Tag: genesis

Grace in Genesis: Tower of Babel

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Grace in Genesis Sermon Series, Sermons Non-LectionaryLeave a comment

Tower_of_Babel

Genesis 11:1-9 NRSV

The pastor stands up behind the pulpit, clears his throat, and announces: “This morning we are going to talk about race and racism.”

All over the sanctuary the congregation winces, and beg under their breaths: “Preacher, please don’t do it, for you’re about to open up a giant can of worms!”

But the old preacher, who has opened up more cans of worms than anyone could possibly count, ignores the grimaces and metaphorically gets out the can opener.

I hear many people in the church say that we should not talk about race or make race an issue. However, I believe we make it an issue when we pretend that it is a non-issue. I believe we do great harm to the cause of Christ when we ignore racism or deny that it exists. Furthermore, if we are to accept and do the will of God that I believe is revealed in the story of the Tower of Babel, the church must be willing to openly talk about race and the inherent racism that is prevalent in our families, our town, our region, our world, even in our own hearts.

In the eleventh chapter of Genesis we read:

Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as they migrated from the east, they came upon a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. Then they said, ‘Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves; otherwise we shall be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.

The whole earth was one. One language. One people. One tribe. One race. And they all came together to live in one place. They all came together to build something special, something big, something wonderful that would be a symbol of their unity, pride and patriotism.

Now, what is not to like about that?

Unity, oneness, togetherness, harmony, people of the same minds living in one accord.  Isn’t that the aspiration of all? Isn’t true that great minds think alike? Isn’t this the will of our God, God’s great purpose for humanity?

So what’s not to like in this seemingly perfect picture of unity in Genesis chapter 11? As it turns out, according to God, the creator of all that is, not very much.

Let’s look at God’s reaction to this oneness in verse 7 of our story: “Come, let us go down, and confuse their language there, so that they will not understand one another’s speech.”  So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth…”

What? Are you serious? What is wrong with this great portrait of human unity, of one race of people, one nation, under God indivisible, all of one mind, coming together to make a name for themselves, to build great things, to be on top of the world, to celebrate their purity and pride as one master race?

The truth is that the builders of the great tower in Shinar had accomplished not what God wants for humanity, but what many throughout history, including the likes of Adolf Hitler and the Ku Klux Klan, have wanted for humanity: One master race of people coming together to form one supreme social order, one culture, sharing the same ideals, values and moral principles. Diversity is a threat. Diversity is something to fear. Diversity is something to segregate and discriminate. Diversity is something to send to the gas chambers or lynch in a tree.

I am not sure if anyone in my lifetime has articulated the thinking of the people of Shinar better than Atlanta Braves pitcher John Rocker back in 1999. Some of you may remember his response when he was asked by Sports Illustrated if he would ever play for the New York Mets or New York Yankees.

Rocker said:

I’d retire first. It’s the most hectic, nerve-racking city. Imagine having to take the number 7 Train to the ballpark looking like you’re riding through Beirut next to some kid with purple hair, next to some queer with AIDS, right next to some dude who just got out of jail for the fourth time, right next to some 20-year-old mom with four kids. It’s depressing… The biggest thing I don’t like about New York are the foreigners. You can walk an entire block in Times Square and not hear anybody speaking English. Asians and Koreans and Vietnamese and Indians and Russians and Spanish people and everything up there.[i]

The story of the Tower of Babel teaches us that what John Rocker said racked his nerves in the world is what God wills for the world. In verse 4 we read that the purpose of building the tower was to avoid what depressed John Rocker on the No. 7 train leaving Manhattan for Queens, and to avoid what John Rocker heard in Times Square. The purpose of settling in Shinar and building that tower was to live in a world with no foreigners, no confusing babbling in the streets, no queers or kids with purple hair to encounter on the way to work, no eating in the marketplace with people on strange diets, no rubbing elbows with people wearing weird clothes, head coverings or dots on their foreheads. So they came together and said, let’s build a tower of unity “to not be scattered over the face of the whole earth.” And God’s reaction to this racial purity and pride was to “scatter them over the face of the whole earth,” to create a world of diverse languages and cultures, to create a world of foreigners.

God was only accomplishing what God had always willed for the creation: diversity. In chapter one of Genesis, we read that the original plan for creation was for humankind to “multiply and fill the earth.” And after the flood in chapter ten we read where God sanctions and wills all nations to be “spread out over the earth.” (Gen 10:32). Simply put, from the very beginning of time, in spite of our will, in spite of our fear and our racial pride, God wills diversity.

Therefore, if we ever act or speak in any manner that denigrates or dehumanizes another because of their race, language, nationality or ethnicity, we are actually disparaging the God who willed such diversity. According to Genesis, diversity is not to be feared, avoided, prevented or lynched. If we want to do the will of God our creator and redeemer, diversity is to be embraced. In other words, if we love God, we will also love our neighbor. And this is what God wants us to be united by. It is why Jesus called it the greatest commandment—love God and our neighbors as ourselves. Love is what should unite us; not racial pride or patriotism.

The story of the Tower of Babel belongs to the same genre of the stories of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel and Noah and the Flood. They are considered to be “pre-history stories.”[ii] That is, they are describing God’s relationship to the world before the call of Abraham and the history of the Jewish people. It amazes me how God in each of these stories is so often misinterpreted by Christians who believe that the God of the Old Testament is a God of wrath; not a God of grace. They say that they believe Jesus Christ is God; however, they fail to see Christ in these stories.

Consequently, God is often seen as one who curses Adam and Eve by kicking them out of the garden instead of as one who bends to the ground and clothes them with grace. God is seen as someone who curses Cain by sending him to the land of Nod, instead of as one who protects his life with a mark of grace. God is seen as one who curses all of humanity with a great flood with the exception of one family, instead of one who makes a decision to graciously suffer alongside all of humanity. And here in this story, God is seen as one who curses the builders of the tower by scattering them over the face of the earth, instead of being seen as one who reacts to racial pride and unity by fulfilling the purpose of creation from the very beginning, filling the earth, by graciously creating diverse languages, races and cultures.

The tragic irony is that throughout history many have used the story of the Tower of Babel to support slavery, apartheid, segregation and other forms of racism. Bob Jones University once used this story to ban interracial dating on campus. However, this story teaches something very different. The story of the Tower of Babel is God’s gracious stamp of approval, of blessing, on every race, every tribe, and every language in every land. It is the fulfillment of God’s original purpose for creation. The song we learned as little children cannot be more true: “Red, yellow, black and white, they are all precious in God’s sight.” God is not color-blind, as I hear some say, for God creates, wills, blesses and loves color. And it is this love that unites us all, as we have all been created to harmoniously see humanity as God sees it: as a beautiful, diverse, colorful rainbow created by, sanctioned by, and graced by God.

As a Bible-believing Christian, it confounds me when I hear that another, supposedly, Bible-believing Christian, has decided to put their house on the market and move because a person or a family of another race has moved into their neighborhood. I often think about this story in the first book of our Bible that describes a beautiful and diverse creation willed by God. But I also think about a passage in the last book of our Bible that describes an eternity willed by God. And I wonder what in the world these people, who claim to be Christian, are going to do if they do get to that place they think they are going after they die to live forever and ever.

Because guess what? According to Revelation, heaven looks more like Times Square and that No. 7 train on the way from Manhattan to Queens than some affluent suburb outside of Atlanta, Georgia.

In Revelation 7, we read these words:

After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands. They cried out in a loud voice, saying, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!’  And all the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures [each representing the diversity of all creation], and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshipped God, singing, ‘Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God for ever and ever! Amen.’

[i] Read more: John Rocker – At Full Blast – York, Braves, City, and League – JRank Articles http://sports.jrank.org/pages/4014/Rocker-John-At-Full-Blast.html#ixzz39oVUCEtA

[ii] See Walter Brueggemann Genesis

 

Other Sermons in this Series:

Grace in Genesis: Adam and Eve

Grace in Genesis: Cain and Abel

Grace in Genesis: Noah

 

Grace in Genesis: Noah

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Grace in Genesis Sermon Series, Sermons Non-LectionaryLeave a comment

Rainbow-flood-ark

Genesis 6-9 NRSV

The Ebola virus is spreading throughout the world, recently killing a renowned doctor. Financial turmoil has seized Argentina. A Malaysian plane was shot down over Ukraine, and fierce fighting has broken out around the wreckage. The death toll rises in Gaza as deadly violence occurs every day. Israel has attacked a UN school killing 20 evacuees. Mobs of Islamic militants have killed dozens in China. Christians in Iraq are being murdered for their faith. An unprecedented crisis at our own border continues. Immigrant families are being torn apart. Kidnapped Nigerian girls for whom churches all over the world prayed, including ours, are still missing. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright summed up the state of the world last week in one simple sentence: “To put it mildly, the world is a mess.”

I am sure I am not the only preacher to point out that the state of the world today is reminiscent of a story found in the early chapters of Genesis. It begins just one chapter after of the story of Cain and Abel, the world’s first two brothers. In Genesis 6 we read:

The Lord saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that he made humankind on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart.

In other words, the state of the world, the state of the human heart, caused God great suffering. Other translations read that the state of the world “broke God’s heart.”

We know the rest of the story. The Lord said, “I will blot out from the earth the human beings I have created” and in Genesis 7, we read that for forty days and nights the rains fell as God intended to start the whole thing over with Noah and his family.

It is an absolutely dreadful chapter. Whoever that first person was who decided to sentimentalize the holocaust of Genesis 7 into some sweet, adorable bedtime story for children needed to have their head and quite possibly their soul examined.

And all flesh died that moved on the earth, birds, domestic animals, wild animals, all swarming creatures that swarm on the earth, and all human beings; everything on dry land in whose nostrils was the breath of life died. He blotted out every living thing that was on the face of the ground, human beings and animals and creeping things and birds of the air; they were blotted out from the earth.

We even teach our children silly songs to dull the horror:

The ark started moving, it drifted with the tide The unicorns looked up from the rocks and they cried And the waters came down and sort of floated them away That’s why you never see unicorns to this very day.

“Sort of floated them away.” That’s certainly a nice way to put it.

The scene is horrific; however, it makes perfect sense to many of us. And some of us, deep down, may even like it. For this is how we would rule if we were God; thus, this is how we like to picture our God. Our God is an awesome God. There is “thunder in his footsteps and lightening in his fists.” If you are wicked and evil, if you are mean and hateful, if you are not a Christian, you better look out, for our God will come down and blot you out! Our God controls the sea, creates and steers the hurricanes, breathes tornadoes and spits wildfires, speaks earthquakes and sends or withholds the rain. Our God is an immovable force with which to be reckoned. Our God is a volcanic eruption, an avalanche, a tsunami, a hail storm, and a great flood. After all, we don’t call those things acts of God for nothing. So you better be believing, be shaping up, be straightening out, and be getting yourself right. This is the portrait of the God made in our own image.

However, in spite of what we may have learned in Sunday School, and in spite of what we may want to believe, this is NOT the portrait of the God that is painted in the story of Noah. The God of Noah is not an immovable force that stands safely behind, lords comfortably over, or reigns painlessly above the brokenness and suffering of humankind. The God of Noah is very much moved by it, broken by it. The God of Noah grieves and suffers with, alongside it, in it, and through it.

Just one chapter after the flood scene, the futility of the intentions of the God made in our own image to rid the world of evil became painfully obvious, as the state of the world had not changed. It is the concept, the understanding of God that changes. After the flood “…the Lord said in his heart, ‘I will never again curse the ground because of humankind, for the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth; nor will I ever again destroy every living creature as I have done.’”

In the following chapter, we read where the rainbow is forever a beautiful reminder of this great promise.

Sadly, I believe we tend to forget what this promise truly means. Perhaps it is due to the selfish inclination that we have had since our youth. But for whatever reason, we tend to only remember that the rainbow means that God will never again try to “blot us out.” Selfishly, we think the rainbow is about us.

However, this promise means so much more. And it is not about us at all. It is about who our God truly is and how our God acts and relates to this world. The rainbow means that our God has freely and deliberately chosen a path of suffering. God has intentionally chosen to grieve. The rainbow is a reminder to each of us that the state of our world, the state of our hearts, continually breaks the very heart of our God.

And again, those of us who call ourselves “Christians” or “Disciples of Christ” should not be surprised.

There is a reason that when we read the words of the 53rd chapter of Isaiah about “a man of suffering acquainted with infirmity who is wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities,” there is no doubt in our minds to whom the prophet is referring.  And I do not think it is a coincidence that we find following words in the very next chapter:

“With everlasting love I will have compassion on you,” says the Lord, your Redeemer, “This is like the days of Noah to me: Just as I swore that the waters of Noah would never again go over the earth, so I have sworn that I will not be angry with you and will not rebuke you. For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed, says the Lord, who has compassion on you.”

Our God is an awesome God. But not because God is an immovable force to be reckoned with. Our God is an awesome God because our God is a suffering and grieving, merciful and gracious, compassionate and deeply-moved Spirit who beckons us to join with this Spirit in a loving relationship.

There is a reason Jesus said to his disciples that the “Son of Man must suffer many things.” It is the very nature of who our God is. There is a reason whenever Jesus encounters human suffering, sickness and death, the gospel writers tell us that he was moved at the very core of his being with compassion.  There is a reason at the death of Lazarus we read, “Jesus wept.” There is a reason Jesus cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” For unimaginable suffering and inconceivable pain was his lot. Furthermore, there is a reason the soldier standing at the foot of the cross, standing under a bruised, bloody and crucified body exclaimed: “Surely this man was the Son of God” (Matt 27).

There is a reason that each Sunday we break bread, symbolizing the broken body of Christ and drink from a cup symbolizing the shed blood of Christ. And there is a reason those symbols of suffering give us hope and lead us to follow this way. There is a reason we sing: “Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all”

There is a reason we are called to be with, and minister to, the hungry, the thirsty, the imprisoned, the sick, the grieving, the least of these our brothers and sisters. And there is a reason that when we do, we encounter God.

Before I went to seminary and thoroughly studied the scriptures, I used to think that the job as a minister was to have all of the answers for the suffering of this world. Stand above the suffering, over the pain. Thus, when I would visit the hospital or a nursing home or go the home of someone who had just lost a loved one, I thought I was supposed to say something that would bring healing and hope. I thought I was supposed to say something that would bring some type of cure. I was supposed to come with power and might, come with thunder in my footsteps and lightning in my fists, come with a vengeance and a cure, wipe out, blot out the source of their ill. However, I quickly learned that all I really needed to do was just show up, be present and care. Care; not cure. Be present with compassion, which means to suffer with, grieve alongside and hurt together with another. And when I truly care, when I truly have compassion, someway, somehow, I believe God also shows up. And it is through God, through God’s presence and God’s compassion, through God’s suffering and grief, through God sharing the pain with and alongside us, through God’s heart breaking with ours, through God’s care, that a cure comes. Healing and hope and salvation come.

This is the great promise of the rainbow in this world that, to put it mildly, is a mess. And this is the good news of the gospel. This is grace, and this is hope, yesterday, today and forever.  Amen.