January 26th, 2025 - "Epiphany Scripture Surprises: Love Changes Everything - Even Scripture" - Rev. Dr. Michelle Morris

Matt Nelson: Welcome to the sermon podcast from First United Methodist

Church in downtown Bentonville.

If you have questions related to what you hear today, or just want to

find out more about the ministries at First United Methodist Church, please

visit us online at fumcbentonville.

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Rev. Dr. Michelle Morris: My

name is Michelle Morris.

I'm the lead pastor here, and it is a joy to welcome you in worship here at First

United Methodist Church in Bentonville.

We are in a series That is called Epiphany Scripture Surprises, and everyone that's

been invited to preach, and I want to thank the people that have preached the

last couple of weeks for me, for Bill, and for Angie, in this space, they did

a wonderful job, and everyone's been invited to pick a scripture that surprised

them, moved them, changed them, inspired them, And so I will continue on with

that and share with you a passage that's probably going to surprise you just a bit

because it is from Leviticus chapter 14.

Leviticus 14 · chapter mention

So hear now the word of the Lord.

The Lord said to Moses, this will be the instruction for anyone with skin

disease at the time of purification.

When it has been reported to the priest, he will go outside the camp.

If the priest sees that the person afflicted with skin disease has

been healed of the infection, the priest will order that two birds wild

and clean, and cedarwood, crimson yarn, and hyssop be brought for

the person who needs purification.

The priest will order that one bird be slaughtered over

fresh water in a pottery jar.

He will then take the other wild bird along with the cedarwood, crimson

yarn, and hyssop, and will dip all of this into the blood of the bird that

was slaughtered over the fresh water.

He will sprinkle the first person who needs purification from skin disease seven

times, and declare that they are clean.

Then the priest will release the wild bird into the countryside.

The person who needs purification will then wash their clothes, shave off

all of their hair and bathe in water.

At that point, they will be clean.

After that, they can return to the camp, but they must live

outside their tent for seven days.

On the seventh day, the person must shave off all their hair again,

head, beard and eyebrows, everything.

They must wash their clothes and bathe in water.

Then they will be clean again.

This is the word of God for the people of God.

Thanks be to God.

Let us pray.

Lord, open our hearts, our minds, and our eyes that we might see and know

the word you have for us this day.

In your holy name we pray.

Amen.

So, Leviticus.

Some of you were here a couple of years ago when we read through

the Bible as a church and you may recall that we started with Matthew

instead of starting with Genesis.

And you may also recall that my reasoning on that was that if you

ask a bunch of people who have never read the Bible to start with Genesis,

By Leviticus, they think you're crazy, and by Numbers, they hate you.

So, we started with the Gospels.

So, this is the book that you might think we're crazy for coming to,

and I certainly understand that I have read through Leviticus as

a whole three times in my life.

The first time, when I was a 13 year old reading the Bible for the

very first time, and it was a slog.

I didn't understand most of what I was reading.

I was reading the King James Version, so that was an obstacle in itself,

but figuring out all of this stuff.

This legal code was a little bit beyond me, but I made it through it.

And then the next time I came to Leviticus was as a 20 something year old

when I did disciple Bible study, which is another journey through the Bible.

And that time of my life, I was just kind of fascinated by some of these weird laws.

I'm going to read you a few of them today.

First from Leviticus 11, 9 through 12, you are allowed to eat the

following from all water animals.

You may eat anything in the water that has fins and scales, whether in sea

or stream, but anything in the seas or streams that does not have fins and

scales, whether it be any of the swarming creatures in the water or any of the

other living creatures in the water, is detestable to you and must remain so.

You must not eat their flesh and you must detest their dead bodies.

Anything in the water that does not have fins or scales is detestable to you.

Quite a blow to someone who loves crab and shrimp.

And then I also read further Leviticus 11 20 to 23 any flying insect that

walks on four feet now We know that most insects have six feet, but they

just mean prone in that way walks on four feet It's detestable to you, but

you can eat four footed flying insects that have jointed legs above their

feet with which they hop on the ground.

Of these you can eat the following, any kind of migrating locust, any

kind of bald locust, any kind of cricket, and any kind of grasshopper.

But every other flying insect that has four feet is detestable to you.

So good news, you can go to lunch and have a grasshopper.

But no bees, no flies, no mosquitoes, none of that.

And then from Leviticus 19, 19, and this one fascinated me, it seems so odd.

You must keep my rules.

Do not cross breed your livestock.

Do not plant your field with two kinds of seed.

And do not wear clothes made from two kinds of material.

How many of y'all are in trouble right now?

So that was my journey through Leviticus at that point in my life.

And then the third time that I came to Leviticus was in seminary.

When I was in my 30s.

And this time I came to this book with a true sense of dread.

Because this time I was coming to this book as a mom.

And specifically, I was coming to this book as a mom of a

child with a skin disease.

And I knew what Leviticus contained were restrictions on

skin diseases and the removal of such people from their community.

So my son, when he was about a month and a half old, suddenly got all

of these marks all over his body.

And I took him to the doctor and said, what are these?

And the doctor said, those are stork bites.

For those of you who are unfamiliar, that's what we sometimes call birthmarks

that show up on little babies.

But this seemed like an excessive stork.

Like it was really picking on my kid.

Because they were all over.

And I was like, okay.

And then a few weeks later, all of those stork bites blistered.

I took him back to the doctor and said, this is not stork bites.

And they said, no.

But they didn't know what it was.

They brought every doctor from the practice in to look at my child.

And they had no idea.

So they said, you're gonna have to go to a dermatologist.

Well, in Northwest Arkansas at the time, there were two dermatology

clinics in the whole area.

It was almost impossible to get into them.

One dermatology clinic had a seven month waiting list.

The other had a month and a half.

And despite the fact that I said, I have a baby with blisters all over his

body, they said, yeah, the soonest we can get you in is a month and a half.

A month and a half later, I do make my way to the dermatologist, and he takes

one look at my child and says, well, that is clearly Urticaria Pigmentosa.

Clearly, urticaria pigmentosa is a condition in which the cells in your

body that have produced histamine had concentrated not just all over my son's

skin, but every surface of his body, which meant that he had these marks not

only on the outside on his skin that we could see, but on every internal organ

and all through his digestive tract.

It also meant that if he had any kind of allergic reaction to anything, His

entire body was inflamed and itched.

We were sent home with a very strong antihistamine and some

instructions, including do not use soap at all on this child's skin.

So that was the child I was bringing to Leviticus as I

was reading it this next time.

And as I picked it up and knew that I would come across the regulations

that would say my son needs to be cast out, I said to myself, if he

is cast out, then I go with him.

And I did find in Leviticus those words that would restrict

the movement of my child.

But I also found something interesting.

I found his story all over that book because, you see, the doctors had told

me that people with Urticaria Pigmentosa should avoid shellfish at all costs.

Anything in the seas or streams that does not have fins or scales, whether it

be Of any of the swarming creatures in the water or any other living creatures

in the water is detestable to you.

And then the doctors had said people with Urticaria Pigmentosa should avoid bees.

Could have a reaction to those, so, of course, any flying

insect that walks on four feet.

is detestable to you.

And people with urticaria pigmentosa should only wear

100 percent cotton clothes.

Do not wear clothes made from two kinds of material.

People with urticaria pigmentosa should be washed every day with just

water and then anointed with lotion.

And suddenly that ritual that I was reading about how to mark someone as

clean was something we did every day, something we did every day for my child.

And suddenly this book was no longer a book that cast people out, but a

book that worked to keep everyone in.

Because we didn't know, they didn't know who would eat shrimp

and have allergic reaction.

But some will, so none of us eat.

And they didn't know who would have an allergic reaction

if they were stung by a bee.

But some will, so stay away.

And they didn't know what children would break out in hives

because they had mixed fabric.

But some will, so nobody wear it.

And all of a sudden, this book became a book that was seeking the homeless and

the healing and the inclusion of everyone.

And it was asking everyone to make a sacrifice so that that could happen.

So that the most vulnerable among us, the ones that would be the smallest,

the weakest, the sickest, would be protected by a society that just

put borders down to keep them safe.

Would it mean some of us would have to give something up?

Yes.

But for the benefit of others.

And it was marked by these two birds, one which sacrificed its life so that the

other would be dipped in its sacrifice.

and set free.

And then even the restriction of sending these folks outside of town

didn't seem so bad because all it is is sending them to the hospital.

We still do it when you're sick, when you're hurt, when you're injured, we

put you in a place where your healing can be the focus and where you're

not exposed to the crowd and where you're not exposed to more infection.

And where you can't spread that infection to others either.

It's not a casting out, it's a healing.

It's a healing.

So all of us make the sacrifice.

All of us make the sacrifice.

And organize our lives in a way that the vulnerable are taken care of.

Whether that's the leper, or the widow, or the orphan, or the stranger.

Whoever is at risk, we make the sacrifice so they're okay.

Reading this book as the mother of a child with a skin disease changed my lens from

a lens of judgment when I came to this book to a lens of love and inclusion to

see this book now as a book of healing, as a book of wisdom, as a book of wholeness,

as a book of protection and to see it as an invitation for us to organize

our community in such a way as well.

Using some of these laws would be outdated.

We don't actually need the restrictions on shrimp anymore because we have EpiPens.

There are a lot of things that are specifically spelled out here

that are very time bound to the knowledge and the way that the

people saw the world in that day.

But there are, as I mentioned, some timeless things.

that call us in this book, as does Deuteronomy and the prophets and

Jesus, to the care of the widow, the orphan, and the stranger, always.

To note the vulnerable, and to make space, and to make it safe for them.

Some laws are time bound, like our medical knowledge, and some laws are eternal.

Because they are laws that are based on love, and love never dies.

Love is never irrelevant.

Love is always needed and we are, I believe, always called to come to this

book, all of this book, with a lens of that love, a lens that calls us to

love God and to love neighbor, and to view this book from that perspective.

That is who we are.

That is who we are called to be.

But let me warn you, if you come to this book with that

lens, Scripture will change.

It will change.

It did for me all because I was a mom of a child.

I loved all because I had someone I loved.

I wanted to be included.

And all because I know that God loved him, God loves me, God

loves you, God loves us all.

Thanks be to God.

Matt Nelson: Thanks for listening to the Sermon Podcast from First United

Methodist Church in downtown Bentonville.

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Grace and peace.