Psalm 98

O sing to the Lord a new song, for he has done marvelous things. His right hand and his holy arm have gotten him victory. The Lord has made known his victory; he has revealed his vindication in the sight of the nations. He has remembered his steadfast love and faithfulness to the house of Israel. All the ends of the earth have seen the victory of our God. Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth; break forth in joyous song and sing praises. Sing praises to the Lord with the lyre, with the lyre and the sound of melody. With trumpets and the sound of the horn make a joyful noise before the King, the Lord. Let the sea roar, and all that fills it; the world and those who live in it. Let the floods clap their hands; let the hills sing together for joy at the presence of the Lord, for he is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world with righteousness, and the peoples with equity.

On Wednesday morning, my little sister went to the elementary school where she is fulfilling a student teaching requirement. Like every other day, she gathered with the young children in their classrooms, explained and demonstrated their projects, and then went around the room to help individuals as needed. One particular young girl was clearly distracted from her work, and when my sister asked if everything okay, she looked up with terror in her eyes and asked, “Am I going to get deported?”

On Wednesday morning, thousands of angry citizens gathered in California to protest the results of the election. Though initially peaceful, the protest quickly turned violent and the crowd began attacking the police and lighting dumpsters on fire. As tear gas was fired into the crowd to break up the demonstration, the people only shouted their chants even louder, “Kill Trump, Kill Trump, Kill Trump.”

On Wednesday morning, a woman walked into a Wal-Mart somewhere in the Midwest while wearing her hijab. She went down the aisles picking out her items when another woman walked up, grabbed her by the shoulder while pointing at her hijab, and said, “That would look better around your neck. This is our country now.”

On Wednesday morning, countless Trump voters woke up to the news they prayed for, only to receive hateful and violent comments from friends and relatives alike. They received emails and notes saying things like: “If you voted for Trump, you’re the reason America has fallen apart. If you voted for Trump, you are a bigoted racist sexist monster.”

On Wednesday morning, white students at a Junior High School in Michigan formed a human wall to block minority students from entering the building. There were shouts of “go back to your country,” and “we’re making America great again.”

On Wednesday morning, a man was driving through a suburb of Chicago when a crowd of young men surrounded his car, pulled him from the vehicle, and dragged him through the streets. They attacked him because he had a Trump sticker on the bumper, and videos show the crowd screaming, “You voted for Trump, and now you’re going to pay for it.”

Sigh.

Throughout scripture, if the Israelites are told to do one thing more than any other, it is to remember. Remember the covenant God made with Noah and Abraham, remember the acts of God which liberated you from slavery in Egypt, remember the care God provided to you in the wilderness through water and manna, remember the mighty deeds of God delivering you to the Promised Land, remember the story and teach it to you children, and your children’s children.

It is easy to remember God’s salvific work in the world when things are going our way. When we rest contently in the communion of our friends and family, when we check the bank account and see our savings increase, when we sleep comfortably in our beds with the heat pumping through the vents. It is easy to sing a song to the Lord when we feel like everything in our life is part of God’s great victory.

We can grab the hymnal and belt out the great songs of our faith. We can be reconnected with the great tradition of the church, and the story of scripture, which helps to root us in our discipleship. We can sing because we feel God’s marvelous work.

However, it is hard to remember and be thankful for all of God’s deeds when it feels like our lives are falling apart. When we wake up and see that our candidate lost the election, or when we wake up and are belligerently berated for voting for the candidate that won, when we are terrified about how we will pay all the bills by the end of the month, when we throw dirt onto the coffin of someone we love, when we shiver in the loneliness of life wondering if anyone even cares about us. It is hard to sing a song to the Lord when we feel like everything in our life is crumbling under the weight of suffering.

We struggle to lift up the hymnal and sing the songs of faith because they feel so disconnected. How can we sing the Lord’s songs when life feels so miserable? How can we sing when people on both sides of the political aisle are filled with anger, fear, and resentment? We fail to praise the Lord through song because we feel like there’s nothing worth praising.

And yet the psalmist calls for us to sing a new song. We might be sitting by the rivers of Babylon and still we must sing. We might’ve voted for Hillary Clinton and can’t believe she lost, and still we must sing. We might’ve voted for Donald Trump and our being attacked for our political opinions, and still we must sing.

We sing a new song because God is doing a new thing. God is working in and through the people of this church to bring about the kingdom of God on earth. Whether through a bible study, a prayer, or a simple smile from a pew on Sunday morning, God is doing a new thing here through the establishment of a community based on God’s love and not our own political opinions. God is doing a new thing here by giving us the strength and the courage to pray for, and love, the people who don’t agree with us.

We sing a new song because in singing we proclaim God’s victory. And to be abundantly clear, God’s victory is not in a new president being elected to the White House; we do not praise the Lord for a victory of one political candidate over another.

God’s victory is altogether different.

In singing of God’s victory, in praising the Lord for God’s steadfast love and faithfulness, we break free from the tyranny of things, and the bondage of our own modern Babylon. With one voice, let me say that again, with one voice we reject the messiness and despair of our world and look for God’s mercy and grace.

Over the last week, and throughout the entire election, we witnessed greed, and anger, and derision in one another and ourselves. Our communities are no longer neighborhoods of neighbors, but are instead isolated walls of division that prevent us from encountering God in the “other.” Instead of joining together in worship on Sunday mornings, or gathering together for celebratory block parties, we are consumed by computers and phones that promise “true” communities through social networks of people who look like us, think like us, and behave like us.

And yet God offers a new thing to this new community we call the church. God offers us himself in Jesus Christ, the one for whom we sing. Jesus Christ was, is, and always will be the new thing God is doing in this world. The life, death, and resurrection of the Son of Man shows how God can make a way out of no way, how God defeated death, and how God frees us for true and perfect freedom.

So we sing a new song, because in singing we proclaim that God lives and reigns. We sing because the world is about to change – God is changing it. We sing not because we are happy, and not because we are sad, but because we have a song to sing, a song about our God who loves, cares, and remains steadfast.

For we know that those on the margins of society, the ones who are afraid in the wake of the recent election, the children who are afraid of being deported, are the very people God calls us to love and care for. Through the songs of the past and the stories of scripture we experience the importance of ministering toward the sojourners for we, like them, are strangers in a strange land.

We know that that violent protests calling for the murder of Donald Trump are an abomination to the Lord. God implores us to remember the sanctity of all life from a young girl in an art classroom to the new president-elect of the United States of America. Through God’s mighty acts in Jesus Christ we know there is goodness in all people, and we are the ones often tasked with looking for it while others turn blind eyes.

We know that threatening people of other faiths is in fundamental dissonance with God’s willingness to elect us gentiles into the great covenant of the Israelite people. For a long time, we were the strangers from the outside looking in. We were the ones viewed with suspicion and unease. And that to do that to others now, is to forget and be ignorant of God’s love made manifest in the one who died on a cross for the world.

We know that denigrating and berating people for their vote is the equivalent of the judgment God commands us to abstain from.

We know that making a human wall to prevent minorities from entering a school is in sharp contrast to the one who invites all to the table and to the feast.

We know that violently attacking someone for a bumper sticker, for their political identity, is the beginning of a slippery slope back toward a world in which 6 million Jews were murdered, blacks were segregated from the rest of society, and Christians were stoned and beaten for believing that Jesus is Lord.

And we know all of this because we know Jesus Christ, and him crucified. In the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus we receive the story of our own lives that transcends all other identities, including our political opinions. Jesus Christ is the one who transformed, and continues to transform the world. We sing our songs in praise of the Lord because Jesus Christ makes a way where there is no way.

Not a way of ignorance and lazy unity, but a way of unrelenting commitment to the poor, the marginalized, and the vulnerable.

            Not a way of isolation and fear, but a way of courage in our convictions about who we are and whose we are.

            Not a way of violence and death, but a way that brings forth new life and new opportunities for all to discover the beauty of the infinite.

So we sing a new song to the Lord, for God has broken the chains of our slavery to political isolation and frees us to love one another without fear. We sing a new song of God’s unending love and amazing grace in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We sing a new song in response to God’s mercy that reigns like a flood. We sing a new song because the Lord is doing a new thing. Amen.

Luke 6.20-31

Then he looked up at his disciples and said: “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh. Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven; for that is what their ancestors did to the prophets. But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. Woe to you who are full now, for you will be hungry. Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep. Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is what their ancestors did to the false prophets. But I say to you that listen, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again. Do to others as you would have them do to you.

Jesus came down with them to a level place and mingled with the crowd. Instead of ascending to a pulpit position of superiority, Jesus stood among the people where he can feel what we feel. His sermon, if we want to call it a sermon, is short and to the point: It’s time to weep. Blessed are you who are empty now and disappointed. Fortunate are those among you who grieve and know that the pain won’t go away. Lucky are you who have something to cry about.

But woe to you who have lots of money, because your lives are never going to get any better. Beware if you are full now, you will grow hungry. Take care that you are not filled with laughter, those chuckles will soon turn into tears.

Love the people who drive you mad. Pray for the people who make your lives miserable. If anyone hits you, offer yourselves willingly. If someone takes your coat, offer them your shirt too. Give your money to the poor. Treat everyone the way you wish you were treated.

This good news doesn’t sound much like good news to us. In fact, it sounds like bad news. If you’re anything like me, you squirmed when the liturgist read Jesus’ words from the bible. And if you didn’t, maybe you weren’t really listening.

Our lives are being turned upside down, whether we want them to be or not. For those of us comfortable with our wealth and salaried jobs, and for those of us desiring deeper pockets and larger paychecks, we will never be truly content. For those of us who are full from stocked refrigerators and overflowing gardens, there will come a time when we hunger for something that no consumption can ever satisfy. For those of us who will laugh with joy on Tuesday evening when our candidate is elected, our laughter will turn to mourning and weeping when things don’t change the way we thought they would.

Jesus’ good news sounds more like bad news.

Blessed are you who weep. To be sad, to be overly emotional, is regarded so negatively these days. Many of us see tears as a weakness, a weakness that’s supposed to be kept private and locked away. But it takes great courage to weep, to open our eyes to the brokenness of this world and our own lives, and know that it is incomplete.

We might be satisfied with our lives at the moment, we might be fine with a world of sadness and emptiness, and if we are, then the blessings of Jesus’ sermon are not meant for us.

But we might be unsatisfied with what’s happening right now. We might be here in this sanctuary because we want a dose of hope and reality in a world filled with despair and deception. Perhaps we believe and know that neither presidential candidate can, or should be, our messiah. Maybe we are filled with grief over the Standing Rock tribe protesting against the principalities and the powers. Perhaps we are filled with sorrow after a black church in Mississippi was set on fire last week. Maybe we cannot hold back the tears because this place reminds us of someone we’ve lost. If so, then Jesus’ strange words are meant for us.

I’ve done a lot of funerals over the last few years. I’ll be in the midst of something totally different when the phone will ring, and just the breathing on the other side is an indication that someone died. I’ll talk with the funeral home about arrangements, schedule a time to meet with the family, and we will try our best to faithfully weave together a service of death and resurrection for the dead.

More than a year ago, two of our church members died a day a part, and their funerals were scheduled for the same day; one in the morning and one in the afternoon. While meeting with both families I asked them to share reflections about the person who died so that I might faithfully proclaim their lives from the pulpit. Both families said they wanted the services to be a “celebration of life” and they asked me to focus on the “good times.”

I knew the man and woman who died well enough to know that when the families asked me to focus on the good times, one didn’t want me to talk about how the dead man was estranged from his wife, and the other didn’t want me to talk about how the dead woman lost her son years ago.

At the time I smiled and nodded along, knowing full and well that life is messy and filled with sadness and shame and disappointment, even if they wanted me to omit it from the pulpit.

And then both families, independent of one another, gave me a bible that belonged to the person now dead.

In the days preceding their services, both bibles sat on my desk. Both were well worn, earmarked, filled with clippings, and had lots of notes written in the margins.

The first one belonged to the man and when I picked it up I flipped through the Old and New Testaments to read whatever he wrote about living a faithful life. In the margins there were dates corresponding when the text was preached about in church, there were question marks and exclamation points, and there were other scribbles that were impossible to decipher.

And when I was moving through the New Testament I nearly dropped the bible in my lap. In big and bold letters in the margins were the words, “Wedding Scripture.” It was clear that this page had been read perhaps more than any other as I could see depressions in the page from where his thumbs used to rest. And covering all the words were the remnants of his teardrops.

The second bible belonged to the woman, and likewise I lifted it up to flip through the Old and New Testaments. Hers was filled with countless lines under particular scriptures, pages were earmarked with stars scribbled next to names and dates, and there was a stack of obituaries tucked behind the back cover. I made my way through the bible and stopped when I came to one of the most well known passages in the book of Revelation. I saw the name of her dead son next to the words, “God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning or crying or pain.” And covering all the words were the remnants of her teardrops.

We see tears, and emotions, and hunger, and grief as weaknesses. But Jesus saw something far worse than weeping – what’s worse is the dangerous deception of believing that our lives are secure, stable, and perfect. Jesus would have deplored the bumper sticker reduction of life to “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” Woe to us who feel too comfortable, too settled, too blessed.

Unlike many of us, Jesus saw the world for all of its cracks and its ugliness. He walked toward the margins of life, rather than avoiding them. And in so doing, he offers us something different, something strange, something unlikely, and frankly, something holy. You are blessed if you experience loss and feel the pain and cry your eyes out. Because one day, it might not be tomorrow, but one day you will laugh, you will sing, and you will rejoice.

This is the promise of the Good News that sounds like bad news; God promises us this hope even though we don’t know how it will happen, we only know that it will happen. For only God could come in the form of a baby, grow to preach the strange and upside-down Gospel, die on a cross, and then offer us hope in an empty tomb three days later.

What some of us forget, perhaps because we cannot help ourselves from skipping over Good Friday to Easter Sunday, is that the disciples ran for fear and wept for loss of their friend who died. They had to go through the grief and the misery of a friend buried in a tomb, they had to spill their tears of sadness before they could laugh on Sunday when death was defeated. Grief cannot be avoided, and it cannot be skipped over.

Blessed are those of us who suffer now, who grieve the loss of those we love, because we will laugh and rejoice in their, and our, resurrection from the dead.

But woe to us who laugh now, who feel not a care in the world, for there will come a day when the rug is pulled out and our laughter will turn to tears, and our dancing will turn to mourning.

This is as paradoxical as the life of faith gets, but that’s part of what makes us sinners into saints.

Today we remember all the saints. Since nearly the beginning, the church has set aside a day to remember the great cloud of witnesses who have gone before us in the faith, stretching across the centuries and around the world. We know that some of them struggled to hear this very same proclamation as good news, and we know that some of them lived their lives under the tyranny of tears with an almost complete lack of laughter.

We read their names and pause for a moment of praise to the Lord for placing them in our lives, for being vessels of God’s grace, for helping each of us see what it means to follow Jesus.

It is hard to follow Jesus, to hunger for transformation, to love our enemies, to weep without shame, and today is a reminder that though we may feel crazy, we are not alone.

If we want to know what it takes to be a saint, we need not look further than Jesus’ sermon on the Plain. For a saint is anyone who is brave enough to grieve for the world, who resists the temptation to be satisfied with the status quo, who leave behind tear marks in well worn bibles.

A saint is anyone who comes to this table and knows they don’t deserve it.

Perhaps you’ve heard the expression that “church is not a museum for saints, but a hospital for sinners.” This is true, but the line between sinners and saints is remarkably fine. We do well then to know that this place is a hospital for saints, a place for us to be made well.

If you’ve been looking for happiness in a new house, or a new job, or heaven forbid a new president… You will never find what you’re looking for. There will always be a bigger house, a higher paying job, a better president, and all of those things are hollow. Only the radical and literally life-giving dimension of God can fill those holes in our souls.

Instead, come to the table. Join with the church immemorial. Feast with the communion of the saints. If you are poor, then take what you need from the offering plate. If you hunger for change and righteousness in this world, be filled with the body and blood of Jesus. If you feel moved to tears, then weep without shame. Amen.