Wet Fear [Lent 1B]
The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson
Genesis 9:8-17
Wet Fear
I am not a seafaring man. I knew ponds and streams as a boy, but I knew
hills and fields better. On those rare
occasions, when I would gaze over the vastness of Lake Erie – or even rarer still, the impossible expanse of the
Atlantic Ocean – those bodies of water seemed to me
strangers. But not the kindly strangers,
friends one has just not yet met, but dark and mysterious strangers. I suspected, just below the surface, there was
danger.
I still shy away from any water
that has not yet been domesticated. I am
very fond of the water that comes from a tap, that courses through the copper
pipes of my house. But I prefer to keep
the water that fills lakes, rivers and oceans at an arm's length. There is too much unknown. Under the surface are creepy creatures that I
cannot see, that I am pretty sure want to touch me or bite me. There are currents that are trying to pull me
under, as if that body of water was hungry enough to swallow me whole. I'm not interested in that. Am I afraid?
Maybe. I might prefer to say I am
sensible. I'm sure it is a matter of
interpretation.
But if am afraid of the water, I am
in good company. The ancient Israelites
were a desert people. They wandered in
the emptiness of rock and sand for generations.
They led their flocks between sparse pastures – always looking for a land able to sustain life. When they settled down, they built their
Temple in the rocky hills of Jerusalem.
They were not a seafaring people.
In fact, as far as they could tell,
the sea was simply chaos with boundaries.
The sea was the realm of monsters and terrors. It consumed ships and ate sailors alive. To a desert people the sea was a stranger – a mysterious stranger full of darkness and
danger.
And this fear surfaces in their
sacred stories. God's command of the
waters, is proof of God's might and power.
Only God was able to tame their most worthy adversary. God split the water of the Red Sea. God brought water from a rock in the
desert. God gave God's prophets the
authority to shut up the heavens and open them back up.
And it all began in the
beginning. “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the
earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep
waters, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.” It all starts
with this wrestling match: God versus the Waters. In the creation stories found at the
beginning of the book of Genesis, God's most significant challenge is to tame
the chaotic waters. And so we read that
God created a dome in the sky – something like a force field to
protect the creation from the chaos; the dry land formed the earthly
boundaries. In creation God tamed the
water – that terrifying water. That is how the people knew God was powerful;
God wrestled what they most feared into submission.
With the waters under God's
control, life could emerge and thrive on the earth. But it was always there, that dangerous water
– threatening to destroy them,
threatening to drown them. The chaos
barely under control – hanging over their heads, lurking
at their shores. In the desert not
enough water would eventually lead to famine, would cause them to pull up the
tent stakes and journey on; but too much water would mean a flood – instant devastation and death.
And we know that is exactly what
happens. God lets the chaos loose. Biblical scholar Tony Cartledge points out
that, “God does not say 'I will make it
rain' but 'I will bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all
flesh...' The word translated 'flood' is...a technical term for the waters of
chaos, not a simple flood.”
The Bible says that “the fountains of the great deep
burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened.” Cartledge
continues: “Water comes up as well as down, and
the very order of the universe is threatened, like creation in reverse. In Genesis 1, God separated the chaos waters
from the dry land. During the flood, that part of creation was reversed and
chaos again imperiled the earth.”[1]
This was the nightmare
scenario. This was the worst case. Their deepest primal fear realized. That is what the Flood story is – the story of their fear come to life. And that is why today's passage is so
important. They need to know this will
never happen again.
This post-flood reading from
Genesis is the very first Scripture reading in this new season of Lent. And while the passage repeatedly uses the
word “covenant”, this is not a covenant. It is a promise. A covenant is two-sided. An agreement between two parties. When we renew our baptismal covenant with
God, God promises to love and keep us forever.
We make promises too. We promise
to live lives worthy of God's love. We
of course continue to fail to live up to our end of the deal. And God, in God's inexhaustible mercy,
continues to renew covenant with us.
But this is not that. This is one-sided. And a one-sided covenant is not a covenant;
it is a promise. God promises Noah, and
his descendants, and every living creature: never again. Never again will chaos reign. Never again will the water overcome
them. Never again will their worst fear
be realized. God is strong enough. They can rest in God's promise. And just to be sure, God hangs God's bow up
in the clouds as a reminder – not for us, but so that God will
always remember the promise.
We all have fears. Israel's greatest fear was the chaotic
depths, the waters. It represented to
them the thing they could not control, could not overcome. It posed a threat to their very existence.
They had two choices: allow the
fear to eat them alive or hand it over to someone or something who could handle
it.
This season of Lent is a time of
self-reflection and prayer. Many of you
are planning to give something up. What
about fear? All of us carry fears deep
within us – fears that control us and dominate
us. Fears that would prevent us from
becoming the men and women God is calling us to be, preventing us from growing
into the full stature of Christ. What
the Noah story, especially the piece of it we heard today shows us, is that God
is strong enough to save us from those things that we most fear. Are you willing and ready to trust God with
your most precious fears? Do you trust
that God is strong enough to tame that chaos?
Abba Doulas, the disciple of Abba Bessarion said, ‘One day when we were walking beside the sea
I was thirsty and I said to Abba Bessarion, “Father, I am very thirsty.” He said a prayer and said to me, “Drink some of the sea water.” The water proved sweet when I drank some. I
even poured some into a leather bottle for fear of being thirsty later on.
Seeing this, the old man asked me why I was taking some. I said to him, “Forgive me, it is for fear of being thirsty
later on.” Then the old man said, “God is here, God is everywhere.”[2]
In the chaos of the sea.
In the depths of our fear. God is
everywhere. And God is strong – stronger than our most precious fears.
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