The Widow Proper 27B

 The Widow’s Mite

That’s what the church traditionally calls the story in Mark 12:38-44. Which is to overlook at least half, if not all, of what this little episode may really be about. Appearing in what we euphemistically call “stewardship season,” when we not only urge but honestly need people to reconsider their annual support of the local church and its mission to the world in which it lives and moves and has its being, we have tend to trumpet the extravagant, if not downright foolish, generosity of this poor widow who puts he only two coins into the Temple Treasury. I say “trumpet” because evidently in the Court of Women in the Jerusalem Temple there were a number of large trumpet-shaped containers in which people would place monetary offerings to support the administration of the Temple and its system of sacrifices – burnt offerings believed to make the One God of Israel happy and therefore continue to send rain and sunshine to produce an abundance of crops, and good luck in dealing with neighbor countries which often sought delight in plundering Israel’s good fortune. 

The general arc of sermons in this season often say something like, “Look, if this poor widow can give everything she has to the Temple, you can certainly increase your pledge to your local congregation so we can keep the lights on and to heat and air condition our buildings to keep ourselves cozy and comfortable – which surely must be an important component of being God’s covenant people in today’s world.” I will confess to being guilty of turning this poor widow into a hero of sacrificial giving to support the institutions we love to think of as ours; as our own little real estate holding in the emerging Kingdom of God. 

Upon closer review, this turns out to be a fumble that ought to be recovered by the other team. And yes, that other team would be Jesus’s team – those seeking, as he will say later in the Passover week ahead, a kingdom “not of this world,” much to the bafflement of one Pontius Pilate, representative of the Emperor Caesar, whose face was on all the coins of the empire proclaiming, “Caesar is God!” Which of course raises the question already raised earlier in chapter 12 of Mark’s Gospel – why would the administrators of the Temple, the Chief Priests and Sadducees, and of course the Scribes, those arbiters of what the Torah scrolls say and mean, why would these folks be so insistent on gathering as much of these Roman coins as possible if indeed said coins proclaim that a mere mortal like Caesar is God? 

Again, just a few verses earlier in Mark chapter 12, Jesus is asked by a Scribe what is the greatest of all the commandments, of which in Torah there are 613 – 365 “thou shalt nots,” and the remaining 248 “thou shalts”. Jesus answers correctly, reciting the one prayer recited several times a day, the Shema, “The first is, ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; 30 you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” And then adds, from Leviticus, “The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” The Scribe is impressed, and goes so far to say, “…this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.” When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” After that no one dared to ask him any question. This Scribe represents the critique of the Temple’s sacrificial system lodged by all the prophets of the previous six or eight hundred years! That to put all our energy into sustaining this sacrificial institution is to imperil the neighbors we are meant to be loving as God loves us – especially for those who by circumstance and no fault of their own have no male patriarch to look out for them, no pater familias as the Greeks and Romans would have it.

 Of these neighbors in need, it was understood that God had repeatedly commands that widows, women who had lost their pater familias, as well as orphans and aliens - sojourners, strangers in the land fleeing poverty, warfare, or any number of conflict and problems in their own countries - were all to receive the same love, sustenance, and care as one’s own family and fellow Israelite neighbors. All of these particular circumstances – widowhood, orphanhood and migrant worker-hood– had no benefit of a pater familias, and therefore are to be cared for by the community at-large.   

Admittedly it is strange, that after Jesus had such a meaningful encounter with a Scribe who was understood that the Kingdom of God means to care for these marginalized groups of people like the widow in our story, that Jesus would then rip into the Scribes for wearing long robes, saying long prayers, and demanding preferred seating in synagogues and banquets. I confess, every time I read this and similar instructions from Jesus not to wear two tunics, etc, I tremble each Sunday morning as I put on long robes to lead our worship, to sit in front of even the front row week after week, and recite long prayers over our sacred meal we share – a meal that calls us to care for those without resources like our widow and her fellow orphans and resident aliens. Indeed, this story is meant to hold a mirror before each and every one of us. Most especially me. 

For the central question in this would be: to what degree do we participate in sustaining institutions that allow there to be individuals in our society that have nothing more than these two little coins which even in today’s world would be worth a little less than two dollars? 

As we were sharing in Holy Communion at Diocesan Convention on Friday, I found myself jotting down in my notes: Just what kingdom do we support and serve? The Kingdom of God? Or, the kingdom of presidents; the kingdom of Congress; the kingdom of Wall Street; the kingdom of corporations; the kingdom of Church? Or, the kingdom of those in need? 

The Widow’s Mite. I suspect Jesus does not mean to make her the hero of the story, or even a role-model for disciples of his. The widow is, and ought to be, an embarrassment for the Scribes and all of the rest of us who fail to honor her need and follow in the Way of Jesus. She and her cohort of orphans, and sojourners in the land, the homeless, the hungry, and any and all who have no source of family and friends to offer them sustenance, support, and a place to rest their weary bones should not exist if we were to honestly love God and love neighbor.

 Every day on social media I read scathing and even hateful critiques of “the church” and religion, and religious institutions. Yet, it is a fact, that in The Episcopal Church, a percentage of each dollar one gives to the local church goes to the Diocese, and a percentage of that goes to The Episcopal Church Center, to support programs that serve those in need at home and abroad, programs that no local congregation could sustain on its own. We are a mutual aid society. Our official corporate name is: The Foreign and Domestic Missionary Society. We serve people in our community, across the state of Maryland, and throughout the world with each dollar we pledge right here in Rock Spring and all Parishes. And this is for all of us and our small and mighty parish, Good News – the Good News of Jesus Christ the Son of God according to Mark.

All Saints Day 2024B

One day a parishioner from a nearby parish cornered me in my office on All Saints Day and asked, in all sincerity, “Why do we pray for the dead?” I was taken aback. And mumbled something like, “Because they are no longer dead, but alive in Christ. And they pray for us.” He was unimpressed and unmoved. 

All Saints Day is part of at three-day Christian festival and mediation on death and new life. It begins with All Hallows Eve, with little munchkins demanding treats, feigning tricks, and giving us ample permission to laugh at that which we try so hard to forget and transcend. Death. The one certainty like taxes we all must face. As when Saul, fearing death, sought refuge with the Witch at Endor. She was scared since the king sought to put an end to her kind. Yet, here he was, asking her to help him to speak to the dead. Surprisingly, she knows what he really needs: care, in the form of rest and food – hospitality, or what the Bible calls love of neighbor – even the most unlikely of neighbors. It’s a story meant to remind us that God is never far from us at such times. It has been suggested that fear is that singular point of vulnerability through which God actually reaches us, touches us, to transform our fear into hope. 

Hallows Day, or All Saints Day, then arrives and presents itself as a time to look back at those who in our tradition have experienced that presence and touch of God in difficult time, and allow their experiences to fuel our collective imagination to move us beyond our greatest fears to believe that a hopeful future is real, and even within our reach! Perhaps the first example of a saint as we think of them would be Miriam, sister of Moses, who celebrates after the great escape from bondage in Pharaoh’s Empire of endless toil to a newfound, and unimaginable future with God as she gets the sisters together with their tambourines to dance and sing their way forward with God: Then the prophet Miriam, Aaron’s sister, took a tambourine in her hand, and all the women went out after her with tambourines and with dancing.  And Miriam sang to them: “Sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously; horse and rider he has thrown into the sea.” [i] 

Try to picture that moment? Imagine the relief, the joy, the laughter, the singing, the dancing The end of generations of darkness into a new world of light. A world, as Psalm 24 declares, is God’s world, not ours: The earth is the Lord's and all that is in it, the world and all who dwell therein. This world does not belong to the endless number of Pharaohs and their empires of bondage and toil for all but a handful of elites. This is God’s world, where wonders never cease – only if we refuse to let our remembrance of things past and our prophetic imaginations dwindle and fade. 

This is why we recall the words of that prophet of the exile, Isaiah and his companions, who though God’s people had been swept away to yet another faraway empire, a long way from home, imagined a great homecoming as a feast: “a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear.” The death dealing of Babylon and Pharaoh shall be swept away forever. “Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.” [ii] And it is the imagination of Isaiah that envisions that one day the God of Israel would make straight a highway from Persia back to Jerusalem, the City of Peace, and once again the people would dance and sing their way home once again. 

In the midst of yet another occupation under yet another brutal empire, comes another man of the Lord to reinforce the prophetic imagination among an exhausted, lonely, and beaten-down people. He was good friends with sisters Martha and Mary. They called for him when their brother Lazarus was dying. After a delay of several days, word comes to them that Jesus is at the edge of town. The sisters are sitting shiva, the days of mourning. Martha, ever the more practical of the two, marches out to the edge of town and lets Jesus know her frustration that he had not come when they called. “Our brother might still be alive!” she shouts at him. “He will live again,” he says. “Do you believe this?” She says, “I know he will rise again on the Last Day, the day of resurrection, but we want him now.” Says Jesus, “I am resurrection, and I am life. Do you believe this?” That’s when it happens. Martha is transformed on the spot. She forgets all her anger and her fears, “Yes, Lord, I believe you are the Christ coming into the world.” 

Mary joins them. The crowd at the house sitting shiva comes along. At the tomb Jesus weeps. The crowd murmurs, “See how he loves him!” Yet, others complain in the midst of his weeping. Jesus prays to his father. Jesus calls Lazarus to come out. Out he comes, wrapped in the funeral cloths, not unlike Jesus was wrapped in swaddling-cloths “in the beginning.” “Unbind him, and set him free!” Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty Lazarus and we are free at last. No doubt they remembered that first Mary, Miram and the sisters, dancing and singing the people into a new reality, a new world, a new life. [iii]

All Saints reminds us that there have been others. There is an out-of-date list in our Book of Common Prayer of others who have shed God’s light in the darkness of later times. Even in our own times. Baltimore’s own Thurgood Marshall and Pauli Murray are on that list today, who like Martin King issued a new call for their people to be “unbound and set free.” We remember them all on All Saints so that we too might follow in the Way of Christ as they once did. 

Another woman is in consideration for sainthood in the Catholic Church. Were she alive, I have no doubt she would tell them to stop it! Dorothy Day, a lay woman who cared for the working man and woman, who founded a series of houses for those in need of shelter across the country, and who founded a newspaper in the midst of the Depression, The Catholic Worker, which fearlessly advocates hope for a better future for America’s working class. She worked tirelessly for a more just society, inspired by people like Miriam, Isaiah, Jesus, and others. She wrote this in her autobiography: “We have all known the long loneliness and we have learned that the only solution is love and that love comes with community.” 

I wish I had known this when I faced my questioner in my office. We have all known the long loneliness, the long darkness, the long days of war, the fear of others, fear of the future, fear of one another. I might have said to him, “The only solution is love, and love comes with community.” Community with one another. Community with those Saints have gone before. Community with Christ, Miriam, Isaiah, Martha, Mary, Thurgood, Pauli, Martin, and that most imaginative of all biblical writers, John the Revelator who declares, “And the one who was seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new.’ Also he said, ‘Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.’ Then he said to me, ‘It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.’” [iv]  For this and for all the saints we give thanks! Amen.

---

[i] Exodus 15:20-21

[ii] Isaiah 25:6-9

[iii] John 11:32-44

[iv] Revelation 21:1-6a 

What DO You Want Me to Do for You! Proper 25B

 

What Do You Want Me to Do for You?  Mark 10:46-52

This sermon was written for Sermons That work by the Rev. Canon Whitney Rice for Proper 25 (B) in 2021. 

Who doesn’t love blind Bartimaeus? Here is a man who knows what he wants and goes after it no matter how much he embarrasses everyone else. “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” he shouts. His fellow townspeople are mortified. “Shut up!” they say. “Be quiet, you hollering maniac! The one celebrity we get in this town and you yell at him like a yokel!” Bartimaeus doesn’t care. He knows Jesus has what he needs and he is going after it. He will not be silenced. We could learn a lot about boldness in prayer from Bartimaeus. We could learn a lot about asking for what we need. 

But even more important than Bartimaeus’ persistence in this gospel is Jesus’ response to him. Bartimaeus is hollering and causing a ruckus, and “Jesus stood still and said, ‘Call him here.’ And they called the blind man, saying to him, ‘Take heart; get up, he is calling you.’ So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus. Then Jesus said to him, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’” 

This is one of the most important moments in the entirety of the gospels for telling us about who Jesus is. Jesus does not assume that Bartimaeus wants to be made able to see. He does not assume that Bartimaeus sees his blindness as a disability. Furthermore, although Jesus undoubtedly knows what is best for Bartimaeus, Jesus does not force it on him. Jesus asks him, “What do you want me to do for you?” 

Neither does Jesus impose his will on us, or make any assumptions about what we need or want. He asks us as openly as he asks Bartimaeus: “What do you want me to do for you?” 

Just by asking this one question, Jesus provides us with a mechanism to delve deeper spiritually. It’s a deceptively simple question. On the surface, it seems like a matter of value exchange. What can we earn or get from our relationship with Jesus? But if we spend time with this question we find new truths opening up within ourselves. 

Let’s sit with the question ourselves. Jesus asks us, “What do you want me to do for you?” 

Well, first off, Jesus, it would be great if you could make our churches successful. 

Is that really what we want? He asks us again, “What do you want me to do for you?” 

Could you magically make all our money and membership worries go away? 

Again, that would be great, but that’s not really what we truly want at the bottom of our hearts. We know because he’s asking us again, “What do you want me to do for you?” 

Okay, we’ll try again. Jesus, could you make our ministries a success? No, that doesn’t feel right either. 

“What do you want me to do for you?” 

Could you make us successful as disciples and ministers? No, still not it. We’re starting to dig through the layers of our ego as Jesus continues to ask us this pivotal question. If we dig deep enough, maybe we’ll hit our hearts. 

“What do you want me to do for you?” 

Help us to do more, to try harder, to do better, we say to Jesus. Getting closer to the truest desire of our hearts, but not there yet. 

“What do you want me to do for you?” Help us to love people more, to love people better?

Very close, but he asks us one more time with such gentleness in his voice: “What do you want me to do for you?” 

“My teacher, let me see.” 

Bartimaeus’ words become our words. Let us see how loved we are, let us see how hungry for love others are, how worthy of love they are, how precious and beautiful and wonderful our neighbors are. And let us see that all this love comes from you, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and God the Creator, and the indwelling Holy Spirit. “My teacher, let me see.” 

Digging down through all the immediate superficial answers, down through fear and ego and all the concerns of this world, we find the desire at the core of our being, which is the desire to give and receive love, the desire to give and receive God. “My teacher, let me see.” Let us see that below all the noise and through all the distractions and beyond all the divisions that can isolate us from one another is the Presence that outlasts the stars. That is what we want you to do for us, Jesus. Let us see the Love. And then let us share it. 

Bartimaeus occupies a unique niche in the gospel: his is both a healing story and a call story. It is his healing that enables his call and it is his call that is the final ingredient of his healing. “Jesus said to him, ‘Go; your faith has made you well.’ Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way.” 

This is worth a very close look in our own lives, this relationship between healing and call, how very short a distance there is between the two, how intermingled they are. Often we feel unequipped to answer the call Jesus places in our lives, too broken and mixed up, sinful or apathetic or trapped in a net of responsibilities and habits that seems inescapable, even for gospel work. How could someone as “unhealed” as we are do something radical for Jesus? 

But we do not have to wait for healing to answer Jesus’ call. Bartimaeus doesn’t. The people in the crowd say, ‘‘Take heart; get up, he is calling you.’ So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus.” Still blind, relying on no guidance from the people around him to feel his way, reacting with joy and abandon, he throws away his cloak and goes to Jesus. 

This is not an insignificant moment. Bartimaeus was homeless, a blind beggar on the street. His cloak was his only asset. It was his only protection from the weather and the cold, the closest thing to shelter he had. He cast it away without a second thought, and still blind, still unhealed, answers the call to make his way to Jesus. We can do the same. 

And in perhaps the most remarkable turn in this remarkable story, Bartimaeus is not the only one healed and called in this story. Did you catch who else had a radical conversion? The crowd. They begin with cruelty and exclusion in their hearts, doing everything they can to keep Bartimaeus away from Jesus: “Many sternly ordered him to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’” And this is the pivotal moment. Jesus does not call Bartimaeus directly. He calls the crowd to call Bartimaeus. “Jesus stood still and said, ‘Call him here.’” 

And then the redemption, so easy to skip over if you’re not paying close attention. “And they called the blind man, saying to him, ‘Take heart; get up, he is calling you.’” This is the moment of the crowd’s conversion, the crowd’s healing, and the crowd’s call. Jesus’ love is so sneaky and so powerful that it broke open their hardened hearts and they probably didn’t even notice it. They go from trying to keep people away from Jesus to urging them forward. They go from seeing Bartimaeus as an embarrassment and trying to shut him up and keep him hidden, to telling him to take heart and go forward into Jesus’ embrace. 

What we learn here is that call is never individual. We hear call in community. Bartimaeus calls for Jesus, Jesus calls the crowd, the crowd calls Bartimaeus, then Jesus calls Bartimaeus to follow him on the way. This entire process of call and response is deeply healing to everyone involved. 

Where do we start? We listen, and we call out to Jesus, just as Bartimaeus did: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Because he is always calling and always healing. And it begins with his simple question to us: “What do you want me to do for you?” So we take Bartimaeus’ words to our hearts, “Teacher, let me see.”

To Follow Christ Proper 22B

 

To Follow Christ

Beginning in Mark 8:22 and continuing to the end of chapter 10, we find Jesus making his way to Jerusalem. The narrative is bracketed by the healing of two blind men: one in Bethsaida, and the other, Bartimeus, outside the gates of Jericho. Both seem to represent those, like many of the demons in Mark, who recognize who Jesus is immediately, so unlike the disciples, who almost never do. 

The pivotal question throughout the saga of this journey is the one Jesus puts to the disciples just after the first blind man recovers his sight. After first asking the twelve who people are saying he is, he puts the question directly to them, and in turn to all of us: “Who do you say that I am?” Peter appears to be on the right track, answering, “You are the Christos, the anointed, the Messiah.” Jesus orders them “not to tell anyone about him,” and goes on to teach them that it is necessary that the Son of Man suffer many things, be rejected, and be killed, and after three days rise. Peter objects, to which Jesus replies, “Get out of my sight, Satan, you don’t judge things the way God does, but the way people do.” i This was the first time he spoke plainly to them about what would happen when they got to Jerusalem. 

Just before our episode with James and John, Jesus tells them for a third time, “The Son of Man will be handed over to the high priests, be condemned to death, and they will hand him over to the Gentiles – that is, the Roman occupational forces. The Romans will mock him, spit on him, flog him, and kill him. After three days he will rise.” Again, Jesus speaks plainly to them, that it is the Gentiles, the Empire of Caesar, Rome, who will kill him. ii 

It is then and there that the Brothers Zebedee, James and John, a couple of fishermen, walk up to Jesus and say, “Uh, Teacher, whatever we ask, you have to do it, okay?” Jesus asks, “What do you want me to do for you?” They reply, “Uh, okay. Give us this: in your glory, one of us sits on your right, and one of us on your left. Okay?” Jesus replies, “You have no idea what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink? Or the baptism I must undergo, are you able to take that, too?” iii 

It helps to understand that in the Psalms and prophetic literature, “the cup” means to indicate the fate that lies ahead of a person, which Jesus has three times tried to make clear. And he is not referring to the baptism of John, nor Christian baptism, but rather invokes a common biblical metaphor in which trials and dangers that lie ahead are going to be like passing through turbulent and stormy waters. What we today might call a “baptism by fire.” Confronting the Roman Empire is not going to go well. Jesus has just asked them if they, too, are ready to endure that which he has made clear now for the fourth time, rendering their response at best ironic, and even laughable: “Sure, we can do that. No problem!” 

Yet, surprisingly, rather than chastising them, Jesus affirms their declaration: “Yes, you will drink the same cup, and yes, you will face a baptism of fire, but sitting on my right and left is not for me to say. It belongs only to those for which it was prepared by my Father. Please understand, there is not going to be an immediate and happy ending. I’m not going to emerge as some imperial potentate with absolute power over all the world. I will suffer, as I have said, and I will surrender my future into the hands of God my Father, in whose power, mercy, love, forgiveness, and generosity I have complete trust.” 

Before James and John can say anything else, the ten remaining disciples are angered by the brothers’ pre-emptive strike for sharing in what they perceive will be Christ’s power and glory. Glory throughout the Bible refers first to God’s aura of splendor, power, and sovereignty, often understood as God’s presence in Israel as a brightness of light that shines visibly, as when he had guided the people out of Egypt and through the wilderness sojourn. And any person, like Jesus, who might share in God’s glory is considered a person of significant “weightiness, power, influence, prestige, and gravitas.”  This is what the brothers want for themselves. iv 

Realizing once and for all the need to spell out the misunderstanding of what it’s going to be like once they are in Jerusalem, Jesus says, “You know that the ones who seem to rule over the Gentiles, like Rome, like Babylon, like Egypt, lord it over them. Their great ones push them around. It is not to be that way with you! On the contrary: You want to be great? Wait on tables. Serve others. You want to be in first place? Become everyone’s slave. The Son of Man, after all, did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life, a ransom worth many people.” 

Ransom, he says, as opposed to sacrifice, signifies a price paid to liberate people from some kind of bondage. When he says, “many people,” this is a Semitic idiom that does not mean, “many people, but not all,” but rather is inclusive. That is, it does not mean that many are saved, but some are not, but between the many and the one that acts on their behalf, all will be liberated. v 

What begins with Jesus’ attempt to counter the disciples’ blind ambition becomes instead the most profound interpretation of just what his death in Jerusalem means for the community of those of us who wish to follow him. Father Brendan Byrne, an Australian Jesuit and biblical commentator, sums it up like this: The statement that concludes this episode “grounds the community’s exercise of authority as ‘service’ on nothing less than the redemptive action of Christ. If James and John and the other ten disciples – and indeed all who would be disciples – wish to enter into and share Jesus’s glory, the only ‘way’ is to follow him in the self-sacrificing service of humanity that will have its high point of concentration on the cross.” 

We do well to acknowledge that the Church has, throughout history, vacillated between the blind ambition and presumed power sought by James and John, and believing that to serve Christ as he serves the world is perfect freedom. We must look back at eras like the Crusades, the Inquisition, and the Holocaust as times when we were like James, John, and the ten and acted in ways contrary to the Way of Christ, which is the Way of the Cross. Fortunately, there have been examples of those like Lawrence, Deacon of Rome, Deitrich Bonhoeffer, Mother Teresa, and Martin Luther King, Jr., who have shown us the way of service to ransom the lives of many. 

It is no coincidence that the lessons from Isaiah and Hebrews today are also included in the lectionary for Good Friday, to which this entire section of Mark’s Gospel points those of us who wish to be faithful in following Jesus Christ, the Son of God. We are to see in the cross a mirror that reflects our true image: The image of who we are reflects the image of what we are; the image of love incarnate that serves the world; the image of Christ. vii  May God the Father, his Son our Lord, and the Holy Spirit help us to remember who we are and whose we are, and to act accordingly. Amen. 

i  Mark 8:31-33

ii  Mark 10:33-34

iii  For the following excerpts of the text in Mark 10:35-45, I am guided by the translation of Richard W. Swanson in his book, Provoking the Gospel of Mark (Pilgrim Press, Cleveland: 2005) p.303-305.

iv  Brueggmann, Walter, Reverberations of Faith, (Westminster-John Knox Press, Louisville: 2002) p.87-89

v Byrne, Brendan, A Costly Freedom (Liturgical Press, Collegeville, Minnesota:2008) p.169, n.61

vi  Ibid, Byrne, p.169

vii  Delio, Ilia, The Primacy of Love (Fortress Press, Minneapolis:2022) p.49-50

Supersessionism, Marriage, and Metaphor Proper 22B

 

God speaks to us in many different ways at many different times. Once upon a time, The Letter to the Hebrews was thought to be one of Paul’s letters. The lack of greeting common to all his letters, the vocabulary, and a carefully sustained argument, sets it apart as utterly un-Pauline. In fact, it stands out from all other New Testament documents in three distinct ways: it is the only document that contains a sustained argument on the nature of Christ as both human and divine; its origin is unknown, its intended audience is unknown, and thus its connection to the rest of the New Testament is unclear; and it is often perceived as among the New Testament’s most anti-Jewish texts. [i] It is this third perception that has caused much mischief, especially as we witness a meteoric rise of anti-Semitism in America, and around the world, today. 

Which is too bad. We can never know the unknown author’s intention in this regard. It is too bad because in many ways it is the very best example of New Testament Greek rhetoric, and presents some of the more compelling early reflections on who and what Jesus is. From the very outset in its opening statement, it tells us that God speaks to us in many different ways in different times. Long ago God spoke in one way through the prophets, then in a new way through a Son “whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom he also created the worlds. He is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being, and he sustains all things by his power word.” There is perhaps no more majestic depiction of just how this unknown author has experienced Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus is a ‘reflection’ and an ‘imprint’ of God. He is not God, but it is easy to see how one might get that impression. 

Where Hebrews gets into trouble is when it makes similar suggestions that this ‘appointed heir’ is a new kind of priest, not like the Temple priests, offering a new kind of sacrifice only one time, instead of repeatedly, and therefore it has been interpreted by some to say Christianity replaces Judaism and God’s covenant with Israel. This replacement theory is called supercessionism, and suppersessionism happens to be the foundation upon which the current White Christian Nationalist movement is based. Jesus never meant to start a religion, let alone a nationalist movement. In fact, for nearly three hundred years it was anti-nationalist, and served as an alternative to the brutality of life in the Roman Empire. Jesus called people to become a community of love – to love God and to love neighbor. All neighbors. For becoming a community of love, the earliest Christians were routinely arrested, tortured and killed by the Empire. All notions of a modern Christian Nationalism go against all that Jesus taught and lived, and against our founders intention that in America there be a separation of Church and State. 

Such interpretations of this document called Hebrews stands in direct contradiction to Paul’s assertion that those of us who follow Christ have been grafted onto the vine that is Israel, and that together we are all God’s people. I have no doubt that our unknown author likely believed something similar to Paul, but from time-to-time Hebrews can be understood to suggest that Jesus and Christianity replaces Israel. Such an interpretation of Hebrews seems also to contradict Jesus’s story of the Good Samaritan which teaches that we are all in this together, even those most unlike ourselves, and that as the familiar hymn Jesu, Jesu puts it, “All are neighbors to us and you.” Christian, Muslim, Hindu, and Jew, and all other religious and wisdom traditions are neighbors to be loved, as God loves those of us who strive to faithfully receive the call to follow Jesus of Nazareth, who lived, died, and rose again as a Jew – a beloved Son of Israel. Whatever Jesus was, is, and always shall be, he is no anti-Semite, and no White Christian Nationalist. 

Then consider the opening episode in chapter 10 of Mark’s Good News of Jesus Christ the Son of God. It is easy to interpret it as fundamentally being about divorce. The Pharisees ask Jesus if it is lawful for a man to divorce his wife. What is not in the text is the fact that for nearly a century, the Pharisees had been debating this question among themselves. There were two schools of thought: the school of Shammai said only the man can dismiss his wife, and only for unfaithfulness, while Hillel allowed for more latitude, which eventually included a woman being able to initiate a divorce as well. Jesus is a real shrewdie and is not about to enter into this long-standing debate. He knows it’s a trap either way. Instead, he changes the conversation to be about marriage. It helps to remember that marriage in first century Israel was still a business arrangement between two fathers, involving dowry payments meant to protect everyone’s interests, but which payments would need to be returned if the marriage failed. 

Marriage, says Jesus, is a covenant, very much like the covenant God makes with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, that is, with Israel. In fact, the prophets use marriage as a metaphor for the covenant between God and Israel. Which covenant is utterly unlike a typical marriage contract in the ancient world in that no matter how many times Israel gives up on God, God never gives up on Israel. Jesus knows this better than most. Despite his cries of abandonment on the cross, he rose to live another day.  He also knows that the debate on divorce misses the essential truth: when relationships of any kind break down, everyone is hurt no matter who initiates the breakdown, and no matter what happens next. 

Which may be why Jesus brings back the teaching on children which began back in chapter nine where the disciples evidently did not learn the lesson. People are bringing children to Jesus for a blessing, and the disciples try to send them away. Oy vey! Children had no rights, and, like women, were considered property. They were in every way marginalized like the poor, the halt, and the lame. Jesus says in effect, if you welcome me into your life, you must welcome them. As you reach out and receive into your life and into your heart those who are most hurt, damaged, marginalized and broken, it is as if you have welcomed me and my Father into your heart. Let’s not get hung up on blaming one another for whatever breaks down in our relationships, but rather let’s love one another, as my Father loves us and never gives up on us. We may not agree on all the details, we may go our separate ways, but if we do not stay in relationship with one another, then all truly is lost. 

God speaks to us in many different ways in many different times. As we consider these sacred texts from Hebrews and Mark: May the words of my mouth, and the meditations of all our hearts, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.

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[i] Levine, Amy-Jill, Brettler, Marc Zvi, The Jewish Annotated New Testament (Oxford University Press, USA:2017) p 460

Have Salt In Yourself…… and be at Peace, Shalom, with one another Proper 21B

 Have Salt In Yourself…… and be at Peace, Shalom, with one another

Most churches, like other public buildings, are required by code to place Exit signs over doors that open out from the church. This is of course for safety reasons. Barbara Cawthorne Crafton reminded us last week of one of the essential sayings of the late Archbishop of Canterbury, William Temple: “The Church exists primarily for the sake of those who are still outside it.” [i] The archbishop is absolutely correct. This suggests that these signs over church doors ought to  say, “Entrance.” They are the entrances to the mission field of “those who are still outside of it.” This is why the Holy Eucharist concludes with a dismissal such as, “Let us go forth in the name of Christ.” Which is to say, we come to church precisely to be sent out, dismissed, and dispersed into the mission field to bring the Good News of Christ to those – all those – who are outside the church. 

This recalls another saying of William Temple: “It is a mistake to suppose that God is only, or even chiefly, concerned with religion.” [ii] This all sounds frightfully counterintuitive until we ponder this enigmatic text from Mark 9:38-50. Jesus’s disciples had witnessed someone casting out demons in the name of Christ. Disciple John tells Jesus, “We tried to stop him, because he is not one of us.” Poor John. Elsewhere, he and his brother James tell Jesus that he must seat them at his right hand and his left when he comes into the glory of his Father’s Kingdom. In that instance, Jesus says to be careful what you ask for, because in my case it leads to execution by the Romans. John and James just don’t get it, which leads to the misconception that there is some sort of division between us and them; we are the insiders, and those not “in the church” are outsiders. How dare these outsiders be doing the work we are meant to be doing. We promise in our baptism to follow Jesus when we walk out the “Entrance door” to our mission field! 

Jesus issues a mild rebuke to John, and to any and all of us who would be followers of the man from Galilee. “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. For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward.” I often wonder if we really get the sense of what Jesus is talking about. He says that one need not be a member of the Church, which in fact he had no idea of starting, to do the work he does, and “greater works than these” he tells them later. Indeed, the archbishop’s corollary that God is not chiefly even concerned with religion at all is meant to remind us that what we do outside the church is what matters. And outside can mean many things. You might be a Buddhist, a tradition that had been underway for some 600 years by the time of Jesus, or a Muslim, or Daoist, or even an atheist, and if you are casting out demons, or healing people, or even just offering someone who is thirsty a cup of water, then you are doing the work Jesus calls us to do. And greater works than these! 

Jesus’s rebuke to John reminds me of a saying coined by the 20^th century Hindu Guru Meher Baba: “Don’t worry, John. Be happy!” Anyone who does the work of bringing my Father’s peace, God’s healing, loving, and forgiving Shalom, is not against us, but is for us. This is very Good News! All is well. All shall be well! All manner of thing shall be well. Would that more people inside and outside our community of God’s Love would do the work we are called to do: to serve others – all others – as we serve one another, and as I have served you, John. 

But then comes a text-driven whiplash as Jesus continues to address John, and any of us who think that somehow this work is in any way, shape, or form, the sole possession of the Church. To think this mission is ours and ours only has been the source of much mischief throughout the history of Christianity and the Church. Jesus seems to incite violence and self-mutilation when he says, “If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea.” Ouch! At the time of Jesus this was one method of execution among many for the occupying  Roman empire. Jesus then goes down a list of amputations: if your hand, foot, or eye causes you to cause “one of these little ones” to stumble, cut them off! Rip out that eye! These “little ones,” does not just mean the children we heard about last Sunday. Many have suggested that this refers to the am ha’aretz, the people of the land: the poor, debt-laden, farm workers, fishermen, as well as the sick, the halt, the blind and the lame; not to mention widows, orphans, and resident aliens; foreigners passing through, those seeking asylum danger elsewhere, looking for work, and many simply curious to learn more about the One God of Israel they have heard so much about. A God of love, mercy, forgiveness, and compassion. These outsiders are the ones we are meant to serve in the name of Christ as he does at great peril. 

 Then Jesus talks about salt. Salt. Next to water, salt is the most essential element to human life. Our bodies are approximately 60% water – salt water. Salt is crucial to many life-giving ongoing chemical reactions in our bodies. Too much or too little can cause problems. We need salt. Salt is also used as a preservative and flavoring for foods, and for well over 6000 years has been used in a variety of religious rites and rituals of purification. “Everyone will be salted with fire.” Fire, one of the metaphors for the Holy Spirit, God’s ruach, God’s life giving, life sustaining breath. We are to have salt in ourselves, both as individuals and as a community; a community of God’s Love, God’s Shalom, God’s Mercy and Justice for all the world, and everyone and everything therein. Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace, at Shalom, with one another. This saltiness enables us to serve others beyond the door of our churches. 

Where are we to get this “salt”? This salt is not something we can find on our own. We cannot mine it. We cannot buy it. We cannot earn it. For this life sustaining salt is a gift. A gift of the Holy Spirit. This salt is given to us each time we come to hear and meditate on God’s Word; to Pray; and to share in the Body and Blood of our Lord, Jesus Christ. To take, bless, break and share bread with one another, and with all who come to His table. And this gift of Salt is given to others in other traditions, in other ways, and yet, results in all of us, we who are Christ’s own, and those who may have never heard of Christ, to go out and into the world and bring the Love, Mercy, Compassion and Forgiveness of God to others – all others. Jesus uses what may be the most provocative of metaphors and imagery to get this into John’s, the disciples’s, and our heads! And more importantly into our hearts and souls. 

What Jesus seems to say is, “When you walk out that door, the Entrance to the mission field outside the church, what are you going to do? Don’t worry about what others are doing. Just continue to do the things I do, and greater things than these you shall do!” Amen.

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[i] Frequently quoted in slightly varying forms, such as ‘the only organization that exists solely for the benefit of non-members.’ Recalled as a personal dictum in ‘Letter from the Archbishop of the West Indies’ in Theology (1956), vol. 59

[ii] R. V. C. Bodley In Search of Serenity (1955) ch. 12

In Memoriam Patricia A Rohrman

 

Patricia A Rohrman

In Memoriam

September 27, 1932 ~ July 31, 2024 

We come from love. We return to love. Love is all around.

This is the essence of what Jesus teaches his disciples at his Last Supper with them. He had just told them that he would be returning to his Father’s household of love – that place from which he came down to dwell among us as the full embodiment of the Father’s love. The disciples are upset. Peter protests, saying, “I will go wherever you go.” Yes, yes, says Jesus, all in good time, but now is not the time. Your day will come, but you have much more work to do. 

This is when he says, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” [ John 14:1-6] It’s as if he is speaking to us all right now. Having lost a vital, essential, and much-loved member of our community of God’s love does trouble our hearts. Trouble mixed with love, knowing, that as he promises his disciples, Jesus has come to take her home to his Father’s house to be reunited with her beloved Charles, Thomas, and Timothy for whom he had already prepared a special place for them all. 

We notice that although Jesus is the one who will soon suffer in Jerusalem, it is he that is comforting the disciples. That’s what he comes to do – to be the visible presence of God his Father, and an ambassador of his Father’s love for the world and everyone and everything therein. Jesus comes to assemble a community of love that is all around us at all time, day and night. At that same supper, he issues a new commandment: “Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” [John 13:34-35] 

Which is what brings us all here today. In our love for one another, and our love for Pat, we gather as his community of love to comfort one another, to share our troubled hearts with one another, to bear the grief, the joy, and the love we all share for Pat and for one another. Jesus reassures us that this is the Way, the Truth and the Life he calls us to live. Both Jesus and Pat are surely glad to see that here, this morning, the love for one another is overflowing, and comforting our troubled hearts. 

We also gather to remember and celebrate a life faithfully lived as an essential part of the love that is all around us at all times. As a volunteer in the Harford County Sheriff’s Office, the Community Action Agency, and the RSVP Program, Patricia A Rohrman was nominated twice for one of Harford’s Most Beautiful People Awards for her volunteer efforts. Here at historic Rock Spring Parish, she served on the Altar Guild, the Newsletter Committee, the Episcopal Church Women’s Group, and much much more. Tuesdays she worked here and at home with the Harford County Piecemakers, a quilting group that makes and distributes beautiful lap quilts to hospitals, nursing homes, and the sick, all free of charge. 

Pat had a deep love for Christ Church Rock Spring Parish. My first day in the office here, Pat was the first person to come in and charge me with the task of finding out just what had been going on here the previous ten years. There were questions that needed answers, and believe me, as she made her case, I hopped to it until we all could understand where things stood and move forward. Pat also had a special ministry to her priest: whether it was Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Birthday, the arrival of a new grandchild, on every special occasion a card arrived, on time, every year as long as I have been here with a personal message from Pat to me and our family. 

I am certain that everyone here has stories to tell about their special times with Pat, and there will be time in the parish hall after this service and The Committal in the cemetery to share those stories with one another. Pat Rohrman was and always will be a vital part of the love that surrounds us here at Christ Church on all sides, at all times. 

Just as we gather to love and comfort one another, and to remember and celebrate the life of Pat Rohrman, we also gather to affirm her faith in her Lord, Jesus Christ. As long as she was able, Pat was here on Sunday mornings to celebrate the Lord’s Supper, the Holy Eucharist. She attended our parish suppers, our annual Lenten breakfast, worked at our rummage sales, but it was sitting in this historic church, singing, praying, and taking Holy Communion that tied her to Christ and to all of us. 

Her faith recognized that life is changed, not ended, and that when our mortal body lies in death, there is prepared for us, as Jesus promises, a dwelling place eternal in the heavens of his Father’s household of love, mercy, and forgiveness. This is why we dress the church in white and gold for Easter, for Resurrection. We light the Paschal Candle that was lit the day she entered the church in Holy Baptism, and we light it again today as she enters her new resurrected life with the God who is Love. Whose love was embodied in Jesus, his Son, the morning star that knows no setting. Whose light forever shines in the darkness, dispelling all darkness, and all troubled hearts; a reminder that we will all, one day, return to that place of love from whence we all have come. Our true home. We come from love. We return to love. Love is all around. Amen.