I just got back from my annual family reunion in Connecticut. When I was a child, it was mandatory. One did not miss it, or my grandmother would, well, I’, not sure what she would do but whatever it was scared us enough never to ask. Nobody ever missed the family reunion.
And each year, my grandmother, God rest her soul, would ask us the infamous question. “Well, dearies, what did you accomplish this year?” Unwittingly, she pitted her grandchildren against one another. Who was going to the best colleges? Who had the best jobs? Who was raising their children well? Without knowing it, she played favorites, comparing us, complaining about our mistakes, reveling in our successes. I got to the point where I felt like going on a diet before the family reunion just so that I didn’t get her evil eye. What kind of a vacation is that? Now that she has died, the family has relaxed so much. We don’t dress up for dinner. We laugh and cry and eat and act silly. God bless my grandmother. I did love her but she etched competition into my skull.
Joseph was a favorite in a family where his father played favorites. And their competition was not just for a once-a-year family reunion. Joseph lived with his competitors all the time. Joseph was one of twelve brothers, born of four different mothers. All four of the mothers were in constant competition with one another so it is no surprise that there was near constant rivalry going on all the time among their sons. It must have been an intense atmosphere to grow up in. Joseph was younger than most of his brothers. By the time the Biblical story begins, he is seventeen and most of his brothers are grown men. Joseph’s mother was his father’s favorite wife, so Joseph became his favorite son. Joseph’s father gave him a coat with long sleeves, which would protect him from the sun. An obvious sign of favor, this coat enrages his brothers. The competition rises to a feverish pitch and soon his brothers want him dead.
Have you ever read the book Lord of the Flies? It is a must read for anyone raising boys. A gang of boys are shipwrecked on an island without adults. They gradually become wild, reduced to their baser natures without any supervision. They begin to bully one small boy. The bullying goes unchecked and eventually becomes violent. In the end, they kill the smaller boy. It is a horrible story about the cruel realities of young men when rivalry goes unchecked.
Couple competition with numerous unsupervised young men and you soon get Lord of the Flies. With no adults around, Joseph’s brothers become ugly when he boasts of a dream that he had in which they bowed down to him. Joseph was either so innocent as to trust his dreams or so naïve as to be unsuspecting of the depth of his brothers hatred. They are about to kill him when one brother gets a conscience and intervenes. As an alternative, they decide to throw him into a pit.
It must have been incredibly dark in that hole. Israel has a very dry climate. Joseph could have died of thirst or starvation. Maybe he thought that it was a practical joke at first, that his brothers would relent, cool down and change their minds. But they did not.
When slave traders approach, Joseph’s brothers decide to sell him as a slave.
Thus, in an instant, the favored boy is reduced to slavery. Bound by ropes, he is dragged to a foreign land to work himself to death.
This is the beginning of a three-part sermon series on the life of Joseph. Why? Because he was a man who listened to God. In my first year as your Dean, together, we are trying to determine God’s will for the future of this church here in downtown Jacksonville. It is time for us to listen, and Joseph is going to help us learn how. When listening to God, there is no better place to start than with the stories of Scripture.
From all human perspectives, Joseph’s life just about ended in this passage today. He went from prosperity and favor to slavery and poverty. He lost everything and not through some random tragedy but through the betrayal of his family members, the people who were supposed to love him the most. Joseph was at a dead end
Life could have ended for him that day, but it did not. The reason his life did not end was because he never stopped listening. He believed that God could make something from the bottom of a pit. And he was right.
In all the best stories of Scripture, there is a dead end: a death, a crises, a loss. In all these stories, life never seems to go as we would have chosen. And yet, God seems to do his best work at the bottom of a pit. The dead end is resurrection time.
Be awake, Jesus says in today’s gospel. Be awake and aware, for you do not know when God will come. You must be willing to follow him, even in the middle of the darkest night.
If Joseph had not been betrayed by those who loved him, he would not have served God in the magnificent way that he did. If he had not suffered, he might never have listened to God with the intensity that he did. Joseph let God run his life. Later, as a prosperous ruler in Egypt, he would literally save his family from starvation. Every Savior must die to himself before being truly able to save. And every one of us must stare at the walls of a dead end before God can wake us up to truly listen.
I have been learning a lot about our neighborhood here in the heat of downtown Jacksonville. A lot of people think that we are nowhere. No one comes here. This church is no longer on a main drag. Downtown has suffered. How many times have I heard people say, ‘I just don’t go down there anymore!” Or “I remember when we used to go downtown to shop and work, remember that?” People want to know what it’s like downtown, as if I have moved to the Sahara desert. “Is it dangerous?” they ask…
The new Courthouse is nearing completion. Soon many of the lawyers will move their offices from this district to be closer to the new courthouse. What will happen to this corner of downtown? Will we become a place of abandoned properties and half-way houses? It feels as if we are hitting a dead end.
Alleluia. Sounds like just the right time for God to become intimately involved. I believe that we were all called here to this dead end of downtown for a reason. If this Cathedral does not care for this district, no one will. God is giving us a call here, folks, I am convinced of it.
And another thing, I am almost at the point where I want to put up a huge bill board that says, “Where would Jesus be?” with a picture of the heart of downtown. He would be here! I am convinced of it. He worships with us every Sunday.
Joseph saw some hard days in the service of God. He was framed and imprisoned, he was left to rot in jail. By many accounts, his life was a mess. And yet God kept raising him to new heights, using his misfortune to make him wiser and to get him where he needed to go.
I say that the poverty and homelessness around us tell us one thing as a Cathedral- that we are exactly where we are supposed to be. This is our time to impact this city. And as we listen, vision is taking shape.
I knew a woman who was one of the best psychologists in town. Everyone respected her. Her practice was full for she could be so genuinely loving and so very tough all at the same time. As a member of my parish years ago, she told me that she had suffered from massive clinical depression for years. It got so bad that she could not go to work, but lay in her bed under her blankets all day. Her husband was terrified and did not know what to do. She would lie there alone in the dark, wishing that she would simply cease to exist. After months of suffering that continued despite the best of medical care, she awoke in the middle of the night in the pit of darkness and something happened. Even years later, she had trouble putting the experience in words. Peace was a word she used. The peace that passes all understanding. A feeling of such beauty and deep joy came to her. And it altered her life forever. She got out of bed. She ate. Her life began.
“It took me years to understand that I had to experience that darkness in order to help people the way that I do. I had to see the pit in order to know the grace of God, in order to know what it means to be lifted up, to be saved. I understand salvation now. I really understand.”
God has us here in the heart of downtown for a reason my friends. There is a reason for all of this. This city is our greatest struggle and it is our greatest opportunity. For it is here that we need a Savior. It is here that we can find Christ and be saved.
Amen.
