Sermons and Spirits: Recent Episodes
Abby Norman
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Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52
31 He put before them another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in his field; 32 it is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches." 33 He told them another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened." 44 "The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and hid; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. 45 "Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; 46 on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it. 47 "Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and caught fish of every kind; 48 when it was full, they drew it ashore, sat down, and put the good into baskets but threw out the bad. 49 So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous 50 and throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 51 "Have you understood all this?" They answered, "Yes." 52 And he said to them, "Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like the master of a household who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old."
I have preached on these verses over and over and over again and I gotta tell you, Jesus did not take even one course on attractional church and growing a group of believers. Cause you aren’t supposed to tell people any of this. If you want to grow a church, if you want to attract believers, the workshops and zoom calls and books tell you, you need to make things as easy as possible for people. You need to not let them know how the gospel you have to offer already goes with the lifestyle they have chosen. You have to let them know how all their friends will be down with the thing.
Jesus did not take this route.
Jesus, in these few paragraphs lets you know. The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed or some leaven. It may seem small but it is gonna spread and it is going to change everything. The kingdom of heaven is going to cost you, it is going to cost you everything you own, it is going to cost you all of your dollars, if you found it for real you become obsessed with it and your life changes. You make some serious sacrifices. It is worth it. The kingdom of God catches everybody up, but people get sorted out in the end.
Dang Jesus. Don’t you know that is not what people want to hear? Aren’t we supposed to be about the good news?
The good news is that we are invited to this work. The good news is that Jesus does transform us. The good news is that one taste of the kingdom of heaven and we are ready to be all in. A tiny bit of yeast is gonna change the whole bread, even if you can’t see it working right away. One look at the treasure of the kingdom of God and you will sell the whole farm to get in on it. The good news is that we get to be the scribes if we want to. We get to be witnesses to this stuff.
In the time of coronavirus when I feel like my whole life has been put on pause, it is easy to believe that the kingdom of God has been put on pause, but that isn’t the way the kingdom of God works. It works like leaven in the bread, it works like the roots of a mustard seed. It sneaks in, it changes things. It works when we aren’t seeing. It expands, it sneaks into cracks.
And the kingdom of God is worth whatever sacrifice you have to make. It is worth it to sell everything you have, to lose friends, to lose opportunities to lose social cache to follow the kingdom of God.
Over and over again I am struck by how what we see as foolishness God says, nope this is it, this is the way it is. This is how the kingdom comes. I am struck by the people hanging Christmas lights to bring their neighbors joy, the power of leaf blowers to push tear gas away, the people who hand out free food and water and the wall of mothers bodies to protect protestors. Things that are “silly” are “average” are “not very valuable or useful.” That is where the kingdom comes. That is worth everything we’ve got.
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Isaiah 44:6-8
6 Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts: I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no god. 7 Who is like me? Let them proclaim it, let them declare and set it forth before me. Who has announced from of old the things to come? Let them tell us what is yet to be. 8 Do not fear, or be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? You are my witnesses! Is there any god besides me? There is no other rock; I know not one.
I am not sure how many times in the Bible someone is instructed to “be not afraid.” Pinterest has a lot of cute pictures with a lot of different numbers, and the more scholarly sources don’t totally agree. But it is a lot. That much I know. Over and over and over again God calls out to “Be Not Afraid.”
Oh. Okay. No problem. There is a pandemic and my governor is suing my mayor because she wants everyone to wear a mask. Some of my friends are facing eviction and don’t know how they will eat pretty soon, churches are navigating an environment when “normal church” is one of the most dangerous things you can do, but sure I will just be over here not afraid. Got it. Does binge eating ruffles on my couch qualify as not being afraid? It does not? Oh. I may have some work to do…
In the western world we have a deep disconnect between what we think/feel and what we do. When we hear “do not be afraid” we hear “do not FEEL afraid, do not THINK about fear.” That isn’t what this original audience heard. They heard do not ACT in fear. To be was more like…to embody than to think or feel. Do not embody the fear.
Do Not Embody the Fear: I know you feel afraid. I do too. How could we not? Do not act in that fear. Sometimes fear makes us freeze, tells us there is nothing to do done. There is not good work. We must succumb to the inevitability that the world is going to hell in a hand basket so we should just distract ourselves with endless TV. But God says that isn’t true. God says God is the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end, the redeemer of ALL THINGS, even the things currently in a hand basket. Do not freeze in fear, instead ask God for the next right thing to do, for the next tiny way to embody hope. Do Not Embody Fear.
Do Not Embody Fear: Do not fight with the small things that are making us distracted, but instead bear witness to the power and principalities that insist that there is even one who should be sacrificed on the alter of the economy. Fear sometimes makes us fight battles that are not worth it, that are not ours. Instead bear witness to the good trouble we are meant to continue to embrace. Now WHO you are and WHOSE you are and WHO God is asking you to fight for, those who are most oppressed by the things that seem to be making us all afraid, those battles we fight, but not out of fear. Fear tells us to fight for our “normal” back so that we can all feel safer. God calls us to fight for a better way where we actually all do get to thrive. Do Not Embody Fear.
Do Not Embody Fear: Do not flee the things that are scary. Stand with the God who is first and last. Stand with the Lord of hosts. Look at what exactly the world is asking us to fear. I will not be fearing the mothers who are just trying to give their children a chance. I will not be fearing lack of resources causing me to hoard what I do not need. I will not be living in fear and making parenting decisions based only on how my kids can get theirs. I will go to the zoom board of education meeting even if it makes me feel afraid. I will face the realities of pastoring in a pandemic even when I want to just pretend my congregation will be fine. The world says if it makes you scared don’t listen, flee, run as far as you can from that reality, but God says “do not be afraid” there is nothing we can’t face when God is with us.
And God is With Us.
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Zechariah 9:9-12
9 Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. 10 He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war-horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations; his dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth. 11 As for you also, because of the blood of my covenant with you, I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit. 12 Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope; today I declare that I will restore to you double.
This week was my official transition from my old church, New Hope on Moreland Avenue, to my new church, New Hope 40 minutes south of the church on Moreland, in a gorgeous part of the state called Chattahoochee Hills. From New Hope to New Hope. It is funny, and leaves me a little breathless and occasionally confused in the general conversations of how my church is going, but also, from New Hope to New Hope, isn’t that always the way?
What are we hoping for? I live in America and there are people flooding our streets (masked, thankfully) protesting the structures of our systems that are deeply unfair. Many of them are religious and they are leaning on God to show them the hope that is a mandate of this faith of ours. New Hope isn’t just the name of the church that I served, and the church that I serve, it is a blessing and a burden that we hold as Christians. If we know God, if we follow Jesus, we are Prisoners of Hope.
There is a lot of darkness in our world, and I am in no way asking us to just “look on the bright side.” I am not. As prophets to this world we aren’t called to sugar coat the truth, but we are called to remind the world, as Andre Henry says (and has a t-shirt!) It Doesn’t Have to Be this way. Desmond TuTu said “Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness.” I think that is what being a prisoner to hope is all about. Acknowledging the darkness all around us and then pointing to the one tiny sliver of light, that could grow is we wanted it to.
The people this scripture was originally written to were no strangers to darkness, they knew what oppression felt like. And I am sure that very many of them would have been just fine with the same systems that were, as long as they were the ones on top of the whole thing. But God isn’t after maintaining the pyramid scheme of flourishing this world wants us to believe in, simply replacing those on top with others, God is after a world where EVERYONE gets to flourish. This is why we see God come in powerful and humble, aligned with the poorest of the poor, and then cutting off the systems that are hurting people “He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war-horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations; his dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.” Hope isn’t about being on the top. Hope is about believing that we could live in a world where everyone is on top.
This pandemic has opened my eyes to all the beliefs I have about scarcity and opportunity. I have to do it NOW. I have to get whatever I want to do in! It will be too late! With my book advance money we had planned on going on a Disney Cruise (don’t tell my kids). When, I thought, will I ever be able to do something like that for them again? The week everything shut down my husband and I were going to go on a just us trip to New York City. And even though I know it is about the dumbest thing on earth to do, and I especially know that taking risks like that would cause risk to my family, and also would absolutely not be loving to my neighbors who are at a higher risk, there is a piece of me that thinks if I don’t do it, it will just disappear. Somehow the scarcity justifies behavior that is not loving, and won’t please God. God promises that we don’t have to do that.
My examples are selfish and self focused (though real, I mean I think God is sad I didn’t get to do those things too but also..) the things God is promising to restore two-fold are generational. They have had property and promises stolen from them for yours. The people God is speaking to have lost just so much. But God sees it, and promises to restore it beyond anything they have asked. God promises to move them from a prison with no water to a fortress of hope. God is their fortress, and God will restore them. It is more than optimism, it is living into a place of belief. I want in on that restoration. I believe that we aren’t free until everyone is free, that our liberation is tied up together, and in that believe I that we are all invited to participate in this restoration. The world will tell us that if we give up our privilege in the service of our siblings in Christ means less for me. But I know that is a lie. I live in the fortress that is our God and I get to be a Prisoner of Hope.
Prisoner of hope On Being
Hope and Hard Pills with Andre Henry and Alicia Crosby
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When Faithful Work is Never Wasted: The Audio
If you are on this email list I already sent you this. But then I realized I left the audio off. Forgive me. Through July everything I post will be free. Starting in August the Podcast of these sermons will be for subscribers. If you want to, but cannot afford to subscribe I can find you a sponsor. This is God’s table and everyone gets in.
Abby NormanJun 28
Tomorrow is the end of an era. I will stand on the steps of my first church and say goodbye to those who I have served in my very first appointment for the last two years. Facebook reminds me that two years ago we were throwing picnics and imagining big things. I was taking donations of squirt guns and slip-n-slides and hoping to build a robust community of dreamers on the south east side of Atlanta. I had a lot of ideas and an endless amount of enthusiasm. Some things will never change.
We had a lot of successes at that little church. We re-did the sanctuary. We invited our neighbors to outdoor movies, Christmas photos, and easter egg hunts and they came! We invited them to art events that were less successful. We found some solid funding by inviting unique renters during the week. I learned that the banner making genes are strong even if I use a paintbrushes where my mother and grandmothers used sewing machines and crisply cut fabric.
Most importantly, I learned what faithful work looked like and how to claim that as enough even when the butts in the pews and the money in the plate told a different story. I learned that God calling something good doesn’t gaurantee success. I learned that God has a much different view of success than we do.
I will not be preaching on the lectionary text for this week in my grey pulpit in that pretty white building. It isn’t my pulpit anymore. But I will be reflecting on it here, in my new newsletter. Covid-19 has laid bare so many things, has closed a lot of doors, but also has let me preach to a wider audience, something I would like to continue to do even though I will not be preaching on the New Hope Facebook page anymore. But I love writing for the internet, and I love preaching, and it seems that the next iteration of that is right here, as a subscription newsletter.
So, with that introduction let us look at the text for today
Matthew 10:40-42
40 "Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. 41 Whoever welcomes a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet's reward; and whoever welcomes a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive the reward of the righteous; 42 and whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple—truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward."
None of these will lose their reward. You don’t know how I have needed to hear that. None of these will lose their reward. We are living in a state of extreme uncertainty. In the past four months alone their has been a lot of changing information on how to be safe, what sacrifices you and your family should be making if you can, even the efficacy of wearing a mask has been up for debate. It is not anymore, wear your mask.
As we think about the sacrifices we are trying to make, I wonder if it wouldn’t be a whole lot easier if we knew for sure those sacrifices would make things better. It would be easier to stay in my house and wear my mask if I was told yes! This is helping! Your corona-virus inconveniences will make this world better. We don’t have those assurances, we really only have our best guesses. Is all this work for nothing?
Jesus promises us in this passage it is not all for naught. Jesus says He sees us and understands and if we are trying to love our neighbor well then it does matter. The efforts that we make, the inconveniences we take, the simple act of giving water to those who are thirsty, that stuff matters. God sees it.
Tomorrow I turn in my keys to the church that didn’t go the way I was hoping. There is no garden, the chickens died, there are not enough people who come every week to need a social distancing plan. Did it matter? Did all those hours of painting and scheming and laying down bricks for a labyrinth that no one else used? I think they did. I think that God’s economy does not look like ours, and what counts as “wins” and “losses” are not counted that way in God’s accounting book. By all accounts New Hope failed. We did not gain enough members to continue. And yet, the work that we have done in the sanctuary has provided an opportunity for rentals that will let the feeding program continue. If those things continue those who live on the grounds get to stay.
It was supposed to be the end. But it is not. And it seemed like everything I did as a pastor did not end “succesfully.” But God does not keep track like we do. The scoring system in the kingdom of God is so much more generous than we could ever imagine.
Wear your mask. Give out cool drinks freely. Keep dreaming even when you fail. God is keeping track of the ways that you are trying to serve this world God loves, and God is proud of you.
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