Our Sermon Section
By Maynard S. Clark - 14 Aug 2011
In Reference to: 28 August 1988 - IS IT ALL RIGHT TO QUESTION GOD?
"Melchizedek met Abram, with foods of peace, foods that are not the products of human-inflicted pain, suffering, or death; and they are also the same foods of our communion services."
How much of our respective traditions could be ethically continued as persons sensitized to the implications of the far broader array of personhood?
How can we effectively cultivate kindness and compassion if the 'proof texts' are not systematically spelled out?
Can you imagine a Gideon's Bible with textual references of compassion, or a Compassion Reference Bible (like CI Schofield's reference work)?
I'm thinking that it's pretty inaccessible to most first-time readers (newbies,
if we will) without its being spelled out for them.
August 1988 sermon proceeds to make referential meanings from things observed
in the reading of the text:
Abram driving the crows away from the dead animals; some animals 'split' and
others not (referencing being split from God, with Whom the believers have
organic communion).
Then the Call:
"Please, Lord, now send the message by whomever Thou wilt."
'halt of speech'
"Moses believed that God was able to accomplish all that He said He would do; that is, except for eliminating his stuttering."
I've long associated this side of Moses with Demosthenes, who preached to the
waves in the oceans with pebbles in his mouth.
Then questioning in the New Testament, and often enough it's really very innocent questioning from those whom God loves.
And without questions, how would we know at all much that is in depth.
The question remains, what do we do about basic science if our questioning - even our earnest questioning - is affirmed and encouraged?
How do we draw reliable information without causing the suffering and pain and life degradation that so much are part of our present 'research arsenal'?
I see this sort of question - about research, which admittedly IS questioning
- as something not yet spelled out is this sermon.
But alas, Frank DID put a question mark around questioning itself; unlike some, he did not give it a defiant exclamation point! And maybe that, too, is a spirit within which we could pursue some of these questions.
Maynard