Having a few hours to look for that story about the janitor and eschatology and after finding the wonderful picture of the hospital cleaner whose Americanism should make every Trumpian xenophobe shut up forever, as I purused the news, I found that the wonderful Walter Brueggemann had more to say about janitors and how their perspective on the world had probably more to tell us than the elite voices of those they clean up after. I don't have the time to go through the entire paper, which I've read far too quickly, but I wanted you to have a link to it because the paper and the embedded sermon have such profound relevance right now.
Just a sample:
So the panel ended. The folks went home. The king retired to his quarters exhausted and satisfied. He was only mildly alarmed by the Deuteronomist, for who listens to such abrasive theology? And anyway, that guy always said the same thing and people no longer paid him any attention. Everybody went home, except of course the janitors. A big crew had to clear up the litter. It was everywhere. Old bulletins of the service were even left around the ark. The ark had been the focus of the service. It was the oldest, most honored symbol, kept over from the days of the revolution. It was said to be God's special place. One of the young custodians, who had become cynical by living too close to "holy people," thought he would take a peek. He did not believe much about God's presence, but he did not have the skill or ability to doubt the claims of the throne very critically. It just seemed to him it was all more mundane than the liturgy suggested. His cynicism had helped him notice that the ones who believed all these liturgical claims so deeply were also the ones who seemed so well-off and secure. Perhaps such self-contained, excessively reassuring liturgy is more compelling when one has more of this world's goods. He suspected the claims might not convince so easily if one were not so well-off.
So he took a look into the ark. He did not touch it, for his cynicism had not advanced that far. Nor was he that jaded. He did not know what he expected to see. But he was shocked when he looked. What he saw was not God, but two tablets.
There was nothing in the ark except the two tablets of stone
which Moses put there at Horeb, where the Lord made a
covenant with the people of Israel when they came out of the land of Egypt. (I Kings 8:9)
The words said nothing mystical or enigmatic or eloquent or supernatural about God's presence. Only the old simple words first uttered to the liberated slaves:
No other gods,
No graven images,
You shall not steal,
You shall not commit adultery,
You shall not covet.
Kings have better words, more syllables, smoother, more reassuring, not so costly, but slaves and peasants tend to get down to basics. The janitor, at the end of the pageant, was driven back behind the pageant to the liberating miracle and the moment of bonding when Israel's life was changed and Israel's identity was set for all time in obedience against all the rulers of this age. The janitor was not a sophisticated theologian, or he would not have been messing with the litter. He never made the choir. He never participated in a theological forum, but it dawned on him that simple folk have found God's presence in the daily radicalness of holding to a covenantal ethic. Obedience is the shape of God's presence.
Moses had put obedience and presence together:
What great nation has a God so near,
,
What great nation has a torah so righteous. (Deut. 4:7-8, author's translation)
The Deuteronomist loved that word remembered from Moses. Moses did not have in mind the triviality of morality, but the deep vocational embrace of covenant. The janitor had a hunch that day that God's presence would not be found in the large, eloquent liturgies. He sensed inchoately that most of that was for reasons of state, contrived to enhance security and legitimacy. One must not be deceived and God must not be mocked.
It seems to be the theme of my day, janitors and what they see from where they are. The ones who are as important as the ventilators and treatments of the doctors, the ones who are doing the scrubbing down to lessen the dangers to everyone else and what they know. I hope everyone includes the when they are applauding and blowing their horns and making the speeches because they're as heroic as anyone in this.
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