Chetwynd Shared Ministry
October 8, 2017 - Thanksgiving Sunday
Reading: Deuteronomy 8:7-18
I’m about to say
something that you have probably not heard said very often. I love the book of Deuteronomy. Yes, I know that it has its problems. There are teachings in this book that promote
violence – killing and stoning and war.
There are teachings in this book that uphold the patriarchy where women
were lesser humans than men. There are
teachings in this book about slavery. I
took a course a couple of years ago on the book of Deuteronomy, and at the
start of the course, our professor Dr. Susan Slater told us that if, at the end
of the course, we had come around to the idea that stoning wasn’t as bad as we
thought that it was, then she would not consider the course to have been
a success!
But at the same time
as all of these troubling aspects, there are also some fabulous aspects to this
book. It includes laws about how to have
fair business dealings. It includes laws
about being generous to those who are on the margins of society – widows,
orphans, and refugees. It includes laws
about how to live well together in community.
There are also a couple of nuggets in the text, like the Shema, the
enduring prayer of the Jewish people that begins: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the
Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your
God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.”
But what I love most
about the book of Deuteronomy is the story arc.
To put it into context, Deuteronomy is the fifth and final book of the
Torah – the “law” or the “teaching.” The
Torah begins with the book of Genesis, which includes many of the stories we
know from Sunday School – the creation stories, the tower of Babel, Noah and
the arc, Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Rachel, and Joseph.
Then after Genesis
comes the book of Exodus. Our Old
Testament readings over the past month or so have been coming from Exodus. We read about how the Israelite people were
slaves in Egypt, and how God called to Moses out of the burning bush. God told Moses that he was to go to the
Egyptian Pharaoh and demand that he let the Israelite people go. When the Pharaoh finally did let the people
go and they were leaving Egypt, God worked through Moses to part the waters of
the Red Sea so that the people could pass through to the other side.
But then trouble
came. The people were there, on the far
side of the Red Sea, wandering in the wilderness. Now keep in mind, this isn’t the wilderness
like we have in this part of the world.
There were no trees and lakes and deer.
The wilderness that the people were in was a desert wilderness – dry and
rocky with blazing hot sun during the day and bitterly cold nights.
And the people
complained to Moses. They asked him,
“Why have you brought us out here in the desert to die? Surely it would have been better if we had
stayed in slavery back in Egypt! At
least when we were there, we had food to eat and water to drink and shelter at
night.” And Moses did what most leaders
do – he passed their complaints on to his superior. Moses told God that the people were complaining,
and God responded.
God responded to the
people by giving them food to eat – each morning, manna, or bread fell from
heaven, fell on the ground like dew and the people were able to gather it up;
and each evening flocks of quails came to where the people were camped. There was always enough for everyone – the
only rule was that you could only collect what you needed for today and not
hoard it in fear of the future.
God also responded to
the people by giving them water to drink.
There, in the middle of the dry and rocky desert, God told Moses to take
his staff and hit a large rock with it; and when Moses did that, fresh water
started flowing out of it.
God also responded to
the people by keeping them safe and leading them through the desert. During the day, God would appear as a pillar
of cloud, showing them the direction that they were to travel, and when the sun
went down, God appeared as a pillar of fire, and continued to accompany them on
their journey.
There in the desert,
Moses climbed a mountain and received the law for the people – what we call
today the ten commandments, as well as the details of how to follow them. You can find these details if you look in the
next two books of the Torah – Leviticus and Numbers.
And then we get to the
book of Deuteronomy. At this point, the
people have been wandering in the wilderness for forty years, being fed by God,
being given water by God, and being led by God.
Forty years of constant movement, traveling from one place to the next,
depending on God for everything. But
now, at the start of the book of Deuteronomy, the people have reached the banks
of the Jordan River. They are about to
cross the river into the land that God had promised to them and to their
ancestors; a land of plentiful fresh water and abundant food to eat. Listen to the description from today’s
reading:
“For the Lord your God
is bringing you into a good land, a land with flowing streams, with springs and
underground waters welling up in valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley,
of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, a
land where you may eat bread without scarcity, where you will lack nothing, a
land whose stones are iron and from whose hills you may mine copper. You shall eat your fill, and bless the Lord
your God for the good land he has given you.”
What a place. Other than the fig trees and pomegranates and
olive trees, it sounds a bit like Canada…
But before the people
are allowed to cross over the river and enter this land of abundance, they stop
and camp on the far shore one more time.
And Moses begins to recite the law to them again – a repetition of sorts
of the two books that come before. In
fact, the name of the book in English, Deuteronomy, comes from the Greek
meaning, “Second Law.” But it isn’t
quite a second or new law – it is more a second telling of the law. I actually like the Swahili title of this
book of the bible – it translates to English as “Remembrance of the Law.”
But why do we have to
sit through a second telling or remembrance of the law that God gave to the
people? Surely once was enough?
It is because of where
the people were at in their journey. For
the past forty years, they have been completely and immediately dependent on
God for everything – for their food to eat, their water to drink, for guidance
and protection there in the wilderness.
But they are about to enter a new place – a place where there is
abundant food and water. God is still
the one who will provide the rain and make the seeds grow, but it is a less
immediate, a less obvious dependence on God.
But God wants the people to remember that they depend on God for
everything.
It’s easy to remember
to call on God in difficult times. It’s
harder for us – and I include myself in this “us” – it’s harder for us to
remember to call on God and thank God when things are good in our lives. It is hard for us to remember during the good
times that everything that we have comes from God; that we are dependent on God
for our food, for our water, and for the air that we breathe.
If I may quote Dr.
Slater, my Old Testament professor again, she says that the forty years spent
wandering in the wilderness were the “desert school” for the Israelite
people. God was schooling the people in
how to be thankful for everything that God gives. It was a situation where, without God, they
would have died with no food or water or GPS.
But now the people are
on the verge of something new. Life is
about to get a whole lot easier for the Israelite people. But God doesn’t want the people to forget the
lessons that they have learned in the desert school. And so in today’s reading from Deuteronomy,
God tells the people, don’t forget. Remember.
Remember that it was
God who brought us out of slavery.
Remember that it was
God who kept us safe in the desert amid the poisonous snakes and scorpions.
Remember that it was
God who fed us with manna and quail.
Remember that it was
God who made water flow out of the rock for us to drink.
God tells the people
that even when life becomes easy, we aren’t to forget that it is only easy
because of God. It’s not about us or
what we do or earn.
And so here we are,
Thanksgiving weekend in Canada. The
connections to the text are easy to make.
Many of us are in situations where we have much to be thankful for. We have food on our table and family and
friends to share it with. This reading
calls us to remember that all of this is only because of God.
And here at Chetwynd
Shared Ministry, we also have the opportunity to participate in God’s mission
of providing manna to those who are in the desert. There are those in our community who don’t
have food on their table at holiday times; and so the Care Group here, among
others in the community, are collecting donations for the Christmas Bureau to
make sure that everyone in Chetwyd has food on their table at Christmas… manna
in the desert. If you would like to
participate in this part of God’s mission, there is a donation box right beside
the door, and the Care Group will make sure that the donations get to the
Christmas Bureau. They need regular
non-perishable food donations – anything that you would normally donate to a
food bank – to make the hampers happen this year.
So we have today’s
reading from Deuteronomy speaking to us as we are reminded to offer our
Thanksgiving for all that God gives us when life is good. We also have today’s reading from Deuteronomy
speaking to us as we are challenged participate in God’s mission of providing
manna to those in the desert.
But given everything
that has happened in the world this week, I don’t think that I would be doing
my job if I don’t ask the question, how does this reading speak to the pain and
the heartbreak of the world? In the past
week, there has been an act of terrorism close to home in Edmonton. In the past week, there has been an act of
terrorism in Las Vegas. In the past
week, there has been no sign of peace coming to the Korean peninsula. In the past week, another hurricane has hit
the Caribbean and southern US. In the
past week, people have lost loved ones, people have been in accidents, people
have lost their jobs. In the midst of
our Thanksgiving celebrations, we don’t have to look very far to find grief and
fear.
But I do think that
this reading speaks to the pain in our world.
The Israelite people in the desert were also dealing with grief and
fear. They had left behind their homes
and their lives in Egypt. They were
facing an unknown future. They faced
danger on a daily basis in the desert.
In the forty years that they were traveling, an entire generation passed
so that most of the people who had left Egypt did not live to enter the land
that had been promised to them.
And so in times of
danger and fear and grief, I think that this reading speaks a message of
hope. Hope that better times are
coming. Hope that a different way of
being is possible. The desert is going
to give way to the promised land.
Scarcity is going to give way to abundance. A time and place of death are going to give
way to a time and place of life. A
different world is not only possible, but a different world is coming soon.
And, when you think
about it, isn’t that the very core of the Christian story? One of the central stories that we gather
around is the Easter story. On the
Friday, Jesus was killed and it seemed like the story was over; but Sunday
brings the resurrection and life rather than death has the final word. Death gives way to life. The ending gives way to a new beginning. Grief and heartache give way to hope and joy.
And so this reading
from Deuteronomy speaks to us on so many different levels. When times are good and we celebrate the
abundance that surrounds us, this reading calls on us to remember that all good
things come from God, and it calls us to remember to give thanks.
On another level, the
reading also calls on us living in the midst of abundance to remember those who
are in the scarcity of the desert times and it calls us to participate in God’s
work of providing manna to those in the desert.
And finally, on a
third level, this reading speaks to us when we are living through desert times,
whether that desert is one of scarcity or one of grief or one of fear. This reading reminds us that the desert time
doesn’t last forever but we can live with the hope, with the confidence that we
are about to enter the promised land of abundance and security.
Have I mentioned that
I love the book of Deuteronomy?!
In a few minutes, we
are going to gather at the table and share in the bread and the wine. Last month, we made the connection between
the word “Communion” and the word “community.”
At the table, we don’t break bread alone, but we break the bread
together in community. Another word that
is used for this shared meal is “Eucharist” and the root of the word
“Eucharist” means “Thanksgiving.” Each
time we gather at the table, we are giving thanks to God. We thank God for calling us to the
table. We thank God for all that God has
done and provided for us. We thank God
for being present with us at the table.
And we thank God for the future that we know God has promised.
This is Thanksgiving
weekend. Let us give thanks to God!
Let us pray:
Generous God,
we give thanks for all that you have
given to us –
for food to eat and safe
water to drink,
for shelter over our
heads to keep us safe and warm,
for friends and family,
both near and far,
for your promise that a
different better world
is not only possible
but
is coming,
and most of all, we give
thanks
for your
loving presence with us.
Thank you for being
you,
for being more than we could ever
imagine –
more loving,
more generous,
more holy,
more welcoming,
more more.
With humble awe,
knowing our words can never say
enough,
we simply say “thank you.”
Amen.
(Thanksgiving Display at Chetwynd Shared Ministry)
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