NOTE: I didn't deliver this sermon. The text presented here is what I had intended on delivering but God changed the message significantly before I delivered it. You can listen to the actual sermon here.
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This morning I want to look at a passage from 2 Kings. It is not too often that the church hears sermons from these historical books. In fact, the Revised Common Lectionary, which I love, only has 5 passages from the entire 25 chapters of the book and almost ignores the entire testimony of 1-2 Kings and 1-2 chronicles with only 17 passages total for all 112 chapters and 500 years of monarchy, give or take a few years. But the real reason I am preaching on this text, today, the first Sunday of the New Year is because it relates to New Years resolutions. Particularly, to the kinds of resolutions and reflections we must be concerned with. I say that b/c the resolutions and reflections we make, fail to make, or just don’t take the time to make and implement in our lives will have effects on our children and grand children. The very words that close our passage end with a sobering reminder that to this day the children and the grandchildren continue to do as the fathers did. So as we enter the New Year, let’s consider carefully a passage that brings to light the greatest tragedy which can be passed on – the tragedy of syncretism.
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This morning I want to look at a passage from 2 Kings. It is not too often that the church hears sermons from these historical books. In fact, the Revised Common Lectionary, which I love, only has 5 passages from the entire 25 chapters of the book and almost ignores the entire testimony of 1-2 Kings and 1-2 chronicles with only 17 passages total for all 112 chapters and 500 years of monarchy, give or take a few years. But the real reason I am preaching on this text, today, the first Sunday of the New Year is because it relates to New Years resolutions. Particularly, to the kinds of resolutions and reflections we must be concerned with. I say that b/c the resolutions and reflections we make, fail to make, or just don’t take the time to make and implement in our lives will have effects on our children and grand children. The very words that close our passage end with a sobering reminder that to this day the children and the grandchildren continue to do as the fathers did. So as we enter the New Year, let’s consider carefully a passage that brings to light the greatest tragedy which can be passed on – the tragedy of syncretism.
To understand what “the tragedy of syncretism” involves, we need to understand some of the history our passage is referencing. Our passage comes at the end of the Northern Kingdom of Israel. These are the rebellious Jews who splintered off after Solomon’s son, Rehoboam, promised to be harsher than his farther. These guys said, no thanks, and started their own kingdom, established their own temples and worshipped in their own ways. In the 17th Chapter of 2 Kings we read that Hoshea is the king of Israel when Assyria captures Samaria and all its territory and deports the inhabitants of the land. This is the great Diaspora of the Jews, 10 tribes, scattered across the ancient near east and verse 9 tells us why:
“The Israelites secretly did things against the Lord their God that were not right.”
(2 Kings 17:9a NIV)
The text then goes on to elaborate a whole list of things that were not secret from idolatry being listed in 10 different ways, to refusing to listen 5x, failing to trust 4x, imitating the nations 2x, and selling themselves to do evil once. If these are the visible sins, you can only imagine the secret sins they engaged in, the sins of the heart: the internal rebellion, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life (1 Jn 2:16), arrogance, greed, hedonism. And the list could go on and on and on. These were the sins of Israel, the sins, which got them carried off into exile.
While it is only mentioned twice in the list, I believe the words, “They imitated the nations around them although the Lord had ordered them, “Do not do as they do…”” serve as a proper summation of the crime of Israel – the secret sin of a heart not directed to God, but rather focused on the world. Such is the background as we enter into our story. The Assyrian king, after deporting Israel, imports inhabitants from Babylon, Cuthah, Hamath, and a few other obscure locations along the Fertile Crescent. Such was the way of the Assyrians. Their foreign policy consisted of moving conquered peoples out of their lands and bringing other conquered folks in. It was brilliant, if you completely destabilize a people and a culture then you have a greater chance of getting them to adopt your culture and be obedient subjects.
The new inhabitants arrive and the first thing they do is to start worshipping their gods. The only problem is God Almighty has a special claim on this land. This is the promised land and there is to be no idolatry within its borders, for God spoke through Moses saying Deut 7:5 “This is what you are to do to them: Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones, cut down their Asherah poles and burn their idols in the fire.”
In the Promised Land, Israelite and alien alike are to be worshippers of God alone, there is to be no compromise, no tolerance, no peaceful coexistence. And since these new inhabitants were failing to obey the law of God, remember ignorance is no excuse with the Authority – Almighty or Civil, God sends lions among them. When they first lived there, they did not worship the Lord, so he sent lins among them and they killed some of the people (2Kings 17:25)
The fascinating thing about it is these immigrants actually pay a little heed to this, they recognize that there is something supernatural going on and that the ‘god of the land’ is not pleased. It was reported to the king of Assyria: “The people you deprted and resettled in the towns of Samaria do not know what the god of that country requires…” (2Kings 17:26) Presumably they make a plea to the rulers for someone to instruct them in the worship of this god. So, the king of Assyria commands that the people be “evangelized in the worship of Yahweh.” “Then the king of Assyria gave this order: “Have one of the priests you took captive from Samaria go back to live there and teach the people what the god of the land requires.” (2Kings 17:27) Isn’t this great, God drives a nation out for idolatry, brings a new series of nations into the Promised Land and then opens up a way for them to be evangelized.
Hold that reality with you while we switch gears for a moment. Imagine you are at the upcoming winter Olympics and you have tickets to see the synchronized figure skating competitions, one skating pair after another takes to the ice. Each moving precisely the same in action and time. Each pair able to skate as though they are one organism being controlled by one master puppeteer who is able to make all the moves occur simultaneously and in complete harmony.
Or picture yourself on a dance floor, each pair of dancers gracefully moving across the wood effortlessly, their movement matching one another perfectly. But wait, what’s this, there is a couple who appears to be dancing, but not together. He is dancing to the jitterbug, while she is dancing to the waltz and the music is that of a samba.
We all understand the absurdity of such an image when compared to the beauty of synchorized sports, the sheer amazement we get watching two souls flow gracefully together, whether as great dancers, skaters or swimmers. Let these images serve to illustrate what has gone on in Israel and what is about to happen again. Who is familiar with the term “syncretized religion”?
Syncretism is like our dancers. Those who propose and practice syncretized religions want us to believe that two opposing belief sets are entirely congruent, that they really are like two perfectly matched partners performing a precision work of art, yet from God’s perspective, they are like two idiotic dancers claiming to be in sync but really pursuing different ends with different means of getting their. There is nothing beautiful about it.
Returning to our story lets see how this fits into the mix. One of the priests returns to evangelize the people. The problem: this is one the very priests that had been evicted from the land for idolatry and imitating the nations. So the priest who had been exiled from Samaria came to live in Bethel and taught them how to worship the Lord. (2Kings 17:28) These were the very priests who had tried to syncretize the worship of Yahweh with the ways of the nations around them. These were the folks who refused to worship in Jerusalem like God said. So this guy does his best to articulate the worship of God, syncretized and all, and the people do what Israel had done before them: They adopt a syncretized form of worship as well. Twice it is stated that these new inhabitants “worshipped the Lord but also served their own gods.” This is the definition of syncretism.
In our modern day attempts at evangelism, we would shout a great “hip-hip-horray” for such a wonderful outcome. These pagans now have knowledge of God. They are saved, sure they are still in the world, but they worship God. That’s good isn’t it? No, it’s not. The tragedy of syncretism is that it is passed on to the children and grandchildren. The tragedy of syncretism is that it becomes a way of life for people, not a temporary transition into true religion, but a whole way of deadly living.
And in a biting commentary on this absurd reality, we have a sharp reversal from the earlier words, they “worshipped the Lord but also served their own gods.” What immediately follows this statement in verse 34 is this, “To this day they persist in their practices. They neither worship the Lord nor adhere to the decrees, ordinances, laws and commands that the Lord gave…” God calls syncretism the unmatched pair of dancers. The former ways, the ways of the nations, and the new ways, the ways of God, cannot be mingled into a beautiful dance. It is absurdity to try, and only the foolish attempt it. It is not true worship.
So what does this have to do with us? Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” I say, “The unexamined life perpetuates false, syncretized worship.” The tragedy with syncretism is that all of us are its heirs. Whether we are the Israelites who were driven from the land, raised by idolatrous parents who knew God, or whether we are the new inhabitants of the land, brought into the Promised Land later in life, the product of the church’s evangelizing mission, we are all syncretistic in our faith.
We all try to hold on to the old ways of the world. We want to imitate the society around us. We are enamored with the gods of the World – the Baals and Ashtorahs, the Nergals and Molechs.
We uncritically wed the values of society to the life of faith. We accept society’s materialistic focus, its fascination with beauty and success, its sensualist appeal, its fascination with fashion. These are the Baals and Asherahs – the gods of fertility, productivity, and worldly blessing. We run after the almighty dollar and believe that the soccer mom syndrome is normal, even healthy. We believe that the desires of our children should be met, even when their desires are destructive and syncretistic at best.
Consider the absurdity of telling children that death is the enemy and life is immensely valuable, then buying them a video game, they want, which put the players into the roles of those who take life, and who cheat and steal. Or taking them to participate in Halloween, the celebration of the dead. Or turning on television and movies which are full of violence and destruction. These are our modern day Molech and Nergals, the gods of destruction and death, fire and storm. These are the gods who demanded human flesh and a lack of emotion at its destruction. What are we really telling and teaching them? We are saying, “syncretism is a beautiful dance, join in.” We erroneously believe that our children need to be exposed to all that the world offers and posits as normal, even thinking that they are not going to imitate the world, while everything we do is telling them to imitate the world.
Now consider the absurdity of placing children in a system of indoctrination for 14000 hours (6 hr/dy, 180dy/yr, K-12), add to that 2 hours of TV/dy = 9490 ours, add in 8 hours of sleep a day and 16 hours a day are used up. 24000 hours in indoctrination, 37960 in sleep, compared to the average 2 hours a day parents spend in direct interaction with their children, not supervision, but direct interaction. That is the same are TV watching. We are trying as parents and caregivers of our children to undue the indoctrination they receive of 24000 hours over 13 years with 9500 hours of “quality time.” Is it any wonder that our children and grandchildren are serving idols and leaving the faith? Is it any wonder that the gemstones of society – sexual freedom, tolerance, money, and spirituality devoid of Christ have infiltrated the church and become main themes within the lives of most of our progeny?
Our children are living the lives we have given them and they are doing it because syncretism is the easiest way out there. If we aren’t reflecting on our life and the life of society, then we are going to continue falling into the tragedy of syncretism; we will persist in the old ways.
I am not trying to guilt trip or condemn anyone. If your kids aren’t walking with God right now, I am sorry. Pray and trust God, but for you younger parents. For you grandparents, aunts, uncles, teachers… how do we move forward? How do we get out of the trap we are caught in? Let me out line a way forward, maybe not the only way, but one way as I see it.
1) Cry out to Jesus. Since we are hopelessly syncretistic, we must pray for the Lord to break us free from all those things that seek to hinder and hold us back. Remember that prayer of Paul’s, the 3-2-1 prayer from 2 Thes 3:1-5. Pray that the gospel will advance over our life. Pray that everything which hinders us will be defeated and we will be delivered up as a dancer able to follow the leading arm of God, not pounding our head into the floor while God is trying to waltz with us. Pray that God will control us so that our sins are not passed on, nor modeled to our children/grandchildren. Be intentional about seeking and submitting to God. I am going to begin a Sunday school class on this very topic – how to seek and submit to God through the Spiritual Disciplines – next week.
2) Study the Word, devote time to study and meditation. Reflect on your life and the changes that the Word is requesting of you. Evaluate your usage of time and money. Ask yourself, (for those without children, insert nieces, nephews, children of the church whom you have made baptismal vows to…)
· “What patterns have I inherited from my parents?”
· “Are these consistent with the Word of God or the society around me?”
· “What would it look like to use my time and money in a more Godly way?”
· “How can I intentionally pass on God’s values to my children or grandchildren in the ways I act?”
3) Be intentional as you reflect on what you are doing to indoctrinate your children/ grandchildren into the ways of God. I use the word “indoctrinate” very specifically and purposefully. Society is trying to indoctrinate them into a worldview, and we must indoctrinate our children into a Christian view.
· “Am I aware of what my children/grandchildren are being taught in school, on tv, at sports events/camps, etc.?” “Do I want this indoctrination as part of their life?”
· “How much time do I want to directly influence the input my children/grandchildren receive?”
· “How does that compare to what I am actual doing? What changes will I make to achieve these goals?”
· “How am I training my children/grandchildren in prayer? How am I training my children in service? How am I training my children in the Word?”
4) Make a list of the character qualities you desire your children/grandchildren to have when they are 18, 35, 50, 70 years old.
· “Are they distinctly Christian qualities, or are they the qualities of the world?” Change those that need to be changed.
· “How much of my life exhibits those qualities?”
Then pray over this list regularly for yourself and for them. As we come into a New Year and are making our resolutions, if this passage it to teach us anything, we must remember that our children will do as their fathers have done – and this is the tragedy of syncretism that only God can change in our lives and the lives of those we love.
Haggai gives us words of pause, that are wonderfully mated to this message. In his prophecy, Haggai asks the people this question a few times, “Give careful thought to your ways…” (Haggai 1:5,7, 2:15, 18) Haggai was the Socrates of the Jews. Reflection, resolutions and such are valuable as seeking to mitigate sin and ceasing from passing it on, but even that is not enough.
Like I said earlier, we are all hopelessly syncretistic. We need a savior. And so Jesus has come to redeem us from our sin. He has come to rescue us even when all our reflection and resolution still is not bearing the ultimate fruit that we desire: faith, hope, love, righteousness and holiness. Christ alone is the answer, so cry out to him, as you reflect on the legacy that is being passed to the next generation. For he alone can save each and every one of us – sinful though we are. He has redeemed you! Amen.
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