{"id":1295,"date":"2012-03-20T19:02:09","date_gmt":"2012-03-20T19:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=764"},"modified":"2017-08-26T15:26:28","modified_gmt":"2017-08-26T19:26:28","slug":"the-point-at-the-centre-by-marilyn-zehr-march-18-2012","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/?p=1295","title":{"rendered":"The point at the centre – by Marilyn Zehr – March 18, 2012"},"content":{"rendered":"

View Archived Sermon<\/a><\/p>\n

Listen to This Sermon\u00a0<\/font><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Lent IV, Psalm 107, John 3:14-21<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/span>As we draw near to Good Friday and Easter, the most significant and transformative story of our faith, we find ourselves in familiar territory with our scriptures for this Sunday.\u00a0 We\u2019re on a path or a trail or sidewalk, if you will, we may know quite well.<\/span><\/p>\n

John 3 verses 14 to 21 are the final verses of the story of the encounter between Nicodemus and Jesus.\u00a0 Nicodemus was the Pharisee who came to see Jesus at night.\u00a0 The story may be familiar, but for me it has always had this aura of mystery.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Maybe this story seems mysterious because of its setting <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2013 the encounter between Nicodemus and Jesus\u00a0 – happens at night.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Or maybe this story seems mysterious because of the esoteric nature of the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2013\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>one must be born again, or born from above to see the kingdom of God<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\u2013\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>the spirit is wind and the wind is spirit and we know not where it comes from or where it goes <\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\u2013\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\u2013\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>and this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

If we are on a familiar path or trail or sidewalk with this story, I\u2019ve always wondered when it comes to interpretation of this text why it can seem that we, like Nicodemus, are wandering around in a fog.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 But holding this text next to the three other Scripture passages for this Sunday \u2013 the one about the bronze serpent on a pole in Numbers, the movement from the death to life in Christ in Ephesians chapter 2:1-10, and the movement from sickness to health in Psalm 107, I began to see shapes in the fog. <\/em><\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Here are the shapes that I see.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

All of these texts are full of dualities, sin and forgiveness, sickness and health, death and life, darkness and light.\u00a0 These are the images that shimmer or shift back and forth in the fog.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

In the story of the serpent in Numbers, the Israelites complain to Moses about being in the wilderness and they are pretty explicit about their dissatisfaction.\u00a0 \u201cWhy have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness?\u00a0 For there is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food.\u201d\u00a0 After this complaint their situation gets even worse because poisonous snakes bite them and many of them die. The story views this as punishment by God for their sin. When the people admit their sin of \u201cspeaking against God and against Moses,\u201d they ask Moses to pray to God for them.\u00a0 Moses does so and God instructs him to make a bronze serpent, put it on a pole and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look upon the serpent of bronze and live. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

There are lots of things in the fog of this story we could trip over, like what do we make of the snake on the pole? We may be familiar with the snakes entwined on a pole as a common symbol of medicine and healing in our culture too\u00a0 \u2013 a symbol that predates Western society to at least ancient Greece with the healing cult of Asclepius, but presumably this story in Numbers predates the Greek myth by another 500 to 1000 years. In another part of scripture, during the reign of Hezekiah, the bronze snakes among the Israelites are considered idolatrous and are destroyed during his religious reforms. Both Hezekiah and the story in Numbers seem to be struggling with the people\u2019s understanding of the source of healing and in Numbers the text points to God as that source, but is willing to use a presumably familiar symbol \u2013 the snake on a pole as something through which God works. These are just some of the challenges of this text.\u00a0 But if we try to discern the shapes in the fog of this story we see that here the most important issues are ones of death and life, sin and forgiveness, sickness and health.\u00a0 <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Moving on to the Ephesians text, in summary, the hearers of this text are told that they have been brought from being dead in their trespasses and sins into life in Christ.\u00a0 They have been transferred from being slaves to the powers of the world into a life of grace and freedom where their deeds can reflect the life that God has prepared for them.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

The shapes in the fog of this letter again are issues of sin and forgiveness, death and life, powers of this world and the power of God, deeds that lead to death and deeds that are done as a way of life in Christ.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 And going back once again to the text in John: at the beginning I went over parts of that story.\u00a0 The shapes in the fog of the last half of the story of the encounter between Nicodemus and Jesus are again darkness and light, deeds done in the dark, deeds done in the light, condemnation and salvation, perishing and eternal life.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 But it was Psalm 107 that held the key to all of these texts.\u00a0 Psalm 107 is a beautifully patterned Psalm within which there are four distinct sections that describe four movements,<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

from homelessness to home, from imprisonment and oppression to freedom, from sickness and death to health and life, from danger at sea to safety at sea and all of this movement from one place to the next is credited to the steadfast love of God.\u00a0\u00a0 The steadfast love of God becomes the point in the centre.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure many or most of you are familiar with the mathematical concept of concentric circles.\u00a0 On a children\u2019s website I found this definition and example. Concentric circles are circles that share the same centre. They<\/span> fit inside each other and are the same distance apart all the way around no matter their size. <\/em><\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

In Psalm 107<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

The steadfast love of God becomes the point in the centre.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0Hesed is the Hebrew word that is used here.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Everywhere you read \u201csteadfast love\u201d in this Psalm, this is a translation of the Hebrew word Hesed. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Our attempts in English to translate this Hebrew word include and are probably not limited to love, mercy, compassion, steadfast love and loyalty.\u00a0 <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

God\u2019s commitment to God\u2019s covenant with humanity and all of creation is all of these things\u00a0 – love mercy, compassion,<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

steadfast love and loyalty. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

From the covenant with Noah and his family,<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0through God\u2019s covenant with Sarah and Abraham<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0through God\u2019s call of Moses and the liberation of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt through both God\u2019s impatience and patience with the Israelites in the wilderness,<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

through the period of the kings and the prophets <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

through the revelation of God and work of God in Jesus the Christ;<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

there is one point in the centre of all of it and this point is the key word in Psalm 107, Hesed<\/em> \u2013 steadfast love, mercy, kindness, faithfulness.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Let\u2019s look at the centre of the texts that I previously reviewed.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

First in Numbers 21 between verses 7 and 8 Moses prays and God answers.\u00a0 There is no use of the word compassion here and as this story tells it, God is as willing to act impatiently as patiently with these people, but just because we act impatiently or patiently with each other or our children does not mean that we don\u2019t love them or won\u2019t faithfully take care of them.\u00a0 The faithfulness of God in this story is God\u2019s willingness to provide healing and forgiveness when the people repent and Moses prays.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

In Ephesians, the centre of this text is found in verses 4,5 But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, – by grace you have been saved. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Mercy, love and great love, in Hebrew that would be \u2013 Hesed<\/em>, \u2013 bring us from deeds of death to deeds of life.\u00a0 These are words for salvation. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

The Hesed <\/em>of God is the connecting point from one state of being to another \u2013 or from one way of life to another.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

And in John, the centre of this text is one of the most used and probably well-known verses in our entire Bible, John 3:16:<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

For God so loved the world that God sent God\u2019s Only Son so that everyone who believes in him will have eternal life.\u00a0 I know as soon as I say this verse, it is one that some of us trip over in the fog of its interpretation.\u00a0 We trip over it because of the way it has been used and over-simplified \u2013 to emphasize personal individual salvation.\u00a0 But today I want to focus on the first six words \u2013 For God so loved the world. \u00a0We can if we wish or are able hear the depth of compassion in this verse.\u00a0 God so loved the world (I presume that can mean everyone and everything in the world) – that God created a way for everyone and everything to pass from darkness to light and from death to life and God created a way for this to happen that \u2013 begins in God\u2019s compassion, the Hesed<\/em> of God.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

In all of these texts and stories, <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

God is committed to being the centre \u2013 that point or nexus where death and life, sin and forgiveness, sickness and health, darkness and light touch and we are transferred from one realm to the other by the Compassion and work of God.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

The work of God occurs in many ways and in many places. \u00a0In our Christian tradition, the work of God happens in Christ;<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

in who he was and how he lived, in his approach to certain death and in the power of God that raised him. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Jesus lived a life in conflict with and opposition to powers of death and darkness.\u00a0 As the Hesed<\/em> or compassion of God dwelt within him he was empowered to resist and transform those forces.\u00a0 And he did this daily when he healed the sick, cast out demons, offered forgiveness, calmed the storm at sea and freed those who were oppressed.\u00a0 I\u2019m looking forward to talking more about the work of Christ in my Easter sermon in a few weeks, but for now I wish to conclude this sermon by getting back to our concentric circles.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Our circles, the ones we reside in, the ones where we wrestle with ourselves and God and scripture, are sometimes foggy places, where we wish we knew more precisely all that there is to know about the nature of God and how our particular life\u2019s journey fits within or is connected to the life of God and the life to which God calls us.\u00a0 We get sick, we sin, we are sometimes in danger, and worst of all sometimes the ones we love die or leave us and in all those places of darkness we seek meaning as we take our case before God.\u00a0 Our scriptures reveal to us this week that in the centre of our sometimes-foggy circles \u2013 God resides with compassion.\u00a0 This is a stable centre, no matter what the size or composition of the circle and it is there at the centre that the compassion of God has the potential to make all the difference.\u00a0 <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

When our lives are touched by the compassion of God, at least in that spot and in that moment, the fog lifts and we can see and move towards, as it says in Ephesians, the good works which God prepared before hand to be our way of life. And we are empowered to do the good works which God prepared before hand to be our way of life precisely because of God\u2019s commitment to being compassionately present at the point or nexus where death and life, sin and forgiveness, sickness and health, darkness and light touch.\u00a0 Like a drop of water in a still calm pool, the expanding concentric circles created by one touch from our compassionate God, expand endlessly outward and into the world that God loves so much.\u00a0 May it be so.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

View Archived Sermon Listen to This Sermon\u00a0 Lent IV, Psalm 107, John 3:14-21 \u00a0 \u00a0As we draw near to Good Friday and Easter, the most significant and transformative story of our faith, we find ourselves in familiar territory with our scriptures for this Sunday.\u00a0 We\u2019re on a path or a trail or sidewalk, if you will, we may know quite well. John 3 verses 14 to 21 are the final verses of the story of the encounter between Nicodemus and…<\/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-1295","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\/1295","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=1295"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1295\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3943,"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1295\/revisions\/3943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tumc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}