The Adventurous Lectionary – November 12, 2023 – Pentecost 24
Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25
Psalm 78:1-7
I Thessalonians 4:13-18
Matthew 25:1-13
What does it mean to be a monotheist? What does following God mean in daily life and when we must choose between competing goods? What are the practical implications of following the One True God rather than the many deities of our own creation? The objects of our faith, what Paul Tillich describes as our “ultimate concern,” shape our character and relationships with others, and they can be a matter of spiritual and physical death for ourselves and others, including the planet. Believing in God isn’t enough: gods vary in character and intentionality. They vary in terms of what they require of their followers. The type of God who commands our loyalty – our vision of God – may be a matter of life and death. Theological reflection, accordingly, is essential to the life of faith as a way of affirming healthy images of God and challenging unhealthy images of God and the values they promote. Our image of God can promote inclusion, community, and earth care; it can also promote hatred, persecution, and destruction. Our image of God can multiply abundance or diminish vitality.
Put away the gods of old! Move from the many to the One, serve the one God alone, Joshua commands. Leave your old haunts, as Abraham and Sarah did, and discover a new God, a god of sufficient size to embrace the whole universe and not just the land upon which you live. The God of our parents suffices, not the gods of those with whom we contend, but even the God of our parents requires reformation. While Joshua is right, we cannot interpret his vision of God in terms of yesterday’s deities, but must affirm the living, loving God.
Joshua’s god was sufficient for his people, but perhaps too small for us in a pluralistic age. Though universal, the One God was still too closely aligned with the projects of the Hebraic people. The One God of their faith had clear favorites and was indifferent, if not harmful, to other peoples, most particularly the Canaanites. This legacy is still at work in the Middle East by Jews and Muslims alike. We need bigger images of God than nationalistic and militaristic visions that inspired our Hebrew parents. Still, Joshua raises some important theological issues: Who are these foreign gods? Do they have a reality apart from the one true God? What are the consequences of leaving one or many gods to follow a different vision of the divine? What old gods do we need to leave behind – even Christian images of God – to be faithful to the Holy One? (These questions might be too complex and subtle or a twenty-minute sermon, but they would be great for an adult faith formation class or sermon talk back.)
As I noted earlier, theologian Paul Tillich saw our God-visions in terms of our ultimate concern, that is, what we are willing to live or die for, the primary objects of our loyalty. What we worship and treasure shapes our character. Anything that demands exclusivity or primacy focuses our spirit. Placing the one God above all others orders our lives and enables us to live globally as well as locally, transcending the individual ego in light of larger visions. Yet, exclusivity and absolutism, when not mated with humility and appreciation of diversity, can also lead to violence and displacement as it did in the Israelite occupation of Canaan. Joshua demands a choice. There is no “cheap grace” here; following your god’s path is not optional, and there are consequences to serving the “wrong” deities. We need the wisdom of the apophatic mystery to purge us of assuming that we truly know the dictates of our God-image.
The passage from Joshua challenges an easy pluralism or laissez faire relativism. It also challenges the parochial and materialistic gods of our culture and the “practical polytheism” of following the gods of the moment, including the gods of consumerism, nationalism, politics, and ideology. Following one God requires a type of faithful – albeit open-spirited – commitment to a particular vision of reality and way of life that may be at cross purposes from the values of other religious traditions. All religions are not alike, nor do all roads lead to the same destination. Further, some visions of God are healthier and more insightful than others. In a pluralistic age, we can incorporate the wisdom of other religious traditions, but still, we must choose to see Christ as the lens through which we encounter other faiths and their spiritual practices. This does not preclude Christians practicing yoga, reiki, tai chi, or Buddhist meditation. It does challenge us to integrate these practices with our Christian faith. (For reflections of Christianity and pluralism, Bruce Epperly, “The Elephant is Running: Process and Open and Relational Theology and Religious Pluralism,” “The Energy of Love: Reiki and Christian Healing” and Bruce and Katherine Epperly, “Reiki Healing Touch and the Way of Jesus.”)
Like Joshua, the Psalmist sees our faithfulness as grounded in remembering what God has done and trusting what God will do in the future.
The reading from Thessalonians is about hope, not world-destroying apocalyptic. Death and grief were real in the early church just as they are today. Denial is not the answer, nor is the suppression of our pain. Healthy grief comes from a vision of reality in which we affirm that our times are in God’s hands and that nothing can separate us from the love of God. We can grieve, cry, yell, and swear, knowing that God is with us, treasuring our feelings and memory of those we loved. Moreover, the future is in God’s hands; the end of the world as we know it is the prelude to God’s everlasting adventures.
While most of our congregants are not focused on an apocalyptic Second Coming or the rapture of the saints in the air, we must challenge the faux theology of datable Second Coming theology: those doctrines have left in their wake injustice and ecological destruction and turning heavenward while abandoning the earth to the “powers and principalities,” the forces of evil in high governmental, business, and political places. We must confront world denying theologies, with the earth loving theology of the Word Made Flesh. Sadly, Christian Second Coming world denial motivates conservative Christians and their political leaders’ opposition to climate change research as evident in Mike Johnson’s willingness to radically cut the budget of the Environmental Protection Agency.
The story of the vice and foolish bridesmaids, found in Matthew 25, counsels preparation and wakefulness. We never know when the bridegroom will come, that is, we never know when we will be called upon to respond to God’s call. The vagueness of Messianic appearances is good, rather than bad, news. Vagueness inspires us to see every encounter as holy, an opportunity to love God by loving God’s children. God is always coming to us: we don’t have to wait for a God-directed end-times scenario to experience God’s presence.
The passage, however, begs the following questions: Would sharing among the maidens have been possible? How would this story differ if the maidens shared their resources or invited their companions to join them in the vigil? The point of the story is awareness of God’s coming into our lives, but we need not imitate the insider-outsider aspects of the story. God’s coming into our lives awakens our charity for others, even those who are ill-prepared for divine visitations. We must be prepared to share our resources with others, even those who have practiced poor stewardship. They too are deserving of God’s grace and a second chance.
Faithfulness to the wisdom of God found in our faith is life-transforming. Still, our commitment should foster what philosopher Alfred North Whitehead described as world-loyalty and not parochial in-group, out-group attitudes and behaviors. Following the One God may be the greatest inspiration to look beyond our own ego-interests, mean-spirited patriotisms and ideologies, to seek the well-being of God’s creation and humankind in all times and places.
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Bruce Epperly is a pastor, professor, spiritual guide, and author of over seventy books, including PRAYING TWICE: THE TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS IN CAROLS AND HYMNS, JESUS – MYSTIC, HEALER, AND PROPHET; THE ELEPHANT IS RUNNING: PROCESS AND OPEN AND RELATIONAL THEOLOGY AND RELIGIOUS PLURALISM; PROPHETIC HEALING: HOWARD THURMAN’S VISION OF CONTEMPLATIVE ACTIVISM; MYSTIC’S IN ACTION: TWELVE SAINTS FOR TODAY; WALKING WITH SAINT FRANCIS: FROM PRIVILEGE TO ACTIVISM; MESSY INCARNATION: MEDITATIONS ON PROCESS CHRISTOLOGY, FROM COSMOS TO CRADLE: MEDITATIONS ON THE INCARNATION, and THE PROPHET AMOS SPEAKS TO AMERICA. His most recent books are PROCESS THEOLOGY AND THE REVIVAL WE NEED, TAKING A WALK WITH WHITEHEAD: MEDITATIONS WITH PROCESS-RELATIONAL THEOLOGY, and SIMPLICTY, SPIRITUALITY AND SERVICE: THE TIMELESS WISDOM OF FRANCIS, CLARE, AND BONAVENTURE. He can be reached at drbruceepperly@gmail.com.
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