Who are you? Who are you in the Gospel stories we have just heard? In 1978 the English rock band The Who released a new album. It had the title song “Who Are You?” The song quickly became the introductory song for the television series “CSI.” “Who are you,” the band sang, “Who, who, who, who? Who are you? Who, who, who, who? Tell me, who are you? ‘Cause I really wanna know.” Even if you don’t watch CSI or listen to The Who, our two gospel passages challenge us to put ourselves into Jesus’ story and to ask ourselves, “Who are you?”
Who are you? Were you an excited member of the ragtag band of Jesus’ followers? Were you one of those standing alongside the road watching Jesus ride in on a colt? Perhaps you were there because you wanted to avoid the imperial parade taking place on the other side of Jerusalem. Scholars tell us that parade was meant to remind Passover pilgrims that the Romans were powerful and invincible. Perhaps you guessed that Jesus deliberately staged his own “triumphal” entry into Jerusalem in order to mock Roman power and remind people of Zechariah’s prophecy that the messiah would return riding on a donkey. Perhaps you wondered if the attention that Jesus was drawing to himself would get him in trouble with the authorities. So where were you that day? Were you watching the Roman legions, shouting along with the crowds who were applauding their power and might? Or did you cast your lot in with the Galilean rabbi and his motley followers? Were you secretly hoping that by coming into Jerusalem as he did that Jesus was inaugurating a regime change? Did you regret your choice when you saw how events played out?
Who are you? It might be hard to admit it, but were you one of the disciples who fell asleep in Gethsemane? You had pledged never to desert Jesus, but when crunch time came, were you disengaged, indifferent, or unmoved by Jesus’ struggle in the garden? Were you afraid of what might happen next? Or were you just plain worn out by the day’s events?
Who are you? You’ll never admit it, even to yourself, but were you Judas? You were Jesus’ friend. Yet, when you saw that he wasn’t doing what you expected, when you realized that he did not intend to stage a military rebellion against the Romans, did you elect to betray him instead? Did you even think about what might actually happen if you betrayed him? Afterwards did you feel any remorse?
Who are you? Were you one of the religious or political leaders? Did Jesus’ staged event make you nervous? Did you begin to fear that Jesus was overly upsetting the status quo, and that Jerusalem couldn’t take any more demonstrations? Did you want desperately to be rid of Jesus? Did you – reluctantly to be sure – join in the accusations against him? When he declared himself to be God’s anointed one, did you agree that he deserved to be condemned to death and handed over to the Romans? Did you even think about what they might do to him?
Who are you? Today were you part of another crowd, not a crowd welcoming Jesus into Jerusalem, but a crowd calling for his death. Did you ask the Roman governor instead to release Barabbas, a known criminal? Were you swept up by the mob? Did you come to think it was OK to persecute an innocent person?
Who are you? Could you have been Pilate? Most of us won’t admit to playing his part either. Did you perhaps see that things in Jerusalem were getting out of hand, and that your reputation for keeping order was in danger of evaporating? Did you reassure yourself that you were innocent, while you gave in to crucifixion, and destroyed an innocent person? Rome does not execute innocent people, does it?
Who are you? Did you stand with the soldiers and the other people who mocked Jesus? After all, he said he was God’s anointed one, didn’t he? It’s easy to mock someone who is unable to answer back.
Who are you? Were you among those loyal women, the ones who didn’t desert Jesus, but, unlike his other friends, stayed with him to the bitter end and beyond? You knew you were powerless to save Jesus, but still you stood, knowing you could not be anywhere else. Were you there with him, weeping and faithful to the end? I’d like to think I was.
Who are you? Who, who, who, who? Who wants to know? Does God want to know? Nope. God knows already who we are. Do we? As we walk with Jesus through this most holy week of the Christian year, I invite you to ask yourself: who is Jesus? More important, who are you?
Sunday, March 29, 2015
Sunday, March 22, 2015
We Wish to See Jesus
“Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” What an odd request! It was Sunday. The great crowds who had begun gathering for the Passover festival had heard that Jesus was coming. They had gathered in the streets, shouting, “Hosanna,” at him, ready to anoint him as king. Why had these Gentile Greeks – we don’t even know how many of them there were – approached Philip asking to see Jesus? Hadn’t they been among the crowds? Hadn’t they seen Jesus then? Had they missed Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem and now wanted to find out what all the fuss was about? Perhaps they were God-fearers, Gentiles who sympathized with Judaism. What did they hope to see? Did they expect to see a king? Perhaps they hoped to share in the new political regime that this triumphant king would surely inaugurate. Or perhaps they’d heard about the healings Jesus had done and were seeking healing for one of their own. Or since Greeks generally did not believe in miracles, perhaps they’d come for some learned philosophical discourse. Gingerly, they approached Philip, who then went with Andrew to ask Jesus. Would Jesus actually be willing to meet with them?
The Gospel account doesn’t tell us whether the Greeks actually got a face to face meeting with Jesus. In a sense, it doesn’t matter. In this part of the story, the “Greeks” represent the totality of the human race. They stand in for all those outside the Jewish fold who will also be drawn into covenant with God through Jesus’ Passion. Jesus has performed all the miracles he is going to perform. He has shown forth all the signs of his identity as God’s son. The approach of these non-Jews signals to Jesus – and to us – that now the time has finally come for Jesus to take the next step on his journey: to the Cross and beyond.
Before Jesus can take that next step, he needs to make sure that the “Greeks,” if they are still there, his disciples, and the crowds, know just what that next step means. He needs to make sure that his followers “see” him as he truly is, and that they understand what following him will mean for their lives. So, for all who have ears to hear, Jesus sums up the gospel in three succinct statements. First, he tells his hearers that the seed of grain must die before it can bear fruit. Embracing the death he knows is coming, Jesus reminds his hearers that death must precede eternal life, and that without death there will be no life. Second, Jesus warns his hearers that they are called to “hate” their own lives in order to gain eternal life. Jesus is not counseling self-destruction or self-hatred. Instead, Jesus reminds his hearers that they must let go of everything in their lives – and in the world – that separates them from God and from God’s love. Finally, Jesus promises his hearers that those who follow him will be honored with him by God the Father. As he calls out, “And what should I say – ‘Father, save me from this hour,’” Jesus reminds his hearers that discipleship means following him specifically from death to life, but that God’s promises of life are trustworthy and sure. If his hearers are inclined to doubt, the voice from heaven provides a reassuring affirmation that Jesus – and his followers – have chosen the right path.
“Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” Conservative church leaders were delighted, while social activists were disappointed, when Oscar Arnulfo Romero was chosen in 1977 as Roman Catholic Archbishop of San Salvador.1 Most people thought that Romero was a pious, scholarly bishop who would not make waves or call for change. Three weeks after his consecration Romero was called on to officiate at the funeral of his friend Rutilio Grande, a Jesuit priest who was assassinated because of his commitment to social justice. Deeply shaken by Grande’s death, Romero experienced what many considered a personal transformation. Amidst the violence engulfing El Salvador, Romero became an outspoken champion of justice. In his weekly sermons, which were broadcast throughout the country, he detailed all the ways in which the government trampled on human rights. When he visited the Vatican in 1979, he presented the Pope with seven detailed reports of institutionalized murder, torture, and kidnapping in El Salvador. Early in 1980 he sent a letter to President Jimmy Carter, appealing for an end to U.S. military support of the Salvadoran government. Drawing strength and courage from peasants, Romero embraced the cause of the poor. Indeed, he identified care for the poor as the defining characteristic of Christian discipleship. “A Church that does not unite itself to the poor,” he said, “in order to denounce from the place of the poor the injustice committed against them is not truly the Church of Jesus Christ.”
Romero was shot to death on March 24, 1980 while celebrating Mass at a small chapel near his cathedral. Only the day before he had preached a sermon in which he called for soldiers as Christians to obey God's higher order and to stop carrying out the government's repression and violations of basic human rights. Many believe that his assassins were members of Salvadoran death squads, including two graduates of the U.S.-run School of the Americas. Romero is buried in the Cathedral of the Holy Savior. More than 250,000 people from all over the world attended his funeral mass on March 30, 1980. On May 23rd of this year, in San Salvador's central square, Oscar Romero will be beatified by the Catholic Church. Having seen the face of Jesus in the poor and oppressed, Oscar Romero was privileged to follow his master in the way of the Cross.
“Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” “Show me Jesus,” the young man said to the pastor. Someone told me that you talk about his life and miracles every Sunday. Show me this Messiah who came to save the world.”2
The pastor led him into the parish hall, which was filled with chairs and tables. The young man looked at the people lined up in the foyer, and he smelled the food. “Here, help with the meal,” the pastor said. An elderly woman led him to the kitchen and handed him a potato peeler. He began to peel potatoes.
“Why did you come here today?” the elderly woman asked. “I want to see Jesus,” the young man replied.
“Then why don’t you go up front and help dish out the food?” He began to serve out the soup. An old man thanked him for giving him a hot meal on a cold day. A girl he knew from school smiled at him.
Then someone handed him a bowl of soup. “You’ve been working hard,” the man said, “sit down and have something to eat.”
“But I didn’t come here to eat.”
“Why did you come here?” the man asked.
“I came here to know Jesus.”
“Then go and sit with the people he loves,” the man said, gesturing to the crowd eating at the tables before turning back to serve the next person soup. The girl he knew from school motioned him to sit down beside her.
“This is a good place if you are hungry and lost,” she said. “I haven’t seen you here before. What brings you here today?”
“I asked the pastor to show me Jesus,” the young man said.
“And have you seen him?”
“I’ve seen people working together to help other people, and I’ve seen hungry people fed,” the young man said. “But I’m not sure I’ve seen Jesus.”
“Maybe you need to know why the other people are here,” she said.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
“Because I was hungry, and I know that when I come here I receive more than just food,” she said as she put her empty bowl in a tub of soapy water.
The young man went to the man serving soup to those waiting in line. “Why do you give food to these people?”
“Jesus asks me to feed the hungry,” the man said.
The young man went into the kitchen and asked, “Why do you make food for people you don’t know?”
“Because Jesus tells me to love my neighbor,” the elderly woman replied.
The young man went back to the hall and saw the pastor eating soup at a table. He sat down next to him. “I asked you to show me Jesus,” the young man said.
“Did you see him?” the pastor asked. “Did you see his love and concern for others, the generosity of his heart, and the change he brings into people’s lives?” The young man thought for a moment and nodded. “I think I’ll come back and help tomorrow, and come to church on Sunday too.”
The pastor smiled. “Then you have done something more than simply see Jesus. You have begun to follow him.”
Lord Jesus Christ, you stretched out your arms of love on the hard wood of the cross that everyone might come within the reach of your saving embrace: So clothe us in your Spirit
that we, reaching forth our hands in love, may bring those who do not know you to the knowledge and love of you; for the honor of your Name. Amen.
1. Based on Robert Ellsberg, “Oscar Arnulfo Romero, in All Saints (New York: Crossroad, 2000), 131-2.
2. Based on Peter Andrew Smith, “Showing them Jesus,” in Lectionary Tales for the Pulpit, Series VII Cycle B (Lima, OH, CSS, 2011), 67-70.
The Gospel account doesn’t tell us whether the Greeks actually got a face to face meeting with Jesus. In a sense, it doesn’t matter. In this part of the story, the “Greeks” represent the totality of the human race. They stand in for all those outside the Jewish fold who will also be drawn into covenant with God through Jesus’ Passion. Jesus has performed all the miracles he is going to perform. He has shown forth all the signs of his identity as God’s son. The approach of these non-Jews signals to Jesus – and to us – that now the time has finally come for Jesus to take the next step on his journey: to the Cross and beyond.
Before Jesus can take that next step, he needs to make sure that the “Greeks,” if they are still there, his disciples, and the crowds, know just what that next step means. He needs to make sure that his followers “see” him as he truly is, and that they understand what following him will mean for their lives. So, for all who have ears to hear, Jesus sums up the gospel in three succinct statements. First, he tells his hearers that the seed of grain must die before it can bear fruit. Embracing the death he knows is coming, Jesus reminds his hearers that death must precede eternal life, and that without death there will be no life. Second, Jesus warns his hearers that they are called to “hate” their own lives in order to gain eternal life. Jesus is not counseling self-destruction or self-hatred. Instead, Jesus reminds his hearers that they must let go of everything in their lives – and in the world – that separates them from God and from God’s love. Finally, Jesus promises his hearers that those who follow him will be honored with him by God the Father. As he calls out, “And what should I say – ‘Father, save me from this hour,’” Jesus reminds his hearers that discipleship means following him specifically from death to life, but that God’s promises of life are trustworthy and sure. If his hearers are inclined to doubt, the voice from heaven provides a reassuring affirmation that Jesus – and his followers – have chosen the right path.
“Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” Conservative church leaders were delighted, while social activists were disappointed, when Oscar Arnulfo Romero was chosen in 1977 as Roman Catholic Archbishop of San Salvador.1 Most people thought that Romero was a pious, scholarly bishop who would not make waves or call for change. Three weeks after his consecration Romero was called on to officiate at the funeral of his friend Rutilio Grande, a Jesuit priest who was assassinated because of his commitment to social justice. Deeply shaken by Grande’s death, Romero experienced what many considered a personal transformation. Amidst the violence engulfing El Salvador, Romero became an outspoken champion of justice. In his weekly sermons, which were broadcast throughout the country, he detailed all the ways in which the government trampled on human rights. When he visited the Vatican in 1979, he presented the Pope with seven detailed reports of institutionalized murder, torture, and kidnapping in El Salvador. Early in 1980 he sent a letter to President Jimmy Carter, appealing for an end to U.S. military support of the Salvadoran government. Drawing strength and courage from peasants, Romero embraced the cause of the poor. Indeed, he identified care for the poor as the defining characteristic of Christian discipleship. “A Church that does not unite itself to the poor,” he said, “in order to denounce from the place of the poor the injustice committed against them is not truly the Church of Jesus Christ.”
Romero was shot to death on March 24, 1980 while celebrating Mass at a small chapel near his cathedral. Only the day before he had preached a sermon in which he called for soldiers as Christians to obey God's higher order and to stop carrying out the government's repression and violations of basic human rights. Many believe that his assassins were members of Salvadoran death squads, including two graduates of the U.S.-run School of the Americas. Romero is buried in the Cathedral of the Holy Savior. More than 250,000 people from all over the world attended his funeral mass on March 30, 1980. On May 23rd of this year, in San Salvador's central square, Oscar Romero will be beatified by the Catholic Church. Having seen the face of Jesus in the poor and oppressed, Oscar Romero was privileged to follow his master in the way of the Cross.
“Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” “Show me Jesus,” the young man said to the pastor. Someone told me that you talk about his life and miracles every Sunday. Show me this Messiah who came to save the world.”2
The pastor led him into the parish hall, which was filled with chairs and tables. The young man looked at the people lined up in the foyer, and he smelled the food. “Here, help with the meal,” the pastor said. An elderly woman led him to the kitchen and handed him a potato peeler. He began to peel potatoes.
“Why did you come here today?” the elderly woman asked. “I want to see Jesus,” the young man replied.
“Then why don’t you go up front and help dish out the food?” He began to serve out the soup. An old man thanked him for giving him a hot meal on a cold day. A girl he knew from school smiled at him.
Then someone handed him a bowl of soup. “You’ve been working hard,” the man said, “sit down and have something to eat.”
“But I didn’t come here to eat.”
“Why did you come here?” the man asked.
“I came here to know Jesus.”
“Then go and sit with the people he loves,” the man said, gesturing to the crowd eating at the tables before turning back to serve the next person soup. The girl he knew from school motioned him to sit down beside her.
“This is a good place if you are hungry and lost,” she said. “I haven’t seen you here before. What brings you here today?”
“I asked the pastor to show me Jesus,” the young man said.
“And have you seen him?”
“I’ve seen people working together to help other people, and I’ve seen hungry people fed,” the young man said. “But I’m not sure I’ve seen Jesus.”
“Maybe you need to know why the other people are here,” she said.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
“Because I was hungry, and I know that when I come here I receive more than just food,” she said as she put her empty bowl in a tub of soapy water.
The young man went to the man serving soup to those waiting in line. “Why do you give food to these people?”
“Jesus asks me to feed the hungry,” the man said.
The young man went into the kitchen and asked, “Why do you make food for people you don’t know?”
“Because Jesus tells me to love my neighbor,” the elderly woman replied.
The young man went back to the hall and saw the pastor eating soup at a table. He sat down next to him. “I asked you to show me Jesus,” the young man said.
“Did you see him?” the pastor asked. “Did you see his love and concern for others, the generosity of his heart, and the change he brings into people’s lives?” The young man thought for a moment and nodded. “I think I’ll come back and help tomorrow, and come to church on Sunday too.”
The pastor smiled. “Then you have done something more than simply see Jesus. You have begun to follow him.”
Lord Jesus Christ, you stretched out your arms of love on the hard wood of the cross that everyone might come within the reach of your saving embrace: So clothe us in your Spirit
that we, reaching forth our hands in love, may bring those who do not know you to the knowledge and love of you; for the honor of your Name. Amen.
1. Based on Robert Ellsberg, “Oscar Arnulfo Romero, in All Saints (New York: Crossroad, 2000), 131-2.
2. Based on Peter Andrew Smith, “Showing them Jesus,” in Lectionary Tales for the Pulpit, Series VII Cycle B (Lima, OH, CSS, 2011), 67-70.
Monday, March 9, 2015
Was Jesus Mr. Nice Guy?
Was Jesus Mr. Nice Guy? If pictures of Jesus cradling sheep, or embracing children came to mind, no doubt you thought, “Sure, he was.” Or perhaps you heard Jesus intoning, “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow….” Was Jesus Mr. Nice Guy? Or, does today’s gospel reading make you think again?
We have switched to the Gospel according to John for this and the next two Sundays. We return to the Gospel according to Mark on Palm Sunday, at the very end of the month, when we hear Mark’s story of Jesus’ death. Since the three-year Revised Common Lectionary does not set aside a year for the Gospel of John, as it does for the three synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, it interweaves readings from John into the various seasons of the liturgical year. We’ll hear a lot more from John during Easter tide.
John takes a very different approach to Jesus’ story from that of the synoptic gospels. Although it may contain earlier material, the gospel of John assumed its final form about 90 AD, thus making it the last of the four gospels. The Temple had been destroyed about twenty years earlier, and Jesus had been gone nearly sixty years. This gospel was written for a community of mostly Jewish Christians, most of whom were fighting with leaders of the mainline Jewish community around them. Each of the evangelists had a decided purpose for writing down Jesus’ story, and that purpose is reflected in the how the story is told. The writer of this gospel wanted especially to reassure the members of this beleaguered Christian community that they had made the right choice in separating themselves from the mainstream. We hear right at the beginning of this gospel how the evangelist views Jesus, that Jesus is the Word of God become human. At the end, the evangelist again states the purpose for the gospel: “these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name” (20:31).
So was Jesus Mr. Nice Guy? At this point in the story, Jesus has just come down from Galilee to celebrate the Passover. In Galilee he had attended a wedding in the village of Cana, where he offered the first sign of who he was to a small group of friends and relatives. When Jesus came into the great temple in Jerusalem, which Herod the Great had begun rebuilding forty-six years before, was Jesus tempted to be just another ordinary pilgrim, blending into the crowd with all the others? Apparently not. Instead, Jesus became angry. He flipped out, he lost it. Why? The evangelist is not clear. The commerce that was taking place in the Court of the Gentiles wasn’t really wrong. In order to follow the 610 commandments of the law, especially the laws regarding sacrifice, pious Jews had to offer unblemished animals, which they typically bought just as they entered the temple. They could not pay for those animals with ordinary coins, the coins with Caesar’s head on them, but had to exchange the Roman coins for Palestinian shekels. Both the animal sellers and the money changers were thus necessary for the required sacrifices to take place. The gospel doesn’t say that either the vendors or the money changers were gouging the pilgrims, or cheating them, or colluding with the Romans, or doing anything against the law. Why do we need to see Jesus call them to account and demonstrate his anger at them?
Perhaps the reason is that the evangelist was less interested in the pilgrims or the vendors and money changers and more interested in Jesus. Perhaps the evangelist wanted his readers to remember that one of the roles of the messiah, of God’s anointed one, was to be God’s prophet, to speak God’s truth, to challenge those in authority, even when those around him don’t want to hear him or face him. A long line of prophets in the Hebrew Scriptures had spoken God’s truth to leaders who resisted hearing it. Jeremiah, in particular, spoke hard truths to the king and was put down in a cistern, and then subjected to house arrest for his trouble. In the opposition that Jewish Christians were confronting, perhaps the evangelist wanted to remind his hearers that speaking God’s truth is dangerous. Most important, perhaps the evangelist wanted his hearers to remember, long before the story comes to Calvary, that, although Jesus’ story culminated in his death, it did not end there.
Was Sam Dodson Mr. Nice Guy? Sure he was. He was a well-regarded Methodist minister in a white congregation in Nashville Tennessee.1 It was the early 1960s. Dodson had been born in a small town in Tennessee, gone to Vanderbilt University, and earned his divinity degree at Yale. He had come to Calvary United Methodist Church in 1958 at the age of 43. Although they didn’t always agree with his sermons, his parishioners knew that Dodson generally supported sit-ins and racial integration. In 1963 he accepted the governor’s appointment as chair of the Tennessee Human Relations Commission, which had been formed to work on civil rights issues. A few members of Dodson’s congregation bristled at the appointment. Then came the unthinkable. On May 5, 1964 Dodson joined 150 seminarians and other members of the clergy, marched to the city hall, and presented the mayor with four demands: immediate desegregation of the public schools, ordinances assuring complete access to all public spaces, full access to recreational facilities, and equal employment opportunities in city government.
The hate mail poured into Dodson’s office during May and June. Most of the letters chastised him for his involvement with “politics.” His board wrote to his bishop asking that he be demoted to assistant pastor. Dodson stayed for another year, then in the spring of 1965 he and his family left for Athens, Greece, where he became the pastor of St. Andrew’s American Church.
Sam Dodson’s story culminated in his leaving Nashville in disgrace, but it didn’t end there. About ten years ago or so, people rediscovered his work in Nashville. Those who left Calvary Church because of Dodson have returned and apologized. When Dodson died in 2002, he was eulogized on the front page of the church newspaper. In 2013, a committee at Calvary began working on a permanent memorial to his work and courage. Today, on the wall outside the senior pastor’s office is a colorful timeline and display. Written across the top of the display are the words, “Dr. Rev. Samuel R. Dodson, Jr.: Man of Courage.”
And what about us? The evangelist has shown us Jesus’ prophetic actions. Jesus spoke out and demonstrated against what he considered unacceptable practice. He did so knowing full well that wearing the prophet’s mantle would not endear him to the authorities. Sam Dodson spoke and publicly demonstrated against practices he knew to be unacceptable and unjust. What about us? Lent calls us to “self-examination and repentance.” What do we need to face in ourselves, our parish, and our community? What wrong or injustice do we need to speak and work against?
In ourselves, do we need to forgive? Do we need to confess a wrong and seek forgiveness? Do we need to put aside anger, hurt, or indifference, and reconcile with someone? Do we need to forego gossip? Do we need to listen to someone’s story more attentively? Do we need to free ourselves of addictions, even harmless ones? Do we need to quit making excuses for ourselves and find time for prayer? Do we need to take our Christian commitment more seriously? I invite you, between now and Palm Sunday, to look at your way of life and find one thing that you know needs changing.
In this parish, what needs facing and changing? Are there conflicts that need to be resolved? Do we need to be more attentive to one another? Do we need to be more serious about supporting the parish with our resources? Is our ministry truly serving the needs of those around us? How else might we serve Jesus in our neighbors?
In the community and the world, are we taking seriously our commitment to work for justice and peace? Do we support elected leaders who work for the welfare of the poor and seek to defuse, rather than exacerbate, conflicts? Are we serious about addressing climate change, and especially about looking at our own consumption habits? Do we ever speak out for issues close to our hearts and support organizations seeking change? Between now and Palm Sunday, I invite you to find one issue about which you can be passionate and educate yourself on that issue, whether it be food insecurity, adequate access to healthcare, literacy education, clean water, climate change, opposition to capital punishment, or whatever calls out to you. Educate yourself and make a commitment to doing what you are called to do.
Jesus did not call us to be nice. Jesus called us to follow him and take up the prophet’s mantle, to seriously and intentionally follow his lead as one who actively critiqued the powers that be. Jesus called us to stand with the truth as we see it and to actively work against oppression and injustice. He did not promise that the way would be easy. Like Sam Dodson, we may indeed find ourselves with Jesus at the cross. And, like Sam Dodson, all our hope on God is founded. As Jesus’ story did not end with the cross, neither does ours.
1. The following is based on Erin E. Tocknell, “The Cost of Discipleship,” Sojourners, March 2015, 31-33.
We have switched to the Gospel according to John for this and the next two Sundays. We return to the Gospel according to Mark on Palm Sunday, at the very end of the month, when we hear Mark’s story of Jesus’ death. Since the three-year Revised Common Lectionary does not set aside a year for the Gospel of John, as it does for the three synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, it interweaves readings from John into the various seasons of the liturgical year. We’ll hear a lot more from John during Easter tide.
John takes a very different approach to Jesus’ story from that of the synoptic gospels. Although it may contain earlier material, the gospel of John assumed its final form about 90 AD, thus making it the last of the four gospels. The Temple had been destroyed about twenty years earlier, and Jesus had been gone nearly sixty years. This gospel was written for a community of mostly Jewish Christians, most of whom were fighting with leaders of the mainline Jewish community around them. Each of the evangelists had a decided purpose for writing down Jesus’ story, and that purpose is reflected in the how the story is told. The writer of this gospel wanted especially to reassure the members of this beleaguered Christian community that they had made the right choice in separating themselves from the mainstream. We hear right at the beginning of this gospel how the evangelist views Jesus, that Jesus is the Word of God become human. At the end, the evangelist again states the purpose for the gospel: “these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name” (20:31).
So was Jesus Mr. Nice Guy? At this point in the story, Jesus has just come down from Galilee to celebrate the Passover. In Galilee he had attended a wedding in the village of Cana, where he offered the first sign of who he was to a small group of friends and relatives. When Jesus came into the great temple in Jerusalem, which Herod the Great had begun rebuilding forty-six years before, was Jesus tempted to be just another ordinary pilgrim, blending into the crowd with all the others? Apparently not. Instead, Jesus became angry. He flipped out, he lost it. Why? The evangelist is not clear. The commerce that was taking place in the Court of the Gentiles wasn’t really wrong. In order to follow the 610 commandments of the law, especially the laws regarding sacrifice, pious Jews had to offer unblemished animals, which they typically bought just as they entered the temple. They could not pay for those animals with ordinary coins, the coins with Caesar’s head on them, but had to exchange the Roman coins for Palestinian shekels. Both the animal sellers and the money changers were thus necessary for the required sacrifices to take place. The gospel doesn’t say that either the vendors or the money changers were gouging the pilgrims, or cheating them, or colluding with the Romans, or doing anything against the law. Why do we need to see Jesus call them to account and demonstrate his anger at them?
Perhaps the reason is that the evangelist was less interested in the pilgrims or the vendors and money changers and more interested in Jesus. Perhaps the evangelist wanted his readers to remember that one of the roles of the messiah, of God’s anointed one, was to be God’s prophet, to speak God’s truth, to challenge those in authority, even when those around him don’t want to hear him or face him. A long line of prophets in the Hebrew Scriptures had spoken God’s truth to leaders who resisted hearing it. Jeremiah, in particular, spoke hard truths to the king and was put down in a cistern, and then subjected to house arrest for his trouble. In the opposition that Jewish Christians were confronting, perhaps the evangelist wanted to remind his hearers that speaking God’s truth is dangerous. Most important, perhaps the evangelist wanted his hearers to remember, long before the story comes to Calvary, that, although Jesus’ story culminated in his death, it did not end there.
Was Sam Dodson Mr. Nice Guy? Sure he was. He was a well-regarded Methodist minister in a white congregation in Nashville Tennessee.1 It was the early 1960s. Dodson had been born in a small town in Tennessee, gone to Vanderbilt University, and earned his divinity degree at Yale. He had come to Calvary United Methodist Church in 1958 at the age of 43. Although they didn’t always agree with his sermons, his parishioners knew that Dodson generally supported sit-ins and racial integration. In 1963 he accepted the governor’s appointment as chair of the Tennessee Human Relations Commission, which had been formed to work on civil rights issues. A few members of Dodson’s congregation bristled at the appointment. Then came the unthinkable. On May 5, 1964 Dodson joined 150 seminarians and other members of the clergy, marched to the city hall, and presented the mayor with four demands: immediate desegregation of the public schools, ordinances assuring complete access to all public spaces, full access to recreational facilities, and equal employment opportunities in city government.
The hate mail poured into Dodson’s office during May and June. Most of the letters chastised him for his involvement with “politics.” His board wrote to his bishop asking that he be demoted to assistant pastor. Dodson stayed for another year, then in the spring of 1965 he and his family left for Athens, Greece, where he became the pastor of St. Andrew’s American Church.
Sam Dodson’s story culminated in his leaving Nashville in disgrace, but it didn’t end there. About ten years ago or so, people rediscovered his work in Nashville. Those who left Calvary Church because of Dodson have returned and apologized. When Dodson died in 2002, he was eulogized on the front page of the church newspaper. In 2013, a committee at Calvary began working on a permanent memorial to his work and courage. Today, on the wall outside the senior pastor’s office is a colorful timeline and display. Written across the top of the display are the words, “Dr. Rev. Samuel R. Dodson, Jr.: Man of Courage.”
And what about us? The evangelist has shown us Jesus’ prophetic actions. Jesus spoke out and demonstrated against what he considered unacceptable practice. He did so knowing full well that wearing the prophet’s mantle would not endear him to the authorities. Sam Dodson spoke and publicly demonstrated against practices he knew to be unacceptable and unjust. What about us? Lent calls us to “self-examination and repentance.” What do we need to face in ourselves, our parish, and our community? What wrong or injustice do we need to speak and work against?
In ourselves, do we need to forgive? Do we need to confess a wrong and seek forgiveness? Do we need to put aside anger, hurt, or indifference, and reconcile with someone? Do we need to forego gossip? Do we need to listen to someone’s story more attentively? Do we need to free ourselves of addictions, even harmless ones? Do we need to quit making excuses for ourselves and find time for prayer? Do we need to take our Christian commitment more seriously? I invite you, between now and Palm Sunday, to look at your way of life and find one thing that you know needs changing.
In this parish, what needs facing and changing? Are there conflicts that need to be resolved? Do we need to be more attentive to one another? Do we need to be more serious about supporting the parish with our resources? Is our ministry truly serving the needs of those around us? How else might we serve Jesus in our neighbors?
In the community and the world, are we taking seriously our commitment to work for justice and peace? Do we support elected leaders who work for the welfare of the poor and seek to defuse, rather than exacerbate, conflicts? Are we serious about addressing climate change, and especially about looking at our own consumption habits? Do we ever speak out for issues close to our hearts and support organizations seeking change? Between now and Palm Sunday, I invite you to find one issue about which you can be passionate and educate yourself on that issue, whether it be food insecurity, adequate access to healthcare, literacy education, clean water, climate change, opposition to capital punishment, or whatever calls out to you. Educate yourself and make a commitment to doing what you are called to do.
Jesus did not call us to be nice. Jesus called us to follow him and take up the prophet’s mantle, to seriously and intentionally follow his lead as one who actively critiqued the powers that be. Jesus called us to stand with the truth as we see it and to actively work against oppression and injustice. He did not promise that the way would be easy. Like Sam Dodson, we may indeed find ourselves with Jesus at the cross. And, like Sam Dodson, all our hope on God is founded. As Jesus’ story did not end with the cross, neither does ours.
1. The following is based on Erin E. Tocknell, “The Cost of Discipleship,” Sojourners, March 2015, 31-33.
Sunday, March 1, 2015
Where He Leads Me, I will Follow
Did Jesus really die? When I was a dean, I often ate my brown-bag lunch at a table in my office. During Lent, as often as I could, after I was finished eating, I would close my door and take a little time to pray and write in my spiritual journal. One year it was Good Friday. As I sat in my office after lunch, I began to meditate on the passion story. Much as we did in the session on Ignatian prayer last Wednesday, I put myself into the story, taking the role of Mary. Then I began to feel the story as if I were watching my own son being cruelly executed for a crime he did not commit. In that moment, I felt the stab in my own heart, and I understood the painful reality of Jesus’ death in a new way.
Every church has a cross in one form or another. For most of us, the cross has lost its power to shock us, the way a representation of a gallows or electric chair would – or should. In most Roman Catholic churches, the crucifix, the cross with Jesus’ body on it, overshadows the altar. Seeing the crucifix, you can’t forget that Jesus died. By contrast, most Orthodox churches depict Christ in glory, often surrounded by saints and angels. Most Protestant churches, including this one, have a plain cross. Gathering here, we are reminded neither of Jesus’ death, nor his return to heavenly realms. Certainly, you will say, we hear the Passion stories, on Palm Sunday, complete with dramatic reading, and again on Good Friday. But, in a liturgical setting, do we really get it that Jesus died? It’s still so easy to forget that Jesus was a flesh and blood human being, who enjoyed life just as we do, and that he was tragically executed by the state for no discernible crime. That is not the story we want to hear. It is so easy to overlook Jesus’ death!
We’ve come to a turning point in Mark’s story. Jesus was baptized by John. Having retreated into the wilderness, Jesus discerned his vocation. He has preached the good news, taught, and healed. He has called some close friends into his inner circle. He has drawn crowds and has caught the attention of the authorities. Probing how much his friends understood of his mission, he asked, “Who do people say that I am?” More pointedly, he asked his friends, “But who do you say that I am?” Hothead Peter blurted out, “You are the messiah. You are God’s anointed one.”
Now Jesus must explain the meaning of being God’s anointed one and remind his followers what their commitment to him might mean for them. So Jesus says quite plainly – not in parables but plainly – what the plan is: that Jesus will be rejected by the religious leadership, and that the political authorities will execute him. Jesus will be a messiah who will lead through suffering, weakness, and death. This is clearly not the messiah that Peter had in mind: Peter expected Jesus to be another David, able to drive the hated Romans out of Israel. “Nope, you’ve got it wrong,” Jesus says, “God’s plan is different.”
And then, to be absolutely plain and open – no false advertising here – Jesus spells it out for all his friends and hangers-on. “I will be executed,” he says. “If you want to really be one of my followers, you’d better be prepared to die also. That’s what following me involves. If you’re one of mine, you don’t lord it over others, you don’t cling as tightly as you can to your possessions and wealth, you don’t expect to get your own way in everything that you do. Ultimately, you let go of everything that is important to you, including your very life – for my sake. Despite what you might think,” he says, “the way of the Cross isn’t contrary to God’s will, it is God’s will.”
Don’t you shudder at least a little when you hear those words? Who wants to give up everything for Jesus? Actually, Jesus’ message – and this is just the first of three times in Mark’s gospel that Jesus predicts his execution – would have resonated with the first hearers of this Gospel. They were Gentile believers who were suffering and dying at the hands of the Roman Empire. They knew what oppressive systems did to people, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. In these words of Jesus, they would have heard encouragement. They would have understood that by faithfully enduring persecution they were sharing in Christ’s sufferings. African Americans in this country took strength and courage from Jesus’ death on a tree, even as they watched members of their own community being tortured and lynched. Surely today’s besieged Christians, in Egypt, Pakistan, Iraq, or Palestine also identify with Jesus and understand their own sufferings as part of their call to follow him. In Juba, in southern Sudan, where Christians were a minority community, the faithful often sang, “With the cross before me and the world behind me, I will follow wherever he leads me, I will follow wherever he leads me. There’s no turning back, no turning back.”1
But what of us privileged North American Christians? Aren’t we faithful followers of Jesus? What does it mean for us to take up our cross and follow him? Where and to what are we following him? Surely not to persecution or execution? One kind of answer comes as we look around at our churches. Historic church communities in Europe and North America are shrinking. In the UK, the home of our mother church, average church attendance stands at about 6% of the population. The same is true on the Continent. Average attendance in North America is higher, but we too are seeing our communities shrink in size, we too are closing buildings, and we too are contracting our ministries. Some years ago, Canadian theologian Douglas John Hall wrote The Cross in our Context, a book that continues to attract a wide readership. Hall begins by reminding his readers that, like Jesus, the church began in weakness. Christians only became powerful and influential in the fourth century, when the emperor Constantine declared Christianity to be the religion of the Roman Empire. Now we are seeing what Hall calls the “disestablishment” of Christianity, as the institutional church grows weaker and the church ceases to be a major cultural force. And yet, contrary to what we might think, in losing its power, prestige, and wealth, in again becoming dissociated from the social and political rulers, the church is – finally – following more closely in the footsteps of its founder.
And what of ourselves? Where is Jesus leading us? How do we take up our cross and follow him? In Falling Upward, Richard Rohr, a Franciscan writer whose work I admire greatly, suggests that, in the first half of our lives, our task is to create a strong self-identity. We immerse ourselves in finding our vocations, our life partners, our preferred religious communities, our ethical systems, and our places in the world. But there comes a time, for most people as they approach the second half of life, when we must endure what Rohr calls “necessary suffering.”2 We come to realize that the life we have fashioned for ourselves is insufficient and shallow. We can try to duplicate or strengthen our old lives – an effort that is exhausting and ultimately futile. Or we can let ourselves be pruned by God. Pruning is surely painful for trees and for us. But, with Jesus, we can embrace our losses, gratefully let go of what has been, and open ourselves to becoming the larger person that God has created us to be. We can let God enable us to give up our self-centeredness, embrace weakness, and begin giving ourselves freely in service of others. We can give up all that we thought we knew or were and let ourselves be transformed by God into something very different.
For that is exactly the good news in Jesus’ explanation of what being his disciple means. Did you hear that last phrase in Jesus’ teaching? “Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.” Perhaps nobody really heard that part of Jesus’ teaching. Certainly, as we watch the behavior of Jesus’ first disciples, as Mark portrays them, it is clear that they did not understand what Jesus was saying. We are on the other side of Easter, yet we too most likely miss Jesus’ promise that death must always give way to new life. Many church historians believe that the church is not merely declining but is beginning to arise in new forms. Just as those who lived through the Reformation could not see what the outcome of that great movement would be, we do not as yet know what the church will look like a hundred years from now. We only know it will be reborn and different. It is the same for us. God willing, as we continue to let God do God’s work within us, as we let go of old certainties and embrace new uncertainties, we can be sure that, by God’s grace, we are becoming the people God created us to be.
Following Jesus is the work of a lifetime. There will be pain, there will be pruning, there will be the death of much of what we hold dear. We have been forewarned. Only let our prayer continue to be, “Where he leads me I will follow, I’ll go with Him, with Him, all the way.”
1. Marsha Snulligan Haney, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Gospels, Mark, Cynthia A. Jarvis and Elizabeth Johnson, eds. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2014), 250.
2. Richard Rohr, Falling Upward (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2011), 11, quoted in Thomas R. Steagald, “Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Gospels, op.cit., 253.
Every church has a cross in one form or another. For most of us, the cross has lost its power to shock us, the way a representation of a gallows or electric chair would – or should. In most Roman Catholic churches, the crucifix, the cross with Jesus’ body on it, overshadows the altar. Seeing the crucifix, you can’t forget that Jesus died. By contrast, most Orthodox churches depict Christ in glory, often surrounded by saints and angels. Most Protestant churches, including this one, have a plain cross. Gathering here, we are reminded neither of Jesus’ death, nor his return to heavenly realms. Certainly, you will say, we hear the Passion stories, on Palm Sunday, complete with dramatic reading, and again on Good Friday. But, in a liturgical setting, do we really get it that Jesus died? It’s still so easy to forget that Jesus was a flesh and blood human being, who enjoyed life just as we do, and that he was tragically executed by the state for no discernible crime. That is not the story we want to hear. It is so easy to overlook Jesus’ death!
We’ve come to a turning point in Mark’s story. Jesus was baptized by John. Having retreated into the wilderness, Jesus discerned his vocation. He has preached the good news, taught, and healed. He has called some close friends into his inner circle. He has drawn crowds and has caught the attention of the authorities. Probing how much his friends understood of his mission, he asked, “Who do people say that I am?” More pointedly, he asked his friends, “But who do you say that I am?” Hothead Peter blurted out, “You are the messiah. You are God’s anointed one.”
Now Jesus must explain the meaning of being God’s anointed one and remind his followers what their commitment to him might mean for them. So Jesus says quite plainly – not in parables but plainly – what the plan is: that Jesus will be rejected by the religious leadership, and that the political authorities will execute him. Jesus will be a messiah who will lead through suffering, weakness, and death. This is clearly not the messiah that Peter had in mind: Peter expected Jesus to be another David, able to drive the hated Romans out of Israel. “Nope, you’ve got it wrong,” Jesus says, “God’s plan is different.”
And then, to be absolutely plain and open – no false advertising here – Jesus spells it out for all his friends and hangers-on. “I will be executed,” he says. “If you want to really be one of my followers, you’d better be prepared to die also. That’s what following me involves. If you’re one of mine, you don’t lord it over others, you don’t cling as tightly as you can to your possessions and wealth, you don’t expect to get your own way in everything that you do. Ultimately, you let go of everything that is important to you, including your very life – for my sake. Despite what you might think,” he says, “the way of the Cross isn’t contrary to God’s will, it is God’s will.”
Don’t you shudder at least a little when you hear those words? Who wants to give up everything for Jesus? Actually, Jesus’ message – and this is just the first of three times in Mark’s gospel that Jesus predicts his execution – would have resonated with the first hearers of this Gospel. They were Gentile believers who were suffering and dying at the hands of the Roman Empire. They knew what oppressive systems did to people, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. In these words of Jesus, they would have heard encouragement. They would have understood that by faithfully enduring persecution they were sharing in Christ’s sufferings. African Americans in this country took strength and courage from Jesus’ death on a tree, even as they watched members of their own community being tortured and lynched. Surely today’s besieged Christians, in Egypt, Pakistan, Iraq, or Palestine also identify with Jesus and understand their own sufferings as part of their call to follow him. In Juba, in southern Sudan, where Christians were a minority community, the faithful often sang, “With the cross before me and the world behind me, I will follow wherever he leads me, I will follow wherever he leads me. There’s no turning back, no turning back.”1
But what of us privileged North American Christians? Aren’t we faithful followers of Jesus? What does it mean for us to take up our cross and follow him? Where and to what are we following him? Surely not to persecution or execution? One kind of answer comes as we look around at our churches. Historic church communities in Europe and North America are shrinking. In the UK, the home of our mother church, average church attendance stands at about 6% of the population. The same is true on the Continent. Average attendance in North America is higher, but we too are seeing our communities shrink in size, we too are closing buildings, and we too are contracting our ministries. Some years ago, Canadian theologian Douglas John Hall wrote The Cross in our Context, a book that continues to attract a wide readership. Hall begins by reminding his readers that, like Jesus, the church began in weakness. Christians only became powerful and influential in the fourth century, when the emperor Constantine declared Christianity to be the religion of the Roman Empire. Now we are seeing what Hall calls the “disestablishment” of Christianity, as the institutional church grows weaker and the church ceases to be a major cultural force. And yet, contrary to what we might think, in losing its power, prestige, and wealth, in again becoming dissociated from the social and political rulers, the church is – finally – following more closely in the footsteps of its founder.
And what of ourselves? Where is Jesus leading us? How do we take up our cross and follow him? In Falling Upward, Richard Rohr, a Franciscan writer whose work I admire greatly, suggests that, in the first half of our lives, our task is to create a strong self-identity. We immerse ourselves in finding our vocations, our life partners, our preferred religious communities, our ethical systems, and our places in the world. But there comes a time, for most people as they approach the second half of life, when we must endure what Rohr calls “necessary suffering.”2 We come to realize that the life we have fashioned for ourselves is insufficient and shallow. We can try to duplicate or strengthen our old lives – an effort that is exhausting and ultimately futile. Or we can let ourselves be pruned by God. Pruning is surely painful for trees and for us. But, with Jesus, we can embrace our losses, gratefully let go of what has been, and open ourselves to becoming the larger person that God has created us to be. We can let God enable us to give up our self-centeredness, embrace weakness, and begin giving ourselves freely in service of others. We can give up all that we thought we knew or were and let ourselves be transformed by God into something very different.
For that is exactly the good news in Jesus’ explanation of what being his disciple means. Did you hear that last phrase in Jesus’ teaching? “Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.” Perhaps nobody really heard that part of Jesus’ teaching. Certainly, as we watch the behavior of Jesus’ first disciples, as Mark portrays them, it is clear that they did not understand what Jesus was saying. We are on the other side of Easter, yet we too most likely miss Jesus’ promise that death must always give way to new life. Many church historians believe that the church is not merely declining but is beginning to arise in new forms. Just as those who lived through the Reformation could not see what the outcome of that great movement would be, we do not as yet know what the church will look like a hundred years from now. We only know it will be reborn and different. It is the same for us. God willing, as we continue to let God do God’s work within us, as we let go of old certainties and embrace new uncertainties, we can be sure that, by God’s grace, we are becoming the people God created us to be.
Following Jesus is the work of a lifetime. There will be pain, there will be pruning, there will be the death of much of what we hold dear. We have been forewarned. Only let our prayer continue to be, “Where he leads me I will follow, I’ll go with Him, with Him, all the way.”
1. Marsha Snulligan Haney, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Gospels, Mark, Cynthia A. Jarvis and Elizabeth Johnson, eds. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2014), 250.
2. Richard Rohr, Falling Upward (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2011), 11, quoted in Thomas R. Steagald, “Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Gospels, op.cit., 253.
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