Sermon
for July 20, 2014
Proper
11, Year A, 6th Sunday After Pentecost
The
Rev. Vicki K. Hesse
St.
Philip’s In The Hills Parish, Tucson, AZ
For
readings click here
Lord,
Open our lips
That
our mouth shall proclaim your praise.
Amen
Years ago, at the small Episcopal
church I attended,
the priest invited parishioners
to share their experience of God
during their recent “pilgrimage.”
That was, for these pilgrims in
Colorado,
a 7-day, 400 mile bike ride called “Ride
the Rockies.”
One woman said that she saw the face
of God
in the columbine flower at the top
of Monarch Pass.
A man told how he experienced divine
kindness
in the generous free food at the
rest stops.
Another stood with tears in his eyes
with gratitude
for the angel EMT who helped him after
his fall
on the back side of Trail Ridge
Road.
These remarks, surprisingly,
touched my heart and connected
my childhood experience of earthy
grace
to the wonders of divine heaven.
These remarks were a ladder that appeared to me
when I thought God was not part of
my life.
At that time, I was a “none” –
one who checked the “no religious
affiliation” box
on the census.
But that day, these remarks were my
ladder.
Like Jacob, I thought, “Surely, God
is in this place!”
We hear about Jacob in today’s OT
reading.
Jacob.
That no-good younger brother of Esau
& son of Isaac.
Jacob.
The one who bilked his brother out
of the birthright
and tricked him out of his father’s
blessing.
Jacob.
Who named God from a distance,
like when his father asked,
“…How is it that you have found
[this savory food and game] so quickly?”
Jacob answered,
“Because the Lord
your God granted me success.”
Jacob, a “none,”
had been sent north by his mom
to find a wife from his uncle’s side
of the family.
“Don’t pick a Canaanite wife,” his
father yelled.
And “don’t let the door hit your
butt on the way out!” could have been his parting good-byes.
Jacob gladly left, running away
from his brother’s rage and his
father’s dismay.
Jacob left so quickly that he didn’t
even take a bedroll.
At sunset, sensing that no one
followed him,
he finally “arrived at a certain
place” & rested.
Pulling up a stone for a pillow
(since he didn’t have one),
he fell into that kind of sleep with
which
some people are gifted: deep
exhaustive sleep.
Oblivious-to-the-elements kind of
sleep.
Drooling on the pillow kind of
sleep.
He must have twitched
when the ladder appeared in the
screen of his mind, with the bottom rungs on earth
and the top rungs in heaven.
Perhaps his closed eyes moved
quickly
as he watched the divine messengers
going up from earth to heaven
and coming down again.
Jacob watched as from a balcony,
which is how he had lived his life.
Distant, judging.
As far as Jacob was concerned,
it was survival of the fittest.
He didn’t know of God’s
faithfulness.
He didn’t concern himself with
religious matters.
He didn’t know God. He was a “none.”
The ladder was just a dream, at the
time.
I wonder… if
Sometimes, we too don’t know of
God’s presence.
We, too, have been known
to forget about God’s
faithfulness.
We, sometimes, believe it is
survival of the fittest.
Maybe our health is declining
and we feel bereft
of any relief from God.
Our loved one’s loss brings tears to
our eyes
at the strangest
times for the smallest reasons.
Our recent fight with a friend
has left us feeling
isolated and alone.
How can we find God in the midst of
waging wars,
plane crashes and
suffering neighbors?
How does God find
us
when there are
so many who are in
need?
Our own city has a suffering
population of teens
who seek a better life,
living couch-to-couch and
friend-to-friend,
with little assistance from
government.
One local teen said,
“Looking back, basically all my life
was a struggle.
…that
was all I ever knew.
Most of these
[struggles] were due to
my mother’s drug
and alcohol addiction.
[So] I was focused
on surviving
and not much else.”
Our country’s borders have migrant
children
who seek a better life:
fleeing violence and instability in
their family
and communities.
The book
Enrique’s Journey
recounts the unforgettable quest
of a 16-year old Honduran boy
looking for his mother,
after she is forced to leave her
starving family
to find work in the United States.
Braving unimaginable peril,
often clinging to the sides and tops
of freight trains,
Enrique travels through hostile
worlds full of
thugs, bandits, and corrupt cops.
Like Enrique, these children at the
borders
are scared and alone.
They are desperate for someone
to accompany them and care for them
as they seek a future that will be
brighter
than their past.
At a Diocesan meeting yesterday, a
priest shared
he visited a group of these children
– sang songs, visited with them –
including 32 infants with their teen
mothers.
Some have been sent by their
parents;
some have chosen to leave.
These children are leaving their
homelands,
not out of a desire for wealth, but
for life.
Jacob, too, left his homeland,
not out of a desire for wealth but
for life.
Jacob, who didn’t know God or God’s
faithfulness,
suddenly, in that certain place,
got a full dose of God’s own,
unconditional self.
Jacob realized,
as he watched the ladder in his
dream,
that The Lord stood beside him. *pause*
Not in the background.
Not in the “heavens.”
Beside him. *pause*
Jacob knew God’s presence in that place.
God spoke to him.
And Jacob was afraid,
for he was expecting to be chewed
out. *pause*
But God said something altogether
different.
God promised land to Jacob and his
offspring.
God promised that his offspring
would be like the
dust,
spread throughout
the land
(and don’t we know
about dust, in Tucson?)
God promised that Jacob’s
descendants
would become a
great nation
and a blessing to
all other nations on earth.
But, wait, there’s more!
God promised to be with him
and to keep him
wherever he went.
*pause*
As theologian Frederick Buechner so
eloquently said,
“It wasn't holy hell that God gave him, …,
but holy heaven,
not to mention the marvelous lesson
thrown in for good measure.
The lesson was, needless to say,
that even for a dyed-in-the-wool,
double-barreled con artist like Jacob
there are
a few things in this
world you can't get
but can only be given,
and one of these things is love in
general,
and another is the love of God in
particular.”[1]
*pause*
When Jacob woke up, he realized the dream’s
import.
The ladder was the bridge between
Jacob’s earthly existence and God’s
divine realm.
Now, Jacob’s life changed.
For in that moment, in that certain
place,
God bound God’s own
self, unconditionally,
to Jacob and his
offspring –
both personally and
forever.
“Surely,” Jacob responded,
“the Lord is in this place and I did
not know it!”
*pause*
So we, who sometimes don’t know God
or don’t remember God’s
faithfulness,
we are assured and
encouraged through this universal story.
Every day,
God binds God’s own
self, unconditionally, to us.
Every day, God pours out what
we can’t get in the
world
but can only be
given…
And that is love in general
and the love of God
in particular.
Regardless of our remembering or not
knowing – whether we are a “none” or a religious or a just a regular Jacob.
See, God doesn't love people because of who
they are,
but because of who God is.
*pause*
God invites us to dream –
to dream of a world
that has never been seen
but has always been
promised.[2]
God invites us
to open our arms and
eyes and hearts
to the blessings we
have been given
and to pass those
blessings on
to our neighbors in
need
to make God’s dream
come true.
God invites us
to respond to all the children –
by helping to find
shelter,
by advocating for
them with congress,
by seeking out
local service opportunities
such
as Casa Mariposa or
Youth
On Their Own,
or by donating to Episcopal Relief &
Development.
God binds God’s own self,
unconditionally,
in love, in faithfulness, in promise, in blessing,
with
grace.
Free grace.
It was by grace that it was Jacob of
all people,
who became not only the father
of the twelve tribes of Israel, [3]
but the great-great-etc…
grandfather of Jesus of Nazareth,
The Ladder who bridged
earth to heaven.
It was by grace
that Jesus of Nazareth was born into
this world at all.
And that is good news, indeed.
Can you see the ladder set up on
earth,
reaching to heaven?
Can you see the angels
ascending and
descending?
Surely God is in this place! Now we know it.
Amen
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