A Global Covenant of Peace: Genesis 9: 8-17

*This sermon was preached on the first Sunday of Lent, February 26, 2012 with a Lenten theme of "A New Covenant."


The Noah story is a tale of terror, a horror story of global apocalypse. What? This
beloved children’s story? Although we most often think of it as a children’s story, the Noah story must be read as a story for adults. Our first reading of the Noah story was probably as a child in Sunday School. Childhood images of the Noah story have stuck in our heads. Ark floating peacefully on the water. Smiling animals stuffed inside the bobbing boat. Giraffe head poking through the ark window. Noah's hand reaching out to feel for drops of rain. Dove with olive branch. Rainbow arched across the clear blue sky. And all is well on the earth. That's the children's version. And unfortunately, many of us still read the story through the lens of our childhood. Understandably, our children's version leaves out the utter destruction of the story. As children we didn't read Noah and the flood as the tale of those who survived the total annihilation of all creation.

If we read the story of Noah as a children's story, we will continue to avoid the interpretive work of struggling with the questions it raises. We need to face head on the problematic issues in the text as we reread this story as adults. To read the story as an adult may mean reading it as it is read within the Jewish tradition---with the freedom to raise questions about the story without feeling our faith will be denied, the Bible will be denigrated, or God will be disturbed. And raising questions doesn't mean we will get satisfactory answers to all our questions. An important part of adult faith is wrestling with our holy texts and living with the questions that remain.

An adult reading might begin with some of the problematic issues surrounding the Noah character. The text says that the world was irredeemably wicked and Noah was "alone righteous, blameless in his generation." Was Noah really the only righteous person in the whole wide world? Of all the people in the world was there not at least one other person worth saving? What about the children in diapers who perished under the waves? Were they all "bad seeds," mere fish food? Must they have suffered along with the wicked? Should we, and even more so God, ever look at humans as irredeemable? Was humanity really more wicked and beyond saving than other countless moments in human history? Did all those outside the ark deserve death by drowning?

I once wrote a poem on the flood that took a sympathetic position toward those left outside the ark. I entitled it One guy outside the ark:

a sour stream runs through my life
it rushes through the canyons of my days
wearing my body thin, tearing up my roots
who can fight against the torrents of God,
against the headwaters of Yahweh's foul flood?

I am not Noah, nor one of his relatives
I am just a poor guy who missed getting into the ark
before the door slammed shut with a loud bang
the blood drained from my face
as the slow drip of water fell from the sky

The water is beginning to rise
and the boat begins to creak
I feel the wetness on my feet
I cry out and bang my fists bloody on the ark door
the water rises to my ankles, then my legs

my voice is going hoarse from the screaming
my knees are now covered in the mud and debris
It's up to my waist, my chest, now my neck
the churning waters try to pull me under

I stand on my tip toes and look up into the gray sky
shouting to the Noah-god as the water reaches my mouth
I gurgle to the heavens, "please open the door for me...
there is still room in the ark for one more...
open the door before I............

Were all those outside the ark really so bad as to die at the hands of an angry, vengeful god?

Now, stay with me. I think we must also ask: Was Noah really such a tzaddik, a righteous person? Was he as righteous as Oscar Schindler. The story of his life was entitled, Schindler’s Ark. In an utterly wicked generation, Oscar Schindler was a womanizer and scoundrel, schmoozing with the Nazis. Yet, unlike Noah, he didn't simply think of himself, but tried to save others from the flood of the Nazi holocaust. Was Noah more righteous than the womanizer Oscar Schindler? Can we consider Noah a mere "innocent bystander," not uttering a word of protest amidst the screaming, gurgling and gasping for air, the clawing and pounding at the gofer wood door, and remaining silent at the sight of all the muck and mess and bloated bodies lying in front of the ark's open door? Can anyone be called "righteous,” who stands by silently, protecting themselves while others suffer tragically? Would we call "righteous" those who stood by and said and did nothing during the holocaust? Doesn't righteousness mean speaking up or doing something for the victims, expressing concern for others beyond ourselves?

Abraham was a tzaddik, a righteous person. He argued with God in an attempt to spare the people of Sodom and Gomorrah who were facing annihilation. Was Noah really all that blameless? After leaving the ark he got stinkin' drunk, lay in his tent naked as a jay bird exposing himself to his children, then overreacted by cursing his grandchild because his son saw him in his birthday suit! Why curse his grandson? Would we consider such a man as a moral example, a hero of our faith? Was Noah that righteous or just the most righteous in his generation, which was probably not saying a whole heck of a lot? Or, as the biblical text and Jewish commentary indicate, did Noah merely find favor in God's eyes? That is, was he saved by God's sheer grace?

Don’t tune me out yet. A few more hard questions. I’m hoping not to be struck by lightning! What about God's hand in this shetef (flood), this "humanicide"? In our story we have a God who regrets having made humanity. People, supposedly we're talking about the God of the universe, God with a capital "G." God regrets having created humanity? Shouldn't God have thought this through before Genesis chapter two? A little forethought might have been nice before wiping out all of creation. I mean it's not like God didn't have time to figure out that we humans were going to blow it. I could have told God that! Wasn't God being just a bit rash? What would you think if a parent looked at their own children and said, "I regret having created these children. It makes me so sad they turned out so bad, so I guess I'll just have to wipe them off the face of the earth and start all over again, like starting a new game of “cosmic Monopoly.” Oh, but I will spare little Johnny and his friends"?

We consider it “childish behavior” when the child doesn't like the sand castle he made and says, "I don't like this!" and throws a fit and knocks it down. The problem is after God knocks down the sandcastle of this world, the new one isn't a whole heck of a lot better. According to the story, after totally destroying all of life on earth, except in the ark, the text says God finally learns something about us humans that God didn't seem to know before the flood---we humans are evil from the start. It’s not just that we humans do bad things. We are bad to the bone! But then, God repents. God changes his mind. He rethinks this whole apocalyptic destruction thing. Well, maybe by using water. Some think God will use fire next time! Much cleaner approach. As long as the earth lasts and the seasons change, God will not kill us all off with a flood again. Does the God of Noah need an education at the expense of all of created life?

Or, we might ask of the text, was the destruction of all living things really necessary? Total annihilation? I mean, this was a cataclysm beyond the help of the Red Cross and Mennonite Disaster Service! Wasn't this overreacting a bit? Could not God have been a little more selective in judging the world? Remember the children in diapers outside the ark? Well, tell me also, what horror had the hippos done? What was the sin of the sparrows? What crime had the kangaroos committed? Isn't nondiscriminating, mass genocide or "cosmocide" overdoing it a bit? Does the punishment fit the crime? Like Noah, does God need to learn some self-restraint and to not overreact so much? Tough questions I think an adult faith needs to ask.

Now, we realize that the ancient writer of the story presents God from a very human point of view. I have been questioning the text from a modern viewpoint, wrestling with the text, questioning the god portrayed, probing for its truth. Some of us may want to stick with the children’s version of the story with drifting ark with animal heads poking out and the rainbow arching overhead. But, as adults I think we may need to ask these kinds of questions of the Noah story. Remember, this is not a child's story. It's a story for adults. This is tale of terror to wrestle with.

At the same time that this is a tale of terror, it is also a story of hope and global peace. This story has some affirmative things to say to us as a people. Admittedly, the God of Noah brings both weal and woe, judgment and grace. However we understand or whatever we think of Noah’s “God,” this God is one whose heart grieves humanity’s wickedness, rebellion, and violence, like a parent grieves a wayward child. The God of Noah calls for humanity to avoid the shedding of blood or the taking of human life. God says, “I will require a reckoning for human life.” Violence and killing must be countered with justice.

Then, God establishes a covenant with Noah and his descendants. This is a covenant with all of humanity. God binds God’s own Self to this irrevocable covenant with humanity to never again destroy the earth by a flood. God’s cosmic weapons will “never again” be drawn. What has changed is not humanity or creation. God has changed. This does not mean that evil has ceased or that war, death or destruction will not come. It does mean that these destructive things are not rooted in the heart of God. They do not reflect God’s desire for retribution or vengeance.

I wonder if what we see reflected in this ancient tale of terror and this story of hope is a primitive grasping after an understanding of God or Reality. Since in this early human grappling with Reality all things come from God, does the story place the chaos and destructive nature of creation in the lap of God? We know that this story is borrowed and modified from Babylonian stories of a flood. Aren’t floods a sign of an angry God? Do we see in this tale not only a revolution in God’s heart, but a revolution in our human perception of God as being for us and offering undeserved grace toward all humanity and creation? Possibly what we have reflected in this ancient story of Noah is a seismic shift in humanity’s understanding of God or Reality as turned toward grace and peace. I wonder.

The sign of the covenant with Noah and his descendants is a rainbow in the sky. It is a promise to humanity and creation. The bow represents not just a weapon, but an undrawn weapon. God is no longer looking for an enemy. God will not be “brain-washed” by the destructive flood as a symbol of divine retribution. God will look upon the rainbow and remember this global covenant of peace with humanity and creation.

We can align ourselves with this cosmic shift toward peace, this divine covenant of peace with all humanity and with creation. As descendants of Noah, as God’s children, as partners with creation, as followers of Jesus, as Peacemakers, and Anabaptist-Mennonites, we align our lives with the God who proclaimed this global covenant of peace. Not only is this a covenant that speaks to global peacemaking, but also to ecological concerns, for God made this covenant with “every living creature.”

If the heart of God has turned toward peace with humanity and creation, then to align our lives with this God is to follow the way of peace and preservation, conciliation and conservation. We could say the same as followers of Christ. If we align our lives with Jesus Christ, we will be a people of peace. Our symbols are the dove with the olive branch and the unstrung bow overarching the earth. As Menno Simons sang with his life: We are people of God’s peace as a new creation…a new covenant of peace binds us all together. This is the covenant that binds us together with God as a congregation and as a people. This is our collective identity. This is who we are as a people. This is who we are as descendants of Noah. This is who we are as followers of Christ. We are people of God’s peace.

At the same time, God’s covenant of peace transcends our own nation, our own faith tradition, our own denomination. This is a global covenant of peace. It is a covenant with all the descendants of Noah, a covenant with all of creation. So, we can celebrate wherever the descendants of Noah honor and nurture God’s global covenant of peace with humanity and creation. While the world may continue to be flooded in chaos and violence and humans destroy the environment, there are descendants of Noah who remember, honor, and nurture God’s global covenant of peace.

Transformed by Degrees: Exodus 34:29-35; Luke 9:28-36; II Corinthians 3:12-4:2

*This sermon was preached on Transfiguration Sunday, February 19, 2012 at Zion Mennonite Chuch, Hubbard, Oregon.


One in a million is awake to the divine life. So said Henry David Thoreau in his famous writing Walden. Thoreau goes on to say: To be awake is to be alive. I have yet met a (person) who was quite awake. How could I have looked (them) in the face? The words of Thoreau remind me of the story of Moses, when he came down from Mt. Sinai following a rendezvous with God. The people couldn't look upon his face because of its radiance. His own face had been transformed by gazing upon the face of God. Where, today, are the faces of those who are awake to the divine life? Who has been transformed by the splendor of God?

We may have difficulty beholding the radiant splendor of God's presence. Unlike Moses, most of us don't commune with God face-to-face. Our encounter with God comes through splinters of the reflected glory of God that shine through occasionally when we read the scriptures, break the bread and drink the cup, listen to our favorite music, sit alone in silence, watch a child playing, or bask in the setting sun. Shafts of God's glory sometimes beam through the cracks in the curtain of this world and we catch our breath.

Imagine what might happen if God's glory broke through the veil of this world unhindered and unmediated. We would all need crash helmets and fire suits to protect us. We're like the Israelites who, according to one interpretation, were afraid of even the reflected glory of God in the face of Moses, so he had to wear a veil in their presence. The Hebrew people believed that a direct encounter with the splendor and awe-full glory of God could mean death. That's why a rope was tied to the leg of the High Priest before he entered into the Holy of Holies, just in case he kicked the bucket they could pull him out without having to go in after him. Pulitzer prize winning writer Annie Dillard once remarked that she often thinks of the various parts of the church's worship as words people have successfully addressed to God without their getting killed.

Rudolph Otto, in his classic study The Idea of the Holy, describes the human experience of this mysterious, awe of God. His term for it is Mysterium Tremendum. Mysterium points to the awe-inspiring, incomprehensible, unutterable experience of a Wholly Other God. Tremendum indicates the aweful, fearful aspect of encountering God. The terrible glory of God is both fascinating and fearful. This experience of God's radiant presence is dramatized in Steven Spielberg's movie Raiders of the Lost Ark. A sinister archaeologist poses as a Hebrew high priest and dares to invoke the Shekinah or Glorious Presence from the ark of the covenant that had been recovered in an Egyptian tomb by the Nazis. At first the priest is fascinated and overwhelmed by the light of God that begins to arise from the open ark. Then, after a moment a deep rumble and moan begins to rise up from the ark of God's presence. The horrible light of God consumes the priest and all the Nazi soldiers who stand near the ark with their unholy feet trampling on sacred ground. The unveiled glory of God is too aweful for any human to behold directly.

But, in Christ we see clearly the radiant reflection of God's glorious presence. The story of the transfiguration dramatizes this truth. Like Moses on the mountain, Jesus radiates the glory of God. The disciples get a peek at God's splendor shining through Jesus. The veil of his humanity is pulled back for a moment and we catch a glimpse of the glory that was and is and is to come. Edwin Muir, in his poem Transfiguration, has the disciples looking back on their experience of the transfiguration and asking,

Was it a vision?
Or did we see that day the unseeable
One glory of the everlasting world
perpetually at work, though never seen
Since Eden locked the gate that's everywhere
and nowhere?

"In Christ the veil has been removed from our faces," says the apostle Paul. We all, with open face behold as in a glass the glory of the Lord. Christ is the glass that reflects into our eyes the awesome glory of God, like looking at the brilliant sun through the windshield of our car near the end of the day. Christ is the bright reflection of God, which we can bear to gaze upon with unveiled faces. To see in the face of Christ the glory of God is to be, in the words of Thoreau, awake and alive to the divine life.

For Christ is the untarnished icon of God. Paul uses the term eikon or "image" to describe the reflected glory of God in Christ. Christ is the icon or image of God. In Orthodox Christian churches icons or painted images of Christ, surrounded in shining gold leaf and with a hallooed head, are used in worship. The Orthodox worshipper may bow down before the icon, light a candle in front of it, and pray to God while meditating upon the icon. The icon is believed to re-present Christ in such a way that Christ is present through the icon. As the icon of God, Christ re-presents the presence and glory of God. Christ is the meeting place, the blood and bone sanctuary where we meet God. Christ reflects the unbearable splendor of God not only in his transfiguration and resurrection, but also in his life and death. In the transfiguration we see clearly the brilliance of God in the veil of Jesus' human flesh. So that with unveiled faces we may behold in Christ, the icon of God, the reflection of God's awesome and terrible brilliance.

What's amazing is that we are being transformed into that very image little by little. Paul says that as we behold the glory of God in Christ, we're being changed into that image or icon from glory to glory. Origen, an early church leader, put it like this: The human who has been made in the image of God by contemplating the divine image...(will) receive...that form... By degrees we are changed into that which we contemplate. This is true negatively as well as positively. For example, children who grow up with their minds filled with TV violence, see violence in their schools and on their streets, and hear violence justified by their political leaders, become, little by little, what they have fed into their minds and hearts. We are changed, bit by bit, into what we contemplate. As we read, study, imagine, meditate upon, hear, and apply the word of Christ to our daily lives, little by little we become what we contemplate. In spoonfuls, we become more Christ-like. We become icons of Christ.

We are becoming more and more icons of Christ, through whom the glory of God in Christ shines. We become icons as our lives reflect the light of Christ through meditation, visualizing ourselves in God’s image, reflecting on the story of Christ’s life, shaping our lives by imitating the image of the living Christ. That's an awesome thought and responsibility; one which we shouldn't take lightly.
As icons of God in Christ we are to be ready to let our lights shine before others so that they may see the splendor of God's glory reflected within and around us. We re-present to those around us the image of Christ, at times the only image of God that others will see, no matter how dusty and tarnished we may be. As we continue to fix our eyes on the image of Christ, we are bit by bit, glory to glory, being transformed into the radiant image of Christ. The amazing truth is that it is in our faces that others will see the image of the divine face.

In a pleasant, sunny valley surrounded by lofty mountains, lived a girl named Christa. On the side of one of the mountains, in bold relief, nature had carved the image of a gigantic face. From the steps of her cottage Christa would gaze intently upon the stone face. Her mother had told her that someday a stranger would come to the valley who looked just like the image of the Face on the Mountain. The coming of this wayfaring stranger would bring the light of joy to the entire community. "Mother," said the girl, "I wish the face could speak, for it looks so kind that its voice must be pleasant. If I were to see a person with such a face, I believe I would be a different person." So, Christa continued to gaze at the Face on the Mountain for hours on end.

Several times the rumor spread that the long-awaited stranger whose face reflected the image of the mountain's face was coming, but each time the person arrived the rumor proved to be false. Years past and Christa had grown into adulthood, doing good to all people. The people of the village loved Christa. As she aged, Christa still waited for the arrival of the long-expected stranger, whose face reflected the image of the Face on the mountain.

One day a poet came to the valley. He heard about the prophecy concerning the Face on the Mountain. One evening, when the sun was setting, he saw Christa going about her business of helping others. As the last rays of light flooded the massive outlines of the distant mountainside, they fell on Christa's face. The poet cried aloud to all the people in the valley, "Behold! Behold! Christa herself is the image of the Face on the Mountain!" Then, all the people looked and, sure enough, they saw what the poet said was true. By looking day by day upon the Face on the Mountain, little by little Christa had been transformed into the very image of that majestic face.

And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory
of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being
transformed into the same image from one degree of
glory to another.

So let us, who gaze into the transfigured face of Christ, contemplate these words of contemplative Thomas Merton:


Make ready for Christ
Whose smile
like lightning
Sets free the song of everlasting glory,
that now sleeps
in your paper flesh
like dynamite

Healing Racism: 2 Kings 5:1-15

*Prophetic sermons are sometimes difficult to preach, but it is often necessary to tell the truth. This sermon was no exception. It was preached with some "fear and trembling" on Sunday, February 12 at a white congregation by a white preacher.


When Barack Obama was elected as the first African-American president of the United States, there was a lot of talk about the US becoming a “post-racial” society. Supposedly racism was now a thing of the past along with slavery, white hoods, Jim Crow laws, segregation, and discrimination. How could our society be racist when we had elected a black president? But, I, and others, didn’t fall for this line.

Usually the ugly face of racism is more subtle, hidden, or disguised under a mask of concern for the equal rights of everyone, including whites, who have more than our equal share of benefits and privileges in our society. Recently, in the Republican primaries, racism blatantly showed its ugly face again. Now, I don’t exclude Democrats from racism. Just a few examples being, Roosevelt’s Japanese internment camps, Robert Byrd and other democrats’ membership in the KKK, democratic filibustering of the civil rights act, just to name a few. Democrats are equal opportunity offenders! I use incidents during the Republican primaries primarily because they are very recent, sustained, overt and public examples of racism that are usually exhibited with a bit more subtlety and more often couched in coded language within the public square.

On Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday beneath a Confederate flag flying over South Carolina, Newt Gingerich unapologetically put Juan Williams, a conservative black journalist, in his place for being an “uppity negro" when he asked Gingerich about the racist overtones of calling Obama a “food stamp” president and suggesting that black people are lazy and their children should be given mops and brooms to learn the value of hard work. Newt’s condescending backlash at “Juan” drew the applause of the audience.

This was one of a number of more overt examples of racist political rhetoric during the Republican primaries. Ron Paul argued that the landmark federal legislation that dismantled Jim Crow segregation in the 1960s was a moral evil and a violation of white people’s liberty. And we could go on about his other comments about most black males being criminals. Rick Santorum told white conservative voters that he doesn’t want to “make black people’s lives better by giving them somebody else’s money,” meaning “white people’s money.” Yet, the fact is 84% of welfare recipients in Iowa, where he made the comment, are white. Mitt Romney used the phrase “Keep America America” reflecting the Ku Klux Klan’s phrase “Keep America, American.” And it doesn’t take a genius at breaking codes to understand that in the phrase “Keep America, America” the second America equals “white.” And finally, Michelle Backmann stated that black families were stronger during slavery than in freedom. Again, racism is just as much a part of the Democratic party, but this recent sustained barrage of public racism, along with thousands of other ongoing examples since Obama’s presidency, reveal clearly that we are not living in some kind of “post-racial” society.

Racism is still alive and well. Whether or not we are prejudiced against people of color, racism is a reality that permeates North American society. In this post-civil rights era we are encountering a far more ingrained, deeply rooted, subtle form of racism that is more difficult to recognize and to heal. The story of Naaman and his healing from leprosy can serve as a narrative metaphor to address another kind of healing needed today----the healing of racism.

The story of Naaman begins in the land of Aram. Naaman was the commander of the Aramean army, a mighty warrior held in high honor and esteem. He was afflicted a skin problem; leprosy. Even though his "leprosy" was probably only a mild form of skin disease, it must have caused him untold moments of social embarrassment. Naaman's wife heard through her slave girl of a prophet in Samaria, who can cure him. She told her husband. Naaman decided to send a letter to the prophet through the official royal channel of King Hazael of Aram. Naaman was able to use his power and privilege to get what he wanted. I could comment on how that works for whites in American society, but I’ll let that one pass for now.

Upon receiving an official communique from the king of Syria asking that Naaman be healed King Joram of Israel ripped his clothes. He couldn't heal Naaman of leprosy any more than having an African-American president can heal our nation’s racism. Elisha informed the king that Naaman needed to come to him. Surely this bruised Naaman's ethnic ego.

Naaman's skin problem was bad enough to cause him to take the risk of stepping over to the other side of the tracks. Naaman gathered his entourage and headed south of the border. He was probably singing, “I’m proud to be an Aramean, where at least I know I’m free.” As he halted his chariots in front of Elisha's house the coins he brought jingled. Still wrapped up in a flag of ethnic and nationalistic pride, Naaman didn't even get down from his chariot to speak directly to Elisha. Elisha, who was a dignitary in his own right, must have considered this a slap in the face, something akin to calling an African-American man a “boy.” So, he responded in kind by sending out a messenger to Naaman to tell him a thing or two. Elisha's messenger told Naaman that he must go and wash himself seven times in the muddy Jordan River, another big blow to Naaman's ethnic ego. This demand raised the hackles on Naaman's skin and he stormed away infuriated.

In our story we find Naaman infected with an ethnocentric worldview. Admittedly, he did have to eat a slice of humble pie in order to cross the border into a foreign land and to stand before a foreign prophet of a foreign God. Naaman wasn't looking for any long term relationship with another ethnic group. Maybe all he wanted was to be able to say, “Hey, I’m not prejudiced. Why, I even know some Israelites.I’ve been to their country.” Naaman wanted to do his deed and get the heck out of there. This was kind of like the hit-and-run approach of short-term mission work. Go to some ethnic community, do your thing, and then go back to right side of the tracks, with no long term commitments.

Naaman figured his healing wouldn’t take too long. He expected Elisha to come out to him, like one of the priests of his own religion. The prophet was supposed to call on his god's name, magically wave his hand over Naaman's spotted skin, and abracadabra, he would be healed. Then, he would be on his merry way. Instead, Elisha told him to go and wash himself in Israel's Jordan River. "What? Are you nuts? Aren't the Arbana and Pharpar rivers, the rivers of my land and people, better than the waters of the Jordan? Why can't I be healed in my own land, among my own people?" What did Elisha's Jewish land and rivers have that were so special? Naaman didn't get it. He had trouble understanding how washing in a foreign, inferior river was going to heal him. Naaman, the river is not the issue here. It's your ethnocentric attitude that needs to get washed away.

Our process for healing racism may begin with overcoming our ethnocentricity. Ethnocentricity is a viewpoint and attitude which says, "My race, my ethnic group is superior to others." In order to understand Naaman's actions and attitude toward another people we need to understand his actions in collective terms more than as an individual attitude. Let's think of Naaman as part of a larger social system of a people displaying prejudiced attitudes toward another people group. Ethnocentricity says, "My people, my nation, my land, my ethnic group is better than yours." Ethnocentricity keeps us from healing relationships. As long as we cling to white superiority and privilege, we will not be able to nurture those relationships which can be healing balm to our lives. Dealing with our ethnocentricity can become the first step on the road to healing racism.

Ethnocentricity blocks the power of God's healing streams that flow through all races, ethnic groups, and nations. To consider our race, our people, our land as better than everyone else's fosters xenophobia, the fear or hatred of the stranger or foreigner. Ethnocentrism has dominated our white, European culture and history. It has resulted in a nation wounded by imperialism, colonialism, slavery, genocide, racism, and violence. Ethnocentrism is, in reality, one of the first words that must be written on the pages of American history. As European Americans we need to be reminded that the land on which we live was not our land to begin with. The death of millions of Native Americans, their ghettoization, and the destruction of many indigenous cultures in the process of taking this land was fed by ethnocentrism. There is no record that any of the white intruders into these native lands looked positively upon the Native American peoples, their religion, or culture. The Naamans who took this land of America thought, "What do the streams of Native American life have to offer to us Europeans? Aren't the cultural streams of our own native lands much cleaner?"

In our own day ethnocentrism still permeates the land founded upon "liberty and justice for all." It has resulted in systemic white racism. One of the ways we blind ourselves to the presence of racism is by thinking of it only in individual terms as racial prejudice. Racism is not about personal prejudice. When we say, "Well, Black people can be just as racist as white people," or throw around ideas like “so-called “reverse racism,” we are thinking of racism in individualistic terms.

Racism is not just a matter of personal prejudice. Mennonite Central Committee's Damascus Road Antiracism training defines racism with this formula: Racism= prejudice + abuse of systemic power. Trainers are adamant upon this analysis in understanding racism, even when white people don't get it. No other ethnic group in our society has the power to enforce their prejudices upon another group, no matter how many individual exceptions we might conjure up to try and negate this systemic reality. Therefore, with this definition racism is primarily a white problem. If anyone still doesn't get it, I suggest that they take the Damascus Road training, another small step into the stream of healing racism.

The disease of racism causes us to break out in a skin condition called "white supremacy." I'm not talking about white supremicists like the KKK marching down the streets in white sheets unashamedly yelling "white power!" I’m talking about the pervasive, prevailing, but unrecognized problem in white American society where white people, white culture, and white religious expression are seen to be the norm. Our ways, white ways, are not only normal and standard, but are superior. White is our social norm. Just look at a “flesh colored” band-aids or crayons. Look at Jesus’ color in our Sunday School pictures. As a collective group white, European Americans hold the most power and privilege in our society. Whites hold economic, judicial, educational, political, and social power. Whether or not we are overtly prejudice or racist in intent, all whites, including myself, participate in and benefit from a racist system, which subordinates and oppresses people of color.

White racism is still with us. Racism is not exclusive to the KKK, the Aryan Nations, and the Skinheads. That's why electing a black president has very little to do with systemic racism. Systemic racism exists in the systems and institutions of our whole society. Racism shows up in pocketbooks, politics, and perceptions. Take, for instance, these findings from some recent surveys and studies. A Census Bureau study from ten years ago revealed that the average college-educated African American man earned less than the average college-educated European man by $10,000 a year. That gap is most likely the same or wider today. Another survey revealed different perceptions among whites and blacks about work among the races. Two-thirds of the whites surveyed believed that African-Americans get "equal pay for equal work," while two-thirds of blacks believed just the opposite.

In another study, for whites an integrated neighborhood is a community with at least one Black household out of fifteen, while for African Americans it is a fifty-fifty ratio. Also concerning housing, another survey showed that 55 percent of whites said blacks are not worse off concerning their homes than other groups with comparable education and income, but 64 per cent of the blacks surveyed believe they are worse off. One survey showed that more than one-third of whites still think blacks tend to be "less ambitious," "breed crime," and "have less native intelligence than whites."

Naaman had a skin problem. Racism is, in a real sense, a skin problem; the problem of power and privilege that comes with having white skin and judging others based upon the amount of melanin in their skin. It is disease that has infected our institutions and infected our social arrangements, including education, housing, job opportunities, economics, legal and judicial systems. Ethnocentrism, white supremacy, and racism block the healing streams of God's power that flows out to all nations, races, and peoples. And we remember from last week how Jesus broke through these types of barriers to allow God’s healing streams to flow to a Samaritan woman.

Healing racism will require that we step into God's healing streams. It will require a religious and social conversion; a baptism against the strong currents of racism. Naaman was cured of his leprosy only as he obeyed the word of God from the foreign prophet, Elisha, and washed himself in the Jordan River. He was not only healed physically from his leprosy, but also personally and spiritually from his egocentricity, and socially from his ethnocentricity. He stood face to face with Elisha and confessed his faith in the God of Israel. A religious and social conversion took place within Naaman's life. His new perspective caused him to act in a rather strange way. He asked to take some dirt from the land of Israel to worship on! Naaman even asked to be pardoned when he bowed within the house of worship of his former god, Rimmon. Naaman missed the point by focusing on the land, like some who wake up to racism and advocate "cultural awareness" or "multicultural training" as a solution to racism. They are missing the point. It’s more than simply appreciating other cultures. It has to do with dismantling the structures that keep the healing streams of life from flowing to all people.

The story of Naaman can point us to the healing waters. Our own spiritual and social healing from the disease of racism will require that we listen to the Word of our universal God that comes from the prophets of other races. We will be called upon to bathe in the living streams of other races and peoples. In order to be healed of our racism we will need to listen to and take seriously the prophetic voices among African Americans, Native Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Asian Americans. Their word may open blind eyes and set captives of racism free. We will need to trust the leadership of people of color to show us the way to the healing streams and not think our way of doing things is always the right or only way. But, be prepared. Our white communities will probably be far more resistant to following the word and leadership of people of color than Naaman was in following Elisha's advice. Yet, the word of our brothers and sisters may be just the Word from God's that we so desperately need to hear for our own healing. The streams of lives and communities different from ours may be the water we need that cleanses us of America's original sin.

To be healed of our skin problem will require stepping into God's healing streams. We can put our toes into the stream by educating ourselves and our children about the dynamics of racism and the cultures of people of color. One of our white privileges is that we don't have to know anything about other cultures or think about race or racism, which is a daily reality for people of color. We can step into healing waters by making long term relations with people of color in our communities, like with Bridging Cultures. We can go waist deep by dealing with racism on a congregational level. Both my wife, Iris, and I have been involved in antiracism work through MCC, Mennonite Mission Network, and MC USA and will continue to advocate for the institutional dismantling of racism, so God’s healing grace can flow freely.

And what does this all mean for Zion? Racism is admittedly a tough topic to tackle in white congregations. Where do we even begin? I don’t suspect Zion has openly and intentionally intended on becoming a “white congregation.” It is not in your constitution, any confessions of faith, or mission statements. But, have you ever sat down and seriously explored the simple question, “Why is Zion a white congregation?” Hopefully, it would be more illuminating than guilt or justification producing. As with most white congregations, this is not a question we have ever had to ask ourselves or would feel comfortable asking ourselves. It’s not a topic we care to or would find any real reason for discussing. If we honestly answered the question, “Why are we a white congregation?,” we would have to explore the historical, traditional, community, social, economic, religious, familial, and attitudinal roots and the boundary markers that have formed us into a white congregation? Just asking and discussing that question among ourselves might be the splash of cold water in the face needed to wake us up.

Or even before discussing that question, we might first begin by recognizing and naming ourselves as “white.” Not so much as a description of our pigment, but as a classification of our racial group’s privileged social and economic status. You see, we have the privilege, unknown to other racial groups, of never have to think of ourselves as a race, let alone as “white” or as a “white congregation.” When have we ever had to be identified like this, “My friend, Dave, he’s a white guy,” “I go to a white church over in Hubbard,” “Yeah, I attend a white school in Canby” “In seminary I studied white theology.” Naming our whiteness and its privileges and problems may be just putting our little toe in the river, but it might be a start toward healing our racism.

Some of us may still be wondering what in the world the story of Naaman has to do with ethnic/racial issues. Isn't this stretching the application a bit? Well, a precedent for applying the story of Naaman to ethnic issues was once set by a well known preacher. When he was in his early thirties, just starting his ministry, he preached his first sermon in his home church. He read the scripture text for the morning service and started to preach. The congregation was amazed at the eloquence of his sermon. That was until he got to the part where he applied the Scripture text to their lives. He applied the scriptures to some ethnocentric viewpoints and attitudes of his audience. The preacher simply referred to the familiar story of Naaman and let its meaning bubble up in the well of their consciousness. He said, "There were also many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.” The congregation shifted in their pews and tugged at their collars. The implication was right there in their own Holy Scripture. God is free to choose another people, nationality, or race above their own, through which to act and to bring healing. When the sermon was over the congregation didn't come up to the preacher after the service, smile, and say, "Nice sermon, preacher." Instead, they went into a rage, drove him out of town, and were ready to throw him off the edge of a cliff! Who was that young preacher? Jesus! (Luke 4)

If we are to be healed of our disease of racism, like Naaman we will need to listen to the Word of God coming from unexpected sources and strange sounding requests. Today's prophets are telling us to go and dip ourselves in God's healing waters, however foreign and unfamiliar the streams. It’s time to step into the healing waters.

Breaking Through the Barriers to Life: John 4:5-42

*This sermon was preached at Zion Mennonite Church, Hubbard, Oregon on Sunday, February 5, 2012, the fifth Sunday of Epiphany.

Jesus sits on a rock beside the well at Sychar resting his dusty feet. The hot yellow sun creates heat waves on the horizon. Jesus waits under a date tree for some merciful passerby. His lips are cracked and dry. There’s no clay jar for drawing the water to quench his raging thirst. The sound of jingling ankle bracelets can be heard along with the distant bleating of a goat. A woman, with a water jar balanced ever so precariously on her head, makes her way down the sunbaked road. Her dark almond eyes are painted and her lips pomegranate red. In one nostril is a small silver ring. She comes upon this bone-weary stranger and a conversation begins to flow and life-giving waters begin to gush forth.

This chance meeting of Jesus and a Samaritan woman, as told in the gospel of John, appears to be a normal and natural human encounter. And yet, this ordinary meeting turns into an extraordinary life-giving conversation. Jesus offers the woman something deeper and more soul-quenching than the water from Jacob's well. It is but a symbol of the gift of living water which Jesus offers to her. Living water is the gift God offers in the life of Jesus, who reveals God's gushing gracefulness in life. From her simple encounter with Jesus at Jacob's well this woman's life begins to overflow with living water from a well within. Jesus satisfied her deepest thirst.

If we look closely, we will see there were many invisible barriers that could have dammed up the healing stream that flowed between them. Jesus and the Samaritan woman had to break through a number of barriers in order for God's living water to flow between them. We may not readily see the barriers, but they are in the story. Given all the barriers that existed between them in their particular cultural context, it's a miracle they even met let alone have a life-giving encounter! Everything was working against their conversation ever happening and the flow of God's living water between them.

Jesus asks the woman for a drink. She responds, "How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria." The first words in their conversation indicate two barriers they broke in their meeting. First, they broke through a gender barrier. The fact that Jesus was a man and she a woman was an obstacle which stood like a wall between them. Her question reveals the patriarchal culture of their day. It can also be seen in the reaction of the disciples upon returning: They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman. Men and women, including married couples, did not speak to each other in public. It was not proper first century Mediterranean custom. What makes it even more astonishing is Jesus not only asks for a drink from a woman, but as a rabbi he openly discusses theology with a woman in public.

It hasn't been that long ago women could not drink from the streams of life as men could. And in many situations today women still face barriers to experiencing the fullness of life God offers in the arenas of family, the job market, economics, politics, and religion. Just walk into any number of churches where this story is read and you will find women not allowed to teach or preach or who are serving in limited roles within the church.

How odd that congregations who would restrict women’s place in the church have read this story of the Samaritan woman over and over again. Here was a woman who had a theological discussion with Jesus, preached and "evangelized" the Samaritan people through her personal testimony, and converted many to belief in Jesus as the Messiah! And yet, if she were present today in many churches, she wouldn’t be allowed to preach or she would probably be looked upon as being in a lesser role than a male leader. What’s up with that? Now, Zion Mennonite has moved beyond all that, right? We have a woman as an associate pastor and one woman elder. I’m glad no one at Zion has those old patriarchal attitudes toward women. That’s why I’m sure everyone here will be open to considering a woman as your new pastor. Ahem. Just clearing my throat of some irony. Jesus and the preaching, theologizing, evangelizing Samaritan woman were transgressing the gender boundaries of their day in order to have a life-giving conversation.

Second, they broke through an ethnic/racial barrier. The Samaritan woman was thrown off guard by Jesus initiating a conversation not only because she was a woman and he was a man, but also because she was a Samaritan and he was a Jew. The gospel writer even notes that "Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans." There was enmity between Samaritans and Jews. The Jews considered the Samaritans "half-breeds" in that their Israelite ancestors co-mingled and intermarried with the Gentiles that earlier had colonized their territory. The tension between Jews and Samaritans was proverbial, which makes Jesus' parable of the "good Samaritan" a subversive, counter cultural story. The language of John's comment about Jews and Samaritans not sharing things in common indicates the prevailing attitude that Jews considered Samaritans unclean, particularly their women. By drinking from the pitcher of a Samaritan woman Jesus risked becoming "contaminated."

Remember the separate drinking fountains for Blacks and Whites in America only a few decades ago? This weekend Iris is on a 4 day bus learning tour of the South visiting places where social barriers to the waters of life were walled off by whites. There were even separate drinking fountains for blacks and whites. Whites, including religious folk who had read the story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman, feared being "contaminated" by blacks.

The invisible wall that separates people of color from whites is still a thick one. That wall surrounds most white congregations, including Zion. It has been said that the most segregated day of the week is Sunday. The bricks of this racial barrier are built upon the foundation of white supremacy, privilege and power. But, the racial barrier that damns up God's flow of life is cemented with far more subtle tactics of excluding people of color, such as patronizing attitudes, acceptance of the status quo, and stereotyping. Racism continues to damn up God's gift of ever flowing life to all people. We will explore this theme further next Sunday. Jesus and the Samaritan woman broke through an ethnic/racial barrier in order to share the fountain of life that God freely offers to all.

Third, Jesus and the Samaritan woman broke through a moral barrier. It was not by accident the Samaritan woman came to the well about noon time. Most women came to fill their pitchers with water in the cool of the morning or early evening. This woman comes during the heat of the day, probably to avoid the glaring eyes, furrowed brows, and whispered comments of the other women in the village. Most likely she was not considered one of the most morally upright citizens of Sychar. Jesus knows all too well how true this is. He asks her to go call her husband, as if to open the door for her to confess her lifestyle.

She is something of a Liz Taylor. She has had five husbands and is not married to the man with whom she currently shares her bed. Co-habitation existed in the first century. How shocking! Well, it doesn't seem to shock Jesus. It doesn't even ruffle his feathers. You would think Jesus, being a prophet and a holy man, should have pursued the subject of co-habitation and sex outside marriage with this wicked Jezebel. What kind of prophet is he, anyhow? Jesus doesn't even press the moral issue. It appears that he has a more important issue to discuss with the woman.
But what could be more important than dealing with sexual morality? Jesus, you need to get your priorities straightened out! Maybe Jesus should take some lessons from us. We Americans have sex on the brain. It's a major preoccupation of our culture and our churches. The hot moral issues used to be divorce and co-habitation or "living in sin." Now the big moral issue is homosexuality.

Homosexuality has become a central moral issue of the church, to the exclusion of all other moral issues, like injustice, war, violence, inequity, globalization, materialism, consumerism, and intolerance. And some Mennonites think homosexuality is an issue the church can easily solve with a simplistic bumper sticker theology like, “God said it, I believe it, and that settles it!” Both sides in this debate grab Jesus by the arm and shout, "Jesus is on our side!" and yank him this way and that practically ripping the body of Christ apart. And instead of focusing upon how we together can share the healing streams of God's grace, we remain intensely divided over this moral issue.

Though Jesus is not disinterested in morality and ethics, maybe Jesus isn't always interested in pressing moral issues, particularly in his encounter with real human beings. Maybe Jesus has a more important subject for us to consider. He has within himself God’s wellspring of life to share freely with everyone, no matter what their moral situation. Jesus and the woman broke through the moral barrier that could have hindered the flow of God's life-giving river.

If moral positions don't divide us, then surely religious ones will. The fourth barrier Jesus and the Samaritan woman broke through was a religious, social, and political barrier. Remember, religion and politics were mixed in Jesus' day, along with social attitudes, as they often are today. The Samaritan woman initiated a conversation with Jesus about the differences between Jewish and Samaritan religion. She acknowledged that Jewish worship was centralized at the temple in Jerusalem, while Samaritan worship was centered at Mt. Gerizim. Differences in religion had hardened political and social divisions between Jews and Samaritans.

Is there nothing new under the sun? We have a hard enough time breaking down the barriers between Mennonites who are like us and in our own congregations, let alone trying to break through barriers to find commonality with our Catholic, Orthodox, Episcopal, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Evangelical, Baptist, Nazarene, and Pentecostal brothers and sisters. And we can’t forget about the necessity of dialogue with persons of other religions, like Hindus, Buddhists, and Muslims. Sadly enough, some Christians would just as soon push people from other religions into the well rather than share with them a cup of refreshing water!

And the streams of religion always seems to get mixed up in the political ocean. We see it in the politics of the conservative Right and the liberal Left in the U.S. We have seen it in the religious politics of Bosnia and Serbia, Tutsis and Hutus in Rwanda, Protestants and Catholics in Ireland, Middle Eastern Muslims and American Christians. These rock-hard barriers damn up God's free flowing streams of healing grace and produce stagnant pools of death. What a shock it was for many Americans to hear of a small group of Mennonite Christians, which included my wife Iris, meeting with, eating with, and talking with Iranian President Ahmadinejad out of their faith in this Jesus. How controversial, to follow the example of Jesus who sat, talked, and shared a cup of cold water with a Samaritan woman at a well.

While most Jews would go around Samaria to avoid it when traveling between northern and southern Palestine, our text says Jesus had to go through Samaria, as if it was a spiritual necessity. Maybe there's a real sense in which Christians have to go to the Muslim countries and open conversations with Muslims. And though he spoke of salvation in Jewish terms, Jesus nevertheless chose to speak to the Samaritan woman what they shared in common. He talked about how their same God, who is Spirit and not some tribal god, transcends the differences in their places of worship. Dare we dialogue with people of other denominations and faiths based on what we hold in common? In order for God's life-giving water to flow between Jesus and the Samaritan woman, they had to break through the gender, ethic/racial, moral, religious, social, and political barriers of their day.

What barriers will we need to break through in order for God's life-giving stream to flow to all people? I might suggest that the barriers to the fullness of life God offers to all are often dammed up by these same barricades. Otherwise, why are women still not treated equally with men? Why are most of our communities and congregations still segregated? Why is ecumenical and interfaith dialogue so difficult? Why does the church fall in line with our national agenda of hating our enemies instead of at least trying to talk with them? Why do we quickly judge and look down our noses at those whose moral lives are not perfect, like ours? Ahem! Clearing my throat of some more irony. Two thousand years have passed since Jesus spoke with the Samaritan woman and the issues are still the same.

Let us remember who we are, O children of the baptismal waters. We have been baptized into a community where the barriers to God's living water are dismantled! The barricades to God's river of life have been toppled. We, who have entered the baptismal waters of new life, have been initiated into a new community where the human barriers to God's living water have been removed. The apostle Paul said of all who have been baptized in Christ, "There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:27-28). Elsewhere Paul said Christ is our peace, having broken down the dividing wall between us (Ephesians 2:14). He was most likely using the image of the temple walls which had literal walls that separated God's presence from priests, priests from people, men from women, Jews from Gentiles, and everyone from the impure.

In their grace-full encounter Jesus and the Samaritan dismantled these kinds of invisible walls between them allowing the life-giving water of God to freely flow. When the walls that divide us as human beings are dismantled, God's gurgling brooks of grace flow between people.

Here I Am: I Samuel 3: 1-10

*This sermon was preached at Zion Mennonite Church on the second Sunday of Epiphany, January 15, 2012.

There you are in bed. The alarm clock is set. The red numbers glow in the dark room. All is quiet. Your pillow is fluffed just right. You curl up in your favorite position. But, in a few moments, you know this is going to be a night of tossing and turning. You can't sleep. A voice is stirring a pot full of questions in your head. The voice is relentless. Should I take that new job or not? It's a promotion. The salary and benefits are better. But, do I have what it takes? It will mean taking the kids out of school. Losing friends. Finding a new church. Starting all over. What's best for me, my wife, and my kids? Most importantly, what does God want me to do? A quick glance at the clock and it's 2:00 a.m. You long for some clear vision of what to do. You ache for a clear word.

Most of us would be envious of the clarity of the call of Samuel. We would like to hear the voice of God with the clarity of a phone call on Verizon. Can you hear me now? But, remember, Samuel's call was exceptional. The phone line from heaven was not ringing off the hook then, any more than it is in our day. As the text says: "For the word of the Lord was rare in those days." Not every Tom, Dick, and Harriet got a call from God.

Samuel's unusual call happened something like this. The near blind temple priest Eli was sleeping as snug as a bug on a rug. The temple lamp gave off a dull yellow glow causing shadows to dance like spirits in the room. The wind softly breathed through gaps in the curtains. Young Samuel had lain down near the Ark of the Covenant. The golden cherubim on the ark spread their protecting wings over him like a mother hen. From out of the silence came a whisper as soft as the desert wind. Samuel. One eyelid opened, looked around, and then closed. Samuel. "Here I am," Samuel mumbled, half-asleep. Then both eyes shot open and young Samuel sprang to his feet like a soldier caught sleeping on duty. He ran to the commanding officer, Eli and shook him. "Here I am. You called me?" said Samuel reporting for duty. "I didn't call you. Go back to bed," Eli groaned rolling over and pulling the covers up under his bearded chin. Samuel made his way back to his pallet and went quickly back to sleep. From within the hushed temple the voice came again. Samuel. "Here I am,” Samuel once again spoke back to the darkness. Once again he shook a grouchy Eli, who told him to go back to bed. And once again Samuel lay back down to a troubled sleep.

A third time Samuel heard the mysterious voice calling him. But this time Eli figured out that something unusual must be going on. It must have been the Lord calling him. So he told Samuel to go lay down, and if he heard the voice again he was to respond with words that sounded like a set formula: Speak, Lord, for your servant hears. So, the next time the Lord spoke Samuel heard the message as clear as a church bell.

We would like to hear such a clear and unambiguous voice. We debate with ourselves and struggle with decisions like what vocation should I pursue; should I take that new job offer; should I marry this person; should I go back to school. We systematically weigh the advantages and disadvantages on the scales of our mind. We flip through our busy calendar and logically examine our responsibilities. We have an inner dialogue about our gifts and abilities and try to imagine the risks and sacrifices required before making such decisions. We may even pray. But no answer seems to come from on high.

Most of us don't live in the temple of the Lord. We find it hard enough to just simply cast aside our nets and follow the call of Christ. We have competing loyalties. Job, school, marriage, family, social life, kids sports, enjoying retirement. So, when an invitation comes to teach a Sunday School class, serve as an elder, take a position in church, or the need arises for a new ministry, we look at our time schedule and our divided energies, question our abilities, get anxious, feel guilty, wonder whether it is simply the church that is calling us because it needs workers or is the voice of Christ calling us. And then, we pray that God will just tell us what to do. Speak, Lord, for your servant needs an answer, yesterday. We may toss and turn on our beds of indecision wishing that we would be given a sure word from the Lord. But, it seems like we are living in the days of Samuel, when the word of the Lord is rare.

Hearing and responding to God's call is never a simple affair. At first, Samuel thought it was Eli's voice that he heard calling him. I thought it was my own voice that was speaking to me when I was called to the ministry. The call came at a turning point in my life. Or maybe the call was a turning point in my life. Nevertheless, as a student preparing to graduate from junior college, I was planning on going to art school to be an illustrator, something I had dreamed about since I was Samuel's age. In those days I found myself constantly in "the temple of the Lord" enjoying my involvement with the youth group at my church; voraciously studying the Bible, teaching a youth class, playing drums in the youth choir band. But, when the thought came to me of the possibility of "entering the ministry," I immediately dismissed the thought as my own inner voice.

The only similarity that I have with Samuel's call is that it was repetitive. From the first time the thought of becoming a pastor entered my mind, there wasn't a day that passed that this thought did not spring to the surface of my mind like a beach ball pushed under the water. But this was not just---three times, “speak Lord,” and “I read you loud and clear.” I had this inner dialogue every day for over a month. It was a painful, daily struggle of discernment; talking with a number of pastors about what was going on, constant prayer, wrestling with these daily thoughts, doubting, questioning, self-examination, and in the end, still believing that it was only my own voice. Really, I wanted to become an artist. Deep down I think I knew that I was not the minister-type. And if I did become a minister, it was not going to be based upon personal interest. It had to be the voice of God calling me. By the end of this time I was practically worn out by what I thought was my own nagging inner voice. If I had gone to a therapist at the time I would probably have been diagnosed with Vocational Anxiety Syndrome or some such neurosis.

One night, while driving on the freeway to visit a relative with Iris, that beach ball thought of becoming a pastor surfaced again. I was tired of pushing it back under. So, I missed my turn off and kept driving, knowing I had to make up my mind whether this was my voice or the voice of God. I had never had such an experience before, and have not had one since. I began questioning why my own inner voice would put me through such a struggle and over such a long period of time. Now, I doubted whether it was really my voice. So, a few miles down the road, I finally had to admit to myself that this must be God calling me. When I made that resolution it was like a weight was lifted from off my shoulders and I knew at that instant that my future vocational direction would change and my life would never be the same. A strange additional note: I hadn't mentioned to Iris a thing about my wrestling with this calling. When I told her about it that night on the freeway, intuitively, mysteriously, somehow she already knew that I was struggling with a call to the ministry and had told her mother so that she would have verification when I finally told her about it! God moves in mysterious ways!

God's call is not always that dramatic, nor is it always clear and unambiguous. God's voice may sound like Eli's, or our own, or the wind blowing through the curtains of your mind. Have any of you ever had the thought enter your mind of entering pastoral ministry, teaching theology, or doing missionary work? Most of you would probably quickly consider the pay, the hours, the stress, the responsibility, and immediately respond to the thought, "No way!" Some Mondays I have had that same thought!

But if that thought has ever entered your mind, it is a thought that I would listen to and dialogue with in fear and trembling. I would not quickly dismiss it as my own voice and rollover and go back to sleep. Nor would I jump into such a calling without a great deal of discernment. It is not a commitment one takes lightly. As a matter of fact, I agree with the advice Alan Jones gave in a wonderful book he has written on the call of the ordained ministry. He said, "When someone comes to me for advice about ordination I suggest that he or she avoid it if at all possible! Ordination should be the last resort, the final response to a lover who will not let go." A vocation, a call to the ministry of the Word will in the end, if it is a call from God, be a compelling call, even if it is not always a clear and unambiguous call.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., whose birthday we celebrate today, had a call to ministry that came almost as a natural part of his life, though his call to be a leader of the Southern Freedom Movement came in quite a different way. King said:

My father was a preacher, my grandfather was a preacher and my great-grandfather was preacher. My only brother is a preacher and my father’s brother was preacher. I guess I didn’t have much choice but to be a preacher. I grew up in the church and it was good to me, but one day I realized it was inherited religion. I had never had an experience with God that you must have if you are to walk the lonely paths of this life.

Then as a young pastor I was called to serve a church in Montgomery Alabama, where a woman named Rosa Parks was a member. She decided she was tired of being tired and would no longer sit at the back of bus. I didn’t know what to do but I knew what Jesus wanted me to do. So we stopped riding that bus. For 381 days, we walked.

Then one night at around midnight, when the house was quiet; and King’s wife and baby girl were asleep, he got a telephone call. And it wasn’t a midnight call from God! On the other end was a vicious voice saying mean and hateful things; finally the voice said, “N…r” if you don’t get out of town we will blow your brains out and burn your house down.” Then the caller hung up. King goes on to say:

I couldn’t sleep. All I could think about was my precious baby and my wife. I went to the kitchen thinking a little coffee might help me, then I brought to mind all my recent philosophy and theology, but that didn’t help. I realized I couldn’t call upon my Daddy, 180 miles away in Atlanta. I realized I couldn’t rely on the experience of others with God. I had to call upon God myself. I said, ‘God I am trying to do what is right in your sight, but I am weak and tired.’ Around midnight I heard God say, ‘Martin stand up for justice. Stand up for righteousness. Stand up for Jesus. I will never leave you alone.’

King’s call to ministry came as a part of his family heritage, his involvement in church, his own experience of God beyond “inherited religion,” a congregational invitation, a social context of racism and segregation, a woman tired of discrimination, and his personal experience of God’s voice. King heard God’s voice in the night, like Samuel, but as you look at his whole life it seems as if his vocation chose him.

In the real sense of the word , you do not choose a vocation. A vocation, literally, “a calling,” chooses you. This not only applies to a call to vocational ministry like a pastor, but applies to other vocations, as well as to church leadership. God may call us; choose us, through the voice of our own giftedness. God has planted within each of us our own uniqueness, our own personality, and bank of experiences that lend themselves to certain outlets, expressions, vocations, ministries. Sometimes it takes the mysterious wind of God's breath to blow on those embers within us, to fan the flames of our gifts of service. Then it is a matter of discerning how and where our giftedness, or calling, is given concrete expression.

At other times the voice of God may sound as human as Eli's or the voice of someone from our church's Nominating Committee over the phone or the Educational chairperson after church or the pastor from the pulpit. From one who has struggled to discern God's call, I would not assume that you should immediately say "yes" to any and every invitation to serve, nor to believe that every voice that calls you to leadership or ministry is God's call to you. Neither would I respond upon the basis of guilt, arm twisting, nor because you think that nobody else will do it. I would advise that you look within, listen and pray and examine yourself and your gifts. I would advise that you look at your other obligations, your available time and energy and how it is being used, your other responsibilities to family, friends, job, and community, and your responsibility to nurture yourself.

But, the best advice that I could give to you concerning the discernment of God's call to leadership or service, in whatever form it may take, would be the advice that Eli gave to Samuel. When you want to know if it is God who is calling you, seek solitude or go within yourself for a while and talk to God. And simply say, "Speak, Lord, for your servant listens." I don't guarantee that you will hear a clear, audible voice, like Martin or Samuel saying, "Do this or that or go here or there." But, I honestly believe that God will speak to you somehow, someway. Exactly how or when, I cannot say. But, in the end, through the silence, the struggle of listening, and the ambiguities of discernment, you will know if it is God who is calling you. And once that becomes clear, the real question then becomes "How will you answer?"

Water Marks: Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

*This sermon was preached on the Sunday after Epiphany, January 8, 2012 at Zion Mennonite Church, Hubbard, Oregon.

The oldest known baptistery, constructed around the year 232 AD, was uncovered alongside the Euphrates River at Dura-Europos, once a Roman outpost located in modern Syria. It is located within the home of an early wealthy Christian and is the oldest known building used as a Christian meeting place. It probably accommodated 50-70 worshippers. The baptistery is an open pool surrounded by images. Around the baptistery are frescoes of Adam and Eve, David and Goliath, and the earliest images of Jesus as the Good Shepherd, healing of the paralytic, walking on the water with Peter, and three women at Christ’s tomb. We can see how visuals and art played a key role in the worship of the early church.

If you were one of those baptized in that ancient baptistery, as a catechumen you would have had to sit at the feet of an episcopos or overseer for three years of instruction and examination in preparation for becoming part of that house church. If your vocation was an actor, a government official, a gladiator, or a soldier you would have been immediately turned away from baptism. A clear and certain break from your pagan world was required. Many nights would have been spent before the golden glow of an oil lamp instructed in what it means to live as a Christian, as well as learning the basics like the Lord's Prayer and the Apostle's Creed. Your moral life would be thoroughly examined to see if you were truly breaking free from the surrounding pagan culture. At the weekly Sunday assemblies you would have been able to sit through the service of the Word, but excused when communion was about to be served.

When the day of your baptism approached, most often at sunrise on Easter Sunday, your stomach would probably be growling from fasting on Good Friday and Holy Saturday. Your skin might be wrinkled from various washings and bathings. The darkening sky of Easter eve would have found you once again before the glow of lamps attending an all-night vigil of scripture reading and instruction. The first rays of sun on Easter morning would have warmed you as you walked through the colonnaded courtyard of the Roman home and entered the room where the baptistery was located.

As the cock crows, there you are in the room set aside for baptism. Your eyes fall upon the sparkling baptismal waters with an image of Christ, the Good Shepherd watching over you from above and Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden reminding you of your own sins and brokenness. The episcopos intones a blessing over the clear, rippling water. The aroma of sweet smelling oils floats through the room. You are invited to disrobe, to shed the garments of your old life like a snake sheds its skin. Then, you renounce Satan and his evil works as the wet sign of the cross is drawn on your forehead with warm, fragrant oil.

The cool water splashes and gurgles as you step into the baptismal pool. The leader asks you three questions of faith based upon the Apostles Creed. You respond to each saying, "I believe." With each response you are dunked under the crystal waves. Assistants hold your arms and help you out of the pool. A fresh white robe is placed upon your wet body like a new skin. You are drenched from head to toe in the waters of baptism. The assistants lead you to a large hall where the table is set with flat bread and a pitcher of wine. The assembly welcomes you with the holy kiss. You are now part of this community of Christians, who are ready to break bread and share the cup with you. You have left behind the world you once knew as you stepped out of the baptismal room. You have a new identity. Christ is your Lord. This is your new family. These are your people. You belong to God and the church. You have been marked for life.

This initiatory rite of baptism goes back to the days of Jesus. Along the Jordan River John the Baptizer was drawing crowds of people. They came to hear his fiery preaching and to be dunked beneath the murky waters as a sign of repentance, a moral about face, before God bursts through the doors of time and like a farmer separates the chaff from the wheat. Some thought John to be the Messiah, the Coming Judge. John pointed his finger to the horizon and said, "I dunk you in water. The One who is coming will dunk you in the Holy Spirit and fire!"

Though the temple had its ritual washings for purification, John's baptism was a counter ritual to the temple. His baptism "for the remission of sins" was offered as an alternative rite to those of the temple system, which needed its own purification. As the common people turned from their old lives in preparation for the coming judgment, they were marked as people identified with John and his apocalyptic message of the coming judgment.

One of those who come to be baptized by John is Jesus. He steps waist deep into the brown water with the rest of the people. By all appearances he's just one more sinner come to repent and be scrubbed clean by the Spirit. The reeds along the shore bend in the breeze. Expanding circles spread out around him from the water drops. A crane soars over the surface of the river. John dunks Jesus beneath the watery skin of the river with a splash and gurgle. The dripping of water harmonizes with the mumbling of a prayer as Jesus lifts his wet arms to the heavens. The cobalt blue sky responds to Jesus as if opening to receive his prayer. The Spirit of holiness descends upon him as when Noah's dove finally found a resting place. A thunder clap in the sky speaks, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased."

Jesus is a marked man. His baptism marks him as one identified with sinful humanity. He is one of us, wading right beside us through the murky waters of life. His baptism by John for the remission of sins and identification with sinners would prove to be an embarrassment to the early church. How could a sinless Savior be dunked in the sin-soaked waters with the rest of us? As his mission unfolds we will soon see that Jesus is not embarrassed to cavort with tax-collectors and traitors and to dine with the social outcast. Jesus will continue to be marked as a prophet of the people, a Savior of sinners, Lord of the lost.

Jesus' baptism marks him as one identified with God and God's people. Like a baby born from a watery womb and named by their parents, Jesus emerges from the baptismal waters and is named by his heavenly Parent. Jesus is declared to be God's own beloved Son. Like the kings of ancient Israel, who were anointed with oil to set them apart as exercising a special relationship between God and God's people, Jesus is anointed by the Holy Spirit to be God's representative to the people. But, this wet king will take up the towel of the Suffering Servant and rule with the basin and reign from a cross. The waters of Jesus' baptism mark his identity as one with God and God's people.

Water can leave indelible marks. Consider the rocky banks of a lake where the water has marked the rise and fall of the water level. The winter snow melts and drains off the mountains into the lake. The hot summer sun drinks up the water revealing the lines of years of the ebb and flow of the lake's changing face. Water changes whatever it contacts. I remember storing my artwork in the shower of a garage turned into a small house, where Iris and I lived while serving as youth director in my first church position. The shower had not been used for a long time and the water had been shut off. One day something happened and water backed up through the drain. Even though the water was clear, it left a permanent sign of its presence on all my artwork. Water leaves its mark.

There is another kind of water mark. You can see it on quality paper. That is, if you hold a sheet up to the light. There stamped, almost imperceptibly on the paper, is the identifying water mark of the company from which the paper was produced and the quality of the paper. The water mark identifies the paper and to whom it originally belongs. The scene of Jesus' baptism in Luke's gospel is as if the writer were holding up Jesus' life to light of God to reveal his water mark. There, almost imperceptible, hidden beneath his humanity is his identifying stamp. Holding him up to heaven's light, there is no mistaking to whom he belongs. This is God's Beloved, a servant of the people.

Our baptism is our water mark. It identifies who we are and to whom we belong. In our baptism we are named for who we truly are, God's beloved children, followers of Christ, sealed with the Spirit. Remember, when you knelt in front of the church with your head bowed. To get to that moment, you had to sit through those long, tedious catechism classes, which sometimes bored you to tears. You were a bit nervous as the day for your baptism approached. The new flowered dress or suit jacket was laid out on the bed that Sunday morning. When you got to church, you were trembling and rubbing your hands together. When the time in the service came, the pastor called you to the front. Some passage was read from the Bible and some words said that you can't remember any more. As you knelt down you heard, "I baptize you in the name..." The water streamed down your face. Everyone sitting in the pews was smiling. A firm shake of the hand. The pastor said, "We welcome brother or sister so-and-so to the congregation." Maybe the water was at a stream or in a baptismal pool, or poured over you while you knelt, like at Dura-Europos. But, wherever and however it happened, you were marked for life. You stepped into that stream of saints flowing through the ages that have claimed allegiance to Christ and were engrafted into the church.

In that simple, yet profound act of baptism, we all received our water mark. We publicly declared our identification with Christ and God's Spirit sealed us as one of God's own, stamped on our lives an indelible mark. The application of water in baptism inscribed upon us a mark, not immediately apparent, but which indicates to whom we belong. We are God's children, Christ's followers, born of the Spirit. When you hold us up to the light of God you can see our water mark. We have been marked as followers of Jesus Christ. Our baptism has stamped his life, teachings, death, and resurrection upon us. Christ is our Lord. Our allegiance is to Jesus, his way, his people. No longer is our primary identity one of belonging to the people that makes up our nation, our race, our political party, or even our blood family. We have been marked as members of a people from every nation, tribe, and race set apart by their baptism in the name of Jesus Christ. We have been marked for life.

Occasionally we need to be reminded that we bear an indelible water mark that shows who we truly are. When our job serves us up a cold cup of put downs; when the cacophony of voices on TV blare out at us telling us who we should be; when the flags of other allegiances begin to wave over our heads, it is good for us to take another look at our water mark and remember to whom we ultimately belong.

I once walked into entrance of a sanctuary of a Catholic church in Houston, Texas and was surprised to see a cross-shaped baptismal pool in the floor. Not only was it a delightful surprise to find it in a Catholic church, which most often practices infant baptism by sprinkling, but that this baptismal pool was located right in the entrance way of the sanctuary. Everyone who entered to worship would have to walk by the baptismal pool as they came into the building for worship. I thought it was a wonderful architectural reminder, to all those came through the church's door each week, of their baptism and the covenant they made with God and God's people.

We all need to be reminded that we have participated in a holy bath. We have been set apart as God's beloved, followers of Christ, sealed by the Spirit. We belong to God and God's people. The people sitting in the pews around you are not just friends and acquaintances. They are your family, your community, along with all those who claim allegiance to God in Christ. Remember, above all else, we are God's children. Baptized into Christ. Sealed with the Spirit. Marked for life.

The Word became flesh: John 1:1-14

Prelude to a Poem

Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ Λόγος, καὶ ὁ Λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν Θεόν, καὶ Θεὸς ἦν ὁ Λόγος.

The prologue of the Gospel of John differs from the infancy narratives of the gospels of Matthew and Luke. It is in the form of a poetic narrative. It is written in the language of worship more than that of theology. In essence, it is a hymn of praise to the logos, the Word, who becomes incarnate in human life. John takes us back further than Jesus’ birth to a genesis time “in the beginning.”

Since John’s prologue to his gospel is in poetic form, I would like to echo John’s literary form and share an extended original poem entitled “The Word became flesh” that I have drawn from John’s poem along with visual images that reflect its words, thus the word again becomes flesh, or should I say, icon and image.

_____________________

The Word became flesh


Jesus Christ,
where do we begin?
In the beginning,
which wasn’t a beginning.
At a time
when there was no time.
Long before the morning stars sang together.
Before God’s body
warmed the cool air of stellar space.
Before the world was hung
on invisible string
and spun like a top on its axis.
Before the seas roared in angry voice,
and the trees laughed in the wind.
Before the mountains proudly lifted their heads,
and the deserts cried out in thirst.
Long before an Unseen Hand
scooped up a batch of clay
from a muddy stream
and molded a living sculpture
that caught the breath of angels.
Before pain was etched on the brow
of a solitary face,
or a tear dropped crystalline
from a single eye.
Before the first cry was heard to burst forth
from between a mother’s legs,
or a note was plucked
upon the string of an angel’s lyre.
When the world was but an egg
incubating in the mind of God.
In the beginning.
When all there was
was silence….
and the Word.


The Word.
In the beginning
without beginning.
Eternity spinning in upon itself
and out again.
The Word was as timeless
as God,
as a clock with no hands or face.
As endless as Life.
Without lips to loose labials
or tongue to grunt gutturals.
Without teeth to sing sibilants,
or mouth to speak it into being.
The Word was.
Logos,
Theos,
Reason,
Thought,
Intelligence,
Wisdom.
Ready to communicate
Being.
Ready to speak
the first stammering,
s…s…stuttering syllables.
The Word hung on Sacred lips,
puckered
for the moment it would speak itself
into words that form sentences of reality.
Then, the silence will be broken.
The Word speaks universes, galaxies,
a tiny rotating blue orb,
and finally….
a word of skin and speech
not unlike itself….
a babbling being.


Imagine
the Word as
Woman.
Sophia.
Divine Wisdom.
She waits to woo and win the world,
even before She walks
into the room of time.
One with God,
like two peas in a pod,
twins who wear the same clothes
and think the same thoughts.
Sophia.
Over,
under,
alongside,
around,
through,
behind,
between,
with,
within,
alike,
distinct from,
yet, fully God.
Sophia.
Very God of very God.
One with the Word.
And yet, other.
As other as the babe nestled in Mary’s womb
waiting on the edge of the world
to be born.
In a word,
to be heard.


Without throat, teeth, or tongue,
the Word spoke….
And silence shattered
into a billion stars,
like broken glass
from an opera singer’s high note.


A world was expelled
by a cough from the lungs of God,
spoken into being.
Tinier than a mustard seed
caught in God’s teeth,
it was flung into space
by one able to move mountains
with the blink of an eye,
fill seas with her tears,
create canyons with her footprints,
who says “Be!”
and it is.
After speaking a six-day sentence,
the tongue of the Word rested,
then tasted what She had made
with one luscious lick.
The Word said,
“It tastes mighty good!”
And the Word became
silent….



One day in time,
in eternity
spinning in upon itself
and out again,
Adam’s hand
snapped the string that held the world.
The wobbling world
fell from Eden’s perch
with a CRASHHHH!!
and cracked like a fragile vase
from a Potter’s wheel.
In pain and anguish
the Potter spewed forth colored words
over the broken, gray world.
The words landed
on the tongues of poets and prophets,
who cried out
in the desert
of punctured promises,
wilderness wanderings,
corrupted kings,
tainted temples.
God’s tongue
tasted the nation of her choosing.
It had gone sour.
The Word kept crying out
word upon word upon word.
Holiness,
righteousness,
justice.
The stammering, stuttering Word
stuck on the same sounds,
a broken record,
playing over and over and over
for a broken world
lying on the dying floor.


From deep within the bosom of God
the Word prepared to speak
a word unlike any word
that ever fell on human ear
or rolled off prophet’s tongue.
The Word rumbled around
in the belly of God
awaiting
a mouth to speak it,
a tongue to articulate it,
a body to dance it,
a womb to birth it.
Then, the Word found
an open door into the world,
the only way to enter
the blood and bone sanctuary.


The Word became flesh.
Not like the putting on of clothing
to walk into the cold of winter.
Nor like an ancient actor wearing a mask
that displays personae and hides identity.
The Word became flesh,
vulnerable and vexed,
weak and wearied,
finite and fragile,
flesh.


Just to speak the word
grates across the tongue.
Flesssshhhh.
Paraded and pink
on long legs looking for lonely lovers,
pleasure for pay.
Flesssshhhh.
Tan and taut
as leather stretched over a cage of bones
lying on the streets of Calcutta.
Flessshhh.
Bruised and battered
by angry hands
in a home bittersweet home
where Sophia cries.
Flessshhh.
Pale and pocked
By a four-letter disease
that numbers your days.
Flesssshhhh.
Wrinkled and wormed
lying in a satin-lined box
dust to dust.


The Word became flesssshhh.
Tormented and tempted,
tried and tested,
troubled
and tight enough
to be pierced
and hung out to dry
on two crossed sticks.

The Word
packed up its heavenly tent
and moved to a new home
sweet home
in the belly, of all things
…. a virgin.
From flesh came flesh.
In a barnyard of beasts.
Pushed out onto the hard earth
like raw meat
hanging in the window of a butcher shop.
The screaming wonder
wrapped in strips of cloth,
a mummy for the tomb.
The Word entered the world
of babbling beings
unable to speak…a word.
While angels bent over the earth
silent as a whisper.

Wrapped up tight
in the humanity of that child,
a future of unborn days,
when that fine hair will glisten
with water from the Jordan river,
when those tiny hands will scoop up mud
and heal hollow eyes,
when those lips will drip words of honey
on the tastebuds of hungry ears,
when those two round eyes,
as big as worlds,
will look upon the multitudes
hungry for more than bread,
thirsty for more than wine,
longing for true communion.
The day will come when those small ears
will hear the whispers of heaven
and clothe them in words.
The Word pitched a tent among us,
stretched out the cords of a sacred temple,
nailed them down,
and made our home his home,
our sod his sod,
our God his God.
Even death,
the end of speech,
could not silence him.
The Word still speaks.


The Word that was
and is
and is to come,
is with us.
When we toss and turn
in the sheets of pain,
sit in solitude,
hold the crumbs of our future
in our trembling hands,
or when life bursts through our door
with party horns blaring
and rainbow streamers flying
curly-cue in the air,
or when sitting
on the edge of the world
watching the dying sun
paint the sky with invisible brush
colors that pale the palette of Picasso.
The Word is with us,
when little ones make their singing debut
in the maternity ward,
or when a wrinkled hand drops limp
at the side of a rocking chair
in a rest home,
sweet rest, home.
The Word still speaks
in words wrapped in the swaddling clothes
of the human .


The Word became flesh.
With human face.
Have you seen the Word?
Cardboard-sign-carrier,
broken smile,
broken spirit,
begging near the freeway off ramp.
Shopping-cart-pusher,
looking for cans in the park,
a sleeping place in the dark.
The Word with a face
seen between empty spaces
of iron bars
or at empty places
like local bars.
To miss the face,
the other,
the Word,
among the least of these,
is to stop the ears
to the sound of sacred speech,
and to end up as guilty as a goat
on judgment day.


O, Wondrous Word,
Let us see your face.
As black as night
in a Savannah swamp,
as pale as the moon
on Chesapeake Bay,
as red as mud
on an Oklahoma road,
as brown as earth beneath
Mexican sandals.
O, wonderful Word,
Will we listen for your voice
only in soaring song and silent sanctuary,
in petitioning prayer and preacher’s proclamation,
in bound Bible and believer’s bosom?
Or will we tune our ears
to listen for the Word
in the lost and lonely places,
the forgotten and forsaken places,
the marginal and manger places
of this turning orb?


The Word still speaks
from as far away as forever
or as near as a neighbor.
The Word still speaks
louder than dividing walls that fall.
Quiet as a flower budding
on April’s first birthday.
The Word still speaks
in eternity
spinning in upon itself
and out again
and in the still, small voice
of this moment….
The Word
is with us.
And we behold the glory,
full of grace and truth.
Amen.