I am struck, today, by the passage from the Hebrew Bible. If you recall, last week we heard the story of Moses and the burning bush, when he was called out by God to lead the Exodus from Egypt—to help enact God’s desire to free the Hebrew people from slavery and bondage. Fast forward nine chapters and nine horrible plagues, and we find ourselves at the night of the first passover.
You can probably picture the scene in each household—how exhausted everyone is, Egyptian and Hebrew alike. No one had ever witnessed such powerful and bizarre supernatural forces: frogs, gnats, flies, dead livestock, storms, disease, even the Nile River turning to blood. Emotionally and physically worn out, and no-doubt beginning to take their fear, grief, and frustration out on one another, Moses tells them that there is a final plague to come—the worst of them all. During the night, God will sweep over the land of Egypt, visiting each household to take the life of every firstborn. To avoid this fate, however, the Hebrews were to undertake a particular set of actions, including smearing the posts and lintel of their doors with the blood of a lamb they were to have ritually prepared for dinner. God would see this blood on the doorposts as a sign of faithfulness and pass over the household. The consequences of this final plague proved too much for Pharaoh, and the Hebrew people were sent on their way to freedom.
I know there is a lot to unpack here–it’s a heavy story–but I just want to focus on one idea today, and that’s faithfulness. If you’re like me, you might have drawn some parallels between the exhaustion of the characters in this story to your own fatigue in the midst of our modern plagues. We’re on the tail end, thank God, of a recent literal plague, yet recovery is slow and complicated. Things still aren’t quite what they used to be. And there is no shortage of anxiety-producing reporting on the 24-hour news cycle. I can tell I’ve reached my saturation point when I find myself tuning into the morning show on the local top-40 radio station rather than keeping the dial on NPR. I’d rather hear light-hearted banter about the best YouTube cat videos than the play-by-play on a certain senator and his medical troubles during press conferences, for example. It can all be a bit much to take.
Times of transition can be stressful too, and All Saints’ has certainly had its share of transition. The announcement this week of a new vicar notwithstanding, you’ve been in a leadership transition for eight months, diocesan leadership is changing, and the attendees of the Spanish-language service have been experiencing challenges as well. Patience can wear thin and relationships can become strained during times like these. You get tired of “working on your attitude,” and “taking deep breaths” don’t always cut it. So, what then is left? Let’s talk about faithfulness.
Now, before you dismiss it and say, “oh, I’ve tried to be faithful, but I just can’t get past the idea of a God that would allow plagues and suffering in the first place,” let’s take a minute to understand the concept of faithfulness a little more. Having faith is not the same as “working on your attitude,” “taking deep breaths,” or having your theological conundrums comfortably solved. Having faith is not a self-help strategy that aims to improve your mood. Rather, faith “involves a decision to trust rather than a logic that verifies” (Sheldrake 297). Again, faith “involves a decision to trust rather than a logic that verifies.” To be logical you have to have your wits about you. It’s hard to be logical when you’re stressed. I doubt that the Hebrew people, after feeling the crippling effects of nine plagues, reasoned that it still made sound logical sense to believe Moses’s stories and this promise of freedom that seemed to never come. They were probably just doing their best to get out of bed in the morning. But even if they didn’t have the mental space to “logic” their way out of this situation, they still had a decision to make. They could choose to be faithful–that is, trust in God’s goodness–or they could choose to give up.
And here’s the key. For the Hebrews, faithfulness was lived out in the form of action. As Moses instructed them, they painted blood on their doorposts, they prepared a meal in a particular way, and they ate together as families, inviting neighbors as well. There may have been some shouting across the dinner table as they took out the their frustrations on one another, as families tend to do, but through these ritual actions they demonstrated their hope for the fulfillment of God’s promise, and their deep love for one another. They demonstrated faithfulness.
Theologian Michael Paul Gallagher writes that faith is “more a drama of companionship and vision than a theory, more of an event than a philosophy. It is a lived adventure…” (Sheldrake 298). Living faithfully during challenging times has less to do with logic, rationalization, or mood, and more to do with action. We demonstrate our trust in God and love for one another by praying together (even if we’re on the outs with our neighbor), by sharing meals together (whether it’s at the Eucharistic table or just coffee and snacks on Sunday morning), and by serving the larger community together–cooperating in projects that aim to further the Kingdom. Living out this “drama of companionship,” is faithfulness, and God recognizes this when God passes over.
Today’s gospel passage from Matthew echos this sentiment, I think. Jesus has some very specific guidelines for how to manage a stressful situation, particularly when it involves relationships. If you’re in conflict with your neighbor, talk to them about it. If they won’t listen, bring a friend or two to help mediate. If that doesn’t work, look to the larger community for a more formal intervention. If we’re honest, I think many of us have trouble with the very first one. We would often rather post our grievances on Facebook than communicate them honestly and directly with a neighbor. Faithfulness, on the other hand, requires more of us than that. It asks that we trust in God’s goodness, and that we actively look for that goodness in our neighbor.
How do you, personally, paint your doorposts today? How is your faithfulness less about mood and more about action? And how do you demonstrate this faithfulness to a world that needs to see it? If the stories in Exodus are to be believed, it is faithfulness that will lead us to the parting waters and reveal a clear path ahead.
As I reflect on this time of transition here at All Saints’, I feel blessed to have worked with this beautiful and faithful community. We have faced challenges over these past few months, but I see the waters beginning to part. I’ve witnessed strained relationships begin to heal. I’ve seen people come together to accomplish important tasks on behalf of this community. I’ve seen a hard-earned dedication to this place develop. As the Israelites learned, faithfulness leads to freedom. That’s what in your future too. Freedom from fear. Freedom to explore and be creative. Freedom to love each other and the community of Bentonville with passion and purpose. It’s an exiting time to be a member of All Saints’ Church. I can’t wait to see what’s next.
Proper 18, Year A
See Sheldrake, Philip. The New Westminster Dictionary of Christian Spirituality. Louisville: WJK = Westminster John Knox Press, 2013.