“Subversive Grace” based on Job 2:7-10

February 5, 2017February 15, 2020
by Sara Baron

This
week a clergy friend reached out with a concern about our United
Methodist Bookstore and recourse center, Cokesbury. In the most
recent Cokesbury catalog, on page 21, listed under “Women’s
Studies” was a book entitled “Zip It” with a cover image of
women’s lips zipped closed. He asked us to join him in expressing
displeasure. I did. I got a response from Cokesbury that attempted
to reassure me by informing me that I was ignorant of their intent.
The email informed me that the author, “offers
practical how-to’s meant to inspire her readers to use their words
‘to build, not to break; to bless, not to badger; to encourage, not
to embitter; to praise, not to pounce’. Her work is very
specific to women’s group Bible study and personal devotion and
reflection.”¹
Clearly the author of the book along with the author of the email
perceive this to be EMPOWERMENT of women. You might stake a guess
that I disagree. You’d be right.

Now,
this particular exchange was fairly trivial this week. It was almost
nothing, except that it served as a reminder of the inherent sexism
in The Church and the resiliency of the patriarchy in the
institution. It was just another
piece of frustration and sadness. In the language of Parker Palmer,
it was another expression of the “tragic gap.” He explains it
this way, “Of
all the tensions we must hold in personal and political life, perhaps
the most fundamental and most challenging is standing and acting with
hope in the “tragic gap.” On one side of that gap, we see the
hard realities of the world, realities that can crush our spirits and
defeat our hopes. On the other side of that gap, we see real-world
possibilities, life as we know it could be because we have seen it
that way.”²

Palmer teaches that much of what we struggle with in life is the
reality of the tragic gap and how to be authentic in response to it.

The
tragic gap ALWAYS exists. For the past few weeks though it has felt
like every piece of news, as well as every time I’ve accessed social
media, I’ve been bombarded with reminders of the tragic gap. At
times it has felt like I’ve been drowning in them. My natural
emotional disposition tends toward happiness and playfulness (along
with overthinking 😉 ), but recently I’ve been feeling tired,
overwhelmed, and bogged down.

Now,
it feels imperative to mention that I do not think that a publishing
foible by Cokesbury is a tragedy, it did not send me into a
depression, and it is not even OVERLY significant. In the face of
the scope of issues today, it barely registers. I have to say this
because the last time I acknowledged being personally harmed by the
existence sexism in the church at large I was told by Annual
Conference Leadership that I was a hysterical woman and sent to
Emotional Intelligence training. So, now that’s cleared up.

Truth
be told though, there are so very many reminders of the tragic gap
right now that they are piled on top of each other. There are all
the normal ones and all the exceptionally new ones. I think it is
creating a phenomenon similar to grief: when a new grief occurs it
also serves to reawaken all the grief we have experienced before it.
No one attack on the world as it should be is the problem: they all
add on to each other and start to snow ball. For many in my life,
I’m hearing that they are now avalanching. Dear friends (please
note: friends, none of you, I wouldn’t share your struggles from this
pulpit) have told me this week that they are experiencing physical
symptoms of the anxiety they experience given the current depth of
the tragic gap. I’m also hearing people are having trouble sleeping,
as well as turning to junk food and alcohol to make it through the
days.

As
for myself, this week I noticed that EVERYTHING I try to do is an
uphill battle. It all just feels harder, sort of like how it does
when I haven’t taken vacation in entirely too many months. My
yearning has been to sit on the couch, drink tea, pet my cat, and
watch West Wing and anything more than that requires steeling myself
to do what needs to be done.

I
don’t know how all of you are doing. I hope some of you are fine and
dandy, with either sufficient coping mechanisms, sufficient hope, or
sufficient joy to counterbalance the world’s problems. I know some
of you are really struggling, and that those struggles are often a
combination of the world around us and the personal issues that keep
coming. Perhaps some are also in the middle: aware of the struggles
and making it. After last week’s sermon, and the Biblical book from
which we read, many of you may be feeling anxious that I’m about to
make it worse.

I
don’t think I am. Ironically enough, Job feels like a friendly
figure right now, and his story seems to give us reason for hope.
For those of you who aren’t inherently familiar with the story, let
me summarize quickly: Job is presented as a truly good human.
Everyone agrees that he is “blameless and upright,” faithful to
God, and even overly observant. He made sacrifices to God JUST IN
CASE one of his sons accidentally sinned. He was also wealthy in the
form of enormous flocks. He and his wife and had 10 children, 7 sons
and 3 daughters. God is said to be proud of Job’s good heart and
faithfulness.

Suddenly
things changed: all of his wealth was either killed or stolen. At
the same time, all of his children, who had been feasting together,
were killed when a wind knocked down the tent. Job turned to grief
and turned his heart to God in prayer. Then, in our text, his
health deteriorated, with painful sores opening all over his entire
body. He is already sitting on an ash heap and appears to simply,
calmly, pick up a piece of a broken pot to use to scratch himself.
It seems that he is already so heartbroken that the physical symptoms
barely register.

That
seems right. The deepest grief I have seen in my life has been the
grief of parents mourning for their children. In the face of losing
10 children, I don’t think anything else would even register. Job’s
wife is convinced that his death is imminent, and even in the midst
of her shared grief, she manages to register the degree of his pain.

The
meaning of her words is not entirely clear. She says, “Do you
still persist in your integrity? Curse God, and die.” The big
question is: does she assume he is dying already and wish to ease his
death by helping him speak words of truth on the way out; OR does she
believe his suffering is too great for anyone to handle and believe
that if he curses God, God will finally let him die? That is, it
isn’t clear if she thinks he is dying anyway which then also makes it
unclear if she thinks cursing God will kill him. Since this is a
book especially designed to argue against the idea that a difficult
life indicates that God is punishing you, I’m going to suggest that
the more likely meaning is the first: she wishes for him speak out
loud of his pain to ease the suffering on his way to death.

Truly,
Job’s wife speaks with outstanding grace, especially for a woman who
is also grieving the loss of all of her children. The capacity to
attend to anyone else’s pain in the midst of that grief is unusual –
humans are built that way. She wants his pain to be eased, both
physically and emotionally. She thinks he is being too stoic, and
should let go of his pride in order to find some relief. In Bible
Study we found ourselves telling stories of the end of people’s
lives, and the grace-filled ways we had known loved ones to ease the
end of the dying person’s life. This woman’s words reminded us of
how difficult it can be to let go of a loved one, and at the same
time how much of a relief it is when someone we love is no longer
suffering.

Job’s
wife encouraged him to do what he could do to be at peace at the end
of his life. He refused her, responding that his faith required him
to deal with the pain as it came. In case you haven’t read Job, it
is interesting to note that for chapters upon chapters after this he
expresses his pain with great intensity. However, the prelude seems
to forget those speeches.

Now,
the grace-filled response of Job’s wife has not been heard as such
throughout history. “Chrysostom asked why the Devil left Job his
wife and answered with the suggestion that he considered her a
scourge by which to plague him more acutely than by any other
means.”³
Yep. And he wasn’t alone, “The ancient tradition, reflected in
Augustine, Chrysostom, Calvin, and many others, that she is an aide
to the satan
underestimates the complexity of her role.”⁴
Most male commentators throughout history have condemned Job’s wife
for her words, seeing her as a part of the problem. I wonder how
much of culture’s assumptions about females fed into that
perspective. It was difficult for those of us who studies this
together to hear anything but gentleness, love, and grace in Job’s
wife’s words. They’re subversive grace, for sure, not at all
reflecting the most common ways of showing love, but they’re grace
nonetheless.

The
book of Job explores human suffering, and asks the big questions
about how human suffering and God’s will are related. God’s answers
to Job’s questions are in chapters 38-40 if you want to read them
yourselves. The book of Job gives us a space to reflect on suffering
itself, and it gives us words to name the suffering. We don’t have
to be in Job’s particularly awful position to be suffering, there are
many kinds of suffering in the world.

This
week we had a Gathering of (The) Connection where we talked about
finding peace. We were gifted with wonderful questions: what is
peace? What helps you find peace? What keeps you from peace? We
discussed the balance of righteousness anger and peace, and we
wondered about it. As we discussed a thought started to form in me:
I think I’ve been doing it wrong. (Or if not “wrong” than in a
less than optimal way.)

In
recent weeks, I have allowed my fears and angers to motivate and lead
me, and I am not at my best when I do that. Certainly there is
plenty worth protesting, there are great organizations to donate to,
and imperative conversations to have. However, if I want to be as
useful as I can be in building the kin-dom of God, then I need to
start those actions from the best motivation. Now I’m wondering if I
can attend to centering myself in the unconditional love of God and
wonder of life and Creation – even now, ESPECIALLY now? Can I
allow myself to slow down enough to consider where my energy belongs
and where my gifts are most useful? Can I show up, wherever I show
up, grace-filled and at peace so that the love I have to share can be
part of what I offer in changing the world? Can I learn how to hold
peace in such a deep way that it allows me to hold anger differently?

Please
be aware that I think grace-filled and at peace can be a reasonable
way to protest, chant, and resist!! I’m talking about the inner
motivation and way of responding to the rest of God’s people. When
it comes down to it, I think that the energy we bring into the world
changes it more than the words we use. The world is desperately in
need of love and peace – and listening as well as many many forms
of resistance. Furthermore, in the past few weeks people’s hearts
haven’t stopped breaking in the normal and awful ways human hearts
break. There is still a lot of need around us for patience and
compassion.

So,
I’m hoping that in the face of great suffering I might be able (on
good days) to share subversive grace: to share God’s love from a
place of peace and gratitude WHILE calling the world out of the
tragic gap and into the kin-dom. This will take times of quiet,
intentional reflection, deep conversation, and attending to hope,
gratitude and goodness. This will take paying attention to what
brings me energy – and doing those things. This will take a
regular practice of Sabbath, in particular Sabbath from the news
cycle. I got one of those this week and it made all the difference.

Finally,
I hope that my journey is of use to you as well. In the midst of her
own suffering, Job’s wife found the way to hear her husband’s pain
and respond to it with love, grace, and compassion. That’s
especially hard work right now. But, may God help us to treat
ourselves, and those we love, with similar love, grace, and
compassion. May we find our energy sources, good spiritual
practices, and the freedom to breath outside of the news cycle.
And, with God’s help, may it lower our anxiety and fill us with some
much needed peace. Amen

1Personal
Email, February 1, 2016.

2Parker
Palmer, Healing
the Heart of Democracy,
p. 191. Accessed at
http://www.couragerenewal.org/democracyguide/v36/
on February 2, 2017.

3Marvin
H. Pope, Job.
In
the Anchor Bible Series, (Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Co, 1965)
page 22.

4Carol
A. Newsom “The Book of Job” in The New Interpreter’s Study
Bible Vol IV (Nashville:
Abingdon Press, 1996), page 355.

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

Sermons

“Allowing the Boys to Live” based on Exodus 1:8-22

October 9, 2016February 15, 2020
by Sara Baron

Throughout the Hebrew Bible, the people are reminded that they were once slaves in Egypt. It is used to explain the Sabbath, or maybe just to explain why servants get to have Sabbath too in Ancient Israelite society. It is used in the commandments to take care of the widow, the orphan, and the foreigner as well. Basically, the people are reminded time and time again to have compassion for the vulnerable because they were once a vulnerable population.

However, there aren’t many stories about the people being enslaved in Egypt, this is one of the few. The ones that exist all revolve around Moses, and this story is the prelude to the story of Moses’ birth. It is very difficult to tell if there is any authentic memory underneath this story, because it is an old enough story that there really shouldn’t be and yet there are such epically profound truths in it about what it means to be an oppressed people and what subversiveness looks like from within oppression that it feels more true than most stories in the Bible. This story may not be a factual accounting of a particular incident in history, but because it contains so many larger truths, I’m going to treat it as if it is, and let it speak for itself.

According to the end of Genesis, the descendants of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob had all moved down to Egypt during a famine after Joseph had become the right hand person to the Pharaoh. Joseph had urged them to come down, where he could ensure that they would have sufficient food and land to be safe. The story explained that Joseph had interpreted the Pharaoh’s dream and predicted 7 years of excellent harvests followed by 7 years of famine. Pharaoh was so pleased that he elevated Joseph to the 2^nd highest office in the land, and while there Joseph reigned over an agricultural policy that completely impoverished the entire nation and brought their wealth into the Pharaoh’s hands. The people ended up selling their livestock, their land, and then themselves for access to Joseph’s grain stores.

So the same guy who “saved” his family did so while utterly destroying the people of the nation he was – supposedly – serving. The new Pharaoh “didn’t know Joseph” (the Bible suggests this story happened 400 years later, so that would be reasonable). However, it is a bit ironic that the Hebrews were enslaved by the people who one of their forefathers had masterminded enslaving.

Perhaps that suggests that oppression breeds oppression, and oppressors should be careful. In any case, by the premises of this story, by this time the Egyptians were in full fledge oppressor roles and the Hebrews were enslaved by them and oppressed by them.

In our Bible Study we were struck by the similarities between the story in Exodus and the experiences of slaves here in the United States. There is something universal about this story, and it strikes cords through the eons.

Puah and Shiphrah are midwives who are given an immoral order. They are to kill all the baby boys of their people. The names Puah and Shiphrah are classically Hebrew names, and the text reminds us that they’re Hebrew as well as mentioning twice that they are in awe of God. (The “awe” is often translated “fear” but “awe” is a much better translation.) We are not supposed to miss that they’re Hebrew, or that they’re being ordered to kill the boys of their own ethnic group.

It took me entirely too long to figure out why the boys were to be killed. I was thinking of males as especially strong laborers in the fields, and wondered why you’d want to have fewer of them. If you wanted fewer descendants, I thought, why not kill the girls who have the babies and leave the workers? Our Bible Study participants responded that the death of the male babies meant that the females would be sexually available to the Egyptians, and they’d presume that as half-Egyptian – the next generation would be more pliable and “better.” The participants in the Bible Study figured this out by considering American slave history.

We also noticed the language of fear created around the oppressed group, and the dehumanization of them. The Hebrews are called “powerful” and “numerous” and the myth is that they would do harm for the Egyptians, a myth used to justify enslaving them. It is suggested that they could be spies, or fight against Egypt in a war, or abandon their posts of much needed labor. Therefore, the myth of the oppressors says, we must enslave them and double down on the harm we do to them to keep them below us.

Oppression is very powerful, and human oppressors are capable of extensive harm, but there is a resiliency to life itself, and it fights back when life is oppressed. This story says that the more the Hebrews were oppressed the more they multiplied. I think we’re supposed to believe this was God’s hand at work; I think it is more the myth of the Egyptians continuing to justify evil. In any case, both the Hebrews of this story and the African American slaves oppressed in the United States suffered great losses as a community – losses of life and identity, language and culture, dignity and hope. Yet, the communities found ways to fight back, reform, and try again and again. This story suggests that the power to do so came from God, as do many of the songs and stories that remain from the American slave era. God supports the experience of the oppressed in overcoming oppression.

The midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, were unusual women. It doesn’t seem reasonable that only two midwives could have been sufficient for all the births of the Hebrew women, so more likely they were the LEADERS of the midwives. It may even be that they were also midwives to the Egyptian women, as they imply they know the difference between each set of women giving birth. They are BRILLIANT, DEFIANT, and seemingly FEARLESS (although I’d stake a bet that they were terrified even while they kept their cool.)

They are given a direct order by the most powerful man in their country to kill the baby boys of their community and they don’t! If it is true that they were the leaders of the midwives, they give counter instructions. In any case, the voices of all the midwives are united in the shared voices of Puah and Shiphrah, and their voices respond to this immoral command with “no.” They just don’t! It makes me wonder how they had been formed as humans, and what empowered them to know better. The text says it was that they knew God, and I hope it is true for all who know God that our relationship with God empowers us to refuse to follow unjust orders, but I’ve seen it go other ways. How is it that knowing the Holy One can form us into people who more deeply believe in the sacredness of life? How is that being present to God helps us overcome our fears of the powers of the world? How were the midwives able to be so brave? I wish I knew, but for now I’ll accept the premise that God can help us overcome our fears and resist the power of oppression.

Did the midwives refuse the Pharaoh because he was Egyptian? Because the order was so atrocious? Because someone had already been training them on resisting oppression? Was it about who gave it, how terrible it was, or about who they were? How were they strong enough to simply refuse? And how were they wise enough NOT to say “no” to the Pharaoh (who would have killed them and replaced them with someone who would do what he said) but instead to simply not to it? I’d love to know, but for now I’ll accept the premise that God helped them overcome the power of the oppressor.

When they get called back to account for the live baby Israelite boys, they have a crafty answer in hand. They give a compliment to the femininity of the Egyptian women while using the fear of the Hebrews and assumptions about them to their benefit. They respond along the lines of “your women are more feminine and fragile while ours are more like animals.” To be precise, they say, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.” You see? The answer they give manipulates the Pharaoh by complimenting his ethnic group and denigrating theirs, and it is believable to him. They save their boys. To do it they have to imply terrible things about the lack of humanity of the women they were related to, and they did because it was totally worth it.

Puah and Shiphrah aren’t the only ones in history who have played the assumptions of oppressors against the oppressors to gain freedom for the oppressed, but they did it as well as anyone.

Now, the incredible actions of these subversive women to save the lives of Israelite boys ended with things worse off than they started – sort of. The midwives had been told to kill the babies, the tactics then were supposed to be somewhat hidden and covert. Their actions forced his hand to make the death sentence to baby boys OVERT and visible. He continues to order the death of the baby boys, and he makes everyone responsible for it, since he hadn’t been able to control the midwives. In the short term, that meant more babies died.

But in the long term, it meant that the Hebrews lived. The overt action of the Pharaoh led to more subversive actions – by Moses’ mother and sister – and by Pharaoh’s own daughter. The fear of Pharaoh that led to his orders for murder resulted in Moses being raised in his own house – an Israelite boy who he had ordered killed. When Pharaoh raised the stakes it ended up backfiring on him and he eventually lost all his slaves.

It seems important to take note of how it must have felt to be Puah and Shiphrah in the moment when Pharaoh ordered the Hebrew babies to be thrown into the Nile. It would have felt like failure, right? They took risks with their own lives and likely the lives of those who worked with them to save the babies. They took morality and the love of God more seriously than the power of the Pharaoh/King. They fought with their wits about them for the well-being of their people and they won…

Until the Pharaoh made it worse and raised the stakes. They tried to save those baby boys and allow them to live, and then Pharaoh orders everyone to kill the baby boys and the organizational methods of the midwives can’t protect the babies anymore. Puah and Shiphrah must have been dismayed. Yet, the tactics they used ended up in one generation with the freedom of their people – instead of the death of the males of a generation and the rape of that generation’s women. Yes, things got worse. That’s what happens when you fight back against oppression. The oppressors make things worse first. Which means that when women – and men – are forced to use subversive tactics they have to be prepared for things to get much worse before they get better.

In The United Methodist Church right now, things are getting worse. The many brave people who have refused to follow unjust rules in the church have upset the status quo. Those who are committed to excluding LGBTQ people from full participation in the Body of Christ are furious that they can’t make people follow the rules. As they double-down on exclusion and tightening rules and punishments, they push the UMC toward schism. This weekend in Chicago a group of 1700 people deeply committed to exclusion gathered, and formally launched a para-Church structure they are calling the Wesleyan Covenant Association. Their first demand is that the Church end the resistance to exclusion once and for all. Since we all know that the progressives fighting for inclusion will not be silenced that is not possible. They suggest, that if resistance can’t be silenced that a plan needs to be developed to divide the denomination. Things are getting worse.

That means we are on the road to ending oppression. Thanks be to God for the midwives and all those willing and able to follow their lead. What a joy it is, in God’s holy name, to be part of ending oppression in any form. 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

October 9, 2016