Note: This page is optimized for a display size (screen resolution) of 1024 x768 or higher. How to change display size.

Trinity Episcopal Church Hattiesburg, Mississippi Proper 24, October 22, 2006 Go To Trinity's Home Page

Job 38:1-7, 34-41
Psalm 104:1-9, 24, 35c
Hebrews 5:1-10
Mark 10:35-45
Collect of the Day
From the Revised Common Lectionary as Adapted for Use by the Episcopal Church
and Authorized by the 74 th General Convention of the ECUSA

Bless the Lord, O my soul. O Lord my God, you are very great. You are clothed with honor and majesty, wrapped in light as with a garment. You stretch out the heavens like a tent, you set the beams of your chambers on the waters, you make the clouds your chariot, you ride on the wings of the wind, you make the winds your messengers, fire and flame your ministers. You set the earth on its foundations, so that it shall never be shaken. You cover it with the deep as with a garment; the waters stood above the mountains. At your rebuke they flee; at the sound of your thunder they take to flight. They rose up to the mountains, ran down to the valleys to the place that you appointed for them. You set a boundary that they may not pass, so that they might not again cover the earth. O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom you have made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. Praise the Lord! (Psalm 104:1-9, 24, 35c)

Hattiesburg Can Be Eden
The Rev. Dr. Bill Stroop

     Just before I left Roseburg to move here, I went to the doctor’s office for an appointment. As I approached the receptionist’s desk, I realized I had forgotten my book. Since waiting always takes longer without something to read, I scanned the tables for a magazine of interest. An old (you expect new in a doctor’s office?) issue of National Geographic caught my attention. I’ve always liked National Geographic because it transports me into to a different world, a more primitive place in time.

     The island of New Guinea in the South Pacific is famous for all kinds of things. In my academic career, New Guinea was famous for being the place where the exotic neurological brain disorder Kuru was discovered to be caused by a unique infectious agent called a prion. The disease was previously thought to be an sex-linked inherited disorder, passed mainly from female to female. But in fact it was shown to be related to the unique burial rites performed by the women of the Fore Tribe of New Guinea; burial rites that involved cannibalism of the brains of their dead loved ones.

     A little less than a year ago a group of twelve American, Australian, and Indonesian researchers plunged into the remote regions of the Foja mountains of New Guinea. Believe it or not, this 74,000 acre area had not been visited by human beings before. This area is so remote that even the local Kwerba tribe of Indians do not venture into the jungle. As the explorers blazed a trail through this untouched pristine and misty jungle, they encountered strange and new plants and exotic animals. Although they did not encounter dinosaurs that had managed to escape extinction, what they did find was almost as exciting.

     “ In wisdom you have made them all; the earth is full of your creatures.”

     It took ten days for the researchers to reach the remote mountain camp that had previously been carved out of the jungle by the rest of their group who had been dropped into the jungle by helicopter. And for the next month, the explorers discovered that they had indeed found a modern-day Garden of Eden: A pristine area of the world, untouched by human beings, where animals and plants, insects and fungi were free to create as their natures would allow.

     Among their first finds was a bird that ate honey and that had an amazing orange face. It was the first new species of bird to be discovered in New Guinea since 1939. They found a population of golden-mantled tree kangaroos, catalogued 20 new species of frogs, five new species of woody plants, and four new species of insects. Large mammals that had been hunted to near extinction in other parts of Indonesia were found here in abundance. Because of their unfamiliarity with the human species, many animals were unafraid of the men and women who walked among them. For example, the scientists were able to simply pick up long-nosed, marsupial Echidnas – animals that are among the earliest of egg-laying mammals known.

     Many of you may have had similar experiences in remote areas of the country. When I was growing up I frequently went back packing in remote regions of the Cascade Mountains. There, deer would walk up to me and nuzzle my back pack. Frogs and toads would often sit on top of the toes of my boots in order to gain a more advantageous feeding perch. Squirrels and chipmunks would climb my legs to smell the food on my plate. From this personal experience, I have a tiny glimpse of the kind of excitement that the New Guinea researchers must have experienced as each day brought new discoveries and an appreciation for the kind of naivety that one can only find in Gardens of Eden.

         “ In wisdom you have made them all; the earth is full of your creatures.”

     As a scientist – someone who likes to discover things about the world around me – you might find my next thought a little strange. I am glad that there is are still places on planet earth where humans are the ignorant ones, where the imprint of our so-called civilized humanity cannot be found, and where human beings are not at the top of the food chain. That’s apparently the appeal of National Geographic to me. It reminds me that there are whole forests that contain nothing but mystery. It helps me remember that as a species, human beings have not figured it all out yet. The magazine reminds me of my insignificant place in the great scheme of things. I am reminded once again of how interconnected humanity is to the earth. The ancient Hebrews – like many nomadic peoples – seemed to understand this well. The words for humanity, adam, and earth, adama, reveal the deep relationship human beings have with the earth.

     “ Bless the Lord, O my soul. O Lord my God, you are very great.”

     Everything that we know, everything that we see, everything from the tiniest frog or miniature orchid to human beings; from the littlest bacterial cell to the most majestic of mountains, all things are a part of God’s created order.

     Scripture tells us that we are created in the image of God. And one way I think that we manifest an image of God is our tendency – our need really – to classify and categorize. We humans spend huge amounts of time classifying things in our world, and I suspect that is because we are trying as best we can to understand something of God by studying the “stuff” around us. And a very good way to learn about that stuff is to contrast and compare the things we categorize. But what we fail to understand is that while we might learn something about our world by classifying things, classification is a very human activity. We are attempting to derive formulae that will break the world down into repeatable and predicable groups or patterns. We are trying to derive some sense of certainty about this world. We very much want to create order from chaos. Although this process helps us order things according to our understanding of the world, it does not explain, engage, or discover the wonder and mystery of God’s work in the world.

     God’s work in this world is vastly larger than we can grasp. When Job in the midst of his suffering calls God on the carpet to explain God’s seemingly unrighteous, unfair behavior, God doesn’t put up a theological or scientific defense. God thunders back at Job, “Who is this that darkens counsel? Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?” God – and his prophet Elihu – declare that while Job is very aware of Job’s own experience and his own pain, only God is privy to the big picture and the grand plan of creation. Note that I am not saying that God causes pain; I am only saying that sometimes pain happens as a consequence of our actions, the actions of others, or because of biology.

     The Scriptures teach us that God never promises that life will be easy, or even that we will come to the end of our life with a clear understanding of God’s view. But Jesus’ life and ministry – and a major message of the gospels – teaches us that no matter what kind of glory or tragedy lies ahead of us, God will be there. In part, that is what Jesus was telling naive James and John when they asked whether they could sit next to Jesus when Jesus came into his glory. They did not have a clue about the fact that the political and social road they had chosen to walk with Jesus would take them to the cross, and they had even less of an idea that in death they would see life eternal. But Jesus promised over and over again that God would be with them.

     Bruce Beehler, a co-leader of the expedition to New Guinea, said that the Foja Mountains and the biodiversity that they contain is about as close to Eden as can be found on earth. The fact that a scientist said this might seem surprising, because you might think that all he would be interested in is exploring the evolutionary relationships between known and newly discovered animals and plants. But instead, he was struck by the grandeur and mystical nature of the place. And I think it was the mystical that must have fueled the researchers to get up each morning to see what new exotic, beautiful, and maybe dangerous creature God had placed in this garden for them to see.

     In many ways I think Bruce Beehler expressed the same kind of wonderment that I see in the faces of the children in our day school. These very young children look at each person and everything in their world with wonder and astonishment. Everything to them is a new species, and new thing to be examined.

     When you leave Trinity this morning, I want to invite you to live into the sense of adventure that our Psalmist and researchers like Bruse Beehler and his colleagues expressed. Try to see all creatures, all people, and all situations as opportunities to open your vision of God’s goodness in creation. Every day is a chance for God to surprise us and shape us with something new. But we need the eyes and sense to experience them. Every encounter with a new person is an opportunity to blaze a new trail of understanding. And our day to day ethics of stewardship for God’s creation can lead us to new and better ways of treating each other with dignity and respect. And in time, we will all develop an understanding of what is really important in the grand scheme that is God.

     To this end, I would like to call on the people of Trinity Parish to dedicate themselves to helping the city of Hattiesburg move toward the development of curbside recycling. There was a time when recycling was not considered a worthwhile goal in Mississippi because of the availability of land and the low population density. But those times have changed. But more importantly, we should not be contaminating the earth with Styrofoam and plastic, batteries and other contaminants that our children’s children will have to deal with, when there are better existing alternatives.

     We can do better. We should do better. It is what we as God’s people are called to do: to be good stewards of our portion of Eden.

     Bless the Lord, O my soul. O Lord my God, you are very great. You are clothed with honor and majesty, wrapped in light as with a garment. You stretch out the heavens like a tent, you set the beams of your chambers on the waters, you make the clouds your chariot, you ride on the wings of the wind, you make the winds your messengers, fire and flame your ministers.

Note: The Back to Top button above requires Macromedia Plug In.
Click here to download Macromedia Player Version 7.

COMMENTS? E-Mail Me

Job 38:1-7, 34-41

Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind: “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me. “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements-- surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone when the morning stars sang together and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy? b) “Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, so that a flood of waters may cover you? Can you send forth lightnings, so that they may go and say to you, ‘Here we are’? Who has put wisdom in the inward parts, or given understanding to the mind? Who has the wisdom to number the clouds? Or who can tilt the waterskins of the heavens, when the dust runs into a mass and the clods cling together? “Can you hunt the prey for the lion, or satisfy the appetite of the young lions, when they crouch in their dens, or lie in wait in their covert? Who provides for the raven its prey, when its young ones cry to God, and wander about for lack of food?

Psalm 104:1-9, 24, 35c

1 Bless the LORD, O my soul.
O LORD my God, you are very great.
You are clothed with honor and majesty,

2 wrapped in light as with a garment.
You stretch out the heavens like a tent,

3 you set the beams of your chambers on the waters,
you make the clouds your chariot,
you ride on the wings of the wind,

4 you make the winds your messengers,
fire and flame your ministers.

5 You set the earth on its foundations,
so that it shall never be shaken.

6 You cover it with the deep as with a garment;
the waters stood above the mountains.

7 At your rebuke they flee;
at the sound of your thunder they take to flight.

8 They rose up to the mountains, ran down to the valleys
to the place that you appointed for them.

9 You set a boundary that they may not pass,
so that they might not again cover the earth.
O LORD, how manifold are your works!

24 In wisdom you have made them all;
the earth is full of your creatures.

35c Praise the LORD!

Hebrews 5:1-10

Every high priest chosen from among mortals is put in charge of things pertaining to God on their behalf, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. He is able to deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he himself is subject to weakness; and because of this he must offer sacrifice for his own sins as well as for those of the people. And one does not presume to take this honor, but takes it only when called by God, just as Aaron was. So also Christ did not glorify himself in becoming a high priest, but was appointed by the one who said to him, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you”; as he says also in another place, “You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.” In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the one who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him, having been designated by God a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.

Mark 10:35-45

James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you. “ And he said to them, “What is it you want me to do for you?” And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” They replied, “We are able.” Then Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.” When the ten heard this, they began to be angry with James and John. So Jesus called them and said to them, “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”

Collect of the Day

Almighty and everlasting God, in Christ you have revealed your glory among the nations: Preserve the works of your mercy, that your Church throughout the world may persevere with steadfast faith in the confession of your Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

To Bill Stroop's Sermon Index Page

To Bill Stroop's Current Year B Sermon Index Page

To Trinity's Home Page

To Bill Stroop's Home Page

Copyright Notice
Copyright © 2006, William G. Stroop - All Rights Reserved.
19 October 2006

This publication, ie. this page and the preceding document that has a link to this page, are copyrighted. Except as permitted by the Copyright Act, no part of it may in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or any other means be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or be broadcast or transmitted without the prior permission of the publisher.