God is a Fallen Deity
Iuke 24: 13=21; 28-35
August 30, 1970

In many ancient cultures the worst thing that could happen, the ultimate
disaster, was the toppling of an idol . Ancient men believed that when an
IDOL SLLL, the god symbolized by that idol died. Society was held together
by a common religion ~ it was the adhesive force. Invaders and marauders
usually headed straight for the temples - or the sacred places to deseorate ~
tke to topple the édols, for that act demonstrated their victams' helplessness.
The toppling of an idol ~ the falling of a god was an ominous sign that life
suddenly did not mean much, and that the future was not going to be worth
living ins
& That's ancient history, but it is also contemporary history. Today, the
idols are toppling, the old gods ere dying, and for many a whole way of life
is dying with them.

And yet, we Imow thet an important part of maturing is the realization
that one's idols have feet of clay. It is possible to keep an idol on a
pedastool only by retaining a juvenile image and by engaging in some kind
of self deception, ‘That , in turn, results in a failure really to under=
stand the significance of the particular idol. Fake George Washington or
Abraham Lincoln, for instance; popular folk ~ heroes; the closest thing
we have to cultural idols. I+ is possible to think of Washington only in
terms of cutting down the cherry three, throwing a dollar over the Potomac
and praying in the snow at Valley Forge. That'a the “larger than life,
idol ~ ilmage.” And many people get upset when it's suggested that WVashington
really had feet of clay ~ because an ordinary mortal doesn't make a very
good idol. A recent biography, by the way, reveals that Washington's major
sacrifice in the cold and hunger at Valley Forge ~ was to substitute rum and

WATER #08 THs USUAL brandy in the General's tent, and that he was a very

won
adroit book-keeper regarding the accounts at Mount Vernon and his govern
ment vouchers.

Now that kind of information topples the idol. But it does some~
thing else as well. It frese us to see and understand the man. I+ sheds
veal light on the times, the events, the revolution. And it makes possible
@ mature knowledge of our heritage and history.

ie live in a day when a lot of idols are thppling. ‘Time magazine
suggested some time ago that there could be no more MacArthers of Fisen~
howers} that the media ~ the sheer speed and depth of news transmission
rules out the emergence of an honest - to ~ goodness cultural idol.

Look at — Teddy Kenedy ~ and lately Martin Luther King. The list is long
Jackie, Joe Louis, Joe Namath, F,D.R.

But I feel strongly that the results are more good than bad. where
idols are toppled, people emerge ~ and we are abje tp be ratbpmajte abpit
their meaning and the real significance of the events they caused to happen.

in a day when all tdols are subject to the blumt process #6 demytho--
logizing, popular religion finds itself in deep trouble. ‘The truth is that
much religiosity is no more then juvenile idol worship — that connot stand
the harsh glare of truth and rationale inquiry. And yet, here too] I feel
that there is more good than bad - that the cynical, ime brutally honest
approach of the 1970's is a creative possibility for the Gospel of Jesus
Christ, which = by the ~ is not interested at all in idols.

All that by way of preface to @ very significant portion of soripture
read this morning.

Two men, on the dusty, dirty road from Jemusa@om to Kmmaus ~ had re~
cently experienced the toppling of an idol and the death of hope. I+ was

the first day of the week after Jesus had been executed. In him they though+

~3-
they had discovered meaning for their lives, somdthing to live and die
for, something seul. ‘hay had considered the possibility that he might be
divine ~ the true Bon of God. But now he was dead and there was nothing
livt. they probabil; atill hoped for some sigm, some miracle that vould
dramacically reverse tne tide of events and restore the idol to its ped-
astool. Perhapn the henvens vould open and Cod'e son Jesus would descend
accompanied by -. lesion of angels.

out, of courte, nothing like thet happened. Instead, they met a man,
who joined them on their jourmey down that dusty road. At the end of the
day they invited hin to join them for dinner. And then, as Luke records it
in one of the most simple and yet signifisaent statements in all of literature:
"When he war ot table with them, he took the bread and blessed, and broke
Lt, ond gave it ta chem. jAnd their even were opened and they reconizen
him . . «"!

Shatta n ryiner nodent way of putting it. “hat it means ic this: ex-
periences of crace have their context not in the dramatic ceremony so mach
as the common round. ‘whe reality of Jecus Christ, the teuth of the recurreosionn
the very existence of God - cll eniled inte mucetion by the toppliny of an
idol = wore expevierced br these men on the dusty rond to “mmauc and
the modest act of Drealing bread tovether.

The church his alwara Imown the cirpnmificance of that vrangsction;
that is, that Jerus Christ ic knew and experienced in the common cct oF
breaking bread together . In the sacrament of Holy Communion wo offarn
this truth by reenocting the table scene that evening. Aut, unrortunitaly,
we often fail to see that communion teatifigs to a reality beyond itseld.
It if a ceremony = and it means that the reality of God may be experienced

at every table, and in every encounter, dimple, common — not jurt the stately

a
ritual of worship. I wish we could remember thkt.

The skepticisim toward things religious of the 20th century, is
forcing us to, whether we want to or not. ‘The world has always asked the ¢
chureh the fundamental question; is there a God?", but today there is an
added hitch. God, the idol; Jesus ~ the idol of childhood Sunday School
leseons - have been toppled. “Is there a God" has been replaced by the far
more important question, “whemeiis He? Does it really matter whether or not
th exists?"

How do you answer that one? How do you cope with a new kind of skeptics
that looks at the traditional offerings of popular religion and asks "So
what?"

The old idols have been toppled. We can't rely on mature to bale us out
any longer. Once upon a time men bought the idea that the umanswered
mysteries of the natural order were evidence enough for any man. Hen saw
fire leap from the eky and destroy = tree and said: “See ~ that is God".

But don't try that today, becamse lightning isn't really very much of a
mystery; and while walking on the moon may inepire some of us &t the magni-
ficence 86 the Creator's work, to the skeptic it simply meang that given
the time, money and will,man is quite capable of banishing the word mystrey
from the vocabulary.

Billy Graham may anewer the mfixiied “death of God school” with a smug
"I know he's alive because I talked with him this morning", but don't try
that with any reasonably articulate man who knows that the human psyche is
eapable of believing almost anything, After all we live in a century when
millions of men believed Adolf Hitler, and Karl Marx; and spend millions of
dollars a year to be told how to conduct their affairs on the basis of inane
Babylonian Astrology. The personal approach won't work either.

You can't even use theology. It was once enough to say that God was in
Christ because the Bible says he was. And all that meane to the skeptic is

that your toppled God is held shakily upright by your superstitions belief

oa aad
in an outdated, discredited bhak.

Strong medicine? You bet it is, but that's the kind of world we're
living ine I do not mean that nature, personal experience and theology
are irrelevant. ‘the eyes of faith see the hand of God in nature. The heart
ef faith knows the presenee of God; the mind of faith understanda that the
love of God was incarnate in the man Jesus,

But the growing impotance of the Christian religion is that it is an=
swering questions nobody is asking any more, looking @6@r Cod in the wrong
places and peinting the world the wrong images.

The only really valid question is "where is he now:what id he doing
that matters to me". And if we can't deal with that one, we have no bus-
iness suggesting that our religion warrants anyone's attention.

But rather than becoming defensive about the position the 20th century
puts us in, I think that we have the best opportunity of ali to be honest
about our faith. And I think the New Testement lesson this morning is
a good place to begin. ‘The reaslity of God was there established on a
dusty road. The reality of the Risen Christ was then experienced not in
any dramatic revelation; not in the emotional hystrionica of mass eman~
gelisum: certainkly not in a pecowl ation, philosophic discussion —- but in
in the ordinary, everyday act of breaking bread.

The best articulation of our faith that I kmow is the single sentence
thht begins "God so loved the world, that he gave his only son. . ." About
that sentence, Wm. Stringfellow has written: ‘It is this world, the world
we know, the world just as it is into which God comes, for which God cares,
in which God is withus . .. " That means that if we are looking for

God we ought to be looking at the world -— for that is where he is.

abu

Now, we have a lot of thouble with that ~ because part of the worn ~ out
idol theology upon which we were weaned suggests thht God really doesn't
love the world ~ just parts of it; and that he really nr a force active
in the world — or at least his activéty is pretty mich confimmddto those
events, movements and cause we happen to prefer.

Well, the really good news of the Gospel is that God, in fact, inhabits
the world, and that there is no place, no event, no movement apart from his
presence, ‘The good news is that there is redemption possibility in every s
situation out there. liven ~ and this is most incredible of all — even in
death. in the Apostles Creed we affirm, as an item of belief, that Jesus
Christ discended into hell. I take thet to mean that themeis nowhere in
life I can go- including my own death ~ where God has not preceeded me;
or where he is not present. ‘That's the best news of all.

Our God, you see, really is a fallen deity. A God who has condescended
to be among us. Uniike the ancients whose entire life fell apart when an i
idol toppied, our lives have meaning because our God does not reigh from
somewhere out there, but frrom the world he loves.

If yomrexperience of God is not very real ~ and I expect this is true
occassionally for all of us ~ perhaps you're been looking in the wrong
places. Try a dustx road ~ or the city streets: try bread broken ~
or a common meal: try the ebb and flow of current history - or that emeall
bat of history which constitutes your life. The good news of the Gospel is
that that is where he is; and that is where we shall find him — or better
said ~ be found by hin. Amen

We often look for you , our Father, in desparation, out of lonlinese ~
or fear ~ or perhaps habit. And we confess that we wait for the dramatic
moment of clear, bright light that never comes, Gtant us, 0 God, the sen—
sitivity to experience your presence in the world you love, and in the every-

day affairs of our own lives. ‘Though Jesus Christ Our Lord. Amen