The Rampage

The Rampage

A sermon delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

August 5, 2018

at Bethany Presbyterian Church, Zuni, Virginia

Psalm 19

Revelation 22: 1-5

Let us pray,

Help us to see despite our eyes

Help us to think outside of our minds

Help us to be more than our lives

For your eyes show the way

Your mind knows the truth

Your being is the life.

Amen.

Rolling Rolling, Rolling, Rolling River Ramage, the song. . . let’s go down

I was asked at the beginning of the week, Pete, why do you think they called this thing, Rolling River Rampage. . . . I said I think they were just going for the alliteration thing. . .

And rampage sounds like an adventure kind of thing. . . or a Monster trucks kind of thing, Rampage, Mayhem, Grave digger.. . . Sunday Sunday Sunday. . . it has that kind of feel

But what does rampage actually mean?

I had to look it up, I mean I kinda know what it means or at least what it feels like it means. . .

I remember my buddy Peel had an intellivision. . . (old gaming system) and he had this game called Rampage, where you were like a gorilla and you ran around breaking buildings. .. and I think Player 2 was a Rhino or something.

            Definition – To rush around violently or out of control

                        To go through and areal making a lot of noise, possibly causing damage

                        Violent and usually wild behavior

So you can see where the video game was coming from?

But VBS? Wild River Rampage. . . noise, wild, damage?

I think the curriculum writers must have done VBS themselves before. . .

It was a wild River Rampage, but the verse, theme of the week

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you. . .

Presence, the presence of God in all things, even during a wild river rampage. . .

And having made it safely through the rampage part, I want to get into the river

But let’s start with the old Testament Lesson. . .

Psalm 19^[a]

For the director of music. A psalm of David.

¹ The heavens declare the glory of God;
    the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
² Day after day they pour forth speech;
    night after night they reveal knowledge.
³ They have no speech, they use no words;
    no sound is heard from them.
⁴ Yet their voice^[b] goes out into all the earth,
    their words to the ends of the world.
In the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun.
⁵     It is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
    like a champion rejoicing to run his course.
⁶ It rises at one end of the heavens
    and makes its circuit to the other;
    nothing is deprived of its warmth.

⁷ The law of the Lord is perfect,
    refreshing the soul.
The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy,
    making wise the simple.
⁸ The precepts of the Lord are right,
    giving joy to the heart.
The commands of the Lord are radiant,
    giving light to the eyes.
⁹ The fear of the Lord is pure,
    enduring forever.
The decrees of the Lord are firm,
    and all of them are righteous.

¹⁰ They are more precious than gold,
    than much pure gold;
they are sweeter than honey,
    than honey from the honeycomb.
¹¹ By them your servant is warned;
    in keeping them there is great reward.
¹² But who can discern their own errors?
    Forgive my hidden faults.
¹³ Keep your servant also from willful sins;
    may they not rule over me.
Then I will be blameless,
    innocent of great transgression.

¹⁴ May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart
    be pleasing in your sight,
    Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.

Look at what the Psalmist connects here. . the great creation of the world, the sun in its orbit, the stars, the very natural order of the universe  he created. . . he connects all this, with what he calls the Law of the Lord, but he doesn’t stop there he calls them statutes, precepts, demands, decrees, and connects it with fear of the Lord, as well. It is as if all this is the natural order, and us a part of that, that the Law of the Lord is directives to us to live, just like the sun is directed in its orbit, and this law and loving care of the creator God is on going, it happens on the daily, it happens every hour, it is happening every moment. . .

That the Lord who creates all of the world, and everything in it, thinks enough to include us each in that creation, with the same care, and detail, inside and out, ongoing, both in substance, our skin, our organs, our flesh and blood, in spirit, too, but also our lives, the events, the people he gives us, and prescribes how it is we live in that world. If God brings all of these together, quoting from a typical marriage, let no one tear asunder.

We live in a connected world, with one active present creator making it.

So it would make perfect sense, what the prophet Isaiah tells us that God has promised, that when we go through the waters, God will be with us.

And there is great comfort we can take from that, that he is with us, but there is more we can glean for not only is he with us but he made the river, too, himself.

Rivers are important in the Bible. We find them created in Genesis 1, we see them marked and described in Genesis 2, how the Garden of Eden finds its place in connection with four great rivers. We hear of Abraham leaving his home in Ur, which is situated on the Euphrates. . . we learn through out the story of the Nile, the great center of civilization in Egypt, how its flood waters brought great riches, where Joseph saved his family from starvation and famine, to where, having been forgotten his people were enslaved on the banks of that same Nile. Only to find themselves wandering in the desert, until being called to cross over Jordan, and into the promised land. Until it was many years later, that it was on the banks of the Rivers of Babylon, that they sat and wept as Jerusalem was destroyed and the people were exiled. And Jesus is baptized into the Jordan, God baptized into that human history, into that story, that he himself is writing.

And we know God is writing it because there is a river to come. . . for John exiled on the island of Patmos, receives a vision that he shares in order to strengthen and call Christians to be witnesses to Christ, even though it might cost them dearly. . . they can do so because God is in control, and Jesus is Lord. This is towards the end of that writing, what we call Revelation chapter 22: 1-5

 22 Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb ² down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. ³ No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. ⁴ They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. ⁵ There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.

Rivers everywhere.  . . and of course that makes sense historically, humans needed rivers, to transport grain, the floodwaters would replenish the soil making it fertile, irrigation was much more possible near great bodies of water, so naturally we see people needing rivers, and making their homes on the banks of great rivers.

Langston Hughes, in his poem Negro Speaks of Rivers writes

I’ve known rivers:

I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the

     flow of human blood in human veins.

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

Souls that grow deep, like the rivers, and he even marks the fact that each of us is kept alive by countless rivers within us, our very life blood, and the flow of it all.

I know something about rivers too.

I grew up just north of the Potomac, where I found a taste for Blue Crabs, and made fast friends with those who, caught them.

Then moved to Christchurch, on the Rappahannock, whose campus rises above those waters, I sailed, I fished, I swam, I taught, I wrote, I crossed it, sometimes on Sunday mornings to attend church on the other side of the river. I played music on its shores for alumni fundraisers and a few weddings.

To Hampton, across the York, and was married just a short bagpipe led walk from the church to that next river in Hampton.

Then for the last 8 years I was away from rivers, and perhaps that is why something always felt a little off.

And now I’ve come back the James, the Black water. . .

But the river that taught me the most, I guess is technically the James, for this river joins with the Jackson to form the James, the Cowpasture river. . . Bath and Allegheny County.

I can see it all. Each bend. Each memory.

Floating. From the bridge. .

Carp hole, deep slow water

Around the curve to the Camp

Straight to the swinging bridge and beyond. . .

A bridge stands at the river’s rightward bend.

Technically it forks there, but straight and left

The stagnant water stands still to end in mud

Still in view, unless that is, the water’s high,

While the river just falls and pours to the right,

Shallow and fast, it is low enough to ford, but

High enough to send you around that bend

Into unknown darker shadowed waters,

If you don’t paddle quick enough to shore.

Rivers work like that, and single life flows as such,

Choices  you make, dead-ends, and mysteries,

Where one’s life races seemingly out of control

Around a new bend, or slows into a muddy slough.

Seemingly out of control. . .

Fear of what led around that curve

Flood waters and holding on. . .

But then we went

Water falls, sharp rocks, long bend, took much more time. . .

God was there through it all, or he made that river and he made us

My soul has grown deep in that water. . .

But life is much like that river. . .

It bends and speeds up, there are jagged edges, there are slow places, deep dark places where shadowy fish swim below, it twists and turns, the flood waters rise, but there is one constant, it flows, the waters change,

Heraclitus, you can’t step in the same river twice

God is making all things new

IN our lives, like rivers,

But at the same time, God is with us through it all.

I can’t think of any better lesson to teach our kids,

I love that this curriculum didn’t try to teach them how to behave,

But instead sought to teach them simply that they are loved. . . by us. . . and by the God who will always be with them no matter what. . .