Homily Proper 12B - July 29, 2012

 Proper 12 B

July 29, 2012

My daughter is a baker.  All bakers know that one of the important steps in baking is to test your creations. You test cakes to see if they’re done.  You test yeast to assure it will rise.  And of course you test the frosting or the dough, just to make sure it tastes just right.  

Testing is part of the process.   It’s a part of baking, part of our readings today, and part of life.  

In the Old Testament, we hear about David and Bathseba.  David is tested, as sees Bathseba out his window. His subsequent activities with Bathseba, and her husband Uriah should be considered an epic fail.  And yet, David goes on to do great things, to be the mighty King David, writer of psalms, ancestor of Christ. 

 

There is an apparent moral of this story, and a not-so-apparent lesson.  First the obvious.  Please.  Don’t sleep with your neighbor, and then to fix things, kill their spouse.  It’s not going to end well.  And just because David  became a mighty King, I wouldn’t assume the same outcome for you.  

Now the other lesson, which really is good news.  Despite having behaved in a reprehensible way and failing the test, David went on to become a great and mighty king.  So even when we fail pretty basic tests - epically fail -  there is hope.

The Gospel contains a well known story, the miraculous feeding of the 5,000.  And another great test story.  

First, imagine the scene.  

5000 people.  These are people who are rugged because of the harsh conditions in which they live.  And 5000 people come to see and hear Jesus.  They hungered for God, for Jesus.  Driven by that hunger, they came.  And came.  And they finally arrived in the vast nothingness  to hear Jesus. 

Jesus knows how he’s going to handle this, and yet he tests the disciples.  He asks them, innocently enough, “where are we going to buy bread for this many people”?  He led them to a response dependent on money, on that stuff which is rendered to Caesar.  The whole time, he knew the answer had nothing to do with money.  Not the answer to the problem of the food.  And more importantly, not the answer to the crowds’ spiritual hunger.

But by framing the question that way, he led the disciples to offer a response that was doomed the moment it left their mouth.  “Six months wages would not buy enough bread”. 

I see this as the first test Jesus placed before the disciples.  

Jesus framed  the problem and offered a possible solution within a context the disciples knew. Money and scarcity.  There’s not enough money.  Resources are scarce.  “Where are we going to get enough money to buy bread?  And their response? Six month wages aren’t enough. . Going back to the baking analogy, after putting the toothpick in the center of the cake to test its doneness, the cake is not ready yet.  It needs more time to become the cake it was intended to be.  

For as much as the disciples were loyal followers and believers of Jesus, they still hadn’t wrapped their heads around the idea that God is a God of abundance.  Not abundance, as in excess, but abundance as in enough, with some left over.  The disciples respond from a concept of scarcity, and respond with fear. 

When a resource is truly scarce and limited, people behave in unpredictable and dangerous ways.  Oil is a great example.  There is only a finite amount of oil in this world.  Protection and acquisition of this truly scarce resource causes people and nations to fight wars.   True scarcity creates havoc.  

More disturbing are the problems and havoc caused by nothing more than a perception of scarcity.  Food is a great example.  This country, this world, produces enough food so that no one, no senior citizen, no families, no child, ever needs to be hungry.   And yet, we are number one.  Oregon is the number one state for the prevalence of hunger.  We are second only to the district of Columbia for the percentage of children who are “food insecure”.  This means the caretakers of these kids are consistently unable to access enough food to meet their daily food needs.  32% of our state’s children.  Imagine the grief and fear for all of their parents and guardians who cannot routinely provide sufficient food for their children.  And yet, there is absolutely enough food produced in Oregon to feed Oregon.    

Hungry people here are not caused by scarce resources.  But by a perception of scarcity, and the stockpiling of food and resources that creates obesity and wasted food while others go hungry.  

In the Gospel story, the initial action and fear shown by the disciples reveal their belief in a God of Scarcity.  Luckily, some in the crowd did believe, or were trying to believe in a God of abundance - the boy who had 5 barley loaves and 2 fish, and Andrew who brought him forward.  They offered their paltry resources up, with a slight disclaimer - , “but what can this meager offering provide with this big crowd”?  Yes, they doubted, but more importantly, they acted.

Every week, we pray, in the words the Lord taught us, “Give us this day our daily bread”.  We pray for what we need.  Today.  Weekly, we pray words that reinforce that God give us what we need, perhaps no more, but what we need.  Abundance.  Enough.

Jesus offers a second test, with equally disappointing results in the Gospel story.  He asks the disciples, where are “we” going to get enough money.  He invites them to include him in the solution.  But their first response is “they” don’t have enough money.  They forget to include Jesus in the solution.  

The solutions begin to materialize when Andrew and the boy offer to Jesus their meager 5 loaves and 2 fish.  And Jesus does the rest. 

I think we are posed the exact same tests today, and often with the same disappointing results.  We see challenges, and we quickly frame the resolution firmly rooted  in concepts of scarcity.  There isn’t enough money. There isn’t enough time.   We let society, and history, and culture frame the question for us, leading us down paths that are limited and myopic.  This leads us to equally limited and myopic solutions, just as occurred with the disciples.  “Where do we get enough money?” 

Practicing a belief in a God of Abundance doesn’t necessarily make the resolution quicker or easier.  But I’m certain that without a belief and practice of abundance, we need to be exceedingly careful about any question or problem or impossible or constrained solutions we perceive.  The problem or resolutions may be constrained by scarcity, and without questioning it, we are limited by that implicit scarcity.  

Believe in a God of Abundance.  Take steps and actions based on that belief.  And then turn over the hard work to Christ.   When posed with a difficult problem or solution, stop and think about the words we heard from the Epistle today from Paul, that Christ can accomplish “abundantly more than we can ask or imagine.”  Abundantly more.  Than we can even imagine. 

The disciples didn’t feed the 5000 all by themselves.  Christ didn’t feed the 5000 all by himself . But together, miracles happened.   

Believe in abundance.  From that belief of abundance, offer your five loaves. 

Invite Christ to do the rest.   

With Christ, working together, we too can feed the multitudes. 

Proper 8 B - July 1, 2012

Proper 8 B

July 1, 2012

From today’s psalm, we heard, “If you Lord, were to note what is amiss, who could stand?

Sometimes I think I know what’s amiss, and I am pretty good about deciding how to fix what’s amiss.  Would you believe that it mostly does not work out like I think it’s going to?  In fact, the world doesn’t need me to decide what is amiss, because normally, I don’t see everything, don’t know everything, and make bad decisions about the “right way” to resolve things.  

God doesn’t note what is amiss.  Rather God has a vision of the way things are supposed to be that doesn’t involve noting what is amiss. 

This morning, we heard some hard words from Paul that are contentious, and divisive.  He talks about “a fair balance”.  A fair balance between one person’s present abundance and another person’s need. Paul is talking to the people of Corinth, who lived in a socially and economically divided time, not unlike our time now. Some people had much. Others had little.  Paul is doing the verbal equivalent of shaking a person by the shoulders, to wake them up and make them understand that what God seeks.  God seeks a fair balance.   He urges the people of Corinth to take their faith, and put it into action.  From that place of faith and action, they are to offer gifts acceptable and according to what they had. He was asking them to use their abundance to create a life of equity for all. 

Tough stuff for the people of Corinth, and for us now. People who hear it often fall on one side or the other of the abundance/need continuum.  If you hear the story from a place of perceived abundance, it sounds like a personal criticism.  After all, we don’t live in a socialist state, and Robin Hood was over-rated.  Really just a criminal.  On the other hand, if we hear this from a place of need, we can be frustrated, angry, or defeated, living regularly with the impact from a world of imbalanced resources. 

Regardless of where you are when you hear this story, bringing up this idea of abundance and need is discomforting, and can make us feel bad. 

But there is a way to see this as comforting, and to feel bolstered by these words.  Paul’s letters may not be the best source for that sort of comfort, so we’ll turn to the Gospel.  The Gospel paints a great picture about abundance, need, and God not noting what is amiss. 

We hear about Jesus and two stories of healing, one interrupted by the other.  We first hear that Jesus has been petitioned by Juyrus the leader of a synagogue, who’s fallen at Jesus’ feet to beg him to come see his 12 year old daughter who’s near death.   On the way to heal her, with the throngs pushing in, a woman who’s been bleeding for 12 years struggles through the crowd to touch his robe.  Immediately, Jesus feels power leave him, and she is healed. He wonders who touched him, and the disciples dismiss the question, seemingly hurrying him along to attend to Jairus’ daughter. Besides, with the crowds, probably dozens of people touched him.  He heals the woman, and continues on to attend the daughter of Juyrus.  By the time Jesus arrives, the little girl’s family is distraught because they believe her to be dead. Jesus enters her room, and heals her. 

These are interesting stories, and given the context at the time, they are also symbolic of need and abundance.  The girl, Juyrus’ daughter, represents abundance.  She is the daughter of a synagogue leader.  She is entering child bearing years, and she has a man petitioning on her behalf.   In that time, those were much-desired traits.  Mark tells us that Jesus is petitioned by abundance, and he responds. 

In contrast, the other woman does not have much going for her.  She is ritualistically unclean because of her bleeding. In her times, this meant she was unfit to come in contact with other people, and unfit to worship God.  She has no male relative or friend to petition on her behalf and does not even have a name in the story.  Jesus is petitioned by a person of need.  Mark tells us that he diverts his attention from the girl of abundance, and heals the woman in need.  AND, after doing that, he continues on to heal Juyrus’ daughter.  Jesus cares, responds and heals all.  Those who come from abundance and those who come from need.  

And the lessons from this meaty story don’t end with what you can see on the outside.  There is also good news about abundance and need on the inside, the part you can’t see. In both healing stories, Jesus talks,  and what he says speaks volumes.  He tackles the issue of outward appearance, inward reality, abundance and need.   To the family and friends of Juyrus’ daughter, the girl of abundance, he says “Do not fear. Only believe.”  This family with apparent abundance is lacking belief, and filling the hole where belief should be is fear and doubt.  To this, Jesus provides reassuring words.  

How easy is it to slip into fear and doubt from a place of comfort and privilege.  We’re used to things going well.  We work hard.  We’re predisposed to this thinking, having been raised to know about “The American Dream”.    We’re so ruggedly independent.  Unfortunately, it’s easy from that place of confidence to lose belief, and slip into fear and doubt and spiritual need.  We become so self-reliant when things go well that when things don’t go well -  a loved one is sick, work is challenging, finances are impossible -  we don’t understand why.  We can’t fix things in our normally self-reliant way. We lose sight in the good times that we need, and we get out of practice asking for God’s help.  .  When it becomes apparent that we cannot do everything on our own, we’re out of the habit of asking of asking for help.  And where belief used to be, we’re filled with fear and doubt. 

 We need faith.    We need hope.    We need love.    We need God.  And often, we can’t even see it.

The other woman, the ritualistically unclean, nameless woman, hears a different message from Christ.  To her, Jesus says,  “Daughter, your faith has made you well.”  From that place of outwardly visible need, she has faith.  She has abundance. 

I’m not suggesting that every person, with apparent need is always spiritually richer than every person with apparent abundance. But I am consistently surprised by how often people I assume are on the “need” side of the equation are blessed with abundance. 

More interesting than the mix of abundance and need in each of these stories is the fact that one is visible, and easily judged by society. The other is not visible.  How easy it is to see someone and judge the whole person by the apparent abundance or need.  And how easy it is to be wrong.  

At the Saturday morning community breakfast, there are hundreds of people who come for hot meal, reportedly one of the best meals west of Denver. Invariably, one of the breakfast guests goes to the piano and serenades diners through breakfast.  I’ve heard jazz, honkey-tonk, and romantic classics played beautifully from grimy hands, and toothless smiles.   From a place of very apparent need, there is an internal abundance, abundance of talent, grace, and joy that is shared with the diners, and volunteers alike. 

Rarely can we accurately see the needs inside us.  We can’t possibly see the abundance or needs inside others. 

Paul says that your abundance should be shared for some one else’s need.  At some point, their abundance may be shared for your need.   Since we all are a hodge-podge mix of inward and outward abundances and need, I can get behind God’s vision for a fair balance.   Besides, Christ didn’t judge or respond differently to the people from apparent outward abundance, or inward abundance.  He treated, loved and healed all fairly.  Those with prestige.  With doubt.  With nothing.  With faith. 

Regardless of where you see yourself, what abundances or needs you have, we should all be striving for God’s vision of a fair balance.

If you agree that the world should be fair, if you aim to create a fair balance, be bolstered that you have the same vision as God.  Yes, the details can be messy – abundance and need can be challenging concepts.  But we have the opportunity to start from a common place, a common vision, God’s vision of a fair balance.  Our challenge and responsibility is to help make that vision a reality here. 

We need to acknowledge the abundances we have, visible and invisible.  We need to be very aware and honest about the needs we have, visible and invisible.   With others, we need to be grateful for their abundance, and be exceedingly cautious making assumptions about what their invisible needs or abundances are. 

Thankfully, God does not judge what is amiss.  God loves, heals and seeks a fair balance for all God’s people.  We should strive to do the same.