Poem for a Tuesday — “Unexpected Manna” by Gary H. Holthaus
“Those ancient Greeks
Who had a word for everything
Were more articulate than I.
Those Israelites
Who could not spell
The name of God
Are closer kin to me.
Some thing too highly prized
Or close; those that skirt
The edge of pain
Will always be unnamed.
So you,
Falling on my days
Like unexpected manna,
Alter every image
And rearrange my mind
So wholly
I am rendered silent
Gathering in my self
So quietly
That what you do for me
Remains unnamed.”
in The Gift of Tongues, ed. Sam Hamill. Port Townsend: Copper Canyon Press, 1996. p. 129.
Gary H. Holthaus has been one of Alaska’s most important thinkers and writers. He came to Alaska in 1964 to teach in Naknek with a special interest in helping Alaska Native students remain in school. He was the first director of the state’s bilingual education program. The Founding Director of the Alaska Humanities Forum, Holthaus spent nearly twenty years developing programs, including The Alaska Quarterly Review, one of America’s premier literary magazines and a source of powerful new voices. He is a past recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, the author of eight books of poetry and three works of narrative non-fiction, and a Unitarian Universalist Minister.
This is the second message in a Lenten series on the Seven Deadly Sins.
Aristotle described envy as the pain we experience when we learn of the good fortune of others. We see the ability, resources, or excellence of our neighbor, and we want that for ourselves. Thirteenth century scholastic theologian Thomas Aquinas characterized envy as an active, escalating resentment. Seeing our neighbor’s good fortune, we first seek to lower their reputation, perhaps through tale telling or criticism. Next, we feel joy at the other’s misfortune, or we feel grief at our neighbor’s continuing prosperity. Finally, over-focused on their success or well-being, we feel hatred. Augustine taught that envy is a truly diabolical sin because it seeks to minimize, end, or destroy what is good in our neighbor, and we, consequently, rob our community and world of that God-given goodness. Last week, I shared that C.S. Lewis characterized pride as the anti-God sin. Well, envy is the anti-neighbor sin. Envy stands in bitter opposition to that second half of Jesus’ Great Commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
The root of envy is the Latin word invidia, which means unseeing or blind. When we are envious, we don’t see things as they truly are. We waste our time in over-focusing on the lives of others, and we fail to see and pursue our own unique God-given gifts and purpose. The Medieval poet and philosopher Dante Alighieri depicted the sin of envy in his Divine Comedy. The envious are second only to the prideful in their fall from grace. In Hell, they plod eternally under grey cloaks made of lead. In an act of poetic justice, their eyes are sewn eternally shut with metal wire, unable to see their neighbor or themselves.
That most essential biblical paradigm of envy is the story of Cain and Abel (Genesis 4). Cain, the farmer, brings a portion of his harvest as an offering to the Lord. Abel, the herdsman, presents to God the best of his flock—the firstborn with the choicest and fattiest portions. Abel gave God the best while Cain did what was adequate. Instead of learning that God deserves our first-fruits, Cain was filled with envy at his brother’s acceptance. Even after God cautioned Cain about the destructive power of envy, Cain met his brother in the field and murdered him. The world was robbed of Abel’s gifts and Cain was cut off from his family and even the land.
In the New Testament, Matthew’s gospel tells us that the Chief Priests and elders of the Temple handed Jesus over to Pilate for execution out of envy (Matt. 25:18-20). Then, they ensured that Pilate could not extend mercy by persuading the crowd to call for the release Barabbas instead of Jesus. Influence and money changed hands to ensure Jesus’ death. Envious of Jesus’ wisdom, gifts, and God-given authority, those Temple-insiders conspired to discredit him and rob him of his life.
We know envy when we see it. The legendary voting rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer described the experience of her family. They lived as sharecroppers on the plantation where they had once been enslaved. Thanks to the hard work of her father and mother and their twenty children, the family prospered. Her father was able to save enough to buy a team of mules to work more land. Their dreams crumbled when an envious white sharecropper poisoned the mules.
Envy is manifest in the realm of athletics. On January 6, 1994, U.S. Figure Skating Champion Nancy Kerrigan was brutally attacked as she prepared to defend her national title. Badly bruised, Kerrigan withdrew from the competition, and her rival Tonya Harding took the title. An FBI investigation ultimately determined that the attack on Kerrigan was prompted by envy. Harding with her husband and bodyguard conspired to take Kerrigan out of the competition and ensure Harding’s own bid for the Olympics.
Social theorists say that we live in an Age of Envy, which is fueled by social media, like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat. Professor Ethan Kross of the University of Michigan says that envy is at an extreme today because we are constantly bombarded by photo-shopped lives. Barraged by images of the achievement and joy of others—the spectacular vacations, the joyful families, the workplace accomplishments—we feel envy. We resent others, and we feel bad about ourselves.
Envy manifests in our lives when we gossip. We defame the character of our imagined rival and undermine their standing in the community. We criticize and belittle their accomplishments. We refuse to acknowledge their gifts and abilities. We undermine their efforts to get ahead. We attack their expertise and sabotage their work. When I was an undergrad at Colgate, a top student in the pre-med program was caught spitting in the test tubes of his rivals to ruin their research. Our envious actions don’t make us feel any better. Instead, we are left dissatisfied with who we are and what we have, resentful about our lot in life, and unhappy with the world as we know it.
The remedy for envy is found in the virtues of gratitude and kindness. Gratitude is the feeling of appreciation for what we have been given and thankfulness for the generosity of others. Martin Luther taught that gratitude is “the basic Christian attitude” because God is the selfless giver of all good things, and we are all immeasurably blessed. Gratitude doesn’t forget or ignore the negative aspects of our lives, but it sees the good even amid the hardship. The 18th century prophet of the Great Awakening Jonathan Edwards believed that our gratitude is the clearest measure of our spiritual health, because gratitude reveals our awareness of the presence and goodness of God in our every day. Gratitude is the enemy of envy because we see and savor the goodness of God in our own lives, and we acknowledge that God is at work in others in ways that bless them and bless the world around them. Gratitude restores our right relationship with God—we become like that Samaritan Leper, who returned to give thanks to Jesus, falling down at his feet and praising the Lord (Luke 17:11-19).
Professor Robert Emmons of University of California Davis has been the preeminent scholar of gratitude for more than twenty years. His research has found that when we cultivate gratitude, it is good for us and others. People who keep a weekly gratitude journal by recording the ways they have been blessed feel better about their lives and are more optimistic. Folks who maintain a gratitude list—a master list of their blessings—were more likely to make progress toward important goals in school, work, relationships, and health. A daily time of focusing on gratitude increases our alertness, enthusiasm, determination, attentiveness, and energy. The daily discipline of gratitude also makes us more likely to help others and offer our support.
That leads us to our second weapon in battling the sin of envy: kindness. Aristotle described kindness as helpfulness toward someone in need, not in return for anything, but to simply benefit the person whom we are helping. Kindness is the exercise of charity, compassion, friendship, and sympathy simply for its own sake. Studies at Yale University have suggested that kindness is inherent in human beings. Babies have the impulse to be kind, and we can all testify to the natural sympathy of children, to their innate desire to show concern for a peer who is in distress. Mark Twain reminds us that kindness is active. He said, “Kindness is a language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see,” because we are out there doing it. One of the amazing dimensions of kindness is that in practicing it we often find that we are blessed. My seminary professors called this mission-in-reverse. Even as we reach out to help someone else, we find that our interaction touches our heart, expands our understanding, or makes a new friend. We often get so much more out of our kind impulses than we put in.
The biblical paradigm of kindness is, of course, The Good Samaritan (Luke 10). The Samaritan rises above prejudice to come to the aid of his wounded, vulnerable Jewish neighbor when no one else will. He cleans wounds, takes the man to shelter, and pays his way, all out of kindness. According to Jesus, kindness like this is what truly makes us neighbors. Gratitude and kindness are the antithesis of envy because they make us mindful of God’s incredible goodness to us and turn us to our neighbors with open hearts and willing hands. Thanks be to God.
I suspect that as we go forth into the Lenten season, we will experience envy. We’ll be scrolling through our Facebook feed and feel envy’s gut-punch as we read of our neighbor’s epic vacation. We’ll wear a forced smile when our friend tells us they are putting in a new kitchen. Our neighbor will retire early, and we’ll resent their leisure. Envy will rear its ugly head. But we can get the better of it. Count your blessings. Give thanks to the one who fills our lives with goodness beyond measure. Pay it forward. Reach out to the world with kindness. The world will be blessed—and so will we. Amen.
Resources
Becky Little. “How the 7 Deadly Sins Began as the ‘8 Evil Thoughts’” in History, March 29, 2021. Accessed online at history.com.
WJS Martin. “The Seven Deadly Sins: Envy” in Anglican Way Magazine, Feb. 14, 2016. Accessed online at anglicanway.org.
Charles Pope. “The Seven Deadly Sins: Envy” in Community in Mission, April 5, 2019. Accessed online at blog.adw.org.
Moya Sarner. “The Age of Envy” in The Guardian, October 9, 2018. Accessed online at theguardian.com.
Walter Brueggemann. Genesis. Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1982.
Robert A. Emmons. “Highlights from the Research Project on Gratitude and Thankfulness” in Dimensions and Perspectives of Gratitude. Los Angeles: UC Davis, 2010.
Genesis 4:1-12
1 Now Adam knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have produced a man with the help of the Lord.” 2 Next she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a tiller of the ground. 3 In the course of time Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground, 4 and Abel for his part brought of the firstlings of his flock, their fat portions. And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering, 5 but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell. 6 The Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your countenance fallen? 7 If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is lurking at the door; its desire is for you, but you must master it.”
8 Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let us go out to the field.” And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and killed him. 9 Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?” He said, “I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?” 10 And the Lord said, “What have you done? Listen; your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground! 11 And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. 12 When you till the ground, it will no longer yield to you its strength; you will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.”
The mountaintop fortress of Masada was built by Herod the Great as a winter retreat and refuge, complete with palace, storerooms, cisterns, and impressive fortifications. In the Jewish Revolt against the Roman occupation, Masada was taken by Sicarii rebels in 66CE. When the Romans retook Jerusalem (70CE), pockets of Jewish resistance persisted. The last of these was at Masada. Flavius Silva and a legion of Roman soldiers encamped at the base of the mountain and laid siege. Unable to take the fortress, Silva instructed his men to build an enormous tower and ramp to reach the walls. When the building project neared completion and the fall of Masada was imminent, the rebels killed themselves (April 15, 73CE). Two women and five children, who hid in an empty cistern, survived to tell the story. This photo looks out from the walls of Masada to the plain below. Can you see the remains of the Roman Encampment from the first century siege?
Masada by Isaac Lamdan “Who are you that come, stepping heavy in silence? –The remnant. Alone I remained on the day of great slaughter. Alone, of father and mother, sisters and brothers. Saved in an empty cask hid in a courtyard corner. Huddled, a child in the womb of an anxious mother. I survived. Days upon days in fate’s embrace I cried and begged for mercy: Thy deed it is, O God, that I remain. Then answer: Why? If to bear the shame of man and the world. To blazon it forever– Release me! The world unshamed will flaunt this shame As honor and spotless virtue! And if to find atonement I survive Then Answer: Where? So importuning a silent voice replied: ‘In Masada!’ And I obeyed that voice and so I came. Silent my steps will raise me to the wall, Silent as all the steps filled with the dread Of what will come. Tall, tall is the wall of Masada. Deep, deep is the pit at its feet. And if the silent voice deceived me, From the high wall to the deep pit I will fling me. And let there be no sign remaining, And let no remnant survive.”
in Isaac Lamdan: A Study in Twentieth-Century Hebrew Poetry, ed. Leon I. Yudkin, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1971.
Yitzhak Lamdan was born in Mlinov, Ukraine in 1899 and received a religious and secular education. During World War I, he was cut off from his family. He wandered through southern Russia with his brother who was later killed in a pogrom. Lamdan became a Communist and volunteered for the Red Army before returning, disillusioned, to Mlinov , where he began to publish Hebrew poetry. He immigrated to Palestine in 1920, and worked as a ḥaluts (Zionist youth), building roads and working on farms. In 1955, Lamdan was awarded the Israel Prize, for literature.
Poem for a Tuesday — “Gott spricht zu jedem” by Rainer Maria Rilke
God speaks to each of us as he makes us,
then walks with us silently out of the night.
These are the words we dimly hear:
You, sent out beyond your recall,
got to the limits of your longing.
Embody me.
Flare up like flame
and make big shadows I can move in.
Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final.
Don’t let yourself lose me.
Nearby is the country they call life.
You will know it by its seriousness.
Give me your hand.
/
Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) was a Bohemian-Austrian poet and novelist. He was the only son of an unhappy marriage. His mother mourned the death of an earlier daughter. During Rilke’s early years, she sought to recover the lost girl through the boy. According to Rilke, he had to wear “fine clothes” and “was a plaything [for his mother], like a big doll.” He attended military school and trade school before studying literature, art history, and philosophy in Prague and Munich. He was a mystic, proto-modernist, and early proponent of psychoanalysis. He traveled extensively throughout Europe and Russia before settling in Switzerland. At the time of his death from leukemia, his work was largely unknown to the reading public, but his posthumous followers have been many. He is now considered the most lyrical and influential of the German early modernists.
Sabbath Day Thoughts — “Pride” Luke 4:1-13, Luke 18:9-14
This is the first in a Lenten sermon series on the Seven Deadly Sinsand the Seven Heavenly Virtues.
Our Lenten season begins with Jesus in the wilderness. As the Lord fasts and prays, the Devil confronts Jesus with a series of temptations. “Use your holy power to turn stones into bread. Bow down and worship me in exchange for world domination. Put God to the test, reveal your glory, and be worshipped.” Jesus turns away from the tempter’s wiles with scripture quotations. He remains sinless. Unfortunately, we do not.
The Seven Deadly Sins and the Seven Heavenly virtues are grounded in scripture. There are thirteen virtue lists in the New Testament, from 2 Corinthians to First Peter, and there are twenty-three vice lists, from Matthew all the way through Revelation. In the first centuries of our faith with the rise of asceticism, church leaders began to think systematically about those lists of sins and virtues. As Christian mystics and monks withdrew to the Egyptian desert to focus on God, they noticed that they had some big distractions. In the fourth century, Evagrius of Ponta identified a list of eight thoughts that could interfere with spiritual practice—these would become the Seven Deadly Sins. A century later, Aurelius Prudentius Clemens wrote a 1,000-line poem, “Psychomachia,” in which he identified seven heavenly virtues that corresponded to the deadly sins. Clemens argued that Christ our Lord helps us with “the jewels of virtue,” which he places within us to battle sin and delight wisdom. Augustine argued that the seven virtues characterize the new life in Christ and grow within us out of love—agape.
The Seven Deadly Sins and corresponding Seven Heavenly Virtues found renewed interest in the Middle Ages. In his 13th century opus Summa Theologica, Thomas Aquinas wrote that the virtues are habitual dispositions, “patterns of mind and heart,” that bring about good actions and curb our sinful impulses. In meditating on scripture, imitating Christ, and practicing the virtues, God’s grace deepens and matures in us. So popular was this thinking on the deadly sins and heavenly virtues that they became a favorite theme of Medieval art. Church walls were painted with murals depicting them. Countless medieval illustrated manuscripts of Clemens’ poem “Psychomachia” still survive, depicting the sins and virtues—in female form—doing battle.
These days, the Seven Deadly Sins and Seven Heavenly Virtues are a helpful framework in our spiritual formation. We acknowledge that we are saved by grace through faith in Christ alone, yet we realize that God’s grace deserves our response. In meditating upon scripture, in following the way of Jesus, we can look within. We can identify the sins with which we struggle. We can cultivate the virtues, those spiritual weapons given to us by Jesus. We can seek to curb sin and grow into virtue as we grow into the beloved people whom God created us to be.
We begin with the sin of pride. In his 2006 book Pride, Michael Eric Dyson of Vanderbilt University notes that pride has a favorable value in our society. We have school pride. We feel pride in our achievements wrought through long, hard work. We have cultural pride that ties us to our ancestors and celebrates what made them and us the people we are. This reasonable, appropriate regard for others and for ourselves is not what I am talking about.
We can chalk that up to the limits of the English language, in which we have a single word to describe the full spectrum of pride. Latin, on the other hand, uses the word superbia to talk about the sin of overweening pride, arrogance, contempt for others, self-righteousness, and the belief that we are not subject to God. C.S. Lewis taught that superbia pride “is the complete anti-God state of mind. It is ‘The Great Sin’ that leads to all other sins, because pride is the exaltation of Self above all authority, even God’s authority.”
The prime scriptural example of superbia is found in the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector (Luke 18). Two men go up to the Temple to pray. The Pharisee prays, “God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.” The Pharisee clearly thinks he is better than his neighbors—those “other people.” He also imagines that he doesn’t really need God. His exceptional piety and righteousness are enough to justify him.
The tax collector presents a stark contrast. He knows his sin and feels completely unworthy. He stands far off, unable to lift his eyes to heaven. He beats his breast in mourning and prays, “‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’” The tax collector knows that he doesn’t have a leg to stand on before God. In the punchline of the parable, Jesus cautions his listeners that it won’t be the Pharisee who is justified before God. It will be that scoundrel, the tax collector.
We know this sort of superbia pride when we see it. It prompted Hitler to annex the Sudetenland. It has driven Putin to roll his tanks into Ukraine. We see superbia in the racial pride of white supremacy that drives a speeding car into a crowd of peaceful protesters. Superbia is in the arrogance and utter disdain with which we belittle and trash-talk our rivals and enemies. Superbia pride seeks constant adulation and praise from an army of “yes-men.” Superbia kills our marriages and friendships because we believe that we alone are right—and everyone else is wrong. We see superbia in the context of our faith communities when we believe that we don’t need to practice confession, we don’t have to hear what the preacher says because we’ve heard it all before and we know it all, and we don’t really need church because we don’t need saving—we are just fine on our own. Woe to us when pride drives the bus.
Jesus saw the remedy to superbia in the virtue of humility. He followed that teaching about the Pharisee and tax collector with the words, “All who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.” Humility is the recognition of who we are in relationship to God. In other words, God is God, and we are not. Humility submits to the authority of God and the guidance of scripture. Humility acknowledges that our personal abilities and resources are gifts from God that are to be used and shared to the glory of God and for the building up of our neighbors.
To comprehend humility, it helps to think about the origin of the word. The Latin form humilitas shares the same root as humus, the organic component of soil, formed by the decomposition of leaves and other plant matter by microorganisms in the soil. When we practice humility, we are down to earth, grounded, and aware of our limits and mortality. Yet, Martin Luther warned that even humility can lead to sin. As a monk, Luther sought humility. He wore hairshirts to mortify his flesh. He fasted, prayed, and slept on the floor. “I finally achieved humility,” Luther quipped, “and I was proud of it!”
Humility finds its scriptural revelation in Christ’s death on the cross. Although sinless, Jesus took on the burden of our collective sin and died a brutal, scandalous, shameful death to reveal God’s great love for us. Thank you, Jesus.
So, what does humility look like for us? Humility is knowing that we need God at the very center of our lives and our families. Humility is good sportsmanship—acknowledging our losses and our opponent’s better abilities on any given day. Humility is accepting responsibility for our mistakes and seeking to make things right. We say, “I did it. It’s my fault. Let me make amends. I am truly sorry.” Even if we are convinced that we are right, humility demands that we stay in relationship, listen, find common ground, and work through differences. Humility is identifying with the poor, the sick, and the despised people of our world. It’s seeking to make a caring difference because we know that they are worthy, deserving of our love and tender care. A world shaped by humility is blessed because it looks a lot like Jesus and anticipates the Kingdom.
So, my friends, as we begin our Lenten journey, let’s spend some time building that Kingdom by tempering our sins of pride with the virtue of humility. We can begin by noticing the ways that pride has separated us from God and one another. Then, we can find healing as we ground ourselves in humility, turning to the world with deep truth and abounding love. May it be so. Amen.
Resources:
Neal Conan. “Interview with Michael Eric Dyson” in Talk of the Nation, Feb. 13, 2006. Accessed online at npr.org.
Jerry D. Kistler. “The Deadly Sin of Pride” in The Montrose Press, March 8, 2019. Accessed online at https://www.montrosepress.com/.
Ryan Griffith. “The Seven Heavenly Virtues: An Ancient Framework for Spiritual Formation” in desiring God, November 1, 2021. Accessed online at desiringgod.org.
Becky Little. “How the 7 Deadly Sins Began as the ‘8 Evil Thoughts’” in History, March 29, 2021. Accessed online at history.com.
Luke 8:9-14
9 Jesus also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt: 10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.’ 13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even look up to heaven, but was beating his breast and saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.”
Poem for a Tuesday — “I Yield Thee Praise” by Philip Jerome Cleveland
For thoughts that curve like winging birds
Out of the summer dusk each time
I drink the splendor of the sky
And touch the wood-winds swinging by —
I yield Thee praise.
For waves that lift from autumn seas
To spill strange music on the land,
The broken nocturne of a lark
Flung out upon the lonely dark —
I give Thee praise.
For rain that piles gray torrents down
Black mountain-gullies to the plain,
For singing fields and crimson flare
At daybreak, and the sea-sweet air —
I yield Thee praise.
For gentle mists that wander in
To hide the tired world outside
That in our hearts old lips may smile
Their blessing through life’s afterwhile —
I give Thee praise.
For hopes that fight like stubborn grass
Up through the clinging snow of fear
To find the rich earth richer still
With kindliness and honest will —
I yield Thee praise.
from A Sacrifice of Praise, ed. James H. Trott. Nashville: Cumberland House, 1999.
Philip Jerome Cleveland (1903-1995) was a Congregational minister. His diverse ministry included service as a prison chaplain, a newspaper editor, a radio pianist, and a Sears and Roebuck Santa Claus. He pastored churches in Nova Scotia, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts. He had several bestselling novels about church life, including It’s Bright in My Valley, Three Churches and a Model-T, and End of Dreams. After his death, a portion of his manuscripts, articles, and papers were acquired by The University of Southern Mississippi — de Grummond Children’s Literature Collection
Sabbath Day Thoughts — “Mountain High, Valley Low,” Luke 9:28-43a
When Heidi Neumark was called to pastor the Transfiguration Lutheran Church in the South Bronx, she was in for a challenge. The recent seminary graduate came to a parish that faced daunting, even toxic, realities. The community was New York City’s dumping ground. Waste treatment plants managed the city’s sewage. A giant incinerator burned hazardous medical waste from area hospitals. A massive dump received the city’s refuse. The air was filled with toxins that fueled New York’s highest incidence of asthma. Arriving on Sunday mornings, Neumark would often have to clear away garbage. Broken furniture, old appliances, and boxes of worn-out household items were left at the church under the cover of darkness to avoid paying dump fees.
The social difficulties of Transfiguration Lutheran Church were every bit as daunting. 60% of neighborhood families got by on government assistance. 80% of children lived in poverty. Unemployment for the South Bronx was 70%. 20% of adults suffered from HIV. 28% of deaths each year were attributable to drugs, AIDS, and violence. The church’s neighbors were the extreme poor, those left behind when others moved away: addicts, prostitutes, abused women, single mothers and their children, and gangs. Those were overwhelming realities for a church that had seen its heyday in the 19th century and experienced a hundred years of decline.
When Neumark arrived, church doors were locked, except on Sunday mornings. A faithful corps of members persevered, gathering to worship God in the midst of that blighted community. Although it was a tough call for a new pastor, Neumark found hope in the church’s name: Transfiguration Lutheran Church. In Breathing Space, Heidi Neumark’s spiritual memoir of twenty years of service to that church, she writes that the transfiguration of Jesus could be “a vision to carry us down, a glimpse of unimagined possibility at ground level.” The spiritual mountaintop of Transfiguration Lutheran Church was being called to the needs that awaited them in the valley of the South Bronx.
On Transfiguration Sunday, we join the disciples on the mountaintop with Jesus and watch as he is revealed in heavenly glory. Flanked by those titans of the Hebrew scriptures, Moses and Elijah, Jesus is transformed. His face shines. His clothes dazzle. This clearly is no ordinary rabbi and healer. This is no prophet. Jesus is the Holy One of God. Peter may have wanted to enshrine the moment with three permanent dwelling places, but God had other plans. In a theophany, a heavenly proclamation, God instructed Peter, James, and John, “This is my Son, the Chosen One; listen to him.”
Transfiguration Sunday also takes us to the valley. There another father calls for special attention for his beloved son. Although Jesus had given his disciples the power and authority to cast out demons and heal the sick, they have failed to provide relief for this boy. The anger and frustration that Jesus feels as he learns of the child’s suffering suggest that the disciples’ failure had nothing to do with ability and everything to do with willingness. Those disciples may have been daunted by the power of the oppressive spirit. Or, perhaps they feared the boy’s violent seizures. Or, it could be that they had been too busy. Or, maybe they doubted the very abilities that Jesus had entrusted to them. These disciples may have not been listening to Jesus, but the demon that possessed the child does. As the demon convulses the boy in a violent fit, Jesus steps in, rebukes the spirit, and casts it out. Freed from his suffering, the cured boy is returned to his father. Jesus’s healing and restoration transfigure the lives of father and son who are no longer held captive by the power of destructive evil.
Those two very different stories: the shining moment on the mountain and the convulsed chaos of the valley belong together. In reflecting on our transfiguration reading, Prof. Sharon Ringe, a New Testament scholar at Wesley Seminary, writes that “the glory of God’s presence and the pain of a broken world cannot be separated.” That’s a powerful, world changing statement, “the glory of God’s presence and the pain of a broken world cannot be separated.”
Indeed, in Jesus God enters into the world’s suffering and suffuses it with God’s presence. That’s what we see on the mountain high. And Jesus has the power to meet the world’s suffering head-on with healing, compassion, and love. That’s what we see in the valley low. The Lord hopes that his disciples will make his glory known, not just on the mountaintop of reverence, worship, and praise, but also in the valleys of sickness, powerlessness, and despair. When we listen to Jesus, when we bring his power and authority, compassion and love, to our neighbors, transfiguration happens. The world begins to change and so do we.
At the Transfiguration Lutheran Church in the South Bronx, profound change began to happen for the church and the community when members brought the glory of God’s presence to meet the pain of their broken world. They began by listening to their neighbors and pondering how they could respond to some of their most pressing needs. Then, they moved beyond Sunday morning worship, unlocked the church doors, and welcomed the community in. The church launched a food pantry which serves between 130 and 140 families weekly. They opened up their hall to twelve-step fellowships to support folks seeking recovery from addiction. They pondered how they could best help local youth and established the Community Life Center, an after-school tutoring program and job training center. They provided resources and healing groups to address domestic violence and help folks living with HIV. They even partnered with local police to host a gun buyback program to get illegal handguns out of homes and off the streets. Pastor Heidi got other churches involved, too, working to establish South Bronx Churches. This ecumenical fellowship provides mutual support and collaboration for pastors and churches as they seek to address the community’s needs.
As the church brought the glory of God’s presence to meet the pain of their broken community, it wasn’t just the community that was transfigured. Transfiguration Lutheran Church changed, too. They attracted new people, some of whom had never set foot in a church before. They came for programs but got passionate about the church. They worshipped, prayed, and found the love of Jesus. They got busy cleaning and refurbishing. They tackled long-deferred maintenance. They stepped into leadership. Burnice was an addict who came to the church to pick up a Christmas gift at a give-away. She intended to trade the gift for enough drugs to take her own life. But she didn’t. There was something about the church that kept her coming back. With encouragement from the church, she got into recovery, earned her GED, and found a job. Once a neighbor to be feared and avoided, Burnice is now a pillar of the church and a community leader.
Despite their real challenges and personal tragedies, church members have worked together to help one another and their neighborhood. In shining Christ’s glory for others, they have been richly blessed with that glory themselves. Heidi Neumark writes, “I have learned that grace cleaves to the depths, attends to the losses, and there slowly works her defiant transfiguration.”
On Transfiguration Sunday, we hear a renewed call to bring the glory of God’s presence to meet the pain of a broken world. We spend our Sunday mornings on the mountaintop. We encounter Jesus in prayer and music, scripture and the word proclaimed.It’s glorious. Yet Jesus always sends us back down into the valley. We go forth to fathers who worry about their ill children and mothers who struggle to put food on the table. We go forth to a community where sisters and brothers wrestle with the oppressive spirits of addiction. We live in a place of middle-class homes, multi-million-dollar seasonal camps, tumble-down cabins, rusted out trailers, and hardcore generational poverty.
We may feel daunted by the power of those oppressive spirits. We may fear all that need. We may doubt the very abilities that Jesus has entrusted to us. But God’s transfiguration hope is that the glory of Christ may meet the suffering of the world through disciples like us. Transfiguration Sunday finds its fulfillment when we move from reverence to action. The world gets transfigured, and so do we. May it be so. Amen.
Resources:
Heidi B. Neumark. Breathing Space: A Spiritual Journey in the South Bronx. Boston: Beacon Press, 2004.
Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat. “A Review of Breathing Space” in Spirituality and Practice, 2004. Accessed online at spiritualityandpractice.com.
Sharon Ringe. “Exegetical Perspective on Luke 9:28-43a” in Feasting on the Word, Year C, vol. 1, 2009.
Kimberly Miller Van Driel. Homiletical Perspective on Luke 9:28-43a” in Feasting on the Word, Year C, vol. 1, 2009.
Luke 9:28-43a
28 Now about eight days after these sayings Jesus took with him Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray. 29 And while he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white. 30 Suddenly they saw two men, Moses and Elijah, talking to him. 31 They appeared in glory and were speaking of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. 32 Now Peter and his companions were weighed down with sleep; but since they had stayed awake, they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him. 33 Just as they were leaving him, Peter said to Jesus, “Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah”—not knowing what he said. 34 While he was saying this, a cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were terrified as they entered the cloud. 35 Then from the cloud came a voice that said, “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!” 36 When the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silent and in those days told no one any of the things they had seen. 37 On the next day, when they had come down from the mountain, a great crowd met him. 38 Just then a man from the crowd shouted, “Teacher, I beg you to look at my son; he is my only child. 39 Suddenly a spirit seizes him, and all at once he shrieks. It convulses him until he foams at the mouth; it mauls him and will scarcely leave him. 40 I begged your disciples to cast it out, but they could not.” 41 Jesus answered, “You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you and bear with you? Bring your son here.” 42 While he was coming, the demon dashed him to the ground in convulsions. But Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit, healed the boy, and gave him back to his father. 43 And all were astounded at the greatness of God.
On this snowy North Country Friday, I thought you might enjoy a little Mediterranean sunshine. This is the view from the site of Pilate’s compound at Caesarea Maritima. It’s within eyeshot of the Hippodrome where troops drilled, around the corner from the amphitheater, and featured saltwater and freshwater pools for exercise and relaxation.
“I sing requiem for the dead, caught in that mercantilistic madness.
We have not built lasting monuments of severe stone facing the sea, the watery tomb,
so I call these songs shrines of remembrance where faithful descendants
may stand and watch the smoke curl into the sky in memory of those
devoured by the cold Atlantic. In every blues I hear riding the dank swamp
I see the bones picked clean in the belly of the implacable sea.
Do not tell me it is not right to lament, do not tell me it is tired.
If we don’t, who will recall in requiem the scattering of my tribe?
In every reggae chant stepping proud against Babylon I hear a blue note
of lament, sweet requiem for the countless dead, skanking feet among shell,
coral, rainbow adze, webbed feet, making as if
to lift, soar, fly into new days.”
from Requiem by Kwame Dawes, Leeds: Peepal Tree Press, 1996.
Poet, professor, and Pulitzer Prize winner Kwame Dawes was born in Ghana and raised in Jamaica. Dawes’s work in reporting on the HIV AIDS crisis in Haiti after the earthquake for the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting won the National Press Club Joan Friedenberg Award for Online Journalism. He says that his spiritual, intellectual, and emotional engagement with reggae music is a central influence in his poetry. He is a foremost scholar of the work of Bob Marley. Dawes is the Chancellor’s Professor of English at the University of Nebraska.
Joann White 