for God.
God will not shun you because you show your emotions.
Love is not limited to important positions or posh accents.
So join together with others.
Link your hands and link your lives.
Clap your hands and sing.
Raise the roof in praise of God.
Let the vigor of your voices overflow into your living.
Seize each challenge as an opportunity
to promote justice among all the people,
to bring to judgement, those who cause pain and suffering.
Even ruthless dictators cannot resist the surge of popular pressure.
The longer they try to withstand the tide, the deeper they drown.
That is how to give God praise.
Let us praise God!
In the Reading from Exodus, it is helpful to remember that this was written after they reached the Promised Land. They remembered how God brought them out of Egypt. They changed their calendar. They did something new, something different. New place, new times, new ways of doing things!
And we find ourselves also in a time of change. Both in the church and in the world as a whole. It is a time that can be both fearful and exciting. New times, new ways of doing things.
If you listen at all to the news, read newspapers, pay any attention to what is going on in our world, it is easy to become discouraged and/or depressed. The negative seems to be the loudest and most predominate. This psalm tells us what we should be doing. “Raise the roof in praise of God. Let the vigor of your voices overflow into your living.”
On a progressive Christian website called “Kissing Fish Book” I came across this observation:
“A Christian ‘campaign to stamp out sin’ will always bring about less light, love and wholeness in the world, than a ‘campaign to live in love.’ Instead of focusing solely on not sinning, progressive Christians seek to emphasize following Jeus’ over-arching teachings that God is love, God loves us, and we are called to love ourselves and our neighbours in response.”
There seems to be a lot of “campaigns to stamp out sin” by a lot of the fundamentalist branches of the Christian faith. At least what they consider to be sins. “My way or the highway” they are bound to promote. But as progressive Christians we have to be careful…are we saying the same thing? My way or the highway? We have to be careful when saying I’m right and you are wrong. What is the loving way to say this? I really believe they are wrong, but can we love them even as they are? Jesus says yes! We can love them, even while disagreeing with them. Not easy for sure!
The lines from the Paraphrase of the Psalm says,
Seize each challenge as an opportunity to promote justice among all the people, to bring to judgement those who cause pain and suffering.” And “Show you love God with your bodies as well as your words. Use every means you have—your music, your work, your social systems--to demonstrate your love for God.”
I guess what I’m saying is, we need to be louder in our showing God’s love for the whole of creation. We need to drown out the voices of those who are on a “campaign to stamp out what they call sin."
We need to be voicing and showing in our lives the Risen Christ’s campaign to live in love…love of all humanity and all of Creation.
But it is frustrating to be sure. As a wise person said: “there is no point in arguing with someone who does not have an open mind. People with a close-minded mentality will never look at all the variables being presented, just the ones that benefit them”. Or I guess the version that they believe…and they truly do believe them…just as strongly (or maybe stronger) than we believe ours.
So, we won’t argue, it won’t work…we must live the loving example and acceptance that Jesus taught.
And as the last line of the Gospel this morning says: “For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” We can depend on it! That’s the Good News.
Amen
