Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

The readings for Sunday, July 4, 2021:

First Reading: Ezekiel 2:1-5

First Reading (Semi-cont.): 2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10

Psalm: Psalm 123

Psalm (Semi-cont.): Psalm 48

Second Reading: 2 Corinthians 12:2-10

Gospel: Mark 6:1-13

What an intriguing Gospel reading for this Sunday: Jesus rejected by people who had known him since he was little and who knew his family. Perhaps you can relate.

The first part of this Gospel (in the reaction of the people of Christ’s own country) gives us a clear warning about the risks we face when we have expectations of God that might be a bit too firm. We're not really open to God or God's hopes and plans for us when we think we know what God should be up to in the world. The society of Jesus' time had very definite expectations of what the Messiah would look like and what he would do--and Jesus was not that person. How many people ignored God, right there in their midst, because they were looking for someone or something else?

This Gospel also warns us about fame and acclaim. If you've been alive any length of time, you know that the world grants fame to an interesting variety of people, for an interesting variety of reasons--and very few of these people gained fame for their efforts to make the world a better place for more people. If we expect God to act like our modern media stars, we're setting ourselves up for disappointment.

Much of the Bible shows us God appearing as a stranger, as a baby in a manger, as an itinerant preacher, as a crucified prisoner. We hear God speaking in dreams, in a burning bush, a whisper here, a glimmering there. If we’re waiting for angel choirs in the sky to give us a clear message from the Divine, we may wait a very long time. We need to learn to listen for God in other settings.

And the end of the Gospel has a warning for us, as well. If we become believers because we think we'll be famous or we'll make lots of money or we'll have political influence--well, we're likely to be disappointed. The Gospel of Jesus is not about those things that the world considers important--no matter what those Prosperity Gospel folks would have you believe.

If we think of Jesus as building a church, the model that we see in a Gospel might point us in a different direction than the path that many of us have been treading.

Jesus sends out his disciples two by two, with no possessions and not much of a plan. Notice what he does not do--he doesn't make them create a mission statement or a business plan. He doesn't have them raise money. And he doesn't expect them to work fruitlessly--they are allowed to shake the dust off of their feet and move on if a community rejects them.

What would our lives look like, if we followed this model? What would our lives look like if we trusted God more than our retirement plans, our family members, our bosses? Where are we stuck, needing to shake dust off of our feet and move on? Where might God lead us, if we can just learn to trust and learn to move?

Jesus and Boundaries: My Sermon for June 27, 2021

On Sunday, June 27, my pastor was out of town, and he asked me to preach.  The Gospel for the day was Mark 5: 21-43, and I preached that it was a series of boundary crossings:

--By this point in Mark's Gospel, synagogue leaders are already concerned about Jesus and his popularity.  They aren't only concerned about losing their power, but they are also concerned about attracting attention from Rome, and that wouldn't go well.  But a leader of the synagogue is so worried about his sick child that he seeks out Jesus.

--A bleeding woman is so desperate that she, too, seeks out Jesus.

--Jesus heals her before he even realizes that he's done it.  Or is it her faith that heals her?  Or is it the words after the encounter?

--I gave a brief primer about purity laws, and about all the purity boundaries crossed with a bleeding woman and a dead girl--blood and a corpse, and Jesus touches both.

--We have people asking for healing for others, while we also see the bleeding woman assert her own needs--more boundary crossing.

--We see Jesus raise a girl from the dead--she's been dead for awhile before he gets there.  It's not just that her goofy relatives mistake a deep sleep for death--she's dead-dead.  Yet Jesus crosses the boundary between life and death by bringing her back.

So what do we do with all of these boundaries burst?  I wasn't sure how I was going to finish, but as I listened to my spouse chant Psalm 30, it came to me.  I love the end of verse 5:  "Weeping spnds the night, but joy comes in the morning."

As I was preaching about wholeness and healing, I looked across the congregation and realized how many people are wrestling with health issues.  I even made mention that hearing about these miracle stories might make us feel inadequate:  do we just not have enough faith to be healed?  Is it that no one loves us enough to advocate for us, the way the father does for his daughter?

I said that it was crummy theology, which you will never hear me preach.  I read the end of Psalm 30:5 again.  I reminded us all that Jesus never tells us that there will be no weeping.  But Jesus reminds us again and again that God has a different vision for us, a different world that could be possible if we let go of our rigid boundaries and strictures.  

Of course, it may not look like the wholeness that we yearn for.  But maybe it will be better.  I ended this way:  "Jesus comes to say, 'Hey, in your human brain that likes to think of things as ordered and structured, maybe reality isn't that way.  Maybe the boundaries that you think are there are not the boundaries that are really there.  Maybe all you have to do is reach out and a whole life can be yours."

Horrifying Headlines and Miracles of Nature

 On Friday, June 18, I saw this headline in The Washington Post:  "Three dead, two missing after group of tubers plunge off 8-foot dam along N.C. river."  My first thought was that a pile of potatoes had gone over a dam to injure people below.

But then I read the article, which is much more ordinary, but no less horrific.  The tubers in question were humans in innertubes, rafting down a river.

It has been a week of horrifying headlines.  I spent much of yesterday toggling back to accounts of the collapse of the condo building in Surfside Beach, even though I knew it was much too early for anyone to know the cause of it.

But I also want to remember this week as one of natural wonders.  I began the work week seeing dolphins in a tidal lake near me, and I'm finishing the work week seeing a rainbow in the sky:

I also noticed the pots of milkweed that we grew from seed.  Why does that ability to grow a plant from a seed always seem like a miracle?

Later this week-end, we'll enjoy this pineapple, grown from a pineapple top that we planted years ago.  It, too, feels like a miracle.

Language Skills and Gendered God Talk

 I am part of the group that is doing worship planning/service creating for our upcoming Synod Assembly.  We are meeting via Zoom, but the Assembly will be held in person.  However, it won't be the same kind of Assembly--there won't be displays or a prayer chapel or musical groups that will move us between segments.  We will minimize the singing during worship.

I might ask why we are bothering to assemble in person at all, and as we plan, we are aware that much can change between now and the mid-September week-end of the Synod Assembly.  I have my eyes on that new Delta variant, and I'm trying not to revert to my Cassandra self, forecasting doom.  And then there's the issue of all the money that gets spent on an in-person Assembly.  But these are not the topics I want to write about today.

Tuesday a group of us met on Zoom to look at the worship services that were created for last year's cancelled Assembly.  Our goal was to see what we could still use, and the happy news is that much of it was still workable.  We had a lot of language about significant anniversaries like the 50th anniversary of the ordination of women that we will take out.

We talked about the music, about who will be singing/playing and when, and about the settings we will use.  I felt my usual stab of envy--how I wish that music came effortlessly to me.  I come from a family of musicians, so I know that nothing is effortless.  Their capacity with music comes from many years of practice, practice, practice.

We needed someone to rewrite the petitions for the prayers, and I volunteered.  And then again, when we looked at the closing service, I volunteered for another writing task.  The leader said, "You'll be our wordsmith."  He said it in a way that made me feel valued.

And then I realized that I was once again assuming that everyone has the same kind of skills that I do, and thus, I tend to undervalue the talents I do have while wishing for talents I haven't developed.  I forget how intimidating writing prayers can be.  

As we were looking at the worship services, I found myself getting irritated at all the Father God language.  I thought, wait, I'm on the worship planning team.  Speak up!  And so, I raised my hand.

I said, "I've been at Synod Assemblies for years, and I'm always irritated by this gendered language of God.  I prefer God the Creator, but if we must have Father God language, could we also make reference to God our Mother?"

Let me stress that I am not some wild-eyed Gen Y kiddo.  I am about to turn 56 years old, and I am surprised to still have to be making this request decades after my fellow feminists first started advocating for inclusive language when it comes to God talk.  My fellow worship planners looked to be about my age or maybe 10 years older, and yesterday, I was the only female on the call.

I expected to be shot down; I was prepared to argue my point further, but I didn't need to.  Happily, my suggestions found agreement or at least no one voiced disagreement.  Our leader said, "Sure we can do that.  I'll make a note to change to expansive language when it comes to God."

Hurrah!

I think that most worshippers will not notice the absence of the gendered language of God.  A reference to Creator God gives people the space to think of that God as a father or a mother or of their favorite art teacher.  Those of us who notice gendered language will appreciate the absence of Father God, and those who need that language will still get it when we use the Lord's Prayer.  I won't fight that battle when it comes to the Lord's Prayer or the creeds, but for the prayers we're writing, we can make the language more inclusive.

In later years, maybe we'll finally live into the call to be all inclusive; maybe the larger church will rewrite the creeds and the Lord's Prayer.  And I expect that in later years, some young whippersnapper who can't be a day over 56 will let me know how my own notions of expansiveness are so very 2020's.

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

The readings for Sunday, June 27, 2021:

First Reading: Lamentations 3:22-33

First Reading (Semi-cont.): 2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27

First Reading (Alt.): Wisdom of Solomon 1:13-15; 2:23-24

Psalm: Psalm 30

Psalm (Semi-cont.): Psalm 130

Second Reading: 2 Corinthians 8:7-15

Gospel: Mark 5:21-43

Notice how rooted in physicality is our Gospel for Sunday. We've got a bleeding woman and a dying girl. At the end of the Gospel, Jesus orders food for the no longer dead girl. The Gospel practically oozes on the page.

Notice too how we've got a variety of people--all they have in common is their fierce belief and their willingness to do whatever it takes for healing. They will ignore all the years of ill health. They will ignore their rational voices that say that one man can't bring health. Even when they're surrounded by naysayers, they believe. They will ignore death, so powerful is their hope.

Notice that in this passage Jesus focuses his attention on some of the most outcast of his society: a little girl and a bleeding woman. If you've studied the Old Testament, you understand how outcast a woman who never stopped bleeding would be. Ancient purity codes were quite strict about body fluids, particularly when they came from women. And a female child would have also been seen as expendable, at least in the larger society. Yet Jesus doesn't withhold his power from them, even if they're not important to the larger society.

This Gospel echoes the story we heard last week. Here is Jesus again, talking to his disciples about their fears. Here is Jesus, doing what should be impossible for humans to do. Last week he's controlling nature. This week, we seem him controlling the human body. We even see him overcome death.

These stories make me think about my own faith, particularly during these hot, hazy days of summer, when it seems impossible to get off the couch. What would inspire me to go to Jesus in a similar way? I try to imagine Jesus saying to me "Daughter, your faith has made you well." I think of all the ways that my faith can--and does--fall short.

But let me not start down the spiral of self-recrimination. Let me use these ancient people pursuing healing to inspire me to pursue Jesus with similar determination.

Sand, Bone, Wave, Storm

 Today my writing time is much shorter.  I have grades due tomorrow for one of my online classes, so I've spent much of my writing time grading research essays.  

I did manage to play with a poem idea this morning.  On Friday, during the closing worship service of my certificate in spiritual direction program, we did an Ignatian exercise where we imagined ourselves in the boat with Jesus in the storm.  Were we disciples?  The cushion?  The boat?  The storm?

I wrote down some ideas that came to me as I imagined myself as the storm.  And then yesterday, I played with the voice of the sand and came up with a poem-like thing that was just 9 lines long, with no stanza breaks, which is very unusual for me.  

This morning, I wrote a bit more.  I also made word lists of words starting with s, w, t, and b.  I wrote this tweet:  "Still working on what is becoming a poem series or one poem struggling to emerge out of various drafts. Images of sand and bone, sea and wave and storm, salt and skeleton and sacrifices demanded."

Yesterday's morning was more delightful.  I want to record this Facebook post so that I remember:

"On my morning walk, I saw dolphins in North Lake--and I think I saw a baby dolphin or two (smaller back fins). Were they learning to fish? Were they having morning play time? Taking a morning swim?

The day is much more enchanted when it begins with sunrise staining the sky and the water and dolphins gliding through the lake near the shore."

And now, administrator life awaits.  Let me prepare.

Activism, Self-Care, and Transformations

Sunday morning, I listened to this episode of It's Been a Minute with Sam Sanders, an interview with Sarah Schulman.  Her latest book is a documenting of ACT UP.  It's the kind of interview that makes me want to read the book, but I know from past experience that I might get it and feel like I've already read it, because the interview was so wonderful.  So I'll wait for the library to get it.

I already knew a lot of the history, but she gives some interesting background.  For example, she notes how much activism changed once the camcorder was invented.  Before that invention, video equipment, which would include a boom mike, was too cumbersome (and expensive) to use.

It's the kind of interview that makes me feel bad about my own activism, that makes me feel guilty about even thinking I had any kind of activism credibility.  I know that's not her intention.  Those AIDS activists did amazing things, and Schulman reminds us that they were fighting for their lives--literally.  Many of those activists were very sick, and they didn't have much time.

I've done a variety of types of activism, from giving money to going to demonstrations, writing letters and making phone calls and monitoring institutions.  But is it enough?  I could argue that we haven't made the kind of changes that those ACT UP folks did.

But that would be wrong.  We worked to get marital rape bills changed and arms treaties ratified and abortion rights protected.  I think of the work of my campus to get a bus route and a bus stop.  That may seem minor, compared to changing the laws that made experimental drugs more widely available to patients with terminal illnesses.  But for people who don't have to walk a mile or two to the nearest bus stop, that work was critical.  I hope.

Later yesterday morning, as I drove home from a quick trip to restock provisions, I listened to the radio program On Being, which featured a different type of interview, Alex Elle discussing self care as a form of activism on behalf of oneself, and one's future and past self too.  She talks about a friend who encouraged her to go public with her writing and told her that if she changed one heart, that would be one heart changed, which would be significant.

I liked her interview more than her Instagram site.  I do realize I'm in the minority in that preference.  Or maybe it was because I was listening to the Sarah Schulman material again that explains why I found the Instagram site so much less satisfying than the human interview.

I do know that we are less able to advocate for others if we're not even advocating for ourselves.  I do understand that many people aren't taught the self-care lessons that Alex Elle offers.  

But I also wonder how our society would be transformed if we emerged from our self-care ready to fight more passionately for those who need our care.