Scriptural Sermons

Snowflakes. If you aren’t connected to a college campus, you probably think that a snowflake is a tiny crystal of snow. If you are connected to a college campus, however, this word takes on new meaning. Snowflakes are students who are as fragile as their namesake. More particularly, Snowflakes are readily traumatized and offended. If a subject is raised, for instance, that involves exploitation, oppression, persecution, discrimination, suffering, violence, or any ism, Snowflakes meltdown. And that brings us to another word. Trigger. If you aren’t connected to a college campus, you probably think that a Trigger is the mechanism that fires a gun. If you are connected to a college campus, however, this word too takes on new meaning. The meaning relates to Snowflakes. If a professor must raise a subject involving exploitation, oppression, persecution, discrimination, suffering, violence, or any ism -- things that may trigger a Snowflake to meltdown -- they are urged to issue Trigger Warnings so the Snowflake may evacuate the classroom. In my own experience, Trigger Warnings are not feasible. I teach Bible, after all. Genesis to Revelation would issue in nothing but one unending Trigger Warning. After all, the Bible culminates in the crucifixion of the Son of God. But I would think that the same would hold true for most disciplines - certainly history, certainly literature, certainly biology, certainly psychology. At any rate, one of the leading public intellectuals of our times is a professor named Jordan B. Peterson. Peterson has become a well known spokesman against Snowflakes and Triggers. His point is that college is meant to prepare students for life, and you don’t prepare students for life by making them weak, cowardly, and avoidant. You don’t prepare them for life by giving them to believe that life is too much for them to handle. You don’t prepare them for life by over-protecting and sheltering them. You don’t prepare them for life by teaching them that the proper response to life is to run, hide, and cower. You prepare them for life by teaching them what life is, then by fortifying them with time tested convictions that are worth defending, by inspiring them with worthy examples, by encouraging them to assume responsibility for the burden of existence, and by warning them of the historical consequences of fear and ignorance. You prepare them for life by making them strong, courageous, and engaged. It all makes you wonder why students actually opt not to be rightly prepared in life. I guess the reasons that students opt not to be rightly prepared in life are the same as the reasons the rest of us opt not to be rightly prepared in life. It’s the course of least resistance. It is not easy to be rightly prepared in life. It’s downright hard to be rightly prepared in life, because it’s hard to do something as opposed to nothing. It’s hard to take action against an unrealized threat. It’s hard to forswear denial for realism. It’s hard to assume personal responsibility as opposed to relying upon others who have done so. We opt not to be rightly prepared in life, in short, because it is easy. But as Jesus teaches, “The way is easy that leads to destruction.” Because the bottom line is that bad things happen in life. Even privileged people like ourselves are not exempt. Bad things happen in life, and they happen in every way possible. They can happen to us as individuals; suddenly -- like a diagnosis, or an accident, or an attack. Or they can happen to us as individuals slowly -- like a toxic relationship, or a long and lonely end stage of life, or a debilitating condition. Bad things can happen to us as individuals both suddenly and slowly; and they can also happen to us as collective people, again suddenly, like 9/11 or slowly, like climate change. Bad things can happen every which way. And if this doesn’t ring true, just wait. Noah from our gospel lesson is proof of this. In fact, Noah is proof that it can be all of these things at once. The flood would happen to him and his family, and the flood would happen to all humankind. The flood would happen as spontaneously as storms do, but at the same time it would be a long time in coming. Humankind was riding for a fall. After all, “The LORD saw...that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil continually.” The Lord does not let this magnitude of evil stand. It may have its day, but its day ceases to be. The Lord issues his judgment upon it. He always has, and he always will. But Noah was prepared rightly for life. He was prepared for the flood. Yes, it was hard. It would have been easier not to build an ark. It would have been easier not to stock it. That’s what the rest of the world did, after all. But Noah was prepared rightly for life, and he sailed through the flood, and in the process saved humankind from extinction. But here is the punchline for the first Sunday in Advent. “So it will be with the coming of the Son of Man. So it will be with the coming of the Son of Man.” As the Son of Man came, the Son of Man will come. He will come to each of us, and he will come to all of us. He will come as he has portended, and he will come in the blink of an eye. Our gospel lesson orders us with great urgency to prepare for the coming of the Son of Man. And you think preparing rightly for life is hard? As hard as it is to prepare rightly for life, it is infinitely harder to prepare rightly for eternal life. Because this means that amidst the reality of life we must too demonstrate faith and righteousness, mercy and forgiveness; self-sacrifice, truthfulness, justice, peace, and for this first Sunday in Advent we too must demonstrate hope. We must be people he will recognize as his own. Amen.

Genesis 3:8-12 Matthew 6:5-13

Genesis 1 Colossians 1:15-19 Luke 8:22-25

A boss has an employee. He gives his employee an assignment - nothing overly difficult or complicated. Just the opposite, something fairly straightforward and routine. When the boss assesses his employee’s effort, he is not impressed. His effort, in fact, has been careless and inept. The assignment will have to be redone. Now the productivity of the day is undermined. The assignment will have to be redone. This means the boss must take time from what he is doing to confront the employee and supervise him as he redoes what he should have done right in the first place. This makes the boss, understandably, frustrated and angry. He hired the employee and is paying the employee, after all, to help him not to hinder him. And so he has it out with the employee. “There’s no excuse for this kind of slipshod work. You’ve wasted your time and mine. If you want to succeed around here, don’t let it happen again.” The employee now finds himself at a critical juncture. He can do one of two things. As mortified and humiliated as he is, he can say to himself, “The boss is right. I have been called out on this kind of thing before. I need to examine my character to discover where I am falling short. I need to do better in the future, so this doesn’t happen again, and so I can succeed.” He can, in short, accept responsibility and improve himself and his performance. Or he can do what he does do. As mortified and humiliated as he is, he can say to himself, “I hate my boss. If I could I would punch him in the face. What does this stupid assignment matter anyway? What does any of it matter? More proof that life stinks, as though I need more proof. Everyone treats me like dirt.” And he glowers and broods. And it doesn’t end there. His mood does not improve. It won’t until he’s had a few drinks. His commute home is marked with road rage. He screams out the car window and blasts his horn. When he gets home, he’s still looking for someone to take it out on, so he kicks the dog and snarls at his wife. His whole life, it seems to him, has been a chronicle of offenses and outrages. Being has not treated him well, so he has turned against being. He wants to wreak vengeance upon it. I have just described a modern day counterpart to Cain. Being did not treat Cain well either. The story provides no chronicle of his own offenses and outrages, but the story does tell us about his big brother Abel. Abel was, simply put, a great guy, a real role model - earnest, conscientious, competent, and reliable. Some people just seem to be born that way. We are all born with varying sets of givens. Some of us are born optimistic, some pessimistic. Some of us are born active, some passive. Some of us are born outgoing, some quiet. Some of us are born flexible, some stubborn. Some of us are born likeable, some not. Cain seemed to have been born with the short end of every stick. Of course, he could have handled things differently. He could have named and accepted his reality. He could have come to terms with the fact that he had more to overcome, that things wouldn’t come easily to him. He could have struggled a bit more, worked a bit harder. He could have found some niche suitable to him. He could even have looked up to Abel, as everyone else did. But instead, like his modern counterpart, he turned against being. The focus of his enmity was his brother, the embodiment of all that he was not. And when God demanded of both of them a sacrifice - it proved to be the trigger. Abel’s sacrifice was accepted, and Cain’s was rejected. Abel succeeded, and Cain failed. And it was God making the judgment. What better proof of the reality of the situation? Cain’s thoughts turned murderous. God knew it. So God issued him a dire warning. Why is it that when we are the weakest, we need the most strength? Why is it that when we are the blindest, we need the most sight? Why is it that when we are the most vulnerable, we need the most power? “Master it.” God warned him. “Master it, and you’ll do something greater than your brother will ever do.” Instead, Cain wreaked vengeance upon being. Abel’s blood soaked the ground. As jarring as this story may be, it should not be wholly unfamiliar to us. Cain is our spiritual ancestor after all. We are related to him. How reflexively our anger flares. How reflexively we feel the urge to retaliate. How reflexively we curse our fate. To some degree, at least, he’s in us all, and that means he’s all around us. Thank God there’s a better way. There’s the way of Jesus Christ. If there's one thing Jesus taught us, it is that no matter how badly being treats us, we must never turn against it. We must always, at all times, every day and with every breath, affirm the ultimate goodness of being. We must affirm it, and we must strive to enact that goodness. That is nothing less than our entire business in this, “common mortal life.” This was the meaning of the cross, after all, or at least one of its meanings. The meaning of the cross is inexhaustible, but if it means anything, it means this. On the cross Jesus bore being at its absolute nadir. Betrayal, brutality, injustice, cowardice, cruelty, all in the face of his righteousness. He bore all that , because he was affirming and enacting the ultimate goodness of being. Moreover, it’s what he tried to teach before he bore his cross. Think of the Sermon on the Mount. And I mean it. Think of the Sermon on the Mount. Think of it a lot. Because it’s the greatest teaching of the greatest man. And what did Jesus teach in the Sermon on the Mount? Don’t be Cain. Anger is bad. It’s the way of Cain. Put it to rest. The objectification of others is bad. It’s the way of Cain. Put it to rest. Dishonesty of all kinds, and this includes above all self-deception, is bad. It’s the way of Cain. Put it to rest. Retaliation is bad. It’s the way of Cain. Put it to rest. Don’t ever lose sight of God’s righteousness. Pursue that righteousness. And you will become righteous. And how is it that Jesus could affirm the ultimate goodness of being The answer is easy. It’s because he had faith in this father, who is too our father. So it’s our choice, as it was Cain’s. Sin lurks at our door, yet we may master it, for Jesus Christ is the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. Amen.

Imagine this. Imagine a huge arena. Now imagine it ten times bigger than you’ve just imagined it. Now imagine every seat filled so that there is a massive crowd -- tens -- no -- hundreds of thousands of people gathered to witness the contest. Now imagine yourself at the center of that arena. You can imagine yourself just as you are now or embellished in some way so you are at your very best - decked out in finery or armor, what have you. Now imagine facing your opponent, and your opponent is God. How many from among the hundreds of thousands of people gathered there do you suppose would bet upon you to win the contest? I’ll give you a hint. The answer rhymes with hero. That’s right. It’s zero. There could be a million people gathered there, and the answer would still be zero. Even the atheists would bet against you, on principle. I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know. Even you wouldn’t bet on yourself. But then why in the world does Adam bet on himself in his contest with God? Why in the world would he have thought that he had the grounds? God had just formed him, and I quote, “out of the dust of the ground.” Two things here. Number one: Adam did not form himself. God formed him. This would seem to make God creator and Adam creature. Number two: Adam was formed “out of the dust of the ground.” He was dust. Adam’s name in Hebrew in fact means dustling. The point is he was basically made out of mud. After forming him, God provided for him a habitat and a vocation - the Garden of Eden, and he was to till and keep it. With one caveat. He was, on penalty of death, expressly forbidden to touch the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This is because God knew that he couldn’t handle the knowledge of good and evil. He could not choose rightly between them. He would be subject to God on that score. And this guy was about to bet on himself in his contest with God. God then determined that Adam should not be alone. Some creatures should be alone, like tigers and hamsters. God created them for solitude. But God created Adam for community. So once again out of the dust of the ground he formed this animal and that, but none quite fit the bill. God then had a brainstorm. He fashioned a woman from his rib, so that she would be his own flesh and blood. And Adam was no longer alone. But then...enter the crafty serpent. He tricked Eve into tricking Adam into not just touching, but eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. “God’s just being territorial,” the crafty serpent tempted her. “Go ahead and eat. It won’t do you any harm. Just the opposite, it will make you just like God, able to choose rightly between good and evil.” Now I don’t know about you, but if a crafty serpent hissed blandishments into in my ear, it would, in and of itself, raise suspicions in my mind. Blandishments of a crafty serpent over against the fact that God had just fashioned me out of the dust of the earth. Blandishments of a crafty serpent over against the fact that God had just expressly forbidden me, on penalty of death, to touch the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Not Adam. He bet on himself. He reached for the fruit. It didn’t turn out all that well for him. He did receive a kind of knowledge, but it was the knowledge that he was a guilty and shameful creature for betting on himself. The whole thing’s unfathomable, really. Let’s not mince words. Adam was, inexplicably, a fool for betting on himself. Thank God we are nothing like him. But just a second here. In point of fact, the reason the Bible describes Adam as our spiritual forebear is because we bear him so close a resemblance. Like father like child. The fact that we judge him though we are just like him indicates that we may be in denial. So let’s just own up to it. Let’s just admit it. We too bet on ourselves in our contest with God. But why? We know, like Adam, we’ve got no grounds to do so. None whatsoever. So why in the world do we bet on ourselves in our contest with God? The passage does not say precisely, but I have my own idea. It’s because we desperately want our freedom. And we have the impression that if we bet on God we will lose our freedom. We desperately want our freedom! If we bet on God we will have to submit; we will have to obey; we will have to be answerable. But our impressions, just because they’re ours, doesn’t mean they’re right. This particular impression is a decided misimpression. Nothing, in fact, can be further from the truth. If we bet on God we don’t lose our freedom. If we bet on ourselves we lose our freedom. It’s precisely because, just as God told Adam, we can’t rightly choose between the knowledge of good and evil. So when we bet on ourselves we become imprisoned, imprisoned by ourselves. We have all seen examples of this. They’re all over the place. Watch for them, and you’ll see them. A couple weeks ago, the Lottery reached something close to a billion dollars, so there were special interest stories on the internet about past Lottery winners. They read as horror stories. One was entitled, Twenty Five Lottery Winners And Where They Are Now. Number one declared bankruptcy after purchasing two yachts. Number two spent millions of dollars bailing her drug pushing, gang banging boyfriend out of jail. Number three spent a sizable part of his winnings hiring a hit man to murder his wife. Don’t make me go on. Only if we bet on God we will have the freedom we so desperately want. Only if we allow God to choose for us the knowledge of good and evil, will we be free from ourselves, free to find the purpose we were created to find, free to bear the responsibility we were created to bear, free to follow the direction we were created to follow, free to make the decisions we were created to make, free to enact the truth we were created to enact. Bottom line: Adam bet on himself in his contest with God, and he lost. When we bet on ourselves in our contest with God, we repeat his error. We lose. This is why Adam is offered to us as a bad example to resist. But we are offered more than a bad example to resist. We are offered a good example to follow. That good example is, of course, his God’s son Jesus Christ. For Jesus Christ, there was no contest with God in the first place. He simply bet on God every step of the way. At his baptism when God imparted to him that he was called to make a supreme sacrifice for the sake of humankind, he bet on God. Throughout his ministry as he was hindered and harassed and discouraged and disparaged by every incarnation of corruption and falsehood imaginable, he bet on God. At the end of his ministry, when his dearest and most trusted friends and followers to a man denied and deserted him, he bet on God. When he made that supreme sacrifice on his cross, he bet on God. Of course he bet on God. Only a man who bet body mind and soul on God could have used his freedom in that way. For our part, we have a new spiritual forbear we may strive to resemble. We are no longer in Adam. We are in Jesus Christ. My grandmother, God rest her soul, should have been titled, The Queen of the Proverbs. I don’t recall her ever using the narrative voice. She communicated exclusively in proverbs. And she had one for every occasion. “Three can keep a secret, if two of them are dead.” “Lost time is never found again.” “Speak little, do much.” “What you would appear to be, be.” I thought growing up that my grandmother was very odd. As I grow nearer and nearer her age, I realize many of those proverbs were spot on. My grandmother had her share of the wisdom of Solomon. And the thing about proverbs over against the narrative voice is that proverbs you tend to remember. My grandmother would have understood what I have said. Because once she said to me, “When you’re the best that you can be, then you will be truly free.” Amen.

Last week I tried to teach Adam to play the game Candy Land. He’s new to games. There weren’t many games where he came from. I told him to pick a player. He picked the blue one. For my part, I picked the red one. So far so good. Then I put both players on Start. Adam, however, did not want his player to be on Start. He had a point. Start was not a particularly glamorous place to be. So he moved his player to the Lollipop Palace. “No,” I said, “you can’t start there.” He was agreeable enough. He moved his player to Peppermint Forest. “You can’t start there either,” I said. Unperturbed, he moved his player to the Frosted Palace. “Adam!” I said. He began to grow perturbed. So I tried to explain it to him. “You know how at school you have rules? Safe hands? No running in the halls? Raise your hand? Well there are rules to Candy Land too. I am trying to teach you the rules. Just wait a bit. You’ll catch on.” He did catch on. And he learned that toys you can play with however you like, but games have rules you that you must accept. Games have rules that you must accept. The game of life has rules too, rules that you must accept. Now I am not talking about blindly following rules that perpetuate discrimination or oppression or corruption or injustice. That’s another story. But generally speaking, the game of life does have rules, and they are rules that you must accept. For those of you of a rebellious or nonconforming bent who may be bristling, I maintain my position. If you don’t agree, try anarchy for a week. Try it for an hour, for that matter. The Bible takes this for granted, that the game of life has rules, rules that you must accept. You can glean them all over the Bible. Here’s one rule: God tests his people. This one’s not all that hard to glean. You can’t get away from it: From Exodus. Moses said to the people, “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him maybe before you, that you may not sin.” From Deuteronomy. “For the Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.” From Chronicles. “I know, my God, that you test the heart and have pleasure in uprightness.” From Psalms. “The Lord tests the righteous, but his soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence.” From Jeremiah. “Behold, I will refine them and test them, for what else can I do, because of my people?” I could go on. God tests his people. And here’s a second rule: His people can’t test him back. It’s not a two way street. God is sovereign. His people are subjects. You can’t have the subjects testing the sovereign -- or in more familiar parlance, the children testing the parents, the students testing the teachers, the athletes testing the coaches, the privates testing the generals, the clueless testing the clued in. It just doesn’t work that way. This rule exists though because human nature harbors the impulse to try. “If you’re God, prove it. Show yourself. Fix my problems. Exempt me from the conditions of existence. Prosper me. Grant me a miracle.” This one is not that hard to glean either. It too is all over the place. And there’s a third and final rule about testing. The greater the faith the harder the test. It might seem at first glance that places a heavier burden upon the righteous, but it has to be that way. You can’t give someone a test that is way too hard or way too easy. You test to the level. Consider this morning’s Old Testament Lesson. The greater the faith the harder the test. No one in all history had greater faith than Abraham, no one, that is, except Jesus Christ. Abraham started out in life a random nobody. That’s amazing if you think of it. The founding father of the Abrahamic faiths --Judaism, Christianity, and Islam -- more than half the world population today -- started out a random nobody. He was a pagan to boot. This means he deified the forces of nature. But God filled his head with heady promises – the promise of a son and heir, though he was old, if not to say ancient, and his wife barren. The promise that through that heir a multitudinous people would arise. The promise that through those multitudinous people a nation would arise, a nation that would bless all the nations. And Abraham, the random nobody pagan, believed all those promises. His faith was that great. And in time his faith proved justified. The heir was born. Abraham named him Isaac. But the greater the faith the harder the test. God demanded the sacrifice of Isaac -- an unbearable demand, an unfathomable demand, an impossible demand --the death of your child, and at your own hand? And too it meant that God’s promises were null and void. An heir? A people? A nation? Abraham was now a hundred years old. There would be no conceivable way for them to come true. Nonetheless, as hard as the test was, Abraham’s faith was equal to it. It’s been pointed out by a mind no greater than Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s that Isaac was safe all along. If Abraham refused to make the sacrifice, he failed the test. He would have gone his own way, but not as the founding father of the Abrahamic Faiths. But if he passed the test, if he showed a willingness to sacrifice Isaac, then the sacrifice was not necessary, and so the angel of the Lord intervened. The Bible of course is for all generations. This means that these rules apply to us as well. This means that God tests us. This means we don’t test God. This means the greater the faith the harder the test. And it’s a safe bet that God tests us more often than we think. In fact we could and should think that any matter of any import greater than picking a red or blue player is a test. The test can come in the form of a decision we make or we don’t make. It can come in the form of something we should see but won’t. The test can come in the form of whether we say yes, or whether we say no. It can come in the form of a truth we need to sound. It can come in the form of an injustice we need to challenge. It can come in the form of a wrong we need to right. It can come in the form of a mess we need to clean up. It can come in the form of forgiveness we need to seek. It can come in the form of a change we need to make. It can come in any form really. And we will either pass the test, or we will fail it. If we fail the test we get to go our own way. But God will not leave himself without witnesses in this world. God will indeed have his witnesses, but they won’t be us. But if we pass the test they will be us. And this is what life is about. It is not about playing it safe and running from risk. It’s not about conventionality and conformity. It’s not about mundanity and triviality. It is not about wealth and acquisition. It is about bearing witness to God. The people of Jesus’ day broke the rules of life. They tested Jesus. They demanded of Jesus a sign to prove that he was the Son of God. But Jesus of course would have none of it. He demanded instead that they witness God’s test of him -- the test of Jonah -- three days dead in the belly of the earth. Because it was there they would see that he passed God’s test of his faith when he arose victorious on Easter morning. Amen.

A new semester has begun at the college where I teach. Last week in class I made mention of the fact that the Bible is filled with paradoxes - with contradictions that must be maintained as true. After twenty years of teaching, I am pretty good at reading “student body language.” When I say something they are resistant to, they cross their arms in front of the chests. They crossed their arms in front of their chests. “But you must have experienced paradoxes before. Perhaps you have a love/hate relationship with your dog,” I ventured. Their arms remained crossed in front of their chests.” “Think of yourselves then,” I persisted. “We are every one of us paradoxical beings. We are every one of us hotbeds of contradictions. We are good, and we are bad. We are profound, and we are petty. We are altruistic, and we are selfish. We are kind, and we are mean spirited. We are believing, and we are skeptical.” They uncrossed their arms in front of their chests. Because it’s true, we are every one of us paradoxical beings. This is nowhere better seen than in Jacob from our Old Testament Lesson. Jacob was very bad. And he was very good. In his early years his bad side had the upper hand. With the possible exception of Cain, Jacob fell prey to the worst case of sibling rivalry in human history. It was present from the moment of his birth. He was a twin. His brother Esau was born first. Jacob came out after him grasping Esau’s heel, as if to pull him back in and switch positions. But his mother’s anatomy did not allow for that, so Esau beat him out. Jacob was then rightly named - for Jacob means the heel grasper. Why did Jacob want to beat his brother out of the womb? Because the older brother was the winner who took all. He was the future head of the family. He inherited all the money, all the land, all the property -- everything. And to add injury to insult, Jacob was the smart one. It might be going too far to describe Esau as a dim bulb, but he certainly wasn’t the brightest. He was your average run of the mill man’s man - an outdoors man and a hunter. You’d never describe him as subtle or sophisticated. Under these circumstances, who wouldn’t have a serious case of sibling rivalry? And he acted on it. He hatched a plan to supplant his brother. In order to do so he needed to steal two things: his brother’s birthright and the paternal blessing that conferred it. Jacob had all the subtlety and sophistication his brother lacked. Add to that that getting what you want is a great motivator; it’s the mother of invention. And those who are standing in the way of you getting what you want don’t see you coming. That’s why they are so easy to manipulate, which is what happened to Esau. Jacob found his brother at a moment of weakness and tricked him into trading his birthright. Then, posing as his Esau, Jacob tricked his father out of his paternal blessing. One problem though when your bad side has the upper hand is that it makes you, to say the least, unpopular. This goes without saying. You can’t be a total jerk and expect to be liked. Esau was so furious with Jacob that he sought to murder him, and Jacob was forced to flee for his life. He landed at his Uncle Laban’s. It’s been said you will never understand the damage you’ve done to someone until the same thing is done to you. This is true enough. Old Uncle Laban did to Jacob just what Jacob had done to Esau - He manipulated him and tricked him. He cheated him and robbed him. And this is when Jacob’s good side began to have the upper hand. He understood now the damage he had done. He understood now the meaning of remorse and regret. And he understood now there was only one way to right the wrong. He had to face his problems rather than run from them. He had to confront Esau, beg his forgiveness and do what he could to make amends. Proof of the truth of Herman Melville’s words -- Life is a voyage that is homeward bound. Jacob understood too that he had to right the wrong with God. God understood this as well, and he appeared to Jacob in the form of an angel. Jacob wrestled with him the night long, struggling desperately to wrench from him a true blessing -- not like the blessing he stole -- but a true blessing that would legitimate him in the eyes of God. And just when he could struggle no more -- when his last strength was drained from him, when there was nothing more than his anguished need and vulnerability, God blessed him. And in so doing, God renamed him, renamed him Israel. He was no longer Jacob the heal grasper. He was Israel, he who struggled with God and prevailed. But why? Why did God rename him? Why was is so important for God to rename him at that moment? It is because in the Bible your name captured your essential identity. In our time, we can’t relate to that much. We largely choose names that are popular, or that gibe with our ethnicity, or in remembrance of a loved one. But in the Bible your name captured your essential identity. Jacob’s goodness had the upper hand, so he was renamed to reflect that. As a matter of fact, Jesus did as much in this morning’s gospel lesson. Peter had originally been named Simon. Jesus had gathered Simon and the other disciples around him, and he began to question them. He wanted to see if they knew who he really was. Simon knew. He knew that Jesus was the Messiah and the Son of God. For all he warts and freckles, and he had plenty of them, he knew. His goodness had the upper hand, so Jesus renamed him. No longer will you be named Simon, he declared. I rename you Petros, for you are the rock on which I will build my church. There is a lesson to be learned in all this. When our bad side has the upper hand we retain our old names. But when our good side has the upper hand, we may rightly be renamed Christians. That name is not ours automatically, heedless of whether our goodness or our badness has the upper hand. As Christ himself warned, "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father." We may rightly be renamed Christains when we wrestle with the paradox. But it’s worth the struggle, for if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation. Amen.

There are many proponents around these days of “Family Values.” And at first blush these proponents would seem to have a benign enough agenda. Proponents of “Family Values” would seem at least to be proponents of the sanctity of the family. The sanctity of the family. Could there be a more benign agenda than that? But in fact, “Family Values” is a loaded expression, as the Bible would call a shibboleth. Proponents of “Family Values” are proponents of the sanctity of the family, true enough, but the sanctity of only a certain kind of family -- the “traditional” family, as they refer to it. The “traditional” family, as they understand it, is about what you’d expect – a mom, a dad, and two or three children with straight teeth. Proponents of “Family Values” believe in the sanctity of the “traditional” family because they believe the traditional family is the basis for moral society. Conversely, proponents of family values believe that the “non-traditional” family is a threat to moral society. And the strange thing about all this is that they use the Bible as support for their position. And so let us examine the biblical family for what evidence it may yield that the traditional family is the basis for moral society. We may as well begin at the beginning, with Adam and Eve and their sons Cain and Abel. A mom, a dad, and two kids – O.K. so far, a nice traditional family, assuming Cain and Abel have straight teeth. But the family of Adam and Eve, in fact, gives testimony to the fact that the traditional family is not necessarily the basis for moral society. Adam and Eve, after all, through their disobedience occasioned nothing less than the fall of humankind, some time after which Cain murdered his brother Abel in cold blood. The first biblical family in fact, though traditional, would appear to be the basis for immoral society. Well then, what about the second biblical family, the family of Noah? Again, a nice traditional family -- a mom, a dad, and three sons this time -- Shem, Ham, and Japheth. And Noah was, as the Bible states it, “a righteous man, blameless in his generation.” This in fact is why he was preserved from the flood. He wasn’t disobedient, like his forebear Adam. The Lord told him to build an ark, and he built an ark. The Lord told him to bring animals on board two by two, and he brought the animals on board two by two. But after the flood, Noah’s run of righteousness and blamelessness ended. Maybe it was all that family time on the ark, but after he disembarked, he planted a vineyard and got drunk off the fruit of the vine. Poor Ham stumbled upon his father naked and unconscious, and when Noah learned of it he took it out on Ham’s son. He cursed his own grandson, declared that his descendants would all be slaves. Another biblical family that, though traditional, would appear to be the basis for immoral society. Then comes the family of Abraham. Unfortunately, the family of Abraham starts off at a disadvantage, because it is not a traditional family. To be sure, there’s a mom and a dad, Abraham and Sarah, but then there’s an extra mom Hagar. And not in succession either; Abraham was a polygamist. He had the two sons, but that does little to override the polygamy piece. No doubt about it, the family of Abraham was a non-traditional family. And the family of Abraham give testimony to the fact that the non- traditional family is not necessarily the basis for moral society either. Abraham’s wife Sarah got jealous of her rival Hagar and banished her and her son into the dessert where she hoped they would die of thirst. Add to this that Abraham nearly slit his son’s throat. The non-traditional family too would appear to be the basis for immoral society. And if, in the interest of time, we skip a generation and jump ahead to the family Abraham’s grandson Jacob, we discover that the apple did not fall far from the tree— The family of Jacob was another non-traditional family that would appear to be the basis for immoral society. Jacob too was a polygamist. He married a sister set, Rachel and Leah, and then took their maids Bilhah and Zilpah as his concubines. And lest we lay all the blame on Jacob for this arrangement, the women were in full collusion. They didn’t care a fig about being one of four wives. All they cared about is getting a shot at Jacob so they could compete with one another as to who could produce the most sons. Recall this morning’s Old Testament lesson. Leah’s son Reuben found some mandrakes in the fields. Mandrakes were thought to induce fertility. So Rachel traded Leah her mandrakes for a night with Jacob who was temporarily in her custody. “…then he may lie with you tonight for your son’s mandrakes,” she bargained. Maybe if we jump ahead a little further we could find the evidence we seek that the traditional family is the basis for moral society. What about David? Unfortunately, David is the worst of them all all. Definitely a non-traditional family -- at least 10 wives -- and innumerable concubines. King’s harems were huge. David’s son Solomon’s had 1,000 women in it. And again we discover a non-traditional family that would appear to be the basis for immoral society. David impregnated a woman not of his harem, a married woman to boot, then murdered her husband to legitimate his child. And the Bible reports over and over again that David was a downright bad father – weak, indulgent, and inattentive. One of his sons raped his own sister, and another of his sons, because David refused to discipline him for it, avenged the rape by his murder. He was so embittered that he was driven to do what his father refused to that he rebelled against his father and brought the nation to war. And then there is that biblical feature that never fails to raise eyebrows, even the eyebrows of progressives – the so-called Leverite marriage. If a woman’s husband died, her husband’s brother, without benefit of formal marriage, was obligated to inseminate her so that she could produce children. This is so non-traditional as to border on repugnant. What did the children call their father, Uncle Dad? But enough of the Old Testament. Maybe the evidence we seek that the traditional family is the basis for moral society is to be found in the New. We can’t exactly appeal to Jesus’ family though, because his family was unique. His father was, quite literally, out of this world. And when Jesus grew up, he had no family of his own. As he declared in this morning’s gospel lesson, “….there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven.” That was his way of saying that because of his messianic destiny to die, he chose to remain celibate. So what then about the apostle Paul? In this morning’s epistle lesson, he counsels Christians against marriage. Only if they do not have their desire under control should they relent and marry, because marriage is preferable to fornication. This is not exactly evidence that the traditional family is the basis for moral society. Paul would seem to be suggesting that the basis for moral society is unmarried celibates. And when Paul does in another of his epistles describe the traditional family as he understands it, he states that women must be subject to their husbands and slaves to their masters. This model of traditional family advances the subordination and domestication of women and the legitimacy of slavery. Few to none in this day and age would offer this type of traditional family as the basis for moral society. I think it’s safe to conclude that proponents of family values must look elsewhere than the Bible for support that the traditional family is basis for moral society. For one thing, the traditional family as they conceive it is not privileged as such in the Bible. For another, where it exists it is not equated with moral society. The Bible depicts all different kinds of families that were peculiar to its day, just as there are all different kinds of families peculiar to our day. And the Bible would appear to be saying that none has cornered the market on righteousness. So maybe we too should refrain from equating the traditional family with moral society. There’s certainly no biblical evidence on which to do so. And too, it only serves to stigmatize nontraditional families -- to make them feel inadequate or inferior or ostracized. And why add to their burden? Why add to the burden of anyone for that matter? That’s not what Christians are called to do. It’s much better, I think, to recognize and affirm that just about anyone can make up a family. So long as there’s one key thing: Love, love and all that cascades from it: respect, commitment, acceptance, encouragement, forbearance, affection, sacrifice. My sense, anyway, is that if we want to equate the family with moral society, it’s not about traditional families over against non-tradition families. It’s about loving families. It’s nothing more than Christ taught us: In all respects, love is the basis for morality. Amen.