February 16, 2025 · Rev. Dr. Liz Rice-Smith · Jeremiah 17:5-10; Luke 6:17-26
Rev. Dr. Liz Rice-Smith pairs Jeremiah's image of those who trust in God as trees planted by the water with the blessings and woes of Luke's Sermon on the Plain, then says goodbye to the church's own tree beside the waters: the old ash on the green, felled this winter after the emerald ash borer got to it.
Transcript
Like trees beside the waters. That's what we are.
This Sunday is the sixth Sunday in the season of epiphany, and the season of epiphany is unusually long this year due to the lateness of Easter. After today, we still have two more weeks before Ash Wednesday, which marks the beginning of Lent, and Ash Wednesday is on March fifth. Palm Sunday is on April thirteenth and Easter's on April twentieth this year. So we still have some time left to study the nature of Jesus ministry and his teaching and his healing, his miracles to see the ways all that in his incarnation was prophesied by Jeremiah some six hundred and twenty five years before. Before Jesus was even born.
Luke's blessings and woes tie in well with Jeremiah's warning that God sees beyond, before, under and above what is external to look on our hearts.
Now, Jeremiah, you may or may not know, is a Hebrew prophet, and he's known as the weeping prophet, and he's credited with writing the book of Jeremiah, the book of Kings, and the Book of Lamentations. Jeremiah preached against injustice, and he also preached against false worship. He called for reform. He prophesied about the destruction of Judah by Babylonia, and he preached about the promise of a new covenant with God and with Israel. He helped his fellow countrymen survive disasters such as the capture of Jerusalem by the Babylonians in five eighty BC. Jeremiah was not exactly popular amongst his own, and he was taken by Jewish exiles who feared reprisal from the Babylonians. And if you want to read about that, chapter forty three in the book of Jeremiah is the book for you. But even in Egypt, Jeremiah contributed to prophecy and rebuke Extrabiblical sources give an account that they stoned him to death. Biblical accounts say that they imprisoned him deep in a cistern, let him stay there for a good long while, and then pulled him out so he might not have been a happy man to begin with. And he certainly wasn't so happy after that.
But his message is incredibly important. Through it all, Jeremiah anticipated the coming of Christ. Jeremiah anticipated the true heir of David and the worldwide extension of grace through Jesus, far beyond the national borders of Israel. Jeremiah's prophecy resounds with the theme of God as the gate, as the gate keeper of promises. And when God makes a covenant, when God makes a covenant with the nation of Israel, God will not let that relationship be thwarted even when God's people are thwarted. The pledges I will be your God and you shall be my people is the constant promise of God to Israel throughout the book of Jeremiah.
And let us remember that Jeremiah wants us always to remember to trust in the Lord. Jeremiah wants us to be like trees planted by the water, sending our roots out by the streams, and even to the ocean, to the ocean waters. Jeremiah wants us to remember and to trust in the Lord when we are afraid. Jeremiah wants us to not be afraid, but knowing that we will have fear. He wants us to love our green leaves. And in years of drought, Jeremiah wants us not to be anxious. Jeremiah asks us to continue to bear the fruit of our trust in God, and that trust is what makes it possible for us all to bear fruit.
And then, Luke, different from the Beatitudes in Matthew five, Luke's version also contains the Wos in the sixth chapter of Luke. Before today's lesson, so graciously read by Barbara, we read that on the Sabbath, Jesus and his disciples had plucked heads of grain in the field, rubbed them in their hands, and eaten them. And the Pharisees did not like for that to happen on the Sabbath. They didn't like that at all. But Jesus reminded them that even King David had done that years before. They didn't like being reminded of that either.
Chapter six in Luke also holds the story of another Sabbath. When Jesus entered the synagogue and was teaching. When the man with a withered hand came to learn and Jesus just invited him to come and stand in the middle and to put his hands out. The man did this. The man who had just come to learn the man did this, and immediately his hand was restored. And that infuriated the Pharisees too.
In chapter six, we also hear the story of Jesus going to the mountain to pray a very important trip to that mountain, because it was after that that he called his disciples, choosing twelve of them and calling them his apostles. According to Luke Simon, whom he named Peter and his brother Andrew and James and John and Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon, who was called the zealot, and Judas, son of James and Judas Iscariot, It. Who would betray him? And then more healing.
Our scripture today, as Barbara read, tells us then that Jesus came down with them, standing on a level place with a great crowd, his disciples and people who had traveled from all over to hear him traveled from Judea, Jerusalem, and the coast of Tyre and Sidon. And why had they come? Why had they traveled there? They came to hear him, and they came to be healed of their diseases. And those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured. To every one in the crowd was trying to touch him, for power came out from him, and his power healed all of them. And then he told them that the poor are blessed, for theirs is the kingdom of God. The hungry are blessed and will be filled. Blessed are those who weep, for they will know joy. And blessed are you when people hate you, when people revile you and defame you. Rejoice in that day, because great will be your reward in heaven.
From our call to worship this morning, this sixth Sunday after epiphany, from our Call to Worship lectionary passage from Psalm one. We are also asked to remember that happy are the trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither in all they do. Their leaves prosper. And our gift from Jeremiah. Blessed are those who trust in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord. And they shall be like a tree planted by the water, sending out its roots by the stream.
To the ones who were listening to Jesus that day, the Beatitudes were a brand new message. It was new and it was not easily understood. Across lands, across seas and across times. The Beatitudes bring a message that is distinctly Christian, wondrous and troubling. And it is not just for Christians, it's for all of us. The Beatitudes, their teaching conflicted with every norm and every tradition that folk knew. So radical were they. And to hear that those who were usually invisible were in God's sight. To hear that God blessed the lowly and the lonely. Those whom others barely noticed, to hear themselves described as blessed was so shocking. Then, as it can be shocking now. And that message was a huge surprise to those who heard Jesus say it. And it may surprise some of us continue to surprise us even today.
And today, God's story continues, and we find ourselves included in that story, not just included. In fact, we helped to write the next chapters. Our God is still speaking and we are still listening. We are amongst the people in God's sights today, known and loved and blessed.
And the trees. Biblical perspectives on trees and on our tree that was beside the waters. For perhaps as many as two hundred years. We have been so fortunate in Rockport to enjoy the life, the shade, the color, and the beauty of the bark. The trunk, the limbs and leaves of our First Congregational Church of Rockport UCC. Ash tree on the green. Our tree beside the still waters. Near the streams flowing into Front Beach and into Front Beach itself. This tree has been and will always be remembered as an important presence on our green for us as congregants and for the whole community. People who live here and the many who come to visit.
For months now. Our trustees, our trustees have been struggling to make the right decision for us and for our tree. Rick Kasten, Jeff Lyon and Marina Huntsman. Janet Fox, bill Elwell. Paul Hurst. Did I leave any of the trustees out? Have been working together in consultation with Herb Culturists and other specialists to determine what the tree needed and how they might best tend to those needs. Truly a tree beside the waters. And may we be like that tree bearing fruit. Providing joy and shade. And all the rest.
Some of you may have seen this article in the Gloucester Daily Times, and some of you may not. And if I can bear upon you to listen, I'd like to read it to you. Pam Beck and Dan Bing made sure I had a copy of it so that we could have it in our history collection, along with any photographs, any comments, any memories, any pictures from family or other kinds of church events that have been celebrated with that tree over the years? And this is a story that is written by Stephen Hagan called Storied Tree in Rockport to be felled. [reads the article in full]
And so if any of you would like to take a look at this, or you want me to take a picture and send it to you, I will.
Rick Kasten was there the day. That Buckley Tree Care from Essex, the company that did the work of removing the tree, Rick was there and he describes and has taken pictures of the inside of the tree, which was filled with gallons, more than four feet of water. Is that right, Rick? I don't know how much more of this. Water came gushing out of the tree. Many of the limbs had were almost turning to dust on the inside. And lo and behold, lo and behold, there was a family of squirrels living inside the tree. And hopefully they have found a new place to have their nest.
None of. None of the goodness of these memories, and none of the goodness of the shade and cover that this tree gave to us all these years, can take away the sadness that we feel about losing the tree, but it can also serve for us as a really wonderful reminder that we had a tree that stood beside the waters. That it leaves were beautiful, that its bark was strong and it served for many years, and that a new tree or a couple new trees might stand in its place. We know the joy shared by generations of residents and visitors to this dear town will not ever be lost.
And so may we be like this tree. Even when it's time for us to come down. May we trust in the Lord to handle any fears we might have, whatever they might be. And may this trust, which is promised in Psalm one, by Jeremiah and by Luke. May this trust sustain us, inspire us, and may we inspire each other this day and every day. In Jesus name, Amen.