Episodes
Sunday Jun 16, 2019
She Calls!
Sunday Jun 16, 2019
Sunday Jun 16, 2019
She Calls!
A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger E. Gaines-Cirelli at Foundry UMC June 16, 2019, first Sunday after Pentecost. “Confronted by Call, Gifted for Service” series.
Wisdom calls! She calls to all that live, calls us back to the beginning, to what matters most, calls us to wake up and to pay attention. Why? So that we can live as we are meant by God to live!
Proverbs 8, the ancient text we focus on today is, according to Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann, “one of the loveliest and most important biblical texts that respond to the question: ‘What is the world like? How does it work?’”[i] As we read in our passage, Wisdom was present with God at the creation of all things and, Brueggemann says, “is implicated in the act of creation and in the continuing sustenance of creation.”[ii]
Wisdom calls not Israel, not one tribe or family, but all that live back to the basic truth that life is interconnected and has at its core what Brueggemann calls a “moral coherence.” In short this means that within the interconnected reality of creation, our choices matter. What we do, how we live, how we are affects other people and, really, the whole created order. There are consequences in the short or long term for every move we make—or don’t make. This is reflected in the natural world—the climate crisis being a glaring negative example. Predictably, destruction of habitat and introduction of chemicals into the earth, water, and air have negative consequences. Some things are less predictable—as illustrated by the theory of the “butterfly effect”; oversimplified, this is the idea that one small change in an interconnected system can have unpredictable effects on the whole system.[iii] Others of you will know about the extraordinary science developed by now deceased Dr. Masaru Emoto. Dr. Emoto experimented with the effects upon water of negative and positive words and energy. One experiment had some water prayed over by priests and other water had negative, disparaging words (“you fool!”) spoken over it. When the water was frozen, the water crystals of the prayed-over sample were fully formed and beautiful (like perfect snowflakes), the other water crystals were incomplete and deformed.[iv]
These are simple examples of how creation—science!—affirms Dr. Brueggemann’s scholarly insight from the biblical text. The world is interrelated and deeply affected by the choices we make every single moment. One reason Wisdom calls so urgently is that human choices continue to rip life apart instead of mending wounds. We can find the money and ingenuity to make a hand-held device recognize and respond to our face and voice, but can’t find the political will to recognize and respond to the faces and voices of traumatized asylum seekers at our borders and children crying out for care as they are held in overcrowded detention cells. We allow budget talks to get derailed by the potential financial benefits or “bread and circus” offerings of another sports stadium in our city, while public housing for DC’s most vulnerable residents stands in need of $2 billion worth of repairs. And, as my colleague the Rev. Dr. Anthony Hunt recently wrote: “The race problem in America can be most vividly seen in the fact the more than half of all white Americans continue to support (and probably will at the ballot booth in 2020) a leader of these yet to be United States who has consistently, persistently and unashamedly demonstrated - over numerous decades - in word and action - that he is a racist.”[v] These are just a few of so many places that human choices shun the call of Wisdom. She calls! And she has no time for this destructive foolishness!
Wisdom calls us to align ourselves with ways of being that generate peace and wholeness and beauty—in the Hebrew context what is called shalom. Brueggemann teaches, “Wisdom is not a moral code, but a force that is creative and willing creation to its true fulfillment. ‘Being wise’ is bringing one’s life, conduct, and policy into coherence with that generative resolve for shalom.”[vi]
It would be easy to miss the fullness of Wisdom’s call if we were only to read the excerpt from Proverbs 8 that is assigned. However, when you take a look at verses 5-21, the call becomes much more clear. Listen to these other words of Wisdom from the paraphrased version of the Bible called The Message:
Don’t miss a word of this—I’m telling you how to live well,
I’m telling you how to live at your best.
My mouth chews and savors and relishes truth—
I can’t stand the taste of evil!
You’ll only hear true and right words from my mouth;
not one syllable will be twisted or skewed.
You’ll recognize this as true—you with open minds;
truth-ready minds will see it at once.
Prefer my life-disciplines over chasing after money,
and God-knowledge over a lucrative career.
For Wisdom is better than all the trappings of wealth;
nothing you could wish for holds a candle to her.
“I am Lady Wisdom, and I live next to Sanity;
Knowledge and Discretion live just down the street.
The Fear-of-God means hating Evil,
whose ways I hate with a passion—
pride and arrogance and crooked talk.
Good counsel and common sense are my characteristics;
I am both Insight and the Virtue to live it out.
With my help, leaders rule,
and lawmakers legislate fairly;
With my help, governors govern,
along with all in legitimate authority.
…You can find me on Righteous Road—that’s where I walk—
at the intersection of Justice Avenue,
Handing out life to those who love me,
filling their arms with life—armloads of life!
Do you see? Wisdom calls us to right relationship and to justice, to turn away from pride and arrogance and crooked talk and greed, to turn toward discipline and common sense, and to practice the virtues that don’t steal life but set us free to live more fully. Wisdom calls us to align with the things that make for shalom—wholeness, peace, a world where we and all that live have what they need.
As feminist theologian Elizabeth A. Johnson writes of this text, Wisdom “is a beneficent, right-ordering power in whom God delights and by whom God creates; her constant effort is to lure human beings into life.”[vii] Johnson’s image of Wisdom “luring” us into the life we are called to live makes me think of this excerpt from a poem by Hafiz:
We have a duty to befriend
Those aspects of obedience
That stand outside of our house
And shout to our reason
“O please, O please,
Come out and play.”
For we have not come here to take prisoners
Or to confine our wondrous spirits,
But to experience ever and ever more deeply
Our divine courage, freedom and
Light!
Wisdom lures us into life—freedom, joy, courage, and light!—the things that make for shalom. Wisdom calls us to come out and play! O please! Come out and play! A fascinating note about Wisdom and our passage today is that there are two wildly different translations of verse 30. In what we heard read today, Wisdom says I was beside God “like a master worker.” The other translation: I was beside God “like a little child.” The Common English Bible translation for verses 30-31 is:
I was beside him as a master of crafts.
I was having fun,
smiling before him all the time,
frolicking with his inhabited earth
and delighting in the human race.
All of a sudden, I see Wisdom not just as a powerful female co-creator with God, but also as God’s childhood playmate, luring and calling us to come out and play, to play with the crafts that build a better world, a world that is more like it was originally created to be—maybe full of macaroni necklaces and popsicle stick structures and painted rocks…I can just smell the Elmer’s glue and glitter… I see Wisdom as both lamenting the deep brokenness in the world and also finding ways to enjoy it, to recreate it, and to delight in the human family!
This mix of powerful woman and playful child seems somehow resonant with Wisdom’s character. I have heard many talk about the wisest persons they know—from famous ones like the Dalai Lama or Jean Vanier to the ones known only to those lucky enough to travel in their orbit—exhibit a mix of deep strength, discipline, and self-awareness and also a childlike playfulness and self-forgetfulness. This has been my observation as well. Perhaps there is something there for all of us to consider. If you follow me on FaceBook you might have seen my recent post about an ongoing struggle I’ve been having to hold things a bit more lightly. I feel like Wisdom has likely grown hoarse from all the calling She’s done to try to help me lighten up. Maybe you, like me, hear the call daily to mend the world, to care and to serve and to give… but struggle with the “childlike playfulness” part. For me, the issue isn’t that I don’t take care of myself—I practice Sabbath, have regular time with friends and colleagues, maintain healthy boundaries, have actually started working out multiple times every week, and pray every morning. It’s not so much about what I do with my time but how I hold the responsibilities and realities of life and of the world in which we live—my temptation is to hold it all with heaviness, intensity, seriousness. I struggle to release the sense of over-responsibility for the “weight of the world” that isn’t really mine to carry. Wisdom calls saying, “Remember that you are not alone in this work! Remember that God holds the weight of the world so you don’t have to. Recognize you cannot do everything and be wise in your decisions of where to put your energy. Do what you can do and be honest and humble about your limits. Look around at the beauty of the world and delight in the amazing diversity and wonder of the human family. And for God’s sake, Come out and play! Laugh! Explore! Enjoy the gift of this life! Soak up the adventure!”
Wisdom calls to us to choose wisely, each and every moment for the sake of love and justice and the common good. We know that our choices matter, that people depend upon us, that our actions affect life and death of siblings in the human family and creatures and habitats in the natural world, that there are real consequences for how we live our lives. And that is serious business and can feel heavy and exhausting. But what we’re reminded of is that powerful, playful divine Wisdom is woven into all that is; she is eternally available as our energetic guide, giving instruction, reminding us that we have wisdom at our core, calling us to play, to be awake to what is, to respond with intention and love, to perceive the beauty and goodness all around us, luring us to LIVE as we are meant to live. As we close these reflections, hear the words of Wisdom calling to you from the final verses of chapter 8:
32-36 “So, my dear friends, listen carefully;
those who embrace these my ways are most blessed.
Mark a life of discipline and live wisely;
don’t squander your precious life.
Blessed the [one] who listens to me,
awake and ready for me each morning,
alert and responsive as I start my day’s work.
When you find me, you find life, real life…”
New every morning, She calls! Will you receive what she has to offer? Will you share it with others?
[i] http://day1.org/7294-on_scripture_walter_brueggemann_on_wisdom_proverbs_814_2231
[ii] Ibid.
[iii] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect
[iv] https://www.masaru-emoto.net/en/masaru/
[v] Anthony Hunt, FaceBook post
[vi] http://day1.org/7294-on_scripture_walter_brueggemann_on_wisdom_proverbs_814_2231
[vii] Elizabeth A. Johnson, She Who Is: The Mystery of God in Feminist in Theological Discourse, New York: The Crossroad Publishing Company, 1996, 88.
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