{"id":4547,"date":"2021-09-05T17:06:34","date_gmt":"2021-09-05T17:06:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/05\/interconnected-based-on-james-117-27\/"},"modified":"2021-09-05T17:06:34","modified_gmt":"2021-09-05T17:06:34","slug":"interconnected-based-on-james-117-27","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/05\/interconnected-based-on-james-117-27\/","title":{"rendered":"Untitled"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cInterconnected\u201d based on James 1:17-27<\/h1>\n

Welcome to the book of James. It is one of my favorites, despite the fact that it takes away one of my best preaching tools. That is, I usually spend a lot of time explaining context and making sense of a scripture in the time and place it was written. But James is almost a form of wisdom literature. It is universal. So, we’re able to spend our time on the ideas in the book directly.<\/p>\n

James is written to the followers of Jesus in the diaspora \u2013 that is, those who lived outside of the Holy Land. The ones who had been DISPERSED from the land of their ancestors in faith. This feels relevant right now too. I don’t know any church members at FUMC Schenectady who would claim modern Palestine or Israel as their native land, but I think that all of us are displaced from the \u201cland\u201d we once knew, and have not yet settled into the \u201cland\u201d we’ll live in eventually. The Pandemic has displaced us all (although not all the same amount.)<\/p>\n

In this opening chapter of the book of James, we are urged to LIVE our faith. James wants faith in ACTION. He urges people not to just listen to preachers \ud83d\ude09 but to LIVE their faith, and he gets rather specific about it. James believes that people who are followers of Jesus should be acting out different values than the world’s.<\/p>\n

The crux of the advice from today’s passage is \u201clet everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God’s righteousness.\u201d For James, this is integral in what it means to be \u201creligious\u201d – right up there with caring about God’s beloveds who the world doesn’t value (\u201cwidows and orphans.\u201d)<\/p>\n

As far as I can figure it out, the work of Christians is to build the kindom of God. The kindom, sometimes called the beloved community, is God’s vision for the world. We will know it is here when the power of love overcomes the love of power; when the abundant resources of the world are used for the good of all people; when kin-ship connections cross all boundaries; when the poorest and most vulnerable people have enough to survive and thrive; when no one has to teach anyone about God because God is known by all. The kindom is God’s long term plan for us, and our work to get there happens in two broad ways: first, by creating Christian communities where we practice kin-dom values and treat each other like we’re already there and second by working with God to share love, to seek mercy, and advocate for justice so that the world is healed.<\/p>\n

One of the parts of kindom building that can be hard sometimes is that it requires seeing clearly what the world is like now. We have to do this so we can hold it in tension with how God would have the world be in the kindom, but often the aching pain of the world as it is can be hard to let ourselves see clearly. For instance, we can’t work towards a world without rape and violence unless we admit that we live in a world with rape and violence, and that there are barriers to changing it. So, we seek to see clearly. We seek to see how things are AND how God wants them to be.<\/p>\n

Now, I don’t want to shock you or anything, but the United States is a highly individualistic society. (The kindom is not.) We in the US have proven to the world how terribly individualism works \u2013 time and time again. Including in our responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic.<\/p>\n

You might think that if you were looking at this pandemic with clear eyes that you would see that none of us can be well unless all of us are well- that we are collectively only as healthy as the least healthy among us \u2013 that every act of protection and prevention has enormous ripple effects. However, if we had learned this lesson, we’d be spending as much as possible to make it feasible to vaccinate every willing person in the world as soon as possible. We’d even do this before triple vaccinating our own population, because slowing down the spread of the virus is the most important way to keep everyone safe, healthy, and alive. The well being of all and the well being of the USA actually align! Yet, we miss the mark.<\/p>\n

The book of James has an interesting perspective on the relationship that Christians have to the world. In the face of the injustices of the Roman Empire, the wealth inequality, the slavery, the power imbalances, the death rates of the poor, James urges the faithful \u2026 not to get angry.<\/p>\n

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<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

I find that my first instinct is to argue with this a little bit. \u201cAre you sure?\u201d \u201cWhat about when…?\u201d Yet, even as I argue, I am convicted by this passage.<\/p>\n

Society is rife with anger. Anger is pulling us apart at the seams. Some of the anger, I’d argue, is \u201crighteous.\u201d It is a response to injustice that needs to be seen, acknowledged, named, and addressed. We’ll talk about that in a moment.<\/p>\n

Most of the anger is misplaced. The anger is being used to create groups of \u201cus\u201d that stand against \u201cthem,\u201d and those distinctions dismiss that everyone in both groups are beloveds of God. The anger is being used to provoke fear, sell products, pass unjust laws, and elect politicians. The anger is being USED.<\/p>\n

And James points out directly that the people who want others to get angry are selling them on the idea that if they get angry enough, they will provoke God to action. James says it won’t work though. God will act when God will act, and furthermore, prayer is a better way to go about it. Anger serves the people promoting it, not God.<\/p>\n

But what about righteous anger? As I’ve been saying recently, anger is a \u201csecondary\u201d emotion. That is, it exists like a red flag to mark a place where something that is held precious is being violated. It lets us know when our values are attacked, and underneath that is another emotion. Most often anger is there to act as the bodyguard to sadness or the diversion to fear.<\/p>\n

Sadness and fear are sufficient. They can guide us to good action, they can show us the ways of compassion, they can help us grow together. They are wise enough, that once we find them, we can let go of the anger that guided us to them.<\/p>\n

Which means that the way to be \u201cslow to anger\u201d is often to identify anger, and then sit with it and find out what is underneath it. It means that we sometimes need to listen \u2013 to ourselves and our tender emotions. God is there, with us when we listen, with us when we feel, with us when we discover what is under our anger. This is, even, a form of God’s healing, God’s salve in our lives.<\/p>\n

Of course, \u201cbe slow to anger\u201d is the third piece of advice we’re given in today’s passage. The first two are to be quick to listen and slow to speak. It seems clear that James’ advice is aimed at faith COMMUNITIES, because his advice is aimed at deepening and maintaining good relationships among the followers of Jesus.<\/p>\n

For the past several years, I have participated in \u201clistening circles.\u201d These intentional spaces have careful guidelines that are aimed at making sure there is holy and sacred space for listening \u2013 and speaking. At times there have been 20 or 30 people in these circles, and you might think that there would be a lot more speaking than listening. But, there isn’t. Often there are prolonged silences between speakers, and they feel like time to absorb the wisdom one beloved of God has offered. When the obligation to have a response is taken away, along with the tendency toward chit-chat, there is spaciousness for silence and listening.<\/p>\n

When I hear James say, \u201cbe quick to listen, slow to speak\u201d I think of how healing those circles have been in my life. I love being freed from having to have a response to something someone says, and instead just listen to them and receive their wisdom. And, when I do speak into such a space, I am astounded at the power that comes with being heard with love.<\/p>\n

As much as I have loved these experiences though, it isn’t clear to me how to live \u201cbe quick to listen, slow to speak\u201d ALL the time. Really listening to another of God’s beloveds takes energy and attention, and \u2026 let’s be honest dear ones, those are finite resources!!! We will drain ourselves if we try to listen WELL all the time. (I’ve tried.)<\/p>\n

That said, there is a being who is capable of listening with complete attention, and full energy, with love and compassion, with care and support \u2013 all day, every day, to all of us. God, the creator, sustainer, redeemer has gifted us with life, and God is with us breathing new life into us day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute, and even second by second. When we seek God in prayer and meditation, we find that God is close at hand, ready and able to offer us healing. When all we have to offer are sighs too deep for words, God knows what we mean. When we are full of words, God listens until we have exhausted them. When we are able to be with the Divine in holy silence, God meets us there. And, of course, when what we offer God is our listening, \u2026<\/p>\n

well, that’s when things really start to happen \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n

James encourages us to an active faith \u2013 not just to worship God once a week, but to live out faith in every day. He reminds us that the very people the world dismisses (the \u201cwidows and orphans\u201d) are the ones that followers of Christ take care of. James doesn’t hate the world \u2013 though he isn’t impressed with it either – but he doesn’t think being angry with it is going to change it. James encourages the people of faith to act differently. Take care of the struggling and vulnerable, listen deeply, speak with intention, slow down anger and learn its lessons instead of acting it out. Don’t replicate the brokenness of the world \u2013 change it.<\/p>\n

So, dear ones of God, I invite you to God’s restoration, God’s healing of the world, God’s work of the Kindom: be quick to listen; be slow to speak; be slow to anger. With such \u201csimple\u201d acts as these, we can heal the world. May God help us. Amen<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Rev. Sara E. Baron\u00a0<\/p>\n

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady\u00a0<\/p>\n

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305\u00a0<\/p>\n

Pronouns: she\/her\/hers\u00a0<\/p>\n

http:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/FUMCSchenectady<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

September 5, 2021<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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