Why are we shooting each other? April 23

 

Year A, Easter 3                                            Luke 24:13-35                                                             

         In the past week, there have been 4 incidents of people being shot for being in the wrong place and being a stranger.  The first was a 16 year old boy who knocked on the wrong door.  He was shot twice. The 2nd was a 6 year old and her father who went to retrieve a basketball that had rolled into someone’s yard.  The third was a young woman who drove into the wrong driveway. She died. The fourth incident involved two high school girls who accidentally got into the wrong car and were immediately shot.  One week.  One young woman killed and 5 injured for making a mistake that everyone of us has probably made.  How many of us have knocked on the door of the wrong house, drove into the wrong driveway, walked into someone’s yard to retrieve a ball or tried to open the door of a car that looked like yours? I have done all of those things.

These were all different areas of the country. The victims were all young, but that was really all they had in common.  The perpetrators all seemed to have little in common as well.  It seems to me that the only common denominator is fear, particularly fear of strangers. None of the victims were known to those who did the shooting. 

What I want to know is how we got to this point, where 4 different people thought the best thing to do was not simply ask a question and take 10 seconds to find out why the person was in the wrong place, but instead, shoot the people.  How did we get to this place? 

            One of the interesting things about the resurrection accounts is that the disciples of Jesus never recognized him, not at first.  He was always a stranger to them.  It is not clear as to why his closest friends and disciples didn’t recognize him.  Some hypothesize that it was a kind of post traumatic stress.  And that makes sense when you think about it.  Listen to what Simon and Cleopas told Jesus, “But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.”  Jesus had been their chance at redemption and freedom and now he has been killed by the very people who he was supposed to free them from, the Romans.  They had hoped.  They had put all their hope in this man, and now he was dead. 

They were coping with two kinds of trauma—the violent death of someone who they loved and a lost hope.   Anytime someone we love dies, we experience a tremendous loss.  Sometimes that comes with losing hope—hope for a future with someone who is no longer living with us.  Yet Jesus had promised more than just a future with him, he had promised salvation and freedom. He had promised redemption and healing to all people.  When he was killed, people were terrified that all those promises were lost.  It was a trauma of epic proportions.  Embedded in trauma is fear, fear of what will happen next, knowledge that while we may have survived this trauma, we may not survive the next.  Fear is what made it so difficult to recognize Jesus—to believe that it could be Jesus.

On Easter, I talked about Mary Magdalene’s relative lack of fear. I hypothesized that she was able to handle her fear because of the afflictions she had coped with in her life. She didn’t recognize Jesus immediately, but it didn’t take her very long. It took longer for the men in our Gospel reading. I think these two men who met Jesus on the road had a little more fear than Mary did.  This is the first time we even hear their names, so they probably didn’t have as close a relationship with Jesus as Mary and the apostles.  And they were heading away from Jerusalem.  They were basically fleeing the scene.  They were scared. 

So it took them longer, longer to recognize Jesus, longer to remember that hope that they once had.  But they eventually did.  They did because they spent time with him, listened to him, got to know this man who they thought was a stranger.  The more time they spent with him, the less fear they had.  The reason they were able to overcome that fear was because hope was still there. They might have lost their hope for a time, but they never forgot it.  It was that foundation of hope that saved them.

To some varying degree, almost every person in our world is dealing with some  kind of trauma, which means that everyone is afraid.  Not only that, we have become isolated.  It was happening before the pandemic and then COVID made it that much worse.  We also have this wonderful 24 hours news cycle that seems to feed off of fear, which really isn’t helping matters. 

So what’s different now? Why are people so quick to shoot the stranger in front of them?  Part of it is because we have become isolated and it’s easy to avoid people who are different than us.  Many people are able to avoid interacting with anyone not like them. It’s also because fewer and fewer people have the foundation of hope that our faith gives us.  It’s one thing to deal with fear and loss when you have a foundation of hope and love.  It’s another thing to deal with that when you have no hope to begin with.  That is much more dangerous.

Everything that has happened over the last week (and the last several years) makes me angry. It makes me want to lash out and blame someone or something.  That is what a lot of people are doing. But that just feeds the fear and hopelessness.  Jon Meacham wrote: “Fear points at others, assigning blame; hope points ahead, working for a common good. Fear pushes away; hope pulls others closer. Fear divides; hope unifies.”

As people of faith, we cannot allow ourselves to fear the stranger and to blame the other.  We can’t isolate ourselves in our safe places of hope and comfort.  We have to share this hope that God has given us.  Because people are starving for hope in our world and that dearth of hope is killing people.  It is literally killing people.  What can we do?  We can stop blaming the other political party.  We can stop blaming “the other.” We can stop letting fear be our guide when we have a much better guide in Jesus Christ. 

Notice that Jesus walked with the disciples and they walked WITH him, even though they thought he was a stranger.  In the same way, we can start walking along others, even the people who may scare us a little.  I am not telling you to start knocking on strangers doors, but there are safe ways that you can get to know people who are different than you.  If you aren’t quite ready for that, try to talk to the people who you know—who you know but might not agree with, and talk about those things. We are so busy avoiding talking about things that upset us, but it means we are no longer able to understand where others might be coming from.  That means that even people we know are becoming strangers. 

One of my favorite psalms is Psalm 139.  Lord you have searched me and known me.  It’s all about the God who knows us so well because he formed our inward parts.  It’s a gift to be known and loved by God.  Being known by an all loving being is what gives Christians the strength to deal with trauma and pain. And guess what, it’s not just us who God knows.  God knows all his children.  So think about that the next time you see someone who makes you a little nervous, a little wary.  Remember they too are created in God’s image. For God, there are no strangers. 

The Wounds that Transform Us: April 9, 2023

 

Easter, Year A                                             John 20:1-18                                                                           

           Mary Magdalene wasn’t afraid.  She wasn’t afraid when she walked alone to the tomb in the dark…not when she realized that the stone had been rolled away, not when the two angels appeared out of nowhere…not even when a mysterious man approached her who she thought might just be the person who stole the body of Jesus.  She wasn’t afraid. Now you might be thinking, but how could you possibly know if she was scared since her emotions aren’t detailed in the text? That’s true.  But if you compare the 4 Gospels, you will see an interesting juxtaposition.  Matthew, Mark and Luke all have multiple women going to the tomb. John is unique in that it mentions only Mary Magdalene.  All 4 Gospels describe either angels or someone robed in white appearing to the women.  Matthew, Mark and Luke all say that the women were afraid or record the angels telling them not to be afraid. 

            This phrase (Do not be afraid) might be familiar to you, not just because of the Easter story, but because of the Christmas story.  When the angels appeared to share good news, they were always telling people not to be afraid.  This is a theme throughout the Bible, the appearance of an angel scares people.  Yet in John, it never says that Mary is afraid and the angels never tell her not to be afraid. Then when she sees the man who she doesn’t recognize, she doesn’t cower in fear, she demands an answer from him.  “Tell me where you have laid him.”  A woman alone with a strange man, even in this day would be intimidating.  But in Jesus’ time, it was downright terrifying for any number of reasons.

            There was a fierce courage to Mary of Magdela.  There have been a lot of misconceptions about Mary over the years.  Dan Brown made it significantly worse with the DaVinci Code.  She was not a prostitute nor was she a woman caught in adultery.  At some point, someone just conflated all the unnamed women in the Gospels to one woman and all of their gifts and sins got attributed to Mary of Magdela.  The only thing we know about her was that she was an early follower of Jesus.  She started following him after he cured her.  She was at the crucifixion, at the tomb and she was the first person to see the risen Christ.  So here is what I want to know, what gave her the courage to sit at the foot of cross and watch him die, then visit the tomb alone and then eventually spread the rather unbelievable news that he had risen?  I want to know because I want that courage.

            In order to find the source of that courage, we need to go back to the first time we hear about her, which was a very brief mention. She started travelling with Jesus and the disciples after Jesus cured her of seven demons.  At the time, people assumed someone who was possessed by demons was evil in some way. But more likely, the individual was tormented, not evil.  It could have any emotional illness that we now have terminology for.  It could have been extraordinary grief. It might have been a physical illness. Anyone who lives with that kind of affliction has to have some courage.

            Think about it— think about the time in your life that was the most difficult, the darkest time. I bet it was hard just to get out of bed.  And maybe you didn’t get out of bed that day, but you eventually did.  That required courage and faith.  This woman had that courage in spades, even before she was healed.  Yet once she was healed, she also had what seem like an unshakable faith, the faith that comes from living through hell and coming out the other side, the faith that comes from a personal encounter with Jesus.

            It was that faith and that courage that allowed to her to stay and watch her Lord and Savior die.  It was that faith and courage that propelled her to the tomb on that dark and lonely morning. Now I am not saying that her faith was absolute.  I almost started this sermon saying she was fearless.  I don’t think she was.   I believe she was resilient because she had to fight over the course of her life.  During her times of greatest pain and anguish, she was probably alone quite a bit, which meant going to a tomb alone didn’t scare her.  And once you’ve been the home of 7 demons, a couple of angels aren’t going to scare you either.  Facing those immense challenges in her life and then being healed by Jesus equipped her with the courageous faith that she would need to be a disciple and then an evangelist.

            Episcopalians don’t typically talk about demons, so this might be a leap, but I want you to think about your own demons.   Maybe change the word to affliction or burden.  It could be depression, anxiety, chronic pain, a disease, addiction….anything that inhibits you and keeps you from being the person that God has called you to be.  Some of these afflictions are with us a lifetime and some are temporary, but they all leave their mark in some way.  Usually we assume those marks make us less than, not good enough, not strong enough.  But if someone with 7 demons could become a disciple and an evangelist, why not you? 

            You might think, well yeah, but she was cured by Jesus.  She was free.  That’s true.  No doubt getting cured by Jesus gave her a bit of a head start.  Yet…I bet those demons—even exorcized demons— left their mark.  She never forgot them. She could either let that hold her back, or propel her forward.  Remember, even Jesus’ resurrected body still had scars.  We are all wounded in some way.  We are all tormented by something. What matters is how we let those afflictions and wounds change us.  Do we try to hide them?  Are we ashamed of them? Or do we give them over to God’s power and let them transform us into a more complete and beautiful version of ourselves?  Do we let them transform us into a beloved child of God?

            Someone once said that courage is telling the story of who you are with your whole heart.[1]  Being a disciple of Jesus, watching him die, and going to the tomb….all required courage. But I wonder, if the thing that really required courage was Mary telling the other disciples, “I have seen the Lord.” Because her story used to be that she was the woman possessed, that there was something wrong with her.  That she was broken.  But now…now she was the woman who had seen the Lord. 

Our faith gives us this gift.  It provides each one of us with the ability to change our story, transform our afflictions and wounds into something new and beautiful.   That gift is freely given.  Yet it is on us, to accept that gift and allow it to transform us—to live into the Easter message, that God can make all things new, even you and me.

             

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[1] Brene Brown

Feet Can be Gross: Maundy Thursday

John 13: 1-17, 31b-35                                                             April 6, 2023

            Some people are weird about feet.  I have never been one of those people.  I can’t say that I get excited about foot washing, but it also doesn’t unnerve me as it does some people. However, there have been a few times in my life when the experience of having someone wash my feet was almost painful. Last year when I was in the hospital, I never got a shower. Because of the nature of the wound, they could not risk it.  I couldn’t put on the stupid hospital socks because I could not reach my feet, which meant I was walking barefoot. I was absolutely disgusting.   One night when I was complaining about my feet in particular, my husband offered to wash my feet. I said yes, but found myself overwhelmed and embarrassed by the experience (even though it was my husband of 17 years).  I felt conflicted in that I wanted clean feet, but allowing even my husband to touch my infected and gross feet was almost more than I could bear.  I wept as he washed my feet, and had to assure him that he wasn’t hurting me, these were different kinds of tears. 

              It wasn’t until that moment, that I fully appreciated the way that Peter must have felt when Jesus bent down before him with a basin of water and a towel. I am not saying I had the same emotions, but the intensity was similar.  In those days people wore sandals and the roads were not paved.  That meant that people often had dirty feet.  It was customary to have them washed before a meal or upon entering a home.  Typically the person who did the washing was a servant. If there wasn’t a servant, it was the woman of the house.

            There were all kinds of reasons why this action of Jesus should have confused and disturbed Peter.  His feet were actually dirty, a lot more dirty than his hands and his head (which he suggested Jesus wash).  And even if they were clean, it was still inappropriate for a man, any man to be doing this. Then when you add the fact that that wasn’t just any man, this was the Son of Man, the Messiah—well then things got really weird.  So Peter wasn’t too excited about what was about to be happen. 

            His reluctance is understandable, but the intensity of Peter’s reaction indicated something more than just discomfort.  It was fear.  What was the source of the fear? There are a lot of theories, as there often are.  Some think that Peter didn’t want Jesus to see that dirty, gross part of him. Perhaps it wasn’t just the physical dirt, but also weakness. Only a few verses later Jesus revealed that Peter would deny him.  I don’t think Peter knew that would happen, but perhaps, deep down, he knew he was capable of that.  And should he, a weak man, let an all-powerful God wash his feet? Peter was afraid that Jesus would see this weakness, which of course he did.         

            He didn’t need to be close enough to wash his feet to see the weakness. He had always known.  But he loved him anyways.  His love and his display of that love gave Peter strength---gave him enough strength to allow himself to be washed. Later that strength would fail him, but it would return after the resurrection.  Most of our weaknesses and sins are temporary.  We always have opportunities to redeem ourselves.

            The other thing that Peter feared was what this meant for Jesus.  This wasn’t merely an act of humility on Jesus’ part, this was an act of humiliation.  Between this action and all the comments Jesus had made about his impending death, Peter was afraid that this Jesus who seemed divine and otherworldly, might just die in one of the most humiliating ways possible.  But despite all those fears and questions that were rolling around in his brain and making it difficult for Peter to let his guard down and receive this gift of love---despite all of that, Peter allowed Jesus to humiliate himself in front of him. He allowed Jesus to see the ugliness of his feet, the weakness of his faith.

            In the Episcopal Church, we emphasize the importance of the last supper and communion.  Every Sunday we say these words that come from our reading in 1^st Corinthians and from Matthew, Mark and Luke: "Take, eat: This is my Body, which is given for you. Do this for the remembrance of me." And "Drink this, all of you: This is my Blood of the new Covenant, which is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Whenever you drink it, do this for the remembrance of me."  Yet on the night we focus on the story of the Last Supper, we read from the Gospel of John, which doesn’t include these words.  In John, Jesus never presents bread and wine as his body and blood.  Instead, John tells the story of Jesus washing the feet of the disciples.  Jesus then tells them that he has set an example in the washing of the feet and they should do likewise.  Yet we only do it once a year and many churches never do it.

            I did some research and tried to figure out why this was and I could not find anything except from a few people who said that we really didn’t need to wash feet anymore since we wear shoes and bathe regularly.  But I think what it really comes down to is that it’s too intimate.  It requires too much humility and humiliation.  When I was in the hospital, I actually needed my feet washed, but that made it that much worse. It’s so hard to let someone see a part of you that you are not comfortable with. Yet in the end, it was probably one of the most beautiful moments I’ve had with my husband.  Of all the amazing things people did for me when I was ill, that was when I felt most loved and it actually hurt a little, to receive love when I felt weak and unlovable. 

            Jesus told his disciples that everyone would know they were his disciples by how they loved one another.  I think the part of love we can often overlook is how we receive the love of others and of God.  It can be challenging to receive love because it makes us so incredibly vulnerable and no matter how much we talk about it, we still don’t like to be vulnerable.  The beautiful thing about the practice of washing feet is that it forces us to be vulnerable, which is why I encourage you to try it.  I know that many of you won’t.  That’s ok.  It might be too far out of your comfort zone.  If you don’t, I want you to think about ways you can receive God’s love and the love of others.  Consider what might be stopping you from opening yourself to that love and acceptance. Pray about it and then find some small way you can move out of your comfort zone, because in a way, that is what our faith does.  It’s constantly pushing us beyond what we are comfortable with.  That’s what Jesus did for his disciples and that is what he continues to try to do for us.