B Proper 15 20 Ord Pilg 2021
1 Kings 2:1-9, 23-27
August 15, 2021
This
summer I followed the Revised Common Lectionary to write a sermon series hoping
to lay before you a tradition within Scripture that is strongly
anti-authoritarian. Contained within that
Biblical tradition are values which have early strands of democracy sewn within
them and seek to liberate the oppressed and protect the most vulnerable. Particularly in Jewish faith and tradition,
the most vulnerable are known as the widow, the orphan, the immigrant, and
God’s good creation. Many Biblical
writers earmark unfaithfulness, prophets can readily predict the doom of a
nation, when the nation’s values undo these protections and we begin to see
creation coming undone. The whirlwind is
unleashed. Mountains tremble, the seas
foam and roar, and the soil is despoiled.
These are the canaries in our collective coal mine.
As
people of faith, we are required to engage the Biblical tradition as one of our
tools of discernment. I hope you heard
me sharing some of the Bible’s deep and ancient truths during this sermon
series but also challenging part of its tradition—particularly in this story
line—its patriarchy. The Bible can wax
romantic in some unhealthy ways and, at the same time, critique romantic
nostalgia. For example, in this story
line, we can hear the tradition waxing romantically about King David as the
Chosen One but then critiquing that tradition to say that we are to evaluate,
discern, and judge the integrity of a person not based on some romantic,
Chosen-One status but based on deeper values.
A Chosen-One is chosen not because it is foretold but because they
reflect God’s own heart through a love of neighbor, the practice of justice and
defense of the vulnerable, and care and compassion for all of creation. In other words, the Bible also says the
“Chosen-One” is revealed through their life and practice. Even
the greatest of leaders, foretold or not, should be held accountable for their
violence, cruelty, and lack of integrity.
I
hope you have heard me at least imply these Biblical truths at one time or
another during this sermon series. The
Bible is incredibly complex, often with diverse messages, sometimes with
messages that stand diametrically opposed to one another. But there are times when you can see one
tradition talking to another over long stretches of Biblical narrative. For example, when the people ask the prophet
Samuel to appoint for them a king, and Samuel returns to tell them what God has
said the king will do. The king will
take away—repeated over and over again.
Much later in the Biblical narrative, aware of the earlier story, the
story tells how King David rapes Bathsheba and kills the faithful warrior
Uriah. Repeated over and over, in lieu
of the words “take away,” the actions of King David are noted by the word
“send” to reflect his unwillingness to take personal responsibility for his evil
and unjust actions.
I’m
a Biblical geek like that. I find these things fascinating and hope that by
relating them to you, you might develop just a tiny bit of curiosity about the
tradition yourself? Maybe? Or a willingness to engage the tradition
realizing that there is no special wisdom for it? It is just doing hard work with the
text. And some of you might be
interested? Maybe?
Today
we have that continuing, long-running narrative that began with Samuel
appointing a king over Israel. Israel is
approaching its zenith as the world’s number one super-power. David lies on his death bed, advising his
son, Solomon, who is soon to take over the throne, a throne that will have many
rivals with David’s many wives, concubines, and sons. King Solomon will take Israel to its highest
power in the world, the wealth of the world flowing to Israel. But is this what God wants? Does God care about this? To have the wealth of the world flowing to
you, to be the world’s number one superpower . . . are those God’s values?
For the seeds
of division are planted during the reign of King Solomon such that Israel later
splits into two different nations:
Israel in the north and Judah in the south. And the term used for the slave labor Solomon
employs for his building projects, missim, is the same Hebrew word used
to describe the slave labor of the Hebrew people when they lived in bondage in
Egypt.[1] Someone is not happy with King Solomon. And that is being made apparent in the
Biblical text.
Let
me again return to that Biblical text we have before us today. King David lies on his deathbed, just before
his son Solomon is to ascend to the throne.
He sends for Solomon. David calls
him to his side and tells Solomon to eliminate, to kill all his political
rivals. Solomon does so but for one
priest who appears to have too much moral cache to eliminate, the priest
Abiathar. Too many people have seen Abiathar
living out God’s covenant with integrity, about the very things that are found
in the Ark of the Covenant. So Solomon
exiles Abiathar away from the religious, political, and economic center of
Israel in Jerusalem, to Abiathar’s rural hometown of Anathoth.
There, for 400 years, the priests of
Anathoth, watch as Jerusalem falls into ever greater self-deception by aspiring
to the values of material prosperity and military security. Solomon, the master economist, through trade
and arms deals brought gold flowing into the city of Jerusalem. And with that gold, he built a ceremonial
center, the Temple, for a God who had chosen to reside among the people in a
tent--always humble, always on the move.
When the Children of Israel were delivered from the Egyptian Empire this
God chose to abide in a tent.[2]
Mindful of the long-running Biblical
narrative, the book of Jeremiah begins with the words, “These are the words of
Jeremiah, Hilkiah’s son, who was one of the priests from Anathoth in the land
of Benjamin.” Abiathar, the priest of integrity banished to Anathoth by
King Solomon, that whole story now comes full circle. Jeremiah, the prophet, who is imprisoned for
his lack of patriotism, thrown down a well because he is unwilling to agree
with the “good news” brought to the king by the corporate media, comes from the
village of Anathoth, the place of priestly exile. Jeremiah says that the unsustainable imperial
values of wealth, power, and insider information must give way to God’s long
time, community values of chesed,
tzedekah, and mishpat--steadfast love, righteousness, and justice. These are
the deep values which manifest love of God, neighbor, and all of creation,
values spoken in the Ten Commandments which said, “Thou shalt not be like the
imperial power . . . Egypt.” And yet,
the boy Jeremiah now confronts an imperial power that has all the markings of
Egypt.
And the power that Jeremiah critiqued
was just not military in nature, it was of a patriarchal power and violence run
amok that allowed King David to have hundreds of wives and concubines . . . and
still find it necessary to rape the foreigner, Bathsheba and kill her husband,
Uriah.
What does God value? Is it imperial power that God longs for, to
be declared the winner in the violence humankind does to one another? Or are there deeper values, more ancient values
which reflect God’s will for all of creation?
Are there any echoes, any explicit references we might find in Jesus’s
teaching, or something specifically the Gospel writers might share to show
where Jesus’s heart was?
Several weeks back, you may remember
that Diane and Lisa sang the title song from the now Broadway musical, The Color
Purple. Here are some of the lyrics
in that song:
God not some gloomy old man
Like the pictures you've seen of Him
God not a man at all
Gary Ellis
God is the flowers and everything else
That was or ever will be
And when you feel the truth so real
And when you love the way you feel
You found [God]
Just as sure as moonlight blessed the night
Like a plate of corn
Like a honeybee
Like a waterfall
All a part of me
Like the color purple
Where do it come from?
Open up your eyes
Look what God has done
That
song references the moment in Alice Walker’s book when Shug tries to help Celie
get past thinking of God as The Man who oppressed her life, severed her
relationship with her sister, and kept her in-line through violence. Shug tells Celie to look first at God’s
bountiful and abundant love in the trees and then tells her, “I think it [ticks]
God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don't notice
it.”[3]
I told Diane and Lisa when they suggested that song that I had always
I know.
How did you get there, Biblical geek Mike? But I do think that is found within the
Biblical text.
I pray that we might all grow into that
spiritual truth, down deep into our bones.
And then live our lives in that truth so those deep and ancient values
over and against imperial powers shared by Biblical writers, preached by the
prophet Jeremiah, and taught by Jesus might be typed on every last red blood
cell in our bodies. The imperial powers
will forever try to tell us that they dictate value. But we . . . we were born beautiful and wild
and free. Praise God. Amen.
[1]
John J.
Collins, Introduction to the Hebrew Bible, Ed. 2 (Minneapolis:
Augsburg Fortress, 2014), p. 269
[2]
Walter
Brueggemann, The Collected Sermons of Walter Brueggemann, Vol. 1 (Louisville:
Westminster John Knox Press, 2011).
[3]
Alice Walker, The Color Purple (New York: Penguin, 1989). The actual word is “pissed.”
[4] Luke 12:27; Matthew 6:29.
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