(Is 65:17-25; Gal. 5:1, 13-25; Lk 21:5-19)
Since the time of Abraham, the Israelites have had a relationship with the one God, who they called Elohim, El Shaddai, Yahweh Jehovah or Adonai. That relationship has taken place in different places and in different ways.
In the beginning of the relationship, God didn’t have a specific dwelling place – no tent, no building, no temple. Instead, God was free to go where he chose, and he guided the Israelites on their Exodus journey out of Egypt and into the Promised Land as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night (Ex 13:17-22). When the Israelites wanted to make him an altar, God told the them that they need only make him an altar out of earth. If they felt the need to make an altar of stone, they were to use only natural stones, because God feared that a manmade altar would be profane – that is, blasphemous (Ex 20:24-25). As the Israelites became more organized as a people, God commanded them to build a sanctuary that could be moved at his command (Ex 25-30; 33:7-11). And when the Israelites were finally established in Jerusalem, King David wanted to build a house for God, but God wouldn’t let him (2 Sam 7). Instead, God decreed that it would be David’s son, Solomon, who would build the Temple, and, when Solomon became king, he did (1 Ki 5).
As the Israelites became more established, God’s dwelling place became more established, until God only dwelt in the Holy of Holies, in the Temple, in Jerusalem. Later, when Jerusalem was conquered and the Temple was destroyed, the Israelites were exiled, and they were thrown into chaos and confusion. They asked themselves, “Where does God dwell now? How and where can we worship God if not in the Temple in Jerusalem? Is God with us in exile?” They no longer had their Temple, or their certainty about God and the practice of their faith. The stones of their Temple had been thrown down, and so had the stones of their faith.
The Israelites’ understanding of God and the practice of their faith had become centered solely in the Temple. Whenever Jerusalem was conquered and the Temple destroyed by enemies, the Israelites would rebuild the Temple at the first moment that they could. Imagine then, their anxiety and anger toward Jesus when he declared that the stones of the Temple would be thrown down, and that not one stone would be left upon another (Lk 21:6). Jesus’ words challenged their attachment to the Temple. In a sense, the Temple had become a prison for them. Their sense of identity as a people and their faith were attached to the Temple and they were no longer free in their relationship with God.
We also build temples that become prisons for us. Our temples are not usually physical buildings, however. They are the ways we think or the things we do that we won’t let go of no matter how much they are hindering and hurting us. But God doesn’t want us, or our faith practice, or our understanding of him to be set in stone. God wants us to be free to respond to his self-disclosure at any moment, and if we, or our faith practice, or our understanding of him are set in stone we are not free to do so. We must be listening for God’s call, not focusing on maintaining our temples. If we focus on our temples rather than on our relationship with God, our temples become prisons for us. Even though it’s human nature to want to have things set in stone, we must be willing to have our stones thrown down, even to the point where not one stone is left upon another and we are truly free before God.
You may be asking yourself what are the prisons that keep us from being free. They will be different for each of us. But, they are those things that keep us from the “fruits of the Spirit.” The fruits of the Spirit are listed in Galatians 5:22. They are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Any way we think or anything we do that keeps us from these fruits is a prison for us.
Let’s look for a moment at the opposite of the fruits of the Spirit: The opposite of love is hate. The opposite of joy is misery. The opposite of peace is distress. The opposite of patience is impatience. The opposite of kindness is meanness. The opposite of generosity is greed. The opposite of faithfulness is fear. The opposite of gentleness is roughness. The opposite of self-control is rashness. We can tell if we are imprisoned if we are miserable, distressed, impatient, mean, greedy, fearful, rough, and rash. When we find ourselves falling into these ways of being, we realize something is off, and must ask ourselves: What temple have we built that is keeping us from the fruits of the Spirit? What temple have we built that is keeping us from the freedom that Christ has given us? What yoke of slavery have we taken back onto ourselves? What way of thinking or being has imprisoned us?
This past year has been a tough one. We in the United States have gone through what is being called one of the most contentious and vitriolic election cycles in our history. Since the results of the election came in, people on both the “right” and the “left” have been freaking out in various ways. Violent crimes have been committed against people considered to be the “other,” as people express the hatred that was already in their hearts. Effigies of Donald Trump have been burned and protests against his presidency are being held, as people express the fear and loathing that was already in their hearts. People are wailing and gnashing their teeth, literally and metaphorically. It’s been a crazy week!
In other areas of the world, this past year has also been challenging. The United Kingdom voted to exit the European Union and the UK is currently dealing with the fallout of that vote. Other countries are struggling with how to handle over a million refugees escaping from war-torn countries in the Middle East and Africa. Some are welcoming them and some are refusing them, and there are consequences to both decisions. Meanwhile, the refugees suffer. Who will give them a room at the inn? Who will let them rest in their stable? Where will they sleep? What will they eat? How will they survive?
Then there is the whole issue of climate change and sustainable energy and water supply and GMOs. And, what’s with all the black bears in our towns and suburbs? Are we encroaching on their habitat too much?
Should I go on?
In the Luke passage for today, Jesus states, “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be great earthquakes, famines and pestilences in various places, and fearful events and great signs from heaven” (21:10-11). Personally, I am not one to try to predict when the end times will come or if they are present. I don’t believe it is my job to do so. Even Jesus, when questioned about this, said, “Of that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, not even the son, only the Father” (Mk 13:32).
No, it is not our job to speculate about the end times. It is our job, only, to remain faithful despite what is going on in the world. Jesus says to his disciples, “But make up your mind not to worry . . .” (Lk 21:14). We are not to worry. If we worry, we are imprisoned, and imprisonment is not a sign of God’s kingdom! Remember, Jesus came to set us free! We are not to take on the yoke of worry and become enslaved. That is not the way of the Christian disciple.
When we are yoked by worry, then we are not free to follow God, and God desires that we be free to follow the guidance of his Spirit and free to respond to it. He desires that we be enlivened by his Spirit and moving into the future he has planned for us. But when we are imprisoned in our temples, we are inflexible and his Spirit is unable to move among us and inspire us. Then, God cannot do a new thing with us and our world! And God always desires to do a new thing! God declares, “I am about to do a new thing,” not, “I am about to do the same old thing” (Is 43:19). He is the God who makes all things new. He is the God who loves us enough to accept us as we are, and too much to let us stay that way, as Anne Lamott has said! He is the God who loves us enough to accept our prisons, and too much to let us remain imprisoned by them.
The Isaiah passage for today witnesses to the fruits of the Spirit that are manifested after the stones of our prisons are thrown down and God is allowed to build something new in their place:
For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth;
the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind.
But be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating;
For I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy, and its people as a delight. . . .
no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it, or the cry of distress. . . .
for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands.
They shall not labor in vain, or bear children for calamity;
for they shall be offspring blessed by the Lord – and their descendants as well.
Before they call I will answer, while they are yet speaking I will hear.
The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like the ox . . .
They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the Lord. (Is 65:17-25)
It sounds wonderful doesn’t it? The fruits of the Spirit are manifested when we allow God free reign in our lives, but the Isaiah passage is not the whole story. The whole story can only be told in the conjunction of the Luke and Isaiah passages. Yes, we will experience the fruits of the Spirit if we allow God free reign in our lives, but we will also suffer apocalypses on the way to the promise. The stones of our prisons will be thrown down until not one stone is left upon another, and this will be uncomfortable at best and painful at worst. Like the Israelites when Jesus said that the stones of their Temple would be thrown down, we may feel anxious and angry as the stones of our prisons are thrown down. We may suffer a time of nakedness and vulnerability after the stones are gone. There may be conflict, dissent, and argument as we react to the ensuing changes. We will live, for a time, in the rubble and chaos that is the result of having the stones of our prisons thrown down. We may not trust that the new heavens and the new earth will actually come, and when they do, they may feel foreign. It will be a time that will require faithfulness and endurance, both in our relationship to God and to each other. But out of the rubble and chaos a new thing, created by God, will come, and “the former things will not be remembered or come to mind” (Is 65:18) because we will be so caught up with the gladness and rejoicing that always comes when we trust in and wait upon the Lord long enough for God to do his thing. As the Luke passage tells us, “By your endurance you will gain your souls” (Lk 21:19).
Gaining our souls means that we are living the life that God intends for us to live and that we are helping others to do the same – even those “others” who are not like us. (Remember those refugees?) Perhaps then we will not feel the need to build new temples that we worship more than God and that become prisons. Instead, our model will be the movable sanctuary of the early Israelites, described in Exodus:
Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. . . . Whenever the cloud was taken up from the tabernacle, the Israelites would set out on each stage of their journey; but if the cloud was not taken up, then they did not set out until the day that it was taken up. For the cloud of the Lord was on the tabernacle by day, and fire was in the cloud by night, before the eyes of all the house of Israel at each stage of their journey. (Ex 40:34-38)
While they had the tent of meeting, the Lord was before the eyes of the house of Israel at each stage of their journey. They waited upon the Lord in order to know where to go and what to do next. Although they had a structure in which God dwelt and on which they could focus the practice of their faith, none of it was set in stone. There was not one stone to be thrown down. May we be so blessed. Amen.
Sermon preached by Rev. Amy Johnson, Canton Community Baptist Church, Canton, CT, Sunday, November 13, 2016, the Twenty-sixth Sunday After Pentecost.
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