Twenteith Sunday after Pentecost

Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost – Year B, Proper 24 (RCL) 2009
Isaiah 52: 4 – 12; Psalm 91: 9 – 16; Hebrews 5: 1 – 10; Mark 10: 35 – 43
St. Stephen’s Episcopal Parish, Portland, OR
Sunday, October 18, 2009

MIS-UNDERSTANDING OR DIS-UNDERSTANDING?

Let us pray: Holy God your ways are often so counter intutitive to our ways. We desire to know you in all of your complexity and are astounded by simplicity. You come among us in our humanity and we fail to grasp your message of service and surrender. In your Christ we have a glimpse of all that you call us to do and be for each other – and we often fail to grasp that we are your disciples who struggle to submit our lives to your service. Patiently and gently you reach out to us again and again as our teacher, our counselor and our guide. When we stumble in our call, lift us up by your grace and guide us by your Word. Give us the strength to follow your way of service, sacrifice and suffering that we might be messengers of your glory in the Church and in the world you so passionately love. Amen.

(SUNG) WON’T YOU LET ME BE YOUR SERVANT
LET ME BE AS CHRIST TO YOU.
PRAY THAT I MIGHT HAVE THE GRACE TO
LET YOU BE MY SERVANT TOO.

We are fast approaching the end of our liturgical year. At the beginning of next month our readings will turn toward a recognition of the feast of, and our connection with the Communion of Saints. After that we will return to the author of Mark’s Gospel account for the final two Sundays in our long green season after Pentecost and that will complete our lectionary year B in which we have been primarily – though not exclusively focused on the Good News from that author’s perspective. I for one will be grateful to move on to another of the evangelist’s accounts in the new lectionary year cycle. It is not that I dislike this author’s style or perspective – just that sometimes it is so blunt in the depiction of Jesus’ followers and their failure to grasp the message of the Messiah that I am tempted to shout “oh for heavens sake, how many times do we have to go through this”! Thankfully Jesus, in this Gospel telling is far more patient than I – and lays out the message as often as is needed to penetrate the hearts and heads of those who will be entrusted to carry the good news to the ends of the earth.

The disciples in this author’s retelling of the events in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth somehow just never seem to get it! In the earlier Chapters they bemoan why Jesus can’t simply say what he means, instead of couching everything in metaphors and parables. When we reach the later chapters, and Jesus finally begins to do that as they draw closer to the fateful events at Jerusalem – still they fail to grasp what the teacher has been so patiently trying to lay out for them. The events of today’s story perfectly illustrate this denseness of the disciples and their woeful ignorance of the master’s message. Immediately preceeding the narrative where we pick it up this morning Jesus has given them, for the third time, a description of the events which will unfold in Jerusalem. “He took the twelve aside again and began to tell them what was to happen to him, saying, ‘see, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the son of man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condem him to death; then they will hand him over to the Gentiles; they will mock him, and spit upon him, and flog him, and kill him, and after three days he will rise again.’”

(SUNG) WE ARE PILGRIMS ON A JOURNEY
WE ARE TRAVELERS ON THE ROAD
WE ARE HERE TO HELP EACH OTHER
WALK THE MILE AND BEAR THE LOAD.

Not too much couched in metaphor or parable in that statement which the author has come directly from the mouth of Jesus. What Jesus is teaching the disciples, over and over again, is that this will not be the Messiah they were expecting. This will not be the one who comes in and sets everything right, defeats evil and injustice on our terms and ends in glory. No, Jesus will be betrayed, rejected, killed and rise again. Jesus’ identity as the suffering servant Messiah will be crucial for their identities as disciples. It is that suffering servant that the Hebrew prophet Isaiah speaks of in the reading we heard earlier this morning. This is what Jesus is teaching – and none of them are getting it. If we are fair, we would have to admit that what Jesus is trying to teach them is a very difficult lesson to learn. The disciples have been expecting a triumphant, all powerful Messiah. What they get in Jesus, is a suffering servant. They have signed on with Jesus for glory; Jesus speaks to them of the way of the cross and it is hard for them to understand. Jesus tries to keep working with them, using different illustrations and telling different stories, but still they don’t get it.

So here’s the thing that I wonder – did they in fact, “not get it” or perhaps they had a problem similar to a problem that I think we all may experience. It’s not that they don’t understand what Jesus is telling them, it’s that they don’t like what Jesus is telling them. This is a way that nine out of ten people do not want to walk. “The Son of man came not to be served but to serve, and to give up life as a ransom for many.” (Mk. 10:45). Then as for us, “whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all.” When we think about the social order of that day the slave was the lowest on the pole – and Jesus is calling us to be the slave of the slaves! No wonder the disciples don’t understand what Jesus is saying. No wonder they are afraid to ask what all of this means. It’s bad enough that Jesus tells them that he is on the way to a cross – but now Jesus tells them (and us) to take up our crosses as well. Mark Twain is quoted as saying, “It’s not what I don’t understand in the Bible that bothers me, it’s what I understand only too well.”

(SUNG) WE WILL HOLD THE CHRIST LIGHT FOR YOU,
IN THE NIGHT TIME OF YOUR FEAR.
WE WILL HOLD OUR HANDS OUT TO YOU,
SPEAK THE PEACE YOU LONG TO HEAR.

WE WILL WEAP WHEN YOU ARE WEAPING
WHEN YOU LAUGH WE’LL LAUGH WITH YOU,
WE WILL SHARE YOUR JOY AND SORROW
TILL WE’VE SEEN THIS JOURNEY THROUGH.


The sons of Zebedee (James and John) hear what Jesus says about the events that will come to pass when they reach Jerusalem and it is simply a message that they are not able to digest at this point in the journey – so they quickly change the subject from sacrifice and cross bearing and death and turn toward the petiness of the ongoing debate among them – who will be the greatest and who will be rewarded with the highest honors when Jesus establishes the Reign of God. It seems that they can grasp the concept of Jesus’ glory at the throne of God – they just can’t grasp the method of getting to that throne. It seems incredibly insenstive and petty doesn’t it – Jesus pours out to them the reality of betrayal, judgement, degradation and death which will follow – and the immediate response is “do for us whatever we ask of you”. Jesus does not chide them or ridicule their insensitivity – rather he takes the opportunity to teach once again what is expected of those who would claim to be followers and not just admirer’s of the Gospel message he preaches. In their asking for positions at the right and left hand, Jesus tells them those are not decided by him – and in fact, if we remember those positions are filled by two common criminals, theives – once again this Jesus will confound the expectations and re-order the social structure of God’s kindom.

The pettiness though is not contained to James and John (who in this author’s telling along with Peter are often the “inner circle” of those closest to Jesus) but rather the grumbling and discontent spread to the other ten whom the author describes as beginning to get angry with James and John (presumably not because of their insensitivity to Jesus, but because they feel left out of the discussion around who will be rewarded and in what order). This is when Jesus gathers them all together and takes, once again, the opportunity to instruct them about what kind of realtionship they are to have with each other and with those to whom they will bear the Gospel message. In this instance there is an almost chiding tone as Jesus compairs their behaviour to that of the Gentiles (meaning those hated political forces which have long dominated the Jewish people) who are tyrants over those whom they control. Rather, Jesus tells them, they are called to this servant role – as Jesus is – not to be served but to serve. Deborah Smith Douglas in a compilation titled The Other Side, speaks of attending mid week Eucharist at St. Bede’s Episcopal Church in Santa Fe, New Mexico; and how she is struck by the hand lettered sign which hangs over the only door into the sanctuary. It read’s “Servant’s Entrance” there isn’t anyway in or out of that Church except through the service door.

(SUNG) WHEN WE SING TO GOD IN HEAVEN,
WE SHALL FIND SUCH HARMONY
BORN OF ALL WE’VE KNOWN TOGETHER
OF CHRIST’S LOVE AND AGONY

WON’T YOU LET ME BE YOUR SERVANT
LET ME BE AS CHRIST TO YOU
PRAY THAT I MAY HAVE THE STRENGTH TO
LET YOU BE MY SERVANT TOO.

I think that most of us would be terribly uncomfortable if we truly allowed others to be servants to us. Think of how difficult it is to simply be a guest at another’s home and not feel compelled to “do something” to assist the host in their serving us. In order to be a servant, and to allow our sister’s and brother’s to live out Christ’s call to be a servant, we need to adjust to that uncomfortable role of receiving the servant ministry which is offered. That’s the thing about this Jesus that we don’t truly “misunderstand” – we just truly don’t really like some of those things to which we are clearly called. Jesus is attempting to teach us and transform us into what God would have us be, not necessarily what we would have us be. Often we come to church expecting that we will have our faith confirmed – we’ll be able to pray the prayers and sing the songs and hear the sermon and nod our heads in agreement as we say to ourselves, “yes that’s what I believe, that’s what I’ve always thought” and then we can go home and have lunch. Then we have a story like the one we have today which reminds us that Jesus is often more about making us uncomfortable and challenged than he is about making us sure and confident in our fixed faith systems. Sometimes Jesus’ first disciples just don’t get it – and sometimes Jesus’ disciples today – even those of us on the inner circle – just don’t get. Here’s the good news, Mr. Parker, it isn’t about “getting it”. It isn’t about “knowing it all.” Rather, its more often than not about “it getting you” and about “knowing that we don’t know” and being content with that. Knowing that Jesus continues to teach us and continues to talk with us and patiently, ever so patiently explain once again what we are called to do as servants of our God. We can come to church and God can still surprise us, God can still challenge us and we can continue to grow – serving those whom we have been called to serve in Jesus’ name.

Amen.