"Unsettled" (Psalm 32)

When I read the psalms, I sometimes rush. I’m more drawn to the stories of scripture.

You know; those passages that have a plot. And action. And that are easier to preach on…

But the psalms don’t have any of that.

Yet, when I pause, take a breath, and let the words of the psalms sink into my heart, the effect is sometimes quite profound.

I wonder what words from Psalm 32 are resonating in your heart. Here’s what’s resonating in mine:

“While I kept silence, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer.”

Reading that brought to mind times when my body was groaning inwardly; times when it felt that God’s hand was heavy upon me; times when my strength was dried up … and my spirit was unsettled.

I don’t like feeling unsettled. Feeling unsettled is that feeling that something isn’t right. It’s a feeling the rises up from your gut. It’s the feeling of being disturbed by something.

It is not a pleasant experience.

And yet, sometimes, that unpleasant feeling, that experience of being unsettled, comes from the Spirit. It is the Spirit telling me I need to change.

But I don’t want to change. I don’t want to change my way of thinking. I just want to get rid of that unsettled feeling.

So I work hard to deceive myself. I tell myself that the unsettled feeling is because of someone else. Someone else needs to change, not me.

I tell myself this, but it doesn’t work. “Happy is the one in whom there is no deceit or dishonesty.” To be happy, I need to stop deceiving myself.

When do you feel unsettled? When do you sense a groaning deep in your bones? When do you feel God’s hand heavy upon you (as the Psalmist says)?

And how do you respond?

Often, we respond to that unsettled feeling in one of three ways:

We blame others.

We search for distractions.

We get defensive.

For example… The issue of race relations in this country is unsettling. If you aren’t unsettled by the history and the current state of race relations in this country, you should be. It has been, and continues to be, one of America’s greatest sins.

And because I am an American – a white American, no less – I am implicated in this sin.

That unsettles me. So what do I do? I blame others. Look at David Duke, the KKK, Donald Trump… The racists are out there; just don’t lump me in with them.

Or, I search for distractions. Why do we always have to talk about race? There are plenty of other things we can talk about…

Or, I get defensive. I can’t be racist! I had a black roommate in college. I was one of his groomsmen when he got married. (We ate Jack-in-the-Box hamburgers before the wedding and watched the photographer and the wedding coordinator get into a fight at the reception. It was great.)

Blame others. Search for distractions. Get defensive.

The Black Lives Matter movement makes a lot of us feel unsettled. How do we respond?

We blame others. “If he hadn’t been acting suspicious, the police wouldn’t have shot him.”

We search for distractions. “All Lives Matter!”

We get defensive. “The police have a difficult job to do, 99% of them are good, decent, people, we should respect the men in blue.”

All of these things may be true. The problem is that when they take the spotlight away from Black Lives Matter, they deny what is also true: that we live in a society that is still racist.

But to admit that we live in a racist society, that we ourselves are a part of a racist society – that’s too unsettling.

Here’s what I have learned over the years: when I feel this type of discomfort, when I feel unsettled in this way, there is likely some deceit or dishonesty going on within me, which means there is almost certainly an opportunity for me to learn something.

But in order to learn something, I have to stop blaming others. I have to stop searching for distractions. I have to stop being so defensive.

Instead, I need to humble myself. I need to open my heart and my mind. I need to allow that heavy hand of God to turn my eyes toward that which I’d rather not look at, and see what is really going on.

I am so thankful for colleagues like Sandhya Jha, a friend of mine who is a Disciples pastor in Oakland; Leah Francis Gunning, who wrote the book From Ferguson to Faith (and who begins teaching this summer at Christian Theological Seminary, the seminary I attended); and William Barber, the Disciples pastor from North Carolina I mentioned to you a few weeks ago. In person, and through the books they’ve written, they are among those who have helped me learn to stop blaming others, stop searching for distractions, and stop getting defensive. Through them, God has gently turned my eyes to see the truth.

And truth leads to repentance.

Through people like them, and others as well, I have learned how I benefit from white privilege. Even though I have not actively sought out any privilege based on my race, I still benefit from having white skin.

I’m not afraid to call the police if I need to. I don’t have to worry about getting a fair trial if I or anyone in my family is ever taken to court. No one is going to harass me because of my race. No one follows me when I enter a store. And in all my classes, from elementary school to seminary, I never took a class on “white history.” We didn’t have to call it that, because “white history” was just called “history.”

Do I go about trying to create this privilege for myself? No. But if I deny that it exists, then I am complicit with the problem. If I don’t challenge and confront it, I’m complicit with the sins of society.

It’s unsettling. But I’ve learned to give thanks for that unsettled feeling. When my first reaction is to blame others, find distractions, or get defensive, I’ve learned to check myself, and ask if there is something here I need to learn.

And I’m thankful for that. Because it allows me the opportunity to repent, to turn in a different direction, to see the truth, to find new understanding, new life, to experience that happiness the psalmist talks about, that blessedness, that feeling of being at peace, living in a state of shalom, because I have turned and faced a new direction, the direction of truth, the direction of God.

What a blessing that is!

Psalm 32 goes back and forth between confession and celebration. When you think of confession, do you also think of celebration? Probably not. Confession and repentance don’t often seem to us to be times for celebration.

But I’ve discovered that when you feel that unsettled feeling – when something disturbs you in the way that I have described, and you are tempted to blame others, find distractions, or get defensive – a blessing can be right around the corner, if you just stop for a moment, and take a breath, and ask yourself if there is something here you need to see. Ask yourself: can you feel the heavy hand of God upon you, gently trying to turn your head to look closely at what you are trying to avoid.

…And God will lead you from repentance to celebration. As the psalmist says, you will “be glad in the Lord. You will rejoice. You will shout for joy.”

Here is another example from my own personal experience.

When this church voted to become officially Open and Affirming, I was pleased.

But then, as I read the statement that we had voted on and approved, that unsettled feeling began to arise.

Our Open and Affirming statement reads: “Bixby Knolls Christian Church welcomes and affirms all God's children, regardless of race, gender, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, nationality, ethnicity, marital status, physical or mental ability, political stance or theological perspective.”

This time, what unsettled me was the phrase, “gender identity.”

What did I know about gender identity issues or being transgender? Nothing, really, except that it means someone who identifies as a gender that is different from the physical body they were born with.

Which I didn’t really understand.

But because it was in this statement that we had voted on and approved, I couldn’t deny it. I couldn’t distract myself from it. And who else could I blame, since I myself voted in favor of this statement?

So I decided I needed to learn more. I needed to let God’s hand that was upon me direct my attention to the truth.

I ended up at a training for transgender allies. Walking in,

I was given a blank nametag, and was asked to write my name as well as my preferred pronoun.

That unsettled me. I’d never before had to inform people that I wanted to be referred to as “he” or “him.”

Then I watched and listened as several young people bravely described the difficult journey of a transgender person. And I began to understand.

The fact that I had never before needed to inform people what pronoun to use when referring to me shows the privilege that I have in our society…

I left that training finally understanding why we need to be a church that does indeed welcome and affirm all people regardless of their gender identity.

Walking into that training was a bit outside my comfort zone. Putting that name tag on, I did feel unsettled.

But I am thankful for that unsettled feeling. I’m thankful for that groaning in my bones. It allows me to acknowledge that there is some part of my understanding that is not complete, and gives me the opportunity to understand a greater part of the truth.

So. What unsettles you?

Perhaps it was Beyonce’s Super Bowl halftime show… Maybe it was Chris Rock’s comments about the all-white Oscars… maybe it was Bruce Jenner’s transformation to Caitlyn Jenner… maybe it’s the suggestion that some of the stories in the Bible aren’t meant to be taken literally… Maybe it’s something else…

I’m sure if I keep going, I could find something that unsettles you. In case you haven’t noticed, my purpose today is not to comfort you. It’s to make you feel unsettled.

And when you feel unsettled, ask yourself: Is the Spirit there, in that unsettled feeling?

That’s what you need to figure out.

If the Spirit is there… listen to it. Before you deny what’s going on, before you get defensive, before you distract your mind to something else, figure out what’s going on.

As the psalmist says, “Do not be like a horse or mule, without understanding, whose temper must be curbed with bit and bridle…”

Listen to the Spirit.

Let the Spirit lead you to the repentance that gives freedom and joy and happiness.

Only then will that inner groaning cease. Only then will the weight of God’s heavy hand be lifted from you. Only then will your strength be returned to you.

And, like the psalmist, you will discover a reason to celebrate.

Cry of the Heart: Guilt (Psalm 32)

Here we are: week five of our six-week series on the Psalms. Just one more week to go. You’ve almost made it! Today’s “cry of the heart” is guilt. Guilt and regret. And I admit, it’s not the most cheery of topics, and is probably the one that I myself have looked forward to the least. Who really wants to talk about guilt, or listen to a sermon about guilt? But there is no denying that guilt is on the mind of the psalmists. We already heard from Psalm 32, from the psalmist who groans all day long, and whose energy is sapped away, all because of his guilt. In Psalm 38, the psalmist says, “my guilt has overwhelmed me like a burden too heavy to bear.” This reminded me of a book I read recently in which the author talks about guilt, and says it is as if one is carrying around a backpack loaded with rocks. Each rock represents a sin. The more we sin, the greater our guilt, and the heavier our burden is. But here’s the thing: God doesn’t want us to feel guilty. At least, not for long. And God certainly doesn’t want to punish us. What God wants to do is remove from us the burden we carry. In Psalm 103 it says, “The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.” This phrase actually appears so many times in the Hebrew Bible that it’s almost a mantra. God is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. And God’s desire is to save you from sin by lifting from you the burden of guilt and regret. A story I heard told of a woman who had dreams of talking to Jesus. People would ask her questions, and then, in her dreams, she would relay those questions to Jesus, and then bring back the answer to those who asked. Well, her priest was skeptical. So he told her that, in seminary, he did something very wrong, and that it still bothered him. He told her to ask Jesus about it – he didn’t tell her what it was – but he told her to ask Jesus about it, and then to tell him what his sin was and what Jesus’s response was. In this way he hoped to find out if she was for real. Days went by. Then weeks. Finally the priest said to her, “Did you ask Jesus?” She replied, “Yes. The thing is, when I asked Jesus about it, he said, ‘Funny, I don’t remember it any more.’” God doesn’t want to hold our sins over us. God wants to forgive us and help us move on. The fact is that we all make mistakes. We all hurt other people, intentionally and unintentionally. And it is guilt, and regret, that prod us toward confessing, apologizing, and doing what we can to make the relationship right again. So if you are feeling guilt, it’s good to ask yourself three questions. 1. Have I sincerely apologized for the hurt I’ve caused? 2. Have I done everything possible to undo the suffering? 3. Have I sought reconciliation and forgiveness? If you can honestly answer, “Yes, I’ve done everything possible,” then it’s time to move on and leave your guilt behind. But if there is still a confession to be made, or an apology; and if there is anything you can still do to ease the suffering of the one you hurt and move toward understanding and reconciliation, then your guilt may yet have a useful purpose. Maybe you still need to take responsibility for the results of your action. Certainly, this deserves some time spent in prayer on your part. But what if it’s not possible to apologize? What if the person you hurt is no longer alive? Well, we know that no one ever really dies, that those who have passed on form a great, unseen cloud of witnesses that surrounds us. So it is still possible to apologize, and to spend some time in thought and in prayer, intentionally committing yourself to speak and act with greater kindness from this moment on. Your guilt is, in a way, a terrible punishment. But remember: God doesn’t want to punish you. What God wants to do is remove from you the burden we carry. It was two or three months ago that I decided that one of these sermons on the psalms needed to be about guilt. The psalmists talk so much about guilt and sin and being cleansed and being given a clean heart. But it was only in the past week or so that I came across two timely news articles that are really forcing me to think about sin and guilt and our need to recognize sin, confess it, and commit to better living so that the suffering we cause is lessened. The first news article comes from the CNN website, and has to do with Halloween. In Damascus, Oregon, in 2001, Julie Keith went to her local Kmart and purchased a $29 “Totally Ghoul” toy set, complete with fake decorative tombstones very similar to the ones my own sons bought and used to decorate our front lawn this past Halloween. However, when Julie Keith opened her package, a handwritten letter fell out. In broken English mixed with Chinese, the author cried for help: "If you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Right Organization. Thousands people here... will thank and remember you forever." According to the CNN report, the letter went on to detail grueling hours, verbal and physical abuses as well as torture that inmates making the products had to endure -- all in a place called Masanjia Labor Camp in China. Skeptical at first, Julie Keith did some research, and realized that the letter might genuinely be what it appeared to be. Fast-forward in time. CNN eventually heard of this story, and after doing its own investigating, found the man who is believed to have written that note. He had originally been sent to the labor camp for practicing his faith. He had been released from the labor camp but was afraid of being sent back, so his identity has been kept secret. But he told CNN of the systematic use of beatings, sleep deprivation and torture, especially targeting those like him who refused to repent. Some gruesome details were too specific to him to be reported; doing so could lead someone to identify him. This story dug itself even deeper into my conscience because of an incident that happened last weekend. I had taken Tristan and his friend Ryan to the beach, where we met up with other friends and family members. A total of 8 children of various ages played in the sand and surf… And at one point, an old baseball cap washed onshore. One of the kids grabbed it and brought it up to where the adults were sitting under the shade canopy, laughed and said: “Look! A hat, it floated here all the way from China!” I responded, “So what? My hat came from China, too.” I didn’t know that for sure, but I took it off, looked at the label and saw that – sure enough – it had come from China. My brother-in-law, sitting to my left, did the same with his hat, and discovered that it also came from China. And then my friend David, sitting to my right, did the same with his hat. China? “Nope,” he said. “Sri Lanka.” When we hear about what’s going on in places all around the world, we listen in a detached sort of way. But we are not detached. We are directly connected. And we are responsible for the welfare of all people, of all humanity. We are responsible. After all, they made our hats! They made our Halloween decorations! And so, in a very real way, we are responsible for them and their welfare. And if their human rights are being abused as they make the goods we purchase and enjoy, don’t we bear some responsibility for that? In order for change to occur, I think consumers of third world products first need to experience a little guilt. From that guilt will come repentance… Perhaps people will think twice about their Christmas spending. After all, how is Jesus honored when we purchase gifts in celebration of his birth, gifts which are made by sweatshop labor by individuals who endure torture and other human rights violations? In this case, a little more guilt might not be such a bad thing… The second article I read was written by Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite, who is an ordained pastor in the United Church of Christ and a professor of theology at Chicago Theological Seminary. In the article, this highly respected theologian focuses on the link between the typhoon that hit the Philippines last week and other superstorms of recent years, and human-accelerated climate change. These “superstorms” [she writes] aren’t an “act of God,” but an act of willful disregard for God’s creation, and the neglect of the human responsibility to care for the planet. There is moral evil to be seen in these superstorms… on two levels. First, there is the moral evil of continuing to pump fossil fuels into the atmosphere, producing global warming. Second, however, is the moral evil of climate change denial, that is, those who would continue to deny, in the face of mounting evidence, that violent climate change is upon us and it is accelerating… But as some argue politically, the evidence continues to mount, and more people continue to suffer and even die from extreme climate events. According to the Philippine government, the area’s typhoons have been getting stronger… There is a stronger and stronger case to be made that these “superstorms” and “supertyphoon” phenomena are products of abrupt climate changes due to global warming produced by the continued (and increasing) burning of fossil fuels. As the Environmental Protection Agency notes, “The primary human activity affecting the amount and rate of climate change is greenhouse gas emissions from the burning of fossil fuels.” These “superstorms” then are likely the result of human activities that have contributed to the warming of the oceans… [Thisthlethwaite concludes:] There is a theological prescription, in a classical sense, for what we must do: confession, repentance and change. Let me conclude by saying what I’ve said before: guilt is not something we should ignore or fight against. Rather, we should embrace it and care for it, and learn from it. Guilt can be a great teacher. It can motivate us to seek reconciliation. It can motivate us to right the wrongs we have committed. Hopefully there will come a time when guilt has taught us all it can. A time when we have learned from guilt, and have made our lives better as a result. Then we can say to guilt: farewell, dear friend. It is now time for you to go. You have taught me well. You have spurred me to change. Now I am free. Now I am at peace. Thank you.