Prayer, God’s Kind Condescension

Passage:  Psalm5:1-2; Psalm 28:1-2; Daniel 10:12

Introduction.

How many of you have heard of Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout?  In our family one of our most favorite Shel Silverteen poems is about her.

Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout would not take the garbage out

She’d scour the pots and scrub the pans

Candy the yams and spice the hams

And though her daddy would scream and shout

She simply would not take the garbage out

 

And so, it piled up to the ceilings

Coffee grounds, potato peelings

Brown bananas, rotten peas, chunks of sour cottage cheese

That filled the can and covered the floor, cracked the window and blocked the door

 

At last the garbage reached so high that it finally touched the sky

And all the neighbors moved away

And none of her friends would come to play

And finally, Sarah Cynthia Stout said

“OK, I’ll take the garbage out!”

 

But then, of course, it was too late

The garbage reached across the state

From New York to the Golden Gate

And there, in the garbage she did hate

Poor Sarah met an awful fate

 

That I cannot, right now relate

Because the hour is much too late

But children, remember Sarah Stout

And always take the garbage out

 

Who likes to take the garbage out?  How many of us think of taking the garbage out as one of those necessary evils, one of those tedium’s of daily life?  How many of us put it off for as long as possible, perhaps hoping someone else will do it?

Have you ever considered another perspective?  Have any of you ever thought about garbage theologically?  I know you are probably thinking, leave it to a pastor to actually think about garbage theologically, doctrinally, Biblically.

But, the truth is we should think of everything theologically since everything in all creation is from God, by God, through God, for God and to God as Romans 11:36 says.

The reason we don’t think this way about garbage is because taking the garbage out is so utterly routine, dull, boring, unimportant; it doesn’t even rise to the level of conscious thought.

Let me offer you a different perspective.  Garbage is not a dull, necessary, unimportant part of our existence.  It is in fact a divine blessing, and we should view it as a daily sacrament because it is a sign of God’s gracious, abundant provision.

People who have no garbage have no provisions.  If nothing is coming in, nothing is going out.

With bacon rinds and chicken bones, drippy ins of ice cream cones

Prune pits, peach pits, orange peel

Gluppy glumps of cold oat meal, pizza crust and withered greens

And soggy beans and tangerines and crust of black burned buttered toast

And gristly bits of beefy roast

 

These are all signs that our Father in heaven is feeding us.  These are all signs of God’s answer to our prayer, “give us this day our daily bread.”  He has answered that pray so abundantly that we have to carry bags of leftovers out to our garbage cans and big trucks have to come up and down our streets to carry it all away.

Who ever thought of a landfill as a sign of God’s constant, faithful, generous abundant provision, day in and day out, year in and year out.  But it is so routine we never give it a thought.