Spanning Generations

 There is much to talk about today. It has been an emotional week. While the sermon will not speak specifically to news item, the discussion reflects on our understanding of God and living in a complex world.

Today is the 20^th anniversary of 9/11, a day that saw the United States’ World Trade Centre and Pentagon, attacked by terrorists. This anniversary, in conjunction with reading the Jeremiah text, Professor Steed Davidson, McCormick Theological Seminary, Chicago, writes:

“Preaching in the midst of the traumas of past and pending national tragedy requires a sophisticated weaving of a God powerful enough to demand change and soft enough to weep alongside those who suffer.”     --- workingpreacher.org (alternative second reading commentary, Sept 11, 2022)

 

LIVING amid past traumas and pending tragedy, -living in a complex world with faith/hope, requires a sophisticated weaving of a God powerful enough to demand change and soft enough to weep alongside those who suffer.

 

The prophet Jeremiah spent his career warning the people of pending tragedy and pain. His prophecies were spoken to a people who ritually remembered past trauma -the exodus from Egypt as the prime example. For each generation past trauma became more complex as new traumas were added; Jeremiah is ‘of the people,’ his voice articulating pain and fear. His prophecies point to disaster overtaking disaster, breeding more disaster. Woven into the text, spoken from the depths of despair, are moments of lament – of turning ones’ heart and will- and moments of promise and hope.

 

This particular section – chapter 4- of Jeremiah is an interesting discourse, written in a way to be alive, so to speak, to different generations through two distinct approaches or world views.

Consider generations born in the 20^th century (1900-1999). The generation born at the beginning of the century experienced WWI, the trauma of this war was added to by the Great Depression, followed by WWII, the Korean war, the Gulf war, and war in Kosovo. These generations of people understand Jeremiah’s warning of pending tragedy and pain, as disaster overtaking disaster; disasters brought by the hands and wills of humans, empires wielding power, particularly in the machine of war.

Now consider generations born in the 21^st century (since 2000). Hearing the words of Jeremiah this generation’s focus and interpretation of the text centres on the precarity of human life on the planet, -climate crisis- caused by human action or in-action. In verse 23 and following, Jeremiah speaks of the uncreating of the world as told in Genesis; a reversal of the primeval creation story: the earth waste and void, the heavens have “no light,” erased are land, birds, fruit trees.

We hear the same words but have varying world views because we filter them through generational biases that have grown from our own intense traumatic experiences.

As dismal as ‘the word of the Lord’ spoken through Jeremiah is, the beauty is that it resonates across generational traumas, understandings, and future actions.

The trouble for theologians and for people of faith – for generations that come or leave or return or remain indifferent to church community- is that sometimes it is difficult to speak across generations because each generation has a different starting point. Each generation has a particular focus, rooted in a base trauma, and when addressing and applying concepts of God, faith, and the purpose or meaning of life in light of this trauma, so often preachers (the church) fall short of articulating the Gospel to the peculiarities of generations outside of their own. There is always a tension as theology or theological language changes from generation to generation.

20^th century generations read Jeremiah and understand his pointing fingers at the people falling into false complacency; that all is okay, that there is stability; until there isn’t. The prophet holds leadership responsible for civil instability, for their lack of resolve, and lack of transparency.  Despite human inability that has led to present events, the prophet gives assurance of God’s favour amid said conditions; just as God has been present in past conditions and will be in future conditions.

21^st century generations read Jeremiah and viscerally understand his articulation of the cry of creation being uncreated, and that humans have a responsibility to stop uncreating. Hope is heard, or passion is ignited to work for climate justice with an understanding of God’s word

“Yet I will not make a full end.” Compare past generations that told stories of the great flood.

 

German theologian Jurgen Moltmann, a POW in WWII, set to work after the war articulating a systematic theology to address God’s relationship in the continued trauma of his generation in post-war Germany. The result was a form of liberation theology and social trinitarianism. His theology in one sentence: God suffers with humanity and promises a better future through hope of resurrection.

Moltmann explains the cross as divine love and the resurrection as divine promise.

Divine love – dying on the cross- is described, not as required sacrifice, but divine love exhibited through a different kind of suffering (voluntary fellow-suffering); where God models a different kind of love – not benevolence towards humankind but rather, solidarity.

In solidarity with humankind God lives suffering through Jesus – a reality that is outside of God’s experience and character. God experiences the reality of life in bondage to sin, suffering, and death.  God embraces godlessness, that which is godforsaken --- fully living the experience and in the depths of godforsakeness, finds divine love spans the separation of God and godforsakeness.

In addition to being present in the depths of suffering, God’s character rises in Love’s protest of suffering. Love’s protest, God’s protest is resurrection and divine promise. The human condition of suffering is not removed but rather God is present in suffering, and Love rises in protest declaring hope -describing what the future can and will be.

Moltmann’s systematic, like the words of Jeremiah, speaks across the generational spectrum and articulates a focus to reflect on how we understand God and live as faithful and hope-filled people in a traumatized complex world.

Moltmann wrote:

Believing in the resurrection does not just mean assenting to a dogma and noting a historical fact. It means participating in this creative act of God’s…Resurrection is not a consoling opium, soothing us with the promise of a better world in the hereafter.  It is the energy for a rebirth of this life. The hope doesn’t point to another world. It is focused on the redemption of this one.  --- Jurgen Moltmann, "Jesus Christ for Today's World"

That is why faith, wherever it develops into hope, causes not rest but unrest, not patience but impatience.  It does not calm the unquiet heart, but is itself this unquiet heart in [the hu]man. Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it. Peace with God means conflict with the world, for the goal of the promised future stabs inexorably into the flesh of every unfulfilled present.     ---Jurgen Moltmann, "Theology of Hope: On the Ground and the Implications of a Christian Eschatology"

Whether of a generation from the 20^th or 21^st century, whether our world view is human centric, or creation centric, no matter where we place the starting point or the cause of past trauma, together we experience an unfulfilled present. And however, we go about doing it, it is our collective responsibility to live lives that hold suffering and resurrection in the same hand, experiencing and sharing divine love and divine promise; weaving a lived theology of a God powerful enough to demand change and soft enough to weep alongside those who suffer.

God be with us all. Amen.