The Church of St.
Paul and Incarnation, Jersey City NJ
February 23, 2020
Year A: The Last
Sunday after the Epiphany
Exodus 24:12-18
Psalm 2
2 Peter 1:16-21
Matthew 17:1-9
God’s Future
When
I was a kid – when I was a kid – when
I was a kid, the future was exciting.
I
think in my case the future was exciting because, as many of you know, I was
(and remain) a fan of the best TV show ever, Star Trek.
The
original Star Trek, created and aired
in the second half of the 1960s, offered a hopeful and inspiring vision of the
future – one where human beings were able to finally defeat the old demons of
hatred, greed, and ignorance – and boldly go out into space where they worked
together to explore strange new worlds,
overcoming all sorts of challenges.
When
you think about when that show was created, it really is amazing to think of
the crew we saw working together in every episode, a crew that included an
Asian man, a Russian man (America’s adversary, just like today), a black woman
who was not a servant or comic relief but an officer, and, yes, a
half-human pointy-eared alien.
Seeing
that show over and over and over again impressed on me and on millions of
others that it was possible – it was expected
– that in the future we would set aside our differences and do great things
together.
That
show convinced me and millions of others that the future was exciting – that
the future was going to be peaceful and filled with technology that would
improve our lives in so many different ways.
And,
as I was growing up it seemed like that future was happening.
Although
far from the utopia of Star Trek, the
truth was that slowly but persistently we were breaking down the barriers that
kept us apart and we developed technology that soon made the world of Kirk and
Spock seem downright quaint.
Over
the course of my childhood, handheld calculators went from being something that
stores displayed in a glass case under lock and key to something so cheap that
they were sold for a few bucks or even just given away as a promotion.
It
was during this time that clever human beings invented personal computers, the
Walkman (!), the Internet, cellphones, and so many medical marvels.
A
few months ago when I first visited one of our parishioners at the Neuro ICU at
Robert Wood Johnson Hospital, I thought this place feels familiar – and then I
realized that with all of its high-tech wizardry it looked a lot like Sickbay
on the Starship Enterprise.
Over
the course of my childhood and young adulthood we dramatically cleaned up the
environment.
When
I was a kid – when I was a kid – we
had almost no access to the Jersey City waterfront, which was filled with
abandoned rail yards and warehouses – and even if you could get to the water
most of nature had long since been smothered or driven away by pollution.
It’s
so much different today.
This
past Monday it was such a beautiful day that I walked downtown and wandered
along the water, marveling at all of the nature – all of the life - all around
me – including, unbelievable to me, a pair of swans gracefully swimming along
the Morris Canal Basin.
So,
yes, for a while there, many of us had good reason to be excited about the
future, believing that we might finally be able to set aside our differences
and do great things together.
Well,
a new Star Trek series started a few
weeks ago and it offers a much less hopeful, less optimistic, and certainly
less than utopian, vision of the future.
And,
that’s no surprise because the show is simply reflecting our own time.
Unfortunately,
it turns out that the old demons of hatred, greed, and ignorance were not
defeated but were just waiting for an opportune time to strike again.
Hatred
and violence are on the loose, as we have experienced all too painfully here in
Jersey City.
It
breaks my heart to think of an entire generation of children who have been
traumatized by active shooter drills in their schools – and I’m feeling a
little traumatized myself as our church and all of the churches in our diocese
have been required to create a safety plan, preparing as best we can for what
in a sane world would be unthinkable.
Once
again the environment is under threat as the rules that led to cleaner air and
water are being torn up.
I
wonder how much longer those swans will be able to swim in the waters off Jersey
City.
And,
I’m sure you’ve seen on the news the downright balmy weather in Antarctica that
is melting more ice, speeding up the rising of the seas.
We’ve
gotten used to the wonders of technology, no longer awed by the latest inventions,
which now mostly just seem like minor refinements of old technologies, really just
ways for us to spend more money.
We’re
told we live in good economic times but the gap between rich and poor continues
to grow and so many people, so many of our own parishioners, live every day on
the edge of losing everything.
And,
racism, which, as you know, never died, but is now expressed openly, not just
by bigots after a couple of drinks, but by people in positions of authority,
people who receive applause and sometimes even awards and votes for their
hatred.
I
could go on… but it’s no surprise that, unlike when I was a kid, the future is
not too exciting for young people today.
So,
I’ll always love Star Trek.
But, you know, people created the
vision of Star Trek, people who
assumed that in the future we would somehow be able to defeat our old
demons, and that we could create a kind of paradise.
Unfortunately, it
doesn’t work that way.
Because what’s
missing is God.
In
today’s gospel passage, we heard the story of the Transfiguration – one of the
most important moments of Jesus’ life – one of the all-time great mountaintop
experiences – a foretaste of Easter when love defeats hate, when life defeats
death, once and for all.
It’s
at the Transfiguration when the God of Moses and Elijah announces that:
“This
is my Son, the Beloved, with him I well pleased; listen to him!”
“Listen
to him!”
“Listen
to him!’
My
favorite part of this story is that Peter wants to stay – wants to build
dwellings there for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah.
Who
wouldn’t want to stay there, right?
It
was a taste, a glimpse, paradise.
But
the point is that Jesus and his friends need to come back down the mountain to
the “real world” and face the future – a future that will take Jesus and the
others to Jerusalem and to the Cross – the place where it would seem that all
hope was lost, but in fact the God of new life was just getting started.
Listen
to him!
And,
in a way, you and I are about to come down the mountain, too – about to enter
the holy season of Lent.
Lent
can be beautiful but it’s also hard work.
It’s
when we’re called to give up whatever is stopping us from really listening to
Jesus, whatever is preventing us from hearing his call to love one another,
especially the people we don’t like, the people we fear, the people we see as
“other,” as aliens.
Lent
is when we’re called to take on the work of being a follower of Jesus, of
praying a little bit harder, of offering a little more of ourselves, of
forgiving, of asking forgiveness.
Lent
is meant to help us listen – to really listen to Jesus.
And
when we do that – when we listen – we won’t zoom around the galaxy on the
Starship Enterprise, but we will help
to create the future that God has always dreamed of, the beautiful and peaceful
future that God has always intended for us all.
And,
what could be more exciting than that?
Amen.
Posts
