Archives for February 2012

a sermon on Mark 1:9-15 and Psalm 25:1-10 for the First Sunday of Lent 
preached on February 26, 2012, at the First Presbyterian Church of Whitestone

If the New York news media is to be believed, all Christians in New York City celebrate Lent because all Christians are Catholics, and all of us are so excited that our archbishop was elevated to cardinal last week! The press coverage of Cardinal Dolan’s new title seemed perfectly timed for the beginning of Lent, really – the archbishop’s return to the city came right in time for Ash Wednesday, so everyone trying to catch a glimpse of him at work in leading worship got to watch the imposition of ashes and all the other strange practices of Ash Wednesday. Suddenly the press had to try to explain these things to a broader audience – while there was surely a significant group of faithful Roman Catholics who understood it all very, very well and a smaller group of Protestants who were familiar with these things, the growing majority knows so very little about matters of religious practice.

I myself found it interesting and a bit instructive, as I grew up in a world where Lent was not celebrated, let alone enforced with the careful guidelines for fasting and abstinence required by the new cardinal. While Christian influences were everywhere and my second-grade public school teacher even led a blessing before we went to lunch, Lent was a very foreign concept in my life of faith. Receiving ashes on Ash Wednesday was not at all part of our tradition – we just had our normal church events on that Wednesday night. Giving up something for this season was not on anyone’s mind in the church where I grew up. And there were even people around me quoting scripture to say that celebrating things like Lent was explicitly forbidden in the New Testament. Now we certainly celebrated Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday, but these days were not cast in the careful light of preparation that is the norm when we think about Lent.

I suspect I don’t have to defend Lent to you all in the way that I might to some people back in Mississippi, but nonetheless I think it is important that we begin this season by revisiting one of the stories that inspires us to take this journey and considering some words that can give particular shape to the things we do in these days. This morning’s readings take us first to the pretty familiar story of Jesus spending forty days in the wilderness after his baptism, where he was tempted by Satan, surrounded by wild beasts, and attended by angels. In Matthew and Luke, two later gospels that incorporate some additional source material beyond the earlier gospel of Mark, this story stretches on for several more verses, with much greater detail about the specific temptations and Jesus’ responses to them. But Mark’s story is so simple, consolidated into just two verses, that we have to add several verses around it to make it a complete reading for today!

Yet Mark still tells us that this was an incredibly important time of formation for Jesus along his journey. After being named as God’s Son, the Beloved, Jesus is led out into the wilderness to be shaped and formed into something even greater than he had been. Only after this experience is he ready to step up and proclaim his own message to the people of Galilee when John the Baptist is forced off the scene:

The time is fulfilled,
and the kingdom of God has come near;
repent, and believe in the good news.

While Mark says so little about what happened in these forty days, it is clear that they are incredibly important to his story. Jesus was shaped and formed and prepared for his ministry of teaching and healing by his time in the wilderness. He was given this time apart from the rest of the world to resist temptation and gain the spiritual insight he needed for the days that followed. And he could not have done everything that he did – the teaching, the healing, the living, the calling, the suffering, the dying – without this time to get ready.

And so the forty days of Lent are inspired by these forty days that Jesus spent in the wilderness, yet I doubt that the point of these days is for us to seek out the exact same kind of temptation that Jesus found along the way! So I find our psalm for today to be very helpful in guiding our own journeys of Lent in these days.

First, this is a season of reorientation, of lifting our lives and hearts and souls to God, of setting aside the temptation to think that we have it all figured out, of moving beyond our shame and uncertainty, of putting our full hope and faith and confidence and trust not in ourselves but in God alone.

Then the psalm reminds us that this is a season of remembrance and transformation, a time to recall God’s mercy and steadfast love. It’s easy to remember the sins of our past and the places where things have gone wrong, yet God’s steadfast love sets that memory aside because of God’s amazing love. For God, the missteps of our past matter far less than the promise of our future. So in these Lenten days, we set aside where we have been and strive to take a new path, not just “giving up” something for forty days but seeking to find and sustain a new way of life for this season and beyond.

Finally, the psalm gives us a guide for our journey during these forty days. It insists that God will show us a path for all of life. It invites us to humility and hope that will give guidance. And it shows that there is a loving and gracious and sure way in these and all days for those who keep God’s covenant and commandments. In this time of reorientation, remembrance, and guidance, the psalm reminds us of God’s promises to transform all of life through this journey of hope, faith, and love.

As I look at these two texts, I see so many words that can describe this journey of Lent for us – temptation, repentance, penitence, remembrance, transformation, reorientation. These are not the easiest words for us to hear, and this is not an easy season. We are not people who like to be challenged to live differently. Even when we want things to change, it is so easy for us to resist what must be done in order to make that change reality. And the promise of reorienting things toward God means that we will have to give up our hold on power and our desire to be in control.

If that is not enough, we know that the journey of these forty days will get harder before it gets easier. The difficult road of Lent will eventually turn toward the darkness of Gethsemane, the pain of Golgotha, and the gloom of the tomb. Yet we also see that there is more ahead on this road than just these things. We walk this road knowing that even with the darkest hours ahead, there is light coming at the end of the journey. Even the gloom of the tomb is transformed by God’s power into the glory of the resurrection.

This can be our story, too. We do not have to obey every Lenten rule perfectly to find this new way. We do not have to suffer and die as Jesus did to know the promise of the resurrection. But we are nonetheless challenged in these forty days just to walk this road with Jesus, trusting that there is something more going on in this season than we can accomplish through giving anything up on our own; looking for signs of transformation and new life as the days lengthen, the winter turns to spring, and new life sprouts up all around us; and deepening our walk of faith as we cast off what gets in the way of us seeing God’s grace at work around us.

So may this Lenten journey be filled with peace, love, and hope, that through our walk in these days we might be prepared for the sorrow and joy that lies ahead for us and that we might be filled with the faith we need for this and every journey we make with one another and with Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

a sermon on 2 Kings 5:1-14 for the Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time
preached on February 12, 2012, at the First Presbyterian Church of Whitestone

There’s been a lot of talk about economics and class in our world lately. The Occupy Wall Street protests struck a nerve among many people last fall as they lifted up the striking inequality between the top 1% and the rest of us. The controversy has only intensified as the presidential campaign continues, where almost all of the candidates make more in a single year than I suspect we do among all of us in this room!

But I’ve also been thinking about class lately as I’ve become a fan of the television series Downton Abbey. This great British drama airing on PBS traces the life of the noble Grantham family and their servants beginning with the sinking of the Titanic in 1912 and continuing through World War I into 1918 and beyond.

While the interactions between the family upstairs and their servants downstairs were very closely regulated in those days, I’m constantly amazed at how those lines are so often – and so realistically – breached on the show. Most of the servants seem to genuinely care about the welfare of the Grantham family in the midst of their joy and turmoil, and the noble Grantham family shows a similar familial love for their servants, of course with a bit of a paternalistic streak, assuming that they do know what is best. The servants keep the family abreast of the latest developments in the personal lives of the household help, and the family even seeks out the advice of the servants sometimes when facing a difficult situation, sometimes trusting the hired help more than their own relatives.

All is certainly not perfect between these two groups. They all know that there is no real equality between them and that the family upstairs is always in charge. Some things such as romance and love are not to be breached under any circumstances. Yet the genuine care and concern they demonstrate for one another is always evident.

This mutual care and concern by those on both sides of class divides is also evident in our reading from 2 Kings this morning. At its core, this is the story of the miraculous healing of the great general Naaman at the hands of the prophet Elisha – yet his healing would not have been possible were it not for a young slave girl.

Like every episode of Downton Abbey, power, prestige, and class are prominent characters in this story of healing. The young slave girl’s presence in Naaman’s house was due solely to the victory of the army of Aram over the house of Israel. The king of Israel was scared out of his wits when the commander of the army that had just defeated his forces showed up on his doorstep asking for healing. And the powerful Naaman felt shunned and ignored when the prophet Elisha would not even come out to see him when he showed up at his doorstep – and he was even more offended when Elisha’s prescription for healing his leprosy was to bathe in the muddy waters of the Jordan River.

Naaman is just not supposed to have to face this kind of thing at all. His power and prestige as commander of the victorious Aramean army would surely imply that he was safe from a disease such as leprosy. And if for some reason he was affected, he could expect only the best and most effective treatments with the greatest respect along the way. But in the end he had an incurable disease, and his best hope for healing was the suggestion of a slave girl.

So when Naaman took action on the girl’s suggestion to seek out the prophet in Samaria, he returned to his natural position and perspective of power. He received the proper letter of reference from his king and made his way to the king of Israel, figuring he would certainly guide him through the proper channels to meet the prophet and be healed. He took loads and loads of gifts to smooth the way to his healing. Even when he was referred beyond the usual halls of power, Naaman still expected to meet with the prophet personally and receive some sort of magical, immediate healing from his disease.

Amazingly, though, all this didn’t matter. Naaman’s healing was not accomplished through the channels of power but only outside of them. The slave girl who suggested the prophet in Samaria spoke up outside the proper limits on her authority to do so. Neither the king of Aram nor the king of Israel had anything to do with Naaman’s eventual healing. The prophet Elisha didn’t follow the proper protocol for receiving a foreign general at all and communicated with the powerful Naaman only through a messenger. And the prescription Elisha gave insisted that Naaman humble himself enough to bathe in the great river of the enemy.

After hearing all this, I have to wonder if Naaman’s healing had anything to do with those strange, muddy waters of the Jordan at all. Did his path to healing go through the halls of power, or did was he healed somewhere along the journey to humility and openness to the other? Did Elisha understand something about the limitations of power, prestige, and dignity that Naaman did not? Was God working to heal Naaman of his disease as much through a journey to a different way of life as through those waters of the Jordan?

I don’t fully understand what God is really up to in these kinds of healing stories, but it sure seems to me that God is trying to say as much here about the attitude to bring to healing as the healing itself. God clearly could care less about working through the proper channels of power than about making healing real and possible for those who submit themselves to a different way of life. God seems to seek a humble and generous attitude toward others as part of the process of transformation and healing. And God makes it clear that everyone – even and especially those whom the world assumes are nothing – has an important and special role to play in making healing and wholeness possible.

In many ways, this is the same message as what emerges in our discussions of class today, in Downton Abbey, Occupy Wall Street, and so many other places. The people in power may not see it, but I think the overall message is pretty clear. Every person has something to contribute to the life of others. Everyone matters, even those whom the world implies have no value and worth. Death and infirmity strike the rich and the poor equally.

While we are in a very different from that of Naaman and his slave girl or even the household and servants at Downton Abbey, Naaman’s story reminds us that we still have more work to do. Even our best efforts at living out equality are fraught with our own prejudice and preference. Our health care system in this country alone shows a strange and sad preference for caring for those who are well off and leaving behind those who cannot advocate for or finance their own care. And too often our efforts to care for those less fortunate emerge out of paternalism or a personal desire to feel good and be useful rather than actually meeting the needs of those we are trying to help.

So Naaman and his slave girl are important reminders for us – not so much of the direct path to healing for the infirmities of our lives but that God’s path to wholeness for all of us involves giving up some of our deepest-held assumptions and recognizing that healing for one of us requires wholeness for all of us. May God show us the path to healing through all the difficulties and challenges of our life together so that we may live in the fullness of life that God intends for us and all people and offer even a little glimpse of that for all the world through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.

a sermon on Mark 1:29-39 for the Fifth Sunday after Epiphany
preached at the First Presbyterian Church of Whitestone on February 5, 2012

We weren’t sure what was going on, but we started following him anyway. This man named Jesus had stopped me and my brother Andrew one day as we were tossing our nets into the sea. He invited us to cast our nets aside and come with him to start fishing for people. There was something so compelling about him and his presence that we dropped our nets and followed him.

All that was only a few days ago, really, but we’ve been through a lot since then. First, as we walked along the shore that day, we watched as Jesus invited two other fishermen to join us. We had known James and John – they worked with their father in the family fishing business on the same sea as Andrew and me – so it was good to have some people we knew along with us on the way. The next few days went by more or less as we expected. We met up with Jesus and talked about the scriptures and our lives as we walked along the shore and across the countryside.

But then the Sabbath came. We went with Jesus to the synagogue in Capernaum, where he stood up and started teaching as the people gathered there. It was amazing! Everyone listened so closely as he taught – just like us, they were trying to figure out what was going on with this incredible teacher – and it was clear that he was doing more than just reciting the scriptures and assuming that everyone understood.

Then a man stepped up and started shouting at him: “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are. You are the holy one from God.” Many of the locals recognized this man, who was known for these kinds of outbursts and the evil spirits that provoked them. Jesus told the spirit to be quiet and instructed it to come out of the man, and after he shook and screamed a bit more, the man was quiet after the spirit left him. Everyone was astonished at this, and word started to spread about this powerful new teacher in Galilee. We weren’t sure what was going on, but we kept following him.

That afternoon after the synagogue the four of us who were following Jesus went to my house. My mother-in-law would normally have been the one to host the feast, but she was in bed, sick with a fever. Jesus got word of this, and just as he had healed the man with the evil spirit in the synagogue, he healed my mother-in-law, too. She felt well enough right away to resume her usual chores, and she was especially attentive to Jesus, showing him the proper hospitality and demonstrating the real and immediate power of his healing touch.

After we ate, as the sun set that night, bringing the sabbath to an end, a crowd appeared at our house. People were bringing sick friends and relatives to experience Jesus’ healing touch, and others came just to watch the spectacle. After this long sabbath day, he healed many with diseases and cast out a few more demons.

It was quickly becoming clear that this man who had stopped on the seashore and invited us to follow him was far more than we had originally suspected. While we had known from the very beginning that there was something special about this man Jesus, his teaching was just so compelling. If that wasn’t enough, the way he healed people along the way suggested that he had real power to make things different in the world.

Every day, I have gotten more and more astonished at what is going on – and I’m less and less sure why we are with him. What does this powerful, deeply religious man want to do with us, four quiet fishermen from a village in Galilee? He ought to be out looking for more important folks to go with him – but he keeps saying he wants us. We may not be sure what is going on, but for now at least, we’ll keep following him.

Now if all this wasn’t enough, that next morning we assumed that Jesus would want to sleep in a bit before making his way back into our village – he sure had seemed pretty tired after all that healing and casting out demons the night before! When we got up and started to look for him, though, we found that he had slipped out of the house already! We got a little concerned – he’s not from around here, and we didn’t think he knew his way around the area – so we started looking for him. Plus, there were already more people making their way to our house, hoping for his healing power to work for them too. We found him out in a deserted place outside of town, quietly praying and meditating. We told him about all the people waiting for him back at our house in Capernaum, but he wanted nothing to do with them – he told us, “Let’s head in the other direction, to the nearby villages, so that I can preach there too.” As usual, his mind was made up – we were moving on, heading away from our hometown, not quite sure of our next steps, but somehow ready to follow where he was leading. We weren’t sure what was going on, but as usual, we kept following him.

I for one have yet to figure out my role in all this. I’m not a healer, a teacher, or an exorcist – I’m a fisherman – so I can’t take a leading role in what Jesus is doing around here. I’m not as good a cook as my mother-in-law, so I can’t just stand by on the sidelines making sure everyone feels welcome and is well-fed. And I’m no good with directions in general, let alone when Jesus is setting the itinerary, so I just don’t know where we are going next!

Yet I keep following him. The example he sets as we walk together really matters to me. He treats people with kindness, compassion, and gentleness, like no one else I’ve known. He stays grounded and connected – it’s not about him but about something greater than his own personality and presence. Plus, there’s just something special about this journey that we share. I’m meeting the people of my town again, learning more about them, listening to them and their needs more closely, recognizing that they are more than their jobs or their infirmities or anything else that I’ve learned or assumed about them over the years. I’m seeing more of the world too –I’ve never really left Capernaum much, but I figure with Jesus setting the itinerary, we might just travel a bit!

But most of all, Jesus is challenging me to think differently about everything along the way. While he’s transforming people’s lives in very direct ways by healing them or casting out demons, I’m starting to wonder how I might transform the world. Now I’ve always been a bit of an idealist, wishing that things would be different, but I’ve struggled to figure out what to do about it.

After just these few days with Jesus, though, I’m starting to think that I can do actual things that will be steps along the way to something new. I may not be able to touch someone and bring her healing, but I can talk about changing hearts and lives to prepare for God’s kingdom. I might not be able to cast out a man’s demons, but I can encourage people to cast out the things that get in the way of what God is doing here and now. These are little things – they aren’t nearly as exciting or grand as what Jesus does, and I certainly won’t ever be as compelling as he is – yet I think they might actually make a difference along the way, especially if other people get the message and join in. I’m not entirely sure what is going on, but I know I’m going to keep following him – do you want to join me?