A poem by Langston Hughes—
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
A dream deferred – put on hold, pushed aside, even forgotten. The story of Moses and the burning bush, one of the oldest stories held in remembrance by Christians and Jews alike—the story of Moses and the burning bush is a story of a dream deferred. And the dream is not Moses’s dream. Moses, for his part, is not exactly thrilled to be confronted and challenged by God. No, the dream deferred is God’s dream.
The Old Testament theologian Walter Brueggemann has a lot to say about God’s dream. In his book, which is called “Texts that Linger, Words that Explode”, Brueggemann said this about God’s dream exploding into an unjust world: he said, “…(I)n the Exodus narrative, when Israel cries out, God sees, God hears, God knows, God remembers, [and] God intervenes. It is the utterance of hurt that moves God to newness…God’s justice…takes a critical posture over against established power.”
It is the “utterance of hurt that moves God to newness.” The utterance of hurt. Unlike pretty much every other god or king or leader in the known world, Israel’s God actually hears the cry of the poor and the oppressed. And God has heard enough. For the Egyptian Pharoah, and for the established powers of our own day, this is not good news.
And it’s not good news, necessarily, for Moses, or for us. Or at least it’s not comfortable news. God says to Moses, “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians…” And soon enough, as Moses becomes more and more alarmed, God says, “So come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.”
I can almost hear Moses responding to God…
”Really? Seriously?”
My favorite hymnwriter, Susan Palo Cherwien, wrote a hymn text about Moses and the burning bush, and in this hymn she crystallizes the objections Moses raises before God, his rationale for getting out of this uncomfortable spot. She writes, “Moses hid his face in terror, [and] offered his objections four: doubt of worth and doubt of talent, lack of trust and lack of lore.” He doubted his worth: surely the Israelites won’t believe that he is their Chosen One, their leader. He doubted his talent: in our day we’d say that Moses suffered from “glossophobia,” a fear of public speaking. Lack of trust and lore: how can Moses gain the trust of the Israelites? He was raised as an Egyptian, not immersed like the Israelites in their heritage and culture. And even though he killed an Egyptian in defense of a Hebrew slave, he was now on the run, and, let’s just say, not a likely candidate for leadership among the Hebrew people.
But God is not impressed by these arguments, and sends Moses anyway.
This is uncomfortable news for us because, though we might tell ourselves that we don’t have prophetic visions, we don’t stumble upon bushes aflame with God, that’s actually not the case. We are called, confronted, challenged by God—and (to quote one of our own post-Communion prayers) [sent] out to do the work [God] has given us to do. The bush is aflame, even exploding inside us. And the flames are consuming not the bush itself, but rather our own former selves, our former lives, our former priorities.
“I have observed the misery of my people,” God says. And despite our doubts about ourselves—for like Moses, we all have them—despite our self-doubts, surely we can see God’s point. We could walk out of this building and immediately see the misery of God’s people, from our homeless neighbors here on lower Queen Anne to innocent victims of violence, political upheaval, climate change, and war across the world. And that’s not all. We can observe the misery of God’s people in our workplaces, in our own homes, and in our own anxious hearts.
Yes, our own anxious hearts. And it was Katharine Hepburn—of all people!—who I think said this best: she said, “One builds one’s own jail.” And my take on what she was saying is this: that it’s all too easy to lock yourself into a way of life, a belief system, a way of looking at yourself, or a way of relating to others that is increasingly a prison, a jail, enslaving you, keeping you small, eating away at your health, your strength, your own existence as a beloved child of God. C.S. Lewis, a writer from our own Anglican tradition, put it this way: “The doors to hell are locked from the inside.” All too often we get trapped inside our own private jails, our own private hells, whether it’s the prison of a belief, or the jail of life inside an alcohol bottle, or the hell of a way of life that is oriented toward our smallest self, our basest self.
No more! “I have observed the misery of my people,” God says. “So come,” God says, “I will send you…to bring my people…out.” And in today’s Gospel, Jesus piles on: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”
“Really? Seriously?”
Like Moses, we have a pretty understandable concern about these demands. After all, if I’m going to be sent to bring God’s people out—or bring myself out of my own self-created “jail,” well, that’s going to hurt. I’m going to be pushed into situations and places and relationships that I otherwise would have avoided. I’m going to have to speak the truth to my employer, let’s say, about unethical practices I’m seeing in my workplace. Or I’m going to have to speak the truth to my political leaders, or my friends, or my colleagues, about injustice I see and the burning bush inside me that insists I say something, do something. Or I’m going to have to confront myself with the truth.
Starting next week, Andrew and I will be going to St. Andrew’s Church in the Greenlake neighborhood for my nine-month internship. I’ll be working with them on ministry projects and learning outside of St. Paul’s what it’s like to do the work of a deacon. Outside of St. Paul’s. And like Moses in Midian, really, I was just fine staying here, thanks very much. Unlike Moses, I’m not a “Chosen One” in an epic, world-changing way. But like you, and the person next to you, I am not going to get away with staying where I want to stay, at least not always. I am going to be sent out, despite whatever objections I have.
And I have a few.
For one thing, Andrew and I really love it here. And I know you can understand that. Our rich liturgical life is just the beginning. To leave here is to miss out, to leave home.
But it gets worse. At St. Andrew’s, I’ll be challenged to do things way outside my experience, like leading a group of volunteers to New Orleans to help their sister congregation. Haven’t done that yet! Among other things, I wonder: if I have do actual construction work, how will I not get myself killed?
And yet, again, lest I think being called and sent out is just something that happens to ancient patriarchs or weird people like me who feel called to ordained ministry, I console myself with this: each of us, all of us, are called and sent. The people I’ll take to New Orleans? Called and sent. The people here at St. Paul’s? Called and sent. Catharine Reid, in formation for the priesthood? Called and sent. The people who have never heard of church, and wouldn’t want to, and don’t need to? Called and sent. God is aflame inside us all, and so as sad as I am to leave St. Paul’s for this time, I know that we’re still connected, still in this together. “I have observed the misery of my people,” God says. And everything that we love—and everything that challenges us—is caught up in God’s explosion of urgency, of action, of calling and sending.
Hear this good news: this is not about an angry God sending us on one tedious, self-righteous mission after another, relentlessly pushing us and working us for God’s own purposes, so all of you, yeah you, get back to work! No, this is God’s dream, a dream of—and I’m not exaggerating about this—a dream of heaven on earth, heaven in our city, heaven in our homes and offices, heaven in our hearts. And though God sometimes seems to be exploding within us, pushing us, confronting us, sending us out to work for this dream, God does not leave us alone to do the work God has given us to do. God says to us, as God said to Moses, “I will be with you.”
God will be with us.
Really. Seriously.
