The Fireworks of Our Faith An Unusual Invitation to an Extraordinary Celebration Tekoa Robinson Trinity UCC, Manchester, MD

Transcription

1 The Fireworks of Our Faith An Unusual Invitation to an Extraordinary Celebration Tekoa Robinson Trinity UCC, Manchester, MD Thanks for coming out on this fine summer morning as we anticipate the celebration of the birth of a nation that continues to grapple with it s understanding of freedom and equality. I don t know about you, but I can t watch the fireworks without thinking how even the best of intentions can blow up in one s face, and how complex and messy the struggle toward freedom can be and indeed was for those who found their way to this place. History tells us that to the early colonists, freedom meant the ability to choose one s own religion and political expression without fear of tyrannical persecution. It meant the creation of a government based on many voices where the power could shift between parties without violent uprisings or retaliations. It eventually meant the writing of our Constitution & Bill of Rights, housing the ever-important First Amendment, protecting our very own freedoms of religion and speech, and after the Civil War, the writing of the Fourteenth Amendment, which promised equal rights and dignity for all groups of people. It also led to the formation of a government with three branches, each limiting the others for the purpose of liberty. These things are good. Despite the good intentions of those who sought to form a nation of freedom and equality, they were blind to the many injustices of their own time as they chased the silvery phantom of freedom. This is why as the fireworks explode above our heads tomorrow, commemorating the struggle and birth of our nation, I can t help but to recall the hell that was thrust upon the native peoples of this land and on those who were ripped away from their homes, shackled and shipped across the vast ocean only to find themselves in a place of unmerciful and unrelenting servitude, all in the name of a nation that claims to be founded on certain inalienable rights of human freedom. The promise of religious and political freedom for those fleeing religious persecution in Europe was a tantalizing mirage that led many of our European ancestors to rationalize the devaluation of people from other cultures, races, and ethnicities. By systematic categorization and definition of those who

2 2 were viewed as different from themselves, the leaders of our fledgling nation built an idea of freedom that was born out of the blood of the millions of men, women, and children who were torn apart, worked down to the bone, physically and emotionally abused, diseased, and left for dead. No matter how hard they strove to do the good, they were blind to the destructive consequences of their own definition of freedom. This is why their definition of freedom is not true freedom, as it is not life giving to all, but rather, it is life giving to some; namely to those who hold the power. It is this broken understanding of freedom that has and continues to give birth to radical racists groups, radical religious groups, anti-semitic and Isalmaphobic ideologies, and contributes to the extreme political polarization of our country. People in power want to keep power. People in power want to keep control. People in power take a defensive stance! People in power live in fear! We are all people in power at some level and must acknowledge that many of the comforts that we take for granted were born out of the violations committed against those whose backs hold the weight of our liberties and upon whose backs those heavy liberties continue to crush. Our brothers and sisters who were driven like cattle from their sacred lands to unfamiliar and boundary filled parcels across the American West, to those living in South Carolina, Baltimore, Missouri, and elsewhere, to those who bear the scars of chronic poverty all across this nation, know all too well the devastating effects of having to carry such a weighty load for such a long time. These are the fireworks of our nation, but not of our faith. It may be easy to think that because we weren t present to commit these historical atrocities, that we are innocent, however, as Justice Anthony Kennedy reminds us, the nature of injustice is that we may not always see it in our own times. In other words none of us are immune to the blindness of the injustices of our own time and place in history and in the struggle toward freedom and equality. Even when we mean well, we sometimes do harm. For our every thought and movement is couched in our own cultural contexts, whether we see it or not, and whether we own it or not. This is why Paul reminds us, in fact, I would say, indeed warns us in Romans 12:3 not to think

3 3 too highly of ourselves, but to think of ourselves with sober judgment. We all get it wrong more often than not. This is why we need grace. God s grace and grace for each other. The fireworks of our faith explode in Romans chapter 8, where we are told that as children of God, we have been set free from living into the fear-based structures of our world that so often lead to the manipulation of others and to the feeling of a need to control everything and everyone around us. We are told that when we cry out to God, God s Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are indeed God s children. But what does it mean to be God s child? Here is where we begin to slip open the unusual invitation that is extended to us. For if you read the last part of Chapter 8:17, you will notice that we are invited to suffer with Christ. Hmmmmm. I mean I really liked the part about not living into fear, but wait just a second here, what do you mean that being set free from fear might involve some kind of suffering? This freedom from the need to control everything allows us to begin to learn to let go a little and to trust that if we risk loving others, that although we may suffer in and because of that love; that love is what gives us life, and it is life-changing, it is healing, it is redemptive, it creates unexpected resurrection in our dead lives, because as we experience love from one another, we experience God s grace and we begin to understand what God has been trying to teach us in and through the work and person of Jesus Christ. We are invited to a celebration of life that is worked out by the grace of God through the Spirit of Christ in us. Whereas the fireworks of any nation-state throughout the world is based on fear, control, power, greed, individualism, and the overly simplified categorization of people for the purposes of easy manipulation and coercion, we find in the Romans texts, that the fireworks of our faith are characterized by an extravagant love that sets us free from living fear-based lives, that recognize that control is an illusion, that the only real power to be found, is the power to be found in supportive and redemptive love for one another regardless of our cultural, religious, racial, ethnic, gender, or sexual differences. It is characterized by a generosity of mind, spirit, and material goods; by the recognition of our basic connection as human beings whose lives and stories are all sacred

4 4 and beyond categorization. We are invited to receive God s Spirit as it bear s witness to our spirits, and to live into the true freedom from fear that comes when we begin to find our identity in Christ. What does it mean to find one s identity in Christ? It means that we are invited to live toward each other with the same grace and mercy that Jesus gave to those who were marginalized around him. It means that we are to struggle to name and to confront the injustices of our world that we recognize as life taking rather than life giving. It means that we struggle alongside each other and even suffer out of love for one another. It means living as gifts toward one another in ways that help to sustain each other. It means that we don t assume to know others in such a way that would allow us to make sweeping categorical statements. It means listening even to those we disagree with. It means telling the stories of those who have been silenced in our society. It means celebrating our joys together and sharing in life s abundant surprises and challenges. It means taking your life seriously; recognizing that your life has meaning, because your life is not your own, but rather, is connected to all other lives and all other stories. It means taking bodily action in this world to bring about justice. In other words, it means living Eucharistically. Yes, the invitation to join Christ at the table is the unusual invitation to participate in Christ s struggles and suffering out of love for each other, but especially for those who are oppressed and marginalized in our world. The celebration of the Eucharist is the celebration of an extravagant love that looks far beyond itself, far beyond the notion of setting up borders of identity based on nationality, ethnicity, race, or gender. It is a celebration of being set free from our narrowing definitions that lead to so much violence and destruction in our world, to finding an identity in Christ that teaches us to love freely, to give of ourselves and to suffer alongside one another as Christ suffered alongside us. When we eat and drink of the communion elements, we are not only remembering God s gift of grace to us in Christ, but we are reminded, just as we are invited to join Christ as the broken bread and poured cup to our hungry and thirsty world. This means that we are invited to share in the outpouring

5 5 of extravagant grace to those around us. As Paul terms it in Romans 12:1, we are a living sacrifice i.e. our lives and how and what we live for and about matters to God. We are invited to feast at the communion table as we are also at the same time invited to offer such hospitality to others through the gifting of ourselves to each other and to our world. Although this invitation to be an outpouring of grace-filled love seems so utterly impossible at times, God says, try it anyway and see what happens! When we respond to this invitation, it is indeed an act of faith, it is on fire with God s Spirit, for as we risk ourselves in this outlandish kind of love, God s Spirit witnesses to our spirit (i.e. God is with us) and the other person experiences the grace that restores dignity to those from whom it has been stripped away, it restores hope to those who feel isolated by depression, financial hardship, and loss. It encourages the one who is grieving or the one who feels like they don t deserve to live. It extends forgiveness when forgiveness seems impossible to the one who has committed the crime. It sees beauty in broken places and in broken people. And it celebrates the beauty of the diversity of our world. Through this act of faith that is love toward neighbor, our minds are transformed such that we begin to think outside of our own nationalistic and cultural assumptions, and begin to see each other and our world through God s grace-filled vision. Unlike the 4 th of July fireworks that celebrate one nation separating itself from another, the fireworks of our faith are the works of God s Spirit of love and grace in our lives that engage us to see and to experience our world and each other with a borderless vision that recognizes the sacredness of all lives. This takes time, movement, work, and mindfulness. It is our spiritual worship and it is as difficult as it is joyful!