First Presbyterian Church
The Creating Creator
Sermon for February 8, 2009
by Pastor Susan Barnes

Our first reading is on page 688, from the book of the prophet Isaiah. We'll be reading from my translation, so some of the words will be different. The prophet is answering the question “what is God like?” Listen for the word of God as it is found in Isaiah 40:21-31.

21 Haven't you known? Haven't you heard? Hasn't it been made obvious to you from the beginning? Haven't you understood the foundations of the earth?

22 It is the one sitting up above the vaulted roof of the earth (its inhabitants are like grasshoppers); the one stretching out the heavens like a thin curtain, and spreading them like a tent to live in;

23 the one who brought rulers to nothing, and makes the judges of the earth like chaos.

24 Scarcely are they planted, scarcely are they sown, scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth, when that one blows upon them, and they dry up, and the storm wind carries them off like stubble.

25 “To whom then will you compare me, or who shall I be like?” says the Holy One.

26 Lift up your eyes on high and see: Who created these? The one who brings out their host and numbers them, calling them all by name; because that one is great in strength, mighty in power, not one is missing.

27 Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, "My way is hidden from Yahweh, and my privilege is overlooked by my Lord”?

28 Haven't you known? Haven't you heard? The God of eternity is Yahweh, the Creator of the ends of the earth. God does not become fatigued nor grow weary; God's understanding is unsearchable.

29 God gives energy to the fatigued, and strengthens the powerless.

30 Even youths will fatigue and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted;

31 but those who wait for Yahweh will renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not grow fatigued.

 

This ends our reading from Isaiah. Verse 26 speaks of the Lord bringing out the host of heaven—that refers to the stars, that God created the stars, numbers them and calls them by name. Our unison reading is on page 582. Like our reading from Isaiah, Psalm 147 speaks of what God is like by giving us a list of what God has done. The psalm begins and ends with the Hebrew word Hallelujah, which means praise Yah, or praise the LORD. Listen for the word of God as we read it in Psalm 147. (NRSV)

1 Praise the LORD! How good it is to sing praises to our God; for he is gracious, and a song of praise is fitting. 2 The LORD builds up Jerusalem; he gathers the outcasts of Israel.

3 He heals the brokenhearted, and binds up their wounds. 4 He determines the number of the stars; he gives to all of them their names. 5 Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his understanding is beyond measure. 6 The LORD lifts up the downtrodden; he casts the wicked to the ground.

7 Sing to the LORD with thanksgiving; make melody to our God on the lyre. 8 He covers the heavens with clouds, prepares rain for the earth, makes grass grow on the hills. 9 He gives to the animals their food, and to the young ravens when they cry. 10 His delight is not in the strength of the horse, nor his pleasure in the speed of a runner; 11 but the LORD takes pleasure in those who fear him, in those who hope in his steadfast love.

12 Praise the LORD, O Jerusalem! Praise your God, O Zion!

13 For he strengthens the bars of your gates; he blesses your children within you.

14 He grants peace within your borders; he fills you with the finest of wheat.

15 He sends out his command to the earth; his word runs swiftly.

16 He gives snow like wool; he scatters frost like ashes.

17 He hurls down hail like crumbs-- who can stand before his cold?

18 He sends out his word, and melts them; he makes his wind blow, and the waters flow.

19 He declares his word to Jacob, his statutes and ordinances to Israel.

20 He has not dealt thus with any other nation; they do not know his ordinances. Praise the LORD!

This ends our reading of the psalm. The word our pew Bibles translate as ‘ordinances' can also be translated as ‘justices,' or ‘judgments'; the justice of God involves healing the broken-hearted, lifting up the downtrodden, and throwing the wicked down. This is not a psalm that is about how good the local king is; it is about God, the one who names and numbers the stars—this God cares about human beings.

Let's listen to the choir interpret the psalm.

Our gospel reading is on page 35 in your pew Bibles. It's from the first chapter in Mark; Jesus has been baptized, received the Spirit, been tempted in the wilderness, and called his first four disciples. Just before our reading, Jesus has taught in the Capernaum synagogue on the Sabbath. Listen for the word of God as it is found in Mark 1:29-39. (NRSV)

29 As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. 30 Now Simon's mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. 31 He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.

32 That evening, at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons. 33 And the whole city was gathered around the door. 34 And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.

35 In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed. 36 And Simon and his companions hunted for him.

37 When they found him, they said to him, "Everyone is searching for you."

38 He answered, "Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do."

39 And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.

This ends our reading from God's word.

I remember when I was first learning about the disciples. I had this image of Jesus' disciples deserting their families and leaving their jobs and just walking aimlessly with him through Israel, stopping at the nearest town, asking people for a place to stay at random. But after reading the gospels, I know that Jesus had a travel plan, and the disciples saw their families, and some of them kept their jobs. No one was abandoned because a family member decided to follow Jesus.

Our gospel reading is a good example. Simon and Andrew took the other two disciples and Jesus to Simon's house. I expect Andrew lived there too, but probably Simon was the older brother, so it was his house. Simon's mother-in-law was there. That means Simon was married and didn't abandon his family. He just traveled with Jesus some of the time.

It is unusual that Simon's mother-in-law lived at his house. Usually, in that time, a son stayed in his own family's home, and his wife moved in with his family; his mother-in-law would have stayed at her husband's house, with her husband and his parents. So for Simon's mother-in-law to be at Simon's house was unusual. Clearly, he cared for her.

And she was worth healing; she had a fever and Jesus touched her hand, and she wasn't sick anymore. She got up to serve them; that Greek word we translate ‘serve' is diakonos, the root for our word ‘deacon.' When Jesus tells the disciples to serve one another, he used that same word. So her response to being touched by Jesus was to serve him and his disciples.

But Mark the gospel writer doesn't linger there, talking about serving Jesus—he immediately tells us about Jesus healing a bunch of other people in Capernaum. These people are healed after sundown, when the Sabbath was over.

Jesus' mission wasn't just to spend his days healing people. His calling was to proclaim the message. In Galilee, he preached the message that the kingdom of God, the realm of God, was at hand. Repent, and believe the gospel. Jesus proclaimed that message throughout Galilee, casting out demons.

We don't speak of people these days having demons; we say individuals are mentally ill, or over-stressed or depressed. I read in the paper that in a bad economy, with high unemployment rates, child abuse rates and domestic violence rise. When families are stressed they don't behave in loving ways. I can see how that would be attributed to demons.

Sometimes when faced with these kinds of crises, people respond that it's God's will; if God created all things, then God created bad economy and high unemployment; if everything happens the way God intends, then if you have any trouble, you must somehow deserve it. That's an especially convenient attitude for those who are in authority or wealthy; they are often insulated from such problems.

Jesus proclaimed the truth of the gospel and cast out those demons.

In Psalm 147:10, we read that God's delight is not in the strength of the horse, nor his pleasure in the speed of a runner. That means that God is not impressed with strength and speed, but rather in those who are full of awe towards God and hope in God's ‘chesed,' God's covenantal kindness, or what our pew Bibles translate “steadfast love.”

The gospel is about hope and wholeness and healing.

I've heard nurses and doctors speak about how their faith inspired them to choose a healing profession. But medicine isn't the only field that promotes healing. Healing is one of the reasons scientist Francis Collins worked on the human genome project, mapping human DNA. Collins said, “My faith is in an omniscient and benevolent God who created the universe out of nothingness, and whose purposes included the ultimate appearance of creatures who would desire fellowship with [God]. God then provided the inestimable gift of Jesus Christ to teach us how to live, and to be a bridge between our own imperfect humanness and God's perfect holiness.”

He goes on, “I find the experience of scientific discovery also to be an experience of worship…. When we humans discover something about the natural works, God already knew it—so it gives us a chance to glimpse something of his grandeur and omniscient power. I am often asked, however, whether the study of the genome causes me to doubt God's role as creator—quite the opposite! The study of DNA does in fact provide profound evidence in favor of the evolution to create human beings.… My faith adds a powerful dimension to this work. I believe that the mandate to heal is a strong one for a believer—after, all, consider how much of his precious time here on earth Christ spent healing the sick. The study of the genome makes sense as a profoundly exciting adventure in science, but it is more than that; It is our greatest hope for understanding and curing disease in the future. There are risks, of course, as this powerful knowledge could be misused. Here again, my faith provides a powerful reminder of the need to be sure that new discoveries are used for benevolent purposes and not for evil or self-serving ones.” 1

Jesus proclaimed the kingdom, the realm of God, the place and time where we participate in God's work of healing the broken-hearted and lifting up the downtrodden , where our strength is renewed, where we shall mount up with wings like eagles, run and not be weary, walk and not grow fatigued.

Fifty years ago, the physicist Bernard Lovell was walking from a meeting with mathematician and cosmologist Georges Lemaître. Lemaître was a Jesuit priest and professor. Lovell wrote, “He had helped develop the ‘cosmological theory of the evolving universe' from a primeval condensation to which Lemaître referred [to] as the primeval atom. [What most of us know as the ‘big bang' theory.]” Lovell wrote, “As we dodged the passersby, I said, ‘But Lemaître, you are a Jesuit priest and you are the author of this theory of the universe from the primeval atom—how was the primeval atom formed and how did the universe really begin?' He stopped in this crowded street, threw his arms asunder, and responded, ‘If you ask me as a scientist, the answer is I do not know, but as a priest I can tell you.'” 2

I think Isaiah answers that in our reading for today--God made the stars.

Genesis reveals that God is the creator of the world. For some Christians, that means that God created, past tense, in Genesis, and after that everything was fixed. They believe no faithful Christian can think that animals and plants changed or evolved after Genesis. But faithful Christians can hold to and learn from the theory of evolution.

Theoretical physicist John Polkinghorne wrote, “We live in an evolving universe. Theologically, this can be understood as reflecting the fact that God did not create a ready-made world but did something cleverer than that in creating a world that could make itself. Theologically, that is what evolution means.” 3

God is not in the past tense, God continues, working through the creatures God made, makes, and will make. The story of Genesis is not about information, it is about appreciation and celebration. We exist, as part of God's good creation. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord.

1 Martin, Context , April 2005, A, p. 3, quoting Christian Networks Journal, Winter, 2004.
2 Marty, Martin, Context, Dec. 1, 2001, p.3, quoting Times Literary Supplement, 7/13/01.
3 Polkinghorne, John, “A Scientist Looks at Creation,” The Living Pulpit, April-June 2000, p. 7.