Beyond the Wilderness

(Note: Since I rarely write a post on the weeks I’ve been asked to preach in an area church, Joel suggested I put it on my blog. What do you think? This is a message I gave in Bar Harbor, Maine, this past Sunday. The readings were Exodus 3:1-15; Romans 12:9-21; Matthew 16:21-26.)

            Rarely, almost never, do I put a title on a Sunday message prior to writing it.  I believe it is a Spirit-led endeavor and I never know where she is going to take me.  Today’s is the rare exception.  After writing out the lengthy readings weeks ago, three words tucked into them started to haunt me.  It may have been the Spirit totally upending my process.  As soon as I read: “He [Moses] led his flock beyond the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God,” I wanted to know where that was, beyond the wilderness.  And I wanted to be there! 

Scripture works in mysterious ways.  The most inconspicuous words might take hold in your subconscious and show up behind your eyelids before you go to sleep or in morning meditation.  God can be tricky that way!  Then you can’t ignore them, and weeks later when you begin to write, they show right up as a title on the first page.  Well, I decided to go with it.

            “Moses led his flocks beyond the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.”  How do you get there, beyond the wilderness?  I would like to know.  I feel that we have all been wandering in a kind of wilderness together these days.  For me, the wilderness has always connoted an unsettling place of the unknown.  I have four siblings and all five of us live in different states.  Lately I start my day checking the weather in their respective home states.  How hot will it be for my sister KC, her kids and grandkids, in Georgia; are there tornadoes headed for my brother John in Missouri; are floods forecast for Susan as they recently inundated the Albany, New York, area; are there any sharks off the beach where Maureen swims and rescues seals in Rhode Island?  We’re usually okay here in Maine unless the smoke from the Canadian fires threaten anyone’s health.  And possible sharks!  I had none of these fears before.  This is a stressful and unfamiliar territory.  A wilderness of sorts.

            But that is not the only disconcerting region we wander through in our times. No matter what place we hold on the political spectrum, we cannot escape the discomfort of living in a time and place of deep antipathy.  Hostility reigns in many of our once tranquil communities as rage and fear of violence grows.  We live in a wilderness of animosity in our towns, our school districts, our families, and even within marriages and long-term friendships.  We are living in a tinder box with the constant potential of a match thrown in.  Clearly torches have already been hurled into places like the Middle East, central Africa, Eastern Europe, with the west and others setting the fuses.

            But you know all of this.  Must I rehash the woes of our time in a place we often come to for peace?  I’m afraid I do, if only to ask what is the purpose of the church in this wilderness?  Is there a way for the church to lead beyond and away from all the chaos?  Beyond the wilderness?  It is clear that the church needs to respond to our time as it is, not as it used to be, or even as we wish it to be.  This is what Jesus was getting at when Peter tried to soften the teacher’s message, denying the great danger he is in.  Jesus tells him to “Get behind me, Satan.”  Basically, what is happening today and what is soon to happen is what we have to deal with.  We must face it, all the way to the cross.  We cannot deny the times we are in and where we are headed and still serve God.  Jesus said, “If you want to follow me, you must pick up your own cross.”  We cannot get beyond the wilderness in any other way.

            But first, let’s take a look at the biblical concept of wilderness.  Times in the wilderness, the Israelites for forty years after being freed from Egypt and before entering the Promised Land, and Jesus for forty days and nights immediately after his baptism, were about more than uncertainty, unfamiliarity, and fear.  There was purpose in the wilderness.  It cannot be rushed right on through.

            When I was wrestling with those three words, beyond the wilderness, I googled them to see if anything would pop up.  Lo and behold, I found a little book by Rev. Thom Gardner with that very title.  The subtitle is “Rediscovering Opportunity in Crisis.”.  It presents wilderness as an essential period of self-discovery and preparation, a time spent with a God Gardner describes as a “repurposing God who turns trauma into triumph, failure into freedom, and pain into power.” (p.15) Perhaps we are not just lost in a wilderness, we are being “repurposed”. 

            Gardner claims that “wilderness may mean separation from what is familiar, but also separation to God and not from God.” (p 22)   He notes that solitude, which Henri Nouwen describes as a “furnace of transformation” is an element of the wilderness experience.  Without solitude, Nouwen wrote, “we remain victims of our society and continue to be entangled in the illusions of false self.”  I think our current wilderness experience is already beginning to disabuse us of our illusions.  Think about it…what have you learned about these United State of America in this extended wilderness time?  About yourself? 

            Another essential question:  Has the church been living in an extended wilderness time?  I suspect it has as people still long for “the good old days” when Sunday School was bursting at the seams, every church could call a full-time pastor, and the church was a center of social and familial life, a role now held by schools and civic organizations.  It is worth noting that those were the times when mainline Protestant churches seemed to walk hand-in-hand with American culture and norms.  Not so anymore.  And I say “Thank God!”  For would we truly be an authentic church if we celebrated the values that our current culture celebrates?  It does feel like God is repurposing us!  And we are deep in the process. 

            Let’s go back to Moses for a minute.  What happens just as he finds himself “beyond the wilderness?”  He has a powerful spiritual experience.  He sees a bush on fire, but not being consumed.  When he turns to look at it, God calls out to him.  The time Moses has spent in the wilderness has prepared him to hear and recognize the voice of God when he is called and to answer despite his fears and sense of inadequacy.  His time has readied him to be repurposed.  It is the same for us. 

            We have been readied to be a faithful church of Jesus Christ for our particular time and place.  We will not try to become the premier church lording it over a broken culture, which may define the White Christian Nationalist movement.  There is nothing “Christian” about it.  If we are to be authentic followers of Jesus, we must serve and protect the lives of all people.  Every creed, every color, and persuasion.  Particularly the poor and the marginal.  The oppressed and the refugee.  The homeless and imprisoned.  The indigenous and immigrant.  The church is being repurposed in this American culture which has left many of its ideals behind. 

            I add a little P.S. at the end here:  More than ever before it is clear that neither can we be a true church of Jesus without each other.  Without the support of a kind and hospitable community in which love is genuine and all have a strong sense of belonging.  I included the Pauline reading today because Paul’s advice is excellent!  “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”

            Secondly, it is clear we cannot do what we need to do without, like Peter, letting go or our denial and sharing our individual fears about what is happening.  Don’t rush the wilderness, take time in solitude and prayer to deepen your connection with the Spirit who not only calls to you, but is in you.  Keep your eyes wide open to perceive your burning sign and receive your particular mission.  Be reassured that your feet are standing on holy ground.  For God will always be our sure foundation.  Amen