Jennifer E. Copeland - "Raising Prophets" (January 28, 2001)
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
- | My first appointment after seminary | 0:06 |
was in a large church, in a small town, | 0:09 | |
in a state adjacent to this one. | 0:13 | |
Borrowing from Paul, I had the job that Paul | 0:16 | |
might have classified as the less respectable, | 0:18 | |
or inferior, member of the staff, | 0:22 | |
with apologies to Albert Moseley, | 0:25 | |
I was the Associate Minister. | 0:28 | |
Now, there are varieties of Associate Ministers. | 0:31 | |
There are associates in places like Duke Chapel, | 0:35 | |
who participate in great liturgical festivities, | 0:39 | |
and there are associates in small towns | 0:44 | |
who participate in liturgical festivities | 0:46 | |
when the senior minister is on vacation. | 0:49 | |
Well, my situation wasn't quite that bad. | 0:52 | |
The Senior Minister I was paired up with | 0:55 | |
actually listened to my opinions on a regular basis. | 0:57 | |
And one year, as we were preparing for Lent, | 1:02 | |
I suggested we invite the sons of the church | 1:06 | |
back to preach for us during each of our | 1:11 | |
six midweek Lenten services. | 1:14 | |
There were no daughters, of course. | 1:17 | |
And by using ourselves as bookends on Ash Wednesday | 1:19 | |
and then during Holy Week, Monday, Thursday, | 1:23 | |
we had just enough people from that congregation | 1:26 | |
still living, mind you, who had chosen the ministry | 1:30 | |
as a career that we could fill out the middle weeks | 1:34 | |
of the Lenten season. | 1:37 | |
I have never heard Luke 4:24 quoted | 1:40 | |
in so many consecutive worship services | 1:44 | |
as I did during that particular Lent. | 1:46 | |
My own home church hasn't invited me back to preach | 1:51 | |
in over five years, and I'm convinced it's because | 1:54 | |
they don't want to hear me stand in the pulpit | 1:57 | |
and say, no prophet is accepted in the prophet's hometown. | 1:59 | |
That's like a public service announcement | 2:05 | |
for a bad sermon. | 2:07 | |
We're telling the congregation up front, | 2:10 | |
you are not going to like this sermon. | 2:12 | |
But we try to make it their fault. | 2:15 | |
If I hadn't grown up here, why of course you'd like it, | 2:18 | |
but since I did, you won't. | 2:22 | |
Nothing could be further from the truth. | 2:25 | |
Our home congregations are the most forgiving of all | 2:29 | |
when we come back to preach. | 2:33 | |
They'll overlook a great deal that they would never let | 2:36 | |
someone appointed by the mission get away with. | 2:38 | |
They'll forgive our arrogance, our impudence, | 2:42 | |
and our immaturity. | 2:46 | |
And if we happen to stumble upon a particularly | 2:48 | |
profound idea, why they'll talk about it for years, | 2:51 | |
reminding everyone within earshot that I was | 2:55 | |
her junior high basketball coach, | 2:58 | |
or he used to deliver my paper. | 3:01 | |
Even Jesus was accepted in his hometown, | 3:05 | |
at least at first. | 3:10 | |
All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words | 3:13 | |
that came from his mouth. | 3:17 | |
Who knew, Joseph's son, | 3:19 | |
what a wonderful accomplishment | 3:23 | |
for a community to help raise up a child, | 3:25 | |
and have that child turn out all right. | 3:29 | |
Have that child turn out just like us. | 3:32 | |
Same customs, same values, same political allegiances, | 3:35 | |
same haircut, haircut's crucial. | 3:40 | |
Same opinions, same prejudices. | 3:43 | |
We've done all right with Joseph's son, | 3:48 | |
yes indeed, he's one of us. | 3:50 | |
The spirit of the Lord is upon me, read Jesus. | 3:53 | |
I taught his fifth grade Sunday school class, | 3:56 | |
someone might whisper. | 3:59 | |
Today the scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing, | 4:01 | |
announced Jesus. Hey, he used to date my sister, | 4:04 | |
did you know that? | 4:07 | |
Everything has gone well up to this point. | 4:09 | |
And then Jesus starts talking about all these foreigners. | 4:14 | |
Sick foreigners, hungry foreigners, | 4:19 | |
well we've got our own hungry people right here at home, | 4:23 | |
and sickness, well, just take a look around. | 4:26 | |
We've got physical ailments, emotional ailments, | 4:30 | |
social ailments, mental ailments, and we're well on our way | 4:33 | |
to political ailments. | 4:37 | |
Who needs a Syrian to take care of? | 4:39 | |
Even a righteous Syrian. | 4:42 | |
Who needs another widow to feed along with her hungry child, | 4:44 | |
even a deserving widow, even an innocent child, | 4:48 | |
wasn't Joseph a Republican? | 4:51 | |
What happened to this boy. | 4:53 | |
The community invests so much | 4:56 | |
in its children, you know. | 5:00 | |
We rate our schools, we test our curriculum | 5:02 | |
so they can receive the best possible education. | 5:05 | |
We monitor our water, our air, our paint, | 5:10 | |
to keep the children from being unduly poisoned | 5:14 | |
by the poisons we're pouring into the environment. | 5:18 | |
We introduce them to sports so they can learn about | 5:21 | |
teamwork, we enroll them in dance, and music, and art | 5:24 | |
to expose them to the cultural excellence, | 5:27 | |
we raise them to envision a world without limits, | 5:29 | |
where they can be whatever they want to be. | 5:34 | |
Especially doctors, and lawyers, and CEOs. | 5:37 | |
We send them to colleges that always rate among | 5:42 | |
the top ten in US News and World Report because, | 5:44 | |
because we love them. | 5:47 | |
We want what's best for them. | 5:53 | |
We want them to be happy because we love them. | 5:56 | |
Parents and communities take great pride in their children, | 6:01 | |
not just because they want to have bragging rights. | 6:06 | |
When the plaque goes up at the entrance to town | 6:10 | |
announcing that as the birthplace of Jimmy Carter, | 6:13 | |
or John Glenn, or Babe Didrikson Zaharias, | 6:16 | |
you all know who that is, right? | 6:21 | |
When that sign goes up with her name on it, | 6:24 | |
or anyone's name who could put that town on the map, | 6:27 | |
there's more at stake here than look at us, | 6:31 | |
we're famous now. | 6:33 | |
At a deeper level, the town is saying, look who we produced. | 6:36 | |
Look what we're capable of when we're at our very best. | 6:41 | |
And so it is incumbent upon the children | 6:47 | |
to do their very best, to become president, | 6:50 | |
to fly to the moon, to win Olympic gold medals. | 6:54 | |
We want to lob them right into greatness, | 6:58 | |
and right into happiness. | 7:03 | |
Jesus, never one to wait for others to bring it up, | 7:06 | |
introduces the topic of his life's work, | 7:10 | |
before anyone has even asked the question. | 7:13 | |
He mentions Capernaum, because they all know he's been there | 7:16 | |
and in a masterful defense move, Jesus quotes | 7:21 | |
for the home team a few extra versus of scripture | 7:25 | |
than just the assigned lection from Isaiah. | 7:29 | |
He recounts for them two stories about God's saving | 7:33 | |
activity among non-Jewish people. | 7:36 | |
First, the story of Elijah feeding the widow and her son | 7:39 | |
at Zarephath, and then the cleansing of Namaan the Syrian. | 7:42 | |
Before anyone can even ask, what? | 7:48 | |
Jesus has in effect said, I told you so. | 7:52 | |
When the people of Nazareth quoted that proverb, | 7:58 | |
doctor, cure yourself, they meant stay here | 8:00 | |
and take care of your family and friends. | 8:04 | |
The people who raised you, the people who want | 8:07 | |
what's best for you, and when Jesus referenced that proverb, | 8:09 | |
he knew that's what they meant. | 8:13 | |
He's from around there, remember. | 8:16 | |
He's also, at that very moment, doing | 8:18 | |
what the proverb demands. | 8:22 | |
He's reading scripture in his home synagogue, | 8:25 | |
he's proclaiming the word of God for his family and friends, | 8:28 | |
he's offering them a cure, or trying to. | 8:32 | |
But part of his proclamation includes the observation, | 8:36 | |
you just don't get it do you. | 8:41 | |
Their own faith tradition illustrated time and time again | 8:46 | |
how God's love has no geographical boundaries, | 8:50 | |
God's love shows no ethnic favoritism, | 8:54 | |
God's love creates no age limits. | 8:57 | |
Jesus is only telling the home crowd what they already know. | 9:00 | |
He's only repeating what he learned | 9:05 | |
growing up in that synagogue with them, | 9:07 | |
week after week after week. | 9:10 | |
They taught Jesus about Naaman. | 9:13 | |
They taught Jesus about the Zarephath widow, | 9:16 | |
and Jesus went to Capernaum. | 9:20 | |
When Hurricane Hugo slammed into South Carolina | 9:24 | |
11 years ago, I was living 200 miles inland | 9:28 | |
doing that associate thing that I mentioned earlier, | 9:32 | |
but our community still received hurricane force winds. | 9:36 | |
We had trees blocking the roads, weeks without power, | 9:39 | |
basements filled with water, | 9:42 | |
that usual post hurricane havoc. | 9:44 | |
But within the week, I had left that town | 9:47 | |
and headed off to Charleston where the eye of the storm | 9:50 | |
had passed over, headed to Charleston with a van load | 9:54 | |
of food, a pocket full of cash, and a chainsaw. | 9:57 | |
A news reporter saw the church van with its hometown | 10:02 | |
emblazoned on the side, and he ran over | 10:07 | |
with his cameraman in tow to ask me, | 10:10 | |
what are you doing here? | 10:12 | |
Didn't you all have it pretty bad up your way, too? | 10:15 | |
Cameras are rolling, a small crowd is beginning to gather, | 10:19 | |
and I, rising to the occasion, pounded on the Bible. | 10:24 | |
Didn't Jesus offer salvation to Capernaum | 10:29 | |
even before all of Nazareth was saved, I asked. | 10:32 | |
Didn't Paul take the gospel to the Gentiles | 10:36 | |
even before all of Israel believed? | 10:38 | |
Oh, the crowd murmured. | 10:41 | |
The truth was, my best friend lived in Charleston, | 10:45 | |
and I wanted to be down there helping her. | 10:49 | |
I was tired of mopping out basements | 10:53 | |
in the upstate of South Carolina. | 10:55 | |
And somehow, I don't think that confession | 10:57 | |
would have made the evening news. | 11:00 | |
But do you see how we must always validate our desire? | 11:03 | |
Not to stay home and do the work that needs to be done here. | 11:09 | |
When the Duke Wesley Fellowship sends international | 11:15 | |
mission teams to Jamaica or to Palestine, | 11:17 | |
the question is always asked, couldn't you use that money | 11:21 | |
more effectively right here at home? | 11:25 | |
Why, look how much it cost to buy the plane tickets | 11:28 | |
for 15 students from here to Palestine. | 11:30 | |
Well, it cost about $15,000 I guess. | 11:35 | |
Maybe it cost more. | 11:40 | |
And then you heap on top of that, building supplies, | 11:41 | |
food, and lodging, a cash layout begins to go | 11:44 | |
even higher, and when it's all said and done, | 11:47 | |
why, we have money left over. | 11:49 | |
Money left over to spend here at home, | 11:53 | |
or perhaps to save for next year's trip. | 11:55 | |
Money is not the real issue. | 11:59 | |
The issue is why are you helping those people | 12:02 | |
instead of helping these people? | 12:05 | |
It's as if good news for the poor has to mean | 12:09 | |
Or release for the captives has to mean captivity | 12:15 | |
for the oppressors. | 12:19 | |
Why can't we all be rich and free? | 12:20 | |
Is there some limit on God's grace, | 12:24 | |
pushing us into a scarcity of resources? | 12:27 | |
Economic theory theology? | 12:31 | |
Can we get that class at Fuqua? | 12:34 | |
Probably not. | 12:37 | |
But you know the old story about the pump in the desert. | 12:39 | |
The pump sits there in the desert, | 12:43 | |
with a bucket of water beside it, | 12:46 | |
and a sign instructing people not to drink the water, | 12:48 | |
but to pour it into the pump, priming the pump | 12:53 | |
for an unlimited flow of water. | 12:56 | |
Sooner or later, somebody's going to come along | 12:58 | |
and drink that bucket of water, | 13:01 | |
without pouring it into the pump, | 13:04 | |
because he just can't believe there'd be a well out there | 13:06 | |
in the middle of the desert. | 13:10 | |
He doesn't want to go thirsty. | 13:13 | |
Forget the people who will need water tomorrow. | 13:14 | |
We just can't believe | 13:17 | |
that God has enough grace to go around. | 13:20 | |
We just can't believe that college students | 13:25 | |
would take the time to tutor children | 13:27 | |
right here in the Durham public schools, | 13:30 | |
when they could be on a plane to Jamaica | 13:32 | |
to tutor the children there instead. | 13:35 | |
But you know what, they do both. | 13:39 | |
Somehow, God manages to spread that grace around | 13:43 | |
so that everybody has enough. | 13:46 | |
Jesus goes to Capernaum | 13:50 | |
because the people in Nazareth | 13:54 | |
have done such a good job bringing him up. | 13:56 | |
They taught him all about freedom for the oppressed, | 13:59 | |
and good news for the poor. | 14:02 | |
They taught him all about compassion for the outcast, | 14:04 | |
and hospitality for the stranger. | 14:07 | |
They taught him the story of God's saving grace. | 14:10 | |
When the story, when the gospel interrupts our | 14:17 | |
carefully orchestrated lives and the courses | 14:22 | |
that we have plotted for our lovely children, | 14:25 | |
why, it can be scary. | 14:28 | |
It can be a bit threatening for us. | 14:32 | |
Often our first response is self-recrimination. | 14:35 | |
Where did we go wrong? | 14:38 | |
Who forgot to tell him that we hate the Syrians? | 14:40 | |
Who forgot to show her how to walk the path | 14:45 | |
of the straight and narrow, without noticing all the | 14:49 | |
derelicts lying in the ditches. | 14:52 | |
And then we recall that, well maybe we did mention | 14:56 | |
to our children something about compassion. | 14:59 | |
We taught them that rule, you know, | 15:03 | |
even before kindergarten, do unto others | 15:05 | |
as you would have them do unto you. | 15:08 | |
Can't really blame the child for taking things | 15:11 | |
a bit too seriously. | 15:14 | |
Well, that's the problem with the gospel then, isn't it. | 15:17 | |
Some people want to take it so literally. | 15:21 | |
Maybe we should just sing a song now, a psalm about | 15:26 | |
a fruitful harvest, because there's nothing very threatening | 15:30 | |
about bringing in the sheaves, is there? | 15:32 | |
Trouble is, it's too late now. | 15:37 | |
Jesus has spoken the truth, right here at home. | 15:41 | |
Right in the midst of his family and friends, | 15:47 | |
we are those people. | 15:50 | |
It was a good sermon. | 15:53 | |
It was faithful to the text, it was an exegetically sound, | 15:56 | |
and creative in its approach to the material, | 16:01 | |
all those things they look for across the quad, | 16:04 | |
in a preaching class. | 16:07 | |
When you hear a sermon that good, | 16:10 | |
you only have two choices. | 16:12 | |
Either you agree with the preacher, | 16:16 | |
or you kill the preacher. | 16:19 | |
In Nazareth, they opted to kill the preacher. | 16:22 | |
They were unsuccessful, on this attempt. | 16:26 | |
But given our familiarity with the rest of the story | 16:29 | |
we know it's just a matter of time. | 16:32 | |
In the meantime, we learn that the power of Jesus | 16:34 | |
is beyond our control. | 16:40 | |
Ignoring him won't change the message. | 16:43 | |
Killing him won't stop God's grace. | 16:47 | |
Following him, however, | 16:51 | |
makes all the difference | 16:55 | |
in the world. | 16:57 | |
In the name of the Father, and the Son, | 17:01 | |
and the Holy Ghost, Amen. | 17:02 |