A Homiletic for Those Who Dare to Take to the Pulpit during the Demise of Democracy (and Those Who Love Them), part 3
David Albert Farmer, Ph.D.
Preachers, et. al.,
There are scattered moments when silence is in order as the Teacher who penned the poetic “there is a time” section of the Hebrew Bible’s book of Ecclesiastes put it. But those times are not plentiful when the ones to whom you preach find their lives and their nation’s existence credibly threatened.
Many of the people in ancient Israel to whom the prophet Ezekiel ministered—who were his own people—had been ripped from their homes and lands and deported by King Nebuchadnezzar to Babylon. Ezekiel appears to have been one of the few not deported, but before he could breathe a sigh of relief, God was already luring him to the exiles. He’d escaped deportation, only to have God calling him to those exiles who been deported. And the message to be delivered was not going to be well received. That was evident from the start.
The foundational facts were reflected in what God communicated to him:
Ezekiel heard this as if God were speaking to him.
“When I say to the wicked [person], ‘You will certainly die,’ and you do not warn [her or] him—you do not speak out to warn the wicked [one] to turn from [her or] his wicked lifestyle so that [she or] he may live—that wicked person will die for [her or] his iniquity, but I will hold you accountable for [the] death. But as for you, if you warn the wicked [one] and [she or] he does not turn from [the] wicked deed and from [the] wicked lifestyle, [she or] he will die for [the] iniquity but you will have saved your own life.”
The book of Ezekiel is filled with symbolism, and I don’t think for a second that God was promising to strike dead a weak or timid or preoccupied preacher, even a disobedient one. I do think, however, that women and men called to be prophetic preachers who fail to speak urgent messages will die as prophetic voices and be permanently spiritually wounded (by self-inflicted means).
Judgement in Judeo-Christian scripture is not retaliatory, caused directly by forces outside oneself. Judgement is built into misdeeds, careless choices, and evil actions.
If a person or a group is doing wrong it is still up to prophetic preachers, even in pc-preoccupied times and places, to point out and call out the wrong. Otherwise, her or his purpose in life will be attacked in the same way an untreated cancer can overtake healthy cells throughout someone’s body.
That said, it is clear that faithful preachers individually and communally must now speak out against abuser politicians such as Trump and Netanyahu and citizens who buy into their malevolent demands to harm innocent people, children and adults, and inflict genocide on people unable to protect themselves. Preachers in our country must speak out against ICE, and war, and wealth as a deity with starving people and hungry people and rootless people as nothing more than collateral damage.
Preachers, we have no choice unless we want to die inside while those riding the crests of victorious evil prosper—the suffering and dead at their feet.
Don’t wait til Thursday evening or Friday evening or Sunday morning to preach these truths; these are critical hours. Plan additional services this week and next. Preach your hearts out.
Are there risks? Hell, yes there are. Did no one mention that to you in your seminary classes or at your ordination services? This shouldn’t be new news.
To those preachers who have already been speaking truth to power without counting the cost, thank you—even though you haven’t been taking the risks for notice or appreciation.
