Sabbath Day Thoughts

The Choice for Joy

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — “The Choice for Joy” Philippians 4:4-7

This Sunday has long been known as Gaudete Sunday.  That name derives from ancient Latin words that began our worship on the third Sunday of Advent, long before the Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century.  I’m talking about Paul’s exhortation to the church in Philippi.  Gaudete in Domino semper, rejoice in the Lord always.

In the days when Advent was closely observed as a season of repentance, fasting was eased on this Sunday as Christians anticipated the joyful celebration of the birth of Jesus and his triumphant return in glory.  These days, the only reminders of that celebratory observance are the name Gaudete or Joy Sunday and the pink candle on our Advent wreath.  The pink is a softening of the season’s penitential purple.

“Rejoice in the Lord always!  Again, I will say rejoice.”  The theme of this Sunday may feel like a jarring, dissonant message for some this morning.  As we acknowledged in our midweek service of the Longest Night, the joy of Christmas may feel at odds with our personal feelings of sorrow, pain, and hardship.

Burt won’t be merry this Christmas.  His wife Lois died last summer.  This year on Christmas Day, there won’t be a salty, savory ham baking in the oven.  Nor will there be a platter of deviled eggs or a sticky, sweet pecan pie.  This year, the kids and grandkids won’t be coming home for the holiday dinner.  Burt has a big, painful hole in his life.  All Burt can feel is the emptiness and sorrow in his heart.

Kristin is struggling this Christmas.  The kids will be spending the day with their father and his new wife—and they’re expecting a baby.  While her kids are unwrapping presents from Santa, Kristin will have a second cup of coffee and watch one of those Hallmark Christmas movies.  Kristin wonders how her “happily ever after” ended with adultery and divorce.  She feels lonely, betrayed, and defeated.

Joanie and Curt don’t have much to celebrate this year.  Their small business was a casualty of COVID-19.  They have found other work, but it may take years to pay off their mountain of debt.  This year instead of shopping, they’re making special gifts for the kids and upcycling some used toys and clothes.  All the same, Santa won’t have much under the tree.  Joanie and Curt feel stressed, disappointed, and powerless.

“Rejoice in the Lord always!  Again, I will say rejoice.”  That’s what the Apostle Paul said to his friends in Philippi.  Bible scholars tell us that the circumstances of the Philippian church were hardly joyful.  Their Greco-Roman neighbors viewed them with suspicion.  In fact, Paul and Silas had been driven out of their community by prosperous merchants who said they were bad for business.  The young church needed Paul’s leadership, but his return to Philippi had been long delayed.  When news came that Paul was in the imperial prison, the Philippians sent Epaphroditis to Rome to provide support.  Then, came the news that Epaphroditus was sick—near death.  We can imagine the worry and concern of the Philippians as they waited and feared the worst.  It must have felt to some felt like a jarring and dissonant message when Epaphroditus finally returned, bearing Paul’s epistle with the exhortation to rejoice always.

We don’t like it when folks make light of our suffering.  It feels like a gut punch when we are lost in grief and someone assures us that our loved one passed because God needed another angel.  We feel like failures when a more skilled or experienced friend offers to help—after our plans have come to ruin.  Early in my tenure here, I was approached by an older woman who had been a member of the church as a child.  When her father divorced her mother—a scandalous turn of events in that day and age, Rev. Gurley, our pastor at the time, told the bereft wife and children that all would be better when they met a “nice guy.”  Poor Reverend Gurley was well-intended, but his words felt like gall in the ears of those he had sought to comfort.  Almost seventy years later, the anger and hurt of the daughter was still palpable as she told me her story.

It’s important to note that the Apostle Paul wasn’t speaking platitudes or empty promises to his friends in Philippi.  He wasn’t making light of their struggle and fear.  On the contrary, Paul believed that joy was a core characteristic of the Christian life in all circumstances, and he modeled that for others.  The Book of Acts tells us that when Paul and Silas were imprisoned in Philippi, they sang songs of faith and prayed—much to the amazement of their jailor.  When Paul described to the Corinthians the difficulties of his service for Jesus, Paul said he was “grieving yet always rejoicing” (2 Cor. 6:10).  Even as Paul wrote to the Philippians, his end was near.  Condemned to death for the sake of the gospel, Paul had appealed his case to the emperor himself—and everyone knew that would not go well.  Despite every adverse circumstance, Paul lived in joy and hoped that others would, too.

The secret to Paul’s joy was its source.  Paul rejoiced in the Lord.  This wasn’t the fleeting, superficial feeling of happiness that comes when everything goes our way.  Rather, Paul’s joy was found in the knowledge that he belonged to God, who loved him enough to enter the world’s darkness and die for his salvation.  Paul trusted in God’s love in every circumstance.  He boldly wrote to the church in Rome that God’s love was always victorious, saying, “I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  Paul’s joy in the Lord sustained him through rejection, persecution, beatings, stoning, shipwreck, imprisonment, and even the shadow death because he knew that he belonged to God both in this world and the world that is to come.  Now that was something to rejoice in.

Henri Nouwen, one of the finest pastoral theologians of the twentieth century, taught that joy is a choice.  Sounding a lot like the Apostle Paul, Nouwen wrote in his 1994 book Here and Now that “Joy is the experience of knowing that you are unconditionally loved and that nothing—sickness, failure, emotional distress, oppression, war, or even death—can take that love away.”  Nouwen saw joy as a spiritual discipline, the daily choice to remember our belovedness and to live in the light of God’s unquenchable love for us.  This joy is ours always, regardless of what is going on in our lives.

Nouwen himself used daily quiet times of prayer to reflect upon his life and attend to his mood.  In that stillness, in the choice to remember the love of God revealed in Jesus, Nouwen’s world would change.  Worry, stress, irritability, and sorrow would give way to joy.  In Nouwen’s words, the daily choice for joy transformed him from a “victim,” overwrought by the pain and challenge of life, to “victor,” resting in the eternal goodness of God.  Joy can be ours for the choosing.

The choice for joy that Paul and Henri Nouwen described might seem like a dry theological assertion or an unlikely turn of events if we didn’t see it in action.  We have all encountered folks who knew tremendous adversity and grief yet continued to shine light for the world around them.  I think about Anna Ferree, who lost her two sons in tragic accidents.  After their deaths, a friend asked Anna for help with watching her children.  Before she knew it, Anna had a daycare in her home.  There Anna provided love and support for many of Saranac Lake’s children.  Anna still mourned the loss of her sons, yet she chose to make a helping and healing difference in the lives of local families.  There were story times and naps, snacks and tea parties, play time and even prayer time.  Anna saw her experience as a vocation, a gift from God who called her from sorrow to joy. 

We all know people like Anna.  The mother who raised three incredibly successful kids alone.  The dad who never misses a Little League game, despite his battle with cancer.  The older brother who skips college and works hard to provide the resources for others to get an education.  They do the impossible with grace.  We all know folks who have shown us an inner strength and remarkable faith that chooses joy, despite the odds.

Beyond the difficulties and problems that every life holds, there is cause for joy on this Gaudete Sunday, a joy that is both holy and improbable.  When we stand fast in God’s love and make the choice for joy, we can be bowed down by grief, like the recently widowed Burt, and yet we can rejoice.  We can struggle with broken, dysfunctional families, like Kristin alone on Christmas Day, and yet we can rejoice.  We can know hardship and failure, like Joanie and Curt who lost their business, and still we can rejoice.  Joy is ours because we are beloved.  Amid adversity, we belong to God who has overcome the grief and sorrow, pain and problems of this world.

May we rejoice in the Lord always.  Again, I will say rejoice.

Resources:

Holly Hearon. “Commentary on Philippians 4:4-7” in Preaching This Week, Dec. 16, 2008.  Accessed online at workingpreacher.org.

Carla Works. “Commentary on Philippians 4:4-7” in Preaching This Week, Dec. 21, 2021.  Accessed online at workingpreacher.org.

Michael Joseph Brown. “Commentary on Philippians 4:4-7” in Preaching This Week, Dec. 13, 2009.  Accessed online at workingpreacher.org.

Henri Nouwen. Here and Now. New York: The Crossroad Publishing Company, 2006.

4 “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. 5 Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. 6 Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. — Philippians 4:4-7

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Changing Minds

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — “Changing Minds” Luke 3:1-6

Christmas is a beautiful and magical time of year in Saranac Lake.  On Friday evening, I was working in my home study when the windows began to vibrate with the thump and boom of over-amplified bass guitar.  The night sky pulsed with the bright flash of holiday lights.  Big wheels rolled up Park Avenue.  It was Santa, paying neighborhood children a visit pandemic-style, riding through the village streets in a convoy of fire engines.

After a forced hiatus, Sparkle Village returned to the Town Hall this year.  Our favorite crafters, like Martha, shared their one-of-a-kind hand-made wares with neighbors in search of that perfect holiday gift.  There were birch baskets and handknit sweaters, wooden toys and sweet jams, fragrant soaps and hand-poured candles.  This year, to mitigate the risk of sharing COVID along with our holiday cheer, immunization records were checked, masks were worn, and entrance was staggered.

Fortunately, some of our Christmas traditions seem naturally suited to pandemic life.  We can still admire the village Christmas tree on Berkeley Green while sipping a peppermint latte and grooving to Santa’s jukebox.  We can go for an evening stroll and check out our neighborhood Christmas lights.  We can take the kids to drop a donation in the red kettle while a masked bellringer wishes us, “Merry Christmas!”  Despite COVID-19, we are finding ways to enter the spirit of this special season.

For the majority of our neighbors, this is what preparing for Christmas is all about.  It’s Santa and shopping.  It’s seasonal music and decorations.  It’s gift making and gift giving.  I, for one, will freely admit that those are some of my favorite pursuits of the season.  After all, it is Saranac Lake, there’s a fresh snowfall, and it’s just so beautiful.  But John the Baptist always pays us a disruptive visit on the second Sunday of Advent to see if he can change our minds about what this time leading up to Christmas is all about.

Advent is a prophetic, preparatory season, so after Jesus’ apocalyptic message last week, it is only fitting that this week John the Baptist strides across the wild country surrounding the Jordan River, looking and sounding a lot like a Hebrew prophet.  John had heard a message from God Almighty, a word so significant and relevant that he felt compelled to preach it.  Drawn by his powerful preaching, crowds came from the cities and villages.  They flocked to the banks of the Jordan to hear John speak.

Luke calls our attention to the political and religious landscape of the day by naming seven of the most powerful and affluent men in John’s world.  Tiberius rose to the rank of emperor after military conquests in Pannonia, Dalmatia, and Germania and the mysterious deaths of those who were closer to the throne.  Annas and Caiphas were part of a priestly dynasty that would control the Temple until its destruction in the year 70.  Herod and Philip had followed in the footsteps of their father Herod the Great, living lavishly amid the poverty of the people they ruled.  Pilate, a military man like Tiberias, would govern Judea for ten years with a brute force that would eventually lead to his recall to Rome.  These men called the shots in the life of the Hebrew people with an earthly dominion that was brutal, costly, and oppressive.  That’s one heck-of-a context in which John shared the prophetic word of God.

We no longer contend with emperors and high priests or client kings and procurators, but we have our own less than desirable political, religious, and social realities that we contend with this Advent.  Don’t get us started on the gridlock, corruption, acrimony, and big money of partisan politics.  Don’t remind us about multi-million-dollar mega churches, high-flying televangelists, and miracle working faith-healers.  Don’t remind us about the rise of the “nones,” those neighbors, friends, and sometimes family members who say there is no God and scoff at our Christmas joy while putting up a Christmas tree, hanging stockings for Santa, exchanging gifts, and perhaps even coming to church on Christmas Eve.  How weary are we of twenty months of pandemic with shots and boosters, masks and hand sanitizer, social distance and unending variants?  Our world is not the same as John’s world, but we need God’s word to come to us, every bit as much as John’s listeners did.

And what a word it was.  John called his listeners to trust that God was still at work in a world dominated by petty despots.  God’s plan for the salvation of all people was unfolding in their midst.  A Messiah had come to usher in a holy and eternal Kingdom that would have no end.  Tiberias, Caiaphas, Herod, Philip, Pilate, all would one day be footnotes in the greatest story ever told, the story of a holy child, born in lowly circumstance, God Almighty, who would enter all those hard political, religious, and social realities to reveal to us an eternal love strong enough to break the powers of sin and death.  John called his listeners to be a part of that story, to join their purpose to God’s purpose with repentance that would prepare the way for that coming King.

Repentance—metanoia—means to change your mind, to turn around, to be reoriented.  John called his listeners to change their minds about what power and authority looked like.  John summoned the crowds to turn away from the powers, principalities, and preoccupations of their world and to turn instead to God.  John longed for his neighbors to be reoriented, to prepare for the coming Messiah, who alone would be worthy of their ultimate allegiance and devotion.

Alan Culpepper, who served as dean of the McAfee School of Theology for more than twenty years, teaches that John the Baptist continues to remind us that God is at work to bring salvation to all people.  We can trust that John’s prophetic word is true, regardless of our challenging political climate, our daunting religious landscape, the economics of inequality, and the limited social circumstances forced upon us by COVID-19.  Each Christmas, we remember that God continues to enter our world and work in ways that bring healing, redemption, new beginnings, and a love that is stronger than death. 

That promise of God’s salvation calls for our repentance.  Amid the beauty and magic of these weeks, the music and decorations, Santa and shopping, gift-making and gift-giving, we return to God.  We change our minds about what is really important in this busy and overscheduled season.  We turn our lives around.  We make straight the behaviors that have gone crooked.  We smooth out the rough places where we have been captivated by political powers or we have been preoccupied with consumption, or we have lost sight of religious truth.  As John the Baptist preachers, we reevaluate our priorities and grant God the authority and reverence that God so richly deserves.

As the crowds sat on the banks of the Jordan and listened to John preach, their perspective shifted.  They worried less about the trifling despots of their world.  They remembered God’s long history of raising up heroes, toppling empires, and delivering faithful people.  They began to trust that God was still at work for their salvation and the redemption of all people.  Repentance came in the changing of minds, hearts, and priorities.  They returned to God.  Then, as an outward sign of that inward shift, they were baptized.  Afterward, as the people returned to their villages, their political and religious realities hadn’t changed one bit.  Tiberias remained the emperor, Caiaphas still held sway in the Temple, and Herod would continue to collect their taxes.  But John’s listeners felt freer, lighter, more hopeful.  God was at work.  The Messiah was coming.

As John’s prophetic word finds us this morning amid the beauty and magic of a Saranac Lake Christmas, may we, too, find that our perspective has shifted.  In the first year of the Biden presidency and the second year of the pandemic.  When Kathy Hochul was the first woman governor of New York, Clyde was marking his final year as mayor, and the Atlanta Braves shut out the Astros to win the World Series, the word of God comes to us.  God is still at work, my friends.  The Messiah comes with the promise of salvation for all people.  It’s a promise powerful enough to change our minds, turn us around, and reorient us in God.  May it be so.  Amen.

Resources:

R. Alan Culpepper.  “The Gospel of Luke: Introduction, Commentary, and Reflections” in The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. IX. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995.

David Lose. “Commentary on Luke 3:1-6” in Preaching This Week, Dec. 6, 2009.  Accessed online at workingpreaher.org.

Audrey West. “Commentary on Luke 3:1-6” in Preaching This Week, Dec. 5, 2021.  Accessed online at workingpreaher.org.

Kathy Beach-Verhey. “Homiletical Perspective on Luke 3:1-6” in Feasting on the Word, Year C, Vol. 1. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

Veli-Matti Karkkainen. “Theological Perspective on Luke 3:1-6” in Feasting on the Word, Year C, Vol. 1. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

Luke 3:1-6

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’”

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Signs

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — “Signs” Luke 21:25-36

The gap between church and society is at no time more noticeable than it is on this first Sunday of Advent.

Out there, enormous, electric snowflakes hang from village lampposts as a sign of the season.  In here, the Advent wreath has returned to its seasonal home, above the baptismal font. 

Out there, we have weathered the buying frenzy of Black Friday and small business Saturday, and we are anticipating the online deals to be found on Cyber Monday.  In here, we are thinking about using our resources to help neighbors in need throughout the coming weeks.  We are bringing in canned corn for Christmas Food Boxes or undertaking a Reverse Advent Calendar or planning the gift of clean water with shallow wells for Africa. 

Out there, strings of Christmas lights are decking the eaves.  Snowy yards are about to sprout inflatable snowmen and Grinches.  In here, we have donned the penitential color of purple and hung Advent greens that speak of eternal life amid winter’s death.

Out there, the feasting and merriment have begun.  The grocery stores are filled with holiday treats, we can place our order for Buche de Noel at the Left Bank Café, and we are revving up for holiday gatherings with family and friends after twenty long months of social distance.  In here, Advent has traditionally called us to fasting, study, reflection, and repentance.  We probably won’t fast, but we’ll take home Advent devotionals for reading and prayer, or we’ll Zoom together to learn from C.S. Lewis.

Out there, we’ve been hearing Christmas carols ever since Halloween.  In here, we listen to the somber sounds of “Wachet Auf,” “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel,” and “Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming.”

Out there, we are more than a month away from champagne toasts, the ball dropping in Times Square, and the joyful greeting of “Happy New Year!”  In here, we keep God’s time with a holy calendar that today marks the start of a new year.

In these weeks of Advent, there is a palpable gap between our church life and the spin that our culture has put on preparing for Christmas.  Can you see it?  Can you feel it?

That gap between the sacred and the secular seems even more pronounced when we ponder today’s reading from Luke’s gospel.  Sounding a lot like the Old Testament Prophets Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, and Joel, Jesus got downright apocalyptic, warning his listeners of a coming Day of Judgment.  There would be signs in the heavens, chaos among the nations, and tumult upon the waters.  Amid the discord and disruption, Jesus called his followers to vigilance, saying: look, be on guard, stay alert, pray.  All that eerie, end times prognostication sounds ominous and hard to swallow along with our holiday eggnog.

It helps to remember that when Jesus stood in the Temple court and got all prophetic, he was in the midst of a different holiday season, and he was surrounded by people who were sadly and fearfully aware of the gap between God’s Kingdom and the world that they lived in.  It was Passover week. From around Israel and across the Roman Empire, the Jewish people had come to Jerusalem to remember that God had once delivered them from the cruel bondage of Egypt.  With plagues of frogs and gnats, darkness, disease, and death, God had shown Pharaoh who was boss, and then Moses had led the people forth to freedom.  That Passover week, Jesus and his friends would remember God’s deliverance with the sacrifice of a lamb, the signing of psalms, and the sharing of a final Passover seder.

There was a tense, politically-charged gap between those Passover memories and the everyday reality of Jesus’s listeners.  Israel was again in bondage, a vassal state of the Roman Empire.  A legion of Roman soldiers had ridden out of Caesarea and up to Jerusalem amid the Passover pilgrims.  Any dreams of Jewish freedom would be promptly and brutally quashed.  The local political and religious powers served the emperor’s purpose, not God’s purpose.  As that week continued, this would become increasingly clear as the Temple authorities conspired with Judas to arrest and condemn the Lord.

Given the context in which Jesus’s prophetic words were originally spoken, they take on a hopeful tone.  As Jesus spoke in the Temple court, he reminded his listeners that it was God, not Rome, who had ultimate authority.  God, who had launched creation with a Big Bang, hurled a billion stars across the heavens, and delivered their ancestors from slavery in Egypt, God was still at work and would one day bring all things to completion.  Indeed, before the week was out, God’s epic plan for the world’s redemption would embark on a new chapter as Jesus took on the sins of the world on the cross and launched a revolution of self-giving love that continues to ripple through the corridors of time.  God’s Kingdom was coming.  They could count on it.  There was hope to be had amid the world’s darkness.

In the UK, the train conductor encourages travelers to “mind the gap” as they step off the platform and onto the train, to notice and attend to the divide between the two.  In this Advent season, Jesus’s apocalyptic words are a little like that conductor’s call.  We are to be mindful of the gap between God’s Kingdom and life as we know it.  It’s terribly tempting to board the Christmas juggernaut, to be swept along in these coming weeks by the non-stop shopping, eating, decorating, celebrating, and partying whirlwind.  That train is leaving the station and it’s standing room only, but Advent invites us to a different kind of journey.  I’m not telling you to give up your seat on the Polar Express, but Jesus and I are asking you this morning to simply mind the gap.  Remember the true reason for the season.  Notice the people and places where redemption is needed, God feels distant, and the love of Christ would sure make a difference.

This Advent, we could resolve to live as signs of that coming Kingdom where justice is served, the wounded find wholeness, and love prevails.  This Advent we could dare to bridge the gap between “in here” and “out there.”  Would you like to know how?

Be hope for those bowed down with sorrow or grief.  Send them a caring note.  Include them in your holiday plans.  Invite a hurting friend to join you for our Longest Night service on December 8th, when in shared worship, prayer, and music we will be reassured of God’s steadfast love.

Be care and compassion for a neighbor who feels lost and alone.  Take them an Advent devotional.  Share with them a link to our online worship.  Bring them along to a Sunday service or for story-telling and music in our Blest Be the Tie Christmas Evening on Dec. 15.

Be generous with and for those who know poverty and privation in this world of terrible abundance.  Ring the bell for the Salvation Army.  Make a donation for a Christmas Food Box.  Volunteer with the Holiday Helpers.  Help us meet our goal of giving shallow wells to six African villages.

Be love for those people who are hard-to-love.  You know them: the prickly and the grumpy, the mean and the miserly, the bigot and the bleeding heart.  Try a random act of kindness.  Turn the other cheek.  Listen deeply, pray fervently, and don’t give up.  Be your best Bob Cratchitt to the Ebenezer Scrooges of this world.

Mind the gap, my friends.  Be signs of Christ, who bridge the gulf between “in here” and “out there.”  As we stand, like Jesus did, in that uncomfortable gap between life as it was meant to be and life as we know it, we just may catch sight of that other Kingdom, the heavenly one that Jesus anticipated all those years ago.  May it be so.  Amen.

Resources:

Wesley D. Avram. “Pastoral Perspective on Luke 21:25-36” in Feasting on the Word, Year C, vol. 1. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

Kathy Beach-Verhey. “Homiletical Perspective on Luke 21:25-36” in Feasting on the Word, Year C, vol. 1. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

Mariam J. Kamell. “Exegetical Perspective on Luke 21:25-36” in Feasting on the Word, Year C, vol. 1. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

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Luke 21:25-36

25“There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. 26People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. 27Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in a cloud’ with power and great glory. 28Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

29Then he told them a parable: “Look at the fig tree and all the trees; 30as soon as they sprout leaves you can see for yourselves and know that summer is already near. 31So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near. 32Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all things have taken place. 33Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. 34“Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch you unexpectedly, 35like a trap. For it will come upon all who live on the face of the whole earth. 36Be alert at all times, praying that you may have the strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.”

“Birds, Lilies, and the Kingdom”

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — Matthew 6:25-34

Are you worried?  If you are, you’re not alone.  Let’s face it.  These are worrisome times.

We are feeling worried about COVID-19.  The Franklin County Health Department says that we have thirty-nine cases of COVID in Harrietstown this morning and fifty-six in Tupper Lake.  Those are our highest numbers of the pandemic.  While most of us are fully vaccinated and not at risk for severe illness, we worry about our senior seniors and friends with immune system compromises who face greater risk.  We have concern for our kids who are still getting shots in arms.  We think how tough this must be for our healthcare professionals—the hospital staff, nurses, and doctors who have spent the past twenty months on the front lines.

We’re also feeling a worried resignation that we’ll be dealing with the new coronavirus for a long time.  Worldwide in the past week, cases have increased in 72 countries, with twice as many new cases reported here in the states in the past 28 days.  In fact, the only two countries in the world that did not report new cases last week were the Vatican and Oceania—that’s a small cluster of south Pacific Islands.  We don’t like what the experts have to say.  Dr. Amesh Adalja, senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, warns that COVID-19 won’t go away.  It will simply become one of many viruses that cause infections, and there will always be a baseline number of cases, hospitalizations, and even deaths.

Related to the pandemic, we are feeling stressed about economics.  The US consumer price index has surged 6.2 percent from a year ago in October.  That’s the highest rise in thirty-one years.  US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said last Sunday that quashing COVID-19 is key to lowering inflation.  If we can get a handle on this acute phase of the epidemic, then the surge in the price of commodities, like crude oil, should abate in the second half of 2022.  But in the meantime, we are feeling the spike in prices at the grocery store and the gas pump.  We may have also noticed a phenomenon that has been named “skimpflation.”  Businesses can’t keep enough employees to deliver the experiences and customer service that we previously enjoyed, and so we are paying more for less.  Service is slower at restaurants.  Airline flights are being cancelled.  Businesses have cut hours.  To complicate matters, COVID has created supply chain issues.  Santa might give us a raincheck this year as imported goods don’t make it to store shelves or we balk at the exorbitant price of the latest gift fads.  Am I making you feel worried in writing about this?

As Jesus shared today’s words from the Sermon on the Mount, his friends and followers had worries of their own.  Many people in the Galilee were subsistence farmers, always one crop failure or drought away from hunger.  Some of Jesus’ friends were fishermen.  The fish in the Sea of Galilee belonged to Caesar, but you could pay a pretty shekel for a license to cast your nets and earn your living.  That licensing fee was substantial—the cost of about a third of your catch.  A night when your nets were empty wasn’t just a waste of time, it was a threat to your livelihood.   First century financial failure didn’t land you in bankruptcy court.  It led to debt slavery, consigning yourself or your family to a period of conscripted labor.  That sounds worrisome to me.

Jesus and his friends also contended with the constant anxiety of foreign occupation.  Client kings, like Herod, were appointed to rule locally in the emperor’s stead, and they typically did so by living large at the expense of the people.  Every major city in the land garrisoned Roman soldiers.  The Pax Romana (Peace of Roma) was secured with an iron fist, and the law was swift and harsh in responding to civil disobedience.  Jesus and his followers lived with the terror of crucifixion and public execution.

Beyond the poverty and the politics, there were religious problems.  Even the Chief Priest in the Jerusalem Temple was a Roman appointee.  Factions like the Pharisees and Sadducees divided communities with competing understandings of the Torah.  It doesn’t take a Bible scholar to see that these factions were lining up in opposition to Jesus.  Already, his cousin John had been arrested in an effort to silence his prophetic voice.  Already Jesus was anticipating his journey to Jerusalem and the rejection that would await him there.  They may not have faced COVID-19, but Jesus and his friends had plenty to worry about.

Jesus’ words in our reading from Matthew 6 are a response to those worries.  “Therefore, I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?”  Jesus called his listeners attention away from their worries.  He invited them to instead attend to the present moment: the birds of the air and the flowers of the field.  He pointed to pelicans skimming above the surface of the sea and to storks spirally slowly up from nests in the marshes.  Jesus gestured to fields of anemones, bright blooms bobbing in the breeze that swept across the hills.

In the gift of the moment, Jesus called his listeners to remember their place in God’s good creation.  The empire might be Caesar’s, but the world and all that is in it belonged to God.  God, who brought the world into being, continued to care and provide for the birds of the air, the flowers of the field, and those worried first-century Israelites.  Jesus reminded his friends that beyond Caesar’s empire there was a holy Kingdom all around them, like a treasure hidden in a field or a pearl of great price.  Long after Caesar’s empire would crumble, God’s Kingdom would prevail.  It was to this eternal and unstoppable Kingdom that they belonged.

I like to imagine that as the crowd that followed Jesus listened to his words and attended to the birds of the air and the lilies of the field, they felt better.  Those worried furrows in their brows lost their crease.  They took some nice deep breaths.  Their hearts began to beat a little slower and their blood pressure fell.  As they saw God at work in creation with beauty and power, something shifted within them.  They remembered the eternal Kingdom that they served and the Holy One, who had brought them into being and would one day welcome them home.  Heads nodded in agreement.  An occasional “Amen” broke forth from grateful lips.  Everyone went home that day feeling a little less worried and lot more thankful.

We, too, might feel less worried and more thankful if we took Jesus’ words to heart.  I’d like to help us do just that. 

First, we can make some time in the coming days to attend to the birds of the air, the flowers of the field, and the goodness of God’s creation.  Stretch your legs with a favorite neighborhood stroll.  Take to the trail.  Park your car at Lake Colby and watch the sun set.  Watch the rolling flight of the pileated woodpecker.  Let the Grey Jays on the Bloomingdale Bog eat from your hand.  Ponder the blooms on your Thanksgiving cactus.  As we attend to God’s presence and providence at work everywhere all the time, we can trust that God is at work in and for us.  We can know that God is with us, even in the dark valley of pandemic.  God’s Kingdom always prevails.

Next, we can spend some intentional time with the Lord this week.  Carve out ten minutes to sit with God in silence.  You can begin by reading today’s gospel reading.  Then, do some holy listening.  In the quiet of the moment, you can count on your worries to rise up and greet you, as they often do when we actually sit still.  Instead of allowing your cares to hijack your quiet time, hand them off to God.  Use your imagination to put them in Jesus’ hands.  He promises to take our burdens and give us rest.  Take some deep breaths in that quiet space, and remember that God, who has worked in the past, will work again in your future.

Finally, once we are reoriented and centered in God, it’s time to get busy in service to that holy Kingdom that calls for our ultimate allegiance.  Lace up your sneakers and run to raise money for neighbors in need with the Saranac Lake Turkey Trot.  Find a nice, sturdy cardboard box for your Reverse Advent Calendar, adding a canned or dry good daily in December to benefit the Food Pantry.  Serve the church in this Advent season by sharing your dramatic or musical talents to help me with a pre-recorded Christmas Program for the children and those feeling a little childlike.

I suspect that as folks travel for the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays, our COVID numbers won’t improve.  We’ll still be wearing masks and minding our social distance.  We’ll pay more than we should for that Christmas gift for someone special.  When we get a gander at the price, we’ll trade our Christmas roast beef and Yorkshire pudding for ham or turkey.  And yet, I have hope that in the coming weeks we may also feel less worried.  We’ll consider the birds of the air, the balsam in the forest, and the billion stars in the Adirondack night sky.  We’ll remember who we are and Whom we belong to.  Thanks be to God. 

Resources

Steven P. Eason. “Pastoral Perspective on Matthew 6:24-34” in Feasting on the Word, Year A, vol. 3. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011.

Richard Beaton. “Commentary on Matthew 6:24-34” in Preaching This Week, May 25, 2008.  Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/eighth-sunday-after-epiphany/commentary-on-matthew-624-34-2

Emerson Powery. “Commentary on Matthew 6:24-34” in Preaching This Week, Feb. 27, 2011.  Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/eighth-sunday-after-epiphany/commentary-on-matthew-624-34

Data Team, Lisa Charlotte Muth. “The coronavirus pandemic is far from over” in Deutsche Welle: Science, Nov. 19, 2021.  Accessed online at The coronavirus pandemic is far from over | Science | In-depth reporting on science and technology | DW | 19.11.2021

Christine D’Antonio. “Pittsburgh doctor on pandemic: ‘We will be living with this virus, there is no covid zero’” in WPXI-TV News, November 14, 2021.  Accessed online at Pittsburgh doctor on pandemic: ‘We will be living with this virus, there is no covid zero’ – WPXI

Shep Hyken. “The Great Resignation Leads to Skimpflation” in Forbes Magazine, Nov 14, 2021.  Accessed online at https://www.forbes.com/sites/shephyken/2021/11/14/the-great-resignation-leads-to-skimpflation/?sh=6d93bf5d6c2b

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Unfailing

/ reverendjoannwhite / 2 Comments

Sabbath Day Thoughts – 1 Kings 17:7-15

He toddled after me.  Bare feet kicked pebbles and stirred small storms of dust.  He was practicing his words.  “Deshe,” he said, handing over a tuft of dry grass, brittle with drought.  I added the grass to my basket. 

“Giza etz?” he said tentatively, holding up a stick, just the right size for kindling.  Into the basket it went. 

“Perach.” He smiled shyly, extending a tiny wilted bouquet of chamomile, clenched in his small fist. 

Such a good boy!  So generous!  I tucked the flowers behind my ear and scooped him up, holding him next to my heart.  I could feel his little ribs beneath his robe and see the delicate throb of a vein, pulsing at his temple.

It hadn’t always been like this.  My husband, like his father and his father’s father, had gone to sea.  We Phoenicians are a seafaring people, weaving a vast web of trade that spans the Great Sea from Sidon to Cyrene, Rome, Malta, and beyond.  We pluck fish from the ocean depths, harvest rare pearls from the Gulf of Arabia, and hew great ships from the cedars of Lebanon.  For men, it is an adventurous but dangerous life, always at the mercy of wind and wave.  For women, it brings loneliness.  Always the siren call of the water pulls our men back.  Always, there is the waiting.

They said my husband was killed by a lightning strike.  First the rigging caught, then the weathered decking.  When the fire reached the amphorae of olive oil in the hull, it launched a ball of fire into the sky, worthy of the Great Lighthouse of Alexandria.  I don’t know if he drowned or if he burned, but I do know the tight cage of fear that had held my heart ever since.

Our son was weeks old.  There was no patriarch to take us in, no kindly kinsman to offer protection.  In Zarephath, my neighbors made the sign of the evil eye behind my back, worried that my misfortune would rub off on them.  The large amphorae of flour, oil, and salt fish that my husband had left behind slowly emptied, despite every economy.  I had grown slight with hunger and my milk had eventually failed.

I was collecting wood for a final fire, a last loaf to be baked, a little oil to be poured out.  My child, perched on my hip, looked at me with enormous eyes set in wan cheeks that had once been chubby.  As my eyes filled with tears, he demanded to be put down, little arms pushing and legs kicking.  With both feet on the ground, he stretched up a hand for me to hold. 

“Ezra, Ama!” (Help, Mama!) he said.  He tugged on my hand, pulling me homeward.  Help?  Whose help?

We saw him outside the city gate.  He looked like he had been sleeping rough for a long time.  His tunic was rumpled, the armpits stained with rings of sweat.  His beard was enormous and wild.  Bits of straw clung to his shaggy hair.  He held a long, sturdy, wooden staff, the sign of a patriarch or a . . .

“Navi!” (prophet), my little boy said.  His hands clapped with delight and chuckles swelled his small, empty belly.

Hearing my child, the prophet turned with a sharp look, taking in our skinny forms.  “Shalom!” he greeted us, “Please, could I trouble you for some water?”

All the wadis had gone dry with drought, but within the walls of Zarephath, our deep well remained true.  It was a simple thing to fulfill his request, but as I nodded and turned to do so, he stopped me.

“And please, a little bread with that?  Surely, you have a little something to share with Yahweh’s messenger.”

I thought of the handful of flour and trickle of oil at the bottom of my jars, and the fear that clenched my heart held even tighter.  Of all the people in Zarephath to ask for help, why choose us?  Our poverty was obvious. 

“Lechem?” (bread), my son said, pointing to the prophet.

I sighed.  “You do not know what you ask, my friend.  My cupboard is bare.  We are headed home to eat our final few morsels and call it quits.”

But the prophet wouldn’t take my no for an answer.  “Please!” he insisted, sounding both compassionate and authoritative, “Don’t be afraid.  Make me a small loaf, bring it here; then, bake for yourself and the boy.  Yahweh will bless you!”

It made no sense.  Why would I ever consider such a thing at the expense of my child?  Yet, my son seemed to have reached a different conclusion.

“Lechem, Ama!  Lechem!” (Bread, Mama!  Bread!).  He stomped his feet, pointed at the prophet, and pulled me toward home.

It was against my better judgment.  I stirred the coals from last night’s fire.  I fed it with tufts of grass, which caught with a soft chuff.  I carefully added our sticks and watched as tongues of flame leapt up.  I scooped out most of the last of our meal, mixed it with water, and kneaded it into a smooth cake.  I stretched it thin, rubbed it with the last of the oil and slapped it onto the baking stone, now so hot that it sizzled beneath the oiled dough.  The fragrance of baking bread made our stomachs roar as the little loaf puffed and turned golden.  With skilled fingers, I plucked an edge and flipped it over, revealing a well-browned bottom.

“What am I doing?” I asked my son.  His cheeks had pinked with the fire’s warmth.

“Lechem, Ama!  Lechem!” he repeated, pointing back to the city gate.

I wrapped the loaf in a cloth and slipped it into my basket.  I filled a cup with water and stood swaying in the doorway, basket in one hand, cup in the other.  “Stay or go?” I wondered.  My son made the decision for me, stomping off on his short legs to the city gate where the prophet waited.  I followed, questioning my every step.

I don’t know what I was expecting.  A choir of angels?  The peal of thunder?  A heavenly affirmation?  What I got when we found the prophet, waiting outside the gate, was a thank you.  “Now, go and do the same thing for yourself,” the prophet instructed.  He dismissed us with a nod, said his blessing, and began to devour his loaf with grimy hands.

I picked up my boy, balancing him on my hip as I walked slowly home.  I had heard that Yahweh, the great God of Israel, is a generous god with unfailing love for the lost and the poor.  Yet here we were, the widow, the orphan, and a stranger, clinging to life by our fingernails, preparing to eat our last bread before returning to our ancestors.  Maybe my neighbors were right.  Maybe the gods Baal and Asherah had cursed me.  Maybe I deserved what was surely coming in the days ahead.

By now, we were home.  I set my child down and pushed the door open.  He walked over to the great flour jar, taller than he was, and patted it with both hands.  “Lechem, Ama?  Lechem?”  He sounded hopeful.

“Yes, my love, bread.” I answered.  I tied an apron on and pushed back my sleeves.  I crossed the floor and pried the heavy clay top off the amphora. 

Below, my son was stamping his feet.  “Lechem, lechem, lechem!”

I was so shocked by what I saw within that I dropped the clay top.  It hit the hard earthen floor with a dull thud and split in two.  There, within the amphora, finely milled flour rose all the way to the top.  I plunged my hands in, and felt the silky dryness slipping through my fingers.

My son had moved to the oil jar.  Again, he placed his palms on the rounded sides.  He patted with his small hands and sang in a tattoo rhythm, “Shemen zayit!  Shemen zayit!” (Olive oil! Olive oil!).

I pried off the top and gasped.  The oil jar was filled to the brim, the first pressing, fragrant, clear, and golden green.  A few bubbles rose to the top and rested on the surface, as if freshly filled.  My boy was laughing now, spinning with childish delight until he plopped down onto his bottom with a breathless thud.

I sat down next to my son, dizzy with hunger and mystery.  Perhaps Baal and Asherah had cursed me.  But Yahweh, the holy and almighty One of Israel, had blessed me.  In an instant, the certainty of our death had changed to the promise of life.  My heart felt funny, felt wild and free, felt like the cage that had bound it since the death of my husband had been sprung.  I put my hands to my head to stop the world from spinning.  As my son crawled into my lap, I laughed and cried until I felt empty and filled with a peace that I had not known since my husband’s death.

Perhaps it was the generosity of Yahweh that made me do it.  When God is so good, how can you keep it to yourself?  I picked up my son and went back to the city gate where we found the prophet dozing in the sun.  Crumbs from my little loaf dotted his beard.  A smear of oil had been wiped on the front of his tunic. 

I put down my boy and he nudged the prophet’s sandal with his little bare foot.  “Navi?”  I asked.

He opened an expectant eye.  “Call me Elijah.”

“Elijah, my son and I would like you to stay with us.  Will you come?”  The boy smiled.  He reached out one hand to the prophet and with the other pointed home.

The prophet rose and brushed the crumbs from his beard.  He balanced his staff against the city wall then reached down to pick up my son, who settled comfortably into his arms.  The Prophet Elijah smiled, “We thought you would never ask.”

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Dust on the Bible

/ reverendjoannwhite / Leave a comment

Sabbath Day Thoughts

My church has a tradition of sharing testimonies on Reformation Sunday. It’s always a memorable and inspiring service. I don’t have a sermon to share with you today, but it seems only fitting on this day to ponder the privilege of reading scripture and invite us to a new way of engaging the Word.

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.

– Psalm 119:105

Jesus answered, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”

– Matthew 4:4

“Taste (V & VI)”

– Christopher Smart, 1770

“O take the book from off the shelf,

And con it meekly on thy knees;

Best panegyric on itself,

And self-avouch’d to teach and please.

Respect, adore it heart and mind,

How greatly sweet, how sweetly grand,

Who reads the most, is most refin’d,

And polish’d by the Master’s hand.”

When was the last time you read your Bible?  As Presbyterians, we believe the Bible is an important part of knowing God, but few of us have a regular practice of scripture reading. 

We probably have some reasons for that.  We may remember the antiquated language of the old King James translation, so we have a hard time finding meaning in all the Thees and Thous.  We may feel that we don’t have time.  Bible reading is on our “To Do” list, but it seems to always get bumped to the next day.  For many of us, the cultural world of the Ancient Near East, as depicted in scripture, seems alien and confusing.  We feel we need a Bible scholar to unravel the meaning for us.  A few of us just want a Bible buddy, a fellow reader to keep us motivated.  Does any of this ring true for you?

A great irony of our reluctance to engage scripture is that it is vital to our faith tradition.  Churches born in the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century fought for the ability to translate the Bible into the common language of the people.  Armies waged war to read and interpret scripture in worship.  People gave their lives so that we might even have home Bibles for family reading.  Some of you, who were raised in Reformed or Presbyterian homes, may have childhood memories of family Bible reading on the Sabbath day.  Many of us have inherited family Bibles that are well worn because they were well read.  So how, in the words of the Hank Williams, Sr. country music standard, do we “get the dust off the Bible”?

I’d like to get us started by introducing a simple, reflective approach to Bible reading that taps into our natural gifts for imagination.    Begin with a Psalm or Bible story.  You could use one of the weekly lections that we print in the bulletin.  A good starter reading could be the parable of the “Lost Sheep,” Luke 15:3-7:

“3 Then Jesus told them this parable: 4 “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? 5 And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders 6 and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’ 7 I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.”

Allow about twenty minutes for your reflection.  Take a moment to quiet your mind and set aside distractions.  

Begin by reading the scripture slowly to yourself.  Notice the cast of characters (the shepherd, the sheep, the flock, and the neighbors).  Which character calls for your attention? 

Read the passage again slowly.  Now, imagine yourself as that character; put yourself in the story.  What do you see (smell, taste, hear, touch)?  How do you feel?  How do you relate to the other characters?  Allow the story to unfold in your imagination. 

Next, slowly read the passage a third time.  Consider, “How does this reading speak to me?  What does it tell me about myself and about God?”  You may want to capture your new awareness by keeping a journal to record your thoughts.  You could even get creative and draw a picture or write a poem. 

To complete your Bible reading, take a moment to thank God in prayer for your new awareness.

Like most things, developing a habit of scripture reading takes commitment, practice, and support. Make a daily date with your Bible and put it on your calendar.    Try setting a goal of reading each day for a month.  You’ll soon find that you are looking forward to those quiet moments with the “Holy Word.”  And just in case you need some moral support, reach out to your resident Bible scholar – that’s me!

“Dust on the Bible”

— Written by Johnny and Walter Bailes

I went into a home one day just to see some friends of mine
Of all their books and magazines, not a Bible could I find
I asked them for the Bible when they brought it, what a shame
For the dust was covered o’er it, not a fingerprint was plain

Dust on the Bible, dust on the Holy Word
The words of all the prophets and the sayings of our Lord
Of all the other books you’ll find, there’s none salvation holds
Get the dust off the Bible and redeem your poor soul

Oh, you can read your magazines of love and tragic things
But not one word of Bible verse, not a scripture do you know
When it is the very truth and it’s contents good for you
But it’s dust is covered o’er it
And it’s sure to doom your poor soul

Oh, if you have a friend you’d like to help along life’s way
Just tell him that the Good Book shows a mortal how to pray
The best advice to give him that will make his burdens light
Is to dust the family bible, trade the wrong way for the right

Blind

/ reverendjoannwhite / 1 Comment

Sabbath Day Thoughts – Mark 10:46-52

The girl was so wild that they kept her in a cage.  She bit and scratched, screamed and spit.  They didn’t know what was wrong with her, but the Tewksbury State Poorhouse was the end of the line for the orphaned and the indigent.  There was no place else to send her.  She was eight-years-old.  Her mother had died of tuberculosis.  Her father, overwhelmed and unable to cope, had surrendered her and younger brother Jimmie to the state.  Jimmie had died within months of their arrival at Tewksbury.

If it hadn’t been for the kindness of an elderly maid, Annie might have stayed in the cage.  Seeing the little girl so cruelly confined, the older woman felt compassion.  It didn’t seem right that a child should live like that, even if she was disturbed.  The maid baked a little cake.  She left it outside the cage, just within Annie’s reach.  The suspicious child devoured the cake and a bond was forged between the little girl and the old woman.

With the calming influence of the maid, doctors examined Annie.  They learned that she suffered from trachoma, an eye disease that had left her almost totally blind.  All at once, Annie’s behavior made sense.  She was a terrified, grieving eight-year-old, unable to cope with the death of her mother, the abandonment of her father, and the loss of her brother.  The doctors treated Annie’s trachoma and operated on her eyes, restoring some of her vision.

We don’t know how Bartimaeus lost his vision.  Perhaps it was gradual, the world dissolving bit by bit into shadows and darkness.  Perhaps it was all at once – a blow to the head or a workplace accident that robbed him instantly of his sight.  We don’t know how long Bartimaeus had sat roadside, earning his living in the only way left to a first century blind man: wrapped in his cloak and begging, depending upon the kindness of neighbors who might share a few alms.

We do know that Bartimaeus had heard of Jesus.  Maybe, one day a leper had come through the Jericho gates, boasting of the healing he had known at the hands of the Lord.  Perhaps disciples, who had once followed John the Baptist, had hurried past Bartimaeus on their way to Galilee, whispering that the Messiah had come at last.  One day, news had come to Bartimaeus that Jesus had healed a blind man in Bethsaida.  Jesus had spat into his hands, rubbed the blind man’s eyes, prayed powerfully, and the man had then seen everything clearly.

As the Passover drew near, a rumor came to Bartimaeus from pilgrims traveling down the Jordan Valley.  Jesus was coming to Jericho.  Jesus and his followers were going up to Jerusalem for the Passover.  From his seat on the Jericho Road, Bartimaeus, who had long ago given up hope, began to imagine that his life could change if only Jesus would pass by.

We tend not to see them until they trouble us.  Dressed all in black with big boots and a leather jacket, she shouts obscenities into her phone non-stop while her dog poops on our front lawn. 

In Kinney Drug—or was that Stewarts, he stands in front of us in his grimy jeans with a mask pulled down below his nose.  We look at our watch while he buys about a billion lottery tickets and some smokes. 

She hasn’t left her house in years.  Her son brings her the essentials and Meals-on-Wheels makes weekday deliveries.  I hear she has cats—lots.  Sometimes you see her scowling from the porch, turning away when you say, “Hi.”

He squats in a doorway with unkempt hair and a wild beard.  He’s always having an argument in a garbled voice with someone who isn’t there.  They’re everywhere.

She might have been legally blind, but Annie could see that the Tewksbury State Poorhouse was a one-way ticket to a life of poverty and misery.  Occasionally, children left.  Those who showed promising intelligence were sent away to school, but Annie was legally blind.  Where was the promise in that?  When the State Board of Charities sent a commission to investigate the awful conditions of the poorhouse, Annie saw her chance.  She told the commission that she wanted to go to school.

As an illiterate fourteen-year-old, Annie was sent to the Perkins Institution for the Blind in Boston.  There Annie found that her struggles would be greater than her visual impairment.  Institutionalized from the age of eight, Annie lacked social skills, table manners, and appropriate hygiene.  She alienated her fellow students, and her quick temper put her at odds with her teachers.  Despite her difficulties, Annie was tremendously bright and hard working.  She put her prodigious gifts to work and excelled.  Six years later in 1887, Annie took top honors as valedictorian upon graduation from the Perkins Institute.

When Jesus and his friends passed Bartimaeus on the Jericho Road, the blind man knew that this was his big shot.  Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, and odds were good that he wasn’t coming back.  If healing was going to happen, it had to be now.  So, Bartimaeus began to shout, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!  Hey, you!  Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” 

Bartimaeus made the biggest scene imaginable.  It was embarrassing.  The neighbors told him to pipe down, but the more they told him to stop, the more he yelled.  Folks began to look away.  They turned to one another and shook their heads and shrugged their shoulders as if to say, “Can you believe this, guy?”  If the neighbors had had their way, Jesus wouldn’t have stopped.  Instead, the good people of Jericho would have cheered Jesus on and sent him up to the Holy City where meaningful and important things were surely waiting.

We don’t know if it was the “Hey, you!” or the “Son of David” or the “Have mercy on me,” but I’m sure everyone was surprised when Jesus stopped.  As Jesus called Bartimaeus over, the neighbors, who had been so anxious to silence Bartimaeus, had a change of heart.  Suddenly, they were all help and smiles.  “He’s calling you!  ‘Atta boy!  Get up there!”  For his part, the blind man was so confident of his impending healing that he leapt up and left behind the tools of his trade.  His cloak and begging bowl were forgotten on the roadside.

One day, we suddenly knew we were blind.  We were volunteering at the Food Pantry when she came in with her dog in a stroller.  We cried when we heard that her folks had put her out and her dog was sick and she couldn’t afford the vet bills. 

One day, we had a flat tire and he pulled over to help us.  He got out of his rusted-out pick-up, followed by the miasma of cigarette smoke and unwashed hair.  While he helped change the tire, he told us how his grandparents raised him after his Dad ran out, and he never really learned to read, and he does odd jobs to make ends meet, and that’s ok.

One day, we saw the police and paramedics go in after the ambulance arrived without any siren.  Later, we saw the stretcher come out with its quiet, shrouded contents.  The EMTs talked to the cops while the cats cried piteously.  Last spring, the house sold, but they say it was a nightmare to clean out.

One day, we read an article in the paper about mental illness. and we realized how impossible it is to find decent care for big-time disorders in the North Country.  Folks just flail until they become a danger to themselves and others and the police get involved, which may get them off the streets for a couple of weeks, but healing never happens.

One day, we opened our eyes.  One day, we knew that we had been blind to the hidden world of need all around us.

The head of the Perkins School helped Annie find a job after graduation.  The Keller family of Tuscumbia, Alabama had written, looking for a governess who could help with their daughter Helen.  A high fever at the age of eighteen months had robbed Helen of both vision and hearing.  Helen was every bit as wild as Annie herself had once been.  No one knew how reach the child, how to help her communicate with the outside world.  Annie Sullivan went to Tuscumbia.  With patience and persistence, she taught Helen Keller.  Most of us may remember the powerful scene in the award-winning play and film The Miracle Worker when Annie signed “water” into Helen’s left hand while holding Helen’s right hand beneath the bright, wet flow gushing from a hand pump.  Suddenly, a light turned on and Helen Keller, who would never see, finally saw what Annie was doing, and the world opened up for her.

We don’t know how Bartimaeus’ eyesight returned.  It could have taken a few minutes, like a darkened theatre that slowly brightens as the audience rises to leave.  It could have come back all at once—a bright, mind-blowing flash of sun and sky, landscape and people.  It could have started with a bright point of light that grew until the whole world was illuminated like a kaleidoscope shining all about.  Afterward, Bartimaeus, who was no longer blind, saw everything clearly.  So clearly in fact, that when Jesus told him to “go,” he knew he had to come.  He knew he had to follow Jesus, even if suffering and death awaited them in Jerusalem.

Maybe someday we’ll see what Jesus saw all those years ago on the Jericho Road.  Maybe someday we’ll know what Annie Sullivan knew when she walked into the Keller home in Tuscumbia, Alabama.  A hidden world of need is all around us—all the time.  We can be blind, or we can choose to make a healing difference.  Can we see? Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on us.  Amen.

Resources

Jarvis, Cynthia. “Pastoral Perspective on Mark 10:46-52” in Feasting on the Word, Year B, vol. 4. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

Galloway, Lincoln E. “Homiletical Perspective on Mark 10:46-52” in Feasting on the Word, Year B, vol. 4. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

–. “The Story of Helen Keller & Anne Sullivan” in The Helen Keller Society.  Accessed online at http://helenkeller.org.za/HK1/index.php/about-us/the-miracle-and-miracle-worker

Biography.com editors. “Anne Sullivan Biography” in Biography, April 2, 2014.  Accessed online at https://www.biography.com/activist/anne-sullivan

See the source image
Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke in The Miracle Worker (1962) from Metro Goldwyn Mayer. Image accessed online at https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0056241/mediaviewer/rm4062820864/

“Servant Leaders”

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Sabbath Day Thoughts – Mark 10:35-45

When the economy cratered in 2008, the St. Louis-based manufacturing and consulting company Barry-Wehmiller took a big financial hit.  For CEO Bob Chapman it was clear that employee cuts were inevitable, but instead of sending out pink slips, Chapman made a surprising announcement.  He implemented alternating furloughs of four-weeks unpaid leave for all.  Chapman told his workers, “We must all suffer a little instead of letting people go.”  Chapman participated in the rolling furloughs, foregoing wages alongside his employees until the crisis was averted.

When Cheryl Bachelder became CEO of Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen in 2007, the fast-food franchise was struggling.  Popeye’s, which had started 45 years before as a grab-and-go fried chicken joint in the suburbs of New Orleans, had dwindling franchises and falling revenues.  Instead of cutting the bottom line, Bachelder implemented a new leadership model.  Bacheleder cast the vision for what Popeye’s could do: serve excellent chicken to families on the go for a reasonable price in more locations.  Then she set out to help her workers succeed with better pay, benefits, and training.  Bachelder transformed Popeye’s from just another fast-food mill to a business culture where everybody won.

In March 2020 as the world ground to a halt amid the exploding COVID-19 pandemic, the airline industry was in big trouble.  Governments issued lock-down orders, travel plans were cancelled, and we all sheltered in place.  The CEO of Delta Airlines Ed Bastian took drastic steps.  Bastian led his company through the crisis by announcing that he would take a 100% pay cut, going without his $900,000 salary for the next six months.

Bob Chapman, Cheryl Bachelder, and Ed Bastian are advocates of servant leadership, a model for business management first theorized by Robert Greenleaf in 1970.  Greenleaf cast the vision for management that shares power and puts the needs of workers first, so that they can reach their greatest potential.  According to Greenleaf, servant leadership creates businesses where employees are growing as people.  They feel healthier, wiser, freer, and more autonomous.  Those workers are also more likely to become servant leaders themselves.  Beyond the walls of the corporation, these companies make a difference for good, benefitting the least privileged and most at-risk people of the community.  Greenleaf dreamed of a world where servant leaders would create businesses that showed the way for others to follow while making a helping, healing difference for communities.

Our gospel lesson reminds us that, long before Robert Greenleaf cast his vision, Jesus was a servant leader.  He hoped that his disciples would follow him on that path.  Jesus’s words, “whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all,” were spoken as he neared the end of his journey from Galilee to Jerusalem for that final Passover.  Just before today’s reading begins, Jesus had warned his friends.  For the third time, he told them that he would soon be betrayed, arrested, condemned, and executed.

Even though they had heard this message three times, the disciples didn’t understand.  James and John had figured out that glory would not await them in the holy city, so they hatched a new plan.  They would convince Jesus to honor them in the Kingdom to come with places of greatest honor at his left and right.  The fact that the other disciples got so angry at the Sons of Zebedee tells us that they probably had their own visions of grandeur.  How dare James and John assert their right to be elevated above the rest of them!

In stark contrast to those visions of glory, Jesus called his friends to be servants and slaves.  A servant, diakonos, waited on others, whether serving food or completing helpful tasks.  A slave, doulos, simply did whatever he or she was told, acting at the direction of their master.  This was not what the disciples wanted to hear.

Jesus’s model of servant leadership was an extraordinary departure from business-as-usual in the Ancient Near East.  Think about it.  Caesar was a self-proclaimed God.  Petty rulers like King Herod lived in luxury at the expense of the people whom they were appointed to rule.  In stark contrast to Caesar and Herod, Jesus was the prime example of servant leadership.  Jesus allowed his core value of agape, self-giving love, to guide him.  That love called him to a life of service—helping, healing, caring, speaking truth to power, and ultimately giving his life for the salvation of us all.  Long before Robert Greenleaf tried to sell the business world on servant leadership, Jesus was blazing the trail and hoping that his followers would go and do likewise.

Back in 1970 when Greenleaf published his first essay on his new model of leadership, he had plenty of critics.  Those naysayers insisted that leaders would only be respected if they were firmly authoritative—that often translated to white men with graduate degrees from prestigious schools and years of experience at the helm of Fortune 500 companies.  Greenleaf’s critics also said that if you make your workers your priority, then they will walk over you.  They would indulge themselves with those opportunities, perks, and benefits, but they wouldn’t put their shoulder to the wheel.  The skeptics proclaimed that companies who embraced this radical theory of leader-as-servant would never make money.

Yet time has told a different story.  When Bob Chapman became CEO of Barry-Wehmiller in 1975 at the age of thirty, the ninety-year-old company had $20 million in revenue.  Their technology was outdated.  Their financial position was weak.  Today Barry-Wehmiller has survived that 2008 recession and continued to grow.  They now have 12,000 employees and a net worth of $3 billion.  Beyond that impressive bottom line, the company sees its unique measure of success as the way they touch the lives of others.  In addition to his work as CEO, Bob Chapman and his wife operate a foundation which teaches the principles of servant leadership for free to communities in need.

At Popeye’s, Cheryl Bachelder found that when she began to focus on changing the company’s culture to a servant-based model, things began to change for the better.  As franchise owners and employees benefitted, the chain began to grow.  Sales increased by 45%.  Stock price climbed from $13-a-share to $61-a-share.  Better yet, when surveyed, franchise owners, employees, and customers all said that they were happier.  In 2017 when Tim Horton’s acquired Popeye’s, that grab-and-go chicken joint had grown to 2,600 locations worth $1.8 billion.

Although COVID-19 remains an ongoing concern, thanks to the delta-variant, things are looking up at Delta Airlines.  Unlike their competitors, Delta has weathered the COVID crisis without resorting to furloughs.  In an interview last month, CEO Ed Bastian said that flights are full and Delta is hopeful and optimistic.  After losing $9 billion in 2020, Delta turned a profit last quarter and is on track to do the same this quarter.  Delta was the first airline to volunteer to help with the evacuation of Afghanistan.  With more than two dozen flights out of Kabul, they airlifted 3,000 refugees from the crumbling nation.  When praised for his leadership, Bastian brushes aside the compliments, saying, “It’s all about the people.”

Of course, after Jesus, the best example of the power of servant leadership is found in the disciples, the ones who really didn’t get it when Jesus told them three times that whoever wishes to be greatest of all must be servant of all.  Ten of the disciples would follow Jesus in losing their lives for the sake of the gospel.  As they reached out to the world with the good news of God’s amazing love, the disciples died untimely deaths in pursuit of Jesus’ mission and in service to God’s Kingdom.  They were crucified, put to the sword, stabbed, clubbed, stoned, and burned.  Even John, the only disciple to live to old age, suffered—driven out of Israel and forced to live in exile on the other side of the Mediterranean.  Despite the high cost of servanthood, by the time John died, the gospel had spread exponentially.  House churches spanned the Roman Empire, from North Africa to Syria to Spain.  Everywhere people were affirming that God is love and Jesus is Lord.

Those servant churches would grow.  Within four centuries, Christianity, which began as a persecuted sect of Judaism, was granted status as an official religion on the Roman Empire.  Today there are 2.5 billion Christians worldwide, about a third of the world’s population.  Nowadays, the fastest growing churches in the world are in places like Iran, China, and North Korea, where servants of the gospel take great risks to share the good news that Jesus, who was slave of all, loved us so much that he died for our sins.

I suspect that there would be more thriving churches if we worried less about number of members and the size of endowments and we thought more about servant leadership.  It is in putting love into action, it is in choosing to serve others, it is in saying “yes” to Jesus’s humble purpose, that greatness is found and growth comes.  May it be just as true for us as it is for those titans of industry.  May it be just as true for us as it was for Jesus and the early church.  Amen.

Resources:

Thompson, James J. “Theological Perspective on Mark 10:35-45” in Feasting on the Word, year B, vol. 4. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

Black, C. Clifton. “Exegetical Perspective on Mark 10:35-45” in Feasting on the Word, year B, vol. 4. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009.

Tait, Brian. “Traditional Leadership vs. Servant Leadership” in Forbes Magazine, March 11, 2020. Accessed online at forbes.com.

Liden, Wayne, Menser, and Hu. “Servant Leadership: Validation of a Short Form of the SL-28,” in The Leadership Quarterly, 26(2), January 2015.  Accessed online at researchgate.net.

Greenelaf, Robert K. “What Is Servant Leadership?” in The Center for Servant Leadership.  Accessed online at Greenleaf.org.

–. “Leaders Eat Last” an interview with Simon Sinek on CBS Mornings, January 7, 2014.  Accessed online at cbsnews,org.

Gibbons, Mike. “Servant Leadership Examples & Characteristics” in People Managing People Magazine, 2020.  Accessed online at peoplemanagingpeople.com.

Jesus Washing Peter’s Feet 1852-6 Ford Madox Brown 1821-1893 Presented by subscribers 1893 http://www.tate.org.uk/art/work/N01394

Possessed

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Sabbath Day Thoughts: “Possessed” Mark 10:17-31

Americans don’t like to talk about money.  In May, Business Insider Magazine conducted a poll of 2,130 people to determine the topics they were most likely to discuss with friends.  Last on the list was money, outranked by current events, family, health, sex, relationships, and politics.

Rachel Sherman, a sociologist with the New School, reports that how we feel about discussing money may be determined by how much we have.  Affluent Americans say they are circumspect about money because they don’t want their lower-wage-earning friends to feel bad.  Middle income Americans tend to shy away from the topic of money because they may be economically fragile—the cost of their kid’s college education, a surge in healthcare expenses, or an unexpected big-ticket home repair can leave them reeling with more month than money.  Working class Americans are much more transparent about money.  They freely discuss the challenges or even impossibilities of supporting a family on minimum wage work.  They swap ideas about how they stretch their dollars and cut corners.

Kimberly Chong, an anthropology lecturer at University College, London, teaches that at the heart of the taboo on money talk is a cultural belief that money is associated with personal worth.  Social status, power, and respect are tied to our paychecks and our bank accounts.  It’s like that bumper sticker, “The boy, who dies with the most toys, wins.”  That sort of thinking is uncomfortable in a democracy where we affirm the equality of all citizens, even as we acknowledge the reality of income inequality and the concentration of wealth.

We don’t like to talk about money, if we can help it.  We really don’t like talking about it in church.  Perhaps my calling our attention to the topic has got you feeling uncomfortable—or wishing that I would change the subject.

Jesus didn’t have any trouble talking about money.  He talked about it a lot.  Indeed, the only topic that Jesus talked about more than money was the Kingdom of God.  If you counted, you would see that eleven of Jesus’ thirty-nine parables are about money.  Today’s reading from Mark’s gospel speaks frankly about the tension that can exist between our understanding of earthly riches and Jesus’ teaching about the Kingdom of God.

As Jesus and his friends were departing on a missionary journey, a rich man stopped them and asked the Lord an urgent question, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?”  In Jesus’ day, eternal life was just another way of saying the Kingdom of God.  Jesus sounded impatient as he counted off the requirements of the Torah: no murder, no adultery, no stealing, no lying, no fraud, be sure to honor your parents.  Perhaps feeling relieved, the man was quick to share that he was all about that sort of righteous living.

Mark gives us a window into Jesus’ feelings.  The Lord, seeing the rich man and hearing of his obedience, loved the man.  Jesus saw that it was this man’s heartfelt desire to love God and love his neighbor as himself.  This man had disciple written all over him.  And so, Jesus extended to him the same invitation he had made to Levi the tax collector and Peter, Andrew, James, and John, the fishermen: “Follow me.”

When the rich man heard the cost of discipleship, he balked.  The thought of selling his property, and parting with the proceeds made his heart skip a beat, tied his stomach in knots, and sent his mind scampering down rabbit trails of worry and fear.  The rich man went away grieving.  The Greek word that describes how the man felt is stugnasas.  It means shocked, surprised, and in sorrow.  The man had a crisis of character.  He turned away from Jesus, unable to accept what the Lord asked of him.

It’s a story that is hard to hear and perhaps harder to understand.  Even the disciples struggled with what Jesus had to say about the rich man and camels passing through needles’ eyes.  In the ancient near east, wealth was seen as a blessing from God.  From the point of view of the disciples, this rich man was one of God’s beloved ones.  How else could he have amassed that land, those homes, those belongings, those slaves?  It didn’t make sense to the twelve.  If the rich man wasn’t first in line at the pearly gates, then who could be saved?

Over the centuries, Bible scholars and preachers have grappled with how best to interpret this tough story, a story that questions our relationship with God and money.  The monastic tradition has long looked to this passage as a proof text for vows of voluntary poverty.  Postulants of the Franciscan, Claretians, and other religious orders take vows of poverty upon entrance, renouncing their worldly possessions.  What they own becomes the community’s and is used or disposed of for the benefit of all.

In the Reformation of the sixteenth century, our spiritual ancestor John Calvin taught that the rich man’s problem was more than money.  The rich man wanted to know what he must “do” to inherit eternal life.  For Calvin, that smacked of works’ righteousness, as if we earn our way into God’s Kingdom by accruing God’s particular favor with good deeds.  Eternal life, Calvin taught, is God’s freely given gift for all who place their trust in Jesus.  We cannot earn our way into heaven, but God’s grace makes the impossible possible for us.

During stewardship season, generations of preachers have used this story to invite us to be generous givers.  The rich man makes us question what we truly value.  Is it Jesus and a life spent in his company, or is it our money and the things that we possess?  In our love for Jesus, we are inspired, maybe not to sell all that we have, but to hold our possessions loosely.  We prayerfully consider how our abundance may be used in Jesus’ purpose.  We live generously as a blessing to church and community.

I think those are all valid and responsible ways of preaching about the rich man.  Some are called to a life of voluntary poverty and radical sharing.  Heaven is ours only by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.  We are, indeed, blessed to be a blessing to our church and others.  Ultimately, all we have and all we are belongs to God, whether we are rich men and women, or middle-class families, or the working poor who live so creatively on so little.

But the story of the rich man goes deeper than all that.  Jesus calls us to question the core assumptions and the cultural beliefs about money that possess our society.  Jesus contradicts the premise that our personal worth is tied to our net worth.  That assumption prompts us to value some people over others.  It’s a short leap from there to what the disciples presumed: that the rich man’s wealth was a sign of God’s special favor.

But that wasn’t how Jesus saw the world.  Jesus loved the rich man.  Yet, Jesus also loved those low-status, vulnerable children whom he hugged and blessed.  Jesus loved those disciples, who struggled to understand his teaching.  That abundant and overflowing love of Jesus was a reflection of God’s love.  After all, God so loved the world that God sent the beloved son to die for us.

At the close of today’s reading, Jesus told his friends that those core cultural beliefs that we hold about personal worth and net worth don’t apply in the Kingdom of God.  There, many who are first will be last and the last will be first.  Jesus invited his friends—Jesus invites us—to let go of our false assumptions.  We are called to envision a world where the penniless Haitian migrant at the southern border is as loved by God as the billionaire businessman.  It’s a world where the illiterate day laborer is of equal value to the university professor.  It’s a world where the residents of Edgewood House, and others who are reliant upon the social safety net, are every bit as valued and beloved as those who are enjoying a leaf-peeping getaway at The Point this weekend.  That’s some radical stuff, Jesus.

If we accept what Jesus has to say, it will change how we see not only our neighbors but also our possessions.  If our personal worth isn’t incumbent upon the size of our paychecks or our 401Ks or our brokerage accounts, then it gets easier to live generously and share freely.  Our abundance becomes a way to shape a world where all may know that they are the beloved by our limitlessly loving God.  That’s an invitation to discipleship that can make us feel stugnasas—shocked, surprised, or in sorrow.  Or, Jesus’s invitation just might grant us a foretaste of the Kingdom to come and the life eternal.  Jesus says, “Follow me.” How will we respond?

Resources

Black, C. Clifton.  “Exegetical Perspective on Mark 10:17-31” in Feasting on the Word, Year B, vol. 4. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010.

Loudenback, Tanza. “A Survey of 2,000 Americans Found . . .” in Insider: Business Magazine.  Accessed online at businessinsider.com.

Menendez-Atun͂a,Luis. “Commentary on Mark 10:17-31” in Preaching This Week, Oct. 10, 2021.  Accessed online at workingpreacher.org.

Pinsker, Joe. “Why So Many Americans Don’t Talk about Money” in The Atlantic, March 2, 2020.  Accessed online at theatlantic.com.

Thompson, James J. “Theological Perspective on Mark 10:17-31” in Feasting on the Word, Year B, vol. 4. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010.

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When Dreams Die

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — Mark 10:2-16 “When Dreams Die”

The COVID-19 pandemic has been hard on our health—and hard on our marriages.  As employers furloughed workers or businesses went virtual, couples found themselves spending more time together and lots of it.  That round-the-clock intimacy has been complicated by other factors. Lay offs and job loss have meant less income and greater economic pressure.  Social distance has stretched the limits of our family and friend support network.  If you have kids, closed schools and quarantined daycares created impossible challenges of childcare, homeschooling, and distance learning.

Studies show that during the first seven to eight months of the pandemic, the divorce rate surged.  That spring, a survey of 1,277 couples found that 29.9% of them said they were in serious trouble and headed for divorce.  Ken Jewell, a New Yok City divorce lawyer, related that when his office reopened after the shut-down in June 2020, he saw a 48% jump in requests for counsel.  A further dark consequence of the COVID crisis has been an increase in domestic violence and substance abuse.  Apostles’ House in Newark, a shelter for women and children, reports that their beds have been full throughout the pandemic.

Beyond the social science and the statistics, we all know couples whose marriages have become fraught, embattled, or failed over the past year and a half.  Young couples with children, middle-aged empty-nesters, and even retired folks with years of marriage under their belts are calling it quits.  There is a lot of heart-ache out there.  Weddings are among the most hopeful and joyous moments in our lives.  When those dreams die, they take a piece of us with them.

The Pharisees put Jesus to the test with a question about divorce, “Tell us, rabbi, is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?”  The fact that the Pharisees knew by heart what the Torah had to say about divorce reveals that there was a larger controversy brewing.  Deuteronomy 24 instructs that a man my write a certificate of divorce if his wife commits an “erwat dabar”—an indecent thing.  The two great rabbinic traditions of Jesus’ day disagreed about what an indecent thing might be.  The Hillel School taught that it was up to the husband’s discretion.  A poorly cooked meal, childlessness, failure to observe the Torah, sexual immorality, or inability to complete household tasks, all could be grounds for divorce.  The Shammai School allowed men to divorce wives for only one reason: serious infidelity.  The Pharisees anticipated that Jesus’ response, one way or the other, would make him enemies.

It is likely that Jesus’ answer offended everyone.  It certainly left the disciples scratching their heads and asking more questions.  Instead of weighing in on what indecent thing would be grounds for divorce, Jesus called his listeners to re-think their understanding of marriage.  Jesus turned to the creation stories of Genesis in which humanity is created male and female in God’s image.  Something sacred is stamped upon each of us, and we are given to one another in the covenant of marriage.  Two become one with God at the center of the relationship.  In that union, we find a wholeness and completeness that was part of God’s plan right from the start.  “What God has joined together,” Jesus teaches, “Let no one separate.”

Behind Jesus’ words lies a deep pastoral concern for women.  According to Jewish law, a woman had no right to divorce her husband on any ground.  It is hard for us to understand, but in first century Israel, women were a little like sexual property.  Young women passed from a father’s household to a husband’s household in an arranged agreement that had monetary and social benefit for the father.  The husband had every legal right to dismiss the wife at his discretion, like bad goods that failed to live up to their anticipated benefit.  The impact of divorce upon a woman could be catastrophic.  She might be able to return to her kinfolk.  If not, she had no safety net—no alimony, no property rights, no home, no right to even parent her own children.  She depended on the charity of neighbors or was forced to beg or resort to prostitution. 

Jesus’s teaching about divorce contradicted this prevailing notion of women as property.  Indeed, Jesus’s suggestion that women could divorce husbands would have sounded deeply shocking and offensive to the Pharisees.  Jesus invited his listeners to see women as beings created in God’s image, whose equal footing was essential to wholeness in marriage.  Marriage—this shared sacred identity and need for wholeness—was at the heart of God’s best hope for humanity.  Jesus’s words were—and still are—a radical, counter-cultural, deeply truthful lesson.

Despite God’s original intent and Jesus’ provocative teaching, divorce persists.  Presbyterians have been debating it since the Westminster Assembly of the Divines met in 1647.  They allowed for divorce by husbands or wives in cases of adultery and willful desertion.  The aggrieved party could later remarry “as if the offending party were dead.”  Our denomination’s current stance on divorce is best expressed in a 1981 revision of the Westminster Confession.  We acknowledge God’s holy intent for marriage, yet we also recognize the frailty and sin of humankind, “The weakness of one or both partners may lead to the gross and persistent denial of the marriage vows so that the marriage dies at the heart and becomes intolerable.”  When dreams die, separation and divorce may become acceptable and permissible.  That same guidance applies to traditional unions and to our refined definition of marriage, adopted in 2014, between “two people.”

Beyond the words of scripture, the teaching of Jesus, and the guidance of the church, is the uniquely painful reality of divorce.  It feels like something dies at the heart. On the day in 2004 when I accepted this church’s call to serve as your pastor, I stood in the pulpit and shared that I was divorced.  A brief, early marriage to my college boyfriend had come to a sad end, more than a decade earlier.  My ex-husband’s adultery and “willful desertion” might have ticked all the boxes for the Westminster Assembly of the Divines, but it didn’t make me feel any better.  I had felt profound grief, shame, rejection, and a visceral pain that told me that part of my heart was dying.  I know that many of you in your own experience have felt the same, whether you have been through divorce or experienced the end of a long-time committed relationship, whether you are children of divorced parents or your adult children have suffered through divorce.

That collective pain of divorce is so great that it is tempting to not preach about it at all.  Jesus, we hear your beautiful vision of marriage that is sacred and deeply reverent with God at the very heart of it.  We freely acknowledge that there would be a whole lot less divorce, and many more happy marriages, if those relationships were entered into in the spirit of your teaching.  But Adam and Eve have left the garden.  We live in a frail and fallen world where we regularly disappoint you and one another.  Lord, have mercy upon us. 

It’s significant that Jesus followed his tough teaching on divorce with the blessing of children, those most vulnerable and lowest status members of the Hebrew household.  Although the disciples wished to turn the children away as a waste of Jesus’s time, the Lord welcomed them and blessed them.  Jesus welcomed the children, the outsider, the vulnerable, the rejected, the leper, the Pharisee, the low-status-second-class citizen.  It’s safe to presume that Jesus welcomed the divorced.  It’s safe to say that Jesus continues to welcome those who are divorced.  The grace of Jesus Christ is always sufficient for us.  Thanks be to God.

The most recent studies of marriage have shown that as the pandemic has continued, the divorce rate has levelled and begun to decline.  Some of the reasons for that may not be good.  The economic strain of the pandemic may have forced couples to remain together.  The lack of childcare has put plans for separation on hold.  Closed courts and a backlog of cases may be causing a temporary lull.  Five states that make divorce rates public are showing a drop in the number of couples rushing to the courts.  A recent survey of 2,429 couples found that 17% of those questioned now say that their marriage has been strengthened by the pandemic.  They began to communicate better.  More time together deepened their appreciation for one another.  They spent time with the kids, exercised together, cooked together, and cultivated new shared hobbies.  Their feelings changed for the better.  Perhaps they began to glimpse in their spouses that sacred image that each of us bears.  Perhaps they are now finding in one another that wholeness and completeness that God originally planned.

Resources:

Mallozzi, Vincent. “Divorce Rates Are Now Dropping: Here Are Some Reasons Why” in The New York Times, March 24, 101`.  Accessed online at nytimes.com.

Staniunas, David. “Marriage, Divorce, and Mariners” in Presbyterian Historical Society Newsletter, June 26, 2014. Accessed online at pcusa.org.

Wall, Robert W. “Divorce” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary, vol. 2. New York: Doubleday, 1992.

Meyers, Ched. Binding the Strongman. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1988.

Vitalis Hoffman, Mark G. “Commentary on Mark 10:2-16” in Preaching This Week, Oct. 4, 2015.  Accessed online at workingpreacher.com.

Ruge-Jones, Philip. “Commentary on Mark 10:2-16” in Preaching This Week, Oct. 7, 2018.  Accessed online at workingpreacher.com.

Thompson, James J. “Theological Perspective on Mark 10:2-16” in Feasting on the Word, Year B, vol. 4. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010.

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