Proper 11B
In the name of God in whom we take root, Christ through whom we
grow, and the Spirit by which we are fed.
Amen.
A couple of months ago, we had the annual St. David’s plant
sale. We sold more plants than ever
before – due in large part to the reputation we’ve built for having quality
plants to offer to or community. But
even so, I have to admit, that not all of the plants that Michael and I bought
are thriving as much as we’d hoped.
Now, it’s not the fault of the plant sale – Mike and Deb procured
beautiful plants for us. If I were to be
entirely honest, I’d have to admit that Michael and I didn’t really do our
part, as well as we should have. We put
some of the plants in the ground, and in pots and baskets pretty quickly. But there’s never exactly enough time to do
all that we envision doing, and we hadn’t planned ahead and didn’t have all the
materials we’d need right away, and sometimes the days just weren’t the best
days for planting – it would rain, or be too hot, or whatever else… All of that came together into our reality
that some of our plants just didn’t get planted right away. Some had to wait a couple of weeks. Some waited quite a bit longer than that.
One of the plants that suffered the most was the snap
dragons. These beautiful flowers climb
into tall stalks and bud out into dozens of gorgeous flowers in a variety of
colors. But we didn’t plant them in
time. In their little plastic pots, they
kept growing up, but it wasn’t until it was too late that they finally had the
chance to grow down. Their roots just
weren’t strong enough to support the plants they’d become.
We all need strong roots.
Whether we’re plants, or people, or even whole communities. We need to establish ourselves, and grow deep
to support our growing tall. Because
it’s down deep – at the roots – where we are fed, and it’s up high – at the top
– where we can see the light.
In the lessons we read today, we hear stories of roots – people
putting in roots, and people finding and reconnecting with their roots. It all starts in the Hebrew scriptures. David, the young king, and his prophet – his
conduit to God – Nathan, are noticing their experience. David says, “See now, I am living in a house
of cedar, but the ark of God stays in a tent.”
In his discernment and prayer – in his deepening understanding of God,
Nathan realizes that this isn’t right.
The people had begun to put in roots in the place where God had led
them, but even so, God’s place among them was left in a tent – a temporary
shelter. God deserved at least as much
as the people for whom God had done so much.
And this is the beginning of the narrative of the temple in
Jerusalem – a place that would be set aside for centuries of Jewish ancestors
to worship God. God’s roots, planted so
deeply by David, that even though the temple no longer stands, its footprint
and its roots continue to this day.
God was ready to put in roots.
It’s part of how God showed the people that they were not and never
would be alone.
If we fast forward a few centuries – to the time of Jesus – we
hear of roots of a different sort.
If you were here last week, you heard the story of the beheading
of John the Baptist, but that was really more of a side-bar in the life of
Jesus. The story we read today, however,
is really a continuation of the story we read two weeks ago – the story of
Jesus returning to his hometown, only to discover that those roots no longer
supported him.
So he and the disciples get back to business – the business of
healing and teaching and spreading the emerging gospel of Christ. Two weeks ago we heard that the disciples
were sent out into the world to take Jesus’ work even further. Today, we read that they’ve come back. They’ve done as they were told, and came back
to reconnect with their community’s roots (which are, indeed, the community
itself).
And in this community, we hear about two ways that the community
that forms around Jesus roots itself: with work, and with prayer. When the disciples return to the community
from their work, Jesus tells them to go away to a deserted place and to rest –
to spend some time building themselves back up, because the work wasn’t
finished yet.
But the other thing that rooted them, was that work, itself. The teaching and the healing. Wherever they went, the people would crowd
around them to be taught and to be healed.
That work of bringing people closer to God also helped to root
themselves in the life of God.
In our own community, just like that community that first formed
around Jesus, we have roots. And it’s
not all that different from the things that rooted Jesus and his
followers. We come together to teach and
to learn. We go out into the world to do
the work of Christ, to try to bring people closer to God.
And today, in this community, we’re celebrating another thing that
brings us together – that roots us in the community, so that we’ll be prepared
rise to our potential and to see the light.
We’ll celebrate the baptism of Alex Luino, but as a part of that, we’ll
all remember our own connection to Christ and to the community through the
same. As we said at the start of the
service today, “There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism.” And that unity binds us together.
In the baptismal liturgy, we promise to support one another – to
look out for Alex, and for his family and his community, but also to look out
for one another. We promise to pray
together, to spend time together, to respect one another…
These promises, and the water through which we all pass, are what
roots us most to this community and to this faith.
Baptisms are an exciting and joyful time in the life of a
congregation. We can’t help but have
hope for the future when we see beautiful young people coming into the
community. But they’re not just about
the future. Baptisms remind us of our
past, and what roots us, and they give us the strength and courage we need
right now, to keep growing to our greatest potential.
In our garden, the snap dragons, though still growing and
flowering, have fallen to the ground and failed to reach their potential
because they didn’t have roots strong enough to hold them up. We won’t be like that. We are rooted in this community and in this
faith and in the joy that comes from growing the tribe. Today, our roots dig a little bit
deeper. May we also see the light. Amen.
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