\u00a0<\/p>\n
February 11th, 2007\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Jeremy Bergen<\/strong><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Text:<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Jeremiah 17:5-10<\/strong><\/p>\n Psalm 1<\/strong><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 When I was 5, my parents bought their first house.\u00a0 Until that point, as relatively poor students, they had rented apartments in Winnipeg, and for two years we lived in family housing at the Mennonite seminary in Elkhart, Indiana, where my parents were students.\u00a0 They moved back to Winnipeg, and with their two point zero kids\u2014myself and my younger sister, and with jobs in youth ministry and nursing, they bought a small side-by-side in a new subdivision in the south end of Winnipeg\u2014a house we\u2019d live in for about 7 years.\u00a0 And though the house and the yard were quite small, we had a great park just across the street, and the elementary school a 2 minute walk away.\u00a0 It was a great place to live back then.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 My parents did many of the things that you do with a new house.\u00a0 I recall the day that their friends came over to help lay down sod.\u00a0 I recall my grandpa and grandma, whom I always called oma and opa, coming from Alberta to visit.\u00a0 While my oma watched us kids, my dad and opa built a wooden fence around the backyard, and built a small deck.\u00a0 A few years later, my opa and oma came again, and the result was a rec room in the basement.\u00a0<\/p>\n I also have one other distinct memory of settling in to our new place: planting one tree in the front yard, and one in the back yard.\u00a0 When we planted them, they were perhaps 4 feet tall.\u00a0 We would often let the hose run for hours as we watered them and helped them take root.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Now I don\u2019t remember what kind of trees they were.\u00a0 As a child, I thought of them as \u201cregular trees.\u201d\u00a0 They had leaves that turned yellow in fall, and fell off.\u00a0 And the crown began to provide some nice shade for the yard.\u00a0 In fact, even as a child, I was struck by how quickly they grew.\u00a0 Soon they were much taller than any person, and the trunk was less like a stick and much more solid.\u00a0 When I return to my old neighbourhood, which I occasionally do when I go back to Winnipeg, I find that these trees are still there; and they are full grown trees, as tall as the two-storey house.\u00a0 In many ways, they have outgrown the tiny yards on which they were planted.\u00a0 These are trees with deep roots, a full leaf cover, patiently guarding this small suburban side-by-side.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Two of our texts today, from Jeremiah and from Psalms, dwell on the image of a tree. \u00a0A tree is a sign of blessing.\u00a0 It is a sign of being connected with the land. \u00a0It is, quite literally, about putting down roots. \u00a0Planting a tree looks to the future, to the tree growing tall.\u00a0 It is alive, and it is lifegiving: in its shade, and perhaps, in its fruit.\u00a0 In our texts, the tree is connected with life, and with trust.\u00a0 Though we moved as a family away from that house, the trees remained.\u00a0 Certainly, they will not last forever, but trees in signs of life because their spans can exceed our own: in this sense, they reflect life in an abundant way.<\/p>\n From Jeremiah, we read:<\/p>\n \u201cBlessed are those who trust in the Lord, whose trust is in the Lord<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 They shall be like a tree planted by water, sending out its roots by the stream<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It shall not fear when heat comes, and its leaves shall stay green;<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In the year of drought it is not anxious, and it does not cease to bear fruit.\u201d<\/p>\n From Psalm 1, we read that those who are obedient to God\u2019s law are \u201clike trees planted by streams of waters, which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither.\u00a0 In all that they do, they prosper.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This past week, I have thought about this idea of a tree as an image of trust in God.\u00a0 Yet, some questions lurked in the back of my mind.\u00a0<\/p>\n A tree is where it is; it cannot move.\u00a0 It must trust that it will receive water, and sunlight.\u00a0 It must make sense of the world that is given to it.\u00a0 A tree has no choice but to trust.\u00a0 And so, this seems more like fate than like trust.\u00a0 A tree grows where the seed falls, or where it is transplanted by human hands.\u00a0 The trees in the yard of my childhood home prospered because they were fortunate to be planted by \u201cstreams of water,\u201d or, more accurately, in the yard of proud homeowners who cared for them.\u00a0 But a sapling that sprouts up in the desert, or amongst the rocks, will eventually wither and die.\u00a0 Whether or not the tree grows and bears fruit is entirely beyond its control.<\/p>\n Perhaps the point of invoking these images of flourishing trees is not that they are models of steadfast trust in God; but that an abundant life is the consequence, or reward, of trusting God.\u00a0 Indeed, the psalmist presents a stark choice: Those who delight in the law of the Lord will prosper like trees planted near streams.\u00a0 Those who follow the path of the wicked will wither away.\u00a0 \u201cThe Lord watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.\u201d\u00a0 Jeremiah says, \u201cCursed are those who trust in mere mortals.\u00a0 Blessed are those who trust in the Lord. . . Those who do trust will not whither when the heat comes, and will be preserved through drought.\u00a0 The heart is devious above all else; it is perverse\u2014who can understand it?\u00a0 I the Lord test the mind and search the heart, to give all according to their ways, according to the fruit of their doings.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This is theme that runs throughout the Bible: the choice between the way of life and the way of death.\u00a0 Such a choice is not made just in the mind, but with one\u2019s whole body and soul. The implications of the choice are as tangible as the fruit on a tree. \u00a0The way of life follows God\u2019s law: it honours God and neighbour.\u00a0 It welcomes the stranger, and worships God with a sincere heart and right actions.\u00a0 Sometimes this is critiqued as works righteousness, the idea that we can earn favour with God through our own efforts and actions.\u00a0 But in fact the choice between the way of life and the way of death is one that remains in the Christian tradition; it is a choice that we are continually invited to make, in Christ.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Back to our reflections on the flourishing tree as the promise given only to those who chose the way of life.\u00a0 Though the image of a sturdy tree by the water initially seems to reassure us of God\u2019s presence, we are now confronted by the word that God will judge us, not only by our actions, but by our hearts and minds.\u00a0 Maybe even our secret doubts.\u00a0 The stakes of trusting God seem too high.\u00a0 It is not a comforting thought, because it seems that I am thrown back on my own resources, and my<\/em> ability to sincerely trust in God\u2019s leading.\u00a0 We know that there is death; we know that there is suffering; we know that there is pain.\u00a0 But I am terrified of the idea that these might be the consequences of what I do by placing trust in human beings rather than God.\u00a0 My reaction to this is fear, not assurance.<\/p>\n Do I trust in God?\u00a0 Do I really trust in God?\u00a0 How do I even know if I am sincerely placing my trust in God?\u00a0 What does it mean to trust God?\u00a0 Perhaps it is just as difficult to know what it is to place trust in ourselves.\u00a0 After all \u201ctrust in yourself\u201d is a self-esteem message we have all heard.\u00a0 What about listening to our consciences?\u00a0 Is this trusting in ourselves, or is this trusting in God\u2019s word to us?<\/p>\n Questions about trusting God are connected with profound moments in our lives.\u00a0 We all know that two individuals might be diagnosed with very serious and advanced cancer.\u00a0 And in each case, a community gathers around them, and prays fervently for healing, as well as doing all the tangible things needed to support the ill person.\u00a0 And yet, in one case, death results, and in the other, the cancer goes into remission.\u00a0 What are we to make of the trust at work here?\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In another situation, an individual in midlife is contemplating a significant career change.\u00a0 How does she trust God?\u00a0 Does God speak through those friends of hers who tell her that her gifts will be better used in a different vocation?\u00a0 Is that placing trust in God, or is that placing trust in human hands?\u00a0 \u00a0Does trusting God necessarily mean choosing what is most risky, stepping out in the unknown?<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Finally, a young couple is struggling with their dysfunctional marriage, and seemingly incompatible goals for their lives.\u00a0 Does trust in God mean staying together at all costs; or can trust mean something else?\u00a0 Is listening to the conflicting voices of family, friends, counselors, and church community, an element of trust in the wisdom of God, or is it trust in human folly?<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 And what about those situations which lead us to question whether God is even trustworthy at all. \u00a0The crises and the suffering in our personal lives, or of events on a larger scale.\u00a0 The hypocrisy of faith communities.\u00a0 Indeed, it is not a simple thing to say: trust in God.<\/p>\n So we seek some pattern or some formula to know whether or not we have placed our trust in God.\u00a0 One might be pragmatic:\u00a0 if things \u201cwork out,\u201d then it must have been God\u2019s leading.\u00a0 After all, our texts seem to promise an answer: those who trust in God will be like trees planted in water.\u00a0 Tall, green, and prosperous for all to see. We long for assurance, for results. \u00a0But knowing in advance just what trust in God means, and what its results will be, is not the message of Jeremiah. \u00a0\u00a0In fact, it might be an instance of trusting in ourselves.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 We need to take a closer look at the context in which Jeremiah the prophet was speaking.\u00a0 Jeremiah is addressing a defeated people.\u00a0 Centuries earlier, the Northern Kingdom of Israel had been overtaken by foreign enemies, and the people were scattered. \u00a0Prophets pronounced that this happened because the people turned away from God. \u00a0Now, the Southern Kingdom, called Judah, had fallen under the rule of the mighty Babylonians.\u00a0 Jeremiah is speaking to these people, to God\u2019s people in Judah.\u00a0 And these people are trying to understand a situation of immense disorientation and suffering.\u00a0 At first, Babylon made Judah a province of its own, and subjected to severe taxation.\u00a0 Eventually, Judah tried to resist, but the Babylonians defeated them once and for all.\u00a0 Jerusalem, the holy city, was destroyed, and many of the leading figures in Judah were sent into exile in Babylon.\u00a0<\/p>\n Jeremiah, God\u2019s prophet, brought words that were not comforting.\u00a0 At first, we warned the people that because of their sin, God would send their enemies to conquer them.\u00a0 He warned against the sin of rejecting the law, and the worship of God.\u00a0 He called them to repentance, to a deep self-examination, of their own hearts, and minds, and motives, and a radical return to God.\u00a0 And then, when defeat came, he wept over the tragedy of his people\u2019s sin, a sin that led to God\u2019s punishment in the form of capture and exile in Babylon.<\/p>\n Jeremiah speaks to a people wondering if God has abandoned them.\u00a0 They are wondering if there is anything they can do to win God\u2019s favour, or if all is lost.\u00a0 When they look around, they see the withered shrubs.\u00a0 They see their enemies prospering, and making life difficult.\u00a0<\/p>\n For the people to whom Jeremiah is speaking, trust in God is not easy.\u00a0 When Jeremiah tells them that the heart is devious, they know what he means, because their hearts are devious.\u00a0 They have been greedy, and unfaithful to God.\u00a0 And when Jeremiah says that the fruit of such devious hearts is to become like the withering shrubs in the desert, they know what he means.\u00a0 The image of a tree is a particularly poignant image for a people who are about to lose their land, or for a people who have lost their land.\u00a0 In a society so immediately dependant on the prosperity of land, a withered tree is truly an image of death.\u00a0 And they might wonder, rightly, if they will be left out in the desert, all alone and abandoned.\u00a0 Will defeat by the Babylonians, and even more significantly, the loss of the land of Israel, be the end of God\u2019s relationship with his people?\u00a0 Does trust in God mean even accepting the defeat and dispersal of the people is in fact God\u2019s will for them?<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Jeremiah invites his people to trust in God, in spite of anything they can see in front of them.\u00a0 This is part of what it means to trust in God, and not in ourselves.\u00a0 In this particular situation, Jeremiah tells the people to accept God\u2019s anger with them.\u00a0 The people are told to trust that their pain is self-inflicted: they are losing the land because they chose the way of death, ignored God\u2019s law and turned to idols.\u00a0 But they are also invited to choose the way of blessing that follows from renewing their trust in God. \u00a0The vision of a prosperous tree is a future image of a restored land, free from its enemies.\u00a0 It is a vision they cannot see, and perhaps can barely imagine.\u00a0 \u00a0Jeremiah invites them to trust God as the Lord of a world in which we humans are not the masters, and therefore, of a world where we cannot fully understand, control, or calculate outcomes.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I th It is not the case that when we pray for the sick, those who truly trust in God will be healed, and those who do not really trust in God, will be left unhealed.\u00a0 Trust in God doesn\u2019t always mean that we\u2019ll always feel safe, or happy.\u00a0 Trust cannot be verified by a successful life, or even by a long life.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rather, trust, like hope, is always an invitation.\u00a0 It invites us to turn to God, and to look to the future.\u00a0 We are invited to be like Jeremiah\u2019s listeners.\u00a0 To listen for judgment, of comfort, or how to act, or what to pray for. We are invited to listen for a word from God, to our situation\u2014to our particular situation as individuals, as families, as a congregation, as a larger community.\u00a0 We are invited to listen for what trusting God may mean now, for what the shape of the trusting life may be.\u00a0 Though it is difficult for us to trust because it means surrendering control, God is a God who is trustworthy.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Let us pray:\u00a0 \u201cGod of Jeremiah and of all the prophets.\u00a0 We confess our deep desires to trust in ourselves, and seek false assurance.\u00a0 We confess our failure to trust in you.\u00a0 Your love for us is so much bigger than we can comprehend.\u00a0 Open our hearts and minds that we might know what it means for us to trust in you.\u00a0 Grant us the grace to turn to you, and to seek the way of life.\u00a0 Amen.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0 Like a Tree Planted by Water\u00a0 February 11th, 2007\u00a0 Jeremy Bergen \u00a0 Text:\u00a0\u00a0 Jeremiah 17:5-10 Psalm 1 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 When I was 5, my parents bought their first house.\u00a0 Until that point, as relatively poor students, they had rented apartments in Winnipeg, and for two years we lived in family housing at the Mennonite seminary in Elkhart, Indiana, where my parents were students.\u00a0 They moved back to Winnipeg, and with their two point zero kids\u2014myself and my younger sister,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons-a-worship-audio"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nink this says something about how we should not interpret our text from Jeremiah.\u00a0 Though Jeremiah tells the people that their suffering is a punishment for sin, we should not take this to mean that suffering is always punishment for sin.\u00a0 Though the message of Jeremiah to his people is to be patient, because the hardship they are experiencing has a bigger purpose, we should not take this mean that any suffering always has a bigger purpose.\u00a0 Though the message of Jeremiah is that if the people trust God, they will flourish like trees planted by the water, this does not mean that anytime we trust in God, the consequences may be so immediately tangible and visible.\u00a0 There is no rule or formula, or something we can control, domesticate, or manipulate.\u00a0 When we reduce trust to a formula and look for the results, we deny the mystery of God, and are no longer trusting in God.\u00a0 When we think we have the mystery figured out, or when we think we have solved the puzzle of how suffering or blessings fits together with God\u2019s purposes, this is in fact an instance of trust in ourselves.<\/p>\n