Sermon: Liberating Boundaries (Mar. 3, 2024)

Lent 3B – Liberating Joy
March 3, 2024
Exodus 20:1-17

INTRODUCTION

This week’s theme in our series, A Seed of Joy, is “liberating joy.” The first reading is the 10 commandments, which may not at first sound very liberating. I’m sure you’re familiar with at least some of the commandments, but here is where they fall in the biblical narrative: Moses has just led the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt and they are now in the wilderness, finding their way to the Promised Land. As they wander through the wilderness, God provides these “10 words” as guidelines about what it means to live as God’s faithful people. The reading is a bit dry, but it’s actually quite a dramatic moment: God has made sure the people will all stay safely at the foot of the mountain, and then there is thunder and smoke and fire, and a trumpet blast, the whole mountain shakes violently, and Moses talks to God. God makes it very clear this is a big deal! 

The 10 words God speaks seem simple and straightforward enough – yet God’s people have struggled to keep them even to today, as we strive to live according to God’s wisdom, not our foolishness. Now, rules don’t normally bring to mind the idea of freedom. So as you listen to this one, think about how the law, and specifically God’s law, can provide a path toward liberating joy. More later.

Our Gospel reading is John’s version of the famous story in which Jesus overturns the money-changers tables in the Temple. There are a few things that are different in John’s version compared with the other Gospels, most notably that it happens at the beginning of his ministry, not the end. You see, Jesus is making the point right off the bat that things like animal sacrifice and even the Temple itself are no longer necessary to worship and be close to God – because now, through Jesus, God is dwelling right there among them, among us. In this encounter, Jesus declares a sort of spiritual freedom to Israel and to us – freedom to worship God wherever we are. As you listen to this one, consider how knowing that God dwells with us provides a sense of freedom. Let’s listen.

[READ]

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

I have long been a proud rule-follower. I like to know what is expected of me, and I feel very comfortable within a clear set of guidelines. My son, Isaac, and I share this. Isaac frequently reports on kids in his classes who are “not good listeners” or “don’t do what the teacher said.” He and I also share a love of board games, and the security of knowing there is a right way to play. That way, everyone can have fun. 

Michael and Grace are… not this way. For Michael, the value in knowing the rules is so you know how best to get away with breaking them. Grace bristles when anyone tells her how something should be done. Not surprisingly, neither of them are huge fans of board games – Michael tends not to play at all, and if Grace plays, she prefers to add her own rules to the mix. Or just go make art instead, where there are no rules. Consequently, Isaac and I play a lot of two-player games.

It takes all kinds, and there is certainly value to both ways of living. The Isaacs and Johannas of the world provide order and structure and keep people accountable to doing their job. The Graces and Michaels of the world help us have some fun, to think outside the box, and make the world beautiful. 

But here’s my question. Our theme today is “liberating joy.” Which family members do you think experience more liberating joy: the rule followers, or the rule benders? Can rules, the law, be liberating? Or is the law constraining and a buzzkill? We know that God’s grace is liberating – freeing us from the rigors of the law and assuring us of salvation even when we cannot keep God’s law. But is it possible that God’s law can also be liberating?

Spoiler alert: yes, the law absolutely can be liberating. 

In our first reading, we hear the 10 Commandments, the most famous and mainstream of God’s covenants. These come to Moses and Israel at a key moment in their formation: right after the Exodus from slavery in Egypt. (Already we see that this is liberating - it is counter to the experience of slavery.) The Exodus event is an absolutely central one for God’s people. In fact, some of the language in the crossing of the Red Sea moment recalls the creation story in Genesis, giving the sense that the Exodus is the creation of God’s people as a people. It’s their birth narrative. They have been gestating all these years, all through Genesis, and now they have been born of water. Now they embark upon a journey, walking through the wilderness to find the land of Canaan, the land “promised to Abraham and his children forever.” 

1yo Grace explores her boundaries
as the dog looks on.

Anyone who has raised a child knows that those first few years, the toddler years, when children start to travel by their own power and volition require the parent to set some boundaries. In some cases, these are physical – baby gates and whatnot. But it is also softer boundaries, aka rules, rituals, and routines: we do not drink out of the dog’s bowl, we do not throw food, we do go in the potty and wash our hands after, we say please and thank you, we pray before going to sleep. Some rules are universal (I don’t know anyone who lets their child drink from the dog’s bowl, for instance). And, each house has their own, unique rules and rituals. Such boundaries help a child develop their autonomy, even as they also grow into understanding their own identity as a member of this family. For example, one ritual we have is we have prayed with and blessed our children each night since before they can remember, and this is so ingrained that when one parent is out of town, they videochat in for this ritual, and neither child wants to go to sleep until we “God-bless” them. That is a part of their unique Rehbaum identity they have developed from the boundaries and rituals we have put in place as their loving parents.

This is what the 10 Commandments provide for the Israelites in their toddlerhood as a people, and what they continue to provide for the descendants of Abraham, including Christians, to this day. Some of the commandments, like the ones about murder, lying and stealing, are fairly universal, included in our secular laws. And some are particular to the household of God – like the one about idols, or remembering the Sabbath. Some (the first three) are directed at the people’s relationship with God, and some (the rest) are meant to order our lives with respect to our neighbor. Love the Lord your God, and your neighbor as yourself.

But every last one of them is meant not to restrain or limit us, but to liberate us. To show us how to live together and love one another. 

Think again about a toddler. All the parenting books will tell you: kids crave boundaries. They long to know what is expected of them. A kid who understands their limits may still push those limits, but it is all in service of trying to understand where the limits are. When those boundaries are clear to the child, the child can play and explore and adventure freely and with a sense of safety. They feel secure enough to build relationships, to learn what it is to live and to love and to be loved. 

I remember during the pandemic, when I was home with my then 3- and 4-year-old, and Michael was deployed for three months. The days were long and fuzzy, chaotic in their looseness without the structure of going to preschool or work. One day, the kids and I sat down and made ourselves a schedule, which included meals, learning time, quiet time, let-mom-work time, outdoor/wiggle time, mom-play-with-kids time. We hung it on the wall so we could refer easily to it. Our lives completely changed. Suddenly each day seemed more manageable, and if a day was manageable, so was a week. In fact, we were able to find a lot more joy in our days! We didn’t follow it to the letter, but the structure saved our lives in those fearful early months of the pandemic. In fact, my kids still remember it. “Remember when we made that schedule during the pandemic and hung it on the wall?” they ask. “That was good.” Yes. Yes, it was.

You see it isn’t just kids. We all do better when we know what is expected of us. And that is why these 10 words, these 10 commandments from God, are a gift to us, indeed, a means of liberation. They are the baby gates and household rules in the house of God, which guide us and keep us on track, and give us a sense of identity, and show us how God wants us to live in relationship with God and with our neighbor. They offer us a means of accountability, yes, but also, within those boundaries, they grant us space to dare to adventure and be brave, knowing that we are in a safe place, and that God’s grace will catch us when we fall. 

Next week after worship, we will have a chance to dare to adventure and be brave in our ministry, as we begin to brainstorm about what we will do with our recent bequest of $4 million. We will be guided in our discernment by things like our values and vision as a congregation, but going further back, we will be guided by God’s law, the first covenant God made with His people in which God told us how we are expected to act: that is, lovingly toward both God and neighbor, just as Jesus also taught. Knowing that God’s law, lovingly given, is what guides us, we can be brave and liberated in our imagining how $4 million can best be used to love and serve both God and neighbor. And, we can be sure that if and when we don’t quite stay within the limits God has set, grace will catch us, and set us back on our feet, and let us try again.

Thanks be to God for the loving and liberating boundaries that allow and call us to venture and to dare, and for the abundant grace of God that guards our lives from birth to death!

Let us pray… God of covenant and law, you gave us guidelines to make it safe for us to venture and to dare. Liberate us to be brave in how we love you and how we love our neighbor, trusting that your grace will always be there when we fall short. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.  

View the full service HERE.