Preaching the Scriptures

The Rt. Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Genesis 18:1-15, 21:1-7   How the Story Goes St. Luke the Physician, Saranac Lake   In the heat of the day, on the horizon of the desert, the distance is always out of focus.   The hottest heat bends and warps reality.   Abraham was trying to find a bit of relief, an occasional breeze, as the world around him was trying not to melt into a puddle of chaos.   It was hot in the desert.   Blazing hot.  One could smell the stale brine of the Dead Sea from Mamre.  And in that suffocating heat, one could also feel a hint of the death for which the sea was named.  It was not the most hospitable place.    And so, given the treacherous conditions, the patriarch was probably not expecting to see a traveling trio come into focus.   But there they were: three men walking in his general direction.  Abraham should have instantly kicked into threat assessment mode.   They were thre...

  The Rt. Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Genesis 32:22-31   Heel Turn Christ Church, Cooperstown   Jacob was a heel.   It was right there in his name.   He was branded a bad guy at birth.   It’s not that he was evil, per say, but he did have a history of morally questionable behavior.   And it started in the womb.   It can be hard to outrun a name.   Or overcome a first impression.   Jacob struggled with both.   Because his name was the first impression.   And it stuck.   It could have been a cute story of how twins like to stick together.   But that is not how his parents, or the Bible, told the birth story.   When mom and dad, Rebekah and Isaac, saw Jacob’s little hand gripping the heel of his slightly older brother, they decided that the younger one would always be scheming to supplant the older one.   The name Jacob in Hebrew is related to the word for “heel,” and the phrase “one who grasps the...

  The Rt. Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18   Abram’s Doubt Trinity, Plattsburgh   This is not the first time Abram has heard this promise – the one we find in today’s Genesis reading.   He left his country and kindred to follow this very promise – a promise that he chased like a distant horizon.   Once upon a time, his life was normal, stable.   And then this mesmerizing, strange God changed his life – stole him away from his birthright, his plans, from the moon gods of his youth and his people.   This new God saw into his heart, spoke to his deepest longings.   And so, like the disciples on the beach, Abram left everything.   Through deserts and danger, he pursued the promise and yet still, beneath the big, starry sky, he seemed no closer to its fulfillment.   The visions kept happening.   But still there was no evidence.   Every month, with the moon, came a reminder that Sarai was again not preg...

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Genesis 9:8-17   Relentless mercy and fierce love St. Boniface, Guilderland   According to the book of Genesis, death came into this world, not through disease or atrophy, but through violence.   Brother against brother.   A clash of two creatures made in the divine image.   And that shattered God’s heart.   The pain vibrated through the universe.   God laid that pathos at the feet of Cain, the first killer, saying, “Your brother’s blood is crying out to me.”   And in that horrible early moment of human history, God recognized our fatal flaw and tried to stop it.   God inscribed Cain with a mark of protection in hopes that the cycle of violence might stop.   But it didn’t and we didn’t.   The violence continued, in thought, word, and deed.   Until God gave up and made a flood.   The reason God offered Noah for the watery disaster was human violence.   Genesis tells u...

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Genesis 45:1-15   Pit, Prison, Palace: Joseph and the Salvation Story   The brothers were speechless because they were afraid.   They were afraid because standing before them was a ghost, a ghost that they created.   A ghost that had haunted them for years, pursued them in their dreams and in their nightmares.   But only in dreams and nightmares, until now.   Now this one they could not forget was weeping before them.   Joseph: he finally caught them – and they could not escape because they could not wake up because this was not a dream.      It had to be true; every word, every tear: it had to be true.   No one in Egypt knew their secret.   No one else in the world, not even their own father, knew the true story.   They never told anyone.   The real truth was too terrible to speak, what they had done – and to their own baby brother.   They had lived with that lie...

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Genesis 28:10-19a   The God of our Ancestors   I never met Lemuel Menear.   And I never will.   Because he died a long time ago.   He died far away from home and family.   He died in Andersonville, Georgia, in Camp Sumter.   Lemuel was one of 13,000 Union soldiers, prisoners of a civil war, who died surrounded by unbearable human suffering, amidst sickness and starvation.   He died in a prison historians have called “hell on earth.”   He was fifty-five years old.   Lemuel left behind his wife and daughters and all he loved.   To fight.   For his nation?   For unity?   For the ideals of freedom and equality?   For the future?   Because he had no other choice?   I’ll never know his reasons.   But I do know that he departed the rugged mountains of West Virginia never to return.   I never met Lemuel, but when his great-grandson died, I wept. ...

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson   Genesis 18:1-15     Is anything too wonderful?     It was hot in the desert .  Blazing hot .  One could smell the stale brine of the Dead Sea from Mamre .  And in that suffocating heat, one could also feel a hint of the death for which the sea was named .  It was not the most hospitable place .       The heat is why Abraham was sitting at the entrance of his tent .  There was no possibility of air conditioning, no refresh ing glass of ice d tea in his weather ed hand .  But the entrance of the tent at least provided some shade and an occasional breeze .   You could survive there – and that was saying something .        As he sat and sweltered, Abraham looked out over the vast expanse of sand .  He let his mind wander as he watched the air melt above the scorching surface .  There was nothing else out there – nothing to see except sand a...