As the well-known folk tale goes, one day Henny Penny is going about her business, gathering corn in the farmyard, when an acorn falls on her head. She immediately jumps to the conclusion that the sky is falling. Like any good responsible chicken citizen she thinks to herself, if you see something, say something. So she sets out to tell the King about this imminent danger.
On her way, she meets Cocky-locky and tells him, and then eventually Ducky-daddles, Goosey-loosey, and Turkey-lurkey. They all team up to go and tell the King about the impending doom that Henny Penny has discovered. The sky is falling! Eventually they meet Foxy-loxy. Now, we might know that foxes are always sly and not to be trusted, but Cocky-locky, Ducky-daddles, Goosey-loosey, and Turkey-lurkey do not. And Foxy-loxy convinces them that he can provide a shortcut to the King that conveniently runs through his own burrow.
Well, sadly, the animals discover they’ve been deceived when it’s too late. This spells the end for Cocky-locky, Ducky-daddles, Goosey-loosey, and Turkey-lurkey. But Henny Penny escapes unharmed at the last minute when she hears Cocky-locky’s cry. Ironically, it is Henny Penny, the source of all this misinformation about the supposed end of the world, who makes it out alive. And she is left alone with her mistaken view that the world is going to end. The moral of the story rings true: don’t believe everything you’re told, especially when it foretells doom. There might be more to the story.
Can’t you hear a bit of Henny Penny in the Israelites as they are wandering in the wilderness? The sky is falling! They are stuck in a desolate place without any food. They are hungry. They are convinced they will die. Yes, after all they’ve been through and all they’ve survived, they will perish with true freedom in sight. How easily they’ve forgotten their recent history. It’s been just over a month since God delivered them by the hand of Moses from slavery in Egypt. And God has only just given them water to drink at Marah, although it has already become a distant memory.
This is not to say that the Israelites have no legitimate concerns when they are hungry in the wilderness. It has been rough for them in recent years. They barely made it out of Egypt, and we can hardly blame them for wanting to find safety and stability. They are emerging from trauma. But at the first sign of any trouble, in spite of all that God has done for them, they cry out, “Disaster! The sky is falling! Death is near!”
You have to wonder whether it was indeed the whole congregation of the Israelites who found reason to complain. Or did one person become hungry, look around and see no food, and foretell doom to the others? And so, the chain of doomsday predictions moves along: one person after another, passing on the news that they will now die in this God-forsaken wilderness. They make it as far in the chain as Moses and Aaron, their chosen leaders, but they never make it to the King. They seem to have forgotten that God their King is even in the picture, in spite of all that he has done for them.
In all fairness, the cute little character of Henny Penny might seem a bit removed from God’s chosen people and their tragic history as they are starving in the wilderness. But like Henny Penny, the Israelites let their immediate circumstances blind them to the larger picture. If Henny Penny had only stepped back for a moment and contemplated the situation, if she’d only had some perspective and not reacted, she might have realized that there was a bigger world above that was responsible for the falling acorn. Something had indeed fallen from the sky, but maybe the sky was not falling.
And what if the Israelites had stepped back from their immediate hunger and remembered all that God had done for them? Was there something beyond the hunger? Didn’t they know that there was a God leading and guiding them, who time and again in the past had fed them with what they needed?
How many times have we all heard someone say that the sky is falling? The crumbling plaster means the whole building will collapse. A few members of the church have left in a huff, so the parish will close. The economy has taken a nosedive, so the savings account will be depleted.
And how infrequently have these immediate, dire predictions actually come to pass? With a little time and perspective, you might learn that there is something more than the facts of life—that there is a God who cares for us and provides, often in unpredictable ways.
In the Israelites’ localized journey through the wilderness, they have gotten so used to being led by Moses and Aaron, that they have forgotten that they are, in fact, being led by God. What falls from the sky—or doesn’t fall from the sky—spells doom because their world goes no further than what they can comprehend.
And yes, God for whatever incomprehensible reason, has chosen to speak through Moses and Aaron. That is how God has deemed it appropriate to guide the Israelites. But in the end, it’s not God they blame; it’s Moses and Aaron, because the people don’t seem to remember that there is hope in a God beyond the sky that seems to be falling.
We don’t know the exact purpose of God’s testing of his chosen people or why he does it at all. We don’t understand why we seem to be tested at times. It’s all contained within the mystery of God. But we do know that what God desires from his chosen people is trust. He longs for them to do what he says, even if conveyed indirectly through his messengers. Because God seems to be saying that unless you can trust, you will not get very far. There is no relationship without trust.
Henny Penny may be a cute children’s story, and it may seem silly to us, but we are not so far removed from the moral it conveys. We may judge the ingratitude or shortsightedness of the Israelites in the wilderness, but we are all on some version of that wilderness journey where we can easily lose our trust in God and in one another.
Lost in the indirect communications we receive from God, we struggle to see that no matter what ill befalls us, we can still find God in it. In all our perceptions of doomsday and misfortune, we often forget to approach the throne of heavenly grace where our true King reigns, and to beseech his mercy and help. We become so used to receiving indirect communications from God that we fail to see that God wants us to communicate directly with him. Through his Son’s life, death, and resurrection, he has authorized us to approach his heavenly throne and to find fullness of life. And he has given us the Holy Spirit to enflame our hearts and nudge us more and more towards the will of the Father.
Recall Moses’s advice to Aaron: “Say to the whole congregation of the Israelites, ‘Draw near to the Lord, for he has heard your complaining.’” That’s it. That’s the ultimate call: draw near to the Lord. Do not hold back your prayers. Draw near to the Lord, because the Lord desires no separation between himself and us in our prayers. The Lord hears our complaints. And the foundation of this trust is that God can hold all those complaints and worries, and he will provide.
Sadly, Henny Penny and her animal compatriots never make it to the King. Their hasty evaluation of their circumstances leads to unexpected trouble. They go down a fox hole—literally and figuratively—of gloomy predictions. But the Israelites, fare a bit better. Thanks to Moses and Aaron and a recovered memory, they begin to see that the picture is not so bleak. The sky is far from falling. It’s actually raining God’s gracious provision for them, and there’s plenty of food to eat. With Moses’ help, God’s people find that the mysterious manna on the ground is what God has provided to satisfy their hunger. It is a gift, and it can’t be controlled.
As much as we want to control the future ahead of us, it remains yet a looming question mark to us. But there is something beyond the ceiling of the sky, no matter what rains down, or doesn’t rain down, from above. And beyond that ceiling of the sky is a God who asks for our trust. Because only then will we see that sometimes when the sky seems to be falling, God just might be sending manna to feed our hungry souls.
Sermon by Father Kyle Babin
The Tenth Sunday after Pentecost
August 1, 2021