Gospel text for Sunday 23 October 2022

 Luke 18:9-14       Jesus told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt: "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, `God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.' But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even look up to heaven, but was beating his breast and saying, `God, be merciful to me, a sinner!' I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.”

Reflection        Have you ever overheard someone spewing a list of laments about a person or group of “those unworthy people” while assuming a morally superior stance insisting “I am not like that? I would never do such things?” And while we are excavating, shall we be painfully honest? Have you ever heard yourself rehearsing your exceptional credentials, thanking God that you are not like “those disreputable people?” 

Being a respected religious man who goes to the synagogue for all of the appointed prayers, steers clear of contact with undesirable folk and exceeds the biblical obligation to give ten percent of his income to the temple, the Pharisee in Luke’s text assumes he is in God’s favor.. But Jesus does not concur. When Jesus commends the sinful tax collector for humbly petitioning God for mercy, Jesus turns the Pharisee’s self-righteous assumptions upside down. The upstanding Pharisee is shocked.  

I am willing to wager that when most of us hear this teaching tale comparing the Pharisee and the tax collector, we identify with the pious Pharisee. We go to church, say the appointed prayers, we read books and blogs about scripture, we steer clear of contact with undesirable people and fulfill our biblical obligation to give ten percent of our income to the Church (well, maybe not so much). We trust in ourselves and believe we deserve God’s grace. So, standing shoulder to shoulder with the Pharisee our eyes glaze over when Jesus commends our law breaking neighbors and condemns us to humility.

I believe this troublesome teaching tale requires we take out the windex, wipe the dust off our mirrors to look through a new perspective. “Yes, there I am.  No, I am not a thief, a scoundrel, or two-faced deceiver. I worked for everything I have and I give sensibly to my church.  Just look at me Lord. I am not like those reprehensible people.  I am pious and practice the way of perfection. I am law abiding and above reproach.”  But our flourishes hold no sway with Jesus who roundly rejects our litany of “look at me” statements.  In a sleight of hand that we do not foresee Jesus brings us to our knees. 

From our corrected perspective we listen to  Jesus’ confounding comment just a few sentences following this text. While blessing the little children Jesus admonishes us,  “Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” (Luke 18.17) 

Again we join the Pharisee protesting. “How can this be? We are meant to read, mark, study, digest and keep God’s law. Children cannot even read! They do not know the law and furthermore, they have nothing to offer God.” Can you see Jesus scratching his head, screwing up his eyes and muttering, “Precisely! Children never presume they have anything to give to God or anyone else. Guileless and unguarded children simply turn to the One from whom their blessings flow. Children and admitted sinners stand naked before God. Being empty, open and receptive they are available to receive God’s favor.”

Mirroring cloudless contrast between those who put their trust in themselves and those who put their trust in God, Jesus is crystal clear.  There is only one way to be in right relationship with God. Humbly. Those who exalt themselves will be deflated, disgraced and degraded. Those who humble themselves will be filled, favored and pure.

Oh, Jesus, this is hard. Too hard. From the time we are tiny children we are told to prove ourselves, master the world, and accumulate the social, political and religious badges of success. I do not know about you but I cannot count the times my child self heard, “What have you got to show for yourself young lady? What have you done to deserve being here? God helps those who help themselves?” Not until I was well on my way to old did I receive the counsel “To receive the wisdom of the wise you must be empty, open and receptive.” Even then this sage advice did not come from the Christian tradition. It came to me through Taoist wisdom tales.

Assuming the unaffected sincerity of children we find a new perspective. Now cheek to jowl with the tax collector in today’s gospel text, we  are “standing far off… not even look(ing) up to heaven, but beating our breast and saying, `God, be merciful to me, a sinner!'. Just in case your eyebrows scowl and your alarms howl when you hear the word, ’sinner,’ relax. This is not an invitation to self loathing and flagellation. This is a summons to a new perspective.

If sin means we miss the mark and the mark is right relationship with God, then being a sinner means we are turned away from God. A sure and certain way for us to know we are turned away from God is when we hear ourselves announcing our virtues instead of humbling ourselves and proclaiming the goodness and mercy of God. This is why Jesus insists we stop singing our holier than thou sonnets and turn to the One from whom we receive all blessings, blessings we only receive when we are open, empty and receptive as unspoiled children.

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Gospel Text for Annunciation 24 March 2019

Luke 1:26-38        In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, "Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you." But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end." Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I am a virgin?" The angel said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God." Then Mary said, "Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word." Then the angel departed from her."

Reflection   I wonder how many angels God sent to whisper in people’s ears; sent to prophets and widows, soothsayers and slaves, Kings, rabbis and peasants?  I wonder how many prospects were just not listening and how many others rather preferred to keep God in God’s distant place, after all, if God shows up right here right now, we might have to step out of our shadows and recast our selves? 

And God kept sending angels whispering, “Greetings favored one. Do not be afraid. It is the deepest desire of my heart to be born of your flesh.  I long to skip and spin, strut and sing, to be holy human. Be assured,  never will I force myself upon you. Never shall I transgress your will. Give me leave to be with you and we will be whole and holy.” No one can count the number of times God whispered this plaintive plea until at last a guileless girl named Mary consented,"Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word." 

Wide eyed and innocent, unjaded as a virgin, whoever would have predicted that of all the folks on earth this pubescent girl would be the one to hear the whisper of God tugging at her heart and access the audacity to affirm, “God is with me.”

What will it take for us to rescue God from imperial isolation, to eat the flesh, drink the blood and be holy human? What will it take for us to consent and affirm, God is with me? I know this is not the way the teaching tale is told in the Gospel according to Luke. What if instead of worrying about sex outside of wedlock, old women and virgin’s getting pregnant, the potency of the Holy Spirit, the whole question of extraordinary events that cannot be explained by natural or scientific laws, what if we were to consent to divine presence and agency impregnating every cell and every space of our own being? What if we were to consent to being holy human?

Yes, we would have to be bold and humble as Mary… and very very careful because claiming our identity as holy human God bearers is risky business. But that is the story we are preparing for this Lent, the story of Jesus, fully human and fully divine, who pays the ultimate price for claiming his identity. But, for today it is enough to respond to God’s whisper, “Greetings favored one. The Lord IS with you,” by ever so humbly and audaciously consenting to recast ourselves as holy human.

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Gospel text for the Baptism of Our Lord Sunday 13 January 2019

Luke 3:15-17, 21-22        As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah, John answered all of them by saying, "I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”

Reflection      If you are willing, please close your eyes, or leave them open and imagine it is a warm afternoon, you can feel the sun on your back as you stand a bit apart from a crowd of folks gathered near the prophet John, who is knee deep in the Jordan river. You can see sunlight sparkling on the droplets of water dripping from John’s wiry beard. You can not quite hear what John is saying, so slip a bit closer. Intrigued by what is going on you venture to the river’s edge and watch as one at a time people step into the river, approach John who ever so gently holds them as they lean back and are submerged in the cool water. Something stirs inside you. Before you know what you are doing, you find yourself stepping into the river and feel the cool water rising from your ankles to your knees. Now, kneeling in front of the prophet you draw in your breath at the same time you feel his strong hands supporting you as you lean back into the water. All goes silent as the water envelops your entire body. Almost out of breath, you break through the water and rise into the glittering sky. From the depths of your heart you hear, “You are my beloved. With you I am well pleased.”

How might we respond? “Wow! Am I hearing things?” Or possibly we would be paralyzed in silence thinking, “Surely this is not really happening. I cannot speak of this or others will think I have lost my mind. “ Or maybe we attribute it to “something I ate.” Or perhaps we let the vision go straight to our head and we sizzle,  “Aren’t I special! I heard God tell me I am the beloved. I must really be something great.!”

Perhaps that’s why the prophet John speaks of baptism by the Spirit and fire. Maybe the fire John the baptizer mentions has to do with tempering the Spirit? Maybe baptism by fire has to do with separating the wheat from the chaff, breaking the shell and getting rid of the hard edges of our human minds and personalities. You know, that of our human condition which is tempted to think of our selves as special, as equal to God and to interpret our experiences with the motive of increasing our personal gain or net worth?

With that in mind it makes sense that  almost immediately following his baptism while “full of the Holy Spirit” (4.1) Jesus was “led into the wilderness and tempted by the devil.” (4.2) Three times Jesus was tempted to identify with or test God. He was tempted to use power for personal gain or to exert it over people to enhance his position. All three times Jesus chose instead to be humble, to rely on words he learned from the Hebrew scriptures to respond to temptation rather than be seduced by promises of personal position, power or privilege.

This is baptism with fire... the fire of temptation that refines away our creatureliness, the fire that transforms our avaricious appetite for power, privilege and personal gain into generous desire to be in right relationship with God and one another.

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Gospel text for Sunday 9 July 2017

Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30        Jesus said to the crowd, “To what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another,

‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.’ For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’; the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.”

At that time Jesus said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.

“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Reflection        Jesus’ yoke is easy, his burden is light because he is not weighed down with the baggage of pride, insolence, disrespect and acrimony. Because Jesus consents to the present moment exactly as it is, he is not troubled, irritable, harsh, disagreeable or unkind.  Thus unburdened, Jesus is soft spoken, unpretentious and respectful. He is merciful, “gentle and humble in heart.”

As the prophet Zechariah proclaims, “The king comes humble and riding on a donkey… He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations…” (Zech 9.10-11) This is a great paradox. The true king, the one who rules and commands peace in all nations, is humble, rides a donkey not a limousine; is soft spoken not disagreeable;  unpretentious not disdainful;  respectful not unkind. The true king is merciful, “gentle and humble in heart.” 

The psalmist makes the same point, “The Lord is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger and of great kindness. The Lord is loving to everyone and his compassion is over all his works.” (Ps 145.8-9) Here is the thing. Like Jesus we are made in the image and likeness of God and intended to embody and express the attributes of God, the true king. We are intended to be slow to anger and of great kindness, full of compassion, gentle and humble in heart. We are intended to command peace in all nations.

How are we to do or be this? How are we to ward off the news and the uncivil discourse that assaults and carries us away? We are steeped in a world that endorses pride, insolence, disrespect and acrimony. We are constantly bombarded by troubled, irritable, harsh, disagreeable and unkind words and images. If we allow this negativity to grab us and sweep us away we will not be “gentle and humble in heart.”  We will lose all hope.  

But, we are people of God and we find our hope by choosing to live “with-God lives.” So we come together to worship, study and learn from Jesus.  We come together to exchange our  troubled, irritable, harsh, disagreeable and unkind thoughts, words and actions for Jesus’ gentle and merciful ways. We come together to relieve and replace the burdens of our pride, insolence, disrespect and acrimony with Jesus’ compassion and humble heart. 

No, this is not easy, in fact we probably cannot do it by our will alone.  That is why we put our faith in Jesus’ teaching, “For humans it is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matt 19.26)

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Christian Testament text for Sunday 20 September 2015

James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a        Who is wise and understanding among you? Show by your good life that your works are done with gentleness born of wisdom. But if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not be boastful and false to the truth. Such wisdom does not come down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, devilish. For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for those who make peace.

Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from? Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you? You want something and do not have it; so you commit murder. And you covet something and cannot obtain it; so you engage in disputes and conflicts. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures.

Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.

Reflection    Get serious. Get humble. Get on your knees. James’ letter could have been written today to all of us Christians dispersed across the globe who say with our mouths we believe in God and Jesus the Christ and by many of our actions declare the constitutional status of the holy “my;” my preferences, my rights, my desires, my predilections. Where is humility in the sacred-cow of individualism? Where are “the good fruit” born in envy, unbridled ambition and victory at any cost?

Nothing is lost in the urgency of the words penned two thousand years ago. The early Christian community was in crisis as we are. If we dare to call ourselves Christian it is time to pause and look honestly in the mirror. Do we live well? Do we live peaceably? Do we live humbly? Are our lives the living, breathing revelation of God’s good fruit poured out through us? If we cannot answer a resounding “Yes, yes, yes!” to these questions we must then ask ourselves, “How am I not in right relationship with God?”

The “good fruit’ the writer of James’ letter refers to are much the same as the fruit of the Spirit  to which Paul refers in his Letter to the Galatians. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness and self control (Gal 5.22) are evidence of God’s grace working in us as we do the serious work of staying in conscious, conscientious and humble relationship with God. And yes, this is serious work, exercising our spiritual muscles. An athlete works out to strengthen and stretch their physical muscles. A worker practices to develop their competency muscles. An intellectual studies to expand their mental muscles. A person of faith prays rightly to mature their spiritual muscles. Which returns us to the question, “How do we pray rightly?”

The German scholar, Eckhart Tolle, who wrote The Power of Now, encourages us to have disciplined, humble prayer practices and warns us not to let our practices get in the way. Somewhere he wrote, and I paraphrase, “Why don’t we just go there now. Why don’t we just stop and be present to Presence right now?”

Perhaps you would join me in being present to Presence right now. If you would, please close your eyes. Take a deep breath, breathe in and breathe out. Now as you take your next breath experience the place of love in every cell and space of your being. Breathe out. As you take your next breath experience the presence of joy throughout your body. Breathe out.  Now do the same thing with peace, breathing in and breathing out, patience, kindness, gentleness, generosity, faithfulness and self-control.  Then we conclude the prayer, “O God, here I am. I consent to Your presence and action within me. Please allow the fruit of your Spirit to flow through me for the good of humanity. Amen.”  You may or may not want to get on your knees.

The fruit of the Spirit are already in us. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness,   generosity, faithfulness and self-control are the substance of Divine Presence, God with us. Even if we are not experiencing some or any of the fruit they are the fiber, the very meaning of our true self which is not other than God. When we consciously consent to God’s presence and action within us and ask to experience the good fruit of God, we are praying rightly.

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Gospel text for Sunday 28 June 2015

Mark 5:21-43        When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered around him; and he was by the sea. Then one of the leaders of the synagogue named Jairus came and, when he saw him, fell at his feet and begged him repeatedly, "My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be made well, and live." He went with him.

And a large crowd followed him and pressed in on him. Now there was a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years. She had endured much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse. She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, for she said, "If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well." Immediately her hemorrhage stopped; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, "Who touched my clothes?" And his disciples said to him, "You see the crowd pressing in on you; how can you say, `Who touched me?'" He looked all around to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told him the whole truth. He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease."

While he was still speaking, some people came from the leader's house to say, "Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further?" But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the leader of the synagogue, "Do not fear, only believe." He allowed no one to follow him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James. When they came to the house of the leader of the synagogue, he saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. When he had entered, he said to them, "Why do you make a commotion and weep? The child is not dead but sleeping." And they laughed at him. Then he put them all outside, and took the child's father and mother and those who were with him, and went in where the child was. He took her by the hand and said to her, "Talitha cum," which means, "Little girl, get up!" And immediately the girl got up and began to walk about (she was twelve years of age). At this they were overcome with amazement. He strictly ordered them that no one should know this, and told them to give her something to eat.

Reflection        What is going on here? A man of position and power bows to Jesus. A powerless woman, cast out of society presumes to touch Jesus. Both of them must have been desperate and both must have over-heard the buzz around the Sea of Galilee. “There is a man named Jesus, a mere carpenter’s son who teaches with great authority, he cleanses lepers, heals the paralyzed and disfigured, eats with tax collectors and other sinners, he even casts out demons! I hear he is coming back to our side of the sea. Let’s go see what he can do.” 

Imagine the hemorrhaging woman hearing all that and being emboldened to break out of her isolation, leave her house in violation of purity code restrictions  and reach out to Jesus? In her desperation the woman did what was unheard of, she boldly touched a man, and”immediately felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.” By fearlessly stepping out in faith the woman was restored to fullness of life because to be ‘well’ meant not only to be physically cured but also to fearlessly show up and take her place in the community.

Meanwhile Jairus, the powerful religious leader, is witnessing the healing of the hemorrhaging woman when the other religious leaders deliver the awful news, “Your daughter is dead.” What are we to make of Jesus’ perplexing response, “Do not fear, only believe.” I believe Jesus is inviting Jairus and all of us to stretch, not only to have faith when asking for healing but also to have faith when faced with death. 

Divine life-giving power flows through Jesus, not like a hammer pounding a nail rather as water or blood poured into an open, empty vessel. You see, faith is the interior state of open, empty receptivity. Divinity is the fullness poured into the emptiness. Emptiness and fullness live in mutuality. This makes no sense to the rational mind that understands things by contrast, black or white, broken or fixed, empty or full.

Faith is a disposition of heart and mind that enables us to know God’s Divine Presence with us regardless of the situation. In the throes of an excruciating chronic illness, when we have used all of our resources, tried every medical procedure, and nothing works, we protest, “God is with us.”  When our friends throw up their hands, wail and cry, “All is lost,” we humbly aver, “God is with us.” 

Gospel text for Sunday 6 July 2014

Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30        Jesus said to the crowd, "To what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another,

`We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.'For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, `He has a demon'; the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, `Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!' Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds."

At that time Jesus said, "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.

"Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Reflection   Caught between a rock and a hard place. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. Basically Jesus is saying, nothing pleases these people! They hear great music and do not respond with joy. They witness great suffering and do not respond with sadness. All they do is sit around in coffee shops, flaunt their intelligence and complain.    Quite the social commentary two thousand years ago and today.

But Jesus does not leave us there, stuck between the proverbial rock and hard place. Jesus offers a way into freedom. “Come to me… take my yoke… learn from me…” The thing is, we cannot come to Jesus when we are caught up in the local social political commentary. We cannot take from Jesus when we are full of our selves. We cannot learn from Jesus when we rely on our intellect. 

Still, there is a way to freedom. We come to Jesus when we are as infants; artless, guileless and unpretentious. We take from Jesus when we yoke ourselves to him, finding our identity in him even as he finds his identity in God the Father.  We learn from Jesus when we empty our selves of our intellects. In the words of the ancient wisdom teacher Lao-Tzu, “A wise man has no extensive knowledge; he who has extensive knowledge is not a wise man.” (Tao te Ching, c550 BCE) 

Another wise man, Pope Francis, wrote, “If one has the answers to all the questions, that is proof that God is not with him. It means that he is a false prophet using religion for himself. The great leaders of the people of God, like Moses, have always left room for doubt. You must leave room for the Lord, not for our certainties; we must be humble.” How might our world be transformed if everyone prayed for the grace to be “gentle and humble in heart?” How glorious if althogether we found “rest for our souls?” 

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Gospel text for Sunday 23 June 2013

Luke 8:26-39     Jesus and his disciples arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. As he stepped out on land, a man of the city who had demons met him. For a long time he had worn no clothes, and he did not live in a house but in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he fell down before him and shouted at the top of his voice, "What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me" -- for Jesus had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For many times it had seized him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds.) Jesus then asked him, "What is your name?" He said, "Legion"; for many demons had entered him. They begged him not to order them to go back into the abyss.

Now there on the hillside a large herd of swine was feeding; and the demons begged Jesus to let them enter these. So he gave them permission. Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.

When the swineherds saw what had happened, they ran off and told it in the city and in the country. Then people came out to see what had happened, and when they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid. Those who had seen it told them how the one who had been possessed by demons had been healed. Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear. So he got into the boat and returned. The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him; but Jesus sent him away, saying, "Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you." So he went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done for him.

Reflection    Inside my generally poised and quiet exterior I’ve borne a few storms along the way; whirlwinds of uninvited thoughts and indubitable tornadoes of emotion. Inside it felt no less perilous than the raging wind and waves that provoked Jesus’ disciples to shout, “Master we are perishing.” (Luke 8. 24) And although I have never been physically bound “with chains and shackles” I do recall feeling the weight of the world hammering my chest while wirey fingers cuffed my throat. Fear - this will never end. Fear - this will end. I suspect most people have had a taste or two of such extremis, where circumstances (inside or out) seem so grave, so isolating, so out of control, that there is nothing to do except fall down on our face before Holy God and surrender. And then...

We know the story. Something unexpected happens. Jesus calmed the storm his disciples believed would kill them, and then they were “afraid and amazed...(and asked) who is this who commands even the winds and the water...?” (Luke 8.25) Jesus moved on to approach the tormented man of Gersasene, and instead of turning away disgusted by his vulgar behavior, Jesus asked the deranged man whose “chains and shackles” were insufficient to contain the powerhouse of his emotions, Jesus asked, “What is your name?” In other words, Jesus ‘saw’ beyond the circumstance. Jesus ‘saw’ the real man. By asking the man his name Jesus affirmed his very essence. And the tormented man was restored to his right mind. The people who had persecuted him were “seized with fear.” But not the tortured man. His heart was filled with desire. He begged to stay with Jesus, the one by whom he felt seen and loved.  

Exposed and naked the tormented man fell down before Jesus. In an act of utter surrender he prostrated himself before the “Son of the Most High God.” And he was transformed.  In his Letters to a Young Poet Rainer Marie Rilke wrote, “Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are really princesses who are waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.”

Gospel text for Sunday 2 June 2013

Luke 7:1-10        After Jesus had finished all his sayings in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. A centurion there had a slave whom he valued highly, and who was ill and close to death. When he heard about Jesus, he sent some Jewish elders to him, asking him to come and heal his slave. When they came to Jesus, they appealed to him earnestly, saying, "He is worthy of having you do this for him, for he loves our people, and it is he who built our synagogue for us." And Jesus went with them, but when he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends to say to him, "Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; therefore I did not presume to come to you. But only speak the word, and let my servant be healed. For I also am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, `Go,' and he goes, and to another, `Come,' and he comes, and to my slave, `Do this,' and the slave does it." When Jesus heard this he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, he said, "I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith." When those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the slave in good health.

Reflection        “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof.” It is unthinkable that a centurion could say those words to Jesus. Roman soldiers were chosen from the wealthiest and most privileged citizens. When a man swore the ‘sacramentum,’ an oath of allegiance to the Roman Empire, his status changed from citizen to soldier. From then on he was no longer a citizen guided by his own conscience and he bore no personal responsibity for his actions.  All of his actions were subject to the will of his commander.  He would have been trained to feel neither cruelty nor compassion and to unequivocally execute orders. Likewise he expected those under his command to obey orders. As he said to Jesus, “I also am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me.” He knew his place in the chain of authority and in that chain there was no room for conscience or compassion. In other words, once he had sworn the oath and received his armor the centurion’s will was no longer his own. So, what happened?  

Apparently training to be a Roman soldier had not wiped all compassion out of the centurion. He was a man known for loving the Jewish people and for building their synagogue. But, he was also a man under the authority of the Roman empire.  He was commissioned to keep peace and eliminate revolutionaries. There must have been an all out war inside the centurion the day Jesus showed up in Capernaum. “To whom shall I attribute greater authority? The Roman empire or this pecular Jewish preacher?” I wonder if the centurion surprised himself when he sent some Jewish elders to ask Jesus to “come and heal his highly valued slave who was close to death.” After all, even Jesus was amazed!

Not only did the centurion recognize Jesus’ power and ask for his help he did what was unheard of - he humbled himself. Rather than relying on his power and privilege and peacock plumes to get what he wanted, he said to Jesus, “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; therefore I did not presume to come to you.” By every standard the centurion would have been considered dignified and worthy of respect. Yet in spite of his title, power and peacock plumes, he decided in favor of the poor, the hungry and the reviled. The centurion decided in favor of his slave and in so doing he allied himself with Jesus. And Jesus was amazed.

Violating every convention and putting himself at personal risk, the centurion chose the way of blessing the least among us. In two thousand years the need to do likewise has not diminished. Much as  the centurion we are people “set under authority” and sent to do the business of God, sent to decide in favor of the poor, the hungry and the reviled.  Let’s stop limping along.  Let's stop the social, political and religious wars and get on with the business of God deciding "for" the invisible people.

Luke 3:15-17,21-22          As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah, John answered all of them by saying, "I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire."

Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased."

Reflection           While he was praying (after being baptized) Jesus experienced an altered state of consciousness. In other words, Jesus experienced a state of mind or awareness that is not usual in ordinary wakefulness. Jesus experienced God or Divinity breaking directly into his ordinary state of awareness; “The heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form...” Not only did Jesus have a visual experience of the Spirit of God in “bodily form” but he also heard “a voice from heaven.” 

Wow! I imagine if that happened to me it would go straight to my head and I would sizzle,  “Aren’t I special!” Perhaps that’s why the prophet John spoke of baptism by the Spirit and fire. Maybe the fire has to do with tempering the Spirit by seperating the wheat from the chaff, breaking the shell and getting rid of the hard edges of our human minds and personalities. You know, that of our human condition which is tempted to think of our selves as special, as god?

It makes sense that immediately following his baptism while “full of the Holy Spirit” (4.1) Jesus was “led into the wilderness and tempted by the devil.” (4.2) Three times Jesus was tempted to identify with or test God. Three times Jesus chose to be in humble dependent relationship with God. Jesus did not misappropriate his altered state experience. He did not count himself as equal to God.  No wonder the voice from heaven was “well pleased” with him. The question for all of us (who by our baptism received the Holy Spirit) is, what dregs of our human condition, what presumptions, pretensions or pride need to be tempered in the refiner’s fire so that we too may embody our true identity as the beloved daughters and sons of God?