The Power of Peace

This is a sermon based on Matthew 3:1-12 and Isaiah 11:1-10 (the lectionary readings for the second week in Advent, year A).  Enjoy!

It’s a little alarming for us

        in this season of soft lights and kind words,

             to come face-to-face with a character like John                  the Baptist.

In the season of Advent,

        we prefer to hear about Mary and Joseph,

            about messages delivered by angels,

            about the preparation for an important birth in a humble place.

Yet every Advent, we are confronted with a reminder about

        this strange, almost creepy contemporary of Jesus.

John is alarming in every aspect of his character:

        he wears clothes of camel’s hair

            reminiscent of the wild clothing of Elijah.

        he eats locusts flavored with honey – a food of the scavenging poor.

        his location is concerning,

            he doesn’t set up shop in the city – speaking his word to the masses

                      he dwells in the wilderness.

        he has an alarming message:

                     it is full of condemnation.

                        “you brood of vipers,”

                        “the chaff will burn in the unquenchable fire,”

                        “the ax is set at the bottom of the tree,”

                        “you will be baptized in fire”

It’s a strange time of year to be hearing words of condemnation and judgment.

        It’s a strange time of year to be told to repent.

        It's a strange time of year to think about judgment.

Our churches are meant to stand as safe-havens in the world.

            This is a place where we are invited to feel at home

                        this is a place where we are welcomed

                        no matter who we are

                        and no matter what we have done.

            with this, comes an assumption that it is here where judgments are placed aside.

            So it is a little jarring to hear John saying repent.

Is John telling the church to be a place of judgment?

            sometimes it seems so – when we consider the way the church

                        has behaved throughout history.

Yet the words of Matthew 7 ring in my ear:

            Do not judge, so that you may not be judged.

            For with the judgment you make you will be judged

            And the measure you give will be the measure you get.

John is not telling us that we need to be judgers,

            his message is all about repentance.

There was once a holiday in South Africa called The Day of the Vow.

            The vow was taken in the 1800’s during the war

                        between white colonialists and the black Zulus.

            On the eve of a big battle, the besieged whites took a public vow

                        that if God helped them live, they would celebrate that day for                                        generations.

Generations later, after whites took control of the land

            and implemented a system of apartheid, or segregation

            every December 16, whites would teach their children to celebrate that victory,

                        often with violence.

Letlapa Mphalele recalls growing up in this horrible reality        Every December 16, whites would come into his                village

 and beat up any Africans they could find on the streets.

As Letlapa grew up, he and his friends decided to take December 16 back for themselves.

            This day would be the beginning of their armed                                   revolt against apartheid.

        

He quickly became director of a violent movement.

            If blacks were gunned down by whites, he and his fighters

                        would kill white policemen.

Violence mounted and, on a warm October night,

            white soldiers killed five black South African children sleeping in their home.

            So Letlapa ordered the shooting of white civilians at Heidelberg Tavern in Cape                  Town.

One of the four people randomly killed was Lyndi Fourie.

            Lyndi’s mother, Jenn received a phone message upon returning to her home                    that day telling her that her daughter had been killed.

Hatred was felt on both sides

Letlapa felt that the end result was a necessary retaliation

                        for the deaths of the five children his community had buried.

                        that now the whites were going to suffer the way blacks had suffered.

         Jenn Fourie prayed at her daughter’s funeral

                        saying that her daughter had been killed at the hands of evil men

                                    that Letlape was the devil incarnate.

6 months later, Nelson Mandela was elected president,

            and he ended apartheid in South Africa.

            December 16 was renamed The Day of Reconciliation.

Now, a country of people who had been killing each other for generations

            had to look in each other’s eyes and say sorry.

            As part of this process, people who had committed terrible acts

                        under apartheid

            came together to stand before a Truth and Reconciliation Commission

-which was headed by Desmond Tutu-

                        to confess all their crimes and ask for forgiveness.

            But Letlapa wouldn’t go, because he did not believe he was a criminal

                        for doing what was right.

Jenn was heartbroken at Letlape’s refusal,

            so she decided to personally confront him at a press conference.

            She stood up, identified herself, and accused him of trivializing reconciliation.

Letlapa explained his side of the story;

            that his fighters were responding to the crimes of decades of subjugation.

            Lyndi’s death was cast in the light of generations of painful loss.

                        Jenn had never seen things from Letlapa’s perspective.

            Letlapa approached Jenn and shook hands with her in a traditional African way

                        showing deep respect.

                        and Jenn forgave Letlapa.

Letlape never said he was sorry, but not because he wasn’t sorry.

            In his culture, it was his actions that mattered more than his words,

            so he invited Jenn to speak at his homecoming celebration.

            Letlapa had not been home as a free man in over 16 years.

            At the homecoming, Jenn apologized on behalf of her ancestors

                        for what they had done to Letlapa’s people.

                        Not only was she applauded, she was given a new name: Peladee 

                                    which means mother of Africa. (2)

 

These two people have found peace.

On the website for the foundation created for Lyndi Fourie

            Her mother and the man who ordered her murder                 stand side by side. (2)

The road to peace was not short or easy,

            the road to peace required repentance,

                        it required forgiveness,

                        it required reconciliation.

John’s biggest purpose, and the reason he is so crucial for Advent,

        is because he points the way for the one who is coming – Jesus.

        And Jesus enters into the world as God incarnate

        bringing the most astonishing combination of acceptance and admonition. (3)

What we discover at Advent and Christmas

        is not only are we cherished and accepted for who we are,

        but we are also responsible for what we do.

God loves us enough to care about what we do

            to care about our lives, to have expectations for us.

This does not mean that our expectations for ourselves

        or for each other

        necessarily line up with what God expects of us.

            In fact the opposite is probably more often true.

But the fact that God loves us enough to care about what we do

        and sends John to call us into better lives

        and sends Jesus into the world to teach and guide us

            is an incredible testament to God’s mercy.

There’s a youtube video that went viral a few years ago.

        The video is called simply “Dog, cat, and rat.”

        The gist of the video is that a man has a rat

        that rides on the back of a cat

        that rides on the back of a dog.

            all, seemingly, by choice.

                        I know it sounds more like a Dr. Suess poem, but there they are,

                        like the musicians of Bremen.

          The video has over 10 million views.

It seems we are fascinated by the idea of animals living in peace.

We see this in Isaiah’s prophecy.

        To indicate the extent of God’s powerful peace,

            Isaiah uses the cooperation of animals

        The wolf and the lamb,

        The calf and the lion

        The leopard and the baby goat.

The reason we are drawn to these animal videos

        and the reason that Isaiah’s image of the holy mountain is so compelling

        is because these do not indicate what is normal.

The wolf usually doesn’t hang out with the lamb.

The lion and the fatling don’t lie down together,

        and the rat never rides on the back of the cat

        who never rides on the back of the dog.

This departure from what appears to be reality is intriguing

        because it gives us hope.

Nelson Mandela died on Thursday of this week.

        After spending his early life fighting for the end of apartheid,

        the middle part of his life in a jail cell,

        and the last part of his life destroying a racialist system and bringing about peace,

            this man is being recognized for his achievements.

He was elected president of a tumultuous country.

        He had lots of pressure to retaliate against those who imprisoned him.

               To return evil for evil.

        But that's not what he did.

        In fact, at his inauguration he invited the guards who kept him in prison,

             to sit in the front row.

      Because nothing is more humbling than receiving forgiveness

            when you don't feel you've earned it.

Nelson Mandela understood the peace process.

        He understood that the way for two people to move from hatred for one another

            to mutual love and respect,

                        is through repentance and forgiveness.

           It requires asking God for forgiveness,

            asking each other for forgiveness.

         Because once we forgive each other, once we are that vulnerable with each other,

           we understand each other better. Peace can become a reality.

                    that is the power of repentance an reconciliation, 

                    that is the power of peace.

What we do in Advent is important:

        the hymns we sing

        the prayers we pray

        the ways we prepare our hearts and minds for Christmas.

These things really do matter.

Our repentance is important because it prepares us to                welcome God's peace.

         It prepares our souls to embody God's world.

So we approach this Advent season with longing,

        with anticipation,

        maybe, even, with a little apprehension,

but knowing that a shoot shall come out of the dead stump of Jesse,

        into a dead and dying world,

        and he will be Jesus, God’s son.

        and he will be called the Prince of Peace.

AMEN.

(1) Story taken from radio show Snap Judgment episode #314 (August 1, 2013)

(2) http://www.lyndifouriefoundation.org.za/

(3) Feasting on the Word. Year A, Volume 1.

Holy Mountain

This sermon is written in a bit of a different style than my sermons of the past.  There are a multitude of grammatical mistakes, broken up lines, etc.  Please bear with me and remember that it is primarily a spoken thing, which explains the weird breaks.  Thanks!



Isaiah 65:17-19, 25

¹⁷ For I am about to create new heavens

           and a new earth;

The former things shall not be

           remembered

           or come to mind.

¹⁸ But be glad and rejoice forever

           in what I am creating;

for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy,

           and its people as a delight.

¹⁹ I will rejoice in Jerusalem,

           And delight in my people;

no more shall the sound of weeping be

           heard in it,

           or the cry of distress.

²⁵ the wolf and the lamb shall feed

           Together,

the lion shall eat straw like the ox;

but the serpent – its food shall be dust!

They shall not hurt or destroy

           on all my holy mountain, says the Lord.

I had just finished loading my gear in my car at the end of a long weekend of backpacking.

As I typically do I called Claire

            to update her on the weekend,

                        tell her how backpacking had been.

                        get the update on her.

As she usually does at the end of a backpacking weekend she gave me a quick rundown

            telling me about her weekend:

                        where she’d been, what she’d done;

            and then we got to the point in the conversation when she updates me about the world,

            and she told me about the typhoon in the Philippines.

            I asked her for some basic, pointed details:

                        How many people are dead? Is the storm over?

            It was like a weird routine.

                        Claire knew exactly what to tell me and how to tell it.

And I realized in that moment, something that I knew deep down

                        from the moment in our wedding when I said, “I do.”

Claire has me figured out.

            In case there is any doubt, I say it now, for the record:

                        Claire has got me figured out.

We pull our verse today from a section of Isaiah called Third Isaiah.

It is the end of the prophetic book,

            and it is characterized by some sweeping prophecies.

This section was written as the Hebrew exiles were returning to Jerusalem

            after the exile in Babylon.

            They returned with many hopes

                        many plans to rebuild their once glorious city.

But they ran into obstacles as soon as they returned.

            There were people living in the ruins of the city,

                        who had taken over their homes.

            Rebuilding was slower and more difficult than they imagined.

            As so often before, the people didn't turn to God when the going got tough.

So Isaiah writes, the rebuilding of this city is not something that you people are able to do.

            At least not you by yourselves.

Right before our passage today, Isaiah says that the former troubles will be forgotten.

            The Israelites had lots of former troubles:

                        Jerusalem had been conquered

                        they had been exiled in Babylon

                        they had spent years in exile, in a foreign land

                        their temple had been destroyed.

            Theirs was a peace-less land.

Yet God says, into all of this trouble, that there is going to be

            a new heavens and a new earth

                        that God will create.

And this is going to be a place marked by something different: marked by peace.

Isaiah describes this wonderful place of peace in the verses in between our readings,

            where no one will die as a young person, all will grow to old age,

            where there will be shelter and food for all,

            where children will not be brought into a violent, chaotic world,

            where people will not hurt or kill on another.

This is going to be a remarkable place, and God instructs the Israelites

            to be glad, to rejoice forever, for they will weep no more.

I think about the world they faced.

            I think about the world we face and I wonder…

How can this be?

It didn’t take long for Claire to realize that the best way for me to find out about terrible things

            is by her voice.

            She knew from very early on that I was particularly sensitive to shootings.

I was a student at Virginia Tech in 2007 when 32 students and faculty members were shot and killed on campus by a mentally disturbed student.

            I knew people who were shot and injured,

I had a professor who was killed at his blackboard

                                    in the middle of a German lesson.

I lived through the chaos, through the fear,

 through a day of uncertainty and hospital waiting after discovering

                        that a friend of mine had been shot in the leg three times

                                    in her French class.

                                    Through months of watching her recover.

Claire learned very quickly that tragedies like the one at Virginia Tech

are particularly painful to me.

She woke me up from a nap in seminary once

            by coming to my room before class.

            She sat down next to me and told me

that a police officer had been killed at Virginia Tech

                        and they were still looking for a gunman

                        who might be loose the campus.

Claire knows that when there is a mass shooting or senseless violence,

            it’s best if it is her voice that tells me,

            or at least if her voice is the first one I hear.

It seems that this routine has become a near daily experience.

It’s hard to go a full day without seeing an eye-witness report

            or a breaking news story,

                        about some kind of disaster or shooting or instance of violence.

This seems to be the unending violence that our world embraces.

This is the chaos that we seem to breed.

            And I find myself asking: “How long oh Lord. How long?”

                        How long must we endure this unending cycle of chaos?

And I open to find the words of Isaiah.

            Be glad, and rejoice forever,

            for I am about to create a new heavens, and a new earth.

Ghaith Abdul-Ahad is a reporter for the British newspaper The Guardian.

He is Iraqi by birth, and he has covered conflicts

in the Middle East from Afghanistan to the Sudan.

He tells a story about the reporting he did in Libya

following the uprisings which have come to be known as the Arab Spring.

In the Spring of 2011, he was in Libya reporting on the rebels

who were fighting against Muammar Gaddafi.

In the course of his reporting he was captured by

            Gadhaffi’s forces and, despite the fact that he was there legally

            he was dumped in a damp prison cell.

Ghaith was kept company by one light bulb and a dirty mattress on a prison floor.

After a few days in the cell, Ghaith started to realize

            there was only one way he was going to leave.

                        And this would be if the rebels managed to take over Tripoli.

The guards in the prison were severe,

            Ghaith could hear them beating prisoners in cells down the hall.

One guard, a man named Hatam, was particularly fierce with Ghaith.

            The guards became very agitated,

                        blaming journalists for the uprising.

Throughout battles raging around the capitol,

            Ghaith was stuck in the prison

                        With no end in sight.

So he decided to try to get to know his captors,

            particularly Hatam, who hated journalists.

            Ghaith slowly formed a relationship with this man,

                        talking back and forth with him

                        not as guard and prisoner, but just two normal people.

            He knew only that the man had a family, and that he loved the regime.

                        Ghaith talked to him through the small grate in the cell door

                                    for two weeks.

Finally, the Guardian negotiated for Ghaith to be released,

            and he was put on one of the last flights out of Libya.

Four months later, the rebels took the capitol.

The day Libya fell, Ghaith called his editor. There was one person he wanted to find.

            The guard, Hatam.

Ghaith made his way back to the capitol,

            tracked down his house, in a Tripoli suburb and knocked on the door.

            For Ghaith, it felt like meeting an old friend.

                        There was a moment of camaraderie.

            They were laughing, and talking, “How are you, how did you find me.”

For Ghaith, it was a moment of vindication.

Out of chaos, a moment of peace is found.

            When time is taken for one person to understand another

                        for one person to understand the enemy,

                        for a moment of love to pass between two people

            There is a peace that is reached,

                        And both men cannot help but laugh.

How did Ghaith move from a place of conflict to a place of peace?

            With a small, tangible action that increased understanding.

            He took some time to talk to Hatam as one human to another.

                        Some time to get to know this other human being;

                                    to know his struggles and passions

                                    a little bit about his life.

The changes that Isaiah talks about not sweeping, unachievable changes.

            They are tangible, maybe even mundane things.

                        people will live longer lives,

                        they will have fruit to eat

                        they will be able to live in houses.

            But these are the things that would embody a new creation.

            These are the things that would make a difference in that world.

They are the same things that might make a difference in our world.

And we are able to do those tangible things.

            We are able to give that one drink of cold water.

            To bring comfort to the poor, one act of mercy at a time.

                        One book given

                        One friendship claimed.

                        One can of beans

                        One moment of caring.

                        One moment in which a person is humanized rather than objectified,

                        One challenge to the set order,

                        One revelation of the evil that hides in plain sight,

                        One declaration that every single person is a child of God.

These are the little things that bring about God’s kingdom,

            these are the little things in the face of the chaos of the world

that give us a glimpse of God’s holy mountain. 

                                                             (borrowed from Feasting on the Word)

But the task, as Isaiah said, is not ours and ours alone.
In a world where we are totally focused on our capacities,
            Isaiah lifts our eyes so that we are forced

            to contemplate God’s capacities.

We are aided in all of these things by a God who is creating something new.

  

We are reminded of faithful people throughout the ages

            who proclaim a future hope for peace

and work for that hope in the midst of the chaos.

People like Martin Luther King Jr.

            who knew of the painful sea of inequality around him

                        but stood up in spite of that sea and proclaimed, “I have a dream.”

                        And described a future in which that dream would be realized.

People like Eleanor Roosevelt

            about whom it is said

            she would rather light a candle than curse the darkness.

People who understand that God’s holy mountain is not just something to be dreamed about

            in some far off place or time,

                        but something to be worked for

                        and prayed for, now.

These people knew that the world was in shambles,
            but into that chaos, they shined a beam of hope.
That’s what Claire’s voice is for me.

            Into the chaos of a hurricane or an earthquake,

            Into the terror of a school shooting or a violent attack

            Her voice reminds me that God is at work,

                        It reminds me that into the horrors of the world,

                        There is a still, small voice of God.
                        Speaking hope when I feel none.

  

I have had the sneaking suspicion for years that my mother used to be a hippie.

She tells us children of a letter that her father sent her when she was in college,

            asking her to please study more

and to stop going to protests quite so much.

When I was growing up

and news would come on about violence in the Middle East

                        my mother used to say

with a certain amount of desperation

and despair in her voice:

                               “I’ve been praying for peace in the Middle East my entire life…”

Isaiah would tell my mother,

            “keep on praying, keep on dreaming, keep on working

                        because the wolf and the lamb will feed together,

                        the lion will eat straw like the ox,

                        the Israeli and the Palestinian will sit down for dinner together,

the parents will send their children to school

                                    without fear of a shower of bullets,

                        the nations will not rise up against one another

                        they will beat their swords in plowshares

                        and God says no one shall hurt or destroy

                                    on all my holy mountain.

AMEN.