The Divine Crash

Today’s sermon started with a problem with the recorder and I think the recorder storage is full. It has two years of saved sermons on it and is probably full.  As a result, there is no recording.  However, I still thought the sermon was great and I am a little disappointed that there is no recording.  I was so excited by my sermon I went for almost 37 minutes without realizing it and it must have been good because I noticed that the congregation didn’t seem bored.We began talking about how Genesis starts with Tohu Avohu and what that means.  The closest we can get in English is a black hole.   Tohu Avohu is a place where everything seems far away and everything we know as safe and secure is gone.

Moses writes this and the Israelites understand it having just left everything they know as safe, it may not have been fun or comfortable but it was everything they knew and now it is gone.

We understand this. Thousands of years later we get this.

• When the doctor has said there is nothing left but to be comfortable.  That is Tohu Avohu
• When we get home from work to realize that morning was the last time our family would be all together.
• When our lives have become unmanageable because of that same stupid, pathetic, avoidable mistake…..again.
• When we finally hit rock bottom and then our rock bottom falls out, that is Tohu Avohu.

Yet, Moses doesn’t stop there.  Moses writes that on the face of that chaos and empty void God’s spirit was there and was about to do something brand new.

God’s spirit is literally right on the surface.  There is an ancient Jewish tradition that understands this to mean that it is as close as the breath coming out of our nostrils that we feel over our upper lip when we exhale.  That is how close God is.

Moses is saying to these people who are following him that they just need to hold on because God is right there.

When God is on the surface God does something great and brand new.  God turns darkness into light.

This is the best news, this is the gospel that darkness becomes light.

We praise God because darkness became light.  Imagine it is night and you have a sick child.  If their fever goes up it is bad, but by morning the fever has broken and everything is okay.  You don’t praise because it is morning.  We praise God because we made it through the night.

When the phone rings and the doctor says there was an accident, you run to your loved one.  If they make it through the night they have a good chance.  When morning comes we praise because we made it through the night.

Just like creation having a brand new thing in it every day God desires for us to go from darkness to light and have something brand new every day

In Exodus 3:7 God tells Moses that he experiences his people’s pain. When we feel darkness and chaos God feels it too.

God wants to move us from darkness to light so God became flesh and came into the earth he created, as Jesus.

The book of John records 8 miracles for Jesus. Only 8, each one gets bigger and bigger. The last one was the resurrection comes after the world is dark. And if you haven’t figured it out yet, God brings light to darkness and that light means something brand new is happening.  God is creating a brand new thing right in front of a world full of empty, formless, chaotic, voids.

Jesus tells the people who in the middle of the Tohu Avohu Jesus is on the side of those who just don’t have it all together and who are hurting and have dark days.  That Jesus is with them closer than the breath coming out of their nostrils.

And that was my sermon, I closed in prayer and asked God to be with us and give us light when we need it.

My closing benediction was “scholar debate how long a day is in Genesis. I don’t care, I only care how long the nights are because when I hurt or my son is sick or my step-father in the hospital I only want to know how long the nights are.  And to make it worse the Bible never says how long the nights we be, the Bible only says in the darkest parts of the night Jesus will be right there with you.  So may you go in peace because in the darkest part of your night Jesus is with you.”

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Sermon by RevBT