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Since I am among people who will become preachers, I want to share a lesson with you. It's always 10 degrees hotter in the pulpit. So bear with me among the many divine attributes we can name

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. One remains significantly unattended by professional theologians. God's humor. It is difficult to look at. There were many sources of revelation, whether the Bible or nature Christian tradition or human experience and discern those moments

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when the most holy is simply fed up with solemn reverence and just waiting to be funny, no doubt , the experience of a broken world is the source of deep concern, dissatisfaction and plenty of suffering.

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Therefore, it will not be unacceptable to suggest that even God should have a chance to enjoy a good laugh. And for me, that humor is evident at the juncture, whereby happens, stands whatever seems

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trivial and unimportant finds deeper meaning at the most unexpected moment. Let me give you an example two weekends ago, as I opened the Bible to read the text that is the basis of our reflection. This

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evening, my mind gravitated toward that image of a working man losing the head of an ax and by consequence losing his hair of about this predicament as soon as I finished reading the text. And as I

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was about to reach out for my first commentary to help me with my ex work, I could hear a commanding voice addressing me, not from above, not from within, but from the kitchen asking me

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to go out midday and and into the heat to replant three potted shrubs. We have purchased days before there was a simple problem with that request. We have just moved into the seminary's men's and I had

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no tools to take on this chore. But the boys from the kitchen was not only commanding but resourceful as it remind me that there was an unexplored basement and perhaps prior residents have left a proper tool that

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could help me accomplish the task. So I went to the basement praying, praying that prior owners were considered enough not to leave all tools laying around. Thus saving me from the chore and providing me the

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best excuse to go on with my sermon preparation. When I found this all looking tool that belong more in a museum that a houses basement. Yes, siblings in Christ, our prayers are attended to by

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God, but the response providentially does not always go our way. So here I am tool and plants in hand ready to face the scorching sun and the compact soil of the ground that has not received a

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drop of water in months. And since I have always valued solidarity in the struggle. I volunteer my two dogs and ginger to go outside with me and to keep me company as I dug three holes to

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replant the shrubs. As you can imagine, the dry ground was tough to break down with the full force of my arms and accompanying vocal grunts. I was able to finish the first hole. So I

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started to work on the second one with my dogs intensely observing the effort of my labor and perhaps thinking they could have done a better job with their paws because that's what they do. Well, the head

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of this ancient started to loosen up and as I took an arching swing, he flew off the handle , torpedoing close to the dogs snouts and landing on the budget. This is what I call an aha

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moment or what I would prefer to call it a ha moment where God's sense of humor seems to be on display. This was a given opportunity to start my exes of the text without the assistance of a

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commentary. My immediate reaction after recognizing the obviousness of the experience was to stop and meditate. I have just reenacted part of the biblical story without intention. This is a granted chance to take note on my

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own emotional state and empathize with the character of the story. The man in the story in the midst of grueling toy found himself without a tool to help him accomplish his objective to be part of a community

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trying to achieve something of shared significance, the building of a proper place to gather as profits under the total age of a leading profit. So unable to contribute to this corporate mission, producing him great distress

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. He cries out, will I cry in agony ? Because I lost my tool of work. Well , that sentiment was not compatible with the joy I felt in finding the perfect excuse to pause working and

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to finally go back into the house. Sorry, no tool, no work. But unlike this man , losing the instrument I was using to execute my chore did not compromise something of importance. It did

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not compromise relationships for it wasn't barrowed from someone expecting to receive his property back. Perhaps the owner of this tool is not probably among the living today. It did not compromise community for there was no collective

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intention to build something that will create shared memories and shared meaning. While I was indeed trying to please the commanding voice from the kitchen, I was not provi proving myself before God's profit and the company of

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other prophets. Therefore, in discerning my emotional response to losing my tool of work, I found out that the object lesson wasn't working for me and I not may be alone. It seems the story of

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a band of process of prophets chopping trees with faulty axes does not find logical appeal among biblical interpreters and preachers. Very few commentaries address this text extensively with few exceptions, like the excellent commentary on Second Kins

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by Doctor Susie Park. But the text has no place in the lectionary readings of the church for many of you. This may be the first time you have heard this story in the pantheon of Sunday school

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characters and all time greats. The minis school head of an ax was obscure by larger artifacts like a floating zoo or a man swallowing whale or a giant killing slingshot or burning bushes. But in a for

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the more sophisticated interpreters who seek to find theological meaning in text, this narrative creates the challenge of finding the nature of God's action. For the text has the prophet as the initiator and the consumer of the

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miracle with no reference to divine intervention nor any sign of wonder among those who witness that miracle. That may be the reason why something that will not be considered a miracle or something that will be considered a

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miracle. Elsewhere in the scripture is classified here as a prophetic agenda. An anecdote that serves to illustrate the power and authority of a holy man. Fully aware of his intimate relationship with Yahweh Bilic who know

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that the source of the story may prefer to stay away from loft interpretations of this narrative. Since the story seems to advocate the idea that such a selected group of prophets seeking to band together with the leader

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in a special place for them. We're just part of an elite group who believed that God had made an eternal covenant with them. Apart from the race of God's people, the initial suffering of the man

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was for sure in this narrative written down just for the purpose of giving us a happy ending, unlike the suffering of the common people who saw no end to their captivity and exile. So what to do

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then with such a story, perhaps the most effective interpretive approach to a text is usually the most elemental in this case, by ascertaining the reaction of a man who desperately wanted to recover the blade of an

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ax. We can simply ask ourselves, what do we do when we lose our cutting edge? What do we do when we lose our cutting edge like this man? Those of us who are called into

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ministry are giving tools to build the community of Christ as a plausible reflection of God's kingdom. We are here today as seminarians, as faculty, as staff , as faithful worshipers because we are convinced that we

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need to join a company of witnesses in trying to fulfill the promises of the gospel, a gospel of liberating news that is not fully realized until the standing trees of injustice, prejudice, oppression, marginalization,

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and apathy, and everything that grows out from the seed of human arrogance and hate are cut down to the roots so that we can start building another possible assistance in our midst. Yet let us be humbly

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aware we are not the first ones who have attempted to do this work in response to God's call to our lives and the faith communities we serve continue to put that effort into the ministries they carry out to

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this day. But in, in a society that seeks spiritual restoration outside the confines of traditional institutions and religious conventions. Have we lost our cutting edge? Have we lost as a church that which position us

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Christians as a sharp incisive and impactful community within culture ? When did we lose it? Why are we not crying in desperation? Are we working intensely with tools that have lost their sharpness or have we lost

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our cutting edge long time ago and are just insistently swinging a plain handle to no effect? Are you here in this place at this moment? Because you are willing to accept the prophetic role of recovering that

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cutting edge that which will make the Christian witness resurface above the sea of Christian conformism, ecclesial stagnation. And today's theological trans valuation that have given us such proin nations as why Christian nationalism and the capitalist co

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option of faith in something misnamed prosperity gospel. And it is this contorted face of modern Christianity that has tarnished and rusted the Christian coinage, corrupting both the message and the messengers. Let those who claim the

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Christian name be cautioned by the old sage corruption. The corruption of the best is the worst if we are to be the church today a company of believers inspired by prophetic imagination. It is your responsibility and

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mind to recover the cutting edge. The stories of redemption, we tell the message of Christ liberation should become an authentic proclamation of good news. Once again , in reading this text closely, there is something

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that should attract the attention of the reader from a literary point of view. You know, that literary critics seek to interpret the story within the parameters and the norms of the in this narrative, the miracle

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of a floating blade made of iron makes absolute sense . But it is intended for the genre, their agenda to uplift the image of the prophet to legitimize his authority and power. But the performance of the

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expected miracle does not make everything in this story logical as I move my attention from the man who loses the cutting edge to the leading prophet who helps him recover it. I noticed that the author was not

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paying attention to the environment, the environment of the story. Here we are in a place where several men are cut in trees and consequentially, there will be plenty of sticks laying around. Aside from that

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, the man who just lost the blade of the barrel is holding the handle. Yet the prophet goes out of the way to find a tree, break a branch to obtain a piece of guess what wood

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to perform that miracle is that a narrative flaw. The author of the agenda focusing only on the important and not paying attention to the details of the story or was the author intentional in telling us that the

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prophet works on his own with his own resources as to promote the idea of prophetic exceptionalism. Since it is not clear, this irrational account is the result of a careless narrator or an author who just wants

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to validate the role of the prophet as uniquely bestowed with buying power. I prefer to derive meaning as a reader from the three possibilities presented here for answering our main question, how can we recover our cutting

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edge? Can we recover our cutting edge of the people of God by using the same structures we are trying to cut down by insisting the only way we can be the church and the ministry is with the

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same institutional forms we are accustomed to and just cosmetically reforming them by picking up the sticks of fallen trees . Can we recover our cutting edge by using the same tools insisting this time they will work even when

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they have lost their potential to influence a long time ago, wielding a handle that has no blade or do we need to step out of assume ways and pursue new devices to recover our cutting edge? Do

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we need to cut our own branches by imagining new places and new forms of worship and service by discovering new ways of reading the scriptures to re inform our faith by attending new ways of proclaiming the gospel,

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new ways of teaching new ways that render the Christian witness. Not a religious relic, we have to culturally endure but as an authentic spiritual force in this fragmented world. Last year, I discovered the picture

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that was inserted in your service bulletins. And since then, I have used this image as an icon of reflection. The old man is sitting with his ex chipping and shaping pieces of stone into bricks in

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order to make those feet as they are laid down side by side. He observes intensely with patients with intention. And today, I am grateful for the labor of that man. I am grateful. He

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kept the cutting edge sharp so that brake upon brick , a community of learning in the midst of Austin , Texas could build a chapel where to gather as a community to pray, to listen to God's word

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, to praise in song and to read, ready itself to be the faithful company of courageous prophets who dared to proclaim that in our presence, hope for a better world will never sink because this man's cutting

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edge, made possible, displace this place we now inhabit as worshipers. We are similarly invited here to recover our own cutting edge. For those who today wait in God for deliverance and for those who will

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preserve their faith in God after us. Amen.