(A sermon preached at Irvine UCC on August 27. The scripture readings were: Exodus 1:8-20 and Matthew 16:13-20.)
Was it just me, or in witnessing political
events over the last year did some of you also feel like you’d been kicked in
the stomach, repeatedly? It’s been quite
the emotional roller coaster. After the
election, more than one friend who was black, or who had been active in human
rights before the last election, said: “Welcome to my world.”
The Women’s March was cathartic, and
hopeful. Three million people around the
globe marched. My son’s friend Steven,
in Lusaka, Zambia, marched with 200 other ex-pats. Then roughly 2.5 million of those people went
home, hung up their signs, and stopped taking action. Were they despairing? Overwhelmed?
Or just comfortable enough? I
don’t want to be any of those things. I
want to be inspired: so on fire with God’s Spirit that I am compelled to keep
acting for love and justice, for the long haul.
So let us gather inspiration for action,
starting with our scripture readings.
Shortly before Moses floated down the Nile in his baby basket, we find
the first documented nonviolent resisters in history: Shiphrah and Puah, Hebrew
midwives (Exodus 1:8-20). Shiphrah and Puah refused to
kill the babies they helped birth, as Pharaoh had commanded them to do. This does not seem a huge achievement, does
it? But maybe it was. Imagine what our world would be like if every
person throughout history had refused to follow immoral orders.
Shiphrah and Puah were called before Pharaoh to
account for their failure to murder babies.
They stood before this all-powerful ruler and they said, “Oops! I guess we got there too late,” giving
Pharaoh a chance to save face and call the whole thing off. Pharaoh did not call off the massacre, but
now he was forced send his own men in to murder the babies. Which I’m sure helped his popularity ratings.
Shiphrah and Puah inspire me to stand up for
what’s right, and they remind me to do it respectfully, even gently. We can
winsomely speak for the economic
benefits of our cities adopting renewable energy. We can have respectful conversations with our
local police departments about policies for dealing with the mentally ill and
immigrants, and about how not to pull a gun on a black teen for the crime of
entering his own home when bigoted neighbors make unwarranted calls. (Yes folks, this actually happened in UCI
faculty housing.) Making the Powers that
Be the enemy is counterproductive.
Instead, we can appeal to their best nature, like Shiphrah and Puah
did. Our gentle courtesy makes it all
the more starkly ugly when they choose cruelty.
My favorite contemporary inspirer is the Rev.
Dr. William Barber. How many of you know
William Barber? If you don’t, you’re
missing out. Barber is ordained in our
sister denomination, the Disciples of Christ.
He has been crisscrossing North Carolina for years as the head of their
NAACP. He started a “fusion coalition”
where a Planned Parenthood staffer would march and speak for racial justice and
a Black Lives Matter organizer would do the same for reproductive rights. Intersectionality is for wimps. Real unity is what he’s building. This human rights fusion coalition showed up
at the Capital building in Raleigh and got arrested. Every Monday.
For a year. They registered
voters. And they won elections. Rev. Barber organized all this despite a
painful disability that barely allows him to walk. “It’s not about left and right,” Barber likes
to say. “It’s about right and
wrong.” If you want to get inspired,
just watch a little of Rev. Barber on YouTube.
Marianne Williamson was a surprising source of
inspiration when I needed it most. This
past February on a lark, because it was five miles from my house, I attended a
conference she put on, called “Sister Giant.” I thought it was going to be New
Thought spirituality (her specialty) with a little politics thrown in. It turned out to be Activism 101. Two thousand women, and a few men, who might
have shown up to learn how to be enlightened, you know: healthy and wealthy and
happy, instead got cutting-edge speakers on voter suppression, immigrant
rights, or lack thereof, mass incarceration and a host of other very challenging
topics.
Marianne’s favorite line was: Slavery wasn’t abolished because of people
who didn’t like it. Slavery was
abolished because of abolitionists, who did something about it. Throughout the Who’s Who of activist
speakers, Marianne repeatedly asked the people in the audience: “What are you going to do for justice? Figure it out before you leave here.” I already knew I was going to be praying at
the White House as a public witness. But
I found my partner for that public witness because of Marianne Williamson. (If
you want to hear that story, it’s in our Conference E-Zine: http://www.scncucc.org/voices/2017/04/perspectives/praying-at-the-white-house/)
My local inspirer in Northern Virginia has been
Laura Martin, the Associate Pastor at Rock Spring Congregational UCC. She spoke to my broken heart in worship, and
she walks the talk. Laura was at Charlottesville holding hands with other
clergy as they faced the mysterious militias.
Those thuggish looking militia men were apparently quite ethical, if
terrifying. They were seriously trying
to keep the peace, and we need to befriend them. Though I’m really grateful we don’t have open
carry in California. Laura went to the
hospital in Charlottesville to accompany the people who had been beaten with
pipes and required plastic surgery. So
she was there when the car terrorist’s victims arrived. Nothing like a firsthand report.
Before Charleston, Laura wrote this poem, called
“Wild Angels”:
Wild angels are my
Favorite kind.
They have no idea where
They left their haloes,
And they let their robes
Run through fresh mud.
They don’t stand in formation
And sing with a choir.
Instead they show up and
Change tires
On highways,
Sit down and have a beer
And listen,
Trespass in the park
To sit on the swings
Late at night.
They come to hospital rooms
To tell bad jokes,
To airports to carry
Heavy bags,
To food pantries
When it’s the end of the month
And the money has run out.
They believe in
Revelation unfolding,
In the sacred scripture
We write between
Each other.
Thank you, Laura.
Our times require much inspiration. So… I gather inspiring quotes and stories for
activists and publish them weekly on my blog.
It helps me stay inspired.
Jesus is the first source of my
inspiration. Through Jesus, we know the
heart of God, and the call of God upon our hearts. Calling us out of oppression, and out of
complacency. Calling us to live out his
mercy and forgiveness and compassion and justice in loving community.
Jesus’ call puts some limits on our political
methods, doesn’t it? That is actually an
advantage, because creative nonviolence is the most effective kind of political
action. And it is the only kind of
political action that leaves us inspired, instead of making us a little too
much like our enemies. So are we going
to let intolerance co-opt Jesus’ name, or can we frame our action in moral
terms, in biblical terms, in Christian terms?
William Barber is brilliant at this; I’m doing my best to learn from
him.
“Who do you say that I am?” Jesus asks us in Matthew 16. Is he the one whose name got co-opted to
bless cruelty and greed? Well, yes, if
we are silent.
Or we can stand up in front of everybody,
progressive nonreligious activists and conservative Christians and claim with
quiet assurance: I am committed to
justice and human rights because I follow Jesus, and I rely on his Spirit and
his Power to do this work. Jesus is the
first source of our inspiration. Please,
can we stop keeping it a secret?
My purpose this morning is to inspire you into
action in the face of great evil. It’s
bad, folks. Much inspiration is
required. So… in addition to gathering
inspirations for my blog, I participate in a weekly call for inspiration and
accountability. A small group of friends
talk about what we’ve learned and done for justice in the past week and what we
plan to do in the coming week, bookended by those inspirations. My nonreligious friend was dubious about this
format at first. But now she says, “I’m
counting on that inspiration, Terry! Will
you do your closing prayer?” Care to
join us?
Inspiration… is not comfortable. God’s children who are on the receiving end
of hatred and cruelty and injustice are not comfortable. The Spirit of God brings us restlessness and
creativity, challenge and disruption, tears and transformation. I hope you don’t get too comfortable. I hope you stay inspired to act for love and
justice, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
