Preached · April 16, 2023
Series · Practicing Resurrection
Text · Psalm 42
new series. need to introduce a bunch of stuff. sermon is a mess. in pr speak i am lowering expectations.
Observation - worked out our theology; but God seems more distant than ever.
The things that used to get us "on fire" for God now seem corny. Or dangerous. Or triggering.
We want to feel God's presence again. We want to feel spiritual. But it just seems like we can't. Something is dead inside of us.
Listen to the author of Psalm 42 have an argument with himself. One part of her keeps asking, "Why are you depressed? You shouldn't be depressed!" And the other part of her responds, "But you are. Deal with it."
Psalm 42 Just like a deer that craves streams of water, my whole being craves you, God. My whole being thirsts for God, for the living God. When will I come and see God’s face? My tears have been my food both day and night, as people constantly questioned me, “Where’s your God now?”
But I remember these things as I bare my soul: how I made my way to the mighty one’s abode, to God’s own house, with joyous shouts and thanksgiving songs— a huge crowd celebrating the festival! Why, I ask myself, are you so depressed? Why are you so upset inside? Hope in God! Because I will again give him thanks, my saving presence and my God.
My whole being is depressed. That’s why I remember you from the land of Jordan and Hermon, from Mount Mizar. Deep called to deep at the noise of your waterfalls; all your massive waves surged over me. By day the Lord commands his faithful love; by night his song is with me— a prayer to the God of my life.
I will say to God, my solid rock, “Why have you forgotten me? Why do I have to walk around, sad, oppressed by enemies?” With my bones crushed, my foes make fun of me, constantly questioning me: “Where’s your God now?”
Why, I ask myself, are you so depressed? Why are you so upset inside? Hope in God! Because I will again give him thanks, my saving presence and my God. (Psalm 42, CEB)
Or David, the author of Psalm 51, begs:
Create a clean heart for me, God; put a new, faithful spirit deep inside me! Please don’t throw me out of your presence; please don’t take your holy spirit away from me. Return the joy of your salvation to me and sustain me with a willing spirit. (Psalm 51:10-12, CEB)
Practicing Resurrection The name of this series is called "Practicing Resurrection." We just celebrated Easter. Now what?
The phrase "Practice Resurrectoin" comes from a poem by the American novelist, poet, climate activist, and farmer Wendall Berry.
Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front Love the quick profit, the annual raise, vacation with pay. Want more of everything ready-made. Be afraid to know your neighbors and to die. And you will have a window in your head. Not even your future will be a mystery any more. Your mind will be punched in a card and shut away in a little drawer. When they want you to buy something they will call you. When they want you to die for profit they will let you know.
So, friends, every day do something that won’t compute. Love the Lord. Love the world. Work for nothing. Take all that you have and be poor. Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace the flag. Hope to live in that free republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot understand. Praise ignorance, for what man has not encountered he has not destroyed.
Ask the questions that have no answers. Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias. Say that your main crop is the forest that you did not plant, that you will not live to harvest. Say that the leaves are harvested when they have rotted into the mold. Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.
Put your faith in the two inches of humus that will build under the trees every thousand years.
Listen to carrion — put your ear close, and hear the faint chattering of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh. Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap for power, please women more than men. Ask yourself: Will this satisfy a woman satisfied to bear a child? Will this disturb the sleep of a woman near to giving birth?
Go with your love to the fields. Lie easy in the shade. Rest your head in her lap. Swear allegiance to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos can predict the motions of your mind, lose it. Leave it as a sign to mark the false trail, the way you didn’t go. Be like the fox who makes more tracks than necessary, some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.
Former English high school teacher Pastor Tonetta would be the better one to lead us in an analysis of this poem. But notice that practicing resurrection, for Berry, is not some super-spiritual act. It's earthy and tangible and physical.
The Bible speaks of resurrection and life with God in the same way. Just listen to Jesus' parables. The Kingdom of heaven is like—
• A mustard seed, planted in a field.
• Yeast, worked into dough.
• A treasure hidden in a field worth buying
• Like a net let down to catch fish
• Like a wedding banquet
• Like a farmer, sowing seed
The kingdom is not fluffy clouds and harps and pearly gates. Jesus' parables are earthy and physical; dirt under fingernails. It's not super spiritual acts of mysticism. It's banquets and seeds.
I mean, think about how Jesus spent his time after his resurrection.
• Luke 24:30 Jesus meets with the disciples on the road to Emmaus. It's when Jesus breaks bread with them that they recognize him.
• 11 verses later, Jesus appears to the discples. They think they're seeing a ghost. Jesus is like, uh, no, can I have some food please.
• John 21, Jesus shows up on the beach, cooks some fish and has a meal with his disciples.
If we are to practice resurrection in our lives, we need to talk about our bodies, about things that are tangible and earthy and have to do with food and drink and friendship and reality.
That's not to say that so-called spiritual things don't matter. Singing and prayer and meditation and preaching and visions and prophecy—that all matters to. But it matters because of their physicality, not in spite of it. "Spirituality" is at its best when it is physical. Singing is powerful because it engages our lungs and voices. Prayer and meditation can be powerful because it slows down our breathing and our heart rate and stills our bodies.
Spiritual Abuse Now, in order to sort of plow the path for our preachers over the next few weeks, we need to talk about Spiritual Trauma and Abuse.
[!NOTE] Trauma Defintion An event or experience that overwhelms a person's capacity to cope.
There are three basic elements to spiritual abuse:
(1) the asymmetry in power between a person with some kind of spiritual authority and another person;
(2) it is most noticeable when there is a pattern of abuse though a single case can constitute spiritual abuse, and at times spiritual abuse penetrates a culture so much it becomes systemic;
(3) and behaviors by that spiritual authority that psychologically, emotionally, and spiritually wound a person. (McKnight)
Spiritual abuse is a form of emotional and psychological abuse. It is characterized by a systematic pattern of coercive and controlling behaviour in a religious context. Spiritual abuse can have a deeply damaging impact on those who experience it. This abuse may include: manipulation and exploitation, enforced accountability, censorship of decision making, requirements for secrecy and silence, coercion to conform, inability to ask questions, control through the use of sacred texts or teaching, requirement of obedience to the abuser, the suggestion that the abuser has a ‘divine’ position, isolation as a means of punishment, and superiority and elitism. (Oakley-Humphreys, Escaping the Maze)
Pastoral neglect is a form of spiritual abuse. (Amy White)
• Abuse can lead to the trauma.
• Trauma can make ruin what's good.
• I used to really to love chorizo. Then I got food poisining and threw up chorizo. Now I hate chorizo.
• The things that used to move you, make you feel close to God now make you sick.
The good news: we can heal from trauma!
The bad news: abuse and trauma can make the things that can bring healing seem bad.
It is a clinically proven fact that the one thing that can help someone heal from abuse, neglect, or trauma is relationship.
In foster and adoptive world, where I come from, children that suffer neglect or abuse begin to fear all forms of relationship.
So we end up in paradox. We want to feel close to God. Community, small groups, prayer, BIble study worship, meditation can help. But now they taste like food-poisioning chorizo.
So, what this series will do is offer tools to unpoision the chorizo. I'm really streching this metaphor.
We remember that God is good.
Matthew 7
Ask, and you will receive. Search, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. Whoever seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door is opened. Who among you will give your children a stone when they ask for bread? Or give them a snake when they ask for fish? If you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him.
