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God's
Revised Covenant Each Wednesday morning at the Drop-in-Center at 600 Poplar, Calvary clergy and others from city congregations offer a chapel service for the Street Ministry guests. Mimsy Jones coordinates the clergy rotation, making sure we all get a chance at leading worship. My turn came up this past Wednesday. Many of the guests have mental challenges and allied problems. I was doing some thinking about Joshua for today's sermon, so I decided to talk with the worshippers about Joshua. Just before I opened the service, one of the men on the front row said, "I have my Bible, where should I go?" So I told him to look in Joshua 24, just after Deuteronomy. He replied, " I know where Joshua is!" I took note. After opening prayers and a psalm, I asked the 25 or so folks, "What do we know about Joshua?" One of the other men on the first row said, "He fought the battle of Jericho." Another said, "His name means 'God saves.'" Another man said, "He was the leader of the Jews after Moses." I knew I had a savvy congregation on my hands. When I remarked that Joshua had been Moses' right hand man as the Israelites wandered in the wilderness for 40 years, the first man, with the Bible, said, "The people murmured and complained. They just murmured and complained against Moses. The whole time in the wilderness, they murmured and complained…" I knew I was losing ground fast. So I interjected, "Don't you imagine it was tough for Joshua when Moses died, and Yahweh put him in charge?" And the Bible man piped up, "They kept on murmuring and complaining, murmuring and complaining, they just…" and I cut him off by saying, "What else did the people do?" A moment of silence ensued, so I prompted the group, "You know, after Joshua led all the battles to take the land of Canaan, the tribes were assigned their own territories. Some of them went back to worshipping the gods they knew from Egypt, and some began to worship the gods of the people they overthrew in Canaan. What do you think God did about that?" And the Bible man said, "God murmured and complained about the people, he murmured and complained, he just…" The Bible man was right, you know. The death of Moses signaled that the generation he had led out of Egypt had almost all died. As soon as Moses had died, Yahweh spoke to Joshua directly, as Yahweh had done with Moses. He gave Joshua courage to lead the new generation of Israel across the Jordan River, to enter the Promised Land, and to seize it for their own. But Yahweh in effect murmured and complained against anyone who turned away from Joshua's leadership: Yahweh would cut them down. The passage we read today is Joshua's last will and testament. He assembled all the people at Shechem and challenged them to choose whether they will serve Yahweh alone. The people, it seemed, had been worshipping Yahweh as well as other gods, and Yahweh wanted all or nothing. If the tribes chose to serve Yahweh only, there was no going back, no falling back to old gods. Joshua repeatedly warned all the tribes, their elders, heads, judges, and officers assembled at Shechem, that if they chose Yahweh, Yahweh would not forgive them if they returned to their old ways. "He is a jealous God; he will not forgive your transgressions or your sins. He will turn and do you harm, and consume you, after having done you good." The people cried out more loudly their desire to serve Yahweh. Joshua then said to the all the people, "You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen the Lord, to serve Him. Put away the foreign gods among you, and incline your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel." The people said to Joshua, "The Lord our God we will serve, and him we will obey." So Joshua led the people to enter into a covenant with God, similar to the covenant their fathers had entered into at Sinai. Joshua wrote their words of promise with God in the book of the Law of God. After the people dispersed to their territories, Joshua died. It is true of all believers--we need to renew our covenant with God regularly, else we fall off in our faith and forget the covenant we have made. Just last Sunday at the 9:00 service, all of us renewed our Baptismal Covenant, reciting that we would keep our promises with God's help. It's most important to note how different from the Israelites our covenant with God is. Where Joshua's covenant reminded Israel how unforgiving God is, our covenant acknowledges that we do fall into sin, and whenever we repent, God forgives us. Where Joshua's intends to keep Israel separate from the surrounding people, we state in baptism that we will seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbors as ourselves. Where Joshua's covenant celebrated Israel's domination of Canaan, we vow to strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being. Where the covenant of Israel at Shechem confirmed Israel's strict adherence to the law of Moses, we pledge to proclaim by word and example the good news of God in Christ. There are some in the Episcopal Church today who would push us back toward the judgmental, unforgiving, dominating, exclusive Joshua-type faith. They call themselves 'orthodox', and the rest of us 'revisionists.' To tell the truth, the great revisionist was God's Son, giving himself on the cross for all God's people, then rising to carry us into the new life of grace. Jesus has raised us all with him, putting behind us the fear of being cast off by God and putting behind us the need to besiege those who believe differently from us. Jesus comes with open arms, to embrace the sinner and love the world God created. Our renewal in our covenant does have this important similarity to Joshua's: We need to witness each other's statements of faith, and hold each other accountable. It is only as the people of Christ together that we can attain the lofty intent of Christ for us: that we, baptized into the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, will be Jesus for our world. There is no boundary to the territories into which God sends us. There is no war to fight, simply souls to lead, gently, by our example, into fellowship with God and with one another. And finally, even though we murmur and complain, we know that God loves us in spite of ourselves. Old
Testament Lesson: Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25 |
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