Reprieve

Scriptures:       Isaiah 55:1-9, Psalm 63:1-8 (insert)

I Corinthians 10:1-13,  Luke 13:1-9

Why do bad things happen to good people?  Why do some people who’ve lived caring, giving lives die young, while some bitter, selfish, greedy people seemingly live forever?  Why are some who already living on the edge stricken with illness or unemployment, while others who are fantastically wealthy seemingly skate through life without a care in the world?  Why are some communities inundated with one natural disaster after another, while other communities are spared nature’s wrath.

If I had an easy answer to these questions, I would wrap up my sermon right now and send you home for an early lunch.  But in Scripture, as in life, there are no easy answers.  Actually, to be more accurate, while Scripture gives us several ways to understand suffering, they point in different directions.  I think it’s easier to understand the suffering of the unjust, of the wicked: they did something bad, and God punished them.  This is the explanation we read in Genesis chapter 3, in which Eve ate of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and invited her husband to eat as well.  They sinned against God, and were cast out of the garden of Eden into the cold, cruel world outside.  This understanding of suffering, as punishment for sin, also comes through in our reading from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, speaking of Israel in the wilderness, Paul writes, “Our ancestors were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them, and they were struck down in the wilderness.”  He speaks of God striking down those who indulged in sexual immorality and those who put Christ to the test, and those who complained. Paul continues, “These things happened to them to serve as an example, and they were written down to instruct us, on whom the ends of the ages have come.”

This understanding of suffering pops up in a number of places in Scripture.  It seemingly can be boiled down to a simple formula:  good things happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people.  Actions have consequences.  Touch a hot stove, and your finger gets burned.  This line of thinking is so easy a child can understand it.  And for many adults, this is still their understanding, along with the corollary – if something bad happens to somebody, it’s because they’re being punished.

But as we become adults, we see people endure horrific suffering who, while certainly not perfect – all sin and fall short of the glory of God - are basically decent human beings.  This doesn’t fit into the simple logic of good people prosper/bad people suffer.  Why would God single them out for punishment?  Similarly, we see awful people who accumulate great riches for themselves by inflicting great suffering on others, and seemingly they live charmed lives. Why doesn’t God hurl a lightning bolt or two at them for a change?

Our mothers and fathers in the faith wrestled with this question as well.  Perhaps the most famous meditation in Scripture on this topic is the book of Job, in which God allowed Satan to strip everything away from Job, who was blameless and upright before God.  Famously, Job’s friends insisted that, since a series of terrible calamities had stripped Job of his property, his family, and his health, Job must have done something awful to bring all this on himself.  In one long, windy speech after another, Job’s friends insist, “Those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same” – that is to say, “you reap what you sow, and since you’ve reaped one disaster after another, you must have sown some really bad stuff in your life.”  And in one long, windy speech after another, Job protests his innocence, and eventually challenges God to prove him wrong.  Eventually God shows up, basically to remind Job of all the wonders God has created, bringing Job’s situation back into perspective – but then God tells Job’s friends that they had been wrong in saying Job had brought his troubles on himself.

Which brings us to our Gospel reading today.  Jesus has been teaching – basically, a sermon containing much of the same instruction as the Sermon on the Mount.  We’re told that just as Jesus was finishing his teaching, some of those listening told Jesus about some Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices – basically, Pilate had them executed while they were worshiping. Poor people…what a horrible way to die!  But Jesus’ listeners weren’t just reporting the latest gossip -  behind the mention of this bit of news is a question:  hey Jesus, what did these people do to deserve this?  They must have been really nasty folks for God to have punished them so.  But Jesus responds, “Do you think because these Galileans suffered in this way that they were worse sinners than all other Galileans?  No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you’ll all die as they did.  Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell  on them – do you think they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem?  No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”  So Jesus is telling them two things – that God wasn’t punishing the deceased for being especially awful people, and also for his listeners to look to their own lives and put their own spiritual houses in order, rather than speculate about God’s intentions for those who met with misfortune.

Then Jesus tells them a parable:  A man had a fig tree in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none.  So he tells the gardener, “I’ve been waiting three years to see figs on this thing, and nothing’s coming.  This tree is fired!  Get rid of it.”  As it happens, while fig trees normally bore fruit after two years, sometimes it could take three, four, five, even six years.  The gardener knew that the tree might just have needed a bit more time to grow, and so he pleads for the landowner to be patient: “Sir, give me another year and I’ll give this tree some extra TLC, turning the soil and adding fertilizer.  If it bears fruit, great; if not, you can cut it down.”  And so we hope that the gardener’s words carried the day, and the tree got a reprieve.  And Jesus is saying that God’s like that – even when our lives, or those of our neighbors, aren’t accomplishing a whole lot for God, God gives a reprieve, a second chance.

 As you probably know, after the recent storms and especially the very bad storm this past week, our building has sustained significant damage to the front wall.  Last week, we had hoped that some brick pointing could resolve the problem.   However, the gaps that were fairly narrow a week ago have widened significantly this week, meaning that the brick work on our front wall is shifting – which further means that the damage may be – likely is - structural rather than just cosmetic.  And so our situation is considerably more complicated than we thought.  Whatever specific information is available will be presented at the congregational meeting following worship, and while we will discuss some options, none of them will be painless.

We may wonder:  Why us?  Why this?  Why now?  While Emanuel Church has struggled for decades, our congregation has always held on, and in recent years seemed to be gaining in members and regular visitors.  The friends of this congregation have been generous. God has blessed us in many ways.  Why this setback now?  Of course, while we hope to have more definitive answers, the architectural and engineering explanations aren’t hard to guess – a building over 150 years old, stress on the building from heavy rains and high winds buffeting the walls and our high steeple, especially from last week’s storm.  From that standpoint, the relevant question may not be “why did it happen” but “what took so long” and “how did the building hold up as long as it did?”  I know a lot of blood, sweat, and tears went into maintaining the building as well as it’s been maintained.  And so we can give thanks to God for a building that has served us so well for so long.

But while we can understand with our minds the physics of the strength of the building and the impact of the weather-related forces buffeting it, these explanations don’t bring comfort to our souls.  And so we grope for answers.  While it may feel like God has punished us or abandoned us, I don’t think that’s the explanation, any more than God singled out those crushed by the tower at Siloam for punishment.  And in truth, I have no theological explanation, nothing to say that will wrap this problem up neatly in a bow.  We know that bad things happen to good people and to good churches, that the sun shines and rain falls on the just and unjust, and that life sometimes is messy and abounding in loose ends.  

I do think, though, that our circumstances are going to test who we are as individual believers, and who we are as the gathered congregation of Emanuel United Church of Christ.  We’ve taken it for granted that our familiar building with its familiar stained glass windows and familiar but beautiful organ would always be there for our use.  And, somehow, as tight as money has been, funds always somehow held out, our friends and supporters have been generous, and recently we even got some major donations.  Now we will be dealing with unfamiliar circumstances and unfamiliar questions.  What will it be like having a major construction project going on in the front of our church?   How much stress will this put on us and our neighbors?  What if we can’t access our building while construction is underway, and have to worship elsewhere for some number of weeks, or longer?   What if the cost of repairs exceeds our available funds?  Or even if we have sufficient funds to pay for repairs but have little left over, what will that mean to our congregation?  These are just some of the “what-ifs”, small and large, that have kept me up at night this week – and I must say that while I’ve been praying like crazy, I’ve gotten very little sleep these past days.

These property-related questions, though, challenging as they are, drive us to deeper questions.  What does it mean to be Emanuel United Church of Christ?  Do we need this building, in its current location and configuration and with its current amenities, in order to be Emanuel Church? Indeed, is our primary loyalty to a building and a location?  Or can we still be Emanuel Church even if we have to worship elsewhere for a short time, or maybe a longer time?  As the Jews exiled in Babylon asked themselves, “Can we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land, in unfamiliar surroundings?” Indeed, they learned to do just that.  In order to gather and live as faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, what are the essentials, and what can we let go?  And, like Job, we confront the big question of whether we can still trust God, and whether we will still follow Jesus, even amid losses.

As a congregation and as individuals, in days and weeks and months ahead, we will undergo stress, just as our building has undergone the stress of recent storms.  Emotions will be closer to the surface than usual.  In the days and weeks ahead, I would ask us to be gentle with one another, to cut one another some slack if emotions run high, to give one another space to vent if need be, or space for a time-out if need be.

Meanwhile, one way or the other, the life of our congregation, the life of Emanuel Church, our life together, will go on.  Where will we worship next Sunday? – probably here, but possibly yet to be determined.  But will we worship? – yes.  I will be available as always for pastoral care, for hospital visits, home communion for those who request it, for baptisms – though perhaps not in this building for a while – and for funerals – though I sincerely hope we have none.

“God is faithful, and will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way so that you may be able to endure it.”  God is indeed faithful, and while I think God’s testing sometimes push our strength to its limits and seemingly beyond, I am confident that God will carry us through this situation, and that God will provide, perhaps not what we’d prefer, perhaps not what we’re used to, but what we need.  Our hearts may be broken, but God will help us become strong in the broken places.  God will not leave us nor forsake us.  Of that I am sure.  God is faithful.  May God grant us the faith to continue to walk with God, wherever God leads us, as we have for over 150 years.  Amen.