What Are We Building?
After Pentecost • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 4 viewsWhen pharaohs build by making people expendable, Jesus builds by drawing people into belonging. Through Exodus 1–2 and Matthew 16, we explore how the church Jesus is building is called to see who bears the cost, refuse to be complicit, and draw people in.
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Introduction
Introduction
We like to build things.
I remember when I was the CFO for an outpatient physical therapy company.
The owner loved owning properties and developing them.
...and the more I got to know this person...
...and the circle they traveled in...
...the more I began to recognize how much building and developing represented success.
You bought another property...
...you redeveloped another building...
You expanded into the community...
...you climbed another rung on the ladder...
I am not saying there is anything inherently wrong with building.
We build schools and hospitals...
Building can create jobs, strengthen communities, and open possibilities that did not exist before.
However, when I reflect on the scripture today, I am reminded that sometimes we build at someone else’s expense.
We don’t have to look far to see this is still happening today...
Syracuse bears the scars of it...
Banks, real-estate interests, and government policies drew red lines around predominantly Black neighborhoods...
...deciding where mortgages would be available...
...where investment would flow...
Then urban planners drove Interstate 81 through the heart of the 15th Ward...
...displacing families and destroying businesses...
...leaving a divide that limited access to healthcare, jobs, transportation, and other opportunities.
Pharaohs like to divide…
Today, all we have to do is turn on the television and watch how politicians have turned immigrants into threats to national security...
...building systems of enforcement and detention...
...that trade human dignity for the pursuit of security...
Pharaoh’s turn neighbors into threats.
Then, there are the billionaires and corporations building enormous data centers...
...to power our increasingly digital world...
...while communities, often communities already carrying environmental and economic burdens...
...are left asking who will bear the costs to their land...
...their water...
...their electricity...
...and their neighborhoods...
Pharaoh’s make the vulnerable bear the cost.
These circumstances remind us that what looks like progress to some...
...can come at the expense of others.
Our Exodus story tells us that Pharaoh looked upon the growing Israelite population...
...and became afraid.
He imagined what they might do...
...they might become too numerous...
...they might join Egypt’s enemies...
... and we know from the text that Pharaoh's fear didn’t remain fear...
...fear became policy...
...and policy became forced labor...
...and forced labor built Pithom and Rameses.
Pharaoh built his supply cities by making an entire people expendable...
...but then we turn to our Gospel lesson...
...and we hear another builder...
...a builder of grace and love...
Standing with his disciples, Jesus tells Peter, “On this rock I will build my church.”
Friends… two very different builders....
You see, there are times when pharaohs build by making people expendable.
When such occurs, Jesus builds by drawing people into belonging.
Today, I want to invite us to wrestle with...
...how are we called to live as the church Jesus is building...
...when people around us are treated as expendable.
See Who Bears the Cost
See Who Bears the Cost
Let’s delve a little deeper into our Exodus story...
...which challenges us first to see who bears the cost.
Imagine...
Billionaires building warehouses...
...distribution centers...
...and massive data centers for themselves...
But the more they built...
...the more land they acquired...
...the more electricity they consumed...
...and the more communities already burdened by poverty and pollution were asked to bear the cost...
Friends, Pharaoh knew something about building...
Our scripture tells us:
“They built supply cities, Pithom and Rameses, for Pharaoh.”
Biblical scholar Terence Fretheim observes that Pharaoh is more than simply an ancient historical figure.
Pharaoh becomes a symbol of what Fretheim calls the “anti-creation forces of death” that oppose the life-giving work of God.
In the story, Pharaoh looks at the Israelites...
...and he does not see neighbors.
Instead, he sees numbers...
...population growth...
… a potential enemy...
He sees a threat to the status quo...
...and eventually, his fear becomes structured into an oppressive system.
Taskmasters are appointed...
...forced labor is imposed...
...bricks are made...
...and cities are built.
We see Pithom and Rameses rise...
...and Pharaoh prospers...
...but somebody bears the cost of this prosperity...
Human beings made in the image of God...
...but under slavery are treated as objects for somebody else’s purposes.
Friends, when Pharaoh builds, we have to see who bears the cost.
...because Pithom and Rameses still have modern counterparts.
In 2024, the artificial-intelligence company xAI began developing its massive Colossus data center in South Memphis.
...nearby is Boxtown...
...a historically Black community already burdened by industrial pollution.
To provide the extraordinary amount of power required by the facility...
xAI installed dozens of methane gas turbines...
...and residents began asking questions...
...what will this mean for the air our children breathe?
...what will this mean for our health?
...what will this mean for our utility bills?
I wonder… why does technological progress that benefits others...
...requires neighborhoods of color to be burdened?
The NAACP has taken the fight to court...
...challenging pollution associated with the facility...
...and arguing that Black communities should not have to bear the environmental costs of technological innovation.
...and perhaps Exodus is expanding our moral imagination
...to not just ask, what are we building...
...but to look around...
...to look beyond the promises of investment...
...convivence...
...and progress...
Scripture points us to look for the people standing beside Pithom...
...to look beside those living beside Rameses....
...to look for those living beside data centers...
To look at the dignity of all humanity, whose air...
...whose neighborhood...
...whose bodies...
...are absorbing the cost of somebody else’s progress.
Friends, before we celebrate what Pharaoh builds...
...see who bears the cost.
Refuse to Be Complicit
Refuse to Be Complicit
Our Exodus story challenges us to refuse to be complicit.
Imagine a ruler who declares a certain group of people living among us is a threat...
...and government agents are sent out to find them...
...but there are people in the community who fear God more than they fear that ruler...
So when the agents come looking for one of their neighbors...
...the refuse to participate...
Perhaps a friend makes a phone call...
...which leads to someone offering a car...
...which then leads to someone providing a safe place...
...strangers begin helping strangers...
...until an informal network stretches north from Syracuse...
...toward the Canadian border...
...and eventually, a French immigrant named Jeremey...
...who had called Syracuse home for more than twenty years...
...makes it safely across.
Maybe some of you recognize that story because it happened here, not in ancient Egypt.
However, it sounds eerily familiar to scripture...
“But the midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live.”
Shiphrah… Puah… Syracusans...
Each of their stories asks what happens …
…when neighbors decide not to become complicit in the harm being done to their neighbors.
Theologian Wilda Gafney reminds us that the liberation of the Israelites does not begin with Moses.
Before Moses confronts Pharaoh...
...before the plagues or the parting of the sea...
...before Israel takes a single step toward freedom...
...there are women resisting Pharaoh.
Shiphrah and Puah are commanded to participate directly in Pharaoh’s violence...
Yet.… Yet...
they refuse...
...and what I find fabulous about this story is that we know their names...
The names of two women.
Now Pharaoh’s name isn’t mentioned in the story...
The man with all the power to perpetuate violence isn’t remembered...
Just two women who refused to become complicit...
Shiphrah and Puah…
...are remembered for the grace that shaped them to participate in God's work of freedom and liberation.
Friends, their fear of God reflects an understanding of the sacredness of human life.
So when Pharaoh’s command conflicts with the sacredness of human life...
...they choose life...
...and they are not alone...
Pharaoh's own daughter.
She opens the basket and sees a child crying...
She knows exactly who this child is… the text records her saying...
“This must be one of the Hebrews’ children.”
Surely she knew her father’s command and what was supposed to happen to this child...
When one of the people that the system has declared expendable is placed before her...
...she chooses compassion over complicity.
Pharaoh’s daughter with privilege can work on behalf of the oppressed to bring about justice.
These women who love boldly don’t overthrow Pharaoh...
...they lead courageously by refusing to play the part Pharaoh's system has assigned them.
Friends, that is where liberation begins...
Sometimes we look at systems of injustice...
...that seems too enormous...
...entrenched...
...far beyond anything one person could possibly change...
...and we convince ourselves there is nothing we can do...
But Exodus does not ask whether Shiphrah and Puah have enough power to overthrow Egypt...
The scripture asks whether they will become complicit in Pharaoh's death-dealing system...
...and they refuse.
Sometimes refusing complicity looks like marching in the streets.
Sometimes it sounds like songs of resistance rising from people who refuse to be silent.
Sometimes it means showing up at a public hearing...
...and demanding accountability from the people with power.
Sometimes it means using whatever privilege we possess...
....to stand beside someone Pharaoh has decided is expendable.
...and sometimes… just sometimes… it looks like the most simple acts of...
...making phone calls...
...offering rides...
...opening doors...
...and helping a neighbor find safety.
Friends, we may not dismantle every harmful system...
...but liberation begins when we refuse to be complicit.
Kerygmatic Fulfillment
Kerygmatic Fulfillment
The scriptures invite us to examine how we are called into living...
...as the Church Jesus is building...
...and y’all know I am Methodist through and through…
...so you can guess my suggestion is that we draw people in...
...because God’s prevenient grace draws people in...
We know that resisting Pharaoh is not the end of the Exodus story.
Our Gospel takes us to Caesarea Philippi...
...a place surrounded by reminders of power...
...of competing claims about who was lord.
...and it’s no mistake that it’s in a place bearing Caesar’s name and associated with imperial power...
...that Jesus asks his disciples…
“But who do you say that I am?”
...and Peter responds...
“You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
...and Jesus makes a promise...
“On this rock, I will build my church.”
It’s not Peter who is building the church, or the disciples…
...but the very grace of Jesus, because he says...
“I will build my church.”
It’s this grace that distinguishes how Pharaoh builds...
...and how Jesus builds...
Pharaoh builds by deciding who is useful...
...and who is expendable....
Jesus builds by drawing near to people that others have cast aside...
...Jesus touches people others will not touch...
...Jesus eats with people, others will not eat with...
...Jesus sees people others have stopped seeing...
...and ultimately, Jesus himself is treated as expendable...
...rejected...
...condemned...
...and crucified...
The powers of this world take Jesus outside the city....
...they place him upon a cross...
...and they discard him...
But we know the end of the story, friends...
God is not finished building...
On the third day...
...the tomb is empty....
Death does not get the final word...
Pharaoh does not get the final word...
Presidential authority does not get the final word…
Billionaires do not get the final word…
The systems that decide some lives are expendable do not get the final word.
God does...
...and the Crucified risen Christ continues building a church...
A church...
...drawing people whom the world has pushed aside...
...back into community...
...back into relationship...
...back into belonging...
That is the church we have been drawn into.
...and if that grace has drawn us in...
...then grace shapes how we live together.
We learn to see who bears the cost.
We refuse to be complicit when our neighbors are treated as expendable.
...and we draw people in because Christ first drew us into a community of grace.
In the name of our Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer. Amen.
