Call on the Name of the Lord #3 | “My Rock”

0:01 Today is the third Sunday in Lent. Spring ahead Sunday. I said to some of the clergy this morning, fall back feels like grace, spring ahead feels sort of like a punishment. So stars in your crown for just being here today. This Lent, Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church is studying the names of God, as recorded in scripture and as used down through the centuries by Christians in their prayers. This Lent we're puzzling over, marveling at, and reverently making use of God's evocative names.

0:53 Last week we considered the name El Olam, a name assigned to God by Abraham, a name that means everlasting one, steadfast God, God who abides, God who sticks with me, who stands by me, come what may. At the end of the sermon, I challenged worshipers to pray in the coming week to El Olam. I encouraged you to try wrapping your tongue around this ancient and probably strange feeling name for God. I hope some of you accepted this challenge. This week, the clergy at Fifth Avenue want to go a step further in messing with your prayer life. we would like you to send us a short prayer that features one of the names that we have been discussing this Lent. And with your permission, we will share these prayers with the wider community via social media.

2:02 We would love to use some of your prayers in worship to participate in this Lenten exercise. All you have to do is email prayers at FAPC.org. That's P-R-A-Y-E-R-S at FAPC.org. Please include your name so that we may credit you. Be brave. Stretch your spirit. Send us the results. Let's fill the world with good, solid, honest prayers this Lent.

2:41 Today we continue our exploration of God's many names by turning to one of my personal favorites. I use this name for the divine almost every Sunday, echoing Psalm 19, echoing 1 Corinthians. I will often close a prayer with the words, in the name of Jesus Christ, our rock and our redeemer. In fact, I actually have a paperweight, needle pointed by Kathy Henderson, which has those words on it. It sits on my desk, reminding me always, our rock and our redeemer.

3:29 In scripture, God is named rock or the rock about two dozen times. The Apostle Paul calls Jesus the rock. While Jesus famously renames one of his own disciples Peter, which means the rock, the name rock gets wide play in the good book. Although what people have in mind when they evoke the rock shifts as you turn the pages of scripture. This is how language works. Over time and in different contexts, the meaning of words change. Take the word clue. In the ancient Greek story of Theseus and the Minotaur, Theseus uses an unspooled ball of yarn to mark his path and then to help him escape the Minotaur's vast manes. He follows the yarn back.

4:39 In the 1600s, when this story was being shared in Britain, storytellers used an old English word for ball of yarn, and that word was clue. Soon, English speakers began using clue to refer to something that can help you find your way. And today, of course, a clue is a piece of information that can assist in solving a problem or a mystery.

5:15 Words have such interesting lives. Over time, as words rub up against stories, as people adapt their vocabulary for their context, the core meaning of a word can change. The same is true for names. like metal exposed to the elements. Over the years, names develop a patina with poetic undertones and narrative nuance. You can see this in today's readings. Our first passage from Deuteronomy refers to God as rock four different times. And yet even within the scope of this one passage, the meaning of rock dances on theological and poetic winds. Let's listen now for this evocative text from Deuteronomy, chapter 32, beginning with the first verse.

6:20 And we're going to be assisted in this by Austin and Ella. Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak. Let the earth hear the words of my mouth. May my teaching drop like the rain, my speech condense like the dew, like gentle rain on grass, like showers on new growth. For I will proclaim the name of the Lord, ascribe greatness to our God. The rock, his work is perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God without deceit, just and upright is he. Yet his degenerate children have dealt falsely with him, a perverse and crooked generation. Do you thus repay the Lord, O foolish and senseless people?

7:15 Is he not your father who created you, who made you and established you? Remember the days of old. Consider the years long past. Ask your father, and he will inform you. Your elders, and they will tell you. When the Most High apportioned the nations, when he divided humankind, he fixed the boundaries of the peoples according to the number of the gods. The Lord's own portion was his people, Jacob his allotted share. He sustained him in a desert land, in a howling wilderness waste. He shielded him, cared for him, guarded him as the apple of his eye. As an eagle stirs up its nest and hovers over its young, as it spreads its wings, takes them up, and bears them aloft on its pinions, the Lord alone guided him. No foreign god was with him.

8:11 He set him upon the heights of the land and fed him with produce of the field. He nursed him with honey from the crags, with oil from flinty rock. curds from the herd and milk from the flock with fat of lambs and rams, Bashan bulls and goats, together with the choicest wheat. You drank fine wine from the blood of grapes. Jacob ate his fill. Jeshurun grew fat and kicked. You grew fat, bloated, and gorged. He abandoned God who made him and scoffed at the rock of his salvation. They made him jealous with strange gods. With abhorrent things they provoked him. They sacrificed to demons, not God, to deities they had never known, to new ones recently arrived whom your ancestors had not feared. You were unmindful of the rock that bore you.

9:06 You forgot the God who gave you birth. Our second passage for this morning comes from Paul's first letter to the Christian community at Corinth. Here, Paul retells the story of Moses and the rock. The apostle gives new meaning to this story by connecting it to the ministry of Jesus. Let's listen together to this passage from 1 Corinthians chapter 10, beginning with the first verse. I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea and all ate the same spiritual food and all drank the same spiritual drink.

10:12 For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. Our final passage for today is a short but familiar one from the book of Psalms. Here King David embraces in a personal way the notion that God is a rock. Listen again to Psalm 19, verse 14. Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer. This is the word of God for you, the people of God. Thanks be to God. Back in the first century, a fellow by the name of Philo of Alexandria, a Jewish philosopher and theologian, described the hurdles faced by humans who risk opening their mouths and speaking a name for God.

11:24 no one name philo argued can fully capture the essence of god you heard that actually in our opening hymn today no solitary name can adequately answer the question who is god there's no label out there that plums the depth and the breadth of the divine We have to acknowledge, says Philo, that it's absurd to try and name God. It's an impossible exercise. We, finite beings that we are, will never get it right. Philo's old school caution makes sense. Modern psychologists describe humankind as a bundle of flawed memories and self-deception. we are unreliable witnesses we bend the truth we cannot see very far beyond the end of our own selfish noses what makes us think that we with our long list of shortcomings can accurately give a name to the spirit that animates the universe and yet philo notes we keep trying in in the pages of scripture people take this wild leap all the time they they seek to describe the indescribable to define the undefinable to name the unnameable and in the good book people run around boldly foolishly whimsically earnestly sticking names on God. All sorts of names. This, says Philo, in a surprising twist, is a good thing.

13:24 If we own our limitations, if we proceed with humility, then trying to describe the vast mystery that is God becomes profound work. In fact, Philo argues, this is humanity's highest calling. This is our purpose. We were created to reach toward the one who is already reaching toward us. We are at our best when seeking to put a name on the one who has already named us. Nothing, says Philo, is more worthy. No human activity is more important. Nothing is more life-giving than an earnest search for God. This is faith.

14:22 Faith is an imperfect soul, a hungry soul, a brave soul, walking out onto a limb and daring to call God by name. In today's text from Deuteronomy, Moses does this. The old prophet here is preaching. He's ranting a bit. He scolds his listeners. He describes the congregation as degenerate children and a perverse and crooked generation.

15:04 Moses lists the people's sins. They've been consumed by greed. They prefer deceit over truth. They scoff at the real God. And then they sacrifice to demons. It's messy stuff. holding up a mirror to his folks Moses thunders look at yourselves you are headed down a dark path This past week, Polymarket, have you heard of that? Polymarket, an online prediction site where you can bet on anything,

15:52 has been in the news. The Wall Street Journal and National Public Radio report that over $500 million was wagered in recent weeks through online sites like Polymarket and its competitor, Kalshi, as to when bombs would start falling on Iran. Over $50 million was wagered on whether and when Ayatollah Khamenei would be killed. These betting sites have come under journalistic scrutiny because their very premise is an invitation to corruption, a source of great temptation. Those with insider knowledge regarding military strategy can reap enormous profits by placing timely wagers. Although the larger problem, the moral problem, of course, is that Moses was right.

16:59 Human hearts are easily swayed by greed. And now, evil monkeys that we are, we've figured out how to place bets on death and destruction. We've developed markets to profit off assassinations and chaos. This is such a dark path. How did we get here? Moses answers that question in this way. You got here by turning your back on God, the rock, the steady one who champions truth and justice. You decided that your life would be better if you made a few sacrifices to the demons of this age, and now your actions are tearing our community apart.

17:59 Even as Moses delivers this sober diagnosis, the prophet points to hope. He gestures toward an alternative path. In the midst of his furious finger-wagging, Moses pauses to remind his listeners of God's faithfulness and compassion. God, says the prophet, is a father who brought you into this world and who set you up to succeed in this life. God, says the prophet, is an eagle who carried you as little chicks on her wings and who taught you how to fly. the prophet appeals to these images of God at work these these names describing God's character to try and snap people out of their self-involved stupor their their self-destructive behavior their bottomless greed you've lost your way the prophet argues you've chained your dog sleds to demonic forces, you are no longer following the one who made you, the one who cared for you, the one who pursues you still. I'm talking, of course, about God the rock, says the prophet, just and perfect, solid, and true.

19:35 Three times in today's passage, Moses references God the rock, maybe four. Do you remember, he asks, do you remember the time when you were complaining of thirst in the wilderness? Do you remember that time when the Holy One told me to strike a rock and a spring of water came out of that flinty rock? Do you remember God's response when you were in distress, when you had troubles?

20:10 This is the scene that plays out on the cover of today's bulletin. This is such a fantastic painting. Straight out of the Italian Renaissance, Francesco Ubertini serves up exotically clothed people and a wide variety of wildlife. If you're bored right now, you can start counting the number of animals in here. There are a lot, there are more than you think, but if you get the answer right, we'll have a prize. Natalie will have a prize for you.

20:48 But look at this painting. These people look like they've been living large. And yet, they're thirsty. They're so thirsty. The miraculous water flowing from the rock draws this fractious and anxious community together. It slakes the thirst of humans and their livestock. It renews people's strength for a journey to the promised land.

21:22 Ubertini's painting overflows with life. And so does today's text. Look again at the last verse in our passage from Deuteronomy. Here, Moses chastised the people for forgetting God the rock. This is precisely what he says. You were unmindful of the rock that bore you. You forgot the God who gave you birth. here Moses continues to play like a poet with God's name have you forgotten? God is the rock who bore you God is the one who gave you birth and God the rock is the one who can once again bring you to life Moses riffs on the image riffs on this name for God.

22:27 And as the prophet waxes on, a new patina starts to glint on the surface of God. The rock, the name Moses gives to God, shines, glistens with profound feminine power. It's right there. Moses says, you folk have forgotten forgotten the one who gave you life. You've turned away from the rock who birthed you. Basically Moses says shame on you. You've turned your back on your mama. I'm guessing that those words got the people's attention. Folks you need to straighten up, fly right. Nobody wants to turn their back on the one who gave them life.

23:21 It's been a while since I talked about my favorite musician, Paul Simon. Today, I cannot help it because our passage and our conversation about God's name so clearly evokes my favorite Paul Simon song from way back in 1973. loves me like a rock. I'm hoping, see this little piece of paper? Yeah, that's right. Hold them up. You've got them. All right. Because I'm going to try singing. I don't have Natalie Owens' Pike's Pipes.

24:10 So I need your help. The words should appear on the screen for those of you who are online. Will you sing it with me? John Ogren's gonna help us out here, right? You know this. Here we go. When I was a little boy, and the devil would call my name, I'd say now, who do, who do you think you're fooling?