The Scripture Readings this week are:
- Exodus 1:8-2:10
- Psalm 124 (Read Responsively from VU p.848)
The Sermon title is Creative Disobedience
A picture of some controversy
from earlier this summer
Early Thoughts:What do you do when the rules are unfair? What do you do when the government is not acting in the best interests of the whole community?
Pharaoh felt threatened. The Israelite/Hebrew people were very numerous. What if they took power or joined with a foreign power? Imperial societies often worry about revolts by those who are not in power. Pharaoh's first response was to increase the hardships faced by the people, to turn them into slaves. (Which seems an odd choice -- we are worried these people might revolt, let's oppress them and give them more reason to revolt -- but maybe that is just me, after all the British acted similarly in a variety of places, as did the white rulers of South Africa.) Then Pharaoh decided that if the problem was too many strong Hebrews (particularly men) the obvious solution was partial genocide.
First it was the midwives job to commit infanticide at the moment of birth. All male babies should die. The midwives know that this is wrong so they refuse to do it. To cover themselves they tell a story about how robust the Hebrew women were. So then a general rule goes out: see a male Hebrew child and drown them in the Nile. We are not told what the response of the general populace was to this rule.
Enter a family from the house of Levi. A son is born to them. Not wanting her child to be slain his mother (traditionally called Yocheved) fashions a small boat/basket and gives her son to the Nile. Technically she follows Pharaoh's rule, with a bit of a twist. The basket boat is discovered by Pharaoh's daughter who quickly figures out what is going on here. However she is moved by pity and instead of following her gather's genocidal command she arranges for the child to be raised and protected and cared for. The child becomes her adopted son, a boy named Moses. As the faith story continues he plays a pretty important role.
Many of us have heard the story of the baby in the basket since we were toddlers. But it was not until I was an adult that I fully recognized the importance of disobedience in the story. Without the disobedience of the midwives, of Yocheved, of Pharaoh's daughter, the story would not be possible. When one is in the midst of a tyrannical, genocidal, oppressive system the faithful response is disobedience.
Within Canadian constitutional thought we have the idea of "peace, order and good government". Within our religious tradition, our Presbyterian forebears, working from the words of Paul in 1 Corinthians 14;40, spoke of doing things "decently and in good order". Many times church people have pulled up Paul's words from Romans 13 about submitting to authorities. Few of us were raised to be rule-breakers. But are we also sometimes called to be disobedient?
I think so. The challenge is to know when and how. I think of the idea of non-violent non-co-operation espoused by Ghandi in India and in the US Civil Rights protests of the 20th Century. These were acts of disobedience that helped make significant changes in the world.
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| A few forms of this have shown up in my Facebook feed over the years |
What are the criteria we use to determine when we need to engage in acts of disobedience? In a world where we are taught as children the importance of following the law how do we know when to intentionally challenge that law?
In the course of the pandemic this question has come up more than once as people protested what they saw as government over-reach with masking requirements or gathering limits or vaccination requirements. Many of those protestors saw themselves in the same category as the Civil Rights protestors of the 1950's and '60's. Others saw those protestors as working against the common well-being of the society.
For me the way we approach the question of disobedience is rarely about one specific rule. It is about the big picture. AS people of faith our first loyalty is not to a specific government. Our first loyalty is to God. As Christians we are called to participate in the growth of the Kingdom of God, which Jesus proclaimed. Our call is to obey the law of love, the rules that work for the full and abundant life for all of GOd's beloved children. When other rules or laws impede the ability for all of God's beloved children to have full and abundant life we may well be called to disobey.
At times to disobey (without doing damage or violence to others) may well be a duty. That is a challenge for many of us. After all it is now how we were raise.
Can we be creatively (and non-violently that may be critically important for followers of Christ) disobedient when God calls us to be? Can we help weaken the powers of oppression and death by refusing to follow their rules?
--Gord
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