2025-09-08
Brooke Strong
Sermon Text...
This morning, I’d like to introduce you to my dear friend and one of my faith mentors, Margaret Saunders. Margaret passed away in 2011 at the age of 97 but I cherished the decade I was privileged to call her my friend. Part of what made her so special was Margaret’s ability to overcome adversity with grace and joy. She was born legally blind but, with special telescopic glasses, was able to read very large print with one eye. Despite this limitation, she earned her bachelor’s degree from Oberlin in 1936.
Margaret applied to the master of social work program at Case but was rejected because the school said that with her disability she would not be able to complete the work. Undaunted, she applied and was accepted at the University of Chicago where she earned her degree in 1951 and went on to work for 27 years at Metro Hospital. During that time, she suffered severe hearing loss and four years before she retired, she was completely deaf. But she kept on working!
Never one to remain idle, in her retirement Margaret spent her time as a leader in her church and as an advocate for environmental and peace causes. When I last visited her just a week before she passed away, she excitedly shared with me her most recent letters to legislators passionately advocating for these issues.
One time when I was visiting with her, I asked how she was able to remain so positive in the face of so many things that would limit and stymie most other people. “Well,” she said
without hesitation, “when I wake up in the morning, I can choose to feel sorry for myself or I can thank God for my many blessings and be grateful and happy. I choose the latter.” I could always count on Margaret to put things in perspective!
As I read the lectionary text for today that Abby just shared and thought about the Ann Weems poem that I love so much, my mind immediately went to Margaret who always chose life and always celebrated God’s presence. There are many times in the past several years, when the divisiveness of the world has gotten to me, that I wish I could stop by for a chat with my dear friend who I know would help me find the blessings all around me.
Standing before the people as they are about to enter the promised land, Moses shared, “I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live.” The choice seems so clear and yet as we look more closely at the cost of choosing life, many times we choose the path that appears easier, the one that will lead to pain and bitterness and ultimately to a kind of living death.
So, what does it mean to choose life as Moses defined it in his third speech? First, choosing life involves loving God with all one’s heart and soul and might, loving holistically in all that we are and do. Second, choosing life means walking in the ways of God, deciding on a life of discipleship and obedience. Third, choosing life means keeping God’s commands as a way to remain faithful rather than burdened by impossible directives.
Okay, you may be thinking, that doesn’t sound so hard. Who wouldn’t choose life? But if we used this triad as the test case for making this choice, we would pause before we lashed out at someone in anger or fear when their beliefs differed from ours. We would be slow to label someone as pro-life or pro-choice, as thoughtless or a war monger or as an antivaxxer. We might stop and think before we speak or take action, “Is what I am about to do or say something life-giving or life-empowering?”
Sometimes our lectionary text leaves out some important verses and such is the case today. The four verses that immediately precede the reading this morning offers some wonderful imagery. Moses says to the people, in essence, “Hey folks, this stuff God is saying to you through me about life in the Promised Land ain’t rocket science. You don’t have to travel to the far side of the moon to snag this wisdom. You don’t have to sail the oceans to the ends of the earth to get it. In fact, the choice you face is being delivered to you on a silver platter. It’s right within your reach; stretch out your hand and grab it!”
It really is simple, Moses says. Because God loves us, God has given us the gift of the law which, theologian Scott Hoezee call God’s owner’s manual. This manual, he says is as though God created a big neon sign with bright yellow arrows pointing straight at the things we are to do: choose the good path that leads to life affirming choices.
But despite this clarity, human beings are notorious for making decisions that are life-extinguishing and so produce mayhem and unhappiness. Moses knew that simply showing people the better way to live is no guarantee that we will take that path. Think about the corporation that chooses profits over advancing their customers’ and employees’ well-being. Or about the nations that choose soldiers and guns over abundant food and water for their citizens.
If we think we are immune from these life-extinguishing choices, we only need reflect on the things we covet that lead us away from God’s teaching: money, youth, power, a big house, perhaps a new sports car or the latest electronic device. When was the last time what you said and what you did reflected who God is for you? Our actions and words reveal our theology.
Part of what informs our decisions to make poor choices is the way we understand the laws of the owner’s manual God offers us. We often think of laws as the way someone decides things should be. The highway sign that tells you to drive 60 miles per hour is rather arbitrary in our minds and so we may choose to drive 70 instead.
But there is another kind of law that is very simply the way things are in all situations. For example, you may decide to disobey the law of gravity. Maybe you decide you don’t even believe in that law. But those decisions won’t help you if lose your balance on a stepladder or if you drop a hammer while it is over the top of your foot. The pain you’ll feel is real!
Too often we make the mistake of thinking that God’s laws are like speed-limit signs, just arbitrary hoops God has decided to make people jump through. But as the people of God, we need to know that God’s laws are like gravity: they describe things the way they simply are.
Friends, there is much in the world today that may steal our joy and entice us to paths that lead to death instead of life. We can feel discouraged and ready to ignore the laws in God’s owner’s manual, laws that serve as guard rails for our safety and fullness of life. But what if instead we choose life so that we and our descendants may live. What if we choose gratitude even in the face of adversity like my friend Margaret did. What if we decide that balloons really do belong in church, that love and life are worth celebrating, and that we will not allow anyone or anything to take away our joy? What if indeed! May it be so. Amen.