Endurance Tests

3 Lent, March 24, 2019

St. John’s, Newtonville

The Rev. Nancy E. Gossling

Endurance tests, oh boy. Have you ever had one? Or two? Or three? During this past week, I’ve had many endurance tests, and I know for sure that some of you have had them as well. With apologies in advance, I’m sharing some of my personal story with you this morning. Last Sunday night we had a call from our daughter Megan and her husband Josh in Minneapolis. Twenty-five weeks pregnant with fraternal twin boys, Megan had gone into premature labor. As as neonatologist, that is a newborn intensive care doctor, Megan knows the risks of premature birth, and her early labor was something she definitely did not want. Her labor came on unexpectedly and quickly, like a thief in the night. She feared losing the lives of her twin boys.

            Her colleagues at the hospital tried everything in their power to prevent the birth of these two boys. But the boys wanted out; and it became clear that an emergency C-section was necessary. At 8:54 p.m. last Sunday night we learned that Peter Josiah had entered into our world weighing in at 2 lbs. And his brother Nathaniel Joshua came 2 minutes later at 1 lb. 13 oz. Atypically for a baby that small, Nathaniel let out a cry. And so did we. Then the Lord said to Moses, “I have heard their cry. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them.”

Today, one week later, Peter and Nathaniel are both doing very well for their ages and sizes. And yet, their journey remains under a cloud of worry and hope, of sadness and joy, and these feelings will remain with our family for many days to come. Each day, we pray for the twins’ health, and strength, and growth. Each day we thank God for wonderful caregivers and modern medicine. And I thank you today for including Peter and Nathaniel in your prayers. In his letter to the Hebrews, the author wrote, “So then, with endurance let us also run the race that is laid out in front of us.” And together, we will. Together, we will pray for all who are enduring any kind of tests on this day.

My husband Paul and I took the first flight out of Boston on Monday morning and went straight to the hospital. There we met Megan and Josh, who belong to a Lutheran church in Minnesota, and their pastor who had just arrived. Pastor Toby found us all weary from too little sleep, emotionally fragile, and standing in the need of prayer. Life is fragile at all ages, but most especially with preemies, and so we handle them with care. Life is fragile at all ages, and so we handle us with prayer. Alone and together, we pray.

Peter was born first. As you may know, Peter means “rock” and he was one of the first disciples to be called by Jesus. In today’s new testament lesson, St. Paul wrote to the church in Corinth about a rock that was Christ, that followed the Israelites during their journey through the wilderness. Our ancestors were all under a cloud, passing through the Red Sea together. They were all baptized in that cloud, ate the same spiritual food, and drank the same spiritual drink from this rock. As they endured their own suffering and testing, God said to the Israelites, “I will be with you.”

Nathaniel, also known as Bartholomew, is one of the lesser known disciples, and whose name means “gift from God.” He was the second twin born to Megan and Josh last Sunday. “And who shall I say sent me?” Moses asked God in the wilderness, and God replied, tell them “I am who I am.” I am God, the very Being of all beings, the very essence of Life. I am the Creator of Life, and I am the One who will save you. Yea, though you walk through the valley of the shadow of death, you shall fear no evil, for I am with you. And so, with that blessed assurance, under our own cloud of worry and hope, Pastor Toby baptized Peter (the rock) and Nathaniel (the gift from God) with water and the Spirit, in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Many people know that I am a sports fan in general and a Celtics fan in particular. My least favorite sport is boxing. On Thursday, the NICU at the hospital in Minnesota has a “Superhero Day” in which all the preemies are celebrated as “wee warriors.” Having seen Peter and Nathaniel so soon after their birth, I can understand why. They were beaten up in the birthing process, and yet they came out swinging and fighting for their lives. Punching at this and pulling at that, looking for their victory in the ring, they had plenty of coaches in their corners.

            Endurance tests of any kind require physical health and continuing care. Like fig trees, we all need a little digging around our roots, and nutrients to help us bear fruit. We need mental toughness to get through those dark and rainy days.  Emotionally, we swing from one end of the spectrum to the other, and so we need shoulders to cry on, and people to celebrate with us. In my night prayers, when sleep is escaping me, or worries are waking me, I pray to God, asking that those I love will be “defended from all adversities which may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul.” I remember God “upon my bed, and meditate on God in the night watches” knowing that weeping may spend the night, but joy comes in the morning.

Until the boys lungs are more fully developed they will occasionally need some assistance in breathing. Periodically connected to a ventilator, the boys have air that is pumped into their lungs, keeping their lungs inflated and their blood supply well oxygenated. Without a ventilator, Jesus taught his disciples to pray by breathing. The 1st word of the Lord’s prayer, translated in Aramaic, begins and ends with these words:

            One breath breathing

            May I contain the essence of this One

            May I exist for this One

                        Let me not forget who I am,

                        Made in your image and likeness.

At various times in our lives, and under certain conditions, we all need help breathing. Deep-sea divers, lung-disease sufferers, Mount Kiliminjaro hikers and space astronauts, people with sleep apnea or about to have surgery, folks on airplanes, body-pumpers and marathon runners, hyper-ventilating mothers and fathers, and everyone at all ages occasionally need oxygen. Life is both fragile and hard, and when we are undergoing these kinds of endurance tests, we may need help with our breathing. Breathe, my prayer partner reminds me. Just slow down and breathe. Hook your machine up to God and breathe, She says.

It is tempting to think sometimes that God is punishing us for a reason. Or testing us purposefully. We feel guilty for things we did or didn’t do. We are ashamed for what we said or did not. We think that we deserve our endurance tests, and today’s lessons can tempt us to think that God is a “Gotcha God.” We begin to believe that God is our destroyer rather than our creator, a grim reaper who can’t wait to cut down our fig trees, because we have not borne fruit, or we have behaved irresponsibly, perhaps even immorally.

I don’t believe this. Rather I believe that we are all fundamentally good, and that God created us with free wills to make our own choices. God wants us to choose life and not death, to choose a life that is productive and not destructive, a life that bears a variety of fruit at different times. And while we all know that there are consequences for our choices, we also know that rain falls on the just and unjust alike, and that our God is a forgiving God who loves us unconditionally. With warnings to the church in Corinth, St. Paul reminded them not to judge; for if “you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall. (There) is no testing that has overtaken you that is not common to everyone.”

Perhaps you recall our very first lesson in Lent, when Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness and tempted by the devil. Do not put the Lord your God to the test, replied Jesus. And later, St. Paul wrote, “We must not put Christ to the test.” God is faithful, and trustworthy, and true, even when we are not. “God will not let us be tested beyond our strength,” claimed St. Paul; “and with this very same testing God will also provide the way out, so that we may be able to endure it.”

In his letter to the Romans, St. Paul encouraged them, “Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God, and also in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us.” When we have faith and hope in the life-giving, liberating, love of God, we shall not fall; for nothing can ever separate us from that Love, not even death.

There is a Swedish proverb that claims that shared joy is doubled and shared grief is cut in half. We cannot endure our tests alone. We all need God; and we all need other human beings. We need creatures, great and small, and the natural beauty of creation to restore us to our universal health.

The way out of our clouds of worry, fear, and sadness is Christ. The way out of our endurance tests is Christ. Standing on the rock that is Christ, we remember that life is a precious gift from God. For through the waters of our baptism, we are reborn into eternal life, both now and in the days to come. And so we pray to our God who creates, saves, and sustains us with one breath breathing. 

Exodus 3:1-15

1 Corinthians 10:1-13

Luke 13:1-9

Psalm 63:1-8

Almighty God, you know that we have no power in ourselves to help ourselves: Keep us both outwardly in our bodies and inwardly in our souls, that we may be defended from all adversities which may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.