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St. Charles Episcopal Church - Saint Charles, IL

The Second Sunday of Lent - Lent 2 RCL – Year C

Sunday, February 28, 2010                                                                                                                                                                            

Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18 – Psalm 27 – Philippians 3:17-4:1 – Luke 13:31-35

Rev. William R. Nesbit, Jr.

In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!”

The old testament is full of images of safety and support found under the wings of birds, but they are always the great pinions of great birds of prey like eagles. Images of power and strength. Jesus uses a hen; a domestic barnyard fowl. I wonder what he was thinking? Did you know that this is the only place in the whole Bible where hen is ever used, in this story told in both Luke and Matthew. This metaphor for God’s love gained some notoriety when it was used in one of the earlier alternative liturgies available from the national church, as we were working to try and moderate, or remove some of the sexist language from earlier liturgies. It was not well received. I could have predicted that. Anytime someone tinkers with the words in our prayerbook it is not well received, but this attempt was particularly, pardon me, foul. My mother, the long time head of the Altar Guild in our church, called it the “God the Chicken prayer.” It was not a term of endearment. The defensive cry of “Hey, it’s from the Bible,” didn’t add any weight to the argument either. Even the fact that Jesus himself said it could not redeem this metaphor. For some reason it just didn’t catch on. The sad part is that it really is a wonderful and rich image metaphor for God.

I found this out when I was at seminary, but not in the way you might think. It wasn’t from a theologian or some dusty old tome, or a feminist lobbying group, but from a farmer’s daughter. She was one of my classmates, a fellow sojourner on the road to ordination, and her name is Sue. As luck would have it, you may know her as well. She is currently the rector of St. David’s in Aurora. Unlike my origins in Chicago suburbia, Sue’s road to seminary came through the rural south. She tells this story of a chicken she had when she was younger, before she knew she was going to seminary. I swear to you this is a true story. Some of you have heard this story before, but like all good stories, it’s worth re-telling every so often. I only wish she were here to tell you the story because she does a much better job of telling it than I do, but you would expect that. It is, after all, her story. Sue was in charge of raising the chickens, and there was one little hen that was the best in the barnyard at teaching the little chicks to do all the things that chicks need to know to grow up and get by, you know all that scratchin’ and peckin’ stuff. She was so good at it in fact, that when other less worthy chickens would lay eggs Sue would move them into this hens nest. And that little hen would sit on those eggs just like they were her very own. And eventually they would hatch and imprint on the little hen and she would take them out into the barnyard and watch over them and teach them to scratch and peck just like they were her very own. This system worked very well for Sue until one day she decided to try duck eggs. Now I don’t know why she wanted to try duck eggs, but I do know Sue and there must have been a pretty important reason for her to try duck eggs, I just can’t remember what it was. Well Sue, being a farmers daughter and all, knew that the little hen wouldn’t keep the eggs moist like a mother duck would, or turn the eggs regularly like a mother duck would so she took care of that part herself. But other than that the little hen sat on those eggs and kept them warm even though they were much bigger than chicken eggs. Now the day came for the eggs to hatch and Sue came out to watch what would happen. Well, those little ducklings chiseled their way out of their eggs and flopped down exhausted in the nest and looked up at the little hen standing over them. Their eyes met. And the little hen thought those were the strangest looking chicks she had ever seen, but she loved them. And the ducklings thought that hen was the strangest looking duck they had ever seen, but they loved her. And there began one of the strangest barnyard relationship Sue had ever seen. Every morning those ducks would follow their momma in single file, as ducks are wont to do, out to the barnyard where they would scratch and peck to the best of their ability, what with their duck bills and webbed feet and all. And the amazing thing is, they actually got pretty good at it thanks to the teaching of that little hen. And all went well in a strange sort of a way until one day when the wind was just right and the ducklings happened to be in a far corner of the barnyard and they caught a whiff and then a glance of the pond. In a moment their other natures took over and off those ducklings went toward the water. When the little hen realized what was happening she took off after her brood. As it turned out Sue happened to be seeing all this from the porch of the house where she was having lunch. When the ducklings arrived at the waters edge they didn’t even slow down. They splashed right in and commenced to paddle and splash about just like a pack of ducklings. The little hen arrived at the waters edge and didn’t know what to do. Real chicks swim like rocks, you see, and for that matter so do hens, so the water is a very dangerous place for their kind. The little hen was beside herself with fear for her unusual brood and she began to run up and down the muddy beach flapping her wings and making an awful racket. Sue looked on with amusement from the porch until she saw her prize little hen dive right into the pond. In a panic Sue leapt off the porch and headed for the pond at a flat run, all the while watching the little hen flapping wildly in a struggle to keep her head above the water, and losing the battle. Sue ran straight into the water and scooped up her favorite hen from the pond. The ducklings, frightened at first by all the activity, followed as Sue brought the soggy little hen back to the barnyard to check her out and see that she was ok. As fate would have it the little hen survived and soon learned to tolerate her special brood’s forays into the pond, though she would always stalk up and down the shoreline clucking disconcertedly until they had returned safely to dry land.

To those of us whose normal encounter with a chicken is either in a meat market, cut into pieces on a foam tray wrapped in saran wrap, or coming out of a fast food drive up window as a nugget, a chicken is not a symbol of noble self giving love, it’s a meal. We just don’t get it. But to those who were raised in a more rural environment where they encounter chickens on a daily basis and are exposed to the interactions between hen and chick, it is obvious. Why did Jesus choose the chicken instead of the eagle, the more common metaphor of the time for strong faithful protection? We don’t know. Perhaps he wanted to say something different, maybe he wasn’t talking about protection by strength. Perhaps the eagle was too closely associated with the occupying forces of the Roman Empire. Or it could have been any of a hundred other things, we just don’t know. And in our uncertainty, we blunder into the heart of the matter. The struggle to find the right words to convey the ideas we have within us is not new. It began when humanity first started talking. Harder still is the struggle to give new words to old ideas.

In the national church we have been struggling to give new life to the words of Thomas Cranmer written over 400 years ago. Not because the words are dead, but because the people who originally spoke them everyday are. The battle over inclusive or expansive or balanced language Can seem like a new assault on the treasured words of our faith but that is a false impression. We have always struggled to find appropriate words for God. The Right words. The whole crux of the matter is that in a very real sense there can be no wholly right words for God, God is beyond words. Beyond comprehension. But words are all we have. Every time a new prayer book is released some cheer and many boo and eventually it is tolerated, and then grudgingly accepted and soon after that it is revered and then a new book comes out to cheers and boos and it all starts all over again. We use words to try and capture what we mean about God and then we make the mistake of thinking that God is somehow locked in the words; that the words themselves are holy. We fall prey to a subtle form of idolatry. I have heard some people say that if “they” ever touch the Lord’s Prayer that’s it, they’re leaving the church, and I always wonder which one they’re talking about. Is it the “Our Father which art in heaven” version, or the “Our Father who art in heaven” version, or the “Our Father in heaven” version, or is it the Greek, “Pater hei mon. Ho en tois uranois” version, or maybe even Aramaic, “Aboon dah bashmaya?”

I am using an extreme position to make a point. It is the reason behind why I like to change the words we pray in Lent, to the words we are least comfortable with. It gives us a chance to actually listen to what we are praying, and to ponder again what we really mean. When we are most resistant to change is the time it is most important to examine our motives closely. Our God cannot be contained. Neither cross, nor tomb, nor any words we could write could ever hope to fully contain the mystery of God. Every word ever written about God is at best a pale metaphor before the glory of God, and that’s not easy for us to remember. We are such creatures of habit. Whenever “Our Father in heaven” becomes in our minds a male authority figure residing in a distant place, it is time for God the chicken to come along and shake things up. To remind us that God is more than father, or mother, or chicken. To remind us that when we talk about God all words, no matter how sacred they may appear, are metaphors before the unchangeable truth of God’s Word. If we forget that, we may find ourselvesliving in that Jerusalem that Jesus gazes at from the hills. Not the Holy city of God, but a walled town of empty houses and empty people, unwilling, or worse unable, to welcome even their own Savior in. God help us if we forget. God help us to remember. Amen.