{"id":4403,"date":"2025-08-17T18:40:36","date_gmt":"2025-08-17T18:40:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/2025\/08\/17\/frustration-based-on-psalm-801-2-and-8-19\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T17:17:23","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T21:17:23","slug":"frustration-based-on-psalm-801-2-and-8-19","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/2025\/08\/17\/frustration-based-on-psalm-801-2-and-8-19\/","title":{"rendered":"Frustration"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cFrustration\u201d based on Psalm 80:1-2 and 8-19, Isaiah 5:1-7<\/h1>\n
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Photo by John McGarvey found on flickr<\/i><\/p>\n

In our texts today, God is frustrated. In both texts, the same metaphor is used. God is like a vineyard owner who did everything right. God picked good land, dug it and cleared it, planted it with good vines that had been carefully selected and nurtured, protected it with a wall and even a watchtower, and waited the required years before it would yield grapes. In the meantime the wine vats were prepared. The vine grew and was massive.<\/p>\n

But the grapes never came.<\/p>\n

Isaiah makes the metaphor transparent. God expected JUSTICE but saw bloodshed. God planted for right-living but instead got domination.<\/p>\n

So, the story is that God carefully selected people to share a new vision of love in the world, brought the people to the promised land, nurtured and protected them, and watched to see how the vision of justice and equity would play out. It didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m told, actually, it played out quite well for 400 years or so, and maybe that shouldn\u2019t be trivialized. 400 years is a decent amount of time and archeologists who dig in ancient Israel find that for those years the houses were all the same sizes. Which means there wasn\u2019t an accumulation of wealth nor of poverty and that seems to fit the prescribed vision of God pretty well.<\/p>\n

It is important for me to hold on to those 400 years \u2013 the ones before kingship \u2013 as well as to remember that in a lot of societies over the course of history, societies have been capable of mutual care and concern. There have been a lot of ways humans have organized themselves where resources are justly distrusted, where many voices are heard and listened to, where the needs of the whole are prioritized over the desires of the powerful.<\/p>\n

What I can\u2019t figure out is why all societies aren\u2019t like that. Because, truly, that\u2019s better for everyone. The Intersectional Justice Book Club has invited us to read \u201cUnrig the Game: What Women of Color Can Teach Everyone About Winning\u201d by Vanessa Priya Daniel. I\u2019ve been reading it and I thought she summed things up well when she said, \u201cSo much of the fracture of humanity is about our seeming inability to upgrade away from two bugs in the original factory settings of our species: greed and dominance.\u201d (Page 59) She also has some great suggestions on how to respond \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n

When I read the Bible, when I look at Christianity history, and when I look around today, I see that. I see greed and dominance in a variety of formats and formulations. And I see God and God\u2019s people pushing back to say \u201cthis isn\u2019t right.\u201d We aren\u2019t supposed to live in a world of hierarchies \u2013 we\u2019re all made in God\u2019s image. We aren\u2019t supposed to live in a world obsessed with the \u201cnow\u201d at the cost of the future \u2013 killing creation is killing a sacred gift. We aren\u2019t supposed to live in a world where justice applies to some and not all, where food is accessible by some and not all, where care and support are given to some but not all.<\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t supposed to be this way. And it hasn\u2019t always been this way. But heavens, Biblical history isn\u2019t particularly short and these greed and domination problems are PERSISTENT. But it doesn\u2019t have to be this way, it hasn\u2019t always been this way, and it is possible to do it differently.<\/p>\n

Which makes even more sense of God being frustrated, because God had set up the people to do it differently. And they had. And then they stopped.<\/p>\n

Which isn\u2019t the best news. That even when a just society exists, it can stop being one. Darn.<\/p>\n

But, let\u2019s be clear, that\u2019s not our issue right now. Our issue is that we\u2019ve lived in various formations of societies with greed and domination taking precedence for millennia now and at the moment every single bit of progress is slipping away. Compassion wasn\u2019t exactly having an easy time of it at any point in our lives in this society but what was able to be done in the name of compassion is being destroyed systematically.<\/p>\n

Our question is: what know. Bishop Julius Trimble, who is the General Secretary of the General Board of Church and Society of The United Methodist Church wrote an email this week that included these words:<\/p>\n

This is our season for agitation, sustained resistance and disciplined hope<\/b>. The kind of hope and witness born of our Wesleyan heritage and Christian Discipleship. Our Bible and our Book of Discipline give witness that the divine imprint of human dignity and sacred worth originates with God and cannot be taken away by the stroke of a pen or promulgation of any theological or ideological thesis of superiority and isolation.<\/p>\n

The Love Ethic that is so central to the teachings of Jesus and marching orders for the church cannot be free of radical resistance to the oppression of peoples with expectation of quiet acquiescence.<\/p>\n

…This is a time to be counted in the work of bold resistance to all who make adversaries of our neighbors. Join us to do more, speak up more, give more and continue to push for social justice no matter how hard the barrier.<\/p>\n

This is a time to love boldly, serve joyfully and lead courageously.<\/p>\n

In the words of a bold American Academic, Bren\u00e9 Brown, \u201cCourage is contagious.\u201d1<\/a><\/p>\n

My question, then, is what we can do together to keep ourselves focused on God\u2019s dreams for a just society, to support each other in the work of the resistance, and keep ourselves fueled and aflame. Or, to say that more simply \u2013 how do we do this and not burn out?<\/p>\n

The really good news here is that those particular questions are the ones that a faith community are particularly suited to answer!!! We are people who gather together. Who dream together. Who listen to God\u2019s dreams in scriptures and sing them in hymns and pray them together and seek even to live them together. We are people who slow down and try to hear God in nature and in silence and in each other and in those struggling and in EVERYTHING else. But the key is we are people who encourage each other to slow down and listen.<\/p>\n

We are people who PRACTICE the kindom of God. Right? We share \u2013 \u201cour prayers, our presence, our gifts, our service and our witness.\u201d We share what we have in trust that when we all give what we can do together is even more powerful than what any of us could do apart. We engage in shared decision making. Which, let\u2019s be honest, can be slow and annoying. BUT it gets us to better decisions than any other model. We INTENTIONALLY invert hierarchies, pay attention to power, and refuse to accept society\u2019s definitions that suggest some people don\u2019t matter. We practice TRUST \u2013 in God and each other. We, sometimes despite ourselves, work together to maintain hope, because we know hope matters.<\/p>\n

Most of all, we\u2019re in it together. We have shared wisdom, shared resources, shared resilience. When one of us is overwhelmed, others can step up. When one of us needs rest, others can provide it.<\/p>\n

I often think of the wonder that is the fact that choir can hold a note of music indefinitely. No singer can do that, but together, a group of people can. I don\u2019t think there are any organizations better poised to respond to this moment than justice-seeking faith communities and while times ARE hard, I am so grateful to be with you in this. I need to be a part of a community that practices the kindom\u2019s values and you give me hope.<\/p>\n

Because one of these days, those vines that God so carefully planted ARE going to bear fruit and it will be beautiful. And until then, we keep each other going. Thanks be to God who gave us each other. Amen<\/p>\n

1<\/a> Email entitled \u201cIf The Foundations Are Destroyed What Can The Righteous Do?“ Psalm 11:3-4 sent on August 14, 2025<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

August 17, 2025<\/p>\n

Rev. Sara E. Baron\u00a0
First United Methodist Church of Schenectady\u00a0
603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305\u00a0
Pronouns: she\/her\/hers\u00a0
http:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/\u00a0<\/a>
https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/FUMCSchenectady<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cFrustration\u201d based on Psalm 80:1-2 and 8-19, Isaiah 5:1-7 Photo by John McGarvey found on flickr In our texts today, … Continue reading Frustration<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[34,38,28,39,33,1331,1265,1332,56,1330],"class_list":["post-4403","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons","tag-fumc-schenectady","tag-progressive-christianity","tag-rev-sara-e-baron","tag-thinking-church","tag-umc","tag-bearing-fruit","tag-first-umc-schenectady","tag-grapes","tag-schenectady","tag-unrig-the-system"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4403","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4403"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4403\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4628,"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4403\/revisions\/4628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}