COTA Reverb 2/14/09

I gave the reverb at Church of the Apostles this past Saturday. A reverb is what we call a sermon at COTA, its short for reverberation, which means that the reverb is one person’s reflection upon how a passage of scripture has impacted them.  We use the Lectionary at COTA so I did not choose this passage of scripture myself.  

For those of you hold to more conservative theological views, there will be content in my sermon that I’m quite positive you will disagree with.  I encourage you to try and listen to what I have to say, not so you can agree with me, but that you might develop the ability to listen to the “other”.  

 

 

Mark 1:40-45  

40 A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him, “If you choose, you can make me clean.”  41 Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, “I do choose. Be made clean!”  42 Immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean.  43 After sternly warning him he sent him away at once,  44 saying to him, “See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.”  45 But he went out and began to proclaim it freely, and to spread the word, so that Jesus could no longer go into a town openly, but stayed out in the country; and people came to him from every quarter. 

The Story of the Unlikely Evangelist 

Our country recently went through a very long and intense political process.  The men and women who were running for our nation’s highest political office where all put under the severest inspection.  And we as a society can’t get enough of it.  We want to know everything from their attendance records as third graders to what kind of underwear they put on.  Now many of the things that are revealed through this vetting process are not game changers, if they smoked a little pot in college, it probably isn’t going to disqualify them from the race.  However, there are somethings that can pose a big threat to a candidate’s victory: associations.  Who is this person friends with?  What circles did they run in?  And who is endorsing this candidate?  This of course was a big issue for our current president Barack Obama, wither it was Reverend Wright or Bill Ayers.  The strategy for some was to disqualify Obama because he has associating with these “extreme” people.  These anti-American people.  Now sadly, with our consumer driven media, our country failed to have an intelligent conversation about these associations.  It was far too easy to stereo-type people and evoke fear, then it was to listen and try and understand who people are.  

I think Jesus found himself in a similar predicament in today’s gospel story.  Jesus had just begun his ministry on earth, he was God enfleshed, sent to earth to be the Messiah to the Jews and salvation to the Gentiles.  Now considering how prophets have often fared in the past, Jesus must have known that this was not going to be an easy nor a safe task.  He was going to have to confront the religious and political establishments of his day.  Neither of whom had a good track record of paying attention to the will of God: which is to practice radical love and justice.  Nonetheless Jesus begins his mission, and in Mark’s account of it, it has only just begun when Jesus is confronted with a dilemma: a leprous man begging for cleansing.  

Help start a business in the developing world

So my friend Josh here in Seattle told me about this organization. Check it out.

Power, Difference and Community

One of the classes I am taking this semester is called Essential Community. The purpose of the class is to consider core relational categories that must be engaged to become a community. Our main text for the class is Miroslav Volf’s book Exclusion and Embrace.

Yesterday in class we had four guests come visit with us. They sat in on our discussion groups as we worked through different case studies of conflict. Our visitors included an Eastern Orthodox Christian, an African American who pastors an inner city church, an Asian woman, and a Fuller Seminary graduate who works for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, he is a Christian and he also self identifies as a homosexual. It was a valuable experience as we conversed together as a class and with our guests.

The general consensus of the class is that we all desire community. And to a certain extent we desire to have community with people that are different than ourselves. We have hope that love, humility, and open and frank conversation can tear down walls of division and ignorance and bring about community. One of the things that was apparent was that (to use the example of dining together) to dine with each other at the table, everyone needs to be able to have a voice. Everyone should be able to say who they are, what they think and feel, and what their desires are. If there are voices at the table that are silent, then violence is taking place, and people are being excluded.

It is easy for me as an educated white male to come to the table. (At least at a place like Mars Hill Graduate School, and in most church settings, especially Evangelical churches.) To a certain extent I do not fear offering my voice at the table. I believe that I will be taken seriously to a certain degree.

So again it is easy for me to say, “Everyone should have a voice.” The problem is, is that in reality not every one’s voice has equal power. At the table there could be people who are in decision making positions. There could be people at the table who have been victimized, marginalized, and suppressed. So how does the dinner continue with some people having more power than others? Will those with the more powerful voices ultimately silence people at the table? Will the less powerful have to sacrifice who they are to stay at the table? Will the less powerful have to leave the table and sit at another table?

Yesterday we experienced an example of this. At the end of our time together our four guests gathered around a table together to talk about their experiences of our class and of each other. It became apparent that the African American pastor (Joe)and the man who works for the Gates Foundation (Ron) disagreed on some things. Now the powerful and the powerless is not clear in this example (as it is in most examples). But within the church Joe sits in a place of power, he is a pastor. I do not know Ron’s entire story, but it seemed like at one time he wanted to be a pastor, but he in his denomination he is not allowed. Could our four guests remain at the table together? Could Ron remain at the table with Joe and continue to be true to who Ron is? Could Joe remain at the table with Ron and continue to be who Joe is? Is that even a violent modern dichotomy that continues the myth of the isolated individual that leads to genocidal violence? These are the questions I walked away with last night.

Is community with people of significant difference possible? There is very little in our experience that tells us that it is possible. Walls are built on borders, new churches are built everyday, genocidal wars continue to be waged.

I guess what I am saying is that power needs to be addressed and discussed. Difference is not going away. Our time on earth will continue to be marked with people of different religions, ethnicity, sexuality, socio-economic status, etc… The power that these different groups have will sway.

So my initial thoughts on power:

One, power must be recognized. It is naive and it can be terribly abusive to not acknowledge the power one has.

Two, power is not going away.

Three, I think (I could be wrong) power prevents community more than difference.

Four, What does Jesus have to say concerning power? Jesus actively (not passively) submitted himself to power to overcome it. (I say this with the utmost sensitivity to people who find themselves in abusive relationships. For instance Jesus does not encourage women to submit themselves to spousal abuse.)

Five, continuing off of point four, in a post a long time back, I suggested that the role of the church is to not be in charge. How does a pacifist vision of church speak to power?

Six, what might it look like for “the ones not in charge” at the table to remain at the table? Could they do it in a way that is not self-destructing? Could they do it in a way that would humble the powerful? That is the foolishness of the cross isn’t it? The greatest among us, is the servant of all.

Despair and Hope

Justice — do you rulers know the meaning of the word? Do you judge the people fairly?
No! You plot injustice in your hearts. You spread violence throughout the land.
These wicked people are born sinners; even from birth they have lied and gone their own way. They spit venom like deadly snakes; they are like cobras that refuse to listen,
ignoring the tunes of the snake charmers, no matter how skillfully they play.
Break off their fangs, O God! Smash the jaws of these lions, O LORD!
May they disappear like water into thirsty ground. Make their weapons useless in their hands.

Psalm 58:1-7

“You have heard the law that says the punishment must match the injury: ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say, do not resist an evil person! If someone slaps you on the right cheek, offer the other cheek also.

Matthew 5:38-39

“The distinguishing characteristic of absolute despair is silence. There is a world of difference between the person who, believing that there is no use, says so to himself or to no one, and the person who says it aloud to someone else. A person who marks his trail into despair remembers hope – and thus has hope, even if only a little.” -Wendell Berry

The two closest people to me in my life have recently cried out in protest. (See www.krickard.blogspot.com and www.scottdarfur.blogspot.com) The question I am asking is, why do they continue to raise their voices with little assurance that it will actually change anything? What is the use? No one is going to listen, not for very long anyhow. Not because we do not care, we just know that there really is no reason to hope, nothing is going to change. We are up against too much.

But it is in true despair that one can truly begin to hope. What is it that my friends hope for? In one sense (and the sense that I am addressing in this blog, there are of course many more aspects to their hope) they are hoping against a living death. They are hoping that the person that they believe themselves to be, is in fact who they really are.

I love these two people because I cannot imagine the day when violence against the defenseless and the systemic oppression of women does not cause them to cry out in anger and sorrow. Their agony is so beautiful because it is marked with an unquenchable hope.

Real hope is so rare these days. Happiness and contentment are far more desirable. Hope will drive us mad and it will ravage and destroy us. Because ultimately it is insane to ask mountains to lie flat or to plead for deserts to fill with water. And in reality that is what Kate and Scott are asking for.

To Kate and Scott, I thank you for the marks that you have left into your trail of despair. They are guideposts to others who would wish to find hope.