Genesis 37:1-4, 12-28; Romans 10:5-15; Matthew 14:22-33
The Grammy Awards happen every February. There are awards for a wide variety of musical styles and performance combinations: Pop, Rock, Alternative, R & B, Rap, Country, Gospel, New Age, Jazz, Classical, TV and Film. In 2002, the album of the year was the soundtrack from the film O Brother, Where Art Thou. It starred George Clooney, John Turturro, and Tim Blake Nelson as three escaped convicts in the 1930s deep South. The soundtrack included many traditional southern mountain songs, including this one:
Keep on the sunny side,
Always on the sunny side,
Keep on the sunny side of life.
It will help us every day,
It will brighten all the way,
If we’ll keep on the sunny side of life.
A lot of traditional Appalachian Mountain music deals with the notion that people live in this world which is filled with all manner of hardship and the only hope is the future kingdom of God’s gracious goodness – the promised land of eternity. So a person needs to try to keep on the sunny side in order to survive until glory arrives.
Most of us have grown up with the power of positive thinking. We've been warned about negative outlooks and what popular psychologists call “catastrophizing.” To have a successful outcome when facing a problem, we're told that we need to avoid the bad and focus on the good. “Keep on the sunny side,” insists the pop psychology and self-help movement.
But that may not necessarily be the case, according to Julie Norem, author of a highly counter-intuitive book called The Positive Power of Negative Thinking. Sunny, upbeat strategies don’t always work. In fact, they may make some people more nervous than ever.
For some folks, the only thing that can bring a sense of calm is to directly contemplate negative outcomes. This deliberate, structured focus on dark contingencies is called “defensive pessimism.” It is usually described as “Murphy’s Law,” which is, “Anything that can possibly go wrong, will.”
Norem says that there are three steps to work through an anxiety-producing task. First, begin with lower expectations, that is, expect something to wrong.
Second, imagine in detail all the ways in which the task could go awry. These could even be ranked in likelihood.
Third, map out ways to avert each potential catastrophe and be prepared to meet any that arise.
In three easy steps you can move from pessimistic preparations to optimistic outcomes.(1)
There can be positive power in negative thinking. Just ask Joseph. His is one of the longest stories in scripture, running nearly 1/4 of Genesis. We got just the opening scene in today’s reading. The lectionary skips over much of the middle of the story and moves to the ending next week.
Joseph is a happy-go-lucky and optimistic nice guy dreamer. His attitude annoys his ten older brothers, so much that they conspire to kill him by throwing him into a pit. One cooler head among the brothers prevails and at the sight of some merchants headed for Egypt, they sell him into slavery. “Come on, let’s . . . not harm him because he’s our brother; he’s family.”
Down into the pit for death and then up again to life. That was Joseph’s lot. He got a decent slave job working for a mid-level manager in Pharaoh’s household. But the manager’s wife got the hots for him. When he refused her advances, she accused him of coming on to her. Of course it was her word against his, so he wound up in prison.
In prison he was a likable fellow and made friends with a couple of Pharaoh’s staff members with whom Pharaoh had fallen out. He interpreted their dreams: one would regain his position, the other would not. When that happened, the surviving steward forgot about Joseph, leaving him to languish in prison.
Finally when none of Pharaoh’s counselors could interpret Pharaoh’s dreams, the wine steward finally remembered Joseph. Joseph was released and successfully interpreted Pharaoh’s dreams about seven years of bountiful harvests and seven years of poor harvests. Pharaoh appointed the former slave and prisoner Joseph to oversee the entire program of stockpiling the abundant harvests and distributing them during the lean years. Joseph had been down and now he was up, way up as second in power in Egypt.
During the years of famine, his brothers traveled to Egypt to buy grain. Joseph recognized them and toyed with them. First he required one brother to stay in prison and made them bring their youngest brother on the next visit. He secretly returned their money in their sacks. On the next visit he had a special cup hidden in Benjamin’s sack and then sent after them to arrest them for theft. Then Joseph finally revealed himself to them. We will get there next week.
Because we know the whole story, we know that God was with Joseph. Nevertheless, to get through these experiences, Joseph must have gone through an attitude adjustment. His dreamy, positive-thinking optimism didn’t mesh with slavery. If Joseph had used defensive pessimism as a strategy, what would he have said to himself in his mental rehearsal?
- I’ll never see my family again – so I better embrace my new friends.
- I’m going to be eating couscous for the rest of my life – I better learn to like it.
- I will probably be tempted to abandon my faith and principles – I better develop a strong sense of ethics and morality.
- I have no marketable skills to survive – I better study hard and prepare for what lies ahead.
- My life is over as I know it – I better think about how to reinvent myself.
This seems to be a deliberate, structured focus on dark contingencies. It takes the negative experiences of life very seriously and refuses to sugarcoat some extremely bitter pills. But Joseph does more than simply contemplate negative outcomes – he also cooperates with God in the ongoing shaping of his story.
When Joseph was dragged down to Egypt, he remained faithful to the Lord, strong in the face of sexual temptation, courageous in prison and consistently discerning and wise in his dealings with Pharaoh. The result was that he became Pharaoh's right-hand man, the most powerful figure in the land of Egypt.
When he revealed himself to his brothers, they cowered in fear. But Joseph told them, “You planned something bad for me, but God produced something good from it, in order to save the lives of many people, just as he is doing today” (Genesis 50:20).
Our lives, like the life of Joseph, are filled with downs and ups, with pits of despair and apparent misfortune, with moments of success and elation. Neither lasts forever.
Jesus’ life was certainly filled with downs and ups, with rebuffs and acceptances, with death and ultimately resurrection life. He tried to train the disciples toward that end. Sometimes they got it, and sometimes they didn’t. The episode of Peter wanting to walk on water is one of those times.
We are used to thinking that Peter was supposed to keep his eyes on Jesus and so stay afloat. If we were meant to walk on water, Jesus would have said to the others, “Come on in, the water’s fine.” He didn’t. He pulled Peter out of the drink and put him back in the boat. Originally Jesus had sent the disciples in the boat. The way was hard going. Peter wanted the easy – optimistic – way out. “Let me walk on water, too.”
Canadian pastor Brian Donst says that the boat is out on the sea on a mission from Jesus. As hard and slow as the going was, the disciples were called to steer the boat across the sea of change toward a new and different shore to reach yet other people with Jesus’ good news of the kingdom of God.
Brian Donst goes on to say that we really are not meant (or asked by God) to walk on water. And the boat we are in is not meant to stay quietly anchored in a safe haven. We will find security and salvation in the boat, but maybe only as we keep steering and rowing to whatever new place Jesus is wanting to go to with us.(2)
Optimism is fine, but defensive pessimism will keep us focused on the preparations we need to be able to be used by God wherever we are, wherever we are called to, whatever happens, whether it is the pit or the height. As the psalmist has said, wherever we go, God will be there. For that we can be truly thankful.
Let us pray.
Lord of depths and heights, God of good times and not-so-good times, Spirit of salvation, grant us faith-strength to keep focused on what you have called us to be and do, and fill us with wisdom to sense and prepare for hardships and hazards of life that might divert our attention from you. In the name of Jesus who came from heaven to earth to show us the way, from the earth to the cross our debt to pay, from the cross to the grave, from the grave to the sky, to be our glorious life. Amen.
(1) Cited in “Homiletics Online,” August 2002; http://www.homileticsonline.com/subscriber/btl_display.asp?installment_id=3118.
(2) Brian Donst, http://food4fifty.blogspot.ca.
Unless noted otherwise, all scripture references are from The Common English Bible, © 2011 www.commonenglishbible.com.
Copyright 2014 First Presbyterian Church of Waverly, Ohio. Reprinted by permission.
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