Rev. Jennifer Whipple
Congregational Church of Brookfield (UCC)
March 4, 2007

Second Sunday in Lent

Keeping Promises

Genesis 15:1-7, 17-18
Philippians 3:12-16

Prayer:  May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our Strength and our Redeemer.  Amen.

 Last week I spent a day taking care of my 6-year-old nephew, James, while he was on school vacation.  Whenever I spend time with him I inevitably end up learning or reflecting on something.  I was supposed to be off-duty when my sister-in-law arrived home from her doctor’s appointment, but she was literally sick and tired…and very pregnant, so I volunteered to take James to his last day of swim lessons for the session.  I sat and watched him with pride as his tiny body swam the length of a college pool without any swimmies or flotation devices.  So when he asked if he could have ice cream after his lesson at the ice cream store ever so conveniently located about 20 feet from the campus, how could I say no? And my yes became a lock-jawed promise to his 6-year-old mind, and he grew very excited.  So James and I got in the car, drove out of one driveway and into the other with visions of Spiderman sherbet pops and frozen yogurt with rainbow sprinkles dancing in our heads, and pulled up in front of the store just in time to see the guy who was working there put the “closed” sign up in the window.  We were too late.  And as I tried to explain this to James he grew very sad, then suddenly there were tears, and then virtually uncontrollable sobbing.  Now I know that this was not all about ice cream.  After all we had spent a busy day together.  He had just swum 10 laps of a big pool, and he hadn’t napped.  He realized the great treat it was to have ice cream when there was snow on the ground outside and sleet falling from the sky.  But it was the straw that broke the camel’s back.  The door was closed and locked.  The promise…unfulfilled.

             Now clearly worse things have happened in all of our lives than not being able to keep the ice cream promise.  Much larger promises have both been kept and broken.  But the episode outside the ice cream store…and on the entire 15 minute ride home with sobs ringing in my ears…made me think a bit about promises.  It made me think about what it is that we do when we promise something, what it is that we do when we break promises, and what it is that God’s promise means to all of us. 

             We all know that all of the promises we make are not so easy to keep.  As a part of human life, people change.  Feelings change.  Circumstances change.  We change.  If any of you have ever broken a promise to someone else or even to yourself, then you know what it feels like.  At least in the moment you realize a promise is broken it feels like nothing will ever be normal or right again, as if nothing will ever be able to repair the damage that has been done or the trust that has been broken.  Those feelings are the reason why the hope and fulfillment given in God’s promises, ones that are kept throughout the ages, are so vitally important to us as people of faith.   

             When I began to think a bit about the sermon for this morning I went onto the web and Googled the phrase “quotes about promises.”  Some of the ones that came back were quite funny of course.  The first one that was shared on a variety of different websites said, “Promises are like babies.  They are easy to make, but much harder to deliver.”  Others of them, conveniently for me, spoke to the subject of God’s promises as well.  For instance, one of them said, “All that I have seen teaches me to trust God for all that I have not seen.”  And, “Let God’s promises shine on your problems.” 

             The place in my life where I have seen people who so intensely trust in God and who allow God’s promises to shine on their problems is among the Haitian workers – the sugarcane cutters and their families – living in and around the city of La Romana in the Dominican Republic .  As we have commissioned our mission team this morning, I think about the experience of the people with whom we will serve and learn from in La Romana.  They are people who were sold and purchased into perhaps only a mere step above slavery, people who have been given very little of the care & stability of things like housing, medical care, and a living wage promised them by men.  The human promises made to them have gone unfulfilled.   And yet they are people who hold fast to God’s promises.  They hold fast to the idea and the hope that in faith and in community God’s promises come true: that they are protected and supported, that they can be free of fear, that they are cared for and in turn care for one another, that they are promised a better life if not in this world and time then in the one of which the Apostle Paul speaks so highly in his letters to the early church.  

            One of the things that I like best about the scripture readings for today is that they both speak to that kind of relationship.  They both speak to a personal relationship between people and God.  You see, as intensely curious human beings it is difficult to believe or to trust in something that does not offer us visible and tangible proof or immediate gratification.  Abram even asked for a sign from God that God’s promises would become reality, that there would be nations upon nations that would rise up from he and Sarah.  And Abraham hears words of promise from God, words that allow him to grow in faith and keep on in that faith.  God spoke to Abraham, “Do not be afraid.  Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.  So shall your descendants be.”  Abraham hears God’s promise of protection and generations to come and trusts in God.  And God’s work in Israel through Abraham and Sarah is intensely personal, bringing about children and helping them find their way to the Promised Land. 

             Then there is Paul who encourages believers in community.  For Paul one of the ways that people were able to show their faith was by gathering together in community and sharing in the Lord’s Supper as we are blessed to be able to do in freedom today.  The Apostle Paul spent a good deal of time explaining why all people were called to be faithful, that Jesus gave his life as a sacrifice for all people.  He understood as well as any follower of Christ at the time what it meant to be persecuted, to be looked down on, and to be guarded.  He wrote part, if not all, of the Letter to the Philippians in prison, and yet here he is encouraging people to go on in their faith, to be strong and steady…to press on.  Instructing people from prison he spoke to them about running the race and striving for a perfect faith, a faith that meant belief in God’s promises, that was not just faith in word but also in thought and deed as well.   Pressing on meant and continues to mean striving to hold up our end of the relationship with God, to realize that God has offered us so many amazing gifts in our lives…that God will keep the big promises, and that we are to offer our thanks by feeding our spirits, being disciplined, sharing our faith, by supporting and caring for others.           

            Perhaps one of the things we are to gain from the hearing and sharing of these stories is a challenge that is issued to each and every one of us.  Each of us is challenged to go into this Lenten Season and each and every day of our faith journeys trusting in God for guidance and protection.  Each of us is challenged to keep on the path although the way may not always be straight and may even be rocky at times.  Each of us is challenged to keep an intensely personal relationship with God and not just to say that we are people of faith in word and in the hour on Sunday morning as we gather together, but rather to be people of faith in our discipline, our action, our behavior and treatment of others around us…to be people of faith in our community-building, in our reconciliation with one another and in our sharing of the Lord’s Supper in this place.            

            The Good News made known to us today is that God continues to keep the big promises laid out for us in the stories of the Bible.  Perhaps to us as people of faith the biggest and best challenge of all is to trust in the promises of God and to keep ours as well.  Amen.