Exodus 3:1-15; (Matthew 16:21-28)
Consumers, Faith, and God’s Call
James Sledge August
30, 2020
I
don’t suppose I need to tell anyone that we live in an age when many people see
no necessary link between what they hold to be true and what evidence, facts,
or logic might seem to dictate. This is not entirely new. The quip, “My mind is
made up. Don’t confuse me with the facts,” has apparently been around since
before I was born.
However,
the idea that people can simply choose the truth that suits them has reached
new heights in our day. I’m not sure there was ever a prior moment in American
history when the term “alternative facts” would have been offered as a serious
answer to any question.
The
notion that I can have whatever truth suits me is not without serious, even
dangerous consequences. Many continue to insist that climate change in not a
problem despite overwhelming scientific evidence. And choosing one’s own truth
need not be partisan, I know my share of liberals who embrace the most absurd
conspiracy theories while insisting that the complete lack of supporting evidence
is the result of some plot to keep that information hidden.
But
I don’t bring any of this up to lament the state of rational discourse in our
day. I’m more interested in how we got here and how it impacts our spiritual
lives. I doubt there is a definitive answer as to how we found this
age of
“truthiness,” but I think many can agree on some of the causes.
American
notions of freedom and our particular spin on individualism surely come into
play here. These undergird the consumerism that is such a big part of our
culture. Long gone are the days when you could have kitchen appliances in any
color you wanted as long as it was white. We now have a dizzying array of
choices, along with an accompanying idea that certain particular choices are
perfect for me, will help me achieve the happiness I long for.
Take
such consumerism far enough, and why not extend it to facts and truth. Pick
whatever truth makes you happy. And wouldn’t you know it, the internet is more
than happy to provide you with just about any truth you like. Feel like
vaccines cause autism? Plenty of sites that will tell you that is true despite
no hard, scientific evidence. Can’t quite get your head around the idea that
the earth is giant sphere hurtling through space? No worries, you can find
plenty of sites that will assure you the earth is flat.
Many
people have long used scripture a bit like the internet, cherry-picking verses
that depict a God they like. But we’ve entered entirely new territory in recent
decades. Religion has become another consumer item, one that can be customized
and personalized just for you. Churches are old, traditional stores carrying
religious products, but as with other sorts of retail, there is much more
competition than there once was.
Don’t
care for traditional religions, there’s a nearly infinite supply of New Age
spiritualties to choose from featuring everything from crystals to
reincarnation to channeling. And even if your tastes are more traditional, you
don’t have to worry about what the Bible says or any sort of developed
theology. Whatever sort of God and faith feeds you, whatever combination of
religious practices fill your spiritual void is the right faith and God for
you.
But
I am not at all sure how to reconcile such notions of God and faith with either
of our scripture readings for this morning. In one Jesus completely rejects
Peter’s idea that faith should ensure safety and self-preservation. “If
any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their
cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and
those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”
Then
there is Moses’ encounter with God at Mt. Horeb or Sinai. This is no consumer
friendly God but a God of awesome, even dangerous holiness. This God will not
be managed or utilized for one’s own purposes. Instead this God enlists Moses,
against his will, in the purposes of God.
Moses’
experience with God is not some sort of aberration but rather the typical
pattern when God shows up. In the biblical story, God’s intrusion into people’s
lives rarely seems like a good idea at the time. It almost always asks people
to do things they do not want to do and takes them places they do not want to
go.
And
this is not just in the Old Testament. The pattern repeats with Jesus. When he
calls disciples it turns their worlds upside down. Old ways are left behind, things
once valued cast aside. Jesus demands that they completely reorient their lives
to the strange ways of God who in Jesus risks everything, even his life, for
the sake of others.
Nothing
in our experience as individualist, American consumers prepares us to meet the
sort of God that Moses does. Very little about popular spiritualties or
consumer Christianity prepares us for the sort of God who in Jesus calls disciples
to deny self, to let go of everything they thought they wanted, and to follow
the path he will teach and show them.
In the individualist, American
consumerism model, satisfaction and happiness comes from being able to do
whatever you want and have whatever you want. It is about acquiring, getting
things, lots of things, both tangible things and experiences. But when God
intrudes into Moses’ life, when Jesus intrudes into the lives of disciples,
they are confronted with a totally different way, a way they would never have
chosen for themselves. This divine call is not about acquisition. It is about
letting go, letting go of plans, control, even self to discover true humanity,
true fulfilment, in a life turned over to God and God’s ways.
________________________________________________________________
In
modern Protestantism, faith often gets defined as belief. Faith equals
believing in Jesus. But I wonder if a better definition isn’t trusting that
God’s will for us and God’s plans for us are far better than anything we devise
on our own. Besides, I think that a lot of us have a gnawing suspicion that the
promises of consumerism are lies, leaving us endlessly chasing something that
we never attain. What if getting there, making it, finding meaning and
fulfilment have nothing to do with being good enough or acquiring enough? What
if it is simply about faith, about trust, about letting go and trusting our
lives to the way of Jesus?
_______________________________________________________________
This sermon was supposed to end here,
but the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha made me take another look at Moses
and the burning bush. In the past it was common for people to speak of America
as the new Israel in a new promised land. But if anything, it is the Black
experience in America that mirrors that of Israel. God could easily speak the
same words to a modern, Black Moses as those at Sinai. “I have observed the misery of my
people… I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know
their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them…” For Blacks,
for indigenous peoples and people of color in general, white America has most
often played the role of Pharaoh.
But
when God comes down to deliver, the plan is not at all to Moses’ liking. “So
come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of
Egypt.” God calls Moses to become an actor in a drama that he wants no
part of, but God insists. And if we are truly God’s people, truly people of
faith, then surely Jesus is calling us in the same way, insisting that we
become actors in the divine drama of deliverance and salvation.
This
call cannot be answered from the periphery of our lives. We cannot simply say
“Black Lives Matter” and agonize over yet another act of brutality against an
unarmed, Black individual while enjoying and perpetuating the benefits of white
privilege that most of us enjoy. God’s call is about letting go, about a costly
giving of oneself for the sake of others. But dare we trust ourselves to God’s
call?
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