Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

The readings for Sunday, October 13, 2024:

Isaiah 53:4-12

Psalm 91:9-16

You have made the LORD your refuge, and the Most High your habitation. (Ps. 91:9)

Hebrews 5:1-10

Mark 10:35-45


Imagine being one of the 12 disciples; imagine the possible rivalries. Every so often, as with this Sunday’s Gospel, we see the very human side of the disciples.

Most of us, from the time we are little children, we want to be loved best in all the world. Unfortunately, many events happen to convince us that love is rare, and that if one person is loved, it means we must be loved less. Humans tend to see love as finite and to feel like there’s not enough to go around.

If Jesus was a different kind of leader, he might have decided to pit the disciples against each other, so that he could feed his own ego watching them compete for his favor. Those of you from dysfunctional families or Machiavellian workplaces have probably seen this technique in use. Sadly, it's not uncommon at all.

Happily, we don’t worship that kind of God. We might expect Jesus to be a leader of comfort and compassion. We might expect Jesus to figure out a way to respond so that everyone gets to feel good about themselves and be assured that Jesus loves them all exactly the same.

We don’t worship that kind of God either. We may behave like three year olds, but Jesus treats his disciples like the grown ups he expects them to be.

Jesus reminds them that they don’t know what they’re asking. Again and again, Jesus tells his disciples, and centuries of believers to come, that the last will be first. Again and again, Jesus stresses that we're here to serve. Following Jesus isn't about self-empowerment. We don't follow Jesus because we hope to become rich. Other religions, like Capitalism, might make that promise, but not Christianity. Christianity is NOT just a big self-improvement program.

Sure, we might become better people, but not by the route that the larger world offers us. Christ tells us that we fulfill our destiny by serving others. It goes against most everything else we've ever learned. We're not supposed to look out for number one? We're not supposed to be most concerned about ourselves and our families? No, we're not.

You might feel as much despair over the need to have a servant’s heart as you did by last Sunday’s Gospel about giving away all our wealth. But here again, we can change our trajectory by taking small steps. The ways to serve are as varied as humans themselves. Ask God to show you how to have a servant's heart. Be on the lookout for how God responds.

Who knows where this path may lead? But we know that Christ calls us to follow it. By imitating Christ, we can change ourselves, and in the process, we can change the world.

Sermon for Sunday, October 13, 2024

October 13, 2024

By Kristin Berkey-Abbott


Mark 10: 17-31


We might have thought that last week’s Gospel about divorce was a tough one, but this week’s teaching on wealth seems even harder. It’s such a hard teaching, in fact, that even the disciples protest at how impossible it is—and these are people who have already done what Jesus instructs the rich man to do.

The response of the disciples is not different from everyone else who hears this Gospel. Through the ages, theologians and teachers have twisted themselves into pretzel shapes to assure us that Jesus didn’t really mean what he said. As a child, I was told that it’s not really as impossible as it seems, that there was an ancient gate called the Eye of the Needle, and a camel could crawl through it. As far as I’ve been able to tell, there’s no archaeological evidence for that. Some Biblical interpreters have noted the similarity in the Greek word for camel and for a ship’s cable and wondered if Jesus was talking about threading the eye of a needle that way. Some have said that the teaching was for a specific man with a specific question.

In a way, that’s true. Jesus looks the man in the eye and takes his question seriously. But he then expands that teaching to be a lesson for all of us. In the ancient world, people equated wealth with virtue; people were wealthy because they had done something to deserve that wealth, and it wasn’t about working hard. It was the idea that God, or the gods, blessed people who deserved it. We’ve also seen the opposite idea at work in the time period of Jesus, that people are ill or cursed with a demon because of a moral failing, either theirs or their family’s.

Jesus comes at the issue of wealth differently, and we see this difference in two important ways. He tells the rich man to get rid of his wealth, but in a very specific way. He is to give what he has to the poor. In this way, Jesus operates like an Old Testament prophet, like Amos, or a contemporary critic of the economic systems that hold us all in their grip. Jesus knows that when one person has accumulated wealth, it so very often means that other people have less. If the rich man redistributes his wealth, it will alleviate a certain amount of suffering.

Many people have interpreted this Gospel as Jesus telling us to use our wealth wisely, to help those who have little. Many people have suggested that Jesus didn’t really mean to sell all that we have, but instead, to gain wealth so that we might redistribute it, a Robin Hood approach to economics.

But Jesus wants to release the man from his larger situation, not just to alleviate the suffering of not just the poor. Jesus tells the man to give away his wealth, an action that will release the man from his situation of being held captive by his wealth.

Jesus points to a deeper spiritual problem with wealth, and it’s a lesson he returns to, a lesson he gives much more frequently than any lesson about other moral issues that divide our communities, like marriage or divorce. Jesus points out the spiritual danger of wealth again and again. If we have wealth, we are in danger of relying on ourselves, not God. If we have wealth, we risk the pride of thinking that we are wealthy because we deserve to be wealthy and others do not. The more wealth we have, the harder it is to give it up, which may explain why so many of the early followers of Jesus were poor.

But then, Jesus seems to undercut this very message. He tells his followers that if they give up everything-- house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields—they will be rewarded, and not just with an entry ticket into eternal life, which is the question the rich man poses which starts Jesus on this teaching track. Jesus says if we give up wealth, we’ll be rewarded in this life too. Our wealth won’t be replaced, but we’ll get a hundred fold back. That’s quite a return on our investment. Maybe the rich man should have stuck around for the extended teaching. Maybe he wouldn’t have gone away grieving but he’d realize he had found the deal of the century.

And yet, if we take Jesus literally here, there’s a certain risk. After all, who wouldn’t take that bargain? Some of us rely on our stock portfolios and others rely on spiritual abundance, but most of us want some kind of assurance that we’ll be provided for, that we’re not just doing all of this for nothing.

It’s a good question, this deeper question, and some have seen the rich man as someone who has followed the rules and commandments but not done the deeper work of questioning the reason behind them. Or maybe he thinks he’s done all that is required. Maybe he’s thinking that Jesus will praise him and offer him a one way ticket to eternal life that he’s already earned. But we can’t be sure about the motivations for the question.

However, we can look to our own lives. We can think about the cost of discipleship. Like the rich man, we can ask the question about what else we might need to do.

As I’ve returned to this text again and again this week, this week of hurricane clean up, this week where the simple act of doing anything seemed to take 5 times longer, I’ve begun to wonder if Jesus is trying to tell us something about the way we look at doing. The rich man wants to know what he must do to have eternal life, and Jesus gives him a check list of things he’s already done. Jesus looks at him with love.

Jesus looks at all of us with the same love: those of us who want a check list of what we need to do, those of us who hope the check list is full of items that we’ve already done so that we can have the pleasure of checking them off the list. Jesus knows all the things that prevent humans from having a better life, a God-centered life instead of a life full of possessions that create ever more to do lists.

But Jesus also knows what humanity yearns for. Jesus knows our fiercest hungers. We may need to hear the tough answers over and over again. I think of that man who goes away grieving. We assume he’s grieving because he can’t give up his possessions. Maybe he’s grieving because he thought he was doing everything right, and now he’s got another task, a bigger task. Maybe, having done the grief work, he’s able to liquidate his assets, redistribute his wealth, and thus free, come back to follow Jesus.

So often Jesus leaves us with answers that are more parable and paradox than a straight path. But over and over, Jesus assures us that through God, anything is possible. Not just anything, but everything. Let us approach each day the way the Psalmist instructs, knowing that our days are limited, applying our hearts to wisdom. Let us rest assured that we can then approach the throne of grace with boldness, when our days on earth are done.

Partial Restoration

I wrote this post earlier this morning, but had no way to post it, since I still have no internet:

I sit here writing on this desk that was damaged by Hurricane Irma, almost exactly 2 weeks to the day and time we lost power in Hurricane Helene. What’s remarkable about that sentence is that we went through Hurricane Helene in the mountains of North Carolina.

We are just south of Asheville, so we have been spared the worst. We did go without electricity for two weeks, and we still can’t drink our water right out of the tap. But water does come out of the tap, and we can flush the toilets without a bucket. We still don’t have house internet restored, but the phone can work as a hot spot.

If I didn’t live so much of my life online, with classes that I teach and classes that I’m taking for seminary, this might have been an enjoyable time off. But I’ve needed to have an internet connection almost daily, so twice I’ve gone to a friend’s house in Columbia, SC to stay for 48 hours, and this week, my local church, Lutheran Church of the Nativity, opened up their fellowship hall from 10-2 to offer the community a place to charge devices, free wi-fi, and free water, both drinkable and not. It’s been a great service to members and the community.

As I reflect on our experience, I’m realizing how many parts of our lives have prepared us for these weeks that have been somewhat off the grid. We’ve kept some of our hurricane supplies and equipment, like the French press coffee pot. When we remodeled the kitchen, we chose a gas stove, thinking that if the power went off in an ice storm, we could still cook or heat water. Through the years, we’ve lived in various houses in various states of remodel and those experiences have given us skills in doing without modern conveniences.

I will be the first to admit that I did not take this storm seriously, and I won’t make that mistake again. It was my spouse who filled up our first round of water containers and captured rain water in every five gallon bucket he could find. We had both cars full of gas, but that was a fluke. I thought I’d be commuting, and I wanted to fill our cars up on Wednesday night, not Thursday when it would be raining. We had some cash on hand; we’d have had more if I hadn’t spent it at the farmer’s market a week earlier. It was a fluke that we had it at all.

Today I return to work at Spartanburg Methodist College. This past week, both the schools where I teach were closed due to different hurricanes, and today they will both be open.. Tomorrow we make the trip to Bristol, and then on Sunday, from Bristol I go to DC for the onground intensive week for two of my seminary classes. I hate that I will be missing my onground classes for a week so soon after this long hurricane break, but it can’t be helped. I had planned to spend this past week getting the students prepped for my week away, but now I’ll have them write about their hurricane experience.

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

The lessons for Sunday, October 13, 2024:

First Reading: Amos 5:6-7, 10-15

First Reading (Semi-cont.): Job 23:1-9, 16-17

Psalm: Psalm 90:12-17

Psalm (Semi-cont.): Psalm 22:1-15

Second Reading: Hebrews 4:12-16

Gospel: Mark 10:17-31

Today's Gospel is not one that you'll find in most stewardship campaigns. I've been part of church council discussions that revolved around whether or not it was reasonable to expect people to give away 10% of their income. And along comes Jesus with this message about selling everything and giving it to the poor, and then we'll be ready to follow Jesus.

We've spent centuries rationalizing our way around the demands of this text. We talk about how the needle's eye is really a gate in Jerusalem (something that scholars doubt), so that we can convince ourselves that one could be both rich and righteous, even if that might be rare. We return to our stewardship messages, reminding each other that Jesus calls us to be generous.

Many a believer and non-believer alike might ask, "You can't really believe that Jesus means that literally."

But what if Jesus was serious? One of the main themes of Mark is the cost of discipleship. Here is a very real cost.

So far, this century has taught us much about the danger of counting on our possessions for security. We've seen how quickly wealth can be liquidated--and for what? I remember getting an account statement after a particularly volatile quarter. As I considered the drop in value, I thought of how much happier I might be had I given that money to the poor instead of hoarding it for my future. Now it's vanished, gone, like steam. No one has benefited--except, perhaps, for the people who made a profit off my money before it vanished. And I'm fairly certain the poor didn't see the benefit of that.

Jesus returns to this message again and again: our attachment to money is spiritually dangerous, the biggest spiritual danger that most of us face. Comparatively speaking, he doesn't spend much time at all on other sins. He never talks directly about homosexuality, the issue that's splitting so many churches. But he returns again and again to the message that the rich must share with the poor.

Jesus calls us to radical generosity. We are to do more than just follow a set of laws, like the young man was so capable of doing. We are to jettison our stuff, so that we're more able to follow Christ. Jesus calls us to give away our wealth, so that our grasping hands can be open for the blessings that God wants to give us. We are to unclench our hands, release our money (and fear), and trust in God.

Most of us aren't very good at trusting in God. We'll trust the Wall Street investors who control our retirement accounts much more deeply than we'll trust God. But we can learn to trust God. What would happen if we increased our giving by 1% each year? What would happen if we took all the stuff we no longer use to people who could use it? What would happen if we adopted a meatless day of the week? What other types of activities could we do to decrease our reliance on our own wealth?

Like every other spiritual trait, we grow stronger as we practice. Unclench those greedy, grasping hands. Open your hands and your heart to the gifts that God wants to give you.

Sermon for Sunday, October 6, 2024

October 6, 2024

By Kristin Berkey-Abbott



Mark 10: 2-16

When I first looked at the Gospel text for today, my first reaction was, “Week after week of difficult teachings!” But then I looked more closely at the Gospel lesson, and I realized that Jesus isn’t advising us about our marriages. Jesus is giving us a powerful lesson about power and who is in control.

When the Pharisees ask their question, they aren’t concerned with the plight of those who are in bad marriages. They aren’t asking Jesus to weigh in on the question of what type of relationship can lead to human flourishing.

Look at how they frame the question. They ask about men divorcing their wives. Under Roman law, husbands could divorce wives and wives could divorce husbands. To make it clear that they aren’t asking questions about both sides of the marriage issue, Jesus asks them about the law of Moses, and they answer with great specificity, showing that they understand that the laws of Moses are ones that establish the power of males. Do they also understand that this power leads to the diminishment of females? I doubt it.

But Jesus understands. As always, Jesus understands who is where in the power structures of society, and as always, Jesus instructs all who will listen.

Jesus gives a very different answer about male and female relationships. He goes back to the very first teaching about adult human relationships, way back to the first couple, Adam and Eve in the book of Genesis. He gives an answer that presents males and females as much more equal than they will be in the laws of Moses, and in many subsequent laws throughout human history. He gives a picture of two equal people, leaving the family relationships that designated them as children who are unequal to parents, going into the world together as partners holding tight to each other.

Later, Jesus is interviewed in private, and he continues his line of thought, knowing that some marriages will end not in death but in divorce. I don’t think that Jesus is giving modern marriage advice, but ancient marriage advice, advice to people with a life expectancy of 40 years, give or take a decade. But even more realistically, Jesus isn’t giving instructions the way that so many interpreters have framed this text. Let us remember that Jesus is not a pro-marriage family guy, even in light of today’s reading, where he seems to be advocating marriage. This Jesus is still the same Jesus who seems to downplay marriage and family, where he seems to tell people to abandon their families to follow him.

Many scholars see the social justice side of Jesus here, the man who cared for the most outcast of society. Almost no one had fewer options than a divorced woman who lived during the time of Jesus. Then, and to a certain extent now, fewer things were more likely to plunge a woman into the bottom economic realm of society than divorce or widowhood. A woman with dependent children would fare even worse.

In today’s Gospel reading, we see the concerns of Jesus with the most downtrodden of society: women and children.

And yet Jesus seems to know that some relationships need to end. Our Triune God knows that reconciliation isn’t always possible. So Jesus seems to give advice in this situation. But again, we should be careful in assuming that Jesus is giving divorce instructions designed to last through the centuries. It seems more likely that he’s addressing listeners who persist in asking him questions in the hopes that he will say something different from what he’s already said.

Perhaps that’s why this Gospel then shifts to another group with little power: children. Jesus treats children with the same respect that he treats women. He advocates for the people who need compassion, here children, and he goes a step further and blesses them. They can’t advocate for themselves. So Jesus takes up their cause and makes sure that they are received and blessed.

Again and again, Jesus shows his followers how to treat people. Judging by their actions, it’s a lesson that needs repeating. I often think about Jesus who must be saying to himself: “There is so little time, and you want to bother me with questions about marriage law?” Again and again, Jesus points us away from the rigid structure of the law. Again and again, Jesus tells us of God’s vision of grace and mercy.

Let’s be clear about the Pharisees. Their motivation in this line of questioning is not as evil as we like to depict. The leaders of Jesus’ day think that the way to salvation is by following the law to the letter. Jesus reminds us that this path doesn’t lead to salvation at all but to strangulation. Again and again, Jesus declares that a new world is at hand, that the kingdom of God is inbreaking, right here and right now.

Of course, the kingdom of God is also not yet, not finished, which is why we have divorce laws after all. But Jesus promises that a better life in underway, and if we have eyes to see and ears to hear, we’ll see it. If we’re brave, we can go ahead and live it.

I’m finishing this sermon almost one week since the power went off at my house in Arden, North Carolina. I have spent the last week being reminded of how humans are created to care for each other. We have gathered at each other’s houses to have a hot meal once a day. Those of us who are more mobile have taken thermoses of coffee to the neighbors who are not. Those of us who have had more well stocked emergency supplies have shared them with those who did not get to the store ahead of the storm. And resources have flowed in from people outside the area who are desperate to help in some way.

I do feel a bit of sorrow that it takes a disaster to prompt us to behave in ways that are more loving to each other. It takes a disaster to bump stories of hate from the headlines.

I imagine God feeling much the same way. We've got a wonderful world here, and we often forget how fabulous it is. We get so hung up on all the ways we think the world has gone wrong that we forget what is right. We spend time creating laws to try to control behavior, when we might do better to simply accept people for who they are, which is a major step towards loving them. We want to see the world in strict colors: black, white, no gray. We forget that the world is variegated.

Again and again, Jesus reminds us that if we can leave the land of Law behind and enter the world of Love, we'll see a world washed in color, all of it good. We'll know what God knew, way back in Genesis, when God declared that all of Creation is good, very good.

Hurricane Helene Breaking Points

 One week ago, I would be sitting in the dark.  I would have gotten up early, as I always do, and when I made the coffee, I thought, let me make this now, before the power goes out.  But I didn't expect the power to go out so early.  I didn't think it would still be out a week later, at least not back a week ago when the lights first went out.

I had just made this Facebook post at 3:27 a.m., when I got up to check on the progress of the storm:  "Why I could never be a forecaster for the National Hurricane Center. I would say something like, "Hurricane Helene is in Flannery O'Connor country now. Beware of odd men in black cars, Helene. If a Bible salesman tries to seduce you, just keep going. You're in strange territory now, but you'll emerge able to tell stories of grace and salvation in new and terrifying ways."

The power went out, and I sat there for a few minutes.  I went to get a flashlight, and then I assembled our other battery run lights, which are mostly strings of fairy lights.  Happily, we have lots and lots of AA batteries to keep them running:

I've had a few breaking points along the way.  It's surreal to be experiencing a hurricane so far inland.  But we've done this before, and we know what to do and how to endure.  I felt a brief moment of panic the first time that water didn't come out of the tap.  But I reminded myself that other communities aren't impacted, and I can get to them to buy what I need.

My latest gulp/grief moment came last night when I looked up ways to get to Bristol, Tennessee, where I usually preach and preside on Sundays.  I saw a post that said the most direct way, across I 26, would be closed until March of 2025.  I tried to find information on alternate routes.

Not for the first time, I wish I had a paper map.  But even a paper map won't tell me which roads are washed away.  I can't find a website that tells me either--and yes, I've gone to the obvious ones, and they tell me the information might not be accurate because roads may have been washed away.

I will not be making the trip this Sunday.  We are still being asked to stay off those roads, which may or may not be there, so that emergency crews and restoration teams can get to where they are needed.  I will try making the trip next week-end, and then I'll see what the future brings.

Hurricane Helene Aftermath: The Overview

I don't have time to write a long post today.  I'm at a friend's house who has power, water, and internet, which I don't have at my house.  I need to make the most of this time with those things to catch up on seminary work, get some grading done for my online classes, and then I need to do some shopping and banking before heading up the mountain on Friday.

Last Friday, we lost electric at 4:30 a.m.,  as I was writing a blog post about how I didn't expect to suffer many effects from Hurricane Helene beyond some additional rain.  I didn't worry too much until a few hours later when trees started to fall.

Hurricane Helene's Position when the Power Went Out

We are fortunate.  No trees fell on our property or our house, like the 3 that fell on a neighbor's house:

We have spent the last week trying to help our less fortunate neighbors.  

We haven't had much internet access and spotty cell phone service, so it's been good to have a purpose.

Yesterday I headed to a friend's house in Columbia.  I needed to get to a place that had power and enough cell phone service that I could use my phone as a hotspot.  Happily, last night her internet was restored.  Today I plan to write and grade and try to regroup.

Spartanburg Methodist College still doesn't have power, so I don't know if classes will resume on Monday as previously planned.  My friend has offered to have me come back next week, and I may take her up on it if SMC doesn't have power.  I will need to do some additional class work, both for my seminary classes and the online classes that I teach.

I am still stunned by this storm.  I still find it surreal that I moved hundreds of miles inland and still found myself in this situation, and I'm still surprised, as I always am, that a tropical storm strength event can do this amount of damage.  I am hopeful that this will be a once a century storm, and I won't have to see this kind of storm in the mountains again.  But I am also suffering under no delusions that past planetary performance can predict future performance.

But let me once again stress that overall, I am in good spirits.  I know that I am lucky:  I have friends, family, support, a great neighborhood, resources of all kinds.