Sermon for 2-8-09: Speaking of Rats, Singing of Eagles

Texts: Isaiah 40: 21-31; Psalm 147: 1-11, Mark 1: 29-39

I have sometimes talked about my interim ministry in Berwick where I went in 2001 when the congregation had experienced a traumatic situation with their pastor. Part of my ministry there was to work with the congregation to clean up and upgrade the parsonage, which was next door to the church. I moved into the parsonage. We blessed it, cleaned it up, painted all the rooms and renovated the kitchen before I left.

One of my first clean ups was in the kitchen which showed much much evidence of having, or having had, mice.

Several months later in the winter I noticed that something was getting into the bags of birdseed which I had stored in the garage which was attached to the house. I didn’t think too much about it – I knew there had been mice around, and this was out in the garage. Then I noticed something getting into the dog food which I kept in the pantry behind the kitchen. (This was a huge house.)

I had to do something about whatever was eating the dog food (besides my dog). So I started to really pay attention to the pantry area. I thought maybe a squirrel or something had gotten into the house. I talked with the local animal control officer and borrowed a have a heart trap which I set at the bottom of the basement steps which connected to that room in a strange design with no door to close. As I remember I was also hearing little feet skittering above the ceilings now and then.

One nite I saw a rat go across the pantry floor towards the basement. I didn’t have a squirel, I had rats. When I called the animal control officer with this news, she wasn’t so helpful: she was just kind of grossed out and didn’t know what to do. I was on my own.

I was appalled. Evidence of mice was one thing. I had occasionally dealt with mice in other places I had lived. Rats were a completely different story.

Not only was I appalled, I was really ashamed. The rats had come ‘on my watch’, so to speak: they weren’t there when I came, or so I thought. Here I was, supposed to be cleaning up the parsonage, and somehow I had attracted rats!

I tried to figure out where they were coming into the house, and discovered a number of open areas in the basement. I went to the hardware store and got some household mesh (like screens with big holes) and closed up the openings I could see. I had already gotten the bird seed out of the garage and put the dog food into a big can.

I became meticulous about crumbs.

I have never been one to poison animals. I set traps at the bottom of the basement steps. I told no one about this for maybe a week, trying to deal with the problem on my own, because I was feeling both embarrassment and shame and responsibility about this situation. Then I mentioned something to my son Britt, who thankfully said “Mom, you have got to tell the church about this. This is NOT your fault, and not just your problem.” As soon as he said this I realized he was right. The church trustees were responsible for both the church buildings and the parsonage. I spoke to a couple of members of that committee, sharing my embarrassment and my reluctance to put out poison.

Interestingly, the chair of the trustees had had serious mice problems, and gave me some good advice. Over the next week or so I began to share with some other people in the congregation about what was happening in the parsonage. I was amazed at the really helpful advice I got. All kinds of folks in Berwick had dealt with various kinds of critters, including rats. It took me a couple of weeks of trap setting, and the help of the church custodian to close up an old rotted area under the kitchen sink, and I was rat free. But not before spending a couple of weeks as a rat hunter. I can remember sitting on the basement steps, telling the rats: “You have to go. This is MY house. Leave. If you don’t, I’m gonna kill you.” When I came into the house, I would ‘check my traps’. Rat hunter hadn’t been in my job description, but it was in my job.

I learned a lot from that rat experience. Why I share it today was that one of the best things I learned was that when you keep a problem to yourself you are limited to the solutions you can generate from your own knowledge. When you are humble enough to share your problem situation with others, you open yourself to learning what you need to know to solve the problem. Sometimes other people are holding solutions to problems you can’t solve by yourself. At the very least you have support and people to commiserate with.

As I lived through the reality of this situation, I realized that the rats had been invited by me when I put the bird seed into the garage and the dog food into my pantry. This was good news to the rats who had previously lived at the Tannery down the street which had recently closed. And there had been some piles of junk around the house next door to the parsonage which had been recently been cleaned up so that house could be put on the market. And there had been some junk around the parsonage which had been removed as part of our clean up efforts. So the rat world had changed, and I had inadvertently opened a rat hotel, with complimentary meals. Not a good move on my part, but understanding the changes in the neighborhood that impacted the rat population did a lot to reduce the guilt I felt about the mess I was in. And I learned that there had been rats before in the parsonage. This wasn’t a totally new thing. Neighborhoods around tanneries have rats. But no one had done anything about the entryways.

So I speak of rats. What is the good news here? There is very real good news: the way out of the rat dilemma was letting it be known that I had a problem so that the solutions held by others could be invited in. I did the work – it was my house for that time, tho I had friends who told me otherwise.

And there is the good news of All God’s Critters: rats and people – we’re all part of God’s abundant creation – all inter-related, all a part of God’s whole. We serve different functions and have different joys and contentments in God’s household.

If we are feeling afraid, if our security is threatened, we hear in Isaiah and in the Psalms the good news that God is holding everything. There is nowhere we can go that God isn’t.

And there is the good news of knowing that Jesus had the power to heal, to restore health and function because of his absolute trust in God. The demons of destruction and doubt were powerless before him.

And there is the good news of the song we will sing in a few moments that reminds us that God does care for us, that we are held in the palm of God’s hands, and that whatever we are walking towards, individually and collectively, God accompanies us, lighting our way.

Can you hear it? Can you feel it? We can, if in the words of our next hymn, we open our eyes and ears, and then our mouths. For all this good news we can say Thank You, God. Amen.