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Sermon Series: Provisioned for the Journey
Are We There Yet?
February 02, 2012 - February 05, 2012Exodus:32:33--33:3; Deuteronomy 1:26-36; Hebrews 3:7-13
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Elizabeth Shen O'Connor
Several years ago, I went to visit my sister and brother-in-law who were living in Lexington, Kentucky at the time. While there, my sister celebrated her birthday. My brother-in-law’s gift to her was to take us all on a cave tour. Kentucky has several massive underground caves across the state. However, it wasn’t until we arrived at the cave site that I realized this wasn’t a going to be a leisurely walk through cool caverns. Rather, what my brother-in-law had signed us up for was a six-hour cave crawling experience.
That day our guide led us through mountainous caverns, some three or four stories tall. Also at several points, he had us crawling, on our bellies, through the narrow and winding tunnels that connected these caverns – some of them only two feet in diameter. Mid-way through this tour, our guide stopped us in a small cavern. He asked: “How many times do you think we’ve been through here?” The group timidly called out “two times” and “three times.” After a weighty pause, he said: “We’ve walked through this cavern six times and this will be our seventh.” At that point, I thought: Will we ever make our way out of here?
In cave crawling, it is critical to trust and obey the guide. One could easily become lost in the maze of caves we journeyed through. We had to trust that our guide knew his way around and that he could lead us out at the end of the day. We also had to listen to his instructions – stay close to and in clear sight of the person directly in front of us. In other words, we had to be excellent followers.
As with cave crawling, desert wandering also requires trusting and obeying the guide – something the Israelites, as we have been hearing over these last few weeks, do not do well. After an already long and troubled journey, the Israelites are probably asking themselves much the same question I was after passing through that cavern seven times: Will we ever make our way out of here? The desert is dangerous and demanding. And they had already made some pretty big missteps in this journey with God. Most recently, creating and worshiping a golden calf in the absence of Moses and what seemed God himself. Last week, we heard of how fear and uncertainty, coupled with idle time, led them to forge a calf out of their gold jewelry and then to attribute to that calf all of God’s mighty deeds. “These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt” (Ex 32:4b). After discovering their sin, Moses now has the thrilling job of negotiating with God for their forgiveness. He even offers to be punished in their place, but God refuses his offer. No, only those who had sinned are to be punished. God says: “Whoever has sinned against me I will blot out of my book” (Ex 32:33). That book is a list of the righteous – those who will share in God’s promises. That book will not include this generation of Israelites. In spite of this, God moves directly from disciplining the Israelites to telling them to “…go up to the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob…go up to the land flowing with milk and honey” (Ex 33:1b, 3a). God’s original promise holds true. But God must deal with the reality of Israel’s sins. Here we have a foreshadow of the events laid out in Deuteronomy. The Israelites, just about to enter the land of Canaan, once again misstep, once again choose not to trust and to obey. Moses reminds them: “…you were unwilling to go up; you rebelled against the command of the LORD your God” (Deut 1:26). Throughout this journey, the Israelites waver in their trust and obedience of God their guide. Yet God never wavers in keeping his promise. In spite of their spotty commitment, God still intends a future for Israel. So, while the destination remains the same, God recalculates the way by which the Israelites get there – much like a GPS system does when you take a wrong turn. That recalculation meant forty more years in the desert: “No one from this evil generation shall see the good land I swore to give your ancestors…” (Deut 1:35).
God wants the Israelites to trust him and to act out that trust by obeying his commands. And God wants them to base this trust on his previous acts of grace and power. After all, God has a pretty good track record, especially in conquering their enemies. At the Red Sea, the Israelites only had to look over their shoulders to see the Egyptian army pressing down on them and straight ahead to see the waters preventing them from escape. God told them simply to “…move on” (Ex 14:15b). Go! Keep moving and I will clear the way for you. And he does. Raising walls of water to clear a safe path for them. Lowering walls of water to put an end to their enemies’ pursuit. The God telling the Israelites to cross the Jordan, to go up to the land and take possession of it, is the same God already proven to be victorious. The God going before them is strong and mighty to save.
So what’s the problem then? Why do the Israelites suddenly fail to remember what God has already done for them? Why do they fail to cross over into the promised land? Just like with the golden calf, it comes down to wanting to see it for themselves. The people send out spies to take a look at the land, the cities, and the people. To get a feel for what they’re up against. What they bring back is a report that changes their mind. “Our brothers have made our hearts melt in fear. They say, ‘The people are stronger and taller than we are; the cities are large, with walls up to the sky. We even saw the Anakites there.’” (Deut 1:28). The people are giants; the cities massive and fortified. Even the Anakites are among the people living there – warriors of great reknown. Moses tries to calm them down: “Do not be terrified; do not be afraid of them. The Lord your God, who is going before you, will fight for you, as he did for you in Egypt, before your very own eyes, and in the wilderness. There you saw how the LORD your God carried you, as a father carries his son, all the way you went until you reached this place” (Deut 1:29-31). When the author of Hebrews retells this account to the community of Christ’s disciples, he says this: “See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called ‘Today,’ so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness” (Hebrews 3:12-13). Sin has a way of distorting the truth. Sin convinced the Israelites that God could be contained in the mold of a golden calf. Sin convinced the Israelites that the stature of the inhabitants of Canaan and the strength of their fortified cities meant that their conquest was impossible.
We experience sin’s deceitfulness in our own lives. Sin convinces us that lies are truths: that our sickness is the truth and not God’s healing power; that our depression is the truth and not God’s peace and joy; that our broken relationship is the truth and not God’s reconciliation; that our unemployment is the truth and not God’s restoration; that our lack of money is the truth and not God’s good provision.
Sin hardens these lies into truths and that is how we are led astray in our journey with God. These forty years in the desert, these forty years wandering, hand-to-mouth, with God, is the way in which God softens the hearts of the Israelites. God uses this time to re-pattern their behaviors and change their attitude. He uses this time to strengthen their faith. For you see, they weren’t ready to cross the Jordan that day. They weren’t ready to face the giants of Canaan. They weren’t ready to follow God’s lead in trust and obedience. The Israelites had missed the promise in the command: “Leave this place, you and the people you brought up out of Egypt, and go up to the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, saying ‘I will give it to your descendants.’ I will send an angel before you and drive out the Canaanites, Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites.” (Ex 33:1-2). God’s grace is these forty years. In that time, God slowly makes the Israelites into the followers he intends them to be.
We cannot make a one-to-one comparison between the people of Israel and Brunswick Church. This time of transition in the life of Brunswick is not a desert time. This time of one pastor’s leavetaking and another’s coming is not desert time. In fact, my experience in these last ten months, as you have welcomed and accepted me, has been the opposite. I’ve found Brunswick to be a strong and faithful congregation. A community energized by what has been and what is to come. A church that has the capacity to bless Harry, your thirty-eight year pastor, into this new season of his life. A church that has the capacity to welcome this soon to come pastor into genuine and heartfelt relationship. Yes, I have found Brunswick to be a solid church. A church that isn’t perfect; in fact, it’s imperfect because it’s made up of imperfect people. But a church that follows a perfect and holy God, one who remains faithful to us in his promise of a blessed future. Many things have come before us in the past year to test our faith and many things are yet to come that will press our commitment to God and to one another. Through it all, God’s fidelity remains strong.
All that said, though, Brunswick can still learn from the Israelite story and experience as we travel in our own journey with God, so that we don’t make their mistakes twice, so we don’t walk through the same cavern seven times without realizing it!
All of us can benefit from being reminded every now and then that God wants us to be good followers. For the Israelites, it wasn’t that God couldn’t keep his promise – he had proven his power and might on several occasions. Rather, it was that they hadn’t yet grasped the full understanding of what it means to be a good follower. Except for, of course, Caleb son of Jephunneh. “No one from this evil generation shall see the good land I swore to give your ancestors, except Caleb son of Jephunneh. He will see it, and I will give him and his descendants the land he set his feet on, because he followed the LORD wholeheartedly” (Deut 1:35-36). In their discussion about whether or not to proceed with God’s command to take possession of the land, the Israelites refuse to continue out of fear. Caleb, in contrast to the others, tells them not to fear, tells them that if God is with them, they can accomplish this charge. Caleb is not the leader. Yet, Caleb plays an important role. You see, he is the first follower.
There is a YouTube clip online that demonstrates the power and influence of the first follower (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fW8amMCVAJQ). The scene opens onto a grassy, sun-drenched hill. Drums sound in the background. A young man stands up and begins to dance – wild, goofy movements. He’s there by himself for a few seconds, but then another young man stands up and joins him in dancing. Soon a whole movement of goofy dancers has emerged. The commentator notes that being a first follower is a form of leadership and that first followers often take more risk than even the leader. He goes on to say that new followers emulate other followers, not the leader. And so the first follower is important in building momentum, in encouraging others to follow suit. Caleb is the first follower. He takes the risk of trusting God’s promise. Unfortunately, Israel does not pick up on Caleb’s courageous leadership and, well, we know the rest of the story…
Throughout this series, we’ve touched on what good leadership looks like. Let’s also talk about what good “followership” looks like. In his article, “How to Follow the Leader,” Anthony B. Robinson includes this definition of followership: It is “the discipline of supporting leaders and helping them to lead well.” Good followers are not submissive. Rather they remain free thinkers, but free thinkers who recognize that they have a responsibility to help leaders lead well. In this way, good followers and good leaders work together toward mutual growth and encouragement. Robinson also lists five ways in which people can work on being good followers. Good followers:
- Recognize that leadership is necessary, important and difficult work.
- Share a commitment to a larger congregational purpose or mission and the priorities derived from it.
- Cultivate relationship and trust.
- Practice the art of learning and giving good feedback.
- Keep boundaries.
The first involves recognizing the need for good leadership and taking the risk of following a good leader. The second involves cultivating an overriding commitment to the greater mission of the church, even if there isn’t complete agreement. The third involves offering support to a leader that is not conditional or fickle. In other words, being able to disagree without ending the relationship. The fourth involves being intentional about reflecting on a leader’s work. Feedback, which focuses on actions (i.e., what one does), is often more valuable for a leader than praise, which focuses on the person (i.e., who one is). The fifth involves respecting the different roles people take on within a congregation and not overstepping them.
Good leadership is important, but so is good followership. When you boil it down, it’s about working together for a greater purpose. As we prepare to welcome this new pastor, let us be mindful of how we can learn from and support this one. Let us keep good faith with other leaders in the church, building relationship, encouraging trust and commitment to God’s greater purpose for Brunswick. Let us also be mindful that pastors and leaders have a role to play in the life of the congregation, but ultimately, ultimately we are all called to be followers of God in Christ Jesus. The LORD our God will provide for our future – victoriously, miraculously, gloriously. We just have to believe it and act on it, trusting and obeying God every step of the way.
To contact Elizabeth Shen O'Connor about this sermon, please email or write to: Brunswick Presbyterian Church, 42 White Church Lane, Troy, NY 12180
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