B Pentecost16 2015
September 13, 2015
Genesis 2:4b-25
Narrator 1: These are
the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created. In the day
that the Lord God made
the earth and the heavens, when no plant of the field was yet in the earth and
no herb of the field had yet sprung up—for the Lord God
had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was no one to till the
ground; but a stream would rise from the earth, and
water the whole face of the ground— then the Lord
God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the
breath of life; and the man became a living being.
Narrator 2: And the Lord God
planted a garden in Eden, in the east; and there he put the man whom he had
formed. Out of the ground the Lord God
made to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food, the
tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil. A river flows out of Eden to water the
garden, and from there it divides and becomes four branches. The
name of the first is Pishon; it is the one that flows around the whole land of
Havilah, where there is gold; and the
gold of that land is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. The
name of the second river is Gihon; it is the one that flows around the whole
land of Cush. The name of the third river is Tigris,
which flows east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates. The
Lord God took the man and put him in the garden
of Eden to till it and keep it. And the Lord God
commanded the man,
God: You may freely eat of every tree of
the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good
and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.
Narrator 1: Then the Lord God
said,
God: It is not good that the man should
be alone; I will make him a helper as his partner.
Narrator 2: So out of
the ground the Lord God formed
every animal of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the
man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called every living
creature, that was its name. The man
gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every animal of
the field; but for the man there was not found a helper as his partner.
Narrator 1: So the Lord God
caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then he took one of his
ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the
rib that the Lord God had
taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then
the man said,
Man: This at last is bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh; this one shall be called Woman, for out of Man this one
was taken.
Narrator 2: Therefore
a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become
one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked,
and were not ashamed.
Grace to you and Peace from our Lord and Savior, Jesus
Christ.
You
have identified the first value of Bethlehem as The Illuminating Word of
God. You may have heard me preach on
this before…it will not be the last time.
This value is the very reason we enter scripture differently this
fall. Instead of hearing a collection of
stories from a particular gospel, we will begin at the beginning of God’s Word
as we know it. God’s Word that begins
“In the beginning” and ultimately is expressed to us and for us in Jesus. In Jesus’
life, death and resurrection. For this
is what God “says” – it’s God’s Word– this is God’s message of grace.
We are
told in this story today that God’s will is to create and relate. Millennium BEFORE Jesus was born in
Bethlehem, God was sending the same message.
The message of complete and total grace.
Out of nothing, out of the dirt, God graces us with existence and
relationship. This is our journey this
fall… together we will fall into Grace, fall into the Sacred Story, fall into
the epic tale of God and the ones whom God loves.
We will
trace the grace from the garden of
Eden, to Isaac born to Sarah and Abraham, through Jacob, the scoundrel, and
from Moses to the Israelites great covenant of the 10 commandments, by way of
Ruth to the people’s cry for a king, just to land in the prophets (Elijah,
Hosea and Isaiah) as they remind God’s people of the grace of this determined
God who wants to be their king. We will
tell the story of God’s grace even in exile, because grace is most present when
the fallen need to be redeemed. And we
will come to Christmas with a whole new understanding of what God is about to
do with this baby in this manger, for we will have seen God’s grace come over
and over again, until finally God picks a particular time and place to take on
human form, to live out the self-sacrificing grace of loving us to a human
death, and breaking the condemnation of death into new life.
We are
walking on holy ground. Like Moses, God may ask us to remove your shoes. Take a minute to remove that which protects
you. Take off the hard soles that
prevent you from feeling every rock and stick beneath your feet. Take off the armor around your heart that
stops you from thinking too deeply about where God might be showing up. God’s showing up right here.
The
creation story from Genesis 2 that we heard today, is just the beginning. But most of you have already noticed. It’s actually not the very first story in
scripture. Genesis 1 is also a creation
story. These two stories of creation are
different, and there is much to be explored about their differences, sort of
like having four gospels that all tell the story of Jesus. The two creation stories are set side-by-side
so that we might get to know more of the innumerable things there are to know
about this God who wants to grace us with his presence.
You may
know by heart what comes before in Genesis 1: “In the beginning God created the
heavens and the earth…” and each day of creation is accounted for in a neat
7-day week, and all that God creates is acclaimed as “Good.” All of creation is created good, and is
intended for good. God has every
intention of shaping and claiming creation for the beauty of connectedness and
balance: light/dark, night/day, land/water.
Which
makes it all the more noticeable when we get to verse 18 in Genesis 2 and God
says “It is not good [///] that the [human] should be alone.” What? It is Not Good? Something God has created is not good…
YET. For while God creates the Adam out
of the adamah, the human made of humous, the God-shaped-dust… God creates not
just a piece of great pottery, but a BEING meant for relationship. For the God
who is relationship put that imprint upon us.
The God who is relationship created us to relate to God! And for being together in family units, in congregations, in
communities… as the grace opportunity to learn to forgive and to love the way
God does.
God
creates the woman, another God-shaped-dust, because animals, as wonderful as
they are, just don’t make the same kind of equal helpers that other humans
do. Here too, is another way God creates
in his own image. Just like the woman, it
is God who is named an “ezer,” a
“Helper” in the rest of the Grace Story. Like in Psalm 46: “God is our refuge
and strength, our very present help in trouble.” Or, you may know this one, {sing line:} Here
I raise my Ebenezer – that line is about raising a monument to our ultimate
helper, our ultimate grace-giver – God! Eve
is created as Adam’s helper, as Adam is for her, she is the only one who could
equal him, and the completion of the created order of complimentary pairs.
Here,
at the beginning, God creates us. The
Bible story starts with our ever-present, eternal God deciding to start time,
to bring into being with his very breath, a whole world filled with wonder. And a particular species – homo sapiens – who are created with an
imprint of God’s image. Created for the
very purpose of relationship with the creation around us, and with our
God.
Millennium
before Jesus, God puts in place the world that Jesus will one day enter. What possessed God to do it? It looks like God, in God’s three-in-one
self, wouldn’t think of existing on one’s own.
No, God birthed life at the beginning because that’s what God does. Out of the three-in-one God, the God that IS
relationship, a relationship is born. A
relationship with us. What more
powerful grace is there, than the love of our ultimate God for the
insignificant beings, that in relationship to God, are made significant.
As we
continue on this journey through God’s Word, I’ll be filling-in the in-between
stories, as it is helpful. But I am sure
that some of you will be curious to crack open a Bible and see for yourself
what we’ve missed. You will have
Devotional Inserts each week to help you with that. There are bookmarks for you to take home and
put in your Bible, so you can stay connected to the arc of the Grace Story,
even if you cannot be with us on Sunday.
And you can join us on the first and third Wednesdays for ‘Bible and
Wine’ and get another whole level of Bible – the New Testament, to be ready to
more deeply understand the Grace story.
This
week, as you, church, disperse into the community, as you put your shoes back
on for the daily grind. You may take a
little more notice when God’s holy image shows up in your life. In the desire to create something; be it a
spreadsheet or a website or a drawing.
In the desire to relate, to love your pet or your spouse or your child,
regardless of how lovable they may be at that moment. In eating your veggies, or tending and
harvesting your garden, may you remember the garden that God plants us in: the
dust out of which we have come and the breath that makes us like God, and the
ongoing care that God has to help us bear fruit.
The air
we breathe, the water drink, the dirt we till, the dirt we are. That’s grace.
Let’s
fall into it together.
Amen.
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