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Untitled

  • June 19, 2022
  • by Sara Baron

“Tears for Food” based on Psalm 42 and Luke 8:26-39

One of the core tenets of our faith is that we are made in the image of God. Humanity reflects the Divine. Creation is an expression of the Holy.

This may seem simple, but it has proven challenging for humans for quite some time now.

Because it isn’t that we – First UMC of Schenectady – are made in the image of God, nor even we – United Methodists – are made in the image of God, nor even we – Christians – are made in the image of God, nor even that we – people of faith – are made in the image of God. It is that we, HUMANITY, are made in the image of God.

Which has implications.

If everyone is made in the image of God, than how we treat EVERY ONE matters. Each and every person is a beloved person of God, made in God’s image, and a unique reflection of the Holy One.

Which is to say, it seems to follow, that we probably shouldn’t oppress people.

Which is the part that I’ve noticed humans haven’t done terribly well.

Today is June 19th, so today is 157 years since slaves were freed in west Texas, believed to be the last enslaved people in the United States to hear that they’d been freed 2.5 years earlier. Today is a celebration of the end of slavery in the United States, and thanks be to God for that!

The institution of slavery was an abomination, and the end of the practice was a step towards God’s kindom.

I find myself a little bit obsessed with those 2.5 years. The 900 days in between the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, and Juneteenth – June 19, 1865 blow me away. 900 days during which people who were free didn’t know it. 900 days in which people who were ACTUALLY free lived and died as enslaved people. 900 days in which people who were ACTUALLY free were born into slavery. 900 days for enslavers to reap profit, 900 days for people who’d been enslaved to suffer, languish, be beaten, and have their families ripped apart. 900 days when freedom had been declared, but hadn’t come yet. (I wonder, a bit, how often we’re in those in-betweens, when God’s good actions have happened but we haven’t heard yet.)

In the midst of celebrating the end of 246 years of institutionalized slavery in the United States, I’m struck by the injustice of the last 2.5 years. It is possible I’m focusing wrong. Because all of those things I’m angry about having been done to people in the last 900 days were ALSO done for the TWO HUNDRED FORTY SIX years before that.

While, during those years, the institution of slavery was LEGAL, it was just as much of an abomination. During those 246 years from 1619 to 1865, beloved people of God were treated as anything but beloved people of God.

And, while I’m muddying waters, we also have to talk about the end of slavery not being the end of abominations in the treatment of God’s beloveds who ancestors were from Africa. The 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments to the US constitution ended slavery, but they have caveats.

The 13th, section one, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”

The 14th, a portion of section one, “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law…”

As Michele Alexander explains in “The New Jim Crow,” those who were used to gaining profit from enslaving people found ways to keep oppressing them. The formerly enslaved were free, and remained free UNLESS they were convicted of a crime. So, the system convicted people of “crimes,” and forced people to keep working as enslaved people that way. And, WE STILL DO. And we still convict people of color at vastly disproportionate numbers, and then steal their labor. (Cough cough NYS hand sanitizer.)

But, in the midst of this complication is the STILL present reality that June 19th, 1865 mattered. It didn’t change everything, it wasn’t a moment we’d call “one and done,” but it was momentous. An institution of evil ended. God’s people were freed.

Beloved people of God were given space to be who they were made and called to be: gifts to all creation.

It fits, for me, to hear Psalm 42 today. The “tears for food” line fits. The lament of the Psalm, but the underlying hope of it too, makes sense. A longing for God, and for God’s presence – which brings with it justice. An acknowledgement of wrongness, and a desire for rightness. And, even in the midst of the wrongness, a sense of hope that God can and will fix it. 246 years wasn’t a short period of time for God’s people to be enslaved, but it did end. God did not forget God’s people.

(Although it may have seemed like forgetting for a very long time there.)

God is always working for justice, working towards freedom, working to end oppression, working to make space for all of us to be blessings to each other and all creation. May we not get in God’s way.

Today, when we read the story of the Gerasene demonic, I wonder what traumas he lived. Were they all his, or was he the one who held them for the community, or maybe even for the generations. Was he the sensitive soul who expressed the brokenness others pretended away? Or was he simply one who’d been hurt until he couldn’t pretend it away anymore himself?

I don’t know, but I do know that community trauma and generational trauma play out in individual lives as well as communities and families, and the trauma of 246 years of God’s beloved people being enslaved didn’t go away on June 19, 1865.

(Nor, of course, did the trauma end.)

People are still living out the trauma, it is still hurting people. It isn’t OVER.

I wonder, though, if what we are to take from the story of Legion is the power of God to heal what seems un-healable. The man who had been separated from his community, living alone with his pain and without “creature comforts,” was healed. And sent back to his people, to show the power of God to heal.

In some ways this healing feels less realistic to me than even the physical ones. I have watched people struggle with mental illness, and I have seen how tirelessly people work for their mental health, and how slow healing is even with the best possible support. This instantaneous healing of what looks like out of control schizophrenia shakes me, because I so desperately wish others could have it, and I know how hard it is for people who don’t find healing like this.

But I also know that mental health, like physical health, is related to how we construct societies. Are we looking for equity, justice, and a chance for people to thrive, or are we looking to let some people get super rich while others pay for it with their health? How much pressure are we willing to put on people, on families, on vulnerable communities SO THAT others can gain from it?

I don’t know what to make of Jesus’ healing, but I’m always struck by the idea that interacting with Jesus was like meeting someone who could express just how much God loves you. And I believe in the healing power of love. So, I take from this story that if people know how much they are loved, how worthy they are of love, how nothing that has happened to them and nothing that they have done changes that, … miraculous healing is possible. When people are heard, and loved, healing happens. When people are seen, and loved, healing happens.

We have to both stop oppressing God’s people AND work towards healing the traumas of oppression.

On this day when we celebrate the end of one particularly vicious and evil oppression, the end of the institution of slavery (outside of prison), may we learn the lessons once again: God loves all people, ending oppression is Godly work, and healing people is too. May God help each of us do our part. Amen

June 19, 2022

Rev. Sara E. Baron 
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady 
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305 
Pronouns: she/her/hers 
http://fumcschenectady.org/ 
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

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Untitled

  • May 29, 2022
  • by Sara Baron

“Resurrection People” based on Revelation 22:12-14, 16-17, 20-21 & John 17:20-26

There have been so many mass shootings. There have been so many that I suspect all of us have been touched by them not just on the news but also more directly, whether they be from afar, or from close up. My mother spent a year at Sandy Hook Elementary School. A friend went to the “other” high school – not to Columbine. Another friend grew up in the Conklin United Methodist Church, and to Susquehanna Valley Central schools. (The location of the young man who committed mass murder in Buffalo). These little connections make these deaths and the violence very, very real.

For years it seemed like the primary work of Schenectady Clergy Against Hate was to be gathering together with marginalized communities to speak to the pain of attacks against them. We got good at it. I’m still upset about that.

There isn’t much point in standing in this pulpit and decrying a lack of reasonable gun control laws – it is preaching to the choir. But also, how can one stand in this pulpit and do anything other than name the abomination that is a society that puts weapons of mass murder in the hands of those who engage in hate crimes, and those who wish to kill children. Buffalo and Uvalde. Back to back. But we all know what happened after Sandy Hook.

(Nothing.)

We live in a country that says it values the right to bear arms, but does so without providing a right to safety. We live in a country that won’t change its laws because the gun manufacturers have too strong of a lobby. We live in a country that is more invested in profits from murder than in preventing murder.

How can we do anything but grieve?

We live in a violent society, and it impacts us in so very many ways. We live in a violent society.

It breaks my heart. Sometimes it threatens to break my spirit.

But, I’m a person of faith, and so I choose to dream with you and with God about the nonviolent society that God wants for us, the beloved community that Dr. King spoke of, the kindom of God Jesus named, the true “Promised Land” of the people of God. I don’t want to give more time to violence.

Sure, I’m still going to contact my representatives and ask for changes to our gun laws. Sure, I’m still going to object to private prisons and solitary confinement and police brutality, and the like. That isn’t going to end. We can’t get from here to there without actual change.

But first and foremost, I want to follow Jesus on the path of nonviolence. I want to give my energy to how things should be. I don’t want to engage violence with violence. I want to engage the world with love.

Also, we aren’t going to get from here to there without knowing what we’re aiming at.

The text we have from John this week is as convoluted as John tends to be. But his point is that the loving community of faith is meant to be a living expression of the love of God. Jesus prays, asking that we might learn how to love. Jesus tries to place in the hearts of his followers, one more seed in hopes that it will grow: “I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.“ (17:26) We’re told, time and time again, that it is by loving each other in faith community that the world is changed. We start with each other.

The text from Revelation includes the very last words of the Bible, and I’m told that they’re best interpreted, “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.” There is a universality, a hope in both passages that the love that starts with Jesus and extends to the community of faith may become the norm in the world at large, and eventually the way the world works. We end with everyone.

For a very long time, Christianity was so profoundly peaceful that it was assumed a Christian could not fight in a war. (This changed around the time there was a desire for Crusades. Sigh.) This is still true enough that our Social Principals state, “We believe war is incompatible with the teachings and example of Christ.” (165.c) United Methodists are able to use our faith as the bases of being a conscientious objector in the face of a draft.

Yet, there are so many ways that violence seeps in. It seeps into our language. It seeps in to our values. It seems into our lives. At times, it seems right into our faith.

We often talk these days about “echo chambers” and the distances between people of different political parties. We bemoan the increasing partisanship of our society. Which is good, because it is dangerous.

When I need to be reminded of the power of nonviolence, and how deeply rooted it is in my faith, I go back to the King Center for Nonviolent Social Change. Their fundamental tenet, #3: Nonviolence Seeks to Defeat Injustice, or Evil, Not People.

  • Nonviolence recognizes that evildoers are also victims and are not evil people.
  • The nonviolent resister seeks to defeat evil not persons victimized by evil.

Just saying those words reminds me that nonviolence requires great strength, and a community commitment to it. Reminding each other that those who do evil are victims and are not evil takes a faith community. I’ve often been struck by those in this community who have the patience to pray for those who do great harm, and how they guide and remind the rest of us of that need.

I have been for many years a student of “Nonviolent Communication” but if I’m honest, within that community there is a desire to change the name to “Compassionate Communication.” People do not want to define themselves AGAINST something, not even AGAINST violence, but rather FOR sometime, FOR compassion. I think they’re onto something. I think turning towards what we want the world to look like matters, even in little ways.

Our gospels tell us Jesus prayed for those who were crucified with him, and for those who crucified him. “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34). In the midst of dying by state-sponsored violence, Jesus offered compassion, grace, mercy, forgiveness.

That’s the one we follow.

But also, we follow the one who told us to “turn the other cheek” and this is, of course, were our faith gets really interesting. Because to “turn the other cheek” is not simply to accept violence from another passively. To turn the other cheek – because of lack of toilet paper that created a societal norm that only allowed right hands to be used in public and because of a societal norm that indicated one backhanded a subordinate and slapped an equal – was to demand equality without returning violence with violence. Similarly, Jesus’ words on the cross take back the upper hand. They take the power of forgiveness. They take the power of knowledge. In the face of violence, they offer compassion and prove it to be a potent force.

This is the 7th, and last, Sunday of Easter. This is the final time this year that our primary focus is on the Easter Story (well, kinda, every Sunday is a “little Easter” but go with me).

There are many ways to understand Jesus’s resurrection, but for today, let’s focus on this one: The greatest threat the Empire had was violence, in particular violence in the form of a horrid public death. But resurrection says violence doesn’t get the final answer, not even death gets the final answer. Resurrection says that compassion gets the final answer. Mercy gets the final answer. Peace gets the final answer. LOVE gets the final answer.

Nothing, nothing, NOTHING could stop the love of God in Jesus. Romans 8:35-39.

Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written,
‘For your sake we are being killed all day long;
   we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.’
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Violence has a lot of power. A gut wrenching, sickening, disgusting amount of power.

And yet even in the midst of mass murders, we are Easter people. Easter, exists as a response to the violence of the world. We are Resurrection People. We are people of peace, and compassion, and nonviolence. We are people who know that love wins in the end. We are people who believe our lives can be useful in bringing peace, compassion, justice, and hope to the world. We are followers of a creative, loving, compassionate Savior, who could not even be stopped by death.

We are a Resurrection People.

Lord, hear our prayers. Amen

Rev. Sara E. Baron 
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady 
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305 
Pronouns: she/her/hers 
http://fumcschenectady.org/ 
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

May 29, 2022

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“The Richness of the Unknown” based on Isaiah 65:17-25…

  • April 17, 2022
  • by Sara Baron

I am so thankful it is
Easter Sunday.  I’m ready to celebrate the goodness of God, the power
of life, the unstoppable force of love in the world.  I’m thankful
for music that resonates in my SOUL, and functions as a ritual to let
my body know this is a time to let go, to be, to savor.

It has been a long, hard
trudge to get to Easter.  If I’m really honest, we’re still in a
long, hard trudge, but Easter feels like a great excuse to step away
from the trudge and just be joyous for a bit.

It does seem worth
discussion what sort of joy we’re talking about though.  By my count,
there are 10 Easter stories in the Gospels (Mark has 4, Luke 3, John
2, and Matthew for some reason only 1), 10 different stories trying
to make sense of …. something.  The simple fact that there are so
many stories suggests to me that what happened on Easter (and
throughout the 50 days after it), is hard to put into words and thus
a variety of metaphors was the best way people could explain it.  

The stories all point to
the idea that the death Jesus suffered on the cross didn’t have the
final word.  But they struggle to make sense of it.  They did not
understand.  In the two Easter stories we heard from John this
morning the phrase (did) “not know” came up three times.  There
was unknowing in Easter itself and it its early stories!  That
makes it OK for us when we come to Easter with some “unknowing”
of our own.

Somehow, Jesus’ disciples
and followers continued to experience his wisdom, his teaching,
and the power of his vitality even after he died.

And whatever it was that
constituted their experience, it was POWERFUL in their lives.  It
changed them.  The students became the teachers.  Those frightened
and hidden away came out of hiding and took risks for the sake of
sharing Jesus’s good news.  The women kept on keeping on.

The ways we explain
Easter today continue in the grand tradition of trying to make sense
of it all.  Our metaphors abound.  Some stick with the early metaphor
of “Easter is the day Jesus was raised from the dead.”  Others
will say, “Easter is about the unstoppable power of life,
especially life with God.”  Charles Wesley says, “Death in vain
forbids him rise,” and asks, “Where’s thy victory, boasting
grave?”  Marcus Borg gives us the language that Easter is God’s YES
to the world’s NO.

There are a lot of
wonderful and powerful meanings to be made from Easter, and I
encourage you to savor the ones that bring YOU to life.

In the midst of all I’ve
already offered, for me the greatest power of Easter is in its
“always present” quality.  One way or another, when Jesus died,
the goal of the Empire was to kill him, to stop his life and his
ministry.  It worked, as the story says, Mary was weeping
when she showed up that Easter morning.  The power of death worked
UNTIL his disciples experienced SOMETHING on Easter, and after that
they took up his ministry and in doing so claimed his life energy,
and kept it going.  Before Easter, Jesus was the Body of Christ, but
on Easter the disciples became the Body of Christ – and this is
what really matters to me – and the power of his life-energy, and
the importance of his ministry, and the sharing of his God-vision is
STILL the work of the Body of Christ.  In important and meaningful
ways, when I say, “Christ is alive,” I know that is true because
I’m looking at you, the church, doing Christ’s work.

In the Gospel of John,
the words are in Mary Magdalene’s mouth, “I have seen
the Lord.”  In the Body of Christ, I too have seen
God at work.

And I think that’s PLENTY
miraculous.

So, then, if this is our
work, we want to be as clear as possible about what it means to
continued the life, ministry, and God-vision of Jesus.  Because,
well, not everyone agrees about this.  #Shock.

This is where I think the
Isaiah passage is an incredible EASTER gift to us, even if it was
written for a people of a different time who used different metaphors
for God’s power over life and death.

The most striking thing
about the Isaiah passage for me, initially, was its humility.  Isaiah
65 seeks to answer the question, “What SHOULD life look like?”
and it starts like I think we’d expect.  It says life should be LONG
and ABUNDANT.  There SHOULD NOT BE young tragic deaths.  

Amen.

But then it takes what
initially seemed to me to be a sort of weak turn.  In this utopic
dream of a “new heaven and a new  earth” that God is creating
full of justice and wholeness and goodness, what are the defining
factors other than longevity?  “They shall build houses and inhabit
them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit” (65:21) and
also they will be aware of the presence of God.

I get it.  This would
sound miraculous to a people who have build houses but not lived in
them, planted vineyards and not gotten to eat the fruit, that it is
fitting for them that this ends with, “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.”

But all of that together
suggests that … universal vegetarianism and an end to all violence
seems CONSISTENT with … not having your labor stolen or your home
displaced.

Which suggests that not
having your home stolen or the fruit of your labor appropriated is a
REALLY BIG DEAL.  But, is it?  I mean, why stop with just having
people not displaced and able to glean the value of their work.  Why
not have everyone live at Disneyland, or apparition, or … I don’t
know, world peace.

But the longer I thought
about it, the more I realize this dream is EVERYTHING.  It actually
IS world peace – because world peace looks EXACTLY like people
being safe to build homes and live in them without being displaced,
and having the consistency to be able to labor and glean the fruits
of one’s labor without anyone else coming in with violence to take
it.

AND this is a dream of an
end to world hunger too – because people have access to enough land
and resources and the capacity to GLEAN THE FRUIT OF THEIR LABOR.

And the more I think
about people being able to glean the fruit of their labor, the more I
realize that covers A WHOLE LOT of injustices.  If people can glean
the fruit of their labor – then the rich aren’t getting wealthier
off of the labor of the poor.  So, it is like universal basic income
and a living minimum wage rolled into one.  It is also an end to
predatory lending.  This is a dream of equity and equality and
fairness and justice all at once – with the “simple” means of
stable safe housing and people being able to keep the fruits of their
labors.

When we hear of
atrocities in the world, most of them equate to violations of this
dream.  People are killed too young, or displaced from their homes
and communities, or the fruits of their labor is stolen from them.
Please note that the Bible and I agree that part of being a
community with fair labor practices is sharing so that those unable
to labor are still cared for.  There have always been those unable to
work, and a functional society finds ways to care for them as BELOVED
and VALUED members of that society.

It is a good life,
indeed, with stable safe housing and the capacity to glean the fruits
of our labor, and to have enough at the end of it to share with
others.  It
may sound simple, but it is AMAZING when it happens.  Far too few
people have lived this dream, and the dream is for EVERYONE.

The more I think about
this vision, the more I see its power, and the more I see how much it
isn’t one that is yet here.

How many people are dying
too young?  And how many of those deaths would be preventable?

How many members of our
city lack stable and safe housing?  How many New Yorkers?  How many
US citizens?  And then how many people are migrants and refugees in
the world right now?  

Then, how many people see
the just fruits of their labor??  In the interest of some brevity,
I’ll leave that as a thought question for you to ponder.

Isaiah 65 was a vision
for newly returned Exiles and the people who had been left behind
during the Exile.  It was a reminder of God’s wishes for a stable,
compassionate, equalitarian society.  It was a dream to aim for, a
reminder of how God wants the world ordered, a clarity on what
communal holy living looks like.

When we talk about the
beloved community, the kindom of God, the Jesus teaching of a
God-vision, I don’t believe Jesus was breaking with his own Jewish
tradition.  This vision of what God wanted for people is another
version of what Jesus taught.  This vision of what God wanted for
people is a way of talking about what it means to be the Body of
Christ building the kindom of God, or what it means to be an Easter
people.

Long, good, lives.
Stable safe housing.  People able to enjoy the fruits of their labor.
People having enough to share.  

Such a simple vision.  

Such a world away from
our reality right now.

May God help us to build
that future.  Because as Easter people, we believe that love wins in
the end and God isn’t finished with us yet.  This vision is a vision
for us, and for everyone, and God is willing to work with us on it.  
Thanks be to God!  Amen

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“Bread That Satisfies” based on Psalm 63:1-8 and Isaiah…

  • March 20, 2022
  • by Sara Baron

Isaiah 55 contrasts the ways of the Babylonian Empire
(read: all empires and all domination systems) with the ways of God.
One satisfies, one doesn’t.  One has built in rest, one is a constant
system of labor.  One is aimed at the fullness of humanity, one  is
aimed at pleasing a King.

According to the Bible the glory days of ancient Israel
as a nation-state started in in 1000 BCE when David was King, and his
son Solomon after him.  After that the Northern Kingdom left, and in
722 they lost a war with Assyria and were taken into Exile.  In
587/586 BCE the Southern Kingdom lost a war with Babylon and their
leaders were taken into Exile.  

The book of Isaiah centers around the second, southern
exile: first in warning that it might come unless things change
(chapters 1-39), then the exile “happens” and there are
conversations to the exiles about what return will look like
(chapters 40-55), and finally encouragement to those who have
returned and are struggling (chapters 56-66).  Isaiah 55, our passage
for today, is the end of the encouragement to the exiles, and it is
written in “anticipation of a a joyous and secure homecoming.”1

Walter Brueggemann in his commentary on Isaiah 40-66
(amazingly, one of my favorite Brueggemann commentaries) says, “The
initial verse…offers to passersbys free water, free wine, and
free milk.  This of course is in contrast to the life
resources offered by  the empire that are always expensive, grudging,
and unsatisfying. … The rhetorical questions ask,
incredulously, why Jews in exile would invest so much in forms of
life that cannot work – why work so hard and so long in ways that
give no satisfaction; why give life over to the demands and rewards
of the empire that yield nothing of value in return.” ”2

As the text refers to the “wicked”, Brueggemann has
a great explanation for who that refers to.  “’The wicked,’ I
suggest, are not disobedient people in general.  In context, they are
those who are so settled in Babylon and so accommodated to imperial
ways that they have no intention of making a positive response to
Yahweh’s invitation to homecoming.”3

There were, in fact, plenty of people who didn’t return
from exile.  After 80 years, for many, Babylon had become home.  The
scripture says that even those who have accommodated themselves to
the empire – to the systems of domination – can be freed and
pardoned, and come back to a full and abundant life within the
community.

And all of this makes me wonder about how it applies
today.  When are we settled into domination systems, and in need of
being reminded that other options exist, and welcomed home to the
community of God, and forgiven and set free to live in equality and
equity with each other?

When are we the “wicked” who are too enmeshed with
the empire, and need forgiveness?  This is a convicting question for
me.  I continue to struggle to hold onto ONLY kindom values and let
go of the domination ones.  I appreciate the reminder that it can be
changed and forgiven.

One of the tools of domination systems is fear.  Fear
works to keep us from seeing things clearly, fear moves us into
right/wrong thinking, fear moves us into blame, fear moves us into
us/them thinking, and fear kills creative problem solving.  Fear
makes people more interested in authority, which means more invested
in hierarchy, and more likely to accept the commandments of
authoritarians.  Fear leads to snap decisions, instead of careful
consideration.


Fear is a really, really useful tool, if the desire
is to keep people separate, compliant, and disempowered.

And, it can get a hold on me rather too easily,
particularly when I’m not getting enough down time with God.

Another of the useful tools of domination systems is
getting control over meaning making, which usually means
appropriating religion for its own purposes.  We can see this clearly
in looking at the Roman Empire in Jesus’ day, and the Roman appointed
High Priests running the Temple.  That domination system thought
having the Temple’s support was imperative to keeping control, and so
they appropriated it.  That is one example of a rather constant
reality.

Truth be told, when I read the Bible, I’m often struck
by the struggles back and forth between the stories of an all-loving
God encouraging the people to care for each other and the strangers
in their midst AND the stories of a God who controls, rewards,
punishes the people – including by trying to frighten them into
compliance.  I tend to think of the first as the stories of God, and
the second as the constancy of humans trying to to claim the power of
Divine meaning making for their own ends.  The fact that it is a
constant tension in the Bible itself clarifies how hard it is to
separate out the love of God from the desire of people for control.

At the recommendation of my colleague the Rev. Harold
Wheat, I recently read “One Nation Under God” by Kevin Kruse.
The book takes a long view of American religion, and the battles for
control of it.  The history takes a sharp turn after the successful
passage of Roosevelt’s New Deal, which was generally lauded by the
nation’s clergy.  In response, business and industry leaders started
multiple meaning making campaigns of their own, putting clergy on
their payrolls to deride “communal values.”  They spent decades
accessing power at the highest levels, providing resources, and
finally in engaging in nation-wide PR campaigns to encourage people
to attend worship as part of their patriotic duty.  Since these
campaigns were so successful, those pushing worship were confident
that most of those attending worship would be getting their
pro-business messages shared from the pulpit.

This church was one of the ones that did NOT comply with
the campaigns, thank God.  But, being a part of US culture during
that time meant being a part of a society with the highest worship
participation rate in the country’s history, and this church did
benefit from that.  

One of my big take aways from the book was that every
church and every church structure I know well has defined itself from
its heights in the 1950s or 1960s, and created its narratives and
identity in those “high times.”  But that came without an
awareness of the forces that created that high, or the reality that
it was an ABERRATION, not a “new normal.”  It is a bit like the
Jewish people in 506 BCE looking back to the glory days of King
David, and forgetting that in 1500 years of history, about 80 were
the time of nation-state empire.  It was an aberration, not the norm.

The fact that the worship attendance of the 1950s was a
cultural swell of worship attendance nation wide suggests that the
narratives of “failure” for not maintaining the heights are…
well… wrong.  After the nation wide ad campaigns stopped and the
nation stopped being pushed to define being a good American with
being a good worship attender, worship attendance started returning
to more historically normal levels.  

However,  I’ve been in A LOT of meetings over the years
where in direct or indirect ways people have tried to “problem
solve” church decline, and that has almost always sounded a whole
lot like blame.  This is never the story I heard – that the
huge ballooning of membership was an oddity that was unsustainable,
and that it was to be expected that it would not be maintained.

Instead, there are seemingly infinite definitions of the
problem and possible solutions.  “Better evangelism.”  “More
prayer.”  “Clear mission statements.”  “Good websites.”
“More faithful leaders.”  “More training in inviting people to
church.”  “Better missions.”  … Take this class, do this
study, engage in this survey, read this book, ….and some of it is
even useful, but the impact of the whole is the continuation of the
narrative that worship attendance in the 1950s was “right” and
that means that everything since then has been “wrong” and if
that’s true, then it implies we’re doing our FAITH wrong.  

Learning that there is a bigger narrative at play has
helped me reframe those conversations about church growth and church
decline.  It has also helped me see that even when there isn’t active
blame going on, church leaders (clergy and lay) are just
internalizing it.  I’ve done it (I still do it.)  The number of
people who choose to attend worship FEELS like a tangible expression
of how faithful I am to God.  But it isn’t.  Yet, I have to actively
remember that.

And, I worry about all the church leaders in all the
churches for the past 70 years who have asked “why are we getting
smaller” and ended up believing that it was because THEY were doing
their faith wrong, because they couldn’t see the larger dynamics at
play.  They’ve taken in the wrong story.  Our faith is not WRONG, nor
BROKEN.  

Of course, it is hard to see the church in decline and
it is extra hard right now to see the church transforming and not
know if it is strong or weak or.. what it is right now.   But, as I’m
committed to building the kindom of God, and I’m excited to have ANY
partners in that work who want to work with me.  I’m willing to tell
people why that seems worthy of my life energy, and I am delighted
when I get to teach about what kindom/God values are and how they
differ from empire/domination values.  

The thing is that strength, even strength in numbers,
looks a lot like a domination value.  And inflated numbers in the
past were aimed at no good.  God is willing and able to work with any
of us who want to work with God, and to make a big difference with
those who are committed to doing so.  I’m interested in celebrating
those committed to following in the ways of Jesus, and the power that
love has in our midst.  I’m ready to let go of an old, false, and
misleading narrative of who we are supposed to be, and let us be who
we are.

There is the labor that matters, the bread that
satisfies.  And leaving behind the old myths that were created to
control the churches and their people– that’s the empire stuff we
don’t need anymore.  May God help us sort through, and find the
kindom values in our hearts, to put them to further use in our lives.
Amen

1Brueggeman
158.

2Brueggemann,
159.

3Ibid
160

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

March 20, 2022

Uncategorized

“Testing Kinship Loyalty” based on Deuteronomy 26:1-11 and Luke…

  • March 6, 2022
  • by Sara Baron

I’ve got to admit it.  I’m not
tempted by the things Jesus was “tempted” by in the dessert.  I
have never once wanted to change a rock into bread (perhaps because I
lack that skill???), I’m well aware that running kingdoms or even
democracies is incredibly difficult work that I don’t wish to partake
in, and I do not wish to test God by jumping off high places for no
reason.

Nope.  I do not resonate with
these.

There are not my temptations.

You want to know what my
temptations are?  These days I have serious temptations to stop
fighting – to just give up on the pandemic and stop trying to be
safe and stop trying to create safe places.  I want to do CRAZY
things like bring my kid to worship, or have dinner at a friend’s
house, or get a plane and meet one of my dear friend’s new babies.  I
want to just stop worrying.  I want to make people happy.  I want to
encourage people, “sure, do whatever you want in worship.  Take of
masks!  Stop distancing!  Sing!  Don’t worry about it!”  I’m
tempted to just give up.

AND

(and this is the really annoying
part)

I’m also tempted in exactly the
opposite way.  I live in constant fear that a choice I make will
result in my unvaccinated, too young to wear a mask kid getting COVID
and living with long covid for the rest of their life.  And so, I
want to create a bubble and never leave it.  I want to stay home,
stop day care, have groceries delivered, and function on zoom until
…. forever I guess.  

Actually, if I’m honest, more
than really being tempted by either extreme, I’m tempted by the idea
of not having to decide anymore.  “Is this safe?”  “Is this
safe ENOUGH?”  “Is this worth it?”  “If this results in my
kid having long covid, in 20 years will I think this was the right
choice?”  “Do I need to do this because someone else’s needs
outrank my own (or outrank my needs related to my kid)?”  “Is
this the right balance of caution and courage?”

I’m so tired.  It is so tempting
to move to one extreme or the other and just stop deciding.  It is so
tempting to move to one extreme or the other and only have one group
of people frustrated with me and my decisions.

The temptation is to just…
give up.  To pick an extreme and live with the consequences and at
the very least not have to decide OVER and OVER and OVER again.  

This likely isn’t even relevant
to most of you anymore.  Maybe you remember it, but those who are
vaccinated and immunocompetent, those of you who don’t live with
people who are either unvaccinated or immunocompromised, are possibly
just feeling free now.  Numbers are down, and lots of very reasonable
people are ready to go on with life, for good reason.  And for you,
it may even be that my temptations are a sort of unpleasant reminder
of your past, one that you’d rather forget.

I also know that I’m not alone.
There are plenty of families with kids under 5, or with
immunocompromised people, or even just people who work with kids or
immunocompromised people who still adjust their lives to protect
others – or just people who adjust their lives to protect others.
People make these choices because, in the end, they think it is
right.  

Of course, there are ALSO people
who have decided that the needs of connection, or the life-giving
work they do, or the risk they’ve assessed mean that letting go of
fear and seeking out other people is the right choice for them.  

Hmmm.

I guess what I’m saying is that
I’m tempted by simple answers, by choices I can make once and not go
back to, by CLARITY, but CERTAINTY.  I don’t need to be able to make
the choices for everyone or have them be the same, but my goodness
gracious I’d like some simple answers for ME.  I’d likely settle for
a single simple answer, if I could get one.

If you’ve been listening to me
preach for some time, you may be scratching your head at how I, one
of the people you know who is most comfortable thinking in shades of
gray could get to such a desire for certainty, for black and white
answers.  The answer is unfortunately simple:  the higher anxiety
goes, the more humans search for certainty and wish to back it up at
all costs.  So, what you are hearing is that I’m a human impacted by
anxiety.  Just to put it out there, so are you.  Welcome to the
2020s.

Bruce Malina and Richard
Rohrbaugh in “Social Science Commentary on the Synoptic Gospels”
point out that what Jesus is being tested on in the desert is his
loyalty to God.  Does he show faithfulness to God, as kin?  Does he
show faithfulness to God as his leader?  Does he show faithfulness to
God in understanding God’s wishes?  The answers, of course, are yes.

But I rather liked that they
referred to the question about commanding a stone to become bread as
a test of kinship loyalty to God.  They explain it this way:

Note carefully how the devil
frames the first challenge, “If you are the Son of God…”
Precisely that has been the claim and precisely that is what is being
tested.

Note also how carefully Jesus
answers when his lineage is questioned.  He does not
answer in his own words, as if his honor derives from what he is in
himself.  To do that would be to grasp honor above that of his own
Father and turn honor into dishonor.  So he answers as a loyal Middle
Eastern son would always answer – with something from his family
tradition.  He offers the words of his true Father in Deuteronomy and
by such laudable behavior he gains honor as virtue.1

A test of kinship loyalty to
God.  That does resonate.

Probably because all the angles
of what I’m tested by are variations on the theme of “a test of
kinship loyalty.”  What is my loyalty to my immediate family – my
child and others who are vulnerable?  How do I balance that with my
loyalty to my church family – which includes people who are
vulnerable in all sorts of ways including in needs to be together and
in needs to lower COVID risks.  How do I balance THAT with my
“kinship loyalty” to God?

And suddenly, with that framing,
at the very least, I can understand why I feel pulled in so many ways
and exhausted by the pressure of every decision.  Kinship loyalty
itself pulls me in a multitude of directions, and each direction has
its own set of reasons why it is right good, and most of the time
each direction has something pulling in exactly the opposite
direction that ALSO has reasons for being right and good.

But, at least I have a frame to
make sense of it!

And, if I want to simplify
things, I can admit to myself that for me, kinship loyalty to God is
not actually distinct from kinship loyalty to those I already care
for.  (With the possible exception that God would likely include ME
in my calculations, which I notably did not.)

So, the long and short of it is
that I FEEL the testing, I feel the wandering in the desert, I feel
the yearning for clarity, but, at least I know it all comes from
love?

And THAT gets me to the
absolutely fabulous Deuteronomy reading.  It is a favorite of mine.
Deuteronomy is set in the wilderness, but at the edge of it.  The
whole book presents itself as a series of speeches given to prepare
the people before they enter the Promised Land, so that when they get
there, they’ll do it right.

One of the themes of Deuteronomy
is that it is in the adversity and challenge of the desert that the
people learned to depend on God, and it is going to be more
challenging to remember their dependence on God when things are going
well.  As a person who feels like I’m wandering in the desert, I
think I respond along with those who listened the first time, “Yeah,
that’s a risk I’m willing to take.”

The reading says that when they
get there, and they grow things, there is going to be an ABUNDANCE,
as that is what God wants for the people.  As they grow that
abundance, as they settle into a sense of food security, they’re to
remember their wanderings and give thanks for their abundance.  And
as that happens, they are to REMEMBER their story, they are to
REMEMBER their scarcity, they are to REMEMBER what it took to get
there.

Isn’t that interesting?  I think
in our culture we tend toward wanting to remember the glory days, not
the days of struggle.  We think about when we were strong and
capable, not when we were … struggling to find our way in the
desert.

But, the idea of this
commandment to tithe is to do so while recounting struggles, and to
give thanks for abundance by noticing what it took to get there.  AND
THEN taking of that abundance to share with those who don’t have it
(the landless priests and Levites and the foreigners without land
allotments.)

This whole thing just moves me.
That idea that we recognize our weak times, the idea that abundance
is God’s will for us (the culmination of the story), the reality that
the first thing to do with abundance is to share it, the creation of
a system whereby an abundance for some makes life possible for
others, and within all this that this is where our tradition of
offering comes from which is just so cool.

The culmination of the story is
abundance.  The people are being taught how to distribute God’s
abundance fairly.  They may be standing on the edge of the Promised
Land, but the goal is to get there and live there and have it be just
for everyone.

(And they did!  For centuries!
And it was equitable!  It is possible!  That matters too.)

So for me, right now, in my
place of being tested in the desert, I’m going to take hope from the
story about abundance, and the reminder that it is God’s long term
plan for me, for us, for all of us.

That doesn’t actually solve
anything in the present, but it is unsolvable.  However, having some
hope helps me get through.  Abundance is God’s plan for all of us.
God teaches us how to be generous with our abundance.  Kinship
loyalty to everyone is how we get there, and I guess… learning how
to balance a multiplicity of needs within the kinship network is.. a
useful skill?

Well, in any case, hear the
words the people were to say as they brought forward their offerings:

“A wandering Aramean was my
ancestor; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in
number, and there he became a great nation, mighty and populous.
When
the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, by imposing hard
labor on us,
we cried to the LORD, the God of our ancestors; the
LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our
oppression.
The LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand
and an outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with
signs and wonders;
and God brought us into this place and gave us
this land, a land flowing with milk and honey.
So now I bring the
first of the fruit of the ground that you, O LORD, have given me.”

or perhaps:

“I have emerged from a
confused and lost people.  In the midst of existent struggles with
justice and equity, came a pandemic that threatened everything and
everyone in many ways.  The challenges that might have united people
overcame them and separated them.  We became harsh to each other.  I
did not know what to do.  I was never certain of anything.

I cried to the Lord, as did
everyone else, and God heard our voices,

and offered us rest.

God guided us when we didn’t
know where to go.

God gifted us when we couldn’t
figure out which way to turn.

God was with us, when we were
numb.

God did that, and brought us to
a new world, and helped us form it into something better.

So now, I bring the first fruit
of hope, that you, O God have given me.”

May the day come when we can say
THAT as we bring forward our offerings.  Amen

1 p. 240-41
(Textual Notes: Luke 4:3)

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

March 6, 2022

Uncategorized

“Shiny… or Maybe Just Shimmering” based on Exodus 34:29-35…

  • February 27, 2022
  • by Sara Baron

If I got only one word to
summarize today’s stories, I’d go with “shiny.”  Moses gets all
shiny after connecting with the Divine, and the disciples see Jesus
go all shiny on a mountaintop while being blessed by God.

If I got only one word to
describe life right now, it would absolutely, positively NOT be
shiny.  War is not shiny.  It is camouflage, rubble, blood and tears.
Attacking trans kids in Texas isn’t shiny.  In some cases, this is
an ACTUAL desire to prevent some kids from wearing shiny and glittery
things.  Attacking trans kids is a formula that increases suicides,
it is a deadly attack with many years of repercussions.  And, just in
case you missed this memo, pandemics aren’t shiny either.  Used
surgical masks on the sides of sidewalks might be a good image of
this pandemic, and that’s just … shine-less.  Exhaustion and
languishing aren’t shiny.  

Nope, right now isn’t shiny.

And yet, I can remember shiny.
Very little in the world shines like a Pride parade, with glitter and
sequins in the brightest of colors, and outfits that reflect the sun
itself.  I can remember Easter mornings with people dressed up in
bright shiny outfits, singing loud with along with shiny a brass
quintet and wishing to be able to just extend the moment of wonder as
long as possible.  I can remember Sunday morning breakfasts with a
full Fellowship hall when someone got triggered and upset, and others
had the patience and grace to help the person calm down and even feel
safe.  Shiny.

I can remember shiny.

And now isn’t shiny.

Except, every once in a while,
when something breaks through despite it all.  I’m not sure if
anything is shining exactly.  Maybe I could say that some moments
shimmer.  When my kid snuggles in close, while my cat purrs, and my
partner reads, and the sky lights up with sunrise.  There it is.  A
tiny, shimmering moment.  When the banjo is played during the
Contemplative Prayer service and people close their eyes to let
themselves sway along.  Shimmers.  When, during Family Faith
Formation, a kid asks a grown up other than their own to watch them
go down a slide, and trusts they’ll be affirmed.   Shimmers.  When
someone reaches out to the church and asks, “would I, a trans
person, REALLY be welcome?” and I can say “Yes, you REALLY are
welcome, just as you are,” because I know it is true in this church
and that MATTERS.  Shimmers.

I don’t want to pretend
everything is OK.  It isn’t.  Sometimes it feels like NOTHING is OK,
but that isn’t true either.  Life is a complicated both/and.  Things
aren’t OK, and yet God shines through in expected moments anyway.
Things aren’t OK, and love is still here.  Things aren’t OK, and most
of the time most people are doing their best.  Things aren’t OK, and
yet some things ARE OK.  Both/and.  

Which is why I’m landing on,
“this moment in time isn’t shiny, but there are shimmers, and I’m
trying to notice them.”  

But, before we talk about that
anymore, let’s look at our stories again.  They’re interesting, and
they raise a lot of questions.  The gospel story is clearly forming
itself as a new telling of the Exodus story, which suggests we may
learn a lot by noticing the differences.  

It has been suggested that the
10 commandments were groundbreaking in that they understood YHWH to
be one who cared about how people treated people, and not just about
sacrifice or worship directed at a divine being.  Even more so than
monotheism, presenting God as one who cares about a just society and
moral treatment of others, did NOT reflect the religions of that
period of the Ancient Near East.

The story of Moses coming down
the mountain with the 10 commandments in hand reflects how central
this moment was to the people.  This was a story of WHO they were,
why they lived as they did, who they wanted to be, and how they
decided to be that people.  

Stories that matter that much
are often superimposed with extra meaning, to help people pay
attention.  Perhaps, even, they’re superimposed with extra light.

The story says that Moses was
SHINING when he came down the mountain, and it scared people.  In
fact, it seems he stayed shiny for quite a while, and in order to
keep the people more comfortable, he wore a veil to cover the shiny.
(This is terribly interesting in that veils are much more commonly
associated with women in that part of the world.)

The shiny is definitely meant to
communicate that some of God’s holiness has rubbed off on Moses,
which clarifies that he was a sacred messenger, and the 10
commandments were God’s own idea.  The shiny imbues the commandments
with sacred authority.  The shiny tells the people that their God
REALLY cares about their treatment of each other, and creating a
society of justice and equity.

This story is then a part of
what Luke uses to establish Jesus’s authority, his connection with
the Divine, to clarify that his message is also blessed with sacred
authority.  Jesus, also up on a mountain, also connecting to God,
also gets shiny.  Jesus is seen “with” Moses and Elijah,
sometimes called “the law and the prophet,” the one who shared
God’s vision (the law) and the one who called people to account for
it (the great prophet).  In the midst of the shiny and the law and
the prophet comes an EXPLICIT communication from God “This is my
Son, my Chosen; listen to him!”

OK, so clearly this is also
about the authority of God’s chosen to communicate God’s vision.  It
also seems to pass some of the authority onto the disciples who are
the ones who have to tell others about this authority Jesus now has,
which fits the whole Gospel narrative pretty well.  I mean, the
Gospels are presented as being by people who were with Jesus telling
others why his life mattered and how it was infused with the presence
of God.  So establishing that the disciples were the ones who knew
how important Jesus was ends up establishing both his authority and
their authority to tell the story.

Sigh.  I know.  You give me
beautiful, metaphorical, literally shiny texts and I can take most of
the fun out of it in no time flat.  

So, let’s see if I can put some
of the fun back in!  We could wonder why people found the best way to
communicate the presence of God was in shininess.  It is sort of a
delightful question.  I think it may happen because there is a little
bit of truth in it.  Every once in a while, it seems to me that
scales are lifted from my eyes and I can see a glimpse of the world
and its people as God sees them, and let me tell you, they really do
shine with divine love.  Perhaps the ubiquitous halos in Christian
art are actually a reflection of how holy and sacred everyone and
everything  is to God.  Perhaps the whole world, the whole universe,
are supersaturated with love that pours out of their atoms, but most
of the time we don’t see it, but in moments of Divine grace, we can?

That may actually bring us full
circle, right back to “this moment isn’t shiny, but it might still
shimmer.”  While I believe that God is with us, love is with us,
grace and mercy are with us, compassion is with us ALL THE TIME, I
also know from personal experience that we are not always able to
feel it.  Stress can make it harder to connect with God.  Constant
demands make it harder.  Emotional turmoil makes it harder.
Lonesomeness makes it harder (hence the yearning to be able to safely
gather together for worship.)  Trauma makes it harder.  Fear makes it
harder.  Honestly, sometimes the weather makes it harder.


God is with us all the time,
but when things are particularly hard, we aren’t necessarily well
tuned into God’s presence.  I do encourage the practice of
intentional silence to make space to notice God’s presence – even a
minute can help – but that isn’t a fix-all either.  

This week my encouragement is to
see if you can notice some moments that shimmer.  Maybe only one a
day.  Maybe it only shimmers 1% more than the rest of the day.  But,
in times that feels so profoundly unshiny, I think it helps to notice
whatever we can of God breaking through.  Because, God IS with us,
and God is helping, and when we notice, we make it easier to notice
the next time.  And, I think the moments that shimmer and shine are
ones we’re supposed to listen to.  Like Moses, or Jesus, they shine
to help us pay attention, to say “God is here,” to remind us of
the holiness and sacredness of even the mundane parts of life.  Those
moments are part of how we get through these days.  

OR, to say this another way
entirely, a poem by Mary Oliver

Don’t Hesitate

BY Mary Oliver

If you suddenly and unexpectedly
feel joy,
don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty
of
lives and whole towns destroyed or about
to be. We are not wise,
and not very often
kind. And much can never be redeemed.
Still,
life has some possibility left. Perhaps this
is its way of
fighting back, that sometimes
something happens better than all
the riches
or power in the world. It could be anything,
but
very likely you notice it in the instant
when love begins. Anyway,
that’s often the case.
Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be
afraid
of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb.

In the midst of hard things and
hard times, counter the hard by paying attention to where God is
still shining through, however bright, for however long.  That’s how
we build the kindom, even now.  We pay attention, and we appreciate,
we don’t hesitate.  Thanks be to God.  Amen

February 27, 2022

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

Uncategorized

“Like a Tree” based on  Jeremiah 17:5-10 and Luke…

  • February 20, 2022
  • by Sara Baron

In this time of disruption
and destabilization, I am fed by even the metaphor of constancy and
stability.

“They shall be like a
tree planted by water, sending out its roots by the stream.”  
(Jeremiah 17:8a)

image

I want to spend a moment
with those trees, and think about what it might be like to be like
one of those trees.  To have constant, easy access to water.  To be
able to grow strong.  To know the world as dependable place.  To be
able to BE dependable because of having constant access to needs
being met.  

Jeremiah speaks to people
who know and live in a desert.  Sun is abundant.  Air is abundant.
Water is not.  To be a tree planted by streams of water in a desert
is to be: safe.

To have deep roots.  To be
able with withstand whatever comes.

The tree, “shall not
fear when heat comes, and its leaves shall stay green; in the year of
drought it is not anxious, and it does not cease to bear fruit.”  
(Jeremiah 17:8b)

Oh my!  “It is not
anxious!”  What a delight to think about!

Jeremiah presents these
trees as being like those who trust in and depend on God, in contrast
to those who put their trust in their own powers or in the ways of
the world.  Jeremiah urges us to seek God, to trust God, to be lifted
up and fed by the Holy, and to seek the WAYS of God rather than the
WAYS of the world.  (To make that difference overly simple, the ways
of the world are competitive, hierarchical, violent, and value some
lives and not others.  The ways of God are cooperative, un-ranked,
nonviolent, and values all.)

Now, I’m going to say
something pastors don’t say much:  this metaphor shouldn’t be
extended TOO far.  If God is like water that keeps a tree alive and
enables it go strong and bear fruit, great.  But, water is not the
need of a tree.  And, with a few possible exceptions, God is not the
ONLY need of humans.

I mention this because
even before the pandemic we were living in a society with a crisis of
loneliness, and the pandemic has deepened the crisis.  A tree needs
water.  Yes.  We need God.  YES!  AND, a tree needs air and sunlight.
And we need each other, and we need REST.  Jeremiah warns people not
to depend on our own strength or on “mere mortals” but I’m going
to remind you that as a human being you need God, and people, and
rest.

If you are lonely, that
doesn’t mean you are unfaithful.

If you are tired, that
doesn’t mean you are unfaithful.

In fact, those warnings
Jeremiah offered about what NOT to trust  may apply here.  We cannot
depend on our own strength in a system that demands more of us than a
human can give without getting tired.  Tired comes because human
systems are set up WRONG.  Likewise with lonely.  Our society is set
up to keep us distanced and displeased so we’ll BUY more things, and
the forces that keep us distanced are POWERFUL.  Being lonely

is a part of living in our
world today, which is set up wrong.  

Part of what we dream
together as a Body of Christ seeking to build the kindom of God  is
what a world would look like where people are able to SURVIVE and
THRIVE.  We are seeking to use our lives to build a world where
people have dependable access to God, to live-giving relationships,
and to sustainable patterns of rest.

We dream of a time when
people are like trees planted by streams of water, with plenty of
fresh air, and sunlight, so that they can grow up strong and bold,
courageous and loving, whole and able to provide healing for others.

(As was recently mentioned
after I went off on another ramble about trees, you see very clearly
how passionate I am about trees when I am given the chance to talk
about them.)

Now, perhaps you thought
that if I was given one of the most famous texts in all of
Christianity to preach on, I might focus on that, and you aren’t
WRONG.  I’m getting there.  Except, that interestingly enough, Luke’s
version of this particular story is NOT the famous one.  Matthew’s
is, because Matthew’s is a lot easier to stomach.  Matthew gives only
blessings.  Luke includes woes.  Matthew talks about the “poor in
spirit” and “those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.”
Luke talks about the “poor” and the “hungry.”

Right from the get-go,
Luke’s story isn’t Matthew’s.  Matthew tells of the “Sermon on the
Mount”  – a pragmatic choice as a mountain would help with
acoustics.  Luke tells of the “Sermon on the Plain,” making
emphatically clear that Luke is telling a story of God’s interest in
LEVELING.

Debie Thomas, an
incredible theologian, on the incredible blog “Journey with Jesus”
summarizes well:

Then,
standing “on a level place” with the crowd, he tells his would-be
followers what life in God’s upside-down kingdom looks like. 
Those who are destitute, unfed, grieving, and marginalized can “leap
for joy,” because they have God’s ear and God’s blessing. 
But those who are wealthy, full-bellied, carefree, and well-liked
should watch out, because their condition is precarious, not
enviable.  The material “blessings” they cherish most, the
very possessions and attributes they consider signs of God’s favor,
are in fact liabilities that might do them spiritual harm.1

Ms. Thomas reflects deeply
about the material blessings she has, and how they may in fact get in
the way of her awareness of her dependence on God.  She points out
though, that this text isn’t about celebrating misery or hardship,
because immediately before this teaching, Jesus heals and eliminates
suffering.  We aren’t told to seek hardship.  Rather, we’re invited
to see the world as it is.  

Ms. Thomas reflects:

Notice also that Jesus
doesn’t offer four blessings to one audience, and four woes to
another.  His sermon is not a sorting exercise between the good
folks and the bad folks; he addresses every
blessing and every
woe to every
person.  As if to say: this is the human pattern.  This is
where all of us live.  We move from blessing to woe over and
over again in the course of our lives. We
invite blessing every time we find ourselves empty and yearning for
God, and we invite woe every time we retreat into smug and
thoughtless self-satisfaction.  …I think what Jesus is saying in
this Gospel is that I have something to learn about discipleship that
my life circumstances will not teach me.

She
uses this as an invitation to humility for learning from those who
have learned discipleship from a different place.  

I’ll
admit, that when I think about those metaphorical trees planted by
streams of water, with their healthy fruit, their strong trunks, and
their sense of dependability in the world,  – a place I’d like
everyone to get to,I currently worry a little bit that they may look
at the trees whose access to water is less dependable and think them
unproductive.  Or, the trees planted near air polluting factories,
and think them weak.   Or, the “full light” trees planted in the
shade, and think them  not trying hard enough.

(Our
yard doesn’t ever have “full sun” and we keep trying to plant
veggies anyway, and they always seem less productive and less healthy
than, say, those planted where they get what they actually need.  And
the perfect amount of water doesn’t actually overcome the lack of
sun.)

Worse,
yet, I fear that the trees planted far from the streams of water may
judge THEMSELVES in the ways that the trees near the stream do,
without taking into account the differences in access.

I
think, as well, about tree line.  About the point on the mountain
when it is too high, too cold, too oxygen deprived, too windy for
trees to keep growing.  And I think about the trees JUST BELOW “tree
line” that look short, sickly, and quite often bent by the wind.  

Jeremiah
is encouraging us to be dependent on God and focused on God’s will.
I agree, AND I think what Debie Thomas is saying is that the trees
just before tree line, and the shrubs in the desert, as well as the
ones influenced by pollution have a whole lot to teach the trees by
streams of water about scrappy survival, resilience, trust, and
faith.

So,
dear ones, where ever you feel planted, may you thrive as much as it
is possible.  AND may you take note of where you are planted, and
where others are planted, and make sure to learn from those whose
location is different from yours.  After all, God is with us
everywhere, and each of us are therefore able to glean the wisdom of
the Divine from exactly where we are.  Thanks be to God.  Amen

1Debie
Thomas, Journey with Jesus (webzine), Lectionary Essay for 2/13/2022
entitled “Leveled”
https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/3319-leveled.

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

February 20, 2022

Uncategorized

“Stay” based on Isaiah 6:1-8 and Luke 5:1-11

  • February 13, 2022
  • by Sara Baron

Once
upon a time, in an era that feels very long ago, I spent a lot of
time trying to listen to what I was supposed to be doing with my life
and the answer I discerned was “Clergy, United Methodist Church,
Elder, Wyoming Conference.”    

That’s
not the point today.  

Years
after that, I found that I wanted to check to see what I was supposed
to  be doing with my life.  I was, by that point, a clergy member of
the United Methodist Church, an elder in the Upper New York Annual
Conference that followed the existence of the Wyoming Conference.
So, in a similar time of prayer, discernment, and listening, I sought
to determine what I was supposed to be aimed at next.

The
answer I found was, “Stay.”

(I
suspect God is short-winded with me so I can’t wiggle new
interpretations.  Or, perhaps I stop listening too fast?  Who knows.)

The
stories for today reflect big changes.  Isaiah moves from being “not
a prophet” to “a prophet” and Simon Peter, James, and John
moved from being fishermen to Jesus’s disciples.  Those are some
significant changes in role,  identity, and life! They’re BIG answers
to the BIG questions of what each of them was “supposed to do with
their lives.”

Now,
I’ll admit, most of the time these stories aren’t seen as being about
change.  Even I have often preached these as invitations to consider
the possibility that God is calling you to do something radical and
new, and asking if you are willing to listen to the call.  I’ve made
it about CALL, and I think that was because I’m always aware of the
injustice of the world as it is, and the compassion of God, and I’m
all for people listening to God’s calls to make the world more just.
(I still am).

But…
to be a part of healing the world ALSO requires that we allow God’s
healing love to transform US.  And that also means paying attention
to when we are at or near breaking points, and then saying “NO
MORE” for now.  Or, perhaps, listening when God says “stay”
(however it is that God might say that to you.)

It
may be that God is saying “stay” and we are able to tell that
“stay” is what we need when we notice that we are grasping for
control …. and we then take seriously the idea that when we are
grasping for control it is because we are experiencing a lack of
stability and predictably.  (This assumes God wants good things for
us, which I am ok assuming.)

That’s
the most important thing I’m going to say today, so I’m going to say
it again.  One way of listening for God’s guidance in our lives IS
taking seriously the fact that when we are grasping for control it is
because we are experiencing a lack of stability and predictably.

Then,
we start noticing when we’re grasping for control, AND start figuring
out what we CAN do to create stability for ourselves (and others
around us.)  Another BIG clue is when we find ourselves wanting or
demanding COMPLIANCE.  (From kids, from partners, from employees,
from parents, from church committees….)  When we start demanding
compliance, it is probably a good clue that we don’t feel SAFE, and
we’re trying to re-create a sense of safety by establishing that we
have power in the world.  Even if we are doing it by trying to have
power over other people.

These
are coping mechanisms.  I’m actually all for coping mechanisms,
because we all need to COPE.  BUT, they can also do serious damage,
and we are at our best when we increase the number of coping
mechanisms we have on hand, and picking which one to use when.

(Just
as an aside, because I find it terribly interesting, sometimes in
faith people project onto God the desire for compliance.  And I’m
interested in the idea that this may be a way of projecting the lack
of our sense of safety onto God.)

So,
I’m taking these as two “call stories” as stories of change, and
noticing the impact of the calls on their lives.  It probably makes
sense, right now that these stories resonate as CHANGE.  After all,
we are 2 years into this pandemic, but also … maybe… at “the
end” of the pandemic, or at least a significant transition point in
it.  So we’re dealing with the changes of the past 2 years, and the
inconsistencies of the past 2 years, and NEW changes now, and changes
to come, and then on top of that the reality that the new stability
that may emerge is going to look different from the old one…

And
that’s JUST the pandemic.  Most of us have also experienced other
changes in the past two years.  And perhaps because of these past two
years, I think at this point “big changes” leaves a sour taste in
our mouths.

But,
this is not always how we see changes culturally.  Often we think of
changes as exciting, wonderful, things.  My go to fiction genre is
romance, and falling in love is actually a BIG life change.
Actually, the stories we tell, watch, and read are about change.  It
has been said (by a writer named John Gardner) that there are only
two plots in all of literature: You
go on a journey, or the stranger comes to town.  There isn’t much
plot in the status quo.

However,
because we tend to tell stories of change, and celebrate
accomplishments that bring change (graduations, etc), we aren’t
always good at attending to the STRESS created by changes.  The is a
measurement of the stress of changes: The Holmes – Rahe
Stress inventory.1
It is a method for evaluating how people are doing, and what
likelihood there is for an impending HEALTH BREAKDOWN.  Functionally,
it is a list of changes, ranked by level of impact, and people add up
the values of all the changes they’re living to see how BIG they are,
together.  

I’m
familiar with this from some clergy-transition work, because things
like moving and getting a new job are on the list, and the impact of
itineracy is… well, a lot of stress.  But, to get back to my point
about the CHANGE that is romance, according to this list the “social
readjustment” of getting married is the 7th most
stressful thing that could happen to you.  (If you wanted to know,
and you probably do:  Death of spouse, divorce, separation from
spouse” are top 3, although pastorally I think I disagree and death
of a child should be in that top 3.  In any case, if you’ve lived any
of these, please note that it wouldn’t take many other factors to
have you on the high side of this inventory.)  

Other
serious factors in stress that feel relevant to right now (and to our
stories) include:

Retirement

Major
change in health of a family member

Changing
to a different line of work

Change
in work responsibilities

“Spouse
beginning or ceasing work outside the home”

Revision
of personal habits (things like, say leaving the home or not)

Major
changes in work hours or conditions (NO, I’m NOT making this up)

34
Major change in usual type / amount of recreation

35
Major change in church activity (I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP.. its)

36
Major change in social activity

major
change in number of family get togethers

So,
perhaps we might note that the pandemic combined with life itself has
put ALL of us in much higher stress position than we’re used to, and
that means we are much more likely to feel unsafe and out of control
– and to be doing things (consciously or not) to try to gain
control, stability, and predictably in life.

And,
being me, I’d suggest you will be more like to be SUCCESSFUL and to
make HEALTHY choices about how to gain control, stability, and
predictably if you do it consciously.

But,
I am bringing all of this up in the context of the changes in our
stories from the Bible, and I think our lives right now may help us
be in a place to have some empathy for Isaiah and the disciples as
they went through major life changes and experienced the stress of
that.  We are likely able to see that even as they were being
faithful to God, it was hard.  We are able to see that even if the
disciples were moved by Jesus, connected to hope for the future,
prayerfully connected to the Divine, and finally finding their place
in the world …. IT WAS STILL HARD.

Maybe
we are ready, at this point, to let go of the myth that “if we’re
doing things right, it will all come together and be easy.”  I
think that’s likely a myth of capitalism, one that has been used to
keep compliance, and one that has bled into faith.  Following God
doesn’t make it all easy – even if it does make it all meaningful
and valuable and even good.  Doing the right thing is often HARD.
Dealing with the changes around us remains incredibly difficult EVEN
if they are the ones we choose.  Dealing with changes around us
remains incredibly difficult EVEN if they’re the right changes.

We’re
human.  

We
live in bodies, given to us by God, that tune into stress, and
respond with concern to changes.

AND,
we’re also capable of surviving and thriving after major changes.

Which
is really good news.  Because Isaiah became a prophet, and a good
one.  The disciples floundered for quite a while, but eventually
became the trusted leaders of the Jesus movement.

Perhaps
right now it feels unfortunate that we don’t get to skip the
experiences of change and just move on to the “good parts”
(DARN).   But life is a series of changes, big and small, and we
don’t get to skip them.  Here we are.  And God is with us.  And we
have difficult things to face – inside ourselves and outside of
ourselves, and God is with us.  

For
now, I hope you might just hear this:  sometimes God isn’t calling us
to anything new.  Sometimes God is calling us to stay the
course, and get settled where we are, and get some more stability.  

And
that is holy work too.  

Thanks
be to God.  Amen

1https://www.stress.org/holmes-rahe-stress-inventory-pdf

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

February 13, 2022

Uncategorized

“The Only Way” based on  Isaiah 61:1-4 and Luke…

  • February 6, 2022
  • by Sara Baron

I’ve
been wondering about this story of Jesus being attacked on a cliff
for as long as I can remember.  How did Jesus get out?  Perhaps
because of Sunday School materials from my childhood, I have an image
in my head of people fighting and kicking up a cloud of dust, out of
which Jesus walks unscathed. Or, perhaps this really is the
implication of the end of the story, “But he passed through the
midst of them and went on his way.” (4:30)  🤷🏻‍♀️

The
long standing question of “how did get out of such a dangerous
situation” has often distracted me from a far simpler reality:
this is a disturbing story.  Jesus is at home, a place we might think
he would be particularly safe.  Jesus is speaking in the center of
religious worship, a place we might hope would be particularly
nonviolent.  Jesus is claiming the care of God for the people of God,
to people who definitely knew God and needed care – a gift that we
might hope would be well received.

Instead,
they were “filled with rage. They got up, drove him out of the
town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was
built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff.”  (4:28b-29)
Now, I can analyze what was going on that made them so mad.  (Jesus
claimed more “honor” than was his fair share, in a system where
honor was a 0-sum game.) But in terms of the story being a disturbing
one, it doesn’t matter that much.  This attack on Jesus by his
people, a potentially deadly attack, is just awful.

Scholars
think Luke is using this story to foreshadow how Jesus’ message will
be received – that while some will listen and be moved, others will
respond with violence to maintain the status quo.  And, that actually
helps, because it brings into focus that the end of Jesus’s life is
really disturbing too.  I have never managed to come to iaece with
capital punishment, and I find each instance of state-sponsored
killing to be … well, a lot more than disturbing.  But let’s stick
with disturbing for a moment.

While
I had the opportunity to regularly hear fantastic preachers as a
kid, and had thoughtful Sunday School teachers and intentional Youth
Group leaders, the US culture’s basic atonement theory still
penetrated my consciousness.  I grew up thinking that I was supposed
to believe that “Jesus died for my sins” and, since that was
something I was supposed to be grateful for, that meant that Jesus’
death was … useful?  Good?  (You might think I’d avoid “good”
but if so, consider “Good Friday.”)  

As
I’ve grown, I’ve been blessed with spaciousness to consider what I
really believe, and to question things that don’t make sense to me.
While I seek to extend that spaciousness to others, and respect
differences in faith, for me that has meant leaving behind “Jesus
died for my sins” and leaving in its place, “Jesus died because
his movement threatened the power of the powerful and whenever I am
complicit in protecting existent power structures, I am engaging in
the same behavior that got him killed.”  (I’ll admit, it has less
of a ring to it.)

I’ve
come back around to finding it disturbing that Jesus, who was a
powerful prophet, a man of incredible morality,
a truly amazing teacher, a notable healer, a wise mystic, AND a
liberator of the oppressed was killed because of exactly those
things.  In fact, I’m back to finding it disturbing when people are
killed, and that includes those who are killed by state-sponsored
violence.

So,
this early narrative in Luke is a disturbing story that foreshadows a
disturbing story, which end up bookending most of Jesus’
ministry.  All that Jesus offers in teaching, healing, and empowering
has over it the shadow of how threatening people find it to have
systems disrupted.

Luke
uses Isaiah’s vision of someone acting on God’s behalf to

  • bring
    good news to the oppressed,
  • bind
    up the broken-hearted,
  • proclaim
    liberty to the captives,
  • release
    to the prisoners;
  • proclaim
    the year of the Lord’s favor,
  • to
    comfort all who mourn;
  • repair
    the ruined cities,
    (etc)

and
Luke notes, right from the get-go, that this vision of God and being
one called upon to enact it is DANGEROUS work.

In
the end, Jesus’ untimely death was initiated by the powerful
religious authorities, who thought that his movement threatened the
well-being of the entire Jewish population.  It feels like a
parallel to this story, where it seems that the hometown
faithful were terrified by the implications of what Jesus was going
to do.

They
would all have been saying to Jesus, “Don’t rock the boat!”  Now,
“Don’t rock the boat,” is very good advice for getting ahead in
life, moving up ladders of institutional power, being generally
well-liked, and… in lots of cases… surviving.  However, it turns
out that it is not the Jesus way, and that means it isn’t the way of
Jesus followers either.

Jesus
followed the path of nonviolence.  That one is a difficult path, but
one that is abundant in grace and hope.  If we think about the work
named in Isaiah 61, it becomes clear that this is profoundly
nonviolent work.  Not only is the work itself NOT violent (a good
starting point) but it is aimed at disentangling the power of
violence that disrupts life itself.  

It
is far too easy to ONLY take notice of direct, visible, physical
violence – and miss all the other kinds.  Those of us who have been
trained in Safe Sanctuaries were reminded that abuse itself can look
like physical abuse, OR it can look like sexual abuse, OR it can look
like emotional abuse, OR it can look like neglect.  Furthermore,
violence can also look like the simple threat of violence that is
used to keep people in check, even if it isn’t regularly used.  

And,
on top of that, violence can also be a wolf in sheep’s clothing.  
Violence includes allowing people to be hungry when there is abundant
food – because some people don’t “earn enough” to eat.  That’s
a violence that looks like societal neglect.  Violence looks like
people not being able to get health care, or get access to necessary
medication, or get life-saving treatment because of who they are or
what they have.  That’s a violence that kills, but more out of LACK
of access than direct attacks.  Violence looks like campaigns to
doctors to prescribe opiates, knowing they’d lead to addiction,
knowing they’d lead to death – but choosing profit over lives.
Violence looks like the laws we have that prevent people with
convictions from being able to have places to live, or food to eat,
or jobs to provide for their needs – even when convictions
themselves have more to do with our “justice” system than they do
with individual actions.

Or,
to make this a little bit more concise, all forms of inequity and
hierarchy are less visible forms of violence.  

So.
Violence is a lot.

Which
means that non-violence is a lot.

And,
for those of you tuning in for the first time, Jesus led a movement
of NON-VIOLENCE and to choose to be a Jesus follower is to choose the
ways of NON-VIOLENCE.  

There
was a fun note in the Social Science Commentary on the Synoptic
Gospels1
that said, “an over-quick resort to violence is often an unintended
public admission of failure.  In honor challenge, the party that
first resorts to violence loses the exchange: a resort to violence
indicates that wits have failed and bully tactics have taken over.”2
So part of what we’re seeing in this story is that violence tries to
take Jesus down, which itself proves Jesus right, and he does NOT
resort to violence, but rather walks away from it.

And,
then he spends his ministry as a non-violent religious leader who
attempts to CHANGE the systems of oppression that are less visible
forms of violence.  And then he invites us to follow him.

One
of the most visible nonviolent religious followers of Jesus in recent
times was Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, and The King Center
continues to teach the principles and practices of non-violence.  I
regularly reread them, and seek further education on nonviolence as a
way of following Jesus and respecting the movement Dr. King was a
part of.3
The King Center states, “The Triple Evils of POVERTY, RACISM and
MILITARISM are forms of violence that exist in a vicious cycle.”
and expands on what that means, as well as naming the principles of
nonviolence and steps in nonviolent social change.  For example:

PRINCIPLE
ONE: Nonviolence Is a Way of Life for Courageous People.

  •  It
    is not a method for cowards; it does resist.
  • It
    is active nonviolent resistance to evil.
  • It
    is aggressive spiritually, mentally, and emotionally.

I
highly recommend the teachings of the King Center as further reading,
for good living.

For
this moment, however, I have a very pragmatic suggestion about
nonviolence.  I have seen that there are HIGH levels of angst and
anxiety pretty much everywhere right now.  I’m told others have
noticed this too, and it is often being seen via emotional outbursts
at strangers (particularly ones who work in some form of customer
service) or at loved ones (because that’s where we most often let go
of steam).  

I
believe that one of the most powerful tools of nonviolence is
COMPASSION, and I believe it is needed in TWO directions.  One
direction is towards others who are struggling, with a hope that we
might respond with calm, caring, empathy when others need it.  The
other is towards ourselves – which is BOTH how we gain the capacity
to respond with calm to others AND how we work towards fewer
outbursts of our own.

This
week a fellow clergy person asked for help in dealing with her pent
up anger, and asked clergy sisters how they do it.  The responses
were so helpful:  exercise!  Therapy!  Throwing things that are safe
to throw and not at anything living!  Medicine!  Screaming!  …. and
also self compassion.  (I was asked, I answered.)  To deal with
anger, for me, means I need to know what is under it – what value I
hold or need I have is being violated, so I can figure out how I want
to respond.4

Although,
sometimes before I can get to dealing with the anger, I have to do
the work of admitting that I’m angry, and to do that I take the
advice of Thich Naht Hahn, and breath in “I’m angry” and breath
out “I’m angry” until I get the sense that the anger has been
acknowledged.  Then I can look at the why under the anger.  

We
can’t build God’s kindom without doing it nonviolently.  

Violence
isn’t going to get us to nonviolent justice.  And to be nonviolent is
WORK. It takes INTENTION, and PRACTICE, and COMMUNITY, and heaps of
GRACE.  It means we are constantly working on it, in ourselves and
with each other.  It means every moment is an opportunity to try
again.

The
world responded with violence to God’s vision of nonviolence, and to
Jesus’ teachings of justice.  But Jesus responded with the power of
nonviolence anyway, and it turns out that was enough so that we’re
still here, following in his way, 2000 years later.  Nonviolence
isn’t the fastest way, but it is the only way.  May God help us along
our way.  Amen

As
we all grow and learn, we’re trying to learn how to listen to the
lessons of our emotions AND learn how to allow our emotions space to
be our teachers WITHOUT letting them hurt us or others.  May God help
us learn those lessons.  Amen

1I’m
well aware that my sermons could be set up as Bingo games, with this
book being one of the squares, Walter Brueggemann being another,
etc.  Just acknowledging reality here.

2 Bruce
J. Malina and Richard L. Rohrbaugh Social-Science Commentary on the
Synoptic Gospels (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003) “Textual
Notes: Mark 1:21-34” p. 244.

3
https://thekingcenter.org/about-tkc/the-king-philosophy/

4
https://workcollaboratively.files.wordpress.com/…/wc…)

Rev. Sara E. Baron
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305
Pronouns: she/her/hers
http://fumcschenectady.org/
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

February 6, 2022

Uncategorized

“A Vision, for Us Together” based on Isaiah 61:1-4…

  • January 30, 2022
  • by Sara Baron
image

Do you have a Bible verse you claim as your own, one that reminds you of who you are, who God is, and how you want to live. (Possibly three versions of the same question). I’m going to try to guess:

Maybe Micah 6:8:

[God] has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God.

Maybe Amos 5:24,

“But let justice roll down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.”

The Golden Rule from Matthew 7:12?

“In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.”

The Shema from Deuteronomy 6:4-5?

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.”

The great theology of 1 John 4:7-8?

Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.

Maybe the simple repeated theme from Genesis 1:

“And God said it was good”

Or the Hebrew Bible theme of who God is

“God’s steadfast love endures forever"

Or the great equalizing in Christ from Galatians 3:28?

“There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

Or maybe a more particular call from Isaiah 40:1?

“Comfort, O Comfort my people, says your God.”

Or the wise challenge given Esther (4:14) that helps with courage?

“For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”

Or, perhaps, the deceptively simple instructions from Paul in Romans 12:7-8 (The Message)?

Love from the center of who you are; don’t fake it. Run for dear life from evil; hold on for dear life to good. Be good friends who love deeply; practice playing second fiddle.

Or, just maybe, the Jesus theme from Mark (1:5)?

The time is fulfilled, and the kindom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.’

Did I get it? Let me know in comments or an email! If you didn’t have one before, there are some good options, and if you wanted to know more about how I see the Bible, you just learned a lot. I don’t have ONE passage, but all of the above are incorporated into how I try to live, how I understand God, how I understand the vision of the Divine and the work of being a follower of Jesus.

Given the depth and breadth of the Hebrew Bible, there are a LOT of options to choose from to pick a passage to define one’s life and/or ministry. And that’s why I think it is so interesting and notable to hear the one Luke uses to define Jesus. It is a Jubilee passage from third Isaiah, and – perhaps I don’t have quite enough hope, it wasn’t on the list I just shared. This one is BIGGER, broader, more radical, more extreme than any I’d claim for myself. For Jesus, though, it fits.

61The spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
because the Lord has anointed me;
he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed,
to bind up the broken-hearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives,
and release to the prisoners;
2 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor,
and the day of vengeance of our God;
to comfort all who mourn;
3 to provide for those who mourn in Zion—
to give them a garland instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness instead of mourning,
the mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
the planting of the Lord, to display his glory.
4 They shall build up the ancient ruins,
they shall raise up the former devastations;
they shall repair the ruined cities,
the devastations of many generations.

Walter Brueggemann makes a number of great points that help me make sense of this passage, and I’m going to share them with you, largely in my own words.1 It helps to remember that Isaiah 56-66 is considered “Third Isaiah”, distinct from what came before it in both themes and in timing. Isaiah 60 predicts a change for ancient Israel, a reversal of fortunes. It speaks to a people RETURNED from Exile, but struggling in the rebuilding stage. Brueggemann says these chapters are “primally concerned with the future of Jerusalem. It is urgent to determine if the new Jerusalem, which epitomizes new heaven and new earth, will or will not be a place of inclusion, will or will not be a place of neighbor ethic, will or will not manifest a passion for justice.”2

Isaiah 60 predicts that things are going to get better in Jerusalem, that God is going to make things better, and glory and prosperity are on the horizon. Isaiah 61 has a pretty big switch in that there is a HUMAN speaking, as God’s agent, one who is anointed with God’s spirit to MAKE IT HAPPEN.

This human is “authorized and energized to do Yahweh’s deeply transformative work in the community of Yahweh’s people.”3 And what the human-actor is going to do is create a NEW thing.

And the “new thing” is a creating justice for those who are weakened, disempowered, and marginalized. The verbs of what will happen to them speak volumes. The human acting on behalf of God will bring, bind up, proclaim, release, comfort, provide,

give. That is, a whole lot of action aimed at restoring “them to full function in a community of well-being and joy.”4

I know I’m going pretty deep into this passage, but when Luke claims this as Jesus’s vision for his ministry, and when it gives me the shivers like this to see how claiming this historical vision for Jesus fits both in his time and in ours, I think it is worth digging pretty deep.

Because, there are A LOT OF PEOPLE who are weakened, disempowered, and marginalized. And there is a lot of need for restoration, particularly restoring people to a good relationship within a healthy community of mutuality and JOY. Right? This speaks to the return of the exiles, and it speaks to the largely disempowered masses of Jesus’s day, and it speaks right into our day too. Our day, where corporate greed and epic income inequality along with racism and other forms of de-humanizing others prevent the fullness of God’s vision from being lived in people’s lives. A restoration to full function in a community of well-being and joy is another way of talking about God’s kindom, the one we’ve committed our lives to building, and it requires a lot of CHANGES.

Another important theme in this Isaiah passage is the concept of Jubilee. Jubilee is a Torah vision and commandment aimed at preventing generational poverty, and creating an equitable society. I’m currently reading David Graeber’s new book (with David Wendrow) “The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity” in which the professors examine many ways that human societies have organized themselves in order to consider why some societies carefully maintain equality and care for all, and why some create and maintain inequality and hierarchies of privilege.

It helped me see that the careful Torah provisions aimed at creating a just and equitable society were one of many ways of doing so, many of which have been successful for centuries. (Some archeologists see evidence that the lands of ancient Israel maintained a lack of hierarchy and care for all during the period of the Judges, some 300-400 years- which I think is a notable period of time!)

Pragmatically, practicing Jubilee is laid out in Leviticus 25 and relates to regular forgiveness of debts and restoration of land to original owners. Brueggemann says, “There is no doubt that a vision of jubilee -that is, a profound hope for the disadvantaged – is shockingly devastating to those who value and benefit from the status quo.”5 So, add in another element to what it means to have Jesus claiming this passage in his ministry. It names that he is upending the status quo for the sake of the disadvantaged. AND, it puts the advantaged on notice. There is a VERY good reason the Poor People’s Campaign is also claiming Jubilee as a platform, this Biblical concept still has power today.6 It is still NEEDED today.

I cannot resist the recommendation to reflect on Brueggemann’s quote “is shockingly devastating to those who value and benefit from the status quo.” We are, all of us, a complicated mix of powerful and powerless, we are those who benefit from the status quo and those who are held back by it. And it is of great value to our capacity to build the kindom if we are able to become clearer on where we benefit from the status quo, so we can change how we respond to those who are harmed by it. I suspect that this reflection is easiest accessed by attending to when our bodies “tighten up” at some suggestion for justice or another. What do we instinctually respond to as “that’s too far” OR “but, that would be scary (for me!)”? The work of building God’s kindom often requires us to pay attention to the clues from our bodies of what scares us, and then use that as a source of wisdom to listen to and empathize with people who lack whatever power we’re afraid of losing.

OK, a final point on Isaiah 61 (for now), The passage moves the community from sorrow and grief to gladness and praise. As the disempowered and marginalized are restored to full community, the community itself is healed.

So, when Luke tells us about Jesus reading a passage from Isaiah and claiming it as his own, there is A LOT going on there, a lot about God, a lot about the history of a people devoted to God, a lot about who Jesus is, and a lot about what God is asking of us.

Because, the gospels make it clear, the work that Jesus did during his life time is the work that the followers are Jesus are asked to continue in ours.

Which, rather uncomfortably suggests that I should have put Isaiah 61:1-4 on my list of verses to live by. Isn’t THAT a challenge?

Thank goodness we have each other and God: none of us are asked to be the single-human-actor. Instead, we TOGETHER have gifts sufficient for the tasks, and we TOGETHER have vision of justice, and we TOGETHER have power to build the kindom. We, TOGETHER, along with many other workers in the kindom, are given this time of upheaval in the world as a time to re-vision and to seek justice anew. May God help and encourage us along the way – there is a pretty long journey from where we are to where God dreams we will be. Amen

1 Walter Brueggeman, Isaiah 40-66 (Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 1998) 212-215.

2 Ibid, 167.

3 Ibid, 213.

4 Ibid 213.

5 Ibid, 214.

6 https://www.poorpeoplescampaign.org/about/jubilee-platform/

Rev. Sara E. Baron 

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady 

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305 

Pronouns: she/her/hers 

http://fumcschenectady.org/ 

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

January 30, 2022

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