Isaiah 1:1, 10-20
Psalm 50:1-8, 22-23
Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16
Luke 12:32-40
As I stand here this morning, I can imagine many people who have preceded me in my faith—people who are connected to me by faith in Jesus Christ. Family of origin, home church, friends who share my faith, etc. But I also have a family that stretches deep and wide over the face of the earth and beyond—people who are related to me in the simple confession of faith that we share in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Some of them know me and love me. Some of them know me and don’t know whether they love me or not. Most of them don’t know me; many of them would say they don’t love me because of the differences ways we practice the one faith in Jesus Christ we share.
Faith seems to exist for some as an unwavering set of tenets and beliefs that are inflexible and unmoving no matter what other say, do or even prove. Others describe faith as a continuum of life, dynamic and growing ideas that form and reform and transform as time and history move forward. Another author, Frederick Buechner wrote, "Faith is different from theology because theology is reasoned, systematic, and orderly, whereas faith is disorderly, intermittent, and full of surprises….Faith is homesickness. Faith is a lump in the throat. Faith is less a position on than a movement toward, less a sure thing than a hunch. Faith is waiting" (Secrets in the Dark: A Life in Sermons). [1]
In the letter to the Hebrews, the author begins describing the history of faith in God from the time of Abraham—the beginnings of the faith that became Judaism out of which came Christianity. The faith as described here began with one man from the Mesopotamian region of what is now Iraq—and that family of faith traveled around that region of the word as nations formed and reformed, growing, shrinking and disappearing and reappearing in different forms.
We can see in our minds the faces that have preceded us in the faith that we follow—perhaps related to us, but many who drew us into faith and spiritual connections to God. We have been drawn and influenced by those we argued with and those with whom we have agreed deeply. Imagine those first conversations about God and the face with whom you associate those words. What does God look like? Where does God live? Wherever those words began . . .
Now imagine the faces of the current people who are a part of your connection to God—family and friends whose actions and words draw you closer to them and draw your more intimately into your relationship with Jesus Christ. How have you endured the tragedy of untimely death or other loss? What and who have given you strength? Often we are propped up for a time by the strength of others as our own strength is sapped.
We know from our experience and from the witness of scripture that faith is on a continuum, always moving and growing and changing to fit within and draw us closer to God. That is the gift of faith—that even in the darkest moments of sorrow it is still there to be embraced when we have the strength to take it up again.
As we live and move and have our being, we carry with us the most personal experiences of how God has lived with us and cared for us. And within the family tree of faith, we also have the long view of history as told to us through the traditions and stories of the faith of the Jewish people and the faith of the earliest churches and in the faith of the continuing church as it is lived today in so many ways.
The stories of the Jewish people in the First Testament reveal beliefs in blood sacrifice to restore a relationship with God—but as happens many times the ritual became more important than the change in relationship. The scripture from the book of Isaiah this morning condemns burnt offerings, blood sacrifice and other physical ritual. We hear these words:
What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices?
says the Lord;
I have had enough of burnt-offerings of rams
and the fat of fed beasts;
I do not delight in the blood of bulls,
or of lambs, or of goats.
even though you make many prayers,
I will not listen;
your hands are full of blood.
Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean;
remove the evil of your doings
from before my eyes;
cease to do evil,
learn to do good;
seek justice,
rescue the oppressed,
defend the orphan,
plead for the widow.[2]
What these words noted was that the physical sacrifice took the place of spiritual transformation—the action of bringing a gift to the temple took the place of doing action that revealed a real connection to God’s will for justice. The sacrifice was supposed to represent the transformation and repentance and then those sacrifices began to take the place of real faith in action.
God offered a real relationship that will change the way to connect with God and they—like people often do—looked at the surface and not the depths. God told them that they could not pray and be heard when their lives did not match with the love that God had offered.
Those are the legacies and inheritances of faith that we are offered as people share their lives and stories—and as we share our own with others. The story of faith is as old as the human race and we must cultivate the kind of patience that accompanies a history of that length.
Jesus assured those who followed him of their place in God’s household despite the time that might pass, the unawareness of God’s reality that might exist even in those who claim the faith or the pain and suffering that the community would experience. What they valued—community, shared sorrows, caring for those in need and faith in the eternal—would be theirs if it truly was what they desired. What we are ready to receive and what we are given are intimately related.
Though we may seek fast answers to problems and obstacles that surround us, the roots of difficulty may need time to root out and understand, without destroying the living journey we continue to travel. This journey we walk does not end with us—it continues through us into new generations beyond even our awareness.
When we imagine new generations of Christians—new generations of those faithful to the living Jesus Christ—we can offer our prayers of hope and we can offer the support of experience. We can also offer the word of good news that God values those who are in need—and God values those who share what they have with those in need.
The faith in which we journey means that even when our own dreams have not been fulfilled, we can rely on God’s promises for those who come along after us. We can rely on the promise of being God’s own children in the faith that we have received and in the faith that we continue to live and teach and carry forward into the future.
We are connected by faith to that which we value—God spoke through Isaiah about the faith that God wanted, a faith that led to lives of doing good, seeking justice and rescuing the oppressed. God spoke through the author of Hebrews, revealing the long development and revelation of God’s intentions—still being revealed. God spoke through and in the life of Jesus as he taught us of the unknowable and mysterious time in which God works, the hope of knowing the kingdom or household of God is with the faithful and the knowledge that it always has drawn us and continues to draw us forward perhaps for many generations.
A wonderful prayer by Thomas Merton goes well with this reading, and we can almost imagine the letter-writer including it as a closing: "My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope that I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this, you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone" (Thoughts in Solitude).[3]
To the glory of God and in the faith that we share. Amen.
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[1] http://www.ucc.org/worship/samuel/august-8-2010.html
[2] Isaiah 1:11b, 15b-17
[3] http://www.ucc.org/worship/samuel/august-8-2010.html
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