Sunday, July 16, 2023 - The Options
Sunday July 16- Carolyn Smith: Living the Promise:
Summer - the time of road trips and good driving tunes like that Catherine’s music! Summer travels, of day trips and adventures... in our car, we need twizzlers and nuts and coffee. Any other snacks you bring? What about songs?
I remember songs for singing along and the amazing ability to harmonize together, Sharon Lois and Bram, or 99 bottles of beer on the wall...
And Road trips can be stressful - packing the car, mapping out spots to stop, or milestones - Gotta make it to Pittsburgh by the first night. Checking the weather... my sister drove through the scary rainstorms just a bit west ofVermont last week. And How far to the next ONroute before bladders are bursting?
Some of the travelling companions are planning the details ahead of time. Some are packing provisions, some are squirming and have no idea why they’re stuck in a car, some with aching bones are wondering how they’ll make it all the way. So much about road trips and we’ve not even talked about the destinations.
During the summer of 2020, deep in the lockdown of pandemic, our Sunday morning scriptures recalled ancient legends of Moses and wandering in the desert, how to make community in a new way for a wandering disconnected time. Moses and the Israelites left for their journey in a hurry; meagre provisions gathered, and only a promise of something better at the end of all of it.They hardly got started before boom - they are backed up against the Red Sea with the Egyptian Pharaoh bearing down on them. Remember the story? - (Parting of the red sea, the waters... ) and as the last of them cleared to the other side, whoosh...... The Lord Your God saved the Israelites and then released the waters to destroy the Pharaoh’s army. The Lord Your God parted the waters and kept the covenant, the promise to always be with them.
We’re a long way from 2020, in our families and friends and activities, and in our church, things are coming back to life. We’ve left some things behind and we’re remaking what we cared to keep. The journey was long, some friends, as we have honoured, didn’t make it all the way through.
And some of these wee ones don’t know anything from before! What they do know though -is... what have we carried forward, along with us? (Purpose, faith in a loving Way and vibrant community We’ve carried forward this flavour and message of room for all in this lighthearted, justice-seeking, affirming circle of beloved people).
Have we made it to our Promised Land?
Today the journey of this congregation is different. Today isn’t our big meeting. There is no done deal or clear announcement and I know some of us have simmering anxiety. Like our Joshua legend today, we’re somewhere together but we’re not there yet.
So what do we do today?
We rest. We regroup. It’s like we’re at the last rest stop before the push to journey’s end. Or maybe the last campfire on the way, a time for telling old stories.
Where the Moses story with the parting of the mighty Red Sea, 40 years have passed, and Joshua and the people of God now sit at the dry riverbed as once again the Lord our God has paused the flow of the River Jordan. They shade their eyes to look towards the promised land.
The Ark of the Covenant sits in the sun, mid-way across the river with the priests holding safe passage for all the people - ALL of them... there’s been a lot multiplying on this route. There are now 12 tribes among them- imagine preparing provisions for that bunch. Many of them form an army amassed for coming battles, because Jericho likes ahead.
And with the promised land right there, so close after all this time,They could be pushing on, they could be rushing one another, the tribes could be charging ahead, tripping over each other. Because it could be a stressful time.
Andinstead,thereisasenseofresting. Andasenseofreverencetoo. TheLordsaysto Joshua “find 12 leaders from the 12 tribes.” The Lord says tell each of these leaders to “take up a stone from the riverbed of the Jordan, one to carry on your shoulder to the place you will camp."
So when the children someday ask their parents “what do those stones mean,” you can tell them,“the Lord dried up the River Jordan, just as the Lord dried up and parted the waters of the Red Sea, and the people crossed over on dry ground. This is a memorial to our people and here we honour the Lord our God.”
SO much about this story is not the historical details.. the Exodus is essentially legend as far as anyone can tell, BUT it is the significance, of the tangible reminders in this story - the elements - here the Ark & commandments, meaning God goes with us - the priests and the tribes, the use of stones as milestones/markers and crossing the River Jordan - these are still tangible everyday symbols for our Jewish cousins and in our Christian tradition. Here they are all amassed, not DOING anything really - just being the People of God, resting and honouring their time and place together.
The people gathered, paused at this river crossing, the army massing but quiet, the 12 tribes working together, the promised land so close by, 12 stones as markers here, not waiting for what will come later... and the ARK - the temple in miniature but wherever we are God is - holding the commandments -sitting there in the breach, holding back the floodwaters while they gather stones.
Because the destination- the Promised Land - today, what it is, where it is, isn’t our worry. Not Today at least. And really, what has it ever been than a Vision of God’s Kingdom, heaven on earth, all that we work for.
For Joshua and the people - did they ever find a land of milk and honey? Not really... Times of peace came and went, rulers and prophets died and new ones rose up. Each generation had to make sense of universal truths for themselves in their time.
Push to the promised land if you must, but The Lord Your God also gifted us with Sabbath - resting and celebrating and honouring time - BEING time. Because if we aren’t BEING People of the promise, of covenant with God, here now, in each moment, what are we really carrying forward and creating when we “arrive?”
This is about your life, your family, your path. If not now, when? And at St. Paul’s today, it resonates. Except Churches everywhere have struggled forever and wrung their hands about the future. Some of them today are down to like 12 people in their pews. Can’t pay any staff. Can’t muster up a pianist. Some haven’t seen teens or families in decades. We’re in a time where grandparents are unchurched, its’ been so many decades since the modern downturn began. And here we are financially struggling in a different world - the model of people in pews paying for all this is not broken because of us.
So is there promise? Heck.Yah! Look what we’ve done these past 3 brutal years - stepped up, stayed connected, kept kids and families showing up. New ones, baptized, and hung out a lifesaving rainbow welcome and Camp is coming up and Fall plans, our music and technology is amazing and our leaders too, and there is LIFE here living the promise even in exodus and Journey. It’s tough work, hard work, something NEW is dawning,
AND STILL The Lord Your God loves it - or maybe I’ll say we can feel a rising spirit in ourselves and in our community and our world - when you rest, regroup, and honour all the good and the past and the dreams and the life we live together.
We can be, every day, again and again, People of Covenant, of this Promise. Life will always bring challenge and change, but the truth of this Way of Love together gives us direction and strength.
Let’s end with a poem, by Rev.Andrew King: Listen maybe from your own heart, whether it be weary or ready. Listen as this congregation, old friends and these new ones -
INTO THE RIVER
Take the covenant with you into the river – the boundary river, the risky river between future and past, between fear and hope, whose swirling depths can dislodge your feet –
take the covenant with you into the river – the river that is all that is out of control, restless and relentless and gnawing its banks, whose wild floods can drown field and home –
take the covenant with you into the river – chilling and destructive, peaceful and refreshing, the river that is world, full of mystery and song, whose waters can bless like renewal of life –
take the covenant with you into all of your rivers – let it rest on your shoulders when you take
your steps, let it remind you of a promise,
let it remind of God’s presence,
that you do not cross the boundaries alone, that you are not abandoned in the raging floods, that in the depths that would knock you
off your careful feet, God’s love is anchor
to hold and to guide, and waters of danger shall not overwhelm, and waters of chaos
may bring newness of life, and out of the noise of rushing waters may rise a beautiful song.
Take the covenant with you. Watch even the river become servant of love.