Hoping for Hope

We have just finished our “You asked for it” series, and today we have texts found in the church’s lectionary. The lectionary follows the church’s year – beginning with Advent, moving through the Christmas season, the weeks of Lent, and then Easter and Pentecost. Finally, there is this space between Pentecost and the next Advent, called “Ordinary Time” – that is, the ordinary time in which we live, showing in daily life what it means to be a follower of Jesus.

The various seasons of the church’s year each celebrate a particular theme or event. Advent deals with the preparation for the birth of Jesus. Christmas remembers that birth. Lent prepares for the death of Jesus. Easter covers Jesus’ death and resurrection. Ordinary time has no overarching theme. It is simply life as we live it. As such, the readings in Ordinary Time also cover a wide variety of themes.

Today, we have a Psalm that celebrates God’s goodness and grace towards those who give themselves into God’s care. Then we heard the story of Zacchaeus, telling of the beginning of his walk as a follower of Jesus. We could easily make this morning’s message an application of Lee’s sermon last week on the two ways. Zacchaeus chose to walk towards Jesus, giving up all that he had been in order to become what Jesus wanted him to be.

Psalm 32

This psalm is the second of seven so-called “penitential psalms”. That is, in this Psalm, David (presumably) confesses his sins and receives God’s forgiveness.

·         Vv 1-2: The blessing and joy of forgiveness. Living outside God’s love and care is painful; living inside God’s love and care is “blessing”. This word, blessing, is fuller than I can describe. It includes the idea that our lives are full of the spiritual gift of self-control (Gal 5), as well as full of joy and delight.

We use this word a lot in Christian circles. “Bless you!” when someone sneezes. “God bless you,” as someone leaves. The word “goodbye” comes from this “God bless you”. We pray for God’s blessings on our family and friends and on ourselves. What is blessing? A whole sermon is here! Enough for now to say that it includes the fullness of God’s presence and care, protecting and guiding us and giving us joy. Christians are happy people, or at least we should be!

·         Vv 3-5: When we pretend that there is nothing wrong with us and that we’re okay, life is hard and bitter. There is no “blessing”! Often enough, the problems we face are not our fault, but for all of us there is some rebellion, some sense of self-direction inside, which we need to confess to God. We stop trying to fix everything. We can’t, anyway! We turn to God and admit (that’s what “confess” means) our own selfishness, and we throw ourselves on the mercy of the court, on God’s mercy.

·         Vv 6-7: In return, God gives us help and hope. The rising waters – not necessarily a literal flood, even in Manitoba! – cannot reach us. We are safe, even as the troubles continue to swirl around us.

The verses we did not read include God’s response, promising to protect and guide (verses 8 and 9), and then giving a general praise for the whole congregation, as they experience God’s goodness and grace (verses 10 and 11).

Luke 19

The story of Zacchaeus is one we know well. The incident takes place near the end of that part of Luke’s Gospel we call “On the road to Jerusalem”, which starts at the end of chapter 9. This section of the Gospel prepares the way for the Passion accounts of Easter week, giving about 10 chapters of Jesus’ teaching. Most of the miracles recorded in Luke occur in chapters 1 to 9; most of the teaching in chapters 10 to 19.

                                                                                                              

We begin the story as Jesus and his disciples enter Jericho. Their journey had started in Galilee, 80 some miles north of Jerusalem. Now Jesus has come almost within sight of his goal, about 15 miles east and a bit north. Just before entering the city (chapter 18), Jesus heals a blind man, who is then ready to follow him. In our passage, Zacchaeus chooses to follow him. Both the blind man and Zacchaeus stand in sharp contrast with the events that follow as Jesus enters Jerusalem. There, the religious leaders and the people reject Jesus, leading to the crucifixion.

Zacchaeus was a tax collector. As such, he made his fortune by over-charging people on their taxes and keeping the excess. Religious people and ordinary people alike hated the tax collectors, and all of his wealth could not hide from him the hatred that he encountered on every side. He had heard about Jesus, wandering slowly through the countryside teaching and healing. He had heard that Jesus was an unusual teacher. Perhaps he had heard that Jesus accepted people like him, whom nobody else liked.

In any case, when he went to see Jesus coming into Jericho, he found his way blocked by the crowds. He climbed up into a tree so as to see better, and there Jesus found him. Jesus called to him and demonstrated an immediate connection, full of grace and acceptance. He responded to God’s grace in a way that echoes the general theme of Psalm 32, and he received forgiveness and new life. He immediately demonstrated that new life in his commitment to make things right with everyone he had cheated – an endeavour that, if he followed through on it, could leave him impoverished. The story doesn’t tell us, but I wonder what he could have left after restoring everyone fourfold for any extra taxes he had collected.

It didn’t matter. Whatever he had left at the end, he also had something worth far more – “Today salvation has come to this house!” Jesus pronounced him a child of Abraham. Jesus made it clear that Zacchaeus was blessed, and Zacchaeus rejoiced in new life given him at that moment.

And Us?

What about us? I suppose we could read these two passages as a riff on the theme of the two ways that Lee preached on last week. So it is. I want to pick up on one piece of that theme.

The person who confesses before God [which generally also means confessing before God’s people] receives new life, with a joy and delight that the Psalmist describes with the word “Blessed!” What does this new life look like? When you confess yourself before God, what are you hoping for?

You will have to answer for yourself what you are hoping for. Perhaps the safety and security the Psalmist describes. Perhaps the inclusion in God’s people (and communion with God) that Jesus describes for Zacchaeus. In any case, I can tell what I think Jesus actually gives.

I mentioned safety and security – the Psalmist describes it this way: “⁶ Therefore let all the faithful pray to you while you may be found; surely the rising of the mighty waters will not reach them. ⁷ You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.” If this is a Psalm of David, we can say that this was not David’s experience at every point. He was safe – as long as he lived within God’s will.

I have just finished reading 2 Samuel with the story of David, and he was not always “safe and secure” after he became king. When he had Uriah killed and took Uriah’s wife for his own, he experienced the problems that flow from bad life choices. When his problems with the way he raised his sons led to Absalom’s rebellion, he experienced serious problems with his rule of Israel in the years that followed.

We can say, then, that committing our lives to God does not protect us from our own bad choices. We still experience the consequences of our own choices. Sometimes we experience problems that are not our fault. Are we still “safe and secure”? This is a hard question. What I can say with confidence is this: As we seek God’s presence, as we live “in Christ” – where Christ is like a physical space in which we live – we receive strength and grace to deal with the hard times of life. “Surely the rising waters will not sweep us away!” The waters of trouble are still there; we still experience them, but they cannot destroy us. I think that’s what happened with Zacchaeus.

When that happens, something else happens too. We are changed. We are transformed. We may continue to experience problems, but they no longer threaten us at the core of our being. We rise above them (to use a common expression).

Many years ago, I heard Jon Bonk tell a story from East Africa. He called it the story of Indegi (the Swahili name for the eagle). I call him “Ukhosi”, the Ndebele word for eagle. Here is the story of Ukhosi and the Old Man.

One day, an old man was walking through the African bush. As the sun was going down, he came to a village and decided to stay there for the night. At the gate of the village, he called out, “Ekuhle.” (Is it good [for me to come in]?) The father of the village replied, “Yebo, umdala. Ngena!” (Come in, old man.) They sat and visited as food was prepared and a bed made ready. As they talked, the old man saw an eagle running around on the ground, pecking for corn with the chickens.

“Baba,” he said, “Why is Ukhosi running on the ground like inkuku?” [He didn’t say it, but “ukhosi” sounds like the word for Lord, and inkuku just means a silly chicken.]

“Yes, umdala,” the father replied, “I found him on the ground when he was very small. He must have fallen from the nest. I raised him here with the chickens, and he thinks he is a chicken.”

The old man found this disturbing, such a majestic creature, reduced to pecking corn on the ground with the chickens.” “Baba,” he said, “may I try something.” “Of course, my friend.” The old man got up and went to the eagle. He picked him up and whispered to him, “Ukhosi, you are not a chicken. You are an eagle!” Then he threw him in the air to help him fly. Ukhosi fell to the ground with a thud.

The old man stepped over to him and picked him up again. Climbing into the tree to get some height, he whispered again to the eagle, “Ukhosi, you are not a chicken. You are an eagle!” Then he threw him in the air as high as he could. Ukhosi fell to the ground helpless and winded, then scuttled off to hide.

The old man pursued him and finally caught him. Climbing on top of the highest hut in the village, he repeated his words to the eagle, “Ukhosi, you are not a chicken. You are an eagle!” This time, Ukhosi fell even further and harder and lay on the ground trembling. He didn’t run away. It seemed to him that the old man would just catch him and torment him again.

The old man was discouraged and sat down to his meal with the people from the village, apologizing for his behaviour. Darkness fell, and he went to bed, but he couldn’t sleep. Finally, late at night, after midnight, he got up and went searching for the eagle. He found him on a low branch in a tree, sleeping with his head tucked under his wing like the chickens around him.

The old man picked him off the branch before the eagle knew what was happening. Then he started to walk out from the village. They walked across the plain. For hours and hours they walked. Ukhosi wondered where they were going. Then they started climbing. Their path wound higher and higher among the rocks, climbing up a mountainside.

The sun rose above the plain, shining brightly, as they came to the edge of a cliff looking out over the valley. Ukhosi looked down, amazed. He thought he had never been so high. The old man held him up and spoke aloud to him, “Ukhosi, you are not a chicken. You are an eagle!” Then he threw him as far from the cliff as he could, and Ukhosi started to fall. Faster and faster he fell, the wind whistling about his ears. He closed his eyes shut tightly and clamped his wings against his body as hard as he could, but the wind was too strong for him. It ripped a wing out from his body, and to steady himself he put out the other wing. Then the wind stopped, and he cautiously opened his eyes. He found that he was gliding in a big circle above the plain.

He tested one wing and then the other. Soon he was moving his eyes up and down in large gentle beats, and he began to rise still in big circles. He came level with the old man on the cliff edge, and as he turned to fly away for a new start and a new life, he heard the old man call after him, “Remember, Ukhosi, you are not a chicken! You are an eagle!”

We are God’s eagles living in a world that wants us to think we are chickens. We are made like our Lord. We are, if you will, of royal blood, even if we think that we are cheap and weak and worth little. You and I are worth the world. Jesus died for you. Jesus died for me. God transforms us so that we live in the problems of our lives as God’s children. “They who wait on the Lord will renew their strength. They will mount up with wings as eagles. They will run and not be worry. They will walk and not faint.” Remember, my friends; you are not chickens. You are eagles!

Texts

Psalm 32: 1-7

¹ Blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered.
² Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord does not count against them and in whose spirit is no deceit.

³ When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long.
⁴ For day and night your hand was heavy on me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer.

⁵ Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.” And you forgave the guilt of my sin.

⁶ Therefore let all the faithful pray to you while you may be found; surely the rising of the mighty waters will not reach them.
⁷ You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.

Luke 19: 1-10

19 Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. ² A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. ³ He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. ⁴ So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.

⁵ When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.” ⁶ So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly.

⁷ All the people saw this and began to mutter, “He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.” ⁸ But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.” ⁹ Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. ¹⁰ For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”

Steinbach Mennonite Church

3 Nov 2019

Going Deeper Questions:

·         Who is the old man in the story? I don’t think he is God – that doesn’t quite fit. So what does he represent? Where does God fit in all of this?

·         What is the connection between repentance and blessing? What is “blessing” anyway?

·         What part does our choice play in the situations we face? We can’t just choose a good life, so what do we choose anyway?

·         What are you hoping for when you confess? Are you hoping for Heaven – or freedom from Hell – or a good life on earth? What are you hoping for?