Sermons from Mission Hills UCC San Diego, California Rev. Dr. David Bahr [email protected] October 24, 2021 “Gather Us In” Jeremiah 31: 7-9 God proclaims: Sing joyfully for the people of Jacob; shout for the leading nation. Raise your voices with praise and call out: “God has saved the people,[a] the remaining few in Israel!” 8 I’m going to bring them back from the north; I will gather them from the ends of the earth. Among them will be the blind and the disabled, expectant mothers and those in labor; a great throng will return here. 9 With tears of joy they will come; while they pray, I will bring them back. I will lead them by quiet streams and on smooth paths so they don’t stumble. I will be Israel’s parent, Ephraim will be my oldest child. This beautiful text reads like a dream, although, not like my dream life this week! On Tuesday night I dreamt I was trying to ride one of those jet skis. Except, in this case, you didn’t start already in the water. You had to stand it up, race the throttle and jump with it into a raging river. I woke up and laughed that there was no mystery involved in that first-week-at-work dream. Wednesday was one of those classic “can’t get there” dreams. I forgot my sermon at home. I ran to get it but I couldn’t get back fast enough – probably blocked by a marathon. And when I finally arrived, not only was everyone so disgusted with me they decided to leave, you were carrying out the pews! As if to say, nobody is EVER coming back. The prophet Jeremiah had often previously spoken in line with nightmare scenarios, but now instead, Jeremiah’s text reads like a beautiful dream: “I’m going to bring them back.” Everyone. Among them the blind and disabled, expectant mothers and those in labor. “Those in labor” sounds so nice in polite company, doesn’t it? Any of you who have actually been in labor would be shocked, perhaps horrified, by the idea of going on a journey in the midst of giving birth. But Jeremiah proclaimed a vision of being led home from exile with shouts and tears not of pain but of joy and voices raised in praise. A throng of people that included literally everybody. Anathea Portier-Young notes that Jeremiah’s dream “does not promise to remove or transform the physical conditions that produce blindness or lameness, but rather to ensure that these realities no longer function as an impediment to full inclusion and flourishing among God’s people.”[1] For example, it includes women at the moment they are most vulnerable – in labor. As Anathea said, it’s a social world transformed, envisioned as radically inclusive of all God’s people. It’s the world of all those yard signs that proclaim “In this house.” In this house, Black lives matter, women’s rights are human rights, no human is illegal, kindness is everything, and love is love. And there you have it. Jeremiah’s dream of radical inclusion summarized in a yard sign. They are very biblical. Jeremiah goes even further. In the verses that follow, such a transformed world not only includes everyone in worship but, as Kathleen O’Connor describes it, welcome to “the banquet of material life.”[2] Because, in Jeremiah’s vision, everyone will share in the grain, the wine, and the oil, and the benefits of that flocks and the herds.” So, not only a radically inclusive world, but a biblical description of society the meets the basic needs of everyone too. Speaking of biblical, COVID has felt not just like a plague of biblical proportions but like the experience of a biblical-style exile. In fact, when I looked at the lectionary texts for today, I chose this passage from Jeremiah because I was drawn to the line “I’m going to bring them back.” It was August and I was working ahead. I tried to anticipate the world of late October. It seemed like an appropriate text as we emerged both from the pandemic and also as your long period of interim has finally come to an end. But we can’t all come back safely yet – still behind masks, still hesitant to hug. As we endure 2nd waves and 3rd waves and 4th waves, “I’m going to bring them back” feels more unfinished than ever. When will we finally be past this pandemic? We had hoped that by now it would have been something that has been accomplished. Today we’re still wondering and waiting when or whether it will be. It’s a confusing time. A time of anger and especially impatience with those we blame for the delay of our dreams’ fulfillment. Even so, Jeremiah’s dream “I’m going to bring them back” remains the hope. Back to school safely, back to church to sing unmasked, back to traveling… Yet, I wonder, how many times had the exiles had heard this promise before? As we grow impatient, don’t forget, these folks had lived in exile for years; decades actually. How many times had the peoples’ hopes been raised only to be dashed again? How discouraged would they have been? Would hearing Jeremiah’s dream have been hopeful or a painful reminder of broken promises? This in-between time of post-pandemic hope and mid-pandemic frustration actually mirrors a question for the interpretation of the Jeremiah passage. Some translations, like the Common English Bible, say God has saved the people. And others, like the NRSV, plead to God, please save the people. Why can’t the translators all agree? Maybe it’s like this in-between time we’re living through – how do you express something that has been partially accomplished and yet for which we are still waiting. It’s not easy to fully express such a moment in time. As we look closely at this text, there’s another important verse not to ignore. The line isn’t simply “I’m going bring to them back,” but God proclaims, “I’m going to bring them back from the north.” From the north is where their enemies came. Every time they were attacked, it was from the north. Now, instead of a road for the enemy, it would be the path along quiet streams, a wide smooth pathway for homecoming. Which means that Jeremiah’s prophecy is not only inclusive, meets everyone’s basic needs, it is also a long sought-after dream for peace. No more war. Yes, Jeremiah had quite a dream. Of course, I can’t hear those words without also hearing the sonorous, resounding voice of Dr. King 58 years ago proclaim a dream that “one day…” A dream we know today as both fulfilled and unfulfilled, some of it surprisingly already here and yet much of it painfully still delayed. Or rather, denied. Our work to reject racism is as relevant today as it’s ever been. And more so, to understand that means to reject and dismantle white supremacy. Dr. King’s has always been a dream, Clarence B. Jones said, that was about “someone someday,” never about “me now.” You may or may not know that “I Have a Dream” was not in the original script that day. He improvised that part. As the length of the day and heat of late August caused the people’s attention to wane, gospel singer Mahalia Jackson called out to him, “Martin, tell them the dream.” King pushed aside his script. In response, Clarence Jones, co-author of the original speech, leaned over to a friend and said “we’re about ready to go to church[3]” because Dr. King’s audacious dream was straight out of the biblical prophets like Jeremiah. That dream was reimagined earlier this year by the young poet, Amanda Gorman.[4] Just as Dr. King had, she ignited the imagination of the country at the inauguration of President Biden. Among so many lines that speaks to me is this one, spoken just days after the insurrection: “Somehow we've weathered and witnessed a nation that isn’t broken but simply unfinished.” She said, And yes we are far from polished, far from pristine, but that doesn’t mean we are striving to form a union that is perfect, We are striving to forge a union with purpose. And what is that purpose? What is that dream? Amanda said, To compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters and conditions of man. Just like Jeremiah said, “I’m going to bring them back from the north; I will gather them from the ends of the earth. Among them will be the blind and the disabled, Expectant mothers and those in labor; A great throng will return here. With tears of joy they will come; So sing joyfully for the people of Jacob Shout for the leading nation. Raise your voices with praise and call out: God has saved God’s people! Or is it, “God please save your people?” Both, of course, are true. We’re in the midst of that living truth. But what I know for certain, God’s dream is to gather us in, for our exile to end. But only when it’s all of us. [1] Anathea Portier-Young, Connections, Year B, Volume 3, Westminster John Knox, page 410 [2] Kathleen O’Connor, Women’s Bible Commentary, WJK, page 176 (1992 version) [3] Behind the Dream: The Making of the Speech that Transformed a Nation by Clarence B. Jones and Stuart Connelly | Mar 13, 2012 [4] Amanda Gorman, “The Hill We Climb,” 2021. Read the text https://www.newsnationnow.com/politics/biden-inauguration/read-full-transcript-of-amanda-gormans-inauguration-poem-the-hill-we-climb/
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