Deuteronomy 6:1-9                                               Bible Sunday

 “You may now kiss.......(the bride)” You can finish that phrase because it is a ritual of love at the end of most weddings. When you hear this melody (hum The Star Spangled Banner), you automatically want to stand and put your hand over your heart. Ritual. In Catholic and Orthodox churches, when the Gospel is read, what does the congregation do? Yes, they stand to honor the reading of the Gospel. In Scottish Presbyterian churches, in the beginning of the service, someone walks in with the Bible. In our service, we pour water into the baptismal font every week to remind us that we belong to God. We are children of God, saved by grace.

 We are aware that some of our Christian brothers and sisters have a powerful ritual
in crossing themselves, and some of us Protestants are beginning to do that to remind ourselves of the one to whom we belong – the One Triune God, who came to us in Jesus Christ, fully God and fully human – two natures. We mark ourselves with the sign to remember. It can become an empty ritual but it doesn’t become empty by repetition. Richard makes a point of greeting me with a kiss when he comes home from Hospice work. Sometimes that kiss is done without either of us giving it much attention. However, other times, when the children aren’t watching....well enough said. It is a ritual of affection.

 Good morning. How are you? Sometimes we mean it and sometimes we don’t. But saying it, following the ritual of friendship puts us in a position to care for one another.

Today, a day we have named Bible Sunday, a Sunday in which we try to focus on rituals of Bible reading, our scripture is a very significant one in the ritual life of the Jewish faith. The Shema. Shema, Israel. Hear Israel. It’s like calling the Lord’s Prayer, the Our Father. Hear now the Shema from Deuteronomy 6.

 ^NRS Deuteronomy 6:1 Now this is the commandment-- the statutes and the ordinances-- that the LORD your God charged me to teach you to observe in the land that you are about to cross into and occupy, ² so that you and your children and your children's children may fear the LORD your God all the days of your life, and keep all his decrees and his commandments that I am commanding you, so that your days may be long. ³ Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe them diligently, so that it may go well with you, and so that you may multiply greatly in a land flowing with milk and honey, as the LORD, the God of your ancestors, has promised you. ⁴ Hear, O Israel: The LORD is our God, the LORD alone. ⁵ You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. ⁶ Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. ⁷ Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. ⁸ Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead,
 ⁹ and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
 

 The Shema is to be recited at the beginning and the end of every day, “when you lie down and when you rise.” “Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and with all your might.”

 The Jewish prayerbook instructs in making this more than an empty ritual. Say the words aloud. The words are not to be run together. Cover your eyes, so that you can focus on the absolute sovereignty of God. Wear the phylactery on your forehead or arm. Touch the mezuzah on your door. There are very explicit instructions.

 We Protestant Christians tend to make light of all the instructions that Jews follow, all the symbolism in Catholic and Orthodox Churches. We say all that matters is that you love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might or strength or resources. Jesus quoted this and added. You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

 We think Protestants have said that the love for God and neighbor in your heart is what matters. But we are losing the heart of that love because we don’t have the power of rituals to sustain it. It has been suggested to us that Bible reading and prayer is important. But no one said, “when you get up, say these words...Shema Israel.....(Mickey) No one said, “when you lie down every night say this.... No one said, touch this, do that, cover your eyes, focus, concentrate on this part. Protestants are into freedom. There are many ways to be faithful to God. We don’t prescribe particular rituals or prayers for worship because they might become empty rituals.

 Maybe we need to reclaim the power of ritual because it can enliven our faith to have a pattern. You know if the dentist and your parents said to you as a child – brushing teeth is important. Do it as often as you can. Some people would brush several times a day, while others might brush once or twice a week and think that that’s fairly often. Instead we have been told to brush every morning and every night, and after meals when possible.

 So I’m now going to say to you as well as to myself, “You need to practice your devotion to God twice a day – first in the morning and last before bed, and when you sit down to eat, that’s a good time too. It will never work if you now set a goal to spend half a hour doing this in the morning and fifteen minutes every night. Forget that, unless you are already in the habit and are increasing your time.

 No, I’m suggesting two minutes in the morning and five minutes every night, and one - three minutes at every meal time. Now these little adjustments in life are challenging. There are powers at work to keep us in homeostasis – no change. So when I try to change my habit this week, I’ll go in to see if Andrew woke up by his alarm and instead of saying, “Time to get up” I’ll say, “Hear O Israel. Hear O Andrew. The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.” I might get a grumble from Andrew, or I might be tired myself and unable to remember my new resolve. But if we develop a ritual of saying this, then silly insignficant words like “It’s time to wake up. Rise and shine.” will seem strange.

 I have prepared a page for you for your day. I hope you will find it useful. I am sure that as Protestants (who got their name by protesting) and as Americans, who formed a country in freedom, you will feel perfectly free to adapt my suggestions to your situation. I am emphasizing today the role that parents play with children, in developing these spiritual disciplines, but these disciplines, these rituals are necessary in all our lives. These disciplines transform our lives.

 We need simple, meaningful, repeatable rituals to build our faith. We have habits which inform our thinking. If your habit is to run the television during dinner, then you are choosing to shape your thinking by the talking heads on your tv and by the values therein. If your habit is to be loving and affectionate in your family without talk of God, without Bible reading or prayer, then your family learns that spiritual discipline is not essential to Christian family life or to loving one another. If your habit is to schedule sporting activities all week-end, leaving no time for sabbath, for worship and Christian nurture, then you are saying that physical exercise and recreation are more valuable than building Christian faith.

 You never know whether your kids are really internalizing the Christian values you try to teach them – until they are in a difficult position and have a choice to make. Gretchen and John Frueh’s grandson, Andrew was having a bad day about two months ago. The class bully was picking on him. Anyone in the room could see Andrew had just had enough. Then the bully took a marker and wrote on Andrew’s face. Andrew was infuriated, but he held his calm, thought for a second, and then (praise be to God) he turned the other cheek. Andrew knew the Sermon on the Mount. He had heard it enough that it became part of who he is.

 We are called to love the Lord our God with ALL our heart, with ALL our soul, and with ALL our might. How do you love someone without spending time building a relationship? Opportunity for building that relationship is the most important gift we can give our children, our grand children, and all the children and youth of our church. It is the most important gift we can give ourselves and anyone with whom we share life.

 Let us pray: O Lord, fill our hearts with a burning desire to know and love you and to share that love with others. Help us to shape our lives such that we give opportunity for growing in faith. Thank you for those who have given us opportunities to grow in faith, for all the saints who have gone before us.