2nd Corinthians 12:6-10

Though if I wish to boast, I shall not be a fool, for I shall be speaking the truth. But I refrain from it, so that no one may think more of me than he sees in me or hears from me. And to keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to harass me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I besought the Lord about this, that it should leave me; but he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." I will all the more gladly boast of my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities; for when I am weak, then I am strong.

Psalm 118:5-23

Out of my distress I called on the LORD; the LORD answered me and set me free. With the LORD on my side I do not fear. What can man do to me? The LORD is on my side to help me; I shall look in triumph on those who hate me. It is better to take refuge in the LORD than to put confidence in man. It is better to take refuge in the LORD than to put confidence in princes. All nations surrounded me; in the name of the LORD I cut them off! They surrounded me, surrounded me on every side; in the name of the LORD I cut them off! They surrounded me like bees, they blazed like a fire of thorns; in the name of the LORD I cut them off! I was pushed hard, so that I was falling, but the LORD helped me. The LORD is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation. Hark, glad songs of victory in the tents of the righteous: "The right hand of the LORD does valiantly, the right hand of the LORD is exalted, the right hand of the LORD does valiantly!" I shall not die, but I shall live, and recount the deeds of the LORD. The LORD has chastened me sorely, but he has not given me over to death. Open to me the gates of righteousness, that I may enter through them and give thanks to the LORD. This is the gate of the LORD; the righteous shall enter through it. I thank thee that thou hast answered me and hast become my salvation. The stone which the builders rejected has become the head of the corner. This is the Lord's doing; it is marvelous in our eyes.

Sermon Text

If anyone hasn't told you that the work of ministry is like a soup, well... let me be the first. I believe it's really like a great pot of gumbo, you see. You're always stewing in it, and anything can percolate to the top. At any time you could feel like a teacher or a student, doctor or the patient, referee and the player, 'lawyer or the judge, crash test dummy, and the scientist.

Lately, I've been feeling like a garbage collector. One who curiously picks up the trash left behind, and considers the value of what others have thrown away. Now this is labor I am somewhat acquainted with. It is much like the work I did one summer digging through ancient ruins under a searing desert sun. Day after day for three months I explored 3000-year-old trash in this small town tucked away in Israel. If you haven't dealt with 3000-year-old trash, let me tell you, you are missing out! Ashkelon as the town has been called for ages, has amassed some interesting litter, scraps and junk over the centuries. For starters, shards of pottery are strewn about everywhere. As sturdy as Tupperware, this basic building block of commerce and daily life has outlasted personalities, princes, wars and empires. Among the bits of pottery you will find seashells used to adorn doorsteps and necklines, traces of olive and sheep bones. All these durable goods somehow made it through the trauma of history. And oddly enough, all clumped together they form a hill that the current town rests on. So as the resident garbage man I've been pondering the physical, emotional, metaphorical and spiritual leftovers of the Church Universal, through this little slice of it we call New Castle Presbytery. Coming in with the enthusiasm to see the church witness to the Gospel through cross-cultural means, I have been tempered by the complex realities of congregational life. So a little over half my time in Delaware, I have more questions than I do answers. Lots of them in fact. For one, I want to know where has winter been hiding out lately? But I am even more eager to know where is our strength, passion and power as a church? What are those durable qualities that have been preserved when others disappeared?

At moments like these where I feel so weighted down by unanswered challenges and rejected opportunities, I take comfort in the Psalm we have read this morning. There is refuge to be found in its song of redemption for people who experience the daily drudgery of pain and bear the marks of frustration. Verse by verse it offers a litany of oppression, and there are times when each one of us wants to follow in a chorus of Amens.

At its climax it gives this stirring line that at once seems to embody our own pain and hope. "The stone that was rejected," the psalmist says, "has become the chief cornerstone." But nowadays, doing the work of ministry, when I hear those words I cannot tell if I am being convicted or vindicated! For who exactly is the stone? Is it Jesus? Is it the people Israel? Is it the poor? Or one of the countless groups that has experienced the pangs and blows of oppression? And who rejected it, religious authorities, governments, you, or me? While Christian tradition, at different times, has affirmed all of these various interpretations the question of our own role in the psalm goes unresolved. Who we represent will likely vary dependent upon the situation. It also depends upon our vision of the rejected.

One way to understand our vision is to gather up all the scattered pictures we have of these marginalized characters. I have been doing some of that thinking and here's what I've come up with. The rejected have one big trait in common, one vital link between them: they are weak. Now before you misunderstand that statement, let us consider what it means to be weak.

Do any of you remember Gym class? There are some of you still living through it! Gym is one of places where early on we discover what society considers weakness to really be. Can any of you remember being picked last in line? Weakness there was the lack of physical strength. I was bad enough at basketball that they didn't have a 3rd, 4th or 5th string squad that could hold me. Weakness there was about position. If you didn't have it, you had no place.

Paul of Tarsus offers yet another viewpoint on weakness. In 2 Corinthians 12 he says, in prayer he learned power is made perfect in weakness. Paul therefore is "content" with weaknesses put on him from others, for the sake of Christ. And he gives us this contradiction, for when I am weak, I am strong.

Paul' s words help us to put the words of the Psalmist in perspective. In Psalm 118 the weak are described as,

1. The weak are in distress.

2. The only refuge of the weak is in the Lord

3. The weak can have little trust in people and politicians.

4. The weak are hated and reviled.

5. The weak feel surrounded "nickel and dimed"

6. The weak numb themselves as a defense mechanism

7. The weak feel punished and burdened.

8. The weak have memory to encourage them.

9. They are more emptied of selfishness, that God's strength may dwell in them.

Not all who are oppressed wear the stripes of the saints, some are indeed very selfish, very lost. For them the space for God seems lost in a mess of violence, addiction, ignorance. But there is great potential there. The weak depend on each other more; they are rarely self-sufficient. "No man is an island." The weak live on the margins, on an edge and those are places where great wisdom always sprouts because there are parts of life that cannot be ignored on the edge. There is the weakness we choose and the weakness that is chosen for us. The weak can cause trouble for those that ignore them. They create something akin to loose ends that must be tied up.

Understanding weakness in this way, the vision of who the rejected are is broader and deeper than ever before. So let us explore those castaway stones of both church and society.

1. They are among our poor, our working class, among those discriminated against for their color, their accent, or the lines we draw on a map.

2. They are those whose intelligence quotient can't tell us about their spiritual quotient.

3. They are people who work in the trenches who don't have large titles and fancy offices to their names.

The last six months has seen the passing on of two legendary figures in American history, stalwarts in the epic civil rights struggle that altered the landscape of America in ways earthquakes, hurricanes and terrorists cannot. Rosa Parks and Coretta Scott King are emblematic of not only a people who were cast aside, but also a way of being church that is often given short shrift among Christians. In the last several decades, we have seen religious folk focus on propositional faith, to the exclusion of lived faith. Membership takes precedence over discipleship.

Up on a mountain, south of Mexico in the highlands of Guatemala, there are people, called the Mam, who live so high it feels as though they are on the edge of nowhere. Economically impoverished, with little educational opportunities open to them, many cling to the church as a last refuge. What they have formed is a community based on participation and being stewards of their fragile lands. As landslides come and they watch their precious soil slip away under there feet, they make a chain, a narrow chain that leads to life. By themselves they are weak links, but in the arms of God they cross the narrow road that leads to life.

Sometimes the rejected just aren't people, but they are ideas and values as well. We have traded in peace for modem day swords, exchanged the billowing up of grace for the trickling down of finances.

Let me tell you, if some of these stones are the foundation for the next generation of our country, our world, our church, look out! The things we carelessly throwaway are the foundation of God's desires for us. The things we keep become the foundation of our desires for ourselves. The weakest link is the closest link between us and God. If we wish share in the fruit of God's new creation, we must make the so-called "weak" the center of our action.