Some
sermons are not meant to be preached by men.
And this is one of them. To talk
about giving birth as a painful process is merely an abstraction for me. I have no clue, no idea, no way I can
possibly understand what a struggle it is to give birth. I cannot imagine what it is like for some
women to be constricted to bed for the entire nine months. And, my land, nine months! Nine months!
Is there anything in my life for which I have experienced increasing
discomfort, incredible body changes, a flood of hormones, and then terrible
pain to bring it to completion—all over the course of nine months? Give me the epidural. Wake me when it’s over.
To give birth is to
struggle.
Famed African-American abolitionist,
Frederick Douglas, wrote:
The whole history of the progress
of human liberty shows that all concessions yet made to her august claims, have
been born of earnest struggle. The conflict has been exciting, agitating,
all-absorbing, and for the time being, putting all other tumults to silence. It
must do this or it does nothing. If there is no struggle there is no progress.
Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation, are people[
men] who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without
thunder and lightening. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many
waters.[1]
“They
want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters.” Can there be a statement any more true to the
Scripture verse we have before us today?
If the Hebrew people are going to get
to the promised land, from slavery and oppression to liberty and freedom, they
are going to have to travel through the darkness of night, a womb-like
experience, and twice through breaking water—the Red Sea and the Jordan
River. In the Christian church we use
this water mythology during our baptisms to suggest a new birth is occurring,
an adoption is taking place. And these
new births or adoptions do not just happen.
New births and adoptions are often messy, physically taxing, painful,
and almost always a struggle. Have you
ever seen a woman announce to a gathering of women that her pregnancy, labor,
and childbirth were easy? “And I lost
the weight in a week!” I’ve seen
it. Nothing is really said, but you can
see the other women sneering. No
discomfort, no labor, no pain, no struggle--that is the grand exception to a
new birth.
In Jewish mythology, it is said that
struggle is better than a miracle. For a
miracle changes things for only one moment in time. Struggle changes things forever. Struggle changes things forever.
Today our Scripture has the Children
of Israel escaped from slavery in Egypt and pinned against the Red Sea. Pharaoh, who wakes up to the realization that
he has let his cheap work force walk out into the wilderness, and has it dawn
on him that they are not coming back, decides to pursue them with his
army. Perhaps the plagues seem like a
far off dream or perchance Pharaoh wakes up to the fact that he might have to
make his own bricks. Or maybe Pharaoh has been god too, too long
that he still doubts the power of a God who would choose Hebrew slaves. So the army is called, the horses are
mounted, and the chariots assembled to wreak carnage on the Hebrew hordes, the
swarm Pharaoh sought to keep under control by killing their first born males.
“There they are,” he must have
pointed, “caught like cockroaches by the light of day, their God having
delivered them into my hand by leading them to the sea.” And the Children of Israel turn to Moses
foreshadowing the grumbling in the wilderness by saying, “Why, Moses, why bring
us out here to die? Would not it have
been easier just to die in Egypt? Why
get our hopes up and then lead us out here to die?” You see, even the Children of Israel thought
it was just that easy. They wanted no last
labor pains, no struggle. They wanted no
final roar of the ocean with its awful waters.
Moses goes to God in prayer, and, in
effect, God tells Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Children of Israel to go forward, to
step out into the sea, to act, to move their feet.”
Rabbi Michael Siegel says it best, in
talking about this very story, the Children of Israel crying out to Moses and
the Living God and God responding:
For me, one of the most powerful
prayers in all of Scripture is one that has no words, no vocal sounds. It is
not a meditation, but rather a prayer that is nothing more than the sound of a
footstep. Some would say that a footstep does not constitute a prayer, but to
my way of thinking this one step captures the very essence of prayer.
Can you hear the words that God
spoke to Moses now addressed to each of us? Mah Tizak Alai, Why do you cry out
to me?[God says] Go and respond to your own prayer, take a step into the
unknown, take a risk and see what will happen.
Friends, prayer[Rabbi Siegel says] is not a spectator sport Prayer is a
covenantal exercise, in which we work with God to find the answers that we
seek.[2]
If
the Children of Israel are to be born as a new people, if they are to be
created as a free people, they will have to take a step into the unknown, take
a risk and see what will happen.
The story teaches that we are often
like the Children of Israel. We find
ourselves individually or as a family or as a group moving from one place to
the next and we feel boxed in, with chaos on one side and the Egyptian army
bearing down on us from the other. If we
could risk the struggle, risk the next step, perhaps we could give birth to
something that would free us to be the people God has always intended, a new
creation.
Sometimes I hear the upcoming
presidential election like that. Two
candidates promise to be our saviors.
One of them, once elected, will end terrorism, balance the budget, fund
our schools, cut taxes, and deliver brownies to your grandmother. Well, maybe not the brownies part, but you
know what I mean. As we make the
decision for who would be the best candidate to lead our country, we should also
ask ourselves as a nation, “What next steps are we willing to take? What are we willing to risk?”
Church process is also like this story, is it
not? When things get rough or conflict
happens or we are faced with difficult decisions, we hesitate to take the next
step because down deep we want to believe out of some serendipitous moment God
will save and deliver us. Or that growth
is without pain or conflict. We want the
growth without the labor pains. If we
have to struggle too much to get it or enter into too much chaos to give birth
to it, God must not be involved, we reason.
We forget, much like the Children of Israel, that what we are
experiencing is just labor pains.
Progress will not happen without our struggle. As Rabbi Siegel wrote, prayer is a covenantal
process involving our action.
I lost one of my most treasured gifts on the beach
at Tower Hill about a month ago. I’m not
a big jewelry guy so to even think about wearing it meant that it was treasured. It was a foot pendant I wore on a leather
strap. Tracy gave it to me after we had
seen Al Gore’s movie, “An Inconvenient Truth,” about twelve years ago. At the end of the movie, is an African
proverb that says, “When you pray, move your feet.” Whether you liked the movie, believed its
conclusions, or even saw the move, you get the idea. Prayer, relationship with God, is moving
together to bring about freedom and liberation.
So though I’m not much for wearing any jewelry, I
loved it when my wife gave me this simple wooden foot pendant. “When you pray, move your feet.” It is to remember that if I will or wish a
world that is full of love and compassion, gentleness and justice, I best
remember that it will be a struggle.
Every time I would feel the necklace, the foot tapping my collarbone, I
stop my crying and complaining to God long enough to remember that I am a
covenantal partner with God. What next
steps have I taken? What have I
risked? When I pray, have I moved my
feet?
Too often when I go through conflict or experience
difficulty in my life, I assume that God is not in that process. But what the Bible teaches . . . what the
Bible teaches is that that conflict or difficulty, that real life struggle, may
be about labor pains. God may be about
ready to create something new within me.
I just hope and pray it doesn’t take nine months!
This may not be what you came to Zoom church to hear
on a beautiful fall day. You came to
hear joy and gladness to keep you going for the week. But this is the lesson very often taught by
Scripture. Scripture, through its story,
much more often than not, teaches real life, that this is how it is, and not
how it can or will be in ribbons and bows.
The story teaches that the birthing of a new person, a new people,
happens through struggle, a willingness to take that next step, to risk. When
you pray, move your feet. Amen.
[1]
Douglass, Frederick. [1857] (1985). "The Significance of Emancipation in
the West Indies." Speech, Canandaigua, New York, August 3, 1857; collected
in pamphlet by author. In The Frederick Douglass Papers. Series One:
Speeches, Debates, and Interviews. Volume 3: 1855-63. Edited by John W.
Blassingame. New Haven: Yale University Press, p. 204.
[2] Rabbi Michael Siegel, “The
Amen of Action,” 30 Good Minutes,
Chicago Sunday Evening Club, January 23, 2005.
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