KEEPING THE SACRED, SACRED

2 Kings 20:1-22:2; Acts 21:18-36; Psalm 150:1-6; Proverbs 18:9-10

“’They saw everything,’ Hezekiah replied. ‘I showed them everything I own—all my royal treasuries.’ Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, ‘Listen to this message from the Lord: The time is coming when everything in your palace—all the treasures stored up by your ancestors until now—will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the Lord.’”

“… Some shouted one thing and some another. Since he couldn’t find out the truth in all the uproar and confusion, he ordered that Paul be taken to the fortress.”

“The name of the Lord is a strong fortress; the godly run to him and are safe.”

“Transparency” is fast becoming the number one buzz word of 2009. Our collective psyche has developed such a deep suspicion of anything less than full disclosure that we now find ourselves overwhelmed with too much information, and we are ill-prepared to deal with it. Moreover, we find it increasingly difficult to separate the important from the merely distracting. We micromanage our subordinates and harshly judge our leaders, and we overreact to anything that does not fit our definition of the way things should be. In the midst of all the shouting, fear and societal invasions of our personal space, it is no wonder we lose our sense of the sacred.

There are times full disclosure is good, even necessary. But there also are, or should be, times of sacred import we are better off keeping to ourselves. Hezekiah was far too quick to show off the Temple and the instruments of God to those who would eventually become Judah’s Babylonian captors. Rather than inspiring awe and reverence, Hezekiah’s faux pas seems only to have inspired greed, avarice and temptation on the part of his guests. It put both his subjects and their religion at risk. It was, in essence, a profane and insensitive act done without consideration of others or regard for the consequences, simply out of personal pride. Had he remembered he was treading on sacred ground, the King might have fared better.

Even certain pagans in Scripture knew better, and it is a good thing, too. The Roman officer who arrested Paul recognized there is a time and place for reasoning, and that when one is surrounded by an angry mob is no time for full disclosure. It is, in fact, the time and place for discrete withdrawal. Proverbs encourages retreat to God in the midst of the storms of life. Sometimes, sanctuary is the only real security there is.

That’s probably why the Holy Spirit gave us sacraments in the first place. In the middle of our disordered and chaotic world, the sacraments – or, more precisely, “sacred moments” – provide refuge and rest. They require our time and focus, but their reward is clarity and renewed confidence. Communion, in particular, reminds us of who and Whose we are, “as oft as ye shall drink it.” In a hurting and broken world, the time we spend with the sacraments may be the only opportunity we have to truly think clearly and get our priorities and personal stories straight with God.  

 We all need private, sacred moments away with God. When we are too busy or too pressured to stop our lives for the Lord, we are too busy and pressured not to make a special effort to reclaim grace. We all need to foster an individual relationship with Jesus that is uniquely ours. When we persist in telling everyone everything we learn and experience with the Spirit, it’s more likely than not a sign of our own insecurities. We need no validation of our faith relationship other than what we get from the Father. All it takes is some private time and attention.