Genesis 1:1-2:4a
1:1 In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth,
1:2 the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.
1:3 Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.
1:4 And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness.
1:5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.
1:6 And God said, "Let there be a dome in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters."
1:7 So God made the dome and separated the waters that were under the dome from the waters that were above the dome. And it was so.
1:8 God called the dome Sky. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.
1:9 And God said, "Let the waters under the sky be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear." And it was so.
1:10 God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good.
1:11 Then God said, "Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed, and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit with the seed in it." And it was so.
1:12 The earth brought forth vegetation: plants yielding seed of every kind, and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it. And God saw that it was good.
1:13 And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.
1:14 And God said, "Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night; and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years,
1:15 and let them be lights in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth." And it was so.
1:16 God made the two great lights--the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night--and the stars.
1:17 God set them in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth,
1:18 to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good.
1:19 And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.
1:20 And God said, "Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky."
1:21 So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm, and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good.
1:22 God blessed them, saying, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth."
1:23 And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.
1:24 And God said, "Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every kind." And it was so.
1:25 God made the wild animals of the earth of every kind, and the cattle of every kind, and everything that creeps upon the ground of every kind. And God saw that it was good.
1:26 Then God said, "Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth."
1:27 So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
1:28 God blessed them, and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth."
1:29 God said, "See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food.
1:30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food." And it was so.
1:31 God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all their multitude.
2:2 And on the seventh day God finished the work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all the work that he had done.
2:3 So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.
2:4a These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created.
Psalm 8
8:1 O LORD, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens.
8:2 Out of the mouths of babes and infants you have founded a bulwark because of your foes, to silence the enemy and the avenger.
8:3 When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established;
8:4 what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?
8:5 Yet you have made them a little lower than God, and crowned them with glory and honor.
8:6 You have given them dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under their feet,
8:7 all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field,
8:8 the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas.
8:9 O LORD, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
2 Corinthians 13:11-13
13:11 Finally, brothers and sisters, farewell. Put things in order, listen to my appeal, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you.
13:12 Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the saints greet you.
13:13 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.
Matthew 28:16-20
28:16 Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them.
28:17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted.
28:18 And Jesus came and said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
28:19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
28:20 and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age."
And we have forgotten it; DAS is right: we Christians have forgotten that. Or we think Christ is with us, and us alone, and not with those people who don't look like us or don't live like us or don't think like us or don't worship like us, and I mean that person two pews over who you just know is wrong! And you can be sure Christ is not with them! And Christ is not with crazy people like Jeremiah Wright, and Christ is not with anybody who agrees with him, and Christ is not with the pastor when he doesn't say what I want him to say, and when he doesn't make me feel the way I want to feel, and when he doesn't do what I think he should do! Christ is with us, but "us" only means the people who think and act and feel and talk and live and look just like I do!
That's who Christ is with! That's "us"! And Christ is certainly not with our enemies, because then there would be no "us" at all, but only me! and I'd be all alone, and what good would that be? So Christ must be with us, when us is just what I want; and no more. Because life is hard enough as it is; life is tough enough; and I don't need God in my life just making it tougher. No...I don't need that at all.
DAS is right
A faith which just says "love your neighbor" and doesn't guide you toward that goal sets in front of you, it may be argued, a stumbling block before the blind (**) -- also from this last week's parsha. And to say "well you just have failed the impossible test, so you can't achieve salvation (of your own accord)" seems austere to the point of nihilism (c.f. Nietzsche). A pragmatic and graceful God would make it easy on us, not by exempting us from the Law as if we were mere young children, but by being a loving parent and instilling discipline in us as we grow, and to help us grow, spiritually.We've made ourselves pragmatic, and made a loving God impractical. We've wrung all the good and all the support and all the community out of the gospel message, and we've made it exclusive to people just like us, gathered in a church just like we like, gathered around a pastor just like we wanted, gathered at a time convenient to us, and comfortable to us, and reserved for us. Our little slice of heaven, made just for us. This God's for you!, and if you don't like it, well, send it back, and get another. Every version is freshness dated, so you can be sure it's as fresh a god as you could ever want, and if it gets old and stale, just throw it out, and get another one. Yes, I'm afraid DAS is right.
Not that he meant to be; not that he meant to be harsh or cruel or even critical. But the truth is just like that sometimes; the truth hurts. That's why we don't like the truth. That's why we don't like to listen to anything that sounds like it's aimed at us. That's why we like to be comfortable; but too often, anymore, being comfortable means being alone, means having just what I want, and no one to bother me: it means roads without traffic, which would mean without people; it means stores without crowds; which would mean without people; it means quite neighborhoods where no one drives through, and no strangers ever walk: which means without people. It means a world suited to our comfort, to your comfort, to my comfort: which means a world without people. It means a world like we imagine we used to have, when everyone thought like us and did like us and believed like us and acted like us: which, today, would mean a world without people.
But that's a terrible thing to wish for! Why would someone say those awful things? Why would someone make such awful statements! Why do you say that, pastor? Why do I say that, I ask myself!? What's going on here? What's wrong? What's happened?
What's happened is, we've made the world: we've made it comfortable and convenient and cooperative and complete: and now we have to lie down in it. And it turns out, it ain't no bed of roses. Because Jesus tells us: "Love your enemy." But if we do that, we'll be left all alone. Because everyone who disturbs our comfort; everyone who challenges our beliefs; everyone who doesn't let us think we, and the few people left like us, are the only people in the world, is our enemy. And if we love them, then we'd have to love everybody! And we can't do that! Only God can do that! And besides, we don't know anybody who even tries to do that! So how can we do that!? How can we even think to do that!?
Precisely. No one tries to do that. Only God tries to do that. God who is the Creator, who made everything, and saw that it was good. God who loved Creation into being with just a word, and blessed it, and saw it was good. God who made day and night; and it was good; and plants and trees, and saw it was good; God who made fish and birds, and animals and creeping things, and finally human beings, and each time saw: it was good. Which is why God loves God's enemies: because in Creation, everything is good; even enemies of God. God doesn't need us to love; but we need God. And that is good.
But we don't turn to God: we turn to our power over plants and trees and fish and birds and animals and every creeping thing, even over day and night: and we look at our creation, and we say that it is good. And then we never rest. We go inside our houses, and our cars, and the other products of our creation, and we ignore God's creation, or mine it, and strip it, and abuse it, and burn it, and destroy it, and tear at it, and we declare only our work good, and on the work of others like us good, and the work we don't like is not good, and the people we don't like are not good, and those people are not across the world or across the continent or in other countries they are...right next to us. In the pews, in our streets, in the stores, in the city: the city we have made this way. And we say that our city is good, and our life is good, and we ourselves are good: but we are only good by declaring other cities and other places and other people, even on our streets, even in our stores, even in our churches, not good. And there we are. We cannot turn to God, because we don’t know how: because all we expect from God is that God tell us we are good, and everything we do is good, and that can only mean everyone not like us is not good, because that proves we are good, that makes us better! Miserable creatures that we are, who is there to free us from this imprisonment? How are we to free ourselves?
We can’t do it alone; but we insist on living alone. We can’t do it by ourselves, but we insist on doing everything by ourselves. The neighbor with the overgrown lawn is a lazy neighbor; the neighbor who stays up all night working on car in the garage is an obnoxious neighbor; the neighbor whose teenage daughter is pregnant again is an immoral neighbor. The neighbor whose skin color is not like mine, whose language is not like mine, who doesn’t live like I do, is not my neighbor. My neighbors are the people who make me comfortable; and if I only find them in church, then those people are “neighbor” to me. But more and more, even those people don’t think like I do, don’t believe like I do, don’t live like I do. How am I to love my neighbor, much less my enemy, when they refuse to be like me?
13:11 Finally, brothers and sisters, farewell. Put things in order, listen to my appeal, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you.Yes, that must be nice; but Paul must have been talking to special people, to people who all agreed and all thought like he did and were already living in peace; who didn’t have to contend with different languages and customs and rules, who knew what was right and just did it! Surely the people who live right finally receive the peace of God as their blessing. Surely; except we know it wasn’t that way. Paul taught that everyone was equal, in a day when children never ate with their parents, and women were never in the same room as men, not even a wife when her husband had friends over; and slaves ate in their quarters, and never with the family. Paul taught that everyone was equal in Christ, and that meant Mom and Dad and the children and the slaves and the grandparents and…well, everybody! And they accepted that, when no one else in town did. And they lived in peace, and the God of love and peace was with them. But the neighbors thought they were crazy.
13:12 Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the saints greet you.
13:13 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.
Greet one another with a holy kiss. What would it be like to do that today? Greet everyone here in church that way? Or on the street? In the store? Over coffee? All the saints would greet you, but what would everyone else say? Would the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you, even as your friends decided you must be crazy? Even as your enemies in church, in life, decided you had gone insane? I mean, if everybody did that, if just every Christian did that, what kind of world would this be?
Yes. Precisely. What kind of world would this be? We were told to go and make a community, disciples of all nations, meaning followers no matter who they were: no matter race or national origin or place or language. We were told to find and build a community, and promised that Jesus would be with us always, to the end of the age. And what community have we built? What support have we given each other for the hard work of faith, of believing, of loving our enemy and seeing that Creation is indeed good? If Christ came in the doors today to ask us, what would we say?
Maybe we could say we were about to get to it; that we’ll get to it right away. That this Trinity Sunday, the day we honor Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier, we set aside as the day of remembrance that we are together in Christ, and that the work to be done we can do together: that all the saints greet us, and guide us on our way. If we would just greet each other in peace, and accept their teaching, and accept their community, and God’s grace.
Much to be done; and we can begin today. We can begin with prayer, and study. There is a cloud of witness around us, ready to be our guide. Nothing is left to us alone. They are here; we can ask them. God is with us. It is good.
Amen.
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