Cprop25

Joel 2:23-32; Psalm 65; 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18; Luke 18:9-14

October 28, 2007

That we may obtain what you promised

Good Lord, make us love what you command!

The other day I heard the voice of my mother,

“Dena Cay, do I hear that water running while you’re brushing your teeth?”

I hadn’t heard that one in a long time!

Last year, when I was at George Washington’s home, Mt. Vernon,

we were shown the wash house where laundry was done.

We were shown the well, only about 20 yards away,

the big vat in which the water was boiled to wash the clothes,

and the wooden buckets used to carry the water

from the well to the wash house.

And we were told that it took 17 buckets of water gotten from the well,

carried to the wash house, to wash one load of laundry.

They would not have left their water running!

In the 1880’s and 90’s my grandmother’s family

had a farm not too far from here in Monroe County.

There was a water pump right out the back door of the kitchen, in the backyard.

A little easier than getting water from a well…

but they surely wouldn’t have pumped water to

take it inside and pour it down a drain.

And so, even as the use of water got easier,

there was still in the 1950’s in my mother’s house

an assumption about the value and use of water.

I’m sure, like some of you, I was taught to wash dishes this way.

One sink with hot soapy water. The other sink with hot rinse water.

Wash the cleanest dishes first so as not to dirty up the water,

to make it last until the dishes were done.

But once the sinks were filled, the spigot was turned off.

And so, in the midst of the current water crisis,

I heard my mother’s voice when I was brushing my teeth the other day.

A little stab of compunction based on what I’d been taught.

Until I couldn’t water my yard

and until our state began to debate with Florida and Alabama

and appeal to the White House over who has rights to what water…

Until then, I let the water flow from spigot to drain without much of a thought.

Into my house and out of it not having been used at all!

This current water crisis has gotten me back in touch

with the sense that there is a limit

to the water available to me, and to everyone.

There is a limit to its availability

and there is a limit to the energy available (bucket by bucket/pump by pump)

to move it and use it…

and that my use of water affects its availability to someone else.

To neighbors, fishermen, farmers, and the like.

My mother also would make me stay at the dinner table

until I’d eaten all my vegetables

And would remind me to “think of all those little children in China

who don’t have anything to eat.”

Well, that China cliché got old

and I would have gladly boxed up my brussel sprouts

and sent them to China!

But it did say to me that I and my consumption of food

is connected to people on the other side of the earth.

And so a renewed awareness that available water is finite.

That others may go lacking if I use all I want.

That water should be used intentionally.

It begs the questions,

How much I am willing to be connected to other people

so that I feel their lack and am willing to share.

And even more, to consider that if another human being goes lacking,

in a very real sense, so do I.

That we human beings are that connected

by the water that flows across our land.

There are other ways philosophically to ask this question:

Am I willing to move from being a ‘conspicuous consumer’

to a conscious consumer?

Or in terms of our life as Christians in community:

Am I willing to be more concerned with my standards of loving

than with my standards of living.

Then it hit me that water to us is the symbol of our life in Christ.

Out of the waters of baptism we are raised to a new life in Christ.

Have the waters of my baptism flowed from the Church through me

to be used with conscience and love?

Or, like the water in my spigot,

have the waters of my baptism flowed from the Church through me

without being used?

Is there such a thing as a wasted baptism?

In terms of grace, no.

In terms of conscience and love, yes.

It could be said that humanity’s connectness became so broken…

…that the very Light of God, the Word of God,

the Son of God was left to die.

That rampant disconnection of the rest of God’s children said:

In Pontius Pilate’s voice,

Let them take him so that I may keep all my achievements and my position.

In the voice of Jesus’ own religious leaders,

Let them take him so that we may keep our security with Rome.

In the voice of his followers,

Let them take him so that we may protect our lives.

And in the voice of Jesus, alone, disconnected, My God, My God, why have I been forsaken?

BUT! Lest you think this a Lenten sermon:

It was Jesus’ connectedness that remained secure

That refused to be separated from

God his father and us, his brothers and sisters.

That became the conduit to make reconnection possible for us all.

And those that are reconnected through Jesus Christ

are called the Church.

The idea of carrying buckets of water to remind us of water’s worth

is not an enterprise I would want to undertake.

But the reminder to be mindful of our use of water can help us to understand

God’s love and Christ’s living presence in our lives

are like a spigot turned on all the time.

As it flows through us, the Church,

do we receive it thankfully, contain it thoughtfully, and channel it wisely?

There is enough water on this earth for everyone.

But we have access to a finite amount.

There is enough of God’s love on this earth for everyone,

But we at Grace-Calvary have it in our midst

in particular ways - to receive it and share it.

And it comes only through us –

our talents and the work of our hands,

through our smiles and our own thoughtful intentions.

And so we gather what we have received

And decide what to water/sustain/grow:

A children’s garden where they learn about the good earth

and about quiet places to pray,

an Outreach ministry that must consider carefully

how to direct the flow of resources that it has to steward,

a worship space and its surrounding buildings that must be ready

to welcome everyone who is thirsty to come in

and taste in particular ways the goodness of God that flows all around us like rain.

And many other examples.

God’s love is showering all around us.

And, unlike the spigots in my mother’s house,

God’s spigot flows all the time.

And so let’s collect all that we can

And, together, put it to good use.