"Getting Back on the Right Track" - Pentecost 23B

St.  Mark 10:17-31

“Getting Back On the Right Track”

Last Thursday I ushered for the memorial service of a titan of Chicago business.  His family was huge in publishing and when the need for their product was made obsolete by the internet he turned that fortune into an even bigger fortune in financial services.

Close to three hundred people attended the funeral which became a celebration of him.  His brothers talked about his business acumen.  His son talked about all the places his father took the family for vacations and his daughter spoke about how he taught her the value of a dollar.

This guy has so much money and was such a big fan of train travel that what he used to do was lease a private car to take his family and friends across the country for their vacations.  As a rail fan I must admit I was becoming a little jealous of all the places they visited - the California Coast, the U.S. and Canadien Rockies, the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest.  All viewed from the back of a private car stocked with fine food, top shelf liqueur, and the highest quality cigars.  (I would skip the cigars!)
Admittedly he was a larger than life character.

When it came to the homily the preacher was the priest in charge of a large social service agency for the Archdiocese of Chicago.

He took off on the topic of trains and how they were made up.  It was a pretty good idea.

 The baggage car was where the man placed all his accomplishments.  The second car was the business associates.  The third was friends while the private car was for family.

Preacher that I am I kept waiting for God to be mentioned and when Father turned his attention towards the engine I thought it had.  You know, God pulling you through the tough times and giving you the energy to move forward in life.  But no, Jim the deceased was the engine. 

Then he talked about the couplings between cars.  Once again my mind turned to God.  Surely it was God who kept us all bound together.  Nope, that was Jim too.

In the homily God was nowhere to be found - not even the caboose.

As we were walking out of the service another one of the ushers said to me: “There were a lot of egos in that room.  So many that there wasn’t any room for God.”

The funeral train went off the tracks because there wasn’t any room left for God.  Riches, the man’s personality and his lucrative business career didn’t leave much room for God because he was so successful.

I wonder if he ever thought to ask the question another rich, successful, man asked of Jesus.  “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”1

Most people don’t give the rich guy kneeling in front of Jesus much credit for coming up with such a really good question.  Instead they try to psychoanalyze him.  Something must have been missing in his life.  Maybe managing all his money was burden too great to handle?  Maybe he was rich in things but poor in spirit?  Or, maybe he had a great question that he just had to ask about eternal life and how to get it?

Jesus doesn’t care to talk to the man about his psyche, or even his spiritual being, he asks the man about his actions. 

His commandment keeping score is outstanding.  This man has a lot going for him.  If we were Jesus we’d snap him up in a nano-second as a member of our church.  He’s pious and he’s rich!  What more could you ask for in a member of the congregation.

Instead of signing him up Jesus gives him an assignment with a demand so high that it is impossible to meet.  He tells him to “Go, sell everything you have and give it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”2

This is one of those things, as they say on television, that you should not try at home.  Don’t take this sermon so literally that tomorrow when your partner or spouse gets home there no furniture, no appliances, not even am an empty house because even the house has been sold.

I don’t want you telling your loved ones that you took something Pastor Nelson said in a sermon to heart and liquidated everything. You’ll get us both killed!

When the rich man goes away with a frown on his face we may be led to ask the same question the disciples did.  With the criterion that high who can make it?  Eternity is going to be really empty if the standard to get in is unattainable. 

At this point Jesus gives a really crazy analogy.  “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle that for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”

Scholars have wasted gallons of ink trying to explain this away.

Some have suggested that is was a mistranslation of the word camel.  In the Greek a simple vowel change can make the word for camel into the word for rope.  Nope.

Then there was the interpreter [who around 850AD] came up with the brilliant idea that there was a low gate into Jerusalem called “the eye of the needle,” through which camel could squeeze in if unburdened. Get it! If we let go of some of our stuff we can indeed get through the needle’s eye. Sorry, no such gate ever existed.3

 So what are we left with?  I think we are left with Jesus telling us about our God who is so gracious, and so winsome, and so powerful that God could, if God wanted, take a full sized camel (One hump or two, take your choice!) a drop that camel right through the eye of a needle and have that dromedary emerge dazed but unscathed on the other side.


That is the God Jesus tells us to put our trust in.

If we continue to put our trust in what we have accomplished, or what we have, or our 401(k)s (And hasn’t that been a scary ride this past week?) we are going to be on the wrong track.

Trust God more than the laundry list of characters and things Jesus goes on to describe and the train will be back on track. 

Episcopal priest Barbara Brown Taylor explained what we receive this way.

It is a dare to [us] to become a new creature, defined in a new way, to trade in all the words that have described [us] up to now – wealthy, committed, cultured, responsible, educated, powerful, obedient – to trade them all in on one radically different word, which is free”4

We’ll be free to serve God and our neighbors without any thought of reward.  We’ll be free to serve God and our neighbors without any cost/benefit analysis.  We’ll be free from trying to save ourselves by parading our good deeds before God. 


When we forget about thinking about all we’ve done and think about all that God can do with us and through us we’ll be free to follow Jesus wherever he leads.

Jesus turned the rich man’s question about eternal life into a challenge to follow him. 

That’s all Jesus asks of us. All he asks is that we follow him and if we do people will say of us - whether we are rich or poor - at least, they were always on the right track.

Thanks for listening.

____________

1.  St.  Mark 10:18b.  (NRSV) [NRSV=The New Revised Standard Version]

2.  St. Mark 10:21. (NIV) [NIV=The New International Version]

3.  William H. Willimon, ""How Hard to Be a Disciple"," Pulpit Resource, B, 46, no. 4 (October 1, 2018), p. 8.

4.  Barbara Brown Taylor, The Preaching Life, (Cowley Publications, Cambridge, Massachusetts), p.121-126.

"Calvinball" - Pentecost 20

Exodus 19:3-7 & 20:1-17

Every other Tuesday morning a group of men gathers in the downtown offices of the Kirkland and Ellis Law Firm to study scripture.  Most of them are members of The Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago and somehow, in ways too convoluted for a sermon, I got recruited to attend and help keep the guys biblically and theologically on track.

It is mostly led by the laity but every once an awhile one of the retired pastors who attend steps up to lead.  I chose last Tuesday because I was preaching here and wanted to do a good job.  ☺

The first question I asked them was: “How would you preach this text?” 
One of the brighter lights in this group responded (and I am not making this up!)   “I would probably find the equivalent in a couple of other religions and societies: Buddhism, Hinduism, the code of Hammurabi and see what they have in common.”

Now I ask you, when was the last time you heard a sermon on the code of Hammurabi?  Probably never and your not going to hear one today because I like you a lot and I’d like to be asked back.

Instead we are going to ease ourselves into shallower waters, much shallower waters, by beginning with what the children and I were talking about together with Calvin-ball.

It was a game invented by Bill Watterson for his two comic strip characters - a young boy who was an only child named Calvin and whose best friend who was a stuffed Tiger named Hobbes who could be seen in action only by Calvin and the readers of the comic strip.

It is not that Calvin-ball didn’t have any rules it is just that Calvin and Hobbes made the rules up as they played.  So, one moment a tree would be the goalpost and the next, on a whim, it would be the fence, or a fireplug, or the house.  Inbounds and out-of-bounds lines would change at a moments notice.  What was fair and what was foul was always open to interpretation and reinterpretation.  It was a crazy game that usually ended up with them getting hurt, getting angry, or getting in trouble.

If you are like me and have been walking around with your stomach in a knot over what has been going on in our nation and metropolitan area since we have seen each other1  I suggest that it is because we have found ourselves caught up in a game of Calvin-ball where rules are enforced or unenforced on a whim and there is no longer any in-bounds or out of bounds causing people - sometimes innocent and sometimes guilty - get hurt.

The fact of the matter is that we need rules and the Ten Commandments are a very good place to start.

They are known to our Hebrew sisters and brothers as as "the ten words", "the ten sayings", or "the ten matters".

They are words about two very important matters: How we are to relate to God and how we are to relate to our neighbors. 

Legend has it that the first three - which deal with our relationship to God - were inscribed on one of the two tablets Moses carried down from the mountain while the other tablet contained the “sayings” about how we are to relate to our neighbors. 

People have viewed them through Christian eyes as being cruciform.  The trunk of the cross being the three that talk about God and the crossbeam the other seven about how we should live our daily lives.

We know them.

Those of us who come from the Lutheran tradition and endured confirmation classes memorized them along with Luther’s explanation of them in his Small Catechism to the point where the words: “You should so fear and love God” send shivers down our spines.  Not because of our fear of God as much as having to stand in front of the class and recite them from memory.

We know that they are the framework upon which almost all civil law is built.  And if we read on in Exodus we see them forming what almost looks like a civil code that covers almost everything from marriage rites to property rites to what you should do with the local psychic.  The answer to that last one is the very extreme, “put them to death.”

Hebrew scholar Michael Carasik, known for his The Bible Guy blog reminds us:

Everyone is familiar with the image, made famous in art and so much a part of how we think of the Bible that it is used in movies and cartoons, of Moses coming down the mountain with two stone tablets that have the Ten Commandments engraved on them. But not everyone remembers that, when Moses finally did come down the mountain, [in Exodus 32] he saw the Israelites worshiping the Golden Calf, lost his temper, and broke the stone tablets.2

 It is at this point it is almost as if a game of Calvin-ball breaks out. 

Moses seems to be taking forever and the people conclude that something must have happened to him.  So, they turn to Aaron and ask him to build for them a golden calf which he does.  “The people exclaimed, ‘O Israel, this is the god that brought you out of Egypt.’”\\

It isn’t.  But this is what happens when you are making things up as you go along.  Suddenly you can make a god out of anything - gold, money, power, prestige, you name it and humanity can make a god out of it.

When inning becomes our god we can celebrate when our side wins and another side loses.  We can tell ourselves then that the ends really did justify the means.   Rules from God and even the rules we made up get changed in mid-game and people wind up, just as they did in Calvin-ball, hurt, angry or, when adults play, even destroyed.

Listen to how  Eugene Peterson paraphrased the scene in The Message:

Early the next morning, the people got up and offered Whole-Burnt-Offerings and brought Peace-Offerings. The people sat down to eat and drink and then began to party. It turned into a wild party!

 God spoke to Moses, “Go! Get down there! Your people whom you brought up from the land of Egypt have fallen to pieces. They made a molten calf and worshiped it. God said to Moses, “I look at this people—oh! what a stubborn, hard-headed people! Let me alone now, give my anger free reign to burst into flames and incinerate them.3

 .
God is angry because at this wild, wild party the people had not only a good old time at the punch bowl but a good old time at the finger bowl.  They were doing all the stuff to each other that God had expressly forbidden including treating each other like physical objects instead of human beings.  If the first three commandments bit the dust with making of the golden calf the last seven were smashed to bits in the wild party that ensued. 

I think that when we treat others like that God does get angry.

A conservative rabbi, Louis Ginzberg, stated in his book Legends of the Jews, that Ten Commandments are virtually entwined, that the breaking of one leads to the breaking of another.3

And it doesn’t take much to see that in our day either.  Think of the turmoil we put ourselves through.  A nation and a city on edge  is no party.  Being  separated from God as we are separating into tribes that won’t even listen to each other is no picnic.  This is Calvin-ball turned into something ugly when it gets played at this kind of high stakes level. 

You and I know that.  We know it is not right to be angry and divided from one another.  We know it is not right to believe or disbelieve somebody because they don’t belong to our tribe.  We know it is not right to kill one another by our words and certainly not by our deeds.  We know we are breaking God’s heart and leading to our own destruction whenever we start to follow our own wills and ways instead of listening to God.

Another one of the guys in my bible study shared a cartoon from The New Yorker that shows Moses holding the commandment tablets and yelling at God: “Now, how about some affirmations to balance all this negativity?”

How about this affirmation to balance things out?  Jesus said: “I give you a new commandment that you love one another just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.  By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

This means that we treat one another in a vastly different manner, see each other from a vastly different angle, feel compassion for one another.

More directly it means that we see every survivor of abuse as if they really were a faberge egg.  It means we weep with and for the families of victims.  It means we look beyond our tribal and political loyalties and reject those who would try to capture hurt and pain for their own political purposes.  It means we love those who are injured in the process.  It means that in all we do  we strive for healing that love may triumph.

Saint Paul was right!

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant  or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;  it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.  It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.4

At the end of every game of Calvin-ball Calvin and Hobbes, broken, bruised and angry as they might have been, make up.  Their love never for each other never fails, never ends.

Let’s hope that we, all of us, everywhere, everyone who bear the name of Christ, can do as well or better, than a cartoon boy and his pretend tiger.

 Thanks for listening. 

_____________

1.  This sermon was preached on the weekend when the McDonald/Vandyke trial concluded and an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court was confirmed.

2.  Mark Rooker,  The Ten Commandments: Ethics for the Twenty-First Century.  (Nashville, Tennessee: B&H Publishing Group, 2010), p. 3.

3.  Michael Carasik, "The Ten Commandments," The Bible Guy, April 20, 2014, , accessed October 06, 2018, https://mcarasik.wordpress.com/2014/04/20/the-ten-commandments/.

4.  Exodus 32:4.  (TLB) [TLB=The Living Bible]

5.  Exodus 32:6-10.  (MSG) [MSG= The Message]

6.  Louis Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, trans. Henrietta Szolt, vol. 3, 5 vols. (New York, NY: Jewish Publication Society of North America, 1969).

7.  St.  John 13:34-35.  (NRSV) [NRSV=The New Revised Standard Version]

"All In the Same Boat" - Pentecost 19B

Saint Mark 9:38-59

There is and old saying from the African American Church that goes: “We Americans came to America on different ships but we’re all in the same boat now.”2

You may not feel this way and after the events of last week you would be well within your rights.1
  
Who lives like this?  Who talks like this?  Who can be this angry all the time?  Apparently some in Washington have made careers out the encouraging the belief that “we are split between hostile groups, each with its own TV networks, fast-food chains and sporting apparel - FOX News vs.  MSNBC, Chick-fil-A vs. Chipotle, Under Armour vs.  Nike.

But all of those great divides says Steve Chapman, editorial board member of the Chicago Tribune, is “an image from a fun-house mirror, composed of mis-leading distortions.”

Independents now make up a plurality of the public.  Self-described moderates outnumber either liberals or conservatives. [And]most people don’t spend much time watching cable news.
Most people are not very conservative or very liberal.  But “the middle has no home in either party.”3

Still politicians in their ads and by their actions try to divide.  They tempt us to come to the conclusion: “A plague on both your houses.” No more of this he said/she said!  No more of this “well I may be a crook or a kook but my opponent is a bigger one.”  No more of this mud slinging.  No more of this “I’ve made up my mind, don’t confuse me with the facts.” A plague on both of you. 

And the reason why some of us give up is that their behavior is godless.   “Washington is a place,” said Mark Shield of the PBS NewsHour, “where everybody is expected to belong to a church or synagogue but nobody is expected to go.”

So they probably have never heard of this encounter with Jesus and his disciples about who is “for us” and who is “against us.”

The disciples were more than put off by a man who was using Jesus’ name to cast out demons.

It could be that they had just tried to do the very same thing themselves only a few hours earlier by Mark’s time and failed.  They had just tried to cure someone of the very same malady and came up empty.  They also may have been upset about this or they may have been upset that the other guy may not have been following Jesus for as long or as closely as they had been.  To them he is just one upstart doing what they couldn’t do so they stop him.

If it had been our day they might have said, “Call the legal department!  File an injunction!  Charge him with copyright violation or patent infringement – anything to stop him from poaching on our territory.”

As usual, Jesus does something that is completely unexpected, counter intuitive.  He says: “Do not stop him.  For no one who does a miracle in my name can in the next moment say anything bad against me.”4

Then he goes on to tell us what we should be doing.  “Why, anyone by just giving you a cup of cold water in my name is on our side.  Count on it that God will notice.”5

Bible commentator David Donovan told about his daughter “hiking the Pacific Coast Trail, a 2600 mile trek through desert and mountains. She has been blessed at numerous points by “Trail Angels” – people who provide water or other support.  My wife and I thank God for the Trail Angels.  Never once have we suggested to our daughter that she should check their doctrinal beliefs before accepting their aid.”5

There is always the temptation to ask a lot of question or at least wonder about their motives.  Do they want something from me?  Are they trying to get my vote or convert me to their church?  And that’s only about a cup of water!

The nation and the church can become divided over deeper issues.  Democrat/Republican, Liberal/Conservative, Red State/Blue State, you name it politicians can fight about it while the ship of state sinks.

The church isn’t much better.  Mega-churches/Local churches; liturgical/contemporary, fundamentalist/mainline, those who do/those who don’t...  You can fill in the blank for what ever those dos and don’t are.   

My partner grew up in a really, really, really, conservative church in the very northwest corner of Iowa.  His church was one of those “don’t churches”.  They didn’t like the Presbyterians because they were a social club.  They didn’t like the Episcopalians because they were a country club.  And they didn’t like the Lutherans because all they did was drink beer.  My first guess is that the people in those other churches didn’t have very nice things to say about them either.  There were leaks in the ship of the church.

My second guess is that all of them were doing a good work - giving that cup of cold water, if you will, in Jesus name.

Yet they were all cut off from each other for reasons that Jesus describes as no less than being trashy.

Somehow a word got mistranslated in today’s gospel.  The word “hell” in our text in the original Greek is Gehenna and comes from the Hebrew, ge Hinnon, the Valley of Hinnon,  which was the place were all the rubbish from Jerusalem was taken to be burned.  It was a stinking, steaming, garbage dump.

The church has always been referred to as the body of Christ and so what Jesus is saying in a very graphic way is that if there is anything in us that is hindering us or any of his little ones from following him it must be removed lest we wind up literally “down in the dump”.  If there is anything that is causing the church to be divided we need to find out what it is and do anything we can to remove it so that the body of Christ might be united in witness to a world that desperately needs what we have to give.

I’ve come to believe that maybe God doesn’t see what we think are divisions in the same way we do.  I think that while it is not my cup of tea God may like a little “smooth jazz” in worship on a Sunday morning. I’d like to think that while you and I like a formal, structured worship God may like the freedom of those non-liturgical churches or the blessed silence of a Quaker meeting.  I think that God can like the “smells and bells” of what the Anglican or Episcopal church call, with tongue firmly planted in their cheeks, “a smoking service” while at the same time enjoying the red hot emotion of a charismatic revival.

The saying about America can also be said about the way we approach God.  We may have come on different ships but we are all in the same boat now.

And we are to sail on by being salt and light to a world that seems to be sinking deeper and deeper into the bland, bland, darkness.

In one paraphrase of Scripture Jesus says, “Don’t lose your flavor!  Live in peace with one another.” 7

How do we do that?  By coming to the conclusion that people who are not against us are really on our side.  That even if we disagree with them, about religion or politics, or what sports team to root for (Even the Packers or the Bears!) they can still be our sisters and brothers in Christ. 

By admitting that, by and large, very few evil people have ever walked this earth.  And concluding that we all need each other because we are all in the same boat.

Let the motto of Northwestern University, my Alma Mater, borrowed from Saint Paul, be our guide:

Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things. [Do this} and the God of peace will be with you.8

May the God of peace be with us as we salt of the earth people sail on trying to be a light for the world.

Thanks for listening.

____________

1. Sermon was preached during the confirmation hearings for an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.

2.  Clarence Page, "Even in Our Diverse Tribes, We're Still Americans," Chicago Tribune, September 26, 2018, Morning ed., sec. 1; p.  19.

3.  Steve Chapman, "A Polarized America? Not Quite," Chicago Tribune, September 23, 2018, Sunday ed., sec. 1; p.  24.

4.  St.  Mark 9:38.  (NIV) [NIV=The New International Version]

5.  St.  Mark 9: 41.  (MSG) [MSG=The Message]

6.  David Donovan, "Salt & Fire," Sermon Writer: Making Preaching More of a Joy, September 13, 2018, , accessed September 28, 2018, https://www.sermonwriter.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/2018-09-30-Proper21B.doc.

7.   St.  Mark 9:50.  (TLB) [TLB=The Living Bible]

8.   Philippians 4:8-9.  (NKJV) [NKJV=The New King James Version]

"Universal Human Dignity" - Pentecost 18B

Genesis 39:1-23

All of us know what it is like to be unjustly accused and all of us know what is like not to be believed.

You have all seen those lists of “the weirdest laws you never knew existed in your state -- they’re quirky, they’re fun, and after reading [Kastilia Madrano’s research into them on the travel website Thrillist], I can tell you they’re about 95% bogus.”1

But there is one weird law that I absolutely know to be true from personal experience.  If you ever drive into Chicago and park your car more than 12 inches from the curb you’ll get a ticket.  This little lesson cost me $25 and now I carry a t-square and chalk with me so the traffic attendant and I know that I am close enough to the curb.

I was enraged when I found that orange envelope on my windshield but even more furious when my partner’s cousin parked his huge Chevy pick-up that he uses to haul his Airstream that is much larger than  my Suburu Forester.  His truck stuck out so far into the traffic lanes that it almost crossed the double line.

That is minor stuff.  But this week in particular we are dealing with some serious accusations.  Whether it be of a shortstop for the Chicago Cubs or a Supreme Court nominee the charges and denials are flying.

I honestly have no idea what to think but I do believe that today’s tawdry tale of an ancient event from scripture and a tweet from a couple of enraged fans can help us look at the bigger picture and higher stakes of both matters.

Today we find Joseph in pretty good shape.  After an up and down start - loved by his father and hated by his brothers.  After being sold into slavery.  Joseph by skill, luck, or another force  has landed a big job  in his master’s house.  Eventually he became boss over everything - farm and field, flock and forest, kitchen and kitchen utensils. Joseph was so in charge that his master eventually had very little to do with any of the day to day machinations of his domain.  Think Carson’s relation to Lord Grantham in Downton Abbey.

I am not so sure that when Joseph rang the bell, like Carson, Potiphar and his family didn’t dress for dinner.  Talk about Pavlov’s dogs.

Now we get to the tricky park.

There was one person in the household who wasn’t so much interested in dressing as undressing.  In particular Mrs. Potiphar apparently spent a lot of her idle time wondering what Joseph would look like sans tunic. 

Scripture plainly tells us he was a hunk.  And we post #metoo movement skeptics might be well within our rights to ask:  What did he do to contribute to the situation? Did he walk around with a little extra chest showing?  Did he wear his garments above the knee?  Or, was he just walking around minding his own  business never taking that extra moment to glance at his reflection and say to himself, “Dang it!  Look at you sir!  You’re hot.!”

Remembering that all of Scripture is written from a male point of view apparently he does not.  He sees himself as more mope than model, more accountant than object of anyone’s affection.

Never-the-less he gets propositioned in the least subtle of ways.  Mrs.  Potiphar’s pick-up line is startlingly direct.  (You can’t imagine how worried I am about a double entendre here.)  Joseph’s response to this “come on” is very important for then and for now.

“Look,” he told her, “my master trusts me with everything in the entire household; he himself has no more authority here than I have! He has held back nothing from me except you yourself because you are his wife. How can I do such a wicked thing as this? It would be a great sin against God.”2

One of the great Old Testament scholars, Gerhard von Rad, has said of Joseph’s response. 

Joseph’s statement must ... be understood in the sense that a wrong against the husband would be a direct sin against God. Joseph in addition uses the argument of universal human decency which is unwilling to break a trust.3

 That phrase “universal human decency” jumped out at me. 

Joseph didn’t react to the temptation that was set before him with an “Oh, what the heck!” he reacted as he did because he was genuinely  decent man who had a higher loyalty to his master and to God.

Still it doesn’t look good for him.  This is not a he said/she said situation.  On Mrs.  Potiphar’s second attempt at luring Joseph he flees with her still holding his shirt. 

She screams!  He’s caught.  And at this point she also plays the ultimate card when she refers to his ethnic origin.  “This Hebrew slave.” she says first to the guards and then to her husband.  It is almost like she is saying:  “You couldn’t find a nice Egyptian boy to run your household?  No, you had to go and hire an outsider, a foreigner, a Hebrew.”

Even with all the evidence on her side she appeals to tribalism.

In our divided nation we know this all too well.  In this divided moment we are finding yet another way to place ourselves within a tribe.  

These are not benign affiliations they are malignancies that cloud our judgement. 

If he or she belongs to our tribe she or he must be right.  Evidence don’t matter.  Facts don’t matter.  Getting at the truth doesn’t matter.  The only thing that matters is that our side wins. It is like being on the set of “Survivor” and, if you’re like me, begging to be voted off the island.

Let’s leave the unholy mess in Washington out of this. 

Witness the furor of fans at the Chicago Cubs shortstop being put on “administrative leave” in the middle of a pennant race.  Here are two of the tweets which both echo the same thing:

JATaylor wrote: “Good God, Addison Russell's wife blew him up while the Cubs are playing!”

And, Bones McGee responded: “But of course she did five minutes before the playoffs.”4

What is missing is any sense of “universal human decency.”  The only thing that seems to matter is that our tribe triumphs.

You’d think that generations after the Joseph story was first written down things would be different but they are not.  Joseph is in the clink.  And we are in a world where allegations are believed or disbelieved on the basis of what tribe we belonged.

Yet, we are told that even in prison Joseph prospers.  That is the only grace note left in the very sour sounding story.  Commentators maintain that this happened because over and over again the author restates that “the Lord was with Joseph.”

Before long the prisoner is running the show.  The inmate becomes the warden in charge of everything that happens.

Walter Bruggemann writes:

It is not claimed that because of Yahweh everything will work out.  Nor is it promised that the key actor will be easily saved from trouble.  But the narrative offers an understanding ... that there is and inscrutable power for life at work in spite of everything human cleverness devises.5   

Prison will not be the end for Joseph because there is more to his story.  His words, and deeds, and dream lives on.

Prison wasn’t the end for Bonhoeffer, his The Cost of Discipleship, written in a Nazi prison, has become a must read classic. 

Prison wasn’t the end for Dr.  Martin Luther King who in his Letters from a Birmingham Jail, still speaks to those who are “more devoted to ‘order’ than to justice.” 6

Prison wasn’t the end for Nelson Mandella who went from being a prisoner to the president of his country.

The Lord was with these servants in their travail and the Lord will be with us through these troubled times until God’s deepest desire for a sense of “universal human decency” is restored among God’s people.

No matter our tribe let us all strive to be the first in line for God’s good restoration project.

Thanks for listening.

__________

1.  Kastalia Medrano, "The Weirdest Law We Could Track Down in All 50 States," Thrillist, April 27, 2018, , accessed September 22, 2018, https://www.thrillist.com/entertainment/nation/weird-state-laws#.

2.  Genesis 39:8-9.  (TLB) [TLB=The Living Bible]

3.  Gerhard VonRad, "Joseph's Temptation," trans. John H. Marks, in Genesis: A Commentary (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1961), p. 360.

4.   Liz Roscher, "Addison Russell Put on Leave after Ex-wife's Allegations of Physical, Mental Abuse," Yahoo! Sports, September 21, 2018, , accessed September 22, 2018, https://sports.yahoo.com/addison-russells-ex-wife-accuses-physical-mental-abuse-blog-post-143802823.html.

5.  Walter Brueggemann, Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching, ed. James Luther Mays and Patrick D. Miller (Atlanta, GA: John Knox Press, 1982), 317.

6.  Martin Luther King, Letter from Birmingham Jail. The Martin Luther King Jr. Research and Education Institute. Archived from the original on January 9, 2013. Retrieved September 22, 2018.

"Dogged Determination" - Pentecost 16B

"Dogged Determination"

Saint Mark 7:24-27

I am currently between dogs and as one who loves them that is a terrible place to be.

Except for several months a few years ago there has been a dog in my life since before I can remember.  Now it has been five months since my last canine kid passed and I’m getting antsy.

Ladd A. Dogg adopted me at PAWS Chicago only about three-and-a-half years ago.  I went there to look at Greyhounds but they couldn’t see me for dust.  I sat on a chair. I sat on the floor. I reached out my hand. I could have stood on my head but there was no reaction.

So I went for a walk and there was Ladd A. Dogg, a Border Collie/Labrador mix (or Bord-a-Dor as we called her) staring at me with the brownest of brown eyes and wagging her tail.  It was love at first sight.  Unfortunately it was also about three minutes before closing time.  I told her to stay put and when I got home I filled out all the required forms.

The next day, literally as they were putting the key in the door to open up shop I was there.  Three interviews and a meet and greet later we were a team!  She took over the yard, the house, the bed, the front seat of the car, and most of all the bed.  She was my shadow and to this day I miss her as I am sure you are missing those fur-suited friends who became a part of your life.

One of the things I have discovered in this in-between time before Saint Francis finds me another dog is that the kitchen floor needs to be swept far more often then it did when when Ladd A. Dogg was around.

No crumb ever came close to hitting the floor when she was near.  In fact, no crumb was ever left on the table, or a even a plate.  She may have been one of the best counter-surfing dogs in the history of time!  She was a living, breathing, vacuum that sucked up whatever edible was in site.

Ladd A. Dogg also serves as an excellent counterpoint to the uncomfortable little conversation between Jesus and the Syrophoenician woman that we have before us in today’s gospel.

We will miss the truly radical nature of this encounter  if we forget to notice where it takes place.  Tyre and Sidon were in Lebanon - the very place where the conflicts between Israel and Hesbollah continue to this very day.  

The bad blood between these two people goes all the way back to Jesus’ day and extends to our own.  The woman and Jesus were adversaries.  Perhaps it was this adversarial nature that does not seem to bring out the best in Jesus.

No matter how many times I read this story I always wince at Jesus’ reaction to the woman whose daughter was suffering so badly that she would risk crossing nationalist and social boundaries to get what she so desperately needs.

I am just a dog-parent so I can only imagine how much more the feeling of anguish and helplessness parents get when their child is in trouble.  Parents have to be at wits end when they have tried everything and nothing has worked.  That is where this Gentile woman is when she, desperate for help, drops to her knees in front of Jesus and begs him for his assistance.  And what does our sweet, gentle, Jesus say in response?

“It is not good to take the children’s food and throw it to the little dogs.”1

We are in shock!  We’ve heard what he said and this is not the Jesus we know or even want to know.  This is Jesus who is almost unrecognizable making us profoundly uncomfortable.

Nobody we know or even know of would ever call another human being a dog.  Nobody we know or even know of would ignore the pleas of a parent on behalf of a child.  Nobody we know or even know of would exclude a whole people because of their country of origin.  Nobody we know or even know of would act like that.  Those words are unacceptable out of anyone’s mouth and coming from the lips of Jesus they come like a slap on the side of the head.  These words leave our ears ringing.

I have always loved the way scholars have tried to soften the words and stop the ringing.  Gallons of ink and reams of paper have been spent trying to explain Jesus little outburst away.

Some have suggested that it was simple exhaustion.  Others have suggested that when Jesus called her child a dog he really meant a puppy.  You know, a cute, little, adorable puppy who wakes you up seventeen times during the night to be let outside only to sniff around the yard for forty minutes trying to find just the right spot.  Oh yes, puppy makes everything better.

I stand second to none in my love for puppies and dogs but to refer to another person as a dog is to dehumanize them.

So what are we to do with this passage?  What are we to do with Jesus talking like this? 

With no other scholars I can find backing me up here is what I think and I think this because of the events of the last few months.  If Jesus and scripture ever offered a critique of our society this would be it.

Remember who Jesus was.  He was a rabbi, a respected man in the community, whom people looked up to now calling another person a low-life.

And think about her!  Who is she?  She is not only a woman who by law was forbidden to talk to a man in public who was not her husband.  Not only a woman but a woman from a country that many considered inferior full of “rapists, drug dealers and other bad hombres.”

Around these two stands a crowd.  While some in that crowd may have been surprised at Jesus calling the woman and her child dogs perhaps another third was nodding their heads in agreement. 

“You tell her Jesus!” they might have been smiling and saying to themselves.  “This woman has no business bothering you!  You give her what for!”  As we look closer to agreeing faces and nodding heads we see the worse in us and in our society.

But Jesus is setting both the woman and us up.  He sees what a strong person she is.  And, not doubt he is the one smiling when she shoots back at him angrily: “Of course, Master.  But don’t dogs under the table get scraps dropped by the children?”2

She has Jesus and all the rest of us in a very tough spot because we have to answer a very difficult question: “Is the Gospel for everybody or is it only for a select few?” 

In this strong, tough woman Jesus has met his match.  He had sparred with some of the brightest and best minds of his day is bested by someone who, in a single sentence has reminded us all that if the Gospel isn’t meant for everybody than is it really isn’t any good for anybody? 

The Gospel isn’t dependent on who we are or what we are.  The Gospel isn’t dependent on status or orientation.  The Gospel is for everybody.

Maybe Jesus needs to touch our ears too to help us live out the Gospel. Maybe Jesus needs to shout or maybe just whisper to us “Ephphatha” in order that we may speak to each other the way God has spoken to us.

You have probably all seen the plaque in gift shops and those countless Christmas magazines that will soon be filling your mail boxes. You know the one that says: “I only hope that God loves me as much as my dog does.”

And the message of the Gospel is that God does love you that much and even more.  But God doesn’t stop at loving just you and me here in our Sunday best. God loves those people out there in the world who are drinking coffee at home or at Starbucks.  God loves those people who have gone for a jog or to the gym this morning.  God loves those people who are sleeping or torturing themselves by watching one of those Sunday morning news programs with their “Sabbath gasbags.”

God loves all of us and all of us equally.  There is not a sumptuous feast of God’s love for some and table scraps for others.  We don’t have to sit up and beg for God’s love.  We don’t even have to surf counters looking for it.  God’s love is here for everyone fully, completely, unreservedly.

When that is our message I think  people’s ears will be unstopped and they will join us in telling others the wonderful joy, and peace, and love that is to be found in Jesus who welcomes all.

__________

1.  St.  Mark 7:27b.  (NKJV) [NKJV=The New King James Version]

2.  St.  Mark 7:29.  (MSG) [MSG=The Message]

Sermon preached at Our Savior's Lutheran Church

Aurora, Illinois 

September 9, 2018

"Better Than Sliced Bread" - Pentecost 12B

The Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost

1 Kings 19:4-8
Saint John 6:35, 41-51

It is the invention that all other inventions are judged by.

The story of this great innovation began in 1912 in Davenport, Iowa with a man named Otto Frederick Rohwedder.  At first, as with most new ideas, his was greeted with skepticism.  Fellow members of the industry scoffed and said if their product was subjected to his invention it wouldn’t last as long.  Also when passed through his new machine it tended to fall apart all over the floor.  Salespeople also had a hard time placing it in the bag without the pieces exploding out of their hands like a mishandled deck of cards.

Rohwedder resorted to the use of hatpin to keep the product together.  They too fell out resulting in a mess.

Both problems were solved when Rohwedder added a feature that immediately wrapped the product in wax paper as it emerged from his machine.  Still his colleagues remained dubious.

Sixteen years later, in “1928, Rohwedder traveled to Chillicothe, Missouri, where  Frank Bench took a chance on this idea.

The very first loaf of pre-sliced bread went on store shelves  July 7, 1928, as ‘Sliced Kleen Made Bread.’ It was an instant success. Bench's sales quickly skyrocketed.

“In 1930, Wonder Bread began to commercially produce pre-sliced loaves of bread, popularizing sliced bread and making it a household staple.”1

Along with this invention the cliche’ “That’s the greatest thing since sliced bread” was born to laud any new idea.

Bread is one of life’s essentials.  Inmates were reduced to bread and water.  A plate of pasta would not be the same without simple bread soaked in fine olive oil.  Peanut Butter and Jelly would just be a messy combo without bread to hold it together.  Bread is important to almost every culture at every time though history.  And it was specially important in Biblical times.

If you have been in church the last few Sundays you know that. It’s all we seem to be talking about.

Two weeks ago we heard the old familiar story of Jesus feeding the five thousand with a few fish and

a couple of pieces of bread.  Last week we heard Jesus expound on this gift by comparing it to the manna in the wilderness.  This week he tells us that he is “the bread of life.” I have a feeling this may be why your very fine pastor took this Sunday off - he may have run out of things to say about bread.

The importance of bread can even be seen in today’s reading from the Hebrew Scriptures where we come upon a solitary figure sitting under a tree. 

It is Elijah.  He is alone.  He is depressed.  His depression is so great that were we around him we would have been calling 9-1-1.

What had just happened was his legendary showdown at Mount Carmel with the prophets of Baal.  You remember the story.

Elijah and the prophets face off to prove whose god is the real god.  The altars are loaded up with sacrifices and we wait for fire from heaven.  The prophets of Baal have little to show for all their efforts, not even a spark.  Elijah taunts them and then says the word and the LORD sends a firestorm.  The people respond by proclaiming devotion to the God of Israel.

Having her prophets humiliated does not please the queen, Jezebel, who puts a contract out on Elijah’s life. 

After this exercise in speed bible story telling we find the prophet complaining to God.  “Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.”

That is the key to Elijah’s depression.  He thought that he would be able to do what none of his ancestors were able to do.  He thought that with his spectacular fireworks display everybody would turn to the LORD from the lowest peasant to the Queen in her court.  But they don’t.

And thinking that he could save the world and failing, Elijah becomes depressed.

That may a take away for us. 

No one deed, no matter how spectacular, will turn everything around. 

No human can solve all our problems and when they think they can they often get in trouble.

The landscape is littered with the depressed souls of those who began to believe that they were larger than life characters who could do things that others could not. 

I’m thinking of a Cardinal Archbishop and a church leader who may have changed the concept of outreach to the unchurched forever but who have to be sitting under their own broom trees now because they got caught up in their own power.

Politicians who promised to “drain the swamp” being discovered to be swamp creatures themselves.  Or a city looking for that one majestic solution to the carnage of gun violence and failing to see that it is going to take a myriad of good people, with good ideas, to turn things around.

If we go on thinking that we are the only one who can make every thing right we will be miserable.  If we tell ourselves there is nothing we can do we will become even more miserable.

What Elijah forgot was that he wasn’t responsible for all the powerful deeds he was doing in his life - God was.  What Elijah forgot was that he wasn’t responsible for everything, God was.

And so God brings the prophet who only days before was enjoying his greatest success to a place where he has to rely on what he really needs - a radical dependence on God.  And relying on what God gave him he was able to go on his way.

Jesus’ listeners had a hard time with that dependence too.

First, they were unable to get over their history forgetting an important part.  They say to Jesus: “Moses fed our ancestors with bread in the desert.  It says so in the Scriptures: ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”

They forgot something.  Moses didn’t give them the bread, God did.  Moses just passed it out.

Second, they were unable to get over Jesus’ history.  “‘What?’ they exclaimed.  ‘Why, he is merely Jesus the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know.’”

They failed to see that what was at work in Jesus was no less than the power of God.

Saint John’s gospel is the last written and so it is less narrative and more John working out the theology of the church.  In this case what believe about Jesus, the bread of life, we receive at the Eucharist.

What we believe when we come to the table is we receive bread that gives us life, bread that gives us strength for our journeys.

Bread which gives us strength to be a disciple of the living God which means turning the other cheek, walking out of step with the aims of the world, rejecting power and the idolatries of racism, nationalism, materialism and sexism for a real faith that is dependent on God and needs to be strengthened and sustained by God’s power.

The prophets of old couldn’t do it all on their own and neither can we.  We need Jesus who is here for us. 

All we need to do is reach out our hands and receive him and then rise to do his work, as best we can, wherever we are in the world.

The weekly reminder that we need Jesus may be the best thing that ever happens to us. 

Yes, even better than sliced bread.
 

_____________

1.  Jennifer Rosenberg, "Do You Know Why Sliced Bread Is Such and Important Invention," ThoughtCo, , accessed August 10, 2018, https://www.thoughtco.com/sliced-bread-invented-1779266.

2.  2 Kings 19:4b.  (NIV) [NIV=The New International Version]

3.  St.  John 6:31.  (MSG) [MSG=The Message]
  

4.  Saint John 6:42.  (TLB) [TLB=The Living Bible]

 

Sermon preached at Saint Timothy Lutheran Church

Skokie, Illinois

August 5, 2015

"Power, Passion and Compassion - Pentecost 10B

2 Samuel 11:-15

Saint John 6:1-13

This may not surprise you at all but, according to the Pew Research Center, “in general, people in richer nations are less likely than those in poorer nations to say that religion plays a very important role in their lives.”1

Tyler Castle, fleshed this out for us in a blog on the website “Values and Capitalism” writing:

As people become more prosperous, they become more comfortable with their lives.  They find more satisfaction in the material realities of this world, which means they are less inclined to depend on God...

I have found this to be true in my own life, especially during certain seasons. [When] my life is filled with many wonderful things: material blessings, relationships, opportunities for personal fulfillment ... it is easy to get caught up in the goodness of the here and now.  When my life seems to be going well, I am less likely to look to God for my provision.  Instead, it is during the painful, lonely times that I cling desperately to God.2

Is that true for you?  It certainly is true for me.  And it certainly was true for King David

You have been following his story and, last week, you heard about his home building project.  You heard that by every measure he had built the finest house in all the land.  His house was the envy of all his neighbors.  It was a house fit for a king which is what he was. But by our standards it was a dive.

Remember these were very smelly times.  Horses, cows, chickens roaming the streets.  No sewer systems or even any indoor plumbing. Fires for cooking and heating; no glass in the windows; no fans unless you had a slave to stand over you all day.  Any student of history knows that life, even in the early part of the twentieth century, was not easy.

Even so, King David was quite pleased with himself.  If he had a mirror, he would probably stand before it every morning and say: “Dang!  You’re hot!”  Not only that but he was a slayer of giants, a military leader unlike any ever known, a builder of outstanding buildings, and an all around stable genius.

And it is here we find him wallowing in his greatness.

We know his story all too well.  It even seems that we are living in this story.  Everyday we hear about another fallen emperor. Everyday there is another tawdry episode about a politician, or entertainer, or journalist, or tycoon who didn’t remember what his mother, I hope, taught him when he was little: “Keep your hands to yourself.”

“In the spring,” Scripture tells us, “at the time when kings go off to war”3  David mind is way ahead of John Lennon who famously said in the 1960s “Make love, not war.”

I have absolutely no intention of going into the specifics of what happened between David and Bathsheba on that hot night. (In more ways than one!) You can find the dreadful details of such encounters on almost any news program, newspaper,  or in this weeks edition of The New Yorker.4

Let’s just say that the same behavior by powerful men in our day gave birth to the “#metoo” movement in David’s day resulted in a baby boy.  The King would then participate in a cover-up of major proportions. 

As we have heard over and over again it is not the crime but the coverup.  But when you are a king you have absolute power and as the old saying goes: “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”5  Powerful people have the potential to be bad people.

At this point in his life David was a very bad man.

The king invites the husband of his mistress over for drinks, gets him tipsy, and the next morning while Uriah is still hung-over, sends him to the front lines of battle where the he is killed.

(Is it getting warm in here or is it just me?)

If anybody tells you that the Bible isn’t relevant to our day point them to this passage.  It has the misuse of power written all over it.  And when power combines with passion there is trouble of major proportions.

We’ll leave beloved King David to think about what he has done and stew in his own juices until next Sunday because if the only thing you come away from church is the feeling that “as it was so shall it ever be” you might not come back. 

I can’t leave you in despair.  Power does not always have to lead to unbridled passion sometimes it can lead to compassion.

We know the kind of power Jesus had.  He could still storms, heal the sick, even raise the dead.  This is the kind of power no king or political leader will ever have.  And this is the kind of power we are to be inspired to emulate.

Saint Mark remembers in his Gospel that when Jesus lifted up his eyes and saw the crowd his heart and mind were full of compassion.

Now I know you have heard this story countless times in your life. You were probably sitting there as I read this saying, “Oh yes, this old saw.  I remember it: thousands of people, two fish, two loaves, big meal. Speaking of which, I wonder what we should have for dinner.”

But hearing this story in light of David’s untidy little tale gives it new meaning.  To put it directly: King David is all about power used for passion.  It is all about his wants, needs, and desires.  Jesus uses his power to show compassion.

David knew the name of the person he was taking advantage of.  Jesus had no idea who he was feeding and he didn’t care!

Nowhere does either Jesus or his disciples’ question who the five thousand people were or might be. Nowhere does either Jesus or his disciples eliminate, segregate, or exclude. Jesus doesn’t ask the disciples to sort the five thousand by socioeconomic status or by test scores or by academic degree achieved or by strength of their individual faith—or by any faith, for that matter—or by culture or by ethnicity or by gender or by age. This table was open to all, not because of who they were...
 when Jesus was asked to feed people, he showed an unimaginable love ... an unthinkable leap of acceptance... He said, “Feed ’em! Feed ’em all! Every one of them.” Friends, where in this world do we ever (compassion) quite like that?6

Actually I saw it last week when you brought baskets of food up for the Irving Park Food Pantry.  I see it in the churches in downtown Chicago who have banded together to give the homeless a hot meal every night of the week.  I see it in the Chicago Night Ministry who goes out on the streets with their “Night Bus” to deliver health care to people who have fallen through society’s cracks.  

Yes, I can even see it among the wealthy and powerful - the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; Warren Buffet who, according to Forbes gave away $3.4 billion dollars just in April.7 

These are powerful men and women who form foundations to help others and not pay for paintings of themselves to hang in their offices.

What caused King David to fall from grace is that he believed his own press releases.  He believed that he could draw the biggest crowds. He believed that he was smarter than all of his generals combined.  He believed he could outsmart everybody else and do whatever he wanted.    He believed in power and passion over compassion.  He shifted his gaze from God and turned it toward himself. And so he showed his potential one hot night to be a very bad person indeed.

Jesus shows us another way.  

The diabolical one had shown him all the vestiges of money, power, and prestige when Jesus’ was tempted in the wilderness.  Jesus rejected all those earthy treasures in favor of a life and ministry that showed a richness of compassion toward others that was so strong that it even included the giving of his life.

My guess is the none of us sitting here are playing in the same financial league as the Buffets and Gates of the world.  My guess is that all of us here belong to the great middle class of where we have enough to live on happily but not so much that we can become full of ourselves.  My guess is that all of us have discovered that while King David had a nice house for his time it is nothing compared to ours.

So what are we to do?  How are we to live? 

Perhaps these words for John Wesley can help.

 Do all the good you can,
 By all the means you can,
 In all the ways you can,
 In all the places you can,
 At all the times you can,
 To all the people you can,
 As long as ever you can.8

 Thanks for listening.

Sermon preached at Irving Park Lutheran Church

Chicago, Illinois 

Sunday, July 29, 2018

____________________

1.  Gai, George. "How Do Americans Stand Out From the Rest of the World." Fact Tank: News in the Numbers. March 12, 2015. Accessed July 27, 2018. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/03/12/how-do-americans-stand-out-from-the-rest-of-the-world/ 

2.  Castle, Tyler. "Does Wealth Make Us Less Religious." Values and Capitalism. Accessed July 27, 2018. http://www.valuesandcapitalism.com/does-wealth-make-us-less-religious/.

3.  2 Samuel 11:1a.  (NIV) [NIV=The New International Version]

4.  Sermon preached the same week this article was published: 

Farrow, Ronan. "Les Moonves and CBS Face Alligations of Sexual Misconduct." The New Yorker, August 13, 2018.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/08/06/les-moonves-and-cbs-face-allegations-of-sexual-misconduct

5.  Martin, Gary. "'Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely' - the Meaning and Origin of This Phrase." Phrasefinder. Accessed July 28, 2018. https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/absolute-power-corrupts-absolutely.html

6.  Eldred, Mark. "God in My Pocket." Sermon, 4 O'clock Worship, The Fourth Presbyterian Church, Chicago, July 26, 2015.
http://www.fourthchurch.org/sermons/2015/072615_4pm.html

7.  Friedman, Zack. "Why Warren Buffett Just Donated $3.4 Billion." Forbes.com, July 19, 2018. Accessed July 28, 2018. https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2018/07/19/warren-buffett-bill-gates-charity/#59a45d3e3e36

8.  "A Quote by John Wesley." Goodreads. Accessed July 28, 2018. https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/12757-do-all-the-good-you-can-by-all-the-means