Sermon for June 27, 2010
Living in the Whirlwind
2 Kings 2:1-2, 6-14
Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind,
Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal. Elijah said to Elisha,
"Stay here; for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel." But Elisha
said, "As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave
you." So they went down to Bethel.
Then Elijah said to him, "Stay here; for the Lord has sent me to
the Jordan." But he said, "As the Lord lives, and as you yourself
live, I will not leave you." So the two of them went on. Fifty men of the
company of prophets also went, and stood at some distance from them, as they
both were standing by the Jordan. Then Elijah took his mantle and rolled it up,
and struck the water; the water was parted to the one side and to the other,
until the two of them crossed on dry ground.
When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, "Tell me what I may
do for you, before I am taken from you." Elisha said, "Please let me
inherit a double share of your spirit." He responded, "You have asked
a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it will be
granted you; if not, it will not." As they continued walking and talking,
a chariot of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them, and Elijah ascended
in a whirlwind into heaven. Elisha kept watching and crying out, "Father,
father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!" But when he could no
longer see him, he grasped his own clothes and tore them in two pieces.
He picked up the mantle of Elijah that had fallen from him, and went
back and stood on the bank of the Jordan. He took the mantle of Elijah that had
fallen from him, and struck the water, saying, "Where is the Lord, the God
of Elijah?" When he had struck the water, the water was parted to the one
side and to the other, and Elisha went over.
Philippians 4 (New International
Version)
1Therefore, my brothers, you whom I love
and long for, my joy and crown, that is how you should stand firm in the Lord,
dear friends!
Exhortations
2I plead with Euodia and I plead with
Syntyche to agree with each other in the Lord. 3Yes, and I ask you, loyal yokefellow,[a] help these women who have contended at
my side in the cause of the gospel, along with Clement and the rest of my
fellow workers, whose names are in the book of life.
4Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it
again: Rejoice! 5Let your
gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. 6Do not be anxious about anything, but in
everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to
God. 7And the
peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and
your minds in Christ Jesus.
8Finally, brothers, whatever is true,
whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely,
whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such
things. 9Whatever
you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into
practice. And the God of peace will be with you.
Luke 9:51-62
When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to
Jerusalem. And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village
of the Samaritans to make ready for him; but they did not receive him, because
his face was set towards Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw it,
they said, "Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven
and consume them?" But he turned and rebuked them. Then they went on to
another village.
As they were going along the road, someone said to him, "I will
follow you wherever you go." And Jesus said to him, "Foxes have
holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay
his head." To another he said, "Follow me." But he said,
"Lord, first let me go and bury my father." But Jesus said to him,
"Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the
kingdom of God." Another said, "I will follow you, Lord; but let me
first say farewell to those at my home." Jesus said to him, "No one
who puts a hand to the plough and looks back is fit for the kingdom of
God."
When I was a little girl I lived in California and every summer we would go for a week to the beach. My memories begin when I would go out with my mother and jump the waves. The strongest part of that memory is the connection to my mother’s hand. We would be standing up to our waists in the rocking waves of the cold ocean and.. when a wave would come …we would jump at just the point the wave was strongest and the wave would lift us both off our feet for what seemed like minutes of magical joy –as if the water itself had lifted us up and beyond the surf.
As I grew older, I would go with girlfriends and we would jump the waves together ….human flotsam and jetsum riding the ripples …..until we were old enough and brave enough to take on the deeper surf. With most big waves it is possible--- even if the water rises over your head-- to catch it at just the right time and to float suspended… for amazing seconds, hearing the surf crash just behind you…but sometimes, if it comes too fast or is too big---you have to make the decision to dive right through the wave and that is an even more amazing lift. You have to catch the wave just as it is crashing above your head …and dive right through where it begins to foam and then aim your body like a bullet through the crest and out the other side.
Then again there was always the possibility of body-surfing the wave. That takes an even better sense of the wave..of catching it at just the right moment…stiffening your body and riding it to the shore.
I have not done much surfing with a board which can be an entirely other experience. The you have to manage a board as well, waiting outside the surf until a perfect wave comes, paddling quickly to ride on top of the wave to where the surf
begins to fold into a wave then deftly standing on the board and above the wave---finding a balance and then riding it to just our side the shoreline and jumping free.
It is common knowledge that surfing in the West---whether with a board or without—is most heavenly at sunset…when the sun slowly sinks toward the sea and seems to melt along the horizon. You can easily see why the Greeks and Romans thought of the sun as a chariot of fire…leaving a golden path behind at the end of the day.
We can also imagine Elisha in the moment Elijah was carried away—blinded by the sun as it set beyond the hills as he stood at the edge of the Jordan, windswept by the whirlwind that enveloped the place they stood. It was a far different whirlwind than the small still voice Elijah had found on the mountaintop in the scripture we read a few weeks back. This was the full moment of godliness in which Elijah was consumed by God wholly and completely and Elisha was left behind.
I mentioned the story of surfing with my mother because the scripture recounts the same sort of passing on of wisdom. Elisha kept following Elijah insisting he had to be there when he crossed over. They left the prophets’ home at Gilgal and travelled to Bethel. Elijah offered to let him stay but Elisha insisted he had to follow along.
They travelled then to the Jordan and Elijah offered to let him stay on the riverside but he wanted to pass through to somehow live into and through Elijah’s great spirit. And then he stayed as the whirlwind came and the sun shown like a chariot of fire and Elijah was carried away with the whirlwind.
We are encouraged not to take the image literally by scholars--- inasmuch as Greek mythology seemed to have been stirred into this scriptural memory, but it is beautiful nonetheless…and easy to understand if you have been with someone you love and cherish at the time of their death. There are often images and words which surpass our understanding…the one I might share is that of my mother-in-law who was French-canadian by birth and who, at the moment of her death sat up in bed--- her face filled with light--- reaching her hands out as if to a parent proclaiming “ La Lumiere, la Lumiere! In English that would be “the light, the light”. We might well imagine that Elijah at the moment he passed also saw the light as a chariot and Elijah was left on the windswept shore of the Jordan having lived through something otherworldly and yet very real.
What we also know about Elisha is that he feared he wouldn’t be up to the task of bearing Elijah’s mantel and yet he wanted it terribly. He begged Elijah to be sure he knew enough, had enough-no, double of the holy spirit to carry on and he stayed with Elijah to the end that he might have the touch feel smell and comfort of the mantel he left behind…some reminder to carry with him of who his beloved had been. Again, we are encouraged to make much of the mantel itself, there is no real biblical significance to a mantel..it too may be a carry over from the Greek but we know it was precious and something to hold onto as he went forth.
As always the old testament makes human our struggles to live as people of faith in times of change and loss. Elisha manifests what we know so well in ourselves about times of change. We follow after what gives us security, we doubt ourselves, we ask for assurance and we hope that material things might somehow help us hold on to memories or replace those we love.
Jesus, of course, cuts right through all of this in the gospel:
"Foxes have holes, and
birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his
head."
Follow me, he says to the
person-- but they are caught..in their obligations, in their traditions, in
their work.
" Jesus said to him, "No one who puts a hand to the plough and
looks back is fit for the kingdom of God."
Jesus is not talking about
giving up being human--- but rather about remembering what is most important.
We know and will hear in the weeks to come that Elisha does drop Elijah’s
mantel and becomes a prophet in his own right…making wise decisions,
encouraging others to remember God’s love and wisdom above all and encouraging others to make a new
Jerusalem on earth.
Jesus cuts right through
this process and puts it in words:
"Has God indeed said…He
who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will
find it."( Matthew 10:39)
Elisha
takes me back again to the seaside in California where I so desperately wanted
to be able to be at peace with the Great Ocean and probably just as much, ached
for the chance to be alone with my mother and something she loved.
In
the story of Elisha we find the truth of how delicious it can be to follow our
deepest yearnings…
To follow, as it says in
Phillipians….”whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever
is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or
praiseworthy—“
. 6Do not be anxious about anything, but in
everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to
God. 7
…And the
peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and
your minds in Christ Jesus.
I think
of the wave and the learning about just when to jump into the wave trusting
that the
water will lift you up and over every wave.
Rejoice! Paul
says to the Phillipians…” 9Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in
me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.”
Peace when we
follow our deepest desires, leave worries behind and trust in God.
Yesterday,
in the midst of the Strawberry Supper, I came upstairs to my office to get
something and the phone rang and it was the woman I talked about earlier who is
in need of diapers and formula . When she told me who she was I tensed up a bit since I knew we had spent
all we have to spend for her this year but in her cheery voice, as if we were
now friends, she shared with me her news that her older children are in Kurn
Hattin, that she has done all the paperwork for low income housing, that one
possibility had fallen through but she was hoping it would not be long until
she and her children had a home:
"Foxes have
holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay
his head."
The words of Jesus rang in my head.
And she shared how she was almost out of diapers and that her baby
needed special
formula…just like that as if of course I would understand. And the
miracle was that I
did understand. I still
have the memory of buying special formula for my third
daughter because she was
allergic to all the usual formula and of coming to the cash register and
cringing, week after week, and
paying $14 for a quart size can
and thinking, what would I do, what would we do if we couldn’t pay this much?
It
was as if this young woman and her children and I were facing the same wave,
the same whirlwind of concern for our children and the question was whether I
would continue to hold her hand. My child and her child were the same child
with a delicate stomach and I felt myself rise above the wave and ay, Yes! We
can do this, we can do this, I will ask and we will help you feed your
children.
My daughter is now 20 years
old and I praise God that I did not say ---oh no, I must turn away, I Must this
or we must that. I knew that God
had assured her that if she asked she would be lifted up with grace and joy and
I also knew it would really be no problem to respond at all…”to do whatever is true, whatever
is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is
admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. 9Whatever
you have learned or received or heard from Christ, or seen in Christ—and to put
it into practice.”
