This past week, as we were getting ready for the wedding, I was rummaging through stuff, looking for “something old”—you know, the wedding rhyme: something new, something borrowed, something blue— and came across this wooden box that has been in my family for a few years. Over 200 actually. Inscribed on the inside of the lid, it has the signature of my grandmother’s grandfather’s grandmother (my 4th great-grandmother), Maria B Shaw, and the date, Jan 20, 1816. She was married May 1816; I wonder if it was perhaps a gift to her for her “hope chest,” or perhaps a bridal shower?
There’s nothing particularly fancy about it. It has some pictures painted on 5 sides, the bottom is unfinished. But then on the inside, there’s some pretty cool things.
Some old silver spoons, one of which has my grandmother’s grandfather’s mother’s name etched on it.
Some ivory wise men from Tokyo, “certified elephant’s tusk”— perhaps from the years my grandfather travelled as a geologist, or perhaps from my grandmother’s grandfather’s father, who was a ship’s captain who sailed from Maine over to Asia in the 1850s-90s. Definitely ivory, but I can’t date them. These wise men would be fun to add to a nativity set.
A really cool set of scales that did come from that ship’s captain, used for measuring medicines aboard his ship, and complete with some tiny weights for balance.
And finally, simply, a card with my grandmother’s name printed on it.
I have absolutely no idea why any of these things are in this box that has been handed down through my family; none of these items came from the original owner of the box, but rather from her descendants. But there are two things I do know. First, someone who came before me valued or cherished these things enough to save them, store them in this box, and pass them down. And second, I find myself now merely a generational custodian and will pass them on to someone in our family, and share with them what little I do know about their origins.
This summer we’re having a bit of fun exploring some images and themes throughout scripture and ways that these icons ground us into— or point us towards— the deeper reality of our life together in the way of Jesus. We began two weeks ago with bird watching; last week, Mike hiked through some gardens to find life-giving trees. And this week, we are traveling with some boxes, like luggage. Scripture uses the term “ark” but we don’t ever use that term IRL, and the Hebrew terms have a much broader use. Like “container” or “box” or “chest”—think “treasure chest.”
NOAH’S ARK
There’s been a long history within the church— possibly starting with the African theologian Turtullian, in 196 CE— to think of the church as “the ark,” specifically Noah’s ark. That is, in the words of a contemporary preacher even today, paraphrasing Turtullian, “Just as the ark was a place of safety then, so is the church a place of safety today. All saved people are in the church; there are no saved people outside the church. Just as everyone outside the ark died, so will everyone outside of Christ’s body the church.” This idea was a common theme that was perpetuated through the writings of theologians like Augustine.
It also actually influenced church architecture, or at least terms for it. Traditional European church buildings and cathedrals have a main part of the building that’s called the nave. This is where the congregation would sit. The vaulted ceiling looked like an inverted hull of a ship. Nave comes from Latin “navis” meaning ship (and a collection of “navis” is “navy”).
I don’t want to dwell on whether or not God only saves those who have “joined the church,” except to say that, as Jesus reminded Nicodemus one evening, the wind blows where it pleases and you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. Our God is bigger than the boat.
What I will say about that metaphor of the church as an ark like Noah’s, is something akin to these words from Frederick Buechner. See if it resonates with who Englewood is:
In one as in the other, just about everything imaginable is aboard, the clean and the unclean both. They are all piled in together helter-skelter, the predators and the prey, the wild and the tame, the sleek and beautiful ones and the ones that are ugly as sin. There are sly young foxes and impossible old cows. There are the catty and the piggish and the peacock-proud. There are hawks and there are doves. Some are wise as owls, some silly as geese; some meek as lambs and others fire-breathing dragons. There are times when they all cackle and grunt and roar and sing together, and there are times when you could hear a pin drop. Most of them have no clear idea just where they’re supposed to be heading or how they’re supposed to get there or what they’ll find if and when they finally do, but they figure the people in charge must know and in the meanwhile sit back on their haunches and try to enjoy the ride.
It’s not all enjoyable. There’s backbiting just like everywhere else. There’s a pecking order. There’s jostling at the trough. There’s growling and grousing,...and whining. There are dogs in the manger and old goats and black widows. It’s a regular menagerie in there, and sometimes it smells to high Heaven like one.
And at its best there is, if never clear sailing, shelter from the blast, a sense of somehow heading in the right direction in spite of everything, a ship to keep afloat, and, like a beacon in the dark, the hope of finding safe harbor at last.
I’m glad to be in the same boat with all you stinky animals.
ARK OF THE COVENANT
Let’s turn to look at the other ark in today’s second reading, that which is usually called the Ark of the Covenant. This ark was part of the original instructions God gave Moses on Mt Sinai, along with very detailed instructions about every single thing about the tabernacle and everything in it, down to the number and color of loops on the curtains of the tabernacle. This container was about 4’x2’x2’, covered in gold, with a fancy lid on top, and poles to carry it.
And because it was a container, it contained something very important—the words of the covenant God made with the people who became God’s people.
You might know of this ark from that famous documentary Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. A lot of myth and superstition grew up around that ark, even before Indy outsmarted the Nazis. Some of that superstition started even during the journey into the promised land, when God commanded Joshua to have the priests carrying the ark lead the way as the people circled Jericho seven times before the walls fell down. That led to the Israelites thinking that it was the ark itself that helped them win battles, rather than the One whom it represented. This became problematic for the people during the age of the prophet Samuel when the people decided to use the ark as a tool to defeat their enemies; instead, their enemies captured it. The mystery surrounding this ark grew when, as David was bringing the ark into Jerusalem, one of the men walking alongside the cart carrying the ark (apparently the poles had disappeared?) reached out to steady it and died.
WHY ARE WE TALKING ABOUT THIS?
Why are we talking about these two containers today, you might wonder? Let me suggest that, just as there was nothing special or magical about the ark God had Noah build, so there was nothing special or magical about the ark God had Moses have built. Instead, let me introduce yet one more “ark” that might lend itself to how these two arks might connect with us today. In between the creation of these two, at the very beginning of Exodus, someone else builds an ark.
This ark is smaller than the other two, but like the first one, it was built to float on water. When there was an existential threat of the destruction of a people, one particular mother was intent upon saving her child. The baby’s life was first spared because the midwife guild deceived the authorities and refused to execute newborns. But now he was loud and squirmy. And because she cherished him, and because everyone like him was at risk of being slaughtered, she built an ark. Like that first ark, Yochoved covered it in tar so it would be waterproof. And like God, she placed that which she deeply cherished into the ark, onto the water, to escape destruction. And Moses in the ark floated through the reeds of the Nile, guarded by another woman, his older sister Miriam, and was rescued by still a third one, the Egyptian princess.
Because Yochoved cherished her son, sent him adrift, and trusted him to the waters, he became God’s way for the people to be set free, liberated. What if God, like Yochoved, cherished all of creation so much that God preserved enough life on the ark for it to be replenished, becoming abundant after the storm? What if, like Yochoved, God cherished God’s people so much that at Mt Sinai God placed the token of their covenant together into their midst so they would always remember how much God cherished them—setting the stone tablets of the covenant into the ark.
My ancestral treasure box will be passed on to someone else to care for it. Maybe I’ll add something cherished from our generation into it. But unless those who receive it can retell stories about what’s in it and why, it risks becoming meaningless, misunderstood or even worse, idolized —as both arks have been.
God, our creator, redeemer, and giver of life—over and over, creating, redeeming, and giving life—cherishes all that God has made and redeemed, including you and me and us and our neighbors and our enemies. We don’t need to be put into an ark or box to be protected from the world. Instead, we can be there “in an ark,” as the church, as a visible witness to the world of God’s cherishing of the entire world, bearing witness like the ark of the covenant of God’s deep love for all that we dwell among.
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