Sermons

• Come and See – The Rev. Michelle Meech

  January 14, 2024

  There is no recording for today. Rev. Michelle’s voice was affected by her cold. She still preached but did not record.

   

  In today’s Gospel, Nathanael said, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”

  Nazareth was a small agricultural village that wasn’t too far from the Great Silk Road, an ancient trading route where people from all over the world came and went. Nazareth was too far away from the major cities along the trade route to be of any real consequence and too far away from the centers of Jewish worship to have any real importance amongst the Jewish people. Jesus’ mother was from Nazareth and this is likely where he spent his formative years. With about 2000 other people who lived in simple dwellings with courtyards and animals amidst the fields where they worked.

  No one thought much of it, except to make fun of it. Why should they when it had no worldly importance? It was irredeemable in the eyes of power. A place of no consequence. Kind of like calling a place, “the wrong side of town.” Scholars agree that Nathanael’s point in asking his question was to speak contempt. “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”

  Nathanael voices the contempt that arises from fear, of course. A fear that I am not enough and, therefore, need to diminish others as a defense mechanism of some kind. Sarcasm and derisiveness that speak from ignorance and cowardice. The hatred that wails from the littlest part of ourselves when we’re afraid we aren’t going to get what we need from the world.

  

  The Call to Samuel by Frank Wesley

  What is interesting is that John chooses to use Nathanael as a vehicle for revelation in this Gospel. Skepticism and derision turn to awe before our eyes when he realizes even he is known by God. Even he, in his obviously fearful, snarky state, in which he offers no guile to hide his contempt, Nathanael is known by God.

  “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”  And Philip says, “Come and see.”

  Tomorrow, and this weekend, nearly every American is celebrating the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. His faith and his life. His scholarship and his ministry. All of which led him to be a leader in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950’s and 60’s until he was murdered by an assassin on April 4, 1968. This should be a weekend in which we celebrate to offer gratitude for him and his saying “Yes” to God’s call. The Rev. Dr. King was a great person.

  But his work is not done, as we know. And so this should also be a weekend in which we take the opportunity to consider the lessons that we as individuals and we as a society are still learning from this teacher named Martin Luther King Jr. To offer some perspective, I want to look at the story of Haiti. A country about which most of us know very little except through its stories of earthquakes, political coups, hurricanes, and extreme poverty. Seemingly irredeemable.

  Haiti, located on the island of Hispaniola, is a country born out of the endlessly evil institution of slavery. Hispaniola was the first place in the Western hemisphere to become a part of the slave trade at the moment that Columbus’ Spanish ships landed there. It became a major port for the sale of human beings as it was invaded and inhabited by the Spanish colonists. Later in the colonial period, the island was split between Spain and France. And centuries later, the French Revolution inspired the slaves and free people of color to throw off their oppressors and claim independence. They revolted in 1791 and, after more than 10 years of war with Napolean’s army, established the nation of Haiti in 1804.

  Haiti remains the only nation in the entire world to be founded as the result of a slave revolt. Why? Because the colonial powers-that-be learned their lesson about how to NOT be overthrown. They forced the country of Haiti to pay the richest countries in the world for their losses during the revolt, burying the fledgling nation in poverty and instability for 150 years. And then they developed systems of segregation and apartheid in their other territories so that as slavery was gradually outlawed, a slave revolt would never happen again. Entire countries made irredeemable by the arms of power.

  This is how American segregation developed. Haitians emigrating to the American South, mostly to Louisiana, told stories of what happened and plantation owners conspired with law-makers to prevent an uprising. Martin Luther King Jr grew up in this segregation, as we know, forced to use specially labeled bathrooms and water fountains, sent to separate schools, encountering innumerable barriers to voting, property ownership, and economic advancement. Although he was a deeply faithful, intelligent, well-read, and charismatic person, Dr. King suffered from depression in the knowledge that the system in which he lived felt insurmountable at times. It seemed irredeemable.

  Many people in the American South who claimed to be Christians, used their religion to justify the racist laws, just as they had used it to justify slavery. Many others didn’t even bother applying their religious beliefs to their public lives at all, compartmentalizing their spiritual lives from their political, economic, social, and communal lives. The prevailing sentiment at the time among those who held power was that black people were to be feared. Furthermore, the narrative of power claimed that keeping black people in their place was for their own good and it was ordained by God. The men of so-called science at the time concluded that “[black people] were inferior and “riddled with imperfections from head to toe”… that they didn’t know true pain and suffering because of their primitive nervous systems… ” therefore, keeping them subjugated was for their own good.  (Medical Apartheid, Harriet A. Washington)

  Irredeemable by the laws of power.

  The voices of worldly power speaking through Nathanael’s contemptuous question: Could anything good come out of these people of color? Could anything good come out of Haiti? Can anything good come out of Palestine? Out of Syria? Mexico? Afghanistan? Or any of the other places that we claim are irredeemable? And Philip says, come and see.

  It’s less than a month after our celebration of the Incarnation – the Festival of Christmas where we are called to the manger every year. To bring our pride, our power, our worldly riches to a manger, of all places. And asked to offer ourselves over to the knowledge and the hope that God comes to us in the most vulnerable of forms. The so-called wisdom of the world kneels at the foot of the fragile, defenseless one, acknowledging the depth of connection in our responsibility to one another.

  And the silence in that realization of love is world-stopping. It should be. It should stop us in our tracks. It should take our breath away.

  We are in the season after the Epiphany. A day in which we mark the moment the world bears witness to love incarnate and the hope that this epiphany changes us. Changes the world. Finds its way into our hearts to open us up to the possibility of redemption.

  Epiphanies can sometimes be euphoria-like experiences. And sometimes, epiphanies come as a reminder that we could be doing better. Mostly, epiphanies are the moments when we realize that we are human. And we find the space to forgive ourselves for not living up to our expectations. For not being above it all. Forgive ourselves for not having it all together. For not doing all the things we think we should be doing.

  I have found, at least in my own journey, that when I let go of that image of who I should be, I open up a whole lot more room for who I could be. And I can see the ways in which I actually can be doing better than I am.

  Like Nathanael, we don’t know ourselves the way God knows us. But in the moment when that aligns, when we learn to see ourselves more clearly as God knows us, this is the epiphany. And this is the moment when we understand Philip’s invitation to “come and see.”

  The good news is that we always have the opportunity to begin again in the love of God. Nothing we do or say or believe removes us from God’s love. It can’t. God knows you and God knows me so intimately. The whole of who we are. God loves us simply because we breathe. This I believe. And this I know because this is what sustains me in my own darkest spaces when the light feels so far away and I think the worst things about myself.

  Because in the darkest moments of our lives, my friends, we don’t need to be told what to do or be chastised for not being better, or to be fixed or handled or imprisoned or challenged or ignored. Because this is when Nathanael is bringing the voices of the world crashing into our own thoughts. And the question is not: “Can anything good come out of Nazareth? The question is: “Can anything good come of me?”

  In the darkest moments of our lives, we simply need to be known. Just like Samuel was known in the Hebrew Scriptures from today. Just like Nathanael was known in today’s gospel passage. We just need someone to say, “Hey, you’re ok. Let me walk with you a little while so you can come and see for yourself.” Come and see. This is the light of Christ.

  And when make room for Christ in our own lives, we are able to be of service to others. When we surrender the notion of who we think we’re supposed to be and become who we can be, we have so much more to give toward changing the systems and the structures of racism in our society. Like the Rev. Dr. King, we can see the path forward even though it seems difficult at times. Come and see. This is the light of Christ.

  And the ability to take this light of Christ out, past our doors and into the world, is what we are here to cultivate. Here. At this Table. The Sacrament of Eucharist is an act of reconciliation. It is through our thanks, through our gratitude for the breath of life, that God offers us a remembrance of life beyond our own borders. And it’s there that we realize that one life, our life, is connected to another is connected to another is connected to another.

  This reconciliation that we practice teaches us to reconcile with ourselves and the parts of our own lives that we believe to be irredeemable, is the core teaching. Because when we do that, when we reconcile with ourselves do we have the ability to we realize that nothing and no one is beyond God’s love. Those who have been displaced by worldly powers and laws. Those who are in prison or in danger, hungry or in need. Those who are struggling to regain their own dignity through no fault of their own. Nothing is irredeemable.

  The Rev. Dr. King himself said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”

  No one is irredeemable. All are known by God. All have inherent dignity. All are beloved children of God.

  So practice at this Table today so that we may take it out into the world. Come and see, my friends, come and see. This is the light of Christ.