Pastor Julie Rowe has been working here in Jerusalem for almost 5 years; she started out as an Ecumenical Accompanier and has been working for the last 4 years as Assistant to Bishop Dr. Munib Younan of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land. She will be returning to the U.S. at the end of June. Thanks to Julie we have been included in a wide range of opportunities that have opened our eyes to the situation here in the West Bank. She has given us permission to share the excellent sermon that she preached at the Church of the Redeemer on the 4th Sunday after Pentecost.Go… and Follow Me
Rev. Julie Rowe, Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land
June, 2008, Jerusalem Genesis 12:1-9 and Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26
Rev. Julie Rowe, Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land
June, 2008, Jerusalem Genesis 12:1-9 and Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26
The hymn we will sing in a few minutes, Here I Am, Lord, is one of my favorites. I used it at my ordination. So I was surprised one day when I was standing next to one of my favorite bishops in a service in Texas when he said, "I hate this song!"
I said, "Why?" It's a great song about God asking who will answer the call to serve the needs of God's people. But the chorus says, "I will go, Lord, if you lead me."
He said, there's no IF about it! God is always leading you!
So I said, "Well, we could just change the word from IF to WHERE… I will go, Lord, WHERE you lead me."
Well, that pleased him.
But about a year later, I found myself here in Jerusalem wondering what on earth I had gotten myself into….
As they say, be careful what you pray… or what you sing …
I think we have all been there … hearing a call, a voice, that tells you you need to leave the familiar place you are in and go to something or someplace new and different and scary. I've been here off and on for 5 years now, first with the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel on a peace team, then for the last 4 years as assistant to Bishop Younan here of the Palestinian Lutheran church.
I'm here because I heard that call in the night, and I know that many of you have, too. For those of you who are visiting, this congregation is made up of people who have left the places they called home to come here, mostly to work with Palestinian Christians and Muslims and Israelis from the peace camp. It has been fascinating to meet these and others here who have left comfortable homes, jobs and retirement to come and work here in amazingly difficult situations, like people from CPT, who last night slept in an orphanage that has been threatened with closure because they are an Islamic charity accused of supporting Hamas.
Those of us who live here know that it is not an easy journey. Most of us are immediately overwhelmed by everyday realities that fly in the face of what we have always believed. Over these years I have been shocked and saddened by what I have seen done in the name of God, in the name of my own religion and in the name of my country. I have had to question some fundamentals of life and faith I had taken for granted.
I said, "Why?" It's a great song about God asking who will answer the call to serve the needs of God's people. But the chorus says, "I will go, Lord, if you lead me."
He said, there's no IF about it! God is always leading you!
So I said, "Well, we could just change the word from IF to WHERE… I will go, Lord, WHERE you lead me."
Well, that pleased him.
But about a year later, I found myself here in Jerusalem wondering what on earth I had gotten myself into….
As they say, be careful what you pray… or what you sing …
I think we have all been there … hearing a call, a voice, that tells you you need to leave the familiar place you are in and go to something or someplace new and different and scary. I've been here off and on for 5 years now, first with the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel on a peace team, then for the last 4 years as assistant to Bishop Younan here of the Palestinian Lutheran church.
I'm here because I heard that call in the night, and I know that many of you have, too. For those of you who are visiting, this congregation is made up of people who have left the places they called home to come here, mostly to work with Palestinian Christians and Muslims and Israelis from the peace camp. It has been fascinating to meet these and others here who have left comfortable homes, jobs and retirement to come and work here in amazingly difficult situations, like people from CPT, who last night slept in an orphanage that has been threatened with closure because they are an Islamic charity accused of supporting Hamas.
Those of us who live here know that it is not an easy journey. Most of us are immediately overwhelmed by everyday realities that fly in the face of what we have always believed. Over these years I have been shocked and saddened by what I have seen done in the name of God, in the name of my own religion and in the name of my country. I have had to question some fundamentals of life and faith I had taken for granted.
Take, for example, today's Old Testament reading about Abraham and Sarah. One of the most familiar of all texts, where God calls Abraham and Sarah to a new land and promises to make of them a great and chosen nation.
For the last 4 years, I have worked every day with people, Palestinian Christians and Muslims, for whom that has meant they have lost – or worse, yet, are still threatened every day with losing - their homes, their land, their identities.
What does it mean for Christians – especially for Palestinian Christians – that God called the Jewish people as a "chosen people?"
To answer this, you have to read the whole chapter, the rest of the story. The key to me is the purpose: Abraham and Sarah were blessed "so that" Israel would become a blessing to all families on the earth. In the covenant with Abraham and the selection of Israel as the "chosen people," God was doing a new thing: creating a new vision of what it means to live as God's people in the world God "chose" the people of Israel to show the world how to live by faith with justice, equality, righteousness and love for God and one another.
In the Exodus story, for example, God is saying no to the wealth, monopoly, and oppression of Egypt's monarchy. God heard the cries of the landless, enslaved Hebrew people, and said, "Set my people free." God led them out of the bondage of Egypt to be a new community, founded not on the world's values of wealth, power and kings but on God's values of justice, love and righteousness. God called the people to redistribute the land every 50 years (the year of Jubilee in Leviticus 25) to counteract the inevitable inequities and injustice that the world's system generated. God asked the people to let the land lie fallow every 7 years so that those who had nothing could eat from the land themselves.
Once in the land, however, the Israelites began to turn back to the world's values of wealth and power. Against the Prophet Samuel's warnings, they chose to have a king, and invested him with great powers. Then unrighteousness, idolatry and injustice ruled the land. The prophets warned that shunning the covenant responsibilities would bring about their destruction, but the people did not listen. So now, God took them out of the land, into exile. But in exile, when the people were landless and homeless once again, the prophets' message changed again to offer forgiveness and hope through the promise of returning to the land.
This time, instead of coming in to conquer those in the land, they came back to the land seeking to live together with those from other nations already living there.
This evolution shows that God values justice, love and righteousness above any one people. The Biblical message is different for different people at different times. For those who are landless and have no hope or home, God promises homeland and blessing. But those who have land, exploit it and covet more land, will lose it.
The history of salvation shows the clear movement from belief in a tribal, closed-in God to a more universal, inclusive God. The Bible is not a one-act play; it is a complex narrative with a storyline and a movement over time. So from the exile, you have the prophet Ezekiel, for example, giving a different vision of the Israelis living in the land after exile along with those who were already there:
For the last 4 years, I have worked every day with people, Palestinian Christians and Muslims, for whom that has meant they have lost – or worse, yet, are still threatened every day with losing - their homes, their land, their identities.
What does it mean for Christians – especially for Palestinian Christians – that God called the Jewish people as a "chosen people?"
To answer this, you have to read the whole chapter, the rest of the story. The key to me is the purpose: Abraham and Sarah were blessed "so that" Israel would become a blessing to all families on the earth. In the covenant with Abraham and the selection of Israel as the "chosen people," God was doing a new thing: creating a new vision of what it means to live as God's people in the world God "chose" the people of Israel to show the world how to live by faith with justice, equality, righteousness and love for God and one another.
In the Exodus story, for example, God is saying no to the wealth, monopoly, and oppression of Egypt's monarchy. God heard the cries of the landless, enslaved Hebrew people, and said, "Set my people free." God led them out of the bondage of Egypt to be a new community, founded not on the world's values of wealth, power and kings but on God's values of justice, love and righteousness. God called the people to redistribute the land every 50 years (the year of Jubilee in Leviticus 25) to counteract the inevitable inequities and injustice that the world's system generated. God asked the people to let the land lie fallow every 7 years so that those who had nothing could eat from the land themselves.
Once in the land, however, the Israelites began to turn back to the world's values of wealth and power. Against the Prophet Samuel's warnings, they chose to have a king, and invested him with great powers. Then unrighteousness, idolatry and injustice ruled the land. The prophets warned that shunning the covenant responsibilities would bring about their destruction, but the people did not listen. So now, God took them out of the land, into exile. But in exile, when the people were landless and homeless once again, the prophets' message changed again to offer forgiveness and hope through the promise of returning to the land.
This time, instead of coming in to conquer those in the land, they came back to the land seeking to live together with those from other nations already living there.
This evolution shows that God values justice, love and righteousness above any one people. The Biblical message is different for different people at different times. For those who are landless and have no hope or home, God promises homeland and blessing. But those who have land, exploit it and covet more land, will lose it.
The history of salvation shows the clear movement from belief in a tribal, closed-in God to a more universal, inclusive God. The Bible is not a one-act play; it is a complex narrative with a storyline and a movement over time. So from the exile, you have the prophet Ezekiel, for example, giving a different vision of the Israelis living in the land after exile along with those who were already there:
"So you shall divide this land among you according to the tribes of Israel. You shall allot it as an inheritance for yourselves and for the aliens who reside among you and have begotten children among you. They shall be to you as citizens of Israel…" (Ez 47:21-22).
The prophet Isaiah clearly prophesies that they are to stretch their minds and hearts to all peoples. "It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth." (Is, 49:6; Is 42:6-9; Is 56:6-8)
He foretells a day when "on this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food (Is 25:6) and calls on Israel to be "a house of prayer for all nations" (Is 56:3-8).
Jesus takes this concept even further. Today, we hear him inviting the outcast tax collector to follow him and even eat with him. Jesus embodied a God who welcomes all to the table, in fact, says he came for the sinners, so that he could transform them with the power of love and grace. Both of these calls in the texts today…to Abraham to "go from your country to a land I will show you" and to Matthew to "follow me" still echo for us today.
The prophet Isaiah clearly prophesies that they are to stretch their minds and hearts to all peoples. "It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth." (Is, 49:6; Is 42:6-9; Is 56:6-8)
He foretells a day when "on this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food (Is 25:6) and calls on Israel to be "a house of prayer for all nations" (Is 56:3-8).
Jesus takes this concept even further. Today, we hear him inviting the outcast tax collector to follow him and even eat with him. Jesus embodied a God who welcomes all to the table, in fact, says he came for the sinners, so that he could transform them with the power of love and grace. Both of these calls in the texts today…to Abraham to "go from your country to a land I will show you" and to Matthew to "follow me" still echo for us today.
Yet people interpret them in so many different ways, it is sometimes hard to discern where we are to go, what we are to do and which leaders we are to follow. More and more, religious leaders use these stories and words to justify injustice, theft of land, violence and hatred of the other. How are we to know which voices are right?
Look at what happens to Matthew when he follows. It shows us exactly what Jesus is about, and what we should be about.
First, Jesus chooses all, invites all to the table. In a world where we can't talk to terrorists, we shun nations and whole peoples as evil, where it is mostly only the wealthy and powerful that have places at the table, Jesus welcomes all, and then uses the power of God to transform and teach people a better way to live.
Second, Jesus heals all, even when it breaks the laws of society. The woman with the flow of blood for 12 years would have been an untouchable, an outcast of society because of ritual purity laws. Yet when she touched him, he didn't rebuke her, but encouraged her and healed her. Even called her "daughter," showing people that God's love and healing know no bounds.
Third, Jesus is in the resurrection business. He is about moving people from death to life, bringing health out of brokenness, community out of isolation, light out of darkness. Jesus is about transforming people into a new community of abundant life, justice and wholeness.
Jesus still calls all of us on our journeys of faith to follow into new and unexpected places, to go beyond our comfort zones and into the grittiness of daily life where real people live and laugh and cry and dream. But there's no guarantee it will be an easy ride. That's the hard thing about a life of faith … it's just that, a life of faith. Not a life of certainty, not a life of easy answers. A life of faith is a series of many leaps of faith.
What I Don't Like About Jesus … Gerhardt Frost
Let me tell you
What I don't like about Jesus.
He calls me to follow; I like to run around.
He lets me see a single step,
And sometimes even less than that;
I like to know the end.
I choose to travel by sunlight or headlight;
He gives me only starlight.
I like to set the pace;
He asks me to hurry, or worse – sometimes to wait.
He embarrasses me and gets me into trouble;
He sometimes makes a scene.
And just when I feel strong
He calls me to a cross;
I want a crown.
I don't know that I want a crown. But I sure want to see less of a cross. I want God to do something about all this! To stop the madness, the bombings, the rockets, the home demolitions, the land confiscation.
Look at what happens to Matthew when he follows. It shows us exactly what Jesus is about, and what we should be about.
First, Jesus chooses all, invites all to the table. In a world where we can't talk to terrorists, we shun nations and whole peoples as evil, where it is mostly only the wealthy and powerful that have places at the table, Jesus welcomes all, and then uses the power of God to transform and teach people a better way to live.
Second, Jesus heals all, even when it breaks the laws of society. The woman with the flow of blood for 12 years would have been an untouchable, an outcast of society because of ritual purity laws. Yet when she touched him, he didn't rebuke her, but encouraged her and healed her. Even called her "daughter," showing people that God's love and healing know no bounds.
Third, Jesus is in the resurrection business. He is about moving people from death to life, bringing health out of brokenness, community out of isolation, light out of darkness. Jesus is about transforming people into a new community of abundant life, justice and wholeness.
Jesus still calls all of us on our journeys of faith to follow into new and unexpected places, to go beyond our comfort zones and into the grittiness of daily life where real people live and laugh and cry and dream. But there's no guarantee it will be an easy ride. That's the hard thing about a life of faith … it's just that, a life of faith. Not a life of certainty, not a life of easy answers. A life of faith is a series of many leaps of faith.
What I Don't Like About Jesus … Gerhardt Frost
Let me tell you
What I don't like about Jesus.
He calls me to follow; I like to run around.
He lets me see a single step,
And sometimes even less than that;
I like to know the end.
I choose to travel by sunlight or headlight;
He gives me only starlight.
I like to set the pace;
He asks me to hurry, or worse – sometimes to wait.
He embarrasses me and gets me into trouble;
He sometimes makes a scene.
And just when I feel strong
He calls me to a cross;
I want a crown.
I don't know that I want a crown. But I sure want to see less of a cross. I want God to do something about all this! To stop the madness, the bombings, the rockets, the home demolitions, the land confiscation.
But luckily, in a life of faith, hope is not in the facts on the ground or the politics. A life of faith is in "hoping against hope" that God can bring new life out of barrenness and can call into existence things that do not exist.
To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, and kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places – and there are so many – where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act ... To live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory. Prof. Howard Zinn
So on those days when we see the worst, and we stand on a rock ledge, watching while a young child still in her puppy slippers watches her home being demolished, we can also remember the people who have acted magnificently and rebuilt some of those houses.
We can remember those who have lost loved ones who, instead of using their grief to fuel more bitterness and hate are instead working together to heal the nation from occupation and division.
And these people are able to do this because they feel a power and strength beyond themselves that helps them answer the call they hear.
And when it seems we can't find that hope, or that healing, or the courage to take that next step into the void, it is the hope and the grace and guidance of God that finds us, through others, through prayer, through coming together in worship and around the Bread and the Wine.
Because alone it is impossible. But together it is an incredible journey.
May God grant you grace and guidance for the road ahead, wherever it leads you.
Amen.
And when it seems we can't find that hope, or that healing, or the courage to take that next step into the void, it is the hope and the grace and guidance of God that finds us, through others, through prayer, through coming together in worship and around the Bread and the Wine.
Because alone it is impossible. But together it is an incredible journey.
May God grant you grace and guidance for the road ahead, wherever it leads you.
Amen.
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