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| We all come from the same family tree, as we are all God's children. Who will you become as you embrace this truth? Who is God transforming you to be? |
©2024 The Rev. Seth Olson
Holy God, let my words be your words and when my words are not your words, let your people be wise enough to know the same. Amen.
“Father Abraham had many sons (and daughters too!)/
And many sons had Father Abraham/
See I am one of them and so are you (so are you!)/
So, let’s all praise the Lord! (Right arm)/”
Nobody wants to jump up and join me? Do you know this beloved camp song? For several years of my life, I thought this diddy was about Father Abraham… Lincoln. I could not comprehend why we were singing about the 16th President of the United States of America, even if he had four sons. When eventually I learned that we were singing about the Biblical Forefather Abraham I kept loving the song, but I still could not quite get why we were singing about him as having many sons (and daughters too!).
Eventually, as I learned more about the Book of Genesis everything clicked! I picked up that through his relationship with his servant Hagar, Abraham – who was Abram at the time – fathered Ishmael who was the forbearer of the Muslim Faith. Abram was only 86 years young at the time. Then, through an even more miraculous set of events, Abram and Sarai were promised a son, Isaac, who would be the forbearer of the Jewish, and eventually the Christian Faith. This is more amazing because Abram was 99 and Sarai 90!
God spoke, “I will establish my covenant between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you.” To hear at almost one hundred that he would have a child with his wife was at least surprising, but then to imagine that his descendants would be exceedingly numerous had to be shocking if not heart-attack-inducing. I’ll be forty later this year, and I love our younger child Lucy, but being an older parent is no joke. Maybe this is why when Sarai heard of this news she laughed. Yep, she laughed right in God’s face—or at least God’s messenger’s face. Wouldn’t you?
I think we often do! At least, I do. I cannot see the fullness of how God’s transformational, abundant love will manifest in my life.
God though, made an everlasting covenant with Abram. God promised to be eternally faithful to all the descendants of this man and this woman. Even though, Sarai laughed at first, God’s faithfulness was proved trustworthy and true. Abram and Sarai had lived rich, full lives, but this moment changed everything for Abram and Sarai.
God changed who they were as people. Abram became Abraham. Sarai became Sarah. Now I’m not thinking of singing “Father Abraham,” but “I Will Change Your Name!” Yet these changes in name were merely the surface of a deeper transformation within them. It was as though they were no longer free agents. Now, they were recognizing the truth of who they were. They accepted that they were people of God.
Through the centuries the children of Abraham and Sarah waxed and waned in their relationship with the Divine, like a lunar calendar of faithfulness. And, though the intimacy of God never faded, there were ages when God’s People shifted their focus from trust, faith, and relationship to obedience, rituals, and laws. Strangely enough as we mature individually through the life stages, we often find ourselves doing the same thing.
We are made very good in God’s image! As children, we know the purity of God’s love, and yet, as we grow older, we superimpose a system of rules upon ourselves. Essentially, we change from the truth that I am very good made in God’s image to when I perceive that I have done good, then I will deserve God’s love. Maybe we learn this from our culture, families, or experiences. It might even be woven into our nature to set up barriers to overcome, so that we can think we have to do something to finally be worthy to experience God’s favor.
Paul knew this about those in the Church of Rome. We heard some of that letter this morning. He expressed: Abraham did not inherit the world because of the sake of law, but because God’s faithfulness. “For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.” Instead of setting up laws that will bring wrath upon ourselves, for inevitably we will falter, we are called to trust in the grace of God’s faithfulness. That’s freeing, right?!
This leads me to a question: how is your Lent going? Did you give up or take on something? Have you, like me, already missed a day or forgotten what your discipline was at all?
Every year, I learn the same lesson. The Lenten practice I take on is not designed to display how awesome I am as a Christian. Instead, it is meant to help me to remember just how much I rely not on following the rules, but on the grace of God. This grace, God’s favor unearned and undeserved, is promised in the covenant with Abraham and fulfilled in the love of Christ.
Full of this grace, we may find ourselves like Peter ready to call Jesus our Messiah. Right before today’s Gospel lesson, Peter confessed Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah. And yet, like Peter, we might struggle with what this means—what comes next after we profess this belief? Even when we come to the point where we recognize our complete reliance upon God and God’s saving grace, a struggle persists.
When we call Christ, Our Lord or Our Savior or Our Messiah, what do we mean? Peter who had grown up hearing the prophetic hope that a warrior king would come to overthrow oppressors—Roman, religious, and otherwise! Jesus, in today’s Gospel pointed to a different mission the Messiah—undergoing suffering and even death. To have faith does not mean relying on God only when it is convenient or beneficial to us. This was the mistake of Peter: He rebuked Jesus for doing the will of God when it meant distress and agony.
Before we join in piling on Peter who became a stumbling block—Satan—to others. We would be wise to check out the plank in our own eye. How often do we doubt? Do we not make God in the image we want? Are we not susceptible to creating God in our image instead of the other way around?
For all Peter’s struggles, misconceptions, and failings, in the light of the Resurrection, he eventually got it! God slowly transformed Simon into Peter, the rock on which this Church movement began! Just like God transformed Abram into Abraham and Sarai into Sarah. The question I have for you is who will you become? Who are we to become? God will always be faithful, good, and loving! What’s our response?
We have never stopped being God’s people. The promise made unto Abraham—that God will be Our God—continues to this very moment. Think about this very common practice within our Church: When I say, “The Lord be with you,” what is your response? And, also with you. In this moment we are saying, God is Our God and God is here! Sure, it might be a strange way of saying this truth. We probably would not say to one who is standing with her mother, “Your mother be with you,” unless we are wanting to sound like pirates (YARRR!). What we are really saying is your mother is with you and more to the point, God is with you! This is not just part of our service, but the truth of our Faith.
God continues to fulfill the promise of Abraham through the redemption of Christ and the work of the Spirit. God is always with us—faithful, good, and loving! What is our response? You’re made in God’s image and loved unconditionally, so that you may become faithful, good, and loving—not the other way round! That would be to put the cart before the horse. You don’t have to be these things so God will love you—God loves you so that you can be faithful, good, and loving!
When we trust in God, we will be transformed! We might even receive a new name. Childless Abram became Father Abraham. Laughing Sarai became Mother Sarah. Simon the stumbling block became Peter the rock on which Jesus founded the Church. Who will you become when you trust in God? Who will we become when we put our faith in God? May we keep walking to the Cross, to the Tomb, and beyond to find out together! Amen.
