Is this glass half-full, or half-empty?
You know that old chestnut, supposed to tell you if you’re an
optimist or pessimist.
But what you see also depends on what else you know about
the glass – about its history, about its ordinary state. If the glass had been full
a moment ago, and I just drank a lot of water, then the glass is half empty
now. If it were usually empty, and you’d watched me pour some water in, you’d
probably tell me I’d gotten it half full.
What we know about the glass depends on what we expect, and
what we have experienced.
And so does what we know about God.
That’s what’s happening in the story from Exodus that we
hear this morning. The people of Israel have gotten used to the experience of having
Moses right in front of them, right among them. They’ve come to expect that
symbol that God is right there, too, leading them and paying attention.
Now Moses has been up a mountain with God so long they’re
starting to forget what he looks like. He’s gone. God now seems far away, and we want – no we need – something to show that God is
here. It’s important enough to sacrifice some of their treasure for, and they
do.
And the result is – as you well know – a golden calf. An
image that takes the place of God, even though what we were looking for was the assurance of the God
we know.
That’s often what lures us into idolatry. Whether it’s
money, or self, or righteousness, or freedom, or security or any of those other
good things that winds up replacing God in our hearts and minds, it’s often because
we were focused on looking for something we had once experienced with God.
I’ve been known to go looking for the feelings of trust and
confidence that have assured me of God’s presence, thinking that I’m looking for God, only to wind up with a fragile
and rigid kind of independence, a shiny but lifeless substitute for the
presence of God that I thought I was
looking for.
With the help of a few wise friends, I’ve learned that one
way to spot this mistake is anxiety: Worry. Over planning. Perfectionism. Maybe
for you it’s sleepless nights or sudden anger; long to-do lists or bouts of
panic.
And I know I’m there when the shiny thing I wanted – the
bright gleam of freedom or security or cash or rightness – is right in front of
me, but I still worry that I’m going to lose it.
Anxiety is – not always, but so often – the signal flag of
idolatry. And idolatry – so often – is at heart the belief that God has gotten
away from me, and I have to chase down or create what’s gone missing.
So, then…
Rejoice! says Paul, Rejoice! The Lord is near.
Paul writes this from prison, locked up for his zeal in
proclaiming the gospel, not sure if he is going to die or to live – you’d think
this would look like evidence of God’s absence – but Paul’s letter to his
friends in Philippi bubbles and drips with the words “rejoice” and “joy”, and
with his conviction that God is near. That Christ is both coming soon, and already present, vibrant in the
community of faith and worship.
Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I say rejoice.
Let your forbearance be visible to everyone: The Lord is
near.
Do not worry about anything.
Joy, it turns out, is the opposite of anxiety, the signal
flag of the presence of God,
the indisputable evidence of a heart, and a community, that knows and lives the presence of God, here, and now, and always.
Joy is what people see in us, together, when we know that God
has taken up such permanent residence in our hearts, in our relationships with
one another, that we cannot be lost from God.
Joy is not the feeling of happiness (although they go
together a lot). Joy is an attitude of the heart, a deep orientation toward
God, that persists in the midst of grief, and pain, and the boring ordinariness
of the everyday.
Joy is a signal and effect of a deep sense of God’s presence,
but it doesn’t just happen to us. We can choose
joy, by acting on a trust in God’s presence and care even before we feel it. By
embarking on ministry in the confidence that the funding and the volunteers
will come. By giving more of our heart and self than we believe we have to
give. By loving the apparently unlovable, we can – as a community – choose joy.
This is what Paul tells his friends when he reminds them to
focus on “whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just… pure… excellent…”
It’s a shift in perspective, from looking for the signs of
God’s leadingor God’s presence that go missing; to a perspective of accepting the
presence of God even when all the evidence points to God’s absence: at the
cross, at the empty tomb, in the face of tragedy, and greed, and loneliness,
and failure.
It’s the perspective that looks at this half glass of water,
and says, “Well, actually the glass is always
full. One hundred percent full: with 50% water, and 50% air.”
You can see the
partial evidence of the presence of water, or the absence of water, and on that
evidence decide whether the glass is half full or half empty. Or you can know
the unseen fullness of a glass that has any amount of water, drink what’s in
front of you, and rejoice.
And the peace of God, that surpasses understanding, will
guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, in the fullness of joy.
Amen.
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