Ghost Ranch 2007 Week of Peace

Ghost Ranch 2007
Week of Peace, Global Justice and Creation

For a listing of all our stories from the Week of Peace >>

Worship and the Word for the Week

Roberto Jordan describes us as “challenged by God,” and called to interpret the signs of our times
[8-6-07]

Roberto Jordan

Week of Peace, Global Justice and Creation
Ghost Ranch, New Mexico
Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Exodus 3: 1-12

Challenged by God and interpreting the signs

Roberto Jordan

The book of Exodus is a paradigm for theology in countries from the South¹; it is a book that refers to sufferings, fears, injustices, dreams, needs, hopes… life. I could not begin our night worship for this week in any other place, because in more than one sense, today we are called to be Exodus people.

Exodus is central to the religious-political-cultural-social life of the people of God, so much so that in one way or another each of the texts I will turn to these days, will relate to one moment or another of the Exodus experience, where God is not only a religious definition, but rather a concrete expression and experience that transforms life, reminding us that it is true that “another world is possible.”

The book of Exodus reminds us of our Vocation and of the Promise – in which hope, in the midst of suffering, is what sustains women and men. It did then, and it does today. For most of the world population the only reality is one of oppression and fear, los of identity and hopelessness² . Exodus is the reality of God present in the midst of pain and slavery, and also in Liberation; of Pesaj [Passover] and of the Covenant.

The very beginning of the book sets the picture: oppression and slavery (1:11). The voice of the people antecedes the voice of God. A new king in Egypt; he fears the people of Israel and so he decides use their number and strength for building cities which will give him a name in history. This ends up with the people groaning under the weight of slavery and their cry reaches God, and “God remembers the Covenant” (Ex 2: 23-24).

This is what has been going on when we reach the text for tonight. God becomes present as will happen many times in the future, in the midst of such situations.

So one of the challenges put before us today is to clearly express who is the God we believe in. The answer is clear: God sees, hears and comes down, not as an ‘observer’ God but as an involved God. Though it would seem many prefer a judging God, a distant God – that is not God. The God we believe is God who delivers and who liberates. God promises change, and is not indifferent to pain and injustice. God feels with passion, from God’s guts. God decides that the situation must change. For this to happen God calls Moses to draw near, not putting people off but rather calling people close up. The burning bush – so close to us Presbyterians it is still a symbol of calling.

This is a reality extensive to so much of the world today, one we cannot ignore, because it affects the majority of the world’s population. That is why the Accra Confession calls usto read the signs of the times and to interpret them, and clearly this involves an ideological stance. This sounds difficult for a number of people, but in the South it is a clear issue. We all read the signs but not all interpret the signs in a committed way; we all have our ideology and we cannot play the game of ideological innocence. The urgency of the times demands from us clarity on this issue.

The challenge placed before us now, is one of commitment to the Kingdom of God, which not only means announcing the Kingdom but also denouncing the values that go against this Kingdom.

This is one of the reasons why Exodus is central to a theology of involvement. In this short text for tonight we can trace the challenge of God³ :

	To see, recognize, hear the realities of oppression, beginning close by and reaching out. But not as a moment-only situation, rather going into the structural causes: how? who? when? what?
	To organize, get involved; leadership and challenge.
	To confront: God once again promises help, even in the midst of fear. Go to Pharaoh. Even though Moses is still more Egyptian than Israelite, this means going against his education, his social situation, his privileges, even against the people’s sense of defeat (Ex 6:9). At the end of the Accra meeting, one North American Presbyterian reminded us sharply that our criticism of the major influence of transnational corporations was going to be a hard thing to take home to all those Presbyterian CEOs.

God announces that once the people have been liberated from Egypt they will worship God on this mountain (Horeb), indicating a way, an aim, a promise: God will sustain hope.

The situation is clearly economical, political, social, cultural, military and religious. The situation in Egypt fits the definition of Empire of the Accra Confession (AC 11) which reminds us that the Empire always believes God is on their side. It is a shock then, to hear that is not the case, and this is what Moses must communicate to Pharaoh. God is on aside, but not on Pharaoh’s, God is on the side of the slaves. And this has been unacceptable to Pharaoh and to the Pharaoh’s of all times. That is why Pharaoh decides to chase after the people of God: he has lost a formidable and cheap working force.

This is why reading the signs of the times must be central to our witness and message, it cannot be one of confusion. Reading the signs of the times takes us to sacred ground, and from there to a new and very different reality, this calls for conversion and confidence, and leads to confrontation. The Empire responds with armies!

This is why Exodus sets a new situation, and why it is so important to people in the South, and why it is the point of departure for us this week. We have to discover which our “burning bushes” are and where they lead us to. We have to realize with whom we will confront and as a result where will this lead us on the way God calls us to follow.

The God we believe and trust … how do we define God to the people today? A neutral God? A God who takes sides? Whose side? Where is God to be found? What is God doing? With whom is God involved? And finally, what does God expect from us – now and here?

Notes

¹ Severino Croatto, Liberación y libertad.
²Severino Croatto, Historia de la Salvación
³ Jorge Pîxley, Éxodo

Jordan says we are challenged by God to "worship totally" – which for Isaiah means doing justice
[6-8-07]

Roberto Jordan

Week of Peace, Global Justice and Creation
Ghost Ranch, New Mexico
August 1, 2007

Isaiah 58: 1-14

Challenged by God and worshiping totally

Yesterday’s text referred to the sign provided by God, that after leaving Egypt "you shall worship God on this mountain" (Ex. 3:12). The text for tonight is a challenge to true worship in stead of an empty worship that only seeks to conform to personal expectations, but not to God’s. This clearly sets out that not all worship is true worship; that not all worship is worship to God, and we know only too well that this world and these times have perfected worship to Mammon.

Personally the text for tonight is, in one way or another, a sort of initiation text in my life. This text includes the theme of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches General Council held in Debrecen –Hungary, 1997. It was there that the Reformed family gave a strong impulse to what in Ghana, 2004 became the Accra Confession. Without Debrecen 1997, I would not be here with you tonight.

This text for tonight has to be read integrally as part of the section formed by chapters 56-57-58 – the opening of Third Isaiah. No longer the people in exile, now they have returned home, and have to organize life after many years away. After all, exodus people not only leave; they also arrive. And probably they will soon be on the move again! This text points to the basis of such organization (organization which we pointed out as necessary to the text of Exodus). All that Isaiah says in chapter 58 must be read in the light of the opening of chapter 56:1 – "Maintain justice and do what is right, so soon my salvation will come and my deliverance will be revealed".

Justice and righteousness, this is why chapter 58 presents to us a "State of Emergency," because in actual fact, neither justice nor righteousness were/are in abundance. Yes, they exist, but they are not in abundance. Shout out, lift your voice like a trumpet, announce to my people their rebellion. This is the God of the Covenant, the God who remembers the Covenant for liberation (as is mentioned in Exodus). What this text places before us today is the tension between seeking God’s will and practicing God’s will (vs. 2-3), because there is a perverse game going on in the world, here indicated in the words "as if." In the same way that not all who say "Lord, Lord" really follow Jesus, not all worship is true worship.

So then, what is true worship? What is, is not always what should be; that is why God draws the line and says that enough is enough, and having said this, the people respond by saying: We are confused, we don’t understand. But we thought we were doing the right thing. All this reflects so many of the responses we hear in the church today… "What do you mean God? We were sure we were doing the right thing, we were defending the right cause. Isn’t OUR cause, Your cause?"

God clearly reveals the game of corruption which has been installed, even among those people who confess they are God’s people. Here the text points out to us how the people play the game: they are "delighted" (twice in verse 2 alone), they say they are curious about God’s way, but when it comes down to it; they decide to follow their own ways.

The people respond to God, and ask God about their rituals (vs. 3). Why fast? God does not notice all we do for God. It is as if we feel offended. Here again, as in yesterday’s text, there is a clear image of God. They affirm that the God they are so dedicated to in worship does not seem to notice, but they really don’t care why God seems not to notice. They don’t want to know the answer.

But God does answer. God really does notice (vs. 3b-7). This is where God calls their bluff. This then is not a moment of consolation but rather a moment of denunciation: "You do not worship (=fast), you serve your own interests, you oppress your workers, you quarrel and fight, you strike with wicked fist." But who are those who do this? They are the powerful, who oppress. Doesn’t all this seem to bring us back to Exodus 3, and the groaning of the people in Egypt? God heard a cry and came down so as to rescue the people.

God questions the empty pattern of fasting = worship, a worship with no social implications or consequences (vs. 5). This is where God’s challenge lies today. God asks the people: You call that a day acceptable to the Lord? And then God sets out the true agenda, the life giving programme which is to be known as true worship, or what in Second Testament terms we would call life in fullness for all people.

Break the chains of injustice
Undo the thongs of the yoke
Free the oppressed
Break every yoke
Share bread
Receive the homeless
Clothe the naked
Attend to your own.

There before us are 8 actions of solidarity and breaking the chains of selfishness. They ring the bell of Isaiah 61, which centuries later Jesus will proclaim as the map for the ministry he is about to begin (Luke 4).

Clearly we have before us a reference to slavery in Egypt and all the exiles that followed and will come, and exist today. The root causes of Exodus, and the challenge God put before us: Then, says God, and only then – when all this is so, your light will break forth like dawn, your wounds will heal, righteousness before you, and God’s glory behind you.

Doing God’s will has consequences – then, you shall call and God will answer, you shall cry and God will come to help … the prophet leads the people along the path of social praxis, which does not contain empty questions but rather points to concrete answers.

This true worship which attends to the situation of injustice and oppression produces a new liberation, such as Exodus. The Lord will guide the peoples and satisfy their needs even in parched ground (= the desert), and all that has been destroyed will be rebuilt.

The final section is a call to conversion – if you do not – if you do. Leaving behind self interest and honouring only one’s own way, instead taking delight in the Lord. Then God will make them ride upon the light of the earth, God will feed them.

We know the day of worship is not one hour of one day a week, but rather a lifestyle in which we are challenged by God so that worship/life are a total expression of God’s will and at the same time of rejection to what works against God’s will. So there can be no true conversion to God’s will without asking painful questions and finding the answers that will produce such a conversion, today these questions point to structural sin and not only personal sin:

• Who produces such situations?
• Who benefits from such situations?
• Who gains from situations that do not change?
• What do we have to say when faced with these situations?

To be true to God means to put acquired security at risk – this is summed up in the Accra Confession in what the section which expresses "We believe – we Reject" (AC 29, 30, 31, 33), and the call to be clear in what we believe (AC 32).

Worshipping totally challenges the world today to face the hard questions. At the same time as it challenges us it contains God’s promise. May God give us the courage to hear what God expects from us today. Though having heard, will we be able to respond as we should?

For the rest of the week's sermons --
from Roberto Jordan and Larry Rasmussen --
click here.

Isaiah 58: 1-14

Shout out, do not hold back!
   Lift up your voice like a trumpet!
Announce to my people their rebellion,
   to the house of Jacob their sins.
²Yet day after day they seek me
   and delight to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that practised righteousness
   and did not forsake the ordinance of their God;
they ask of me righteous judgements,
   they delight to draw near to God.
³‘Why do we fast, but you do not see?
   Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?’
Look, you serve your own interest on your fast-day,
   and oppress all your workers.
⁴Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight
   and to strike with a wicked fist.
Such fasting as you do today
   will not make your voice heard on high.
⁵Is such the fast that I choose,
   a day to humble oneself?
Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush,
   and to lie in sackcloth and ashes?
Will you call this a fast,
   a day acceptable to the Lord?

⁶Is not this the fast that I choose:
   to loose the bonds of injustice,
   to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
   and to break every yoke?
⁷Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
   and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them,
   and not to hide yourself from your own kin?
⁸Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
   and your healing shall spring up quickly;
your vindicator^* shall go before you,
   the glory of the Lord shall be your rearguard.
⁹Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
   you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am.

If you remove the yoke from among you,
   the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,
¹⁰if you offer your food to the hungry
   and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
then your light shall rise in the darkness
   and your gloom be like the noonday.
¹¹The Lord will guide you continually,
   and satisfy your needs in parched places,
   and make your bones strong;
and you shall be like a watered garden,
   like a spring of water,
   whose waters never fail.
¹²Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
   you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;
you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
   the restorer of streets to live in.

¹³If you refrain from trampling the sabbath,
   from pursuing your own interests on my holy day;
if you call the sabbath a delight
   and the holy day of the Lord honourable;
if you honour it, not going your own ways,
   serving your own interests, or pursuing your own affairs;^*
¹⁴then you shall take delight in the Lord,
   and I will make you ride upon the heights of the earth;
I will feed you with the heritage of your ancestor Jacob,
   for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

The third sermon of the week:

The waters of baptism help us understand the "tipping point" in humanity's relationship with nature.

[8-7-07]

Dr. Larry Rasmussen looks through the Christian rite of baptism to help us understand the water that renews and sustains all of human life -- and shows how we are now at a "tipping point" in the relation between human efforts at domination and the realities of "the great economy of creation."

The sermon >>

Challenged by God and sharing fearlessly

Roberto Jordan's third sermon of the week focuses on Jesus' feeding of the multitude as a model of the new life into which he calls us -- a life of radical sharing. The full sermon >>
[8-8-07]

Challenged by God and responding differently

Roberto Jordan's final sermon of the Ghost Ranch "Week of Peace" reflects on the radical call of the Letter of James to working for peace -- a commitment that sets us off sharply from the secure world of Empire. The sermon >>
[8-8-07]

Isaiah 58: 1-14

False and True Worship