Harry Potter and the Harvest among the Weeds

Sermon 7-19-20

Grace and peace to you from God our creator and from our Savior Jesus the Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, amen.

The Bible is many things. If you have been reading along with our 90 Day Bible Challenge, it becomes obvious very quickly…. It is a history book – telling us the story of how God has been faithful to God’s people in the past, even when we keep messing up. It’s a poetry and song book – teaching us how to pray, and to give voice to our deepest emotions. It’s community bulletin board or blog – sharing the hopes, prayers, and concerns of a fledgling Christian community surrounded by a confusing and scary world. It is an origin story – revealing to us who Jesus is and how he lived and died and rose again. The Bible is all of these things and much, much more. But one thing it is NOT: the Bible most definitely NOT a gardening or farming handbook.

Last week we heard about a sower who went out to sow, who just scattered seeds around willy-nilly. Here again the farmer in Jesus’ story needs to take some remedial farmer classes. What do you NORMALLY do when you see weeds growing in your garden plot? You get down on your hands and knees and pull those suckers out as soon as possible! You don’t wait around and “see what happens.” Come on Jesus, everybody knows that! But this story is not a guide to better gardening.

Because the farmer in the parable waited so long, the removal of the weeds at this stage would actually cause more harm than good, so they are left to grow up with crops. Together the crops and the weeds are watered by the rain, are nourished by the soil, and shone upon by the sun. It is not until harvest time, many months later, that the weeds are separated out and bound into bundles to be burned in a big bonfire. Mmmm I can just smell the pumpkin spice.

But in the meantime, the crops long for the day that the weeds are finally removed. I imagine the good seed crying out to the master of the field – Lord, there are so many weeds! Look at them all! They are everywhere – right here next to us, sharing our sun and water and soil, their roots becoming intertwined with our roots, their leaves brushing up against ours. O Lord, why must we wait until the harvest day? Why can’t they be weeded out TODAY?

The weeds are with us in our newspapers and on the TV nightly news, filling up space and time with BAD news, corruption within our halls of government and bad behavior done in the name of God. O Lord, why must we WAIT until the harvest day?

The weeds are with us in our own communities and our own families, refusing to wear masks, not social distancing at the beach or in the supermarket, targeting people because of the color of their skin, sharing scary rhetoric on social media. O Lord, why must we wait until the harvest day?

But the weeds are also with us …in the mirror. The root causes of sin and evil and brokenness has been sown within us too. The garden plots of our own hearts have been compromised. The seeds of the evil one has all too often found that the soil there is rich and ready. Their roots become deep and stuck fast.

Looking at Jesus’ story from this angle, perhaps our cries for the swift justice of the Lord are a bit premature. We may want to reconsider our eagerness to take up weeding in the name of the Lord… For such a harvest of justice in God’s kingdom would not leave any of us unscathed. So perhaps it is a blessing that our God is “merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.”

God only seems slow because we are living in the middle of the story. It probably took Jesus less than ten minutes to tell this parable from beginning to end, but it has taken, and will take, many lifetimes to live out. We are still in the growing time before the harvest. We’re not “done growing” yet, which sometime makes it hard for us to figure out which is which, who is a crop and who is a weed, as we go about our daily lives. From our vantage point, we can only see a small little plot of land, surrounded by weeds growing big and strong around us, and within us too. Nothing in our lives are uncompromised.

It would be silly to ask if you’ve heard of Harry Potter. Author J.K. Rowling created a literally magical universe where a woman is the smartest and most powerful wizard, the “little guys” become heroes, and the power of love overcomes the power of hate. The first book was published over 20 years ago, and this phenomenon has not lost any steam since – a seven book series, over a dozen movies, and even a play, not to mention Harry Potter World at Universal Studios. Through this universe, J.K Rowling seems to explore big ideas like feminism, racism, being an ally, the AIDS crisis, homophobia, PTSD and mental illness, all with the message of “you are not alone,” bringing comfort to so many teens and young adults struggling to fit in.

Now, really smart people have pointed out the inconsistencies and problematic areas of this magical world… but the most successful fiction does eventually take on a life of their own, much like moving out of your parent’s house, armed with all the wisdom they have taught you, is a mark of adulthood. Judging by this universe as a whole, we might surmise that “Parent” JK Rowling believes that this world – magic and real – is big enough for everyone?  ….right?

Well…. It turns out J.K. Rowling said some pretty closed minded and hateful things on twitter, and her blog last month. It turns out, she’s your run-of-the-mill, transphobic hypocrite. Like many of us. Except, none of us created a world where LQBTQIA+ people once felt welcomed. So what then do we do? How do we separate the storyteller from the story? How to separate the crops from the weeds? Are the good things from “Harry Potter” tainted, because they was created by a bigot?

If you want to scrap the entire thing because of all the hurt JK Rowling has caused you, please do. That is your right.

But maybe… Harry Potter can save Harry Potter. Daniel Radcliffe, who starred as in the movies’ title role, publicly stated he disagrees with Rowling, and gives us another perspective. He responded: “To all the people who now feel that their experience of the books has been tarnished…I am deeply sorry …. I really hope that you don’t entirely lose what was valuable in these stories ... If these books taught you that love is the strongest force in the universe ... then that is between you and the book that you read, and it is sacred.”

The story of Harry Potter lives on and might be able to rise about the flaws of its very human creator. Because that’s what the best stories do – make us long for a more just world – a world after weeds.  It’s why we read books and watch movies where the endings are happy – or if not, at least wrapped up neatly with no loose ends. The bad guys get what they deserve. The lovebirds live happily ever after. The kingdom is a peace. The End: cue the curtain, and roll the credits.

The weeds will be separated from the grains. The oppressed will be set free. All the wrongs will be righted. Sin and death will be no more. All that is evil in this world will come to an end, and the people here who truly are evil will be seen for who they are, get what is coming to them. But we may find ourselves not quite as pure as we thought we were in the process.

Today is not harvest day. It’s a growing day. It’s a day that we do put our hope in the Lord, present with us in the middle of the story, in the middle of the hard stuff. Because that’s where God is too. …Thanks be to God. AMEN.

The Boy Who Wasn't Alone

Sermon 7- 7-19

Grace to you and peace from God our creator and from our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, amen.

There is a game on an improv show called “Whose Line is It Anyway,” that is based on the cast members borrowing two handbags from unsuspecting audience and creating a skit based on what they find in there. Shoes, dental floss, cardigans, earbuds, q-tips, sun hats, empty water bottles, bags and bags of snacks. It’s like one of the usual games you play at a baby or wedding shower – a scavenger hunt all in your purse! The point is to laugh at all the ridiculous things that other people carry around them… but really, are any of us much different?

It’s only fair that I pick on myself for a moment…  Besides the usual car keys, church keys, wallet, and cell phone, in my own bag I carry tissues, hand sanitizer, some pens, lip balm, extra charger, and usually at least on book that I’m reading, of course!  This week I also have with me a VBS CD, so that I can get ready to teach the kids songs about God and going to Mars! So, for the most part, pretty standard stuff. But still. It’s a lot of stuff in there. And sometimes it gets a little heavy. All in the name of “Just in case… “

Being ready and prepared is a good thing, but there comes a point where we can be TOO prepared, which can hinder, rather than help us. Because if we wait until we are absolutely the most prepared we can ever be before we agree to do anything or go anywhere, we would never actually get started, and we would miss out on the adventure that God has in store for us.

The kingdom of God is at hand. Jesus is on a mission, and is getting people on board, though as we witnessed last week some would-be followers were more ready than others to get with the program. The upside is that this week, we hear that the harvest is at hand, the people are ready to hear the good news of God’s love and forgiveness, but there is so much work to do to get ready that even Jesus needs help. Jesus has already called his core group of twelve disciples, but he needs all hands-on deck, people. This is getting big, FAST, and Jesus needs even MORE people to help him, seventy more to be exact.

Jesus chooses them, buddies them up two by two, gives then their marching orders, and then recommends a packing list for them too. Only… Jesus’ packing list is very, very short. Too short for our liking, in fact. We also have to remember that in Jesus’ time, there was no Motel 6 or Hilton to sleep at… no Chipotle, McDonald’s, Panera, or Acme to get food along the way, or a local Target in case you forgot to pack your toothbrush.

So, when Jesus told the seventy NOT to pack a bag, NOT to bring an extra change of clothes, or even a pair of shoes, NOT to bring extra snacks or food…. This is a huge leap of faith, and a giant act of trust. Jesus UN-equips them, to make then totally dependent on the hospitality of those who are hearing the good news. Which seems pretty foolish, like he’s setting them up for failure.

Why would Jesus do that?  Because he is sending them to be physical embodiments of what is means to be totally dependent on God. They will be waking the GOD-WALK and TALKING the GOD TALK, so that when amazing things start to happen, the only explanation possible is that it was God’s doing.

And amazingly, it worked. Like that tweet that unexpectedly goes viral, the seventy came back reporting with great joy that even the forces of evil were responding and getting out of the way of the kingdom. The harvest is being gathered, the good news spread, and the kingdom is coming near. All this they accomplished WITHOUT being prepared to the gills with floss, hand sanitizer, or extra snacks. All this they accomplished while bringing absolutely nothing with them. All this they accomplished without any special training. All this they accomplished with the help of God. It’s not about what you bring, but who.

That’s why Jesus send out seventy people do to the work of the kingdom… and he sent them out TWO by TWO. No one was alone in this work. They had a huge support network of others to lean on, and someone else physically with them, so that they could care for each other when things got tough, like when they entered a town where they were not welcome. And they also had someone else along to share in the joys as well.

Because Jesus didn’t promise that the following him would make our lives stress-free and comfortable, or that doing his work would be easy. But Jesus does provide people along the way to help us through when (and not if) times get tough.

Too often though, we get caught up in thinking that we’ll be successful at making it through life depending on how prepared we are, if we have enough, and what we bring along with us. But what we own can often weight us down and hold us back. Even as the culture around us tells us the exact opposite – all the time we are told to had bigger purses, bigger wallets, better cars, nicer houses, more storage units…. all in the name of “just in case.” And as a reward, we are held back and weighted down with car payments, mortgages, credit card bills, and sore muscles.  

Non-physical things that we carry with us can weigh us down, too – Fear, anxiety, worry, depression, despair, impatience, addiction, apathy, anger, sexism, white privilege…  all these things are HEAVY to carry around with us, and take a toll on us on a daily basis. We need each other, as Paul writes, in order to bear one another’s burdens. We don’t need more things or to be more prepared… instead we are to pack light….  and share the load. Even when things are challenging… especially when things seem at their most bleak and hopeless.

Lately I’ve been watching through the Harry Potter movies again, which tells the story, over 8 films, how an unsuspecting 6^th grade boy learns how to be a wizard and grows up to defeat the one of the most powerful and evil villains in all of fiction – the evil wizard Lord Voldemort. In one of their confrontation, Voldemort enters Harry’s mind, and calls him weak for caring about his friends and family, which made Harry vulnerable to attack. Instead, Harry Potters tells him “You're the weak one. And you'll never know love, or friendship. And I feel sorry for you.”

Earlier in the same movie, The Order of the Phoenix, other students are in awe of all of Harry’s adventures and decided to gather together to learn how to defend themselves from the coming evil that Lord Voldemort is sure to bring. To their accolades, Harry responds, “it all sounds *great* when you say it like that. But the truth is…  I didn't know what I was doing half the time, I nearly always had help.”

We might not be a well outfitted or have as many resources as the powers of evil in this world… but we do have something they don’t: Jesus, and one another.

God is calling us on a journey to spread the news that God’s kingdom is here.  When we refuse to pack some of the things that can weight us down: fear of the future, our belief in scarcity, and our longing for security – then we have so much more room for the things that ARE on Jesus’s packing list: things like vulnerability, trust, courage, compassion, kindness, empathy, and love for one another, which always makes us stronger.

This doesn’t necessarily mean for us to get rid of the all stuff in our purses, wallets, cars, or homes. But perhaps we should start asking ourselves if what we HAVE helps us or hinders us along the way.

Because the stuff we bring with us doesn’t give us strength. Nor does always being 100% prepared for whatever might comes next. But we know just was DOES give us strength: Faith in Jesus and in one another. The seventy disciples could do all things set before them, and we can too, because we bring Jesus WITH us along the way. Amen.