Transcript
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In the name of God present here among us and within us I call us into prayer There is a struggle in the womb of love between simply being and being good between seeing the worst and Setting free the gift of essential humanhood There is a struggle in the womb of the church the shrine the synagogue the sanctuary between spirit power and institution between promises and their execution between rubric and reality We struggle
to know you and name you Shaddai and to understand something of you Grateful to be committed and free to choose you Let us stand and sing of a world we envision Oh For a world where goods are shared and misery Believed We welcome one world family and struggle It's our vision Oh We And we continue to pray Living God Loving God Glory and power and praise are yours Whether or not we know it Whether or not
we see it Present even when glory and power are hidden from our eyes Show us your glory Shekhinah Shaddai in the midst of our sin and our suffering And help us transform ourselves and our world Through your glory in dwelling here now and forever Our scripture reading for this morning is taken from the book of numbers chapter 27 and Then the daughters of Zalophehad came forward Zalophehad was son of Hepher son of Joseph With son of
Hepher son of Gilead son of Machar son of Manasseh son of Joseph a member of the Manassite clans and the names of his daughters were Mahlah Noa Hoglah Milcah and Tirzah and they stood before Moses Eleazar the priest The leaders and all the congregation at the entrance of the tent of meeting and they said Our father died in the wilderness He was not among the company of those who gathered themselves against the Lord in the company
of Korah But died for his own sins And he had no sons Why should the name of our father be taken away from his clan Because he had no sons Give to us a possession among our fathers brothers Moses brought their case before the Lord and the Lord spoke to Moses saying The daughters of Zalophehad are right in what they are saying You shall indeed let them possess an inheritance among their father's brothers and pass the
inheritance Of their father on to them You shall also say to the Israelites if a man dies and has no son Then you shall pass his inheritance on to his daughter It shall be for the Israelites a statute and ordinance as the Lord commanded Moses Zalophehad died in the wilderness Just as he was about to cross over into the promised land He had been given a portion of that promise For the leadership of Israel had divided
the land among all of the tribes and families And the leaders had decreed that this inheritance would pass through the eldest son from one generation to the next but Zalophehad had no sons He died without male heirs to the fulfillment of his dream Zalophehad had no sons But he had five feisty daughters They too had fled from lives of bondage in both body and spirits They too had crossed the desert after spending nearly all of their
lives wandering in the wilderness They too had suffered hardships beyond all human reckoning and they had managed to survive Zalophehad's daughters were justifiably upset by the injustice of a system which denied them their share of the promise so they took their complaint to Moses and Moses presented their case before God and God said let the daughters inherit the daughters of Zalophehad Mahlah Noa Hoglah Milcah and Tirzah Oh, let them not be nameless for too many daughters
have been lost in the anonymity of a witness Which has not been handed down to us from the fathers or their sons The daughters stood up and they spoke out challenging injustice And God said to the leaders of the people let the daughters inherit Indeed God said and God still says let the daughters inherit in fact God said and God still says let my Daughters inherit For we women every one of us Are indeed daughters of
the living God Made as we are in her image Born of her womb love and her wisdom We together with her sons Stand directly in line to inherit the fullness of her shalom Today Like the daughters whose courage we proclaim we too stand up and speak out against systemic injustice Against the countless forms of global injustice which threaten to destroy us all Our deepest desire Is simply to add one more dimension to the dialogue of human
experience To introduce yet another innovative step to the dance of the universe to preach Teach live the good news as if it were in fact good news To cradle with compassion the whole of a hurting heartbroken world And to love it to life again In Bosnia, Herzegovina They are once again dividing the land among fathers and sons Partitioning human freedom destroying past present and future for generations to come Calling this purge an ethnic cleansing And justifying
their actions in the name of ancient hatreds that have deep religious roots And what will their daughters inherit a world we dare not imagine Yet we women cannot help but wonder Would all of this be different? If life and death decisions were made by mothers and daughters And not solely by fathers and sons In Somalia food is a weapon and disputes are decided by guns emaciated babies die because warlords prefer ultimate power to familial blessedness Would
rather pour food into the sea Than put it before a hungry child Have kept food away from wives and sisters and mothers and daughters I have been in Ethiopia During the time of its famine I set up an intensive feeding center there for emaciated children I know what it is like I know how it feels when the food runs out And the well runs dry And humanitarian aid is intercepted and the rains do not come I
also know beyond a doubt That it would indeed be different If decisions about food and family About home and hope and the future Were the domain of mothers and daughters And not solely fathers and sons In los angeles our own nation is again on trial and what is really being called into question There are all of our systemic isms driven by a deep insidious racism Controlling precisely who will inherit the constitutional promises of this nation We
the daughters of god here today Bring to you our perspective On the promises of christ It is a fully inclusive perspective There are things we want to say to society Initiatives we want to take for the benefit of the world and the preservation of our future We are tired of being apologetic Tired of making a case for ourselves and our presence in the tradition Tired of insisting on our right to inherit opportunities equally with men We
know we were there at the birth pangs That we women were central to the origins of our christian tradition As mother to the jesus of history who is the christ of christology Giving to jesus the blood of our blood which he would pour out for all of us Present throughout his life and ministry Present throughout his suffering and death Present at the cross and beside the tomb present as eyewitnesses of his resurrection present at pentecost When
the spirit set our hearts on fire And liberated our enslaved spirits Present at the birth and development of the movement which we call church We were always followers of jesus And we still are We were preachers And teachers and leaders once With full discipleship and we want that reality again There is a universe out there waiting for us to lead it to justice and peace Waiting for us to be invited into a partnership of possibilities Our
universe longing to receive from us our unconditional love We have taken our case to our leaders But they have been slow to deal with it So we've gone directly to god And god says Let the daughters inherit Let my daughters inherit These are my daughters You are all my children and I love you one and all I pray in the name of my sisters everywhere Promise us Oh god of the exodus Promise you will keep your
promise For the land we seek seems far from us And the road we travel Is long Promise we will come to the promised land while we can still remember The vision and the traditions to which we once belonged And let all who feel a part of this prayer say amen Please join me in a continuation of our prayer Oh dawn of the new creation spill array of hope lift the hearts of your sons and daughters For
we are bound by a vision That is not always clear to see Help us to help each other For we truly need each other And that you need us and we need you every day of our lives I would like to create with you now a song benediction You have a text You have no tune That does also invite you then into a moment of trust And creativity and risk taking and maybe doing something that you
never did before I will spell out the melody and the text for you and just simply repeat what you hear in a call response refrain, okay?
[music] Sing we sing of a blessing Sing we sing of a blessing A blessing of love A blessing of mercy Love will increase A blessing of peace Pray now pray for a blessing Pray for a blessing Pray for a blessing Blessing of joy A blessing of justice Love will increase A blessing
of peace Share now share in a blessing Share now share in a blessing Share now share in a blessing A blessing of hope A blessing of courage Love will increase A blessing of peace A blessing of peace Live live live as a blessing Live live live as a blessing A blessing within A blessing among us Love will increase A blessing of peace Rise up rise for a blessing Rise up rise for a blessing A blessing to
all Now and forever Love will increase A blessing of peace Love will increase A blessing of peace Amen
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