Cave of Fear

Mark 9:30-37

 

Once again we hear a gospel lesson that contains elements of fear. Jesus tells his disciples what the Messiah will face: betrayal and death, the disciples are seized with fear and were afraid to ask Jesus anything.

 

There was once a town where the thing everyone feared the most was getting lost at night in the “Cave of Fear”. No one had ever returned from there, and whenever anyone got lost and ended up there, the last that was heard was a great cry of terror, followed by a few enormous guffaws. The townsfolk lived in terror that one day the monster would leave the cave. So they regularly left gifts and food at the mouth of the cave, and these always soon disappeared.

 

One day, a young man came to town, and, as he heard about the situation with the cave, he thought that it was unfair. So he decided to enter the cave and confront the monster. The young man asked for some help, but everyone was so afraid that not a single person approached the mouth of the cave with him. He went inside, finding his way with a torch, and calling out to the monster, wanting to talk with it and discuss the situation. At first, the monster had a good long laugh, and the young man followed the sound of the monster's voice. But then the monster went quiet, and the young man had to carry on, not knowing in which direction to go.

 

Finally he arrived at a huge cavern. At the bottom of the cavern he thought he could make out the figure of the monster, and as he approached it, he felt that something hit him hard on his back. This pushed him forward towards a hole in the rock. He couldn't avoid it, and fell through. Believing that he was about to die, he let out one last cry. Then he heard the great guffaws.

 

-“Darn it, I think the monster has swallowed me,” he said, while falling.

 

However, as he fell, he heard music, and voices. They got clearer, and when he made a soft landing at the bottom, he heard a group of people shout:  -“Surprise!!”

 

 

Hardly believing it, he found himself right in the middle of a big party. The partygoers were all those people who had never returned to the town. They explained to him that this place had been the idea of an old mayor of the town. That mayor had tried to accomplish great things, but was always held back by the fears of the people around him. So the mayor invented the story of the monster to demonstrate to people how such an attitude was so limiting. So the young man stayed there, enjoying the party and the company of all those who had dared to approach the cave.

And what about the town? In the town they still believe that to enter the Cave of Fear is the worst of all punishments... (freestories.com/caveoffear).

 

The two New Testament readings for today (James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a and Mark 9:30-37) point to the relationship between faith and fear. I know you’ve heard me preach on the subject of faith and fear, after all, it’s a topic that seems perpetually relevant as fear is something we are surrounded by through images, the daily news – especially political news! – as well as our own deep seated fears stemming from who-knows-what. We all have fears – and Jesus knows this and he certainly knew this about his disciples. Notice that the disciples do not ask Jesus any questions in response to his prediction of his impending crucifixion because they are afraid. And the next thing you know they’re talking about securing their place in the coming kingdom. Fear does that. It both paralyzes us and drives us to look out only for ourselves.

 

Maybe you have had the same experience as me. Over the years I’ve made some pretty bad decisions and actions because of my reaction to fear. Fear has a way of leading us to identify both threats and opportunities wrongly, sometimes causing irrational behavior, and even narrowing our vision so it’s difficult to see possibilities. I remember a priest preaching on fear many years ago who explained the difference between reacting and responding. He said, ‘we react to fear; but we respond in love’. When we are stressed or worried or even agitated over something, we can react in fear, or respond in love. This is why it’s hard to be wise, prudent, or compassionate when we are afraid. Just look again to the present refugee crisis: the imprisoning and even dehumanizing of refugees trying to make their way across Europe is not a response in love, rather, a reaction in fear. (ISIS itself is gripped by fear. They are obsessed with absolute power because of their fear of having no power. For them, power can not be shared.)

 

You see, because Jesus told his disciples that the Son of Man would be betrayed and killed, fear seized them. They said nothing, Mark tells us: “they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him.” They were afraid to even ask! All of us have fears. Sometimes we don’t even realize that we are afraid. Perhaps in those moments, we become like the disciples and say or do nothing.

 

 

I’m going to take an opportunity now to share with you my own fear. Not just because I think it might make for a good sermon (although I hope it does!), but because as I was studying these readings, I came across a commentary that rang all too true about some fears that I have within the scope of my own ministry as your rector.

 

Taking on the pastoral leadership of any congregation is no small task. Sometimes as leaders we wonder why things at church aren’t going the way we think they should. This past week I had a talk with two staff members who have improved their ministries steadily since they began here at St. Christopher’s: those staff members are Resale Shop manager Aprille Williams and our Day School director, Monica Cadavid. I brought my questions and fears to them to see how we might respond to instances like why a particular Sunday such as Invitation Sunday brought such a low turnout when the opposite was expected. I asked what I can do as a leader to inspire our congregation to be more engaged and to follow Jesus a bit more closely. I asked questions around how we and our parish members might increasingly become better stewards of the gifts God has freely given. I asked them how we might be more hospitable to those seeking a relationship with Jesus through this faith community. My fear was that there must be something I’m doing or not doing.

 

Immediately after speaking with Aprille and Monica, I read a post from David Lose, President of Lutheran Theological Seminary in Philadelphia and biblical scholar, who wrote on this exact topic for congregational leaders. The similarity between my discussion and this posting was uncanny. Lose writes to pastors:

 

“What fears pursue you during the day and haunt you at night? What worries weigh you down so that it’s difficult to move forward in faith? Is it the fear your congregation will shrink or die? Fear that you will not make budget? Concern that you don’t know why what you’re doing doesn’t seem to work like it used to? Or anxiety about what will come next? Perhaps it’s simple anxiousness about whether there will be conflict at the next meeting of your church vestry.

 

These fears have a way of sneaking into our very being and robbing us of the abundant life Jesus came to announce and to share.

 

Only after naming our own fears, I think, is it fair to ask our people what they may fear. (And, to be sure, they may overlap.) Fear about being alone, fear about losing a loved one or a relationship ending, anxieties about health or employment, concern for the future of one’s children or grandchildren, dread about the return of mental or physical illness, apprehension for the environment and the world we will leave behind? All these and more strip life of pleasure and joy and make it very difficult to be wise and faithful stewards of the present moment and resources with which God has entrusted us.

 

Jesus’ response to our fears and anxieties is an invitation not to faith intellectually – as if believing in God somehow prohibits fear – but rather to faith as movement, faith as taking a step forward (even a little step) in spite of doubt and fear, faith as doing even the smallest thing in the hope and trust of God’s promises (davidlose.net).

 

All of us in one way or another have a Cave of Fear that we dread and try to avoid. It is only by entering that Cave, do we end up controlling our fears rather than our fears controlling us. I believe this theology is wrapped up in our Baptismal theology and proclamation. Taking a step in faith, even a small one, in the hope and trust of God’s promises is what we just proclaimed in the baptismal liturgy: “Do you put your whole trust in [Jesus’] grace and love?”

 

Today, we renew our faith and our trust in God through the salvation power of Jesus. As I always share with the family of those being baptized, baptism is not a get-out-of-hell-free card, but rather the initiation into the life of grace; the life of grace promised by God through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is not a call into a life of fear, but rather the entrance into a life of faith, trust, and promise.

 

Talking about my fears with two trusted people on my staff helped to remind me that we are about the work of God in this place. We are not about our own work, but God’s work. Leading an Episcopal Day School is God’s work. Serving and managing a Resale Shop that benefits people beyond our walls is God’s work. Serving and leading a congregation to come to the knowledge and love of Jesus Christ is certainly God’s work – not my work or your work or anyone else’s work, but God’s work. We are simply and gracefully called into this work by our baptism.

 

Let us pray:

Almighty God, we thank you that by the death and resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ you have overcome sin and brought us to yourself, and that by the sealing of your Holy Spirit you have bound us to your service. Renew in us, your servants, the covenant you made with us at our Baptism. Send us forth in the power of that Spirit to perform the service you set before us; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Easter Change

Easter is a natural time for change. I know we don’t usually like change, especially in our faith communities. We like stability and predictability. Although sometimes we do like and appreciate change. Take politics for instance. Have you noticed how many politicians run on the notion and promise of “change”? Maybe when we are open to change, it may be because we are expecting the change to be something like the way we think things use to be, or the way we think things ought to be.
 

Why do I begin on the subject of change? Well, because when we speak of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, we are professing a faith and a reality that changed everything. It changed how we relate to God and how God relates to us. Jesus’ Resurrection was a victory over oppressive political and religious power structures. Jesus’ Resurrection was such an act of love that it’s as if God fell in love with us all over again. That’s what I love about Easter. In God’s eyes, we get to start over again with a clean slate.
 

So how do we, the Church, respond to this love and newness of life? Well, first, with gratitude. Unbridled gratitude. But then this gratitude and response to God’s love for us must – must, extend from us and be passed on to others.
 

Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, calls for a “seismic shift” in the way Anglicans must carry out the work of extending God’s love to others (this is evangelism, by the way). As Anglicans and Episcopalians, we love our church. We love our history and we love our traditions. The Episcopal Church, as I have always considered it, is the “come and see” church (“Can anything good come out of Nazareth? Come and see.” John 1:46). When someone asks, “what is the Episcopal Church” or “what does your church believe”, the best answer, in my opinion, is “come and see”. Come to an Episcopal Church and hear the prayers and experience the rhythm of the liturgy and you will see what we believe in, what we stand for.
 

 

But before we begin to encourage one another to invite others to “come and see”, we have some work to do as God’s people. Archbishop Welby said a couple of things about the Church: “First”, he said, “the church exists to worship God in Jesus Christ. Second, the Church exists to make new disciples of Jesus Christ. Everything else is decoration. Some of it may be very necessary, useful, or wonderful decoration – but it’s decoration.”
 

We as Christians have our work cut out for us because the world needs so much to hear that there is a God that, through the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, has fallen in love with them. We must let others know this very simple, yet profound and most important message. Welby acknowledges, “I am under no illusion as to the seismic shift that needs to take place in order for this to happen. But a seismic shift is what we need. For this country will not know of the revolutionary love of Christ by church structures or clergy, but by the witness of every single Christian.”
 

I believe his words that it will take a “seismic shift” in our Anglican churches to be a church of invitation and sharers of the life-changing message of Jesus Christ. It’s because as Anglicans and Episcopalians we’ve just never really been good at this sort of thing. But we must begin a change, or a transformation from this behavior. We love our church and its people. So why not share this Good News that the Episcopal Church proclaims in Jesus?
 

My immediate plan is to bring a team of vestry and lay leaders to a 2-day Summit at Camp Allen that will inspire us to engage in the work of Invitation and Welcome. Look around in your church on any given Sunday morning and notice the number of people present. The number seems to be declining. Of course, we will never be a mega-church or a Lakewood, and few if any of us would ever strive to be that. Yet, we all want our church to reach more people. Not for the sake of just having them here, but that we will play a vital and exciting role in bringing others to the knowledge and love of Jesus Christ.
 

Another Archbishop from A.D. 407, John Chrysostom said, “To become a disciple of Christ is to obey his law of love; and obedience to the law brings joy beyond measure and description. Love means to want the best for others, sharing with them the joy of love. So the Christian feels compelled to speak to others about the law of love, and the joy of obeying this law.”
 

We are not all going to become evangelists overnight, but we can begin to address the changes we need to make corporately and individually to engage in this work for the Church of Jesus Christ that we are called to steward.
 

So, I have an easy task for you: Invite someone to church for Easter Day. (I have actually done this myself already. I invited a neighbor.) Bring someone in time to have breakfast here on Easter morning, served from 9 to 10. And most importantly, give your guest the “come and see” treatment as we joyfully worship God in gratitude and awe of Jesus’ Resurrection.
 

I conclude with Welby’s final sentences, “Jesus involves us in His work of calling people to follow him. This is the work of evangelism. However weakly, however hesitantly, He calls us to extend our hands and our hearts, to use our words and lives, to echo His call to every person to follow Him. For it is the best decision anyone can ever make is to be a follower of Jesus Christ.”
 

Have a blessed Holy Season of Lent and a joyous Eastertide.

Crumbs and Grace

"Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs." 

 

 

There are a lot of profound sayings or responses in scripture and for me, this response is at the top of the list.

 

 

The response comes from Jesus' initial reaction to a Syrophoenician woman whose daughter lies ill from a demonic possession. She begs Jesus to heal her daughter and Jesus - one might say callously - responds to her request by saying "Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children's; food and throw it to the dogs." Immediately we want to rescue Jesus from this cold response, by dismissing it as a test or some sort of translation miscue that softens the statement. I say no, Jesus said what he said and meant it. We should hold him to it. What might be prudent on our part is to go a bit deeper. It's always a good idea for the scripture-reading Christian to go a bit deeper!
 

A traditional answer to the question of why Jesus answers her so is: He is not actually refusing her but rather testing her. That is, the rebuff, the insult, the rejection – these aren’t real at all but rather the means by which to test her faith, to see if she really, really believes in him. And, of course, she passes.
 

The trouble with this interpretation is that 1) there is no mention of testing in this story, and 2)I think it creates a rather cold-hearted picture of a God who taunts and tests us in our deepest moments of need. If not this interpretation, then what? Why on earth, that is, would Jesus react to someone in need in such a harsh manner?
 

As callous as his response was to her - I think Jesus was elevating this woman's status. Doesn't this sound more like the Jesus we know? Doesn't the thought of Jesus finding an outsider, an outcast, someone who is seen by his religious culture as a lesser human, then elevating that person's identity and humanity to be on par with his? I think it does.
 

Jesus invites this woman - this "woman; a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin" - into a rabbinic dialogue. Rabbi's argued. It's how they discussed the meaning and interpretation of scripture and of God's deeds of power. Jesus invites her. If he didn't care for her at all, he would have blown her off completely, but he doesn't do this. Rather, he invites her into a dialogue.
 

At first glance, Jesus is being cold and callous, indeed, illustrating the prevailing mindset that Jewish men would have toward such an outsider, outcast, and lesser human. He in effect tells her no. Because what he has to offer is for the House of Israel alone, God's chosen, those who will hear his teachings and his voice that Israel will be restored to God. Why would he waste his time on someone who doesn't share this faith? What is this woman really after? Is she really seeking out the Son of God, the Anointed One, to heal her daughter, or is she just desperate and looking for a quick fix? I don't know if Jesus was thinking this way, but obviously there was hesitation in Jesus' willingness to help this woman.
 

One of my favorite biblical commentators, David Lose shares that, "Perhaps, just perhaps, Jesus had not yet realized the full extent of God’s mission or the radical nature of the kingdom he proclaimed.
 

We may find this a somewhat uncomfortable conclusion to reach. We want to think of Jesus as full-bodied, perfect, and immutable from birth, right? But if we are to take Mark’s narrative seriously, never mind the incarnational and creedal affirmation that Jesus is fully human as well as fully divine, then perhaps we should not be surprised to see a development in Jesus’ own recognition of God’s vision for the world. After all, the profoundly expansive notion of a kingdom that included everyone – no exceptions! – was completely and totally novel. (And still is!)
 

If so – if we can imagine that this woman didn’t simply pass a clever test but instead, and as Jesus himself says, demonstrated profound faith – then we might acknowledge that this brave mother actually taught the Teacher something and, therefore, might have some things to teach us as well.
 

"Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs." Such a profound statement, I think, should teach us all something. It should teach us something about ourselves and our own faith, it should teach us something about the stranger and those in need, and it should certainly teach us something about God's grace and the great need all of us have for just a morsel of it.
 

We are surrounded by those who would beg for such grace and indeed as we come together in this beautiful, air conditioned church, seeking comfort in our lives, there are thousands out there right now, surely pleading to God and to whomever will listen, for just a little grace; just a little relief. "Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs."
 

The present Syrian refugee crisis is beyond anything we have witnessed since WWII. Images of fleeing families with no homes to return to; refugee camps filled with career venturing Syrian and other middle-eastern workers and professionals, driven out from violence and the fear of death to find new homes; to resettle. The images of fear-stricken families, hungry children, and yes, even the most heart-wrenching of all, the Turkish policeman carrying the lifeless body of a child washed up on the shore.
 

We know that the cries of the parents and families are filled with exasperation for just a crumb of God's goodness, a morsel of God's grace. The good news is that churches in our diocese are involved and helping with this crisis and that you will hear of ways that you can help as well.
 

Yes, even across an ocean, we are able to do something, and we should. In the meantime we pray. Right now, prayer is the most powerful weapon we have. May our prayers open our hearts and our lives to all those, who are in despair, like this brave outsider and mother that we about in Mark’s gospel.
 

"Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs."
 

If you've never read the book "The Ragamuffin Gospel" by Brennan Manning, I highly recommend it. The Ragamuffin Gospel is filled with stories of God's grace. Brennan recounts an old story about Fiorello LaGuardia, who was New York City mayor during the worst years of the Great Depression.
 

 

One night in January of 1935, the mayor turned up at a night court in the poorest ward of the city. LaGuardia dismissed the judge for the evening and took over the bench himself. Within a few minutes, a tattered old woman was brought before him, charged with stealing a loaf of bread. She told LaGuardia that her daughter's husband had deserted her, her daughter was sick, and her two grandchildren were starving. But the shopkeeper, from whom the bread was stolen, refused to drop the charges. "It's a bad neighborhood, your Honor, " the man told the mayor. "She's got to be punished to teach other people around here a lesson."
 

 

LaGuardia sighed. He turned to the woman and said "I've got to punish you. the law makes no exceptions - ten dollars or ten days in jail." But even as he pronounced sentence, the mayor was already reaching into his pocket. He extracted a bill and tossed it into his famous sombrero saying, "Here is the ten dollar fine which I now remit; and furthermore I am going to fine everyone in this courtroom fifty cents for living in a town where a person has to steal bread so that her grandchildren can eat. Mr. Bailiff, collect the fines and give them to the defendant."
 

 

So the following day the New York City newspapers reported that $47.50 was turned over to a bewildered old lady who had stolen a loaf of bread to feed her staving grandchildren, fifty cents of that amount being contributed be the red-faced grocery store owner, while some seventy petty criminals, people with traffic violations, and NYC policemen, each of whom had just paid fifty cents for the privilege of doing so, gave the mayor a standing ovation.
 

 

What an extraordinary moment of grace for anyone present in that courtroom! The grace of God operates at a profound level in the life of a loving person. Oh that we would recognize God's grace when it comes to us (Manning 91, 92)!
 

 

"Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs." Just a little of what Jesus offers, changes lives.
 

I repeat this statement that the Syrophoenician woman responded with to Jesus, because it is a statement of victory. As I said, Jesus may have seen an outsider in his midst, but he invited her into a conversation, literally an argument as rabbis commonly bantered, and she won the argument! This non-Jewish, non-male nobody, wins the argument with the great Teacher and Master and Jesus has no problem with it. Immediately her daughter is healed.
 

Jesus invites the least likely of all people into relationship with him and restores all people to God by his grace and favor. And we are called as well to invite the least likely of all people into this fellowship of believers. It is only when we open up our selves, both as individuals and as a congregation, to the other, are we the viable, healthy, robust people of God that Jesus calls us to be.
 

Elsewhere in Mark’s Gospel, Jesus says that only those who give away their lives will find it. I think that’s true both in our individual and congregational experience. And I think Jesus first learned just how true that is from this fiercely loving mother.
 

May we too recognize, celebrate, and give thanks for the extraordinary grace that God offers to us through Jesus…and the least likely through whom the Spirit chooses!