“How Lovely”

Psalm 84

A sermon preached by the Rev. Douglas M. Donley

August 26, 2007

University Baptist Church

Minneapolis, MN

 

            I had the fine opportunity to greet a portion of my UBC family at the home of my biological family in Cleveland, Ohio this summer.  The UBC Bell Choirs stopped by the First Baptist Church of Greater Cleveland on their tour and our family was lucky enough to be there.  The Church is often called the Holy Roman Baptist Church of Cleveland.  It’s big, ornate and filled with stained glass.  It has an entire education wing, a separate auditorium that they use for a contemporary worship service, and sits on eight acres of land, three of which is a parking lot. 

I loved that sanctuary and that building growing up.  The sanctuary has enough carvings and pictures in the windows to keep people occupied if you ever found your mind wandering, like when the sermon gets really boring.  They even hang their advent wreath from the ceiling, something the Worship Planning Team wants to do here.  The organ has pipes on both sides of the front chancel and a new set in the back balcony.  The steeple is tall and I confess to have rappelled off of it one summer night in my youth.  I heard more than one of the bell choir members say, “Low Lovely” when looking at the place. 

I’m sure the architects had Psalm 84 in mind when they built that beautiful Baptist temple in Cleveland.  Psalm 84 rejoices in the security and beauty of the Temple of God.  “A day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere.  I’d rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than to live in the tents of wickedness.”  “How lovely is your dwelling place, O God of hosts”

            The Temple in Jerusalem was indeed a beautiful place when it was built by Solomon and his minions almost a thousand years before Jesus.  It was made of stone and adorned with cedar and gold.  The Ark of the Covenant was in the Temple as the footstool of God.  It resided behind a curtain in a chamber called the Holy of Holies.  Only the high priests were allowed in there.  When Jesus was crucified, the Gospel of John says that the curtain of the Temple was torn in two, meaning that God is no longer a mystery that is only attainable by the holiest of religious hierarchy.  God is available and viewable to all.

            The Temple was destroyed in the year 587 BCE when Jerusalem was conquered and the people were sent off into exile.  It was rebuilt after the 50-year exile, but it was a poor substitute for its former glory.  Herod the Great repaired the Temple and adorned it with Roman as well as Jewish symbolism.  It was destroyed again in the year 70 of the Common Era, and has not been rebuilt.  The Muslim Dome of the Rock stands upon the site of the old Temple.

            The Temple was built as a final resting place for God and God’s people.  It was a permanent tent of meeting.  It was where the sacrifices were made and the people felt heard by God. 

Of course, it was fraught with problems.  The Prophet Jeremiah thought the people spent so much time thinking that the temple would save them that they ignored the work of justice, peace and mercy.   He even went so far as to say that their belief that the temple would save them was a form of idolatry.

            And yet, people continued to love the temple.  It was one of those things that granted security and was a reminder of the presence of God.

            This building which houses UBC is a lovely dwelling place.  Patrick Mavity and I had the opportunity to give our new staff members Deirdre Hinz and Billy Cooper a tour of the building a few weeks ago.  As we walked around the Labyrinthian passageways, they both commented upon the beauty of the building.  This is the site of many holy things that have happened.  While this is not the only dwelling place of God, when we come here, we are more attuned to God’s presence.  That’s what good liturgical space does.  This is the place where our collective memory resides from a wedding 25 years ago to a Memorial Service two weeks ago.  Ken Pennings, the Director of the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists (AWAB) commented back in February that this was one of the most attractive and best kept church buildings in the AWAB family. 

            Think about your favorite place. 

It might be this church building or another one from your past. 

It might be a place in your home. 

It might be a lake up north where the loons call to each other in the twilight. 

It might be the boundary waters. 

It might be the old family homestead. 

It might be the seat you occupy next to your life-partner. 

How lovely is that dwelling place. 

It is a lovely place because you feel secure there. 

You feel whole there. 

You feel grateful there. 

You feel inspired there. 

            Many of you know that our family had a farm outside of Cleveland that was the gathering spot for the family for the better part of 90 years.  I have fond memories of being with cousins and grandparents and extended family.  I loved the water from the spring house, flying kites on Sunday afternoons, watching the sunset while spitting watermelon seeds at my siblings and cousins.  While the farm has since been subdivided and someone else’s houses are in the fields of my memory, it is still one of my favorite places.  Sometimes places exist only in memory.

            Our family had the opportunity to visit the homestead where Kim’s mother grew up in Kentucky this past summer.  We visited the graveyard across from the Baptist church and saw the markers for the generations there.  We lingered in that lovely serenity.  Then we drove to the old farm.  As we crested the hill, we saw the old tobacco drying barns in the distance.  But as we got closer, we saw that the land was littered with junk cars.  We shook our heads and tried to keep in mind that the memory of that old place was a lovely one, even if it was presently ugly.

            The lovely dwelling place is the one where you feel whole, or at least put in the direction of wholeness.  We all need places like that, even if they exist only in memory.  The Psalmist may have been writing this from his or her memory.  It’s unclear whether this was written before or after the destruction of the Temple.  But it is clear that the memory of the dwelling place of God gave the writer comfort. 

            You know as well as I do that a dwelling place of God is not dependent upon a building.  Jesus said that we are God’s temple.  How lovely is that dwelling place?  There is an entire industry based upon appearance.  Our family watched a two-hour movie on the Discovery Kids channel last night.  I think the movie actually had about 45 minutes of content.  The rest was commercials.  And the commercials were for Barbies and Bratz dolls and cell phones and commercials for the fact that they were going to run the entire season of Discovery Kids channel for 72 hours straight, “so make sure you have your butts on the couch for the DK marathon”.  Our kids are already obsessing about their weight.  They are extremely concerned about their appearance and are buying in to the media-driven concepts that say loveliness involved being rail thin and buying lots of designer things. 

            The truth is that our bodies are part of the lovely dwelling places of God.  I’m not talking about physical attractiveness, but the wonder that is the complexity and variety of our bodies.  99 percent of our bodies are identical.  It’s only the surface that makes us different.  But God dwells within each of us.  And that’s a blessed presence, don’t you think?

            How lovely is thy dwelling place?  Is the place the psalmist referring to the Temple? Is it the land? Is it our own heart? Where does God dwell? Where is God most obvious? Is all the loveliness in the world the sole handiwork of God? How about the drought and the flash floods?

            I believe that God is in all of the handiwork we see.  God is in the storms and the droughts and the mountains and the intricacies of each living thing.  God is in all of it and more than all of it as well. 

How lovely is thy dwelling place?  We are talking about all of creation and all of the people and plants and animals, the stars and the galaxies.  That is the dwelling place of God.

The question for us is how do we make God manifest.

            That’s the rub. 

            How do we live our lives inspired by God?

            How do we live our lives as if each person and each thing is a portion of God’s handiwork?

            How do we make manifest the inspiration and blessedness that is God’s presence in us?

            Think about the time and places where God was most obvious to you.

            The loveliness of God is exhibited through making music.  I think of choral and orchestral music in particular—you bring all of these disparate voices and instruments together to create something inspiring.  I can’t read Psalm 84 without singing the tenor line to “How Lovely is Thy Dwelling Place” from the Brahms Requiem.

            We make the lovely presence of God manifest by recognizing the divine spark light in all people.

            We do this by taking a stand for those less fortunate than ourselves.

            We make God’s loveliness manifest by loving our enemies and praying for those who persecute us.

            We make God’s loveliness manifest by asking the right questions and rejecting the easy answers when they make us feel better about ourselves and less about someone else.

            We make God’s loveliness manifest when we create great art.

            We make God’s loveliness manifest when we hold another close.

            We make God’s loveliness manifest when we work for peace with justice;

            When we provide comfort from the storms of life;

            When we offer sanctuary to those who have been persecuted or excluded by religion or by society. 

            All of this is a part of God’s loveliness.

            When we think of how lovely is the dwelling place of God, we may well think of those holy places in our world.

            But I also hope that we think about the holy lives that inhabit those holy places. 

            When I was growing up at the First Baptist Church of Greater Cleveland, I was in the children’s choir.  It was the baby boom and there were lots of us there.  The patience of the music director was a part of the loveliness of God.  When we processes down the aisle, there was always a point where we would pass my maternal grandparents.  My grandfather would invariably wink at me.  Now even though they have been dead for 30 years, I still see them in my mind’s eye whenever I pass by that pew.  It’s as if no matter what I would do, that wink was always there, present as I grew.  I like to think that the wink was a recognition of the Divine spark within me, reminding me that no matter what mischief I have gotten myself into, I was loved, watched, and prayed for.  That’s a lovely thought and it has inspired me in my best days to be the best person I can be.  In my worst days it has been a reminder that I am not alone.  Thank God for that presence in that lovely place.

            The Psalmist said:

            “How lovely is you dwelling place, O God of hosts…I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness.  For God is a sun and shield who bestows favor and honor.  No good thing does God withhold from those who walk uprightly.  O God of hosts, blessed is the one who trusts in you.” (Psalm 84:1, 10-12)