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| Vincent Malo (1585–1649): Moses leading the children of Israel out of Egypt Musée des Beaux-Arts et d'Archéologie de Châlons-en-Champagne Via Wikimedia Commons |
Exodus
19.2–8a
Romans
5.1–8
Matthew 9.35 –
10.8
What stories will we
tell of this time, when it is over? What will those stories tell about who we
are?
I remember my parents’
stories of the war, and my grandmother’s, too. Stories of resilience,
hopefulness, comradeship. Stories of everyday life, keeping going, make do and
mend, the inventive recipes of rationing. The time when all the windows got
blown out, but the family was ok in the Anderson shelter. Not much about the
dark times, the terrible threat of Nazism, or the global struggle. Historians
tell us that there was a lot of crime and disorder in society at large, that
the “blitz spirit” was largely a myth. But those weren’t the stories that I
heard. The stories we tell about ourselves are about remembering who we are,
and when people go wrong it’s because they’ve forgotten who they are.
What stories will we
tell about this time, when it is over? What will those stories tell about who
we are? Yes, there’s a great deal of anxiety and uncertainty in our lives at
the moment. Yes, there’s tension, threat and violence on our streets, a cry for
justice amid racism and inequality. But I hope the stories we’ll be telling in
20 or 40 years will be about how we got through, how things got better, and how
in the midst of it we didn’t forget who we are. We will have learned more about
who we are in this testing time., and our stories are about remembering who we
are.
The people of Israel
knew who they were because of the stories they told. The story of Exodus,
liberation from slavery in Egypt, yes, but liberation into 40 years of
wandering in the desert. Not knowing where they were going or when they would
get there. Following Moses like sheep following a shepherd. And not always
making a very good job of it. But learning to follow, learning to trust the one
God who had revealed himself to them, learning to believe even in the darkness
and the unknowing of the journey.
Exodus is the story
that has been passed on. It’s what tells the people of Israel who they are.
It’s not all of what happened. Archaeologists tells us that the arrival of
peoples in the land that became Israel was more complicated, a series of
migrations over a long period. But the identity of the people, as they looked
back, is found in the story of slowly learned trust that was the story told in
Exodus.
Cut forward many
centuries, to the time of Jesus. The story is the same. The identity of the
people of Israel is found in the slowly learned trust of the time of wandering
and testing. But they had lost the thread of their own story. Occupied by the
Romans, the ordinary people abandoned by the religious leaders. The crowds were
harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. They didn’t know who they
were or where they were going. And Jesus had compassion on them. Like Moses of
old. It’s a comparison that Matthew’s Gospel often makes, Jesus is the new
prophet like Moses of old, the new Shepherd sent to guide and save the sheep of
Israel like Moses in the Exodus.
So, Jesus sends his
disciples, and they are named, twelve of them. Just as the twelve tribes of
Israel had been named in their story. Naming them is the first part of giving
them back their story, so the people can remember who they are. They are sent
to the lost sheep of Israel, not to the Samaritans or the Gentiles. Those will
come later, they will be included in Israel’s story, the revelation of the one
God, the salvation that will reach to the ends of the earth. But Israel has to
remember its own story first, before other nations can find their place in it.
The disciples are sent
to cleanse, to heal, to cast out demons, all those powers of division and destruction
that work against human flourishing. They are sent to raise the dead. Like
Ezekiel of old, in the valley of dry bones that were the people of Israel, the
people will be raised up, they will live. And because God’s Spirit moves, and
they live, others will live as well.
The people will find
their place once more in their own story. They will remember who they are.
Remembering. The word
is the opposite of dismembering. Like the bones that came back together in
Ezekiel’s valley, remembering is putting back together a body that it might
live.
The Church continues
that task of re-membering. The Eucharist is the Sacrament of re-membering, do
this in remembrance of me. Putting back together and raising the dead, the
story told at the altar that is our story, in which we find our place, in which
Christ the good shepherd remembers who we are, making us his body, his ongoing
story.
Healing, cleansing,
casting out the demons of society. Which are very much in evidence at this time.
We are broken divided, scared. The people are harassed and helpless, like sheep
without a shepherd. We need to remember our story, to remember how to trust in
wandering and affliction.
What stories will you
tell of this time, when it is over? Anger? Violence? Fear? Division? I don’t
think so. Those things are all around us, but they are not who we are. There
are others stories to tell. There will be stories of sorrow and loss, of
course, people gone from us, and fondly remembered. But they will be framed by
stories of goodness, of remembering that things can be better, of kindness, good
neighbourliness, love, clean air.
And there will be the
ordinary human stories, of keeping calm and carrying on. Stories of empty tube
trains, bad haircuts, and face masks as fashion statements. Going to church in
your pyjamas. All the stories we tell, the great and the ordinary, will remind
us who we are, all will be stories of learning to trust in the darkness of
unknowing.
What story will we, the
Church, tell of this time, when it is over? The story we always tell, the story
of who we are, of who we are in Christ. Found, gathered, healed, cleansed.
Re-membered. Redeemed. God’s people. In all this, still.
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