There is a practice I recently was exposed to during the meetings I attended to fund our green space initiative. They did what they called a Land Acknowledgement. This may be something you are familiar with in your life. The practice of Land Acknowledgement stems from Indigenous tradition and today’s protocol for public gatherings.
"In recognizing the land upon which we reside, we express our gratitude and appreciation to those who lived and worked here before us; those whose stewardship and resilient spirit makes our residence possible on this traditional homeland of the Lenape (Delaware), Shawnee, Wyandot Miami, Ottawa, Potawatomi, and other Great Lakes tribes (Chippewa, Kickapoo, Wea, Pinakahsw, and Kaskaskia). We also acknowledge the thousands of Native Americans who now call Northeast Ohio home. The greater Cleveland area occupies land officially ceded by 1100 chiefs and warriors signing the Treaty of Greenville in 1795." *Prepared by Susan Dominguez for Social Justice Institute at socialjustice@case.edu.
This Treaty was a short lived agreement that was designed to solve problems that expansion would soon make moot. The first thing I thought about was how native people seemed to look at the land differently than the European arrivals. In many ways it was this difference in thinking about the land that let a mostly Christian people steal land they would often say people were not using correctly. Well we certainly civilized this nation is all I will say at this point as I want to move towards more productive discussions.
Thirteen thousand years ago is the first evidence we have of people in Ohio. They hunted the last of the giant ground sloths. Upon receiving bones to analyze, first found in West Virginia, Jefferson did not attempt a definitive taxonomic classification and kept an open mind, writing “Let us only say then, what we may safely say, that he was more than three times as large as the lion” There is a funny story to me here. Jefferson felt there were not enough big animals in America. Europeans inferred that there was something lesser about the new world. These bones were compared to the king of the jungle for a specific reason.
They were just bones of a long extinct creature and don't really prove anything about America. Do you think they knew it was over. The avocado sure misses them. That big seed was not big for those ground sloths. Would go right through them and accumulate fertilizer along the way. Wonderous was our world created. Beyond counting the number of ways it has been broken. They are not hard to see.
Three thousand years ago the mound builders arrived. An effigy mound is a raised pile of earth built in the shape of a stylized animal, symbol, religious figure, human, or other figure. The largest in the country is in Ohio: Serpent Mound.
I am not simply trying to romanticize the other. Which I have a natural tendency to do. The native people are not perfect. Simple is not always right, but it is more than it is not. Europeans did not bring the first problems to America.
When the Iroquois Confederacy depleted the beaver and other game in its territory in the New York region, they launched a war known as the Beaver Wars, destroying or scattering the contemporary inhabitants of the region. During the Beaver Wars in the 1650s, the Iroquois nearly destroyed the Erie along the shore of Lake Erie. Overall, they managed to expand their territory through the North shore of Lakes Ontario and Erie, throughout Ohio, Indiana and southern Michigan and south from their original Homeland in New York, all the way to the James River in Virginia when the war seems to have officially ended in 1701, but the French began aiding other native people's who had fled west and took nearly all of that land for themselves, naming it the Illinois Colony.
There was a conflict for me that we miss the point that we could take it because they never understood the European idea to own. Maybe a better term to use is western culture. This mix of Christianity and Rome. There is another native story here in many ways lost of my people: the Celts. Many know that Rome defeated us in Gaul, but the real story is that we were everywhere on that continent.
We talk of Galatia which you may not know was a Celtic Kingdom Paul arrived to. They already believed they would be going to a better world. Like the native Americans these Celts expected each man to lead his own way. Most battles in Europe had Celts on both sides. They were who Roman mother's scared their children with to go to bed on time. They were great warriors because they knew they were going to a better world already. They also had no leaders, but those who earned respect.
The greatest Celt and Native American leaders had only their words to draw others to them. People voted with their feet. Rome won with a new model: one god one emperor one way. It is hard to say which gained more. If Rome does not adopt Christianity does it make it to us here today? For me this question is essential. Democracy would come through, but freedom?
I don't need to judge anyone, but personally I need somehow to understand. As a part of generation X, I was looking for a generation why. W-h-y not just the letter y, but we have moved quickly on to gen Z. We dismiss each generation. They will soon dismiss us. We go round and round the generations distracted each in their turn.
Who owns this place is the question I find confronting me as we turn to our scripture. There are many things that I do not control, but how I make decisions is something I can control. Things can go in different ways, but I hear this message that if I can live with how I make decisions I can live with the consequences. Our story from Luke 9:51-62 here I read from the Amplified Bible.
51 Now when the time was approaching for Him to be taken up [to heaven], He was determined to go to Jerusalem [to fulfill His purpose]. 52 He sent messengers on ahead of Him, and they went into a Samaritan village to make arrangements for Him; 53 but the people would not welcome Him, because He was traveling toward Jerusalem. 54 When His disciples James and John saw this, they said, “Lord, do You want us to command fire to come down from heaven and destroy them?” 55 But He turned and rebuked them [and He said, “You do not know what kind of spirit you are; 56 for the Son of Man did not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them.”] And they journeyed on to another village.
Samaritans a people they disliked so much they had a story about the one good Samaritan.
“Lord, do You want us to command fire to come down from heaven and destroy them?” I laugh at the humanness on display here. Our political debates today can seem as clear as they were to these people two thousand years ago. I felt this week to rain down fire I can tell you. Beyond that there is just the idea that this seemed like a question to ask Jesus. Had they recently rained fire down? Was this one story Luke did not collect.
Well there seems to be a type of story here. Even to the stories about Jesus as a youth that still remain around. These followers got their answer. Many people would rain down fire in the name of Jesus. And just as these followers they did not see any reason not to.
The Son of Man did not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them. If only his followers taking over Europe and North America would have this first in mind. It is complicated and I can even accept that people believed they were making people's lives better. People today still usually believe they are trying to make their lives better. They need believed in when they should just believe. Following Jesus is an exacting Discipleship:
57 As they were going along the road, someone said to Him, “I will follow You wherever You go.” 58 And Jesus told him, “Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay His head.”
Here we have something beautiful. Partisan.
59 He said to another, “Follow Me [accepting Me as Master and Teacher].” But he said, “Lord, allow me first to go and bury my father.” 60 But He said to him, “Allow the [spiritually] dead to bury their own dead; but as for you, go and spread the news about the kingdom of God.” 61 Another also said, “I will follow You, Lord [as Your disciple]; but first let me say goodbye to those at my home.” 62 But Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back [to the things left behind] is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Here we are confronted with a simple truth. People are living different lives. There is only one way to go. There are many things you can do. You can delay. You can distract. You can justify. You can neglect. You can imagine. But in the end there are things that go together and things that do not. Freedom from loss. Freedom from pain. Freedom from making good decisions will lead no where.
In Galatians 5:1 again from the Amplified Bible, we see something of this Celtic Kingdom in Anatolia that Paul was sent. They knew to walk by the spirit, they got him:
5 It was for this freedom that Christ set us free [completely liberating us]; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery [which you once removed].
I think we yoked ourselves too much these last two thousand years, but here we are. It is not too late.
Continuing in Galatians 5:13-25
13 For you, my brothers, were called to freedom; only do not let your freedom become an opportunity for the sinful nature (worldliness, selfishness), but through love serve and seek the best for one another. 14 For the whole Law [concerning human relationships] is fulfilled in one precept, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself [that is, you shall have an unselfish concern for others and do things for their benefit].” 15 But if you bite and devour one another [in bickering and strife], watch out that you [along with your entire fellowship] are not consumed by one another.
In my darkest moments I recognize that we may have already lost. Maybe already too much pollution. I don't remember the last bug I cleaned from the windshield of my car. I remember it was different. The opportunity of new worlds became opportunities for the sinful nature so far. This is what the kingdom of God brings to end with your help. This is why it takes so long.
16 But I say, walk habitually in the [Holy] Spirit [seek Him and be responsive to His guidance], and then you will certainly not carry out the desire of the sinful nature [which responds impulsively without regard for God and His precepts]. 17 For the sinful nature has its desire which is opposed to the Spirit, and the [desire of the] Spirit opposes the sinful nature; for these [two, the sinful nature and the Spirit] are in direct opposition to each other [continually in conflict], so that you [as believers] do not [always] do whatever [good things] you want to do.
In direct opposition to each other [continually in conflict] - in so few words an explanation.
18 But if you are guided and led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the Law. 19 Now the practices of the sinful nature are clearly evident: they are sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality (total irresponsibility, lack of self-control), 20 idolatry, sorcery, hostility, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions [that promote heresies], 21 envy, drunkenness, riotous behavior, and other things like these. I warn you beforehand, just as I did previously, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
Here we are at peril. Often we think the clearest sounding parts of the scripture we understand the best. We can each make our own definitions. How can we know which is the right ones. Defining sorcery is not that far off from a description of what we do today. These phones we each carry now tell me this is not sorcery. Strife, well there are entire universes here. You can define these things how you wish. I would only say that if it seems easy you might look closer. If there is one thing the last two thousand years tells us: it is not easy.
22 But the fruit of the Spirit [the result of His presence within us] is love [unselfish concern for others], joy, [inner] peace, patience [not the ability to wait, but how we act while waiting], kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature together with its passions and appetites.
25 If we [claim to] live by the [Holy] Spirit, we must also walk by the Spirit [with personal integrity, godly character, and moral courage—our conduct empowered by the Holy Spirit].
But the fruit of the Spirit. But God it does not seem like we are going anywhere. We Acknowledge that the land has a date with history as we do. Looking forward there is no future for this planet. We look back and we find difficulties and we look forward and we find even more.
Do things happen for a reason or do they not? This is the real question. Did Jesus use Rome to spread the word. Did Rome use Christianity to consolidate power? They weren't doing many bible studies. These words we read were used more as weapons than the meditations they are.
It is not clear who has used who, but we are here.
Here are many things that I do not control, but how I make decisions is something I can control. Things can go in different ways.
“Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay His head.”
Patience: not the ability to wait, but how we act while waiting.
- (Summer Solstice
by
Roger Echo-Hawk)
In our retellings I suppose we don’t much bother
Keeping straight the bent details, crooked roads
In one tale after another, how we handed down
Sidelong versions of whatever happened next
Under ebbing oceans an ancient underground
Somewhere in the receding past they kept saying
Their slippery sense of community mattered, it
Shaped them, their history, the story they filled
Themselves with every day, waking their minds
Connecting to the history of memory as if it all
Felt real, seemed specific enough, logical enough
Those changing details that give rise to the world
In our retellings of the tale along a crooked road
Let Us Pray:
Great Creator
We have trouble even to define our words
We have trouble even to deal with the past
We have trouble even to deal with the future
Thank you for this Now
Be with those within any radius of our building
Be with us here in our circle that struggles to close
You have brought us so far
We just ask that you bring us all home
As long as it takes please don't miss one
Amen
Benediction
We are waiting
We are going
We are called to act
We make decisions that make the world
Here we have something beautiful.
Partisan.
Nottingham UMC 6/26/2022
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