Considering Desire

 Luke 13:31-35

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So today we are going to talk about desire.  I don’t mind if you want to chuckle that a guy named Randy is going to talk about desire.  I think it’s likely that at the mention of the word “desire” most of us go there with the naughty thoughts.  Google does.  If you search for the word “desire” on Google you won’t be disappointed I promise.  Yes, there are pages and pages of the same dictionary definition from different dictionaries but there’s all these ads for clothing optional resorts.  Do an image search of the word “desire”, well if you’re a guy, you’ll probably waste a good afternoon on that.  For some reason, as a culture we seem to have bookended the word desire into that realm of the naughty by equating it to lust, and predominantly sexual lust.

Well, I don’t want to disappoint you, but a lusty sermon is not where we’re going today in considering our desires.  To desire something is simply to strongly want it.  If we inventoried the desires of our hearts, the things that we strongly want, I think our list will wind up being not so one-track minded and really quite innocent, things like meaningful companionship, fulfilling work, not having to live hand to mouth, and that our children and grandchildren can grow up safe and healthy and have opportunities.  Those aren’t bad desires.  There are even passages in the Old Testament that indicate our desires aren’t all that “tainted with sin”.  The Psalmist wrote, “Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart” (Ps. 37:4).  I don’t think he was referring to a strong desire to take a Caribbean cruise on a clothing optional ship.  Rather, I think he was referring to the key-to-a-meaningful-life things I just mentioned.  Delight in the Lord and he will make life fulfilling.

Delight is a teaser of word.  So, what did the Psalmist mean by “Delight in the Lord”?  Well, it’s an interesting metaphor.  The Hebrew word we translate as “delight” means to pamper or refresh oneself.  Pamper oneself in the Lord.  Refresh oneself in the Lord.  Take a spa day in the Lord, a mental health day in the Lord.  This is an invitation to sit on the front porch with the Lord and watch the birds come to the feeder, to take some time just to have a little seventh day of creation time with God.  After six days of creating his creation and calling it very good, God then on the seventh day rested, which means he just kicked back and reposed like gods do and enjoyed the beauty of it all.  Another helpful Bible image is in the story of Adam and Eve and how every evening in the cool of the day God would come around and spend some time with his two favourite people and catch up on all they had discovered that day.  

So, the Psalmist invites us to find our delight in the Lord by spending this rest-filled time with the Lord and he will give us the desires of the heart, mainly the things we would otherwise worry about.  Pamper yourself, refresh yourself in the presence of the Lord.  This seems like such a simple gift, but why do we have such a hard time with it?  It’s such a simple gift to sit on the porch with the Lord. If it helps, do something simple like always keep one more rocking chair on the porch than you need so that God can sit with you.  Enjoy that time with the Lord and in time the Lord will look after those desires of your heart.  There’s no need to worry.  So simple, but so neglected.

Well, let’s step into Luke and talk about desire for a moment.  The Greek word for desire shows up three times.  In most English translations it’s hidden under words like “want”, “long”, and “willing”.  I’m going to start with how Jesus used it.  He speaks with reference to Jerusalem, the city that stands as the emblem of God’s beloved people but also the religious establishment and political power that corrupt God’s people.  Jerusalem is a beautiful city like God’s people but it’s got this nasty reputation for murdering those who speak for God.  Jesus says “Jerusalem, Jerusalem how I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings.”  This is a very touching image of God having a motherly love for his people to protect and shelter them.  A mother hen has a very fierce instinct to protect her chicks.  If a fox gets into the chicken run, a mother hen will stand her ground to her own detriment.  She’ll stamp her feet and fluff her feathers to make herself look really big and then squawk loudly to call to her chicks to come gather under her for safety.  Unfortunately, the fox will kill her but hopefully let the chicks run away.  

Of course, there’s a bit of foreshadowing of Jesus’ death hidden in this metaphor, but let’s not miss that God’s love for us, his beloved children, is as fierce as a mother hen for her chicks.  God strongly desires that we find our security with him.  Thinking back to the Psalmist, God strongly desires that we delight in him rather than fear stuff and worry.  

But…notice what Jesus says about the chicks.  Jesus also says that the chicks are not willing to come. The chicks do not desire, do not strongly want to seek security, protection, comfort and warmth under their mother hen.  In this world of powerful foxes invading chicken runs for predatorial reasons, the people of God, the very vulnerable people of God, do not desire to draw close to the Lord for safety, for their protection.  The thing about hens and chicks when threatened is that the hen will instinctually stand her ground before the threat to protect the chicks who will instinctually run to gather under her for protection.  Hundreds of thousands to millions of years of evolution have made it nearly impossible for little chicks to do anything other than gather under their mother hen for warmth and protection and, if we want to humanize them, probably a whole lot of emotional security too.  It’s a law of nature.

This is the way the relationship between God and his beloved children is supposed to be.  God strongly desires that we gather to him not just in times when our lives are out of kilter and we need help or protection, but also when we just need to feel at home in this world.  But, we chicks oddly seem to lack the instinct to desire God, to “delight in” God.  In fact, our instinct is quite the opposite.  As St. Augustine said, we tend to love and trust the right things wrongly and the wrong things rightly.  We are chicks who seem to have the desire to flee to something other than God for delight.  We will even seek to delight in the fox who wants to kill us.

And about the fox here in this passage.  This is the same Herod who killed John the Baptist.  The Pharisees warn Jesus to get out of that area because Herod desires, he strongly wants, to kill Jesus just like he did to John the Baptist.  There are some who once they get a taste of wealth and power, they will desire to kill God and those who speak for him rather than have their way of life brought into question by the God who made and loves them.  It’s a twisted world we live in.

This odd twistedness about us is what the Bible would call sin.  God has a strong desire for us to come and find our delight in him so that he may give us the true desires of our hearts.  God’s not going to give us a cruise on a clothing optional ship.  That kind of desire isn’t what we’re talking about.  We’re not talking about the baser stuff here but rather the important desires like meaningful companionship, fulfilling work, not having to live hand to mouth, a future for our kids, and that when the bad stuff of chaos breaks forth on us God will work all things to the good for those who love him.  But, something’s wrong in that we, his beloved children, don’t desire to delight in God, to find our home in God and rather we pander to baser instincts and are bullied with fear by foxes.

And so, we return to the Psalmist and the invitation to delight in the Lord, to pamper ourselves in the Lord, to refresh ourselves in the Lord.  We are beloved by God.  Like a mother hen fiercely and unquestionably loves her chicks, so God loves us.  God desires we gather to him.  There’s more to this Christian faith thing than just the comfort of coming to church on Sunday to worship together and socialize with the people we’ve known and worshipped with for a long, long time.  There’s comfort in that, yes, and it’s a good thing, but is it really our desire for the Lord that brings us to congregate or simply for the comfort of the familiar that we have in our church buildings and the love we have for one another?   

There is a delight to be had in our relationship to God, a delight that can be found out on our front porches or out for a walk at anytime and not just on Sunday mornings.  It is the realization that God is with us, we are his beloved children whom God treasures spending time with and listening to.  A communicative, restful relationship with the God who made us and knows us, who bears our burdens with us, who comforts us is something God deeply desires for us.  We just need to take the time, make the space for it to happen.  Delight in the Lord and he truly will give you the desires of your heart.  Amen.

 

A Fox, A Hen, and Chicks Who Won't Come (Take Two)

Luke13:31-35
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There are few sights more idyllic than a bunch of little baby chicks pushing their way in underneath their mother hen for warmth and security.  It is amazing that at any sense of danger they will instinctively seek to hide under their mother.  It is all but impossible for them to do otherwise.  If a dog comes into the run, without fail the chicks will flock together behind the mother hen start to burrow in under her.  The mother hen will start to look real ferocious.  She’ll stare the old dog in the eye and face it square on and fluff up her feathers making herself look big.  The brood pushing in under her adds to that effect.  If you’re a curious old farm dog who’s feeling a bit playful, you get the message.  “Stay away from my brood or I’ll poke your eyes out.”

A fox is a different story.  If he’s hungry, he’s got killing on his mind.  That’s what foxes do.  It won’t matter how ferociously fluffy the mother hen looks a hungry fox will just go ahead and kill her.  Unfortunately, she won’t flee.  She will still stand her ground.  The chicks will still try to burrow in under her.  Her grand display of ferocity unfortunately turns to defiant martyrdom and the chicks still get eaten.  Her noble maternal instincts sadly only make her a fairly easy grab for a hungry fox with killing on his mind. 

Looking at our passage here in Luke, Jesus has pulled out quite a powerful image to describe his love, God’s love, for his people.  Due to her instinctual love for her chicks a mother hen will stand her ground to protect those chicks, but sadly, against a fox, she becomes an utter example of futility and vulnerability.  Of course we are supposed to see an analogy here to Jesus’ death on the cross, a revelation of God’s nature by God the Son in which we learn that the power of God is marked by vulnerability and weakness.  God is not all-powerful in the way we think of power.  Rather, God is all-loving. 

Fox’s have power.  King’s have power.  Yet, there’s a rule of thumb when it comes to power.  Lord John Acton wrote in 1887 in a letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton: “All power tends to corrupt.  Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.”  That’s what happens when people have power over people.  If we remember last week’s reading, this is the sort of power that formed the basis of the devil’s second test of Jesus.  The devil showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world in an instant and said he could give Jesus all that power and if Jesus would worship him.  Jesus didn’t fall for it, if you catch the pun.

Returning to our fox in the chicken yard image, it is kind of interesting here how Jesus, the mother hen, deals with the threat from Herod, the fox.  First thing to keep in mind here is that the Pharisees were probably lying to Jesus about Herod having a desire to kill him.  This particular Herod, Herod Antipas, was a Roman pawn who liked to throw parties.  He was indeed the Herod responsible for the death of John the Baptist.  But, we know he was a reluctant participant in a tragic turn of events in that case.  Herod actually enjoyed listening to John the Baptist.  We learn later in Luke’s Gospel that this Herod was equally curious about Jesus.  In chapter 23, after the Jewish authorities arrested Jesus, Pontius Pilate sent him over to Herod to see if Herod could find anything against Jesus.  According to Luke, Herod was happy to finally meet Jesus because he wanted to see Jesus do some sort of miracle.  But when Jesus refused and simply stood there silent, he had Jesus mocked and sent him back to Pilate who in turn stood before a mob roused by the Temple authorities and said that both he and Herod could find nothing wrong with Jesus.  That said, I think it is more likely that the Pharisees are just trying to mess with Jesus using an empty threat to run him off.

So, the Pharisees tell Jesus to get out of there because Herod is longing to kill him and Jesus in response gives a very “cocky” answer.  “You go in my stead and tell that fox that today, tomorrow, and the next day I’m going to be doing what I do – casting out demons and healing the sick – that’s what I’m going to be doing here while I’m on my way to Jerusalem.  Oh, and by the way it’s impossible for a prophet to get killed outside of Jerusalem.”  With that answer Jesus basically told Herod and the Pharisees that Herod was powerless to kill Jesus outside of Jerusalem.  Politicians have no power to stop God or the work of God.

 Jesus’ directs his next comments more towards the Pharisees than to Herod.  And we know about the Pharisees.  They were the hyper-religious people back then and they had the most political power at the populist level of all the groups in Jesus’ day.  Actually, they were effectually more powerful than Herod.  If the Pharisees were as in with God as they believed themselves to be, they should have been able to recognize by the things that Jesus was doing that he was imbued with the true power of God and was therefore their Messiah, but they just didn’t see it.  Powerlust blinded them.  And so, Jesus goes on to note that it’s not kings who kill prophets, but “Jerusalem”. “Jerusalem, Jerusalem”, the power seat of religion, “Jerusalem” is who kills prophets and stones those God sends to them.  It’s impossible for Jesus to be killed by anything other than Jerusalem.

Next, Jesus creates an image that’s not so idyllic.  Imagine a fox coming into the chicken yard and the mother hen calling the chicks to find their protection underneath her.  But the chicks don’t want to come.  There’s something seriously wrong.  By the powerful drive of instinct alone the chicks should run to their mother and wriggle in underneath of her for safety.  But instead, the chicks – Jerusalem – attack and kill the mother hen.  What a bizarre scene.  

If you’re paying attention to the original Greek text in this passage which we obliviously can’t and it’s a shame that the translators haven’t done very well here for us either, if you’re paying attention you’ll notice that the root of it all is problem with desire.  The Greek word for desire, for longing shows up three times in this passage.  First, the Pharisees said that Herod was not simply wanting, but rather longing to kill Jesus.  The next two times is when Jesus says to “Jerusalem”, the religious leadership of God’s people, “How often have I longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you (Jerusalem) did not long for it.”  Shuh-mack.  So, Jesus tells the Pharisees that their house, the Temple, is left empty to them meaning God is not there anymore and they are not going to recognize him until they see the children of Jerusalem whom they are responsible to raise in the faith welcoming him, Jesus, into Jerusalem singing, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”  Please don’t miss the foreshadowing of Palm Sunday here.

The heart of the matter driving this whole bizarre scene of chicks turning on their mother hen when a fox is in the yard is a lack of a longing desire on the part of the political and religious leadership to find the security of a life giving relationship with their God.  “Jerusalem”, this interesting mixture of religious and political power likes its power to control others be it with empty threats or with rules for morality and proper ritual.  “Jerusalem” likes its power and will even kill God to keep it.

The moral of this story is that religion and politics make odd bedfellows.   Religious authorities should not use politicians to enforce religious values nor should politicians use religious values to seek power.  Presidents should not sign Bibles nor should they be asked to –even if it's Jimmy Carter.  That is bizarre.  Christian faith is not a religion to be used to undergird a nation.  Christian faith is new human existence, people indwelt by the Holy Spirit so that we are in a relationship with God in which nothing can separate us from his love and presence; a relationship with God in which God is a work transforming us to be more Christ-like, which means bearing--the-cross-vulnerable in our ways.  Like a mother hen God longs, deeply desires, for us to come to him...not to some religion about him.  The new human existence that God has wrought in Christ Jesus is new human being in which God is restoring his image in us, the image of a self-giving, loving communion of persons.  This new existence is not found in the observances of religious institutions for the sake of national solidarity.  But rather, in prayer and in meditation on Scripture and in heartfelt worship which are times when we are in his presence and his nature simply rubs off on us.  It is found as we learn to love our neighbours as we love ourselves with a love that is unconditional and unselfish and indeed sacrificial.  It is found when we forgive and love those who have hurt us and we try to bear them up understanding their woundedness.  It is found in extending hospitality and gracious fellowship, friendship, to all.  All who are in Christ are new creation, the old life is gone and a new one has begun – a new life filled with and transformed by God.  We, this congregation, we are new creation in the midst of the old, new humanity in the midst of the old.  The more we live it, the more we will know it. Amen.

A Fox, a Hen, and Chicks Who Won't Come

Luke 13:31-35

There are few sights more idyllic than a bunch of little baby chicks pushing their way in underneath their mother hen for warmth and security.  At any sense of danger they will instinctively seek to hide under their mother.  It is all but impossible for them to do otherwise.  If a dog comes into the yard where there is a mother hen with her babies, without fail the chicks will flock together putting the mother hen between them and the dog and then they will start to burrow in under her.  The mother hen will start to look real defensive.  She’ll stare the old dog in the eye and face it square on and fluff up her feathers making herself look big and ferocious.  The brood pushing in under her adds to that effect.  If you’re a curious old farm dog who’s feeling a bit playful, you get the message.  “Stay away from my brood or I’ll poke your eyes out.”

A fox is a different story.  If he’s hungry, he’s got killing on his mind.  That’s what foxes do.  It won’t matter how ferociously fluffy the mother hen looks a hungry fox will just go ahead and kill her.  Akin to a squirrel trying to avoid a car while crossing the road only to meets an unfortunate demise, a mother hen will still stand her ground.  She will not run away to save her self.  The chicks will still try to burrow in under her and she will do her best to remain atop her brood.  Her grand display of ferocity unfortunately turns to defiant martyrdom.  Her noble maternal instincts only just make her a fairly easy grab for a hungry fox.

Looking at our passage here in Luke, Jesus has pulled out quite a powerful image to describe his love, God’s love, for his people.  Due to her instinctual love for her chicks a mother hen will stand her ground to her death to protect those chicks.  Sadly, against a fox she becomes an utter example of futility and vulnerability.  Of course we are supposed to see an analogy here to Jesus’ death on the cross, a revelation of God’s nature by God the Son in which we learn that the power of God is marked by weakness.  God is not all-powerful in the way we think of power.  Rather, God is all-loving. 

Fox’s have power.  King’s have power.  Yet, there’s a rule of thumb when it comes to power.  Lord John Acton wrote in 1887 in a letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton: “All power tends to corrupt.  Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.”  That’s what happens when people have power over people.  If we remember last week’s reading, this is the sort of power the formed the basis of the devil’s second test of Jesus.  The devil showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world in an instant and said he could give Jesus all that power and if Jesus would worship him.  Jesus didn’t fall for it, if you catch the pun.

Returning to our fox in the chicken yard image, it is kind of interesting here how Jesus, the mother hen, deals with the threat from Herod, the fox.  First thing to keep in mind here is that the Pharisees were probably lying to Jesus about Herod wanting to kill him.  This particular Herod, Herod Antipas, was a Roman pawn who liked to throw parties.  He was indeed the Herod responsible for the death of John the Baptist.  But, we know he was a reluctant participant in a tragic turn of events in that case.  Herod apparently liked to listen to John the Baptist.  We learn later in Luke’s Gospel that this Herod was equally curious about Jesus.  In chapter 23, after the Jewish authorities arrested Jesus, Pontius Pilate sent him over to Herod to see if Herod could find anything against Jesus.  According to Luke, Herod was happy to finally meet Jesus because he wanted to see Jesus do some sort of miracle.  But when Jesus refused and simply stood there silent, he had Jesus mocked and sent him back to Pilate who in turn stood before a mob roused by the Temple authorities and said that both he and Herod could find nothing wrong with Jesus.  So, I think its more likely that the Pharisees are just trying to mess with Jesus, and this whole exchange is like basketball players out on the court talking shmack.

So, the Pharisees tell Jesus to get out of there because Herod wants to kill him and Jesus gives a very “cocky” one.  “You go tell that fox that today, tomorrow, and the next day I’m going to go do what I do – casting out demons and healing the sick.”  Jesus comments here are not directed towards Herod, but rather to the Pharisees.  And we know about the Pharisees.  They were the devoutly religious people back then who knew their Bibles and had the most power of all the groups in Jesus’ day.  Actually, they were effectually more powerful than Herod.  They should have been able to recognize by the things that Jesus was doing, that he was imbued with the true power of God and was therefore their Messiah, but they didn’t see it.  And so, Jesus goes on to note that it’s not kings who kill prophets, but “Jerusalem”. “Jerusalem, Jerusalem”, the power seat of religion, “Jerusalem” is who kills prophets and stones those God sends to them.  It’s impossible for Jesus to be killed by anything other than Jerusalem.

Next, Jesus creates an image that’s not so idyllic.  Imagine a fox coming into the chicken yard and the mother hen calling the chicks to find their protection underneath her.  But the chicks don’t want to come.  There’s something seriously wrong with this picture.  By instinct the chicks should run to their mother.  They should flock together putting their mother between themselves and danger and wriggle in underneath of her, but that’s not what’s happening.  Rather, it seems the fox could care less and all the while, the chicks are actually attacking the mother hen.  What a bizarre scene.

What a bizarre scene.  The Greek word for desire, for longing shows up three times in this passage.  First, the Pharisees said that Herod is desiring, longing to kill you.  The next two times is when Jesus says to “Jerusalem”, the religious leadership of God’s people, “How often have I longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you (Jerusalem) did not long for it.”  Shuh-mack.  So, Jesus tells the Pharisees that their house, the Temple, is left empty to them meaning God is not there and they are not going to recognize him until they see the children of Jerusalem welcoming him into town singing, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” The day of his triumphal entry, Palm Sunday.

The heart of the matter driving this whole bizarre scene of chicks turning on their mother hen when a fox is in the yard was a lack of a longing desire on the part of the Jewish religious leadership for those entrusted to them to find the security of a life giving relationship with their God.  “Jerusalem” likes its power to control others with religion, with rules for morality and proper ritual.  “Jerusalem” likes its the power to condemn and to enslave and oppress by means of rules and images of an angry, judging God who must be pacified lest he break forth in wrath against you.

The moral of this story is “don’t let your religion get in the way of your relationship with God.”  Christian faith is not a religion, though the institution of Christianity can be.  Christian faith is new human existence, people indwelt by the Holy Spirit so that we are in a relationship with God in which nothing can separate us from his love and presence.  Like a mother hen God longs, deeply desires, for us to come to him...not to some religion about him.  The new human existence that God has wrought in Christ Jesus is new human being in which God is restoring his image in us, the image of a self-giving, loving communion of persons.  This new creation is not found in the observances of religious institutions.  But rather, in prayer and meditation on Scripture and in worship – times when we are in his presence and his nature simply rubs off on us.  It is found as we learn to love our neighbours as we love ourselves, unconditionally and unselfishly and indeed sacrificially.  It is found when we forgive and love those who have hurt us and try to bear them up understanding their woundedness.  It is found in extending hospitality and gracious fellowship, friendship, to all.  All who are in Christ are new creation, the old life is gone and a new one has begun – a new life filled with and transformed by God.  We, this congregation, we are new creation in the midst of the old, new humanity in the midst of the old.  The more we live it, the more we will know it. Amen.