The Prophet Amanda Gorman
Sermon on Jonah 3:1-5,10 and Mark 1:14-20
Prophets are often disguised. Hard to distinguish from other ordinary people. Sometimes like fishermen. Or like carpenters who turn out to be God’s Son. Sometimes like runaway guys spit out by a big fish to do their duty and tell the truth. Prophets are people of faith, speaking truth to power.
And sometimes, a prophet shows up in the middle of an Inauguration while the entire world is watching. In a “skinny black girl descended from slaves and raised by a single mother [who] can dream of becoming president only to find herself reciting for one.”
I am talking about Amanda Gorman. Of course. Like literally everyone else since she appeared on stage last Wednesday in front of the Capitol. Gorgeous like a young queen, in bright colors, her head up high. Speaking truth to this country and the world. Just like Jonah.
In her yellow coat, she looked like a risen sun, ready to reveal things to US we might want to deny but have to hear. Like a true prophet. Saying powerful sentences like “We’ve learned that quiet isn’t always peace. In the norms and notions of what ‘just’ is isn’t always justice.”
When I first listened to her, it took my breath away. The beauty, the elegance, the playfulness of her grand, strong, powerful words. The speed in which she changed between outright truthfulness and outright hope. The ability to bring together a painful history and a bright future without denying the harsh presence. She explained, “But what I really aspire to do in the poem is to be able to use my words to envision a way in which our country can still come together and can still heal. It’s doing that in a way that is not erasing or neglecting the harsh truths I think America needs to reconcile with.” [1]
I felt like drinking a good wine way too fast. Because I am thirsty and I just can’t stop.
Thank God, this wine of words was alcohol-free and I was able to replay the recital on YouTube over and over again. Getting high on the possibilities of words. Suddenly believing again, that words can and will change the world. Not just the yelled ones full of hatred and fear that tend to dominate. But also the carefully crafted, lovingly spoken words. Maybe even more so. And quite different in her tone from Jonah.
I have always imagined Jonah either angrily yelling in the streets or speaking in a hushed tone that’s closer to a desperate whining than anything else. As much as Jonah was determined to do what God told him to do (he definitely didn’t want to end up in that fish again), he doesn’t sound very confident of his message. Or at least not of its implications. Sure, he calls the people of Nineveh to repentance. But he clearly doesn’t believe that what he says will be heard, least have a positive impact.
His attitude is the “told you so” instead of the “listen, kid, this is important, you better get working”. That’s why, when his mission turns out to be successful, he mournfully sits under the fig tree he didn’t plant. As Amanda put it: “Scripture tells us to envision that everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree and no one shall make them afraid.” Except that Jonah is afraid and angry that his mission worked and the stubborn people listened.
Instead of celebrating his great success, he was pouting. No glory to God from his side, just frowning. God had asked him to preach and then sit back and wait. Jonah wanted to preach, stand by and watch his mighty powers play out in the destruction of a city. As we all know, God scolded him and put him back in his place. And yet, he did it. He proved that one person can bring great about a city when being led by God. And that that change will have to be embraced by everyone, “great and small”. To change the people’s hearts and lives in the long run. Even the kids put on sackcloth in Nineveh to repent their sins. Sins they hadn’t even committed yet but acknowledged that they would have done so without the call to repentance.
Sometimes, repentance is something we have to do just because we are part of a certain people with a certain history. Sometimes, we have take responsibility for something we weren’t responsible for in the first place. But it’s on us to make it better and to move forward to a brighter future. As a German, whose Great-Grandparents were either Nazis or at least bystanders, this is the story of my life. It’s not a bad story. It’s not a story about shame or guilt. It’s a story about owning my heritage and my future at the same time. One could very well call that a way of life-long repentance. It’s a call to a change in culture. It’s not just an individual call to repent individual sins.
Just like Jonah Amanda Gorman at first struggled with her calling. Not because she didn’t want to, but because she thought she couldn’t. In elementary school she battled a speech impediment. She simply couldn’t pronounce the R. Even today she is still working on her confidence as a public speaker. “But I don’t look at my disability as a weakness,” said Gorman.
“It’s made me the performer that I am and the storyteller that I strive to be.” [2]
Her call was stronger, so to speak. And so, she persisted and pursued. At age 16 she went to study at Harvard. She continued to write poetry and to send it to competitions to be heard. And finally, she was being heard.
Yes, she is following in the footsteps of great poets like Robert Frost and Maya Angelou. And she is following in the footsteps of great prophets. Just in a 21 st century version.
Amanda speaks from a position of deeply rooted faith and scriptural knowledge. When describing the current situation and how we got here, she is bold. She clearly believes that people care about what she cares about. And that one woman can bring change for good. Guided by God.
Listening to her, I didn’t get the impression that she counted on 2 leaders fixing the problems of this country all by themselves like superheroes. She invoked everyone, young and old, great and small. She speaks about a “nation that isn’t broken, but simply unfinished.” Urging us to “close the divide because we know to put our future first, we must first put our differences aside. We lay down our arms so we can reach out our arms to one another. We seek harm to none and harmony for all.”
Those are beautiful words, utopic words to some. Which is what prophets do. They envision life how it can be and point out how it is. And they show a way to get from one point in history to the other. If we can just hear them and trust them and start repenting. This kind of repentance is hard work. The work of all of us. Including me who just arrived here 2 years ago. Simply by living here, I am part of the country’s history, of its failures, of racism and slavery as its original and of its responsibilities derived out of this.
This is not about shame or guilt. This is about a call to a change in culture. To a change of our hearts and lives to bring forth communal change.
Other than Jonah, Amanda’s call to repentance and change has no interest in destruction or watching God’s wrath. Her call is grounded in hope and defiance. Hoping that despite the current state of this country, we can’t let the future slip away. And that God won’t have it. That we all have the tools to change paths.
In today’s Gospel Jesus calls fishermen to become fishers of men. He summoned marginalized workers to join him in, to “catch some Big Fish” instead of struggling to merely survive at the shores of a lake that was exploited by the Romans. Stop fishing for survival. Start working to restore God’s justice for the poor. The men responded immediately. Little had they to lose.
Jesus had spoken truth to power and the poor fishermen knew it. And they wanted to be part of that movement that would call out the rich, the privileged, and the people standing by doing nothing to change the injustices of their world. Telling folks that “what just is isn’t always justice.” The fishermen didn’t know much about their new lives. All they knew was that it would be different, that it would serve a greater purpose and that they were following the light of the world.
“But one thing is certain, if we merge mercy with might and might with right, then love becomes our legacy and change our children’s birthright.
For there is always light. If only we’re brave enough to see it. If only we’re brave enough to be it.” Amen.
