Happy Holy Humor Sunday!
- Read Shel Silverstein's "The Missing Piece" for Children's Time -
History informs us that churches in the fifteenth century Bavaria used to celebrate the Sunday after Easter as Risus Paschalis (‘God’s Joke,’ or ‘the Easter laugh’). Priests would deliberately include amusing stories and jokes in their sermons in an attempt to make the faithful laugh. After the service, churchgoers and pastors played practical jokes on each other, drenched each other with water, told jokes, sang and danced. It was their way of celebrating the resurrection of Christ – the supreme joke God played on Satan by raising Jesus from the dead.
The observance of Risus Paschalis was, unfortunately, officially outlawed by Pope Clement X in the seventeenth century. Perhaps people were having too much fun. Well, I was planning today to put Rick in a dunking booth this morning, but alas he is out of town, so we will have to postpone that fun for another day.
But, In honor of Holy Humor Sunday, though not a comedy, but on the “lighter” side we are going to encounter a children’s story this morning. So at this time I’d like to invite the children to come forward to hear this story…Maybe you have read this book, The Missing Piece, by Shel Silverstein. It’s quite remarkable really how much you can learn from a few lines, a circle and a triangle. Let’s hear now from Shel Silverstein, and listen for God’s words in these words...
READ BOOK
This story reminds me somewhat of my own childhood…perhaps this will resonate with you as well. How many of you remember middle school? Right, exactly, those of you not raising your hands are lying you just don’t want to remember middle school…
So, when I was in middle school there was a big emphasis on having a Best Friend…You weren’t accepted in the “popular group” unless have a best friend…And no, not just a good friend, or a group of friends, but a BEST friend. And, rather than just hanging out with this friend all of the time, sitting by them on the bus, in class, talking after school, going on sleepovers, etc., everybody else had to KNOW who your best friend was too, so what we did was we bought these little necklaces. They were heart shaped and said “best friends” on them, and the weird thing about them was that they were broken hearts. So my best friend and I would wear these necklaces; hers being one half of the broken heart and mine the other half of the broken heart. The idea, of course, being that when you put them together they’d say best friends. Like this- (show broken heart pieces)
Well, it was fine for a little while… but the problem was that after a few weeks or even days, in middle school, right, you’d get tired of spending all of your time with this one other person, this best friend and you’d want that other half of yourself, or your heart, back. In the world of middle school teeny bopper drama there would be a meltdown and you would say, “Give me back my heart,” or “I need to roll on my own for a while”. Then, you’d roll along and find another best friend and give her the heart and on, and on and on… until the whole school had at one time or another been your best friend…. or maybe i’m exaggerating, but you get the point. For those of you who didn’t raise your hands I “get it” I wish I could forget that ridiculousness too!
So why all of this foolishness about broken hearts and missing pieces?
Well, in the letter of 1 Peter, the author writes so eloquently, lifting up the idea of inheritance, which I think beautifully illustrates this idea of “trying to fill something that is perceived as missing”. This inheritance, he says, has been shored up for those believers in this community by the resurrection of Christ, promised them at the end of their lives, and we read that under this resurrection inheritance which is “imperishable, undefiled and unfading”, they are being “protected, now, by the power of God”, “through [their] faith”, for their salvation which is ready to be revealed in the last days.
What is an inheritance, really? Lutheran Pastor, Peter Marty reminds us that the Bible makes more than 250 references to inheritance, a clear sign that legacy during ancient life was part of everyday conversation and an important aspect of familial relationships.
Here are just a few of the texts throughout the entirety of scripture dealing with this issue:
In Matthew 21, we read “This is the heir; come, let us kill him and get his inheritance”,
In Luke 12, “Someone in the crowd said to him, ‘Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me’”.
Proverbs 13:22, “A good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children, but the sinner's wealth is laid up for the righteous.”
Joshua 14:9, “And Moses swore on that day, saying, ‘Surely the land on which your foot has trodden shall be an inheritance for you and your children forever, because you have wholly followed the Lord my God.’”
1 Kings 21:3, “But Naboth said to Ahab, 'The Lord forbid that I should give you the inheritance of my fathers.’”
Colossians 3:23-24 ”Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.”
So Inheritance, in some of these instances points to a kind of security or insurance policy if you will for which some were even willing to kill. A security, for them, that would sure up their lives on Earth, with wealth, prosperity, a future, a lifestyle probably unlike they had known before. The kind of security, even, that a little girl could wear around her neck, showing others, that she too had a place in the social order of her cultural milieu, that she did, in fact, have a best friend.
In other cases we heard of a different kind of security…the one echoed by Peter, an inheritance that comes from God that promises to restore one’s soul rather than their bank account or social status…an inheritance that will not be fully realized until the last time. This kind of inheritance is what left our friend, the big piece, looking for more…rejecting the “completeness” of being filled by the missing piece that presented itself before him ready to fill his emptiness. The Big Piece, seeking to fill himself, instead, with something other than the physical, visible, tangible, “Picture perfect” pieces that were eager to be his quick fix. Rather than rolling away with the short straw in hand, desperate for earthen treasures-an idolatry of possessions which he would then bury and sit atop waiting for the first train to gold-paved streets-he sang his song, danced under the sun, rolled up and down the mountains with ease, all the while piece-less, inherit-less yet poised for the security of God’s unfading, imperishable, undefiled inheritance- in the last days. Living under the wings of this kind of inheritance, writes Peter, “You rejoice” even if in the past or even now in the present you have suffered greatly, or find yourself longing for completeness, in this promise you rejoice. Why? Because of your faith.
The inheritance-vs 4, the protection-vs 5, the refining-vs 7, the joy-vs 8, the salvation-vs 9……all point back to faith…he says which leads to the salvation of your souls…the singing and dancing and praise always on our lips. It is important to note that The author of 1 Peter, in this letter, was writing to Christians, probably both Jews and Gentiles, who were outsiders-sojourners, women, and some have even characterized them as slaves, who as a result from the Assyrian and Babylonian captivities had been scattered across the Asia Minor region now dispersed and living among the Greeks…Therefore the receivers of this 1 Peter message were living as Pilgrims in a foreign land. Described as “people at the very bottom of the social pyramid they inhabit,” Elizabeth Johnson says “because they violate the prime virtue of espousing the religious practices of the heads of their households, their friends, neighbors, and family members also consider them to be antisocial, rebellious, even “atheistic,” since they refuse to honor their families’ gods. They defy traditional family values by refusing to obey the head of household, and they jeopardize community welfare by insulting civic religion.” So, the idea of inheritance meant life for them…they had no earthly inheritance coming of which to speak and suffered constantly the scorn and contempt by their communities because of their FAITH. So hearing this new promise of HOPE that through their faith, they would be protected by God, cared for, that they had been given a new birth rite through a living HOPE through the resurrection of Jesus…that would be their inheritance…their lives depended on believing it… as should ours.
I am sure that many of you heard the story of the 9 year-old boy, Willie Myrick, who was kidnapped earlier this month from his own driveway outside of Atlanta, GA. He described having been taken from his home by a man who had lured him away from his house by scattering money throughout his yard, and then grabbing him and throwing him into the back of his car. For the next three hours Willie said he “sang praises to God” singing the gospel song, Every Praise by Hezekiah Walker, over and over and over and over again. He sang it, he says, “Until the man threw me out of the car”. Willie told reporters that the man got tired of hearing him sing that song..so he threw him onto the street…where he was finally able to call for help.
While you and I aren’t likely to be the next abductees in the headlines of the Paper or even scorned with contempt for our beliefs in God or in a resurrection HOPE, we can be certain that our faith is being, and will continue to be tested by fire- as we read in 1 Peter 3:7, “so that the genuineness of your faith- being more precious that gold that, though perishable, is tested by fire-may be found to result in praise and glory and honor when JesusChrist is revealed.” The question for us on this post-resurrection Sunday is whether or not our faith, as gold, will hold-up through the flames. Even though we do not see him now, Do we love him, do we live as if our lives depend, as young Willie’s did, on the HOPE that is ours in Christ…rejecting the inheritances clothed in “shiny pieces” everywhere ready to fill us with a false sense of completeness that IS perishable, fading and defiled? Will we open our lives to God, and accept the inheritance that is ours through faith, and which will lead us to a salvation for our souls in this life and the next?
As pilgrims ourselves navigating life’s obstacles amidst suffering and uncertainty, struggling to walk this resurrection path in an unreconciled world where security and stability seem to be the only assurances in this life, we are faced with no easy task, my friends. But Nurturing a faith that can muster praise in the face of fear, Hope amidst the twirling chaos of suffering and steadfastness in the hull of defeat is, for us, the salvation for our souls. Let’s take hold of it, even now, today, as we sit in the presence of God within our an incredible community of spirit-filled people. Look around this room, and receive the blessing that is yours through his great mercy, a new birth, into a living HOPE through the great mystery and power of resurrection life.
May it be so this day, and all of your days. Amen.
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