Sermon: Lekh Lekha, Genesis 12:1-7 (August 20th, 2023)

Genesis 12:1-7

Now the Lord said to Abram, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. ²I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. ^…In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’

4 So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. ⁵Abram took his wife Sarai and his brother’s son Lot, and all the possessions that they had gathered, and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran; and they set forth to go to the land of Canaan. 

Sermon: Lekh Lekha

When I graduated from high school, I immediately enrolled in a university in Seoul, the capital city of Korea, and left my home in Gwangju, the fifth biggest city in Korea, the birthplace of Kia cars and Keumho Tires. My family and friends had long been aware of my intention to leave; my hometown was a place of oppression and protest, where a thousand students were openly killed in the streets by a military dictatorship, just a year after I was born. I wanted to leave that city, because I did not want to go through one more day of envisioning the streets wreathed in tear gas thrown by the police and the Molotov cocktails thrown back by the protesting students. So, moving to university was my first experience of “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.” (Genesis 12:1)

In today’s story, Abram (He would be given his new name, Abraham, by Yahweh later) is called to leave his homeland, Haran, and move to the unknown region of Canaan. Unlike travelling, moving (in this case, also migration) entails the aspect of uprooting. Abram set forth to Canaan with partner Sarai and his nephew Lot, and all the possessions that they had gathered and acquired in Haran. But would be life the same as living in Haran, even if he brings everything with him to the new region? 

Min-Goo and I migrated to Canada from Korea after two years of marriage. I count that as my second “Leaving Haran”. We first settled in Burnaby, BC. Before we decided to leave Korea, I knew that if I did not make changes, I could be marginalized in the patriarchal family system of Korean society and the church, as a young mother with no job and the wife of an ordained minister. The ordained minister could become a prince at church, while their wife gets buried in the patriarchal expectations of becoming a silent, smiling angel. Min-Goo and I decided together to leave Korea to experience more open systems of church and society. After some searching, Min-Goo was called to be a youth minister in a Korean United Church in Vancouver. Then, I quickly enrolled at the Vancouver School of Theology. God’s calling is mysterious; the immediate reason for my enrolment was not only the desire to start myself on a track to ordination, but our need for a student visa, so that Min-Goo could obtain a spouse work permit, to sustain our family’s finances. Since then, I’ve made many “Leaving Haran” decisions, including moving back to BC to join BVU.

The immediate reasons for moves could be due to job changes, to join family, or because we are seeking milder weather. Upsizing, downsizing, retirement, university, there are many different reasons to move. Some reasons remain mysterious to others, like my family leaving BC for Winnipeg. In 2014, Vancouver and Vancouver Island had been the only regions I lived in. I did not know Canada was so wide, and assumed that every other place in Canada was not significantly different from Southwestern BC. But I still believe that the land and the history called me to the prairies, at that time. Because of my innocence, I could laugh and sincerely enjoy the farewell party that Chemainus United folks threw for me and my family. 

In the skits, they showed me two things and said, I will need both in Winnipeg. The blue line paint colours in winter: Keep yourself warm so that your face doesn’t turn blue. If it turns this shade of blue, it’s no good! And the mosquito net for summer to cover my entire head and face… Some reasons are easy to understand, like my family moving back to BC after eight years in Winnipeg - no more mosquito net.

Some of us make moves for reasons beyond our control. The diaspora of African-descent peoples… Natural disaster or climate change diaspora. Economic collapse, war, genocide. A few years after I left Korea, there was a very difficult economic depression. Young people, especially, struggled because of unemployment and insecurity. They called those years “Hell Choseun.” Choseun is a dynasty’s name in Korea. Korea was in real trouble; it felt like the country was stuck in Hell. Many chose to emigrate in those years. 

People decide to leave their country to seek human rights. I have known LGBTQ people in the world, leave the culture they grew up with, their families, everything they’ve known, for freedom and safety. 

In the Bible, we can find many who make moves. Our spiritual ancestors migrate or become refugees. Hagar, Sarah, Abraham, Moses, Ruth, Jesus, and the disciples, almost everyone we know in the Bible, or at least the ones we find most interesting, have displacement in their stories. The reasons for their moving are different. Years of flood, drought, hunger. Becoming captives. Becoming slaves. Escaping from slavery. They seek liberation; they choose diaspora. What the ancestors in our stories have in common is that on the crossroads of life and death, they deepen their understanding of their relationship with God - through covenant and promise - and listen to God’s call. For Abram, today’s story is the first moment of being called. In Genesis 12:1, God says, “Go from your land, from your family, to where I will show you.” What is interesting about this call and covenant is that, in Hebrew, it begins with “Lekh Lekha”. And the repetition of Lekh Lekha is unusual because both words are in the second person. So, this call of, “Abram, Go, Leave” literally translates to “Abram, you go to you”. (Thanks, Janet Ross)

God’s call to Go, Leave, Move, is not about WHERE you go. Not the destination, the final location. “Abram, Lekh, Lekha”, God’s call to Go, Leave, Move, is about “Go, to you, Go and know yourself.” You must be you. Abram, Ha Na, Shelagh, Kyla, Micia, Broad View, First Met, you go to you to follow my/your call. The blessings that accompany our going, leaving, moving, are not about continuing offspring like the number of stars in the night sky, a promise of future prosperity, but Abram’s first and fundamental call from God is to know yourself, journey with yourself, to recognize who you are, your potential, your liberation, and your call to become you. You go to you is presented as the first step of following one’s call. 

So, my invitation for you today, Broad View and First Met, is to find your Lekh Lekha call from God, or from within, to know that, whether it is your voluntary choice, or a mix of diaspora transition and dislocation, the first call to Go, Leave and Move, is to find ourselves, establish ourselves, lift up ourselves in the original blessing of being Beloved. To follow God is to become you, to be beloved for who you are, and make ourselves whole. It is to journey with you, the core of you. Lekh Lekha! You go to You. 

Through changes, moves, migration, dislocation, everything that can both challenge us and bless us, what does not change is that you are in the moment. You are in the movement. You are accompanied with God’s call to go to you, to find, establish, liberate the original blessing within you, and with you, to be beloved. 

It is about seeking liberation towards the original blessing that is more beautiful, true and good than the forces that restrain you and oppress you. God calls you into the process that moves you into a state where you can love yourself. Yesterday, I had a dream, and in it, someone asked me, “What if the understanding of the direction of my life comes later, belatedly? What if I only come to know the reason for God’s call after all of this?” So, I responded, “The Word of God is called ‘logos’. ― Logos is like lekh Lekha ― . The logos moves. The logos is here. The Word of God, the logos, is present throughout all of space and time, and it is also, always, presently, now, accessible to anyone. The Lekh Lekha (“You for you”) is moving within you, living with you, right now. What we can do is to listen. 

I have faith that the call has moved my journey through moving to Canada, moving to Winnipeg, moving back to BC. I have been accompanied by the call. Even outside of my knowledge, it never left me for one second. 

When Sarai and Abram left Haran, the story notes that Abram was seventy-five. Perhaps the Ancient Hebrew math for calculating human age may be different from ours now, but it is certain that Abram was not young. God was calling him to have a youthful mindset, though – to be willing to move, to change, to adapt. Even after Abram and Sarai moved to Canaan, they still needed to make another move - moving into Egypt, due to famine. (In the meantime, God gave him a new name, Abraham, meaning Father of Many). 

The womanist theologian Emilie Townes beautifully says that the fullness of liberation is a process. “Liberation and freedom are not the same. Liberation is a process. Freedom is a temporary state of being. Liberation is dynamic. It never ends.” 

BVU and First Met, now becoming a young church, and yet still old, the call is within us, moving, and living with us, calling us to Go to You, leaving Haran, the familiar, in favour of  the call towards the beloved unfamiliar.

 

Sermon: "We-racle" (John 6:1-14), August 6, 2023

Sermon: We-racle                   

Ha Na Park                  for Broad View United & First Met UC

On July 8th, my mother-in-law and Min-Goo’s niece arrived from Korea for a month-long visit. They will leave soon, next Tuesday, and I am already sad about their departure. We were completely ready to share our home and this city with our two guests. Then, two weeks ago, my mother-in-law’s sister, Min-Goo’s aunt, also joined us, and suddenly, Min-Goo and I were in charge of feeding and entertaining seven people, including our two kids. Seven different food preferences, seven different eating habits. My mother-in-law loves sweet and sour Korean style salad for every meal. Our niece loves seafood; our kids are not fans of seafood. They are fond of Korean hot and spicy chicken and western food. In addition, for health reasons, my mother-in-law needs to have two snack-times between the three main meals. In the meantime, Min-Goo developed his sourdough making skills using this month’s holiday time. I started making Jun Tea (something like Kombucha), a fermented probiotic drink. It turns out our holiday month became not just a “break” from work, but beautifully and metaphorically a time for “breaking bread” (and brewing fermented teas and sourdough starters every night.)

It was a busy month, and it offered me the wonderful regularity of providing bread for seven people in July. When I am focused on tasks and want to finish them on time, I tend to skip lunch. It could be the influence of capitalist culture, where one is expected to work non-stop in order to finish as much work as quickly as possible. I might have learned it growing up in super-competitive Korea, but North America is not that much different – success is associated with sacrifice of personal time. This holiday month, some time after I built new routines of baking bread and cooking rice every day, I gave myself more time for eating, with great pleasure and with a full table. I learned that I liked it! As you see, I could use more meat on my bones. While Min-Goo and I focusing on feeding family and making sure everyone is fully satisfied with each day’s meals, I also ate fully and happily and it was SO GOOD. I felt healthier, more stable, and energized. 

The first thing that shocked me when my family moved back to the Island from Winnipeg, especially in Victoria, were the apple prices at our first grocery store visit last September. All apples were, at most, $ 1.99 per lb in Winnipeg. Here, prices started with the number 2- two dollars and 99 cents per lb. The first thought that occurred to me was “Oooh, I don’t think we can afford these apples.” Then, a few more visits led me to think “Can we really live here and still eat apples?” My kids love apples. We started to buy apples only after some people told us where we can get more “affordable” apples - farmers markets are good - and Min-Goo got his second half-time job at UVic. The top two troubling challenges in the city are food insecurity and housing, along with a lack of family doctors. In the holiday month that blessed me and my family, I learned that, while my family can enjoy good food and nourish our bodies, enjoying food security, a safe home, time to fully rest as our right, these rights become privileges if others are not able to enjoy full access to them. Students struggle with food insecurity. Our younger generations raise their voices for affordable housing. Emerging leaders need to be ambitious to build a community that elevates values such as mutual aid, community care and the radical power of dreaming. Each time a property is sold to a market developer, the rental price goes up and more people lose the stability of having a place to rest and call their home.

What if we hear today’s story as if “The other side of the Sea of Galilee, the mountain place with a great deal of grass” is this place, this city, this planet, where five, fifty, or five thousand people can go hungry or lose their homes, no matter how hard they keep fighting to keep their place, to feed their family and secure stability. Then, keeping that question in mind, I invite you to wonder who the child in the story would be in our own reality. I have met some emerging leaders in the city, who told me they were organizing a community called the “Plenty Collective”, because, for example, “There are not many places in this affluent and expensive city where young people can experience being a community, meeting friends and having food, without spending money.” 

I confess that I learned why some of us, including myself, can be silent in front of their persistent cries for justice, when I attended a GVAT (Greater Victoria Acting Together) event about housing last year. Moving to this part of Canada from Winnipeg, we experienced huge ‘sticker shock’ with housing as well as apples. We were lucky enough to be able to buy a small old townhouse, and the stories that the settler and indigenous folks shared about why they were losing homes or could not afford to buy or rent homes in Victoria were painful to hear. Right now, it seems like we are scrambling to save ourselves, protecting our few loaves, our just-enough fishes. It would be miraculous for us to have the resources to act together, like the child in the story.

I would also like to invite you to imagine with me, what if we witnessed the event of feeding the five thousand through the eyes of the child who offered their small lunch and saw in wonder everyone that day fully filled, in both body and spirit? I am sure the child, that day, witnessed something I would like to call, a “We-racle”. You got it! We-racle, not a me-racle. What if we witness today’s story, traditionally called, Jesus Feeding the Five Thousand, as a ‘We-racle’, not a miracle? Let me explain. The evangelists who wrote the Gospels interpreted the feeding of the five thousand as a miraculous sign; the impossibility of feeding “five thousand” people with two loaves and five fish points to Jesus being the Son of God, a confirmation of divinity. The purpose of the evangelists’ storytelling is to reveal Jesus who can do a Me-racle. A “We-racle”, however, offers a new understanding of the story. The moment when a crowd of strangers transforms into a community where everyone makes sure no one goes hungry, in body or soul, becomes the sign because it was a We-racle. The sign of the “Word made flesh”’ is not about the individual divinity of Jesus (which makes a Me-racle); the sign is revealed in the community witnessing the beauty of the five thousand people, the holy ones’ open arms. The child saw a We-racle. 

Somehow five thousand and more people learn from the child, just as we learn from emerging leaders. Their lunch and their voices. The least recognized, neglected, or ignored groups will be able to lead us in the ways closer to what the Kin-dom of God can be like. Those folks, including myself, who are more complicit than others with the privileges of food security and housing can also break our silence and act together. Take the example of climate change. If we owe a lot to the generations that follow us, then let’s not just be “generous” (= Giving as good but optional, rather than intrinsic to our moral obligations to one another in an unjust world.) Let’s not just be generous, but “give back” to them what we unquestioningly inherited: the health and well-being of the earth and their future. 

The body is the place where we learn about how God’s Kin-dom vision works. HERE IS THE MOUNTAIN where, in the Gospel story of feeding the five thousand, no one, no child, went away hungry. We, Jesus’ mountain people, are called to be an “embodied” community in which everyone’s well-being is cared for, especially the body, nourished by good food, the inclusive Word, and full rest. That large number, 5,000, means that we continue to reach out beyond the boundary of “us”. Broad View United us. First Met United Church us. 

How does a community move forward? 

I met a highly successful and experienced Executive Director of an organization in this city. She said, “It is not the strategic planning that moves forward a community.” Now, the following is my interpretation of what she said. What really moves forward a community is when the community is a safe and welcome place to be. Hunger can be many things. It's not just bread that sustains us; emotional, intellectual, spiritual and physical needs can, and must, be fed. Your hopes, your dreams, your true feelings, how you experience belonging and inclusion, these are bread and fishes, the ingredients of a We-racle. In a welcome and safe place, everyone can be vulnerable and honest, speaking the truth, including how they experience hunger, or do not, in the community. No one should fear to say they are hungry, stuck, tired and need good food, nourishment and rest, stability, safety, fulfillment of their personal purpose. Therefore, let us, First Met and Broad View, become one beloved community, sharing the ministry of counting 5000, 5001, 5002, until all on earth, all bodies in the city and the world, find fully embodied wholeness. Let such impossibility lead us to the beauty and the impetus of the We-racle Kin-dom.