Strike the Rock

Exodus 17: 1-7, OT page 64 From the wilderness of Sin the whole congregation of the Israelites journeyed by stages, as the Lord commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. The people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?” But the people thirsted there for water; and the people complained against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and livestock with thirst?” So Moses cried out to the Lord, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” The Lord said to Moses, “Go on ahead of the people, and take some of the elders of Israel with you; take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. I will be standing there in front of you on the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it, so that the people may drink.” Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. He called the place Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites quarreled and tested the Lord, saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?” Sermon Last Thursday below the fold our Daily Herald ran an article by Kevin Hardy of the Chattanooga Times Free Press titled, “Poll: Religion’s influence waning, but religion in politics growing.” It’s hard to say that the article was good – the reporting was good, but the news it reported isn’t very good at all. Hardy reported the results from a new poll released Monday by the Pew Research Center, which found that 72 percent of the public think religion is losing influence in American life. For any of you who are reading about churches closing their doors or of denominations like ours whose total membership numbers have been declining since the 1950’s, this is old news that I’m almost used to hearing. If you go to any place where pastors gather to talk the conversation is almost always the same – numbers are down and our influence is waning, which makes the interesting part of this article Hardy’s claim that “more than ever, Americans say religion is losing its influence in society, though the public’s appetite for religion in politics is only growing.” Now that is a major change, as I know that a pastor who preached politics from the pulpit would never have been tolerated in the church I grew up in. Generally Presbyterians like to keep religion and politics separate, but society is changing: while church attendance isn’t required, being able to talk about faith is, especially when it comes to running for major political office. I’m not sure that this change is very good for our country or our church, because the form of Christianity that is used to get votes can hardly be called Christianity at all for when politicians talk religion far too often they have no idea what they’re talking about. Let me give you my favorite example: Miriam A. Ferguson was the first female governor of Texas. She served the state for three terms, stood firm against the KKK, but is often credited with a quote allegedly spoken in reference to bilingualism in Texas schools: “If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, it ought to be good enough for the children of Texas.” Just a couple years ago President Obama had urged the passage of a provision in his jobs bill by saying, “I trust in God, but God wants to see us help ourselves by putting people back to work.” A reporter later asked his press secretary Jay Carney if the President crossed the line by bringing God into the jobs debate and Carney responded: “I believe that the phrase from the Bible is, ‘The Lord helps those who help themselves.' ” However, the “Lord helps those who help themselves” is actually attributed to Benjamin Franklin. But the more important religious misunderstanding that some politicians suffer from is believing that following the example of Jesus will help get you elected – it won’t - it will get you crucified – and following the example of Moses leads to nearly the same place. If democracy had been the political system of the Israelites, Moses’ campaign never would have stood a chance. As soon as the polls came in Aaron would have advised him to change course. I can imagine his cabinet suggesting that he get back to his roots – start using some of those slogans that worked so well back in Egypt: “let my people go!” they wanted to hear him say. But catchy slogans run out of steam when the results slow down. Even though they were free – now they were thirsty. “The people quarreled with Moses, and said, “Give us water to drink,” and in the absence of immediate results they complained about him, they questioned his judgment, and they asked if he had taken them out of Egypt to kill them, their children and their livestock with thirst. None of that has the makings of a great political legacy – but every bit of this second scripture lesson has the makings of real leadership, a subject that too many of our politicians in Washington seem less and less in touch with every day. The reality is that approval ratings often have little to do with leadership – if public approval is what you use to guide you than good luck getting anywhere. That’s why Moses is different. Even when the tide of discontent swept over the people, rather than join them in their frustration Moses stays rooted in the truth. Isn’t that what the world needs? More people like Moses who remember something that everyone else has such a tendency to forget – more people like Moses who hold onto a memory of a faithful, liberating God, even when thirst, frustration, and doubt could take everything away. He remembered the only source of living water, even when doing so didn’t make any rational sense. We live in this world where so often all we hear is that things are getting worse – that everything is being taken away. The schools are bad, the jobs are few, and freedom isn’t free. We must protect our jobs, our children, and our health care. The church needs to make some radical changes to appeal to a new generation or we’re sure to loose even more members. The people are thirsty and they want to know when someone is going to do something about it. But Moses wasn’t thinking about the dryness of his throat or his popularity that was slipping away. He was remembering the liberating power of the God who freed him from Egyptian oppression. He was remembering the promise of the God he knew would provide. Now I don’t know how to fix any problem that the church or our society faces today, but I have been thirsty and knowing some very thirsty people, knowing that we are all thirsty people thirsting for something, I want to remind you that water will come again. It is every Christian’s duty to testify in the desert of life to the God who makes water come from rocks. To remind the hopeless of a God who makes a way out of no way. To remind the family pulled apart by too much pressure and too much to do, that the Lord is in their midst and love will see them through. To remind a world that rushes to violence of the power of peace. To remind each other of goodness in a world that seems so cruel – for we all need to be reminded of a present God when we ask, “Is the Lord among us or not?” Moses stood before a rock in what everyone believed was barren land, and as foolish as it must have seemed, he struck that rock with his staff in the sight of the elders of Israel, and water streamed forth. Now this is leadership – believing when everyone else has given up – staying faithful to the promise despite the tide of public opinion – holding tight to hope and enduring the complaints of those around you because some things are worth holding onto, and there are some destinations that only those who persevere stand any chance of reaching. You must strike the rock – even when it doesn’t make any sense – even when everyone else has already given up. You must strike the rock because in our world hope is in short supply but the water of salvation is still there even if you can’t see it. Strike the rock, and make it to the Promised Land. Amen.

Hunger

Exodus 16: 2-15, OT page 62-63 The whole congregation of the Israelites complained against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the fleshpots and ate our fill of bread; for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.” Then the Lord said to Moses, “I am going to rain bread from heaven for you, and each day the people shall go out and gather enough for that day. In that way I will test them, whether they will follow my instruction or not. On the sixth day, when they prepare what they bring in, it will be twice as much as they gather on other days.” So Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, “In the evening you shall know that it was the Lord who brought you out of the land of Egypt, and in the morning you shall see the glory of the Lord, because he has heard your complaining against the Lord. For what are we, that you complain against us?” And Moses said, “When the Lord gives you meat to eat in the evening and your fill of bread in the morning, because the Lord has heard the complaining that you utter against him – what are we? Your complaining is not against us but against the Lord.” Then Moses said to Aaron, “Say to the whole congregation of the Israelites, ‘Draw near to the Lord, for he has heard your complaining.’” And as Aaron spoke to the whole congregation of the Israelites, they looked toward the wilderness, and the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud. The Lord spoke to Moses and said, “I have heard the complaining of the Israelites; say to them, ‘At twilight you shall eat meat, and in the morning you shall have your fill of bread; then you shall know that I am the Lord your God.’” In the evening quails came up and covered the camp; and in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. When the layer of dew lifted, there on the surface of the wilderness was a fine flaky substance, as fine as frost on the ground. When the Israelites saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, “It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat. Sermon “When the Israelites saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?”” This phrase is a difficult one to translate from Hebrew, especially if you grew up going to Sunday School and think of this story as the story of how the Lord provided manna from heaven, because the word “manna” in Hebrew simply means “what is it.” They didn’t have a name for it and so they named the flakey substance that preserved their lives and filled their bellies in the wilderness “what is it” because they didn’t know what else to call it. And we don’t always know what to call it either. There’s a story about Bill Sutter’s sister. When she got word of her brother’s sudden death, she immediately went to the airport. She could have waited to fly with her husband and children but decided she had to be in Columbia as soon as possible even though that meant going through metal detectors and luggage inspections all by herself with no one to share her grief. She boarded a plane barely holding her emotions in, she was just about to fall apart but didn’t want to break down surrounded by complete strangers so she kept a stiff lip and suffered in silence all alone. Somehow or another she revealed to the woman next to her that she was flying to Columbia, TN for her brothers funeral – and that’s when our own Nicole Stallcup’s mouth fell open, amazed by who sat down next to her. Of all the planes, of all the passengers, of all the seats – Bill’s sister sat down next to Nicole Stallcup, member of this church and friend of Bill’s family, and so his sister had a shoulder to cry on during one of the hardest flights a person ever has to take. Now what do you call that? A gift, a gift from God, but surely a shoulder to cry on is not what she would have wished for had she just one wish. “What is it” they asked, for they did not know what it was. Now the Lord had delivered them from the hand of Pharaoh, led them by the hand out of Egypt, and then when the chariots and chariot drivers charged to their heels the Lord divided the sea and they walked through on dry land. But when they were hungry they wanted something familiar and they longed to go back to what they knew. So they called it “manna” or “what is it” because it preserved their life and satisfied their physical hunger but when it came down to preserving their faith and satisfying their need to see God at work in their lives, still they had trouble connecting the dots because the Lord responded to their cry but not by giving them what they asked for exactly. Which reminds me of our friend John Hill who once gave a homeless man who was missing several teeth an apple. Rather than saying thank you he looked that apple over and asked John, “Now what am I supposed to do with this?” And every chance she got my grandmother gave me a red dress shirt from Hamrick’s, but there were years of Christmases when I’d take her wrapped present out from under the tree to shake it and wonder what it could be. Every year it was the same thing and after a while it was hard to be thankful because how many red shirts does one person really need? We don’t know what to call that. You sit by your aging mother who recognizes you some days and other days she doesn’t and you wish for something else besides this situation that you’ve been given – so hard it is to be grateful for this time that you have left. That’s how they were with the manna, not knowing what to call it, caught up in wishing for something else, or bogged down by the memory of the fleshpots of Egypt. Our eyes cannot see the blessings always, and it’s not ingratitude so much as it is confusion. We really don’t know what to call it. But Moses said to them, “It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat.” Oh what do I call it? For years I called it just another red shirt – but today I call each one a reminder of my grandmother’s love. Now that she’s gone each shirt is the assurance that she is with me still. Tom DuBois was having his car cleaned the day of his mother’s funeral. Not doing well himself Tom asked the woman vacuuming his car how she was. “This is the day that the Lord has made,” she said, “Let us rejoice and be glad in it. We do not always get what we ask for, but are such gifts as these not manna from heaven. Thanks be to God. Amen.

Tell the Israelites to go forward

Exodus 14: 5-31, OT pages 60-61 When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, the minds of Pharaoh and his officials were changed toward the people, and they said, “What have we done, letting Israel leave our service?” So he had his chariot made ready, and took his army with him; he took six hundred picked chariots and all the other chariots of Egypt with officers over all of them. The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh King of Egypt and he pursued the Israelites, who were going out boldly. The Egyptians pursued them, all Pharaoh’s horses and chariots, his chariot drivers and his army; they overtook them camped by the sea, by Pihahiroth, in front of Baalzephon. As Pharaoh drew near, the Israelites looked back, and there were the Egyptians advancing on them. In great fear the Israelites cried out to the Lord. They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us, bringing us out of Egypt? Is this not the very thing we told you in Egypt, ‘Let us alone and let us serve the Egyptians’? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.” But Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid, stand firm, and see the deliverance that the Lord will accomplish for you today; for the Egyptians whom you see today you shall never see again. The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to keep still.” Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why do you cry out to me? Tell the Israelites to go forward. But you lift up your staff, and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it, that the Israelites may go into the sea on dry ground. Then I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them; and so I will gain glory for myself over Pharaoh and all his army, his chariots, and his chariot drivers. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I have gained glory for myself over Pharaoh, his chariots, and his chariot drivers.” The angel of God who was going before the Israelite army moved and went behind them; and the pillar of cloud moved from in front of them and took its place behind them. It came between the army of Egypt and the army of Israel. And so the cloud was there with the darkness, and it lit up the night; one did not come near the other all night. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea. The Lord drove the sea back by a strong east wind all night, and turned the sea into dry land; and the waters were divided. The Israelites went into the sea on dry ground, the waters forming a wall for them on their right and on their left. The Egyptians pursued, and went into the sea after them, all of Pharaoh’s horses, chariots, and chariot drivers. At the morning watch the Lord in the pillar of fire and cloud looked down upon the Egyptian army, and threw the Egyptian army into panic. He clogged their chariot wheels so that they turned with difficulty. The Egyptians said, “Let us flee from the Israelites, for the Lord is fighting for them against Egypt.” Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Stretch out your hand over the sea, so that the water may come back upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots and chariot drivers.” So Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and at dawn the sea returned to its normal depth. As the Egyptians fled before it, the Lord tossed the Egyptians into the sea. The waters returned and covered the chariots and the chariot drivers, the entire army of Pharaoh that had followed them into the sea; not one of them remained. But the Israelites walked on dry ground through the sea, the waters forming a wall for them on their right and on their left. Thus the Lord saved Israel that day from the Egyptians; and Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore. Israel saw the great work that the Lord did against the Egyptians. So the people feared the Lord and believed the Lord and his servant Moses. Sermon There are times of hesitation in life. Times when you know where are supposed to go, you know what you are supposed to do and what direction to move in, the only problem is that your feet stay rooted to the ground. You can see it at any swimming lesson if the teacher will let you come and watch. She probably won’t let you come and watch however, because no swimming teacher wants there to be a witness to her near criminal act of pushing three year old girls in their sweet little bathing suits into the pool. She has to do this however, because the three year old who has never been in the water will stand there all day just looking at it in terror, not moving a muscle. When I was a little older than that my mother drove me to my first basketball practice. Being the mother of three she needed to move quickly to pick up one of my siblings, so she walked me into the rec-center on the north side of town, then she pointed out my coach standing on the other side of basketball court, and she told me to walk over there and introduce myself, then she hustled back to the car and left me standing there. I was still standing there in that exact spot when she came back to pick me up, because there are times of hesitation in life when you know where you are supposed to go but your feet stay rooted to the ground. The Israelites were led out of Egypt by the hand of Moses, but then, as Pharaoh and his army of chariots and chariot drivers advances, they cry out to God, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt, that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness?” Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the Lord told the Israelites to go forward but they were afraid to move. The Psalmist recounts this event: “Your way was through the sea, your path through the mighty waters; yet your footprints were unseen. You led your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron.” A flock of what, the psalm doesn’t say, but what is clear enough is that there are moments, even for faithful people, when the direction is made clear but the first step towards freedom is nearly impossible to take. There are times when we are not like firefighters rushing into the stairwell of the Twin Towers, brave and without hesitation despite the dust and bodies falling from the sky, the warning creak of beams soon to give way, there are times when we are more like a flock of sheep, so fearful of what we don’t know that we cannot move one step forward, so uncertain of what to do that we do nothing. Even still, “tell the Israelites to go forward,” the Lord said to Moses, because the life demands it. But our vision – so rarely is it ever clear. My mind is so trained to a litany of anxiety and worry, grief and sorrow. The Egyptians are there on my heel and they have my attention so completely. Some will say that we go forward as sheep to be slaughtered. But the Apostle Paul sees more clearly – and so he said that those who go forward are more than conquerors through him who loved us. The Lord provided a way and commanded the people forward – so forward you must go even if it means passing through a sea of tears. “Do not be afraid, and see the deliverance that the Lord will accomplish for you today.” Amen.

A Day of Remembrance

Exodus 12: 1-14, OT page 58 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: This month shall mark for you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year for you. Tell the whole congregation of Israel that on the tenth of this month they are to take a lamb for each family, a lamb for each household. If a household is too small for a whole lamb, it shall join its closest neighbor in obtaining one; the lamb shall be divided in proportion to the number of people who eat of it. Your lamb shall be without blemish, a year-old male; you may take it from the sheep or from the goats. You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month; then the whole assembled congregation of Israel shall slaughter it at twilight. They shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. They shall eat the lamb that same night; they shall eat it roasted over the fire with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. Do not eat any of it raw or boiled in water, but roasted over the fire, with its head, legs, and inner organs. You shall let none of it remain until the morning; anything that remains until the morning you shall burn. This is how you shall eat of it: your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat of it hurriedly. It is the Passover of the Lord. For I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike down every firstborn in the land of Egypt, both human beings and animals; on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord. The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live: when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague shall destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt. This day shall be a day of remembrance for you. You shall celebrate it as a festival of the Lord throughout your generations you shall observe it as a perpetual ordinance. Sermon The one who chooses which story will be told has a lot of power, so I can understand why our daughters argue when it’s time to read stories before bed – whose book will get read first is serious business, just as which stories get told around the dinner table matter and which ones don’t – some stories are told over and over again while others are never mentioned. There’s no telling how many times my grandmother told me about her years in nursing school, studying late eating ice chips to stay awake on the bathroom floor because 9:00 was lights-out, but the lights in the bathroom stayed on all night long, so you could study in there. There’s also a grandfather I never knew, but I heard stories about him. He’d stop the car if he saw a snake in the road, carry it home and leave it in the bathtub until he could find a safe place to keep it or until somebody else stepped into the bathtub and found it first. How often I heard about his reptile collection, and how rarely I heard about his alcoholism, because we pick which stories to tell. That’s just the way it is. We pick and choose the stories that we tell because the stories that get told shape the way we see the past, and the way we see the past shapes the way we see ourselves. That’s why history matters. Just last Friday the Daily Herald published an article by Joel Mathis and Ben Boychuk who were duking it out over history books. According to Mathis conservative scholars want to control the way our national history is told, whitewashing our past, hiding all the warts, choosing to make students feel good about their country rather than just telling the truth. Boychuk takes the opposite stance claiming that liberals have been politicizing American history since the 1960s. He quotes Peter Wood, president of the National Association of Schools, who said that “The idea of America as a nation founded on the pursuit of freedom and equality is presented mainly as a myth ever in need of more repudiation” by too many textbooks, and that history must be retold to inspire pride in her citizens. (Joel Mathis and Ben Boychuk, “The battle over history books continues,” The Daily Herald, Friday, September 5, 2014, 4A.) There’s controversy and disagreement here because the one who decides which story will be told has a lot of power, and here in Exodus chapter 12 the Lord tells Moses and Aaron which story will be told, how it will be told, and when. Every year, the feast of Passover “shall be a day of remembrance for you. You shall celebrate it as a festival of the Lord throughout your generations you shall observe it as a perpetual ordinance.” Every household in the assembled congregation of Israel shall take part, every household shall have a lamb of their own unless they are too small and need to share with their neighbors. “This month shall mark for you the beginning of months,” says the Lord, “it shall be the first month of the year for you,” so that you begin every year by remembering the story that defines who you are. Those who know which story to tell know who they are and who God is, but for those who are in search of the right story, listening always for the story that tells them who they are and who God is, they are like ships without a rudder, blown by the winds of other peoples words without direction or self-understanding. That’s really true in the case of preachers. We all stand at the front of the sanctuary as our congregations shake our hand – “that was a good word preacher,” or “thank you for the sermon” with every kind handshake, but it’s a guarantee that someone will walk down the aisle with a determined look in her eye ready to tell you that they have just heard the worst sermon of their entire life. I tell you that because it’s happened to me, more than once, and for the rest of the afternoon you just wallow around wondering which story got you right. But don’t feel sorry for me because I bet its worse for you. I knew a professor pretty well in college, and every year he’d give his students the chance to evaluate his teaching style, so every year he’d be told that his teaching style was too boring and that his wardrobe was too dated, year after year the most specific comment he’d receive is that he needed to buy some new ties - but I’ll tell you that he was one of the best teachers I ever had. So you see there are all kinds of stories, but which story will you listen to? If you’re on Facebook you’re really in trouble, not because there’s anything wrong with posting pictures and telling people where you’ve gone on vacation, but because there is something wrong with keeping track of how many people like what you’ve put up for the world to see – because no matter how many likes you get Facebook can’t tell you who you are. It’s not that what they say doesn’t matter – some of those people who told me that my sermon was terrible were exactly right – you have to listen and learn and be uplifted and shaped, but you have to remember some stories more than others – you have to understand yourself according to the story that the Lord has told about you. More than once I’ve prayed with the Alzheimer’s patient who doesn’t even know who she is, but who still knows who she is to Christ and so she still prays with me every word of the Lord’s Prayer. And more than once I’ve told you to remember your baptism – and if you were an infant when it happened there’s not really any way for you to remember it – but there is too. “Remember always who you are,” because you were saved from slavery in Egypt whether you remember it or not. You shall eat of that lamb with your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, your staff in your hand - you shall eat of it hurriedly to remember that no matter where you are right now, the Lord rushed you out of Egypt and the Lord will move you from where you are to where you’re meant to be. The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live: so that you will remember that the Lord passed over you – that no plague destroyed you when the Lord struck the land of Egypt – and no matter what you face today there is no plague so great that it can separate you from the Lord’s presence. This day shall be a day of remembrance for you. You shall celebrate it as a festival of the Lord throughout your generations you shall observe it as a perpetual ordinance – because no matter how you need to be brushed off or dried out or cleaned up or redeemed or forgiven you are the Lord’s forever. It’s too easy to forget this kind of thing while living in a culture where people are only as good as they look – where success is made known by what kind of car you drive or how big a stone on your ring – it is so important to remember who you are in a world where people use their words to tear you down and make you small – so remember that there are always many stories to choose from but let the story that the Lord tells about you matter most. The one who chooses which story will be told has a lot of power – but you have the power to decide which story you will define you. Listen then to the Word of the Lord. Amen.

Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh?

Exodus 3: 1-15, OT page 50 Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian; he led his flock beyond the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of a bush; he looked, and the bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed. Then Moses said, “I must turn aside and look at this great sight, and see why the bush is not burned up.” When the Lord saw that he had turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” Then he said, “Come no closer! Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” He said further, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face for he was afraid to look at God. Then the Lord said, “I have observed the misery of my people, who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the country of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. The cry of the Israelites has now come to me; I have also seen how the Egyptians oppress them. So come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites out of Egypt.” But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” He said, “I will be with you; and this shall be the sign for you that it is I who sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall worship God on this mountain.” But Moses said to God, “If I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” He said further, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘I am has sent me to you.’” Sermon Curiosity can be dangerous. You can tell that much from any number of books where the main character peeked around a corner, pulled a sword from a stone, or climbed into a mysterious wardrobe and so began a life altering adventure, but the same thing happens in real life too. My mother and father-in-law brought a new puppy home and she was curious, poking her nose around rocks and into holes on the ground. Before long a snake bit her right on the nose. I’m not any different. I remember a drive through our old neighborhood, several cars were stopped and a group of people was standing around looking at something in the middle of the street. Naturally I got out of my car to see what all the excitement was about and next thing I knew, I was elected to try and remove an alligator snapping turtle from the middle of the road. The same kind of thing can happen at a church. A curious person sticks her nose in the door of a church and who know what might happen next. Rev. Sarah Hayden, a seminary classmate who now works for our denomination’s New Church Development Commission, once told the story of how her family came to join their first Presbyterian Church. A new church building had been under construction near their neighborhood and when the construction was finished and the opening worship service was scheduled, her father suggested that they go and check it out. The family walked in and considering how often one church is just like all the other ones, they approached a man holding a stack of bulletins by the door into the sanctuary, but instead of handing each member of the family one this man handed Sarah’s father the whole stack saying, “You must be the one who supposed to hand out the bulletins.” “Actually, no I’m not,” her father said, “We’ve never been here before and we just wanted to check it out.” “Well,” the man said, “you hand out the bulletins.” That was years ago – Sarah’s now a Presbyterian minister and I think her family is still a member of that very church – and that’s how curiosity is – you see something interesting and decide to see what it’s all about and next thing you know your life goes in a direction you never could have expected. That’s how it was for Moses too. He was as far away from Pharaoh as he could get – not just in the wilderness but our 2nd Scripture lesson says that he was tending the flocks of his father-in-law beyond the wilderness. I think “beyond the wilderness” is out on the other side of Culleoka – and while he’s there not thinking about Egypt any more, not thinking about the Israelite family of his birth nor was he thinking about the family who adopted him, Pharaoh’s daughter who drew him out of the water in a basket and raised him in the palace until that day he lost his temper and killed the Egyptian who was beating an Israelite. He left all that behind just as he left behind the body of that Egyptian taskmaster, hiding his body in the sand. So there he was, he’d distanced himself as far as he could from his past and started a new life with a wife, children, and flocks to tend – life was just fine, the past was in the past and the future was secure – until he got curious about a bush that blazed without being consumed. Moses said, “I must turn aside and look at this great sight, and see why the bush is not burned up,” but this curiosity like all curiosity has the potential to be, led Moses into the presence of God – and once we find ourselves in the presence of God it’s best to be prepared for life to move in directions we never could have expected. That how it was with me. We just went to church when I was kid, and my parents would teach Sunday School and in the service we’d stand up and sing when we were supposed to, I’d bow my head and close my eyes when I was supposed to, and I knew the service was almost over…finally… when Dr. Jim Speed stood in front of us with his arms up saying the words of our 1st Scripture Lesson as his benediction. “Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good,” he’d say – and he’d say it as though we were actually supposed to do it. Go pocking your nose in a hole and you might get bit by a snake. Walk over to a group of people looking at something in the street and end up responsible for a snapping turtle. Get out of bed, get dressed, show up at the church – and it’s possible to leave here no different from how you walked in - but if you’re open to hearing God’s voice you better be careful or you’ll wind up going places and saying things that will dredge up the past and re-chart your future. Moses just wanted a closer look, and next thing he knew the God of his ancestors was telling him, “The cry of the Israelites has come to me; I have also seen how the Egyptians oppress them. So come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.” The Lord had heard their cry, and I am confident that the Lord hears the cry of the oppressed even now. The quite weeping of the sweat shop worker, the mourning wails of the mother whose children are torn away, the father who can’t make ends meet, and the child who sits hungry in the classroom in every school in Maury County. We want to know when someone is going to do something about it – when it’s going to get better – where are the jobs, the justice, the healthcare, and the wisdom? Where is the one who is going to get us out of this – who can make it better – who can bind up our wounds, get the job done, and finally fix up all that has gone so badly wrong? It’s easy to wonder where God is – or if God knows. Where has God been? And I think I know. God’s been calling, waiting on you to answer.

Moses was spared

Exodus 1: 8 – 2: 10, OT page 49 Now a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. He said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are more numerous and more powerful than we. Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, or they will increase and, in the event of war, join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land.” Therefore they set taskmasters over them to oppress them with forced labor. They built supply cities, Pithom and Rameses, for Pharaoh. But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread, so that the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites. The Egyptians became ruthless in imposing tasks on the Israelites, and made their lives bitter with hard service in mortar and brick and in every kind of field labor. They were ruthless in all the tasks that they imposed on them. The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah, “When you act as midwives to the Hebrew women, and see them on the birthstool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, she shall live.” But the midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live. So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this, and allowed the boys to live?” The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.” So God dealt well with the midwives; and the people multiplied and became very strong. And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families. Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, “Every boy that is born to the Hebrews you shall throw into the Nile, but you shall let every girl live.” Now a man from the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman. The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw that he was a fine baby, she hid him three months. When she could hide him no longer she got a papyrus basket for him, and plastered it with bitumen and pitch; she put the child in it and placed it among the reeds on the bank of the river. His sister stood at a distance, to see what would happen to him. The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river, while her attendants walked beside the river. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her maid to bring it. When she opened it, she saw the child. He was crying, and she took pity on him, “This must be one of the Hebrews’ children,” she said. Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?” Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Yes.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother. Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give you your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed it. When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and she took him as her son. She named him Moses, “because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.” Sermon The Israelite people came to live in Egypt; from the time Joseph saved his brothers and their families from the famine in the land Promised to Abraham and his descendants, they lived in Egypt and they died Egypt, many of their children were born there with no memory of any other land besides the fields and river banks nourished by the Nile River. It’s in a time and place like that when you can hear grandparents interrupt their grandchildren’s conversations concerning the fastest chariots or the best places to swim in the Nile with old stories about a homeland flowing with milk and honey. The grandparents wanted them to remember and prepare themselves to go back one day, but the grandchildren just wanted to fit in because that’s what grandchildren want to do. However, if a cat crawls into an oven to deliver her litter – they’re still kittens, not muffins. And in the same way just being born in Egypt doesn’t make one Egyptian any more than being born at Maury Regional makes you a local. In fact, just as the Israelites lived in Egypt you can live somewhere for years and years never quite belonging, though we all want to belong, whether in the place we were born or in the place we’ve adopted, so while my father-in-law who moved from Columbia, South America to Knoxville, Tennessee always planning on moving back home eventually, he did try to fit in at the University of Tennessee. He landed in Knoxville to study architecture while still just getting a grasp of the basics of the English language. Not yet grasping all the nuances, a couple nice church ladies asked him on the sidewalk if he’d been saved and he assumed they were asking him about his bank account. Then one of his first times through the cafeteria line at breakfast he asked for a biscuit with groovy instead of a biscuit with gravy. This was the 60’s so you can imagine how he’d make the mistake. Fortunately the cafeteria lady on the other side of the serving line laughed and so did he because he’s the kind of guy who can laugh at himself, but even still, fitting in is a serious business. Nobody wants to feel like the new guy forever. Sooner or later we all want to be one of the group laughing and talking in the cafeteria instead of the one on the outside sitting alone, just watching the others laughing and talking. From the outside looking in it seems like they’ve known each other forever, and to be one of them, if you’re lonely enough, you’ll do just about anything. That’s why these midwives are worth remembering. That’s why not even Pharaoh is named in our second Scripture lesson – he’s just called Pharaoh - but here in Exodus they are referred to not as two midwives but as Shiphrah and Puah. Remember their names because they had this chance to please the king of Egypt but they chose instead to honor their God. And they knew what pleasing him would have meant. They knew what disappointing him would have meant too. Already he had ordered the execution of babies, and just as he was capable of great evil so also in his words they may have heard an invitation to something good. A part of them must have been ready to do what he asked, as there is a part of all of us ready to walk down the easy path and away from who we are and who we should be. There’s a man at the County Fair who knows that well enough – so he tells you that a good father will pay three dollars to throw a shoe and knock over some cans to win his daughter a prize. Now you want to be a good father don’t you? The grocery store knows it too – so they don’t just sell food, it’s not just cereal in that box, the commercials say that it’s fuel for a school day, a ticket to academic excellence, or even worse – they’ll tell you that having this or providing that will make you a good mother. You want to be a good mother don’t you? It’s not just in High School where the one whose self-worth constantly hangs in the balance of what other people say walks a precarious line – every man and woman who seeks acceptance from the world faces the worst kind of danger day in and day out – it doesn’t matter how many hours you work, you could still work more, how many people you please, there will still be expectations unmet. Despite whatever Pharaoh threatened or promised, they chose to remain Shiphrah and Puah – remember their names and be like them, let the God who created you define who you are. They made the choice to save those Hebrew babies – they chose to listen to their heart rather than the voice of a sin sick world – and that same choice is yours today. The standards of our world will tell you how to act and speak – but the ways of this world must not be your ways. “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God – what is good and acceptable and perfect.” Do not be conformed to this world for you don’t belong to this world any more than Moses belonged to the Pharaoh’s palace. Do not be conformed to this world, but honor the God who created you, the one who will spare you as Moses was spared. Amen.

It was not you who sent me here

Genesis 45: 1-15, OT page 42 Then Joseph could no longer control himself before all those who stood by him, and he cried out, “Send everyone away from me.” So no one stayed with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers. And he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard it. Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph, is my father still alive?” But his brothers could not answer him, so dismayed were they at his presence. Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Come closer to me.” And they came closer. He said, “I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. And now do not be distressed, or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life. For the famine has been in the land these two years; and there are five more years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God; God has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt. Hurry and go up to my father and say to him, ‘Thus says your son Joseph, God has made me lord of all Egypt; come down to me, do not delay. You shall settle in the land of Goshen, and you shall be near me, you and your children and your children’s children, as well as your flocks, your herds, and all that you have. I will provide for you there – since there are five more years of famine to come – so that you and your household, and all that you have, will not come to poverty.’ And now your eyes and the eyes of my brother Benjamin see that it is my own mouth that speaks to you. You must tell my father how greatly I am honored in Egypt, and all that you have seen. Hurry and bring my father down here.” Then he fell upon his brother Benjamin’s neck and wept, while Benjamin wept upon his neck. And he kissed all his brothers and wept upon them; and after that his brothers talked with him. Sermon There was a young woman, a friend of a friend, just moved to New York City, living in her very first apartment just large enough to sleep in, working her very first job that just paid her enough to survive, so when a co-worker asked her to stay in her apartment and care for her cat while she went on vacation this young woman was excited to oblige. The apartment was wonderful – air conditioned, full kitchen, cable TV, and all she had to do was keep the cat – the only problem was that on the third day the cat died. She felt horrible, as you can imagine, and rehearsed the phone call a few dozen times before finally calling the cat owner and delivering the bad news. Fortunately for the young woman, the cat owner understood completely as the cat was 14 years old, her only request was that she go ahead and deliver the cat’s body to the vet’s office where they would handle the remains. But unfortunately, the young woman was so relieved that she hung up the phone before realizing that she didn’t have a car to drive the cat across town to the vet. How would she transport the cat then? She couldn’t walk – it was too far. She didn’t have enough money for a taxi, and even if she did, she couldn’t just hold a dead cat in her arms – so she looked around the apartment and finally found an old brief case. She put the cat in it and went down to the subway, got on the train and sat down, the brief case on the floor between her feet, and she tried hard not to act like anything at all was the matter. A nice looking young man sat down next to her. After a little while he nudged her and looking down at the brief case asked her if she was on her way to work. “Yes I am as a matter of fact,” she replied with a little too much confidence, “just going in to the office with my trusty laptop,” she said looking down at the brief case. Then she asked what he was on the way to – he was headed to the Met to enjoy some artwork since it was his day off, or something like that – well she loved the Met too and it turned out that’s not the only thing that they had in common, so at some point in the conversation this young woman began to wonder if she was about to be asked out on her first date in New York City with a dead cat between her feet. But before that could happen, train came to a stop, the young man grabbed that brief case and ran out of the train never to be seen again. Now I tell you this because it’s not every story that ends so well. The story of the young woman who moves to a new place and is robbed blind has been told and told again – which goes right along with news reports of the Ebola Virus – a disease that shows no mercy nor partiality, or the war in Palestine that has flared up again and has little hope of ever ending, the murder of children in Iraq – a place where hatred is not in short supply, protests in Missouri where mothers and fathers call for revenge, and the suicide of Robyn Williams that shines a bright light on the kind of suffering that will hide behind a smile. You’ve heard such stories and know them well enough; hear then another kind of story – where suffering was not meaningless, where brothers came face to face and found reconciliation, where everything did turn out happily ever after, where revenge would have been so easy but forgiveness was given instead. The story begins with a little brother who didn’t know when to stop talking about himself, so his brothers helped him find his way to a pit with no water in it – and he looked up waiting for the joke to be over and saw his brothers looking down on him in it, glad to have put him in his place. It turns out they weren’t just joking, they meant to get rid of him, so there were chains next as they sold him for silver coins, then a long journey to a world he’d never seen surrounded by words he couldn’t understand, and he was helpless to do anything about it. He went from the chains of a slave to the cell of a prisoner wrongly accused, though the rats and the guards, neither cared that he was innocent – and each day passed slowly, alone with his memories of the brothers who got him there in the first place. You can imagine that he was ready for the moment when he would finally see them again. Probably he had rehearsed his words and actions through a million times before. Only from his seat of power, having risen through the ranks of the Egyptian hierarchy, he not only sees the faces of his brother looking down on him from the edge of that pit in his minds eye, he sees also the hand of God leading him, sustaining and preserving him, lifting him up for just such a time as this. He said to them after so many years of rehearsing, “I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. And now do not be distressed, or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life… God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God.” Such perspective, such maturity, such faith – all in short supply – so hear this uncommon story and know that it is true. Hold this story close when the devil convinces you that all hope is lost – that you’ve made the wrong step, that you’re too far from the path – hold this story close and remember the God who led Joseph from hardship by an invisible hand. Hold this story close when famine and disease strike fear in the world – and remember that our God still provides a way out of no way. Hold this story close when it is clear that you are the victim – and see your hardship through the lens of faith trusting that “the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable” and nothing will separate you from the love of God. Hold this story close – when death knocks on the door whispering cold words of uncertainty and despair – hold this story close and remember the God who speaks life everlasting. Amen.