To listen to the sermon as it was preached by Fr. Bill Nesbit, Jr. at the 9:00 AM service click here.
To listen to the sermon as it was preached by Fr. Bill at the 10:45 AM service, click here.

St. Charles Episcopal Church - Saint Charles, IL

The Second Sunday after Pentecost - Proper 8 RCL Year A

Sunday, June 26, 2011                                                                                                                                                                                   

Genesis 22:1-14 – Psalm 13 – Romans 6:12-23 – Matthew 10:40-42

Rev. William R. Nesbit, Jr.

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

Every time I read the story of God’s testing of Abraham, the command to sacrifice Isaac, I wonder. Even though it turns out well in the end, it doesn’t turn out well until the very end. The God of everlasting love, the God ofhesed, loving-kindness seems very far away in this story. There seems to be so many other ways that God could have tested Abraham that wouldn’t have appeared so cruel. To plead to God for so many decades for a child, and then just as the child is approaching manhood to be asked to sacrifice him to prove to God that you have faith enough, seems more diabolical than almost anything else I can think of. And even if it really did happen, why on earth is this a story that we remember and retell? Why not just let this story slip away into the mists of time? The God of this story is deeply unsettling at best and at worst simply terrifying. There is no way I want to get anywhere near that God...And yet, this is the same God who did not spare his own Son. Who gave his own Son, his only Son, to die for us and for our sins, in some ways also an unsettling act, even though it is for us.

What are we to make of this God? How do we reconcile these two faces of God? Why keep bringing it up, telling these stories? And then I remembered the stories from Joplin. The stories of children ripped from the arms of parents as their homes came apart around them. Some of the children have yet to be found. Some of them walked out of the night into loving arms after the storm had subsided. As I contemplated what I would do in a situation like that, I saw with fresh eyes the wisdom of the story of Abraham, and why that story is remembered and retold over and over. And why we need to hear it today. We tell it for all the children that do not survive. The children who die in horrible accidents, in simple mistakes, or in senseless violence. The world is dangerous place and children will die, even with the best of our efforts to prevent it. Sometimes in our language, when we get lazy, we speak of God “taking” someone when they die. Nothing could be farther from the truth. God never takes anyone, God only receives.

The good news of the story of Abraham and Isaac is that God was so intimately involved in their life together that God manifested his saving power in the instant it was needed. As Abraham drew his hand back to strike, in that very instant the Angel appeared. We must always remember this. We must never forget that even in our own lives the power of God’s saving help is always with us. Even when it seems the darkest, we are not alone... we are never alone. I do not know the pain of losing a child and I pray daily that I never will. But I do know that God’s love for us is the only way that we can ever hope to get through it. We will never get over it, but God's love will hold us up when we cannot stand, for God stands with us in that pain.

God saved Isaac for love of Abraham and Isaac and God sacrificed his Son Jesus for love of us all. Each one of us. And every time one of us dies, adult or child, for we are all God's children, every time one of us dies, God endures the pain and loss of the crucifixion again so that we may know everlasting life. The story of Abraham and Isaac is just one way the Bible reminds us, that God’s love is a terrible and unsettling love. It is a love that stretches beyond race, or creed; nation or family. It is a love that knows no sides. Even without the scourge of war that mankind seems hell bent to upon against each other, this fragile earth, our island home, is a dangerous place. What hope can love bring to such a dark place?

When we talk of casualties, war or otherwise, we normally speak in numbers. Numbers help distance us from the pain of death. As best I can find, 141 people died in the tornado in Joplin. When I see the pictures of the devastation I think that is an amazingly small number. Still, each individual death was a tragedy of loss. The so called “War on Terror” has claimed almost 6000 American soldiers in over 10 years of fighting. There is no accurate count of how many Iraqi and Afghanis have been killed, but it is almost certainly at least three times as many. I shudder at the magnitude of the pain and suffering that has been endured by all the mothers and fathers, both friend and foe alike, as I contemplate our history of war. But even more I shudder, as the war grinds on, at the terrible grief of God as each casualty is mourned not as a number, but as a son or daughter. And like the psalmist I wonder...How long, O LORD? will you forget us for ever? how long will you hide your face from us? How long shall we have perplexity in our minds, and grief in our hearts, day after day?

What was going through Abraham’s mind as he walked across the wilderness to the distant place that God had shown him? How did he look into the eyes of his son when the boy asked where the lamb for the sacrifice was? When Abraham said, “The Lord himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son,”was he really answering a question, or was he praying a prayer? Maybe the end of war is a fool’s hope, but still I hope. Maybe that high hope is beyond us, but can we not at least work to find a way to end this war?

Dear God, I pray that we may find the tangled way to a just peace, and quickly, but if that is beyond us, Dear God send us an angel. Amen.