Power Struggle

22^nd Sunday after Pentecost

October 21, 2018

Mark 10:35-45

(Or watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlZtXtJ6ZfQ )

Are we there yet? [pause] Are we there yet? [pause] Are we there yet? If you’ve ever been on a road trip with children, or people with no sense of time passing, then chances are good you’ve heard this question. It might even be that no more than two minutes after you left your house, someone has asked for a snack, or a bathroom stop, or a cigarette break if you’re traveling with a smoker. When our kids were 3 and 1, my husband sent me a on a trip by myself to see my best friend from college, and it was so different traveling by myself! Quieter. No one asking for anything. No one holding on to me. No one to worry about or keep track of but myself. However, we’re social people. We tend to travel with others when we have the opportunity. And Jesus traveled with others; he was not a lone wolf. The twelve disciples plus other followers went with him as he traveled around, teaching and healing.

We’re still in Mark 10, but there’s a pattern that began back in chapter 8 that I want to draw your attention to. Mark is the shortest of the four Gospels, only 16 chapters long. Chapter 8 is the halfway point. And in chapter 8, after some teaching and healing, while on the way from Bethsaida to Caesarea Philippi, Jesus tells the disciples for the first time that he’s going to suffer, be rejected by the authorities, executed by the government, and will rise again after three days. He does this again in chapter 9, while passing through Galilee, from the mount of transfiguration to Capernaum. And Jesus does it a third time in chapter 10, while passing through the region of Judea on the way to Jerusalem, in the verses immediately before the section we read today about James and John.

Three is a key number in Christianity, as you may have noticed. It’s the number of the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It’s how many days Jesus spent in the grave, between the cross and the resurrection. It’s how many times Satan tempted Jesus before he began his public ministry and three years is how long that ministry lasted. Jonah spent three days in the belly of a whale. Three visitors came to tell Abraham and that he and Sarah, in their old age, were going to have a baby. Three is a holy number, representing wholeness, completeness, and perfection. So, here in the middle of Mark’s Gospel, Jesus tells the disciples three times what’s going to happen next. He’s going to be betrayed, handed over to the authorities, given the death penalty, and three days later will come back to life.

Jesus knows this is a conversation topic for a trip. This isn’t a dinner table conversation, or one to have in passing, or even one to have on a mountainside or in a boat. This is one to have while traveling. Road trip conversations are often different than ones you have every day. Road trip conversations are when your mind wanders and you get to think about different things and process things that you hadn’t finished thinking about before. In a car, it’s time in a confined space with your travel companions, who are a captive audience, and it can become a time to catch up, to share deeper thoughts beyond logistics and day-to-day details. Now, Jesus and his disciples aren’t in a car or a plane or train, they’re walking. Not everyone is going to hear all parts of the conversation because some are walking in front, some behind, some to the side, some are walking and talking with someone else. The second and third times Jesus has this conversation with the disciples, Mark says that Jesus actually takes the twelve aside to tell them. There are no eavesdroppers from the crowd. It’s just the thirteen of them. They’ve been traveling, thinking about what they’ve seen and heard, maybe lost in their own thoughts, maybe shooting the breeze with a fellow traveler, and Jesus tells them, look, this is what’s going to happen. The advantage is that they are traveling, they have time and space to think about this, they don’t have to move on to the next thing immediately. There is value in the journey itself, rather than as an ends to a means.

However, here’s the thing, all three times Jesus tells them about his impending death and resurrection, the disciples have trouble dealing. Even though Jesus has given them this time and space of a journey to process it, each time they still struggle. The first time, it’s Peter, who after Jesus shares, rebukes Jesus. And that’s when Jesus rebukes Peter back with the line of “Get behind me Satan! You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” That’s chapter 8, Peter’s just plain in denial. No way, Jesus, this is just not happening. The second time, in chapter 9, Mark says the disciples “did not understand what it meant and were afraid to ask him about it.” Jesus has said this twice now, and he sounds a little cuckoo. So they talk with each other instead and when they get to their destination, Jesus asks them what they were arguing about on the trip. The disciples “keep quiet because on the way there had argued about who was the greatest.”[1] Jesus tells them he’s about to be killed by the government and they’re jockeying for position for who’ll be the next leader of the group. They’re afraid to ask Jesus about it and so they focus on themselves. Who’s the best disciple? Who does the most for Jesus? Who sacrificed the most?

Saint Ignatius of Loyola was a Spanish priest who founded the Jesuit order in the 16^th century. Before he became a priest he was a soldier and after being seriously wounded, spent some time convalescing in a castle where the only books were about the lives of the saints. Ignatius was bored enough that he started reading about the saints and comparing his life to theirs and imagining how he would go about doing the same great things that they did. That is a healthy competition, when it’s encouraging and inspiring. After Ignatius was healed was when he went to seminary, became a priest, and went on to found the Jesuits, an order known for their emphasis on education and service.

But the disciples were not building each other up and inspiring each other to do great things for Jesus. They were arguing who was the greatest and why I’m better than you. That kind of competition is not healthy, it’s not helpful, it does not belong in the church. In Mark 9, Jesus tells the disciples, “Anyone who wants to be first must be the very last, and the servant of all.”

This is similar to what happens in chapter 10 as well. A third time, Jesus tells them about his impending betrayal, death, and resurrection, and this time, it’s James and John, the sons of Zebedee, also sometimes called the sons of thunder, who come to Jesus and ask him to do them a favor. They know it’s not the best thing to ask, otherwise they wouldn’t have asked for their request to be granted before they gave the request. In fact, in Matthew’s Gospel, it’s their mother who comes and asks for them! And we know, there are some people who ask for a favor, and we say, “sure, anything,” and there are other people to whom we say, “depends on what you’re asking,” which is the answer Jesus gives them. James and John ask to sit on each side of Jesus when he comes in glory. Jesus says, “You don’t know what you’re talking about. Are you really able to do that?” They say, “yes,” Jesus agrees that yes, they are, but they still may not sit on his right and his left. Then the other ten find out and they are angry with James and John! How dare they! They had just been reprimanded for arguing about who was the greatest, and here these two brothers go sneaking off trying to guarantee their good position in advance.

Jesus tells all twelve of them, “Rulers can be tyrants. But you’re not. Whoever wishes to be great must serve and whoever wants to be first must be last. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” You are not to engage in power struggles. You are not to jockey for position, or the best seat in the house, or the best parking space, or anything else. Life is not about others serving you. Life is about you serving others. You are to be last, you are not to worry about your position. You are to give your life for others. You are to “go about quietly, taking care of the needs of others.”[2] Not boasting, not giving orders, no favorites. There is no individual power or prestige when you gather in my name. You come as brothers and sisters. You come to serve.

Serving is the appropriate response to our incurable human tendency to put ourselves first.[3] Our goal is not to be the biggest and the best. Our goal is to be faithful, and to help others be faithful as well. In my gospel parallels book, which lines up the four gospels as best you can so you can easily compare the similar passages, where Matthew, Mark, and Luke all talk about service, the author puts John’s example of service.[4] Only in John is the story of Jesus washing the disciples’ feet.[5] As all this traveling was done by walking, and typical shoes were sandals, your feet got quite dirty on the road. When you arrived, you washed your feet, or if it was a nicer place, a servant was there to wash your feet. After the last supper, the night Jesus is betrayed, Jesus gets up from the table, ties a towel around his waist, and washes his disciples’ feet. Jesus is the ultimate servant. He’s a king, too, but he doesn’t act like any king we know. He leaves the throne to get down and dirty, not with the noble class or white collar, or even really the working class. He takes on the role of a servant. This was Jesus’ humility. Paul describes it in Philippians 2 and advises us, “Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn’t claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death – and the worst kind of death at that – a crucifixion.”[6] This is who our role model is. Not someone who took advantage of his connections, not someone who pulled strings, not someone who threw his privilege around, or lorded it over others. Jesus said, no tyranny. “To be a tyrant is to claim a false power based on deep fear. To claim a healing power is to find strength in humility.”[7] Not a false humility, or self-deprecating humility, but a quiet taking care of the needs of others.

Paul says later in Philippians 2, “What I’m getting at, friends, is that you should simply keep doing what you’ve done from the beginning. When I was living among you, you lived in responsive obedience. Now that I’m separated from you, keep it up. Better yet, redouble your efforts. Be energetic in your life of salvation, reverent and sensitive before God. That energy is God’s energy, an energy deep within  you, God himself willing and working at what will give him the most pleasure. Do everything readily and cheerfully – no bickering, no second-guessing allowed! Go out into the world uncorrupted, a breath of fresh air in this squalid and polluted society. Provide people with a glimpse of good living and of the living God. Carry the light-giving Message into the night.”[8]

People take a second look at you when you quietly do good things, when you help without asking for compensation, when you do hard things without grumbling, when there’s something different about you and it intrigues others. Be that breath of fresh air. Carry the light. Provide others with a glimpse of God. That’s what we who are called by Christ’s name, who are called Christian, are called to do. Show the world that God loves them.

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[1] Mark 9:34

[2] Forbid Them Not, Year B, by Carolyn Brown, p. 169

[3] Feasting on the Word, Year B, Volume 4, p. 190

[4] Synopsis of the Four Gospels, edited by Kurt Aland, p. 226

[5] John 13:1-17

[6] Philippians 2:5-8, MSG

[7] On the Mend worship series by Dr. Marcia McFee, Healing Power synopsis

[8] Philippians 2:12-15, MSG

Hold-outs

21^st Sunday after Pentecost

October 14, 2018

Mark 10:17-31

(Or watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jzfq0Z0zLY )

            Hold-outs. What are your hold-outs? It probably depends on what we’re talking about. I wrote a few lists of various hold-outs. I was told I don’t need to share the list of hold-outs to going to church, because y’all have overcome those and I’d be preaching to the choir. So, I wrote a list of hold-outs to writing a sermon, because I was stuck. It was interesting, all of my hold-outs had to do with a lack of something – lack of inspiration, lack of three points that came out of my studying the word and reading commentaries, lack of self-discipline to just sit down and start typing, which I finally did and why you’re getting an odd introduction to this sermon. When I started writing this, I didn’t know where exactly I was going. I like it much better when I get to my Friday writing time and I’ve got a three point outline ready to flesh out. This week, I didn’t. So, let’s start with why we’re talking about hold-outs.

            Our Gospel reading is immediately after last week’s story of Jesus blessing the children. So, Jesus has just finished placing hands on the children and blessing them. As he is on his way from that place, a man runs up to him, falls on his knees before Jesus, and asks, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” In other words, what must I do to be saved? How do I get to heaven? Today we might say something about confessing your sins, asking Jesus into your heart, and having a personal relationship with Jesus. But Jesus doesn’t say anything about that. Instead, he replies, “Why are you calling me good? No one is good, only God. You know the commandments: Don’t murder, don’t commit adultery, don’t steal, don’t lie, don’t cheat, honor your father and mother.” What’s interesting to note is that the six commandments out of the ten that Jesus quotes are the last six, the ones having to do with how we interact with each other. The first four all have to do with our relationship with God; these last six that Jesus mentions are about our relationships with other people. The man says, “Teacher, I’ve kept all these commandments since I was a boy.” And Jesus looks at him, and loves him. In the whole Gospel of Mark, this man is the only person singled out by Mark as being loved by Jesus. Jesus looks at this man, who’s on his knees in front of him, and lovingly says, “You’re only missing one thing. Go, sell everything you own and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” At this, the man’s face fell and he was dismayed and saddened. Because now we learn that this man was very rich. Selling everything you have is not what he wanted or expected to hear. This was his hold-out. Jesus asked him to give up what he wasn’t ready or willing to give up. And the man goes away.

            So, again, what are your hold-outs? What are you unwilling or not ready to give up if Jesus were to ask you? What are you holding onto a little too tightly? I will tell you one of the ones for me is my children. I’ve heard stories of missionaries who feel called to go to some remote place where they can’t bring their children, and so their children live elsewhere and are raised elsewhere. I have a problem with that. A call to serve God does not supercede your call to be a parent, or a spouse. I know clergy whose call to ministry broke up their marriages, not by their doing but by their spouses. Their spouses did not want to change their lifestyle or did not want to be a clergy spouse. It didn’t have to be that way, but that was those spouses’ hold-outs. I’ve shared before about giving up practically all my material possessions and financial independence to serve in Nicaragua. Well, one of my bigger concerns was about missing out on major life events in my family. The mission agency’s policy was that you stayed in the field for a full year before your first trip back home. I knew my grandparents were getting up there in age, and I was of the age, in my 20s, where a lot of my friends were getting married, and I wanted to be able to go to their weddings. The mission agency agreed that major life events, like wedding and funerals, I could go back for. My first trip home was after ten months, and in the two weeks I was back, my middle sister got married, my youngest sister graduated from high school, and I went to my cousin’s wedding, too. Where Jesus calls you, when Jesus calls you, he knows what else he’s already called you to. All your vocations get taken into consideration, not all of your commitments, but all of your vocations. When God called me to seminary, I had to break my commitment to the mission agency and to the schools where I was teaching. My commitment to God comes first. And Jesus knows what else he’s called you to, he’s not forgetting about those callings, you cannot use those as hold-outs when they are simply another piece of the call he has placed on your life. It all works together.

            My husband and I have started watching a new TV show this fall, “Manifest” on NBC. In the first episode there’s a mom whose favorite bible verse is Romans 8:28, “We know that God works all things together for good for the ones who love God, for those who are called according to his purpose.” In case there’s any doubt in your mind, we are those who love God, we are those whom God has called. Yes, God has called you. Maybe not to serve in another country, or ordained ministry, but God has still called you, is still calling you. God knows all those different pieces of your life and how you’re trying to weave them together and how he’d love to weave them together if you’d let him. God’s got a master design of how all things can work together. You might have to let go of some of your hold-outs, you might be holding on to something a little too tightly, maybe even to the point that it’s holding you instead of you holding it.

            The youth group is also doing the same bible study as the evening group, that the morning group did last spring. The book is Restored: Finding Redemption in Our Mess by pastor Tom Berlin. He’s a United Methodist pastor serving in northern Virginia. One of his analogies for a mess and restoring a mess is the restoration of the Sistine Chapel. Michelangelo painted it in the 16^th century and minor repair and cleaning had been done on it. But over the centuries, dust, grime, candle smoke, cigarette smoke, and gazillions of visitors had started to obscure the work. A few years ago a major restoration process was begun to clean and repair and brighten the faded artwork. Well, in the youth group version of the bible study, one activity is to put different kinds of tape over a poster and then have the kids work to restore the poster – to remove the tape, to fill in what’s missing, to get a sense for how to clean up and bring a mess back to its original state. The kids only had scissors, tape, paper, and markers to work with; they did not have high-tech or cutting edge tools that might have allowed them to do a better job. But they did an excellent job with what they had. This was a poster I bought in college of the Maldives Islands at sunset. I forgot I even had it until I went looking for old posters. Even repaired with basic materials it’s still a picture of the Maldives at sunset. 

Among the improvements are some surfers, seagulls, and a monkey in a palm tree!

Now, some of the kids got frustrated with the process of trying to fix it. Some gave up. Some of us have perfectionist tendencies that can be major hold-outs. I didn’t give them fancy artist tools like they had to restore the Sistine Chapel. But some kids kept going, doing the best they could with what they had, not holding any preconceived ideas too tightly, just fixing what they could, improving how they could. Working it all together until this was the finished product.

            Hold-outs can keep you from working on something. They can keep you from participating how you might otherwise. And we all have hold-outs. We all have something, whether perfectionism, or wanting it my way, or distractions, or anxiety, or fear, or a feeling of not enough or lacking something, there is something that tries to keep each of us from fully following Jesus. The man was invited to follow Jesus while he was on the way somewhere. He didn’t know where Jesus was going, if there were hotel reservations for that night or where he was going to lay his head, where his food would come from, if he was going to like his traveling companions. There is a lot of unknown when we follow Jesus. It can become a hold-out. Yet Jesus says, “Whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.”[1] Or, in Ecclesiastes, that book that gives us the great wisdom that “there is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven,”[2] it also says, “Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.”[3] What is your bread that you’re holding on to too tightly? Is it money? Is it status? Is it a certain feeling? What’s your hold-out? Is it fear? Is it selfishness? Is it the unknown? Is it belonging, or not belonging?

            That is what is most curious about the man’s question. What must I do to inherit eternal life? You don’t do anything to inherit. You can’t earn your way to an inheritance. It’s about belonging, not about actions. Salvation is through faith and not by works. Jesus freely offers it, invites himself into our lives, stands at the door and knocks, all we do is accept our inheritance as God’s children, or turn it down. It’s pure grace, unconditional, unearned, undeserved, unmerited. It’s not about keeping the commandments. It’s being part of God’s family, which is an open invitation. I know you’ve said yes. And that means you can quit striving. It’s not a competition. You can’t earn your way into heaven. You belong to God. So get rid of whatever hold-outs there are between you and God. There’s a hymn by another Methodist preacher, Charles Albert Tinley, called “Nothing Between,” it’s in your hymnal, #373. We’re going to listen to it and enter into a time of prayer.

            1. Nothing between my soul and my Savior,

naught of this world's delusive dream;

I have renounced all sinful pleasure;

Jesus is mine, there's nothing between.

Refrain:

Nothing between my soul and my Savior,

so that his blessed face may be seen;

nothing preventing the least of his favor;

keep the way clear! let nothing between.

2. Nothing between, like worldly pleasure;

habits of life, though harmless they seem,

must not my heart from him ever sever;

he is my all, there's nothing between.

(Refrain)

3. Nothing between, like pride or station;

self or friends shall not intervene;

though it may cost me much tribulation,

I am resolved, there's nothing between.

(Refrain)

4. Nothing between, e'en many hard trials,

though the whole world against me convene;

watching with prayer and much self denial,

I'll triumph at last, there's nothing between.

(Refrain)

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[1] Matthew 16:25

[2] Ecclesiastes 3:1

[3] Ecclesiastes 11:1

Gather in as Children

World Communion Sunday

October 7, 2018

Mark 10:13-16

(Or watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81wKIr9aqxo )

            Some of you are aware that when I was out a couple weeks ago, I was not just at, but in a wedding. Rather than officiating, I was a bridesmaid for my best friend from college. My husband and I chose not to bring our children with us to the wedding, but other families brought theirs. When the dance floor opened at the reception, some of those children got up to dance, too. While a couple only lasted a few songs, there was one child, maybe eight years old, dressed in a fancy pink dress complete with a tutu, who just never got tired of dancing. She was out there, doing her own thing, dancing by herself, and she was a joy to watch. She wasn’t self-conscious, she wasn’t afraid of messing up or stepping on someone’s foot. She wasn’t trying to impress anyone with her moves. She was just enjoying the music and enjoying dancing! Do you remember ever dancing like that? Footloose and fancy-free? Not worrying about who was watching, not really caring whether she was dancing with the beat or not. It’s hard for an adult to dance like a child. We are so much more mindful of judgment, criticism, skill level, and a host of other things that keep us from just letting go and dancing without self-awareness.

Our Gospel reading this morning about Jesus and the children is a familiar one to many of us. People brought their children to Jesus hoping he would bless them. The disciples prevented them. When Jesus saw this going on, he was indignant and said, “Don’t push these children away. Don’t ever get between them and me. Let the children to come to me. Don’t forbid them, because God’s kingdom belongs to people like these children. These children are at the very center of life in the kingdom. I assure you that whoever doesn’t welcome God’s kingdom like a child will never enter it.”[1] While we tend to tell children to grow up and act more like an adult, Jesus says for us adults to be more like children.

            Besides dancing like nobody’s watching, what does it mean to be more like a child and why does Jesus say that? First, you have to keep in mind the context of first century Palestine and the Greco-Roman view of children at the time. Children in that culture were not the apple of your eye, they were not princesses and princes, they were not seen as sweet and innocent. Children 2,000 years ago in the Roman Empire were seen as “unbridled little bits of chaos.”[2] They were “terrible nuisances to be tolerated,”[3] they were grubby and dirty, adults did not bond with children. Know why? Because of the high child mortality rate. We do not have exact stats from 2,000 years ago, but as recently as 200 years ago, the global child mortality rate was 43%.[4] Conditions varied widely in the Roman Empire, and so while those in Rome lived better than many others of their time, Jesus lived on the outskirts of the empire. One website I found guessed the child mortality rate to be between 20-30%, depending on local conditions.[5] A mortality table in Wikipedia estimated the child mortality rate at 46 %.[6] Either way, the precariousness of the children’s lives made it easy to disregard them. Jesus, though, says to pay attention to them, that they are important in God’s kingdom, and are a model of citizenship in his kingdom.

            Now, I don’t think being childish is what Jesus had in mind. Yet there are other characteristics of children that Jesus liked and valued and these have changed little over the centuries. Renowned theologian and bible commentator, William Barclay, compiled this list in 1954.[7] First, there is a child’s humility. Most children are embarrassed by prominence and publicity. There are a few who are exhibitionists, but most don’t want the spotlight on them. Second, that even though all children disobey at some point or another, their natural instinct is to obey. You ask a child to hold your hand to cross the street, or sometimes even just reach out your hand, and, until the child learns to suppress their instincts, will take it. Third, there is the trust of a child. They generally accept authority and have confidence in other people. They have not yet been disillusioned or disappointed. Fourth, Barclay pointed out that children have short memories. They do not hold grudges, unless they have been taught to, and do not hold onto bitterness. I would add one more to Barclay’s list, which is that most children are curious and interested in the world around them and look for connections in things. These are all qualities of children that come naturally, qualities that we all started with before the bumps and bruises of life took their toll.

            Yet it’s these qualities that Jesus is looking for in us: humility, obedience, forgiveness, curiosity, trust. “Jesus is clear that children hold the keys to the kingdom. He repeatedly invites us to become more like children in order to receive the world as God intends.”[8] So, in order to rest in the healing wholeness of God, Jesus invites us not to become childish, but to become like a child, being willing to be gathered in, the way children come to Jesus and are “willing to be taken up in his arms, trusting him for blessing and not ill.” The question here is “what in our lives has damaged the trusting child [in each of] us that keeps us back, that keeps us scared and skeptical of the goodness of God?”[9] What are those bumps and bruises? Can you name them? The 18^th century English poet William Blake wrote a whole book of poetry called “Songs of Innocence and of Experience” describing this shift from childlike innocence and wonder and trust to the world of experience. Growing up is hard, and it can be hard to not let those bumps and bruises negatively affect who we grow up to be. Bitter. Cynical. Closed off. Not trusting. Skeptical. Scared. Arrogant. Some wounds don’t heal properly. Sometimes we don’t learn the appropriate lesson from an experience. One bad marriage doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be married at all; it means you shouldn’t have been married to that person. We tend to take that proverb, “once bitten, twice shy,” to mean don’t ever again put yourself in a position of vulnerability where you might be bitten again. What the adage really means is just to use extra caution the second time around.

            Yet the truth is that we are so afraid. We’re afraid of failure, of rejection, of judgment, of criticism, of getting hurt. We want to be liked, we want to be accepted, just how we are, yet we’re so afraid that if folks really knew us, they wouldn’t want to hang out with us. And we are social creatures, we were created to be in relationship with each other. We crave companionship. And we crave to be seen as we really are. Uncool. Nerdy. Skinny. Fat. With weird hobbies and bizarre interests. With wounds that haven’t quite completely healed even though we have an iron-tight band-aid on it so you will never get a peek at what hurt us. If you knew, you might use it against me. We’re afraid to trust. We’re afraid to trust each other. We’re afraid to trust ourselves. We’re afraid to trust God. We’re afraid that our inner child is going to be hurt and disillusioned and disappointed all over again. We put up walls. We put on a mask. One psychology book I read said we often start experimenting with this around the middle school years.[10] We don’t want to be seen as vulnerable, and so we put up some protection so that others can’t see our weaknesses. Of course, then they can’t see us, either. And over time, we’re not even sure who the real me is anymore, either.

How do we overcome this deep-seated fear? Isaiah 41 is one of my favorite chapters in the bible. I’ve probably mentioned it before. Verses 8-10 read, “But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, you descendants of Abraham my friend, I took you from the ends of the earth, from its farthest corners I called you. I said, ‘You are my servant’; I have chosen you and have not rejected you. So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” Great passage, right? Comforting, affirming, calms your fears. This past week, I read it in a different translation, the Jerusalem Bible, a Catholic bible which was published in 1966, just after Vatican II. Instead of “do not be dismayed, for I am your God,” this version says, “Stop being anxious and watchful, for I am your God.” In this age of anxiety, in which anxiety affects approximately one-third of adolescents and adults,[11] here is God saying, “Stop being anxious and watchful.”  Not stop being observant, because there are lots of places where God tells us to pay attention. But stop waiting for the other shoe to drop. Stop waiting for the next bad thing to happen. Stop waiting for the next bad news cycle. Pay attention to what’s going on around you, especially the beauty of creation and the ways God is at work in your life. But you don’t need to be hyper-vigilant. You can pay attention like a child, observing and learning about the world around you, and then still sleep well in your bed at night. God is taking care of you. God is your God. Though Isaiah, God says, “I will give you strength, I will bring you help, I will uphold you with my victorious right hand.”[12] Two verses later, God says, “For I, Yahweh, your God, I am holding you by the right hand; I tell you, ‘Do not be afraid, I will help you.’”[13] Sounds like a parent holding the hand of a child, doesn’t it? I think that’s what we often forget as adults. That even when our parents and grandparents go home to Jesus and aren’t physically holding our hands, Jesus still is. And the next generation of children still are. This isn’t hand-holding as in you can’t do it by yourself or we don’t trust you or you need help. This is hand-holding that is comforting, reassuring, calming, reminding you that you are not alone, that you do not need to be afraid, that you can do this. This is the holding hands that says, “I love you. I believe in you. I see you. I’m here for you.” Just like holding a child’s hand.

My Dad and my son (age 20 months)

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[1] Mark 10:14-15, MSG and CEB

[2] Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year B, After Pentecost 2, p. 56

[3] Ibid.

[4] https://ourworldindata.org/child-mortality#empirical-view

[5] https://www.quora.com/What-were-infant-mortality-rates-in-the-Roman-Empire-circa-200-CE-and-how-did-this-shape-attitudes-towards-newborns

[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_Roman_Empire#cite_note-16

[7] William Barclay, The Gospel of Mark, p. 250-251

[8] Marcia McFee, Worship Design Studio, “On the Mend” worship series, “Healing Trust” service

[9] Ibid.

[10] Brené Brown, Daring Greatly, p. 113

[11] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/11/magazine/why-are-more-american-teenagers-than-ever-suffering-from-severe-anxiety.html

[12] Isaiah 41:10, Jerusalem Bible

[13] Isaiah 41:13

We Are All Connected

19^th Sunday after Pentecost

September 30, 2018

Esther 7:1-10; 9:20-22; Psalm 124; Mark 9:38-50

            We have again witnessed a week of blistering divides in our country, men and women, white and black, rich and poor, urban, suburban, and rural, Republican and Democrat, he said, she said. You’d think we’d be sick of it by now, or over it, or just plain ready to accept the consequences and move on. But we haven’t. You see it on social media. You see it on TV. It’s been a week of raw emotions for many people. I was at our District clergy gathering on Thursday and conflict was a dominant theme of our conversation. What was interesting was the observation that different people perceive the same conflict to be at different levels. For some, the conflict is a level two, it’s simply a disagreement. They don’t see eye to eye, they’re not going to see eye to eye, and they don’t like it, but they can live with that. For others, it’s level three, a contest to be won, or even level four, a straight-out fight where you must soundly defeat the other side in order to win. For some, though, what others may see as a level three, they see as a level five, which means the conflict is completely intractable, there is absolutely no way to work this out. It’s become us v. them, the original issue is inconsequential, it’s not a competition to win, it’s a battle in which the other side must be annihilated, in which the other side isn’t even seen as human anymore. I think all of us have witnessed these different levels at one point in time or another. Our Scriptures this morning give us two different examples of conflict, and they both have to do with belonging, who’s in and who’s out, exclusion and inclusion.

            First is the story of Esther.  She was a Jewish orphan raised by her Uncle Mordecai in Persia in the 5^th century BCE. The King of Persia got the not-so-bright idea to call for his Queen to come entertain the court wearing nothing but her crown. The Queen refused to be used in this way and was put to death. The King then held a beauty contest to find his next Queen and Esther won. Esther kept her Jewish heritage a secret, however. A few years later, the King made a guy named Haman his new prime minister and ordered that everyone had to kneel and bow to Haman. Esther’s Uncle Mordecai refused, giving the reason that “I am a Jew and cannot bow to Haman.” Rather than punish only Mordecai, Haman decided to punish all of Mordecai’s people, too, and destroy all the Jews in the Persian Empire. Haman took something that many would see as a lower level of conflict and escalated it to level 5. This insolent fool and everyone like him must be annihilated! Without naming names, Haman got the King’s permission to execute everyone who did not obey the King’s laws. Mordecai and Esther exchange messages between the palace and the King’s gate and Mordecai’s last message to Esther said, “Do not think that because you are in the king’s house you alone of all the Jews will escape. For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”[1]

Esther risked her life by approaching the King without being requested and after the King received her, she asked for the King and Haman to attend a banquet. At the banquet, she asked for them to attend another banquet the next day. At the second banquet, Esther asked for her life and her people’s lives to be spared, tying their survival into the King’s honor and reputation. “If I have found favor with you, Your Majesty, and if it pleases you, grant me my life—this is my petition. And spare my people—this is my request. For I and my people have been sold to be destroyed, killed and annihilated. If we had merely been sold as slaves, I would have kept quiet, because no such distress would justify disturbing the king.”[2] Obviously, Esther had found favor with the King, he had even offered to give her up to half his kingdom. So, the King agreed, and then wanted to know who had dared to do such a thing. Haman was executed instead of the Jews. Moreover, in the instructions for celebrating their salvation, the Jewish people were to give gifts to each other and give gifts to the poor.

“For such a time as this,” Esther was made Queen: to save her people, to tie the salvation of the Jewish people with the land in which they lived. That’s one thing the Jewish people are told when they’re in exile: to seek the welfare of the land in which they find themselves.[3] We are all in this together. We are all connected, black, white, male, female, rich, poor, urban, rural, Republican, Democrat. In the superhero movie, “Black Panther,” that came out this year, the final scene is of King T’Challa addressing the UN, saying that his country, “Wakanda will no longer watch from the shadows. We cannot. We must not. We will work to be an example of how we, as brothers and sisters on this earth, should treat each other. Now, more than ever, the illusions of division threaten our very existence. We all know the truth: more connects us than separates us. But in times of crisis the wise build bridges, while the foolish build barriers. We must find a way to look after one another, as if we were one single tribe.”[4] Are you building barriers? Or are you building bridges? That’s part of what’s great about the story of Esther: it invites us into the narrative. What would we have done if we were in Esther’s place? She resolutely said, “I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish.”[5] It is worth the risk. Building bridges is risky. Extending an olive branch is risky. De-escalating a conflict when the other person is at level five is hard. It’s much easier and safer for us to put obstacles in each other’s way, yet look at what Jesus had to say about that, “If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them if a large millstone were hung around their neck and they were thrown into the sea.”[6]

            You see, in our Gospel story today, Jesus’ disciples had forgotten that God is not only, exclusively, on their side. The psalm we read repeats the phrase, “If it had not been the Lord who was on our side.”[7] It does not say that God is always on our side, or that God always champions our causes or is our special possession.  Trying to put God on their side only got the disciples into trouble.  The disciple John says to Jesus, “Teacher, we saw someone driving out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him because he wasn’t one of us.”[8]  The disciples forgot, what I have seen recently put by the popular author John Green, that “there is no them, there are only facets of us.”[9] We are all in this together.  We sink or swim together.  And competing “for power in God’s name often leads to abuse of the vulnerable, the weak, and the powerless. Better to choose personal loss, as Esther risked, than break the unity of the kingdom of God through our power plays.”[10] There are no power plays in God’s kingdom. This isn’t hockey, or politics. We are not a country club. We do not cater to the rich and powerful. Jesus is always concerned about the least of these, about those on the fringe of society, about those who are lost, about those who are sick, about those whose voice is not heard, about those who simply need a cup of water. One of the pastors at this clergy meeting last week commented on the slow change taking place in the church she serves, from an institution or country club mentality to simply knowing and following Jesus. Do you know Jesus? Do you know you need Jesus? Jesus, who says, “Whoever is not against us is for us,” even if you don’t personally know them. Jesus, who says, “Do not put a stumbling block in front of little ones.” Jesus, whose principle is to include, not to exclude.[11] The disciples were angling for authorized activity only, you know, the doors marked “authorized personnel only.” They wanted to be special in the sight of those around them and have access to restricted areas, so they could feel important. Jesus says that all healing done in his name, even apart from his supervision, is still authentic. Validity does not come through a church rulebook but through the discernment of the Holy Spirit.

            We are in this together. We’re in this together as a country, as a community, as a church. There is a lot going on the higher levels, way up here, and most of us don’t have any control over what happens up here. But that is not cause for anxiety or fear, because we do have control over what happens down here. We have a say in how we act, whether we put a stumbling block in front of someone or offer them a drink of water, whether we include and welcome everyone or act like an elite club, whether we work for our common good or put ourselves first. In the morning bible study we read about how “unhealthy autonomy turns to unhealthy ego,”[12] as in, when you focus on me, myself, and I, then you lose focus of everyone else. Self-care does not mean you only care for yourself. God is on our side does not mean God’s not on someone else’s side, too. God’s bigger and can do more than you possibly imagine. God can make a way when there seems to be no way. When all this divisiveness is going on, it’s easy to go to level five and not even see the other side, the other person, but it is essential to remember that we are all beloved children of God. We are all made in God’s image. Do not fall into the trap of dehumanizing those with whom you don’t see eye to eye.

During the 2016 election, I shared one political post on Facebook. It was a picture of both candidates and the caption read, “Both of these candidates are made in the image of God. Yes. Both.” I feel like we need one today with pictures of Judge Kavanaugh and Dr. Ford. They are both made in the image of God. They are both hurting. “Humanization does not say, “I don’t believe her or him,” it just says, “I will cause no further harm.”[13] There is a lot of harm that has been done, across the board, on all sides. There has been a lot of dehumanization, of conflicts escalated to level five. Let us be people of peace. Let us be people who talk others down from the ledges. Let us be people who dare to build bridges. Let us be people who always remember that every person, no matter how similar or dissimilar from you they may be, is still a person and made in the image of the living God. 

Jesus ended his correction of the disciples by saying, “Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can you make it salty again? Have salt among yourselves, and be at peace with each other.”[14] My scientist husband was perplexed by how salt can stop being salt. He pointed out that salt is made up of one sodium and one chloride, NaCl, and the only way for it to stop being salt is to break the bond between the two elements. To keep being salt, we have to keep that bond between us. We have to strengthen that bond. To be salt, we have to be connected to each other.

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[1] Esther 4:13-14

[2] Esther 7:3-4

[3] For example, Jeremiah 29:7

[4] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1825683/quotes/?tab=qt&ref_=tt_trv_qu

[5] Esther 4:16

[6] Mark 9:42

[7] Psalm 124:1a, 2a

[8] Mark 9:38, emphasis mine

[9] https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/116454-there-is-no-them-there-are-only-facets-of-us

[10] http://www.ministrymatters.com/all/entry/6269/worship-elements-september-27-2015

[11] Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year B, After Pentecost 2, p. 65

[12] Adam Hamilton, Forgiveness, p. 9

[13] Stephanie K. Moore, Facebook post, September 28, 2018

[14] Mark 9:50