Mark 12:28-34
October 31, 2021
This fall, we have traveled in the company of the twelve disciples. They have been taught one lesson after another, lessons that we have overheard as we reflect on what kind of Christians we will be. They have been moving toward Jerusalem, and now they are there. So we listen in again:
One of the scribes came near and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, he asked him, “Which commandment is the first of all?” Jesus answered, “The first is, ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
Then the scribe said to him, “You are right, Teacher; you have truly said that ‘he is one, and besides him there is no other’; and ‘to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength,’ and ‘to love one’s neighbor as oneself,’ —this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.” When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” After that no one dared to ask him any question.
The scribe asked a single question. "Which is the first commandment? The number one spiritual obligation?" Jesus gives two answers, "Love God. Love people."
Mark says his response shut down the interrogation. Nobody dared ask him any more questions. Who can blame them? Jesus gave an irrefutable answer. What is the summary of our religion? What comes first?
Jesus says, “Love God.” Love the Lord with everything you are and all that you have. And without so much as taking a breath, he tags on a second commandment, from Leviticus 19, “You shall love the neighbor as much as you love yourself.” It is a stunning answer and cannot be argued against.
Those who teach the faith will sub-divide the Ten Commandments this way. The first four commandments are about loving God: no other gods, no attempts to capture God in an image, no misuse of God’s name, remember your creation and redemption by saving a complete day for God every week. Love God!
The remaining six commandments constitute loving the neighbor. Honor your parents, for they are your closest neighbors. Don’t take your neighbor’s life, don’t take your neighbor’s spouse, don’t take your neighbor’s stuff. Don’t lie or distort the truth about your neighbor. Don’t desire anything your neighbor possesses.
There it is: love God, love your neighbor. As the scribe babbles back in astonishment, if we keep these, our lives will be greater than trying to earn our way into God’s good graces by lighting a candle, sacrificing a sheep, smoking up some incense, writing a check, or sitting in a long meeting. God looks upon the heart, the soul, the mind, the strength. What God is looking for is any evidence of love, extended simultaneously in two directions: love returned to God, who is the source of love, the essence of love; and love extended to the neighbor.
The scribe who intended to interrogate Jesus said, “You are right, Teacher.” And then Jesus said something a bit quizzical, “You’re not far from the kingdom of God.”
I have always pictured him saying that with a smirk on his face. “You’re not far.” How are is ‘not far’? Would the scribe be a little bit closer if he hadn’t tried to pile on with the Pharisees, Sadducees, Herodians, and all the other opponents who pounced on Jesus during that final week in Jerusalem? Would he have been closer to the kingdom if he weren’t a scribe?
After all, immediately following this account, Jesus poked fun at the scribes and the flattened way they interpreted the scriptures. Mark says the crowd loved it. Then he warned about the scribes, “They prance around line long robes, claim good seats at banquets, and then fleece the widow’s estates.” As they practiced faith, there was not much love of neighbor, and more love for themselves than for God.
The lesson is it’s possible to quote the Bible, then get it wrong. You can agree, “Love God, love neighbor,” and never actually love anybody. You can be a professional religious dignitary who understands that love draws us closer to God and God’s rule over our lives. Yet in your life, something else takes precedence.
The Gospel of Mark highlights the inconsistency. Flip a couple pages forward, and we see the scribes in the inner sanctum of religious professionals when Jesus is arrested and condemned (15:1). The scribes stand in the mob that hand over Jesus to Pontius Pilate. The scribes stand among those who mock the Christ when he is on the cross (15:31). It’s one thing to know God teaches us to love; it’s another thing to love.
The distance between is “not far.”
To focus the question for us: whom do you love – and whom do you find difficult to love? Loving God may sound difficult because, at least on the surface, nobody can see God. Through the ages, some people have heard God speak. They have written down what they’ve heard in the Bible. If they keep the teaching, it is a way to love the Lord. If they show up regularly in the places where God continues to speak, it is another way to love the Lord.
But I remember a lady with purple eyes. When I was a kid, they looked purple to me. She could comprehend what God is all about. See an acorn, she said, “God is making another tree.” If you were feeling down, she would slide over by you, put her arm around you, and say, “God is with us.” In church, if she knew the hymn, she would lose herself in singing. She emptied her whole soul to the God she could not see.
That’s when I ever understood we can love the God who stays out of sight. We can give ourselves to God and God’s purposes. If we can do this, we are close to the kingdom.
And you would think it’s so much easier to love one another, whom we can see. Right? Here they are, standing in front of us, available for us to love. That’s easy, right? It’s not easy at all. People have warts, and opinions, and differences. They say things that disturb us. They toss over the things that we treasure.
And should we think for a minute that it’s easier to love the God we cannot see than to love the person we can see, we have the reformer Dorothy Day who held both together. She said, “I really only love God as much as I love the person I love the least.”
One of the clearest examples emerged after the horrific shooting of the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh three years ago. They wheeled the gunman into Allegheny General Hospital. He had been wounded in the gun fight after the massacre. When they brought him in, he was still yelling anti-Semitic curses. Then a man in a white coat approached him and said, “I’m Dr. Jeffrey Cohen. I’m here to take care of you.” He was president of the hospital.
As Dr. Cohen later explained, “We are here to take care of sick people. We’re not here to judge. We’re not here to ask, ‘Do you have insurance?’ We’re here to take care of people who need our help.” As someone noted, “It is a stark reminder that there is something more powerful than caring for one’s own.” It was a radical demonstration of humanity.
A person of insatiable curiosity, the doctor took a special interest in the shooter, a 46-year-old high school dropout who had few friends. He perceived someone incapable of generating his own hate and so absorbing it from others. Without dismissing what the gunman did, Dr. Cohen said, “He’s just a guy. He’s not the face of evil. Once he was a child and people looked at him with all the hope in the world. Now, he’s someone all alone and all he hears is the noise in his head all the time.”
An FBI agent watched how Dr. Cohen greeted the gunman, how he sat down next to him, how he talked to him and tried to understand him, and then how he handed him off to the medical team to dress his wounds. The agent said, “I don’t think I could have done what you just did.” Dr. Cohen nodded in understanding; and he did it anyway.[1]
And where did Dr. Cohen learn this? At the Tree of Life synagogue where he is a member. He lives across the street from the sanctuary, in the same neighborhood where Mister Rogers once lived. When he heard the gunfire from his house, he left immediately for the hospital, knowing someone needed help.
You shall love God with heart, soul, mind, and surgery. You shall love the neighbor, made in God’s image. If we do not love, as Cohen loves, as Christ loves, we remain captives to the power of death.
Where do we learn this? In the church, just like the synagogue. I don’t know anywhere else where the lesson is being taught. There is so much noise in the air. People demanding to be heard above everybody else. So many voices that are arrogant, boastful, arrogant, and rude, insisting on their own way, rejoicing in wrongdoing. The choice we face is love or death, exemplified in Jesus, who learned it from Moses.
This is why the church is so important. Here is where we are taught to love God and love one another. And not merely as a concept or an idea – but as a live-giving, life-saving practice. If we don’t give ourselves to Someone or Something greater than ourselves, life grows cold, love grows stingy. We fall into isolation, never tasting joy, drifting without purpose, cut off from the very gifts that God provides for our well-being.
One of my spiritual teachers is a short nun, advanced in years. The great teachers can say it with simplicity, and she says, “True spirituality is always directed toward somebody else.” The choices are simple, too. You can direct it toward God or direct it toward neighbor, but it is always expressed in acts of love.
So hear again, O Israel, the central invitation of the faith we share: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength; and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is not greater word than this.
And for all who love, you’re not far from the kingdom. In fact, you’re very close.
(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.
------------------------------------------------
[1] Eli Rosenberg, “I’m Doctor Cohen,”
Washington Post, October 30, 2018. https://wapo.st/2EU31zP
Saturday, October 30, 2021
The Question That Keeps Coming Up
Saturday, October 23, 2021
Sometimes We See
October 24, 2021
They came to Jericho. As he and his disciples and a large crowd were leaving Jericho, Bartimaeus son of Timaeus, a blind beggar, was sitting by the roadside. When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout out and say, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Many sternly ordered him to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” Jesus stood still and said, “Call him here.” And they called the blind man, saying to him, “Take heart; get up, he is calling you.” So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus. Then Jesus said to him, “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man said to him, “My teacher, let me see again.” Jesus said to him, “Go; your faith has made you well.” Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way.
One of the ways for us to understand Jesus is remember how that Mark understands him. In this Gospel, Jesus is a healer who restored human life to its original shape.
- A man who was banished because of a skin disease is healed and restored to the community (1:42).
- The woman who bled so much she was considered perpetually unclean is healed and restored to her family (5:34).
- The young man who was driven out of his skull by voices he could not control is now seated, dressed, and in his right mind. (5:15)
Strengthen the weak hands, make firm the feeble knees.
Say to those who are of a fearful heart, “Be strong, do not fear!
Here is your God … he will come and save you.
Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and ears of the deaf unstopped.
Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. (35:3-6)
Sounds like the script of the Gospel of Mark. That man who couldn’t speak now speaks. The one who couldn’t walk jumped up from his sickbed. The one who could not hear is opened up. And today, the sightless man can now see.
He has a name: Bartimaeus. He has a place: on the road leading out of Jericho. He has become a fixture there, spreading out his cloak to collect the coins of those who take pity on him. Sitting in the dust in a high traffic area, somehow robbed of sight, everybody knew who he was. By the sound of it, if he discovered who you were, Bartimaeus was a relentless beggar.
At least, that’s how he gets the attention of the Messiah. “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me! Jesus, Son of David, over here. I’m over here. Have mercy on me. Son of David, I’m talking to you. I’m right here. Have mercy on me.” And Jesus, true to form, invites him forward and gives him sight.
Twice there is a hint that is an act of restoration. Bartimaeus doesn’t only ask for sight. He says, “Give me my sight again.” When Jesus makes that happen, Mark says, “He regained his sight.” Not only did he get it; he got it back.
A good friend was nervous before cataract surgery. I said, “I’m sure it’s going to be fine.” “Maybe so,” she replied, “but I hope nothing goes wrong. I don’t like anybody messing with my eyes.” A week later, here he comes, an aura of brightness around her. I didn’t need to ask how it went. She told me, “I had no idea how much I was missing.” There’s a grateful woman. She decided to celebrate by driving to the library to check out a few books. In regular print, too!
At the humanitarian level, what Jesus did for Bartimaeus was a gift. Pure gift. In the words of the favorite hymn, “Was blind, but now I see.” But this is the Gospel of Mark. The more we look at this story, the more we begin to perceive.
Here’s something to notice: the man takes the initiative to be healed. He is not passive. He does not sit and wait. He is not content to beg. When he hears that the One Person who can do something for him is available, he calls out. Does what he can to get his attention. Raises his voice. And he makes a specific request: give me my sight back.
For the Gospel of Mark, the man shows more than chutzpah. He professes his faith. And it’s more than merely calling out, “Jesus, Jesus, Son of David.” It’s putting the request right there and trusting it will be met. Bartimaeus turns to Jesus who can heal – and he participates in his own healing.
How different this is, say, than the pew sitters in the synagogue at Nazareth. Jesus went back there, to his hometown, to preach and teach. It seems the press releases were more impressive than the results. The people yawned, and said, “He was supposed to be something special. But we know who this is – it’s Mary’s kid, the carpenter. His brothers and sisters are our neighbors. Big deal.”
And the Gospel says, “He could not do a single deed of power there. He was stunned at their unbelief.” By contrast, Bartimaeus says, “I want your help, Jesus. I want to get healed.” That’s what did the trick – he believed.
Here’s a second thing to see: there is more going on than eyesight. When Jesus calls him forward, he throws off his cloak. That is, he leaves behind the money that people have tossed to him out of pity. He leaves behind the money – and his one possession, his cloak. How different that is from the rich man who knelt before Jesus to ask, “What must I do to gain eternal life?” He could not leave behind his money, or his many possessions. But Bartimaeus could.
In the same way, Jesus asked him, “What do you want me to do for you?” It’s the same exact question he asked in the story we heard last week, which is immediately before this one. He said to James and John, “What do you want me to do for you?” Remember what they said? They wanted status. Bartimaeus wants vision. His request is honored. Theirs is not. Because there is a world of difference between those two requests.
Bartimaeus is willing to give up everything to see. He doesn’t care about the financial gain. He doesn’t care about exaltation, self-promotion, and getting his name tweeted ten million times. What he wants is infinitely greater: vision, depth perception, the ability to perceive color, and absolute, complete clarity. No visual distractions for him. No optical illusions. To see is so much more than merely looking.
One more thing to watch for: vision comes with a cost. When we see clearly, we must do something with what we’ve seen. Sight is the invitation to engage. When Bartimaeus gets his vision back, he sees Jesus – and he “followed him on the way.” In the Gospel of Mark, that’s code language for the road to the cross, the highway of self-sacrifice. He sees Jesus, he sees what lies ahead if he follows Jesus, and he sees the mission that the Christ has come to inaugurate. He chooses to engage.
It is a remarkable move. In my experience, it’s rare. Bartimaeus moves from beggar to disciple. He never steps off to the side to watch.
It’s like that silly old joke I remember from childhood. Somebody asked the comedian Flip Wilson about his religion. “Oh, haven’t you heard?” He said, “I’m a Jehovah’s Bystander.” A what? Never heard of that. To which Wilson replied, “They asked me to be a Witness, but I didn’t want to get involved.”
You know, it’s quite easy to watch and not see. We watch the neighbors on our streets, but do we know their names? We observe the person at the store, struggling to reach something on the top shelf, but do we ever ask if we can help. We look at the names in the newspaper, some of them going through great trouble, but it might never occur to us to pick up the phone and ask if they are OK. It’s easier to watch than it is to see.
The sermons this fall focus on the question of what kind of Christians we are going to be – what kind of church we will be – particularly in the ongoing disruption of this pandemic. The story of Bartimaeus offers an invitation for all of us to see. To perceive and not merely observe. Should we ever pray to Christ, “Lord, let me see,” it’s kind of like praying to learn patience – these are two prayers that are always answered. If we want to learn patience, he will teach us that. And if we want to see, it could profoundly change our perception.
We’ve been blessed to have Glynis Johns to speak here a few times. A brilliant young scholar, she is the founder of the Black Scranton project. Her research into the city’s history has uncovered the rich and vital history of African Americans that has been (shall we say?) “out of sight” for too many of us. She sees so clearly that she is fearless.
Just the other day, she had the opportunity to chat with the President of the United States when he was in town. She said, “Mr. President, you’ve been telling people there were no Black folks in Scranton when you were growing up. Here, let me help expand your view.” I guess he had not seen them, just as I haven’t – and many of us have not. We cannot love as neighbor those we cannot see.
In the past couple of years, that same request, “Lord, let me see,” has become one of my prayers. And it has been a challenge, especially regarding race. Thanks to some of you, I’ve been reading a number of books on Honest American History, which I define as the kind of American history that many Americans don’t want to ‘fess up to admit. So much of the resistance is rooted in willful blindness, in deciding not to have your eyes opened. And it reinforces the lie that some people are better than others, which is simply not true.
All of us have our hurts, just as all of us have our blind spots. So if we pray like Bartimaeus, “Lord, let me see,” it challenges us to embark in unexamined territory. We will become more attentive to the real damages that we have done to one another, and others have done unto us. This is the first step to undertaking the work of healing. And I see that healing as one more dimension to the restorative work of Christ.
The good news is that the same Jesus who opened the eyes of Bartimaeus is the living Christ who offers to open ours. He is alive and very much at work. And he wishes us to be well. Trusting in him is what promises to restore the world as it was created to be. The journey begins with the simple prayer, “Lord, let me see.”
(c) William G. Carter. All right reserved.
Saturday, October 16, 2021
Tyrants and Servants
October 17, 2015
They were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them; they were amazed, and those who followed were afraid. He took the twelve aside again and began to tell them what was to happen to him, saying, “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death; then they will hand him over to the Gentiles; they will mock him, and spit upon him, and flog him, and kill him; and after three days he will rise again.”
James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” And he said to them, “What is it you want me to do for you?” And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” They replied, “We are able.” Then Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.”
When the ten heard this, they began to be angry with James and John. So Jesus called them and said to them, “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”
It is a bold request. Now preserved in scripture, the Gospel of Mark offers a continuing embarrassment for James and John. "Teacher, give us a privileged position in the kingdom of God." “When you come into your glory, grant us to sit at your right hand and your left.” Give us good seats.
What a goofy thing to ask. If they could simply leave it on the level of, “Teacher, could you do something for us?” That would resemble a prayer – a request by two brothers based on their own needs. Jesus has been doing all kind of things for all kinds of people: healing broken bodies, restoring souls, feeding stomachs, teaching truth. James and John know the Christ is gracious enough to later say, “Ask whatever you want, and I’ll do it.”
So they ask. What they ask is for their affinity with Jesus to provide them an advantage. For their love for the Lord to lift them above those less committed. That their perseverance for his sake would gain them an eternal reward. “Teacher, on the day when you sit on your throne, seat us on slightly smaller thrones by your side.”
Jesus takes them off at the knees. He declares they don't know what they're talking about.
As Mark tells the story, it’s sadly comical. For the third time, Jesus has told the twelve he’s going to die. He declares the road they travel together is the road to the cross. Each time he says it, there is pushback. Or complete ignorance. Simon Peter says first, “Oh no, the Messiah will not die.” Then the disciples are caught bickering about their own importance. And here, James and John request a promotion.
Meanwhile, Jesus describes his destiny in ways that grow longer each time. In chapter eight, he speaks of “suffering, rejection, and death.” In chapter nine, “betrayal, suffering, and death.” In today’s text, “betrayal, condemnation, judgment, mockery, spitting and flogging, and death.” To which these two fishermen say, “Hey, can you put both of us on thrones?”
What are they not understanding? Certainly, they don’t understand what lies ahead for Jesus. Are they in denial? Confused? We don’t know. Mark does say they were “amazed” and “afraid,” two terms that he will use when he gets around to describing Easter. The witnesses at the empty tomb were also “amazed” and “afraid.” Along the way, there have been moments when all the disciples were amazed and afraid. That is the standard reaction when somebody stays close to Jesus.
Yet this shameless appeal for prestige, for exaltation over all others, is as tone deaf as a cracked bell. Jesus teaches there are no hierarchies in the people of God. Nobody is better than anybody else. There are no differentials in status, no rewards for being smart, good looking, or capable. We have a variety of skills and diversity in callings, but God regards us the same.
If only James and John could understand that. These two Galileans were among the initial disciples. They left their homes, left their jobs, left their families, all for the sake of the kingdom Jesus has been preaching. If anybody is keeping score, Jesus chose swaggering Simon Peter and quiet Andrew about five minutes before James and John. Yet these two, affectionately nicknamed “the Sons of Thunder,” have stuck with Jesus from the very beginning.
After all that time, they understand the nuances of his jokes. They know his habits. They read his mood when he rolls his eyes or wrinkles his brow. They comprehend his countenance when he’s angry and can tell when he is sly. And Jesus includes them in the top-secret moments of his ministry. Like when he cured Simon’s mother-in-law of a headache, or raised that little girl from the dead, or that day he burst into living flame on mountaintop. They have belonged since the beginning. Shouldn’t that count for something?
It is an open question. Shouldn’t longevity come with benefits? I’ve been here for a while. And some of you have been here a whole lot longer. You’ve staked out your seats and announced, “This is my place. Don’t sit in it.” And Lord knows, I have my place too. This is a common assumption – or is it presumption? – when you have put in your time, when you are an insider. The temptation creeps in. You look for special treatment.
Years ago, when my daughters were little, there was one Easter Sunday when all the wheels weren’t rolling in the same direction. There were special dresses, hair to brush, breakfast before what would be a long morning, to say nothing of sugaring up on jellybeans and chocolate bunnies before jumping in the car. “Come on,” I said, “We are running late.”
Alas, we came around the corner of School Street and all the parking lots were full. Cars parked on both sides of the street. It’s ten minutes before the service begins and I’m scheduled to preach. The choir is lining up for the procession, and I can’t find a parking spot. With the car windows rolled up, I’m fuming, “It’s Easter, and I’m the pastor.”
Finally I found a spot about three blocks away. So I get them out of the car, down the hill without breaking a heel in those new shoes, hand them off to the surrogate grandmother, only to have an usher say, “You’re cutting it kind of close, aren’t you?” The organist finished the prelude as I pull on the preaching robe, and all I’m thinking is, “Shouldn’t I have a specially reserved parking space just for me?”
In this room, all of you were thinking, “Jesus Christ is Risen Today,” but I was thinking “privileged parking space for the big days when I’m running late.” Just then the Lord spoke to me and said, “Bill, you are special. And every one of my children is special. The wise ones are those who never presume they are better than anybody else.” I groaned and said, “Yes, Lord, it’s your big day. And it’s not about me.” This was an important moment in my continuing conversion.
We would like to think if we put in our time, we will advance our position. That expertise, skill, and good looks will lift our status. But the reality is closer to how the Gospel of Mark describes the twelve disciples: all of us are beginners. None of us are experts in the ways of God. None of us are all that far ahead of others. And if we serve a term in leadership, it will always be a term of service.
Jesus offers this as an alternative to how the world works. “The Gentiles have their tyrants,” he says. “They dominate, dictate, and declare.” Don’t we know that to be true! Every day, someone claws their way to the top. If they can climb faster by pushing others down, they will do it. If they can grab power by denying power from others, this is their advancement scheme. Nothing will stop them, short of a conversion.
And we are talking about more than finding a parking space. These days, there are so many sad reminders of domination. Here’s one: many of our fellow citizens are systematically discouraged from voting. They want to determine their future, but the local polling place was moved twenty miles away. And there might not be public transportation to get there. Or they can’t afford to take off from work to get there. Or the requirements for identification have changed. These quiet shifts happened because those who aspire to power are threatened by new voices, specifically by people they deem lesser than themselves.
It's one more variation of the old request of James and John, “Lord, put us on higher seats than everybody else.” And Jesus is not interested in that.
There is a word here for all the churches that I know. Here’s a news flash: we are all in the same business. We share the same mission of making disciples who are capable of following Jesus. So much for declaring my church is better than your church. Those lingering voices of superiority don’t mean very much in the kingdom of God.
The other day, I was joking with the new pastor next door. He’s an old friend and we are both a lot older now. The comment was made that, in Clarks Summit, the Presbyterians are on higher ground than their neighbors. Geographically that’s true, but Monsignor Mike and I both agree that following Jesus is all uphill. The ladder we all must climb is the ladder of humility – we only climb closer to heaven if we intentionally choose to be humble. The first thing that needs to go is the old dead carcass of superiority.
Those of us who have engaged in works of service know this to be true. If we go blazing into a place of need as experts, we will be dismissed. If we go in and throw money around to feel better about ourselves, and then leave, we haven’t accomplished a thing. If we presume our job is to tell others what to do, it might never occur to us how we are coming across as tyrants.
The only way to make a difference in a painful world is to step alongside, to listen, to learn, to do the hard work of collaboration, and to stand on the same level ground as the rest of our fellow human beings.
Listen again to that shameless request: “Teacher, we want you to do whatever we ask of you.” As if they are in charge. As if they are already seated on those lofty thrones, to the right and left.
Wouldn’t the better prayer be this? “God, make us more like Jesus. Open our hearts to those around us. Save us from an inflated view of our own importance. Liberate us from every form of selfishness. Give us the heart of a servant, for we see this in the Christ who has given his life to ransom us from the powers of evil. Amen.”
Saturday, October 9, 2021
If I Were a Rich Man
October 10, 2021
As he was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; You shall not defraud; Honor your father and mother.’” He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.” Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.
Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” They were greatly astounded and said to one another, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”
Peter began to say to him, “Look, we have left everything and followed you.” Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields, for my sake and for the sake of the good news, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.”
Here is the Bible story most likely to make us groan. Whenever the preacher reads this one, folks hang onto their wallets. That’s particularly true if it’s October and the church leaders have begun to assemble the next year’s budget. I checked my files and I have eight different sermons on this one. All of them were preached during a stewardship season. And as I recall, none of those sermons had the desired effect: after listening, nobody gave all their money away, especially if they sensed the preacher wasn’t going to give away all his money, either.
That’s fair. On the road to the cross, Jesus invites this wealthy man to give it all away, not to the church, not to the synagogue, not even to God – but to the poor. Even back in the first century, smart people would know that you can’t fund a religious community if people have already given all their money away. This is probably a lousy stewardship text.
So you will be glad to know that other than the regular invitation for the offering, there will be no fundraising appeal today. No, we are going to wait on that…until next week. I want to talk about discipleship, about following Jesus. I want to talk about this rich man, for he is the only person in the Gospel of Mark whom Jesus loved. I want to talk about his sadness, his grief. And I want to talk about the confusion of the twelve disciples.
Let’s take them in reverse order. First, the disciples. If you have been traveling with us the past few weeks, you know that Mark’s Gospel describes the twelve followers of Jesus as bumbling fools. They never understand. They never get it right. You can take that literally; I take it rhetorically. This Gospel is trying to instruct us.
As Mark describes him, Jesus invites rank-and-file people to get in step with him. He doesn’t care if they are important or have a lot of education. He is not interested if they come from significant social standing. In an act of sheer grace, he calls them. He invites them. He never tells them where they are going, only says, “Come, follow me.” Where he goes, they can go.
Yet there’s a big hook to this invitation. It is best stated this way: you can come with him as you are, but you’re not going to stay that way. The journey will change you. You will be challenged to grow, pressed to reach for things that you didn’t know were necessary. Some of your values will be turned upside down. We have seen this disruption many times so far in Mark’s Gospel, and we will see it some more.
The big disruption today is money and all the cool stuff that you can buy with it. The disciples are under the impression that the more money you have, the happier and more successful you will be.
Where do they get this idea? Well, maybe they watch Jeopardy at night and salivate over those big cash prizes. Or maybe they have watched a business grow, with increases in sales, customers, and income. Or maybe they are under pressure from their spouses to keep up with the advancements and acquisitions of their neighbors: “Why can’t we move to a larger house like them, or move to a nicer town, or buy a faster camel, or get braces for our kids?” The world is always trying to sell us the notion that bigger is better and more is greater.
And to be honest, we
can find some of that thinking in the Bible. Just take one chapter – Proverbs,
chapter 10:
- “The blessing
of the Lord makes a person rich, and he adds no sorrow to it.” (10:22)
- “The wealth
of the rich is their fortress; the poverty of the poor is their ruin.”
(10:15)
- “A slack hand causes poverty, but the hand of the diligent makes rich.” (10:4)
It’s a consistent message in the Book of Proverbs: you work hard and fly straight, and you make a lot of money. So the twelve disciples can’t understand how Jesus could say, “How hard it will be for the wealthy to enter the kingdom of God!” It’s like a camel squeezing through the eye of a needle. Or as someone paraphrased him, “It’s like a Cadillac squeezing through a revolving door.” (Thanks to Fred Buechner.)
The disciples sputter, “Jesus, what you’re saying is counter to everything that the world teaches us. How can you say this?”
He can say it because he not only knows the tenth chapter of Proverbs. He knows the fifth and sixth chapters of Ecclesiastes. “I have seen a grievous ill,” says the sage. “The lover of money will not be satisfied with money, nor the love of wealth with gain. This is like reaching for smoke (5:10).” “Not only that, God gives them wealth and possessions, but they do not get to enjoy them” (6:2). Again, it’s like reaching for smoke.
“All human toil is aimed toward consumption,” says the Preacher, “yet the appetite is not satisfied.” (6:7)
Just remember King Solomon, traditionally believed to be a source for both Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, a wise man who could hold a paradox in tension. The Bible says Solomon was one of the richest men ever (although there’s a good chance his assets were over inflated). He was a wise man – and a foolish man. God judged Solomon, and this was the judgment: the king was given everything he wanted. He surrounded himself with extravagance and opulence, and then everything unraveled. His life ended with a dull thud.
Do you want to end up like that? Of course now. What’s going on with the rich man who approached Jesus? He came and knelt. Not only that, he butters him up with a title: “Good Teacher.” Then he says, “How can I gain eternal life?” Not merely heaven, you understand, but the life of eternity here and now – the whole thing, the life of God – “how can I gain that?” Because it is the one thing he cannot buy. He knows it. That is his sadness.
In this, he’s not all that different from the twelve disciples. They hear what Jesus says to him, watch him slump and shuffle away, listen to what Jesus says about the struggles of rich folks, and then Simon Peter pipes up, “Hey, look here, Lord. All of us have left everything to follow you.”
Jesus laughs. “Oh Peter, of course. Anybody who leaves it all behind to follow me will gain a hundred-fold here, and eternal life then. But you’re missing the point once again. Life is not a transaction, it’s a gift. If all you want to do is scramble for the top, you will fall flat on your face. And if you are flat on your face, you will be lifted up. It’s that first-last, last-first thing.”
When I hear Jesus say this, I mull over the whole conversation. Money can be both blessing and curse. We know that. Wealth creates opportunities; we know that too. When I make the last payment on my car in two weeks, we may purchase a new chair for the living room. We’ll have the money to do that. But we will buy a new chair because the old one is worn out. That’s the burden of owning a chair, of owning or possessing anything. They have an expiration date. Just like you and me – we have our expiration dates, too.
So here’s what I wonder. Do you suppose the rich man went away sad because he had so much and couldn’t give it up? Or do you suppose he went away sad because he had so much that he was unable to receive a gift? Probably a bit of both, but the inability to receive a gift is always the greater burden.
Think of it: there are some folks who have so much, you don’t know what to get them for Christmas. By their own admission, they are over-saturated. Like my dad. At the height of his earning power, we would say to my dad, “What can we get you for Christmas?”
“Oh, I don’t need anything,” he’d say. “Well, maybe an ice scraper for my windshield.” Christmas would come. Dad would get four ice scrapers. Then we’d feel guilty, spending a buck-twenty-five on an ice scraper, so we’d each get him a sweater. He had a closet full of sweaters and a garage full of ice scrapers.
But do you know what he really wanted? A cup of coffee, a good conversation, a hug, time spent together, and an “I love you.” If there was anything he needed, he’d go out and buy it. But what he really wanted was to be loved, to have his dear ones spend time with him, to ask him for advice, to sit with him for an hour or two. That was the greatest gift. Can’t buy those things. They are gifts.
Jesus looked at the rich man. He took a good, long look … and he loved him. He didn’t love him for his money. He didn’t love him because of his designer tunic or the fancy rings on his knuckles. He loved him because he was his neighbor. He valued the man because of who he was, not because of what he had or because he wanted. He loved him because they were both fellow travelers, breathing the same air, walking the same road, and living on borrowed time. That’s who all of us are.
One of the Bible scholars taught me something new about this story. When you already have eight sermons in the file, you’re tempted to think you heard it all, but no, not the case. When Jesus looks at this man, loves him, and says, “You lack one thing,” he offers a four-fold invitation in the original Greek language. He says, “Get up, sell what you have, give it to the poor, and come follow me.”
Now, we’ve heard three of those verbs - “sell, give, and follow.” But we’ve never noticed that first verb: “get up.” That’s what Jesus says five other times when he heals somebody: “get up!” They are down, they are sick, and he says, “Get up!” So this is his invitation – “to be healed of the sickness of accumulation.”[1]
It’s difficult to follow Jesus in the worst of times. But it’s no easier in the best of times when we are loaded down with a lot of stuff. Sometimes we just need to let it go. Travel lighter. Cash it in for those who need the essentials because we are burdened with the extras. So drop it, and then, get up and get moving.
I don’t know about
you, but the further I travel with Jesus, the more I can lay down, the less I
need to carry. Whatever else you want to say about this Gospel story, it is an
invitation to freedom. It’s a reminder that no matter how much we have, there
are some things we cannot buy, only receive. And the greatest of these is love –
the love of Christ for all of us, the love that invites us to be free.
[1] Ched Myers, Binding the Strong
Man: A Political Reading of Mark’s Story of Jesus (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis
Press, 1988) 273.
Saturday, October 2, 2021
Making Room
October 3, 2021
World Communion Sunday
People were bringing little children to (Jesus) in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them. But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.
Bob Chase is a creative guy, a minister with the United Church of Christ, and a good friend. For many years, he worked as Director of Communication for his denomination. Bob led an identity team at the church’s headquarters in Cleveland. The goal was to let people know there is a United Church of Christ.
They waved through the nice-looking couple - but turned away that other couple – the two men. A beautiful young teen drew near. “No, I don’t think so.” Apparently, her skin was the wrong color. Just then a middle-aged man in a wheelchair rolled up. He was stopped by an outstretched hand and a firm “No.”
With this, the tag line went up on the commercial: “Jesus didn’t turn people away. Neither do we. The United Church of Christ.”
The commercial was a big hit. A lot of people saw it. Maybe you remember it. The only problem is the networks refused to air it.
Bob Chase and his team pushed back. “Why?” They didn’t get a straight answer. So they pushed again. The United Church of Christ was ready to pay $1.7 million for a national campaign. After hemming and hawing, CBS declared, “We reject any ad that take a controversial stand.” Then NBC turned it down, saying, “The ad implies that there are churches that exclude people.”[2] Hmm – imagine that!
Exclusion is an old story, at least as old as the New Testament. Before the original Jewish church argued bitterly about welcoming Gentiles, the twelve disciples of Jesus were turning away noisy children. Mark said they spoke “sternly” about it – “Get those kids out of here!” They would not let the children come.
The Gospel writer offers no reason for their action. Were the children noisy? Or the parents pushy? He doesn’t say. Did Simon Peter, James, John, and the rest believe that church is only for the mature and well-educated? That it is available only for those who are well put together? If so, they – of all people - should know better. This is the sixth story in a row where the twelve disciples get it wrong. In most of these stories, Jesus must pivot and correct them. They do not understand him. They cannot comprehend his mission.
Today we hear Jesus say, rather indignantly, “Permit the children to come to me. Let them come. This is what the kingdom of God is like.” And he threw out his arms, hugged them, and blessed them. Yes, that’s the kingdom: an open invitation, an embrace, and a holy blessing. This is the essence of grace. Who do these disciples think they are? They act like bouncers outside of a dance club.
And they should have known better! Just two Sundays ago, we heard the twelve of them bickering about which of them was superior to all the others. Remember what Jesus did? He led a child by the hand into the middle of circle. Then he got down on the same level, and said, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me; whoever welcomes me welcomes the One who sent me.” It’s all about welcome.
That’s at the end of chapter nine. This is the beginning of chapter ten. Did they forget so quickly? Or is it difficult for the grace of the kingdom to seep into the souls of those who follow Jesus?
I believe it’s the difficulty, not the lapse of memory. Chapter ten begins with Jesus sitting down to teach the crowds, “as was his custom.” (10:1) He keeps teaching and teaching and teaching. It’s his custom. Why? Because he’s trying to teach what it’s like when God rules the world. For those of us who have seen how the world operates as the world, his wisdom will only break through if it’s repeated. Over and over and over.
“Whoever welcomes such a child welcomes me.” Does he need to say it again? Yes. Over and over again. “Let the children come to me.”
This is a familiar saying, of course. But it’s bigger than we realize. At least one Bible scholar reminds us of the specific children that we have met in the Gospel of Mark. There’s the little one who is used as an example of what it means to be small, vulnerable, and humble. And there are three others: the daughter of a synagogue ruler who is deathly ill (5:21), the daughter of a woman up on the coast who is in terrible distress (7:26), and the young boy who cannot speak or hear who has terrible convulsions (9:17-26).
These are the children that Jesus meets in Mark’s Gospel. Each one is in trouble, vulnerable, and under threat. These are the little ones Jesus welcomes. As scholar Ched Myers notes, children in the first century world were at great risk. They had no power. They had no social standing. They had to be protected from irresponsible adults.[3] To welcome the children meant to love all the little ones that nobody sees. The call for the church was to make room for them and embrace them. As somebody puts it, Jesus announces a “kingdom for nuisances and nobodies.” (John Dominic Crossan)
So this isn’t merely a happy little Bible story about caring
for adorable, little tykes; that would be a no-brainer. It’s so much more than
that. It is an invitation to broaden our awareness of who we are as the
people of God. Jesus calls us to make room for those at risk, to welcome all who
cannot defend themselves, for those who cannot make it on our own. They are
already here – we are already here.
If there is any continuing lesson from the pandemic, it’s the lesson that we are fragile. All of us. An unseen virus can sweep in, so we continue to take precautions. We have a safe place to admit our human weakness. Nobody is going to throw us out for being honest about our struggles and our worries. No black-shirt bouncer stands outside to declare, “You are not fit to be admitted.”
No, oh no – we are welcomed because Jesus the Christ sees us as little children – still learning, still growing, always in need, and ever ready for grace. We become like little children when we confess we are little children.
· We come, not because we are competent. We come because we are loved.
·
We come, not because we have it all together. We
come because Christ is refinishing our hearts and souls.
·
We come, not as experts. We come as disciples.
·
We come, not to guard the door. We come because
Jesus has opened the door so widely that nobody can shut it.
Remember the one, big sermon that Jesus gives? He says, “The Kingdom of God is at hand.” It’s right here. It’s available for the little ones. Like you.
[1] Watch the video: https://youtu.be/mW6X6l5XGsw
[2] See, for instance, http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/americas/12/01/us.church.adban/
[3] That’s all I will say
about adults who won’t let children wear masks to school in a pandemic.
Posts
