The Rev. Thomas McAlpine preached this sermon, as the second of two sermons based on the Book of Tobit.  This year St Dunstan’s developed its Vacation Bible School around the Book of Tobit and the two Sundays after VBS bumped the normal Old Testament readings to continue the focus. 

Readings: Tobit 14:3-4a, 5-8; Psalm 80:1-2, 8-18; Hebrews 11:29-12:2; Luke 12:49-56

How do you live when you’re off the map?

Moses had provided a pretty clear map: live righteously and you’ll prosper in the land; live unrighteously and you’ll lose the land. But when you’re off the land through no particular fault of your own, what then? So it’s not surprising that we encounter a number of stories about that in the Old Testament: Joseph (minus his technicolor dreamcoat) in Egypt, Esther in Persia, Tobit in Assyria. The Joseph and Esther stories have a certain fairy-tale quality to them: Joseph becomes the #2 man in Egypt; Esther wins the beauty contest and marries the king. Tobit, after achieving some success in exile, gets bird poop in his eyes and goes blind, the loss which kicks off the main story in the book that eventually results in Tobit regaining his sight.

How do you live when you’re off the map? In addition to telling us a rollicking good story, complete with a carnivorous fish, a damsel in distress, and an angel in disguise, the book gives serious attention to that question. This morning we’ll look at two elements in its answer: bless God and give alms.

Bless God

God blessing us: we’re used to that idea. In the catholic (small c) tradition we believe that priestly ordination authorizes the priest to convey God’s blessing to us, and so we leave each Mass with “the blessing of God Almighty” ringing in our ears and working its way into our very selves. Scripture takes blessing as a given and so doesn’t define it. An approximate definition might include God’s presence, God’s generosity, health, fertility, success in ways designed to benefit us and those around us.

That’s important in Tobit. But Tobit focuses on our blessing God. We heard it in our first reading: “to be mindful of God and to bless his name at all times with sincerity and with all their strength.” It shows up at the beginning of some well-known psalms (Ps 103, 104). What’s that about? It’s like praise, but more oriented to the future: God’s reign really is beautiful; may it grow and expand! It’s like thanksgiving, but not tied to something specific I’ve or we’ve received.

We Christians haven’t done much with this, but our Jewish brothers and sisters have, and their practice might enrich ours. A Jewish prayer book puts it this way: “A berachah acknowledges God as the “Source” of whatever we eat or enjoy, or whatever natural marvels excite our awe.… The blessing makes us conscious that nothing in nature is to be taken for granted…”

So there’s a blessing before drinking wine or grape juice: Blessed are You, the Lord our God, King of the universe, who creates the fruit of the vine.

One for seeing beautiful trees or animals: Blessed are You, the Lord our God, King of the universe, who has such as these in His world.

One for hearing good news: Blessed are You, the Lord our God, King of the universe, who is good and beneficent.

One for hearing bad news: Blessed are You, the Lord our God, King of the universe, the true judge.

You get the idea. For the vision behind the practice we might look to Psalm 19. It starts:

The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the firmament shows his handiwork.

It continues in this vein for a number of lines. The heavens clearly their act together. What about us? Notice how the psalm ends:

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight,
O Lord, my strength and my redeemer.

Blessing God is one of the quite lovely ways this can play out.

One more thing about this before I move on. Part of most people’s consciousness is this running series of responses that plays as a sort of sound track throughout the day, approving of this, disapproving of that, being anxious about this, being relieved about that. The practice of blessing God can be part of that running series, helping our responses to be more mindful, more realistic, perhaps less anxious.

Give alms

We heard that in our first reading too: “Your children are also to be commanded to do what is right and to give alms…”

What’s that about? In the last month or so our first reading has been from the prophets, Amos and Hosea. In coming weeks we’ll get a good dose of Jeremiah. And one of the primary prophetic themes is God’s passionate concern for the poor, God’s anger at how the poor are getting crushed. That anger explains why Tobit is in exile in Nineveh rather than home in the Upper Galilee. And the prophets were speaking directly to the folk in power, the folk who could do something about it:

Cease to do evil, learn to do good;
seek justice, rescue the oppressed,
defend the orphan, plead for the widow. (Isa 1:16b-17 NRS)

But in exile, or in the bowels of some foreign empire the possibilities for doing something about it are severely limited, so God’s passionate concern for the poor translates into the repeated exhortation to give alms. Give, that is, to those at the bottom, to those who have no realistic prospect of paying you back or returning the favor.

The language for this practice is important: that “give alms” that we heard could be translated more literally as “do mercy.” “Doing mercy” is, of course, broader than giving alms, and in Tobit includes Tobit’s dangerous practice of burying discarded bodies. But “doing mercy” often, from context, means “giving alms” and that’s important because it connects the mercy we hope to receive from God with the mercy we’re exhorted to show to those who need it.

Being in exile makes it difficult to follow the Law’s commands regarding gifts for the sanctuary. And in exile the faithful connect those commands with almsgiving. So earlier in Tobit we hear Tobit tell his son Tobias: “Indeed, almsgiving, for all who practice it, is an excellent offering in the presence of the Most High.” (4:11)

This shows up in other writings of this period (Sirach), and lies behind some of Jesus’ teaching on almsgiving:

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. (Mat 6:19-20)

We, probably, are at a point somewhere between the prophets’ audience and Tobit’s audience. We have some power to “do something about it” with regard to the condition of the poor, and to that degree we need to listen to the prophets. But we often don’t have the power to do much, and to that degree we need to listen to Tobit, and pay attention to whether some of our resources are going into mercy, helping those in no position to return the favor. So Tobit is, alas, not particularly helpful for a capital gifts campaign, but very relevant when we pass the plate for the Middleton Outreach Ministry.

Bless God & Give alms

How do you live when you’re off the map? Bless God and give alms.

Looking at these two themes we might think of them as pointing to the twin virtues of gratitude and generosity. I could go on about this for a good stretch, but I’ll leave that for you in the coming week. Notice how many elements in our culture work against any sense of gratitude. Notice how nurturing gratitude, also through the practice of blessing God, helps us see our world more clearly. Notice how gratitude, in turn, frees us for generosity. The world is not zero-sum. God continually drenches the world with gifts. All of us have the privilege of blessing God for it, and mirroring God’s generosity in our own.

The privilege, that is, of doing so with Tobit and Anna, Raguel and Edna, Tobias and Sarah. And that’s not bad company.

Where you go, I will go; where you stay, I will stay. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God.  

That is the sixteenth verse of the first chapter of the Book of Ruth, the source of today’s Old Testament lesson. It’s the most familiar – the most famous – verse of the whole book. Most notably, it’s become a favorite text at weddings. If you go on Pinterest, the notorious craft idea sharing site, you’ll see Ruth 1:16 featured in many an artful wedding decor shot, painted on barnwood, letterpressed on a poster, written in cursive on a vintage globe.

But the thing is, this is not a marriage text. Its message of love and loyalty, of forging new and lasting ties, fits easily in with the language of our sacramental bonds. But these words are spoken by a young woman, a widow, to her mother-in-law. Let me tell you the story – you know I love to tell these stories – and then I’ll circle back round to Ruth 1:16 and Pinterest weddings and all that.

This is how the Book of Ruth begins. In the days when the judges ruled – before the time of the Kings, Saul, David, Solomon – there was a famine in the land of God’s people.  And a certain man of Bethlehem in Judah went to live in the neighboring country of Moab, he and his wife and two sons. The name of the man was Elimelech and the name of his wife was Naomi, and their two sons were Mahlon and Chilion. Don’t bother to remember those names, though. Elimelech died soon after the family moved to Moab, but they remained there; the young men took wives from among the Moabites, named Orpah and Ruth. But within a few years Mahlon and Chilion, Naomi’s sons, died too, and left Naomi a widow without sons – a woman without a man to protect and provide for her, one of the worst possible fates in a patriarchal society.

Naomi decides to return home to Bethlehem; there is nothing for her here in this foreign land. She encourages her Moabite daughters-in-law to return home to their families, as well; after all, nothing now binds them to her. The daughters-in-law weep and insist on staying—which is when we start to get a sense that Naomi was someone special. We all know that daughter-in-law/mother-in-law relationships can be tense, and these daughters-in-law weren’t even Jews – Naomi might well have been disappointed by her sons’ choices. But apparently Naomi was such an affectionate mother-in-law that Orpah and Ruth were quite devoted to her. Naomi harangues the girls, reminding them that she has no more sons in her womb for them to marry, and Orpah at last consents to return home.

But Ruth is more stubborn. She insists on coming back to Bethlehem with Naomi. And this is when Ruth speaks those famous words, making a vow to bind herself to Naomi: “Wherever you go, I will go; wherever you lodge, I will lodge; your people will be my people, and your God my God.” She makes herself Naomi’s daughter, she joins Naomi’s family – and more: Christian writer Lauren Winner writes, “With that pledge, [Ruth] makes herself a Jew.”

So Naomi and Ruth return together to Bethlehem, poverty-stricken. It is harvest time, and in order to get food for herself and her mother-in-law, Ruth goes out to glean in the fields. Gleaning was a duty of the rich towards the poor, established in the Book of Deuteronomy: when landowners harvested their grain, the poor could come and collect the ears of grain which were missed.

Quite by chance, Ruth goes to the fields of Boaz, a distant cousin of Elimelech, Naomi’s dead husband. Boaz is in the fields, overseeing the harvest, and notices Ruth, a young woman, a stranger, and alone. Learning who she is, he extends kindness to her, offering her free access to the workers’ water, giving her some food at lunchtime, and warning the men working the fields not to bother her.   Ruth asks Boaz, “Why should I, a foreigner, be favored with your notice?” Boaz’s reply shows that he is impressed with Ruth’s character: “I have had a complete account of what you have done for your mother-in-law after your husband’s death; you have left your father and mother and the land of your birth, and have come to a people whom you did not know previously.”

Ruth gleans in Boaz’s fields for the rest of the harvest season, at his invitation, but Naomi wants more for her daughter-in-law than a life of scavenging. And the harvest is ending soon – gleaning won’t sustain them much longer. Naomi knows that Boaz is a kind man, and that he is also a kinsman of her late husband, and that this means he is one of a number of people who has some obligation to marry Ruth. Here’s where you need a little anthropology to understand this story: the ancient Jews followed a set of marriage practices called the levirate. This meant that when a man died childless, his brother had an obligation to marry his widow and produce children on behalf of the dead brother; if there was no brother, that obligation passed on to other near male kinsmen. Now, in practice, men were often unwilling to take on these duties towards a widow and a dead brother or cousin. After all, the children you produced weren’t yours, they belonged to the dead man; but you were the one who had to support the widow and her family.

Perhaps anticipating that Boaz might be reluctant to take on a widow, Naomi decides to try to push the issue a little. She has Ruth bathe and anoint herself, and dress up in her nicest clothes; then she tells Ruth to sneak up to Boaz as he is sleeping at night, out in the fields where the workers are processing the grain. It’s the end of the harvest season so Boaz and the workers are feasting and drinking in the evenings; Naomi assumes Boaz will have had a few. She tells Ruth, When he lies down, go to him; uncover his “feet”, and do whatever he tells you to do. Ruth says, Okay, I’ll do as you say.

If all this sounds a little sketchy to you, it should. The implication seems to be that Naomi and Ruth hoped to lure Boaz into a sexual relationship before he had a chance to consider all the implications of marrying a widow, and perhaps decide against it. Maybe Naomi assumes that Boaz’ basic decency means that, having gotten some milk for free, he will nonetheless go on to buy the cow and marry Ruth. It’s not Naomi’s best moment, for sure; but we have to remember just how completely without power or resources these two women were. Ruth’s youth and attractiveness may have felt like their only asset.

But Boaz—as we’ve already seen—was a good man, and it didn’t happen quite that way, as today’s portion of the Book of Ruth tells us.  Ruth went down to the threshing-floor in the evening, all gussied up. When Boaz had eaten and drunk, and was in a contented mood, he went to lie down and sleep near the pile of grain. Ruth came quietly and uncovered his feet and lay down. Suddenly he woke up startled, and found a woman lying beside him. He said, “Who are you?!” She answered, “I am Ruth, your servant; spread your cloak over me, sir, for you are my husband’s next-of-kin.” Boaz said, “Bless you, my child, for your loyalty in this is even greater than your loyalty to Naomi. You have not gone after young men, whether poor or rich. Do not be afraid; I will do what you ask and take you as my wife, for everyone knows that you are a worthy woman.” The text hints that Boaz is older, and perhaps on the homely side. There’s no hint that he’s been married before. He seems genuinely touched that this young woman is willing to be his bride – not only to do the right thing for her mother-in-law, but to bring some happiness and fulfillment into his life, too.

So Boaz tells Ruth that he will take her as his wife. but not right away, not until he can do it properly. He will not take advantage of her desperation and vulnerability. First, as he explains, he has to check with another man who is a nearer kinsman to Elimelech, and thus has a greater right to Ruth.  Boaz tells Ruth, Go to sleep. We’ll sort this out tomorrow. In the morning he wakes Ruth early, gives her some extra food, and protects her honor by sending her home “before people could recognize one another” in the morning light. And as soon as the sun is up, he goes to seek out the man— the book doesn’t name him; let’s call him Joe— who has greater right to Ruth and to the rest of Elimelech’s estate, including some land.

Now it’s Boaz’s turn to be a little crafty. He tells Joe that Naomi is selling off Elimelech’s land, and that Joe has the right to buy it, if he wants it. Joe thinks sure, he could use some more land. Then Boaz adds, Oh, by the way, if you take the land, you also have to take Elimelech’s son’s widow Ruth, and “raise up a family for the dead man on [Elimelech’s land].” That scares Joe; he’s afraid that might be a drain on his own resources. So Joe refuses his rights of redemption over the land and the woman, passing them on to Boaz. Without wasting any time, Boaz announces that he will take Ruth the Moabitess as his wife, and will raise up a family in the name of her dead husband.

And everyone lives happily ever after, more or less. Ruth and Boaz are married. Ruth bears a son, and names him Obed. Naomi, of course, is delighted; she is so close to her daughter-in-law and grandson that she even helps to nurse him. The women of Bethlehem praise God for his restoration of the family, and remind Naomi of Ruth’s faithful love: “[She is] the daughter-in-law who loves you [and] is worth more to you than seven sons!”— strong words in a culture which generally valued sons over daughters!

So ends Ruth’s story— but attentive readers will notice her name again, in the genealogies at the beginning of Matthew’s Gospel. Little Obed becomes Jesse’s father, and the grandfather of King David, and the great-great-great-some grandfather of Joseph, husband of Mary, mother of Jesus. So Ruth the Moabitess becomes part of that holy lineage.

An interesting thing about the Book of Ruth is that God is just barely a character in it. God is mentioned often; it’s a story about people of faith who turn to God for guidance and protection, and honor God as the source of blessings.  But God works in this story the way I believe God works in our world, our lives, a lot of the time.

God acts in this story through coincidences that advance God’s plot – Ruth just happens to go gleaning in Boaz’ field; Boaz just happens to spot Joe first thing that morning.

And God acts in this story through human hearts and human relationships at their best – Naomi’s affection and determination;  Ruth’s loyalty; Boaz’ kindness and decency; the open-heartedness of the people of Bethlehem, who accept and celebrate Ruth even though she is an outsider.

Where you go, I will go; where you stay, I will stay. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. It’s a beautiful text, and if you used it at your wedding, that’s cool! However, I believe that the trend to appropriate this text into the realm of romance reveals something important about our impoverished imagination for human relationships. We look at these words about intimacy, trust, and commitment, and we think, Oh, this is about romantic love, because that’s where we expect to find intimacy, trust, and commitment.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not down on marriage. I am married to an extraordinary human being, for whom I am grateful on a daily basis. But alongside my spouse, there’s a whole circle of people who sustain and ground and support and challenge me, and I hope that’s true for most of you, too.

My friend Jonathan, the chaplain of the UW Episcopal Campus Ministry – for whom a few Dunstanites are making dinner tonight – talks often about holy friendship.  It’s an idea he’s exploring with the chaplaincy community – how are the friendships formed there different from everyday friendships? More intentional – less conditional – deeper – more fruitful? He wrote about it a few months ago on his blog: 

“The first step toward loving one another is to let yourselves be friends: friends who care for each other, reach out to each other, inside and outside of the hours we share in this place; friends who remember and show interest in one another’s lives; friends who eat together, pray together, laugh together, sometimes cry together…. To be friends is to see one another as gifts of God.

“The second step toward loving one another is to let Christ live in your friendships. Realizing that this second step runs the risk of sounding pious, I think what I mean is that I hope you share with one another the parts of your lives that matter most: the true parts, the God-at-work-in-you parts. I hope you will talk about … what you are seeing of God’s movement in this world and in your life. I hope you will ask questions of your friends here that let others tell you what they see.

“I hope, at some point, you will experience the great gift of being prayed for by a friend, and praying for a friend who needs a prayer especially from you. I hope you will become friends who struggle through the hard parts of Scripture together, and the best parts of Scripture together. I hope you will never forget the gift it is when you show up for each other, and that you also remember how, at times, you have teamed up together, to reach goals you could not have accomplished alone….”

I believe that holy friendship, as Jonathan describes it, is a pretty good description of the bond between Ruth and Naomi. Romance is a very particular kind of relationship that some people spend a lifetime seeking. But holy friendship can unfold all over our lives, in many forms and seasons. Think about the holy friendships you already have, and the blessings they have borne in your life. Think about the friendships or even acquaintanceships that have that potential, with some care and cultivation.

I try not to preach on my children; it’s hard enough to be the pastor’s kid without also being a sermon illustration. But they are some of my best teachers, so now and then, I have to share something. One night this week I asked my kids whether they had done anything lately that they were especially proud of. My daughter said, “Not especially.” So I said, “Well, I’m really impressed with the way you’re getting along with your classmate B. Just a week ago, you guys were fighting a lot.” And my daughter looked at me sternly, paused for a moment, and said, “God is in all of us.”

God is in all of us. And one of the most important, life-giving, fruitful ways God is in us is in our capacity for relationship. Our capacity to reconcile. To connect. To listen, share, support, encourage, collaborate. To establish and live into holy friendships. That’s how God shows up in the story of Ruth. That’s how God shows up for us, much of the time. And that’s a hopes I have for this Christian fellowship: That the bonds of holy friendship will become the strongest threads of the fabric of our common life here.

Jonathan’s blog entry in full: http://thepatienceoftrees.blogspot.com/2015/04/a-flock-of-holy-friendships-our-good.html

This sermon was preached by the Rev. John Rasmus, a retired priest who makes his home at St. Dunstan’s. 

Have pity upon me, Have pity upon me, O ye my friends for the hand of God has touched me.

A few Sundays ago Miranda spoke in her sermon about story, about how our lives are part of a great story and that story is reflected in the great story that God is telling — the old, old story of Jesus and His love.

This morning I would like to speak more about that story in my life.  I begin by reminding you of these words from the Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien.  Sam and Frodo have found themselves walking alone, the fellowship of the ring has been broken, Gandalf has been lost in the mines of Moria, Boromir has betrayed the fellowship and has died at the hands of the orcs; and now Sam and Frodo have found themselves on the dark and dangerous road to Mordor.  As they walk along Sam turns to Frodo and says, “I wonder what sort of tale we’ve fallen into.”  And that is the question isn’t it for each of us.  Just what sort of tale is this?  Is it as Macbeth says, “A tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury and signifying nothing?”  Or is there something more and deeper into which we have fallen.  A tale of meaning and life, a story of fellowship and community, a story of life and love.  Let me share a moment in my story and how once I found my story tied up with a greater story.

There are three threads that are woven together to make this story.  The first thread is about what was happening in my life and in my father’s life.  I have told you before about how in 1965 my father was dying of colon cancer and I went often to visit him during that time of his dying.  But my dad had made a promise that he would make it to my high school graduation.  It had been a hard and difficult struggle.  I want to return to the conversation I had with my dad on April 10, 1965.  On that day when I walked into my dad’s room he began to weep.  After a moment or two he regained his composure and said to me, “Johnny, I just can’t make it.”  We both wept together.  Then my dad said, “Johnny I want to place you and Mary Ann, my sister, into the hands of my best friend.”  He paused and I spoke up, “That’s OK dad I have come to love Geneva and Alfred and I’ll be OK with them.” My dad looked at me intensely and then said, “Oh, Johnny, I’m not talking about guardianship, no, I want to place you in the hands of the best friend I have ever had and that is Jesus.  I love you so much that I could not let you go without you in His hands.”  That evening after that conversation my dad he slipped into a coma from which he would never wake up again.  My dad’s voice would grow silent.  That is the first thread of my story and my dad’s story, but let me move to the second thread – the thread of my community of faith.

The day I had that conversation with my dad, April 10, 1965, was the day before Palm Sunday — Holy Week.  And that week had always been a precious time to me.  I attended all of the services every year — Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday.  And I should tell you that on Holy Saturday in those days there was no Easter Vigil.  The Holy Saturday service consisted of an Old Testament reading and an Epistle, but no Gospel, no Eucharist.  Jesus was in the tomb and He too was silent. And this Holy Week was especially hard on me.  For my dad was dying, was already in a coma, and my Savior was dying on a cross for me — the One who as my dad’s friend, the One who gave His life for me.

One other thing I was a lector at the Cathedral in Eau Claire, and in late March, the lector’s schedule came out for April.  And I was scheduled to read the Old Testament reading on Holy Saturday. That year Holy Saturday was April 17, 1965.  It was just seven days after my dad had slipped into a coma, seven days since I had had that last conversation with him.  Now at that time the readings were always in the King James Version of the Bible.

And so now the third thread — the scripture that I read that night.  Let me read that lesson as I read it on that evening from the King James Version of the Bible.  The reading scheduled was from the Book of Job — the same book from which our Old Testament lesson comes this morning. I am reading from the 19th chapter beginning at the 21st verse, “Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, O ye my friends; for the hand of God has touched me.  Why do ye persecute me as God, and are not satisfied with my flesh?  Oh that my words were now written, oh that they were printed in a book.  That they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock forever.  For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth; and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh I shall see God.  Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold and not another.”

The third thread was those words of Job, those words from scripture, but words that were so meaningful to me that night and still are for I was living that story and that was my dad’s story.  My dad had struggled for 16 years with Multiple Sclerosis and now colon cancer.  His flesh was being destroyed, and yet my dad’s faith in his Lord Jesus was as unwavering as Job’s had been in God.  He knew that his redeemer lived and he knew that he would see God and know him and be known by him. And as I read those words that night in the Cathedral I wept. I knew that this great story was my story.  That I had been invited into a greater story.  There was a larger story, and I was being called into that greater story.  It was not a story that was a walk in the park, rather it was a story of pain and sorrow, trials and even danger, a story told amidst a great storm, but it was the story that God was telling in me and through me and it was also about Jesus and His love.  God had planted eternity in my heart, and God’s story was being written in my heart as it had been written in the hearts of so many others before me, as it was being written in my father’s heart.

And though at that moment there seemed to be a great darkness all about me I began to believe and trust that there was a redeemer who would stand on the latter day — that I was not destined to darkness and sorrow, but life and love and redemption!!  There was grace and I was invited into a life of grace, into a future and a hope.  That at the end of it all there was not only sorrow and sadness, but resurrection and victory.  And it was not that I had sought God out, but rather that God was seeking me, holding onto me when I was barely holding on. For Jesus has come to seek and save that which was lost.  He came for me.  He also comes for you.  He came that we might have life and have it abundantly.  And God has written His story in my heart, a story of human brokenness, spiritual blindness, struggle and sorrow, but also of hope and joy and peace and trust and love.

And I also believe that this is possibly what is going on in that Gospel story this morning as well.  I concede that James and John may be looking for special recognition, but I am convinced that what they are really asking for is to have a part in the story that Jesus is living.  They want to stand with Him; they want their lives to matter — to have meaning.  And they have discovered that thrie lives have more meaning when they are with Jesus.  They wanted to belong to the community of those who were with Jesus.  And they wanted a significant part to play — “Can we be there Jesus, one on your right hand and one on your left in your kingdom?  We want to be baptized with the batism with which you are baptized.  We want to be with you in your kingdom!!”  I believe that is the hunger and the deire of these two men.  They want to have a significant part in the story that God is telling in Jesus!!

And I am also reminded of the end of the Narnia stories which is a story that is an echo of the story God is telling.  Let me share a part of that.

“And Aslan turned to them and said, ‘You do not look so happy as I mean you to be.’  And Lucy said, ‘we’re so afraid of being sent away, Aslan.  And you have sent us back into our own world so often.’  ‘No fear of that, ‘ said Aslan. ‘Have you not guessed?’  Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose within them.  ‘There was a railway accident,’ said Aslan softly. ‘Your father and mother and all of you are — as you call it in the Shadowlands.  The term is over; the holidays have begun.  The dream is ended; this is the morning.’  And as he spoke he no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great a beautiful I cannot write them.  And for us this is the end of all stories, and we can most truly say that they lived happily ever after.  But for them it was only the beginning of the real story.  All their life in this world and all of their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page; now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has ever read; which goes on forever; in which every chapter is better than the one before.”  And so C.S. Lewis ends his story of the Last Battle.  And I often cannot read this without tears, for that too is my dad’s story now and someday it shall be mine as well.

We are all invited into the story that God is telling, a story of victory in the face of disaster; the story of life in the face of death, the story of wholeness and holiness in the face of sin and death.  Job shouts it out to his friends. “I know my redeemer lives.”  I know my redeemer lives.  It is God’s story and we have been invited.  That is the tale that we have fallen into. God is weaving together the threads of our lives into a beautiful tapestry, into a great story and God has given us a part to play.  May we find our place in that story; may we fall more deeply in love with Jesus as we enter into life with Him.  We are loved.  You are loved. Shalom.

This sermon was written and preached by the Rev. Miranda Hassett in November of 2014. 

The Parable of the Talents is an important and, I believe, often mis-read parable of Jesus, which has a lot to say to the church in this age and in every age. And… I’m not going to talk about it today. I may talk about it next week; I make no promises. But I am confident that if you keep hanging around churches, you will hear a sermon on the Parable of the Talents. Maybe even a good one.

In the meantime… I’m going to tell you a story.  A story that, unlike this parable, doesn’t get told in church very often.

The narrative comes from the fourth chapter of the Book of Judges; the poetry, which is very old indeed, perhaps among the oldest texts preserved in the Bible, comes from the fifth chapter.

Listen…

God’s people had come into the land of Canaan, the land promised to them by God. Their great general Joshua had warned them: God will not tolerate divided loyalties.  Serve and worship God only, and observe the Law and the Covenant – or worship the false gods of your ancestors, and the idols of the neighboring peoples; but if you do both, you’ll be sorry.  And the people cried out, The Lord our God we will serve and obey!

But then the Israelites entered the promised land. They lived side by side with the Canaanite tribes. They took Canaanite girls as wives for their sons, and Canaanite boys as husbands for their daughters. And they began to worship Canaanite gods, Baal and Asherah and many others, forgetting the Lord their God who had freed them from bondage in Egypt and made them a holy people.

So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel; and God gave them over into the hands of their enemies. They were conquered by the king of Aram, and when they had gained their freedom, they were conquered by the king of Moab, and when they had gained their freedom, they were conquered by the king of Canaan, King Jabin, whose general was named Sisera. Sisera had nine hundred iron chariots, and he oppressed the Israelites cruelly for twenty years.

In these days Israel had no king. Instead the Lord raised up Judges,  who ruled the people in God’s name, dealt with their disputes, and led them in battle. The Judges called by God delivered the people Israel from the power of those who plundered them. Yet they did not listen even to their judges; for they bowed down to other gods, and turned aside from faithfulness to the commandments of God. Whenever God raised up judges for them, the judge would lead the people to freedom; for God would be moved to pity by their groaning because of those who persecuted and oppressed them. But whenever the judge died, the people would relapse and behave worse than their ancestors, following other gods, and returning to their stubborn ways. It was Othniel the Judge who led Israel to freedom from Aram. It was Ehud the Judge who led Israel to freedom from Moab. And then came Deborah.

In those days Deborah the Prophet was judging Israel. Ignore the fictional husband Lappidoth named in our Bible translation; the Hebrew words there mean, literally, a woman of flame. This fiery prophetess used to sit under a particular palm tree  that bore her name for generations to come, between the towns of Ramah and Bethel; and the Israelites would come up to her for judgment. She is the only female judge recorded in the Bible; the people Israel were strongly patriarchal.  But it is precisely in times like these, times of chaos, conquest, disorder and struggle, when unusual leaders sometimes rise and shine.

Deborah the prophet, Deborah the woman of flame, Deborah the Mother of Israel, sent and summoned Barak, whose name means Lightning, from his home in Kedesh. And she said to him, “The Lord, the God of Israel, commands you, Gather ten thousand fighters. God will draw out Sisera, the general of Jabin’s army, to meet you by the Kishon channel. And God will give him over into your hand.”

And Barak said to her, “If you go with me, I will go; but if you will not go with me, I will not go.” And she said, “I will surely go with you; but this road will not lead to your glory – for it is the will of God to give Sisera into the hands of a woman.”

Then Deborah rose up and went with Barak; they gathered their army, and marched to the channel of Kishon.

Awake, awake, Deborah! Awake, awake, utter a song!
Arise, Barak, lead away your captives. Then down marched the remnant of a great people;  the people of the Lord marched down for him against their mighty foes. 

When Sisera, the Canaanite general, heard that Barak had gathered an army against him, he called out all his chariots, nine hundred chariots of iron,  and all the troops that served King Jabin. And they, too, marched to the channel at Kishon. Then Deborah said to Barak, ‘Up! For this is the day on which the Lord has given Sisera into your hand. The Lord is indeed going out before you.’ So Barak arose against Sisera, with ten thousand warriors following him. And the Lord threw Sisera and all his chariots and all his army into a panic before Barak; Sisera got down from his chariot and fled away on foot, while Barak pursued the chariots and the army to the city of Harosheth. All the army of Sisera fell by the sword; not one was left.

Even the stars fought from heaven, from their places in the sky they fought against Sisera.  The torrent Kishon swept away the enemy,  the onrushing torrent, the torrent Kishon.  March on, my soul, with might! 

Now in this region was the homestead of a man named Heber, who belonged to the Kenite clan,  neither of Israel nor of Canaan. Heber was not at home; his wife Jael was there, alone. And the general of Canaan, Sisera, running away from Barak’s army, came to the tent of Heber,  the tent of Jael. There was peace between King Jabin and the Kenites, so Sisera hoped for safety here.  Jael came out to meet him; she said, “Turn aside, my lord, turn aside to me! Have no fear.”

So Sisera came into her tent, and lay down, for he was weary; and she covered him with a rug. Then he said to her, ‘Please give me a little water to drink;  for I am thirsty.’  So she opened a flask of milk and gave him a drink and tucked him in.  He said to her, ‘Stand at the entrance of the tent, and if anybody comes and asks you, “Is there a man in here?” you say, “No.” ’

And so Sisera rested, believing he had found safety.

And then Jael, wife of Heber the Kenite, took a tent-peg in one hand, and a mallet in the other hand.  She went softly to Sisera, the general, who lay fast asleep from weariness.  And she drove the tent peg into his head, until it went down into the ground.

Most blessed of women be Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, of tent-dwelling women most blessed! He asked for water and she gave him milk, she brought him curds in a lordly bowl.  She put her hand to the tent-peg and her right hand to the workmen’s mallet; she struck Sisera a blow, she crushed his head,  she shattered his temple. At her feet he sank, he fell; where he sank, there he fell dead. 

Then Barak came, seeking Sisera, and Jael went out to him, and said, “Come, and I will show you the man whom you seek.” So he went into her tent; and there was Sisera, lying dead.

The Song of Deborah, that ancient, ancient text, imagines the false confidence  of the fallen general’s mother, awaiting his return:

Out of the window peers Sisera’s mother,
  she gazes out through the lattice:
“Why is his chariot so long in coming?
   Why do I not hear the hoofbeats of his chariots?”

Her wisest ladies make answer,
   indeed, she answers the question herself:
“Oh, they are finding and dividing the spoil—
   A girl or two for every man;
plunder of dyed fabrics for Sisera to bring home to me,
     a scarf of dyed and embroidered fabric for my neck as the spoils of war.” So on that day God subdued King Jabin of Canaan. So perish all your enemies, O Lord!   But may your friends be like the sun as it rises in its might. 

And the land had rest for forty years,

Have you heard this story before?

I know neither of our Sunday school programs include it in their selected texts. And our lectionary gives us just enough to give us the warm feeling of seeing a woman in leadership, without the discomfort of seeing a woman on the front lines in battle, or another woman offering hospitality to a fugitive, then killing him in cold blood.

It’s a pity, really, that this isn’t the week for a children’s sermon; I could have brought in a tent peg, a mallet, and a melon.

Why don’t we know this story? It’s exciting! It has God delivering God’s people from oppression! It has not one but two strong women in it!  Why does it stay hidden away in the shadows? What makes it hard for us to read this as a story for us, for our times?

For one thing, I think we feel distant from the mindset of the story. This is a time in Israel’s history when they understood their relationship with God in entirely political terms. When they are conquered by their enemies, that means God is angry at them; when they are free, God has forgiven them and accepted them back into God’s favor. It seems barbaric to us on the face of it; but are we really so different? Are we not tempted to feel abandoned by God when our political party loses or our cause fails, and justified by God when our party wins or our cause advances?

If Deborah lived today,  a courageous and plain-spoken woman, calling reluctant male leaders to step up and do what needs to be done for the welfare of God’s people – if Deborah lived today, my Facebook feed would be full of artsy photos of her face, alongside pithy quotations from her speeches. We can love Deborah easily enough, even if, as good progressive 21st-century Christians, we’re a little uncomfortable with the rush to a military solution.

But… Jael. What do we do with Jael? The woman with the blanket, the milk, and the bloody tent peg?

If you were filming this story, would you cast her as young and lovely, seductive? Or middle-aged and motherly, the archetype of security and comfort?  And when the actress asks, What’s my motivation?what would you say?  You have secret loyalties to Israel and Israel’s God?  You fear that this general may abuse you, when he wakes from sleep, and you’re acting in preemptive self-defense? Or – maybe most credibly – you guess, seeing the Canaanite general running for his life,  that Israel has won the battle, and you’d like the new sheriff in town to think of you as a friend and ally.

The Song of Deborah, in Judges 5, calls Jael, “Most blessed among women.” That phrase is used three times in the Bible. First for Jael, who murders Sisera. Second for Judith, a woman of Israel who becomes a hero for beheading an enemy commander and freeing her city. And third… for Mary, the mother of Jesus.

Most blessed among women: Jael, Judith, and Mary.  Which of these things is not like the others?…

In a few weeks the stories of Mary will come to us in the lectionary; in a few weeks we’ll be surrounded by images of Mary, sweet-faced, mild, and gentle, on Christmas cards and nativity scenes.  We will say & sing together her holy song, the Magnificat:  God has shown the strength of God’s mighty arm, God has scattered the proud, brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly!

Maybe as we say those words,  this year, every year, we should remember the company Mary keeps, the other women blessed by Scripture: Jael and Judith, liberators and murderers. As followers of Christ  who calls us to love our enemies, we can hardly endorse their violent actions; but as followers of Christ we are also sometimes too prone to forget that nice is different than good.

Maybe we should see in Mary’s serene face, not just sweetness and innocence,  but the bone-deep determination of a young woman saying Yes to a new world, whatever it may demand from her and those she loves.  Maybe we should hear in her song the fierce hope that calls on the power of God and the faltering courage of humans to rise, to act,  to seize the moment and strike the blow, for the cause of freedom and the wellbeing of all God’s children.

Maybe we should hear in Mary’s words the echoes of a much, much older song,   the song of Barak, Deborah, and Jael:

March on, my soul, with might!