The courage to see, (10/24/21)

 Mark 10:46-52

If you want to really understand a piece of music or composer well, you would want to listen to a movement or a symphony or an album in its’ entirety, not just little snippets.  This would be the case for anyone from Beethoven to Paul McCarthy.  One soundbite of the Puerto Rican group, Calle 13 would get you the line “You’re a thief.”  One song or especially one album of theirs would get you a fascinating and poetic, sociopolitical critique.  Now, I’ve never grouped the gospel of Jesus Christ directly with Calle 13, and there is a whole other sermon in that, but I’ll simply say, that, for the purpose of today, one sound byte of Jesus’ message just can’t give us the same flavor that the arc of a story would.  

In this section of the gospel of Mark that we’ve been exploring the last few weeks, we hear about the disciples grasping to understand who Jesus is.  What does it mean to follow this guy? Today, we hear a story about a man named Bartimaeus who was blind. But before we get to his sound byte, we need to back it up a little.  

In the first half of the gospel of Mark, Jesus tells the disciples to follow him. They spend the first chunk of time with him soaking up his teachings as they travel around.  Jesus does a lot of awesome things: he heals a bunch of people, he calms a violent storm, he feeds 4,000 folx with some fish and bread, he walks on water, he teaches the crowds stuff like “don’t put your lamp under a bowl but let it shine.” 

He and the disciples are ministering all over the place until one day, they come to a place called Bethsaida in the region of Galilee where the tides begin to turn. At Bethsaida, there’s a man who (like today’s man, Bartimaeus) can’t see. Jesus puts spit on the man’s eyes and he can see clearly.  Whether this is physical clarity of vision or spiritual clarity of vision, or a little of both, we’re not entirely sure, but something happens as they leave that place and head for Cesarea Philipi that leads the disciple Peter to announce: 

“All right, Jesus. I’m convinced. I’ve seen enough. You are the messiah.” 

It’s at this point where Jesus sets the record straight with the disciples for the first time.  He is trying to help the disciples see clearly. 

“You’ve got it backwards,” Jesus says to them. 

Jesus is indeed the messiah, but not the traditional version many people in some Jewish circles were hoping for. He was not a military monarch who was going to thunder in on the cavalry overthrow Rome in an act of power and might. Jesus didn’t bulldoze every obstacle in his path. It seems upside down, Jesus explained, but the way of strength is one of service, generosity and love.

A few days later, Jesus repeats the conversation with the disciples. The this time,  the disciples aren’t calling for a glorious military victory, instead, they’re arguing, mirror mirror on the wall, who is the greatest of us all, and Jesus again says,  “you’ve got it backwards,” and he takes a child into his lap.  This is not a journey to the top as the world defines it with the A+ career and perfect partner, and perfect everything. This is a journey to become the “least of these,” he says, holding the child, not the greatest of them all. Instead of grasping and striving for the worldly best, its’ a journey of service, open heartedness and grace.

Round three, the disciples and Jesus enter the ring again and this time, two of Jesus’ disciples ask him if they can one day sit in glorious stardom as “superstar-disciples” at his right hand: the best followers ever. Take a wild guess how that one went over…

For the third time, Jesus shakes his head:  “You’ve got it backwards, man,” he says.  We’re not about leveling up in the great competition of life, but leveling down to service and grace. That is the locus of true power,” he explains.

Three times, Jesus returns to this chorus of the love. 

Will the disciples get it? 

Will they see it? 

Will it sink in?

Although it might appear that the world turns on an axis of power and striving and money, there is a deep heartbeat underneath the surface that propels everything.  This is the deep stabilizing muscle of service, generosity and grace, a shared physics of love.  This is God’s essence and it is the gravity that everything hinges on. Jesus is trying to reorient his disciples.  He’s trying to get them to pivot. Will they see what he is trying to show them?

At the point of today’s story, I don’t know if the disciples really got it that they were now headed towards Jerusalem. Or more specifically, towards Golgatha towards that hill with a cross on it.   But they are.

At this point in the story, they’re passing through the city of Jericho about 20 miles outside of Jerusalem. Jericho was the city where light dawned for the ancient Israelites as they entered the promised land. And it’s there, passing through the city that a second man who was blind, named Bartimaeus, cried out, “Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me!” And Jesus stops in his tracks.

Confucius once said that, “To see what is right and not do it is want of courage.”

Bartimaeus, the blind man, sees. He sees this upside down way of life that Jesus is teaching. This “last shall be first” business.  He gets it. But that day there on the side of the road, not only does he get it, he shouts out and rankles people, he throws off his cloak, he tells Jesus how he wants to see again. Bartimaeus doesn’t see Jesus, son of David, who will topple the system from above, but Jesus, son of David, will revolutionize it from below.  This is Jesus who hears his cries of suffering on the side of the road and does something about it. 

When Jesus talks about having faith (particularly in the gospel of Mark), It’s almost always bound up with the word courage.  In the gospel of Mark, there are stories of a dad who boldly lobbies for healing for his daughter, a woman who courageously reaches out to touch Jesus’ cloak, a man who persistently shouts out from the side of the road, even when folks try to silence him.

Although the disciples may understand what the way of Jesus looks like, are they just following along and studying Jesus, or are they actually employing stuff he’s talking about? When the rubber hits the road, do they have the courage to put the lessons into practice and really live them?

To invert Confucius’ saying: Courage is to see what is right. And do it.

I am provoked by Bartimaeus. This brash, bold disciple who gets what Jesus is about and follows him into Jerusalem. It is directly after this interaction with Bartimaeus that Jesus will ride into Jerusalem, not on a warhorse calling for people to draw their swords, but on a donkey the people will crowd around him as he rides into Jerusalem they will waive palms and cry out “All glory, laud and honor to you redeemer King, Hosanna!” After Jesus rides into Jerusalem, Roman power with brute force and violence will strike him down and nail him to a cross, but the way of servanthood and love and generosity will not be defeated.  And he will rise. 

I see what Jesus is about. I study his teachings. I hear them. I wrestle with them. I know them. The question is, when the rubber hits the road, do I have the courage to live them? To let God write my song into this symphony? To follow Jesus to the cross?  (The cross being places of poverty or mental illness or sickness or bigotry or addiction or even my own pain).  To follow Jesus into the pain and struggle that my neighbor feels? …Through being patient. Through forgiving?  Through sharing my money more sacrificially?  Through living more simply?  Though being more vulnerable about my ups and downs in life?  As people of faith, there are life-changing consequences to really seeing who Jesus is. And we must live differently because of it. 

We see these teachings of Jesus. They’re mind benders, but they’re not rocket-science. The question is: Will we let them transform us? How is my life shaped by this clear-eyed vision?  How is yours?

A letter to 2021 Confirmands (10/17/21)

Mark 8:27-38

Dear Confirmands, 

We have had quite the confirmation journey the last two years!  

If not sure if you were the determined ones or if it was your parents, but it has been a journey! One of my better memories from confirmation last year was that time a handful of us met, during the height of Covid, on that freezing night to walk around the neighborhood in the middle of January. We called people and prayed in front of their houses. It was dark and really cold but mostly, it was just kind of wonderful to see other people.  

I know there is a lot about life that has gotten back to some kind of normal and you all finally have more people to interact with than you did last January!

I suspect that, when you first meet people your own age, you interact a little differently than perhaps some of us adults do.  To a new person sitting next to you at school, you might break the ice, and offer them a piece of gum, or say “this class is so annoying or hard right now” or “this teacher is boring.” 

That is not exactly how we do small talk at church. We don’t always offer a piece of gum to the grandma sitting down the pew from us. We don’t usually pass the offering plate to the person down the row and say, “oh man, the melody of this song is so hard,” or “this pastor is so boring…”

We all get to know people in different ways.  As we get to know people, here at church, or school or wherever, it gets easier and eventually, we get to know the values of the other person: is this someone who I can trust? Is this someone who is kind? What does this person care about? And then maybe, the acquaintance turns into a friend. There are, however, limits as to how much we can know about another person and we can still be surprised by people we’ve known for a while. 

In today’s scripture reading, Mark tells us a story about a moment that took place after Jesus and the disciples had known each other for a while. At the point of this bible story, the disciples and Jesus had spent time together. They knew each other. They had healed people, and eaten meals together. The disciples had been soaking in Jesus’ teaching and, one day, while they are—again--road tripping together, Jesus asks them: What are people saying about me? Who do people say that I am? 

Peter, who is one of Jesus’ disciple-besties answers, “You are the Messiah,” and Jesus agrees.  (Jesus goes by a lot of names: Messiah, Christ, Lord, Savior, friend, teacher, prophet, role-model, Son of God, redeemer.) But then, Jesus says, yeah, I’m the Messiah, but don’t tell anyone. 

There may be multiple reasons that Jesus tells them not to tell anyone, but as the conversation unfolds, we start to get it.  It seems like Peter has the title of “messiah” right for Jesus but he doesn’t quite grasp the job description or the way Jesus is living out that role.  

In the ancient world, in a lot of Jewish circles, people waited for a Messiah who would be the person who would free them from the powerful Roman rule that was sucking them dry. This person was a great deliverer: “Christos:” the anointed one. This was a title given to a king and would mean that this messiah would come in glorious power as a king and a military conqueror.  This was a mighty warrior-messiah thundering in on the cavalry who was going to defeat the Roman imperial occupation and restore the throne to the line of King David.  It seems like, Peter, Jesus’ bestie-disciple, may have had this triumphant, violent image of messiah in mind when he answered Jesus. 

The conversation between Jesus and the disciples that day devolved into an argument, there on the road trip. Peter pulls Jesus aside to give him a piece of his mind. Jesus yells, “get behind me Satan!” Thing start to get a little crazy and that’s when Jesus essentially does the equivalent of pulling the bus over, unbuckling and turning around to set the record straight with everyone. 

You see, they were on the way to a city about 125 miles north of Jerusalem called Caesarea Philippi. It was an impressive major roman city that was built by Herod the great.  Herod happened to be a practicing Jew, and as governor of Judea, he had built this awesome temple in Caesarea Philippi which he dedicated to the Holy Roman emperor, Augustus. (The Roman emperor Augustus, mind you, was the guy who added the tag line “son of god” to his bio and then stamped his image and divine title on coins that circulated all over the place. The guy had--just a little bit of—an ego.)

So it’s on that roadtrip when Jesus, Son of God, and his crew are bumping up the road towards this city with this magnificent temple when the argument breaks out about what it means to be a messiah and Jesus pulls the bus over.  He looks at everyone.

“You got it backwards, man,” he says. “We’re not marching as military conquerors here. This isn’t a violent push or movement. The son of humanity must suffer and die and be rejected. And then, he will rise.”

Jesus totally flips this traditional warrior-Messiah idea on its’ head and by doing so, he proceeds to freak everyone out.  They had been hoping for a war-hero and Peter is beside himself. This is not what he signed up for! Everyone is stunned there on the bus with people craning to see in the windows and hear what’s going on. You could have heard a pin drop.  As the engine idles there on the side of the road, there’s the outline of that awesome temple in Caesarea Philippi way off in the hazy distance; and someone mumbles,  “I thought we were going to storm the gates and take it all down…”

Jesus goes on: “This isn’t some kind of violent campaign of domination. We are not going to thunder in on the cavalry and conquer the temple.  That isn’t the path I’m asking you to follow me on, he says.  I’m not headed there, he explains, but to Jerusalem, to a hill with a cross on it. Right here, right now,” Jesus explains gesturing at the temple, “we’re coming up to a crossroads. A decision point.”

Matthew Myer Boulton writes, it’s as if Jesus goes on to say to the crowds and disciples gathered there:

Let me tell you a great mystery: deep down in creation, there is a physics more profound than the surface of things, that superficial layer in which [everything] appears to be driven by might and violence and grasping. Underneath all of that is a deeper physics, [where] what’s truly important is actually driven by love and humility and generosity.

On the surface, things like love and generosity and service may seem sweet, maybe Pollyanna: as if they are simply good values to have in your pocket in the game of life.  At face value, it can seem like, service and love and generosity are just helpful supporting actors in the play; but when we honestly get down to it, they can seem a weak and fragile out there in the real world. 

But they’re not. 

They are some of the strongest things we know. 

Jesus and the disciples will walk into that city not with fists ready for battle, but with open hands.  

I would invite you to take a moment to open your hands on your lap.

This teaching. It is indeed a great mystery.  It might seem like, as Boulton puts it, that the world turns on the axis of power, might, and my whims, my agenda but there is a shared physics of love deep within us that everything hinges on. 

Jesus knows: it doesn’t make sense to say that the way of love and generosity is actually stronger than the path of self-interest. 

Jesus knows: it doesn’t make sense to say that the way of community is more powerful than the way of self. 

Jesus know: It doesn’t make sense to believe that the way of compassion and kindness and justice is stronger than the way of money and might.

It just doesn’t make sense.

But it is the hidden physics of creation, the physics of love embodied in Jesus, Son of God, that actually make our world turn.  And this is what you confirmands are standing up today to affirm.

In this scripture I read a minute ago, Jesus tells us that we will take up our cross and follow him.  We know that there will be suffering, because all movements of love and justice—from the civil rights movement, to gender equality movements, to our current environmental healing movement—they all involve some struggle and some suffering. But that is the cross that we take up to follow Jesus in this way.

Today, you confirmands will profess a decision that you have made to walk in this way of Jesus and to step into this collective space of faith in God, to take it as your own. And while that decision may seem really big and monumental today, the truth is, that we all, here in this room with you, face this decision every day. 

These temples, of Cesaria Philipi of self-centeredness and unbalanced power, of greed and apathy and selfishness, these temples are everywhere: in our work, in our extended families, in our purchasing habits, in our treatment of others, in our concern for the earth and all it’s creatures; and every day, all of us stand at that crossroads multiple times.  The question, as we stand there is: will we be bystanders even or even cash out on this God-thing, or will we do our best to live the lives we were called into in our baptisms?  

Today, you all will stand up, (we’re going to put a whole lot of ritual and tradition around it) and you will commit as confirmands--and we again as congregation--to live the baptism-shaped life that God calls us to. Through sinking our roots into our sacred stories, through the practice of faith with the people here we’ll commit to letting God shape us into fuller versions of ourselves that we didn’t realize we could be.  

Now I can’t promise you a lot of things about the church.  One thing I can most certainly promise you is that this church will disappoint you at some time or another in your life.  And yet, this church is a part of your journey and you a part of theirs. You, with your passion and clear-eyed vision for justice will strengthen this church and bring healing to this world.

We come together in this strange group of people, called the church with our different politics and unique life stories and particular perspectives and we say, “yes, let’s do this. Let’s live this life of faith together.” Faith is a practice that we will commit to doing together as a church, and the more we exercise it the stronger it becomes. I truly believe that through participation in this life of faith, as followers of Jesus, I truly believe that this way of love will strengthen the immune system of humanity. 

God bless you, dear confirmands in this beautiful, painful, mysterious life of faith.

You are loved.