Sermon 10/5/2014
Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 12-20
Promised Land: Commandments
For the next four weeks we’re continuing our journey in
the book of Exodus, but we’re shifting our focus a little bit. We’ve been
journeying out of Egypt, but now
we’re heading to the Promised Land.
The different might not sound like much, but I think with study we’ll find that
while initially, the Israelites can only think about where they’ve come from, and can only demand sign after
sign from God that they haven’t been led into the wilderness simply to die, now
God is pushing them, encouraging them to look forward, to the life that will become theirs. They are no longer
going to be simply people who are on the run from slavery in Egypt. No, now
they are going to be the Israelites who are seeking the Promised Land. A nation
unto themselves. And they need a more compelling identity than “formerly slaves
in Egypt.” Instead of knowing who they aren’t,
they really need to start worrying about who they are now.
I think this is a transition we all need to make at times
in our lives, and sometimes, like the Israelites, we need continual reminders
and encouragements that we aren’t in the same place we started anymore. I
remember during my first years of ministry, it was hard for me to stop thinking
of myself as someone just out of seminary. For a long time when I started in my
first parish, I would explain my ignorance about a particular situation by
saying, “well, I’m pretty new at this.” But now I’m in my twelfth year of
ministry. I’m no longer just out of seminary. In fact, the last time I visited
Drew, where I attended school, I realized that perhaps more than 50% of the
faculty I studied with at Drew are now retired or moved on to new places. The
Drew I attended isn’t there anymore,
even if I wanted to go back and make that my context again. I’m sure you’ve had
similar experiences in your own lives, and I know this congregation has had
that experience. You’ve been through the process of creating a new congregation
where once there were four different communities. And no doubt for a while in
that transition, you were defined mostly by where you came from. How you did things at Cardiff or Navarino or South Onondaga
or Cedarvale. But now, these many years in, even though you still cherish the
memories of where you’ve come from, you are Apple Valley United Methodist
Church. A new family, forged by your new shared experiences.
And so now, our scripture texts focus not so much on what
is being left behind, but on what kind of future the Israelites want in the
land to which they’re headed. So today we find ourselves with a familiar text –
the giving of the ten commandments. Sometimes I think familiar bible passages
are the trickiest for us, because we assume we already know what the text says.
Oh, the ten commandments – I know what those are already. Just don’t ask me to
recite them on the spot, right? The first four commandments, as I mentioned
with the children, talk about our relationship with God. I am God, no one else,
and no other gods are before me. Make no idols of any kind. Don’t wrongfully
use my name. And remember the Sabbath and keep it holy, a day of rest. And then
the other six commandments are reaching outward, emphasizing how we are to live
as neighbors, a community, a people. Honor your parents. Do not murder, or
commit adultery, or steal, or lie, or covet what belongs to another. Eventually,
the laws that will govern the Israelites are much expanded, but these are the
building blocks, caring for the relationship with God and neighbor.
David Lose writes that biologists would tell you that
we’re hard-wired to look out for our own wants and needs over all others, and
that this is where the concept of the strongest – and presumably most selfish –
surviving comes from. Theologians, he said, would tell you that this is what
human sin is: selfishness that puts
our needs above the needs of others, but actually limits “human flourishing”
and contradicts God’s desire for us to love one another. The law, then, at its
most basic level, is something that God gives us to curb us from our tendency
to put ourselves first. The law creates boundaries that enable us to flourish
as a whole, that “create room in which we can live with each other.” Lose concludes, “That’s the law, in its first
use, functioning as a gift from God to tell us – children and adults alike –
“no” so that we can then say “yes” to a richer and more abundant life together.”
(1) For the Israelites, the ten commandments are a starting point of the new
community that they’re building. A way that they will agree to live together,
so that all people in the community have the chance to flourish. Of course, as
we’ll see in the weeks ahead, their journey to the promised land is not all
smooth sailing. But now they have a framework for their lives together.
Last week, I met with the Staff Parish Relations
Committee to do some of our work in preparation for Charge Conference in
November. One of the tasks that we must complete is creating a covenant between
the pastors and the congregation. The covenant, especially when you have new
pastors leading you, can be pretty simple. But the basic purpose is something
like the purpose of the commandments: it’s setting out some priorities and a
way of living together as a church that will create the space for God to help
us flourish. That’s what we want, right? For this community of faith to
flourish. And if we want that, what do we need to decide about how we will live
together? What things are most important to us? What are the core values at the
center or what we do, and how we treat each other, and how we reach out in love
and service? We’re working on that, and I encourage you all to think about that, whether you are part of SPRC or not. What
principles do you think should guide our life and work together? Love?
Forgiveness? Hope? Joy? What ways of being together will help us create space
so that here at Apple Valley, we can, together, seek to follow Jesus?
Today is World Communion Sunday. It’s a day when
Christians from many traditions make the effort to celebrate communion to
remind ourselves of our common purpose and identity as members of the body of
Christ. The table is a space Christ creates where all are invited. There’s room
for everyone. And there’s one bread, one body, so that everyone can take part,
and everyone can flourish. As Christ invites us, makes space for us at the
table, let us strive to live in a way that we are always making room for others,
so that together, we might live into all that God hopes and dreams for us.
Amen.
(1) Lose, David. “Law,
the First Use.” http://www.davidlose.net/2013/10/law-the-first-use/
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