Sermon: The greatest part of feeling God's hear-t is hear-ing God's Word
A
number of years ago at a minister’s retreat, I heard a minister who was quite
well regarded as a preacher and worship leader talk about his preparations for Sunday
worship, and what he considered most important.
Surprisingly, what he said he most cared about and gave the most careful
attention to, was not the sermon. Nor
was it the music, even though he helped pick the hymns. Nor was it the prayers or the children’s
story.
He
said it was the Scripture reading. What
he most cared about, and what he never compromised even when a busy week might
mean cutting corners in other areas, was his preparation for reading the
Scripture. He took time to understand what
it was saying in its context, and what it was not saying, and then to imagine
what manner of inflections and pauses, even gestures of facial expression or
posture, might best help open the reading up for the congregation, and help
them hear it new and afresh.
His reasoning
was that even if the sermon was bad – or good, but not for everyone, and even
if the hymns and prayers and even children’s time went flat, at the very least
every person in worship would still have the chance to hear the Word of God
read well – encounter it in some personal way, be drawn into its story and
message for the day, and perhaps have it weave its way into their heart and
mind in some meaningful way.
That’s
what our stories are about today – about really hearing the Word of God, in
such a way that it actually penetrates your learned ways of being, thinking and
acting in the world, and when necessary changing or transforming who and how we
are in the world as believers in Jesus and children of God.
We
have the story from Nehemiah. The people
of Israel are back in their land and it’s a wonderful time. God’s promise to bring them back from exile
and let them inhabit the promised land again, has been fulfilled, and now they
are back and beginning to rebuild.
And
their leaders decide to do it right.
Once the people are settled and starting the rebuilding, the leaders appoint
a special day when all will gather in the great square before the temple and
the city they are working on. And the
leaders arrange a grand, public, official, celebratory reading of the Word of
God – specifically the Law of God given through Moses to the people at the time
of their first beginning.
And
the leaders make a good job of it. Ezra
the high priest is doing the reading in front of all the tribes. The Levites of each tribe undertake the interpretation
of what is read, to their own tribe. And
all the people – not just the men, but also the women and any children of an
age to understand, are there and they get it.
They hear the Law read and they understand it, and it cuts them to the
heart.
At
first they weep and wail as they consider how far they have wandered from the
way that the Law of God spelled out for them – how un-godly they had become as
people of God. And then Ezra tells them
not to lament, but to rejoice – to let their tears be tears of joy and
thanksgiving that God still is their God, and is giving them now this grand
chance to start all over again.
This
is not the first time they have heard the Law of God, or read it. Even in exile they kept their traditions as
much as they could – their stories and bo0ks and practices and laws.
But
this was a special time. Now they are
home and rebuilding. They are ready and
open to hear the old Law with brand new ears and hearts. In that setting, it really is as though they
are hearing it – really hearing it, for the very first time.
It’s
the same in the Gospel story about the people of Nazareth in the synagogue the
day Jesus reads the Scripture. In many
ways that sabbath day was not unlike all other sabbath days. The Jewish people in town went to
synagogue. There a reader would be
appointed. The reader would read the
appointed lesson for the day. He would
read standing up, with appropriate ceremony and reverence, but it was something
that happened every sabbath. And then
the reader would sit – distinguish any commentary that followed from the
Scripture itself, and he would begin to comment on the passage. Perhaps the rabbis and other leaders would
join in, and together they would piece together the meaning of the passage for
them and their day.
Except
this time is different. For one thing,
Jesus is reading and Jesus is different
from the way they remember him. He has
been away from Nazareth for a while. He
went to be baptized by John at the Jordan, and then word is that he spent some
time – maybe 40 days, in the wilderness encountering God and the devil and who
knows what, sorting out what’s real and holy and what’s not, what God is up to in
the world, and how to be part of it. And
now he has returned. He’s been visiting
different towns, proclaiming God’s kingdom, teaching, healing, gathering
disciples.
So as
he stands in the synagogue and reads there’s a new power visible within him, an
authenticity and depth and integrity that wasn’t quite there before.
And
this in turn changes the people who listen to him read. They’ve heard this passage before – many times. Many know it by heart. It’s something God promised to the people
ages ago through the prophet Isaiah when they hard-pressed and oppressed,
broken and in need of healing. It’s
something they expect God will do – a promise God will fulfill some time in the
future – some day.
There
has always been that double sense of distance about this reading – distance between
the time of the prophet and their time, distance between their time and the
time of the fulfilment. But now somehow
they are opened to hear it without that distance – as though the distance melts
away, and the time of the prophet and the time of fulfilment both become also
their time – the day and the time they are living in right then – right now.
In
their hearing – as Jesus himself comments on, in their hearing and the way the
Word of God penetrates and changes their life and their view of the world right
now, the Scripture is fulfilled. The Word
of God comes to life.
It’s
because this is what God longs for, and what our lives and our world most long
for – the melting of that distance between us and God, between God’s Word and
our living, that I think one of the most important prayers we say every Sunday
is the one just before the Scripture is read:
One: O God, our Teacher,
All: open our hearts and minds by the power of your holy Spirit,
that as we listen to your Word
we
may hear what you are saying to us today. Amen.
One last thing, though – what part of God’s Word is God really speaking
and trying to breathe into the life of the world today?
The Bible is a big book, and it’s good for us to know it as fully as we
can, to gain as wide a perspective and understanding as we can about what we
are given to know about God. But the
Bible is made up of different words from different times and
situations, and it remains a compilation of different words for
different times and situations.
Just consider the two stories we have read. In Nehemiah, the people are rebuilding –
starting again from scratch, so the perfect Word for them at that time was the
old Law of God given through Moses at the time of the first beginning. It was exactly what they needed and were
ready to hear.
Then in the Gospel story, in the synagogue of Nazareth, the reading was
from the prophet Isaiah – a promise of hope to people in despair, a promise of
healing, release and freedom to the people of Israel when they were broken,
imprisoned and oppressed by more powerful people around them. And isn’t that what the people of Nazareth
were ready and open and needing to hear?
They were living in their own land, but were very much oppressed,
imprisoned and broken by the Romans and the empire that controlled their lives
and owned their land. They were ready
and open to hearing God’s promise of freedom and healing, and in their own
hearts and homes and communities, to start living into and towards that
reality.
So what is the Word of God for today?
What word, what part of the Word is God trying to breathe into the life of
the world today, and into the hearts and actions of communities of faith today?
I know
for some in this congregation, a Word that catches and changes their life is a
hymn – number 509 in Voices United, “I, the Lord of Sea and Sky.” The words are based on two Bible passages –
Isaiah 6:8 and I Samuel 3. For others,
it’s a single verse from the prophet Micah:
“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?”
And
it’s easy to see how this is something all the world needs to hear – as divided,
violent and unjust as it is, and needs to have at least some communities take
to heart.
In the
wake of climate change and the threats that we pose to the balance of life on
Earth, some are beginning to really hear Genesis 2, rather than Genesis 1 as
their creation story. Their ears and heart
are turning cold and deaf to Genesis 1’s great assertion of human superiority
and dominion, and they are finding themselves warming instead to the more
humble command of the Genesis 2 creation story to live in, and to take good
care of the life of the garden God has created.
This
past Christmas Eve, as I pondered the Bethlehem story for the later-night
communion, I was very aware of the debate in Canada and in our own community
about the Syrian refugees, the threat they may or may not be presenting, and
what we should or should not be doing.
And what I found myself hearing in the story is the role of the people
who filled up the inn ahead of Joseph and Mary – the ones who have
reservations, and who got there early enough to have a room and shelter for
themselves. I could not escape hearing
that that was me and that is us. And
what I heard in God’s story is that if we want to see Jesus, we have to come
out of our room in the inn to where he is in the more open and risky
places. We have to give up some of the
warmth and shelter we have found.
So I
wonder … what Word of God … what passage or part of all that we know of God’s
Word, is God speaking and trying to breathe into the world today?
It may
be something different for each of us.
But
whatever it is, may God help us hear it – really hear it.
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