Rev. Jennifer Whipple
Congregational Church of Brookfield (UCC)
11th Sunday After Pentecost
August 16, 2009
"Inquiring Minds..."
1 Kings 2:10-12 & 3:3-14
Prayer:
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our minds and hearts
gathered here this day be acceptable in your sight, Oh Lord, our Strength and
our Redeemer. Amen.
Have you ever been in the check out line at the grocery
store caught behind someone with an unusually large order and need to fill some
time? So what do you do?
If you are like me you start to browse through the magazines – check
out all of the headlines and subject titles.
If you are really lucky you are in a checkout line that has some crazy
tabloid magazines. And I’m not
talking about the ones that say everything about who is dating or breaking up
with who in Hollywood, but true supermarket tabloids – like the old National
Enquirer, Weekly World News, or the Sun.
Why do we have these things? Because
“inquiring minds want to know.” “Inquiring
minds – like me!” So we stand in
the checkout and read headlines like:
o
“Woman Delivers Own Baby While Skydiving”
o
“Man Rushed to Emergency Room After Money Burns Hole In His
Pocket”
o
“Servant Tipped 25 Tons of Gold”
o
“Researcher Determines Deer and Antelope Never Played
Together!”
o
“Judge Orders Baby Cut In Two As Part of Verdict”
o
“Generous Kids Ship Their Uneaten Peas to Starving Children in
Appalachia”
o
“Man Weds Wife Number 700”
o
“Satan Hires Publicist to Improve His Image”
Sometimes the things we are intrigued by, the things we
want to know more about are just crazy. And
to tell you the truth three of the headlines I just read weren’t tabloid
headlines at all. They are real
parts of the story of King Solomon. In
this successor to David we meet someone just sensational enough that he could
have made the supermarket tabloids if he lived in the here and now.
In Solomon we meet a young man and king who reigns in the peace that his
father had established. In the forty
years of his reign Solomon managed to expand his kingdom and create immense
prosperity by establishing alliances and trade routes throughout Asia, Africa,
Arabia, and Asia Minor. He had the
original Temple in Jerusalem built. He
uttered more profound sayings, verdicts, and lessons than any other king before
or after him – which is why the majority of the book of Proverbs about a
parent teaching their child, the Song of Songs about love, and even some of the
Psalms are attributed to him – and why people came from all over to sit with
him and learn from him, as well as brought him gifts from all throughout the
known world of the time. If there
was one thing Solomon was known for it was his wisdom.
Nowadays we seek wisdom in all sorts of ways.
Two new commercials on TV now illustrate this point perfectly.
The first is for the new question answering service called “kgb.”
One of the newer commercials in the series of “kgb” ads is about
college mascots. The question that
someone is randomly looking for the answer to is “Is there a stranger mascot
than the aardvark?” The answer the
“kgb” folks give is “the boll weevil” – the commercial then promptly
cuts to a shot of the aardvark and boll weevil fighting in the school hallway,
while the kgb spokespeople proceed to share that you can text them any question
from your cell phone, and they will answer it – all the while charging special
rates.
The other commercial is two women in a Yoga studio – one is pregnant.
The one woman asks the other, “So what have you found that you can’t
eat while you’re pregnant.” The
response is “Panda gives birth to largest cub born in captivity.”
The first woman asks, “What? No
I mean like I heard you can’t eat fish while you’re pregnant.”
The reply this time is “Live fish the Adirondacks.
Let host Eugene Cogan show you his favorite fishing holes.”
“Are you okay?” the first woman finally asks.
And the other woman replies, “Oklahoma – abbreviated OK.
Oklahoma, where the wind goes sweeping down the plains.”
Search overload – the voiceover explains.
After all, all you need to do in order to find the answer to a question
or information about ANYTHING – whether completely reliable or not -- is go to
bing.com, yahoo answers, or Google it! This
is the way that we have come as a society to seek out information, knowledge –
wisdom. We want to be right in any
situation – to know the answer to the question that will get us the final pie
in Trivial Pursuit or the win in Jeopardy.
Solomon ended up the wisest king in history, not by Googling every
question that he had when he was first appointed to the position, but rather by
asking God for it in a dream. God
appeared to Solomon and asked him what he wanted.
“Ask what I should give you,” said God to Solomon.
Solomon replied to God, “And now, O Lord my God, you have made your
servant king in place of my father David, although I am only a little child.”
(Most sources say that Solomon was probably only about 20 years old at
the time.) “I do not know how to
go out or come in. And your servant
is in the midst of the people who you have chosen, a great people, so numerous
they cannot be numbered or counted. Give
your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, able to
discern between good and evil; for who can govern this your great people?”
20-year-old Solomon is approached by the Lord and told to ask for
anything. Instead of wealth, power,
or long life, Solomon asks for wisdom – for a discerning mind.
What would I or you have done if we had been in Solomon’s shoes at
20-years-old with the world at our doorstep?
What would we do now if God came to us offering anything?
Would we ask for something that this world offers or would we ask for a
special gift, talent or wisdom to face the world we live in and to accomplish
the tasks to which we have been called?
Because you see the wisdom we are talking about here isn’t just about
knowing things. It isn’t just
about accumulating more and more knowledge like we do through years of school or
book learning – or web searching. What
we are talking about is knowing how to best survive and thrive in life –
it’s about the hands on, street smart, trial by fire kind of knowledge and
understanding and strength that comes when we truly live our lives.
It is discerning the right course of action to take to keep your family
afloat when your boss comes in to tell you that you need to take a pay cut or
worse off that you no longer have a job. It
is the conviction to fight when the doctor comes in to tell you that you have
cancer and have a choice of how to treat it or not.
It is coming to know what to do in the situation when your son or
daughter comes to you because they are in trouble and need your help or in those
joyful moments when they tell you they won an award or are getting married.
The wisdom we are talking about here is about what to do each day as we
encounter new situations – ones that challenge us and ones that are cause for
celebration alike.
Solomon knew that he would be in for quite the ride as the king of the
newly united Israel under his rule. He
knew enough to think that people might come looking for him to have the answers
in his role as king, priest, or judge. He
knew enough to understand that inquiring minds would be searching for him –
and even trying to trick him in order to prove him wrong and weak.
So instead of asking for riches and power, Solomon asks for wisdom.
Solomon requested something that would stick with him long after the
worldly perishable things were gone, used up, and wasted away.
In humility he realized his own limitations and the great task to which
God called him, and he relied on God to accomplish the tasks ahead of him.
And God was so pleased with this request that God granted Solomon not
only the wisdom he sought, but also the riches and power and prosperity that he
did not. The only thing God required
of Solomon in return was faithfulness – for Solomon to follow God’s ways.
Yes. The Solomon of renowned
wisdom is the one we remember most – the one who answered questions for
prostitutes and the Queen of Sheba alike. And
that would have been the only face of Solomon that we needed to remember if he
had only continued doing what God had asked of him.
After his dream God spoke to Solomon two other times during his reign,
reminding him of the conditions God laid out for him.
As Solomon was building the Temple in Jerusalem God spoke to him saying,
“About the temple you are building – what’s important is that you LIVE the
way I have set out for you and DO what I tell you, following my instructions
carefully and obediently.” And
again later in his reign, as God saw Solomon beginning to slip in his
faithfulness, God warned him that if Solomon lived in his ways and followed
obediently Solomon would continue to live a prosperous life, and if he didn’t
– if Solomon worshipped falsely or didn’t obey God – the bet was off.
Unfortunately in Solomon’s case he grew to love money and women and
power more than God. Solomon’s 700
wives led him to worship other gods and build shrines to them.
In doing so Solomon faithlessly disobeyed God’s orders.
Solomon went from a font of wisdom to power hungry, instead of from a
position of power to increased wisdom. If
Solomon had only gotten out of his own way – followed the Godly wisdom that
was helping he and his kingdom to prosper, instead of the earthly wisdom that
brought him down in the end – we would have a different story.
Because after Solomon walked the path of unfaithfulness God considered
him a lost cause and promised that his successors would never again rule a
united Israel, and shortly after his death the kingdom was divided – leaving
only one tribe to be ruled by the descendants of David.
Even in his folly though, Solomon teaches us a lesson – imparts some
final wisdom. It is through his
actions that we are reminded to walk the walk.
It is one thing to speak of faith, but it is another thing to live it –
and to live it to the point that we then have wisdom to pass down to the
generations to come. And living it
is not always easy. In this time in
our world when we have a major war that continues to rage on, when the
healthcare debate looms large, when immigration is an issue – we are often
times asked to live and proclaim opinions that are counter to the popular
culture. We are called to proclaim
peace and to work toward bringing it about.
We are called to share our thoughts with those in power – to work
toward a healthcare solution that allows all people to care for themselves and
their families. We are called to
minister to refugees – to offer them a safe space in our country and help them
thrive – when many others are turning their backs.
We are called to respond to everyday situations with a wisdom that is
deeper than mere book learned knowledge or simple common sense.
Instead we are asked and invited to live each day in discernment with our
faith as a guide – working to bring about God’s will.
That is the difference between asking God to be a magic genie and give us
power and riches – and entering into a covenant with God that invites God’s
wisdom and power into our lives. The
world’s wisdom says do your own thing, take care of yourself, get ahead –
and God’s wisdom says serve with the gifts I have given you following me, and
I will be certain that you are taken care of.
“Ask and it shall be given unto you.
Seek and you shall find. Knock
and the door shall be opened unto you.”
On mission trip and again the other night at our Christian Education
committee meeting a prayer was shared that is called a “Prayer for Today.”
It speaks to making decisions and living our lives with the wisdom that
God offers in order to make the most of every day.
I would like to close with the words of this prayer:
This is the beginning of a new day.
God has given me this day to use as I will.
I can waste it....or use it for good,
But what I do today is important,
Because I am exchanging a day of my life for it.
When tomorrow comes, this day will be gone forever,
Leaving in its place something that I have traded for it.
I want it to be gain, and not loss,
Good and not evil,
Success and not failure,
In order that I shall not regret the price I have paid for it.
May we face this new day and all of our days making the best of the time God
has given us, serving our world with the gifts with which we have been blessed,
and calling on the wisdom of God. Amen.
