A sermon by the Rev. Dr. Cynthia Briggs Kittredge, Associate Professor of New Testament, given in Christ Chapel on October 26, 2006

There is not much moral clarity in our public life or in our personal lives.

Military historians talk about the “fog of war,” an atmosphere of confusion where it’s hard to distinguish the contours of the terrain, the position of the forces, and even your own soldiers from the enemy. Today this fog of war has spread from the battlefield “over there” to our own political discourse and obfuscated the true and the false. When “torture” becomes an ambiguous concept, relativism has reached the point of tragic absurdity.

Where we spend the summers, we are dependent on a small boat on a big sea, so the weather’s an obsession -- we listen to every update. Some July’s the low pressure system sets in and for days, then weeks, for fishermen and boaters, the report is the same hour after hour: “Visibility poor in fog and fair in showers.” So we get out the coloring books, make soup, turn up the radio, and wait for it to clear. . .

Poor visibility means a lot can be fudged. A Chief Executive Officer can change the date on his stock options to a few days earlier, and his fortune can be even more huge. A senior member of Congress can sexually harass kids term after term and his colleagues tell each other and themselves – it’s harmless, just warn them to watch out. It’s not serious. Doubts and excuses proliferate, and wind up in acceptance. Today even the tools of science are called into question by those who plant doubt. Instead of the science of evolution, schools can teach the “controversy” over Darwinism.

Meanwhile, while we bewail the murkiness around us, we do plenty of our own spiritual fudging and moral spin doctoring. We make excuses for not making decisions that we should which sound more eloquent and convincing than the simple grace of what’s right. When no one’s there to see or confront us, we can delay and put off and be lazy. What psychologists label “denial” is incredibly powerful – I believe in denial – like Reinhold Neibuhr said about original sin – the only self evident empirically verifiable doctrine we have.

We adjust and get used to functioning adequately in the environment of syrup and mush -- phoniness but it drags on us. Just under the surface of keeping going is wanting to give up, losing hope, getting angry, becoming furious, guilty, depressed despairing. Terminal compassion fatigue makes it really hard to be the people of God. And so we need a preacher, someone to exhort us, inspire us, and then help us forward.

Living is the word of God, active “energetic” more sharp than every two-edged sword, piercing up to the division between soul and spirit, and also between joints and marrow;

The word is able to judge – to criticize the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Nothing in creation is invisible before it, but all things are naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom we must render an account.

The preacher of Hebrews describes the incisive clarity of God’s word, slicing through ambiguity, and shining a light as revealing as the fluorescent lamp in the physician’s office or the . . . or the July sun burning off the fog. We’ve gotten accustomed to sloth, and the preacher offers this swashbuckling picture of the logos, and we say YOU GO.

. “the word is sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow”

The Word is the speech of God, addressed to the people through psalm this preacher is explicating. “Come let us sing unto the Lord. . . . ends with the anger of God, I swore they shall never enter my rest.” The Word will not return empty, ever, but which will prevail and sustain us. The Word is vitally relevant, active, energetic, it pricks us, prods us, wakes us up. The word of God speaks the refugee people of God journeying, tired out, losing vision.

The word is a tool wielded by God with dexterity and strength on which we can rely. The Word of God does not give moral simplicity but critical reflective clarity – intellect, truth seeking, the ability to analyze, distinguish and divide and discriminate. (all these rare philosophical/medical words here – diknoumenos.). We can identify and name torture. Even in an atmosphere of fear. We can stop making excuses for not telling the truth.

When we have gotten dragged down, how heartening it is to hear the truth told. When we have lost our way, what a bracing drink is reason. I think the living and active word of God must be like sobriety, tough as nails, but clarity and life out of death.

At a conference recently I heard a man speak about the twin skills of empathy and accountability in his coaching practice. (Empathy is my strength, so I warmed to that part right away.) Will is a slight man, gentle, pastoral, and all of a sudden he pulls out this long sword. He says it's from the Citadel where his father graduated in 1936. His father gave it to him. . . he explained that he was a conscientious objector, a pacifist, but that this receiving this sword from his father, he understood to be a gift of respect and of power. He had gotten the handle repaired and the blade re-attached. . . and treasured it. To him it represented strength and accountability and the sharp edge his work with people. I found myself strangely moved by this sword and his story (surprising since I am not at all comfortable with weapons or things military or so masculine. . .)

I thought of the Word of God, sharper than any two edged sword, and all the things a sharp instrument can do besides kill and maim. I thought of the white hot intellect and dry humor of Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. I thought of my friend, Tammy, out of the blue faint and dizzy, diagnosed with oligodendroglioma, and the doctor whose knife, laser-like found the dividing place between soul and spirit, joints and marrow and saved her brain and herself.

With this gripping, goose bump raising, galvanizing description of the Word of God, the preacher reminds us that we who bear the name of Christ are not without resources in the wilderness in which we wander. The Word, God’s Wisdom, lives. It judges accurately. It is the only fair and balanced arbiter. When we are about to make an excuse or duck responsibility or speak something not exactly the truth, it’s because we’ve lost view of the Word, before it, no creature is hidden. The brilliant exegete, Harry Attridge, in the Hermeneia commentary on Hebrews remarks offhandedly that the idea that nothing is hidden before God is a commonplace in the ancient world. Perhaps so, but in our culture it comes as a blast of icy and clarifying wind.

We are in an election season. In the midst of a Dean search. The second half of fall semester. Late, late Pentecost. Perhaps visibility is poor. Perhaps fatigue threatens or demoralization. Perhaps we wonder who is making the rules. The preacher says stay the course, take the tools, keep going, look ahead, cheer up. The promise of rest lies ahead, hold fast to our confession, approach the throne of grace with boldness. The preacher of Hebrews embodies the living and active Word, communicating both empathy for our human plight and speaking the sharp demand for honesty and faithfulness. The Word of God, spoken by God, preached by human word, received and discerned by the people of God, cuts through to truth and to healing. It lets us see, allows us to speak in the world, and to render our word to God.

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Amen