a sermon for Pentecost 13 - Moses, the river and faithful women

 

Water, Fire, Earth and Air

A sermon for Pentecost 13 2023

preached at Holy Evangelists and Goolwa picture from the Art Gallery of Victoria

In the opening verses of Genesis, the breath of the Creator shapes the Universe in great poetry.  Genesis explores the great vistas and horizons and records the stories of families and communities. Nomads, farmers, and cities rise and fall and religions are created to explain the agonies and ecstasies of human existence and the quest for meaning. Four great rivers flow from the primordial garden.

In Hebrews the author says that ‘faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen’

In our Gospel Peter confesses Jesus as the Christ in Caesarea Phillipi where the gates leading to the underground river and place of the dead were believed to be situated. Here says Jesus in this confession of faith is the key to liberation in this life from fear and hopelessness.

In our reading from Exodus the people are enslaved, fearful and without hope. The land of Egypt, called Kemet from the rich alluvial soil from the river Nile has been a place of refuge for the starving people but now they faced extinction.  From 1570 – 1300 BCE Semitic people worked as slaves under Pharoah Seti 1.

Exodus is mostly the story of one man Moses and his relationship with the Holy One. Later he will meet and find his life’s calling on Mount Horeb and will return to liberate the people. Yet here at his birth it is women who responding in faith are the key. In the New Testament once again the faith of women, beginning with Mary are the key to the ministry of Jesus the liberator and life giver. Shiprah and Puah deceive the Pharoah. Moses mother obeys the order in placing her son in the river, but she makes a basket and in faith entrusts her son to the flowing river, the source of life. Moses sister intercedes for her brother and Pharoah’s daughter names him and adopts him. Paul reminds us that we are adopted into the Covenant not by birthright but through faith. We remember that too often we have been the Egyptians in the story utterly faithless turning on Jewish people and enslaving others often in the name of the very Jesus who renounced violence and taught compassion.

What can we take from today’s Scripture readings?

Firstly the call to confess Christ and through grace be people of a fearless faith.

The midwives, the mother and sister of Moses and the courage of Pharoah’s daughter in adopting a baby of a different race and culture demonstrate the power of faith.

In humility when we make a hold space for our hands in communion let us pray for ‘the renewal of our minds’

Let us hold firm with faith, hope and wonder in the Christ who liberates us from the slavery to opinion, our sense of who we are, our sense of entitlement and our thoughtlessness placing our trust in the giver and maker of life in a society where bitterness and resentment are all too common and where fearfulness and hopelessness cause us to turn away from the stranger who arrives unannounced.

In this story the water sustains, leading not to the place of the dead but to an ever-unfolding story of life, grace and hope.