Reflecting on the new year, 1.5.14

Lamentations 3:21-26

21But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: 22The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; 23they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. 24“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.” 25The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul that seeks him. 26It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.


Psalm 90

1Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations.

2Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.

3You turn us back to dust, and say, “Turn back, you mortals.”

4For a thousand years in your sight are like yesterday when it is past,

or like a watch in the night.

5You sweep them away; they are like a dream, like grass that is renewed in the morning;

6in the morning it flourishes and is renewed; in the evening it fades and withers.


7For we are consumed by your anger; by your wrath we are overwhelmed.

8You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your countenance.

9For all our days pass away under your wrath; our years come to an end like a sigh.

10The days of our life are seventy years, or perhaps eighty, if we are strong;

even then their span is only toil and trouble; they are soon gone, and we fly away.

11Who considers the power of your anger? Your wrath is as great as the fear that is due you.

12So teach us to count our days that we may gain a wise heart.

13Turn, O Lord! How long? Have compassion on your servants!

14Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love,

so that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.
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One of the greatest strengths of the biblical faith we share with our Jewish neighbors is the ability to take in trouble and still rest in God’s care. We don’t read from Lamentations very often. As you might guess from the title, it’s sort of a depressing book.


Lamentations is a series of poems reflecting on the defeat and destruction of Jerusalem. It is heartbreaking poetry because the poet’s heart is broken. His city, not only his home, but the center of his religious and national life has been destroyed. The city lies in ruins. Many of the poet’s friends and family have probably been killed. The dead are still lying in the street.

The poet takes it all in and pours out his grief openly, mournfully and honestly. But right in the middle of this tragic book come the words we just read together: “But this I call to mind and so I have hope: the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.”


There’s no covering over the shame and pain and grief. There is no disguising or pretending about the hardship that is still to come. And yet, there is still hope. God’s mercies never end; God’s love shines through even in the darkest night. We fail and fall, we suffer and we grieve, we get sick and we die. Through it all, God is faithful. Through it all, God loves us.


God is with us when things are going well, even though sometimes we’re too busy to notice. God is with us when things are just plodding along, when things are neither great nor terrible but just status quo. God’s faithfulness is great; God is steady and constant.


At the same time as God is constant, God’s mercies are new every morning. Each morning brings new joys and new challenges. There are new places we need God’s help, new failings and hurts that need God’s mercies. So every morning, every moment, God is finding new ways to show grace and love and care; we just have to open our eyes, open our hearts and receive.


The Bible teaches us about God. It also teaches us about ourselves. The new year is a natural time to reflect on our lives, on how we’ve done in the last year and what we want to do with the year to come. Psalm 90 is a great New Year’s passage because it invites us to that reflection.


God is eternal, but we are not. We ignore that fact at our peril. Our culture is so scared of death and illness that we are unable to face those things honestly or well. Instead, we rush around trying to cram as much as we can into our time while almost denying the reality of death. I’ve seen families in the hospital refuse to admit that their loved one is dying even in their last days. Most patients don’t take full advantage of the extra care available through hospice services because patients, families and doctors keep battling death long after the outcome is clear.


The psalmist encourages us to count our days so we can gain wise hearts. That means that we need to think about our life, our days and weeks and years, knowing that they are limited. Our time on earth is precious because we don’t have forever.


The trouble is, sometimes when we think of our time as precious, it makes us stingy with it, and that’s different than taking it seriously. We want to be generous with our time, like with our money and energy. We want to give freely, partly because that means we enjoy them (our energy, time and money) more than if we clutch them with white knuckles. At the same time, we don’t want to throw away our days because we can’t ever get them back.


Having a wise heart is not just about being generous with our time either. It’s about knowing our time on earth is precious and limited, but also that our impact is limited. We are fragile and, in the grand scheme of things, nothing we do will last forever either. The psalmist imagines us returning to the dust from which we came and pictures our days like grass springing up in the morning and withering away at the end of the day. Our lives, our accomplishments, the things that seem so important in the moment are fragile and temporary.


At first that sounds discouraging; it almost makes us think, “Why bother?” But ultimately it is liberating. We tend to get caught up in ourselves, caught up in our work or our family struggles or our decisions. The stakes feel so high; everything feels like an emergency, so we rush around constantly trying to manage situations to keep them from getting out of hand.


Thinking about life from the perspective of God’s time frame reminds us of that in a thousand years, whatever we are so worried about now will not matter. No one is going to remember why we were so mad at someone else. No one will care about the church budget or the rent or the election.


The moment at hand is both precious and ephemeral; both important and fleeting. That means taking our time, our decisions, our work seriously because they are precious. It also means taking them with a grain of salt because none of it lasts forever. It seems like those two things are opposites, but they aren’t. Holding on to our time and decisions lightly actually helps us make the most of them because it helps us see them more clearly, while treating every issue like a crisis makes us more likely to mess up. In almost everything we do, humans perform better if we are relaxed.


That’s where our passages come together. Our lives are temporary and precious. God is trustworthy and loving. God is faithful in hard times and in good times, and, while our lives are short, we also have the chance to be part of the work of God’s kingdom, which is eternal. God calls us to share in building up community, in making life better for others, to work for peace and reconciliation. That can be as involved as starting a hospital and as simple as saying a kind word to a stranger. Our calling as disciples of Jesus touches every part of our lives. We’re freed from the anxiety of our own lives because it’s really not about us in the end.


The new year is a great time to step back and take a look at our life. How are we doing at trusting God? Are we spending our time in a way that fits with our true priorities? Are we treating others kindly, like their lives and feelings are precious? What do you want to do differently this year?


The new year is also a time to think about our life and future as a church. As you probably know, I’m leaving this coming summer. That’s sad for me to think about because I love serving with you; this is a wonderful church. We have been a good fit for each other and we have grown together. There’s going to be a time to say goodbye to each other, but now isn’t that time.


Now is the time to think about how to use the time we have together to get ready for what’s next. We’ll be talking about that the next couple of weeks, including right after worship. Pastoral transition has not always been kind to Laurelton, but here we have time to do it right. So think about what do we need to work on together to help you take the next steps with courage and confidence.


A church is not about a pastor. It’s about a community making God’s love real through relationships and ministry. It’s about finding ways to make God’s eternal faithfulness make sense to people in everyday actions and words. It’s about growing together in trust, in faith and in love. It’s about learning to trust each other, to be honest and open with each other and to treat each other like the precious children of God we are. It’s also about having fun together because the message of faith is good news for all people.


This church has so many of the gifts the wider church and the world needs. You are relaxed and able to absorb change, which equips you well for the world we live in. You are open to all kinds of people, so you can welcome the community and invite them in to God’s story. You are committed, generous givers of time and money and energy. You have the gifts you need to thrive in ministry. This next six months we will work together to consolidate and polish your gifts and to discern how God is calling you in the next step of your ministry.


In our lives as individual disciples and our life as a church, a new year is a new beginning. It’s also a small part of the great tapestry of God’s love. God has been faithful in the past and God will be faithful in the future. This moment is full of potential for joyful, exciting ministry. So let us number our days, gain a wise heart and rest in God’s endless grace as we spend the precious time God has given us.


Thanks be to God.

Women warriors, 1.13.13

Do me a favor and open your pew Bibles to the front, to the table of contents. The last few weeks we’ve been reading from the New Testament, from the books of Luke and Matthew. Find those in the table of contents.

We’ve been talking about Jesus these last few weeks. We’ve been talking about how God sent his son Jesus into the world to be born as a baby in Bethlehem. Last week we talked about how wise men from a far away place came to Bethlehem to see Jesus, the new King of Israel. Today, we’re going back in time, back to a time before Jesus. Back to a time before Israel was dominated by Rome, before the Roman Empire even existed, before Israel had a king, before Israel was really a nation.

            Long ago, God’s people Israel were slaves in Egypt. God saw their suffering, saw the way their Egyptian masters oppressed them, saw their sorrow and decided to do something. God sent Moses to lead the people out of slavery into a new future. Moses did just that. He led the people of Israel out of Egypt into the desert. We find that story in the Book of Exodus.

Moses led them through the desert for forty years. In those forty years God fed them with bread from heaven. God gave them commandments and laws that would teach them to be God’s holy nation of priests. Laws that protected the poor and weak. Laws that protected the land and organized worship. God gave them laws to build a just society. We learn the laws and stories of building a nation in Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers. Those years in the desert taught the people to trust God.

Finally, after forty years of wandering through the desert, God brought the people to the border of the land of Canaan, the land we know today as Palestine and Israel. God told Moses that he wouldn’t be the one to lead Israel into their new home; that was Joshua’s job. So Moses spent some time preparing the people for a new life in a new land.

The Book of Deuteronomy is a series of sermons in which Moses warns the people about the dangers of stability, the dangers of having their own land. Even though they’ve been wandering for years, looking forward to God’s promise of a land of their own, Moses knows that having what we want can be dangerous.

Once the people are settled in a good place and become prosperous, it will be tempting to believe that they have achieved this on their own. It will be easy for them to get comfortable and to forget that everything they have comes from God. It will be easy for them to say, “Look at these beautiful houses and all the crops we’ve worked so hard for. Aren’t we something special?” Moses warns them to remember God, and to remember the righteous laws God taught them.

Moses dies right at the border of the Promised Land and his second in command, Joshua takes over. You’ll notice that the next book is called Joshua and it tells the story of how Joshua led the people into the land and started to conquer it. Under God’s direction, Joshua and the leaders of the people divide the land into territory for each of the 12 tribes of Israel. At that point, each of the tribes basically go their own way to their own land and get on with the business of settling into a new life in their land.

The Book of Judges continues the story. In Judges we see the people trip up. Time after time they turn away from God and start worshiping the gods of the nations around them. Each time this happens God allows them to be defeated by their neighbors and they suffer. When they cry out to God in their trouble, God sends a leader to bring them back to the right path and to free them from oppression. These leaders were called judges.

What we notice in the Book of Judges is that Israel isn’t really a nation as we think of it now. It was really a collection of tribes. Each tribe had some organization and some leaders, but the whole nation wasn’t really organized. At different times in the book different enemies take center stage. In this part of the book the Canaanites are the focus of concern. As with most stories in Judges, this one starts with the people turning away from God. Let’s listen for God’s voice as Sally begins the story.

Judges 4:1-16

The Israelites again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, after Ehud died. ²So the Lord sold them into the hand of King Jabin of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor; the commander of his army was Sisera, who lived in Harosheth-ha-goiim. ³Then the Israelites cried out to the Lord for help; for he had nine hundred chariots of iron, and had oppressed the Israelites cruelly twenty years. ⁴At that time Deborah, a prophetess, wife of Lappidoth, was judging Israel. ⁵She used to sit under the palm of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim; and the Israelites came up to her for judgment.

⁶She sent and summoned Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali, and said to him, “The Lord, the God of Israel, commands you, ‘Go, take position at Mount Tabor, bringing ten thousand from the tribe of Naphtali and the tribe of Zebulun. ⁷I will draw out Sisera, the general of Jabin’s army, to meet you by the Wadi Kishon with his chariots and his troops; and I will give him into your hand.’” ⁸Barak said to her, “If you will go with me, I will go; but if you will not go with me, I will not go.” ⁹And she said, “I will surely go with you; nevertheless, the road on which you are going will not lead to your glory, for the Lord will sell Sisera into the hand of a woman.” Then Deborah got up and went with Barak to Kedesh.

¹⁰Barak summoned Zebulun and Naphtali to Kedesh; and ten thousand warriors went up behind him; and Deborah went up with him. ¹¹Now Heber the Kenite had separated from the other Kenites, that is, the descendants of Hobab the father-in-law of Moses, and had encamped as far away as Elon-bezaanannim, which is near Kedesh. ¹²When Sisera was told that Barak son of Abinoam had gone up to Mount Tabor, ¹³Sisera called out all his chariots, nine hundred chariots of iron, and all the troops who were with him, from Harosheth-ha-goiim to the Wadi Kishon.

¹⁴Then 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 went down from Mount Tabor with ten thousand warriors following him. ¹⁵And 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, ¹⁶while Barak pursued the chariots and the army to Harosheth-ha-goiim. All the army of Sisera fell by the sword; no one was left.

Judges 4:17-24

¹⁷Now Sisera had fled away on foot to the tent of Jael wife of Heber the Kenite; for there was peace between King Jabin of Hazor and the clan of Heber the Kenite. ¹⁸Jael came out to meet Sisera, and said to him, “Turn aside, my lord, turn aside to me; have no fear.” So he turned aside to her into the tent, and she covered him with a rug. ¹⁹Then he said to her, “Please give me a little water to drink; for I am thirsty.” So she opened a skin of milk and gave him a drink and covered him. ²⁰He said to her, “Stand at the entrance of the tent, and if anybody comes and asks you, ‘Is anyone here?’ say, ‘No.’”

²¹But Jael wife of Heber took a tent peg, and took a hammer in her hand, and went softly to him and drove the peg into his temple, until it went down into the ground—he was lying fast asleep from weariness—and he died. ²²Then, as Barak came in pursuit of Sisera, Jael went out to meet him, and said to him, “Come, and I will show you the man whom you are seeking.” So he went into her tent; and there was Sisera lying dead, with the tent peg in his temple. ²³So on that day God subdued King Jabin of Canaan before the Israelites. ²⁴Then the hand of the Israelites bore harder and harder on King Jabin of Canaan, until they destroyed King Jabin of Canaan.

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            The next time someone tells you the Bible says women should home and be quiet, you can think about this passage. The Bible doesn’t say one thing about women or men or violence or government. The Bible is a bunch of different stories in a bunch of different books written over hundreds of years. At the same time, the Bible is a meaningful whole because it tells God’s story.

It is a complicated story because our relationship with God is complicated. Sometimes we listen to God and follow; other times we turn away and go our own way. There are different messages in scripture because different situations call for different ways of living. Sometimes courage in the face of oppression is what we need. Other times we need to be gentle.

It’s also complicated because even though the Bible tells God’s story and was guided by the Holy Spirit, it was written by human beings and also reflects the limits of its writers. In the time of the Bible women were not equal. The Bible reflects the sexism shared by ancient societies. We haven’t conquered sexism yet, but we’re making progress. Even though the Bible is often used to justify limiting women, God created men and women different and yet equal. Even with all the inequality in the world and in the beliefs of the biblical writers, God’s calling for women still shines through.

The lesson to take away from this story for your life today is not that conflict should be solved with a tent peg and a hammer. Instead, take home the lesson that God sometimes, even often calls surprising people to do surprising things. Deborah was a prophetess, a woman in a sexist culture whose job was to share God’s voice with the people. She was also in charge of settling disputes and working out justice in Israel’s community life. That’s a surprising leadership role for a woman in that time. But it’s even more surprising that she would be part of leading Israel into battle.

Jael wasn’t even an Israelite. Her people knew Israel and the Canaanites. Maybe they profited from the oppression of Israel or maybe they were offended by it. Maybe some of both. The Bible doesn’t tell us anything about why she decided to kill Sisera. We aren’t allowed into her thought process. What we know is that this mighty man who led the powerful and oppressive Canaanite army was defeated by a woman.

That’s how God does things sometimes. On the outside there’s no reason Jael would be part of God’s plan to save Israel. We don’t know if she had a relationship with God. But God chose her to finish the job Deborah started.

If God can use a woman like Deborah to start a war for freedom and a woman like Jael to assassinate the big bad guy, God can use you for something special. Don’t let anyone tell you that you’re too weak or too scared or too dumb or too young or too old. Don’t let anyone tell you you’re not good enough. Maybe most of all, don’t let the negative voice inside you tell you what you can’t do.

The truth is none of us is good enough, but by God’s grace we are all redeemed for freedom and service. Sometimes our fears and shortcomings, or our beliefs about our shortcomings keep us from doing something great. Other times our pride or sense of entitlement gets in the way of the humility that lets God work through us.

You are not too good to need God. You are not too bad for God to love you. You do not need to be limited by your age or your sex or your history. God can use your gifts for something surprising if you let him.

For years religion has taught that women are not equal. Some churches still believe that. And there are places in the Bible that talk about things women shouldn’t do. But the big picture we see in scripture is of a God who reaches out to surprising people and leads them to do amazing things. In this case it’s a woman living in a tent named Jael who strikes down an oppressive ruler. In the Christmas story it’s a poor woman named Mary who has the courage to say yes to God’s incredible plan even at the risk of being rejected by her family and culture.

I don’t know what God has planned for you. Maybe you’ve been feeling a calling inside you to something new, something surprising and exciting but a little scary. Maybe you’ve doubted that calling because part of you doesn’t think you’re capable of great things. Maybe you doubt that calling because you grew up hearing that women weren’t supposed to do x, y, or z. Maybe you heard from a parent or a lover or a spouse that you weren’t worth listening too, that you were weak or stupid or ugly.

Those voices are lies. God’s voice is the truth. God’s voice speaks in the stillness of you heart, in the murmur of a child, in the sound of music or the whisper of the wind. Close your eyes and listen. God says to you: “I love you. I forgive you. I welcome you. I have made you special and wonderful. I have given you gifts and perspectives and abilities that no one else has. I want you to nurture those gifts. I want you to use your experience and your imagination to make the world a little bit better. I want you to stand up for justice, to comfort the hurting, to reach out to those who feel alone. I will be with you; you are not alone. You are my beloved daughter, my beloved son. Together we can do wonderful things.”

Thanks be to God.