Sermon 2019.05.26
Love in the Neighborhood
(Jeremiah 29:4-7,11-14a; sermon 4 of 4 in series “Won’t You Be My Neighbor”)

1. Beautiful day in the neighborhood.  This May, our focus at church has been on connecting with our neighbors. It’s one of our church’s goals for this year of connection – connect with our church family, connect with our neighbors, and connect with our community. We are connecting with folks so that we can love, serve, prepare and celebrate as we fulfill our mission. Remember our mission? Let’s say it together…

To make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.

At the beginning of the month we talked about how Jesus invites us to love our neighbors with the same energy as we love God – because our neighbors are an expression of God’s good creation. We talked about stranger danger, the fear we have of unknown folks, and how God calls us to overcome those barriers. 

Last week, Jessica and the kids talked about how Mr. Rogers taught us to see as God sees, recognizing the beauty and diversity our neighbors. When we see with God’s eyes, we sing:

	It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood,
	a beautiful day for a neighbor.
	Would you be mine? Could you be mine? …
	Please would you be my neighbor?

Mr. Rogers was right – it really is a beautiful day in the neighborhood!

2. Living in exile.  But, we sometimes have a hard time seeing the beauty where we live. Such was the case for the people receiving the letter we read in Jeremiah today. This comes from the period of exile in Jewish history. The Babylonian Empire had sacked Jerusalem, killed or captured the kings, and destroyed the temple of God that Solomon had built. 

Tens of thousands of young Jewish men and women – the flower and future of the country – had been force-marched hundreds of miles to Babylon, where they lived as slaves and servants. Imagine if a foreign nation snatched away all our graduates we are celebrating today, and how terrible that would feel, both for those captured, and those left behind.

The Jewish people felt like God had abandoned them. Out of this time came some of the most gut-wrenching, tragic prayers we have in the bible, like Psalm 137:

By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion.
There on the poplars we hung our harps,
for there our captors asked us for songs, 
    our tormentors demanded songs of joy;
    they said, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”
How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land?  (Psalm 137:1-4)

The psalmist concludes this lament with an angry outburst, praying that all the Babylonian babies might be smashed upon the rocks (137:9).

Maybe some of you know this feeling of utter despair. Sometimes life knocks us down so hard – cancer, bankruptcy, addiction, divorce – that it seems like we are strangers in our own lives. All around us people are going about their business, enjoying life, but we feel isolated by disaster… alone, despairing, even angry at those who can still experience happiness.

3. Grow where planted.  It is to people living in just this sort of despair that God told the prophet Jeremiah to write the letter we read this morning. “Snap out of it,” God says. Don’t dwindle in despair, but thrive in adversity. If you’ve been cut down to size, pruned by life, the intent is not to kill you, but to make you grow stronger.

The irony of exile in Babylon was that it was the great city of the world at the time – the wealthy, cosmopolitan, beating heart of the most powerful empire on earth. Babylon was situated in the fertile crescent of the middle east, a lush land watered by many rivers. The hanging gardens of Babylon were one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. The city teemed with opportunity, knowledge, power, wealth, and growth.

Through Jeremiah, God tells the Israelites, “Snap out of it! This may not be the soil you’re used to, but it is the most fertile garden spot on earth right now. So build houses, plant gardens, have babies! Grow where you are planted!” (Jeremiah 29:4-6 paraphrase)

4. Pray for your neighborhood.  There’s more. God says to the Jewish people, “enough of these weepy, angry prayers! You’ve had your chance to cry, and you’ve prayed the hate out of your system. So no more bashing babies – here’s looking at you, Psalm 137!”

Instead, God says, “Pray for the good of the city where I’ve placed you. In its welfare you will find your welfare” (Jeremiah 29:7).

That’s good advice. Whether you are in a dark valley or enjoying the sunshine in life, praying for the good of our neighbors and your city is an exercise in opening our eyes and really seeing the folks around us. You can do this whenever you walk or drive around town… 

When you hear a siren, pray for the safety of the firefighters.
If you see a messy yard or rundown house, 
pray for the occupants who struggle with life.
When you see a kid on a skateboard, pray for our children to grow and thrive.
When you see a business closing, 
pray for those who lost jobs, and for the next business to come and thrive.
When you mow the grass for the umpteenth time this spring, 
pray thanks for sunshine and water and growth.

Every second Tuesday of the month, the same night as our community dinner, the Onalaska City Council meets. They intentionally begin their meetings with an open comment period, and I coordinate the local pastors who take turns bringing a word of blessing to the meeting each month for those who wish to pray. 

5. A future with hope.  This June marks my fourteenth year in ministry. In 2005, I was a small business owner with a young family. We lived in the beloved community where I was born, on the family farm, close to friends and family. And then God called me into ministry – to uproot my wife and children and take them far from family to the strange garden Babylon of North Carolina while I was in seminary, and then to commit to the itinerant ministry of a Methodist pastor, always moving to strange places with strange names.

First they sent me to Mosinee, Wisconsin. That’s “moose knee” to the old-timers. It literally stank… when the weather was right, the smell of the local paper mill could make your eyes water. Yet the locals celebrated the good jobs at the mill – they called that paper-making odor the “smell of money.” We came to love Mosinee, a Mayberry-like town on the edge of the great north woods of Wisconsin, where our kids could walk anywhere in safety.

Then, four years ago, the DS told me I was being sent to Onalaska. Erick had just finished his freshman year and had a great group of friends. His response when we called a family meeting to discuss it: “If we’re moving, I’m gonna kill someone.” (Psalm 137, anyone?) When I told folks in Mosinee where I was going, they thought I was being sent into exile. Someone actually asked, “What did you do, that the bishop is sending you to Alaska?”

But Onalaska has also been great. With the lush bluffs behind our house, it literally feels like the hanging gardens of Babylon. Erick thrived at school, my wife found fulfilling work serving Wesley UMC as they move into a new future as Bridges UMC, and Onalaska has been a blessed community.

From the first days of my call into ministry, I have clung to the promise of Jeremiah 29:11, “For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.”

Surely I know the plans I have for you: plans for good and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.

This promise is for all of God’s people. It is for our graduates as they go off to start new lives, and for those of us settled and rooted deeply in our community. Wherever you find yourself, whoever surrounds you, whatever you struggle with or celebrate, God is with you, and God has plans for you. So pray for your neighbors, grow where you’re planted, and look for a future with hope.							- Amen.