TEXTS: LAMENTATIONS 3:19-24
19 The thought of my affliction and my homelessness
is wormwood and gall!
20 My soul continually thinks of it
and is bowed down within me.
21 But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:
22 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases,*
his mercies never come to an end;
23 they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
24 ‘The Lord is my portion,’ says my soul,
‘therefore I will hope in him.’
is wormwood and gall!
20 My soul continually thinks of it
and is bowed down within me.
21 But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:
22 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases,*
his mercies never come to an end;
23 they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
24 ‘The Lord is my portion,’ says my soul,
‘therefore I will hope in him.’
I CORINTHIANS 13
13 If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast,* but do not have love, I gain nothing.
4 Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant 5or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. 7It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8 Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. 9For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; 10but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. 11When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. 12For now we see in a mirror, dimly,* but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. 13And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.
SERMON Title: 9/11 In Christ there is no east or west
Let us pray: May the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in your sight O Lord, our God and our redeemer.
amen.
Ten years ago today, I was at the Baptist East Hospital waiting room in Louisville, KY with an elderly parishioner as his wife was in surgery. We all watched TV as though hypnotized. And then I remembered that the Church ladies were getting ready for our “PW Fall Kick off luncheon at the Church”. So I quickly ran back to the Church and found the ladies crying. We had a moment of silent and prayer.
Several weeks ago my best friend from India, Hmingtei, and her husband came with their daughter to visit us. Their daughter was entering Purdue to study engineering this fall. My husband Will and I introduced them to the beauty of this part of Texas - the Galveston beach, the Space Center, downtown Houston - and yes they bought boots and cowboy hats! And then we took them on a road trip ending in Purdue. We went to Memphis to see Elvis Presley’s Graceland, which they loved; Louisville, KY to see my sister and her family; the Washington DC area New York City; Niagra Falls where we all got very wet; and West Lafayette, Indiana - the home of Purdue University.
In New York we took a day tour. Our guide was a pleasant woman who was just a little more excited about the baby shower for her first grand child than she was about showing us New York. We saw the usual sites including the Empire State building, the Rockefeller Center, Harlem, China Town, Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. Oh yes,
We walked and shopped on Madison Avenue.
But the most important site for all of us was “Ground Zero.” We were amazed at what we saw. Two huge buildings were growing toward the sky in a rush of workers and cranes and noise. One of the buildings, she said, will be taller than the previous towers and have 115 floors. At their base two reflecting pools were being built on the foot prints of the towers that were destroyed ten years ago today.
In between the towers and the pools there is an atrium entrance to an underground Memorial Museum commemorating 9/11 and the lives of each person that died there. It will also honor the heroes of that event. It was overwhelming to see the towers going up. The day we were there the taller building was already 79 floors up. Very impressive in deed!
Our guide was a native New Yorker and proud of it. She was proud of the resilience of New York. She told us that the remembrance celebrations would take place on September 11th - that is today even as we worship here it is going on there. She told us that the chief guests were the families of those who had been killed - thousands of them were coming. She also surprised us by saying that no external people including politicians were invited.
I remember thinking that they miss the point. These were the WORLD TRADE TOWERS that housed some of the largest- most international companies in the world. It was not only New Yorkers, who worked and died in those towers. But people from all across the U.S. and from many countries around the world. It was New Yorkers, but not just New Yorkers, who responded in grief and prayer and service. This was a New York tragedy and a U.S. tragedy and a world tragedy.
At that time my husband, Will was the Associate Director of Ecumenical Partner ships at the Worldwide Ministries Division of our national church head quarters, Louisville, Kentucky. He told me that as soon as the first tower fell the messages of condolence began pouring in - by email and fax and phone from churches around the world. The first message was from the Presbyterian Church of Pakistan. So many messages followed. That day the vast majority of the world grieved with us and stood with us and did what it could-- to wrap its arms around us. The world understood that not only New York and the U.S. were attacked - but anyone who valued freedom and opportunity and peace. They understood- a new war had begun that would touch to the farthest parts of the world.
As a pastor I found the members of my congregation in shock. Some knew people who had been killed or were missing. Others knew folk who had narrowly escaped. It was shocking to realize that we had ENEMIES who hated us that much.
A tragedy - an act of evil like this - raises difficult questions of why our God of goodness and power permits such things to happen. Why did God let so many die that day? why would any one hate us so much as to do this?
I can neither pretend to speak for God or explain why this happened. As I seek for comfort and hope I look to scripture passages. In our Call to Worship, Psalm 100, we were reminded that we are most fundamentally to identify ourselves as God’s people. We are God’s people and the sheep of his pasture. And God alone is our God. And, despite any and every evil we are called to worship and praise God - for “his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.”
In Lamentations 3 we hear the wisdom from the long history of Judaism’s experience with suffering and God’s apparent silence. We hear words born out of walking through bitterness into hope. It says, “The thought of my affliction and my homelessness is wormwood and gall! My soul continually thinks of it and is bowed down within me. But this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end: they are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. ‘The Lord is my portion’ says my soul, ‘therefore I will hope in him.’‘
1 Corinthians chapter13 is the apostle Paul’s writing about the power of God’s love. We often take this beautiful poem and only apply it to marriage or family situations. But Paul was speaking these words against human division wherever it is found. The context of I Corinthians was division in the church. Paul was bringing the promise of the power of God’s love - to stand against any kind of division that separates people from people.
What Paul wrote here surely speaks to us as we consider the evil of this division marked by 9/11. Speaking like a prophet, Paul reminded us that God’s love is for all people even in the midst of crisis such as this. He went on describing what love is and what it is not.
Paul also talked about our great need for humility as we live in a time between the life of Christ and when he comes again. We must remain humble and know that we understand and see dimly - as does everyone else we meet. The only things that overcome our despair and our division and our hurtfulness to others are faith, hope and love. And, ultimately, it is love that makes the difference....love that keeps us humble...love that keeps us seeing our enemies as humans more like us than different from us ...love that wants something better into which children can grow up.
I don’t have the answers about why people did hateful things. I have questions of my own to ask God about things that happen. But I do know this. Hate is not the answer. I also know that God calls us to nurture healing and peace and hope and love. I don’t know why there is evil, but I know God is present in the suffering. We are all, together God’s people. All of us are- people for whom Christ came and died and rose and for whom he prays this day. In Christ there truly is no east or west.
On this day as we remember what happened ten years ago, let us be aware that New York is busy wrapping its arms around the grieving families. Let us join in wrapping our arms around the New Yorkers and the families. Because - in Christ there is no east or west we know that people all around the world are also in prayer and thought wrapping their arms around all of us, and around all of those who have been victims of violence and terror.
Finally and most importantly let us remember that God grieves with us and that God’s love is for all the world and that “the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end: they are new every morning.” Thanks be to God. Amen.
CHARGE:
Go in peace
remembering God’s presence is with us
in every time and circumstance.
BENEDICTION
May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ
the love of God and
the fellowship of the Holy Spirit
be with you and forever.
Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment