Tear Open the Roof: A Response to Sandy Hook- Sermon Dec. 16, 2012

On Friday afternoon the sermon I was planning to deliver this morning blew up in my face. I guess it wasn't really the sermon that blew up but it was actually that the world around us that blew up. The sermon I had prepared was a nice, neat and proper Advent sermon speaking about John the Baptist and a brood of vipers and baptism, but it just didn't speak to the life and death events that have been swirling around for the last few days. And so that sermon has been mothballed for another day and another time.

December 14^th may be a day that changes the face of our country forever.

For many of us the struggle with life and death didn’t begin on Friday morning with the senseless executions of 20 some odd children and teachers at Sandy Hook Elementary -- for many of us life and death hit us squarely between the eyes on Tuesday when we learned that our friend Lynn Avery had lost her valiant battle with cancer. For me personally, this week also has been shrouded with the fact that Friday was also the eighth anniversary of the death of a seminary classmate Adam Goren, Adam was found dead in his dorm room in 2004 at the young age of 26.

On Friday, as the news started to trickle out about the tragedy in Newtown - my grief and anger began to well- with each new detail-- a shooting at a school, twenty children dead, a whole classrooms of children decimated the weight upon my heart got heavier and heavier- the grief more real, the anger more pronounced.

I can remember thinking-- How long o Lord, How long must we endure these tragedies- How long till we see the days that the prophet Zephaniah promises - how long until You turns away our enemies, how long until we will fear disaster no more, how long until God will save the lame, gather the outcast, how long until our fortunes will be restored…”

After that lament-- the practical thoughts crept in-- I wondered why couldn’t God have blown out a tire on the shooter’s car causing him to careen head first into a tree on his way to the school, why hadn’t God stopped it- why hadn’t he intervened. I knew the answer in my head- God gives us free will, with free will he gives to us the ability to choose him or not, and with that he also gives us the power to do horrific, unspeakable acts--- but even knowing that didn’t make of course didn’t make Friday any less infuriating.

It really wasn’t until I read Bishop Franklin’s statement on the shootings late on Friday afternoon that I realized that I had been thinking of God in an almost clinical, distant, detached sense- I had been thinking of God as very removed from the situation in Connecticut, It wasn’t until I read Bishop Franklin’s response to the shooting- did I realize that God was not removed- but that God too was weeping for those children, that God’s heart was shattered on Friday morning along with the parents and grandparents and brothers and sisters, sons and daughters and husbands and wives of the slain. I remembered that God’s heart breaks with every sadness that invades our lives.

Of course, God had stepped in to the fray - God was there—in very tangible heroic ways- like when Victoria Soto shielded some of her first grade class from the bullets being fired from Adam Lanza’s gun, ultimately giving up her own life in the process.

In the early 1980’s , the popular music group U2 wrote a song entitled Sunday Bloody Sunday- it was a song written in response to British troops killing unarmed civil rights demonstrators in Northern Ireland. At the end of the song the lyrics take an unexpected turn they say —“The real battle just begun- to claim the victory that Jesus won on Sunday Bloody Sunday…” “The real battles [has] just begun- to claim the victory that Jesus won on Sunday Bloody Sunday…”

That is our role as the church on this day--- that is our role in the face of unspeakable tragedy, in the face of unspeakable evil to shout from the rooftops, to claim the victory that Jesus has won. That light does shine in the midst of darkness, that love does triumphs over evil, that life does emerge out of death. That God does win!

Today, our job is to stand in the gap for our brother and sisters in Connecticut, in Sandy Hook, in Newtown, we stand in the gap for all who lives have been scarred by gun violence--- we stand in the gap for all who eyes are filled with tears on this day-- we stand in the gap proclaiming the victory that Christ has won on the cross at Calvary-

On this day we lift our brothers and sisters into our arms and carry them in all their brokenness to the doors of heaven and into the presence of almighty God- we make prayers on behalf of those whose only prayers today are the tears that fall from their faces.

We make prayers today for those whose only prayer is the unquenchable grief that has ripped their hearts open.

We come before God for them and for ourselves, asking for healing, asking that someday we might open our eyes to see and know fully --the victory that Christ has won. AMEN.

I would to share a prayer written by a colleague named Sarah in response to the horrific event in Norway a little while back- I have modified it slightly. Let us bow our heads in prayer.

God, there are lots of words we want to say to you,

lots of people we want to pray for with you,

places we want to give into your care.

Today we want to say things to you about Sandy Hook -

we want to say, Why?-----What?

We want to say - No!

We pray with you for the people of Newtown, Connecticut

those who have died,

their family and friends who have lost sisters, brothers, mothers fathers,

children, friends ...

the people of the city and the country whose hearts are breaking -

our hearts are breaking with them,

and we know your heart is breaking too.

We pray for our brothers and sisters at Trinity Episcopal Church in Newtown- Mother Kathie Adams Shepherd fill her with your strength and especially we pray for the Wheeler family of Trinity who lost their beloved Ben, We pray for Ben’s father, David and his mother, Francine.

We pray for the emergency services people finding the broken bodies

healing the wounded, protecting the living.

We pray for Adam, the person who did this terrible thing

for his troubled soul.

We give to you what is your land,

our country, our nation

may you be known as peace and love.

may we not forget the land and the people of Newtown and Sandy Hook

in the weeks and months as they heal. AMEN [1]