Resurrection rut

Acts 9: 36-43; Revelation 7: 13-17
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
April 17, 2016

                

             What do you think of when you hear the word “rut”?  

             

             Mud
             Stuck
             Endlessly repeating pattern
             I'm in a ...
             Complacent
             Boring
             What pigs do when they search for truffles
             A hole

            Most of the time the word ‘rut’ has a negative connotation.  It’s a habit or way of being that’s boring and ineffective but also difficult to change.  We can often think of a rut as sucking the life, taking the joy out of something.  A rut can be mechanical, automatic, brainless.

            But a rut also implies that a relationship has been established, whether it’s between wheel and road, plow and soil, or two people who share a life together.  Madeleine L’Engle, in her book Two-Part Invention, writes about the evening ritual she and husband Hugh fell into after more than three decades of marriage.  In the late afternoon she reads the mail, and then plays the piano for an hour.  At 7:00 Hugh comes into the living room with drinks, and then they cook dinner together, eating in the dining room by candlelight, followed by walking the dog, and preparing for bed.  For some this may sound dull, but ritual is never dull when love is present.  Several times during one of those evenings the same as the one before it, Hugh remarked to Madeleine, “I love our rut”.

            I say that when the heart is engaged, a rut is more like a groove.  So what do you think of when you hear the word “groove”?

            Record player

            1960's

            I'm in a ...

            Stella got her groove back

            Full steam ahead

            Rhythm

            We're going somewhere

            In sync (not the band!)

            I think of musicians getting into a groove with each other; a place of deep trust, mutual respect, and vulnerability that allows for improvisation, for emotions to find unheard of expression, for magic to happen.  I think of vinyl records and a needle in the groove that releases sound.  I think of friends who can complete each other’s sentences, community that responds and moves with the fluid grace of Jesus, who was in the groove of the One who sent him.

            The whole premise for this sermon came from a cartoon I saw online a few weeks ago.  A husband and wife are shaking hands with a pastor after worship on Easter Sunday.  The husband remarks to the pastor, “You’re in a rut, Reverend.  Every time I come here, you preach about the resurrection.”

            After the chuckle and the knowing, rueful smile, I thought, “Wouldn’t that be an interesting way to live, to be in a resurrection rut?”  To always be seeking resurrection, new life, rebirth—joy—and to always be putting oneself in its path.  To trust that resurrection doesn't just happen once, but over and over again.  Resurrection is not only our past, but also our present and our future.

            In this morning’s reading from the book of Acts we’re at that point in the story when we’re well past the resurrection, Jesus’ ascension, Pentecost, even’s Paul’s conversion.  The faith of the resurrection of Jesus is on the road, beginning its journey beyond Jerusalem, beyond those of the Jewish faith and into the world of the Gentiles.  The story of the raising of Tabitha echoes the story of Jesus raising a little girl in the gospel of Luke.  Jesus simply tells the little girl to arise: talitha cum, much as Peter says “Tabitha, get up.”  These stories of resurrection may have begun with Jesus, but they continue beyond him and his lifetime.

            In John’s Revelation we have a vision of the resurrection to come.  Those who have been through the great ordeal come through much in the way that Jesus came through the crucifixion: through pain and suffering.  I’d like to be fond of this resurrection rut, but it circles right through the valley of the shadow of death, the broken road, the fearful unknown, the worst that life has to offer.

            We could show up only on Easter and hear the good news of rebirth, and let that be our resurrection rut.  But then the worst that life has to offer becomes that giant pothole we didn’t see, the bridge that’s washed out, the ditch we get stuck in.  When hope gets confused with positive thinking, life can not only blindside us, but derail us.  We see only a pathetic power at work in our lives or in our life together and we despair.

We could put our heads down and bear our way through the pain, brace ourselves, and endure our way through whatever ordeal we’re facing.  We could be cynics and skeptics, judge and jury, keeping our hearts above the fray.  “The trouble with steeling yourself,” Frederick Buechner writes, “against the harshness of reality is that the same steel that secures your life against being destroyed secures your life also against being opened up and transformed by the holy power that life itself comes from.”[i]

            Stephen Jones, in his reflection on the story from Acts, writes that these early Christians, “they were unafraid to wade into each other’s lives in transforming ways”.[ii]  This kind of transformational hope and courageous community comes from journeying in that rut that yes, leads us into the valley of the shadow of death but also from having come out on the other side.  And the only way to come out on the other side is to travel into that valley, no matter how long it takes; to wade into the lives of others, allow others to wade into our lives, and enter into ruts of pain, hopelessness, and fear, injustice, prejudice, and discrimination that we all might be transformed.

            A resurrection rut is a direct and repeated encounter with the cross.  There’s just no getting around it.  And yet it is this gritty faith, this unbowed willingness to embrace life’s messiness and pain that also gives us the irrational ability to hope against hope.  In a world that profits from the pain, suffering, and death of others, believing in resurrection is a rebellious act!  

         We become able to love even more than we thought was possible.  If you’ve ever received an email from me, you’ve seen these words from Henry David Thoreau: “There is no remedy for love but to love more.”  When loving is hard, downright difficult, seemingly impossible, the only remedy is to love more.  The only remedy for the resurrection rut, the rut of life, death, and new life is to live more deeply, fearlessly, and hopefully; to move into that rut and groove with it.

            Simply put, the resurrection rut is this:

            Holy One, you are my shepherd; I shall not want.

            You make me lie down in green pastures.

            You lead me beside still waters.

            You restore my soul.

            You lead me in right paths for your name’s sake.

   Even though I walk through the valley 

   of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, 

   for you are with me.  Your rod and your staff, 

   they comfort me.

            You prepare a table before me 

             in the presence of my enemies.

            You anoint my head with oil.

            You fill my cup to overflowing.

            Surely your goodness and mercy shall follow me 

            all the days of my life.

            And I will dwell in your house my whole life long.

            Amen.

           

Benediction

We were made to walk through fire in our dance shoes.
We were made to sail upon the meteors.
We were made to love the heck out of our bones.
God gave us words, they were 

“I love you, please, and thank you”.
God gave us thirst, and it’s a hunger for the universe.

God gave us hands so we could pick up our broken pieces.
God gave us feet so we can find our own way home.

May you find grace when overtaken by the tempest.
May you find humor in the cynic and the pessimist.
May you find faith in the Great Unknown.[iii]

           

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[i] Frederick Buechner, The Sacred Journey.  San Francisco:  Harper & Row, 1982.

[ii] Stephen Jones, Homiletical Perspective on Acts 9: 36-43 in Feasting on the Word, Year C, Volume 2.  Louisville, KY:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

[iii] Cloud Cult, To the Great Unknown, on their album “The Seeker”, 2016.