(Note: I apologize for not having updated the blog in several weeks - I've caught up by publishing sermons from June through July 15. Pastor Dave was part of a delegation from the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference, United Church of Christ, to Cuba, departing July 21, 2012 and returning July 28, 2012. Below is a report Pastor Dave made to the congregation.)
Dear Members and Friends of Emanuel- Hope you've been well - I've been catching up on emails. I got back from Cuba on Saturday, arriving back in Conshohocken around 11:30 pm last night. The trip was wonderful. Thanks for your prayers for my health. I'm writing with a brief initial report.
There were eight of us in the group. I had no health problems at all - and while this was my third trip to Cuba, this is the first time I've gotten through the trip without getting sick. Two of the group had mild illness due to the extreme heat, but that was the extent of health problems.
The churches we visited belonged to the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba (FIBAC), a progressive Baptist denomination whose theology shares much in common with the UCC. One of FIBAC's distinctives is that they have many, many female pastors, which is still fairly unusual (even controversial) in Cuba. We saw ten or so churches, with a lot of amazing ministries - in addition to very lively preaching, worship, and music, there were many gardens (including some gardens with medicinal herbs) and agricultural projects to benefit the church and surrounding neighborhoods, a Christian center which ministered through art and music, a seminary which serves around 500 students in all (very few of whom live on campus full time, but the seminary offers "intensive" courses that last for 2-3 weeks)...on and on. Many of the churches are quite small - several were house churches roughly the same size as Emanuel, and even the larger churches were less than 100 people, but they did amazing ministry with small numbers and limited resources. The churches are also very adept at leadership development and at planting new congregations; many of FIBAC's congregations have emerged within the past 10 years or so. We saw one church that had extensive fields that produced a great deal of food for the church, for the Cuban government, and for the neighborhood. This church, in the far west of the island, has also planted a number of new church starts in its area, which is quite rural and doesn't have as many churches as other parts of Cuba. We also learned that even for the Cubans, finding uncontaminated water can be difficult; some of the churches have water filtration systems and have outdoor water taps with filtered water that is offered free of charge to the neighborhood. We saw neighbors line up with their bottles, following a diagram near the tap to first sterilize their bottles with chlorine (also offered by the churches) and then fill up their bottles.
There were three pastors in our group - the Rev. Dr. Geneva Butz from the Conference, who preached for Emanuel's 150th, the Rev. Darryl Cruz, pastor of St. John's UCC in Reading, PA, and me, and each of us preached at one church each. We also had several translators - a member of one of the Cuban churches who teaches English as a second language, a missionary from the American Baptist church who accompanied us, and Rev. Cruz......and a few times, when none of these were nearby, I was able to help with some limited translation assistance from the little bit of Spanish I know. On Wednesday we took a needed break, spending the morning and early afternoon at Varadaro Beach, said to be the most beautiful beach in the world.....and it really was just like stepping into a picture postcard, it was so, so beautiful. And periodically through the trip we stopped at various cultural venues, including Havana's art museum, which is quite impressive.
For our UCC churches, it was mostly a time to observe and reconnect. There had been trips from the Pennsylvania Southeast conference (UCC) in 2007, 2008, and 2009, but it had been a few years since the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference (UCC) had sent a group, and had we not gone this year, the connection could easily have gone by the wayside, given the personnel changes at the Conference. Our group brought supplies (donated from our UCC churches, including some donations I made - so Emanuel was represented!) to give to the churches - especially medical supplies and drugs, which are very scarce in Cuba. Our group also brought various eyeglasses (some used prescription eyeglasses as well as some over-the-counter drugstore reading glasses), a few thermometers, two big boxes of non-latex medical gloves, several bottles of over-the-counter aspirin and tylenol and such, disposable razors (we were told the pastors routinely made "disposable" razors last for months due to the shortages), some coloring books and such for children.....except for the specialized medical donations, we broke our donations up into ten gift bags and left a bag with each church we visited. The specialized items, we left with the executive director of their denomination and asked him to direct them as most needed. Some of us (including me) also donated some of our clothing at the end of the trip......which were very sweaty, but the Cubans were most willing to wash them as the price of wearing them; that's how much need there is for basics like clothing.
Our grouphad some money left over at the end of the trip, almost $800 in American currency. One of the churches (the one on the far western side of the island with the extensive fields of vegetable gardens) was trying to get money for their music ministry to create a "master recording" for their music, to sell to finance their evangelism and vegetable raising ministries. We heard their music ministry at an evening church service where Geneva preached, and were very impressed with their music. We donated much of our remaining funds toward this ministry so they could make a master recording - with the provision that we get a copy of the master recording so we can also produce CD's to raise money to bring a group of youth to Cuba.
As I said, Emanuel Church was present, through donations and through my being there. At each church I introduced myself: "Me llamo Dave. Soy el pastor de la Iglesia Emanuel in Philadelphia. Estamos un poco iglesia con treinta miembres, y semana a semana esta quince presente, mas o menos." (There may be a grammatical glitch or two in that introduction, but it's the best I could do with my limited Spanish vocabulary.) I told several churches about our anniversary, and our role in founding Bethany Children's Home. Of the photos I took on July 15, I had copies made and gave them to the churches.
I'll be able to say more next Sunday, if desired. Mostly, at this point, I just wanted to let you know I got back from Cuba in one piece, and to share a little from my experiences there.
See you next Sunday -
Blessings - Pastor Dave
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Chosen
(Scriptures: 2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19 Ephesians 1:1-14, Mark -29)
Today we celebrate a rare moment in the life of our congregation – the ordination of an elder and a deacon, and a recognition of our congregation’s lay leadership. I’m not sure when the last ordination and installation of elders and deacons happened, but it’s likely been a few years.
I’d like to say a few words about the function of elders and deacons. In preparing for the service of installation, I reviewed the liturgy from the Evangelical & Reformed order of ordination and installation of elders and deacons. Even though we are a congregation of the United Church of Christ, our roots are in the Reformed tradition, and I felt it was important to give that tradition a voice in today’s service.
According to the E&R liturgy – and while I’m paraphrasing and summarizing, you’ll be hearing many of these words again during the installation, but since it’s been a while, hearing them twice may help us remember – elders are appointed to assist and support the ministers of the Word – that would be the pastor – in the general government of the church. Elders are to be the advisors and counselors of the minister in the performance of his duties, acting as the pastor’s hands and eyes. They are to watch over the congregation in the Lord, to take an active interest in the congregation’s spiritual welfare, to feel responsibility for its condition, to be at hand in all circumstances with spiritual aid for all its needs and wants. Moreover – and this is something we seldom mention in the UCC, but it does exist – to the elders, in conjunction with the pastor, belong the whole discipline of the church to censure members and to restore them to fellowship.
According to the E&R liturgy, Deacons are appointed to assist and support the Pastor in sustaining the more outward needs of the general household of faith. They are to aid in securing the funds necessary for the support of the church, and to cultivate the spirit of liberal and cheerful giving.
I’d also like to lift up some guidance from the United Church of Christ, which I’ve included in your bulletins, and from Scripture. We’re reminded that the office of elder actually pre-dates the existence of the Christian church. From the earliest days of the Hebrew people, the elders were those tribal leaders, those wise ones whose counsel, borne of long experience, was sought out in times of decision. In the book of Numbers, 11th chapter, at a time when Moses was feeling overwhelmed and nearly beside himself with frustration with the burden of leading the Israelites through the wilderness, the Lord instructed him to choose seventy elders, and the Lord took some of the spiritual power from Moses and confer it on them, so they could help Moses bear up under the burden of leading the people. In the book of Acts, as Paul planted new churches, he would appointed elders in each church, and with prayer and fasting entrusted the church to the Lord in whom they had come to believe. In the UCC, following the Reformed tradition, elders oversee the spiritual welfare of the church – preparing for and assisting in serving communion, assisting with the provision of communion to sick and shut-in members, visiting the sick and homebound, and keeping the pastor apprised of members who are in difficulty and need pastoral care.
The UCC reminds us that the office of Deacon originated in the 6th chapter of Acts, when the Gentiles complained that the Jewish widows were getting more assistance than the Gentile widows. The twelve called together the disciples and said, “It is not right that we should neglect the word of God in order to wait on tables.” So seven men of good standing were appointed – many, perhaps most of them Gentiles - and the apostles prayed and laid hands on them. Therefore, the Deacons are to assist with the more outward aspects of the church’s ministry – to distribute aid to the poor and support the church’s ministry in the community, to encourage stewardship and faithful giving to the church, to promote the church’s work of evangelism. Deacons can also assist with serving communion.
In considering these offices, it’s important to keep in mind Paul’s words about the church as one body of Christ with many parts having different functions. Which is to say that elders and deacons must work in harmony with the body as a whole. A church with elders and deacons who know how to work together and promote the congregation’s ministry is richly blessed. A church with elders and deacons who cause discord and disorder in the Lord’s house is sorely distressed. Remember Paul’s words to the fractious church at Corinth: “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.” And our elders and deacons should lead the way in building up the church.
Our sharply contrasting readings from the Old Testament and from Mark’s Gospel capture the range of emotions elders and deacons can experience. In our reading from 2 Samuel, David and his entourage are bringing the Ark of the Covenant, which had been captured in battle by the Philistines, back to the Hebrews in triumph. It’s a time of rejoicing, King David is dancing with all his might, throwing reserve and propriety to the winds. We’re told that his wife, Michal, Saul’s daughter, looked on David’s gyrations and despised him for making a spectacle of himself…..not unlike some prim church folk who look down their noses upon the more ..shall we say… expressive forms of worship. No matter: let Michal be as uptight as she wants; this was a day for celebration, and king David would be second to none in dancing his heart out before the Lord. And while we may not necessarily, in the words of the praise song, dance like David danced – these days Pastor Dave dances like Methuselah danced - elders and deacons will experience those moments of celebration during those high moments in the life of our church – the anniversaries, the baptisms, the weddings, those other holy moments we’re privileged to witness. In those moments when the presence of the Lord rocks the house and fills the house with joy, our elders and deacons can lead the way in rejoicing.
And then there are those other moments – those moments when, like John the Baptist, we step out in faith and make a bold statement or take a decisive action, and folks want our heads on a platter. It happens. It’s part of the package, unfortunately. Serving the church as elder, as deacon – indeed, as pastor, or in any other capacity - is not a popularity contest. In some situations it seems that no matter what you do or don’t do, somebody’s going to be unhappy. And especially if God is using our church’s ministry to take on the powers and principalities of the world, and spiritual wickedness in high places – that is to say, if the church is truly being the church, acting according to God’s will – those powers and principalities will push back, and people will be coming for our heads on a platter.
Our reading from Ephesians gives us a broad perspective which should keep us grounded during the highs and lows, keeping us from getting carried away with ourselves when things are going well and keeping us from throwing in the towel when things seem to be crashing and burning. In the UCC, elders and deacons are chosen by the congregation – but Ephesians reminds us that elders, deacons, and indeed every member of the congregation are chosen by God, indeed have been chosen by God from before our birth. Our life here at Emanuel is a banquet, to which God invited each of us before any of us were born. We were chosen – not to get a swelled head or to indulge an overgrown ego, but – what does Ephesians say? – to be holy and blameless in love – let’s repeat that together – “to be holy and blameless in love”…..and later, Ephesians says we are to live for the praise of his glory. As we ordain Al as Elder and David as Deacon, and as we reaffirm the ministries of those who have been serving, may God be glorified, and my God’s love be known among us. Amen.
Homecoming
(Scriptures: 2 Samuel 5:1-7, 9-10, 2 Corinthians 12:1-10 Mark 6:1-13)
This weekend was the annual Arts Festival at Penn State. It’s a big annual alumni event on campus, in which the art displays are almost secondary to the chance to meet with long-ago classmates and catch up. I’ve kept in touch with a few classmates over the years, and of course when we get together, out come the old stories, often stories that I’ve long since forgotten, but that were memorable for my classmates. I missed the festival this year – with the extreme heat, I really didn’t want to be outdoors stomping all over campus – but one couple keeps in touch with me regularly via Facebook and shares memories – “hey Dave, remember that time in college when we tried to feed you cat food.” (I told them that with the economy what it is, I’d probably be eating plenty of cat food after I retire; no need to start now.) We’re 30 years older and, at least in my case, many pounds heavier, but our strongest memories of each other date from when we were age 20 or so. I’m not the same person I was when I was 20 – thank goodness! - and neither are my friends, but while our lives have moved on, our memories of one other are, to some extent, frozen in time.
Our Scriptures this morning are also, in part, stories about memories, about how memories of the past live and give shape to the present. Our Scriptures this morning give us two contrasting homecoming stories – David in Hebron, being acclaimed as king by a grateful people who remembered that during the reign of Saul, it was David who, like a shepherd, “led out Israel and brought us in.” And Jesus, in his hometown of Nazareth, being dismissed by those who knew Jesus when he was growing up, who were perhaps grateful for his skills as a carpenter, but had no time or patience to hear his God-talk.
You see, the crowd at Hebron knew David, and the crowd at Nazareth knew Jesus – so they thought. Reasonably enough, the crowds expected that past behavior would predict future performance. For those at Hebron, the grateful tribes of Israel expected that as David had led them successfully in battle, he would be at least as successful in providing civic leadership as their king. And, for the most part, their expectations would be met, as future generations would look back at David’s reign as the golden age of the united kingdom of Israel and Judah. And the crowds at Nazareth? They expected Jesus would continue to make tables and chairs, and couldn’t imagine what had possessed him to run all over the countryside, healing who knows how, and teaching who knows what.. Mark tells us that Jesus’ previous visit to his hometown had been less than auspicious – Jesus’ family tried to have him locked up, and some visiting religious leaders basically accused Jesus of being Satan’s little helper. Not exactly a Kodak moment. The hometown visit in today’s Gospel reading was even more of a letdown – the crowds turned on him, and Jesus found that his power was limited by their lack of faith. A sentence in our Gospel sticks in our mind: “And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. And he was amazed at their unbelief.” Jesus, the Son of God, who had cured the Gerasene demoniac, healed the woman with internal bleeding, and raised Jairus’ daughter, was reduced to near-powerlessness by the unbelief of the hometown crowds.
At our Bible study, more than once the question has come up, “why don’t we experience healings and miracles like the ones in the Bible?” Perhaps our lack of faith limits God’s power to act in our lives. In the words of James, “we don’t have, because we don’t ask. We ask and do not receive, because we ask wrongly, to spend what we get on pleasure.”
Memories have power to confine, or to liberate. The Apostle Paul writes of a powerful vision he was granted, a spiritual experience in which he was seemingly caught up into heaven and granted extraordinary revelations, too wonderful to repeat. Along with the revelations he experienced physical limitations as Paul said, to keep him from getting carried away with himself, to keep him grounded and dependent on God’s grace, made perfect in weakness.
“God’s grace is made perfect in weakness.” Few people would describe Emanuel Church as a powerhouse congregation. Our building, while lovely and full of holy memories, will never be mistaken for the Vatican or even for the Cathedral of St. Peter and Paul down on the Parkway. Our congregation, even in its heyday, was never a megachurch, and even less so today. From a worldly, materialistic point of view, weakness abounds. Perhaps it is in just such a congregation as ours, amid such apparent weakness, that God’s grace can be seen most readily. We can be present for one another and look after one another in a personal way that isn’t always available in larger congregations. With no particular worldly clout to throw around, God can – and I believe, does - use our small congregation as a channel of grace to reach those in need of grace, one person at a time, one family at a time – when we believe, when our faith gives God enough room to act. And when we are willing to act on our faith – by welcoming those God sends our way, by sharing what we have, however little, with those in need. Even if we may not be able to do great things in a worldly sense, by God’s grace and in God’s name we can do small things with great love.
In the words of Elizabeth Barrett Browning:
Earth’s crammed with heaven
And every common bush afire with God:
But only he who sees takes off his shoes
The rest sit ‘round it and pluck blackberries.
Here at Emanuel Church, we cherish our memories, our stories of those holy moments in which God met us in the past. Like Paul’s memory of being caught up into heaven, like his memory of the encounter with Christ on the Damascus road, may our memories inspire us, but not limit us. May our faith leave space for God to continue to do new things in our midst. May those who visit Emanuel Church come away saying, “Surely the presence of the Lord is in this place.” Amen.
This weekend was the annual Arts Festival at Penn State. It’s a big annual alumni event on campus, in which the art displays are almost secondary to the chance to meet with long-ago classmates and catch up. I’ve kept in touch with a few classmates over the years, and of course when we get together, out come the old stories, often stories that I’ve long since forgotten, but that were memorable for my classmates. I missed the festival this year – with the extreme heat, I really didn’t want to be outdoors stomping all over campus – but one couple keeps in touch with me regularly via Facebook and shares memories – “hey Dave, remember that time in college when we tried to feed you cat food.” (I told them that with the economy what it is, I’d probably be eating plenty of cat food after I retire; no need to start now.) We’re 30 years older and, at least in my case, many pounds heavier, but our strongest memories of each other date from when we were age 20 or so. I’m not the same person I was when I was 20 – thank goodness! - and neither are my friends, but while our lives have moved on, our memories of one other are, to some extent, frozen in time.
Our Scriptures this morning are also, in part, stories about memories, about how memories of the past live and give shape to the present. Our Scriptures this morning give us two contrasting homecoming stories – David in Hebron, being acclaimed as king by a grateful people who remembered that during the reign of Saul, it was David who, like a shepherd, “led out Israel and brought us in.” And Jesus, in his hometown of Nazareth, being dismissed by those who knew Jesus when he was growing up, who were perhaps grateful for his skills as a carpenter, but had no time or patience to hear his God-talk.
You see, the crowd at Hebron knew David, and the crowd at Nazareth knew Jesus – so they thought. Reasonably enough, the crowds expected that past behavior would predict future performance. For those at Hebron, the grateful tribes of Israel expected that as David had led them successfully in battle, he would be at least as successful in providing civic leadership as their king. And, for the most part, their expectations would be met, as future generations would look back at David’s reign as the golden age of the united kingdom of Israel and Judah. And the crowds at Nazareth? They expected Jesus would continue to make tables and chairs, and couldn’t imagine what had possessed him to run all over the countryside, healing who knows how, and teaching who knows what.. Mark tells us that Jesus’ previous visit to his hometown had been less than auspicious – Jesus’ family tried to have him locked up, and some visiting religious leaders basically accused Jesus of being Satan’s little helper. Not exactly a Kodak moment. The hometown visit in today’s Gospel reading was even more of a letdown – the crowds turned on him, and Jesus found that his power was limited by their lack of faith. A sentence in our Gospel sticks in our mind: “And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. And he was amazed at their unbelief.” Jesus, the Son of God, who had cured the Gerasene demoniac, healed the woman with internal bleeding, and raised Jairus’ daughter, was reduced to near-powerlessness by the unbelief of the hometown crowds.
At our Bible study, more than once the question has come up, “why don’t we experience healings and miracles like the ones in the Bible?” Perhaps our lack of faith limits God’s power to act in our lives. In the words of James, “we don’t have, because we don’t ask. We ask and do not receive, because we ask wrongly, to spend what we get on pleasure.”
Memories have power to confine, or to liberate. The Apostle Paul writes of a powerful vision he was granted, a spiritual experience in which he was seemingly caught up into heaven and granted extraordinary revelations, too wonderful to repeat. Along with the revelations he experienced physical limitations as Paul said, to keep him from getting carried away with himself, to keep him grounded and dependent on God’s grace, made perfect in weakness.
“God’s grace is made perfect in weakness.” Few people would describe Emanuel Church as a powerhouse congregation. Our building, while lovely and full of holy memories, will never be mistaken for the Vatican or even for the Cathedral of St. Peter and Paul down on the Parkway. Our congregation, even in its heyday, was never a megachurch, and even less so today. From a worldly, materialistic point of view, weakness abounds. Perhaps it is in just such a congregation as ours, amid such apparent weakness, that God’s grace can be seen most readily. We can be present for one another and look after one another in a personal way that isn’t always available in larger congregations. With no particular worldly clout to throw around, God can – and I believe, does - use our small congregation as a channel of grace to reach those in need of grace, one person at a time, one family at a time – when we believe, when our faith gives God enough room to act. And when we are willing to act on our faith – by welcoming those God sends our way, by sharing what we have, however little, with those in need. Even if we may not be able to do great things in a worldly sense, by God’s grace and in God’s name we can do small things with great love.
In the words of Elizabeth Barrett Browning:
Earth’s crammed with heaven
And every common bush afire with God:
But only he who sees takes off his shoes
The rest sit ‘round it and pluck blackberries.
Here at Emanuel Church, we cherish our memories, our stories of those holy moments in which God met us in the past. Like Paul’s memory of being caught up into heaven, like his memory of the encounter with Christ on the Damascus road, may our memories inspire us, but not limit us. May our faith leave space for God to continue to do new things in our midst. May those who visit Emanuel Church come away saying, “Surely the presence of the Lord is in this place.” Amen.
Only Believe
(Scriptures: 2 Samuel 1:1-4, 11-12, 17-27, 2 Corinthians 8:1-15 Mark 5:21-43)
You’ve likely heard the saying “It’s not the destination, it’s the journey.” It’s a saying of which I need to be reminded frequently. As a person juggling multiple crowded schedules – as an employee, as a seminary student, as a pastor – I’m usually very focused on getting from point A to point B as directly and, most importantly, as quickly as possible. .I rarely take time to stop and smell the roses. When I’m running behind schedule and in a hurry to get someplace, I’m not always known for my patience with those slower drivers unfortunate enough to find my car bearing down on them, sometimes with the horn going full blast. And I’m sure many of us can tell similar stories, as we’re all juggling multiple crowded schedules – work schedules, children’s school schedules, schedules of doctors appointments for ourselves or for family members, and so on. We all find ourselves with promises to keep, and miles to go before we sleep.
“It’s not the destination, it’s the journey.” Try telling that to Jairus in our Gospel reading. Jesus has just returned from casting out a demon on the Gentile side of the Sea of Galilee, and is back in familiar territory. Jairus, a local synagogue leader hurries up to Jesus to enlist his healing powers to cure the synagogue leader’s twelve year old daughter, who was near death. And Jesus begins to journey with Jairus……
…..and Jesus apparently gets sidetracked. You see, someone else had healing on her mind. She’d had hemorrhages for 12 years – as long as Jairus’ daughter had been alive, that’s how long this woman had been ill. We’re told that she had spent everything she had on one doctor after another, none of whom could do anything to help her. And I’m sure we all know people who’ve had similar experiences with the medical profession – in this day of high unemployment and lost medical benefits, many uninsured are one medical crisis away from destitution and bankruptcy. Because of the Levitical purity laws around illness and especially anything involving blood, the woman likely suffered not only bodily illness, but social isolation. Think of how this woman must have felt – weary, discouraged, verging on despair. No great planning as involved: the woman just happened along where Jesus was, and hoped that if she could touch, not even he himself, but just the fringe of his clothing, she might be healed. So, tired as she was, discouraged as she was, she was also persistent. She made her way through the jostling of the crowd to where Jesus walked, and touched his cloak – and was healed. Jesus himself felt that healing power had gone out of him, and asked “Who touched my clothes?” [Imagine yourself as Jairus at that moment when Jesus starts going on about his clothes, and the crowd stops dead in its tracks.] Something in Jesus voice let everyone know that he wasn’t playing, that he felt someone touch his clothes in an intentional way beyond the normal jostling of the crowd. Eventually, the woman told her whole story to Jesus, who replied, “Daughter, your faith has made you well, go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”
Good for her. Not so good for Jairus, who must have been just about beside himself at this point – especially after some people from his household came to tell that his daughter was dead. Jairus was urged not to bother Jesus any further, but Jesus reassured Jairus – in today’s language - “hey, I’ve got this. Do not fear. Only believe.” He raised the girl, and reminded those who were standing around with their mouths hanging open that, oh, by the way, she’s probably hungry and might appreciate something to eat.
I began this sermon with the saying, “It’s not the destination, it’s the journey” and so I’m going to digress just a bit to talk about the way Mark tells the stories in today’s Gospel. Of course, Mark wrote down these stories for a very explicit purpose – to bring people to belief in Jesus as Messiah, as Savior and Lord. The writer of Mark’s Gospel used many different techniques to accomplish all this. One of Mark’s favorite techniques is to sandwich one story inside another – in this case, the story of the healing of the woman with the hemorrhage is sandwiched inside the story of the healing of Jairus’ daughter. We start with the story of the girl being sick, apparently digress to the story of the woman touching Jesus’ clothing, and return to conclude with the healing of the little girl. So Mark not only wanted these two healings to be remembered, but wanted them to be remembered together. Not only is one story sandwiched inside the other, but the two stories are linked by the number twelve - We’re told that the girl is twelve years old, and that the woman had suffered from her illness for twelve years. The number twelve has significance in Jewish thought – twelve tribes of Israel, twelve months of the year – and so the number twelve appearing in both these healing stories would have helped anchor these stories in the memories of Mark’s readers as they came to belief in the saving power of Jesus.
What both these stories together tell us is that an illness that slowly drained the life out of a woman over the course of twelve years, an illness that threatened to claim the life of a twelve year old girl – neither of these is beneath the notice of our Lord Jesus. Nor are our diseases and afflictions. Nor are those of our neighbors. We pray for those who are ill, fully expecting God to act – and sometimes we’re called to put hands and feet on our prayers by acting as well as praying. The Good News we proclaim must be good news in the lives – bodies, minds, souls – of those around us.
In his earthly ministry, among many other things, Jesus was a healer, and his healings were seen, not just as grace for those who were healed, but as an attack on the powers of evil. We likely cannot heal people with a touch as Jesus did - though even in my short time here, I’ve seen God work in wonderful ways for some of the folks on our prayer list. But we are called to remember that every single person we meet is created in God’s image, bears some resemblance to the divine, even if we have to look really hard to find it sometimes. The same God who created us, created our neighbors. Certainly during this week, as there is so much political debate over the question of who has access to health care, we might remember that Jesus not only performed his healings for free, but performed them without asking any questions about the worthiness or unworthiness of the recipients of his healing grace. In our Gospel readings from Mark over the past few weeks, we’ve watched Jesus travel from one side of the Sea of Galilee to the other to ministered to Jew and Gentile alike, without distinction. Under God, our lives are all connected – there is no us vs them, but only us, all of us. Therefore we cannot, like the priest and Levite in Jesus’ parable, walk on the other side of the road when we see sister or brother struck down by illness or misfortune, but are called to stand with them in solidarity.
This past week, I got a reminder of how demanding solidarity can be sometimes. Like most pastors, I receive occasional calls for assistance. This past week I got a doozy – a single mom, with several children, no husband in the picture, about to give birth – and she and her family are homeless. Did I know of any place that could provide shelter? I responded as I often do to such requests – “Let me make a few phone calls” - and quickly got a crash course learning how much our society’s safety net has been shredded. Like Mary and Joseph seeking a place in which Mary could bring our Lord into the world, what I heard over and over was “no room in the inn”. With their funding cut, social service agencies are completely overwhelmed by the demand for their services. Shelters might find a way to squeeze in a single man or a single woman, but a pregnant woman about to give birth, with other kids in the picture – no way. Boarding houses – full. Even motels – almost without exception, full, or unaffordable. Eventually a relatively cheap motel was located, and enough money scraped together so the woman and her family would have a roof over their head – for a few days anyway. After that? Quite literally, God only knows.
With our annual July 4 celebration of Independence rapidly approaching, it seems appropriate to consider the intersection between our faith and our national life, to ask the question “What kind of a country do we want to be?” You may have read in the news about the recent fracas between the Pope and the Leadership Council of Women Religious – an umbrella organization that brings together Roman Catholic nuns of various religious orders. The Pope issued a highly-publicized statement chastising the nuns for being too vocal on social justice issues, and strongly urging them to keep a lower profile. (One might wonder if somebody’s spiking the incense with controlled substances, as apparently here at home the US Conference of Catholic Bishops is attacking that breeding ground of radical feminism – the Girl Scouts – which our church used to host until our troops ran out of adult leaders, and whom I think we’d welcome in a hot second if leaders for a Bridesburg troop could be found.) But anyway, back to the nuns - a subgroup of the nuns saw the Pope’s widely-read pronouncement as an opportunity, not to be silent, but to bring their advocacy to a wider audience, to stop preaching to the choir and start preaching to the public. The “Nuns on a Bus” tour came to Chestnut Hill College this past Friday, and shared their vision for a federal budget that doesn’t leave behind the poor and dispossessed. It’s a vision supported by a diverse array of religious communities, including the Justice and Witness ministries of the United Church of Christ. If you want to take a look, it’s at the website in the bulletin – faithfulbudget.org
Today’s account of the healing of Jairus’ daughter reminds me of the familiar UCC saying, “Don’t put a period where God has placed a comma: God is still speaking.” When the messengers told Jairus that his daughter was dead, it certainly seemed like the end of the daughter’s story. But God was indeed still speaking, as Jesus said, “Do not fear. Only believe.” When we – as individuals or as a society - react from fear, we become guarded, defensive, seeking to put distance between ourselves and the problems of our neighbors. We pull into ourselves, becoming less than what God intended. But when we – as individuals or as a society - respond out of our faith, we extend ourselves, reaching out to God and following where God leads us. This is the course of faith taken by the “Nuns on a Bus”, as they follow God’s lead from city to city. We too are called to respond to God in faith, and to follow where God leads. I don’t anticipate that God will call us to embark on a national bus tour, but God may very well call us to stretch and grow beyond what’s familiar, to open our hearts and open our doors to those in need whom God sends our way. Do not fear. Only believe. Amen.
You’ve likely heard the saying “It’s not the destination, it’s the journey.” It’s a saying of which I need to be reminded frequently. As a person juggling multiple crowded schedules – as an employee, as a seminary student, as a pastor – I’m usually very focused on getting from point A to point B as directly and, most importantly, as quickly as possible. .I rarely take time to stop and smell the roses. When I’m running behind schedule and in a hurry to get someplace, I’m not always known for my patience with those slower drivers unfortunate enough to find my car bearing down on them, sometimes with the horn going full blast. And I’m sure many of us can tell similar stories, as we’re all juggling multiple crowded schedules – work schedules, children’s school schedules, schedules of doctors appointments for ourselves or for family members, and so on. We all find ourselves with promises to keep, and miles to go before we sleep.
“It’s not the destination, it’s the journey.” Try telling that to Jairus in our Gospel reading. Jesus has just returned from casting out a demon on the Gentile side of the Sea of Galilee, and is back in familiar territory. Jairus, a local synagogue leader hurries up to Jesus to enlist his healing powers to cure the synagogue leader’s twelve year old daughter, who was near death. And Jesus begins to journey with Jairus……
…..and Jesus apparently gets sidetracked. You see, someone else had healing on her mind. She’d had hemorrhages for 12 years – as long as Jairus’ daughter had been alive, that’s how long this woman had been ill. We’re told that she had spent everything she had on one doctor after another, none of whom could do anything to help her. And I’m sure we all know people who’ve had similar experiences with the medical profession – in this day of high unemployment and lost medical benefits, many uninsured are one medical crisis away from destitution and bankruptcy. Because of the Levitical purity laws around illness and especially anything involving blood, the woman likely suffered not only bodily illness, but social isolation. Think of how this woman must have felt – weary, discouraged, verging on despair. No great planning as involved: the woman just happened along where Jesus was, and hoped that if she could touch, not even he himself, but just the fringe of his clothing, she might be healed. So, tired as she was, discouraged as she was, she was also persistent. She made her way through the jostling of the crowd to where Jesus walked, and touched his cloak – and was healed. Jesus himself felt that healing power had gone out of him, and asked “Who touched my clothes?” [Imagine yourself as Jairus at that moment when Jesus starts going on about his clothes, and the crowd stops dead in its tracks.] Something in Jesus voice let everyone know that he wasn’t playing, that he felt someone touch his clothes in an intentional way beyond the normal jostling of the crowd. Eventually, the woman told her whole story to Jesus, who replied, “Daughter, your faith has made you well, go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”
Good for her. Not so good for Jairus, who must have been just about beside himself at this point – especially after some people from his household came to tell that his daughter was dead. Jairus was urged not to bother Jesus any further, but Jesus reassured Jairus – in today’s language - “hey, I’ve got this. Do not fear. Only believe.” He raised the girl, and reminded those who were standing around with their mouths hanging open that, oh, by the way, she’s probably hungry and might appreciate something to eat.
I began this sermon with the saying, “It’s not the destination, it’s the journey” and so I’m going to digress just a bit to talk about the way Mark tells the stories in today’s Gospel. Of course, Mark wrote down these stories for a very explicit purpose – to bring people to belief in Jesus as Messiah, as Savior and Lord. The writer of Mark’s Gospel used many different techniques to accomplish all this. One of Mark’s favorite techniques is to sandwich one story inside another – in this case, the story of the healing of the woman with the hemorrhage is sandwiched inside the story of the healing of Jairus’ daughter. We start with the story of the girl being sick, apparently digress to the story of the woman touching Jesus’ clothing, and return to conclude with the healing of the little girl. So Mark not only wanted these two healings to be remembered, but wanted them to be remembered together. Not only is one story sandwiched inside the other, but the two stories are linked by the number twelve - We’re told that the girl is twelve years old, and that the woman had suffered from her illness for twelve years. The number twelve has significance in Jewish thought – twelve tribes of Israel, twelve months of the year – and so the number twelve appearing in both these healing stories would have helped anchor these stories in the memories of Mark’s readers as they came to belief in the saving power of Jesus.
What both these stories together tell us is that an illness that slowly drained the life out of a woman over the course of twelve years, an illness that threatened to claim the life of a twelve year old girl – neither of these is beneath the notice of our Lord Jesus. Nor are our diseases and afflictions. Nor are those of our neighbors. We pray for those who are ill, fully expecting God to act – and sometimes we’re called to put hands and feet on our prayers by acting as well as praying. The Good News we proclaim must be good news in the lives – bodies, minds, souls – of those around us.
In his earthly ministry, among many other things, Jesus was a healer, and his healings were seen, not just as grace for those who were healed, but as an attack on the powers of evil. We likely cannot heal people with a touch as Jesus did - though even in my short time here, I’ve seen God work in wonderful ways for some of the folks on our prayer list. But we are called to remember that every single person we meet is created in God’s image, bears some resemblance to the divine, even if we have to look really hard to find it sometimes. The same God who created us, created our neighbors. Certainly during this week, as there is so much political debate over the question of who has access to health care, we might remember that Jesus not only performed his healings for free, but performed them without asking any questions about the worthiness or unworthiness of the recipients of his healing grace. In our Gospel readings from Mark over the past few weeks, we’ve watched Jesus travel from one side of the Sea of Galilee to the other to ministered to Jew and Gentile alike, without distinction. Under God, our lives are all connected – there is no us vs them, but only us, all of us. Therefore we cannot, like the priest and Levite in Jesus’ parable, walk on the other side of the road when we see sister or brother struck down by illness or misfortune, but are called to stand with them in solidarity.
This past week, I got a reminder of how demanding solidarity can be sometimes. Like most pastors, I receive occasional calls for assistance. This past week I got a doozy – a single mom, with several children, no husband in the picture, about to give birth – and she and her family are homeless. Did I know of any place that could provide shelter? I responded as I often do to such requests – “Let me make a few phone calls” - and quickly got a crash course learning how much our society’s safety net has been shredded. Like Mary and Joseph seeking a place in which Mary could bring our Lord into the world, what I heard over and over was “no room in the inn”. With their funding cut, social service agencies are completely overwhelmed by the demand for their services. Shelters might find a way to squeeze in a single man or a single woman, but a pregnant woman about to give birth, with other kids in the picture – no way. Boarding houses – full. Even motels – almost without exception, full, or unaffordable. Eventually a relatively cheap motel was located, and enough money scraped together so the woman and her family would have a roof over their head – for a few days anyway. After that? Quite literally, God only knows.
With our annual July 4 celebration of Independence rapidly approaching, it seems appropriate to consider the intersection between our faith and our national life, to ask the question “What kind of a country do we want to be?” You may have read in the news about the recent fracas between the Pope and the Leadership Council of Women Religious – an umbrella organization that brings together Roman Catholic nuns of various religious orders. The Pope issued a highly-publicized statement chastising the nuns for being too vocal on social justice issues, and strongly urging them to keep a lower profile. (One might wonder if somebody’s spiking the incense with controlled substances, as apparently here at home the US Conference of Catholic Bishops is attacking that breeding ground of radical feminism – the Girl Scouts – which our church used to host until our troops ran out of adult leaders, and whom I think we’d welcome in a hot second if leaders for a Bridesburg troop could be found.) But anyway, back to the nuns - a subgroup of the nuns saw the Pope’s widely-read pronouncement as an opportunity, not to be silent, but to bring their advocacy to a wider audience, to stop preaching to the choir and start preaching to the public. The “Nuns on a Bus” tour came to Chestnut Hill College this past Friday, and shared their vision for a federal budget that doesn’t leave behind the poor and dispossessed. It’s a vision supported by a diverse array of religious communities, including the Justice and Witness ministries of the United Church of Christ. If you want to take a look, it’s at the website in the bulletin – faithfulbudget.org
Today’s account of the healing of Jairus’ daughter reminds me of the familiar UCC saying, “Don’t put a period where God has placed a comma: God is still speaking.” When the messengers told Jairus that his daughter was dead, it certainly seemed like the end of the daughter’s story. But God was indeed still speaking, as Jesus said, “Do not fear. Only believe.” When we – as individuals or as a society - react from fear, we become guarded, defensive, seeking to put distance between ourselves and the problems of our neighbors. We pull into ourselves, becoming less than what God intended. But when we – as individuals or as a society - respond out of our faith, we extend ourselves, reaching out to God and following where God leads us. This is the course of faith taken by the “Nuns on a Bus”, as they follow God’s lead from city to city. We too are called to respond to God in faith, and to follow where God leads. I don’t anticipate that God will call us to embark on a national bus tour, but God may very well call us to stretch and grow beyond what’s familiar, to open our hearts and open our doors to those in need whom God sends our way. Do not fear. Only believe. Amen.
Rocking the Boat
(Scriptures: I Samuel 17:32-49, 2 Corinthians 6:1-13, Mark 4:35-41)
Any horror movie fans in the house today? I have to confess, it’s not my favorite genre of film, but I’ve seen a few over the years. In many horror movies, you can tell when something – er….horrible…is going to happen, because the creepy background music starts up. It’s predictable, as predictable as a scene of a woman being chased by the bad guy or monster and tripping over something while they run….they always trip and fall. In many movies, such non-verbal cues such as changes in background music or lighting and camera angles help prepare the viewer for what is to come.
The writer of Mark’s Gospel is, among other things, a master storyteller. Our Gospel reading, about Jesus calming the storm, marks a transitional moment in the early days of Jesus’ early ministry. Up until this point, Jesus has been ministering mostly among Jews. Having taught the crowds along his side of the sea of Galilee, Jesus launches across the sea to heal and preach among the people on the other side of the sea. And these people are…..for the most part, Gentiles. Non-Jews. People of different beliefs than those whom Jesus has encountered thus far. So Jesus is moving out of his comfort zone, and dragging his disciples with him. If Mark’s Gospel were a Star Wars movie, right about now Peter or one of the other disciples would probably be saying, “I have a bad feeling about this.”
The boat sets out on the water – Mark tells us other boats were him. As Jesus is in the back of the boat, asleep on the cushion – Mark gives us that level of detail – a violent windstorm comes up. It’s almost as if nature itself is aroused and trying to prevent Jesus from crossing. The disciples wake Jesus up with words, not only of fear, but of reproach – “Don’t you care that we’re dying?” We’re told that Jesus rebukes the wind and says, “Peace, be still” – and conditions become dead calm. The exchange between Jesus and the disciples bears mentioning: Jesus says, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” But we’re told the disciples are filled with great fear and ask, “Who is this, that even the wind and waves obey him?” One wonders, after all this happened, whether they were more afraid of the storm that had threatened to drown them or of this Jesus, who appears so nondescript but who could calm the storm, just like that.
The story of Jesus calming the waves is so important that accounts of it appear in all four Gospels. Apparently the early church saw this story as crucial to understanding who Jesus is. The sea was seen as large, threatening, beyond human control or even comprehension – but very much within Jesus’ control. The story also foreshadows what will happen on the Gentile side of the Sea of Galilee – Jesus casts a demon out of the Gerasene demoniac, who lived among the tombs. Jesus who could calm the storms swirling around the disciples could also calm the storm going on within the man living among the tombs.
For the earliest readers of Mark’s Gospel, Jesus’ miracles were not just along the lines of cosmic good deeds done to impress and instruct his disciples. Rather, they were seen as a strategic advance of the Reign of God, an attack by the forces of God against the forces of evil, as represented by the storm and the demon that possessed the man who lived among the tombs.
This story – of Jesus crossing the sea of Galilee into Gentile territory, of storms threatening to end the mission before it began, of Jesus calming the storms and casting out demons on the Gentile side of the sea as he had on the Jewish side – would have resonated strongly with the earliest Christians. For they encountered the same obstacles. The 27th chapter of Acts tells of another sea voyage – a voyage of Paul to Italy - in which the ship encountered violent storms, and while the ship was run aground and destroyed, miraculously everyone’s life was saved. Paul, like Jesus and the disciples in our Gospel reading, traveled far from his own people to share the Gospel, encountered danger both from the sea and from opposition – and found that God was present, even in the midst of the storm. Reflecting on his experiences, in his letter to the church at Corinth he writes: “As servants of God we have commended ourselves in every way: through great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; in honor and dishonor, in ill repute and good repute. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet are well known; as dying, and see — we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything.”
Our little congregation, and our individual lives, may feel like small boats caught in a hurricane. We may find the deck swaying and our teeth rattling, may shake, rattle and roll as we’re tossed up and down and side to side. Especially if we are faithful to the Gospel, we are guaranteed to encounter pushback. After all, the best way to avoid getting caught in the storm is never to leave the dock. While it’s safe to stay on shore, it’s not faithful. Like those early disciples, like the Apostle Paul, we’re called to leave the safety of our backyards to set out for unknown territory, to go where God calls us to go. And we’ll encounter opposition and discouragement – if are serious and committed about doing the work of the Reign of God and taking on powers and principalities and spiritual wickedness in high places, the powers and principalities are going to push back. Our fear will make us want to turn around and go back to what’s familiar. The Bible doesn’t promise us blue skies and calm seas, but rather that God will be with us in the midst of the storm. In our fear we may cry out to God, “Don’t you care that we’re about to go under!” It is then that we can remember that we worship an awesome God who is very much in control.
Let me close with these words:
Be still, my soul, thy God does undertake to guide the future as he has the past.
The hope, thy confidence let nothing shake; all now mysterious shall be bright at last.
Be still, my soul: the wind and waves still know his voice who ruled them while he dwelt below.
Amen.
Good Soil
(Scriptures: I Samuel 16:1-13, 2 Corinthians 5:1-23 Mark 4:1-34)
Today’s Gospel reading gives us three parables about agriculture – about raising crops or, on a smaller scale, about gardening. I have to admit, I have struggled at times with preaching on these agricultural parables – because I’m not a farmer and it’s hard to preach on something outside my daily experience. I grew up in rural Berks County, in a small town surrounded by cornfields on all sides – this was years before Cabellas put Hamburg, Pennsylvania on the map for sporting enthusiasts. But while I had some exposure to farms when I was young, I’ve been living and working in the Philadelphia area now for more than 20 years. So my memories of farms and farmers have faded with the passing of the years.
This has changed recently, as an offshoot of the Occupy movement – Occupy Vacant Lots – has been reclaiming abandoned lots, with the city’s blessing, for small urban gardens. Feeling a bit nostalgic about getting my hands dirty, perhaps, I’ve hung out the with group as they worked on a lot on North 24th Street just below Cecil B Moore Ave and a series of small plots near 10th & Indiana, surrounding the Fair Hill Cemetery. Both plots are near public housing projects, and for me one of the unexpected blessings of the experience was watching the interactions between the Occupy folks and the folks from the projects. The hope – fulfilled in part – was that some of the project folk might get involved in the gardening – and enjoy the eating that came at the end. Because, really, the point of the garden is not just to raise food, but to create community where there was none.
This work had been going on for a number of weeks before I wandered onto the scene, and so much of the ground had already been cleared of debris; some had already been broken up to some extent. I was also told that the ground had been tested for hazardous materials – while the soil in these former industrial neighborhoods wasn’t exactly pure as the driven snow, it was deemed acceptable for gardening - and the gardens were being raised without fertilizer or pesticide or such. There were lots of different small plants being put in the garden – peppers, lettuce, tomatoes, eggplants – and I was grateful for the patience of those who were there, as I couldn’t always tell, for example, the difference between baby pepper plants from baby eggplant plants. While we pulled a lot of weeds, I also learned that some of what I had assumed were weeds to be pulled, were in fact edible and could be boiled for greens. We did pull lots of dandelions, but one of the folks wanted to take them home and boil up a mess of dandelion greens. I handed him my pile of pulled dandelions and said, “Bon appetite!” This gave me a bit of fresh insight into Jesus’ parable of the wheat and the weeds – a parable about, among other things, the mixed state of the church - in which the landowner cautioned against yanking out plants willy-nilly, because it was easy to mistake edible plants for weeds – or by application to the church, it’s easy to reject people whom God is calling to discipleship, but who may not fit the profile of “good church folk”. Certainly there were edible plants in the garden that didn’t fit the profile of the kind of veggies you’d find at Acme, but were good to have around all the same.
Jesus’ parable speaks of seed that fell on the path, on shallow soil, among thorns, and in good soil – and of course, the seed that fell among the good soil bore a bumper crop. One insight from my vacant lot adventures is – good soil doesn’t just happen. It’s hard work! The plots of land that are being turned into gardens, before the work began, had hard-trodden ground, rocks, thorn bushes, along with other delights - the occasional empty beer can or broken bottle or discarded tire, and so on and so on. You know how quickly beer bottles and such can build up in our cemetery, so you can imagine what these lots were like before the Occupy people arrived - nobody had been picking up trash from these vacant lots for quite some time. Good soil is what you hope to be left with after you’ve broken up downtrodden soil, removed the rocks, uprooted the thorns, and otherwise prepared the soil. And in the kingdom of heaven, people with hearts prepared for the gospel may sometimes just happen along, but more often God has to uproot the rocks and thorns – those things in our lives that block the growth of God’s word. When we are facing difficult changes and decisions in our lives, it doesn’t mean that God has abandoned us. Perhaps it just means that God is digging into our lives so he can pull some weeds out by the roots.
Perhaps the main lesson I learned from Occupy is that good soil can occur in unexpected places. You would expect to find good soil in the farm country of Berks County, where I grew up. In Brewerytown, in Fair Hill, in other parts of North Philadelphia, near housing projects – not so much. And yet, some hard work, some preparation, and Jesus’ parable re-enacts itself – “The seed sprouts and grows, we know not how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head” – or in the case of the lot gardens, instead of grain, tomatoes or peppers or such.“ In neighborhoods that many have left for dead, life blossoms amid the ruins.
And the same is true for the Reign of God. While God is present in places with stained glass windows and organ music, God also has a way of showing up in the most unlikely places, in the most unlikely faces. Situations that seem like a dead-end turn out to be unexpectedly life-giving. Persons who seem to have nothing of value to offer may come out with unexpected words of wisdom.
I’ve seen some of these seeds of God’s kingdom growing in some very unlikely places. Sr. Margaret McKenna runs a long-term recovery program at 20th & Norris Streets, bringing life and hope to an otherwise desolate neighborhood. Shane Claiborne’s Simple Way community in Kensington embraces what they call new monasticism to share in the life of their neighborhood, to live simply with their neighbors, that their neighbors may simply live.
How about here? Certainly Bridesburg does not seem to be the most promising place for God to do a new thing. Our congregation, the other congregations of the Bridesburg Council of Churches, find the spiritual soil of the neighborhood such that it’s a struggle to hang on, let alone blossom. Even All Saints, which would find the spiritual soil of this historically Roman Catholic neighborhood more favorable for growth, isn’t thriving as it once did. At first glance, it may seem that the spiritual soil in Bridesburg is as hard as a rock, overgrown with thorn bushes, perhaps depleted of nutrients for more delicate plants. To outsiders, a visit to Bridesburg can be one prickly experience.
And that’s where we, you and I, come in. I have to believe that God has put Emanuel Church here in Bridesburg for a reason, that we exist for some purpose of God beyond ourselves. And I mean that quite literally: I have to believe. I have to. After all, while I think Emanuel Church offers outstanding music – at least on the Sundays when Ralph is here, not so much when he’s away – and caring fellowship and good refreshments, and mercifully short sermons most of the time, is that reason enough to come here? As it happens, many of the pastors of the Council of Churches commute here – I come in from Conshohocken; Scott Bohr from the Presbyterian church comes in from Blue Bell; Tom Adams from the Baptist Church, God bless him, in his 80’s drives in every Sunday from Cape May, NJ. I assure you there are organ music and fellowship and dessert to be found in Conshohocken and Blue Bell and Cape May, NJ and any number of places in between. Any one of us can find outstanding organ music and good fellowship and tasty coffee and cake much closer to home. Why come to Bridesburg for all that? I come here, and the other pastors come here to their respective churches, because we believe in God and we believe in Bridesburg. I come because I have to believe that God calls our congregation together for worship each week here, in this place, for a reason – not to moan and groan about the hardness and overgrown and depleted state of the spiritual soil, but to change it, to do the hard work of pulling up thorn bushes and digging up rocks, to add mulch, to convert it to good soil that is receptive to the Gospel.
What might it look like to try some spiritual urban gardening here in Bridesburg? If our church is closed up most of the time, only open briefly on Sunday, we are like the hard ground of the path….there’s no way for folks to get in the door, no place for a seed to catch hold. So we need to find ways to have the doors open more often, and need to step outside our doors and take the Gospel to the neighborhood. If our church only welcomes certain kinds of people, or only welcomes them if they behave a certain way, we’re like the thin soil on rocky ground – newcomers might come and stay for a short time, but at some point in trying to integrate into the congregation, they feel like they’ve hit a brick wall, and stop coming. So we need to be a house of prayer for all kinds of people. If our lives outside the doors of the church don’t reflect the love of God, if our lives reflect the world’s priorities and not God’s priorities, if we are only out for ourselves and not for others, then the thorns have grown around our spiritual life and the fruit which God would have us bear, has been choked out. So in a culture full of idols such as money and privilege calling for our loyalty, we need to live in a countercultural way, so that our lives may bear fruit, that we may plant the seeds of the Gospel in the lives of others.
"Other seed fell into good soil and brought forth grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.” May God use our small congregation, Emanuel United Church of Christ, each of us here, to bring forth seeds of mercy and justice and lovingkindness, the seeds of the Gospel, the seeds of the Kingdom of God, seeds that will grow here in Bridesburg, in Philadelphia, and to the ends of the earth. Amen.
Today’s Gospel reading gives us three parables about agriculture – about raising crops or, on a smaller scale, about gardening. I have to admit, I have struggled at times with preaching on these agricultural parables – because I’m not a farmer and it’s hard to preach on something outside my daily experience. I grew up in rural Berks County, in a small town surrounded by cornfields on all sides – this was years before Cabellas put Hamburg, Pennsylvania on the map for sporting enthusiasts. But while I had some exposure to farms when I was young, I’ve been living and working in the Philadelphia area now for more than 20 years. So my memories of farms and farmers have faded with the passing of the years.
This has changed recently, as an offshoot of the Occupy movement – Occupy Vacant Lots – has been reclaiming abandoned lots, with the city’s blessing, for small urban gardens. Feeling a bit nostalgic about getting my hands dirty, perhaps, I’ve hung out the with group as they worked on a lot on North 24th Street just below Cecil B Moore Ave and a series of small plots near 10th & Indiana, surrounding the Fair Hill Cemetery. Both plots are near public housing projects, and for me one of the unexpected blessings of the experience was watching the interactions between the Occupy folks and the folks from the projects. The hope – fulfilled in part – was that some of the project folk might get involved in the gardening – and enjoy the eating that came at the end. Because, really, the point of the garden is not just to raise food, but to create community where there was none.
This work had been going on for a number of weeks before I wandered onto the scene, and so much of the ground had already been cleared of debris; some had already been broken up to some extent. I was also told that the ground had been tested for hazardous materials – while the soil in these former industrial neighborhoods wasn’t exactly pure as the driven snow, it was deemed acceptable for gardening - and the gardens were being raised without fertilizer or pesticide or such. There were lots of different small plants being put in the garden – peppers, lettuce, tomatoes, eggplants – and I was grateful for the patience of those who were there, as I couldn’t always tell, for example, the difference between baby pepper plants from baby eggplant plants. While we pulled a lot of weeds, I also learned that some of what I had assumed were weeds to be pulled, were in fact edible and could be boiled for greens. We did pull lots of dandelions, but one of the folks wanted to take them home and boil up a mess of dandelion greens. I handed him my pile of pulled dandelions and said, “Bon appetite!” This gave me a bit of fresh insight into Jesus’ parable of the wheat and the weeds – a parable about, among other things, the mixed state of the church - in which the landowner cautioned against yanking out plants willy-nilly, because it was easy to mistake edible plants for weeds – or by application to the church, it’s easy to reject people whom God is calling to discipleship, but who may not fit the profile of “good church folk”. Certainly there were edible plants in the garden that didn’t fit the profile of the kind of veggies you’d find at Acme, but were good to have around all the same.
Jesus’ parable speaks of seed that fell on the path, on shallow soil, among thorns, and in good soil – and of course, the seed that fell among the good soil bore a bumper crop. One insight from my vacant lot adventures is – good soil doesn’t just happen. It’s hard work! The plots of land that are being turned into gardens, before the work began, had hard-trodden ground, rocks, thorn bushes, along with other delights - the occasional empty beer can or broken bottle or discarded tire, and so on and so on. You know how quickly beer bottles and such can build up in our cemetery, so you can imagine what these lots were like before the Occupy people arrived - nobody had been picking up trash from these vacant lots for quite some time. Good soil is what you hope to be left with after you’ve broken up downtrodden soil, removed the rocks, uprooted the thorns, and otherwise prepared the soil. And in the kingdom of heaven, people with hearts prepared for the gospel may sometimes just happen along, but more often God has to uproot the rocks and thorns – those things in our lives that block the growth of God’s word. When we are facing difficult changes and decisions in our lives, it doesn’t mean that God has abandoned us. Perhaps it just means that God is digging into our lives so he can pull some weeds out by the roots.
Perhaps the main lesson I learned from Occupy is that good soil can occur in unexpected places. You would expect to find good soil in the farm country of Berks County, where I grew up. In Brewerytown, in Fair Hill, in other parts of North Philadelphia, near housing projects – not so much. And yet, some hard work, some preparation, and Jesus’ parable re-enacts itself – “The seed sprouts and grows, we know not how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head” – or in the case of the lot gardens, instead of grain, tomatoes or peppers or such.“ In neighborhoods that many have left for dead, life blossoms amid the ruins.
And the same is true for the Reign of God. While God is present in places with stained glass windows and organ music, God also has a way of showing up in the most unlikely places, in the most unlikely faces. Situations that seem like a dead-end turn out to be unexpectedly life-giving. Persons who seem to have nothing of value to offer may come out with unexpected words of wisdom.
I’ve seen some of these seeds of God’s kingdom growing in some very unlikely places. Sr. Margaret McKenna runs a long-term recovery program at 20th & Norris Streets, bringing life and hope to an otherwise desolate neighborhood. Shane Claiborne’s Simple Way community in Kensington embraces what they call new monasticism to share in the life of their neighborhood, to live simply with their neighbors, that their neighbors may simply live.
How about here? Certainly Bridesburg does not seem to be the most promising place for God to do a new thing. Our congregation, the other congregations of the Bridesburg Council of Churches, find the spiritual soil of the neighborhood such that it’s a struggle to hang on, let alone blossom. Even All Saints, which would find the spiritual soil of this historically Roman Catholic neighborhood more favorable for growth, isn’t thriving as it once did. At first glance, it may seem that the spiritual soil in Bridesburg is as hard as a rock, overgrown with thorn bushes, perhaps depleted of nutrients for more delicate plants. To outsiders, a visit to Bridesburg can be one prickly experience.
And that’s where we, you and I, come in. I have to believe that God has put Emanuel Church here in Bridesburg for a reason, that we exist for some purpose of God beyond ourselves. And I mean that quite literally: I have to believe. I have to. After all, while I think Emanuel Church offers outstanding music – at least on the Sundays when Ralph is here, not so much when he’s away – and caring fellowship and good refreshments, and mercifully short sermons most of the time, is that reason enough to come here? As it happens, many of the pastors of the Council of Churches commute here – I come in from Conshohocken; Scott Bohr from the Presbyterian church comes in from Blue Bell; Tom Adams from the Baptist Church, God bless him, in his 80’s drives in every Sunday from Cape May, NJ. I assure you there are organ music and fellowship and dessert to be found in Conshohocken and Blue Bell and Cape May, NJ and any number of places in between. Any one of us can find outstanding organ music and good fellowship and tasty coffee and cake much closer to home. Why come to Bridesburg for all that? I come here, and the other pastors come here to their respective churches, because we believe in God and we believe in Bridesburg. I come because I have to believe that God calls our congregation together for worship each week here, in this place, for a reason – not to moan and groan about the hardness and overgrown and depleted state of the spiritual soil, but to change it, to do the hard work of pulling up thorn bushes and digging up rocks, to add mulch, to convert it to good soil that is receptive to the Gospel.
What might it look like to try some spiritual urban gardening here in Bridesburg? If our church is closed up most of the time, only open briefly on Sunday, we are like the hard ground of the path….there’s no way for folks to get in the door, no place for a seed to catch hold. So we need to find ways to have the doors open more often, and need to step outside our doors and take the Gospel to the neighborhood. If our church only welcomes certain kinds of people, or only welcomes them if they behave a certain way, we’re like the thin soil on rocky ground – newcomers might come and stay for a short time, but at some point in trying to integrate into the congregation, they feel like they’ve hit a brick wall, and stop coming. So we need to be a house of prayer for all kinds of people. If our lives outside the doors of the church don’t reflect the love of God, if our lives reflect the world’s priorities and not God’s priorities, if we are only out for ourselves and not for others, then the thorns have grown around our spiritual life and the fruit which God would have us bear, has been choked out. So in a culture full of idols such as money and privilege calling for our loyalty, we need to live in a countercultural way, so that our lives may bear fruit, that we may plant the seeds of the Gospel in the lives of others.
"Other seed fell into good soil and brought forth grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.” May God use our small congregation, Emanuel United Church of Christ, each of us here, to bring forth seeds of mercy and justice and lovingkindness, the seeds of the Gospel, the seeds of the Kingdom of God, seeds that will grow here in Bridesburg, in Philadelphia, and to the ends of the earth. Amen.
Family
(Scriptures: I Samuel 8:1-22, 2 Corinthians 4:1-18; 5:1 Mark 3:20-35)
I’d like to open this sermon by asking you to ponder a bit on the word “home” and what it means to you. When you think of the word “home”, what images come up? Perhaps the house you grew up in, the neighborhood where you grew up – for some of us – though not all - Bridesburg or somewhere else in the lower northeast. Perhaps images of mom in the kitchen making turkey for Thanksgiving, or images of dad or sisters or brothers or other family members. .Or if our memories of our families of origin are more ambivalent, perhaps the world “home” calls up images of the home we’ve made as adults, with a spouse or partner and maybe some kids. We can go on a vacation and have the time of our lives seeing unfamiliar sights, but at the end of it, we’re ready to go home.
Our culture has many sayings about home, some positive, some not so much. We hear that “home is where the heart is.” Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz said, “There’s no place like home.” Robert Frost wrote, in “Death of a Hired Man,” “Home is where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” On the other hand, the title of Thomas Wolfe’s 1940 book, “You Can’t Go Home Again”, reminds us that though we can return to the geography of our childhood, it may no longer resemble the nostalgic images of home we carry in our minds – and that there’s often little satisfaction to be found in trying to relive the past. Some who grow up in rural areas with minimal economic opportunities or cultural activities leave their villages for the big city, and never look back. While many cultures are accustomed to having two or three or even four generations living under one roof, in our culture, grown children are expected to leave mother and father to set up homes of their own, and adult children in their 40’s who have never left home may get funny looks if they talk with others about living at home with mom.
In our reading from Mark’s Gospel, we watch Jesus come home, after a whirlwind ministry tour, to a very mixed reception from his hometown. Having done numerous healings and exorcisms, selected his disciples, and spent some time with God in prayer, Jesus needs some time to chill out – so he’s homeward bound.
His return home prompts a variety of reactions. The crowds continue to follow him, hoping for healing and release from suffering. His family and neighbors, though, aren’t so impressed. They watched Jesus grow up, watched him help his father in the family carpentry business, and can’t imagine why all these people would want to follow Jesus around. And the things Jesus is saying these days – my, he’s gotten big for his britches. Or so the neighbors think. Actually, they think Jesus has lost his mind – become some crazed religious nut – and so they’re chasing him around with the proverbial big net to try to catch him and restrain him. Their reaction would be comical if it weren’t so typical –when one member of a family behaves in ways that beyond the norm and the others try to get that person back in line - and in some ways, so sad. Some visiting religious scholars from Jerusalem are even less impressed – they think Jesus is demon-possessed, and that what he’s doing is the devil’s work.
As tired – and probably annoyed with family and religious leaders alike – as he is, Jesus tries to use the confrontation as a teaching moment. First he tries to reason with the religious leaders: Why would Satan want to cast himself out of somebody. Why would Satan work against himself, work to defeat himself. As Jesus tells it, the accusation of the religious leaders doesn’t even make sense.
But then Jesus goes on to say something that has had ordinary believers tied up in knots of false guilt, and Bible scholars tied up in knots of confusion trying to explain the verse. “Whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.” An eternal sin….can never have forgiveness….wow! That’s a heavy statement to ponder. Lots of sincere Christians have lost lots of sleep wondering if some statement hollered in anger or some obscenity uttered in a time of stress constitutes blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and therefore has them locked outside the pearly gates.
This is one of those statements where, I think, context is key. And what is the context? What Jesus had been doing through the power of the Holy Spirit, the religious leaders were attributing to Satan. And what had Jesus been doing – works of healing and especially of exorcism.
There are some words of comfort and of challenge to be found here. The comfort is, that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit – attributing the works of God to Satan – is not something most people are tempted to do. If we’re concerned that some action of ours constitutes blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, the fact that we’re concerned and seeking repentance pretty much rules out any possibility that we’re beyond forgiveness.
The challenge is that the very people who might be tempted to this sin are, ironically, a certain kind of religious person – the kind who think they have everything all figured out, who have all the answers, who make snap judgments about what God does and does not do, who are very quick to attribute unwelcome developments in their life and unwelcome actions of others to the work of Satan. Hear me carefully on this: You really, really don’t want to risk the possibility of taking something that God is doing and say it’s the work of the devil. You just don’t. This is why, when I’m asked about speaking in tongues or being slain in the spirit or other charismatic worship practices that are unfamiliar in our tradition, whether they are the devil’s work – why I refuse to give an across the board ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer. Do some people fake speaking in tongues – I’d imagine that some do. Is speaking in tongues a response to the work of the Holy Spirit – For some people, I’m sure it is, just as it was in New Testament times. Often, when we encounter some religious practice with which we’re unfamiliar and we’re not sure if it’s of God or not, the most honest response and the most faithful response is simply – “I don’t know.” Which is why I say “I don’t know” a lot, and am not afraid or ashamed to do so. The words “I don’t know” keep us humble, which is good for our spiritual development. Often it’s best, if we encounter a religious practice we can’t support, to just let it go and await developments. Sort of like the parable of the wheat and the weeds – in this world, we can’t always tell wheat and weeds apart, so we’re in no position to start yanking plants out of the ground or yanking people out of Christian fellowship willy-nilly. Or like the counsel of the rabbi Gamaliel in Acts: if it’s of men, it’ll eventually fall of its own weight, but if it’s of God, you don’t want to be found in opposition to God. The problem with the religious leaders who opposed Jesus is that they lacked humility, they weren’t willing to say “I don’t know” and leave Jesus alone; they in their pride had to be seen as having all the answers. And that was their downfall.
At that point, Mom and the family are outside the house where Jesus is teaching, and they ask those inside to let Jesus know that Mom and the family want to have a word with him. And let’s listen to Jesus’ response: in effect: “Who is my family? You (referring to those listening to him) are my family! Anyone who does God’s will is part of my family.
At this point, in the very traditional culture of Jesus’ time, and even in our culture, Jesus’ answer to the question “Who is my family?” may sound, to their ears and ours, as if Jesus himself uttered blasphemy against prevailing ideas of family. In Jesus’ culture, family would have included not only parents and children, but grandparents (and great grandparents if folks lived long enough), aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews – the whole extended family. It would have been a large grouping linked by blood and biology, but with boundaries - those not so linked were not family. American culture puts much less value on the ties of extended family, so in our culture, family is mom, dad, two or so kids – and that’s it. To underline this point, I included in your bulletin a photo of a statue in Conshohocken, where I live, in honor of “The Family”. This statue, created by one J. Pavone and commissioned by an Italian-American veterans organization, virtually turns the American model of mom, dad, and two kids into an idol to be venerated.
They say that “blood is thicker than water”, but there are times when blood ties aren’t enough to carry the day. Our reading from I Samuel tells of such a time. Faithful Samuel has been judge over Israel for many years, from his youth until he was old and grey. In his old age Samuel appointed his sons as judges – hoping they would carry on after Samuel had passed from this life - but the sons were corrupt. While the sons shared Samuel’s bloodline, they didn’t share Samuel’s values or the same priorities. Because of the sons’ corruption, the people asked Samuel to anoint a king for them. Jesus said that “A house divided cannot stand”, and in the case of Samuel’s house, his children’s rejection of Samuel’s priorities led to the end of his family line of judges.
In saying “Anyone who does God’s will is part of my family”, Jesus is lifting up a new, broader vision of family, a vision of family defined, not by blood, but by a shared commitment to doing God’s will. In effect, Jesus’ followers become his family, a family of choice, we might say, in contrast with his family of origin.
What might this look like? One comparison arises out of the tragedy of our society’s response to HIV/AIDS in the 1980’s and early 1990’s, before the advent of life-prolonging treatments. Many of the early cases of AIDS were among gay men, and society’s revulsion against homosexuals, combined with its fear of a new, mysterious, fatal disease led many families to disown their gay brothers and sons, to throw them out on the street just at a time when they were dying and vulnerable and in need of support. Out of necessity, many of those thrown out of their homes found that their circles of friends became their new families, families of choice who would look in on them and care for them when their families of origin refused to do so, who would wait by their bedsides as they became sicker and stand by their graves when they died. For many rejected by families of origin, as their bodies – their outer natures - were wasting away, the support of friends, of their families of choice, renewed their spirits day by day.
It’s not that Jesus turned his back on his mom and brothers and sisters. From John’s Gospel, we know that Mary was present at Jesus’ crucifixion, and Jesus commended her to the care of John, the beloved disciple. It was perhaps in that tender moment amid the brutality of the crucifixion that Jesus invited his family of origin to join and become part of his family of choice. We also know that James, the brother of Jesus, was a leader in the early church in Jerusalem. So it’s important to say that Jesus did not reject his family of origin – but it’s also important to say that Jesus was not limited by it.
It has been said, jokingly, that the family ties that bind can also be the ties that gag. Jesus calls us to expand our field of vision beyond the cozy, sometimes cramped perspective of our own households – and certainly to resist the call of many in the church to turn the ideal of the family into an idol to be worshipped – but rather, to follow Jesus’ example in welcoming all who do God’s will as family. May we at Emanuel Church, in the words of Paul, be conformed to Christ’s image, so that we may become members of the large family of faith, of which Jesus is the first-born. Amen.
I’d like to open this sermon by asking you to ponder a bit on the word “home” and what it means to you. When you think of the word “home”, what images come up? Perhaps the house you grew up in, the neighborhood where you grew up – for some of us – though not all - Bridesburg or somewhere else in the lower northeast. Perhaps images of mom in the kitchen making turkey for Thanksgiving, or images of dad or sisters or brothers or other family members. .Or if our memories of our families of origin are more ambivalent, perhaps the world “home” calls up images of the home we’ve made as adults, with a spouse or partner and maybe some kids. We can go on a vacation and have the time of our lives seeing unfamiliar sights, but at the end of it, we’re ready to go home.
Our culture has many sayings about home, some positive, some not so much. We hear that “home is where the heart is.” Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz said, “There’s no place like home.” Robert Frost wrote, in “Death of a Hired Man,” “Home is where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” On the other hand, the title of Thomas Wolfe’s 1940 book, “You Can’t Go Home Again”, reminds us that though we can return to the geography of our childhood, it may no longer resemble the nostalgic images of home we carry in our minds – and that there’s often little satisfaction to be found in trying to relive the past. Some who grow up in rural areas with minimal economic opportunities or cultural activities leave their villages for the big city, and never look back. While many cultures are accustomed to having two or three or even four generations living under one roof, in our culture, grown children are expected to leave mother and father to set up homes of their own, and adult children in their 40’s who have never left home may get funny looks if they talk with others about living at home with mom.
In our reading from Mark’s Gospel, we watch Jesus come home, after a whirlwind ministry tour, to a very mixed reception from his hometown. Having done numerous healings and exorcisms, selected his disciples, and spent some time with God in prayer, Jesus needs some time to chill out – so he’s homeward bound.
His return home prompts a variety of reactions. The crowds continue to follow him, hoping for healing and release from suffering. His family and neighbors, though, aren’t so impressed. They watched Jesus grow up, watched him help his father in the family carpentry business, and can’t imagine why all these people would want to follow Jesus around. And the things Jesus is saying these days – my, he’s gotten big for his britches. Or so the neighbors think. Actually, they think Jesus has lost his mind – become some crazed religious nut – and so they’re chasing him around with the proverbial big net to try to catch him and restrain him. Their reaction would be comical if it weren’t so typical –when one member of a family behaves in ways that beyond the norm and the others try to get that person back in line - and in some ways, so sad. Some visiting religious scholars from Jerusalem are even less impressed – they think Jesus is demon-possessed, and that what he’s doing is the devil’s work.
As tired – and probably annoyed with family and religious leaders alike – as he is, Jesus tries to use the confrontation as a teaching moment. First he tries to reason with the religious leaders: Why would Satan want to cast himself out of somebody. Why would Satan work against himself, work to defeat himself. As Jesus tells it, the accusation of the religious leaders doesn’t even make sense.
But then Jesus goes on to say something that has had ordinary believers tied up in knots of false guilt, and Bible scholars tied up in knots of confusion trying to explain the verse. “Whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.” An eternal sin….can never have forgiveness….wow! That’s a heavy statement to ponder. Lots of sincere Christians have lost lots of sleep wondering if some statement hollered in anger or some obscenity uttered in a time of stress constitutes blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and therefore has them locked outside the pearly gates.
This is one of those statements where, I think, context is key. And what is the context? What Jesus had been doing through the power of the Holy Spirit, the religious leaders were attributing to Satan. And what had Jesus been doing – works of healing and especially of exorcism.
There are some words of comfort and of challenge to be found here. The comfort is, that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit – attributing the works of God to Satan – is not something most people are tempted to do. If we’re concerned that some action of ours constitutes blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, the fact that we’re concerned and seeking repentance pretty much rules out any possibility that we’re beyond forgiveness.
The challenge is that the very people who might be tempted to this sin are, ironically, a certain kind of religious person – the kind who think they have everything all figured out, who have all the answers, who make snap judgments about what God does and does not do, who are very quick to attribute unwelcome developments in their life and unwelcome actions of others to the work of Satan. Hear me carefully on this: You really, really don’t want to risk the possibility of taking something that God is doing and say it’s the work of the devil. You just don’t. This is why, when I’m asked about speaking in tongues or being slain in the spirit or other charismatic worship practices that are unfamiliar in our tradition, whether they are the devil’s work – why I refuse to give an across the board ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer. Do some people fake speaking in tongues – I’d imagine that some do. Is speaking in tongues a response to the work of the Holy Spirit – For some people, I’m sure it is, just as it was in New Testament times. Often, when we encounter some religious practice with which we’re unfamiliar and we’re not sure if it’s of God or not, the most honest response and the most faithful response is simply – “I don’t know.” Which is why I say “I don’t know” a lot, and am not afraid or ashamed to do so. The words “I don’t know” keep us humble, which is good for our spiritual development. Often it’s best, if we encounter a religious practice we can’t support, to just let it go and await developments. Sort of like the parable of the wheat and the weeds – in this world, we can’t always tell wheat and weeds apart, so we’re in no position to start yanking plants out of the ground or yanking people out of Christian fellowship willy-nilly. Or like the counsel of the rabbi Gamaliel in Acts: if it’s of men, it’ll eventually fall of its own weight, but if it’s of God, you don’t want to be found in opposition to God. The problem with the religious leaders who opposed Jesus is that they lacked humility, they weren’t willing to say “I don’t know” and leave Jesus alone; they in their pride had to be seen as having all the answers. And that was their downfall.
At that point, Mom and the family are outside the house where Jesus is teaching, and they ask those inside to let Jesus know that Mom and the family want to have a word with him. And let’s listen to Jesus’ response: in effect: “Who is my family? You (referring to those listening to him) are my family! Anyone who does God’s will is part of my family.
At this point, in the very traditional culture of Jesus’ time, and even in our culture, Jesus’ answer to the question “Who is my family?” may sound, to their ears and ours, as if Jesus himself uttered blasphemy against prevailing ideas of family. In Jesus’ culture, family would have included not only parents and children, but grandparents (and great grandparents if folks lived long enough), aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews – the whole extended family. It would have been a large grouping linked by blood and biology, but with boundaries - those not so linked were not family. American culture puts much less value on the ties of extended family, so in our culture, family is mom, dad, two or so kids – and that’s it. To underline this point, I included in your bulletin a photo of a statue in Conshohocken, where I live, in honor of “The Family”. This statue, created by one J. Pavone and commissioned by an Italian-American veterans organization, virtually turns the American model of mom, dad, and two kids into an idol to be venerated.
They say that “blood is thicker than water”, but there are times when blood ties aren’t enough to carry the day. Our reading from I Samuel tells of such a time. Faithful Samuel has been judge over Israel for many years, from his youth until he was old and grey. In his old age Samuel appointed his sons as judges – hoping they would carry on after Samuel had passed from this life - but the sons were corrupt. While the sons shared Samuel’s bloodline, they didn’t share Samuel’s values or the same priorities. Because of the sons’ corruption, the people asked Samuel to anoint a king for them. Jesus said that “A house divided cannot stand”, and in the case of Samuel’s house, his children’s rejection of Samuel’s priorities led to the end of his family line of judges.
In saying “Anyone who does God’s will is part of my family”, Jesus is lifting up a new, broader vision of family, a vision of family defined, not by blood, but by a shared commitment to doing God’s will. In effect, Jesus’ followers become his family, a family of choice, we might say, in contrast with his family of origin.
What might this look like? One comparison arises out of the tragedy of our society’s response to HIV/AIDS in the 1980’s and early 1990’s, before the advent of life-prolonging treatments. Many of the early cases of AIDS were among gay men, and society’s revulsion against homosexuals, combined with its fear of a new, mysterious, fatal disease led many families to disown their gay brothers and sons, to throw them out on the street just at a time when they were dying and vulnerable and in need of support. Out of necessity, many of those thrown out of their homes found that their circles of friends became their new families, families of choice who would look in on them and care for them when their families of origin refused to do so, who would wait by their bedsides as they became sicker and stand by their graves when they died. For many rejected by families of origin, as their bodies – their outer natures - were wasting away, the support of friends, of their families of choice, renewed their spirits day by day.
It’s not that Jesus turned his back on his mom and brothers and sisters. From John’s Gospel, we know that Mary was present at Jesus’ crucifixion, and Jesus commended her to the care of John, the beloved disciple. It was perhaps in that tender moment amid the brutality of the crucifixion that Jesus invited his family of origin to join and become part of his family of choice. We also know that James, the brother of Jesus, was a leader in the early church in Jerusalem. So it’s important to say that Jesus did not reject his family of origin – but it’s also important to say that Jesus was not limited by it.
It has been said, jokingly, that the family ties that bind can also be the ties that gag. Jesus calls us to expand our field of vision beyond the cozy, sometimes cramped perspective of our own households – and certainly to resist the call of many in the church to turn the ideal of the family into an idol to be worshipped – but rather, to follow Jesus’ example in welcoming all who do God’s will as family. May we at Emanuel Church, in the words of Paul, be conformed to Christ’s image, so that we may become members of the large family of faith, of which Jesus is the first-born. Amen.
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