I want to state the obvious,
although we may have forgotten it
or simply never thought about it
because it is so completely obvious.
Everything we have to offer here
is rooted in Biblical Wisdom.
The worship…
the traditions…
the community…
the sacraments…
the sermons…
any of it that is of enduring value
is rooted in Biblical Wisdom.
In the same way
that our Laws are supposed to be rooted
in the Constitution,
and in the same way that medicine
is supposed to be rooted in biology and chemistry,
and in the same way that astronomy
is supposed to be rooted in astrophysics,
we are rooted in Biblical Wisdom.
As with any of those bodies of knowledge,
take away the substance of that to which they are rooted,
and our confidence in their value
will be radically if not completely diminished.
By Biblical Wisdom
I do not mean
what many churches proclaim
when they talk about being “Bible-based.”
I do not mean
that we are rooted in
or even tied to
the literal words
or facticity of the stories.
Rather, the Wisdom
is embedded in the interpretive process,
and is dependent upon
a roly-poly wrestling
to connect the text
to each new generation’s situation.
Like dragging a heavy extension cord
a far distance to reach a lone plug,
there is no juice
until the connection is made.
When it comes to the Bible
we cannot point to a word
or words
or single story
or phrase
and say, “See, that’s what the Bible says!”
When we make that kind of
unimaginative,
literally-minded attempt
to match what ‘we already think’
with words in the Bible,
we end up
approving of slavery,
condemning homosexuality,
and unable to sleep with our wives
at certain times of the month.
And because so much of popular Christianity
does that kind of maneuver,
Liberal and Progressive Christians
have been total punks
when it comes to Biblical Wisdom.
What Liberal and Progressive Christians
should have discovered by now,
is that without Biblical Wisdom
we have nothing…
nothing.
Whenever Liberal and Progressive Christians
have embarked upon Social Action
or Civil Rights
or any kind of advocacy
without being spiritually and emotionally funded
with a deep connection to Biblical Wisdom,
we have ended up defeated,
emotionally and spiritually bankrupt,
and exhausted.
We have been reactionary
against the literal-minded
and politically regressive wing of Christianity,
and so we have lost the very thing
that empowered us to begin with.
I mention all of that,
because that Exodus text
is the nest
that holds
the first tender eggs
of Biblical Wisdom,
from which everything else
is hatched.
Actually,
Biblical scholars believe that those verses,
Exodus 19:1-6,
are the remains of a very early
Covenant Renewal liturgy.
If you think of our Baptismal Covenant,
the one we said last week
during Lucia’s Baptism,
that is the kind of thing
they are talking about.
Scholars think that those verses in Exodus,
like a petrified tree trunk
or ancient mummy,
are the remains of a very ancient
Hebrew cult ritual.
So imagine
that three thousand years ago,
a very nomadic and tribal religious movement
spreading across the hill country of Judea,
gathered on the third new moon of the year
around a sacred fire
to recited a creedal affirmation
something like this:
“House of Jacob,
you have seen what I did to the Egyptians,
and how I bore you on eagles’ wings
and brought you to myself.
Now therefore,
if you obey my voice
and keep my covenant,
you shall be my treasured possession
out of all the peoples.
Indeed, the whole earth is mine,
but you shall be for me
a priestly kingdom
and a holy nation.”
Covenant with God,
that is what this scrap of parchment memory is about;
and covenant is
the very first spiritual idea
of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition.
This idea is whispered
across three thousand years
from them to us.
We should be speechless
in its presence,
as if seeing the Grand Canyon for the first time.
But truthfully,
it is probably nothing more to us
than reading the directions for microwaving broccoli,
when we should be astounded.
Really.
I do not know if human beings
will be here
three thousand years from now,
but if they are,
these words will make it to them…
of that I am almost certain.
The Church might not make it.
Christianity might not make it.
But these words will make it.
And these words tell us
that we are in a relationship
with the Creator of the Universe.
But stop there.
Stand on that ground for a moment.
Hold your breath:
We are
in a relationship
with the Creator of the Universe.
WE are.
US:
Little imperceptible dust particles
dangling at the tail end
of a modestly sized galaxy,
in the vast,
enormous,
unimaginable expanse
of interstellar space.
We are.
“If you keep my commandments
you shall be a priestly kingdom
and a holy nation.”
Now, of course,
we have gotten that wrong
almost from the beginning,
and so many times throughout history
it would be laughable
if not for the cruel acts of violence
embedded in our idiocy.
“Nation”
does not mean sovereign state,
and “kingdom”
does not mean a land with borders,
and “priesthood”
does not mean a religious caste.
We humans
heard that invitation and promise of Exodus 19
and we heard: “Get some!”
Get some land.
Get some power.
Get some affluence.
To that is not where the emphasis is,
at least God’s emphasis.
The invitation and promise,
to state it more clearly, is:
If you live in relationship with one another
in the ways I have shown you how to live,
other people will see it
and find it compelling,
and all of you will prosper.
It does not mean
other people will then become Jews,
or that Jews will be the rulers of the world,
or that The Promise Land
is the State of Israel.
It means
that there will be a people
that know how to live with one another
so that others will know how to live.
It means
that there will be a people
who understand the nature of the Creation,
and how to live in it
with one another
so that all of it is sustainable, and
there is abundance rather than scarcity.
From that core hive of human wisdom
there will emanate
a spirituality and maturity
that others will find compelling
and adopt for themselves –
not a religion
but a way of living in the world together;
a way of being in relationship with one another.
Just as the Cosmos includes
stars around which planets orbit,
a community of sacred wisdom
issues light and understanding
around which other human communities
may become sacred.
So it is amazing;
or whatever superlative you want to use
but that is inadequate to sum up its stunning place
at the heart of the human experience.
We are in relationship with God
and when we live in the ways God has invited us to live,
heaven and nature sing.
There is no summing up
Biblical Wisdom into some Hallmark Card punch line.
But there this nub at the core
that changes everything
once we understand it.
And it is about love,
and loving.
When we understand
what Biblical Wisdom means by love,
it will change how we hear
and understand
a speech like the one in John 15.
In Common Wisdom,
more often than not,
we speak of love as a commodity.
It is a thing.
In our world
love is a psychological thing,
or a sociological thing,
or a chemical thing
or an economic thing
or an emotional thing
or a sexual thing.
Love is something
we have,
want,
need,
or are going to ‘get.’
That means love is a commodity
and the value of commodities is based upon scarcity.
But in Biblical Wisdom
love is a verb,
an action, and
something we do
rather than something we get.
In Biblical Wisdom
love is a concrete act
taken in a given situation
and for
or with
a particular person.
We have not only been corrupted
by French romanticism
that emotionalized love,
we have been corrupted by consumerism
that turns love into a commodity.
In Biblical Wisdom,
to say, God is love
is to say,
that God is committing an action,
or committed to action.
To say, God is love
is to say, God is actually doing something.
A God that does not do something
is not a God of love.
In Biblical Wisdom
to say, we love
or to say we are loving,
whether to ourselves or one another,
is to say we are acting like God.
To act like God
is to abide in God’s love;
to act like God
is to rest in God’s love.
To act like God
we must love God in a particular body
and in particular ways.
To love God
is to DO love for another person’s body,
as if that body was God’s very own body.
To love God
is to DO love for our own body
as the place God has chosen
to cohabitate with us.
To love God
is to DO love for the earth
as if the planet is the body that most reflects
the image of God for us.
You and I are incapable
of doing love universally –
to a dis-embodied God,
to a generic class of people,
to an idea about the earth.
In other words,
God as the poor people of the world, is unlovable.
God as the homeless people of the world, is unlovable.
God as the peacemakers of the world, is unlovable.
God as the suffering people of the world, is unlovable.
We get a rush of intellectual juice
from imagining we love justice
and love some category of marginalize people,
but it is just a rush of junk.
We cannot love categories of people;
we cannot DO ideas about people.
But God incarnate
in the particular face
of a particular person
who is poor,
or who is homeless,
or who is subject to violence,
is loveable.
We can DO love
for a particular person,
and abide in the love of God
in the presence of a particular body.
So the task before us is this:
To do love in small,
concrete action
for particular people.
We must get good,
and I mean really good,
at DOing love for the particular people
who are right in front of us
and around us
in our ordinary days,
because the inflated mental flatulence of generic
love and concern for the masses
will not be DOing a lot of good
for anyone but our own satisfaction.
The point is to stretch ourselves
to DO love for particular people
who seem just outside the reach of our comfort zone,
and to extend our concrete action
to people
and places
we may not otherwise go,
as if…
as if to love God
means to act like God.
And that is what Exodus 19 is about.
When we act like God
we become a holy kingdom
and a priestly nation.
Not one with borders
but one with a matrix of relationships
that changes the world.
Not one with power
but one with actions
that show other people how to act.
Not one with wealth and sovereignty
but one that has an abundance of joy and gratitude.
To be in covenant with God
is not about having the right ideas about God,
or ascribing to the correct doctrine about God,
is has to do with acting like God.
So I started out
saying that without Biblical Wisdom
we have nothing, nada.
That is not quite true.
You and I have learned from our own experiences,
both positively and negatively,
how to act like God.
We know what kind of actions
create and feed
sustainable relationships
and sustainable equity
and sustainable environments.
We know it
deep in our bones,
from our own failures
and our occasional successes.
But Biblical Wisdom was there first,
and it is amazing to me
how deep
and profound
and astoundingly powerful
the insights of ancient people are
for highly sophisticated
and technologically adorned
highly mobile people
of the 21st century.
We like to imagine
we know more than they did
and that, given our achievements,
we are smarter than they were.
But what I find comforting
and a bit unnerving at the same time,
is how abiding such wisdom is.
So, in some ways your mother probably
taught you the same thing:
Act like God and everything will turn out better.
©R Cameron Miller
