The Prophet's Dream (Isaiah 65: 17-25)

What do you think of when you think of the biblical prophets?

The prophets were men and women who saw the way the world was, and they saw the way the world could be. And they saw the difference between the way the world was and the way the world could be – the gap between what was possible and what actually was – and that is what led them to speak, write, and engage in their symbolic, prophetic acts.

Martin Luther King, Jr., was a prophet. He saw what America was capable of, the ideal America that was possible; and he also was well-acquainted with the America that failed to live up to that ideal.

The biblical prophets lived in times of oppression, injustice, and economic inequality. In the midst of this, they described their vision of a better world.

This was their dream. Or, more precisely, it was God’s dream transmitted through them.

Each prophet had their own dream, and yet the dreams are one.

Amos’s dream was that justice would roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

Micah’s dream was that the world would be characterized by justice, kindness, and intimacy with God.

Isaiah’s dream included the rough places being made plain, and the crooked places being made straight; every valley exalted and every mountain be brought low.

A new heaven and a new earth; a world in which there is no more sadness, no more weeping, no more lives cut short before their time. All people, living in their own homes; working their own vineyards and enjoying the results of their labor. The wealth they create through their labor will not be taken from them. They will not be driven out of their homeland. They will not be taken into slavery. They will not be oppressed.

And there will be peace.

The wolf and the lamb shall feed together. The predator and the prey. The powerful and the weak. The mighty mountain and the deep valley will be leveled out, so that one is not higher than the other. One will not look down on the other.

It’s an ancient dream; a dream that God has shown to generation after generation.

Martin Luther King, Jr. saw the dream. He saw it in Moses’s description of a promised land. He saw it in the writings of Amos, Micah, and Isaiah. He saw it in Jesus and his description of the kingdom of God.  What Jesus called the kingdom, MLK called the “beloved community.” It’s the world as it should be.

We recognize Martin Luther King as a prophet for racial justice. His dream stated “that our nation will be transformed “into an oasis of freedom and justice…” and “that children will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. was also a prophet for economic justice. He said once, “the inseparable twin of racial injustice is economic injustice.”

The beloved community, the kingdom of God, does not exist when one race oppresses another race; nor does it exist when the rich oppress the poor. The kingdom is not present when the wolves on Wall Street ignore the needs of the lambs on Main Street.  The dream is but a fantasy as long as there is a mountain of wealth in one place, and an empty valley of poverty someplace else.

This, too, is part of what the prophets talked about.

The prophet Hosea (for example) talks about a trader. Not Trader Sam or Trader Joe, but “a trader in whose hands are false balances, and who loves to oppress.” This trader says, “Ah, I am rich, I have gained wealth for myself; in all of my gain no offense has been found in me that would be sin.” [11:7-9]

But then God judges and condemns the trader.

In every society, there are rich people and there are poor people. In some periods of history, the rich are much richer than the poor people, while at other times, the disparity between the rich and the poor isn’t as great.

In the times when there is a great disparity between the rich and the poor, the poor end up being oppressed, forgotten, left behind.

In the times when there is a great disparity between the rich and the poor, eventually one of several things happens: either the poor people revolt, or the economy collapses because it is unable to sustain itself.

And sometimes, an enemy attacks and invades, because the enemy recognizes that an unstable, top-heavy economy weakens the government’s ability to defend itself.

In these times of great disparity, when the rich are much richer and the poor are much poorer… that’s when God called prophets, to speak to the people. Isaiah, Micah, Amos, Hosea, and all the rest.

When the economy was more stable and sustainable, when the poor as well as the rich were able to benefit from economic growth… there were no prophets.  God didn’t call prophets to pronounce judgments on the nations when the gap between the wealthy and the poor was small.  Only when the gap grew, did God call the prophets, and call the nations to judgment.

In our own American history, there have been periods of great inequality, and periods in which the gap was not quite so large.

In the 1920s, the gap between the haves and the have-nots was huge. It was the era of Great Gatsby, the roaring 20s. Things were going great, for those at the top, but little attention was paid to those at the bottom.

An economy like that is unsustainable. It is top-heavy, and in 1929, it all came crashing down.

So, policies and programs were implemented for a fairer, more sustainable economy. Regulations were put in place to ensure that the economy wouldn’t run away for those at the top, leaving those at the bottom behind.

But as the decades passed, and as corporations became more and more powerful, those regulations were eased. Wealth again began to concentrate at the top. And just like in the 1920s, there was a housing boom, the advent of new financial instruments and forms of lending, Ponzi schemes, an increase in the general population's investment in the stock market, and problematic monetary policy.

And at the end of 2007, the economy came crashing down once again.

That was seven years ago. According to economists, the economy has recovered. The stock market is up, although low oil prices seem to be slowing that down a bit.

But has the economy recovered for everyone?

The gap between the rich and the poor is still almost as large as it was in 2007.  Wealth is still concentrated at the top. The current recovery isn’t benefitting everyone. And therefore we continue to live with an economy that is unjust, an economy that fails to move us toward the dream of the prophets.

In the prophet’s dream, the ruling class elite no longer own the vast majority of the world’s wealth. In the prophet’s dream, the poor will no longer work only to have the riches of their labor benefit the wealthy.

In the prophet’s dream, the poor will share in the wealth they help create. All people will be able to live in their own homes. We know that in our own time, home ownership is becoming increasingly difficult. Recent studies say that to afford a home in Los Angeles County, you need a salary of $97,000. Any less than that, and home ownership is out of reach.

The median household income in the county is $56,000.

In the prophet’s dream, people will be able to work their own vineyards and enjoy the results of their labor. The mountains that stand in their way will be made low, and the deep valleys in which they find themselves will be exalted.

Last week, in one of its very first acts, the new House of Representatives voted to make it easier to cut social security benefits… which means that seniors who have labored all their lives and contributed to this country’s great wealth might now find it harder to share in the wealth they helped create.

Before social security, half of all seniors lived in poverty. Since social security, only about nine or ten percent of seniors have lived in poverty. Clearly, cutting social security benefits does not bring us closer to making the prophet’s dream a reality.

Pope Francis has spoken on this issue of how wealth is shared in today’s economy. He said “While the income of a minority is increasing exponentially, that of the majority is crumbling. This imbalance results from ideologies which uphold the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation, and thus deny the right of control to states, which are themselves charged with providing for the common good.”

Many years ago, Theodore Roosevelt recognized this when, in his “Square Deal” speech, he said, “The death-knell of the republic had rung as soon as the active power became lodged in the hands of those who sought, not to do justice to all citizens, rich and poor alike, but to stand for one special class and for its interests as opposed to the interests of others.”

The prophet’s dream has not been fulfilled, but the dream is still alive. It was proclaimed boldly by Jesus, who said he was anointed by the Spirit to bring good news to the poor.  In Jesus, God identified with the poor of the world, by choosing to be born to a mother and father who couldn’t even find a suitable shelter, in a small town of ordinary people living under the shadow of the mighty Roman Empire.

The prophet’s dream is still alive. Martin Luther King, Jr., brought it back to the nation’s attention, and even though many of his supporters cautioned against it, he made the connection between racial injustice, economic injustice, and the injustice of war.

The prophet’s dream is still alive. It is not fully realized, but it is alive in all those who hold the dream in their hearts, and who take action to bring it to fruition.  As Martin Luther King, Jr., said, it is a long journey. The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.

The dream will be realized.

The dream will be realized whenever people join hands together – black and white, Jew and Christian and Muslim, rich and poor – and stand for a more just society, a world in which all people experience freedom, a world of joy, of people living in their own houses, sharing in the wealth they helped create, the wolf and the lamb together.

The dream is still alive, and it’s up to us, to allow God’s Spirit to work through us to bring good news to the poor, to bring the mountains down and lift the valleys up.

The dream is still alive.

The Most Segregated Hour

At Sunday's very moving and powerful worship service celebrating the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., members of Pacific Southwest Region (Disciples of Christ) congregations were called to task for allowing 10:00 a.m. Sunday morning to remain the most segregated hour in America... even among Disciples... even in the Pacific Southwest region.

In response, I would like to extend an invitation to all those who recognize the truth of that statement to visit Bixby Knolls Christian Church. We are a small congregation, one that often remains outside the spotlight; and yet -- if it is true that 10:00 a.m. Sunday is still the most segregated hour -- I feel called to share this simple message:

We are Bixby Knolls Christian Church, and we are black, white, Asian, and Hispanic. In our pews are people who have come from other countries, such as Cambodia, Pakistan, Burma, Samoa, and Canada. Our members speak over a half dozen languages. We are heterosexual, homosexual, transgender and cisgender.

And we worship together every week.

This is not due to anything I have done in my 6+ years as BKCC's pastor. I think most in the congregation would say this is not because of anything any person or persons have done. It's because of what God's Spirit has done among us. Mostly, we just try to not get in the Spirit's way, and not mess up what God has been doing through us.

I extend to you an invitation to visit us, but please don't come expecting a "perfect" church. We are diverse, but we are not perfect. For example, last Sunday we couldn't even figure out how to turn the microphone on.

Yet we are thankful for the gift God has given us: a beautifully diverse, multi-cultural congregation that gathers each week at the Lord's Table, a table where the welcome never ends.

"What Good Can Come" (John 1: 43-51)

Every once in awhile I get the opportunity to talk with someone who doesn’t know much about the Christian faith.  Well, except for what they hear in the media, which, in my opinion, is most often a distorted image of Christianity.

For example, their impression of Christianity is that it is a religion that is constantly putting people down, telling them that they are no good, that they’re a sinful abomination doomed to hell unless they straighten up.  That’s how Christians – and especially Christian pastors – behave.

Now, they don’t come right out and say it in so many words, but I can tell what they’re thinking.  They’re thinking that I’m a Christian pastor, and yet they have a hard time imagining me being as condemning as their media-fueled image of Christians.  If they did imagine me that way, I don’t think they would have said anything at all.

What they do say, if they are especially curious (and many people are curious), is: “What’s your church like?”  Or, if a certain image of Christians is so dominant in their minds, they’ll mention how much they can’t stand Christians, or how much they hate the church, the implication being that I’m not like all those Christians and the church I attend is not like all those other churches, that perhaps I and my church are in a different category altogether, because after all, how could I be in the same category as all those hypocritical, condemning, judgmental – and you’ve gotta say it with a sneer – Christians?

How did we ever get to this point?

I don’t know, but maybe Nathanael had something to do with it.  When told that the messiah had come from Nazareth, he said – with a sneer – “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” 

The question was rhetorical.  No one expected anything good to come from that dinky, backwoods village full of people who were poor, lazy, and stupid.  It was a real hillbilly hell.

When looking for something good, Nathanael looked to the people who were like him – or the people he aspired to be.  People from Jerusalem.  People whose pictures appeared on the cover of People magazine.  But not someone from Nazareth.

Well, what I know of the Judeo-Christian faith tradition is that it has a long, long history of focusing on those who were thought to be no good, those who were different, those who were from someplace else.  And throughout the entire Bible, both the Old and the New Testaments, there is a movement that is ever-expanding, a movement from provincial to global, a movement that is like an ever-expanding circle that seeks to welcome and draw in more and more of God’s people, until no one is left behind; until no one is told that they are not good enough.

That’s what I tell people.

Early on, when the nation of Israel was first established by God through Moses and Joshua, it was important for Israel to establish its identity.  I mentioned last week how establishing one’s identity is an important developmental task, but that it isn’t one’s final or ultimate task. 

And so Israel was told early on to shun foreign practices and to only marry other Israelites.

However, already there were signs that the path God leads us on is a path of embracing ever larger circles of people.

Hospitality to foreigners, sojourners and aliens was one of the highest virtues of ancient Israel, and was even important before Israel’s establishment.  Abraham and Sarah were honored by God for the hospitality they showed to some travelers from another country, while the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed by God because of their lack of hospitality, and their rude and abusive treatment of those who were not like them, those who were from somewhere else, those who were considered no good.

Many other stories in the Old Testament show how God’s favor came to those who were thought to be no good, folks who weren’t from around here.

Perhaps you remember the story of Naaman, who was not an Israelite but an Aramean.  Nevertheless, God used the prophet Elisha to bring healing to this foreigner.  All Naaman needed to do was come to the Jordan River, wash himself in the water, and be healed.

Ironically, Naaman threw a fit.  “The Jordan River?  That muddy ditch?  The rivers of my own country are much more magnificent.  Nothing good can come from the Jordan.”  But he gave in, went to the Jordan, and was healed.

Perhaps you remember the story of Ruth.  She was not from Israel, but came to Israel as a result of the previously forbidden practice of intermarriage.  Despite the previously law against intermarriage, scripture does not condemn Ruth or anyone in her family.  The circle is getting wider.

Ruth’s faith and her loyalty were remarkable, and in fact scripture lifts her up as a model of faith.  The 8^th book of the Bible bears her name, and her great-grandson was David, the greatest king in all of Israel’s history.

This progression towards inclusivity continues in the New Testament.  Yes, Jesus came from Nazareth, a town from which few thought anything good could come.  But to the people of Nazareth, Jesus said, “My work is bigger than this.  I must go to the other parts of Israel, too.” 

Well, those other parts of Israel were the parts that told Nazareth that it was no good.  The people of Nazareth didn’t want Jesus going there.  “Jesus, don’t you know what they’re like?  They’re mean and rude and judgmental.  Just stay here with us; be our Savior, our own personal Savior, just for us.”

Jesus said no.  He said he had to go to all the children of Israel, wherever they may be.

The people of Nazareth didn’t like that answer.  They tried to take Jesus by force and toss him off a cliff.  I guess they figured that if they couldn’t have Jesus all to themselves, to create in their own image, then no one could.  I guess if they couldn’t make Jesus fit into their tiny, provincial image of who they thought he should be, then it would be better to get rid of him.  After all, we don’t want to let the real Jesus interfere with the tiny, provincial image of Jesus that we’ve created.

Perhaps you remember the time when Jesus met a Syrophoenician woman.  To say that she was a Syrophoenician is to say that she was a Greek, a Gentile, a Canaanite, a pagan.  In other words, she was not one of the children of Israel.

She came seeking healing for her daughter, but Jesus said that he was sent to and for the children of Israel.  She insisted, but Jesus still refused, referring to her the way all children of Israel referred to foreigners and outsiders, by calling her a dog.

Eventually it becomes clear that her faith is a faith that will not give up; and that, I think, is the point, the same point that is made in several other stories that we have about Jesus:  that the children of Israel are not the only ones who possess a genuine faith in God.  In the end, Jesus commends her faith, and grants her request.

And perhaps you remember that the book of Acts begins in Jerusalem, expands to the surrounding regions of Judea and Samaria, and then eventually expands to the ends of the earth.  On the way from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth there are many stories, including one about an Ethiopian eunuch.

Nothing good was expected from an Ethiopian eunuch.  For one thing, he was an Ethiopian.  He was from a different country – a different continent, even – where people worshiped differently, talked differently, and even looked different.

And for another thing, he was a eunuch.  Whether it was by choice, or – more likely – forced upon him, he was sexually different.  For all intents and purposes, he was gender-less.  And for that, he was not permitted in the temple in Jerusalem.  To find out why, read Deuteronomy 23.

But we are on a journey from exclusion to inclusion, a journey from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.  Isaiah 56 specifically overturns Deuteronomy, insisting that God’s house is to be a house of prayer for all people; no longer will the eunuch or the foreigner be told that they are no good.

What good can come from an Aramean? A Syrophoenician? A Gentile? A foreigner? A eunuch?

What good can come from Nazareth?

We live in a world that tells us not to expect anything good from all sorts of people.  Christians.  Republicans.  Democrats. Muslims. Hispanics. African-Americans.

The Christian response is that good can come from anywhere; good can come from anyone. For we are all children of God. And we are all on a journey from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

Once upon a time I was the pastor of a congregation in which there was an elderly woman named Iris.  Iris was a Japanese-American, and spent part of her childhood at a place called Manzanar, an internment camp for Japanese Americans during World War II.

When the war was over and she was allowed to return home, she found discrimination and prejudice everywhere she went.  People were constantly telling her that she was no good.

Except for the people of this little Disciples congregation that welcomed her with open arms.  That congregation recognized that it was on a journey from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth, a journey from exclusivity to inclusivity; and the people of that congregation saw that there was a lot of good in Iris, just as there is in every person.  It made me proud to be their pastor.

Unfortunately, over time things changed.  Iris died, and it wasn’t long after that that the congregation forgot which way it was going on that journey.  Instead of going from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth, it started going back to Jerusalem.  It stopped moving toward inclusivity, and started moving back toward exclusivity.  And there was nothing I could do about it.

That congregation is no longer a Disciples congregation.  They have made it clear that those who are sexually different are no longer welcome.  And even though this congregation has welcomed the leadership of women pastors in its past – even African-American women pastors – today women are discouraged from any leadership within the church, including serving as an elder or deacon.

Thank God we have a day to honor the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr.  He reminded us that we are on a journey from exclusivity to inclusivity.  He reminded us that good can come from any person, of any race or place of origin.

The reason we honor Martin Luther King is because he stopped asking, “can anything good come from white Americans?” He knew that there is good in all races, in all people.  He taught us how to see the good, to love both the oppressed and the oppressor, to love even the perceived adversary and the enemy, because even in them there is something good, and from them – even them – something good can come.  It may be a long time in coming, and it may need a lot of love to help make it come, but it is possible.

Can anything good come from Nazareth?

Can anything good come from people of different races, nationalities, sexualities, and religions?

Can anything good come from you?