St. Andrew’s Pictou, October 24^th 2004

 

Stuck?

 

Joel 2:23-32

Psalm 65

2 Timothy 4: 6-8, 16-18

Luke 18: 9-14

 

I find it somewhat amusing that many people will look at a happy person and think that they are, and always were exactly that way. In other words, when people see a person being happy, they can’t seem to get the message that maybe the reason that this person is happy is because they simply have good coping skills. They never seem to think that the happy person is not one who has never experienced pain and suffering, but maybe they are a person who knows how to deal with pain and suffering.

 

Some people, who are sad, are that way because they are emotionally “stuck” at some point or event in the past. Some great loss looms so large in their view of the world that they can’t seem to get over it; they can’t seem to move on. Nothing will make them forget; they can’t seem to remember anything else.

 

There are many ways that we can get stuck:

-we can get stuck in resentment,

-we can get stuck in habits,

-we can get stuck in our point of view,

-we can get stuck in despair,

-we can get stuck in the past,

-we can get stuck with a failure, (we see a failure event as “life defining” instead of being a temporary glitch)

-we can get stuck in lies or in erroneous assumptions,

-we can get stuck in our opinions of people and those very same opinions may even be wrong!

 

This whole notion of us getting “stuck” is a very human trait and it is not a new one.

 

In today’s reading, the prophet Joel was trying to help the people get un-stuck from the pain and suffering of the past. Joel was an encourager; an up-lifter.

 

“O children of Zion, be glad and rejoice in the Lord your God;

for he has given the early rain for your vindication,

he has poured down for you abundant rain…

The threshing floors shall be full of grain,

The vats shall overflow with wine and oil…

You shall eat plenty and be satisfied…

And my people shall never again be put to shame.”

 

We know where the people were “stuck” because Joel tells us:

Years of swarming locusts had destroyed crops.

There had been devastating drought.

 

It may be difficult for us to imagine how utterly dependent they were on the weather, and how much rain they received. Their choice was not choosing between the specials at Sobey’s or Superstore; if there was no rain: you starve.

 

Some of us are still at the mercy of such things as rain, early frost, and mad cow disease. On the news last night, we were told that winter has hit the prairies and much of the crop has not been harvested and is now lost under the snow.

 

The essential part of Joel’s message was that the Spirit of God is what can change things:

“I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh:

your sons and your daughters will prophesy,

you old men shall dream dreams,

and your young men will see visions.”

 

So when we become stuck, it is the Spirit of God that can release us and help us to move on with our lives, as moving on we must go.

 

Various way of being stuck in the past, (stagnation) are only ways of describing a life stopped, suspended from the fruits of life and the joy of being alive.

 

Joel is telling us that the Spirit of God calls us to life.

 

In case you haven’t noticed the pattern yet, getting “stuck” is when we are preoccupied with our own point of view and can’t see the larger picture. For some reason, when things are bad, we sometimes think that things cannot ever get better. This is not to say that something can’t happen to us that isn’t absolutely devastating, but the Spirit of God calls us to step back and look at ourselves form a distance, as well as from the inside.

 

Take the Pharisee in Jesus’ parable for example.

 

The Pharisee worked very hard at being what he thought was a good, God respecting, God fearing man. He was praying in the temple and observed a tax collector.

 

From his own point of view, he was gathering his thoughts about himself and this so-called low life tax collector. (Tax Collectors back then were not regulated by Revenue Canada. The taxes were set, but the collectors made their money by taking what they could over and above the going rate. It may be no surprise to you, that they often gouged the people.)

 

So the Pharisee was musing to God in prayer about his good character and how thankful he was that he wasn’t like this tax collector:

“God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all of my income.”

 

Wasn’t his prayer really, “Thank you God for making me so good, even better than all the rest!”

 

Jesus had another take on the story. Jesus’ position seemed to be that the man was “stuck” with an incorrect opinion of himself.

 

The tax collector was having a rough time of it. He couldn’t even look up. He just stared at the floor and said, “God be merciful to me, a sinner!”

 

Jesus was quite clear on how he saw these two men:

“I tell you that this man (the tax collector) went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.”

 

I don’t think that there is much disagreement that Jesus’ point was that the humility and awareness of his own brokenness has made the tax collector “justified” rather than the Pharisee.

 

But the deeper issue for us is, “Why was the Pharisee stuck where he was stuck?” Or better still, “How do we get ourselves unstuck, when we are stuck”

 

One of the indicators that show us the issue of humility is important is that so many good and beautiful Christian people are so overly careful of being boastful that they can’t even take a sincere compliment.

 

A woman was talking to me at Synod about her new minister and how great he was and how well things were going at the church. I later met him and said, “I’ve been hearing some really good things about how things are going at St. Matthew’s.”

 

His immediate reaction was to throw my comment off as a joke, and I stopped him and said, “When someone gives you a compliment, you just say, ‘Thank You.’” To his credit, he knew right away and said “thank you” at about the same time that I did.

 

The word “humble” comes from humus, meaning “earth.” A humble person is one who is grounded and connected; in relationship with the earth.

 

The prophet Joel talked to the people in helping them to get unstuck by helping them to realize their connection to God.

 

The exact same thing is true for us: we become unstuck when we get out of ourselves and foster our relationships and communication with each other and with God.

 

Getting unstuck happens when we get out of ourselves and foster our relationship and communication with each other.

 

To be healthy, whole, balanced and humble we need to be connected: to God and each other.

 

Back in the early 60’s my parents had taken us out for a Sunday drive in our 1952 Chrysler Saratoga. I don’t know if you remember what they looked like, but it was not much different that a tank.

 

We stopped in to see one of my father’s aunts in the country. When we left we were going up one of those Island muddy red clay roads that was full of deep ruts and mud.

 

We got Stuck! That big blue Chrysler sat in that mud as unmovable as the rock of Gibraltar.

 

Back to the farm my father went and he and his cousin came back with a tractor and pulled us out of the rut and we were on our way.

 

When you and I are “stuck,” it is extremely difficult to get out of the rut ourselves, we need help from someone else because like my Dad’s cousin with the tractor, they have something that we need and that we don’t have. Could be a tractor, could just be information, could be a welcome word, a warm hand, a new idea, or a hot cup of tea.

 

I heard back in the 30’s that there was one of those long, muddy, rutted roads in Saskatchewan with a sign that said, “Choose your rut carefully. You will be in it for the next 40 miles!”

 

Please, just remember that when you are in stuck in the ruts of life, that God did not intend that you were to get out of it alone. With the Spirit of God working in and through all of us together, we can get out of any rut!

AMEN                      Rev. Alan Stewart