Feb 26 Construction Within (Jeremiah 31:31-34)
Anchor:
Signposts of Renewal
Frame:
“Construction Within” (a sign akin to “construction ahead)
How do we get ready for
construction?
Thread:
Signs added each week
When I am out driving, I dread seeing those orange
signs: “Road Construction Ahead.” Sometimes they forecast: “Road Construction
Next 13 Miles.” Sometimes the just let us guess how long it is likely to go on.
Sometimes the construction is obvious with big trucks and rubble and workers in
reflective vests. Sometimes you drive past a mile or more of orange cones set
out to channel the traffic but see nary a sign of any work. We all appreciate the
results of the construction. We like the wider, smoother roads. But most of us
are at least annoyed by the inconvenience of slowed traffic, rough roads, of
waiting for the flag-person to turn the sign from “Stop” to (finally!) “Slow.”
Internal construction is often greeted the same way.
When we come upon a time of change and transition, it’s like seeing those
orange signs. We know there may be rough road and slow going ahead, and often
as not we have no idea how long the construction will continue. But without
ongoing reconstruction our spiritual infrastructure will deteriorate, crumble,
and fail to support us. We need the work to be done.
Jeremiah 31:31-34 says: "Behold, the days are
coming, says Yhwh, when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel
and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their
ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them up out of the land of Egypt—a
covenant they broke, though I was their spouse, says Yhwh. But this is the
covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says Yhwh: I
will put my Law in their minds and on their hearts. I will be their God, and
they will be my people. No longer will they need to teach one another or remind
one another to listen to Yhwh. All of them, high and low alike, will listen to
me, says Yhwh, for I will forgive their misdeeds and will remember their sins
no more.”
Jeremiah’s time was one of painful, terrible
destruction and reconstruction. The prophet saw that as long as the covenant of
God remained an external addition it was for most people irrelevant and
forgotten. It was time for a new kind of covenant: not one written on calf-skin
and hauled around on a scroll. It was time for a covenant carried within one’s
heart. There the covenant would shape and inspire and construct a life of
justice, compassion, and peace. The people would not have to teach the covenant
because they would live it. The people of Israel avoided this kind of
construction within until they were finally conquered by Babylon. That conquest
started one of the most painful but significant periods of construction for the
Israelites, second only to the Exodus. Liberation and homecoming became their spiritual
signposts, by which they were renewed, healed, and restored.
We live in a time when people are looking for “Christian”
signs. Franklin Graham (son of Billy) says he can’t tell if Obama is a
Christian because of the church he goes to (UCC!), because of his lack of moral
stands (?), because of his soft gloves approach to Islam (!). He doesn’t see
the signs he’s looking for. It seems like we get off track pretty badly when we
look for signs of other people’s construction without observing those signs
calling for our own.
So, how do we prepare ourselves for interior
construction? While the 12 Steps are all about interior construction with the
aim of exterior reform, I want to look at 3 Simple Rules. Back in the late 1700’s,
as Europe was riding the crest of the Enlightenment, John Wesley proposed 3
Rules for changing one’s life and also thereby changing the world. In
contemporary language those rules are: 1. Do No Harm, 2. Do Good, and 3. Stay
in Love with God. Refraining from doing harm allows construction to be
undertaken on our baser instincts: anger, hatred, greed, even apathy, etc.(example:
not return the bird when flipped off on the road!) Doing good takes the
construction into positive action: actually doing those things that make the
world a better place (example: allowing the harried mom behind you check out
ahead of you at the grocery store, [Oh! buying grocery cards to help SCUCC!]).
Staying in love with God entails doing those things that open our lives up to
God: prayer, worship, giving, sacraments, meditation, time with scripture and
spiritual reading. As Lent begins, we can invite our people to take on 3 Simple
Rules, as opposed to giving up stuff that we probably should give up in
ordinary time anyway. This is one way of allow the covenant to be written in
hearts and lives and not just on paper.
I have a simple labyrinth that I think will fit on
the floor in front of the steps. The labyrinth is a great metaphor for the road
within. It is not a long labyrinth, and if we have read parts, the reader could
walk to the center of labyrinth to read. Or as we lift each of the 3 Rules, it
could be done from the center.
I see the 3rd Rule as the heart of the
day: staying in love with God. We might invite the gathered community to
experience centering prayer. My labyrinth isn’t big enough to invite everybody
to walk it at the same time, but it could be available after worship.
For our threshold moment, I see a construction
worker sauntering up front with one of those signs that has STOP on one side
and SLOW on the other (like a flag person in a construction zone). After
getting set, this person then turns the STOP sign toward us and waits for
everything to stop. They could listen on a walkie talkie, look at their watch,
choose an album on their ipod. Finally, after getting the OK on the radio, they
turn the sign to the SLOW and gives us permission to continue! They could come
back in occasionally during the rest of the morning and repeat the actions
(more briefly!). Even someone walking the labyrinth could have to wait…
Here is a video featuring Diana Butler Bass, whose
book we are studying in Lent. While it does not use the specific language of
signposts, it does talk about Christianity under construction and may be useful
for our beginning Sunday (or some other Sunday). http://www.theworkofthepeople.com/index.php?ct=store.details&pid=V00722
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