A Generous Kind of Faith

I once heard a Jewish comedian talk about Passover and the requirement that the bread at the Seder meal be unleavened. He pointed out that the original reason for this stipulation was that the Hebrew slaves were in such a hurry to leave that they didn’t have time to bake regular bread, and then he said, “It’s been three thousand years; let the bread rise!”

It was good for a chuckle, but on theological grounds the comedian’s observation fell short. Yes, in one stream of the tradition about the first Passover the reason for the Hebrews’ eating matzah was their hurried escape from Egypt on the night the plague on the firstborn ravaged the Egyptians’ households, but another stream gives a different reason. Or rather, it theologizes the original reason. Eating unleavened bread may have started out as a necessity, but as the Passover tradition developed it came to symbolize the whole Passover experience. Later generations were to remember the events of that night and symbolically enter into them by eating unleavened bread.

In Exodus 13:10, Moses instructs the people to “keep this ordinance at its proper time from year to year.” The original reason for eating matzah may no longer apply, but the symbolic reason is still valid. That’s why, even after three thousand years, observant Jews still don’t let the bread rise.

This notion that the memorialization of the Passover is a way for later generations to participate in the original story symbolically is a rich one, and it has implications for us Christians, especially when it comes to the Lord’s Supper. Every time we partake of the bread and the wine, Paul tells us that we “proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes” (1 Cor 11:26). Jesus tells his disciples that when it comes to sharing the bread and the cup they (and we) are to “do this in remembrance of [him]” (1 Cor 11:24). A lot of tears and ink and even blood has been spilled over the precise meaning of this command, but it seems to me that everyone can agree that something mysterious happens when we gather around the Lord’s table, and one way of expressing this mystery is to say that we in some fashion participate in the events of that night in Jerusalem nearly two thousand years ago.

There is a line in the reading from Exodus that captures these ideas from a different angle. It comes in verse 5, where Moses tells them to keep the Passover observance in future generations. He says, “When the Lord brings you into the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, which he swore to your ancestors to give you. . . .”

Did you catch that? Moses doesn’t say “the land which God swore to your ancestors to give them,” but rather that God swore to give you. The promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were not that they would possess the land but that this generation several centuries removed would. It puts a new spin on the faith of the patriarchs (and matriarchs), doesn’t it? They were willing to obey and follow and worship God not for any personal gain they would receive but for the benefit of descendants they themselves would never know. That’s a generous kind of faith, if you ask me.

And it’s a kind of faith that is in short supply these days. If you disagree, just look at our treatment of the earth. Despite a long series of increasingly dire warnings about the terrible things our inaction will cause down the line, many powerful people and corporations continue to deny that climate change is an existential threat to life on our planet. And the reason for this denial is simple: selfishness. The profit motive is stronger than the desire to leave something of value to later generations. Short-term gain outduels long-term good.

What would our future look like if we were to take the long view the way Abraham and Sarah did instead of grasping for all we can get and to hell with anyone who comes after us? And how can we convince the powers in our day to take that long view as well? We are already seeing the deadly ramifications of our refusal to act. How would that change if we took seriously that the promises God has made us may not be for us, but for unknown generations down the line?

God, forgive us our selfishness, and grant us the generous faith of Abraham and Sarah. Help us to take the long view.