Something more profound. October 23. 2022. The Rev. Kathleen M. Sturges

 

Luke 18:9-14

“I am the most giving person I know.” Now those aren’t my words, but someone I knew years ago. Let’s call her Susan. And when she said this about herself, “I am the most giving person I know,” I was shocked because you don’t usually hear someone trumpeting about themselves so openly. Susan said this in front of a small group at her retirement party. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a well-attended party - probably because Susan was hard to be around. True, she did give a lot of herself. She was always organizing, always serving, always doing things for others, however, in the midst of all her good works she was also always letting people know about it. It was rather sad because, my guess is, that her need to serve others and be recognized for it came from a deep place of pain and insecurity. She seemed desperate to justify herself.

Like the Pharisee in the story that Jesus tells in the gospel of Luke where two men go to the temple to pray. The first is a Pharisee, a truly religious person who does so many things right. but in the guise of a heartfelt thank you to God, he offers a personal progress report of his own awesomeness. “God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers.” Then he continues to humble brag about his pious lifestyle, how he regularly fast and generously gives. I think it’s safe to say that he ends up leaving the temple feeling exactly the same way he felt when he walked in, just fine. No growth, no healing, no change.

The second man who goes to the temple to pray is a tax collector, a Jew who works with the occupying Roman Empire. He is a traitor to his own people. And upon arriving at the temple we are told that he stands far off, keeps his head down, beats his chest, and prays just one line, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” Darn right he's a sinner! No truer words have been spoken. But it turns out that those true words reveal the tax collector’s willingness to lay aside any attempt of self justification, of explaining why he does what he does, of propping up his own ego - he let’s go of all of that which opens up his heart to receive mercy and justification from God.

It’s not lost on me the irony that in response to the story of these two men I am tempted to pray something along the lines of, “God, I thank you that I am nothing like the obnoxious Pharisee. I thank you that I'm at a point in my faith journey where I much more like the tax collector in the sense of being self-aware, and teachable, and, of course, oh so humble...." Ah, how easy it is to slide down the slippery slope of self justification.

Because, you know, we do it all the time. Sometimes it’s obvious, like in Susan’s case, other times we can be a bit more subtle. Nonetheless, we'll invoke almost anything - whether it’s out loud to others or silently in our heads - in order to justify ourselves. Where we went to school or our secure financial status or the success of our kids or our wonderful job are just a few of a host of ways we seek to prove that we are ok. And, if we let it, it can be never ending because the world is relentless in demanding proofs and justifications of our worthiness. But it doesn't work. And, thank God, it isn't even necessary. For in the words of the famous hymn, God accepts me "just as I am." God accepts you, just as you are.

Now to live without self-justifications can make me feel vulnerable and exposed. What are people going to think of us if we don’t put it out there that we are worthy? But when you think about it, living without self-justifications is absolutely liberating. As we really get the message - not just in our heads, but in our hearts and souls - that we are truly accepted and loved by God, then we never, for any reason, need to prove ourselves again.

To get to that place, Jesus says that we need only seven words — those mumbled by the tax collector as he stood at a distance and stared at the ground: "God, have mercy on me, a sinner." Honestly, though, I don’t know many people who like the word, “sinner.” It’s so wrapped up in shame, self-punishment, and creepy sermons that involve hellfire and brimstone. Too often, “sinner” is a word that frightens us away from God rather than drawing us closer. Yet Jesus doesn’t shy away from using that word. On the contrary, he insists on it. He insists that we continually acknowledge and name our core sinfulness because, as the tax collector demonstrates, there is healing power in such a confession. It is healing because it tells the truth - the truth that as sinners each one of us is a beautiful mess. Each one of us is made in God’s divine image AND, at the same time, riddled with human brokenness. When we are willing to use the word “sinner” in our prayer life leads us to something more profound and more clarifying than, “I’ve made mistakes,” or “I’ve got issues.” To use the word sinner is to reject the self justifying posture of drawing lines between us and them, like the Pharisee, and instead embrace the fact that all of us are utterly lost but for the amazing grace of God.

It’s worth noting that Jesus doesn’t end his story with something like, “And the tax collector went forth and sinned no more.” Instead, we have no idea what the tax collector does once he leaves the temple justified. Does he give up his dishonest profession? Does he give back the money he has unfairly taken from his neighbors? Does he continue with business as usual while coming back over and over again to the temple praying the same prayer? In other words, we can’t say if he does anything to deserve God’s generous mercy towards him. But that’s the point. The point of all this is that lavish and relentless mercy of God is always flowing in our direction. It cannot be earned with haughty justifications because, in fact, those justifications actually get in the way and block God’s mercy from reaching us. That only way that we can receive the gift of grace is with the humble recognition that we are always in need of God. A God who can be depended upon to welcome sinners - and even some self-righteous saints. For as we open up our hearts, our minds, our souls to God’s mercy and justification we will be changed. We will be healed. We will grow and thrive.

God, be merciful to me, a sinner!

 

With the end in mind. October 16, 2022. The Rev. David M. Stoddart

Luke 18:1-8

The late Nobel laureate and holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel once recounted an incident that happened when he was 15 years old and a prisoner at Auschwitz. One day a group of his fellow prisoners who were also Jewish scholars put God on trial, accusing him of being indifferent to the suffering of his people and failing to save them. After much discussion, they reached a unanimous verdict: chayav, guilty. After pronouncing it, Wiesel said, there was a minute or so of silence – and then they all said evening prayers together. What a striking, even shocking juxtaposition: God doesn’t care . . . Let us pray.

 Consider with me for a moment: why do we pray? Maybe we just go to church on Sundays and say grace before meals because it’s a habit, something we think we are supposed to do. Or maybe we pray every day that God will bless the people we love. Maybe we ask God for particular things, like getting a new job or being healed of some disease. Maybe we just pray when we feel desperate and don’t know what else to do. But if we have prayed at all, then we will probably be able to sympathize with those Jewish scholars putting God on trial. We are not, thankfully, in a concentration camp — hopefully none of us here has ever experienced something so horrific — but many of us here have no doubt prayed for things that we did not get: healings that did not take place, blessings that never materialized. And perhaps we also felt that God was indifferent to our prayers, or at least nonresponsive. S0 we might well ask ourselves: why do we pray?

 Jesus tackles that question in the Gospel today, but I don’t think his message is as simple and straightforward as it might at first appear. He tells this parable about a widow who relentlessly hounds an indifferent judge until he finally gives in and grants her request. If a sinful judge like that will respond to such pleas, Jesus says, how much more will a good and loving God respond to us: And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. The problem is that we know God does not always respond quickly to us. In many cases, God never seems to respond at all. And Jesus knows this. He tells this parable while the Roman Empire is oppressing the Jewish people in an occupation that has already lasted decades and will go on for many years to come, even though they are praying for deliverance. Jesus knows that when the Israelites called out from their captivity in Egypt, they remained slaves for some four hundred years. In John’s Gospel, he encounters a man who has been ill for 38 years. Will he delay long in helping them? Well, yeah, he will. People have faced long delays in the past; they continue to experience long delays in the present.

 And since Jesus clearly knows this, the problem must be with our interpretation. A simplistic, transactional understanding of prayer – “tell God what you want, and God will give it to you fast” – just won’t suffice, even if we add the caveat, “you gotta tell God a lot.” It just doesn’t work that way. I think the only way we can understand this teaching, and the way I think Jesus meant us to understand it, with the end in mind, the final consummation of all things. It’s only then that God’s justice will be fully established, only then that God’s love will fully prevail. And while that may seem a long ways off to us, in the light of eternity it will come quickly. We know Jesus is thinking along these lines because he says:  And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth? He’s referring to his coming again at the end of time. Will people persevere in prayer until that time, even when they receive no immediate reply? Will you and I persevere?

 We might say, “What’s the point? Why pray when we don’t get instant gratification?” But prayer is not about instant gratification. Prayer is not transactional at all. A few moments ago I asked, why do we pray? But that was a trick question: Jesus actually tells us why at the very beginning of the passage: Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. People, we pray so that we don’t lose heart. What matters in prayer is not the outcome: what matters is the connection. When we pray, we stay connected to God’s presence and grounded in God’s love. That is the beginning and end of all true prayer, and the source of tremendous strength and endless hope.

 But here’s the amazing thing about God’s economy of salvation. If we adopt a tit-for-tat idea of prayer – God, I’ll say these words if you’ll give me what I want – our prayer will probably not be productive at all. But when we love God, love others, and love ourselves in prayer and through prayer, then the Spirit moves and our prayer often does produce visible results. When our focus is on loving and not losing heart, then God’s power is unleashed and good things happen, things that lead to greater justice, greater healing, greater peace. We can’t control how that happens, nor should we try: we don’t have the wisdom for that. But consciously staying connected to God’s presence and staying grounded in God’s love changes the world and gives us all we need until God’s kingdom comes in all its fullness.

 Let me end with a story. Years ago, when I was serving a parish in Rhode Island, one of my parishioners had liver cancer. The prognosis was bad from the beginning. Praying for the cancer to go away did not work: the cancer continued to spread. Feeling powerless, all I could do was to pray for God’s love to enfold him and all who were close to him. One day, towards the end, I visited him and prayed with him. But right as I was about to leave, he did something he had never done before. He took my hands and said, “Now I want to pray.” And he thanked God for his wife and his children, for his church and for me, and told God how much he loved God and all of these people. It was a holy moment. He died not long afterwards. Did our prayer work? He lost his battle with cancer, but he did not lose heart. Nor did I. I know that I will see him fully alive and healed in the world to come, along with everyone else I’ve ever cared for. And until then, I keep on praying, with or without visible results. I have experienced the reality of God’s love – and that is reason enough to pray and never to lose heart.

Pause to recognize. October 9, 2022. The Rev. Kathleen M. Sturges

 

Luke 17:11-19

Ten lepers cry out to Jesus to have mercy on them and Jesus heals all ten. But only one returns to give thanks. Hopefully it's a familiar story to many. It certainly is to me. And yet I'm struck at how different it sits with me in the year 2022 versus three years ago when we last read it in church together - and I last preached on it. Because back in 2019 what caught my attention and what I ended up talking about was gratitude. How it does us well on so many levels to regularly practice being thankful to God. And that’s still true. But the last three years of life has added several layers to experiencing this story. Because we all now know firsthand what it's like to be afraid of an unknown illness. Some kind of virus that we aren't exactly sure how it is transmitted. We now know what it's like to look at other people, strangers and friends alike, and wonder if they are dangerous in some unforeseen way - that they might infect us or those we love or even be carrying something that could impact an entire community. And because we know all that, we also know what it’s like to live in isolation. The toll it takes on our lives and wellbeing. Life especially during the worst of Covid-19 was hard on everyone.

 It was in May of this year when I tested positive for Covid. Thankfully my symptoms were very mild, but it meant that for ten days I completely isolated myself from others. Now for some that may sound like a vacation, but for me, an extrovert, it was torture. And during those long ten days I thought about lepers of Jesus’ time. Forced by law to live away from their community and to call out, “Unclean! Unclean!” to anyone who came near - not just for ten days, but sometimes for their entire lives. Their loneliness, their isolation, the flatness of their lives must have been excruciating. Likely worse than anything that actually ailed them because back then leprosy was a catch-all term for a host of skin issues -  psoriasis, eczema, athlete's foot, or any other minor skin disease, all the way up to and including actual leprosy. So when we hear that there were ten lepers, we don’t really know what they actually had or how contagious they really were - and neither did the people of their time. But because of that unknowing and the fear around it, what we do know is that all who were deemed leprous were cast out of their homes and considered unclean.

 Now the priests were the keepers of cleanliness in all realms of Jewish life which included but was not limited to physical health. We could think of them as the ancient equivalent to the Centers for Disease Control. If someone back then was lucky enough to recover from some sort of leprosy, the priests were the ones to certify that recovery, and only then with that certification could a person reenter their community. It was a system intended not to victimize, but simply to prevent the spread of disease. However, it came at great cost to the sick.

 So here in our reading from Luke’s gospel we have ten lepers. Likely they banded together in order to create their own mini community. And as Jesus comes near one day they stand at a dutiful distance crying out of the pain of their disease and the depths of their isolation, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” And Jesus does. He tells them to go and show themselves to the priests. And as they go they are made clean. In that moment of healing what they receive is really two gifts. They are physically cured, but likely even more wonderful than that is that they are given back their lives. What overwhelming joy they all must have felt. They could go home. They could hug their family and friends and be hugged. They could be a part of all the normal, everyday things again. All the everyday things that likely they had taken for granted - just as we took for granted what was normal and every day before the pandemic.

 Ten were cured but only one paused in the midst of their joy to return to Jesus with thanks. And in doing so, Jesus says, your faith has made you well - well in the fullest sense of the word. And likewise we become more well, more whole, more complete when we pause to recognize all the ways that God has blessed us with life, with love, with each other. It is a gift that we can gather here again in this sacred space. That we can touch and hug each other, if we so choose. That we can be fed with bread and wine, the body and blood of Christ. There is so much to rejoice in. Living a life of faith with gratitude to God in community with God’s people does make us well. 

 But that is not the only message contained in this story. Because what might feel like the kicker actually doesn’t come until the end. And that is that this band of ten lepers are not all equal. One, we eventually learn, is a Samaritan. An outcast of outcasts. Despised and shunned by Jews - leper or not. Yet Jesus makes no distinction between those in need. Everyone in the group who asks for help receives assistance. Only after the cure is granted are more details revealed.

 In addition to the Samaritan - status of one, another detail is where Jesus encounters these ten lepers. The gospel specifically tells us that they are existing in a region between Samaria and Galilee. It’s a border place - which makes me think about our own borders where countless people exist crying out for mercy and help. It seems to me that they are a type of modern-day lepers and outcasts. For various reasons we want to keep our distance from them or for them to keep theirs from us so that we might feel more safe and secure. Yet as we seek to follow Jesus and love our neighbors, surely I’m not the only one who struggles with how we are to respond to such people - God’s beloved people - who are flowing to our borders desperately seeking some form of relief. Now some would say that they ought to be turned away and forced to return to their homelands. However, in looking at Jesus's response to those who are in need when he was at the border perhaps we should follow his example: help first, deal with the details second.

 As faithful followers of Christ we must ask ourselves how we can show compassion to the outcast foreigners and offer relief from the disease of tyranny. As the hands and feet of Jesus in this land there must be a response that includes the same manner of kindness extended to the lepers. While the decision of what ultimately happens to asylum-seekers and others is made by public officials, God implores his followers to, at the very least, care for our neighbor while they are here. For the love of Jesus makes no distinction of nationality or clan as he seeks to provide comfort and mercy to a hurting world. As Jesus cares for all his people – the lepers, the outcasts, and the foreigners – so should we. And as we do, it is then that our faith will make not just some of us, or most of us, but all of us truly well.

Faith is something we do. October 2, 2022. The Rev. David M. Stoddart

 Luke 17:5-10

Growing up I went to an Episcopal school, St. Mark’s in Dallas. It’s a K through 12 school, but I attended from seventh through twelfth grade. When I was a senior I took a religion class, taught by the school chaplain. As part of the class, we had to do a final project. But when I went to see this chaplain and talk about possible projects, he gave me a surprising choice. He told me I could do a research paper — or give a talk at middle school chapel. Without hesitating, I said, “I’ll take the paper.” Without hesitating, he said, “No, you won’t.” I really resisted the idea of a chapel talk, but he pushed hard for it. And he was a man I respected and looked up to: he was an important figure in my spiritual story. So with great reluctance I agreed to do the talk. The prospect terrified me, and when the day arrived I felt like I was going to throw up. But somehow I got up in front of 200 middle school boys and said something. I have no memory of what I said: I just know I managed not to throw up and I was beyond relieved when it was over. It was the first homily I ever preached, but that’s not why it’s important. I’m sharing it with you because I think it was probably the first time I remember consciously acting on faith. And it taught me a truth that I continually need to relearn: faith is not something we have. Faith is something we do.

I would define faith as trusting in God: trusting that there is a God, trusting that God loves us, trusting that God is always working for our ultimate good. When I gave that talk I trusted that God would give me the strength to do it and somehow use it for good. But while trusting is a verb, it is very tempting to think of faith as a noun, as a thing we have or we don’t have; a lump we have a lot of or a lump we have little of. But that kind of thinking can inhibit us because we might feel that we have to acquire or build up a certain amount of faith to do something: we have to have x amount of faith to be kind to someone we don’t like, say, or we have to have x amount of faith to invite someone to church. And if we don’t think we have the right amount of faith, we just won’t do it. And the disciples seem to feel this way in our Gospel today. Jesus asks them to do lots of hard things. Immediately before our reading today, Jesus said to them: And if the same person sins against you seven times a day, and turns back to you seven times a day and says, “I repent,” you must forgive. So the disciples say, “ We need more faith to do that. Increase our faith!”

And Jesus’s response . . . is so Jesus. As he is wont to do, he uses hyperbolic language and a seemingly absurd image to make a crucial point: If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, “Be uprooted and planted in the sea,” and it would obey you. I do not believe we are meant to take this literally, and that we are supposed to somehow measure or quantify how much faith we have, and then act based on that. If I have the faith size of a mustard seed, I can uproot this tree. So if I have faith the size of a watermelon, I can uproot a whole forest of trees. And if I have faith the size of a minivan, I can redirect an asteroid. I’m pretty certain the point here is that we should not assign any size to our faith at all. The disciples are asking for the wrong thing. It doesn’t matter how much faith you have. What matters is actually exercising faith and trusting in God.

If we had to use a physical metaphor for faith, I would liken it to a muscle. If we want to grow more muscle, we have to use the muscle we have. If we want to get stronger, we have to do things that require strength. Growing in faith does not mean passively waiting for God to fill us with more of this mysterious substance we call faith. It means using whatever faith we have, because whatever we have is enough. It’s the doing that matters.

So in light of that, let me pose a question. Can you think of a time in the past week when you exercised faith? When you did something consciously trusting in God? Maybe you can think of a dozen times you did that; maybe you didn’t do it at all. But if we are going to follow Jesus and grow in faith, that will demand that we act with faith, that we do things that push us beyond our comfort zone, things that require us to trust in God. What are those things? Well, of course that will vary from person to person, depending on our circumstances, on our spiritual maturity, and on God. The Holy Spirit is continually calling each of us personally to exercise faith by taking the next step in our own spiritual journey, whatever that may be. For example, maybe we don’t pray much, and we feel tugged to devote some time each day to praying and connecting with God. Doing that would involve some sacrifice, maybe getting up earlier or having less free time in the evening. But doing it would be acting in faith, trusting that God will be there in that prayer and that God will use that time to bless us. God won’t give us that faith first: showing up to pray will be our faith. Or perhaps we feel called to get involved in an outreach ministry, like serving dinner at the Salvation Army. But we feel uncomfortable about doing that: we aren’t used to soup kitchens, maybe, or feel uneasy dealing with the people who come to the Salvation Army for food. We can’t wait for God to give us faith to do that: actually doing it is faith. And it doesn’t have to be a churchy thing at all: God can call us to exercise faith in all sorts of ways and all kinds of circumstances. 

But always what matters is not storing up faith in advance, because that’s impossible. It’s not a thing we can bank. What matters is following Jesus, trusting God, and answering the call of the Spirit in our lives at any given moment. Because doing that is faith. And whether we think our faith is great or small, it is enough.