Discussion Question #1: When have you forgotten God?
Discussion Question #2: How do you remember God?
My Mother is an amazing cook.
Her skills are not limited to the Kitchen, She is also an amazing educator, scholar, and artist, but she can do things in the kitchen that very few others can do.
Now if any of you have had my Mom’s cooking, you would know that I am not just saying this because I am her son. Whether it is Cornish Hens on Christmas Eve or Wednesday night’s leftovers, the food speaks for itself…and the food says, “Your mom can cook.”
Now, I didn’t always know that my Mom was an amazing cook. It wasn’t until I started going over to my friend’s house for dinner, until I ate macaroni out of a box and hotdogs boiled in water that I began to understand that my mom’s cooking was different.
My mom cooked with a hospitality and generosity that was unique. Her cooking accommodated food allergies and dietary restrictions. She would serve up such an abundant spread that having seconds was never a question, that guests would leave the house with the leftovers packed away in Tupperware.
Hospitality, generosity, abundance these are the qualities that made my mom such an amazing cook.
And I took a lot the meals my Mom made for granted. Growing up good food was a given, not something to be grateful for…. At least not until Mom started teaching a graduate class on Monday nights and Dad began making us meals.
As if Monday’s were not bad enough already, Dad’s dinner consisted of: Potato Wedges, Tortilla chips, and Ketchup. The meals my dad made were so bland and so dry that I could not help but grumble and ask to be brought back to the land of boiled hotdogs.
And it is funny, because I remember this meal that my Dad made as clearly as the Christmas Eve dinner’s my Mom would make. Just as I cannot forget the care with which my Mom made her twice baked potatoes overflowing with bacon and cheese, I cannot forget how sad and desolate my Dad’s potatoes wedges were.
They had this remarkable crispy toughness that can be only be achieved by baking without oil for too long a time. And if you were able to bite through the tough exterior of the wedge, you would encounter an unpleasant starchiness that would instantly dry out your mouth. Unless, of course, the wedge was covered with an obscene amount of ketchup.
This is the stuff you cannot forget.
Mom’s Christmas Eve Dinner, Dad’s Monday night meals; I grew up living between these two tables. And in our passage today, we find God’s chosen people sitting on the border of the Promised Land, caught between two tables of their own.
The chosen people are living between the table of wilderness wasteland and the table of promised abundance. They are living between the table of what has happened in the past and the table of what will happen in their future. They are living between the table of dry potato wedges and cheesy twice baked potatoes.
And as the people sit on the border, caught between these two tables, Moses speaks. And the word Moses chooses to say is, “remember.” The command Moses decides to give is, “do not forget.”
In verse two of our passage this morning, Moses says, “remember how God sat with you at the first table. Remember how you were served up forty years of Dad’s cooking, forty years of wilderness. And remember that for forty-years God never got up and left the table. God was with you through it all.”
Now, Moses acknowledges that there was not a lot of food at table one, and the food that was served up, it was not very tasty. You did not want seconds and you could not take it home in a Tupperware container.
So Moses admits, at this table the people got hungry, at this table people ate and were not very satisfied. But God wanted them to sit and eat at this table anyway. This was a meal that God did not want the people to miss.
Moses goes on to say that the menu at this table was intentionally prepared by the chef, that there was a reason God served up three courses of manna and humble pie for dessert. In fact, Moses will go as far to say that the whole dining experience at table one was a test of sorts, a way for God to see and know the hearts of the people who sat at the table.
The wilderness was God’s way to get to know the people. To Truly know them.
You see if God took the people out to a fancy dinner, the best God would get would be a performance. The people would dress themselves up, and act extra proper, trying to convince God and themselves that they belonged.
God did not want a show, God wanted authenticity, God wanted realness, so God took the people on a 40 year camping trip in the desert. And as the people got hungry, and tired, and got sore feet. And it was only then that God really got to know who they were.
In the wilderness, the people let their guards down, they became vulnerable, and God got to see their hearts.
In the wilderness the people were humbled and God met them in their humility.
In the wilderness the people were hungry and Got was able to feed them.
And so Moses tells the people to remember. Remember not just terror of the wilderness, but remember the grace of the wilderness.[1] Remember the grace of God coming close, the grace of God seeing you at your worst, and sticking with you anyway. Remember that Grace.
Moses urges the people to remember the wilderness of table one because God is about to invite them into unimaginable abundance at table two. God is taking them into a land where they will have Christmas Eve dinner every day. A land where Cheese and Bacon will stream down from the mound of mashed potatoes and gravy will well up in the valleys.
Moses tells the people that their dinner invitation is in the mail and it wont be long until they find themselves sitting at a table where there will be enough, where everyone will have seconds, where everyone will have enough to take home for tomorrow’s lunch.
The prosperity and abundance that Moses envisions in the Promised Land at Table Two, it is a prosperity that makes Joel Osteen and Creflo Dollar appear parsimonious and prudent. Moses is preaching full blown prosperity gospel, telling the people that they will eat and they will be satisfied, they will build mansions and they will live in them. Their investments are about to grow and their bank accounts are going to balloon!
And for every dollar sign they see, it will be a confirmation of God’s covenant with them.
Moses is preaching prosperity, but unlike Mr. Olsteen or Mr. Dollar, Moses is not preaching in a mega-church or a football stadium. Moses is preaching his message of prosperity on the border, caught between the two tables.
And there is a sad irony here, because Moses will not experience the prosperity he is preaching about. Moses vividly describes the abundance at Table two, but he will never sit at that table, and he will never taste the figs and pomegranates on that menu.
Moses will die in Moab. Moses will die between the two tables.
There is another sad irony here for the people as well. There is a sad underlying irony that says as the people step into the land that has everything; they will risk losing the one thing they need for life.[2]
As the people sit down to eat at table two, they will enjoy such great abundance that there may no longer be room at the table for God to sit with them.
At table two their lives will be filled with so much stuff and their hearts will be full of so much pride that God will no longer have a clear path to live in their hearts.
Moses knows that as the people step into the promised land, materialism will impact their memory. That the promised abundance will lead to the pit-fall of amnesia.[3] That hoped for savings-account will lead to hollow self-centeredness. And that the blessing of prosperity will lead to the burden of pride.
So unlike the prosperity preacher who says: “be encouraged, be an over-comer, claim your blessing.” Moses says be careful. Be careful as you enter into the land of enough.
You can sit at the table, you can eat your fill, you can give God thanks, but be careful not to forget what hunger, true hunger feels like.
You can build your house, you can live in it and settle down, but be careful not to forget what sore feet feel like.
You can watch your possessions and wealth multiply, and you can count it as divine blessing, but be careful not to forget what humility, vulnerability, and dependence feels like.
Moses says remember the pain of hunger, and the ache of sore feet, and the vulnerability of humility, so that you will not forget God. Because if you forget God, you will perish, you will be destroyed.
Wilderness and abundance… without God we will not be able to
survive either.
Wilderness and Abundance… unless we are willing to humble ourselves enough to
ask for help, we will not survive either.
Wilderness or abundance… unless we remember to make room for God at the table,
unless we remember to make room for the least of these at the table, unless we
remember to make room for the environment at the table, what we eat will not
give life, but will lead to destruction.
Remember. Do not forget.
Mom’s Christmas Eve dinners and Dad’s Monday night meals, these were more than just opportunities to eat, these were the tables I grew up at, tables that shaped who I am. And each table shaped me.
And it did not matter if mom cooked or dad cooked, at each table, I never had to
eat alone.
Whether mom cooked or dad cooked, there was always enough at
the table.
Whether mom cooked or dad cooked, we would be nourished. We would be nourished
with a love that was generous, a love that was abundant, a love that sustained
us for life between the two tables.
And this is a love that I will always remember. This is a love that I can never
forget. This is love that continues to give us life.
Amen.
[1] Walter Brueggemann, Deuteronomy, 106.
[2] Walter Brueggemann, Deuteronomy, 110.
[3] Walter Brueggemann, Deuteronomy, 109.
A sermon preached on Sunday, October 20, 2019 by Derek Elmi-Buursma.
Word in the Loop 