Fully known

He is a good man, perhaps even a very good man. He comes to Jesus – he ran up to him, we’re told – and he kneels before him with a question. His approach and his posture tell us that he’s not merely asking out of curiosity; he’s not asking to test Jesus or to make him say something that would get him in trouble with the authorities; he’s asking with urgency, and he is sincere, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

We have heard the story before, many times. With him kneeling there, we can already hear those dreaded words from Jesus’ lips, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” We know the man will go away grieving, with his many possessions holding him back. Our hearts grieve with him as we watch him go away.

In the entire Gospel of Mark he’s the only person singled out as being loved by Jesus. He’s also the only one whom Jesus called who didn’t follow. Turned around and walked away. And we are once again left standing at the scene, wondering what we would have done, what we would do, what we should do in response to Jesus’ unsettling words.

The writer of Hebrews declares, “Indeed, the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, … it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And before him no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare.” The word of God is not safely contained between the covers of an old book, but living and active, and it cuts with laser-like precision. It gets to us. It unsettles and disrupts. It finds its way to our innermost thoughts and intentions, things we may not even share with our best friends, rendering us naked and bare before God. We have learned to wrap ourselves in protective layers, but the word of God cuts through them like butter; it is aimed at the heart and it never misses. “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”

Am I too rich to enter?

Do I really want what Jesus offers?

Am I letting my stuff get between me and the life God wants for me?

Is my stuff getting between me and the life I really want?

Do I have to sell what I own and give it to the poor? All of it?

Maybe that was only meant for that particular man, and not for me?

I’m not rich anyway, not really. Rich is relative, and I’m not Oprah or Jeff Bezos.

Our minds add protective layer upon protective layer at the speed of thought so we don’t stand quite so naked and bare before God. Surely this episode isn’t to be taken literally, we tell ourselves. Surely its true depth lies in its symbolism—so why don’t you unfold the metaphor for us, preacher? Give us something spiritually uplifting to cover our nakedness.

It’s been done, quite creatively. In one medieval commentary, a scholar surmised that “the eye of the needle” was the name of one of the city gates of Jerusalem. In order for a camel to get through, the burden had to be taken off its back, and the beast had to get on its knees. This was obviously an excellent interpretation for a time when every bishop dreamed of building a cathedral: tell folks who wish to enter eternal life to get on their knees and write checks to the church until the burden on their back is small enough to let them slip through the gate. Never mind that Jesus told the man to give the money to the poor, not the church. Never mind that there never was such a gate. It certainly was a lucrative interpretation, but the word of God is living and active and sharp, and no effort of ours can render it convenient and dull or dead. There’s no easy button.

Just before this scene with the rich man, Jesus said, “whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.”[1] A little child is the personification of need and trusting dependence. The rich man in today’s lesson is everything a little child is not; he is the personification of achievement and confident self-reliance. He knows how to get things done. When presented with a challenge, he has various options at his disposal, and a solution is never more than a phone call away.

But he ran, Mark tells us, to get to Jesus and ask him, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus names the commandments dealing with our responsibilities toward family and neighbors, and the man replies, “I have kept all these since my youth.” Nothing in the story suggests that he is lying or bragging. Jesus tells the man, “You lack one thing. Go, sell what you own, give the money to the poor; then come and follow me.”

The two scenes highlight a great irony: the little children who possess nothing, don’t lack anything – the kingdom of God is theirs. Yet this man who has achieved so much and knows so much, and possesses so much, lacks the one thing that would open to him the door to eternal life. “Go, sell what you own, give the money to the poor; then come, follow me.” He can’t do it. “Children,” Jesus says to the disciples, “how hard it s to enter God’s kingdom!”

Children he calls them, all of the grown-ups who are trying to keep up with him on the way—and like us, they are perplexed and stunned. The eye of a needle is so very small, too small to squeeze through—then who can enter?

The kingdom of God is not a matter of squeezing through. No amount of knowledge, goodness, or wealth will open the door to life’s fulfillment. The question is not, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” We want to believe that with enough effort and control we will be able to secure our own future.

The real question is, “What is God doing to make life whole?” And Jesus looks at us and says, “Come with me.” The fullness of life we seek is found in the company of Jesus. According to Jesus’ response to this man, even those among us who have done everything right and have been very successful in every way imaginable, even those very few, in the end, do not accomplish our way to God’s reign, but enter it in the company of Jesus.

The good news sounds like bad news at first: we cannot save ourselves. But it is indeed good news: we cannot save ourselves; only God can. And so Jesus invites us to trust God with our lives and our future, to trust God completely with the work of saving us. And he helps us turn our attention away from ourselves and our anxious worry about our salvation to the needs of those around us: to the poor, the hungry, the unhoused, the little ones.

For life to be truly fulfilled, the perils of wealth must be addressed as well as the perils of poverty. Jesus gets us to think and pray deeply about those perils with his challenging answer, and his word resists all our efforts to domesticate it or dull its sharp edge for easier handling.

It may well be that Jesus’ call to “go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, … then come, follow me”— it may well be that this isn’t meant for everyone; but the call could still be meant for me or for you. We have to let it do its work. “Today, if you hear God’s voice, do not harden your hearts.”[2]

The writer of Hebrews reminds us that

the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And before him no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom we must render an account.

The language of a sword that pierces and cuts may be offputting, but the reality it describes is a hopeful one: no part of the human life is beyond the knowing gaze of God. We are fully known. In Psalm 139 we are invited to say with the psalmist,

O Lord, you have searched me and known me.

You know when I sit down and when I rise up;

you discern my thoughts from far away.

You search out my path and my lying down,

and are acquainted with all my ways.

Even before a word is on my tongue,

O Lord, you know it completely.

Where can I go from your spirit?

Or where can I flee from your presence?

It was you who formed my inward parts;

you knit me together in my mother’s womb.

Search me, O God, and know my heart;

test me and know my thoughts.

See if there is any wicked way in me,

and lead me in the way everlasting.[3]

No part of the human life is beyond the knowing gaze of God, but this gaze is not the round-the-clock surveillance of our every thought, word and deed by the big eye in the sky. It is the knowing gaze of a loving God who wants us to finally be who we were created to be—without fear, without pretense, without hiding.

[1] Mk 10:15

[2] A line from Ps 95:8 which is quoted repeatedly in Heb 3:8, 15; 4:7

[3] Ps 139:1-4, 7, 13, 23f.

Pioneer of our salvation

In 1849, in fear that she, along with the other slaves on the plantation, was to be sold, Harriet Tubman resolved to run away. One night she set out on foot. Following the North Star, she made her way from Maryland to Pennsylvania and on to Philadelphia. She found work there, saved her money, and the following year she returned to Maryland to escort her sister and her sister’s two children to freedom. And then she went back again to rescue her brother and two other men.

And she didn’t stop. The reward for her capture kept going up. By 1856, it was at $40,000. That’s a lot of money. We know that the Christian Church in Nashville, the congregation we know today as Vine Street, built a mighty fine church in 1852 for half of that. Nineteen times during a ten-year span, Harriet Tubman made the dangerous trip into the South, leading more than 300 slaves to freedom. And, as she once proudly pointed out to Frederick Douglass, in all of her journeys she “never lost a single passenger.”[1]

Calling her a “conductor” for the underground railroad seems very understated. John Brown addressed her as “General Tubman” in their correspondence, and many others simply called her “Moses.” She made a way in the wilderness, from the house of slavery to freedom. And she didn’t just tell others how to escape, she went with them, again and again, and she “never lost a single passenger.”

The author of Hebrews describes Jesus as one “bringing many children to glory” and calls him “the pioneer of their salvation.” A pioneer makes a way where there is no way, and the pioneer of our salvation doesn’t just blaze a trail and urge us to be careful and stay on it; he walks with us through the difficult landscape.

Somebody once asked Anne Lamott what she most wanted to convey to her son Sam about God. “I want to convey that we get to be human,” she answered.

We get to make awful mistakes and fall short of who we hope we’re going to turn out to be. That we don’t have to be what anybody else tries to get us to be, so they could feel better about who they were. We get to screw up right and left. We get to keep finding our way back home to goodness and kindness and compassion… I want him to know that no matter what happens, he’s never going to have to walk alone… That’s what I’m trying to convey to Sam.[2]

When you hear the opening verses of Hebrews, that kind of intimacy and closeness may not be the first thing that comes to mind. The first lines are like the Grand Tetons of poetic God-talk rising from the plains of everyday speech: enormous, majestic, awesome.

Long ago God spoke to our ancestors in many and various ways by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son, who is the God-appointed heir of all things, through whom God created the worlds, who is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being, who sustains all things by his powerful word, who, having made purification for sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs.

In the original Greek, the first four verses are just a single, carefully composed sentence, drawing listeners into the radiance of the divine presence and illustrating the bold claim that the entire history of creation, from the first day to its consummation, is contained in the life of Jesus. Commentators have long suggested that the writer may indeed be quoting, in entirety or in part, from the liturgy of the church to which the words were first addressed, reminding them of the powerful affirmations they shared.

I keep saying “the author” or “the writer” because no one knows who wrote Hebrews, and no amount of research has been able to overcome the anonymity. But we can piece together a picture of the community for whom the text was composed: They are believers who have experienced a great deal of shaming and hostility from their neighbors. Why? They have withdrawn from certain religious and social activities that bind a city and its people together, and their neighbors disapprove.[3] The believers experience serious pressures to conform to the ways things are done in the city, ways that go against their values as followers of Jesus, and not going along has consequences. The ongoing assaults on the believers’ honor, their economic standing, and even their persons are taking their toll on individual commitment. Some have stopped identifying with the Christian community entirely, others are in danger of “drifting away” or “turning away.”[4] The hymnic opening lines of Hebrews redirect their attention and ours toward the Son and the significance of the divine word spoken through his life and suffering, his death and exaltation. If this pioneer is not our constant, our central point of reference amid the swirling currents and pressures of our days, be it in first-century Rome or in twenty-first-century Nashville, who or what is?

The writer of Hebrews wants us to remember that the righteousness of God is not an idea or a concept; it is an embodied reality in Jesus. In him God embraces humanity, all of it, the best and the worst we’re capable of, our deepest joys as well as our anxieties, our desires, our hurts—us. And in him humanity opens itself up to God’s embrace, in complete trust and obedience. And so Jesus is the exact imprint of God’s very being and of ours as creatures made in the image of God.

The author of Hebrews recognizes God’s deep solidarity with us particularly in Jesus’ death:

We see Jesus, who for a little while was made lower than the angels, now crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. It was fitting that God, for whom and through whom all things exist, in bringing many children to glory, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings.

For Jesus, any life short of suffering and death would have been less than a complete identification with humankind, less than a complete embrace of our condition. And tasting death for everyone, he made a way for everyone, to set free those who were held in slavery by their fear of death, and never to lose a single passenger.

Rowan Williams has referred to the church as the “pilot project for the new humanity.”

What is the new humanity? The humanity set free for intimacy with God. It’s the restoration of God’s image in us. That image, which is fulfilled perfectly in Jesus, is now communicated to us, and we are restored to where we ought to be. Our position in the world is now what it was meant to be because we were made for intimacy. We were made for communion. We were made for meaning. And for all those things to come alive again in the presence and the power of Jesus, that is what life in the body of Christ makes possible. That’s why the Church is the pilot project for the new humanity. The point of the Church, if you like, is that glory may dwell in our land. The glory of God in transfigured human faces, and we are there to hold that space and that hope, that place for the imagination to go, where human beings are allowed to grow into more than they’re allowed to grow into in [this] materialist environment. Our job is to try to make sure that the Church goes on being a landscape for that kind of humanity: a pilot project for the human race, a project worth joining because it leads into a bigger, not a smaller, world.[5]

Our passage from Hebrews ends with a joyful exclamation from Psalm 22, words spoken by Jesus who is not ashamed to call any of us his siblings. “I will proclaim your name to my siblings, in the midst of the congregation I will praise you.” Psalm 22 continues for several more verses after this one, and they open windows to an even bigger world. The psalmist - and I don’t mind imagining Jesus as the one speaking those lines as the author of Hebrews did - Jesus proposes a banquet for all the beneficiaries of God’s deliverance: himself, the poor, the sick, foreigners, even the deceased and future generations—all of us are siblings by virtue of our deliverance, all of us come home to goodness and kindness and compassion, all of us have a seat at God’s table because Jesus is the pioneer of our salvation.

Every Sunday we gather at the table to give thanks to God for the gift of life and for Jesus who leads his siblings out of any house where their dignity as children of God is being denied. And today we give thanks that this table stretches across the ages and around the world, reminding us who and whose we are, and inspiring us to give ourselves to the pilot project for the new humanity, to entrust ourselves completely to the pioneer of our salvation.

[1] http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4p1535.html

[2] Jennifer L. Holberg, ed., Shouts and Whispers: Twenty-One Writers Speak About Their Writing and Their Faith (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2006), 199-200.

[3] See Hebrews 10:32-34; with thanks to David A. deSilva for his notes about the pastoral situation https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-27-2/commentary-on-hebrews-11-4-25-12-5

[4] See 10:25; 2:1; 3:12

[5]Rowan Williams, Archbishop's address to the Chelmsford Clergy Synod, 4th May 2006,

http://www.archbishopofcanterbury.org/sermons_speeches/060504%20Chelmsford%20clergy%20address.htm

Stumbling on the way

They had been arguing with one another who was the greatest, when Jesus took a little child and put it among them, and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” There hasn’t been a generation of disciples who didn’t have that argument about greatness, and across the ages, disciples have been confounded and confused by Jesus’ declaration that it’s the little ones, the ones without any power or status, in whom we welcome Christ himself and the Holy One who sent him.

I wonder if Jesus was still holding the child in his arms when John interjected, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.” It’s profoundly ironic that John, a disciple belonging to the inner circle among the Twelve, wasn’t paying attention to what Jesus was saying, but rather to what someone else was doing in Jesus’ name. “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.” Yes, you heard that right. “We tried to stop him,” he said, not “because he was not following you” or “because he was not following with us.” Someone was liberating people from demonic possession, and was doing so in Jesus’ name, and John said, “we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.” The apostolic circle was worried about ministry in Jesus’ name that hadn’t been authorized by them. And their worries had taken up so much of their mental and emotional bandwidth that they casually equated following Jesus with following them.

The big question was, who holds the copyright on Jesus’ name? Who determines what is legitimate ministry and what is not? John clearly was thinking about some kind of restraining orders in order to maintain the boundaries of legitimate, apostolic ministry.

Mark has told us that, at the beginning of his ministry, Jesus went up the mountain and called to him those whom he wanted, and … he appointed twelve, whom he also named apostles, to be with him, and to be sent out to proclaim the message, and to have authority to cast out demons.[1] Now Jesus hasn’t withdrawn his commission of the Twelve, but he also shows no interest in issuing restraining orders. “Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. Whoever is not against us is for us.” John is worried, perhaps suffering from a little status anxiety, but Jesus opens the horizon of kingdom ministry as wide as can be imagined, and once again redirects our attention from what others may be doing in Jesus’ name to who we are called to be and what we are called to do. Our eyes need to be on the One who is going ahead of us and on the little ones he puts among us. Our feet need to be following in his footsteps, so we don’t stumble over our attitudes, our distractions, ourselves. Our hands need to be serving the neighbors he has given us, and just like John couldn’t see the child in Jesus’ arms because his attention was elsewhere, we will be blind to the presence of God in those of little or no status, unless we have our vision adjusted by the living Christ.

Our eyes must become eyes of compassionate attention. Our feet, the feet of peacemakers. Our lips, the lips of truthtellers. Our hands, hands of service and comfort. Our minds, minds of Christ-inspired thinking. Our whole selves conduits of God’s grace and mercy for the life of the world.

But then Jesus says, If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and go to hell, to the unquenchable fire.

And he’s not done. If your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell.

And still he’s not done. If your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell.

I hear the words and they terrify me. I don’t know what to make of them. The images are so vivid, it’s difficult to remember that Jesus isn’t promoting self-mutilation. The brutality of the actions shocks me, the violence disturbs me. My immediate reaction is to look away and keep silent—and then I’m inclined to joke: Now if your other hand causes you to stumble, you’ll find it difficult to cut it off since you have only that one hand left. I’m desperate to find a reason to laugh to release at least some of the tight tension, yet at the same time I know that these words are no laughing matter. These words have a history; people have been scapegoated and cut off from their communities for allegedly causing others to stumble. Heretics were cut off and burnt at the stake lest they cause the body of Christ to stumble. Dissenters were cut off and disappeared lest they cause unrest in the body politic.

No, these words are no laughing matter. I wonder if they are meant to shock—because so much is at stake, and we don’t get it when Jesus tells us to stop obsessing about status and start paying attention to each other. Could it be that he speaks of decisive, violent action, because our lives are at stake and nothing else gets our attention?

I am reminded of a wolf who stepped into a trap and it snapped shut. For an entire day, she tried unsuccessfully to free herself, pulling and biting the chain, trying to pry open the steel jaws with her snout, her entire ordeal caught on a trail camera. The next day she bit off her own leg, leaving her foot in the trap. She was limping, but she was no longer caught in a deadly trap.

You know it’s not your foot that’s causing you to get off the path, literally or metaphorically. It’s not somebody’s hand that’s causing them to lash out and hurt their spouse or a child. It’s not my eye that’s causing me to overlook the needs of others and to see only what I want to see. It is my lack of attention to the will of God that’s causing me to stumble. It’s my fear, my apathy, my impatience. It is my being absorbed with myself, my status, and my needs that’s pulling me astray.

Jesus says that this path of self-centeredness can only end in hell, and I believe him. I don’t believe in hell, though, I believe in God. “Hell,” writes Daniel Migliore,

is best understood as wanting to be oneself apart from God’s grace and in isolation from others. Hell is that self-chosen condition in which, in opposition to God’s self-expending love and the call to a life of mutual friendship and service, individuals barricade themselves from God and others. It is the hellish weariness and boredom of life focused entirely on itself. Hell is not the vengeful divine punishment at the end of history depicted by religious imagination. It is not the final retaliation of a vindictive deity. Hell is self-destructive resistance to the eternal love of God. It symbolizes the truth that the meaning and intention of life can be missed. Repentance is urgent. Our choices and actions are important. God ever seeks to lead us out of our hell of self-glorification and lovelessness, but neither in time nor in eternity is God’s love coercive.[2]

The meaning and intention of life can be missed. We are made in the image of God to love as God loves. We are made for communion with God, with each other, and with all of creation. We bear the name of Christ in order that we might be conduits of God’s grace and mercy, and anything that blocks their flow must go.

The imagery of cutting limbs and gouging eyes is disturbing, but it reminds us that repentance and real change are needed, including the removal of any obstacles that hinder the flow of grace—the walls of fear and suspicion come to mind, the traps of pride, the dams of greed. Our formation as disciples of Jesus Christ involves our whole selves, from the soles of our feet to the crowns of our heads, and from our relationships across space and time to the depths of our soul. And the work of transformation occurs in prayer and in practice, in our gathering with the community believers, in silence and in praise, in our obedient attention to God’s work among us. In the end, it is not our willingness to go to violent extremes with ourselves or with others that allows us to enter life; it is God’s unwavering commitment to us and our redemption, and our willingness to allow God to do this work with us.

Just moments before he was betrayed, Jesus said to the disciples at the Mount of Olives, “You will all become deserters.” The word “deserters” is the same word translated “to stumble” in our passage and “to fall away” earlier in the gospel.[3] We will all stumble. We will all abandon Jesus, even Peter who was so very certain that he would never do that.

But it’s never our willingness to go to violent extremes with ourselves or with others that allows us to enter life. It is always God’s loyal, non-coercive love. It is always and forever God.

[1] Mark 3:14

[2] Daniel Migliore, Faith Seeking Understanding: An Introduction to Christian Theology, Third Ed., (Eerdmans Publishing, 2014), 366.

[3] Mark 14:27; see also Mark 4:17

Attention shift

I spent some time in Germany this summer, in the town where I grew up. I walked down the hill from our house where my mom still lives to the tram stop at the center of town, the same way I used to walk just about every schoolday for twelve years to get to school. And I noticed that the streets looked so much narrower than they had been in my memory.

I passed the Elementary School - a lovely building with lots of carved sandstone details around the windows and the tall, arched entrance. I remembered how stepping through those doors felt like entering a sacred space, a temple of sorts; I couldn’t help but look up, and I straightened my back, and I swear I felt less like “just a little boy” and more like a scholar, an explorer, a person. Passing my Elementary School this summer I noticed that it was much smaller than in my memory, a rather humble two-story building, but it still communicated the importance of the people who gather inside and the significance of their endeavors. I found myself wondering if perhaps it had been built to scale for 6-10-year-olds, a thought I found quite moving.

Do you remember how big everything was when you were little? How you had to reach up to touch the door knob? How getting on a chair was like climbing a piece of playground equipment? And do you remember that room full of adults who were all standing tall as trees and chatting way up there while you were trying to find your way across through a forest of legs?

We all have memories like that, memories of a world just beyond our reach, a world we can’t wait to belong to. Getting to sit at the grown-up table at family gatherings is easy, it’s just a matter of time, all you have to do is grow a little every year. Getting to hang out with the people you really want to hang out with at school is a lot tougher. That may be when many of us begin to wonder if just being who we are is enough; and we begin to project being the kind of person we believe others want us to be.

The disciples had met Jesus. They had met the one who would set all things right, and they had begun to follow him. He had talked about going to Jerusalem, and they were ready to go with him. But then he kept talking about being betrayed into human hands and being killed. They did not understand what he was saying, and they were afraid to ask him.

Why were they afraid to ask? Well, we kinda know how it is. You want to fit in with those who get it, those who nod knowingly whenever he speaks. Even when you’re frightened, confused and clueless, you still want to project confidence and make everybody else believe that you have it all together. And so in Mark’s story, the disciples, instead of asking how the way of the Messiah could possibly have anything to do with getting killed, they share their aspirations for high office in the kingdom.

Two of them discuss sitting at Jesus’ right and left in his glory. One of them never misses an opportunity to mention that he has been with Jesus the longest. And while one touts his revolutionary zeal, another braggs about his connections in the business community from his days as a tax collector. They are afraid to ask what Jesus meant when he talked about betrayal, suffering, and death in the city, but they clearly have no trouble imagining their seats at the big table and their names and titles on kingdom letterhead.

Jesus, of course, is never afraid to ask. “What were you arguing about on the way?” And suddenly they were silent, the whole chatty, ambitious bunch; no one said a word. Why the sudden silence? Well, we kinda know how it is. Had he asked them in private, individually, several of them probably would have told him about Theophilus who “thinks he’s the greatest” or about Bartholomew who is “dreaming about a seat on the supreme court.” But with everybody gathered around, perhaps they were afraid or too embarrassed to be open about their dreams of greatness.

Three times in the gospel of Mark, Jesus talks about being rejected and betrayed, about being handed over and condemned to death and being killed and rising again after three days. Three times, and not merely because this is disturbing news that messes with our assumptions and won’t sink in easily, but because being a disciple of Jesus means being on the way with Jesus and letting his way of loving surrender of self for the sake of the kingdom shape us. Our ways of thinking, speaking, doing, living are inextricably tied to his way. We don’t understand and we’re afraid to ask not just because we want to keep up the appearance of our deep knowledge. We’re quiet because he messes with our assumptions and has this habit of flipping things upside down in our world. And he does it again. He says, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.”

In our world, those at the top of the ladder lord it over those at the bottom. But in the world Jesus lives, proclaims and opens up, in the world of God’s reign, earth and heaven do not touch at the top, in the clouds of power, but at the bottom where Jesus kneels to wash the feet of all. He defines greatness in terms of service, and nothing else. His way remains at ground level and it leads to all of us, every last one of us.

We all start out little. We all start out needing to be welcomed. We all need somebody to see us and speak our name, somebody to pick us up and hold us, because we all start out small, needy and helpless. How much of our drive for greatness, do you think, has to do with that deep need to be seen, to be noticed and recognized, and finally welcomed?

Jesus took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” We argue about who is the greatest and Jesus puts a little child among us. Who even knew there was a child? Who noticed? We were engaged in important matters, making sure our voice would be heard, our opinion registered, and our contribution recognized in its true significance. And Jesus puts a little child among us.

Politicians pick up little children all the time, it looks good on any screen and it makes them more likeable. But Jesus doesn’t pick up a child to draw attention to himself. He does it to draw our attention to the child.

“In any culture, children are vulnerable,” writes Elisabeth Johnson.

They are dependent on others for their survival and well-being. In the ancient world, their vulnerability was magnified by the fact that they had no legal protection. A child had no status, no rights. A child certainly had nothing to offer anyone in terms of honor or status.[1]

Pheme Perkins observes how “our social conventions have exalted childhood as a privileged time of innocence,” but in stark contrast, “the child in antiquity was a non-person.” And Jesus identifies himself with the child, who was socially invisible.[2]

“Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” You want to be great and you make yourself as big as you possible can, just to be seen and recognized. But in the world of God’s reign you’re not being welcomed because you’re great. You are being welcomed because you belong. So don’t be afraid to shift your attention. Notice the ones that habitually go unnoticed, who are not great by any common measure, and welcome them.

“Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” The welcome, welcome, welcome of Jesus’ radical hospitality on earth resounds like the holy, holy, holy sung in heaven.

Much of our religious tradition has taught us to wonder, “What must I do, who do I have to be, who do I have to become in order to be worthy of welcome by the holy God? How can I work my way up?” But Jesus works at ground level. He looks us in the eye and says, “I see you. I know you. I love you.” He turns our attention away from ourselves and our anxious obsession with our status,  and frees us to turn our attention toward each other. He stops the lonely ascend to the top that is our quest for recognition and control, and he guides our feet into the path that leads us to see and serve each other. Jesus opens our eyes to see that the neighbors who are constantly rendered invisible by our arrangements of power, are indeed the embodiment of the invisible God.

Perhaps some of you have been wondering in recent weeks, what became of the men and women who used to live in tents under the Jefferson Bridge. And what became of the people who used to camp at Brookmeade Park? Where do they live now?

How long do we want to pretend that rendering them invisible is the best we can do? When will we finally see them?

[1] https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-25-2/commentary-on-mark-930-37-5

[2] Pheme Perkins, Mark (NIB), 637.

Feathers and ambers

There’s a Jewish folktale that’s been told and retold for generations. A man went about the village telling tales and gossip about the rabbi. Later, he realized the wrong he had done, and began to feel remorse. He went to the rabbi and begged his forgiveness, saying he would do anything he could to make amends.

The rabbi told the man, “Go home, take a feather pillow, and cut it open. Then come back here, and on the way, drop handfuls of feathers as you go.”

The man thought this was a strange request, but it was a simple enough task, and he did it gladly. When he returned, he asked the rabbi, “What now?”

“Now, go and gather the feathers.”

“But that’s impossible! The wind has blown them all over town!”

“Just like the thoughtless words you spoke.”

According to the Talmud, a body of ancient teaching in Judaism, “the tongue is an instrument so dangerous that it must be kept hidden from view, behind two protective walls, the mouth and teeth, to prevent its misuse.”[1] In the book of Proverbs, those who desire wisdom are taught that “to watch over mouth and tongue is to keep out of trouble.”[2] And already in the first chapter, James has declared with urgency, “let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak.”[3] Steve and Cokie Roberts, in their book, From This Day Forward, write,

A friend recently told us about a twenty-fifth-anniversary party where the husband gave a toast and said, “The key to our success is very simple. Within minutes after every fight, one of us says, ‘I’m sorry, Sally.’”

Good line, but it’s also true that what you don’t say in a marriage can be as important as what you do say. We often joke that the success of a marriage can be measured by the number of teeth marks in your tongue. Keeping quiet in the first place means you don’t have to say “I’m sorry” quite so often.[4]

Speech is potent and dangerous. Sticks and stones may break my bones but words—words will hurt or heal, delight or destroy, offend or befriend. James compares the tongue to the rudder of a ship, small and incredibly powerful, and he speaks of “bridling the tongue,” but then he quickly moves to a different image, an image that denies notions of control which rudder and bridle suggest. And it’s not feathers he has in mind. The tongue is a fire, he writes. Thoughtless words aren’t just blowing all over town like feathers in the wind. Careless words, reckless words, loveless words are like hot embers that spark and spread uncontainable wildfires.

James may have been able to relate to a saying like, “Falsehood will fly from Maine to Georgia, while truth is pulling her boots on.”[5] But when he wrote his meditation on the power and dangers of speech, he couldn’t even begin to imagine today’s categories of Twitter storms or the spread of delta variants of toxic speech spreading via Facebook, WhatsApp, and YouTube. The tongue is a fire, and thanks to more and more capable technologies, a blaze will spread farther and faster than ever. James sounds rather pessimistic:

Every species of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by the human species, but no one can tame the tongue—a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this ought not to be so.

L. T. Johnson writes,

From the sages of ancient Egypt, through the biblical books of Proverbs and Sirach, to the essays of Plutarch and Seneca, there is a consensus that silence is better than speech, that hearing, not speaking, is the pathway to wisdom, that speech when necessary should be brief, that above all speech should be under control and never the expression of rage or envy.[6]

And then he adds that the philosophers and moralists were

aware how difficult control of the tongue is, but they [were] fundamentally sanguine about the possibility of bringing speech into line with reason and virtue. James is not. He flatly asserts that no one can control speech… In James’s treatment, the tongue is almost a cosmic force set on evil.[7]

But James hasn’t argued himself into a corner where all he can do is urge silence. A fig tree cannot yield olives any more than a grapevine figs. And a spring doesn’t pour out fresh water and brackish water. Only humans let blessing and cursing flow from the same mouth. Only humans are made in the image of God and yet dishonor the image in each other, again and again.

But God hasn’t left us to our lies and alternate facts, our slander and our slurs. God has spoken and God is speaking - light and life, truth and redemption and righteousness. And our first language has always been blessing and praise in response to God’s creative speech. Blessing and praise are as old as creation. Long before there were hymns and prayers and liturgies, there was praise.

Our babies remind us of this truth. I remember a little boy, still an infant, singing his morning psalms. Lying there in his crib, usually some time before the rest of the family was up, he awakened with the first morning light. He could not walk, couldn’t even stand up yet. But with the light of dawn in his eyes he chanted his morning prayer of giggles and gurgling, almost every morning, a song of thanksgiving for life, a hymn of praise to the maker of heaven and earth. That praise is the beginning and the end of every word and language and song. That praise is our mother tongue.

The heavens are telling the glory of God;

and the firmament proclaims God’s handiwork.

Day to day pours forth speech,

and night to night declares knowledge.

There is no speech, nor are there words;

their voice is not heard;

yet their voice goes out through all the earth,

and their words to the end of the world.

“Not many of you should become teachers,” says James, “for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.” He begins his discussion of disciplined speech with those for whom speaking is a vocation. He doesn’t mention spouses who may or may not succeed at biting their tongues. He leaves aside leaders who who are so busy spinning, they themselves can’t tell what’s real anymore. And he doesn’t tell a story about words blowing every which way after they have left the gossip’s mouth. I wonder if he begins with teachers because he is one himself; because he trembles at the thought of having to find words to speak about the dangers of language and speech. He’s certainly good company on a day when we ordain one of us, Jackie, to serve as a minister of word and sacrament.

James doesn’t say why those who teach will be judged with greater strictness. But he’s already talked about what the judgment will be based on. “So speak and so act,” he writes in 2:12, “as those who are to be judged by the law of liberty.” In other places he calls it the “perfect law” and the “royal law” or “law of the kingdom,” and he quotes it: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”[8]

Liberty is not the freedom to say and do what I want. It is the freedom to be who we were made to be; the freedom to let ourselves be rooted in God’s love and to love each other well. May it be so, for all of us.

[1] http://storywork.com/when-stories-become-weapons-to-do-harm-and-kill/#_edn1

[2] Proverbs 21:23

[3] James 1:19

[4] Cokie and Steve Roberts, From This Day Forward (New York: HarperCollins, 2001), xi.

[5] Portland (Me.) Gazette, Sept. 5, 1820, quoted at https://freakonomics.com/2011/04/07/quotes-uncovered-how-lies-travel/

[6] L. T. Johnson, James, NIB, 203.

[7] Ibid., 204.

[8] See James 1:25 and 2:8

Proud division ends

Mark only tells us that Jesus went away to the region of Tyre, that’s a port city on the Mediterranean coast, in what’s Lebanon today. We’re not told why he went so far from rural Galilee, both geographically and culturally. Did he have to leave the country just to get a little peace and quiet? That would explain why he didn’t want anyone to know he was there. Whose house did he enter and how did the woman find out and get in? We don’t know; it’s as if Mark stripped away all potentially distracting details so we would give our full attention to the encounter between Jesus and the woman. He does tell us that her little daughter was tormented by an unclean spirit. But then he just lets us sit for a moment with this explosive tension: a gentile woman and a Jewish man in a house on Gentile land - at the time an almost unthinkable clash of gender, culture, language, and religion. She throws herself at his feet, begging him to cast out the demon that has bound her daughter.

We don’t know why Jesus crossed the border, but we do know why she stepped across every boundary of custom and propriety; we know what having a sick child can do to a parent. Having a sick child makes you desperate.[1] It makes you say horrible things to the receptionist who won’t give you an appointment until Wednesday next week. It makes you very rude to doctors who will spend hours running test after test and then tell you in less than two minutes that the nurse will call you tomorrow. It makes you scream at the insurance representative who tells you that your plan does not cover the treatments your child needs. It makes you stay up all night doing research on the web, finding out where the best clinics are, the best doctors, the best therapists, the most promising programs. And after you’ve exhausted all options, would you consider a trip to Mexico or India or anywhere else on God’s green earth? Of course you would. You will do anything it takes to make your child well. You will knock on any door and cross any border for your child’s wellbeing. That’s where this mother is – in the place at Jesus’ feet where love and determination have given all and now await an answer.

“Let the children be fed first,” he says. Yes, the little ones, of course, who wouldn’t agree that the young ones, the ones who have so much life ahead of them — who wouldn’t agree that they need to be fed first, that they need to be showered with love and good, nutritious food, with quality education and health care and freedom to play…anything to allow them to thrive and flourish.

“Let the children be fed first,” Jesus says, “for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” It may take you a moment to realize that he just told her No, and not just that, he insulted her by calling her and her child “dogs.”

We love our dogs. We love ‘em a lot. Cartoonist David Sipress allows us to overhear two little dogs chatting on a Brooklyn sidewalk.[2] Each is on a leash. Each has just dropped a you-know-what on the pavers. And each has a most attentive owner with a little baggy picking up what the puppy just dropped. Says one pooch to the other, “I don’t know about you, but it always makes me feel kinda special.”

We love our dogs, and for many of us they are simply canine family members. There are currently 69 million U.S. households including at least one dog. This number is not based on the latest census figures. Every other year, the American Pet Products Association conducts a National Pet Owners Survey. If you want a copy of the full report, it’ll cost you $3,600. The information is costly, because pets are big business. According to APPA report estimates, basic annual expenses for dog owners include

$700 Vet Visits

$368 Food and Treats

$228 Kennel Boarding

$81 Vitamins

$47 Grooming supplies

$56 Toys[3]

That’s about $4 a day. For perspective, in 2018, nearly half the human world population lived on less than $5.50 a day. So yes, we love the canine members of our households.

This was very different in the world in which Jesus grew up. In Jewish communities dogs weren’t pets, but semi-wild animals that roamed the streets scavenging for food, and they were not allowed in the house. They had to stay outside. So Jesus is telling the woman that her place is outside and that the door is closed. In saying “Let the children be fed first,” he implies that the time is not right.

Galilean peasants often were not fond of city folk like this woman. Small farms produced most of the food for the urban populations, but city folk controlled the markets. People in the cities bought up and stored so much of the harvest for themselves each season that frequently people in the country did not have enough, especially in times when supplies went down and prices went up. In the ears of poor Galilean farmers, Jesus told this rich lady to get in line and wait her turn.[4] In God’s reign, the last would be first, and those rich, urban Gentiles who always managed to be first, those dogs would be last. God’s salvation would come to the gentiles, in time. The day would come when those on the outside would be welcomed in, but not yet, not her and her child, not now. Jesus’ mission was to the house of Israel first.

“Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” If you were to write the script for a Jesus movie, that’s a scene you’d likely want to skip, unless you want Jesus to come across like a ranting talk radio host. This line about children and dogs — it just doesn’t sound like the kind of Jesus you’d want to portray, does it? It’s like he’s sitting in this little house of exclusive concern for his own people, telling the rest of the world that we’ll just have to live with our demons.

But this mother is already in the house. And if you want to call her a dog, call her a bulldog, for she won’t let go. She is courageous. She’s determined. And she’s quick-witted. “In my house, Sir,” she says, “even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”

In my house, dogs don’t wait until the children are finished; dogs and children both eat at the same time. The doggies wag their tails in expectation of every bit of bread dropped either by accident or by a child’s secret cunning. In my house, the children eat their fill and the dogs still get to feast on the crumbs. What I’m asking of you isn’t taking away anything from the children. Must I remind you of your own miracle? Five loaves, and 5,000 ate until all were full and wanted no more, and the pieces filled twelve baskets. Your table can’t hold the abundance you bring, it overflows with blessing. Let the doggies have a feast. My little daughter is bound by a demon, and I know that what she needs is yours to give. Crumbs will do.

This is the only story in all the gospels where Jesus is bested in an argument, which is remarkable. The fact that he’s being bested by a woman is perhaps no longer remarkable in some quarters, but it surely was for centuries, and there are plenty of places where it still is astonishing. And the fact that she’s a gentile puts the cherry on it. Like Jacob who wrestled with God through the night, saying, “I will not let you go unless you bless me,” she didn’t let go.[5] She left the house with a blessing she had wrestled from him: “You may go,” he said, “the demon has left your daughter.”

The word “faith” is never mentioned in this story, but everything about this anonymous, gentile mother embodies it: her courage, her tenacity fuelled by love, and her insistence that mercy is not a limited resource. When she went home, she found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone. The house of bondage and fear had become the house of laughter. And this unbinding, this joy is the promise of God for all of life.

Almost immediately following this story, there is another bread story.[6] At first glance it looks like an awkward repetition of the feeding of the 5000. Jesus breaks bread with thousands, seven loaves for 4000 people. All of them eat and are filled; and they take up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full. Plenty of crumbs, don’t you think?

What ties the two bread miracles together is this gentile mother’s fierce love. Because of her we can see that the two stories are really one: two courses of the one meal. Of this bread of mercy, there is more than enough for all of us, and the door is open. No need to keep anybody outside or under the table.

The miracle of Jesus’ power and this woman’s faith brought healing to a child, and not only that. The miracle also became manifest in the bridging of the divisive distance between two cultures, in the overcoming of realities that deeply separate us—and you don’t need me to remind you of the realities that so deeply divide our country and our world. The miracle continues wherever the power of God in Jesus Christ and the tenacity of our faith come together. The house of prejudice becomes the house of promise, and the house of bondage becomes the house of laughter.

As Christ breaks bread and bids us share,
Each proud division ends.
The love that made us, makes us one,
And strangers now are friends.

[1] With thanks to Anna Carter Florence, Lectionary Homiletics, Vol. 19, No. 5, August-September 2008, 30.

[2] New Yorker 2012, see http://tinyurl.com/d7guo7o

[3] All data from http://www.americanpetproducts.org/press_industrytrends.asp

[4] See Theissen, Gospels in Context, p. 75-80

[5] Genesis 32:22ff.

[6] Mark 6:30-44 is the feeding of the five thousand; Mark 8:1-10 is the feeding of the four thousand

Doers of the word

Last weekend, we saw the first images of devastation and heard the stories of terrible loss from Humphreys County and Waverly. This weekend, on the 16th anniversary of Katrina, we hope that hurricane Ida will not hit the Louisiana coast with similar levels of destructive force. In the days between, dozens of people were murdered in a bombing attack in Kabul, and we learned that Tennessee surpassed 1 million Covid-19 infections. Brett Kelman wrote in the Tennessean,

Not only [does Tennessee have] one of the highest [infection rates] in the nation, but it also grew 53% from the previous week, an increase that is more than 45 other states. … No other state in the U.S. reports the same combination of per-capita infection rates that are both very high and growing quickly… [And] over the past week, more than one quarter of all new infections have occurred among school-age children, ages 5 to 18.[1]

Heartbreaking as all of this is, it’s hardly surprising. “Be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger,” counsels James with one of his 59 imperatives in just 108 verses, and I find myself pushing back, wanting to suggest that anger isn’t wrong in itself, that it can alert us when something’s wrong, and that it’s really a question of what we do with it; that anger can be quite destructive, but also constructive. I fondly remember a saying the late Bill Coffin attributed to Augustine of Hippo, “Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are.”[2]

The picture I am taking with me from this very difficult week is that of a little Afghan girl in yellow pants, skipping across the tarmac of an airport somewhere in Belgium, the picture of a beautiful daughter following her mom and dad and little sister into a future that I hope will remain wide open to her dreams.[3] Seeing that little girl made me very happy, and I continue to be grateful for her little leaps of exuberance. Seeing her gave me much-needed courage. Seeing her made me want to give myself anew to the work of changing the world so there would be fewer reasons for families to flee and more occasions for children to skip and jump for joy.

On Thursday afternoon, one of our members sent me a text, asking if we had ever talked about refugee resettlement. “I have no physical strength to be of help,” this dear friend wrote, “but my heart just wonders what we could do.”

“We have been involved in refugee resettlement, but we have always depended on higher level agencies like Catholic Charities to help coordinate,” I responded, “and during the last administration, due to sharp cuts in the number of refugees allowed into the country, all resettlement agencies across the country had to cut their staffs. But let me find out how things have changed.” And so I called the Catholic Charities office in Nashville, and they confirmed that, yes, they had to let go of their entire resettlement staff over the past four years, but that they were in rebuilding mode, and that the refugee numbers were going up, and that they needed help.

And the entire time I saw that little girl in yellow pants skipping across the tarmac. She and her family will need a place to stay, they’ll need furniture and all kinds of household items, they may appreciate getting help with transportation and with navigating an unfamiliar culture, and no matter what they need, they will do better, just like we all do, with neighbors who care.

I wrote back to the friend who had texted me, “Thanks for the nudge!” Later this week I’ll find out more details about the local process, and I’ll let you know how we can get involved.

In James we read, “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: To care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” It may take us a while to sort out how to keep ourselves unstained by the world while also engaging with it, how to challenge and change it without conforming to it[4]—but caring for orphans and widows in their distress is about as plain and straightforward as it gets. “Orphans and widows” is biblical shorthand for the most vulnerable members of our communities - anyone in economically precarious circumstances; anyone without access to education or healthcare; refugees, undocumented immigrants, the unhoused - all those who find themselves pushed to the margins. Our care for them in their distress, according to James, is the measure by which our piety is being assessed - not the purity of our convictions or the fervor of our prayers. Not that ideas, doctrines or fervent prayers don’t matter - they do, they very much do! - but only if they help us become the people God wants us to be; only if they help us become doers of the word and not merely hearers; only if they help us embody our love for God in our loving actions toward our neighbor.

Much of the life of faith is aspirational; many of us would probably hesitate to claim that we are Christians, and be much more comfortable affirming that we try to live as Christians, that we want to follow Jesus. And yet, “when asked about the church, the first word college students think of often is ‘hypocrite’,” as Laura Holmes reports from the classroom.[5] There’s a distance between what we profess and do, and we often find it easier to see where others have fallen short of walking the talk - they may be folks sitting in the pew behind us, or entire congregations and traditions whose faith has a very different flavor, or the driver of the car who cut me off in the parking lot and took my parking spot, and then I saw the sticker from a local congregation on the rear window. “Is that what they teach you there?” I grumbled.

It’s much harder for most of us to see where we ourselves have failed to live out the faith to which God has called us. You remember what Jesus said about that:

Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your neighbor, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ while the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.[6]

So, yeah, when asked about the church, the first word college students think of often is one Jesus thought of as well.

James compares those of us who struggle with becoming doers of the word with people who take a quick glance in the mirror. You check your hair or make-up, you make sure there’s no spinach stuck in your teeth, and off you go. The moment you turn away, you forget what you were like. And now James contrasts that with the look into a different kind of mirror, the word of God, which he calls the perfect law, the law of liberty. This look isn’t a quick glance in passing, nor is it a narcissistic gaze. It’s an unhurried look, unrushed and honest, one that welcomes with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save our souls. Bill Coffin wrote, “I read the Bible because the Bible reads me. I see myself reflected in Adam’s excuses, in Saul’s envy of David, in promise-making, promise-breaking Peter.”[7] And because you can see yourself reflected, you may notice that log in your eye; you may see clearly what needs confession and repentance and practice. Søren Kierkegaard, a 19th-century theologian and philosopher from Denmark, taught that

The fundamental purpose of God’s Word is to give us true self-knowledge; it is a real mirror, and when we look at ourselves properly in it we see ourselves as God wants us to see ourselves. The assumption behind this is that the purpose of God’s revelation is for us to become transformed, to become the people God wants us to be, but this is impossible until we see ourselves as we really are.[8]

James says, “Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” And for James it almost goes without saying that our transformation includes our becoming welcoming, because the God we worship has welcomed us; and that it includes our becoming generous, because the God we worship is generous toward all. And because we praise, in the company of all God’s earthly creatures and the heavenly host, the “God from whom all blessings flow,” we become a little less prone to greedily grasp what is so generously given, and learn to share—and learn it not just in our minds, as a concept or a beautiful idea, but in our actions.

This past week has been a very difficult one, after months and months of difficult weeks, and I know that for many of you “difficult” doesn’t even begin to describe what you’re going through. Where does hope come from?

James reminds us that the world, whether we perceive it as vast or small, is not a system in which various forces are constantly pushing, pulling, shifting, rising, dropping, and emerging; a system in which all that ever happens, happens; a system that is essentially closed. James reminds us, or at least suggests for our careful consideration, that the world, all of reality, is an open system, one defined by the endless bestowal of gifts by a generous God - a reality where genuine newness is possible. A reality where, even when optimism has long taken a seat in the corner, hope comes skipping across the tarmac in yellow pants.

[1] Brett Kelman, “This Week in COVID-19: Tennessee has one of the worst outbreaks in the U.S.” https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/health/2021/08/27/covid-19-tennessee-has-one-worst-outbreaks-united-states/5601740001/

[2] As quoted, without reference, by William Sloane Coffin, The Heart Is a Little to the Left: Essays on Public Morality (Hanover and London: University Press of New England, 1999), 6.

[3] https://twitter.com/reuterspictures/status/1430544933463760896

[4] I’m reminded of Paul’s warning to the church in Romans 12:2

[5] Laura Sweat Holmes, Connections, Year B, Vol. 3, 276.

[6] Matthew 7:3-5

[7] William Sloane Coffin, The Heart Is a Little to the Left, 41-42.

[8] Steve Evans summarizing Kierkegaard’s insight as quoted by Robert Kruschwitz https://www.baylor.edu/content/services/document.php/174976.pdf

Stand firm

After prepared remarks on Friday in the White House briefing room regarding the evacuations from Afghanistan, the President answered several questions by journalists. He said,

One question was whether or not the Afghan forces we trained up would stay and fight in their own civil war they had going on. No one — I shouldn’t say “no one” — the consensus was that it was highly unlikely that in 11 days they’d collapse and fall, and the leader of Afghanistan would flee the country. …But the…overwhelming consensus was that…they were not going to collapse. The Afghan forces, they were not going to leave. They were not going to just abandon and then put down their arms and take off. So, that’s what’s happened.[1]

I’m not going to join the ranks of armchair experts who quickly turned from opining on infectious disease to assessing foreign military strength through the rearview mirror. I heard and read the news like the rest of you, but in my mind it was filtered through the passage from Ephesians we just heard.

“Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil,” it says there. I have issues with the language of “spiritual warfare,” mainly because too often, in history as well as in our own day, the struggle against “spiritual forces of evil” turned into violent actions against fellow human beings; we children of Adam and Eve are just not very reliable when it comes to differentiating between ideas and the people who hold them. But the language and images of combat are part of our tradition, and so we have to deal with them, even if it’s just to keep them from fulfilling the worst of their potential.

“Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.” I suspect that the words “armor” and “devil” draw the most attention in this sentence, and both invite all kinds of intriguing associations that can keep our minds occupied for a while. But the word I want to draw your attention to is much humbler, much less likely to tickle the imagination. It’s the word “to stand.” Perhaps some of you learned early in Sunday school about the belt, the breastplate, the shield, the helmet and all the rest; they are memorable, much more memorable than the simple fact that, according to Ephesians 6, all of this gear is meant to help you stand and not fall, or run, or hide. So you would stand tall because you are somebody. So you would stand up and be counted. So you would stand for something worthy. Three times the humble word “to stand” is repeated in this brief passage from Ephesians, so clearly it meant a great deal to the apostle. “Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. Stand therefore. Stand firm.”

Some scholars compare this passage to a military leader’s speech before the big battle. Most of us may never have heard one in person, but we’ve certainly seen them in movies. The battle speech is geared to fortify and motivate the troops to face the clash with courage, to stand shoulder to shoulder, shield by shield, boot by boot. To hold the line. To move as one.

“To stand firm,” according to Walter Wink, has the sense of drawing up a military formation for combat. And the apostle uses this kind of language to talk about the mission of the church in the world. “Stand firm!” he shouts across the field.

The overwhelming consensus, according to the President, was that the Afghan forces were not going to collapse; that they were not going to leave; that they were not going to just abandon and then put down their arms and take off.

But the assumption may have been that they knew what they were supposed to fight for, and that they thought it was worth putting their lives on the line for it, and that they trusted their leaders. And perhaps all of those assumptions were simply wrong.

In Ephesians, the apostle reminds the church that because of Jesus’ death and resurrection, the whole world, all of creation, is no longer what it used to be; that it has been irreversibly transformed at its core. Because of the cross, the world is no longer in the grip of the forces and powers opposed to God—economic, political, and social forces that can do much good, but somehow, always and everywhere, also contribute to developments that do not serve the flourishing of life. Some might call this the law of unintended consequences, but theologians look at it as sinful human impulses being translated from personal relationships into institutions, systems and structures that in turn shape human beings. And the bold claim made in Ephesians and elsewhere in the New Testament, is that God in Christ has broken the power of these rulers, authorities, cosmic powers, and spiritual forces. God raised Christ from the dead and seated him at the right hand of God in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come.[2] In other words, Jesus, and along with him the love and compassion and the challenging teachings we encounter in him, has been raised far above the human institutions, systems and structures that put him to death, and therefore it is no longer they, but Jesus who determines what becomes of God’s good creation.

“God has made known to us the mystery of his will,” the apostle declares, “according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.”[3] All things brought together in Christ, all things brought from fragmentation to wholeness, including a new humanity: where only division, alienation, and hostility have reigned for so long, Christ is our peace.[4] Why then does the author urge us toward the end of the letter to put on the whole armor of God? What is the battle supposed to be about when the war apparently has already been won?

Much of the language in our passage goes back to the prophet Isaiah; it was taken up and further shaped in texts like this one from the book of Wisdom, written just a few decades before Ephesians was composed:

The Lord will take his zeal as his whole armor,

and will arm all creation to repel his enemies;

he will put on righteousness as a breastplate,

and wear impartial justice as a helmet;

he will take holiness as an invincible shield,

and sharpen stern wrath for a sword,

and creation will join with him to fight against his frenzied foes.

Shafts of lightning will fly with true aim,

and will leap from the clouds to the target, as from a well-drawn bow,

and hailstones full of wrath will be hurled as from a catapult;

the water of the sea will rage against them,

and rivers will relentlessly overwhelm them;

a mighty wind will rise against them,

and like a tempest it will winnow them away.[5]

This author envisions the Lord arming all creation to join the fight against his frenzied foes. And this is where an important difference comes to the fore: The author of Ephesians presents us with an image of believers standing as fully armed infantry soldiers, drawing flaming arrows from all sides, and standing firm, holding the line. Brian Peterson writes, “The imagery used here is armor for violent battle; however, the strength advocated is not the might of armies, but the world-reconciling power of God embodied in the cross of Christ.”[6] He makes an important point, but there’s more going on here. The entire armor is defensive: breastplate, helmet, shield. The only offensive piece of equipment is the sword, and it is described as the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. The only weapon believers carry is their proclamation. And what kind of combat boots are given out at the Lord’s arsenal?

“As shoes for your feet put on whatever will make you ready to proclaim the gospel of peace.” That is the purpose of the entire campaign: to live and proclaim the world-reconciling power of God embodied in the cross of Christ. Christ has defeated the rulers, powers, and authorities in the heavenly places, but the good news of his victory must still be proclaimed. And “anyone who does so,” writes Pheme Perkins, “can expect to enter the arena against all the personal and social forces that resist transformation by the Word of God.”[7]

The proclamation of a world rooted and grounded in love is offensive to many powers, but stand firm. Hold the line. Dietrich Bonhoeffer stood firm on following Christ and no other. Martin Luther King, Jr. stood firm on nonviolence. Margaret Sanger, the twentieth-century suffragette, stood firm on women’s rights. Nelson Mandela stood firm against apartheid. John Lewis stood firm on voting rights. Oscar Romero stood firm on honoring the dignity of the poor and marginalized. All of them stood firm against injustice.[8] All of them stood firm on love becoming more tangible and real in our life together.

In Ephesians 6:11 we are told to “put on” the whole armor of God so that we may be able to stand firm. That same verb is used earlier in the letter in 4:24, where we are told to clothe ourselves with the new self, created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. That parallel reminds us that the church’s spiritual armor has little to do with adopting a more bellicose language or attitude. Our spiritual armor is nothing other than living the new life we have been given in Christ, rooted and grounded in the love he has revealed. And to do so even now, during these challenging and confusing times. To stand firm and live each day rooted and grounded in the love of God.

[1] ​​https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/08/20/remarks-by-president-biden-on-evacuations-in-afghanistan/

[2] See Ephesians 1:20-21

[3] Ephesians 1:9-10

[4] See Ephesians 2:14-16

[5] Wisdom 5:17-23; see also Isaiah 59:15-19

[6] Brian Peterson https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-21-2/commentary-on-ephesians-610-20-4

[7] Pheme Perkins, Ephesians, NIB, 464.

[8] See Archie Smith, Jr., Feasting, Year B, Vol. 3, 376.

Wisdom cries out

The first day of school endures as an occasion for picture taking. Thanks to social media, we get to see the little ones who are very excited about going to Kindergarten or 1st grade, and we get to see the older ones who can’t quite decide whether to look excited, bored, amused, or cool. And then there are the pics of college dorm rooms with beaming first-year undergraduates and the occasional glimpse of a parent who doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

It’s a big deal when a new school year begins. You get to see old friends again after the long summer break, and you’re excited about making new ones. There are new teachers to meet, new notebooks to decorate, and for some, whole new buildings to explore. We mark those first days because we look forward to looking back some day and recalling the wondrous reality of growing up: we all turn from babies into people, it’s the most common thing, but it’s a marvel to witness. And it’s equally marvelous for our children to see pictures of their parents and grandparents on their first day of school many years ago, and to realize that these mighty adults once were little ones, too.

What you can’t see in those pictures is the joy of the moms and dads who took them, the deeper-than-in-the-bones love they have for their kids, and the hope in their bellies — hope that they will be healthy, that they will be surrounded by people who help them become who God wants them to be, and that growing up they will love the person they’re becoming, and that they will find not just a job, but good work that allows them to apply their gifts and skills, and flourish.

These days, of course, many parents are worried sick about sending their kids to school. Moms and dads, whether they wanted to or not, had to become risk mitigation specialists with a minor in epidemiology, and largely because public health has become politicized at the worst imaginable moment.

“Be careful then how you live,” it says in today’s passage from Ephesians; “not as unwise people but as wise, making the most of the time, because the days are evil.” I’d probably want to push back a little against the declaration that “the days are evil,” because no day that God has created can be entirely devoid of good. But some days are closer to good than others, and recently we’ve had quite a few more of those a little farther from good, it seems. And the load they put on our shoulders is heavy.

When you watch the news reports about the school board meeting in Williamson County this week, those images stay with you. When you see on your screens the flames and plumes of smoke of the wildfires out West and in Siberia, those images stay with you. These days are far from good, and strong majorities of Americans share a sense of great urgency along with various levels of perplexity as to what is keeping us from moving forward together.

One set of the parents who attended Tuesday’s school board meeting were Dr. Maxwell and his wife, who is also a medical professional. When the energy in the room had gotten hot, and he knew things were going to get a lot worse, he suggested to his wife that it was probably best to leave. He took her arm and, walking to the door he said, “Just remember, no matter what they say, these are the lives we’re trying to save.”

There was a crowd chanting when they stepped outside, Maxwell told CNN. Someone approached him. “[They] put their hand in my face and called me a traitor,” Maxwell recalled. “I don't see how anyone can say that when I’ve been on the front lines of this pandemic since the beginning, treating patients in rooms, unvaccinated for the vast majority of it, hoping I wouldn’t take it home to my family. And for someone to say that, it’s mind-blowing.”[1]

Yes, it is, and to think that it’s over something as seemingly simple as a mandate to wear masks on busses and in classrooms — mind-blowing.

“Be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise, making the most of the time.”

In the days when the book of Proverbs was compiled, very few children went to school. They learned the life skills they needed at home, in the neighborhood, and in the synagogue. Only some very privileged boys attended schools that were attached to the court and the temple, or were run independently in larger cities. The teachers at those schools were venerated as sages, and they were probably the ones collecting sayings and lectures in compendia like the book of Proverbs for teaching purposes. But just like today, parents played a key role in educating their children.

In the opening verses of the book of Proverbs it says, “Hear, my child, your father’s instruction, and do not reject your mother’s teaching; for they are a fair garland for your head, and pendants for your neck.”[2] Those parents also carried hope in their bellies for their children, and sooner or later, at just the right age, they would introduce them to Woman Wisdom, the personification of the kind of knowledge they wanted them to attain.

Happy are those who find wisdom,

and those who get understanding,

for her income is better than silver,

and her revenue better than gold.

She is more precious than jewels,

and nothing you desire can compare with her.

Long life is in her right hand;

in her left hand are riches and honor.

Her ways are ways of pleasantness,

and all her paths are peace.

She is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her;

those who hold her fast are called happy.[3]

Parents wanted their kids to be smart and skilled, confident and kind, and the figure that integrated all these attributes and elevated them as godlike was Woman Wisdom. And in the book of Proverbs and other ancient Jewish texts Woman Wisdom is not only spoken about, but she herself speaks:

Wisdom cries out in the street;

in the squares she raises her voice.

At the busiest corner she cries out;

at the entrance of the city gates she speaks:

“How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple?

How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing

and fools hate knowledge?

Give heed to my reproof;

I will pour out my thoughts to you;

I will make my words known to you.

And then she adds, with a blend of sorrow and frustration in her voice,

Because I have called and you refused,

have stretched out my hand and no one heeded,

and because you have ignored all my counsel

and would have none of my reproof,

I also will laugh at your calamity;

I will mock when panic strikes you,

when panic strikes you like a storm,

and your calamity comes like a whirlwind…[4]

Wisdom wonders how long scoffers would delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge, and remembering how she stretched out her hand and no one heeded, she lets the passersby know she would laugh when their foolishness would cause calamity.

The Earth’s atmosphere is overheating, the land is dry and hard as concrete in some parts and flooding in others, forests and woodlands are on fire, infection rates are on the rise, and folks opposed to masking threaten neighbors who support it. Calamity certainly has come like a whirlwind, but I can’t bear the thought of Wisdom laughing at our foolish ways.

And I don’t believe she does. For she has built her house, she has prepared a feast, she has set the table, and from the highest places in the town she calls, “Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed. Lay aside immaturity, and live, and walk in the way of insight.”

She’s not laughing, nor is she mocking. She’s inviting us to her feast, with words reminding us of Jesus, and with deep compassion. “Lay aside immaturity, and live,” she calls. There’s urgency in her words, because much is at stake. She knows that ultimately the path we’re on is a matter of life and death, and she wants us to live.

In the deep mess we find ourselves in, our hope is that we are not quite grown up yet. Our hope is that in many ways we’re like Kindergartners on the first day of school: eager to learn, open to God and to the world, excited about the possibilities that lie ahead. We’re very much like Kindergartners, although most of us have forgotten it, and not just because of old age. Our hope is that God isn’t finished with us yet.

“Be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise.” That remarkable line from Ephesians doesn’t shake its finger at us with a strict and stern expression. It addresses us as human beings who have become new through Jesus’ deep solidarity with us in his death and resurrection. It reminds us of our true identity as members of the body of Christ, reconciled to God and to one another. “Be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise.” The line points us to the countless, daily opportunities to be attentive to how we act, what we say and how we say it, and how we think. It’s easy to see others as fools and just as easy to call them such; but the real work is to become a little wiser ourselves every day. The real challenge is to trust that God isn’t finished with us yet, and that none of us will cease becoming who we are as children of God.

[1] https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/12/us/tennessee-covid-mask-mandate-school-board-protest/index.html

[2] Proverbs 1:8-9

[3] Proverbs 3:13-18

[4] Proverbs 1:20-27

Come away

“Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves, and rest a while.” That’s a great word to ponder in the middle of summer. Come away and rest a while. Almost sounds like a commandment, this urgent invitation, doesn’t it? It’s the word of the Lord. A sweet commandment for the tired and the weary, the busy and the hurried.

Some of us don’t have to be told twice - we just go and rest a while in the mountains, on the beach, with our toes in the sand, or in the hammock, with a big glass of something chilled and fruity, hearing nothing but some chirping critters and the faint sound of an airplane flying high above. Come away and rest a while - what a pleasure it is to keep the Lord’s commandments!

Friday last week I paddled down the Cumberland River, and I praised the Lord for Great Blue Herons and juvenile Ospreys, the surprise of two big, long fish with spots like leopards whose names I don’t know, several Green Herons, a gorgeous Copperhead, and turtles, turtles, turtles - and I took pictures, of course. And when I got to the mouth of the Harpeth I thought I’d take another picture, just for documentation, I guess, that I had indeed paddled that far, and that’s when I dropped my phone in the river. Just a plop, no splash, and that unremarkable sound marked the end of the restful portion of the day. After that, it was all about getting back to the car and to the nearest phone store and dealing with all the crazy ripples a phone dropped in a river is bound to cause.

Reflecting on that unpleasant disruption, I thought about a summer several years ago, when Nancy, the kids and I had driven down to Fort Morgan, AL for a week on the beach. We had arrived on Sunday afternoon, and on Monday I got up early, made a pot of coffee, poured myself a mug, and sat on the deck. I could see Mobile Bay and the gulf from my chair; I could hear the waves, a few seagulls, and the soft voices of a couple of joggers running past the house. I watched brown pelicans fishing for breakfast as the sun slowly climbed above the pine trees. It was a perfect Come-away-and-rest-a-while moment — until suddenly an all-too-familiar whining sound pierced the morning air: a leaf blower! I will not repeat the words that came across my lips on that bright morning, repeating them would not be appropriate—not here, not now—but at the time they felt just right.

Then I saw him. The noise came from the house across the road; a house just like ours, sitting about 9 feet above ground on pylons, with two vehicles parked underneath on the concrete slab, and wooden steps leading up to the deck and the entrance. Our neighbor, with legs as pale as my own—clearly a very recent arrival—was blowing sand from the carport. The house was practically sitting on the beach, but he seemed determined to keep the sand off the slab.

“I just hope this isn’t part of your daily routine, buddy,” I said to myself, wondering if their house came with a leaf blower or if he had brought it all the way from home, just in case.

It takes a while to get used to the rhythms of life on the beach, I told myself. He probably woke up before everyone else in the house, and he was so used to doing stuff and staying busy, he just had to find something to do until the rest of the family got out of bed, I told myself. The rest of the week, thank God, the leaf blower remained silent.

“Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while,” Jesus said to the disciples. They had just returned from their first mission trip. He had sent them out two by two, empowered to proclaim repentance, and bring wholeness by casting out demons and anointing the sick. They still were disciples, pupils, followers and students of the master teacher—but here Mark refers to them for the first and only time as apostles, that is, sent ones. These emissaries, these newly-named apostles of the Lord gathered around Jesus, two by two, to tell him what they had done and taught. On their mission they had discovered, to their surprise, that they could do much of what they had observed Jesus do; that his authority and power became manifest in their own words and actions. They had stories to tell; yes, they were tired, but they were also wound up like children who cannot possibly go to sleep until they have shared every wondrous moment of their day.

“Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while,” Jesus said to his excited and exhausted missionaries who had no leisure even to eat. There were people everywhere, driven by curiosity and drawn by the promise of wholeness; people came to wherever they heard he was. So Jesus and the disciples went away in the boat to a deserted place by themselves, to a place with the promise of soul-nourishing solitude.

Just to be out on the water was great. They pulled away from the shore, away from the daily demands, away from the needs and the noise. Soon they heard nothing but the sound of the bow cutting through the swells and water splashing from the oars.

It didn’t last, though. When they pulled up on shore, they discovered that a crowd had followed them on land. It was as if they simply couldn’t get away at all. They could feel how their care and concern was slowly turning into resentment, and they hated it. They didn’t tell each other because they felt ashamed for what they thought was a profound lack of love and presence.

We’re all in that boat, disciples of Jesus, sent to proclaim good news and bring wholeness. But how do we respond when we feel emotionally and physically drained by the brokenness we encounter constantly? Compassion fatigue is a modern expression, but we have known the reality it describes for generations. Our emotional capacity to let ourselves be touched by the suffering of others, let alone respond to the demand they make on us, is limited. There’s a reason we sing, Jesus, thou art all compassion, pure, unbounded love thou art—we sing because none of us are all compassion; pure, unbounded love we are not. The wells from which we draw strength for the great work of living and proclaiming the good news, the wells are not our own. And that is why we sing of Jesus, why we sing to Jesus in whom divine compassion meets us in wondrous and complete human translation.

The scene in Mark is incredibly short: As he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things.

We may be so eager to know what exactly it was he taught them, that we almost miss what he is teaching us. We want to know the many things he taught them, because we’re pupils learning to think of ourselves as sent ones, and we want to pick up the lesson and run with it. What we miss is that we are very much part of them; that without him, we all are like sheep without a shepherd. What we miss is that it was him who went ashore and began to teach; and that we get to stay in the boat and eat the bread of his teaching; and that we don’t have to go anywhere or do anything but be here in his presence and receive his gifts, let him speak to us. Some of us still remember Herod’s party that ended with the death of John, the herald of the kingdom, and we notice that wherever Jesus goes, people live and experience wholeness. Some of us let him speak to us and we receive words of forgiveness and renewal. And some of us hear the sound of little waves rolling up on the beach, until we doze off, rocked to sleep like babies in a cradle. And when we awake, we rub our eyes and rediscover that the world did in fact turn without us. Oh, he knows what he’s doing, and he knows what we need better than we know ourselves, and he gives it to us. Come away and rest a while.

We follow Jesus because the rest he offers is more than just a break in a relentless race. We’re invited to rest in the movement of God’s compassion in the world, to draw strength from it, and to let it shape our actions, words, and thoughts with divine purpose.

Mark shows us a scene with people everywhere; people constantly arriving; people not just following Jesus around, but anticipating where he’s headed and hurrying ahead of him, seeking to cut him off before he can move on. They need healing and deliverance, and all the commotion, the crying, begging, and pushing bespeaks real desperation, desperate need—our desperate need, for we are them.[1] But we are not sheep without a shepherd. We shall not want.

[1] With gratitude to Cheryl Bridges Jones, Feasting B, Vol. 3, 260ff.