Sermon, 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time, August 15, 2021, "King Solomon and the Long Arc of Justice"

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

thought Walker’s beautiful prose was reminiscent of a Scripture verse from the Gospel of Matthew and Luke, “Consider the wildflowers!  They neither work nor labor and yet King Solomon in all of his glory was not decorated in beauty like the flowers of the field.”[4]   It is a reminder that Jesus does not value the things that Solomon does but is in keeping with a Jewish tradition of critiquing imperial power.  And we cannot add value to our lives in our labor or striving, in our anxiety or worry, but that we, indeed God’s good earth, are created in wild and free-growing beauty.  That value is created within you and you and you.  It is something that no world superpower can give to us, something no king or president can “take away.”  You . . . we were created beautiful and wild. 

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. 

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[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. 

Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, August 7, 2016, "Be hypocrites!"

C Proper 14 19 Ord OL BFC 2016

Luke 12:27-34

August 7, 2016

            I am departing from the Revised Common Lectionary today because the Revised Common Lectionary skips right over this passage in the twelfth chapter in Luke and this just happens to be my favorite passage of Scripture.  “Look at the wildflowers in the field.  They don’t wear themselves out with work.  They don’t spin cloth.  Yet Solomon in all of his glory was not dressed like one of these.” 

          It is the passage where Jesus says that to know the love of God, the way God works in the world, we must turn away from the halls of power and wealth and military victory, to turn toward God’s work in the subtle beauty of creation.  But it is an unusual comparison.  Jesus does not set wildflowers opposite the power of Caesar or Pharaoh. 

          It is an unusual invocation of a name.  Jesus invokes the time when Jewish power was at its zenith.  Under the reign of King Solomon, the world’s wealth, power, and insider information came to the doorstep of Israel.  Jesus critiques what it means to be empire not by talking about some alien or foreign domination.  He talks about it within the context of his own Jewish people and their choices. 

          Hebrew Scripture scholar, Walter Brueggeman, goes even further back than Solomon[1].  He takes us back to the time when King David lies on his deathbed, just before his son Solomon is to ascend to the throne.  He 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.  So Solomon exiles Abiathar away from the religious, political, and economic center of Israel in Jerusalem, to Abiathar’s rural hometown of Anatoth. 

          There, for 400 years, the priests of Anatoth, 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 for a God who had lived in a tent, always humble, always on the move, when the Children of Israel were delivered from the Egyptian Empire.  The same word used for slave labor, missim, under King Solomon was used to tell the story of the slave labor under Pharaoh in Egypt.[2] 

          So while there is a tradition within Judaism that celebrates Solomon, there is also a tradition that criticizes him.  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.”  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 Anatoth, the place of priestly exile to say 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.  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.  

          Behold the wild flowers of the field . . . Solomon in all his glory was not dressed like one of these.  God’s love is known over and against imperial power through the beauty of creation.

          This past week I was alarmed by an article[3] written by environmental activist, Bill McKibben.  McKibben talked about the photos being taken of him by monied interests to try embarrass him and paint him as a hypocrite.  And so, there are pictures of Bill McKibben forgetting his cloth bag at the supermarket and going home with his groceries in plastic bags.  There are even photos of him, gasp, getting out of a car to show his use and dependence of fossil fuels.   It goes even further.  As a way of robbing McKibben of his courage, these stalkers even show up at the airport to take pictures of his daughter.

          As Christians like Bill McKibben, we are all caught up in an economy that is overwhelmingly destructive.  We are all hypocrites.  The argument used against Bill McKibben is the same one Adolf Hitler used against the Christians who were critical of his ascent to power and his policies.  Hitler pointed out the hypocrisy of the Christian Church itself and stilled voices who were afraid of being revealed for not practicing what they preached.  It was Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who helped develop opposition to Hitler and died in a concentration camp himself . . . it was Bonhoeffer who counseled “grace.”  Yes, you could be a hypocrite.  Yes, you could fall so very short of living out an authentic life.  But God had enough grace to hold you so that you might speak and act with the steadfast love, righteousness, and justice you could muster.  

          We are all caught sucking on the tailpipe of empire.  We are all hypocrites.  So?  To live undestructively in an economy that is overwhelmingly destructive would be virtually impossible.  We are just now beginning to build the groups, families, and coalitions that might begin the hard work required.  In the struggle to preserve and protect the evidence of God’s love found in creation, we are not easily divided into environmental saints and sinners.[4]

          As Bill McKibben wrote, “Changing the system, not perfecting our own lives, is the point.  ‘Hypocrisy’ is the price of admission in this battle.”[5] 

          What we are called to do first is to just take our mouths off the tailpipe of empire for a moment to notice the beauty, joy, and love God intends for us.  It is, as in that great book by Alice Walker, The Color Purple, that Shug teaches Celie that the first movement from getting “The Man” out of your head is to notice the trees, the wildflowers, the beauty around you.   Shug tells Celie straight out that she believes God gets ticked off when we walk passed the color purple and don’t notice it.[6]  The first act away is to be aware, pay attention to, the love and joy God intends for you.  Look at the wildflowers of the field.  They don’t even have to work at it.   

          God wants us to know we are loved.  And it matters not that we are hypocrites.  Go.  As Martin Luther counseled, “Sin boldly!”  Risk.  Make mistakes.  Be hypocrites.  What matters now, so that the wildflowers, and the rivers, and earth may be seen as a sign of God’s love in all of its beauty, is that we change the system.  Be hypocrites.  Change the system.  For we are loved, as evidenced by the wildflowers and the ravens.  We are loved.  Amen. 

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[1] Walter Brueggeman, The Collected Sermons of Walter Brueggeman, Vol. 1 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2011). 

[2] John J. Collins, Introduction to the Hebrew Bible, Ed. 2 (Minneapolis:  Augsburg Fortress, 2014), p. 269.

[3] Bill McKibben, “Embarrassing Photos Taken of Me By My Right-Wing Stalkers,” New York Times, August 5, 2016 http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/07/opinion/sunday/embarrassing-photos-of-me-thanks-to-my-right-wing-stalkers.html?_r=0.

[4] Wendell Berry, The Unsettling of America:  Culture and Agriculture (Berkley:  Counterpoint, 1977).

[5] McKibben, “Embarrassing Photos.”

[6] Alice Walker, The Color Purple (New York:  Open Road Media, 1977).