UNITED
CHURCH OF CHRIST in SIMI VALLEY
Third Sunday in Lent - March 23, 2003
The Meaning of Covenant
Anne G. Cohen
Exodus 20:1-17
For Our Reflection:
The people of the earth having agreed
that the advancement of man [sic]
in spiritual excellence and physical welfare
is the common goal of mankind [sic];
that universal peace is the prerequisite
for the pursuit of that goal;
that justice in turn is the prerequisite of peace,
and peace and justice stand or fall together;
that iniquity and war inseparably spring
from the competitive anarchy of the national states;
that therefore the age of nations must end,
and the era of humanity begin.
- World Constitution: Preamble to the preliminary draft (1948)
Peace Prayers (p.119) edited by the staff of Harper San Francisco c.1992
Behind every war there is a big lie... The big lie behind all murder,
from the random street killing to the efficient ovens of Auschwitz, to
the even more efficient hydrogen bomb, is that the victims deserve to
die. - Jim Wallis Peace Prayers (p.15)
To confront evil successfully, we as a nation must also confront our own
darkness; we must act not as a messiah, filled with undue majesty and
certainty, but rather as a healer, filled with compassion, empathy, and
humility. - David Spangler Peace Prayers (p.93)
Signs of Covenant: The Book
I Am God. I care about your freedom and well-being.
. Choose me as your partner in life.
. Keep me at the center of your life. Avoid losing yourself in petty or
destructive pursuits.
. Speak my name with respect.
. Rest one day out of seven. Restore yourself, as I do, and keep our
relationship healthy.
. Honor the covenant you have with those who gave you life and/or raised
you to adulthood.
. Celebrate and protect LIFE itself.
. Honor the covenant you have made with your human life partner.
. Be satisfied with what you have and allow all interactions with others
to be free of coercion.
Page Two
. Be honest; protect your integrity and the integrity of others.
. Honor and respect the covenant you have made with your neighbors,
your community;
respect the boundaries that make communal living
possible and preferable.
I Am God. I care about your freedom and well-being.
These are the challenges and opportunities I lay before Humankind
- in hopes that every human will step up to the challenge
- in hopes that humankind will recognize the responsibilities that come
with cognition, self-awareness, conscience, spiritual sensibility.
I choose you - humans being - as my partners in creation.
Choose me in return - and your life will have purpose and meaning,
clear challenges and worthy goals.
Choose me, choose life, choose the honorable path -
and I will help you to survive the rest.
*****
This is how I interpret this text at this time.
Interpretation of such texts is what we do - as People of the Book.
Muslims, Christians, Jews - we are People of the Book - interpreters and
messengers of a sacred covenant with the One Who Made Us.
There are others people - Panentheists, Indigenous communities,
Buddhists, Pagans, Druids, countless others - who are People of the
Earth.
They are interpreters and messengers of that same sacred covenant with
the One Who Made All of Us. But instead of a printed Book (already a
translation) - they read God in the original language - the Mother
Tongue of Natural Law and Seasonal Cycles.
They too have stories - but they are free stories - written in the earth
and in the human heart. They are less the stories of nations and more
the stories of peoples and creatures. They are often the stories in
which our Book is rooted and from which our book gains nourishment and
breath and life.
As People of the Book we have much to learn from People of the Earth.
They are interpreters and messengers of our Creator with whom we have an
ongoing covenant. And in the face of the fact that we don't seem to be
doing so well these days holding up our part of the covenant, we would
do well to listen and to learn.
Page Three
We have too often held ourselves within the confines of The Book,
particular interpretations, ideologies, world views. Our covenant
requires that we open ourselves to the innumerable interpretations of
our own stories and set aside the dogma that captivates our minds and
spirits, impedes our growth, trades away the adventure of meaning for
the relative security of perceived truth.
God cares about our freedom and our well-being.
Perhaps it is time that we do too.
On Thursday evening a number of us gathered for soup and study. We set
aside the book we have been focusing on and chose to listen to each
other in a different way. Each person was given two minutes to express
feelings that were uppermost - regarding the U.S. war on Iraq. This is
some of what I heart Thursday night.
. Our people are afraid, angry and confused - for multiple reasons.
. Americans are being lumped together as aggressors - perceived by the
world as establishing an empire, a Pax Americana - peace through
military occupation.
. Our aggression is likely to incite more violence and chaos.
. We are out-of-step with the rest of the world - powerless to stop
these events - questioning whether the government or the people are in
control.
. The power of the Iraqi government and military to do harm to the
United States, Israel, it's own people, is frightening. Like a cancer,
it needs chemotherapy - which may kill good cells along with the bad -
but may be the only path to long-term health.
. Some of us work for defense contractors - and have hope that
technology will save lives (theirs and ours); that our equipment will
allow for more precision and simplify the liberation process. We are
sometimes accused of having no compassion and being war mongers and that
hurts.
. Some of us believe we must continue to vigil and demonstrate for peace
and the safe return of our military women and men. We feel we need to
continue to give voice to a nonviolent solution. We worry that we have
no power to influence or affect change, that we are jeopardizing our own
Page Four
future, the morale of our troops, our civil order. We are sometimes
accused of being unpatriotic and taking the side of Sadaam Hussein and
that hurts.
. Some of us are confused by the ineffectual behavior of the United
Nations over time, the arrogance of our president, the justification of
our actions through the intertwined rhetoric of politics and religion,
economics and humanitarianism, occupation and liberation, assassination
and the rule of law.
. We feel ignorant of the Islamic, Arabian, Iraqi way of life and
thought. Opening our minds and changing the way that we think is hard
and it frustrates us.
. We are not certain of our pacifism, not certain that this is a Just
War, afraid this is a Crusade, hoping that we are doing the right thing
in the long run - knowing that Time WILL tell - worried about the
outcome.
. Resorting to war seems primitive in our stage of civilization. Yet it
has opened a channel for global dialogue that may eventually overcome
Nationalism, establish different structures for nonviolent conflict
resolution and covenant keeping.
. We shared cynical optimism, gratitude for our ability to share
differences without judging one another, and affirmed that there are
multiple ways that we as individuals and as a Christian community might
address this dangerous time.
And we decided the following:
. Thursday evenings during Lent we will share (over soup) what we are
doing as individuals to work for peace, support our troops, change the
world, grow in our thinking and our spirit. We will share resources and
organizations that we are working with toward the transformation of our
society.
. The second hour will be a time of study, reflection and prayer.
This coming Thursday we will explore ways to pray in the midst of fear,
anger, war and terrorism. We will practice prayer together.
. Being People of the Book, we are exploring the possibility of a book
study on becoming a Just Peace Church - a U.C.C. designation - like
being Open and Affirming. The U.C.C. text reads:
Page Five
A Just Peace Church is grounded in God's activity in creation. Creation
shows the desire of God to sustain the world and not destroy ... Just
Peace is grounded in covenant relationship...
Ezekiel 37:26 "I will make a covenant of peace with
them..."
When God's abiding presence is embraced, human well-being results, or
SHALOM, which can be translated Just Peace.
- A Just Peace Church, ed. by Susan Thistlethwaite (p.134)
There is a saying in 12-Step programs that makes a similar statement,
"Love does not survive long without the element of justice."
It is a place to begin.
The invitation to join the Thursday evening study is wide open. Bring
friends, bring an open mind, bring respect for our covenant with god and
with one another.
It feels to me as though we are moving toward being a People of BOTH
Book and Earth - following our roots to their source. We are grounding
ourselves in God's original language - while honoring the stories of our
ancestors - and creating our own stories to carry the message to others.
If we really DO choose God as our partner in life, we have some work to
do NOW to honor that covenant and keep our relationship healthy.
There is Passion here. There is Life and Love, Spirit and Hope.
May these be the Heroes that overcome all else in the Story of our
lives.
*********************************************************************
BULLETIN
Music for Gathering
Welcome and Perspective on the Day
Celebration of Women's HerStory
Month Billie
Dierking
+ Call to Worship (responsive)
One: The people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the
Sabbath in every generation as a covenant for all time. It is a sign
forever between God and the people of Israel, for in six days the
Eternal God made heaven and earth, taking rest and refreshment on the
seventh day.
Many: O God of Israel, may our worship on this day help us to grow in
loyalty to our covenant with You and to the way of life it demands: the
way of gentleness and justice, the path of truth and of peace.
+ Story Hymn Deep in the Shadows of the Past Hymnal # 320
+ Opening Prayer (unison) Hymnal # 837
+ Our Common Prayer
Heavenly Father, heavenly Mother,
Holy and blessed is your true name.
We pray for your reign of peace to come,
We pray that your good will be done,
Let heaven and earth become one.
Give us this day the bread we need,
Give it to those who have none.
Let forgiveness flow like a river between us,
>From each one to each one to each one.
Lead us to holy innocence
Beyond the evil of our days -
Come swiftly Mother, Father, come.
For yours is the power and the glory and the mercy:
Forever your name is All in One. Amen
Time for Silent Reflection
One: My soul waits in silence.
All: God is my rock and my fortress. I will be at peace.
Silent Reflection
The Assurance of Good News (unison)
God says "I forgive you not ten times, not a hundred times but EVERY
time. Do the same and make this life better for the world and for
each other."
Sung Response- Hallelujah - God be praised!
Conversation with Our Children The 11th Commandment
by The
Children of America
Reading from the Jewish Torah Exodus 20:1-17
+ Hymn of Faith We Limit Not the Truth of God Hymnal # 316
(Sung to the tune of Hymnal # 12)
Teaching and Proclamation Signs of Covenant: The Book
Intercessions, Celebrations and Encouragements
Call to Prayer Be still and know that I am God Hymnal # 743
Time for Silence
Our Joys and Concerns and an Offering of Prayer
Sung Response In Solitude Hymnal #521 vv. 1 & 2
We Offer Our Gifts So That Our Lives May Be Our Prayer
Offertory
Prayer of Dedication (unison)
May all our gifts and all our works point to You, O God.
May our lives follow Your paths of Peace. Amen.
+ Hymn of Peace This Is My Song Hymnal # 591
+ Commissioning (unison)
May God's face shine upon you and be gracious unto you.
May God give you grace never to sell yourself short;
grace to risk something big for something good;
grace to remember that it is politically expedient for this nation to be
generous to its poor at home
and the poor around the world;
grace to remember that the world now is too dangerous
for anything but truth,
and too small for anything but love.
So, may God take our minds and think through them;
may God take our lips and speak through them;
may God take our hearts and set them on fire. Amen.
+ Sung Response Hymnal # 433 v.3
In our End is our Beginning; in our Time, Infinity;
In our Doubt there is Believing; in our Life, Eternity.
In our Death, a Resurrection; at the Last, a Victory,
Unrevealed until its Season, something God alone can See.
+ Postlude
WORSHIP NOTES
The cross marks (+) in the order of service are an invitation for those
in the congregation who are able to stand to do so.
The New Century Hymnal or Hymnal has a black cover.
The Chapel Songbook is a blue, looseleaf notebook.
Call to Worship is from Gates of Prayer for Shabbat: A Gender Sensitive
Prayerbook by Chaim Stern, Central Conference of American Rabbis c.1992
(p. 40)
Our Common Prayer as adapted by Parker J. Palmer is from Peace Prayers
edited by the staff of Harper San Francisco c.1992 (p.132)
The Assurance of Good News is from Seasons of the Spirit curriculum
(p.38)
Commissioning is from The Rev. William Sloan Coffin