Transcript
Therefore what God has joined together. Let no one separate. Please be seated.
Here’s the deal. I can almost guarantee that after that gospel reading, you are doing one of two things. One, you have completely stopped listening. You’re too busy thinking about divorce and adultery and all those amazing people whom you love and who had to make that really, really tough choice and end a marriage. Maybe even you had to make it yourself or you are paying all of your attention to me, undividedly, and what I’m about to say, because you want to know how I’m going to interpret these words from Jesus about divorce and adultery, and you want to pay extra close attention so you can repeat it to anyone who will listen to you.
Unfortunately, I am sorry to disappoint you all, because while I’ll touch a little bit on that gospel reading, I will not be preaching on Jesus’s opinion about divorce. My mom called me a chicken. Why will I not be preaching on it? Because it’s pledge season. Woo!
And if last week was all about the gifts we receive from each other and from God and from Saint John’s, today we’re focusing on thank yous. Thank yous to each other. Thank yous to God, and thank yous to Saint John’s. After all, isn’t that the natural process? Someone gives you a gift. And of course, there are so many ways we can say thank you once we have that gift.
I mean, think about it. Think about when you’re driving and a car lets you into traffic in front of them. And maybe you do that little hand wave thing in the rearview mirror. You know, the thank you. Or when a stranger holds a door open for you and you might do a head nod or shrug and a smile and say, oh, thank you. Or maybe when you were a child and your parents and grandparents were teaching you how to write a thank you note, something like, dear Mrs. Jones, thank you so much for the very kind Christmas present. The socks match my new outfit perfectly. I look forward to wearing them soon.
What would that thank you note look like if you were writing it to God, or to Saint John’s, or even to each other? Of course, as I mentioned last week, it might be about the stained glass or the beautiful music or the amazing children’s programs. It might be about the history of the church, or the graveyard, or even the location right in downtown Hampton. You all were lucky you did not get stuck in race traffic. It might be the community that is here.
The grace that each person offers to one another. The care that we extend to each other. And if we keep going, those thank yous would go on to God too. Maybe for the gifts that God has given each of us. Tangible gifts like someone’s ability to cook the perfect souffle, or someone’s ability to balance complex financial statements and intangible gifts like grace and mercy and love and community. Especially the community of Saint John’s.
In today’s Old Testament reading, we get part of the second creation story. Yes, there are two creation stories in Scripture. The first one is roughly chapter one of Genesis, and the second one is most of chapter two and all of chapter three of Genesis. The first one involves a formless void and darkness covering the face of the deep. It involves six days of creation in the seventh day for rest. It involves God proclaiming at the end of each act of creation it is good. The second creation story involves a garden and a rib bone, and a piece of fruit from the tree of the Knowledge of good and evil, and a serpent. In both creation stories, God creates all that is around us the animals and plants, and God creates us. Humankind.
In the first creation story, after God has created all the other animals and plants and whatnot, God creates humankind. We are the last act of creation, and God gives to us all that God has already created. The verse is chapter one, verse 26 in Genesis. Then God said, let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.
In the second creation story, though, God creates humankind according to the passage we get today, this version begins with in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, when no plant of the field was yet in the field, 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. And then God created Adam, that that’s Hebrew for humankind, pronounced A-dam from ha-adamah — that’s Hebrew for “dust of the earth”. And once human is created, God creates the garden for human to live in and tend. And God realizes human is lonely. So God decides to create a partner for human, and God creates all the various beasts and human decides none of the beasts should be human’s partner. So God creates a second human.
And just an odd note at this point, the Hebrew changes from A-dam, for a human created as a sole individual, to to ish and ishah: as Man and Woman, as in a community doesn’t have a name, a partnership doesn’t have a name until there are more than one, until two are created, until A-dam becomes ish and ishah. I would argue that community doesn’t have a name here either, until we are all together as one. Before we are one, we are Ron and Debra and Bill and Ellen. We are Jane and Gary and Ann until we are brought together, until we become Saint John’s. And Saint John’s would not be complete without each and every single one of us. Just as God’s creation is not complete without every single one of the animals and the plants, and even the lights and the winds and the waters.
During pledge season, you are invited to think about the one, the one community that each of us is part of here at Saint John’s, the community that is joined together in the pews and off the altar rail in the Sunday school classrooms and at the Little Free Pantry, in the choir, and even at a gravestone. All of this and more brings us together, and all of this and more is worthy of gratitude. And right now, during pledge season, one of the best ways to say thank you to this community, to each other, is by filling out a pledge card. You all should have seen that one coming.
Consider this pledge card like a thank you note. A chance for you to say, Dear Saint John’s, dear God, dear, my community. Thank you for all you do and all you are. And even more thank you for dreaming and imagining and helping. Thank you for giving and honoring and supporting. Thank you for being you called together as one.
There’s a line in the gospel reading today that I absolutely love. It said in an Episcopal wedding service as well. And it is one line that I always point out to every couple. In today’s reading, it is what God has joined together, let no one separate. And the wedding rite, It is those whom God has joined together, let no one put asunder.
May we as a community, as Saint John’s, see that what we have here is a gift from God given to each of us, a promise to love one another even in the hardest moments, to support one another even when we ourselves are sagging. To extend grace and mercy to each other as we are receiving grace and mercy from God, a community united that no one can separate or put asunder. May our gratitude for this community put together by God for God’s intention, reflect the gratitude we have for God, who loves us so much.
Thank you. Thank you to each and every single one of you. Thank you. Saint John’s. Thank you God. Amen. Amen.