A Mantra at the Point of No Return

Pent 14C-2019
Thursday was a visiting day for me. During one visit, the conversation turned to the state of the world – the synopsis being that it might be too late to fix the current problems in the world; just as it was too late in the time of Jeremiah. One can turn around, peoples can turn and change their ways, but, there comes a point of no return.  It is as the saying goes, at the point of no return one can only stand back and watch the train wreck.  Or once the toothpaste is out of the tube, you can not put it back.
The conversation turned to questioning, that when it is too late, or we deem it too late, or we are beyond the capacity to work towards a solution, what are one’s options? In the moment of no return and the aftermath, what options are there?  The thought of the wise person I was visiting was that there is only prayer.  Asking what one should pray, the words that came to us were very simple:
Strength for today, and hope for tomorrow.
Later in the day, another visit happened via text because our face-to-face meeting was interrupted due to circumstance, the very words that were needed were the prayer: strength for today, hope for tomorrow.
I looked the prayer up, the words  are from Thessalonians.  Although not from the texts for today, the words speak to the texts of today as a whole.
Strength for today, and hope for tomorrow.
After the warnings voiced by Jeremiah the prophet last week, today’s text has moved on to a point of no return.  The people find themselves estranged from God. Their communal relationships are broken. Their relationship with the land is in peril. Armies have crossed into their territory and the land is being laid waste. The people can no longer turn around, can no longer make peace; destruction has started. What options do the people have?; to run – there are other armies on their other borders-, to fight – without weapons, without leaders, with a lack of will, to acquiesce -to be led away into exile?  In whichever choice there is an option available to the people, to pray. I have noted in conversations with people who have lived through war, various disasters, or trying circumstances, that in the telling of their tales most acknowledge turning to prayer. When everything is gone and chaos is the norm, prayer becomes the stable item; a place to turn, a concrete action, a connection, a hope, an option. Crazy though, is that it takes extenuating circumstances to draw people back to prayer – to relationship with God, with others, with creation. Everyday, not just those that fall apart, we could certainly pray: Strength for today and hope for tomorrow.
I am sure that you have noticed election signs going up around the city. I would love to see a party use the campaign slogan: strength for today and hope for tomorrow, to see those words on signs dotting the neighbourhood.; to have politicians who live the motto and provide strong leadership to tackle the tasks at hand -the environment, medi-care, immigration, reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, electoral reform, and so on; and in their actions and decisions grow hope for tomorrow. Unfortunately, too often people are praying the words strength for today and hope for tomorrow, as they witness and experience chaos at the hands of poor leadership, poor government.
And that is where we find Jesus – confronting poor leadership and poor government; while sitting with those who are in the kind of circumstances that require a prayer of strength for today and hope for tomorrow.
 It is the scribes and the Pharisees who start the interaction with Jesus.  Under their breathes they note that Jesus is eating with tax collectors and those whom the scribes and Pharisees label sinners. So, as was Jesus’ practice, he told them parables. The parables of the lost sheep and the lost coin are meant to point a reflective and accusatory finger at the grumblers; Jesus is confronting poor leadership by addressing the actions -or lack there of- of the scribes and the Pharisees.
Jesus confronts the leaders of the time who are responsible for interpreting the Law, that is the covenant God made with the people in the time of Moses.  The Law was a set of rules to assist people in strengthening their relationship with God, and with other human beings. In Jesus’ time the scribes and Pharisees taught the law and policed the Law.  They were responsible for executing judgement against people seen to be deviating from the Law.
So what were the parables about?
Is Jesus suggesting to the scribes and the Pharisees that they are the sheep or the coin - the lost?  They were lost; lost in the sense that the policing of the Law had become more important than the relationships it was meant to foster. The scribes and Pharisees had lost touch with God, with the people; they were out on their own, lost in their own self-righteousness. Or are the Pharisees and scribes the shepherd, the woman? In this case could Jesus be implying that the Law requires the leadership to be responsible, to focus on protecting, finding, restoring, every person, and to be about the wholeness of the community; where no one is lost or forgotten?
These thoughts are not new to us.  All year we have been listening to Luke’s theological themes. Again and again Luke writes stories where all those who are deemed outsiders are included in God’s grace. He emphasizes that the kingdom comes for everyone. Luke points fingers at a society that has become legalistic, rather than compassionate and merciful.  The Law is not being lived according to the heart, and when this happens everything falls apart. There are those who are forgotten and neglected, called sinners and kept out of relationship by being held at arms length.  If the scribes and the Pharisees were living the Law there would not be sinners because their needs would be met in community, met with compassion and mercy.  Right relationships would mean strength for today and hope for tomorrow for everyone.
Luke also tells us when we will know that we are living in a time of right relationships – where compassion and mercy abound- it will be at the time when people rejoice for each person who is restored into community.  There will be joy and rejoicing. Luke says it five times in just a few lines.
That is not the reality of the world – joy and rejoicing.
Jeremiah’s dower words, the lament of the Psalm, the self-righteous leaders labeling sinners and shunning tax collectors,  this sounds like a world moving towards a point of no return.  This sounds like now. The texts resonate because they capture some of what we feel when we look at the state of the world, the environment, relationships,  and another election season. In this climate before I consider my options – our options – with conviction I will pray: strength for today and hope for tomorrow.
National Bishop Susan Johnson has invited congregations, has invited you, to join her in a year of prayer -beginning now and running to the end of August 2020. The insert in today’s bulletin is a resource to help you in forming a daily prayer practice. She has said more than once, “wouldn’t it be wonderful if we were known as the church that prays.” Her conviction is that prayer is the essence of all that we say and do; prayer overtime works at a heart level. When we pray – connections are made – with God, with people, with creation.
This morning we were blessed to be part of Rebeca’s baptism.  Collectively we promised to pray for her in her new life in Christ. That’s relationship building. In the rite of Baptism, parents and God-parents are entrusted with responsibilities: the responsibility includes teaching the Lord’s prayer and nurturing the child in faith and prayer. This is important.  The why is written into the liturgy, so that the baptized (that’s us) can learn to trust God, proclaim Christ through word and deed, care for others and the world God has made, and work for justice and peace. Prayer does this to us.
When we stop praying, the opposite comes about, we do not work for justice and peace, we lack in our care for others and the world God made, we no longer proclaim Christ through word and deed, and our trust in God falters... and then we find ourselves at a point of no return, toothpaste out of the tube, a train-wreck in process.
I’m with Bishop Susan, I invite you to pray with me this week. My prayer for this week is the wise words from Thursday’s visit; I plan on praying the words before I put my feet on the floor in the morning, after listening to the morning news; when out walking I will silently pray the prayer for each person I pass; I will share the words aloud with those whom I visit; the prayer will be the last words I say before going to bed.Through prayer may we be once again washed in the waters of baptism, and by nurturing ourselves in prayer may we once again learn to trust God, proclaim Christ through word and deed, care for others and the world God has made, and work for justice and peace.
...to you and your household, strength for today and hope for tomorrow. Amen.