(Mark 4.21-23)
A sermon preached by Dave Shull
Spirit of Peace United Church of Christ
Sammamish, Washington
Pentecost Sunday: May 31, 2009
Today is Pentecost. The word comes from a Greek word that means 50th day. Today is the 50th day after Easter. And it is the day in the Christian calendar when we remember a story. People from all over the known world were gathered in one place in Jerusalem. And suddenly a force like a mighty wind came upon them. This force was a force Jesus had promised would come after he was killed. It is the force the Christian church calls the Holy Spirit. In Greek and Hebrew, sprit, wind, and breath are all the same word. On this day, God's Holy Spirit, God's Holy Wind, God's Holy Breath came upon a group of people. That spirit/wind/breath filled them with God. It filled them with love and filled them with a call. To go out into the world, into their communities, their homes, wherever they were. . . to share and live the love of Jesus Christ. Many religions speak of a Divine Spirit. For Christians, it is Christ's Spirit we receive again on this day. It is Christ's spirit, wind, and breath that fills us with love and fills us with a call. To follow Jesus. To get to know Jesus. To walk with him, challenge him, question him, argue with him. To bring him out of the pages of the gospels into today's world. So we who want to follow him can live and share his love in this world. Wherever we find ourselves.
Jesus promised his disciples that God would send this spirit after he was killed. He called it by different names. One of those names was the Spirit of Truth. In the Gospel of John, Jesus says to his followers, "When . . . the Spirit of Truth [comes], [the Spirit] will take you by the hand and guide you into all the truth there is" (John 16.13, The Message).
It is this Spirit/Wind/Breath of Truth that we need to have blow over, around, and through us this day. For Jesus is going to call us to do something that many of us have a very hard time doing. And if we want to do be who we say we are every week, if we want to share and live the love of Jesus Christ (Purpose Statement, Spirit of Peace United Church of Christ), then we need all the help we can get!
Listen for the Word of God.
Jesus said, "Does anyone bring a lamp home and put it under a washtub or beneath the bed? Don't you put it up on a table or on the mantel? We're not keeping secrets, we're telling them; we're not hiding things, we're bringing them out into the open.
"Are you listening? Really listening?" (Mark 4.21-23, The Message)
May God help us hear and live this word. Amen.
Not a lot of words. But more than enough to remind me what Jesus demands from those who want to follow him.
I like the first part of what Jesus says. About each of us being a light. Every person on earth is God's beloved daughter and son. Each of us has a piece of God in us. A light. This light proclaims every person is sacred.
It's the second part of what Jesus says that leaves me kind of reeling. We're not keeping secrets, we're telling them; we're not hiding things, we're bringing them out into the open. To make matters worse, he follows this with, "Are you listening? Really listening?" Which is Jesus-speak for Don't even think of watering down what I just said..
One of the lines I hear most often from people in recovery from addictions is, "We're only as sick as our worst secret". Which may be why Jesus tells us it's so important to stop hiding them. Because they weigh on us and lock us in dark places of shame and fear and self-loathing. Let the secrets out, Jesus says. Stop hiding things, Jesus says.
A number of years ago I was sitting in a coffee shop in Seattle. I was waiting for a friend, and while I waited I was planning a class I was teaching. I was reading this book with the word Jesus on the cover in really big yellow letters. Usually when I read I hold the book up (more and more these days I hold it out as well as up!). As I was reading I suddenly realized that everyone around me could see the big yellow Jesus on the cover of my book. I thought, Their going to think I'm a Christian. And they're going to think I believe what Jerry Falwell and James Dobson believe. Smack! I slammed my book onto my table . . . which made a couple of people who hadn't even noticed I was there suddenly become aware of my presence. But my secret was safe. No one could see what I was reading.
The Spirit of Truth blows through this place today. And fills us. The Holy Spirit is the force that creates and keeps alive the Church. This church. I believe this spirit/wind/breath is calling us to make this church a place where we can practice radical truth-telling. A place where we can imagine bringing out into the open any secret that saps life from us. Or drains hope from us. Or keeps us from believing we are God's pride and joy. I think the Spirit of Truth wants us to practice being the Kingdom of God by practicing radical truth-telling. Because in the church we do things differently. In the church, we try to share and live the love of Jesus. And that means we help Christ's Spirit build the Kingdom of God.
Over and over in the gospels, Jesus says he came to help create what he called the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God isn't a place, it's a way of being. It's a way of being that is so different from the way things are now. And what I hear Jesus telling us in today's Bible reading is that the Kingdom of God is about telling the truth. If we're going to practice being the Kingdom of God in this place, we risk being real. We risk being ourselves. We risk bringing to light what we have kept inside for so long. Stories of violence, fear, failure, rejection. Stories of loves and passions we have never dared to name. Hopes and dreams we have carried for weeks or years but never voiced because we didn't want people to laugh at us.
But we are products of a culture that encourages us to keep secrets. A culture that encourages us to lie when it's convenient or when we think we'll get away with it. And a culture built on secret-keeping and lying is a culture that is culture that is dying without even realizing it. The culture tries to convince us this is the reality we face, so everybody who wants to get ahead and stay head has to do it. No one's paying attention anyway. They're all looking out for themselves.
The British songwriter David Gray has seen the truth underneath the secrets and lies. He sings:
[A]cross the fractured landscape I see the same things
Tired ideas, broken values, many with the notion that to share is to lose
A hollow people bound by a lack of imagination and too much looking back
Without the courage to give a new thing a chance grounded by this ignorance . . .
We think we've done such a good job fooling everyone. We convince ourselves we're not really keeping secrets; we're not really lying. Which works for a while . . . until someone dares to tell the truth. Someone dares to expose the injustice, the deception, the lies. David Gray uses an haunting image from nature to show what happens when the truth comes out:
A hollow people bound by a lack of imagination and too much looking back
Without the courage to give a new thing a chance grounded by this ignorance
(and the cat comes)
We're just birds without wings (David Gray, "Birds Without Wings", A Century Ends, © 1993 and 2001, Virgin Records, Ltd.)
When the cat comes – when the secrets and lies are exposed for what they are – we're just birds without wings. Trying to escape. Wondering how we got caught. How it all fell apart.
The church of Jesus Christ, born and fed by the Spirit of Truth, needs to be a place where we practice bringing things out into the open. A place where we practice sharing secrets that for too long have kept us from soaring. Hiding, silence, shame, and fear sap us of so much energy and life. They keep us from knowing we are the pride of God's life. They keep our light hidden. Telling the truth, asking the hard questions, knowing we are builders of God's Kingdom, we let our light shine. And no darkness can overcome it.
Let us pray.
Come and be light for our eyes
be the air we breathe
be the voice we speak!
Come be the song we sing,
be the path we seek! (David Haas, "Be Light for Our Eyes," © 1985 GIA Publications)
Amen.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Good Enough
(Mark 4.1-9. 13-20)
A sermon preached by Dave Shull
Spirit of Peace United Church of Christ, Sammamish, Washington
The Seventh Sunday of Easter: May 24, 2009
Last Sunday afternoon, I sat in the gymnasium of the Washington Community High School in Washington, Illinois. My nephew, Warren, was graduating. Near the start of the ceremony, the superintendent of schools introduced the ten graduates with the highest grade point averages. And everybody clapped for them.
This week Kris Allen became the new "American Idol". The first paragraph of the Associated Press story said his victory had "turn[ed] theatrical powerhouse Adam Lambert into the most unlikely of also-rans" ("Boy next door Allen is the new 'Idol'", The Seattle Times, Thursday, May 21, 2009, A2).
Winners get our attention. The people who excel are the people we notice. The biggest, richest, strongest, fastest, loudest, and funniest; the most attractive, outrageous, offensive, intelligent, and tragic: these are who make the headlines. These are who we talk about.
Which means we keep score and keep track. We compare ourselves to others to see how we measure up. Grades, clothes, house, car, looks, kids, talents, boyfriend, girlfriend, popularity, success, the number of Facebook friends I have . . . how am I doing compared to you? And I don't know about you. But most of the time when I compare myself to others, I don't come out on top. I usually see all the ways others are better than I am.
My combined scores on the Scholastic Aptitude Test were good enough to get into the college I wanted to go to. And I was quite aware that more than 50% of the first-year students had higher scores than I did. My dad offered to have a T-shirt made for me that said, "I make the upper-half possible". I didn't take him up on it.
What about the person in my nephew's graduating class who had the eleventh highest grade point average . . . or the person with the 50th or 100th or 200th highest? What about the other "American Idol" also-rans? What about the African-American middle school and high school boys I worked with on the South Side of Chicago whose only dream was to play professional basketball? What about the kids and adults who struggle to get by in this world because their brains and bodies will never win them any awards, or earn them a spot on anybody's top ten list?
Christians are people who have heard the story of Jesus. And something about his story grabs and moves us. Something about him challenges and inspires us. Something about his presence changes and calls us. Christians believe many different things about Jesus. What we have in common is that there is something about him and his story we say "yes" to. So what does Jesus say about being the best? What does Jesus say about excelling and winning and being the one everybody's talking about?
Listen for the Word of God.
Jesus began to teach by the lakeside, but such a huge crowd gathered round him that he got into a boat on the water and sat there. The whole crowd were at the lakeside on land. He taught them many things in parables, and in the course of his teaching he said to them, "Listen! Imagine a sower going out to sow. Now it happened that, as he sowed, some of the seed fell on the edge of the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some seed fell on rocky ground where it found little soil and at once sprang up, because there was no depth of earth; and when the sun came up it was scorched and, not having any roots, it withered away. Some seed fell into thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it produced no crop. And some seeds fell into rich soil, grew tall and strong, and produced a good crop: the yield was thirty, sixty, even a hundredfold.
"Are you listening to this? Really listening? What the sower is sowing is the word. Those on the edge of the path where the word is sown are people who have no sooner heard it than Satan at once comes and carries away the word that was sown in them. Similarly, those who are sown on patches of rock are people who, when first they hear the word, welcome it at once with joy. But they have no root deep down and do not last; should some trial come, or some persecution on account of the word, at once they fall away. Then there are others who are sown in thorns. These have heard the word, but the worries of the world, the lure of riches and all the other passions come in to choke the word, and so it produces nothing. And there are those who have been sown in rich soil; they hear the word and accept it and yield a harvest, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold." (adapted from The New Jerusalem Bible)
I've heard lots of sermons about this story. And they've said pretty much the same thing: "The seed planted in rich soil produced an unbelievably huge harvest. And that what Jesus wants from all of us in the church. If we who are seeds don't produce a superabundant yield, then we're not being faithful." And even if the preacher said we're supposed to be the best seed we can, I'd always hear that I'm supposed to be the best seed. Period. After the sermon, I felt inspired for a little while. Then I started to feel kind of tired. And kind of discouraged. Because I didn't know how to produce that kind of harvest.
Achieving stardom as a disciple is what most Bible scholars say Jesus is calling us to do in this story. A Bible scholar who often inspires me is a good example. He writes, "This [seed planted in] 'good soil' yields a phenomenal return" (Ched Myers, Binding the Strong Man, Orbis Press, 1988, p. 175).
Being faithful means being a champion disciple and a champion church. That's what Bible scholars and preachers tell us Jesus is saying in this parable.
There's only one problem. It's quite possible that this isn't what the parable is about. It's quite possible these well-intentioned Bible scholars and preachers are interpreting this story on the basis of what they expect it to say instead of what it's actually saying (Bernard Brandon Scott, Hear Then the Parable, Fortress Press, 1989, p. 355). The way the story builds up, with three groups of seeds that fail to produce, we expect a big finish, right. The dramatic effect of failure, failure, failure . . . then a phenomenal, stupendous, colossal, only-God-could-produce-a-yield-like-this kind of harvest. That's what the readers expects. And probably that's what the people listening to Jesus tell this story would have expected. But that's not what happens. Instead, Jesus talks about the seeds producing a harvest of 30-, 60-, and 100-fold. That might sound pretty impressive to Bible scholars and preachers who've never operated a tractor or combine. But most of the people hearing Jesus tell this story were poor peasants. Most of them had some experience farming. So they knew what the people writing and preaching about this story don't: There's nothing spectacular about the yield. One scholar who actually did some research on crop yields in first-century Palestine discovered that one seed producing 30, 60, or 100 plants is not a superabundant harvest (Scott, p. 358). A 30-, 60-, or 100-fold harvest was nothing to sneeze at. They were good enough harvests. A 100-fold harvest would be in the top 50% . . . unlike my SAT scores . . . but they wouldn't have made it into anybody's list of top ten harvests in Galilee.
In this parable of a not great but a good enough harvest, Jesus offers a word of profound hope. He says following me means your life will be a mixture of failure, miracle, and good enough (Scott, p. 361). We try something. We fail. God helps us stand back up. And the miracle is that we try again. The miracle is that maybe the tenth or twentieth time we try, something new happens. Something changes. Something works. It might not make us famous. It might not win us any prizes. It's not beyond-the-normal. But it is something. It is good. It is good enough. It brings more love, justice, and home to the world. Which means it's always good enough.
Failure. Miracle. Good enough. That's what being a Christian is about. That's what being the church is about. Not about being the biggest, richest, strongest, fastest, loudest, or funniest, or being the most attractive, outrageous, offensive, intelligent, and tragic. Jesus hung out with prostitutes and tax collectors. He never got invited to the parties where anybody who was anybody was going to be. He didn't even live to see his 34th birthday. Lots of failure here. And, amidst the failure, there were miracles happening for anyone with eyes to see. The sick were healed. The lonely were loved. The people religion and government had no use for were welcomed into the new kingdom Jesus was building and he treated them like royalty. Healing, love, hospitality: it sounds pretty normal. Just like collecting socks and making sandwiches and donating peanut butter to a food bank sounds pretty normal. Just like being captured by a vision for a focused mission project everyone in the church can participate in sounds pretty normal. And what this parable tells us is that Jesus says these normal ways of following him are good enough. That's what he asks of us who want to follow him. Failure, miracle, and producing a harvest that is good enough: this is being Christian, this is being church. As one Bible scholar says, "The parable's structure leads to the expectation of abundant growth as a metaphor of God's mighty activity. But in the end the harvest is ordinary and everyday. In failure and everydayness lies the miracle of God's activity" (Scott, 362).
It's not about being the best anything. Or the biggest anything. Being a Christian is about knowing we'll fail and not giving up when we do. It's about noticing how God's miracles are all around us if we only pay attention. Being Christian is about producing a good enough harvest. Where there's more love and justice and home because the Jesus and his story have grabbed us. And we've said Yes to him.
Let us pray.
May [our] mind[s] come alive today
to the invisible geography
that invites [us] to new frontiers,
to break the dead shell of yesterdays,
to risk being disturbed and changed.
May [we] have the courage today
to live the li[ves] that [we] would love,
to postpone [our] dream[s] no longer
but do at last what [we] came here for
and waste [our] heart[s] on fear no more. --John O'Donohue, "A Morning Offering," To Bless the Space Between Us, Doubleday, 2008, p. 9
Amen.
A sermon preached by Dave Shull
Spirit of Peace United Church of Christ, Sammamish, Washington
The Seventh Sunday of Easter: May 24, 2009
Last Sunday afternoon, I sat in the gymnasium of the Washington Community High School in Washington, Illinois. My nephew, Warren, was graduating. Near the start of the ceremony, the superintendent of schools introduced the ten graduates with the highest grade point averages. And everybody clapped for them.
This week Kris Allen became the new "American Idol". The first paragraph of the Associated Press story said his victory had "turn[ed] theatrical powerhouse Adam Lambert into the most unlikely of also-rans" ("Boy next door Allen is the new 'Idol'", The Seattle Times, Thursday, May 21, 2009, A2).
Winners get our attention. The people who excel are the people we notice. The biggest, richest, strongest, fastest, loudest, and funniest; the most attractive, outrageous, offensive, intelligent, and tragic: these are who make the headlines. These are who we talk about.
Which means we keep score and keep track. We compare ourselves to others to see how we measure up. Grades, clothes, house, car, looks, kids, talents, boyfriend, girlfriend, popularity, success, the number of Facebook friends I have . . . how am I doing compared to you? And I don't know about you. But most of the time when I compare myself to others, I don't come out on top. I usually see all the ways others are better than I am.
My combined scores on the Scholastic Aptitude Test were good enough to get into the college I wanted to go to. And I was quite aware that more than 50% of the first-year students had higher scores than I did. My dad offered to have a T-shirt made for me that said, "I make the upper-half possible". I didn't take him up on it.
What about the person in my nephew's graduating class who had the eleventh highest grade point average . . . or the person with the 50th or 100th or 200th highest? What about the other "American Idol" also-rans? What about the African-American middle school and high school boys I worked with on the South Side of Chicago whose only dream was to play professional basketball? What about the kids and adults who struggle to get by in this world because their brains and bodies will never win them any awards, or earn them a spot on anybody's top ten list?
Christians are people who have heard the story of Jesus. And something about his story grabs and moves us. Something about him challenges and inspires us. Something about his presence changes and calls us. Christians believe many different things about Jesus. What we have in common is that there is something about him and his story we say "yes" to. So what does Jesus say about being the best? What does Jesus say about excelling and winning and being the one everybody's talking about?
Listen for the Word of God.
Jesus began to teach by the lakeside, but such a huge crowd gathered round him that he got into a boat on the water and sat there. The whole crowd were at the lakeside on land. He taught them many things in parables, and in the course of his teaching he said to them, "Listen! Imagine a sower going out to sow. Now it happened that, as he sowed, some of the seed fell on the edge of the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some seed fell on rocky ground where it found little soil and at once sprang up, because there was no depth of earth; and when the sun came up it was scorched and, not having any roots, it withered away. Some seed fell into thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it produced no crop. And some seeds fell into rich soil, grew tall and strong, and produced a good crop: the yield was thirty, sixty, even a hundredfold.
"Are you listening to this? Really listening? What the sower is sowing is the word. Those on the edge of the path where the word is sown are people who have no sooner heard it than Satan at once comes and carries away the word that was sown in them. Similarly, those who are sown on patches of rock are people who, when first they hear the word, welcome it at once with joy. But they have no root deep down and do not last; should some trial come, or some persecution on account of the word, at once they fall away. Then there are others who are sown in thorns. These have heard the word, but the worries of the world, the lure of riches and all the other passions come in to choke the word, and so it produces nothing. And there are those who have been sown in rich soil; they hear the word and accept it and yield a harvest, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold." (adapted from The New Jerusalem Bible)
I've heard lots of sermons about this story. And they've said pretty much the same thing: "The seed planted in rich soil produced an unbelievably huge harvest. And that what Jesus wants from all of us in the church. If we who are seeds don't produce a superabundant yield, then we're not being faithful." And even if the preacher said we're supposed to be the best seed we can, I'd always hear that I'm supposed to be the best seed. Period. After the sermon, I felt inspired for a little while. Then I started to feel kind of tired. And kind of discouraged. Because I didn't know how to produce that kind of harvest.
Achieving stardom as a disciple is what most Bible scholars say Jesus is calling us to do in this story. A Bible scholar who often inspires me is a good example. He writes, "This [seed planted in] 'good soil' yields a phenomenal return" (Ched Myers, Binding the Strong Man, Orbis Press, 1988, p. 175).
Being faithful means being a champion disciple and a champion church. That's what Bible scholars and preachers tell us Jesus is saying in this parable.
There's only one problem. It's quite possible that this isn't what the parable is about. It's quite possible these well-intentioned Bible scholars and preachers are interpreting this story on the basis of what they expect it to say instead of what it's actually saying (Bernard Brandon Scott, Hear Then the Parable, Fortress Press, 1989, p. 355). The way the story builds up, with three groups of seeds that fail to produce, we expect a big finish, right. The dramatic effect of failure, failure, failure . . . then a phenomenal, stupendous, colossal, only-God-could-produce-a-yield-like-this kind of harvest. That's what the readers expects. And probably that's what the people listening to Jesus tell this story would have expected. But that's not what happens. Instead, Jesus talks about the seeds producing a harvest of 30-, 60-, and 100-fold. That might sound pretty impressive to Bible scholars and preachers who've never operated a tractor or combine. But most of the people hearing Jesus tell this story were poor peasants. Most of them had some experience farming. So they knew what the people writing and preaching about this story don't: There's nothing spectacular about the yield. One scholar who actually did some research on crop yields in first-century Palestine discovered that one seed producing 30, 60, or 100 plants is not a superabundant harvest (Scott, p. 358). A 30-, 60-, or 100-fold harvest was nothing to sneeze at. They were good enough harvests. A 100-fold harvest would be in the top 50% . . . unlike my SAT scores . . . but they wouldn't have made it into anybody's list of top ten harvests in Galilee.
In this parable of a not great but a good enough harvest, Jesus offers a word of profound hope. He says following me means your life will be a mixture of failure, miracle, and good enough (Scott, p. 361). We try something. We fail. God helps us stand back up. And the miracle is that we try again. The miracle is that maybe the tenth or twentieth time we try, something new happens. Something changes. Something works. It might not make us famous. It might not win us any prizes. It's not beyond-the-normal. But it is something. It is good. It is good enough. It brings more love, justice, and home to the world. Which means it's always good enough.
Failure. Miracle. Good enough. That's what being a Christian is about. That's what being the church is about. Not about being the biggest, richest, strongest, fastest, loudest, or funniest, or being the most attractive, outrageous, offensive, intelligent, and tragic. Jesus hung out with prostitutes and tax collectors. He never got invited to the parties where anybody who was anybody was going to be. He didn't even live to see his 34th birthday. Lots of failure here. And, amidst the failure, there were miracles happening for anyone with eyes to see. The sick were healed. The lonely were loved. The people religion and government had no use for were welcomed into the new kingdom Jesus was building and he treated them like royalty. Healing, love, hospitality: it sounds pretty normal. Just like collecting socks and making sandwiches and donating peanut butter to a food bank sounds pretty normal. Just like being captured by a vision for a focused mission project everyone in the church can participate in sounds pretty normal. And what this parable tells us is that Jesus says these normal ways of following him are good enough. That's what he asks of us who want to follow him. Failure, miracle, and producing a harvest that is good enough: this is being Christian, this is being church. As one Bible scholar says, "The parable's structure leads to the expectation of abundant growth as a metaphor of God's mighty activity. But in the end the harvest is ordinary and everyday. In failure and everydayness lies the miracle of God's activity" (Scott, 362).
It's not about being the best anything. Or the biggest anything. Being a Christian is about knowing we'll fail and not giving up when we do. It's about noticing how God's miracles are all around us if we only pay attention. Being Christian is about producing a good enough harvest. Where there's more love and justice and home because the Jesus and his story have grabbed us. And we've said Yes to him.
Let us pray.
May [our] mind[s] come alive today
to the invisible geography
that invites [us] to new frontiers,
to break the dead shell of yesterdays,
to risk being disturbed and changed.
May [we] have the courage today
to live the li[ves] that [we] would love,
to postpone [our] dream[s] no longer
but do at last what [we] came here for
and waste [our] heart[s] on fear no more. --John O'Donohue, "A Morning Offering," To Bless the Space Between Us, Doubleday, 2008, p. 9
Amen.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Who God has Made Most Beautiful
(Mark 3.13-21, 31-35)
A sermon preached by Dave Shull
Spirit of Peace United Church of Christ
Sammamish, Washington
May 10, 2009
Every Friday at staff meeting at the Recovery Café, we do a check in. This past Friday I said the Bible passage I was preaching on this Sunday had some challenging things to say about family. On Mother's Day! I wasn't prepared for what came next. One staff member said she always hated going to church on Mother's Day. Because the pastor always preached about Christian motherhood. She said the kind of mother the pastor preached about wasn't anything like her mother or any other mother she knew. She said Mother's Day sermons just made her angry. Because they had no basis in reality. And only served to remind her of the kind of parent she didn't have growing up. She said, "I wish Mother's Day had never been invented." Another staff member shared that, for the first time in ten years, she'd made a card to send her mom. She said, "Most Mother's Days we just talk on the phone for about 30 seconds."
Growing up, I wanted my family to be like The Waltons. I wanted that kind of parent who is always patient and always available. That kind of sibling who always stands up for me. I wanted live-in grandparents whose stories always give me the wisdom and comfort I'm looking for.
Why do we set ourselves up like this? Why does Hollywood, why do novelists and poet wannabes employed by greeting card companies, set us up like that? Why do we believe that somewhere out there, there are such perfect mothers and fathers and families?
For once, I'd love to see a Mother's or Father's Day card with the words we sang in our opening hymn:
Through families we've tasted the value of trust
and felt what it means to be loving and just,
yet families have also betrayed their best goals,
mistreating their members and bruising their souls
(Thomas Troeger, "God Made from One Blood," The New Century Hymnal, Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim Press, 1994, Hymn #427).
Isn't that what all our families are like? All of our families are a mixture of the broken and the beautiful, a mixture of loving souls and bruising those same souls. What would it be like if Hallmark cards put out a series of Mother's Day and Father's Day and In Memory of cards that talked about how all of us really are? Instead of painting a picture of the perfect parent we know will never exist because human perfection is not possible.
In this morning's Bible reading from Mark, we do not find the picture of the perfect family. To us, what Jesus says about his family may sound pretty harsh. To the people in first century Palestine, what Jesus says would have been scandalous and horrifying.
Listen for the Word of God.
Jesus went up the mountain and summoned those followers he wanted, who came and joined him. He named twelve as his companions whom he would send to preach and to have authority to expel the demons. He appointed the twelve as follows: Simon to whom he gave the name Peter, James and John, begot of Zebedee, whom he renamed Boanerges, which means "Children of Thunder"; Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James begot of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus.
Then Jesus went home, and again such a crowd gathered that he and the disciples were unable even to eat a meal. When Jesus' relatives heard of this, they went out to take charge of him, thinking that he had lost his mind.
Jesus' mother and his brothers arrived and, standing outside, sent in a message asking for him. A crowd was sitting around Jesus, and they said to him, "Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you." Jesus replied, "Who is my mother? Who is my family?" And looking at those sitting in a circle around him, he said, "This is my family! Anyone who does the will of God, that person is my sister, my brother, my mother" (adapted from The Inclusive New Testament, © 1994 by Priests for Equality).
Describing this passage, a British Bible scholar says, "Unless you [hear these verses] as deeply shocking, you haven't got the message (Tom Wright, Mark for Everyone, SPCK, 2001, p. 39). These days in the United States, most of us do not stay in the homes and town where we grew up, and our children don't either. We're told to follow our bliss, follow our star, go where our hearts lead us. We talk a lot about families of choice. Because most of us don't live around the families who raised us, we form networks of friends who become like family for us. We do for each other what our relatives did when we lived close to them: childcare, bringing meals when we're sick, sharing chores and helping each other in all kinds of ways. Or we pay someone to do what relatives used to do for each other before we started living so far away from them. We are used to seeing as family people we're not related to.
In Jesus' day, the biological family was everything. Everything. Who you were related to by blood "was the axis of the social wheel in antiquity. "The extended family structure determined personality and identity, controlled [job] prospects, and most importantly [was the means by which people built relationships and arranged marriages]" (Ched Myers, Binding the Strong Man, Orbis, 1988, p. 164). If you brought shame on yourself, you brought shame upon your whole family. And that could never be lived down. So no loyalty was greater than loyalty to family. Loyalty to family was how you were loyal to your god. And family was only people like you. People of your tribe, your clan, your ancestry.
It had always been like this. And with a few words Jesus turns it on its head. He calls 12 people he's totally unrelated to to be his special community. Others had called disciples. But look what Jesus does: he changes the names of Simon, James, and John. Changing the name someone's family has given them means he's changing their relationship with their relatives. Changing their names means Jesus is creating a new family for them.
Jesus' family is sure he's lost his mind. So they do what families are supposed to do. They know the religious and political leaders see him as a threat. So they want him to shut up and come home and let them take care of him until he can regain his senses.
Jesus responds by saying his true family has nothing to do with blood. Instead, he says his true family is the people who are committed to making real the kingdom whose God Jesus preaches, teaches and lives. He says, I'm obeying God's call. And if my blood relations can't support me in this, I need to create another family. My true family is the people who are doing what I'm trying: trying to obey God.
He doesn't say his blood relations can't be his family again. If they decide to support his calling, if they commit themselves to obey God, Jesus will count them as family. And we know by the end of Jesus' life several members of his family did this. Mary, his mother was at the cross when Jesus is executed. And Jesus' brother, James, became a leader in the Jesus movement after Jesus' death.
His words sound so harsh and cold. Which is always how it sounds and feels when someone is trying to change how things have always been done. Throughout his public ministry, Jesus has been tearing down the walls that religion and culture built to tell people they were unclean, impure, unwanted, and unwelcome. To these people treated as shameful nobodies, Jesus said, "If you love God, you are my family!" Can you imagine how that would sound to people who'd always been treated as shameful, as nobodies? It would have been like rain on waterless ground. And what about the relatives? They'd always had reserved seats for this show. Now Jesus makes them feel angry, hurt, and left out. Now they need to re-imagine what it means to be family
If Jesus were preaching to us today about how we need to re-imagine family, I wonder what he'd say. We are in a very different place today than when he spoke these words 1980 years ago. Many of our families include people of different races, ethnicities, and religions. I don't think Jesus is saying we should turn away from them if their understanding of God and how to follow God is different than ours. Many of us include those we're not related to within our circle of family. So what would Jesus say to us today about our expanding our understanding of families? What could he say that was as scandalous and upsetting as his words about family sounded to first-century Palestinians?
The only way I can answer this question is through a story. It's a story I told the first time I preached here in June 2006. When I think about what Jesus would say to us today about who we need to see as our family, I think of Father Elias Chacour and a mirror.
Elias Chacour is a Palestinian Christian. When Israel became a country in 1948, his family was forced off the land they'd had for centuries. He experienced first-hand the brokenness among the children of Abraham. He saw and felt the hatred and lies that spread among Muslims, Jews, and Christians. Pained by the divisions among the children of Abraham, Fr. Chacour started a school. It's the only school in Israel where students and teachers of these three faiths come together every day to be a community that declares the children of Abraham can truly be one family. The Israeli government has fought him all the way. But Chacour knows he is doing God's will. He will not be stopped.
In 2002, a group from University Congregational United Church of Christ and from Temple
B'nai Torah in Bellevue visited Chacour's school. It's near the place Jesus scandalized his listeners by saying what he did about family. Father Chacour told us about a Muslim student from his school who had been shot and killed by an Israeli soldier during a non-violent protest in Nazareth. And he told us about a mirror.
Dear friends of mine from Arizona sent me a mirror, Father Chacour said. Around the frame are
the words, "Come and see who God has made most beautiful." Sometimes when I'm disappointed with myself for not doing enough to help my people, I look at my reflection in the mirror. And I read the words around the frame. The past couple of weeks, I've been holding up the picture of my student who was killed at the protest in Nazareth, and say those words. And sometimes when I'm so angry at what is happening in this land I let hate take control of my heart, I hold up to the mirror a picture of an Israeli soldier. He might be the soldier who ordered the destruction of my village. He might be the soldier who killed my beloved student. I hold that picture up to the mirror, and read the words around the frame. "Come and see who God has made most beautiful."
Chacour knows religions and governments ask people sometimes teach people to hate. They
teach people that it's okay to kill certain people they define as enemy. Blinding them to the fact that all of us are mother, father, sister, brother to each other. So a soldier kills an unarmed high school student. And the story of bloodshed done in God's name continues.
If Jesus were here preaching to us about who's part of our family, what would he say? I think he'd ask you and me, "Whose picture would you have trouble holding up to this mirror, and say, 'Come and see who God has made most beautiful'? Who do you find it hard to treat with civility, let alone love? In whose face are you rarely able to see the face of God? What would it mean for you to take one step toward healing that relationship?" And then I think Jesus would say, "Remember, I called 12 special people to walk beside me as I tried to live in love. So don't do this work alone. If you believe God is calling you to reach out to this one person, who can walk beside you? Is there a community whose support, love, and strength you can call on, so you take one step toward inviting that person to be part of your family?"
May we be such a community for one another. Amen.
A sermon preached by Dave Shull
Spirit of Peace United Church of Christ
Sammamish, Washington
May 10, 2009
Every Friday at staff meeting at the Recovery Café, we do a check in. This past Friday I said the Bible passage I was preaching on this Sunday had some challenging things to say about family. On Mother's Day! I wasn't prepared for what came next. One staff member said she always hated going to church on Mother's Day. Because the pastor always preached about Christian motherhood. She said the kind of mother the pastor preached about wasn't anything like her mother or any other mother she knew. She said Mother's Day sermons just made her angry. Because they had no basis in reality. And only served to remind her of the kind of parent she didn't have growing up. She said, "I wish Mother's Day had never been invented." Another staff member shared that, for the first time in ten years, she'd made a card to send her mom. She said, "Most Mother's Days we just talk on the phone for about 30 seconds."
Growing up, I wanted my family to be like The Waltons. I wanted that kind of parent who is always patient and always available. That kind of sibling who always stands up for me. I wanted live-in grandparents whose stories always give me the wisdom and comfort I'm looking for.
Why do we set ourselves up like this? Why does Hollywood, why do novelists and poet wannabes employed by greeting card companies, set us up like that? Why do we believe that somewhere out there, there are such perfect mothers and fathers and families?
For once, I'd love to see a Mother's or Father's Day card with the words we sang in our opening hymn:
Through families we've tasted the value of trust
and felt what it means to be loving and just,
yet families have also betrayed their best goals,
mistreating their members and bruising their souls
(Thomas Troeger, "God Made from One Blood," The New Century Hymnal, Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim Press, 1994, Hymn #427).
Isn't that what all our families are like? All of our families are a mixture of the broken and the beautiful, a mixture of loving souls and bruising those same souls. What would it be like if Hallmark cards put out a series of Mother's Day and Father's Day and In Memory of cards that talked about how all of us really are? Instead of painting a picture of the perfect parent we know will never exist because human perfection is not possible.
In this morning's Bible reading from Mark, we do not find the picture of the perfect family. To us, what Jesus says about his family may sound pretty harsh. To the people in first century Palestine, what Jesus says would have been scandalous and horrifying.
Listen for the Word of God.
Jesus went up the mountain and summoned those followers he wanted, who came and joined him. He named twelve as his companions whom he would send to preach and to have authority to expel the demons. He appointed the twelve as follows: Simon to whom he gave the name Peter, James and John, begot of Zebedee, whom he renamed Boanerges, which means "Children of Thunder"; Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James begot of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus.
Then Jesus went home, and again such a crowd gathered that he and the disciples were unable even to eat a meal. When Jesus' relatives heard of this, they went out to take charge of him, thinking that he had lost his mind.
Jesus' mother and his brothers arrived and, standing outside, sent in a message asking for him. A crowd was sitting around Jesus, and they said to him, "Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you." Jesus replied, "Who is my mother? Who is my family?" And looking at those sitting in a circle around him, he said, "This is my family! Anyone who does the will of God, that person is my sister, my brother, my mother" (adapted from The Inclusive New Testament, © 1994 by Priests for Equality).
Describing this passage, a British Bible scholar says, "Unless you [hear these verses] as deeply shocking, you haven't got the message (Tom Wright, Mark for Everyone, SPCK, 2001, p. 39). These days in the United States, most of us do not stay in the homes and town where we grew up, and our children don't either. We're told to follow our bliss, follow our star, go where our hearts lead us. We talk a lot about families of choice. Because most of us don't live around the families who raised us, we form networks of friends who become like family for us. We do for each other what our relatives did when we lived close to them: childcare, bringing meals when we're sick, sharing chores and helping each other in all kinds of ways. Or we pay someone to do what relatives used to do for each other before we started living so far away from them. We are used to seeing as family people we're not related to.
In Jesus' day, the biological family was everything. Everything. Who you were related to by blood "was the axis of the social wheel in antiquity. "The extended family structure determined personality and identity, controlled [job] prospects, and most importantly [was the means by which people built relationships and arranged marriages]" (Ched Myers, Binding the Strong Man, Orbis, 1988, p. 164). If you brought shame on yourself, you brought shame upon your whole family. And that could never be lived down. So no loyalty was greater than loyalty to family. Loyalty to family was how you were loyal to your god. And family was only people like you. People of your tribe, your clan, your ancestry.
It had always been like this. And with a few words Jesus turns it on its head. He calls 12 people he's totally unrelated to to be his special community. Others had called disciples. But look what Jesus does: he changes the names of Simon, James, and John. Changing the name someone's family has given them means he's changing their relationship with their relatives. Changing their names means Jesus is creating a new family for them.
Jesus' family is sure he's lost his mind. So they do what families are supposed to do. They know the religious and political leaders see him as a threat. So they want him to shut up and come home and let them take care of him until he can regain his senses.
Jesus responds by saying his true family has nothing to do with blood. Instead, he says his true family is the people who are committed to making real the kingdom whose God Jesus preaches, teaches and lives. He says, I'm obeying God's call. And if my blood relations can't support me in this, I need to create another family. My true family is the people who are doing what I'm trying: trying to obey God.
He doesn't say his blood relations can't be his family again. If they decide to support his calling, if they commit themselves to obey God, Jesus will count them as family. And we know by the end of Jesus' life several members of his family did this. Mary, his mother was at the cross when Jesus is executed. And Jesus' brother, James, became a leader in the Jesus movement after Jesus' death.
His words sound so harsh and cold. Which is always how it sounds and feels when someone is trying to change how things have always been done. Throughout his public ministry, Jesus has been tearing down the walls that religion and culture built to tell people they were unclean, impure, unwanted, and unwelcome. To these people treated as shameful nobodies, Jesus said, "If you love God, you are my family!" Can you imagine how that would sound to people who'd always been treated as shameful, as nobodies? It would have been like rain on waterless ground. And what about the relatives? They'd always had reserved seats for this show. Now Jesus makes them feel angry, hurt, and left out. Now they need to re-imagine what it means to be family
If Jesus were preaching to us today about how we need to re-imagine family, I wonder what he'd say. We are in a very different place today than when he spoke these words 1980 years ago. Many of our families include people of different races, ethnicities, and religions. I don't think Jesus is saying we should turn away from them if their understanding of God and how to follow God is different than ours. Many of us include those we're not related to within our circle of family. So what would Jesus say to us today about our expanding our understanding of families? What could he say that was as scandalous and upsetting as his words about family sounded to first-century Palestinians?
The only way I can answer this question is through a story. It's a story I told the first time I preached here in June 2006. When I think about what Jesus would say to us today about who we need to see as our family, I think of Father Elias Chacour and a mirror.
Elias Chacour is a Palestinian Christian. When Israel became a country in 1948, his family was forced off the land they'd had for centuries. He experienced first-hand the brokenness among the children of Abraham. He saw and felt the hatred and lies that spread among Muslims, Jews, and Christians. Pained by the divisions among the children of Abraham, Fr. Chacour started a school. It's the only school in Israel where students and teachers of these three faiths come together every day to be a community that declares the children of Abraham can truly be one family. The Israeli government has fought him all the way. But Chacour knows he is doing God's will. He will not be stopped.
In 2002, a group from University Congregational United Church of Christ and from Temple
B'nai Torah in Bellevue visited Chacour's school. It's near the place Jesus scandalized his listeners by saying what he did about family. Father Chacour told us about a Muslim student from his school who had been shot and killed by an Israeli soldier during a non-violent protest in Nazareth. And he told us about a mirror.
Dear friends of mine from Arizona sent me a mirror, Father Chacour said. Around the frame are
the words, "Come and see who God has made most beautiful." Sometimes when I'm disappointed with myself for not doing enough to help my people, I look at my reflection in the mirror. And I read the words around the frame. The past couple of weeks, I've been holding up the picture of my student who was killed at the protest in Nazareth, and say those words. And sometimes when I'm so angry at what is happening in this land I let hate take control of my heart, I hold up to the mirror a picture of an Israeli soldier. He might be the soldier who ordered the destruction of my village. He might be the soldier who killed my beloved student. I hold that picture up to the mirror, and read the words around the frame. "Come and see who God has made most beautiful."
Chacour knows religions and governments ask people sometimes teach people to hate. They
teach people that it's okay to kill certain people they define as enemy. Blinding them to the fact that all of us are mother, father, sister, brother to each other. So a soldier kills an unarmed high school student. And the story of bloodshed done in God's name continues.
If Jesus were here preaching to us about who's part of our family, what would he say? I think he'd ask you and me, "Whose picture would you have trouble holding up to this mirror, and say, 'Come and see who God has made most beautiful'? Who do you find it hard to treat with civility, let alone love? In whose face are you rarely able to see the face of God? What would it mean for you to take one step toward healing that relationship?" And then I think Jesus would say, "Remember, I called 12 special people to walk beside me as I tried to live in love. So don't do this work alone. If you believe God is calling you to reach out to this one person, who can walk beside you? Is there a community whose support, love, and strength you can call on, so you take one step toward inviting that person to be part of your family?"
May we be such a community for one another. Amen.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Can you heal me?
(Mark 3.7-10)
A sermon preached by Dave Shull
Spirit of Peace United Church of Christ
Sammamish, Washington
The Fourth Sunday of Easter: May 3, 2009
There is something lonely about being human.
You know what I mean. There's always a space between us and the world around us. A space that means you can never understand me, never love me, never know me, never be as close to me as I want. That loneliness about being human is made more profound in those times when we don't know or understand ourselves.
So sometimes we come to church, as maybe you have today, in a last-ditch effort for someone to heal me. So finally I can be freed from the loneliness that is made more intense by grief, guilt, fear, and longing.
Sometimes, we come to church, as maybe you have today, in a last-ditch effort for someone to answer the questions that deepen the loneliness of being human. Why did it have to turn out this way? Are you there, God? What do I do now? Is this all there is? Is there anyone out there who could actually want me?
I had moved to Chicago. I was carrying out a classic exercise in futility: I was trying to rewrite the calling God had given me by working somewhere other than in a church. So not only was I trying to create a new life in a new place. But I wasn't doing the work that gave me life. And I feared my life-commitment to Peter would mean I never could return to my call to parish ministry.
Sunday after Sunday I went to church after church. Desperate for something. For someone or something to take away that slow tearing of the soul that happens when you're running away from God's call.
And Sunday after Sunday I walked out church after church unhealed. Angry. Tearful. Lonelier than I felt when I walked in.
No church greeted me like I longed to greeted – like the long-gone, feared-dead loved one coming home.
No church loved for like I longed to be loved – in a way that filled all the empty places inside that echoed with the sounds of love lost and love yearned for.
No church had what I most wanted to find – a special room where I could leave my loneliness as I walked out.
It took me a long time to realize no church can offer what I was so desperately looking for. No church can heal us from the pain that comes from being human.
And no human being can do that either. How many relationships do we abandon because they can't save us from ourselves and the loneliness that comes from being selves?
Healing from the loneliness that is part of being human is the work of Jesus Christ, who lives with us and walks by our side yesterday and today and tomorrow.
It's easier to imagine going to Jesus for healing when he's someone we see walking around as a flesh-and-blood being like he did in the Galilee. Hearing your neighbors tell stories of how Jesus healed their daughter is enough to send you out searching for him. Stories of healings spread like brushfire. From everywhere, hurting people came to Jesus. Hungry for a second chance. Hungry for life. Hope. Home.
Listen for the Word of God.
Jesus went off with his disciples to the sea to get away. But a huge crowd from Galilee trailed after them – also from Judea, Jerusalem, Idumea, across the Jordan and around Tyre and Sidon – swarms of people who had heard the reports and had come to see for themselves. He told his disciples to get a boat ready so he wouldn't be trampled by the crowd. He had healed many people, and now everyone who had something wrong was pushing and shoving to get near and touch him (Mark 3.7-10, The Message).
It's an incredible scene. The relentless press, press, press of desperate people. Just hearing Mark's description is enough to send a claustrophobic running for the nearest open space.
The Gospels are filled with stories of people who come to Jesus. With their hands, with their arms, with their eyes, and sometimes even with their lips, they ask him, "Can you heal me?" What all the healing stories in the Gospels have in common is that the healing comes from being with Jesus Christ. He didn't need to touch you to heal you. You just needed to come to him with a heart hungry for healing. A conviction that he could heal you in some way. And an openness to know that the way you wanted him to heal you might not be the healing he offers.
The 13th-century Turkish poet Rumi gives voice to the desperate need these people brought to Jesus, and the desperate loneliness I often want my church and my relationships to fill. Rumi says finally the prayer all of us need to pray is, "God, I have no hope. I am torn to shreds. You are my first and last and only refuge" ("Prayer is an Egg," in Roger Housden, editor, {Risking Everything}, Harmony Books, 2003, pp. 139-40).
There is something lonely about being human. In this life, I don't believe this loneliness ever will be fully healed. But this loneliness can be companioned. As we open ourselves to the presence of the Risen Jesus Christ walking by our side, he touches our loneliness. And he fills enough of it that we no longer desperately seek its filling through people or work or church. We no longer desperately seek to fill that loneliness through addictions or distractions or denials.
We come to church lonely, hungry, hopeful.
When we're honest, we know what the church can do for us and what it cannot.
When we're honest, we know that the church can't take away the loneliness of being human.
Always there will be a space between us and those around us. A space we long to have closed, so we can feel that close, that loved, that understood, that whole.
What church can do – what we must do for each other – is to bear the love, the word, the stories, the presence of Jesus Christ. What church must do for each other is to feed each other with the body and blood of Jesus Christ, the life and salvation of Jesus Christ.
We remind each other that Jesus Christ is alive, and here, and walking beside each one of us. We admit the need we have for him, to be our companion in the loneliness that comes from being human. We bear witness to each other that it's never about trying to tough it out alone. But we show each other how to come before our God like Rumi came before his. "God, I have no hope. I am torn to shreds. You are my first and last and only refuge."
And then the church must stay beside us as we wait for God to reply.
God's reply can be very slow in coming. And when it finally does come, it's often in ways we don't expect or even want. Which is why we need each other as we pray for healing, and pray for God to answer. So we might not lose heart. But so we stay open to open to the companionship of the Risen Jesus Christ . . . who alone can fill enough of our loneliness that we can be healed for the abundant life he offers.
There is a longing in our hearts
O Lord for you
To reveal yourself to us.
There is a longing in our hearts for love
we only find in you, Our God.
For healing, for wholeness,
for new life: hear our prayer.
In sickness, in death,
Be near, hear our prayer,
O God.
(Anne Quigley, "There Is A Longing", OCP Publishers)
A sermon preached by Dave Shull
Spirit of Peace United Church of Christ
Sammamish, Washington
The Fourth Sunday of Easter: May 3, 2009
There is something lonely about being human.
You know what I mean. There's always a space between us and the world around us. A space that means you can never understand me, never love me, never know me, never be as close to me as I want. That loneliness about being human is made more profound in those times when we don't know or understand ourselves.
So sometimes we come to church, as maybe you have today, in a last-ditch effort for someone to heal me. So finally I can be freed from the loneliness that is made more intense by grief, guilt, fear, and longing.
Sometimes, we come to church, as maybe you have today, in a last-ditch effort for someone to answer the questions that deepen the loneliness of being human. Why did it have to turn out this way? Are you there, God? What do I do now? Is this all there is? Is there anyone out there who could actually want me?
I had moved to Chicago. I was carrying out a classic exercise in futility: I was trying to rewrite the calling God had given me by working somewhere other than in a church. So not only was I trying to create a new life in a new place. But I wasn't doing the work that gave me life. And I feared my life-commitment to Peter would mean I never could return to my call to parish ministry.
Sunday after Sunday I went to church after church. Desperate for something. For someone or something to take away that slow tearing of the soul that happens when you're running away from God's call.
And Sunday after Sunday I walked out church after church unhealed. Angry. Tearful. Lonelier than I felt when I walked in.
No church greeted me like I longed to greeted – like the long-gone, feared-dead loved one coming home.
No church loved for like I longed to be loved – in a way that filled all the empty places inside that echoed with the sounds of love lost and love yearned for.
No church had what I most wanted to find – a special room where I could leave my loneliness as I walked out.
It took me a long time to realize no church can offer what I was so desperately looking for. No church can heal us from the pain that comes from being human.
And no human being can do that either. How many relationships do we abandon because they can't save us from ourselves and the loneliness that comes from being selves?
Healing from the loneliness that is part of being human is the work of Jesus Christ, who lives with us and walks by our side yesterday and today and tomorrow.
It's easier to imagine going to Jesus for healing when he's someone we see walking around as a flesh-and-blood being like he did in the Galilee. Hearing your neighbors tell stories of how Jesus healed their daughter is enough to send you out searching for him. Stories of healings spread like brushfire. From everywhere, hurting people came to Jesus. Hungry for a second chance. Hungry for life. Hope. Home.
Listen for the Word of God.
Jesus went off with his disciples to the sea to get away. But a huge crowd from Galilee trailed after them – also from Judea, Jerusalem, Idumea, across the Jordan and around Tyre and Sidon – swarms of people who had heard the reports and had come to see for themselves. He told his disciples to get a boat ready so he wouldn't be trampled by the crowd. He had healed many people, and now everyone who had something wrong was pushing and shoving to get near and touch him (Mark 3.7-10, The Message).
It's an incredible scene. The relentless press, press, press of desperate people. Just hearing Mark's description is enough to send a claustrophobic running for the nearest open space.
The Gospels are filled with stories of people who come to Jesus. With their hands, with their arms, with their eyes, and sometimes even with their lips, they ask him, "Can you heal me?" What all the healing stories in the Gospels have in common is that the healing comes from being with Jesus Christ. He didn't need to touch you to heal you. You just needed to come to him with a heart hungry for healing. A conviction that he could heal you in some way. And an openness to know that the way you wanted him to heal you might not be the healing he offers.
The 13th-century Turkish poet Rumi gives voice to the desperate need these people brought to Jesus, and the desperate loneliness I often want my church and my relationships to fill. Rumi says finally the prayer all of us need to pray is, "God, I have no hope. I am torn to shreds. You are my first and last and only refuge" ("Prayer is an Egg," in Roger Housden, editor, {Risking Everything}, Harmony Books, 2003, pp. 139-40).
There is something lonely about being human. In this life, I don't believe this loneliness ever will be fully healed. But this loneliness can be companioned. As we open ourselves to the presence of the Risen Jesus Christ walking by our side, he touches our loneliness. And he fills enough of it that we no longer desperately seek its filling through people or work or church. We no longer desperately seek to fill that loneliness through addictions or distractions or denials.
We come to church lonely, hungry, hopeful.
When we're honest, we know what the church can do for us and what it cannot.
When we're honest, we know that the church can't take away the loneliness of being human.
Always there will be a space between us and those around us. A space we long to have closed, so we can feel that close, that loved, that understood, that whole.
What church can do – what we must do for each other – is to bear the love, the word, the stories, the presence of Jesus Christ. What church must do for each other is to feed each other with the body and blood of Jesus Christ, the life and salvation of Jesus Christ.
We remind each other that Jesus Christ is alive, and here, and walking beside each one of us. We admit the need we have for him, to be our companion in the loneliness that comes from being human. We bear witness to each other that it's never about trying to tough it out alone. But we show each other how to come before our God like Rumi came before his. "God, I have no hope. I am torn to shreds. You are my first and last and only refuge."
And then the church must stay beside us as we wait for God to reply.
God's reply can be very slow in coming. And when it finally does come, it's often in ways we don't expect or even want. Which is why we need each other as we pray for healing, and pray for God to answer. So we might not lose heart. But so we stay open to open to the companionship of the Risen Jesus Christ . . . who alone can fill enough of our loneliness that we can be healed for the abundant life he offers.
There is a longing in our hearts
O Lord for you
To reveal yourself to us.
There is a longing in our hearts for love
we only find in you, Our God.
For healing, for wholeness,
for new life: hear our prayer.
In sickness, in death,
Be near, hear our prayer,
O God.
(Anne Quigley, "There Is A Longing", OCP Publishers)
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