A Fourth Church Sermon by John W. Vest

January 13, 2008 | 6:30 p.m. Vespers

Water Works

John W. Vest
Associate Pastor, Fourth Presbyterian Church

Psalm 29
Isaiah 42:1–9
Matthew 3:13–17

Over the New Year’s holiday, I had the wonderful opportunity to travel with a group of Fourth Church members and friends down to New Orleans to contribute to the ongoing relief efforts of so many volunteers who have worked so hard over the past two and a half years to rebuild that beloved city after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.

It was truly a blessed trip. I hadn’t been to New Orleans in at least eight years, so it was eye opening for me to see all that had changed since Katrina. From everything that I had heard about the damage to the city, especially from members of our team who went down the previous year, I expected the worst. I was pleased to discover that much progress has been made, though there is still so much more work to do.

Thankfully, there are many volunteers willing to give of their time, talents, and resources to help with the recovery of New Orleans. It was moving to see people coming from all parts of the country to contribute whatever they could to the relief efforts.

Jackie Valentine, a young woman who grew up in this church, has taken a year off from college to work for Habitat for Humanity in New Orleans. We were able to connect with Jackie and her younger sister, Christie, while we were down there, and Jackie showed us some of the incredible work Habitat is doing. Their Musician’s Village is in the process of literally transforming a neighborhood in the city’s Upper Ninth Ward. Where shells of buildings ravaged by floods once stood, new homes painted in bright colors of hope are rising up, a testament to the good that has happened and a reminder of what still needs to be done.

Our work was coordinated by First Presbyterian Church of New Orleans and the Presbytery of South Louisiana, both of which, along with many other faith communities and humanitarian organizations, are doing amazing work in New Orleans. We had the opportunity to worship at First Presbyterian as well as at St. Charles Avenue Presbyterian Church, two congregations with which we have partnered and will continue to partner as we send future trips to the Crescent City. (Our Executive Associate Pastor, Dana Ferguson, will be leading a trip this spring if you are interested in going yourself, which I highly recommend.)

While we were in New Orleans, we stayed at a place called Camp Hope, outside of the city, in St. Bernard Parish. Camp Hope is an elementary school that Habitat for Humanity has converted into living quarters for the thousands of volunteers that descend upon the city each year. Just after New Year’s Day, when we were joined by more than 400 other volunteers, we discovered that at least one meaning behind Camp Hope’s name is that every evening when you come home from a long day’s work, you desperately hope that there will be a hot shower. Unfortunately, our hopes were never realized.

There’s nothing quite like a cold shower to wake you up. The stream of icy water jolts you out of your haze and brings you to a whole new level of awareness. It literally takes your breath away.

I had an experience like that in New Orleans. For the first part of our week, we worked in homes that were devastated by the storm, to be sure, but they were located in relatively nice neighborhoods. For the most part, the houses we saw were structurally sound, though they had all been gutted, and many stood empty and hollow. The people we worked with were regular middle-class people. They held down jobs and, with help from the government and elsewhere, were able to finance a large portion of their home’s reconstruction. In many respects, the need I saw was not that much different from the need I have seen in Appalachia and other parts of the rural South, not that much different from what you can easily find right here in our own city of Chicago. After three days of this, I think that maybe I was getting a little complacent about our work and the need in New Orleans.

But on Thursday, after Jackie gave us a tour of Habitat’s Musician’s Village, she took us on a tour of the surrounding Upper Ninth Ward. And like a cold shower, that drive opened my eyes. I finally saw what I had been expecting. I finally saw the ghost town that was once a neighborhood. I finally saw buildings contorted in grotesque caricatures of their former selves. I finally saw the ruined interiors of homes dragged out across yards and into the streets. I finally saw houses crumbling in upon themselves and rotting away as if with cancer.

I was most disturbed when I would see a lone, new Habitat house standing in the middle of all this. I pondered how hard it must be to come home to a nice, new house in the midst of such devastation. I shuddered at how isolated that must feel.

Amid this wreckage and destruction, I longed for the people that lived in those homes to know some kind of hope. I longed for other people to see what I saw and provide that hope.

And it was all caused by water. Throughout the week our group would notice the notes spray-painted on fronts of buildings throughout town, ghastly reminders of the rescue crews that searched the city for signs of life as the waters receded. Some of the dates were weeks after the floods, and we were horrified to think about the hell that happened during those long, wet days. Many of us took to reading books that described these horrors, stories about these watery graves and those fortunate enough to survive. On numerous occasions we passed the Superdome and couldn’t help but recall the terrible things that went on in there to people seeking shelter. And I felt a little sick in my stomach as I marveled at the revelry of the football games being played that week in that very same structure.

It was all caused by water. Water is both a blessing and a curse. It brings life but can also bring death. We baptize our babies with it. But we also torture our enemies with it. We harness its energy, but it also destroys our cities.

Those of us who went down to New Orleans spent a lot of time processing what we saw, reflecting on how it affected us and the questions it raised. We thought about where God was in the midst of this and what God was trying to tell us and call us to do.

One of our many conversations revolved around the question of need. When you are in the business of helping people, it is sometimes hard to discern who really needs help and who doesn’t. And though it makes you feel dirty to even ask that kind of question, it’s hard not to.

Some of us struggled with this in New Orleans. It was hard to look at survivors driving nice cars and paying for portions of their reconstruction while others were forced to live in one of the hundreds of tents set up under the expressway. Who needs the most help and who makes that decision?

As I spent time talking with the people we were serving, the people who had their homes destroyed by floodwaters and were forced to live in exile for months or even years, I was struck with this realization: these were just normal people, totally unprepared for what happened to them. They were flawed people with problems that preceded the storm and problems that will continue to plague them for years to come. They were people with gifts and talents and resources. They were people of faith and people of unbelief. They were hardworking people and people lacking in ambition. They were normal people, just like you and me.

This, too, was a like a cold shower for me. I wondered how I would fare in the same circumstances. What kind of help would I need? What would I do if everything I owned was irreplaceably lost? What would I do if I was forced to start over from scratch?

The waters of the flood that destroyed New Orleans didn’t care who or what was destroyed. And when the waters receded, all were left equal.

And, friends, so it is in life. Joy and happiness and pain and chaos and pressures and tragedy all come at us like floodwaters, and in the end, we’re all left on equal ground to put the pieces back together. This is what it means to be human. This is what life is all about.

Water reminds us of this, of birth and death, life and destruction. This is why we find water throughout the stories of our faith tradition.

Water was there at the beginning of creation, chaotic at first, but ultimately controlled by God.

Water was there when God regretted what had become of creation and sent a great flood to wipe out all that was evil and begin again.

Water was there to save the Hebrews as they fled their oppressors but also there to destroy their enemies as they pursued them.

Water was there as the children of Israel entered the promised land and water was there to nourish their new home.

Water was there as the ancient Israelites looked for God in nature and found something divine in the powerful storms that raced across the sea.

And water was there as people came to the Jordan River to hear a man named John proclaim the word of God, a word of repentance and transformation. Water was there as John baptized his followers in that river and told them to prepare for something amazing that God was preparing for them.

Water was there when a man named Jesus came to be baptized as well.

John knew who this man was and so he tried to refuse. “You don’t need to be baptized,” John said. “I’m the one that needs to be baptized by you.”

But Jesus knew better. “We all need it,” he told John. We all need it.

And so Jesus, the Messiah that God sent to save the world, submitted himself to the waters of the Jordan River, waters that could have easily taken his life. But in those waters, he was blessed by God.

And so to this day, those who follow Jesus follow in his baptism. The waters of baptism remind us that we are all equal before God, all in need of salvation. And the waters of baptism remind us that God’s grace and love are for all, regardless of who you are or what you’ve done or what you continue to do.

In baptism we are united together with one hope, one calling, one love.

We all need what that water provides. And transformed by its power, we can all provide for the needs of the world—in New Orleans, in Chicago, or wherever God calls us.

Amen.