#thinkingchurch

In 1802 a heterosexual, white, protestant couple got married – and the church freaked out. You want to know why, I promise. They freaked out because she...wore....a red coat! The couple was Abigail and Daniel Harkness, and Daniel was a part of the Society of Friends. They officially censured him for marrying her, both because she wasn't a part of the Society of Friends and because of her coat (which they said made her a “worldly woman”). She refused to give up her coat. He refused to apologize for her coat. So they became Methodists.

Thank goodness they did. I sometimes have some feelings of envy for the peace-loving Quakers, but that one action they did all those years ago was really good for Methodists. Abigail and Daniel's great-granddaughter was fond of telling that story, and made it a part of her story of formation. Their great-granddaughter was Georgia Harkness, the first woman to be a full professor at a theological school in the United States of America, a feat she accomplished as an active Methodist theologian. She was, truth be told, the first RECOGNIZED female theologian, and she was a member of the Troy Annual Conference. She had local ordination, but fought for women's full ordination rights in the Methodist Church.

I do not have enough time to tell you Georgia Harkness's full story today (I'm still learning it), but there are a few other details you need to know. She graduated from Cornell in 1912, after which she taught high school in Schyllerville and Scotia for 6 years (yes, OUR Scotia), but she got restless. After reading an advertisement in The Christian Advocate she went to Boston University (also a Methodist school) for her masters degree and then a PhD in the philosophy of religion. She then taught at Elmira College for 15 years. In 1939 she was hired by Garrett, breaking the stained glass ceiling. She was part of the movement toward full ordination rights for women in the Methodist Church, the social gospel, the creation of the World Council of Churches, and was eventually a General Conference delegate from the Troy Annual Conference (although Junice tells me this happened while she was a professor at Pacific School of Religion in CA and not everyone was thrilled about it.)

While she was teaching in Scotia, she was very active in her “local church” teaching Sunday School and working with youth groups. We haven't yet verified which church was that was. Most likely, Scotia UMC, right? Given our history though, maybe it was us. (We're looking!) In any case, a Methodist Church in the Albany District and Schenectady County sent Georgia Harkness off to her graduate education and to change the face of Methodism, academia, and the world.

Dr. Georgia Harkness attributed her courage to her great-grandmother, Abigail. When women graduate from Garrett-Evangelical Theological school, a United Methodist Seminary north of Chicago, they wear red shoes. They do it to remind themselves of their place in the world as courageous, outrageous women and to celebrate the rich tradition of female scholarship at Garrett-Evangelical.”1 They do it because of Abigail Harkness.

Abigail Harkness refused to do what was asked of her, and in doing so she inspired great change. Her courage laid the foundation for Georgia's. I think Abigail Harkness was to Georgia Harkness what Vashti was to Esther. Now, let me be clear. The book of Esther is a work of fiction. It was written down (no oral tradition) as a work of fiction, for the purpose of encouraging Jews living in the Persian empire to have hope and stay faithful. This story did not happen. History knows too much about the era. This is intentional historical fiction! As Sidnie White Crawford (professor of Classics and Religious Studies at University of Nebraka Lincoln) puts it in The New Interpreter's Bible, “This is also a hopeful message to Jews living in diaspora; the status quo is never such and things can always change.”2

John Dominic Crossan likes to help people understand the Bible by saying, “Emmaus never happened, Emmaus always happens,” by which he means that he doesn't think that there was an actual embodied living Christ who walked with the disciples to Emmaus and explained the Jesus movement to them and then disappeared as he became known in the breaking of the bread at dinner. Rather, he believes that it is in reflecting on history that we come to understand our present, and it is in the communion table that Christ is known. The literal pales beside the metaphorical. Similarly, the book of Esther didn't happen, and yet Esther tells truths of humanity that keep happening.

White Crawford says, “The book, which was written for Jews living in exile, consistently lampoons their Gentile overlords. Ahasuerus is less an awe-inspiring ruler than an easily manipulated buffoon.”3 Obviously the Jews living in ancient Persia were the only people in the history of the world who need to make fun of their ruler to feel safe in the world, so we can't understand it, but we can try ;).

The story starts out describing the excessive opulence of the King's palace and grounds and his outrageous 6-month party for all of his officials. Granted, travel was harder in those days and he was king over a really big empire so you might want to take advantage of opportunites to be together, but who can really afford to both stop their government for 6 months AND have a ridiculous party at the same time? Clearly, he could! And he thought it was worth it. He was clearly very excited to show off his power and wealth.

Now, the author is very wise and quite intentional. The attention to detail wasn't an accident. White Crawford says, “Through the description we get a glimpse of the Persian character: ostentatious, showy, unbridled. This is in direct contrast to the usual Jewish values of modesty and self-restraint (see Prov 11:2-4). Although disapproval is never directly voiced, the message is clear: Such opulence, while immediately awe-inspiring, hides an empty and probably corrupt core.”4 So, after this showy 6 month party, the King decides that he needs a new audience to show off to, and he invites everyone in the city to come to a 7 day party.

It is very clearly stated that at this party people were allowed to drink how they wanted, because usually the expectation was that everyone drank when the king drank. “The author is letting the reader now that everything in this court, including drinking, proceeds according to the whim of the king,” including allowing people to drink as much (or as little) as they wished!5

So, 187 days in to a drunken stupor, the king calls for his wife who is throwing a party of her own with the women. This isn't particularly historical, but it does work for historical fiction! We're told that, “Historically Persian women and men could eat together, but the women left when the drinking began. It suits the purposes of the author to have the men and women separate when the story begins.”6 It fits the story, because then the king can call for Vashti.

She is told to show up in her crown. She isn't told what else to wear. Assumptions have long been that she's not supposed to wear anything but her crown. So, the story sets it up: the king has has been having a six month long drinking party to show off all his wealth, his wife is with her female companions, and he beckons her to come out naked to be shown off before all of the officials of the land and every man in her city.

Now, we don't know a darn thing about Vashti (mostly because she never existed) but I want to play with this idea a little bit. I have, at times in my life, been in the exclusive company of women. During those times, if a particularly inappropriate “request” were to come to one of those women from a man, a certain amount of shared indignation would erupt. The woman who received the “request,” who might have simply hung her head in shame and complied if she were alone, would be motivated to respond differently in the presence of other women. The atrocity of the “request” would be named. Other options would be raised. An assessment of the risk involved in refusing vs. the risk involved in responding would be done. Perhaps, if there were some, particularly powerful women in the group might offer their own resources as protection.

That is to say, that when oppressors make horrible demands of members of oppressed groups, they're less likely to have their dictates followed when the demand comes to the individual while the individual is supported by other members of the oppressed group. Um. Duh. But, the king is presented as an idiot. So, he doesn't know that. And I'm not trying to be subtle here. I'm encouraging all of us to act like the women that Vashti was with – naming injustice when we see it, assessing damage, coming up with alternative plans, using our resources for the vulnerable, and supporting whoever needs the support. I'm reminding us all that there is power in being together, and not in allowing anyone to be isolated. I'm particularly encouraging stand together in the face of unreasonable decrees by unjust rulers.

Vashti says “no.” The story doesn't REALLY tell us what happens to her. She's said to be banished. For most of history that's thought to include being killed. However, I've had a hard week and I'm going to claim that some of those women she was with in her banquet took her in and she lived a lovely life of freedom and access to great books in her exile. It IS a work of fiction after all, and this is my fan-fiction addition for the sake of having some darn hope. ;)

However, before she gets banished a few things happen. First of all, her husband who just spent 187 days showing off his power and wealth can't figure out how to respond her “no” and convenes a war council to try to figure out how to respond. The king's councilors are also freaked out and horrified that once the story gets out (which it WILL when all the women were present to hear her “no” and all the men were present to see her not show up) all the other women in the empire won't obey their husbands either. (May. It. Be. So.) The scholar reminds us, “the character's reactions to events lead the reader to laugh. For example, Vashti's refusal to obey one order is thought to threaten the stability of the empire and leads to a decree declaring, of all things, that husbands should rule in their own houses and speak their own languages.”7 Which happens. The greatest mail service ever known on the face of the earth to that time was put to the task of telling men to be the masters of their houses – in a society that was already a patriarchy - because the men were so freaked out that one woman would say “no.”

That's a powerful no.

It also set up Esther to replace Vashti as queen and save her people from genocide. Vashti and Esther didn't know each other, but we can guess that Esther knew Vashti's story, and learned from it. She did her subversiveness in different ways, but she learned from the one who came before her. Vashti set up Esther to succeed. Abigail Harkness set up Georgia to succeed. Even the failures of one woman who seeks power can inspire the next woman to succeed.

And, beloved people of God, like Vashti and Abigail, we are not powerless. We have the power to say “no” to things that are wrong, and “yes” to opportunities for justice. Furthermore, we can act like the women at the banquet in counseling each other toward courageous acts and outrageous refusals of unjust demands. We are powerful. God is powerful. We can, and we will continue to move the world toward good. NOTHING and NO ONE, not even a narcissistic power-hungry “king” can stop us. Thanks be to God. Amen

1"Red Shoes” by “preacher mom” http://preacherparents.blogspot.com/2010/05/red-shoes.html, accessed 11/10/2016

2Sidnie White Crawford “The Book of Esther,” in The New Interpreter’s Bible Vol. 3 (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1999): p. 858.

3Ibid, 858

4Ibid, 880.

5Ibid, 879.

6Ibid, 880.

7Ibid, 858.

--

Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

Pronouns: she/her/hers

http://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

Have you heard that old conundrum about God's omnipotence? It asks, “Can God make a boulder so big that God can't move it?” If you ever need it, the correct response to that is, “I don't care, that has nothing to do with helping us be more loving.” Today's story raises a similar concern: are we humans capable of screwing up so badly that God can't bring good out of it? Please hear that question with caution. I fully believe we humans are capable of screwing up BADLY and ruining each other's lives. The question is, once the damage is done, is there anything that God can't make better?

Sarai, is the matriarch of both Judaism and Christianity. You may remember her as Sarah. She is the matriarch of ONLY Judaism and Christianity while her husband Abram/Abraham is the patriarch of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Neither of them do good in the this story.

Let's go over the name thing to get confusion out of the way. In the next chapter of Genesis (17), God changes their names to Abraham and Sarah – which is how most people remember their names. The name changed signified God's promise changing their lives. However, at this point in the story they are still called Abram and Sarai, so that's what we're going to call them today.

Abram was one of three sons born in land now called Iraq, whose family had moved to land now called Syria, and continued to reside there until he was quite elderly. The book of Genesis says that when he was 75, God spoke to Abram and said, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (Genesis 12:1-3) The book of Genesis rarely seems to understand how numbers work or what a reasonable human lifespan is, but it is clear that it is saying Abram and Sarai were old.

Phyllis Trible has done great work with these stories. She writes about this first promise made to Abram, pointing out that:

“The Divine imperative requires Abram to break with all that identifies a man in his ancient world, from the large category of native land through clan to the small unit of 'father's house.' In effect, Abram must relinquish his past and present and go forth to an unknown future in an unspecified land. Although the command does not require him to give up Sarai, his wife, of what value for life, family, and future is barren property?”1 (35)

So that you don't think Trible is actually supporting the Biblical assumption about people unable to procreate, let me also quote her saying, “However we may view barrenness, within the biblical narrative it is a tragic flaw. It robs a woman of her labor and her status.  It undercuts patriarchy, upsets family values, and negates life.2” Sarai is introduced to the Bible as a barren woman, it is her defining characteristic, and her barrenness is the central issue of their story for 9 chapters.

Abram goes as he is told to go in that first encounter with the Divine. He goes to the land of Canaan and he lives there for a while until there is a famine and he and Sarai go to Egypt. On their way, Abram decides that Sarai is too beautiful and if he admits that she's his wife they will try to kill him to get to her. So, while the Bible is messed up about the inherent value of women whether or not they can procreate, at least it recognizes the attractiveness of women in their 70s. Score one for Genesis.

Abram is self-protective and thereby lets his wife Sarai be taken into the Pharoah's harem. He is paid VERY well for Sarai. Eventually the Pharaoh learns what Abram has done and both Abram and Sarai are kicked out of Egypt for it. When they get kicked out, Abram left a wealthy man with all his possessions. That is, his lie and use of his wife made him wealthy. Likely Hagar, Sarai's slave, was part of the wealth they left with.

They went back to Canaan and lived peaceably there for 10 years. It has been a long time since God's promise came... 15 years? 20? The Biblical chronology is messy, conflicting, and obviously untrustworthy, but suffice to say, according to the internal logic of the story it has been more than a generation's time since God promised Abram offspring and nothing has happened. Sarai is just as barren as ever and nothing seems to be changing. The promise was reliant on a 2nd generation, and wouldn't work without one.

So Sarai decides to take this into her own hands. Clearly the 2nd generation wasn't going to happen through her, and yet she didn't want to give up on the promise. Abram had to have descendants. She wasn't to bear them. They'd waited years and years.... so she found a way. This passage contains the first words Sarai speaks in the Bible. Sarai speaks to Abram and makes the action happen. She uses her voice to change their reality.

Now, Sarai has been condemned through the ages for this action – but I don't think she's been condemned for the right things. Usually, she's condemned for lack of faith. People suggest that if God said it would happen then God would make it happen and Sarai taking it into her own hands showed that she didn't truly trust God.

That perspective implies that God's ways make human action irrelevant. It fails to acknowledge that we work to be a part of building the kindom. It ignores free will. It depends on the supernatural. It suggests that humans have no responsibility for creating the world into a place of justice and peace, and that any action we take would be trying to take over God's exclusive work of changing the world. That is to say, I think condemning Sarai for taking actions into her own hands is theologically unsound and STUPID.

On the other hand, this story says that Sarai is culpable of getting Hagar raped, and that seems worth condemnation. Sarai was likely raped by the Pharaoh herself, but that doesn't excuse her. I would hope it would have brought her to a place of compassion rather than condemnation of another woman. Trible explains it this way:

“As Abram schemed to save himself by manipulating Sarai and Pharaoh, so Sarai schemes to promote herself by manipulating Abram and Hagar. As Abram tricked Pharaoh into manhandling Sarai, so Sarai would persuade Abram to manhandle Hagar. Like husband, like wife. Altogether, Sarai would treat Hagar in Canaan much as she herself was treated in Egypt; the object of use for the desires of others. Like oppressor, like oppressed.”3

Now, according to custom, Sarai was in her rights to do this. Her slave belonged to her, including her reproductive function, and the baby born would be understood to be hers. It is a projection of 21st century morality to object, and yet I'm doing so. Thus, it IS morally reprehensible AND it didn't work out. Something fundamental changes when Hagar gets pregnant. The dynamic has been, according to Trible that, “Sarai the Hebrew is married, rich, and free but also old and barren. Hagar the Egyptian is singe, poor, and a slave, but also young and fertile. Power belongs to Sarai; powerlessness marks Hagar.”4But Sarai's greatest weakness is being barren when child-bearing was the single most important factor in a woman's life, and the power dynamics switch when her otherwise powerless slave is carrying her husband's child.

Trible continues:

“As the story moves into a crowded marriage of three, the focus rests on Hagar. 'She conceived' (Gen 16:4) The news is precisely what Sarai wants, but it leads to an insight on Hagar's part that her mistress has not anticipated. 'And [when] she [Hagar] saw that she had conceived, her mistress became slight in her eyes' (Gen 16:4*). In the Hebrew syntax, words of sight, connoting understanding, begin and end this sentence: the verb 'see' and the phrase 'in her eyes.' Structurally and substantively, new understanding encircles Hagar's view of herself and her mistress. Hierarchical blinders drop. The exulted mistress decreases, the lowly slave increases. Not hatred or contempt but a reordering of the relationship emerges.”5

But Sarai's view of Hagar does NOT change, and she feels slighted by the move toward equality. She wants to return them to their previous, hierarchical relationship. She wants to regain her power.

Sarai does not talk directly to Hagar, she doesn't attempt to fix the relationship, and she surely doesn't try to understand Hagar. Instead she turns to the biggest source of power: Abram. She brings her problem to him and demands that he fixes it. Abram refuses responsibility, and gives her back the power she needs to do harm to Hagar. Hagar HAD BEEN Sarai's slave, but when she became a secondary wife to Abram, she was no longer a slave. Yet, Abram returns her to the status of slave, permitting Sarai to do her harm, and Sarai does. After demanding that Abram rape Hagar, Sarai “treats her harshly” - which is the same phrasing as how the Hebrew people were treated as slaves in Egypt.

Sarai is an undeniably strong woman who charts the course of Biblical history. She got the ball rolling. She took the power into her own hands. She did it. And she did an enormous amount of damage in doing so. Her actions are HORRIFYING and yet it was a subversive choice to claim her own power and use it to make sure that Abram got an heir. Her choice not to claim Ishmael as her own is also HORRIFYING and yet again subversive by claiming her own power.

In the metaphors of the world, the child Hagar bears, Ishmael, becomes the father of the Muslims. Hagar is their matriarch. In the continued narrative of Genesis, Sarai bears her own child, Issac, and through him becomes the matriarch of the Jews and Christians. Three world's major religions emerge from this set of messed up people in broken relationships. I've often wondered why the Bible is comfortable as presenting them as so HUMAN, but the Bible doesn't seem to be under the impression that God is looking for perfect humans in order to act.

More so, out of these atrocities: the barrenness of Sarai, the willingness of Abram to sell his wife, slavery, the willingness of Sarai and Abram to use Hagar as an un-consenting wife and surrogate mother, and Sarai's harsh treatment of Hagar comes GOOD. Doesn't make any sense, does it? I think that's one of the mysteries of God. We can mess up, but God doesn't just leave things be and allow brokenness to stand. God works through the realities of life, the horrendous brokenness in lives, and the pain we cause each other and finds a way to transform it all. My answer? There is nothing we can do that God can't bring good out of. The net result may still be harm, but God is creative, powerful, and good. We can't stop that. Thanks be to God! Amen

1Phyllis Trible, “Ominous Beginnings for a Promise of Blessing” in Phyllis Trible and Letty M. Russell, editors, Hagar, Sarah, and Their Children: Jewish, Muslim, and Christian PerspectivesTrible, (Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville, Kentucky, 2006) p. 35.

2Trible, 34.

3Trible, 38.

4Trible, 37.

5Trible, 39.

--

Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

Pronouns: she/her/hers

http://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

The characters in this story don't emerge from a vacuum.  Their story has been going on for quite a while by the time we get to this part of Genesis.  Jacob, you may remember, was the second born of a set of twins who infuriated his brother by stealing both his brother's birthright and their father's final blessing.  In order to avoid being murdered by his twin brother, and at their mother's advice, he went to live with her family. The first person he encountered when he arrived was a beautiful woman at a well (which is Biblical foreshadowing for …. marriage) who happened to be his cousin Rachel.  Her father Laban was his mother's brother.  This is not presented as an issue.  Jacob wants to marry Rachel, and Laban says he has to work for him for 7 years in order to pay off her bride-price.  So, besotted, Jacob does.  After seven years there is a wedding and a wedding night, and when he wakes up in the morning Jacob discovers that it is Rachel's sister Leah in his bed.  He objects – rather strongly.  Laban comes up with some weak explanation about not being able to marry off the younger sister first and then suggests that Jacob can marry Rachel too, if he'll simply spend one week with Leah first and agree to work for him for another 7 years. It turns out, in case you couldn't figure this out yourself, that sisters make super terrible sister wives.  I bet you were able to figure that out on your own though.  Leah and Rachel spent years trying to fight with each other for Jacob's attention, and that included a fairly elongated “baby war” in which each tried to outdo the other in producing offspring for Jacob.  If you wanted to know, Leah won, although Rachel remained Jacob's favorite.  After the next 7 years of labor had been completed, Jacob made a deal with Laban to stay on for a while longer in order to leave with some herds of his own.  At that point both Laban and Jacob did everything they could to trick each other into getting the worst possible deal. Jacob was a trickster, Laban was a trickster, and neither of them treated each other well.  On the whole, Laban treated Jacob more roughly than Jacob treated him.   Finally, about 21 years after arriving on his uncle's doorstep – and apparently while his uncle was as far from home as possible, Jacob packed up his wives, his children, his herds, and his possessions and headed back home (uncertain about if his brother still wanted to kill him).   So now we're caught up – as long as we remember that when they packed everything up to leave, Rachel took the family idols with them and Jacob didn't know about it.   What were the family idols?  Well, they're also called the family gods.  They were physical representations of gods used in some sort of ritual worship, usually at an at-home altar.  In addition to being items to which one directed one's prayers, they were also thought to protect the family and its good fortune.  That is, if they were lost or stolen, it was assumed that the LUCK of the family went with them.  While the Bible suggests that Jacob and Laban prospered because God was with Jacob, Rachel may not have shared that assumption. In the story that precedes this one in Genesis, Leah and Rachel discuss how their father cheated them by not giving them their portion of their bride prices, and it is also possible that Rachel just took the idols to counteract that, or to bother her father, or because she was scared and wanted their protection, or maybe she was just greedy.  I do think, on the basis of the stories of Genesis and what they say and what they don't say, that Laban was probably an abusive parent and employer.  Furthermore, by the story Genesis tells, Jacob himself isn't really converted to YHWH worship yet.  That will happen on this journey back into the land, on the night when he is said to have “wrestled with an angel” and gets renamed Israel.  It thus seems unlikely that Jacob's wives would be monotheistic at this point, and whatever other reasons Rachel had for taking the household idols, likely she thought they'd be a source of protection for their family. Laban was furious when he found out and he brought a war party with him to go after the family.  It isn't clear if he would have gone if it were not for the family idols, but it sort of sounds like he is most upset about the idols and not the loss of his children and grandchildren. The story gives us just enough geography to know that the place Jacob, Leah, and Rachel were staying was INSIDE the boundaries of what would one day be ancient Israel. It was just far enough inside that the place Laban slept the night before he caught up with them was inside too.  This is significant because it tells us this is both an OLD OLD story and one that got edited as they years went by.  In the early development of understanding YHWH, there was a time when it was assumed that YHWH's powers only existed within the boundaries of the Promised Land.  Genesis tells us that Jacob had a dream involving a message from God on his way out of the land, and Laban has one right after he crosses into it.  It is as if God is limited by those boundaries.  The understanding of where the boundaries would BE however was defined by political boundaries that existed centuries later, and the clues the text gives us imply those boundaries.  Isn't the Bible fun? OK. So Laban has a dream in which he is warned not to speak harshly to Jacob which is most significant because it reminds us that people used to think that God had boundaries.  Although, let's be honest. People still think that.  It is remarkable how people think about churches and other places of worship as more “holy” or more “filled with God” than other places.  When he does catch up with the next generation of his family, Jacob is HORRIFIED as his accusations and responds with surety that no one has done what he is accusing them of.  That is, Jacob thinks Laban is falsely accusing them – with good reason based on their history – and grandiosely offers a death penalty for the one who has the idols because he is SO SURE they don't have them. This is a problem for Rachel.  Nothing of her motivation is explained in the text but it seems clear that she decided she didn't want to die. She thinks fast and she comes up with a plan,  she enacts it, and it works.  She lives, her father goes home, and all is well, except maybe for the idols.  The plan itself, however, is proof of how little power she otherwise had.  She used what she had – her femininity and how it was treated in her culture – to save her own hide. The plan was super simple: she put the idols underneath her and she told her father she was menstruating.  Was she?  That's completely unclear and likely irrelevant.  However, she SAID she was.  By the customs of the time, no man shouldn't have been in her tent while she was menstruating, and he violated that cultural expectation by examining the rest of her tent.  He wasn't going to push any further though, and he left.  By putting the idols underneath her AND coming up with a valid reason not to get up, Rachel saved her own life and got to keep the idols she'd wanted to begin with.  She used what she had – fear of menstruating women and an assurance that no one would check her on that – to subvert the power of her father. However, she also desecrated the idols.  It sort of doesn't matter if she actually was menstruating on them or not, the implication is enough. It may be that this story has multiple intentions and denigrating the power of idols is one of them.  By the time this story was written down the people knew the Ten Commandments, including the one about not making idols.  It was clear that YHWH was not to be represented in physical form, and Walter Brueggemann says that this is so that people can't pick up the idol, move it around, put it where they want it, and have the sense that they control YHWH.  YHWH is not a God who is controlled by humans.  This story, which discusses menstruating on idols seems like a very effective reminder to those who weren't YHWH worshippers about the relative weakness of their gods. The story also functions as a story about the formation of the national boundaries.  It claims that the Eastern boundary of Israel was first created by a covenant between Laban and Jacob, and that as such it is almost inherent.   It is also a good story – it keeps our attention pretty well.  Sadly though, this is the last interaction that Leah and Rachel have with their father.  Rachel is left sitting alone in her tent while the covenant is formed and her father leaves again.  While Jacob and his family are safe, and while Laban was likely an awful father, there is some lingering sadness at the end. The biggest clue in this story that something is WRONG isn't that Jacob decides to leave while Laban is far away, and no one in the household tells Laban for THREE DAYS.  That would indicate they thought they were protecting the vulnerable from the one who was doing them harm. Jacob got Rachel and Leah, as well as his family, out of an unsafe home for them. Rachel tried to take something with her for protection along the way, and it became the excuse by which her father almost killed them all.  In that moment Laban sounds like an abusive partner who will kill their partner rather than let them leave, and Laban's dream is the only thing that held him back.  Rachel survived, and likely they ALL survived, because of her quick thinking and willingness to use what she had. Many women throughout history have been used and abused by powerful men. Furthermore, many PEOPLE throughout history have been used and abused by those with more power than they had.  Some, like Rachel, use everything they have, everything in their power, every subversive action in the world to get out.  Sometimes they succeed.  May God continue to guide those who seek safety, and may those who need safety keep Rachel's wits about them!  Amen -- Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

Pronouns: she/her/hershttp://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

I recently heard a story, it was the story of the person who told it to me, but it struck me that it was also  many peoples' story.  There was much to celebrate in the story, and also a lot to be frustrated by.  The person who told me the story was someone who lacks access to sufficient financial resources.  That is, in the colloquial – he is poor – although I think poverty is more complicated than that!  The man is a father, and his daughter got into a VERY good college, despite the challenges the family faced and the challenges their school district faced.  As you might hope, the very good college offered this young woman a financial aid package to make it possible for her to attend the school.  However, when the young woman got the financial aid package and read it over carefully, she realized that the loans she was being offered were predatory loans that would be verging on impossible to ever be able to pay back!  She contacted the school. They ignored her.  She kept pestering.  They kept ignoring her.  Her father started calling, and he started calling up the chain of command.  He was told to stop calling.  When I heard the story, that's where it ended – they were unsure if the young woman would attend the very good college because she was WAY too smart to do so at risk to her financial future.

She sounds like the persistent widow.  I've been told that the persistent widow is a very strange character with which to start a sermon series on subversive women – and not just because the Bible presents her as fictional. The bigger issue is that her subversiveness isn't very obvious.  To the naked eye, she just looks like an annoying nag!  Actually, even that may be projection.  This is a SHORT story, there isn't that much to it!  

In our study of the text though, we found a lot to discuss about this short-storied, fictional, persistent widow.  It is helpful to remember that the Torah, the laws of community life that the Jewish people understood to have come from God, were very clear about the care for widows, orphans, and foreigners.  That would be, people who did not have the protection of an adult male who was a member of society and were thus vulnerable.  The system was designed so that even the vulnerable could find ways to survive.  The Torah was also very clear about the threat to society created by an unjust justice system, and articulated frequently, in no uncertain terms, the need to have judges who made rulings based on JUSTICE and not on who had more money or influence.  

That is, the persistent widow is stuck in a situation she shouldn't be in.  She should be cared for.  She isn't!  It is likely that her “opponent” is the person who should have been taking care of her and providing for her livelihood, and wasn't!  The justice system was supposed to help her find a way to justice.  It didn't.   She was stuck in a situation which was untenable for her survival without a means of recourse because of the immorality of the judge.  There was no other means by which she could get justice.  The system was closed to her, and the only option left to her was to agitate the system.

The judge is presented very simplistically.  He doesn't care about justice, people, or God... and it sounds like he just does what he wants to do.  He is a negative caricature of a person abusing power or authority, someone who isn't easy to move toward justice.

The persistent widow won though!  I suspect that she could have taught the courses I took this spring on non-violent direct action!  Jesus says that the judge thought to himself, “because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.” (v. 5) The persistent widow didn't have much power to use in the world, and she didn't have ANY power that could be used without being annoying.  So she used what she had.  She was annoying.  She didn't give up.  And she annoyed him into doing what was right!  

That's what I think is so subversive about the persistent widow.  She can't have been the only widow in that city who was impoverished by a lack of justice, she likely wasn't even the only one to bring it to the judge's attention.  MANY of the widows might have been in similar situations.  However, in cases like that, most people give up. That's what people are counting on, and that's part of why injustices sometimes win out.

I think about that young college bound woman, and how carefully she read the details of her financial aid package to determine that the offer wasn't fair.  How many other people in the same situation come with some trust that the college they want to go to won't do them harm, don't read the package, or don't yet have the math skills to interpret the implications?  How many people would decide to take the package and hope for the best?  How many people would try to call and ask if there was another loan, but give up easily?  I don't know how many people would get as far as the young woman I heard about, and consider giving up their dream school, but I do know that her persistence is NOT what the predatory loan company is counting on.

The predatory loan company is expecting people not to pay attention, to trust, to take a leap of faith, not to run the numbers, and to sign on the dotted line – no matter how high the interest rate turns out to be.  The predatory loan company is able to get away with their loans because few people are as persistent as that young woman. The college, as well, choose to work with that predatory loan company, and in doing so to keep this young woman and those in similar situations IN poverty, while pretending to help them out of it.  It makes me wonder what they might be getting out of it.

Keeping our eyes open to see the injustices of the wold and REFUSING to be quiet about them once we do is wildly subversive.  I'm claiming the persistent widow was subversive because she was a nag, and she didn't stop nagging until justice was found.  It isn't the wildest story in the Bible by any means, but it may represent the most frequently successful mechanism of accessing justice: refusing to give up!

One of the challenges of acting like the persistent widow, though, is that there are a lot of injustices in the world and none of us can give attentiveness to all of them.  That level of nagging can't be multi-tasked!  This is one of the reasons I am so grateful for the image of the Body of Christ.  I come back to it time and time again, reminded that if I do my part faithfully, and trust the rest of the Body to do their part (and God to do God's part), the whole world gets better.  Most often justice comes through collective action (think Montgomery Bus Boycott, Women's Suffrage, blocking the Keystone XL pipeline), but sometimes they're smaller or individual as well.  On occasion we can successfully seek justice alone, but no one of us can seek ALL justice.  If any of us try to all the work of the Body of Christ, nothing gets done at all!  

My college thesis was on John Conway's “Game of Life,” which is a set of rules governing a grid.  On the grid, at any given moment, each cell is “alive” or “dead” and then, from there, things change.  The status “alive” or “dead” is represented visually by two different colors, and those statuses are able to change with time, based on the relationships they have with other cells who are also “alive” or “dead.”  

One night, deep in the trenches of trying to write up my thesis and struggling with a decision about where to go to seminary, I went down to the river to pray.  I sat on a dock and watched the water flow by. As might make sense if you'd spent as many hours and months staring at colored boxes on a graph as I had, I started imagining the river as the graph – and imagining the graph spreading out to cover all the water of the world.  I'd stared at colored boxes for a LONG time, and I was tired ;)  Then, as I continued to pray, ponder, and be overwhelmed, I started imagining one of those boxes as representing MY life.  To my horror, the box that represented my life was blinking!  I took this to mean that sometimes my life was contributing to the well-being of others, but sometimes it WASN'T!  I found myself sitting on that dock on the Connecticut River, aware that sometimes I wasn't benefiting the kin-dom of God and wishing with all that I was that I could ALWAYS be good.

It was at that point that another thought entered my mind, one that was outside of the particular ways my thoughts tend to cycle around. That process has been one I've associated with the Divine, and I have since thought of that prayer time by the river as a vision of sorts -but I'm also giving you the details to consider it so that you can assess how you'd like to think about it.  The thought that entered my mind, seemingly from beyond me, was that if I could manage to be a blessing that contributed to the well-being of the kindom 51% of the time, that was ENOUGH for God to be able to expand the goodness out into the world and to be a net gain to the kin-dom.  

It was certainly a new thought to me then, I'd leaned more towards perfectionism than toward an idea that offering more good than bad was a net gain!  It is a thought I've gone back to in the years since, particularly when I've found myself being extra rough on myself.  It helps me to consider that God is able to make things work with what we're able to offer.

If we do our best, and especially if we are able to offer a bit more good into the world than harm, then God can use what we offer in combination with the rest of the Body of Christ.  The world becomes a safer, fuller, more just place.  The kin-dom becomes.  We don't have to do all the work!  We can't!  We'd burn out.  That means that sometimes we have to work through the process of figuring out which things are ours to do and which things we leave for the rest of the Body of Christ.  Together, each of us offering the love, compassion, and persistence that are our gifts from God, we can follow the widow's course and create the world that the Torah dreams and God wants – the kin-dom of God!  And it doesn't even require perfection ;)  Just persistence.  Thanks be to God.  Amen

Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

Pronouns: she/her/hershttp://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

Our texts today are SCARY. Or at least they are to me. There is ONE well-known hymn that reflects the Jeremiah reading today. Also, as far as I am aware, there really is only one hymn that works with our Jeremiah reading today. Sorta like the issue around “We Three Kings” - you know, that the so-called “wise men” weren't kings and there is no particular reason to think there were three of them – the hymn “Have Thine Own Way Lord” seems to have taken over how people think about this text without accurately reflecting it. It guides their thinking more than the actual text does.

For example, the people who make suggestions of hymns to match the lectionary often do an excellent job. This week they offered variations on a theme: letting God have control over our individual lives. That's a big problem because they text is COMMUNAL. It is about how a group of people (in this case a nation) are living out their covenant with God. The premise is not that one person's actions are molded by God, although that is what that darn hymn says. For those blissfully unaware, “Have Thine Own Way” verse one says:

1. Have thine own way, Lord! Have thine own way! Thou art the potter, I am the clay. Mold me and make me after thy will, while I am waiting, yielded and still.

The hymn is about PERSONAL holiness, and yielding one's power to God. For the time being I'm going to lay aside the questions about if that's valid at all, to focus on what the text actually says. Jeremiah, it might be useful to remember, was the prophet of the exile. He experienced his call when he was a boy, and many scholars believe that the same prophet spoke warnings of the exile, spoke during the exile, and he spoke of the possibility of restoration. In the beginning of the book of Jeremiah, in the story of his call, it is said, “Then the Lord put out his hand and touched my mouth; and the Lord said to me, ‘Now I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up and to pull down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.’” (Jeremiah 1:9-10, NRSV) Jeremiah wasn't born in an era when it would have worked to be soft and fluffy. It wasn't the work that was needed at that time. He did manage to speak some of the most profound words of hope in the Bible, but mostly he spoke of death and destruction.

The text today is a challenging one. I don't think it is challenging to UNDERSTAND, but it raises big scary questions. The prophet goes to a potter's house and watched a potter for a while. Then he has an insight drawn from the metaphor of making pottery. The metaphor suggests that God is the potter and the people are the clay. It suggests that if God is displeased with the nation, God can knock down the clay and start over again. It further suggests that God is judging the people on communal faithfulness to their covenant.

The text actually says, “At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it,” (18:7) and then it makes it quite clear that God can and will change God's mind on the basis of the people's behavior. What does it mean to assume that God steps into human affairs and takes down nations as God sees fit? If the implications of that aren't scary enough on its own, it makes God a monster when we look at what has happened in recent human affairs. If God can and will step in to stop evil, then why didn't God stop Germany before the concentration camps, or Russia before Stalin took over, or any society before they moved to genocide???

This perspective, this image of God as potter shaping the fate of nations, fit well in the time of the prophet Jeremiah. It fit his worldview and the worldview of those to whom he was speaking. It made sense of the political environment around them. It doesn't fit for us anymore. We don't see that God sweeping in to intervene at random moments fits the arc of history NOR our belief in God who is good. Rather, it appears that God works through individuals and communities who are open to the guidance of the Holy One, and through them seeks to bless the world. Free will exists. We get the leaders we empower.

There is still plenty of goodness in this text though! First of all, there is the direct claim about God being willing and able to change God's mind in response to human activity. That seems like good news because it reminds us that we are truly important to God and that our RELATIONSHIPS with God and each other have real impact on God's well-being.

Secondly, there is the reminder that comes from applying the pottery metaphor to communities who ARE seeking God's guidance. Like ancient Israel, many faith communities today seek out the wisdom of the Holy One, and are open to some molding along the way – which likely makes it possible for God to do some molding along the way. Potters rework clay and are able to use the same clay to make a variety of different shapes before anything is fired. It doesn't actually hurt the clay to be reworked, and the moisture level may need some fine tuning along the way to build a solid pot. The suggestion that we are still plastic, and that God is willing to work with us can be rather positive. In this era of exceptional cultural change, and profoundly different responses to institutionalized religion, this may be REALLY good news for us. Perhaps God is getting ready to knock down the UMC and build it back up as a source of greater justice and love in the world! (May it be so!) The plasticity of the clay allows for the reworking to happen without brokenness or pain – although it does require a certain openness to the guidance of the Spirit. We're still working on that ;), especially as a denomination.

OK, so, fine, maybe Jeremiah isn't such scary stuff, but certainly Luke is! This whole cost of discipleship thing is tough. Did you hear the opening threat? “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14:26) HATE? What????? To keep us on our toes, the Jesus seminar thinks that only this verse is authentic to Jesus, and several scholars point out that this is consistent with the rest of Luke's message. Apparently, we are to assume that Jesus said it and Luke thought it was thematic.

Family Life Radio – I think maybe you should be particularly scared ;)

It is probably of use to remember that the basic unit of societal structure in the ancient world was family. Power derived from it. The head of household – the patriarch – had unilateral control over the other members of his household (the women, children, descendants, servants, and slaves), and only the patriarch would participate in public life with voice. To upset the family unit was to upset the entire society in which Jesus lived. I actually don't think that we have a comparable understanding of this in our current family life. The nuclear family, known in our society to be fairly unstable, is not like families were in the time of Jesus.

Jesus was a revolutionary, at least as the writer of the Gospel of Luke understood him. He was interested in upsetting ALL the apple carts, and in order to do so, he started with the most basic. If you disregard the power and authority of the patriarch and the family unit in the time of Jesus, what are you left with? Anarchy and chaos.

Jesus really believed that the kin-dom of God was more important than societal order, and that in order to create a world where all people were cared for and able to thrive required utter devotion to such work. That is, one can't have two masters: not God and money, not the kin-dom and the society, not Jesus and the family unit. The Jesus seminar does not believe that the rest of the words in the passage are attributed to Jesus, they sound too mundane. It is only the radical, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.” that they take to be authentic. They attribute the final line of our text, “So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.” to Luke. Other scholars point out that “possessions” isn't a strong enough translation. It should be something more like “all that you have.”

So, is it possible to follow Jesus while also having loyalty to something else? Can we have bank accounts and be good Jesus followers? Can we value our family and be good Jesus followers? Can we have.... say.... an extensive collection of books and be good Jesus followers? Is there a way to follow Jesus without giving up EVERYTHING – all possessions, all finances, all relationships, and everything that matters to us? It may be Luke who raises the question, but it seems pretty valid to this Jesus-following-stuff.

I've been pondering this particular scary question for many years now.  Reading the Bible, and in particular reading the Gospels, tends to bring it up. The Gospels are pretty clear that those of us who have two coats should be getting rid of one of them to someone who has none. The Gospels are RADICAL in their calls for us to care for each other and to build a world where all people have enough and can thrive - and they ask us to do it both individually and collectively. They stand against inequality and income differentiation. In some interpretations, ones I tend to believe, they stand against economics and markets themselves, staking a claim that money itself dehumanizes and the only way to live out the beloved community of God is to refute the most basic premises of economics.

I do think that the utter anarchy and chaos that would result from people following Jesus' words, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple,“ in the 1st century can be matched by the anarchy and chaos that would emerge in the 21st century if we refuted the principles of the market! Not just if we refused to charge interest, or to be charged interest, not just if we stopped “investing” in stocks and bonds, or if we functioned primarily through trade and barter and ignored money itself, but moreso if we REFUSED to accept the principle that the well-being of the economy was the basic good of our society. That could mess up EVERYTHING our society is based on.

And that's what Jesus seems to be getting to in this speech. So, can we be disciples of we have possessions, family, and alternative priorities? I'll give you the answer that lets me sleep at night. James Fowler, who was Professor of Theology and Human Development at Emory University, wrote a seminal book entitled “Stages of Faith: The Psychology of Human Development and the Quest for Meaning.” (It is one of my all time favorite books.) In it he outlines faith development in stages. He claims that the highest stage of faith development happens when a person stops experiencing a difference between their well-being and the well-being of the whole – and is therefore willing to give away ANYTHING (including their life) for the sake of the well-being of the whole.

That sounds like what Jesus is asking for, right? Fowler's ultimate step in faith development – utter selflessness. Our goal as people of faith is to get get there, but it is a journey and we can't get to the end unless we travel the path. (People do travel at different rates, and not all get to the end goal, and that's OK.) Our contributions toward communal well-being are meant to fit where our faith is today, and our faith development is meant to lead us forward. We don't have to pretend to be anywhere we aren't. Our faith is made up of some scary stuff, but God walks with us on the way, and asks of us what we are able to give WHEN we are able to give it. May we be brave, throughout our faith development. Amen  

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Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305Pronouns: she/her/hers

http://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

Our mother read to us a lot as children, and all of us particularly liked Laura Ingalls Wilder's “Little House” series, so she read it to us several times. In those books the experience of the Sabbath sound TERRIBLE. I remember being really grateful that Christianity had given up on Sabbath by my time! ;)

For those of you who haven't read the Little House books, or had them read to you, they describe Sunday as a day of quiet rest. They would sit on hard chair all day, unable to get up and play, or to talk to each other. Now, I'm going from my memory and not quoting the books directly, but what I remember is that they could only read religious books – the really long ones that were well over their heads - perhaps do needlepoint, but Laura hated needlepoint. It was hard, HARSH, boring, and basically terrible.

I saw why it went out of style.

I fear that when people hear “Sabbath,” that they think of it like that. They think of something boring, restraining, and harsh. That is, I fear many people miss the point of Sabbath entirely! The idea of one day off from work a week is profound, and was totally unique when it emerged. Walter Brueggemann, one of my favorite Biblical scholars and theologians, wrote a short and powerful book entitled, “Sabbath as Resistance: Saying NO to the CULTURE OF NOW”. Brueggemann believes that Sabbath is one of the defining characteristics of YHWH faith, and that it is utterly imperative to a full life.

His work has framed my thinking on Sabbath. For starters, it was in reading Brueggemann commentaries that I realized that Sabbath exists for the people to be fully human! It is a time set aside for relationship and reflection – time for families to be together, time for friends to visit, time for intimacy to flourish, time for human beings to have enough time to consider what truly matters and DO IT. Working 7 days a week doesn't give people enough time to be fully human, but the world of economics wants productively and consumption ALL THE TIME. The first commandments for Sabbath come to a people recently freed from slavery. They knew what it was to work all the time, and YHWH instructed them NOT to continue.

In the US at least, there is an underlying myth that suggests that the well-being of the economy is the ultimate good. Sabbath resists that narrative, and claims that our identities are in being human and being beloved children of God – NOT in our capacity to produce or consume. I want to give you a better idea about what Sabbath really is by giving you access to some of Brueggemann's work. He thinks Sabbath is central to everything. In fact, in his book he supports the claims that “the fourth commandment on Sabbath is the 'crucial bridge' that connects the Ten Commandments together.”1 That is,

“The fourth commandment looks back to the first three commandments and the God who rests (Exod. 20:3-7). At the same time, the Sabbath commandment looks forward to the last six commandments that concern the neighbor (vv. 12-17; they provide for rest along side the neighbor. God, self, and all members of the household share in common rest on the seventh day; that social reality provides a commonality and a coherence not only to the community of covenant but to the commandments of Sinai as well.”2

In addition to seeing the Sabbath commandment as the central one, Brueggemann asserts that Sabbath teaches us about the essential qualities of God. Namely, that our God is not interesting in systems of oppression that dehumanize people. God rests, and that matters. He says, “the Sabbath commandment is drawn into the exodus narrative, for the God who rests is the God who emancipates from slavery and consequently from the work system of Egypt and the gods of Egypt who require and legitimate that system.”3

The idea of STOPPING WORK once a week was radical. It still is. When I have brought the idea up to youth in our society they have looked at me like I have two heads. It seems impossible to them. I'm with Brueggemann though. I think it is imperative if we are to be full humans. He says, “the Sabbath of the fourth commandment is an act of trust in the subversive, exodus-causing God of the first commandment, and act of submission to the restful God of commandments one, two, and three. Sabbath is a practical divestment so neighborly engagement, rather than production and consumption, defines our lives.”4 Remember, Sabbath was designed to be time for relationships!

It has always been hard. Brueggemann again, “Such faithful practice of work stoppage is an act of resistance.  It declares in bodily ways that we will not participate in the anxiety system that pervades our social environment. We will not be defined by busyness and by the pursuit of more, in either our economics or our personal relations or anywhere else in our lives. Because our life does not consist in commodity.”5 I love how he contrasts the systems of the world as anxious and anxiety producing with the fullness of humanity gained from life with a God who rests! It is an important reminder that anxiety need not be the only way!! (Which is getting hard to remember for many people in our society.)

Brueggemann says, “Sabbath is the cessation of widely shared practices of acquisitiveness. It provides time, space, energy, and imagination for coming to the ultimate recognition that more commodities, which may be acquired in the rough and ready of daily economics, finally do not satisfy. Sabbath is variously restraint, withdrawal, or divestment from concrete practices of society that specialize in anxiety. Sabbath is an antidote to anxiety that both derives from our craving and in turn feeds those cravings for more.”6 Taking time off from the merry-go-round of consumption and production is the only way to figure out what really matters. Unfortunately today, with the minimum wage where it is, many workers simply cannot afford to take a day off! This is yet another reason why we need to fight for a living wage. People who work ALL THE TIME can't live entirely full lives, and the ways that our society prevents full humanity are unacceptable.

In the final page of his book, Brueggemann offers this little reflection, “It occurs to me that Sabbath is a school for our desires, an expose and critique of the false desires that focus on idolatry and greed that have immense power for us. When we do not pause for Sabbath, these false desires take power over us. But Sabbath is the chance for self-embrace of our true identity.”7 He really believes that time OFF, that Sabbath itself, provides space for us to become more compassionate to ourselves and to others, that is, to become more fully human.

Now I offered ALL of this because I'm concerned that it is entirely too easy to face our gospel lesson with a blasé treatment of the Sabbath, and worst yet to use the gospel as another excuse to dismiss the Sabbath entirely. That wouldn't be OK. So, now, a few notes on the particularities of our Gospel lesson. This is VERY Lukan passage. It is a story that only shows up in Luke. It is a story involving a woman. The setting is in the synagogue, and that should be our first clue that Jesus is about to cause trouble because Luke has Jesus start something every time he goes into a synagogue.

The woman enters, on her own. She comes to worship God on the Sabbath, even though she would have been separated from community because of her physical illness. She does NOT ask Jesus for help. He sees her and has compassion for her and seeks her out. He speaks to her, of forgiveness, and then he touches her. The touch would have made him unclean, and as per usual, he doesn't care! His compassion for her is greater than his desire to avoid the uncleanness. Her response is praise God when she is healed. Then the story moves away from her. The leader of the synagogue gets mad at Jesus for breaking the Sabbath with the healing. If Jesus had been healing AND EXPECTING PAYMENT FOR IT, I think the leader of the synagogue would have had a valid point. He didn't though. He gave it as a free gift.

Jesus makes a great point about freedom and the Sabbath, using a verb that means “loose.” He points out that in caring for animals on the Sabbath, they are loosed so that they can access water. Should not the woman also be loosed from her bondage to this physical illness – that kept her from community? That is, shouldn't she be freed to celebrate Sabbath in its truest sense again by being a full member of community and participating with others in relationship??

Jesus praises her by calling her a “Daughter of Abraham” thereby acknowledging her humanity, her faith, her faithfulness, and her status as a beloved child of God. The crowd celebrates, which means they think he did right to heal on the Sabbath too!

So what's the issue? As one commentator put it, “In their understandable concern for religious identity, marked by Sabbath-keeping, the religious leaders lost sight of compassion.”8 Ohh! In any organization, the leaders are responsible for maintaining the well-being of the institution. It is 'their job.” Keeping the Sabbath was the central piece of religious identity for most people in those days, particularly in the time of Luke with the Temple had just been destroyed for the second time. The leader of the synagogue wanted to keep the people connected to God! The leader forgot that Sabbath exists to help people become human, to build up relationships – that is, to make space for compassion to grow. The leader missed that the point of the Sabbath was that people might make choices like the one Jesus made – to see another person fully, and be willing to do what you can do to make their life more wonderful. The leader got stuck in the rules, and forgot why they existed.

This happens in the church today as well. Institutional leaders get stuck on the rules, and forget that the purpose of any rule in the faith tradition is to build the kin-dom of God and expand God's love in the world.

Sabbath is a gift from God for the people. It builds the kin-dom by making space for people to be fully human. It expands God's love by giving people time to connect. Sabbath is a way to be alive, to be human, to reflect, to connect, to become more compassionate and whole. May today be such a day for us all! And may a day like this come every week – and may it eventually come for all God's people every week! Amen

1Walter Brueggemann, Sabbath as Resistence: Saying NO to the CULTURE OF NOW, (Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville, Kentucky, 2014) page 1.

2Brueggemann, 1.

3Brueggemann, 2.

4Brueggemann, 18.

5Brueggemann, 32.

6Brueggemann, 85.

7Brueggemann, 88.

8Tokunboh Adeyemo, General Editor, Africa Bible Commentary, Paul John Issak, “Luke” (Zondervan: Nairobie, Kenya, 2006) page 1231.

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Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

Pronouns: she/her/hers

http://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

I'm told it takes years to build a vineyard, and it takes pretty choice land as well. Vineyards need sandy or loose soil, they need lots of sun by day and dew at night. Israel exists in a desert climate so building a vineyard there means that access to enough water would be imperative too. The work of building a vineyard is physically demanding, requiring people to work together. In Israel, big boulders need to be moved (they're a regular feature of the land), walls and towers have to be built to to protect the space from predators and thieves, and a ditch had to be dug around the wall. The land needed to be hoed by hand – plowing wouldn't do, and that was hard work too! Wine presses had to be made as well, and in Biblical times they were made by hewing out those large boulders!1 (Imagine!) And then, grapevines don't produce fruit until their 3rd season.

Vineyards are hard work, and big investments. Both now, and in Biblical times, not just anyone can afford to support land that wasn't producing for 3 years, not to mention paying people to do the heavy lifting and hard labor in the meantime! The act of domesticating the land in order to produce domesticated grapes is intense.

From the earliest examples of literature, vineyards and gardens have been used to talk about fertility, love, and sex.2 The metaphors are pretty easy to follow, and I'm guessing you don't need explanations.  Furthermore, grapes are a common symbol of fertility – likely the threefold combination of the clusters of grapes themselves giving expression to the idea of MANY, the impact of drinking wine, and the human eye's enjoyment of curvy things all had impact in that!  The Bible regularly uses vineyards as metaphors of sexuality as well. (The Bible also regularly acknowledges the horror of planting a vineyard and not being around to enjoy the fruits of your labor!)

It is interesting, though, isn't it? Vineyards and gardens are intentional growing places, domesticated to allow for optimal growing conditions and care. That they become common symbols and allegories for human fertility is a bit ironic, as most of the mysteries of human fertility were unknown to the ancients and many are still unknown to us. The choice of the symbolism itself suggests humans wanting to have more control over sexuality and fertility than they do!!

Let's look at a few of the places that the Bible intentionally connects the ideas of fertility/sexuality and vineyards. One comes from Deuteronomy 20:5-7:

Then the officials shall address the troops, saying, “Has anyone built a new house but not dedicated it? He should go back to his house, or he might die in the battle and another dedicate it Has anyone planted a vineyard but not yet enjoyed its fruit? He should go back to his house, or he might die in the battle and another be first to enjoy its fruit. Has anyone become engaged to a woman but not yet married her? He should go back to his house, or he might die in the battle and another marry her.”

While these are three separate ideas, they are also three interconnected ones, and I believe the order is intentional. The metaphors are most striking in Song of Songs:

My mother’s sons were angry with me; they made me keeper of the vineyards, but my own vineyard I have not kept! (1:6)

My beloved is to me a cluster of henna blossoms in the vineyards of En-gedi. (1:14)

Catch us the foxes, the little foxes, that ruin the vineyards— for our vineyards are in blossom.” (2:15)

Let us go out early to the vineyards, and see whether the vines have budded, whether the grape blossoms have opened and the pomegranates are in bloom. There I will give you my love. (7:12)

Solomon had a vineyard at Baal-hamon; he entrusted the vineyard to keepers; each one was to bring for its fruit a thousand pieces of silver. My vineyard, my very own, is for myself; you, O Solomon, may have the thousand, and the keepers of the fruit two hundred! (8:11-12)

There is a lot of vineyard imagery in this relatively short book, isn't there? Now, I should have been clearer about the metaphor, the vineyard/garden is usually used as a reference for FEMALE fertility.

Which is why the opening line of today's passage is so very interesting. It sounds like a female voice to begin with, her beloved's vineyard might first be assumed to be HER. “Let me sing for my beloved my love-song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill.” Love and vineyards, not only do they classically work well together, they create a well-known direction to start off this passage. It is a love song with a vineyard motif. That's a genre anyone can follow. It would be reasonable for the hearers to assume that we are going to get into some more Song of Songs like stuff!  

The text goes on to explain that all the appropriate care has been given to the vineyard: all the hard work has been done. Boulders were cleared, vines were planted, a watch-tower was built, the wine press was dug out of stone itself, and it is implied that even the wall had been built. But the vineyard didn't produce what was expected. With all that work, the vineyard owner would be expected some great wine – and, um, love.

Instead, only very seedy, un-juicy wild grapes emerged, perhaps the same kind that were growing the vineyard before the work was begun. That's wrong! It isn't supposed to go that way. All the hard work is supposed to produce something! In fact, it is supposed to produce something wonderful: domesticated grapes! Which are good for food directly, for food as raisins, for a sweetener AND for wine. After all, that's why people go through all the work of the vineyard building: it is supposed to be worth it.

In this metaphor, supposedly about love, the vineyard owner decides to give up, and allow the wild to reclaim the vineyard. Connecting it back to the opening verses, it seems possible the “vineyard owner” is divorcing his wive because of her lack of fertility with him. The act of domestication had failed in this vineyard, and the vineyard owner isn't intending to put more effort into it. No more work! The wall and the protective hedge will be destroyed. No more weeding! No more pruning! No more hoeing! And no more rain....

Which is the point when we are supposed to figure out this isn't just a weird story about the wrong crop growing up. Normal vineyard owners don't control the rain. This is when it becomes clear that this metaphor is about God and the people. This is when the text gets super confusing about who the one who calls God her beloved is too, but I don't have a single answer for that. (Feel free to come up with your own answer.)

The final line of our text is the prophet Isaiah interpreting the song/story that has just been told. It feels a bit like a parable of Jesus that comes along with interpretation. The prophet explains, “For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel, and the people of Judah are his pleasant planting; he expected justice, but saw bloodshed; righteousness, but heard a cry!” (5:7)

Now, the explanation doesn't go quite as far as the metaphor does! The story ends with a suggestion of destruction, leaving us waiting for a declaration about exile! Yet, the interpretation just explains how the Israelites were supposed to be different, and aren't. They were meant to be God's dream for goodness in the world, but they're just like the rest of the wild grapes. They have been domesticated: tenderly cared for and loved, but that hasn't impacted what has grown from them. Instead of behaving with God's justice and extending God's love by caring for the poor, the widows, the orphans, the foreigners, and the vulnerable, the people of God have refused to participate in justice. They've rejected mercy for each other, and can't call themselves righteous. The text talks of cries and bloodshed, suggesting that the ways people were being mistreated weren't trivial: they were matters of life and death. The lack of justice meant the most vulnerable people were dying.

The people of God were acting like the wild grapes, the ones that hadn't known tender love and care. They were receiving what God gave to them, but not letting it impact how they treated others.

This wasn't God's dream for the people. God planted justice and righteousness, but it didn't grow. Rev. Paul Simpson Duke, currently copastor of First Baptist Church of Ann Arbor and Campus Minister for the American Baptist Campus Foundation at the University of Michigan, along with his wife, Stacey wrote in a commentary, “Any good news? Well, it is a love song. It ends badly. Has God stopped planting vineyards or restoring ruined ones? The bad news is that we can still be useless and a lethal danger to the world and to ourselves. The good news is that Someone still sings, plows, plants, guards, and looks for good fruit. In this is enough hope to set us humming bits of the song at least, and living toward its true ending, Love's own harvest, sweet justice, festive righteousness, a cup of joy in the lifted hands of all.”3

It turns out that the use of the vineyard imagery wasn't accidental, nor was the opening line claiming to be a love song! The love song part seems a little bit Country-Western, in talking about how the beloved did the person wrong, but it is still a love song. In truth, historically, there was an exile, but there was also a return. The vineyards around Jerusalem were destroyed, and later rebuilt. God's work in the world certainly continues, even if it is a source of IMMENSE frustration to God that we KEEP ON missing the memos on justice, righteousness, and treating each other like we matter! “Someone still sings, plows, plants, guards, and looks for good fruit.“  God may well be tempted to give up on us every once in a while, but as we are told again and again, “God's steadfast love endures forever.”

God is One with a long-view – longer even than than the person who thinks to start planting a vineyard. God still thinks we are fertile soil, capable of producing justice, righteousness, and a world of peace and love. May we take the ministrations of God – the planting and pruning, the protections and the watering, the hewing, and the watching over – and allow them to transform us into ever more fertile soil that may produce exactly what God wants: justice, righteousness, and love. Amen

1To my horror, the things I thought I knew about vineyards were affirmed here: Fred Wight, “Manner and Customs of Bible Lands” chapter 20http://www.baptistbiblebelievers.com/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=TGctIUL-BsY%3D&tabid=232&mid=762. 1953, Accessed 8/11/16

2 C S Lewis, Allegory of Love Oxford (University Press 1936).

3Paul Simpson Duke, “Homeletical Perspective on Isaiah 5:1-7” found on page 345 of “Feasting on the Word Year C Volume 3” edited by Barbara Brown Taylor and David Bartlett (Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville Kentucky, 2010).    

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Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

http://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

The imagery of God as a loving parent in this text is particularly beautiful. However, one commentator suggested that it creates a problem for preachers: if we present God as a “father” we're continuing the damage done by lifting the masculine above the feminine; if we present God as the generic “parent” it feels cold and distant; and if we present God as a nurturing mother we conflate nurturing with motherhood and do damage to nurturing men, women who are not mothers, and people whose mothers were not nurturing.

I'm going to have to go with the idea that these are not all EQUAL problems. While I do think it is possible to reclaim the neutral “parent” as close and connected, I think that the world is more in need of a counter image to God-as-Father. That being said, the concerns about God-as-Nurturing-Mother are worth acknowledging. So, please, know this: not all us have (or have been) the healthy sort of mothers that we would want; there are incredibly nurturing men, and we are grateful for the ways that their forms of nurture benefit the world; AND there are a lot of ways that women contribute to the well-being of the world beyond motherhood. Finally, feminine does not equal nurturing. Duh. There. That being dealt with, let's look at this amazing text of Hosea!

Did you hear the verbs attributed to God? I loved, I called, I taught, I took them up in my arms, I healed, I led, I lifted, I bent down, I fed. These are tender, sweet verbs. They describe a loving, nurturing parent who wants the very best for their child. There are a few places where the description tends to sound more feminine and maternal. The images, “I taught Ephraim to walk”, “I took them up in my arms”, “I was to them like those who lift infants to their cheeks”, “I bent down tot hem and fed them” all sound like a mother caring for a baby or a toddler. The love between the mother and the child is tangible – even as the text acknowledges that the beloved child is currently acting like rebellious teenager!

Did you catch that part? “The more I called them, the more they went from me”, “They did not know that I healed them”, “they have refused to return to me”, “they are bent on turning away from me!” Just in case you are confused about language, the “child” or “son” in this passage is variously called “Ephraim” and “Israel” which mean exactly the same thing in this case. Hosea was a northern prophet who was speaking to the northern kingdom of Israel in during the last kingship of Israel before it lost in battle to Assyria and was exiled. The terms Ephraim and Israel were used interchangeably sort of like we say “America” and “The US”. The text is believed to have been edited, rather strongly, by the southern kingdom after their exile AND return. The southern kingdom seems to have heard truth in the words and wanted to claim them for themselves, particularly that the God's love wouldn't run out on them.

There are, however, some theological challenges to this passage. Most interpreters hear punishment in the text, and then hear it resolved through God's loving nature. I have yet to be convinced by anyone or anything that God actually punishes people, so I find that problematic. I do believe that most of the people who lived in Biblical times and who wrote and edited the words of the Bible believed that God punished, so that certainly explains why it might show up like that.

However, I don't THINK this text actually says that God punishes! I think people are so used to text that do, that they project it onto this one. Listen carefully: “They shall return to the land of Egypt, and Assyria shall be their king, because they have refused to return to me.” (Hosea 11:5 NRSV) It doesn't say – or even imply – that this is a punishment. It could just as easily be a consequence. Because of their actions, particularly the political choices of their leaders to make alliances with Egypt against Assyria, things would go wrong. Their schemes were going to lead to destruction.

Now, I really like my interpretation of that bit of the text – consequence instead of punishment - but it creates a problem soon thereafter. In verses 8-9, the words attributed to God are, “How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender. I will not execute my fierce anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and no mortal, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath.” Now, if we'd stuck with the idea that God was going to punish the people, then we'd have the easy way out here: God is a God of mercy and while God could justly punish the people, God chooses to follow God's nature and be merciful instead. (Mercy IS “compassion or forgiveness shown toward someone whom it is within one's power to punish or harm.”) That'd be grand – other than assuming that when bad things happen to us it is because God is punishing us and making God a really abusive parent.

However, if we go with MY theory that God is simply pointing out the consequences of their actions, then this part of the text suggests that God is deciding whether or not to interfere with the people's free will. Furthermore, after some serious soliloquy, God decides TO interfere and change the course of human history. Sometimes fixing things makes them worse – and that definitely applies to trying to draw good theology out of the Bible!

There are good things here though, and I still think they are worth fighting for. Those last few verses make the fantastic claim that God is not like mortals, and what makes God holy is God's capacity for mercy. That's worth hearing, particularly if we are trying to be holy like God!

Having written myself into a corner, as I often do, now is the time you get to watch me wiggle back out of it! Now, as I often do, I'm going to suggest taking the text VERY seriously. What if the prophet is proclaiming things that are true: that God is like a tender mother who adores her children, that God's people are like rebellious teenagers, that the actions of God's people are going to cause them a whole lot of trouble, that like any good parent God is going to struggle to decide how much God should help out the teenager for the trouble they got themselves into, and that in the end God really really want to help the beloved child – sort of like an overly compassionate mother? That doesn't HAVE to imply an invasion of free will.... it could just be a decision of how much help to OFFER!

Then we come to a new question! When we as a people get ourselves stuck in really bad situations, how is it that we think God helps? Does God change reality and the physical properties of nature around us? Does God interfere with our free will? Does God change the hearts of other people around us – and thereby interfere with THEIR free will?

Or is it more subtle? Does God simply stay with us in the bad times and make sure we aren't alone? Does God help us by guiding us to creative solutions? Does God help us by giving us the courage to admit our mistakes and ask those around us for mercy and help? Does God help us by encouraging those willing to listen to offer us love and compassion?

The more I think about it, the more I think the beginning of this passage fits with its middle and its end. Israel is presented as variously a baby, a toddler, and a teenager. Those are all people that are allowed to make mistakes, to not know, to need some guidance. They are even people – at least the toddler and the teenager- who are EXPECTED to rebel. Often as grown-ups we've bought into the story that we aren't supposed to make mistakes anymore, and that we are now supposed to know things. It makes it much harder for us when we are stuck in difficult situations to get out – because sometimes it feels like admitting that we are imperfect is the same as admitting that we are failures. Unlike the grace given by healthy parents to children, we sometimes forget to give ourselves grace when we make a mistake! Israel is presented like a child making a mistake, and God is presented as righteously angry – and gracious nonetheless.

I have told you this story before, but it is the best one I know, so I'm going to tell you again.

Julian of Norwich was a 14th century mystic in England who wrote the potent little book, “Revelations of a Divine Love” based on a mystical experience she had while desperately ill, and decades of prayerful reflection on it afterward. She tells one of my favorite stories, intending to clarify the relationship between people and God. This is my synopsis of it:

A servant dearly loves their ruler. The ruler asks the servant to go run an errand, and the servant is THRILLED to get do so something to help the ruler. The servant, however, so dearly loves the ruler than even while hurrying away to do the ruler's errand, the servant keeps looking at the ruler, loathe to let the ruler out of their sight. In this awkward form of movement, the servants doesn't notice a hole, and falls right into it, all the way down to the bottom.

The hole is deep, and there is no ladder. The servant is trying to scratch their way back up, to continue the errand, all while berating themselves for their stupidity, “I should have watched where I was going, I'm of no use to the ruler now! How could I have done this! The ruler will be so disappointed! I've messed everything up again! Isn't that just like me!”

The servant, trying again and again to climb out and failing, berating themselves silently, fails to look up and notice that the ruler is at the top of the hole, smiling kindly, and offering their hand to the servant.

God is often the one standing at the top of the hole in which we are berating ourselves, offering us a way out. Sometimes our own guilt, or the ways we berate ourselves, keep us from hearing God's possibilities for our lives. In my own life, I have found that I really believe that God is capable of forgiving everything I do – but I'm not! Many times, instead of asking for God's forgiveness (which I think comes automatically), I've had to ask God to help me forgive myself, so that I can move into the creative solutions that God offers.

This may be all the more important in community. The harms that we have done to one another in the past are imperative to recognize, but guilt rarely helps move anyone toward healing! Learning to acknowledge our individual and communal failings without dwelling in guilt and shame is another way of learning to walk – in grace.

Some of the work of learning to walk in grace is the work of self-forgiveness, and it is pretty important to make space for the goodness that God offers each of us. Truly, God is patient in teaching the people to walk – in grace. May we be patient with ourselves and each other in this process. Amen

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Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

http://fumcschenectady.org/

https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady