It’s Giving Life

Sermon

We are now deep into the Lenten season, the troubled waters now at the waists, waters troubled enough to submerge some and at times overwhelm others, and remaining faithful knowing that the calming of waters and stilling of waters is to arrive, and has arrived, in the name of Jesus and through the Spirit of Christ.

And so, today, I want to preface today’s message. Because, deep into the season of the troubled and overwhelming waters, today’s message begins on a quite grim note. It will undoubtedly sound like I am preaching hopelessness and despair, but as is the story of God’s people, the Exodus narrative, the Gospels, the visions of the prophets, the message is ultimately, and always, about a flourishing hope. It will hopefully be clear why “Be Not Afraid” is one of the most repeated phrases. Because in the midst of the dehumanizing and death-dealing efforts of man-made empires, the life of humanity, of the people of God, wins out each time.

This is in no way to undermine the individual lives of humans lost and suffering under the violence of empires, but an honoring of their stories, families, and communities who have carried on their legacies and humanities with them to create life for themselves and future generations, faithful in a world for these future generations absent of the present violence they are told to endure in the name of respectability and order.

In the communities being terrorized, in the families being divided, in the homes being destroyed, life is finding a way—neighbors rely on one another when in need, parents do everything they can to make sure their children still have a birthday, and homes, through the hearts of those who make up home, continue to find places and spaces to relocate.

Humanity will, as it has throughout history, continue to survive, remain resilient, and carry the lives of those before them, to ensure that less and less people are made to suffer—until human suffering caused by suffering humans is no longer—and more and more people are free to experience the gift of a flourishing life. Throughout history across time and space, the people of God remain the people of God—fully beloved, given life, and created in goodness.

And to pursue that which gives life—to dwell in the gift of life, to be life-giving—is the invitation and call of God’s people; to set the mind on man-made ideals leads to death, but to set the mind on the Spirit of Christ is an invitation to life and peace. And in the face of despair, it becomes that much easier to fear no evil.

The “valley of the shadow of death” is an image known mostly through Psalm 23, or from when Coolio used this phrase in his very popular “Gangsta’s Paradise,” and is immediately followed by a declaration of the psalmist’s faith and comfort in God’s presence. And in the book of Ezekiel, we hear directly from the Lord an illustration of why the psalmist before Ezekiel and the people after him lean on their faith.

In one of the later chapters, there is a conversation between Ezekiel and the Lord about the state of God’s people. This is how it’s described:

“The hand of the LORD came upon me, and brought me out by the spirit of the LORD and set me down in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. The Lord led me all around them; there were very many lying in the valley, and they were very dry.”

This is the state of God’s people: under the rule of Pharaoh, under the oppressive rule of kings, following the fall to neighboring ethno-religious empires, a valley full of dry bones representing the stories and lives of God’s people, overwhelming the desert floor upon which they are scattered, inspiring only a sense of despair and dread.

And this is the state of God’s people when the name of God is used in the name of conquest, and war, genocide and violence; the state of God’s people when God’s people are forcibly kidnapped and enslaved, and then wrongfully imprisoned and violently discriminated against; when God’s people are dehumanized generation after generation.

And I hesitate here, because I want to say that this is just a metaphorical illustration, a symbolic vision, but at that time, and still today, the valley of dry bones is more accurate of a depiction of reality than we might be comfortable confronting as a people. Across the globe, valleys of despair have been carved out by empire, communities within the borders of empire are living in fear because of the arbitrary men arbitrarily determining arbitrary borders, and the image from Ezekiel seems not even grim enough to reflect the reality of oppression today—or maybe I’ve become so desensitized to the onslaught of oppression, violence, and death that the depiction of a valley filled with dry bones feels inadequate.

But this indeed is the state of God’s people, and not one that is reached through happenstance.

Rather, it is the result of generations of people throughout history whose minds have been set on the flesh—on the man-made ideals antithetical to the Jewish law that Jesus came to fulfill: greed instead of equity, power rather than equality, individualism over collectivism, authoritarianism instead of humanism. Because to set the mind on the flesh is death.

And we know this for our individual lives: we know we have to find balance between work and rest; vacation is important. We know that chasing wealth is a bottomless pit unable to be filled, so financial stability becomes enough. We know power only means anything when power is equitable—what is leading if no one is following? And we know we haven’t gotten to where we’ve gotten to without the people before us and around us; it takes a village.

To set the mind on the Spirit of Christ is life and peace.

We find time to rest, create time for vacation, because we know we need it to thrive—doctors tell me it’s medically proven, as do my skin, knees, back, and shoulders.

We pursue stability instead of greed because we know wealth alone will never fulfill anyone, and this leaves more time and opportunity to pursue what you love with the people you love.

We enter into spaces with understanding and grace, recognizing one another’s innate humanity with a sense of equity, creating greater opportunities for new relationships.

And we lean on one another, because the people of God were not created in isolation but in relation.

We build lives for ourselves and encourage others to do so based on fullness and peace.

This very capacity to set the mind on the Spirit of life and peace is designed into our identity as God’s people. Because immediately following the Lord’s description of the valley of dry bones is a similarly descriptive illustration of God breathing life into the purported valley of death, transforming this image of despair into an image of hope:

“Prophesy to these bones and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the LORD. 5 Thus says the Lord GOD to these bones: I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. 6 I will lay sinews on you and will cause flesh to come upon you and cover you with skin and put breath in you, and you shall live.”

As much as death is a part of the people of God’s story, more so is the life breathed into the people of God. And it is that very life—of the Spirit that dwells in us—that drives our individual ways of being.

When our collective society sets our minds on that drive for life—for ourselves and others—on the Spirit dwelling in each of God’s people, for the access to rest and equity, to freedom and stability, or to restorative and healing communities, we as a collective society help build a world of life and peace.

Women in patriarchal societies throughout history set their minds on the Spirit of patience and self-control, having faith that their humanity and life was equal to that of impatient and emotional men, forcing women to risk death for desiring leadership roles or the right to vote.

Indigenous communities set their minds on the Spirit of peace when they witnessed sacred lands being desecrated by man and cultivated creative ways to resist its complete desecration for all of us today to enjoy and help further preserve.

Queer, LGBTQIA+ individuals and communities set their minds on the Spirit of love and joy, inspiring the wide spectrum of expressing love and joy unfamiliar to our limited human perspectives.

Life-giving culture through the likes of social sensibilities, music, language, dance, physical art, movies, is often borne from communities whose collective minds have been set on the Spirit—communities who have rejected the inhumanity thrust upon them by people unable to recognize even their own humanity.

This is where life springs from—from individuals and communities whose minds are set on the Spirit of Christ of joy, love, peace, gentleness, self-control, patience, kindness, and faithfulness—drawing from the deep dwelling place of the Spirit within us.

This is what the season of Lent is about—about uncovering the practices, habits, ways of being, and patterns in your life and community that give life. To resist the temptation to sink even deeper into the valley of the shadow of death, to lean into the faith that death and despair are not the final chapters, to reconcile oneself with the Spirit of Christ that dwells in you, so that life can spring forth.

Take cooking classes, go out with friends, rest without feeling guilty, take a day off, find a spiritual practice, be mindful of what gives you life, and be intentional about leaning into those things.

And as you continue to discern the life you want to build for yourself, whatever the life that is “giving life,” our call as disciples, as Christians, is to help build a world where everyone can enjoy the fullness of life without having to worry about having their basic human needs met.

It is life that dwells in our soul, not death. But we as a collective humanity have set our minds on the flesh, we have created craters and valleys of death, of dry bones, of rubble and destruction; we have fallen short as a collective humanity generation after generation.

But as the people of God—crafted in the very image of God, created in goodness, for goodness, created by Life for life, in whom the Spirit of Christ dwells—as the people of God, dwelling in each of us, from the very moment of creation, is the power to shape and change the world. Let us be life-giving to ourselves, to one another, and for the world, for it is why and how we have been given life.