Sunday, January 21, 2007
Second Sunday After Epiphany
Neh 8:1-10 & Luke 4:14-21

Preached by Adam J. Copeland

I contemplated calling in sick this morning—I hear it’s what some pastors do around here—but since I went to the bother to drive into town, I guess you’ll have to humor me this week. I hope you didn’t get too used to last Sunday—this week the same person who wrote the sermon is preaching it!

Also unlike last Sunday, this Sunday’s Old Testament reading comes from Nehemiah—probably not the most familiar book in the Bible. I'll admit to you, when I began studying the texts in today's lectionary I couldn't recall one thing about Nehemiah—except it’s location, but I only knew that by singing the Bible book song. Eventually, though, I did find some underlined passages in Nehemiah in the Bible I use for class at Columbia—so please don't blame my ignorance on Columbia Seminary's curriculum, but rather on my long-term memory. That is all to say: Nehemiah is not the most familiar book for me, and I expect that I am not alone. And so, why don't we recall the story.

All the people gathered together in the morning--men and women, young and old--they gathered together to hear a reading from the law and an interpretation as well. And so the book was brought in, maybe ceremoniously in a procession, or maybe it was already there. In any case, the priest, the leader, thanked God for the book before them and read from the law in the presence of men and women, young and old. And the people paid attention. When the text was read, the people reacted in different ways: some cried, some prayed, some even lifted up their hands, and when the reading was finished, people responded with the appropriate sayings. The gathered people then prayed for understanding, and the law was interpreted. The priest taught about the holiness of the day, and what the people were to do. And the leader said: go, eat, enjoy and carry-on with life, but give to the poor because that is what God commands. And importantly, act not out of sorrow, but for joy because the Lord gives strength.

And that is the story of Lord's Day worship at First Presbyterian Church, Tallahassee.

One of the wonderful things about worship is its necessarily group structure. Sure, individuals worship, but worship also gathers God's people from all time around God who is greater than us all. In worship, we gather around the Bible, which is in its own way a gathering of books. And today we gather around a particular story in Nehemiah about another gathering of God's people around the word—the same word around which we gather every week. The passage in Nehemiah sounds familiar, for it's a story about what God's people do and have done since the very beginning.

And so we can claim our similarities with the story in Nehemiah, and our similarities with all those who worship in any place on this Sunday morning. But, while we do this, we must also admit our differences, for Christ’s church, though we wish it to be unified, is not.

To confirm, we can look to our own denomination: worship in Presbyterian churches is so diverse these days, that worship in like-minded churches of different denominations is more similar than the worship services of churches within the PC(USA) itself.

And let us not think that worship was in any means unified in the past, for God's people have worshiped in very different ways at different times and places throughout the world.

One of my professors, Brian Wren addresses this phenomenon in a book describing worship throughout the centuries.

God’s people have worshiped for centuries, but we certainly have and continue to worship in different ways. That said, it would be wrong to let the differences completely overshadow the similarities.

Thanks, in part, to the generosity of this congregation, I traveled several years ago, to visit our sister Presbytery in Capetown, South Africa with a delegation from Florida Presbytery. I will never forget the experience of worshiping at a church in Capetown, entering the sanctuary with the choir and pastors, and seeing the congregation in their Sunday-best rise and begin making music, slapping their Bibles to the beat, blowing on hoses to make percussive sounds, and singing in that beautiful African harmony "Blest Be the Tie that Binds." They sang in Xhosa, of course, but we all worshiped in the same language.

And just this month, I journeyed to Kingston, Jamaica with fifteen other Columbia Seminary students to study the Christian church in an alternative context. On Sunday, our group broke up into pairs and visited different churches in the area--Anglican, Baptist, United, Pentecostal, and Moravian. That night we reflected on our experiences in worship in those very foreign settings, and, to a person, we all reported the realization that though differences certainly exist, worship seemed much more similar to worship in the states than we would have ever expected. In some very real sense, then, worship is a universal language.

But what are we to make of the variety of worship practices? If worship today, near and far, is both very different and quite similar, what is a Presbyterian in north Florida to think?

Our text from Nehemiah describes Ezra reading for the book, the people rising in reverence, raising their hands in praise, and bowing down in prayer. And then Nehemiah writes, "So [Ezra and the priests] read from the book, from the law of God, with interpretation. They gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading." (10:8-9) Call me Presbyterian, but this story seems particularly decent and in order. Nehemiah shows us the importance of interpretation of the word.

This idea strangely reminds me of John Calvin's high regard for the word proclaimed, Calvin's insistence that the worship of God's people should include the word read and preached. Partly for this reason, Presbyterians have always had a high regard for preaching—something that terrifies this young seminarian. But, thank goodness, Calvin also emphasized that any biblical understanding comes not at the hands of the preacher, but by the guidance of Holy Spirit, and the grace of God. Understanding and interpretation comes when the entire community is gathered together, God foremost. Interpretation is not a solo act, but the confluence of word, congregation, and preacher.

That interpretation is what the session strove for this weekend at the session retreat. They read the word, worshipped, and interpreted how to best serve God in this place and time. And we look forward to hearing how they discerned Christ’s call for this church in the coming days.

Today's gospel passage also affirms the power of interpretation in worship. Luke writes that on the Sabbath day Jesus read a passage from Isaiah. "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." And then Jesus interpreted, "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing."

Though we didn't read it this morning, Luke goes on to describe the congregation's reaction—they may have reacted favorably in the short term, but soon after they were filled with rage and drove Jesus out of town and tried to kill him.

Nehemiah sees a similar type of misunderstanding in his day so he addresses the problem directly. When he sees the people crying, he says: Do not mourn or weep. Instead, rejoice! Go and eat the best food and drink the best wine, give portions to those who have nothing, but above all do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.

Just as I would be quite suspicious of worship without some type of interpretation of the word, I'm afraid worship without joy completely misses the point. If we sit around interpreting the whole time, but never joyfully serve God in our acts, we have become paralyzed and make an idol of our minds. Certainly not all worship calls for the same type of joy, but the ultimate posture towards our most gracious God is joy, for as Nehemiah proclaims: the Lord is our strength. And because of this, we must be a deeply grateful people.

Presbyterians are sometimes accused of (what should I say?), a too subtle and overly conscientious type of joy--"the frozen chosen," I believe is the phrase. And if worship squelches our joy towards God, or doesn't allow us to participate in joyous praise, then this criticism is valid. But, the contrary is also true: for all sorts of reasons, for most of us here, singing a "good old hymn" with gusto is much more joyful than singing the same praise chorus over and over and over again with drums and electric keyboard, and a key change at the end. And so, it is with a great but reverent joy that we approach the table this morning.

In just a few minutes, the communion liturgy will remind us of God’s faithfulness to all generations, in every time and place. We will be called to lift our hearts in joyful praise with the angels, and all those past and present who forever sing to the glory of God’s name. And we will be fed by the one whose death brings life, whose sorrow brings joy. And thus fed at this joyful feast, we can proclaim this good news to all the world.

©Adam J. Copeland
adamjcopeland@gmail.com

Adam J. Copeland, Inquirer in Ministry, is a second-year student at Columbia Theological Seminary.  On January 22, 2007, Adam was approved by the Session of First Presbyterian Church to apply to Florida Presbytery to become a Candidate for the Ministry of Word and Sacrament.