Preached by Ken Pennings on Sunday, November 1, 2009
“Eight million people have lost their jobs since the recession began. This has been the worst period of job loss since World War II. One out of every four families has seen someone lose a steady paycheck. And few experts expect things to get better soon. There seems to be little doubt that unemployment will climb to more than 10 percent during the first half of next year (Commonweal, Oct. 23, ’09, Editor’s Column, “Stimulate,” pg. 5).
But Matthew Fox writes in his book, The Reinvention of Work, that “All creatures in the universe have work – the galaxies and stars, trees and dolphins, grass and mountain goats, forest and clouds, chickens and elephants – all are working. The only ones out of work are human beings….Unemployment is not natural to the universe; it contradicts cosmic laws…. By undergoing an awakening … to the sense of the whole – we can bring about an awakening of our imaginations, which will, in turn, free us to reinvent work, create good work, cease compulsive and addictive work, and create possibilities of work for others” – pg. 59.
This morning I’d like to reflect on Psalm 8 and borrow from the wisdom of Matthew Fox in the hope that we may awaken to the whole and experience the sacredness of work.
The Psalmist writes: “When we look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established; what are we that you are mindful of us, mortal beings that you care for us? Yet you have made us a little lower than God, and crowned us with glory and honor. You have given us dominion over the works of your hands…sheep and oxen…the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea….”
God’s work = establishing & sustaining the moon and the stars.
Our work = exercising dominion over animals, birds and fish.
Elsewhere in Hebrew scriptures “dominion” (rada) is associated with royal rule, which, in its ideal exercise, represented God’s own rule. The goal of “rada” was to ensure the well being and right ordering of the life of God’s people (especially the impoverished) along with the land and all that it held. Exercising dominion is not benign maintenance and surely not oppressive exploitation but sharing in God’s royal, divine rule that must be understood as care-giving and justice-making. When exercising dominion we are relating to the rest of creation as God relates to it.
Too often, the rule that humans have exercised has been primarily concerned with the way creation can serve human needs and desires, and it has given little thought to creation’s own intrinsic value and balance. The devastating ecological and economic crises of the present moment may be due in significant part to the misunderstanding that gave humans the right to use and abuse creation exclusively for our own “well being.” But if we share God’s rule, our dominion is marked by justice and a loving concern for all of creation (Earth, Our Home: Biblical Witness in the Hebrew Scriptures, pgg. 25-47).
Dominion, not domination! Tending the garden, not exploiting it!
Psalm 8 celebrates human work as part of the Great Work of the Universe. Our work shares in the honor and glory of God’s work. As God is tending the moon & stars, we humans are tending sheep and oxen.
“Since there is only one work in the universe, then clearly our work too springs from the same holy source” – Fox, pg. 67.
With the psalmist, contemplate God’s work. Stand with her on a hillside in rural Wisconsin on a star-lit night. Look up and greet our friends, “Hello Brother Moon, Sister Stars, thank you for visiting with us.” Tonight, we’re altogether caught up in the marvel, wonder, beauty and majesty of God’s work.
Now, think about ourselves, “a little lower than God,” as the psalmist calls us…people crowned with glory and honor…engaged in our work – tending sheep, fixing cars, repairing plumbing, selling clothing, cleaning carpets, collecting garbage, paving roads, educating children and healing the sick. Our work is one with the Great Work of the Universe, and is equally splendid!
“What are human beings?” the psalmist asks. The industrial age left us thinking of human laborers as nothing more than components in a big machine with each cog doing its “own thing,” usually in competition with other objects wanting to do their own thing – Fox, pg. 62.
The industrial mindset was “If I don’t get it, nobody gets it.”
Mesmerized under the spell of industrialism, we ruined our air, water and soil and severely damaged all our basic life systems under the illusion that this was ‘progress.’
“So (writes Matthew Fox) we need a new cosmology…one that brings about the interdependence that we feel and know is behind all things in the universe. After all, every breath we take makes us interdependent; all breath connects us to molecules breathed thousands of years ago by Muhammad, Buddha, Sara or Jesus. In work there is more togetherness than competition, more interdependence than independence” – Fox, pg. 63.
The Psalmist asks, “What are human beings?”
Human beings are co-creators of the world with God in the ever-evolving sacred work of creation. As God calls forth goodness, diversity, beauty, harmony, and fruitfulness into existence, so we, through our sacred work, call forth these same things into existence.
“Just as the industrial revolution defined work for us for two hundred years, so the environmental revolution – and the Creation Spirituality it presumes – will usher in a new definition and therefore new opportunities for work for the next historical era. No small amount of our work will be related to cleaning up the excesses brought about by the industrial era’s reductionist ideas about work – excesses toward the planet, its forests and soil, its waters and sky, its species, and its climate” – Fox, pg. 299.
“The paradigm shift… is not only a shift from machine to green; it is also a shift from machine to sacrament, a shift from the colorlessness of gray industrialism to the hope that is intrinsic to living, that is, green, things.” Eight & a half centuries ago Hildegard of Bingen pictured Christ as the “green man” or the “green figure itself” who “brought lush greenness” to “shriveled and wilted” humanity – Fox, pg. 307.
Orchard Ridge’s Green Team is dedicated to this same mission of bringing lush greenness to shriveled and wilted humanity.
A great Jesuit thinker, Teilhard de Chardin, saw our work in the world as carrying on the work of creation. He wrote: “We may perhaps imagine that creation was finished long ago. But that would be quite wrong. It continues still more magnificently, and at the highest levels of the world. . . . We serve to complete it, even by the humblest work of our hands.”
“The humblest work of our hands”- I love that thought. It reminds me that our real work is the work of compassion, of creativity, of leaning into the mystery that is found in each life. Whatever job we do, we can make it a sacred work of the heart – thus the difference between experiencing our work as sacred and experiencing it as profane.
I worked for 16 years as a pastor of four congregations, and I loved my job. To me it was very sacred. In 1998, I lost my job. Because of this experience, I can empathize deeply with the 8 million people have who lost their jobs since the recession began.
I took any job I could get, first through temp agencies working as a receptionist, a file clerk, or a custodian. Then for longer periods, I worked at Nedrebo’s Formalwear hanging tuxedos and at Rexam Medical Packaging Company cutting huge rolls of plastic. Eventually, I worked as an LTE at Alliant Energy Center supervising events.
And for many years, I hated my jobs. I felt like a non-person — diminished, devalued, deflated, demoralized. I longed to have my work integrated more fully with the greater work of my life, to have this part of my story integrated more fully with the greater story of my life.
As much as I wanted out of my jobs, I was stuck where I was. I had bills to pay. I had hoops to jump through (think of a gay man pursuing a pastoral position in a Baptist context – easier said than done).
When I look back on this period of my life, working these jobs I hated, there was Great Work happening which I wasn’t even aware of.
I thought hanging tuxedos was a waste of my time and talents, but without knowing it, I was also engaged in my real work – channeling positive energy into negative people and situations.
Though I was not even conscious of it, I was, through small acts of kindness, giving back to the Universe in gratitude for all it had given me.
On a cold October night in 1998, on the outskirts of Laramie, Wyo., 21-year-old gay college student Matthew Shepard was brutally beaten, tied to a fence and left for dead. He was found 18 hours later and rushed to the hospital, where he lingered on the edge of death for nearly five days before succumbing to his injuries.
Dennis Shepard, Matthew’s father, read a statement to the court on November 4, 1999, the day after a Wyoming jury convicted his son’s murderer. Dennis’ statement brought me to tears and forever changed my life. He said, “You left him out there by himself, but he wasn’t alone….His lifelong friends were with him. …the beautiful night sky with the same stars and moon that we used to look at through a telescope… the sun to shine on him…the sagebrush and the pine trees from the snowy range…and the wind. I feel better knowing he wasn’t alone.”
With Matthew Shepard, we look up and speak to the heavens: “Thank you for companioning with us on life’s journey. The same energy burning within stars burns within us. We are part of the same cosmological community. As you, the sun, moon and stars, look out for us, we’ll look out for you. As you take care of us, we’ll take care of you.”
On this All Saints Day, we remember and honor not only the great Cloud of Witnesses who strove to do their part with compassion, creativity and concern; beauty, joy and delight—we remember and honor the sun, moon, stars, sagebrush and pine trees, true saints in the faith. We are one with them with all the angels and saints in the ONE whose Great Work is the Universe. (Pause)
This week, in small and large ways, we’ll bring the sun, moon and stars into our work places.
We’ll become more aware of how God’s Great Work of creation is continuing through us, of how our work is really part of God’s Great work, of how we through the sacredness of work are bringing more goodness, diversity, beauty, harmony, and fruitfulness into the world.
“The universe is asking a great task of us today; it is extending to us a pressing invitation to reconnect our daily lives (and work) to the Great Work of the universe” – Fox, pg. 307-8.
May we step outside on this brisk fall day, throw our heads back, feel the sun on our faces and the cool breeze on our skin, breathe the rich aroma of autumn leaves, and exclaim, “Through the Great Work of the Universe all of this beauty is coming into our lives. Through our work, we will bring all this beauty into the lives of others.” Amen
Text:
Psalm 8 (NRSV alt.)
1O Lord, our Sovereign,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory above the heavens.
2 Out of the mouths of babes and infants
you have founded a bulwark because of your foes,
to silence the enemy and the avenger.
3When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established;
4what are we that you should keep us in mind,
Mortal beings that you care for us?
5Yet you have made us a little lower than God,
and crowned us with glory and honor.
6You have given us dominion over the works of your hands;
you have put all things under our feet,
7all of them,–sheep and oxen,
and also the beasts of the field,
8the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea,
whatever passes along the paths of the seas.
9O Lord, our Sovereign,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
