“I Am Who I Am”
August 31, 2008
Exodus 3: 1-15, Psalm 105: 1-6, 23-26, 45c,
Romans 12: 9-21, Matthew 16: 21-28
A young woman in college wrote the following letter to her parents, her first in three months:
Dear Mom and Dad,
I'm sorry it has been so long since my last letter, but I didn't want to worry you about the fire in the dorm and my concussion which happened when I fell out of the window trying to escape. I've been anxious to tell you about that nice attendant from the service station around the corner who made me feel comfortable before the ambulance came. I'm out of the hospital now, and feeling fine, especially since that nice attendant offered to let me stay with him at his apartment while they were fixing the dorm. It's such a nice apartment and he's such a nice person. I really like him very much and I know how happy it will make you to become grandparents.
In closing, let me tell you that you can stop worrying. There was no fire, I didn't fall out of the window, I didn't have the concussion, I haven't moved into anyone's apartment, there is no man in my life, and you're not going to be grandparents. I told you all those things because I received a D in Biology and an F in History and I wanted you to put that into perspective.
Perspective: Seeing events in their full context; viewing facts or events in relation to other facts or events. The drudge of preparing the family for a summer vacation is endured willingly when seen in the context of the fun everyone's going to have. A medical student grinds it out because he or she knows that hard work and sacrifice are necessary preconditions to becoming a licensed doctor. A good musician puts her or his long hours of practice into proper perspective by acknowledging that the goal of excellence can be achieved only through disciplined preparation. As the saying goes if you want to get it all together you've got to put life's events in true perspective, see them as part of a whole.
Perspective-it would seem in today's Gospel Lesson Peter is not seeing the whole picture.
Jesus tells the apostle, for the first time, that His mission soon would take Him to Jerusalem where He would be made to suffer at the hands of the religious establishment and then be executed. Peter, who has just acknowledged Jesus as Messiah, is unable to handle the revelation of His impending suffering and death. Out of care and concern and love for Jesus Peter says; “God forbid it, Lord! That must never happen to you.” Imagine Peter’s surprise when Jesus replies; “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things!” Peter had failed to put this event in its proper perspective. Rather the revelation of Jesus as Messiah was more easily handled than the revelation of His suffering and death.
Even Jesus would not be spared from suffering. Sooner or later, all of us have to bear something that is, to all intents and purposes, unbearable. A young widow is left with three children to raise alone because her husband was killed in Afghanistan. A baby dies at birth. A sister dies in a car crash involving a drunk driver. Sometimes listening to the television news and the way in which the media thrive on images of global famine or horrors suffered is unbearable. Sooner or later, bearing the unbearable, we realize how little control we have over so much that damages our society and ourselves. Grief, rage, anger, and fear flash to the surface of consciousness. Suffering, it seems, abounds!
Here in this church community I have witnessed first hand how each of you care for one another coming together as a family would to support each other in those times of trial. Peter was attempting to do the same for his dear friend, Jesus. He asked God to forbid Jesus’ suffering. Peter’s objection sounds to us so harmless. But how could anyone have known or understood the workings of God in Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection? Matthew writing all this down years later, has both known and understood. When we are bearing the unbearable, we need a God who has suffered the depths of rage and despair as we ourselves do. God has seen it, known it, and taken it into God’s own life in Jesus who was crucified, who died, descended into hell, and was raised on the third day. This is why we cannot and must not take suffering, death, and resurrection out of the Jesus story. God understands the unbearable in human misery; God understands the causes for rage and anger in human life. Because God is with us and for us we, with our faith in hand, are enabled to better bear the illnesses, the pain, the misery and the rage.
In our Hebrew readings this morning we heard the story of the burning bush (the symbol for the Presbyterian Church). Imagine climbing any one of the mountains around us and suddenly coming upon a burning bush. A bush that is on fire and yet the fire does not consume the bush or the land around it. What would you think? Then while staring at this phenomenon imagine a voice speaking to you asking you to go into a nation where the people are being oppressed and take them away from their oppressors. What would you do?
Moses’ response to God was “who am I that I should go…” What would you say to God? God, Yahweh, the great I Am Who I Am empowers Moses to free his people. But still Moses did not rush out, nor did he end up speaking up for his people even though he knew God was on his side, instead, Aaron became the spokes person. God understood Moses’ fears and rather than saying “thank you Moses, I’ll find someone else, God empowered him and Aaron to rescue the Israelites.
So what do we know? We know that Jesus did not forego suffering; we know that Peter, proclaimed as the rock, really didn’t understand everything that Jesus was trying to share. We know that Moses, one of God’s chosen, really didn’t speak up that it was Aaron who did the talking. We know that God, through these scripture stories, enables, empowers, and encourages. Putting things into perspective we can believe that God goes with us and is for each of us because God understands suffering, abandonment, illness, joy, sorrow, defeat and celebration. Even now God is at work transforming death into life, defeat into victory and despair into hope. God is working now, in the midst of our brokenness, our pain, our disappointments and even our fear of death.
God is with us and our response, our “where do we go from her, I think the answer comes from the epistle reading. It points us to those characteristics we are to nourish and grow because we live in a difficult world. Christian people and the Body of Christ are called to be salt and light. The qualities we are to embrace are the qualities that Jesus lived out in the presence of his disciples.
We have been given the gift of the Holy Spirit so that we can become the…
Loving…
Enthusiastic…
Joyful…
Patient…
Prayerful…
Generous…people that God needs deployed in this world.