Life in a Toxic World

In a toxic world, we are created and called to GO TO GOD and COME TO JESUS.  The promise of God in Christ is that God/Jesus will  RESPOND, and the response will be life-giving.

"Toxic" has become a frequently used word to describe the condition of our politics, our church, and our world.  Gridlock in state and national politics, passage of Taliban-like laws relating to women's health, voter suppression laws, passage of right-to-work laws which harm the middle class and further stifle unions, corporate high-jacking of our electoral process, unemployment and foreclosures, poverty and racism, the Trayvon Martin tragedy, continual wars, rifts in the Church, and the list extends ad infinitude. Where do we find life and hope?

Our congregation's Lenten series focuses on Old Testament texts.  I was asked to preach on a text from the Book of Numbers, chapter 21, verses 1-9.  This text provides life and hope through the rhythm of GOING TO GOD, COMING TO JESUS, and God RESPONDING.

The people of Israel had been wandering in the wilderness for decades.  Nearing Canaan, they encountered a Canaanite tribe and snakes.  Here's what happened and how life and hope surfaced.

1.  A Canaanite tribe attacked the People of Israel, killing some and taking others captive.  The Israelites CALLED OUT to God, asking that God deliver them, promising they would destroy them and their towns.  God said yes!  The Israelites were victorious!  I do not subscribe to the notion that God wills the killing of people.  Considering that the Book of Numbers was written hundreds of years after the occasion, Old Testament historians had a theological axe to grind, and tended to kowtow to the warrior god as doing the will of God in order to justify the invasion of Canaan and the settling into their new Promised Land.  Furthermore, there was considerable nationalistic hubris throughout the Exodus narrative, resulting in justification of invasion violence.  The larger point in this story is that the people of God CALLED OUT to God and God RESPONDED by giving them strength to act because God sides with the oppressed, the alien, the stranger, the abused, and God had a made the promise of a Land. God was assuring the People of God that they were not powerless, but powerful because of God's grace, that God would guide and provide for their new home.

We are created for action, to step-up, and stand-up in the face of unwarranted violence.  I recall what MLK, Jr. once said: "When your back ain't bent, nobody can ride you." The strong response to the Trayvon Martin tragedy is consistent with the action within these verses in Numbers.  Historically, the march from Selma to Montgomery which we celebrate this week, was a push-back against injustice.  Going to God and Coming to Jesus about these issues invites the action of God to transform the injustice into hope and life.  Similarly, our calling out, followed by God's response, ignites our further response. Today, we are left with the question of what parts of life need our push-back, our invoking the action of God?

2.  The people complained, CALLED OUT to God and Moses, because there was no water, no food, no food they liked.  Complaint is not lack of faith.  The prophets complained about the lack of justice. Job complained about his misfortunes. But in this text, complaint was linked with lack of faith, denial of God's grace, and disobedience.  They "spoke against God and Moses."  They had the integrity of their honesty.  It was perhaps natural that the people felt betrayed.  They had trusted Moses and God that they were to be led to a new home land, but with all this suffering?  But there was a breakdown in faith and they began to follow their own whims.  Therefore, God RESPONDED by sending snakes to bite and kill  them.  Here again, I do not subscribe to God sending snakes to kill people.  In the desert, snakes happen!  This is a metaphor based on reality, telling us that disobedience and turning against God is sinful.  Where there is sin there are pain, consequences, and accountability.  Sin is a fracture in relationship.  In the OT, the snake was a symbol of evil, lying, deceit, Satan, of the fracture in our relationship with God and each other.

David Brooks, editorial writer for the New York Times, recently wrote an article entitled: "The Monster Lurking in Our Souls".  He was writing in response to the tragic shooting of Afghanistan civilians by Staff Sargent Robert Bales.  Bales was a model soldier and husband.  But he snapped.  Brooks writes that all of us have our dark sides, quoting John Calvin, who believed that "babies came out depraved", G.K. Chesterton that "The doctrine of original sin is the only part of Christian theology that can be proved", and C.S. Lewis saying "There is no such thing as an ordinary person.  Each person you sit next to on the bus is capable of extraordinary horrors and extraordinary heroism."  Crying out to God, to Jesus, in confession is proper Christian discipline.  The People of Israel CALLED OUT to God in confession, and God RESPONDED in mercy.

Complaint is a valid response to many of life's rhythms.  Yet, while we complain, can we still bend our knees?  Can we chant our kyries in obedience?  Kyries invite God's merciful response.  Kyries sing our vulnerabilities.  Kyries express trust in God's grace in our powerlessness.  Complain, yes!  But complain and believe!

3.  Suffering from snake bites, the People of God CALLED OUT to God and Moses, confessing their sins, and asking God to remove the snakes from their midst.  God RESPONDED by promising that if they were bitten in the future, they were to look upon a bronze snake that Moses was to construct, and they would live.



It is important that our CALLING OUT be specific.  Why are we calling out, coming to Jesus?  It must be because of this and that, this person, that situation.  Calling out needs focus.  God wants us to acknowledge the truth within our hearts, so that in calling out, we too have "skin in the game", that God's response also commits us to response through God's grace.  Calling out is intercession involving the unity of God's action and our action.  Certainly, God can transform by God self, but we are God's faithful servants and called to be God's instruments.  As we call out to God, come to Jesus, we are also calling out ourselves.  Obedience to God couples with obedience to ourselves.

As we live in our toxic world, we are given the GRACE to CALL OUT to God, GO TO GOD, COME TO JESUS, in the confidence that God in Christ will RESPOND in ways that grant hope and life!  Living in our toxic world necessitates that we CALL OUT to God, because in our CALLING OUT, our GOING TO GOD, COMING TO JESUS, we are RESPONDING to God's grace, practicing obedience, living intentionally, straightening our backs to face the world, and insisting upon peace and justice, equality and dignity, with the strength of the promises of God's RESPONSE.  CALLING OUT takes faith, humility and courage, how God responds may not always be nice, the journey is fraught with hope and peril, suffering is on the table, and expectations may at times seem out of reach, but the Promised Land is real, we are beckoned, we are focused for discipleship, and life and hope are guaranteed!

We are created and called to GO TO GOD and COME TO JESUS!  In this is life in a toxic world!

Blessings and Peace!

Ron