Sermon: The Voice of the Lord
Texts: Psalm 27; Matthew 3:13-17
Date: January 9, 2005


The amateur video begins with the same image you've seen on countless amateur videos and photographs: a blurry picture of a thumb across the lens.  But then the thumb moves and the camera focuses on the surf on a southeast Asian beach December 26.  The soundtrack of the blurry video is people chatting in a language I don't understand; their tone of voice suggests they are discussing the weather, or their breakfast, or their afternoon plans, or something like that.  The camera zooms in on a wave.  The sound of the surf gets louder.  The sound of the voices stops as the camera and its owners focus on the huge wave just offshore.  The next human voice you hear is awestruck, as the camera operator and his companions say the first word on the tape I recognized: WOW.
"The voice of the Lord is over the waters; the God of glory thunders, the Lord, over mighty waters.  The voice of the Lord is powerful; the voice of the Lord is full of majesty." [Psalm 29:3-4]
Was the roar of the tsunami the voice of the Lord? 
I don't think there is a simple answer to that question. 
My first impulse is to say a very definite "No!"  I despise theologies that are so desperate to solve all life's mysteries that every disaster is interpreted as God's punishment.    One of the first things that came into my mind as the story was breaking was a fervent hope that none of our Christian brothers and sisters would go on the airwaves and declare that God was trying to drown a lot of Muslims and Hindus because they didn't love Jesus.  I was a little out of touch with news media the week following the tsunami, being in rural Montana and Idaho where there were limited sources of news and commentary, so I don't know if anyone slandered God and besmirched the Church in this way.  I hope not.  Was the roar of the tsunami the voice of the Lord?  Not if you hear in it the roar of a vindictive killer God. 
    I did hear a news radio host repeating what he'd heard some Christian theologians say, that this is another sign that we are in the end times.  That's a less direct way of saying that the voice of the Lord was in the sound of the wave, like an early warning signal.  The apocalyptic texts in the Bible (those writings having to do with the end of history as we know it) mention things like wars and earthquakes as signs of the last days.  Wars and earthquakes, we got.  Whether we are in the last days we cannot know.  The Bible is also clear on that topic.  The end will come like a thief in the night.  Those who interpret this disaster as a sign of a coming apocalypse will have to wait to be vindicated or proven wrong like all their apocalyptically minded predecessors through the centuries.
Because I personally reject both of those ways of hearing God's voice in the tsunami, it's tempting to leave it my answer at "no."  But there's something about that word.  The one the guy holding the camera zooming in on the tsunami and all his companions said with one voice.  WOW.  It's a moment, captured on tape and playing on the BBC website, of an encounter with a force so powerful that all of human enterprise is reduced to puniness in a flash.  And the Holy dwells in that encounter.
Psalm 29 is assigned by the lectionary for today.  It's a WOW psalm.  Very ancient.  The writer has been through a heckuva thunder and lightning storm.  Generations of poets and mystics have heard the majestic voice of God in the rumble of thunder, and that's what this poet hears.  The voice of the Lord is portrayed in his words as a formidable driving force in the earth.  "The God of glory thunders…the voice of the Lord breaks the cedars…the voice of the Lord flashes forth flames of fire…the voice of the Lord shakes the wilderness…the voice of the Lord causes the oaks to whirl, strips the forest bare."  And in the temple the people all say….AAUUUUGGGH!  Is that what the psalmist says? 
Not at all.  "And in his temple all say, 'Glory!'"  Which to my way of thinking is just a fancy-schmancy way to say, "WOW."  It's not just a matter of being impressed by the forces of nature and feeling terrified in the face of them, as if God were a military despot showing off the tanks, Hummers and really big guns in the arsenal.   It's more a matter of being rather suddenly and urgently reminded that there is a force more powerful at large in the universe, which puts us, appropriately, in our place.  A force of nature can become an icon for us, something through which we see the majesty of the Creator and get a little perspective on our lives.
I don't watch the weather channel on TV but I'm aware that they run a program called "Storm Stories."  The very existence of such a program is a measure of our ongoing fascination with weather that can kill us.  Weather simply does not listen to the human command, particularly in winter.  Storms teach us over and over about our finitude and the world's power. 
The words of the psalmist remind us that we might hear the voice of the Lord in or through nature and also above or around the sound of the storm.  Peter Weaver writes about Psalm 29, "This is not just a spectacular reminder of God's omnipotence in nature but also the comforting word that God gives strength and peace to God's people in our history lived out in the context of nature and thunderstorms…In all of life's changing landscapes, experiences, and calendars, 'The Lord sits enthroned as king forever.'"  Even as the waters roar, the cedars break, the wilderness shakes, the land floods, God is enthroned as sovereign over all and makes the divine voice heard.  God is not identical with the storm, but God's voice is in the storm, and above it.  Glory!
Jim Taylor regularly paraphrases the psalms in contemporary language.  He tries to capture and rephrase the ideas behind the psalms more than just restating the words.  Listen to his version of Psalm 29:
1            Trust God - don't pin your faith to human capabilities.
2            Science and technology, wealth and popularity -
These will all pass away.
Only God is worthy of lasting worship.
3            Fame and fortune will not save you when the tempest strikes.
The winds whirl in; waves crash upon your shore.
4            Houses collapse like cards; corporations crumble; assets become worthless.
5            Branches break off; mighty empires are uprooted.
6            In a storm, you are as naked and helpless as the day you were born.
Your possessions, your wealth, your status are useless to you.
7            There is just you and the power of God.
8            Before God's anger, you tremble like a twig in a tempest.
9            All that you depended upon is stripped away, like the last leaves from autumn trees.
10            Before God's majesty, you face your own frailty.
Nothing can save you - except God.
11            Only God is greater than every human crisis.
Only God can sustain you through the storm,
and carry you to the calm on the other side. 

Was the voice of God in the tsunami?  If those who experienced it and those of us who contemplate it from afar are stripped of the house of cards we call security for a moment to realize that "in a storm, you are as naked and helpless as the day you were born, your possessions, wealth, and status useless," facing our own frailty, we might hear the voice of God anew.  We might again realize that only God is greater than every human crisis, and only God can sustain us through the storms and carry us through to the calm on the other side.  Then the voice of God is in the tsunami.  And that goes for our personal catastrophes as well as the cataclysms of a global nature.  Is the voice of God in shattering diagnosis of cancer or Parkinson's?  It is.  Not as a voice announcing punishment for some past sin, but as a voice reminding us that only God is greater than every human crisis.  "May God give strength to the people!" [Psalm 29:11]
I adjusted the language on that last phrase of verse 11 in the interest of avoiding portraying God as male but I realize I robbed it of some of its power.  The verse actually says, "May the Lord give strength to his people!"  His vs. the.  You see what I removed.  The sense of possessiveness.  The people are his people, or her people, if you want to include holy femaleness as you envision God.  Whichever pronoun you choose or avoid, it's essential to retain the sense of possessiveness.  Just as the voice of God in and above the storm is a reminder that the whole earth belongs to God, the voice of God prompts us to remember that humans belong to God.  We belong to God.
We hear the voice of God at Jesus' baptism declaring ownership.  The voice of the Lord of Psalm 29 says "This is my cosmos" just as the voice at the baptism says "This is my son."  We often read that line this way: "This is my Son."  Perhaps we should read it another way: "This is my Son."  And that voice, I am convinced, is not aimed exclusively at Jesus.  We who share in Christ's baptism share in that claim God makes on us.  We are named and claimed in baptism.  We are named Beloved, and claimed as God's own sons and daughters.  The subtext of every baptism is "this is my daughter, this is my son, the beloved.
Textweek.com has a movie concordance which I was scrolling through the other day in connection with the theme "baptism."  The movie concordance lists movies that have scenes that might connect with the lesson of the day.  I was surprised to see Pixar's "Toy Story" listed.  I know that movie pretty well, being a parent in a video consuming household.  I couldn't recall a single baptism in it.  You know what the concordance cited?  You know how Andy writes his name with an indelible magic marker on the sole of Woody's plastic boot?  That's it.  Later on, when Buzz Lightyear comes into the family of toys, it is a sign of Andy's favor when the child writes "Andy" on Buzz's sole as well. 
Baptism is a sign of God writing God's name not on our soles but on our souls.   We belong to God.  The mark is indelible.  That's a wondrous thing, to be named, to be beloved, to be owned.  But there's a fearsome side to it.  A weekly email newsletter I get, Rumors, included the author's memory this week of an encounter with a new neighbor some 20 years ago:              One Saturday afternoon the doorbell rang. The young couple at the door giggled a little and then said, "We were having a party with the folks next door, and they said a lady reverend lived here. We thought it'd be kinda sweet if she could pop over and baptize our baby."
            I tried to explain that baptism was a very serious business, but I don't think they were really listening. "If you'd like to leave me your phone number, I'm sure she will call you to arrange a time when you could come and talk about your child's baptism."
            "Nah," they said. "No sweat. We just thought it'd be cute."
Do you see the problem with their perception?  If you take the claims of baptism seriously, baptism is anything but "cute" no matter how "cute" the one being baptized may be.  When we baptized we are compelled to grapple with God's claim on us.  What does it mean to belong to God?  It means we are not completely in control of our own destiny.  We are not our own, at least not exclusively.  I tried to say that to a young person recently who was planning a three day fast which culminated on a day when she had considerable family and work-related responsibilities.  I am certainly not against fasting, particularly when one is undertaking it as a means of spiritual focus, as this young woman was.  But we discovered a different perspective as we talked about who and whose we are.  She thought her fast was her business only.  I think we are stewards of our bodies but not their owners.  The family and the community had a stake in her health and ability to function, and from my perspective God gives us to those networks of people.  Our lives have stakeholders besides our selves, and God is ultimately the creator and owner of every person.
The voice of God, then, may startle us by calling us to tasks and errands we hadn't yet realized were ours.  The voice of God calls us to health and wholeness we haven't yet claimed, not just for our sake but for the sake of the families and communities to which we have been given-or more accurately, to which we have been loaned.     God ultimately holds the title to our earth, which is fairly comfortable for us to acknowledge.  It's a bit more challenging to concede God's possession of our bodies, our skills, our resources, and our time.  But that is the radical claim of our faith, signified in our baptism. 
With this claim in mind, we can hear the voice of God in the tsunami in a different way than those we have already considered.  God has a claim on our compassion.  Haven't you seen it in a marvelous way this last couple of weeks?  The newspapers are chock-full of announcements of fundraisers for tsunami victims.  Musicians and carpenters and poets and personal fitness trainers and chefs and waitresses are offering up their talents in service to the hurting victims of disaster.  Youth are collecting coins and children are baking cookies to sell and people of all ages are emptying out their piggy banks in a flood of generosity to answer the flood of seawater.  Churches like ours all over the world are receiving special offerings to send help.  We have heard God name all her/his children beloved.  We have accepted God's claim on our life energy, some of which is suspended in the form of money and skills we can share. 
The voice of the Lord is powerful; the voice of the Lord is full of majesty.   The voice of the Lord calls you beloved and calls you to be part of a ministry far larger than yourself.   Hear it and answer.