To Desire a Better Country - August 12, 2007
Hebrews 11:1, 8-16In my mind there are two kinds of people: people who move a lot, and people who don’t. I am the first kind. I have lived in fifteen different places in forty-four years. That’s a little more than three years in any place, mathematically. The longest Pete and I have lived in any home was six years in the first house we bought. We’ve been in discussion in our current home for the last couple of years about remodeling the kitchen. I’d like to do that now, and not in several years when we’d only be doing it to increase the resale value, and giving the next owners the granite and stainless steel I could now be enjoying. The conversation continues.
We also talk about where we’d like to live next—once our boomerangs are transformed into soaring eagles and we’re finished writing tuition checks. One of us favors urban condo, the other a small cottage far away from the hustle and bustle. Obviously that conversation continues as well, and I have a feeling we have several years to figure out the solution.
I am very different from my siblings—both are living within a ten-mile radius of our parents, and I suspect they will live out their lives in Greensburg. My brother’s wife has never lived more than two miles from the family farm, and never on land not owned or previously owned by an immediate family member. So you see, there are two kinds of people—all in the same family!
I guess the reason I am like I am is that I’ve never felt tied to geography. It’s not that I don’t appreciate the beauty of any place I’ve lived—in fact I said many times while we lived in Northern California that when I began to take the hillside lights in Sausalito at night for granted, or thought the fog rolling over the hills in Fairfax was ho-hum, it would be time to move away from the Bay Area. And even though we have lived in Waukesha County for over three years, it was just last month that I discovered Lapham Peak, and I now have a new favorite place. But I don’t believe that it will be my last new favorite place.
What’s you favorite place? Is it the family farm, or the town where you went to college? How about the first home you lived in as an adult, or the islands where you went on your honeymoon? Does it change as you grow older, or has it been consistent your whole life long?
The Christian life has often been described as a journey. This means that even those of us who have never wandered very far from our home of origin are sojourners. In our Hebrew text today, the writer focuses on faith as it applies to our Christian journey. Now—a little back ground on Hebrews: Hebrews is one of those letters that doesn’t really seem like a letter, but more like a sermon. It also is not a letter to Jews, as the title might suggest, but was actually written to persecuted second-generation Christians. We don’t know exactly who wrote it, but most scholars agree that it definitely was not Paul. It’s simply not written in Paul’s style. We can think of the author of Hebrews as someone who is preaching about Old Testament texts in a New Testament era, to people who are definitely Christians. He (or she) is emphasizing how Christ is the embodiment of the law fulfilled, and the culmination of the story of God with God’s people.
How does this author do this? By reminding us of where we’ve been. The approach that the writer takes is to look back in order to remind us that faith has a long memory. And this chapter, from whence we get our passage for today, is clearly about faith.
“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Indeed, by faith our ancestors received approval.”
This phrase, “by faith” is repeated over and over in this passage, even in the verses left out of our reading for today. The author of Hebrews truly wants the hearer of these words to understand what it is that underscores the story of creation, of covenant, and of redemption. The examples we focus on today are Abraham and Sarah. If ever there were two who set out on a journey not knowing what the end result would be, it is those two. It was not a clearly marked goal that they were setting out to achieve—it was on faith that they did what was asked of them.
It’s kind of ironic what the author of Hebrews does here—points back to our spiritual ancestors to show us how they were unable to predict what God had in store, in order to reinforce for us that we have no idea whatsoever, either. I don’t know about you, but I get kind of twitchy when I don’t know what to expect. I don’t mind moving, but I sure want to know if my furniture will fit in the new place. Maybe it is just my lack of faith that stands in the way of being able to let go and let God take care of the details.
What I really wish I could be is what Fred Craddock calls a “confident wanderer”, unencumbered by the need to have the detailed map, but following God every step of the way. That’s the Christian life that we see held up as the standard here in Hebrews. Talk about scary!
Faith, then, is the act of journeying without a map. Or maybe more accurately, faith is more than just showing up for the journey, but actively participating in it, in order to move on to the “better country.”
There is a part of this text that gives me pause—it is the promise of a heavenly home. I’ve mentioned to you before that the tradition in which I was raised placed a great deal of emphasis on getting to heaven, and on the beautiful descriptions of the delights that awaited the lucky ones once we got there. So much so that it seemed when I was a child that a person could do almost anything on earth they wanted to, but if they managed to say the right prayers before they died, they could go to heaven. That seemed okay to the child-like me, until I understood that a person could also be a very good person, not say the right prayers, and miss out on heaven altogether. That seemed like a giant rip off. I was glad when I found out that the reformed tradition of Christianity does believe that there is an eternal home, but that the jewel crusted crowns I was encouraged as a child to earn probably don’t exist, and that simply getting there is reward enough. So if our reward is not necessarily a mansion on a street of gold, or a crown, or angels to do our bidding…is heaven and all its comforts the “better country” the writer of Hebrews is talking about?
It’s interesting to talk to people who do not believe in an afterlife. To them, once you’re gone, you’re gone. Maybe some of you see it this way. I would be very disappointed to find out that this is true—not because I want eternity on a cloud or wings, or a never ending chat with Jesus necessarily—but because I believe that there is some part of us, some vital spark that comes from somewhere else, and I can’t imagine that spark not returning to where it came from once the physical body is finished
I’ve been privileged to be with some saints in their final hours—it is perhaps the holiest place I get to stand as a pastor. The act of leaving this earth is not a passive activity. Experts who study death and dying believe that the death process is another step on the human journey, and when I have been granted the privilege of watching that step, it is evident that as much as the person is leaving earth, they are trying to go somewhere else. It is the ultimate moment of faith. This is when I am most reminded that faith has a long memory. Sometimes people in the last days of this life are flooded with memories of the past, and may seem to “talk” to people and pets who are long gone. Faith is not a moment. Faith is cumulative.
The same faith that took Abraham out to seek a homeland, even though he sojourned, living in tents, the same faith that brought forth a son in Sarah at an impossibly old age, that faith propels each one of us to keep with the journey even when we can’t see the prize. And when we are tempted to say, “Oh, I don’t know if I can do such and such, my faith isn’t very strong.” the author of Hebrews reminds us that faith is not seeing something and making it a reality; faith is journeying towards something yet unseen. And sometimes that faith takes over for us when we cannot keep on doing, and being, and working and struggling. It is faith that takes us from the first tentative steps of our lives to the last steps of this earthly journey.
I have come to believe that heaven is not so much the reward for a life faithfully lived; rather faith is how we make this life—this here and now—more like the kingdom of God that Christ describes in scripture. If heaven is all we have to look forward to, then what is this life about?
Even though I am living in a certain place at a certain time, every other move I have made—from the move across the parking lot, to the two cross-country moves we made with children—every single one of those was made with fear and trembling, but have brought me to where I am now. The writer of Hebrews seems to be reassuring us that whether or not we live in the same house on the same land our whole lives or end up living in twenty places in our lifetime, we are on a journey. Even though this life is not the final destination, it is the opportunity to bring a little heaven on earth, for those who desire a better country.
The Christian life can seem as though it is a series of twists and turns down dark hallways sometimes. Maybe it will help if we keep a hand on the shoulder of the person in front of us, and on the shoulder of the person behind us. In other words, let’s journey together, as the church.
Thanks be to God
