Sermon on Solomon's Wisdom, Justice for Black Lives

Scripture: 1 Kings 3:4-9, 16-28 

 

Sometimes I wonder if King Solomon was truly wise, or if he just got lucky when the mother spoke out to protect her child. Years ago in high school I had to do an independent study on Huckleberry Finn, and in that book you may know is a conversation Huckleberry Finn has with runaway slave Jim about King Solomon and this perceived wisdom. Huck tells Jim about Solomon’s 700 concubine wives and hundreds of children, and then recounts the story of the 2 women and the 1 child trying to impress Jim with Solomon’s wisdom, but Jim comes from a very different background than Huck or any of us do.

Jim comes from a background of slavery in Southern US. He has seen slave owners who own dozens of black families and seen how little most care for the slaves.

“From Jim’s understanding, King Solomon wasn’t raised with a good teaching that embraced the value of human life. Jim takes a big jump by comparing the king’s lack of appreciation of his [hundreds of children] with the plantation owner’s lack of appreciation of their [hundreds] of slaves. Jim has one wife and two children who he values more than anything in the world. From his thinking, the owners of slaves are morally equivalent to King Solomon because they would propose to resolve an economic problem by cutting a family in half. This is a logical argument because Jim is escaping because he heard his owner, [Miss] Watson, discussing the idea of selling him to a plantation owner in New Orléans.” ^{(https://www.litchatte.com/2017/08/28/huck-jim-discuss-whether-king-solomon-was-the-worlds-wisest-man/)}

When we read or watch stories, we naturally do so through the lens of our own experiences, but occasionally we are treated to the opportunity to see a story through someone else’s lens, and briefly the world opens up to us in a new way.

In Huckleberry Finn, the story of King Solomon as we read from 1^st Kings is opened up to us in a new way.  For those of us who are white and at least somewhat comfortable, we experience the story from our places of privilege – of course King Solomon valued human life, of course he knew that the true mother of the child would speak up, of course he would do the right thing. If we have never lived a life as someone society inherently deems unworthy, it wouldn’t occur to us to look at this story of King Solomon the way the runaway slave Jim does.

All of a sudden this isn’t a story about Solomon’s wisdom, but a story about justice for all lives.

In this month’s United Church Observer the cover story is about the Very Rev Wilbur Howard, the first black Moderator of the United Church elected in 1974. Howard had been ordained in 1941 but did not enter his first charge until 1965, 24 years later, even though the United Church was so desperate for ministers it was considering whether it would allow any minister to retire, and yet no church would willingly hire a black minister. The Very Rev Wilbur Howard died in 2001 at the age of 89 and so one might wonder why an article would come up now. One of the reasons is because of what happened at General Council this past summer. In the final few hours of a week long meeting we commissioners sat with heavy hearts as we listened to racialized person after racialized person stand up and tell their story of how racism is alive and well in our church as well as our country.  We heard the story of a woman who after what seemed like a successful interview for a position was told that she did not get the job because the committee thought the congregation was not ready for a woman. But a few months later, she learned the same congregation had hired a woman — and the new hire was white. Now sexism that is alive and well is another topic all together, one I will happily discuss another time.

At General Council we commissioners heard about a black minister who was approached by a congregant congratulating him for being a "credit to his race" because he is well-spoken.  We heard of a black minister who as preaching at a funeral where, to his surprise, the son of the deceased announced to the mourners that "my father would have never wanted a Black man leading the funeral." ^{(https://www.ucobserver.org/faith/2018/11/wilbur_howard_moderator_racism/)}

If you want to watch the full 2 hours of this online, send me an email and I’ll happily share the link with you.

We in Canada like to believe that we do not have the same troubles our neighbours to the South do, but the truth is that while we thankfully do not regularly have acts as violent as we saw at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, we do have these acts and the racism is alive and well, we simple do not talk about it, possibly because we simply do not experience it. 

In the Observer article about the Very Rev Wilburn Howard I came across this quote that sums this up perfectly: ‘"Racialized beliefs and practices, although widespread and persistent, are frequently invisible to everyone but those who suffer from them," write Frances Henry and Carol Tator in the introduction to their book The Colour of Democracy: Racism in Canadian Society. "White Canadians tend to dismiss evidence of their racial prejudice and their differential treatment of minorities. Victims' testimonies are unheard and their experiences unacknowledged."’ ^{(https://www.ucobserver.org/faith/2018/11/wilbur_howard_moderator_racism/)}

Now this quote comes from 1995, over 20 years ago and the good news is that we are changing, albeit slowly. The very Rev Howard was elected moderator over 40 years ago and we are just now talking about the widespread and systemic racism he faced, but along with it we are talking about the racism our Black sisters and brothers are facing today, change is happening.

We are beginning to realise that just because we aren’t talking about racism doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist - when we pretend it doesn’t exist, we aren’t stopping it, we’re simply stopping any possibility for change.

The stories are being shared, and for us who are white, the stories are very hard to hear, but it is our responsibility to listen to those who face this hatred regularly. Once we have heard these stories we are better equipped to make real change, change that will one day bring about God’s kingdom of love and peace here on earth.

The scripture we heard today is one that reminds us of the gifts God gives to us, namely the gift of wisdom. As we are reminded that many people in our church, in our country, in our world are dismissed or even shunned and killed simply because of the colour of their skin and their culture, so let us pray to God for wisdom. Wisdom of how to see what is happening around and within us, wisdom of how to change the world, and wisdom of how to change ourselves, and then the courage to speak out against any and all acts of disdain and hatred toward God’s children.

We have seen what hatred and racism have done and continue to do, hurting our racialized brothers and sisters, so let us speak up and tell the world that we know racism is a part of our world and that we want change, that we want true equality for all, that we will open our eyes to see racism happening and that we will work to stop the discrimination and bigotry, beginning with ourselves.