Harvest - Rootedness

The author Barbara Brown Taylor observes that when you meet new people in America, the questions they ask to get to know you will vary depending on what part of the United States they’re from.

Folk from the fast-moving North East tend to go straight for geography. “So where are you from?” they’ll ask.

But Southerners, with their slower, more relational ways, take a different tack. More often than not, they’ll begin the conversation by saying- “So who are your people?”

Place, and people. Two different ways of thinking about your roots.

And here in the North East of Scotland, we cleverly manage to combine the two. I often hear people, usually older folk, saying that they ‘belong’ to Udny, or to Whitecairns or to Belhelvie. And the use of that word ‘belong’ marries the geographical and the relational in a lovely way. In that way of thinking, a place and its people are so tied up with one another, you can’t really separate them. You belong to both.

And by and large, throughout human history, our people and our place have been the main ways that we identify ourselves and speak about the things that give us our rootedness in life.

In terms of people we speak of family, neighbours, community, and countrymen,

In terms of place, we think of

home, town, region and nation.

This is the primary language of our rootedness.

And pride in your people and your place is a good thing. It’s a wonderful thing, even as an Ulsterman, to stand among 60,000 Scots singing Flower of Scotland at Murrayfield, and feel that incredible swell of national pride. It’s even better when the boys in green thump you at Murrayfield to win the Grand Slam – but that’s another story!

But we know all too well, that that kind of pride can have a darker side. It’s a short step from pride to arrogance, and from arrogance to violence.

I’d happily wear an Ireland shirt around Edinburgh on my way to the rugby. But I remember my dad cautioning me about wearing it up the town in Ballymena. Green? Shamrock? Bad idea in my home town. You might just get your head kicked in if you meet the wrong people.

And it looks like we’re entering another of those times when fear, if not outright hatred of those who are different from us, is beginning to infect our politics both at home and abroad. Holland, Germany, France and the UK have all seen a significant resurgence of the far right, while across the pond the so-called leader of the free world is fully engaged in rattling sabres, building walls and pulling up drawbridges.

Pride in your place and your people is one thing; acting as though your place and your people are all that matters is another.

And in a way, that’s the painful lesson that Israel had to learn in the Old Testament.

You’re chosen – yes – you’re God’s chosen people. But you’ve been chosen for service, not for privilege. You’ve been chosen to show the other nations what God is like, and what life under God is like. You’ve been chosen not because God loves only you, but because God loves all his people and wants to use you in drawing them back to himself.

But no matter how the prophets tried, the people couldn’t get that message into their heads. As far as they were concerned, they were the people, this was their place, and God was their God. End of.

It took one of their own, one they would eventually crucify, to finally subvert that thinking and teach them that being rooted in God was far more important than being rooted in a particular place or people.

It’s only when you read the gospels with that in mind that you see how often and how radically Jesus undermined the thinking of his day.

You  might remember that in his discussion with the Samaritan Woman at the well, she tries to distract him from her love life, or lack-of-love-life,  with a bit of religious controversy.  “Sir -our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

Jesus declared, “Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. A time is coming and has now come when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshippers the Father seeks.” (John 4: 19-24)

True worship isn’t about the city you’re in, he’s saying. And nor is it about the building you’re in – even if it’s the temple, the pride and joy of Israel’s religious system.

As he was leaving the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!”

“Do you see all these great buildings?” replied Jesus. “Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.”

(Mark 13:1-2)

Jews in Jesus’ day thought that true worship was rooted in the Temple, and in Jerusalem. And Jesus says ‘no’ – it’s deeper than that.

And they thought that belonging was all about the kinship ties of family and tribe and religion, but Jesus said ‘no’ it’s deeper than that.

One time, while he was preaching and teaching in someone’s house, his mother and brothers came to try and intervene because they were worried he was out of his mind. Someone got word to him:

 “Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you.”

“Who are my mother and my brothers?” he asked.

Then he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.” (Mark 3:31-35)

It’s hard to overestimate how countercultural that was. Jesus, very much against the understanding of his day, is arguing that genuine spiritual ties can be closer than blood ties.

And he goes further, and says that those kinds of ties can be found outside of Israel, the chosen people. Ethnicity is no longer what it’s about, in Jesus’ book. It’s about faith.

So a Gentile woman approaches him asking for healing for her daughter. And when he parleys with her, she answers him with such insight and faith he gives her what she wanted.

A Roman Centurion -the enemy to all intents and purposes - approaches him and asks for healing for his servant. Jesus offers to go and visit the centurion’s home, but he says – there’s no need. I know who you are and I know that if you say the word, it will be done.

¹⁰When Jesus heard this, he was astonished and said to those following him, “I tell you the truth, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith. (Matthew 8:10)

And yet, when he went to his own people, and preached in the synagogue in his home town of Nazareth, they were so incensed at the idea that God might have sympathy for those beyond their own kind, they took him out and tried to murder him.

Can you see the pattern here?

In terms of rooted-ness, place and people are important. But when they become too important to us, we can find ourselves on dangerous ground . Our primary call, as Christians, is to put our roots down into God. Everything else follows on from that.

And if you were listening closely, that’s the common thread between    our three readings this morning.

The tree in Psalm 1, planted by a river, gives its fruit in season because its roots are nourished by good soil and fresh water.

Jesus promises in John 15 that if we remain in him, he will remain in us and we will bear much fruit.

And in Isaiah 37, Hezekiah is promised that at least some of his people will survive. “They will take root below and bear fruit above.” the prophet says.

And this is what I think we need to understand this morning. There’s a direct connection between our being rooted in God, and our bearing fruit for God.

We can race about trying to do things for God, but not actually be rooted in him ourselves – not knowing his peace and his presence in the deep, quiet places of our lives.

But when we operate from that place of knowing God and knowing who we are in God, it gives the whole of life a different slant.

And when you meet someone who’s living this out, they tend to make a good impression, even though they’re generally not trying to.

The writer Brian Draper puts it this way –

“Have you ever met someone who – instead of making you feel bad about yourself because they’re so ‘good’, so sorted, so together – seems to bring you to life and inspires you to greater heights and depths?

They lift you, almost without doing anything at all. They inspire you, just by the way they are. They help you, somehow, mysteriously, to feel connected, alive again, humane, accepted, loved… just through the way that they look at you, or through the way they greet you, or through the way they listen to you with undivided attention.

It doesn’t happen that often, it’s sad to say. But they are out there, such people, if you keep your eyes open for them.”

I’ve been lucky enough to meet a handful of folk like that in my lifetime. Folk who seem so at home in God they are 100% at home in their own skin, and that comes across in the generous and selfless way they treat people.

But I’m pretty sure of this – none of them were born that way. They became that way by putting down deep roots into Christ.

How do we do that? Well discipline is the key to discipleship, and if you’re going to grow you need to be working at it. And that means making prayer and spiritual reading a part of your everyday life. It means meeting with other folk who are making a similar journey and talking honestly with them about how it’s going as you try to live it out. It’s not rocket science, but it works.

I’ve seen people in this congregation becoming more fruitful for Christ in their everyday lives as they develop the spiritual practices that root us in God. More of us need to be making that journey.

You don’t need me to tell you that we live in very challenging times for the church, and the temptation is to rush around trying lots of new things to try and draw more folk in.

But maybe what we need isn’t something new, but something very very old. The people of God  rediscovering the spiritual disciplines that root us deeply in God and help us, in his good time, to be fruitful.

Amen and thanks be to God for his word.