Can't turn back now

 

1 Corinthians 7: 29-31
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
January 24, 2021

There’s a scene near the beginning of the 2009 Star Trek movie in which a teenage James Tiberius Kirk drives a vintage convertible off a cliff, only to leap out of the car at the last moment, landing near the edge and clawing at the dirt to stop himself from going over. With the Beastie Boys song “Sabotage” playing loudly as the soundtrack.



That feels like an overall mood for the past four years.



And yet there is a lot of privilege in that. There is so much more than what has happened in just the last four years, including this wretched pandemic. While we could place a great deal of blame on one person, in truth what has been revealed is everything that is horribly wrong with the world we live in. What has been revealed is the painful truth that many have known and have lived with all along. Some have likened the last four years to living in an abusive relationship, but there are people in this country who have always experienced life here that way, who have experienced this nation as empire.



From Genesis to Malachi, from Matthew to Revelation, the Hebrew scriptures and the writings of the early Church are a treatise against empire. In his letter to the church in Corinth, Paul uses apocalyptic language like ‘no time to waste’ and ‘the world as you see it is fading away’. While it sounds ominous, Paul is offering pastoral comfort to a church that is striving to live the Way of Jesus, which means against the ways of empire. The Greek word apokalupsis or apocalypse literally means “an uncovering”, and this pandemic has certainly uncovered much of what we have ignored or refused to see.

Scholar and activist Adrienne Maree Brown wrote, “Things are not getting worse, they are getting uncovered. We must hold each other tight and continue to pull back the veil.” Paul wrote in the same letter to the church in Corinth, “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.” Author Sue Monk Kidd put a fine point on it when she wrote, “The truth will indeed set you free, but first it will shatter the safe, sweet way you live.”



So what are some things that need to pass away from this world?

• White supremacy
• Racism
• Sexism
• Classism and castes
• Transphobia
• Ableism
• Capitalism or the monetization of the earth and its people
• Fascism
• Christian nationalism
• Cronyism

Also:

• Whiteness
• Bigotry
• Patriarchy
• Empire thinking
• Greed, self-interest, and the hoarding of wealth
• Poverty
• Abuse of power
• Judgment and fear of the “other”
• Using violence to solve problems
• Zero-sum thinking
• Illusion of control and certainty
• Dependency on fossil fuels
• The glorification of busy
• Toxic positivity and individualism
• Intolerance, hatred, and cruelty
• Self-aggrandizement
• Self-centered concepts of freedom

Even as we hunger and thirst for another world, even as our bodies acknowledge the grief and trauma and exhaustion, even as we slowly allow ourselves to be cautiously optimistic, it will be tempting to return to some version of the status quo, to that which is familiar. And yet we can’t turn back now because we’ve seen too much. We know how much it hurts to live in the world as we know it. The world that we know is fading away, and there is no time to waste.



From John’s Apocalypse or the Book of Revelation: “See, the home of God is among mortals. [God] will dwell with them; they will be [God’s] peoples, and God [God’s self] will be with them; [God] will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.”

Author Neale Donald Walsch writes, “Yearning for a new way will not produce it. Only ending the old way can do that. You cannot hold onto the old, all the while declaring that you want something new.
The old will defy the new;
The old will deny the new;
The old will decry the new.
There is only one way to bring in the new. You must make room for it.”



We yearn for God’s Shalom, for wholeness and peace and justice, but we must end the old way first. We yearn for unity, but we must first consider who bears the burden, the brunt of that unity. When Rep. Cori Bush was booed on the House floor for denouncing White supremacy, we witness who bears the burden of unity. Healing that comes at the expense and oppression of others is exploitation—something else that needs to pass away from this world.



Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that.” Greed cannot drive out greed. Only generosity can do that. Intolerance cannot drive out intolerance. Only searching our own hearts can do that. Where in our lives and in our life together do we need to make room for the new we yearn for? All of the things named that need to pass away from this world are the forces we use to ensure that things stay the same, even though they cause destruction and pain. The irony of empire is that what keeps it going is also what will eventually destroy it, but we do not have to be destroyed along with it.



We called ourselves to worship with these words: 

(Thanks to our friends at enfleshed.com)



“God is the practice of radical imagination.
...the freedom to dream of abundance and flourishing.

“God is the practice of adaptability and change.
...the power to break patterns that destroy life and relationships.

“God is the practice of justice that transforms.
...the work that mends, that heals, that builds anew.

“...This is the God who dwells with us.
Among us and within us, God is here.”



We gave our fears free range over our imagination, fear manipulated by greed, power, and aggression, and some of our worst nightmares have indeed come true. We have before us yet another opportunity to evolve, to practice courageous imagination, to dream dreams, to end the old by making way for the new. We have no time to waste, for the world as we know it is fading away.





Benediction



When your path is full of worry
God will see you through
When you feel alone on your journey
God will see you through


All your silver, all your gold
Won’t shine brighter than your soul
Amen
Amen
Amen