All Saints’, Dorval
Proper 12 (National Indigenous Day of Prayer), Year B
June 20, 2021
“Life of David,” The Morgan Leaf of the Winchester Bible, ca. 1150–80. J. Pierpont Morgan Library, New York (Image from the Metropolitan Museum of Art website)
“The Lord will be a refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in time of trouble.”
Thus begins our portion of the Psalms for today, and it goes on to describe how God will not forget the cry of the afflicted, but avenge the blood that was shed; “the wicked shall be given over to the grave,” exults the Psalmist, “and also all the peoples that forget God.” There are also several references to “the ungodly” in the BAS version that we use in worship; this is more accurately translated in the NRSV as “the nations”.
In the Psalms, Israel and Judah are depicted as small, vulnerable peoples, frequently targeted and preyed upon by their larger, more powerful neighbours. This is the scenario dramatized in spectacular fashion in the beloved story of David and Goliath: David, the little shepherd boy, who has been anointed king but is still years away from actually taking the throne, faces down the huge giant with just his leather sling and handful of stones – he can’t even be protected with Saul’s armour, because it’s too big and heavy for him! – and nevertheless he prevails.
Likewise, in the reading from II Corinthians, Paul clearly sees himself as the underdog in relation to the powers of his time – they mete out “beatings, imprisonments, riots, labours, sleepless nights, hunger” as he simply tries to carry on with his work of spreading the good news of Jesus.
And it’s not surprising, then, that Christians reading the Bible automatically tend to see ourselves on the side of the “little guy”, since that’s almost always where the narrative puts us. The person speaking is facing overwhelming threats – a giant, the ungodly nations, the imperial might of Rome – and we relate to and sympathize with them.
But what about the times when we are not David, but Goliath?
Tomorrow is the National Indigenous Day of Prayer, and we are using prayer resources provided by the national church in this morning’s service. But I decided to use the readings from the regular lectionary sequence, because they raise some really fascinating and very relevant questions.
In relation to the first peoples of this land, the settler churches historically have been Goliath, not David. They – we – have had the power, the resources, and the institutional authority. And we have wielded it with indiscriminate brutality for which we are being rightly held accountable and now need to atone.
This is not a fun process. It’s unpleasant, and it hurts. We would (we think) much rather be in the position of the oppressed demanding justice. When asked to change our behaviour in response to our responsibility for our ancestors’ actions, we tend to jump to defensiveness and self-justification – or at least I know I do. Feeling the shame and guilt of a generational crime perpetrated on innocent people is not something anyone would voluntarily choose to do. But we owe it to our Native siblings to rise to the challenge.
And it helps, I think, to contemplate where the violence and abuse perpetrated by our ancestors on our behalf came from. My mother, a very wise person in many ways, has a saying: “When you see anger, look for fear.” I’m not a historian, but I suspect that a lot of the motivation behind the exploitation of this land and its people was fear: fear of the vast “untamed” wilderness and fear of the people who were understood to be “savage”. And in unconscious response to that fear, the settlers tried to take control, with horrific results for both the people and the land.
Our Gospel reading speaks to the experience of fear. The disciples, caught in a storm on the Sea of Galilee, are struck with terror and demand of Jesus, “Do you not care that we are perishing?!” He stills the storm, but also rebukes them: “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?” Have you been with me so long, Jesus wants to know, and you still don’t trust me to stay with you and keep you safe?
I cannot speak for Native people, now or in the past; but I suspect that when you have lived your whole life as an integral part of a thriving ecosystem, relying on your own wits and skills and those of your relatives in order to meet your basic needs, with no separation between work, leisure, culture and spirituality, you live with much less fear and anxiety than the typical member of a developed capitalist society. You may be afraid when a storm comes, or you find yourself face to face with a bear, but you also have a powerful internal conviction of the rightness of your way of life and the deep connectedness of all things, including across the boundary of physical death.
And it is that kind of courage and confidence to which Jesus calls us: not to deny our fear, but to put it in perspective; to trust in God, and to trust that fear doesn’t have the last word. To see all of God’s creatures as our relatives, not our enemies, and ourselves as a part of God’s wondrous creation, not set apart to dominate and control it. To leave the control where it belongs, in the hands of the God who stills the storm – if he’s not peacefully napping in the middle of it.
So let us pause for a moment and bring ourselves into the presence of this God.
There followed a three-part meditation on the question “What would it be like to live beyond fear?”
- What fears and anxieties arise in the mind when you hear this question? What fears are hard to let go of?
- What vision do you have of a life beyond fear? How does it feel?
- What is God saying to you as you welcome this question?
Amen.
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