Wedding bells
Commentary
A former US president and his wife were reputed to have visited their old hometown and
stopped for gas. The attendant happened to be an old acquaintance who had once taken
the wife to a high school dance. Driving away, the president remarked, "Aren't you glad
you didn't marry him, honey? You'd never have gotten out of town."
His wife flashed a saccharine smile and retorted, "If I had married him, he would be president today and you would still be washing dishes!"
We influence one another, especially in the deep commitments of marriage. Neither of us would be the same had we connected so significantly with a partner of a different character.
One priest remembers a wedding rehearsal where the bride was obviously distraught. She had a hard time focusing while her emotions played bumper cars in both her mind and her heart. So he took her aside and gently instructed, "Tomorrow don't try to get your head around everything at once. Just take it a step at a time and you will be okay. First concentrate on the aisle. You've walked it so many times with your family; imagine that it's just another Sunday service. Then focus on the altar where you've knelt for communion; that should settle your nerves. Finally, when you get to the front, look at him -- he is your friend and your greatest support. When you see him you won't have to think about anything else. There it is in a nutshell -- aisle, altar, him. Just think of those three things over and over and you will be fine."
The priest's advice seemed to work. At the ceremony, the bride was almost relaxed. People who gathered in the benches along the processional walkway marveled at her poise. They did, however, wonder about the words she muttered as she passed: "I'll alter him! I'll alter him!"
We do, indeed, alter one another in marriage. Today's passages are all about that. Isaiah pictures a wedding in which Israel regains her royal bearing in the rocky relationship she has had with God. Paul reminds us that the Spirit of Christ lives in the church, and that it changes and alters us in order that the bride of Christ might thrive in a relationship with her divine husband. John brings us to a wedding with Jesus, and uses the occasion to explore the transforming power of divine love.
Several times, as I officiated at marriages, the fathers of the brides were handing out "business cards" that read: "I am the father of the bride. Nobody seems to be paying much attention to me today, but I can assure you there are several banks and credit card companies that are watching me closely!" Too true!
But the richest treasure at any wedding is the strength of character that alloys the bride and groom into a team stronger than their individual resources. In marriage, divine math always projects that one plus one equals far more than two.
Isaiah 62:1-5
Today they are a gracious couple in their senior years who seem absolutely right for each other. They defer to one another in conversation, yet often finish each other's thoughts. They enjoy taking early evening walks, and not infrequently passers-by notice that they are holding hands. They travel some, and golf a bit more, and appear to have the same tastes in food and fun. Around them circles a group of friends who share coffee dates and Bible studies. This could be a textbook marriage success.
But it isn't. Years ago, I took him home several times when he was completely and utterly drunk. On one occasion, he slammed his car into a building, and would have done more damage had it not been for a snowdrift that cushioned the impact. His car was totaled and he was slobbering pathetic apologies. After several times of watching him, suspicious that he was trying to drive under the influence, I even called the police and had him arrested.
His wife was exhausted from attempting to mind his childish alcoholic tantrums, hiding their dysfunctional relationship, and working part-time jobs to cover expenses for booze and broken things and high-risk car insurance. He only made things worse by becoming religiously righteous and attacking every heresy and social ill very publicly and with much noise. Often this involved berating women who didn't mind their places as obedient servants to obviously superior males. With quiet shame, his wife filed for divorce.
Somehow, it never came about. Friends stood by both of them. Together we got him into a crisis substance abuse program. He repented and made a slow series of amends to his wife and family. Through it all, the grace of God once again weaved reconciliation and renewal.
None of us who were on the painful inside of his catastrophic self-destruction imagined this man's sanity or this couple's marriage could be saved. Yet it was. By grace alone, it was.
In truth, their affair was another retelling of ancient Israel's religious soap opera. The pages of Isaiah's prophecy tell an amazing story of tender love between Israel and God, couched in the language of youthful passions and marriage analogies. They also describe Israel's abysmal failure paralleled by God's faithful pleading for her to come to her senses and return home to their children.
Unfortunately, Isaiah would never see God's desire for marriage recovery with Israel become reality. Too soon, Israel would take spiritual adultery and prostitution too far, and be lost forever from the ties of covenant troth.
Still, Isaiah's prophecy lingers in scripture as a testimony of God's faithful love, and as a model for the best of what marriage can be. Those who find a way to imitate both God's long-suffering spousal patience and the best of Israel's too infrequent repentance may experience the recovery of a marriage even when it has been written off as compromised beyond reason and damaged in excess of recovery.
Not every broken partnership can be saved. Nor should foolish, scandalous, hurtful, or destructive behavior be ignored or condoned simply to keep a religious pretense of marital faithfulness. Yet the best remedy to infidelity, or other attacks on marriage, is repentance, reconciliation, and renewal. These, after all, as Isaiah indicates, are very much God's desire.
1 Corinthians 12:1-11
When we built our first home, after years of living in parsonages, we talked with many people before signing the contract with a particular developer. We wanted a house that was planned well to suit to our family needs, located in a neighborhood that reflected our values, and sturdily assembled through construction methods and materials which were in relative harmony with the creation.
We loved that house. It had a soft sandalwood-colored brick front, and a great big forest green door, welcoming all who shared our hospitality. Yet, while my wife and I retain vivid memories of both the exterior appearance and internal layout of that house, our daughters' recollections have dimmed greatly. Not surprising, I guess, since the oldest was only twelve when we moved on.
What intrigues me, though, are the things our daughters do remember. They recall sitting on my lap (all three at the same time!) while I read to them the entire Narnia Chronicles series by C. S. Lewis. They talk about several birthday parties we had in that house. They know the names of their friends from down the street and the games they played together. They can still recite the prayers we prayed with them at their bedsides. And they remember where the family meal table was and what our conversations were around it.
My wife and I recall a fine house; our daughters remember a warm, loving, and spiritually rich home. In this they are in tune with the religion of Paul as he opens this teaching on spiritual gifts. The church, he reminds us, is not about buildings or blueprints or bureaucracy. It is rather about expansive faith that establishes symbiotic blessings among people who are vitally connected to one another by a marriage made in heaven. It is about laughter that lights up faces and turns hands into helpers. It is about conversations through which children are nurtured and learn to breathe spiritually, old folks are respected for their wisdom, and those new to faith are encouraged.
During the horrible 1940s wartime bombing of London, England, air raid sirens too often prevented sleep, and children were bundled away into shelters for fear of the savage destruction that fell from the skies. In an instant, a street could become a junkyard, with flames gobbling the leftover carnage.
One family has carried with them a powerful scene from those days. The bombs fell and their house was obliterated. For nearly half an hour, the parents screamed hoarsely until they found all four children. Some had cuts and bruises, but all were alive. In mixed anguish and appreciation, they hugged each other among the ruins. Sobbing, the mother complained, "We've lost our home!"
But the nine-year-old daughter thought otherwise. "No we haven't, Mummy," she said. "We've got our home right here! All we need to do is find another house to put it in."
So it is with the church when it is functioning according to the lifeblood of its richly diverse spiritual gifts.
John 2:1-11
This is the first of Jesus' "miraculous signs," according to John. We need to pay attention to that note as we craft our homilies and sermons. John gives us several clues as to what we can tell others in describing this scene.
First, he pins the wedding celebration in Cana to "the third day" (John 2:1). By itself, this locative phrase means little. When it is tied to the clues John gives in chapter 1, it is truly illuminating. John carefully links his story of Jesus to the creation story of Genesis (see John 1:1 and Genesis 1:1, and note John's identification of Jesus "the Word" as the Creator). Furthermore, the incarnation of Jesus is a renewal of the original creation of light. So it is that when John tells us of Jesus' coming, it is a remanifestation of what took place on the first day of creation, according to the book of Genesis.
This becomes evident in the chronological sequences noted by John in the verses preceding today's text. Jesus' early actions mimic the revelations of God through the primary days of the creation story. If one follows them along, "the third day" mentioned in 2:1 turns out to be the seventh day of John's record of Jesus. It was on the seventh day, according to Genesis 1, that God rested from creative work in order to enjoy the intimacy of a relationship with the people God created. John is telling us here that Jesus has arrived to share the full intimacy of God with us on planet earth.
Second, the fact that Jesus performs his first miraculous sign at a wedding feast is instructive. We don't know who the bride and groom are, but it was likely that they were relatives of Mary, Jesus' mother, and that she had been asked to serve as caterer for the event. That was the typical way of providing food for the celebration in first-century Palestine. So it was natural for Mary and Jesus to be there, and for Mary to assume that Jesus would help out with the supplies for the party.
But the added link is that John ties each of the seven "miraculous signs" of Jesus to an Old Testament reference. Here the connection appears to be made with the story of Adam and Eve. Since it was within the marriage relationship of the first couple, according to Genesis, that the cancer of sin appeared, so Jesus restores the celebration to the wedding party. Marriages were first to fall prey to the debilitating effects of evil; now Jesus comes to bring restoration and wholeness to a couple whose carefree intimacy is already in danger of compromise even in the first hours of their wedded life.
Third, the method Jesus uses to accomplish this feat is that of taking the symbols of the Old Covenant Age and transforming them into the bearers of blessing for the New Covenant Age. The rituals and ceremonies of Israel's existence were meant to be caretakers and teachers of the provisions of God yet to come. If indeed, in the person of Jesus, the new age has dawned and the light of the world has returned, then the old forms must give way to the new, and the vessels of ritual need to become resources of grace.
This understanding of Jesus' first miraculous sign is confirmed by John's placement of the temple-cleansing scene immediately afterward. The temple was the most complete and complex of the symbols deriving energy from ritual. Jesus steps in to cut through the ceremonial red tape and make it possible for people to connect directly with God once again.
Application
I've beaten the national average, but I'm still not batting 1,000. More of the weddings at which I officiate result in seemingly healthy or strong marriages than do those which end in divorce, at least as far as I know. I assume that my "success" is based in part on my commitment to never officiate at any marriage where both partners could not openly declare their trust in God and common faith commitments, and in my insistence that all must go through significant pre-marriage counseling before the knot could be tied.
But, that has resulted in neither a perfect track record for me nor perfect marriages for those I blessed. One couple lasted a mere fourteen weeks before he didn't match up to her romantic ideals, and she spent far more money than he was accustomed to. Another stuck together for a decade before his hyper-controlling tendencies asphyxiated the thing. Two children were bitterly scarred in that one.
While the failures of these marriages are bothersome, what scares me more is when couples call it quits after twenty or thirty or forty years. Once you get past the "seven- year-itch" and the "eleventh-year-fear" it would seem that some deep interconnectedness would have set in to provide a greater stability for the onslaught of the years. Like the old John Deere tractors I farmed with as a boy, there was more work in getting the thing going than there was in keeping it running. The secret was the massive flywheel. I had to strain in order to turn it over the first time, but once the magneto caught and the pistons popped and the flywheel gained some momentum on its own, it almost took an act of God to kill the thing!
But God is not in the business of killing a good thing. He "gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak," as Isaiah once put it. Even in marriages. Perhaps especially in marriages, since God thought that one up in the first place. In fact, according to the passages in today's lectionary readings, God is the best source of flywheel power to keep a good thing going.
How do we get the power to see it through? How can we find the grace to run the race and not trip at the last lap? How can we go the distance and make it to the top and complete the journey?
The Bible is not about magic. Its verses recall the stumbling and sinfulness of God's people, as the Isaiah pericope notes. They speak also about the warm and compassionate heart of God, displayed by Jesus at the wedding in Cana, and infused by the life-giving Spirit that stimulates vitality, as in the words of Paul to the Corinthian congregation. Spiritual health, like careers or characters, is not made overnight. It happens when we dig in for the long run and keep our eyes on the prize.
M. Scott Peck, the psychiatrist who became a Christian through his observations of human behavior while counseling, said that the scariest people on earth were not those who had quirky personalities or relational scars. The most threatening folks, he wrote in The People of the Lie, were those who did not believe in a higher power, a God or gods beyond themselves. Peck noted that when we stop praying and begin to assume an attitude of belligerent self-sufficiency, we shrink the world to our perspectives and seek to control it according to our whims. The result is always horrifying.
Spirituality that goes the distance is inevitably built on trust -- trust in others who share the journey and trust in God. An 81-year-old man sat in his oversized chair and slapped his hands against the top of the armrests and said to me with a wistful smile, "We're sixty years married this week and mighty proud of our family. But it's not us ... It's the grace of God. It's the grace of God."
Alternative Application
1 Corinthians 12:1-11. The Corinthians lesson can be used well by itself. It is practical and easily illustrated, especially when taken in consort with the "Body Life" passage that follows. One way to think of the Spirit as Paul portrays it is to imagine a reservoir of clean, clear water, high in the mountains beyond the range of human contamination. Engineers (think "apostles" and "church structures") have managed to channel a flow from that lake down to the valley below. It surges through pipes that drive generators which create electricity which radiates out into the community as the source of power to drive many devices. It also pulses into a stream of water that sustains life for those living in the valley.
In this way, the power of God, originating from heaven's throne, is communicated to a world in need. The Spirit is the link and energy, channeled through the teachings and ministry connections of the church, and bringing vitality to the neighborhood.
Preaching The Psalm
Psalm 36:5-10
There is nothing quite so wonderful as someone you can trust. Most of us, if we're lucky, have had someone in our lives whom we can trust; someone who "has our back," through thick and thin; someone whose loyalty is never up for grabs. Maybe it's a parent or family member. Perhaps it's an old friend or a spouse. Whoever it is, there can be no doubt about it. There is nothing quite like knowing that there's someone who will not abandon us; someone who will never leave or betray our trust; someone who will be our rock in the storms of our lives.
The truth is, however, that even in the best of relationships, trust is betrayed. People are frail and weak, and they inevitably make mistakes or simply fail to show up when they are needed. This is, one imagines, why forgiveness is so basic to our faith. Without it, we would spiral down into chaos and destruction.
But there is one whose love is "steadfast." There is someone who does not go away or abandon us; someone who is not fickle or frail. The identity of the "one," is obvious, and rolls easily from the tongue. It is, however, another matter to really let go and trust in this "one," this God.
This is why a psalm like this one is so important. When people and their inconsistencies have left us wounded and prostrate, this psalm announces the wonder of God's "steadfast love." When the vagaries of life leave us empty and out of steam, this psalm bids us "take refuge" in the shadow of God's wings. When as humans we are exhausted and wasted from competition and striving, this psalm offers the ceaseless abundance of God's grace, comparing it to a "river of delights."
Once convinced of the fidelity of God, the rest of life takes on a different hue. Secure in God's "steadfast love," it becomes easier to risk and to take chances. Trusting in God's abundance allows us to lean into this sense of plenty in our own lives and relationships.
So it is that this is a psalm to take with us into our lives of prayer. Pray this psalm daily. Pray it when it seems like a joke. Pray it when cynicism rules the heart. Pray it when trust in people or institutions has failed. Pray it when loneliness creeps about the heart. Learn this psalm and carry it like a precious gift. Its promises, like the one it describes, are authentic and true.
His wife flashed a saccharine smile and retorted, "If I had married him, he would be president today and you would still be washing dishes!"
We influence one another, especially in the deep commitments of marriage. Neither of us would be the same had we connected so significantly with a partner of a different character.
One priest remembers a wedding rehearsal where the bride was obviously distraught. She had a hard time focusing while her emotions played bumper cars in both her mind and her heart. So he took her aside and gently instructed, "Tomorrow don't try to get your head around everything at once. Just take it a step at a time and you will be okay. First concentrate on the aisle. You've walked it so many times with your family; imagine that it's just another Sunday service. Then focus on the altar where you've knelt for communion; that should settle your nerves. Finally, when you get to the front, look at him -- he is your friend and your greatest support. When you see him you won't have to think about anything else. There it is in a nutshell -- aisle, altar, him. Just think of those three things over and over and you will be fine."
The priest's advice seemed to work. At the ceremony, the bride was almost relaxed. People who gathered in the benches along the processional walkway marveled at her poise. They did, however, wonder about the words she muttered as she passed: "I'll alter him! I'll alter him!"
We do, indeed, alter one another in marriage. Today's passages are all about that. Isaiah pictures a wedding in which Israel regains her royal bearing in the rocky relationship she has had with God. Paul reminds us that the Spirit of Christ lives in the church, and that it changes and alters us in order that the bride of Christ might thrive in a relationship with her divine husband. John brings us to a wedding with Jesus, and uses the occasion to explore the transforming power of divine love.
Several times, as I officiated at marriages, the fathers of the brides were handing out "business cards" that read: "I am the father of the bride. Nobody seems to be paying much attention to me today, but I can assure you there are several banks and credit card companies that are watching me closely!" Too true!
But the richest treasure at any wedding is the strength of character that alloys the bride and groom into a team stronger than their individual resources. In marriage, divine math always projects that one plus one equals far more than two.
Isaiah 62:1-5
Today they are a gracious couple in their senior years who seem absolutely right for each other. They defer to one another in conversation, yet often finish each other's thoughts. They enjoy taking early evening walks, and not infrequently passers-by notice that they are holding hands. They travel some, and golf a bit more, and appear to have the same tastes in food and fun. Around them circles a group of friends who share coffee dates and Bible studies. This could be a textbook marriage success.
But it isn't. Years ago, I took him home several times when he was completely and utterly drunk. On one occasion, he slammed his car into a building, and would have done more damage had it not been for a snowdrift that cushioned the impact. His car was totaled and he was slobbering pathetic apologies. After several times of watching him, suspicious that he was trying to drive under the influence, I even called the police and had him arrested.
His wife was exhausted from attempting to mind his childish alcoholic tantrums, hiding their dysfunctional relationship, and working part-time jobs to cover expenses for booze and broken things and high-risk car insurance. He only made things worse by becoming religiously righteous and attacking every heresy and social ill very publicly and with much noise. Often this involved berating women who didn't mind their places as obedient servants to obviously superior males. With quiet shame, his wife filed for divorce.
Somehow, it never came about. Friends stood by both of them. Together we got him into a crisis substance abuse program. He repented and made a slow series of amends to his wife and family. Through it all, the grace of God once again weaved reconciliation and renewal.
None of us who were on the painful inside of his catastrophic self-destruction imagined this man's sanity or this couple's marriage could be saved. Yet it was. By grace alone, it was.
In truth, their affair was another retelling of ancient Israel's religious soap opera. The pages of Isaiah's prophecy tell an amazing story of tender love between Israel and God, couched in the language of youthful passions and marriage analogies. They also describe Israel's abysmal failure paralleled by God's faithful pleading for her to come to her senses and return home to their children.
Unfortunately, Isaiah would never see God's desire for marriage recovery with Israel become reality. Too soon, Israel would take spiritual adultery and prostitution too far, and be lost forever from the ties of covenant troth.
Still, Isaiah's prophecy lingers in scripture as a testimony of God's faithful love, and as a model for the best of what marriage can be. Those who find a way to imitate both God's long-suffering spousal patience and the best of Israel's too infrequent repentance may experience the recovery of a marriage even when it has been written off as compromised beyond reason and damaged in excess of recovery.
Not every broken partnership can be saved. Nor should foolish, scandalous, hurtful, or destructive behavior be ignored or condoned simply to keep a religious pretense of marital faithfulness. Yet the best remedy to infidelity, or other attacks on marriage, is repentance, reconciliation, and renewal. These, after all, as Isaiah indicates, are very much God's desire.
1 Corinthians 12:1-11
When we built our first home, after years of living in parsonages, we talked with many people before signing the contract with a particular developer. We wanted a house that was planned well to suit to our family needs, located in a neighborhood that reflected our values, and sturdily assembled through construction methods and materials which were in relative harmony with the creation.
We loved that house. It had a soft sandalwood-colored brick front, and a great big forest green door, welcoming all who shared our hospitality. Yet, while my wife and I retain vivid memories of both the exterior appearance and internal layout of that house, our daughters' recollections have dimmed greatly. Not surprising, I guess, since the oldest was only twelve when we moved on.
What intrigues me, though, are the things our daughters do remember. They recall sitting on my lap (all three at the same time!) while I read to them the entire Narnia Chronicles series by C. S. Lewis. They talk about several birthday parties we had in that house. They know the names of their friends from down the street and the games they played together. They can still recite the prayers we prayed with them at their bedsides. And they remember where the family meal table was and what our conversations were around it.
My wife and I recall a fine house; our daughters remember a warm, loving, and spiritually rich home. In this they are in tune with the religion of Paul as he opens this teaching on spiritual gifts. The church, he reminds us, is not about buildings or blueprints or bureaucracy. It is rather about expansive faith that establishes symbiotic blessings among people who are vitally connected to one another by a marriage made in heaven. It is about laughter that lights up faces and turns hands into helpers. It is about conversations through which children are nurtured and learn to breathe spiritually, old folks are respected for their wisdom, and those new to faith are encouraged.
During the horrible 1940s wartime bombing of London, England, air raid sirens too often prevented sleep, and children were bundled away into shelters for fear of the savage destruction that fell from the skies. In an instant, a street could become a junkyard, with flames gobbling the leftover carnage.
One family has carried with them a powerful scene from those days. The bombs fell and their house was obliterated. For nearly half an hour, the parents screamed hoarsely until they found all four children. Some had cuts and bruises, but all were alive. In mixed anguish and appreciation, they hugged each other among the ruins. Sobbing, the mother complained, "We've lost our home!"
But the nine-year-old daughter thought otherwise. "No we haven't, Mummy," she said. "We've got our home right here! All we need to do is find another house to put it in."
So it is with the church when it is functioning according to the lifeblood of its richly diverse spiritual gifts.
John 2:1-11
This is the first of Jesus' "miraculous signs," according to John. We need to pay attention to that note as we craft our homilies and sermons. John gives us several clues as to what we can tell others in describing this scene.
First, he pins the wedding celebration in Cana to "the third day" (John 2:1). By itself, this locative phrase means little. When it is tied to the clues John gives in chapter 1, it is truly illuminating. John carefully links his story of Jesus to the creation story of Genesis (see John 1:1 and Genesis 1:1, and note John's identification of Jesus "the Word" as the Creator). Furthermore, the incarnation of Jesus is a renewal of the original creation of light. So it is that when John tells us of Jesus' coming, it is a remanifestation of what took place on the first day of creation, according to the book of Genesis.
This becomes evident in the chronological sequences noted by John in the verses preceding today's text. Jesus' early actions mimic the revelations of God through the primary days of the creation story. If one follows them along, "the third day" mentioned in 2:1 turns out to be the seventh day of John's record of Jesus. It was on the seventh day, according to Genesis 1, that God rested from creative work in order to enjoy the intimacy of a relationship with the people God created. John is telling us here that Jesus has arrived to share the full intimacy of God with us on planet earth.
Second, the fact that Jesus performs his first miraculous sign at a wedding feast is instructive. We don't know who the bride and groom are, but it was likely that they were relatives of Mary, Jesus' mother, and that she had been asked to serve as caterer for the event. That was the typical way of providing food for the celebration in first-century Palestine. So it was natural for Mary and Jesus to be there, and for Mary to assume that Jesus would help out with the supplies for the party.
But the added link is that John ties each of the seven "miraculous signs" of Jesus to an Old Testament reference. Here the connection appears to be made with the story of Adam and Eve. Since it was within the marriage relationship of the first couple, according to Genesis, that the cancer of sin appeared, so Jesus restores the celebration to the wedding party. Marriages were first to fall prey to the debilitating effects of evil; now Jesus comes to bring restoration and wholeness to a couple whose carefree intimacy is already in danger of compromise even in the first hours of their wedded life.
Third, the method Jesus uses to accomplish this feat is that of taking the symbols of the Old Covenant Age and transforming them into the bearers of blessing for the New Covenant Age. The rituals and ceremonies of Israel's existence were meant to be caretakers and teachers of the provisions of God yet to come. If indeed, in the person of Jesus, the new age has dawned and the light of the world has returned, then the old forms must give way to the new, and the vessels of ritual need to become resources of grace.
This understanding of Jesus' first miraculous sign is confirmed by John's placement of the temple-cleansing scene immediately afterward. The temple was the most complete and complex of the symbols deriving energy from ritual. Jesus steps in to cut through the ceremonial red tape and make it possible for people to connect directly with God once again.
Application
I've beaten the national average, but I'm still not batting 1,000. More of the weddings at which I officiate result in seemingly healthy or strong marriages than do those which end in divorce, at least as far as I know. I assume that my "success" is based in part on my commitment to never officiate at any marriage where both partners could not openly declare their trust in God and common faith commitments, and in my insistence that all must go through significant pre-marriage counseling before the knot could be tied.
But, that has resulted in neither a perfect track record for me nor perfect marriages for those I blessed. One couple lasted a mere fourteen weeks before he didn't match up to her romantic ideals, and she spent far more money than he was accustomed to. Another stuck together for a decade before his hyper-controlling tendencies asphyxiated the thing. Two children were bitterly scarred in that one.
While the failures of these marriages are bothersome, what scares me more is when couples call it quits after twenty or thirty or forty years. Once you get past the "seven- year-itch" and the "eleventh-year-fear" it would seem that some deep interconnectedness would have set in to provide a greater stability for the onslaught of the years. Like the old John Deere tractors I farmed with as a boy, there was more work in getting the thing going than there was in keeping it running. The secret was the massive flywheel. I had to strain in order to turn it over the first time, but once the magneto caught and the pistons popped and the flywheel gained some momentum on its own, it almost took an act of God to kill the thing!
But God is not in the business of killing a good thing. He "gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak," as Isaiah once put it. Even in marriages. Perhaps especially in marriages, since God thought that one up in the first place. In fact, according to the passages in today's lectionary readings, God is the best source of flywheel power to keep a good thing going.
How do we get the power to see it through? How can we find the grace to run the race and not trip at the last lap? How can we go the distance and make it to the top and complete the journey?
The Bible is not about magic. Its verses recall the stumbling and sinfulness of God's people, as the Isaiah pericope notes. They speak also about the warm and compassionate heart of God, displayed by Jesus at the wedding in Cana, and infused by the life-giving Spirit that stimulates vitality, as in the words of Paul to the Corinthian congregation. Spiritual health, like careers or characters, is not made overnight. It happens when we dig in for the long run and keep our eyes on the prize.
M. Scott Peck, the psychiatrist who became a Christian through his observations of human behavior while counseling, said that the scariest people on earth were not those who had quirky personalities or relational scars. The most threatening folks, he wrote in The People of the Lie, were those who did not believe in a higher power, a God or gods beyond themselves. Peck noted that when we stop praying and begin to assume an attitude of belligerent self-sufficiency, we shrink the world to our perspectives and seek to control it according to our whims. The result is always horrifying.
Spirituality that goes the distance is inevitably built on trust -- trust in others who share the journey and trust in God. An 81-year-old man sat in his oversized chair and slapped his hands against the top of the armrests and said to me with a wistful smile, "We're sixty years married this week and mighty proud of our family. But it's not us ... It's the grace of God. It's the grace of God."
Alternative Application
1 Corinthians 12:1-11. The Corinthians lesson can be used well by itself. It is practical and easily illustrated, especially when taken in consort with the "Body Life" passage that follows. One way to think of the Spirit as Paul portrays it is to imagine a reservoir of clean, clear water, high in the mountains beyond the range of human contamination. Engineers (think "apostles" and "church structures") have managed to channel a flow from that lake down to the valley below. It surges through pipes that drive generators which create electricity which radiates out into the community as the source of power to drive many devices. It also pulses into a stream of water that sustains life for those living in the valley.
In this way, the power of God, originating from heaven's throne, is communicated to a world in need. The Spirit is the link and energy, channeled through the teachings and ministry connections of the church, and bringing vitality to the neighborhood.
Preaching The Psalm
Psalm 36:5-10
There is nothing quite so wonderful as someone you can trust. Most of us, if we're lucky, have had someone in our lives whom we can trust; someone who "has our back," through thick and thin; someone whose loyalty is never up for grabs. Maybe it's a parent or family member. Perhaps it's an old friend or a spouse. Whoever it is, there can be no doubt about it. There is nothing quite like knowing that there's someone who will not abandon us; someone who will never leave or betray our trust; someone who will be our rock in the storms of our lives.
The truth is, however, that even in the best of relationships, trust is betrayed. People are frail and weak, and they inevitably make mistakes or simply fail to show up when they are needed. This is, one imagines, why forgiveness is so basic to our faith. Without it, we would spiral down into chaos and destruction.
But there is one whose love is "steadfast." There is someone who does not go away or abandon us; someone who is not fickle or frail. The identity of the "one," is obvious, and rolls easily from the tongue. It is, however, another matter to really let go and trust in this "one," this God.
This is why a psalm like this one is so important. When people and their inconsistencies have left us wounded and prostrate, this psalm announces the wonder of God's "steadfast love." When the vagaries of life leave us empty and out of steam, this psalm bids us "take refuge" in the shadow of God's wings. When as humans we are exhausted and wasted from competition and striving, this psalm offers the ceaseless abundance of God's grace, comparing it to a "river of delights."
Once convinced of the fidelity of God, the rest of life takes on a different hue. Secure in God's "steadfast love," it becomes easier to risk and to take chances. Trusting in God's abundance allows us to lean into this sense of plenty in our own lives and relationships.
So it is that this is a psalm to take with us into our lives of prayer. Pray this psalm daily. Pray it when it seems like a joke. Pray it when cynicism rules the heart. Pray it when trust in people or institutions has failed. Pray it when loneliness creeps about the heart. Learn this psalm and carry it like a precious gift. Its promises, like the one it describes, are authentic and true.
