Friends,
NAKED BEFORE GOD, OURSELVES, AND EACH OTHER
Pentecost Sunday
May 23, 2010
Liberation Ministries
Hello, church. I’d like to acknowledge my sister praying for me in Michigan - she was left off the list last time and she let me know about it. [laughing] And I’d like to recognize my friends who are here today - John, Shannon, and Erik. Thank you, Liberation, for hosting me at the pulpit again. While I’m up here I’d like to thank you for your hospitality when I was up here in April. You all were so gracious and generous with me. It meant so much to me to preach here and have you hear my story. Thank you for listening to me - really listening to me and for literally cheering me on. [This section cut for privacy]. I was not left where I was found, [x] was not left where [x] was found. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Holy Spirit. Thank you, human effort. Thank you, surrender. Life is good right now and I don’t want to pretend that it isn’t.
When Darrell asked me to preach on May 23 I said yes, not knowing it would be Pentecost. Nor did I know Darrell’s theme for the month would be “Get Naked” and he would announce to you all last week that I’d be preaching this week on getting spiritually naked with God. That’s no small order. And while this whitey who doesn’t speak in tongues is a little intimidated, I’m also humbled and honored. Up for the challenge. I sincerely pray what I share today will be meaningful to you.
Please join me in a moment of silence.
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing unto you O God, my creator, my strength and my redeemer. Empty me of my ego that I may know it’s not about me standing up here. Empty us that we may hear you.
I’d like to start in the Garden of Eden and make our way to Pentecost. We’ll get there, but I want to go back to garden and talk about nakedness, the loss of innocence, covering up, and the need to get naked again. Naked with God, Naked with Ourselves, and Naked with Each other. What that means, how we might get naked again, and why we’d want to do it in the first place.
Last week Pastor Darrell talked about physical nakedness and care for our bodies. He asked us to imagine that God was in the room with us all the time. Every time we have sex with someone, every time we’re eating, every time we’re using our drugs of choice, every time we’re having a conversation, every time we’re spending money, etc. God is with us all day all the time. And more than imagine, if we believe this to be true - that God is everywhere, within all livings things and in the spaces between all living things, we need to do more than imagine it, we need to acknowledge it and ask ourselves are am I comfortable with the fact that God is with me right now? that Jesus is with me right now? Am I honoring my body? Am I respecting and honoring any other bodies with me? Am I listening and paying attention to that feeling in my gut that tells me this isn’t a good idea, this is harmful? Do we acknowledge God whispering or at times shouting ”you’re abusing yourself, you don’t have to do this. stop. be still. choose life.” or that that feeling and sensation in my gut that tells me - This is life giving. My body is thanking me. I’m not going to regret this. I’m right where I’m supposed to be.
It’s the same with our souls and really we can’t separate them. I can’t separate them and I’m preaching from the perspective that our bodies are good, that our bodies are beautiful, that sex and intimacy is an amazing gift - sacred, but not taboo, that I’m not going to wait to be free of this body to have union with God. I believe that our bodies are one way to life giving union with the Divine. That we, these bodies, we are God carriers as Desmond Tutu says. What we do for and with our bodies affects our souls and what we do for our souls affects our bodies and the decisions we make we them. I like being on this earth and I want my soul to live fully while I’m here, not just later.
So let’s go back to the garden. To our mythical ancestors. I’m also preaching from a place where I don’t need this creation story to be scientifically true and some of the language scares me and offends me, but I believe there is Truth, capital T truth in this story also. Life giving Truth that’s worth sitting with and building on.
Genesis 2: 25 The man and the woman were both naked, and they felt no shame.
We started naked and we felt no shame.
Genesis 3: 1-7, 22 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden?” The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’” “You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
When the woman saw the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed figs leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
Moving on, later in chapter 3.
The Lord God made garments of skin for the man and the woman and clothed them.
And the Lord God said, “The man and woman have now become like one of us, knowing good and evil.”
My bible calls this story “The Fall of Man.” I don’t see it that way. I would title it “Becoming Fully Human.” I heard a Rabbi preach one time about how he thinks God put that tree there and said not to eat it on purpose - knowing we would. And also the serpent didn’t exactly lie. All these years I’ve been hearing about this evil little creature and preparing for this sermon I realized that’s not necessarily true. Yes, now we would die, now we would suffer knowing pain and we would rejoice in the goodness of life, but the serpent also told the truth - our eyes will be opened and we will be like God. Notice it doesn’t say we would be God, it says we would be like God. And God confirms this later in the chapter. Now you are like us, knowing the difference between good and evil. Cracks me up that in this story, from the very beginning, we wouldn’t let God be God. We wanted wisdom and the free will to use it OR NOT USE IT. I read this story and think we chose that, we weren’t tricked into it. We wanted a piece of the Divine and we got it. We were naked and we felt no shame, we saw the Tree of Life and we swallowed the fruits of the Great Spirit into our bodies , our eyes were opened and I believe we were given a gift, not a sin, a gift - we were given the knowledge of the difference between good and evil, right and wrong, life and death, and bodies and minds and spirits to go with and use this knowledge and we covered ourselves up. We covered ourselves. We shied away from this knowledge of ourselves and each other. We became self conscious. We lost our innocence. The man looks at the woman and the woman looks at the man and I imagine they realize and they think to themselves - The God in me sees the God in you and it scares us, the responsibility is overwhelming. We didn’t turn into evil creatures, we become aware that our lives are our own and we are carriers of God. We are God’s partners. I believe this can happen in every relationship afterwards where intimacy of any kind exists- sexual, emotional, intellectual, or spiritual - God willing, all of the above - wherever true Intimacy occurs where we’re willing to slow down, to be naked shining the divine light that lives within us, and truly look at ourselves and another person, to really see the other’s divine light - woman to woman, man to man, woman to man, human being to human being, human to the Divine, Divine to human. It’s a rare moment, holy ground, but it’s a gift given to us and it’s worth cultivating to see that in ourselves and other people. Choosing life for ourselves and being an ally to others choosing life for themselves depends on it. Life depends on us shedding the skins that diffuse and that divine light that dwells within us and Life depends on us working to acknowledge and release it in others.
And notice how God meets us where we are making garments of skin to soften our exposure. God can’t save us from the fully human life and I picture God shaking God’s metaphorical head and says well here we are, can’t go back, but I’ll be with you going forward. I’ll cloth you, I’ll shelter you, I’ll give you food, sun, and rain. And although it isn’t written and there’s no directive I hear God saying to us “Please choose life. Please see yourselves. Please see each other.” And God weeps with us when we don’t. From dust you came and to dust you will return, but I’ll be with you.
Each of us was born in a Garden and we might not choose to call it Eden, but maybe we would. For some of us it was a battleground. Somewhere along the way we lost our innocence. For some it was way too early, for some it came later. But, surely all of us lost it at some point or at least our innocence was bruised and as children or adults we started to cover our divine nature or truest selves, our souls. We developed survival skills as children that helped us to do just that - survive. Here our some of the ways we protect ourselves maybe you’ll recognize yourself in one our more of them: Some of us monitor our reactions, some repress our own feelings, some over identify with others - ignoring ourselves, some channel it into art, some withdraw, some project, some rationalize, deny, some of us numb ourselves. And for all of these things I say thank you. For all of these things we should be saying thank you, because as children and young adults it got us through. We’re sitting here in the pews today. Thank you, tools to survive. Thank you to the folks in our lives who kept reminding us who we were, who we are, who encouraged us to not give up, who led us to living water, and said here drink from this well, thank you for moments of Grace and the Divine light breaking through. However, most of us sitting here in the pews now are adults and we don’t need these tools anymore. We still need our allies, but we don’t need these coping mechanisms. What was once a survival skill is now a character defect. These skills are keeping us from fullness of life, are keeping us from healing and wholeness, are keeping us from shining our Divine Light, living out our calling and by the way everyone has one - not just pastors. We are called. We don’t need to be ashamed of who we are. We don’t need to be ashamed of who we are. We don’t need to cover ourselves. We can hand over the things we’ve done to ourselves and others that we are ashamed of. The kingdom of God is within us. We are filled with the potential of the Divine. Nothing is impossible. You are loved. We are loved.
When we hold on to these survival skills after childhood we choose a little death everyday. We choose to rely on what is known, what is comfortable, familiar. We don’t want to feel that kind of pain again so we let fear control us. We don’t want to let go and surrender.
We don’t want to rely on God and maybe we should pause and ask who is our God anyway? A great bible study question from Wednesday. If I had more time today I would talk more about this. It’s too scary to be truly intimate with someone we don’t know, it’s too hard to trust someone or some thing we’re afraid of. It’s hard to be naked. If we are like the couple at the restaurant Pastor Darrell described last week. Sitting across from God. No really listening, not seeing the other person.
So let’s picture ourselves at the table with God, this is the Lord’s table, a radically open table, everyone is welcome. Are we not paying attention? Are we looking everywhere around the room except into the eyes of the Divine? Are we filling the conversation with meaningless conversation? Complaining constantly? Telling God how tired we are running around doing all our important things. All the things we’re worried about. Focusing on the menu, agonizing over what we’re going to order. And trying to figure how we’re going to feed ourselves? Whoever your God is and maybe God’s a gender bender like Bentley claimed and suggested on Wednesday night and maybe God isn’t personified for you at all? Maybe God for you is silence. Maybe God for you is the Spirit that infuses all life. Perhaps God for you is in nature and you want to be sitting at a river’s edge, on a mountain, at the beach, under a tree. Maybe God is the potential of a blank canvas, a good conversation, telling the Truth in love, the yoga mat, kneeling at the altar. Maybe like Desmund Tutu, you believe that “at the center of this existence is a heart beating with Love.” Picture yourself with your God, where you feel most comfortable, where you feel most safe and at ease. Picture your thin plan where the human and the Divine meet. And if you don’t have one of these places that’s very honest just sit with that longing, with that desire. Our souls are shy, they are skiddish and they are filled with light. Do not be afraid. One good way to get naked, to shed our protective shells is to be honest. To be curious, to peak out from our hiding places. To admit we don’t know, to acknowledge our desires, to risk what it means to surrender and swallow the divine, to swallow the fruit, to swallow and shine the light. Sometimes I sit in the quiet and I ask these questions or speak honestly of my feelings to the empty room, to myself, to the God within me, to the God outside of me, to the Holy Mystery. God’s heart is as big as the ocean. God can hear and absorb anything without being destroyed. God’s love is unrelenting you will not be destroyed by your nakedness.
Holy One, I am afraid. God, we are afraid. Holy Spirit, we are shy.
God, who are you? what are you? where are you?
Creator, I am filled with joy.
Jesus, I feel so close to you.
Jesus, I feel so alone.
God, I feel abandoned.
God, I am tired.
Mother God, I am thankful for my life.
Father God, I am mad at you.
Lord, I don’t understand you.
Silence, I am filled with a sense of mystery.
Breath of life, I am comforted that in the beginning there was order.
God, I am humbled by the beauty of creation.
Holy Wisdom, I want to be naked before you and with you.
Holy Mystery, who am I?
Breathe of Life, breathe in me. Breath of Life, breathe through me.
Jesus, we want to know the Truth and we want to be set free.
God, guide our feet, light our path, show us the way.
As Parker Palmer says “just like a wild animal, the soul is tough, resilient, savvy, resourceful and self-sufficient: it knows how to survive in hard places. Many of us learn about these qualities in the darkest moments of our lives when the faculties we normally depend upon utterly fail us - the intellect is useless, the emotions dead, the will impotent, and the ego shattered. But sometimes, way back in the thickets of our inner lives, we sense the presence of something that knows how to stay alive and helps us to keep going. That something, [Parker Palmer] suggest[s], is the tough and tenacious soul.
And yet the soul, despite its toughness, is also essentially shy - just like a wild animal. It will flee from the noisy crowd and seek safety in the deep underbrush. If we want to see a wild animal, we know that the last thing we should do is go crashing through the woods yelling for it to come out! But if we will walk into the wood quietly and sit at the base of a tree, breathing with the earth and fading into our surroundings, the wild creature we seek may eventually show up.”
This is God, sitting at the base of the tree of our lives, the tree of Life, fading into our surroundings, residing deeply in each and every thing we come into contact with, each conversation, each interaction, each action. This is Jesus, sitting with the woman at the well. This is what we do for each other. And I believe that this is Pentecost.
Acts 2: 1-12 “When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. [Today we are together in this place.] Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them...When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. We hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues! Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, “What does this mean?” Some, however, made fun of them and said, “They have had too much wine.”
This is Pentecost. An outward sign of an inward reality. A magnificent reminder of the divine light that lives within us, but shining on the outside. A moment of extreme clarity. Any overwhelming and awesome view of the experience of God. Who “speaks to each of us as [she] makes each of us”, in our own language, and hears us understands us in all the ways we praise and cry out. All of us telling our truths, testifying about the wonders of God, the amazing reality of this fully human life. Our souls recognize wholeness, our souls recognize each other’s honesty. We see it in each other. We don’t need to speak the same language, we don’t need to have the exact same image of God, we need to trust that the Divine exists in each and every person and living thing. And I really believe that we are invited to be the guardians of each other’s divinity. That we are invited to the stand guard beside each other as we hunger and thirst for the divine, as we start to expose our souls. So let us promise to honor each other, to give each other space to shed these skins to tight for our infinity, to dark for our divine lights. Let us lift each other up and not tear each other down. Let us each take responsibility for our own lives. We are children of God, but we are not children anymore. No one else is going to do it for us. On Pentecost and everyday, God is inviting us to shed our skins, the self consciousness, the shame, the fear. Lay bare our souls and bask in the light of this Mystery we call life and bear witness to the sorrow we call death. Don’t cover up. Stay open. Seek comfort and strength not from hiding, but by claiming and feeding the fire of our divine nature, to release that which smothers our souls and claim what gives us life. To lean into the mystery and the ocean of God’s love.
If you are willing, I would like you to please turn and look at the person sitting next to you or near you. Be close enough that you can look into each other’s eyes and be uncomfortable for a little bit.
So just look at each other for a minute, this fellow child of God.
Soak it in for a moment and take a deep breath.
Now one person in each pair repeat after me while looking at your partner:
The divine in me sees the divine in you.
I acknowledge your shy, beautiful, resilient and rare soul.
The world needs your unique light shining in the darkness.
I will not stand in your way or block your light.
I choose Life.
And now the other person.
Please stand and form an amoeba circle. Join hands. Please pray with me.
[Holy Mystery, who dwells in all that is, seen and unseen. Hallowed be your many names and your namelessness.] Thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us [to Life]. For thine is the kingdom and power and glory that is Love now and forever. Amen.
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