there; or backward, I cannot perceive him; 9 on the left he

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1 Faith Questions: Why have you forsaken me? By the Rev. Dr. Eric O. Ledermann RCL Year B Job , (NRSV) 1Then Job answered: 2 Today also my complaint is bitter; his hand is heavy despite my groaning. 3 Oh, that I knew where I might find him, that I might come even to his dwelling! 4 I would lay my case before him, and fill my mouth with arguments. 5 I would learn what he would answer me, and understand what he would Hebrews (NRSV) 12Indeed, the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. 13 And before him no creature is hidden, but all are say to me. 6 Would he contend with me in the greatness of his power? No; but he would give heed to me. 7 There an upright person could reason with him, and I should be acquitted forever by my judge. 8 If I go forward, he is not there; or backward, I cannot perceive him; 9 on the left he naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom we must render an account. 14 Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is hides, and I cannot behold him; I turn to the right, but I cannot see him. 16"God has made my heart faint; the Almighty has terrified me; 17 If only I could vanish in darkness, and thick darkness would cover my face!" unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Someone a long time ago told me that an active faith was as much about the questions we ask as the answers we often cling to. It was St. Anselm that suggested the practice of theology, the study of God, is faith seeking understanding. He understood faith as a love for God and a drive to understand what it is that God desires, seeking a deeper understanding of God. To seek further requires a certain curiosity, a willingness to ask hard questions without the expectation of easy answers. If there is one thing I've learned, it's that easy answers are often not good answers. The long parable of Job is an interesting study of faith seeking understanding and a series of hard answers to equally difficult questions. The accuser, often called "Satan" (which is a transliteration of the Hebrew word which means "the accuser"), asks if Job, a righteous man, honors God only because he has been blessed by God, and maybe because he is afraid of God's punishments? Would Job curse God if his life suddenly fell apart, despite Job's faithfulness? Page 1 of 5

2 God grants the accuser permission to do whatever he wants, so long as he does not kill Job. Here, at the end of the book, Job is pleading his case, but to whom? God is nowhere to be found, right? The teaching in Job is an attempt to respond to the question of why good people suffer. It is not an easy answer to the question. In fact, it seems to raise all kinds of corollary questions. Why does Job confess to a God who is absent? Why does the psalmist cry out, like Job, to a God who seems to be gone? Yet, notice that even the very act of crying out is an act of faith in this seemingly absent God. We might recognize in the psalm as well as in Job's argument, a belief that God is not as far off as it would seem. The people of Israel often felt God had abandoned them whether it was during their enslavement in Egypt, in the wars against those who sought to destroy them, or even under the cruel oppression of the Roman Empire and their own leadership in the time of Jesus. Today, we hear people say that God has abandoned us, our nation, or even our world. We have spiraled into a state of deep and increasingly secularized despair. In the gospel passage assigned to today from Mark's gospel, a wealthy young man approaches Jesus and asks, "Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" Jesus responds, curiously, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone." He then goes on to affirm the young man's knowledge as a good Jew: "You know the commandments: 'You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; You shall not defraud; Honor your mother and father.'" The young man says, "I've kept these commandments all my life." Jesus then says, "You lack one thing: go, sell all your possessions and give the Page 2 of 5

3 money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me." The text in Mark 10 tells us that the young man was shocked and walked away grieving because "he had many possessions." Jesus turns to those who were present and says his famous quote, "How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!... It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God." This begs the question: What on earth is Jesus talking about? Well, I wonder if this is linked to Psalm 22 and our Prayer of Confession: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" These are the words Jesus cries out from the cross in both Mark's and Matthew's gospels. They are words of utter despair total abandonment. Yet, even in them is a statement of faith: why cry to a God who is not listening? You see, it is not God who abandons us in times of need. It is us who grow blind to God's presence. It is us who become deaf to God's still small voice whispering into our ears, "I am with you in your suffering; I am with you in all your goings and comings; I am with you always." In our Prayer of Confession we don't get to it, but later in the psalm the artist declares: "You [O God] are my strength!... I offer praise in the great congregation because of you... Let all those who suffer eat and be full!" 1 A statement of faith in the midst of what sounds like total despair. Do you remember the poem "Footprints"? A man has a dream that he is walking along the seashore with God. Scenes of his life flash before him in the 1 Psalm 22.19, 22, 26 (NRSV). Page 3 of 5

4 waves. He looks back and notices that in the most desperate times of his life there is only one set of footprints. He asks God," Why in my most desperate times would you leave me?" God responds, "My precious child, I would never leave you. In your most desperate and needy times, it was then that I carried you." When we have those dark times of doubt, when the questions consume us, we must look back on all the times God has carried us and remember that God is not far off. God is still walking with us, often carrying us, and still speaking words of wisdom and hope into our souls. It is not God who has left or become deaf, it is us who have become consumed by our fears and closed our hearts to God. I find Psalm 22 a powerful reminder, as it moves from a presumed position of trust to a place of total despair, to working through feelings of abandonment, to becoming open again to God's love, to finally being able to declare, once again, trust in God's constant presence in our lives. It is a power movement that spans entire seasons of our lives in only 31 verses. The story of Job and the passage from Hebrews is a difficult reminder of our vulnerability, that we can't know everything, that we must rely on our faith as we walk through this life together. In a society that values individuality and self-reliance, this lesson becomes even more poignant and even more difficult. Faith is not about having all the answers. Rather, it is confessing our incompleteness without God and without our community. Faith is the task of working through the inevitable challenges we will face, trusting in the witness of those who have walked this faith journey before us. It is leaning into our fears in order to grow in our knowledge and understanding of the God who continually calls us forward to take the next step in the sand. It is remembering that we are not alone. While I would not go so far as the psalmist does by calling myself a worm, "not a human being" and a disgrace, I recognize that I have sometimes felt that Page 4 of 5

5 way. But often our perceptions can be clouded by our fears and vulnerabilities. All the more reason why we sometimes have to not only lean into our fears to "get curious" about our fears (as author Brené Brown suggests) and lean into the collective strength of our community of faith as well. Sometimes we need to call on our sisters and brothers and ask them to have faith for us when we are struggling to hang on to our own. Sometimes we need to seek out the wise ones in our community to walk with us, to be the voice of God for us when we have grown deaf to it in our despair. I wonder if the rich man who asked Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life walks away said because he realizes that he has grown blind to God's presence and deaf to God's teachings because he has grown to rely more on his own means than on God's grace. To sell all his possessions is to give up the façade he has created for himself of a self-made, self-reliant person who does not need community or God. His grief is the realization that he is not as faithful to God as he had presumed. It is not just about following the rules. It is about truly trusting in the God who provides, and for those who "have" recognizing our part in the providing. If there is one thing I hope we walk away with today, it is that God has not and will not forsake us. No matter how bad it feels, God is with you in it. God will not protect you from the pain or the grief, but God can help you get to the place where you can get curious about it and grow to understand it more deeply. But it does take time. I do not believe the psalmist wrote Psalm 22 in a day it took a lifetime to understand that movement from trust to despair, from despair to hope, and from hope back to trust. Remember, God is with you through every movement of your life. May we wall trust in God's love, for and with one another. For, "indeed, the word of God is living and active," as the author of the letter to the Hebrews suggests. May we "approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need." In the name of our Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, amen. Page 5 of 5