Between Memory and Hope

Transcription

1 September 11, 2011 Psalm 137:1-6 Creekside COB Pastor Rosanna McFadden Between Memory and Hope Good morning. I have a question for you that I believe anyone over the age of, say fourteen, should be able to answer. What were you doing ten years ago today? About this time of day, or for the past few hours? You weren t in church. It was a Tuesday. I can tell you what I was doing. I remember it like it was yesterday. I had gotten Katy and Becca off to school and I was home with Joel, who was five at the time. The phone rang about 8:30, and it was Twig Bibbee. She said, Do you have the TV on? I said no, I didn t. She said, Well, you d better turn it on because they re flying airplanes into buildings in New York. What? This didn t make any sense to me, but I hurried downstairs and turned on the TV. There was an image of one of the World Trade Center towers on fire, and after about 20 minutes I saw this: (YouTube footage :34) And I sat there for hours. I was horrified by the collapse Tower 1 and then by Tower 2. Horrified by the silence of the newscasters as we watched it together on live TV. Those towers were full of people. Finally after lunch, I had to leave the house, to get away from the coverage that kept playing over and over on TV and wouldn t stop playing over and over in my head. It was a beautiful, sunny day in Goshen. But not many people were out, and those who were seemed subdued, speaking quietly. There were no airplanes overhead; the sky, too, was quiet. All after-school activities were cancelled. I

2 waited for my kids to get off the bus and gave them a big hug. That evening, churches were filled with people seeking comfort, sharing grief, looking for answers, trying to make sense of what had happened. Do you remember? Where you were when you heard? The images you saw? The shock and horror and anger that you felt? This will be a day -- it has already been a week -- filled with memorials. Memory is a powerful force: it defines what is important to us, it defines who we identify with, it defines who we are. The Bible, especially the Old Testament record of the history of the Jewish people, hammers at the need for memory -- to never forget who we are. Or, more accurately, to never forget whose we are. Because, in the biblical record, it is not human deeds which are celebrated, it is the steadfast love of God. We are God s chosen people, protected and beloved. In the Old Testament there are two historical events which define the character and identity of the Hebrew people: first is the exodus from Egypt. Yahweh brought his people out of slavery and into a promised land flowing with milk and honey. If any of you have ever attended a Passover Seder, that meal and the ritual food, readings and questions which go with it are all designed to remind adults and teach children the story of the Hebrew people s plight and Yahweh s rescue. Psalm 136 is a lovely antiphonal recitation of Israel s salvation history: it begins with the work of creation and talks about God bringing the people out of Egypt and through the Red Sea into their own land. Every verse of Psalm 136 includes the response for God s steadfast love endures forever. The second historical event which defined the identity of the Jewish people is more problematic. The Jews were given their own land and heritage in Palestine and established the great city of Jerusalem and built a beautiful and lavish temple there where people could bring their sacrifices to Yahweh. The beginning of 1 Kings gives us a record how the temple was built and dedicated, and the end of 1

3 Kings and the book of 2 Kings tell us how the rulers and the people behaved afterward. It wasn t good. In fact, the kings and the people behaved so badly, that prophets began to warn of terrible destruction which would happen if they did not repent and change their ways. In 586 BCE the unthinkable did happen: an invading army from Babylon sacked the city of Jerusalem, destroyed the temple and took some of the Jewish people into exile in Babylon. The people who were taken into exile were the lucky ones: they were the government officials and leaders. The soldiers were killed, stores of food were plundered or destroyed, and the rest of the population of Israel was left to starve. If you want some disturbing reading, take a look at the book of Lamentations. It s a record of what happened in the city of Jerusalem after the Babylonian army left. Psalm 137, the psalm which Bruce read part of today, is written by exiles in Babylon. Unlike the affirmation of Psalm 136, Psalm 137 is a psalm of despair. These people have been torn from their homeland, their families, their religion, their way of life forever, and their Babylonian captors are mocking them. The exiles vow to never forget Jerusalem, and say that they will be cursed -- let my right hand wither and my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth -- if they don t remember Zion, their homeland. I had Bruce stop there, but the last two verses of this psalm go on to say something so shocking that these verses are routinely left out of lectionary readings, or any reading which is intended for public worship. Psalm 137 verses 8 and 9 read: O daughter Babylon, you devastator! Happy shall be those who pay you back what you have done to us! Happy shall they be who take your little ones and dash them against the rock! Happy shall be those who take revenge and kill innocent children? What is that doing in our Bible? That s the end of the psalm. There s no explanation. What are we to make of these verses of violence and hatred? Christians are supposed to be nice, right? There s nothing nice about this. I m not teaching this to a children s Sunday School class. Here s the truth that I think these verses reveal to us: People

4 aren t nice. Our enemies aren t nice. The people who plotted and executed the 9/11 attacks on New York City and Washington DC weren t nice people. They wanted to kill as many Americans as possible, and it didn t matter to them if those were innocent children, they just wanted them dead. They wanted to cause as much anguish as possible among those who were still alive, create as much chaos and confusion and suffering as they could. And here s another hard truth: we re not very nice, either. In the aftermath of 9/11 there was plenty of hatred to go around. We declared war in Afghanistan, and characterized whole countries as evil, vandalized places of Islamic worship, and persecuted people from Middle Eastern countries -- and even some who were Indian and not Middle Eastern, but hey, they were wearing turbans, they were asking for it. I believe that part of the role of memory is to remind us who we are: not just the brave and heroic parts that we can justifiably point to and remember with pride. The firefighters and policeman and medics who risked their lives and in some cases gave their lives to save others, yes! that is who we are, and that deserves to be remembered and celebrated. But we also need to remember the ugly part of who we are; the impulse to pay our enemies back and trample their children to death. I have felt this impulse; it s part of my memory of the horror of 9/11. I ve heard that these verses from Psalm 137 were read to American troops in Iraq by an army chaplain before battle; it distresses me to think that soldiers who have been told to live by these words may be the only Christians that some people will see. And yet these same soldiers have the capacity to sacrifice for their comrades, to love their wives and children, to worship God. How can we sort out good and evil when it is present in each one of us? Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn wrote: If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the

5 heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart? I don t think the solution to evil lies in destroying a piece of our own heart -- or even in destroying a piece of our enemy s heart. That would leave us both heartless, without the ability to feel compassion. I do believe -- and here is where I find hope -- that God has the power to transform my heart. It s a process that takes time and intentional effort, it s a process that goes against much of what I ve been taught about getting even, or having the right to hurt other people. And, most difficult of all, I can t change anyone else s heart, only my own. There is no guarantee that if I give up my hatred, my enemy will give up his. The only guarantee is that if I give up my hatred, I no longer have to carry it around. My heart will have room for something else. I heard a story on the radio on Friday that spoke to this. It was an interview with a man who was a victim of 9/11 who has started and organization called World Without Hate. Its objectives are to engage in 9/11 events to heal and build a more peaceful future; educate people and show them the path to forgiveness; provide support to victims of hate crimes. He says that his religion teaches forgiveness and that God can change hearts. Here s what struck me about his story: this man was no where near New York on September 11. On September 21, 2001, Rais Bhuiyan, a Muslim who was born in Bangladesh, was working at a gas station convenience store in Texas. A man came in, pulled a gun and pointed it at Rais, and asked where he was from. When Rais said, Excuse me? the gunman shot him in the face. Gunman Mark Stroman shot and killed two other people, and was sentenced to death by the state of Texas. Rias Bhuiyan wrote to governor Rick Perry asking that Stroman be pardoned, but Stroman was executed on July 20. Through the organization he established, Rais continues to work for a world without hate. Ten days from now, on Wednesday, September 21, we will have another service of memory here at Creekside. This service is to remind us that September 21 is the International Day of Prayer for

6 Peace. Pastor Betty will show us how to do a slow walk for peace on the labyrinth, church property, or in the neighborhood at Stonegate. You are all welcome to come and be introduced to this practice of transforming your heart. The theme for the day, developed by On Earth Peace, an agency of the Church of the Brethren, is Seek the peace of the city. That text comes from Jeremiah 29:7. In this passage, the prophet Jeremiah is preaching the word of the Lord to the people of Israel. You might think the city that Jeremiah is talking about seeking peace for is Jerusalem. It isn t Jerusalem. It s Babylon. Jeremiah is preaching to the exiles in Babylon -- the same ones who were breathing revenge and violence in Psalm and he tells them this: Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there and do not decrease. But seek the peace of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. Jeremiah paints an image of fruitfulness and prosperity and life: houses and gardens and children and grandchildren! This is the life that God wants for us. This is the hope we are given when we seek the peace of others, even when we have a right to harbor hatred and plot revenge. Memory is a complicated thing, and when we acknowledge the presence and power of God in our lives, memory becomes a sacred thing. We should mourn those who lost their lives in the terrorist attacks 10 years ago, and we should celebrate the heroism of those who saved others, even at the cost of their own lives. But for memory to be true, it must go beyond sorrow and self-congratulation. It must confess the evil which is in our own hearts, and acknowledge that we will never defeat our enemies, no matter how evil they are, by repaying them with evil. Acting out of hatred and revenge only warps our own lives, and keeps us from the life-giving that God wants for us. The only way out of that vicious cycle is through God s transforming power; power which was demonstrated by the teaching, the example,

7 and ultimately the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. May Christ go with us -- behind us, before us, beneath us, beyond us -- as we remember this day.