Gospel text for Sunday 5 June 2016

Luke 1.11-17     Soon after healing the centurion's slave, Jesus went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a large crowd went with him. As he approached the gate of the town, a man who had died was being carried out. He was his mother's only son, and she was a widow; and with her was a large crowd from the town. When the Lord saw her, he had compassion for her and said to her, "Do not weep." Then he came forward and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, "Young man, I say to you, rise!" The dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother. Fear seized all of them; and they glorified God, saying, "A great prophet has risen among us!" and "God has looked favorably on his people!" This word about him spread throughout Judea and all the surrounding country. 

Reflection        Jesus sees beyond the widow’s tears and external appearance of loss. He sees beyond the social condition that defines her as invisible. (A woman with neither husband nor son has no place in society) Jesus sees a deeper truth that rejects the social political narrative of his time in favor of a pastoral relationship with the widow. Jesus looks at the widow, truly sees her, allows himself to be touched by her situation (even makes himself ritually unclean by touching the dead man’s coffin), and Jesus loves her.  In the ineffable light of his love the widow is miraculously transformed, she receives new life.

Of course this raises difficult questions for us. Who in our world needs to be seen? Are we willing to look straight into the face of suffering and allow ourselves to be touched by it? How do we look with compassion at the widows and widowers, the lost , the lonely, the bereaved and the least among us? How shall we allow the transforming light of Christ to shine through us into the darkest moments of the sick, the elderly, the foreigners, the handicapped, the prisoners, and the strangers? How could we do better?

It is easy to stay hidden in the crowd, paying our respect, shuffling our feet, muttering platitudes; “Isn’t it awful. How could such a thing happen. The world has gone to hell in a hand-basket. Let me know if there is something I can do.” All the while our eyes are diverted and our hearts are sealed. 

The compassionate way of Jesus expects more. The compassionate way of Jesus expects us to look directly into the face and fullness of our neighbors' suffering. The compassionate way of Jesus expects us to be touched and affected by our neighbors’ suffering and loss. The compassionate way of Jesus expects us to see a deeper truth that rejects the social political narrative of our time in favor of loving relationships with anyone in our world who suffers. The compassionate way of Jesus expects us to reach out and touch our neighbors and make a difference in their lives.

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Psalm 139 for Sunday 18 January 2015

Psalm 139:1-5, 11-17

LORD, you have searched me out and known me; *

you know my sitting down and my rising up;

you discern my thoughts from afar.

You trace my journeys and my resting-places *

and are acquainted with all my ways.

Indeed, there is not a word on my lips, *

but you, O LORD, know it altogether.

You press upon me behind and before *

and lay your hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; *

it is so high that I cannot attain to it.

For you yourself created my inmost parts; *

you knit me together in my mother's womb.

I will thank you because I am marvelously made; *

your works are wonderful, and I know it well.

My body was not hidden from you, *

while I was being made in secret

and woven in the depths of the earth.

Your eyes beheld my limbs, yet unfinished in the womb;

all of them were written in your book; *

they were fashioned day by day,

when as yet there was none of them.

How deep I find your thoughts, O God! *

how great is the sum of them!

If I were to count them, they would be more in number than the sand; *

to count them all, my life span would need to be like yours.

Reflection       We humans have a knack for hiding, burying, avoiding ourselves; critical thoughts about the person whose voice pushes us over our edge, the swelling of lust for our neighbor or stranger in the market, the times we were offended, overlooked, misrepresented, forgotten or failed. We pretend we do not eat, drink or buy too much. We leap to judgments then cling to them. We deny our feelings then get stuck in loops rehearsing the awful things people said to or about us. Then, we build thick brick walls around all of this, hoping to keep it from leaking out. The trouble is, it does not work.

God sees and knows and so we cry,  

“Where can I go from your spirit?
   Or where can I flee from your presence?
 If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me,
   and the light around me become night’,
 even the darkness is not dark to you;
   the night is as bright as the day,
   for darkness is as light to you. “

The only one who is left out in the dark is us. Those thick brick walls we build keep us from knowing who we are and whose we are. We cannot see that we are the beloved of God who sees and knows our whole story and loves us anyway. 

Years ago while making retreat at Christ in the Desert Monastery in Abique, New Mexico,  a single question rang through my soul, “Have I come here to find or avoid myself?” During Compline the first night of my retreat I quite forgot the question until we turned to Psalm 139 and chanted,                                                                                             

O Lord, you have searched me and known me.
You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
   you discern my thoughts from far away.
You search out my path and my lying down,
   and are acquainted with all my ways. 

Warm tears spilled on my psalm. I am seen. I am known. And I am not annihilated.  While walking to my room I paused in the uninterrupted darkness. “Lord, all the things I have never admitted, You see, You already know. Still You hold me in the breath of this night. You light my way with showers of stars.” Then I noticed a deer, maybe twenty or thirty feet away, watching me watching her. Amidst the unspeakable beauty of the canyon, with echoes of the monks chanting in my heart, I prayed , “Lord, you have searched me out and known me and not thrown me away. You have not stepped on me like an insect. You brought me to this holy place to wake me up in the middle of the night and let me know.  You know me; my journey, my comings, my goings and all the things I thought I had to hide.”

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