PASTOR’S NOTE’S FOR SEPTEMBER – UNDER THE THREAT OF DEATH
There was wonderful, terrible book that we were required to read in seminary. (Wonderful because it was quite timely and theologically accurate. Terrible because it was required reading, several hundred pages longer than we wanted to read and sometimes plodding in its content. We had to read it anyway.) The book was Denial of Death by Ernst Becker. It had won the Pulitzer prize. It was a best seller. The theme was presented in the title. It put forth the notion that there were a great number of things in our society geared toward the denial of death.
Here are some of the things presented in the book; We don’t say death, we say “passed on.” We use vast resources to make our faces look younger; be it cosmetics to plastic surgery. Those horrifying wrinkles and the receding hairlines must not show up the mirror, they would remind us that we are facing death. So. our American youth culture promotes all the products that have us ignore this basic fact. We are going to die. But an unwritten rule of life is to deny death.
(Pastor, cut it out, how can you be so morbid? Look on the bright side of life.)
Okay, I will try, but in all of that written above, I found that our current situation brought the picture into stark relief. Folks were and are horrified that there is deadly virus out there. (You knew I would bring up this COVID-19 stuff, didn’t you? I did it to give you some perspective against that overwhelming influence of culture (the denial of death) and the fear that this virus is a marauding monster that is more than physically dangerous, it is emotionally crippling to many. They are afraid to go out the front door. They are afraid.)
I find a great place to turn is the Bible. Two episodes come to mind. The first is the experience of Elijah. He had just had a showdown with prophets of BAAL and Jezebel the queen of Israel, herself a prophetess of the BAAL cult, was hunting Elijah down and he was hiding in a cave. God comes to Elijah, not in a whirlwind, not in an earthquake, not in a firestorm, but in still small voice, asking Elijah, “What are you doing here?” Then God tells Elijah to get up and do his work. You have something to do. Do it.
The second episode is the response of Jesus to Herod after hearing from others that Herod wants to end Jesus’ life. Herod had just had John the Baptism beheaded. It was pretty clear that Herod would do that to Jesus. The threat was quite credible. When Jesus heard that news, he said, “tell that fox that I must be on my way.” His use of “fox” means that he considered King Herod to be a sneaky lightweight. Herod is no tiger or lion, he has no power like an elephant. A fox can even run over the snow and not break through the crust (you live in the north, you know those wintery days when you step on the snow and your foot sinks down to the next layer.) Wow, have you ever passed off a death threat so lightly? Jesus reemphasized that he had places to go and things to do for God’s kingdom and no one was going to stop him.
So, on one hand we know that Jesus fulfilled his ministry. He was not going to let anything get in the way of that. He was coming in the name of the Lord and that was that. Jesus is blessed, he comes in the name of the Lord. You are baptized, you have died to this world in baptism and now live for Christ. How has this epidemic changed your ministry?
There was wonderful, terrible book that we were required to read in seminary. (Wonderful because it was quite timely and theologically accurate. Terrible because it was required reading, several hundred pages longer than we wanted to read and sometimes plodding in its content. We had to read it anyway.) The book was Denial of Death by Ernst Becker. It had won the Pulitzer prize. It was a best seller. The theme was presented in the title. It put forth the notion that there were a great number of things in our society geared toward the denial of death.
Here are some of the things presented in the book; We don’t say death, we say “passed on.” We use vast resources to make our faces look younger; be it cosmetics to plastic surgery. Those horrifying wrinkles and the receding hairlines must not show up the mirror, they would remind us that we are facing death. So. our American youth culture promotes all the products that have us ignore this basic fact. We are going to die. But an unwritten rule of life is to deny death.
(Pastor, cut it out, how can you be so morbid? Look on the bright side of life.)
Okay, I will try, but in all of that written above, I found that our current situation brought the picture into stark relief. Folks were and are horrified that there is deadly virus out there. (You knew I would bring up this COVID-19 stuff, didn’t you? I did it to give you some perspective against that overwhelming influence of culture (the denial of death) and the fear that this virus is a marauding monster that is more than physically dangerous, it is emotionally crippling to many. They are afraid to go out the front door. They are afraid.)
I find a great place to turn is the Bible. Two episodes come to mind. The first is the experience of Elijah. He had just had a showdown with prophets of BAAL and Jezebel the queen of Israel, herself a prophetess of the BAAL cult, was hunting Elijah down and he was hiding in a cave. God comes to Elijah, not in a whirlwind, not in an earthquake, not in a firestorm, but in still small voice, asking Elijah, “What are you doing here?” Then God tells Elijah to get up and do his work. You have something to do. Do it.
The second episode is the response of Jesus to Herod after hearing from others that Herod wants to end Jesus’ life. Herod had just had John the Baptism beheaded. It was pretty clear that Herod would do that to Jesus. The threat was quite credible. When Jesus heard that news, he said, “tell that fox that I must be on my way.” His use of “fox” means that he considered King Herod to be a sneaky lightweight. Herod is no tiger or lion, he has no power like an elephant. A fox can even run over the snow and not break through the crust (you live in the north, you know those wintery days when you step on the snow and your foot sinks down to the next layer.) Wow, have you ever passed off a death threat so lightly? Jesus reemphasized that he had places to go and things to do for God’s kingdom and no one was going to stop him.
So, on one hand we know that Jesus fulfilled his ministry. He was not going to let anything get in the way of that. He was coming in the name of the Lord and that was that. Jesus is blessed, he comes in the name of the Lord. You are baptized, you have died to this world in baptism and now live for Christ. How has this epidemic changed your ministry?