By Rev. Tracey Leslie Scripture: Jeremiah 4: 11-12; 22-28 Well, that was a cheery little scripture reading, wasn’t it? I believe I’ve mentioned before this thing called a lectionary that assigns scriptures for clergy to preach. Sometimes I use it; sometimes I don’t. But occasionally I’m reminded – as I was this week – of the wisdom bestowed by my seminary preaching professor that the lectionary forces us to preach some scriptures we might want to avoid; scriptures that sound unpleasant and make us feel uncomfortable. It’s tempting to avoid them. It’s hard enough to get people to come to church these days. Maybe we should be paying you or giving you cake every week as incentive. Why would anyone want to come to church to hear bad news? Isn’t that what we’re bombarded with every day? Well, that was a cheery little scripture reading, wasn’t it? I believe I’ve mentioned before this thing called a lectionary that assigns scriptures for clergy to preach. Sometimes I use it; sometimes I don’t. But occasionally I’m reminded – as I was this week – of the wisdom bestowed by my seminary preaching professor that the lectionary forces us to preach some scriptures we might want to avoid; scriptures that sound unpleasant and make us feel uncomfortable. It’s tempting to avoid them. It’s hard enough to get people to come to church these days. Maybe we should be paying you or giving you cake every week as incentive. Why would anyone want to come to church to hear bad news? Isn’t that what we’re bombarded with every day?
As a matter of fact, it is. Today marks the 21st anniversary of 9/11, a dreadful day in our nation’s history. But think of how much tragedy the world and our own nation have seen since then; even just since 2020: a global pandemic; racism and violence in our streets; our own denomination splitting apart; a violent invasion of our Capitol; record inflation; a housing crisis; California burning up and Lake Mead drying up while this summer has been dubbed the Summer of Floods. In an 11-day span, there were four floods that were considered “once in a thousand-years” events. Over this past year, as I’ve observed our nation’s mental health crisis, I’ve been doing some reading and here’s the thing: All of these events and the stress they produce are wrecking havoc on our body’s neural system. Our amygdalae are dealing with more than ever before. The amygdala regulates our emotions in response to stimuli. One of the primary jobs of this part of our brain is to scan the horizon for potential threats. We don’t control the amygdala. It’s like a computer program just running in the background that we’re not even conscious of. But when the amygdala signals threat too frequently and too vigorously, it negatively impacts our decision making, attention, and memory. Do you wonder why people are doing more and more outrageous things in public; acting as though they have no filter, no inhibitions and no common sense? Well, here’s your answer. But, just stuffing down our emotions, telling ourselves to “don’t worry, be happy” isn’t fixing the problem because, as I’ve already said, the amygdala is always doing its thing. So, we need to be purposefully doing things to process what’s going on around us in healthy ways. And this morning, that’s what we’re going to do together. But first, what about those ancient Israelites? If we think we’re living in stressful times, of national and global uncertainty; well, they knew our situation all too well. Let me explain their context. God led the Hebrews or Israelites out of Egyptian slavery and through the wilderness to the Promised Land. During their journey, God gave the people commands or instructions on Mt. Sinai. We might think of them as a bunch of rules, but all those rules were designed to achieve two things: a healthy relationship between the people and God AND healthy relationships among the people. But, once they entered the Promised Land, it didn’t take long for the people to be taken in by the gods and practices of the people already living there. The religious practices for some of those foreign gods were brutal – things like child sacrifice. So, God raised up prophets to warn the people that God would punish them if they continued to worship false gods and exploit one another. This wasn’t really about breaking commandments. It was about breaking relationship. God had given them guidance on how to be in right relationship with God and one another. But they no longer wanted to follow that guidance. God warns them for a long time. But, as you could hear in this morning’s scripture from the prophet Jeremiah, eventually, warnings become dire consequences, devastating destruction. Jeremiah can’t believe his own eyes. This is like a bad car wreck. We don’t want to look, but we also can’t look away. And so, four times Jeremiah tells us, “I looked…” and what Jeremiah saw was unspeakable desolation. But, there’s an interesting phrase in verse 23, a phrase that only occurs in one other place in the Hebrew Scriptures – right at the beginning of our Bible, in the story of creation. In English, we translate it: a formless void. This is utter chaos. And yet, at the very beginning, God organized that chaos, creating and causing life to spring forth. So, even in the midst of this dreadful picture of destruction, there is a phrase tucked in there to remind the Israelites that, even when chaos reigns and there is nothing but a dark formless void, it’s never really the end because God – our God – can always create new life. That is the hope that God’s people cling to throughout history. That is why every psalm of lament in our Bible ends expressing confidence that God will come to the aid of his people – we just want God to hurry it up! Friends, this morning, we’re going to compose a communal, a congregational, psalm of lament for what is taking place in our nation and our world. In your program this morning is the format, an outline for writing a lament. Friends: we need healthy ways to process what’s going on in the world around us. Our amygdalae are not going to allow us to ignore the chaos that reigns around us. Stuffing it down is no help. Laments are a meaningful ritual in our biblical tradition that provides a way to get that emotion out in the presence of one we trust will respond and continue to bring life even out of chaos and formless voids. Hear now this example from Psalm 79: O God! Barbarians have broken into your home, violated your holy temple, left Jerusalem a pile of rubble! They’ve served up the corpses of your servants as carrion food for birds of prey, threw the bones of your holy people out to the wild animals to gnaw on. They dumped out their blood like buckets of water. All around Jerusalem, their bodies were left to rot, unburied. We’re nothing but a joke to our neighbors, like graffiti scrawled on city walls. How long do we have to put up with this God? Do you have it in for us… for good? Will your smoldering rage never cool down? If you’re going to be angry, be angry with the pagans who care nothing about you, or rival kingdoms who ignore you. They’re the ones that ruined Israel, who wrecked and looted our habitation. Don’t blame us for the sins of our parents. Hurry up and help us; we’re at the end of our rope. You’re famous for helping; God, give us a break. Your reputation is on the line. Pull us out of this mess, forgive us our sins – do what you’re famous for doing! Don’t let the heathen get by with their sneers: “Where’s your God? Is he out of lunch?” Go public and show the godless world that they can’t kill your servants and get away with it. Give groaning prisoners a hearing; pardon those condemned to death – you can do it! Give our jeering neighbors what they’ve got coming to them; let their God-taunts boomerang and knock them flat. Then we, your people, the ones you love and care for, we will thank you over and over and over again. We’ll tell everyone how wonderful you are, how praiseworthy you are! Format for composing a Psalm of Lament:
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Pastor Tracey
On a lifelong journey of seeking to live out God's call on my life and to reflect His grace. 10 Minute SermonsCategories
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