Reality Check

Folks encounter Jesus with one idea of what following him means. He wastes no time setting them straight – because following is only part of the picture.

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Gospel: Luke 9:51-62

⁵¹When the days drew near for [Jesus] to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. ⁵²And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; ⁵³but they did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. ⁵⁴When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” ⁵⁵But he turned and rebuked them. ⁵⁶Then they went on to another village.
 ⁵⁷As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” ⁵⁸And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” ⁵⁹To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” ⁶⁰But Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” ⁶¹Another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” ⁶²Jesus said to him, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

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Dear people of God, grace to you and peace this day from God through Christ who calls us to a life of apostleship as well as discipleship.  Amen.

On first read, we might call this story “that day when Jesus DIDN’T get a nap.”  He comes off as rather impatient with his disciples.  Though admittedly they sometimes don’t look so good themselves.

As I step back from this story, what I would entitle it is “Reality Check.”

I’m reminded of so many situations, in my life and others, where what we think we’re getting into is so not the reality of that thing at all.

I think the first real experience of this I ever had was entering freshman year at UC San Diego – confident as all get-out, since I had had ALL the great drama roles in high school, don’t you know.  So I figured I was there to get the training that would ensure my smooth transition to a storied career on Broadway.

Oh honey.

It didn’t take long for my lofty dreams to fall on hard ground.  There were people in that program who were WAY better than me.  I did find a niche in stage management, and certainly my theatre training serves me well to this day.

But I needed a reality check.

In our gospel story, it seems that everyone interacting with Jesus needs a reality check.  I can sort of understand how Jesus gets a little terse with folks; he must be frustrated having tried to clearly preach the kingdom of God but nobody really seems to get it.

And this start of Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem – to his ultimate destiny – begins with James and John asking if Jesus wants them to call down fire from heaven to get back at these rude Samaritans.

Small wonder they’re called “the Sons of Thunder.”

And here’s the first reality check: yes, there’s tension between Jews and Samaritans, but Jesus gives the Samaritans the benefit of the doubt.  Getting mad at them for lack of welcome isn’t going to change anything, so move on.

It’s not even “don’t get mad, get even.”

It’s just as Jesus says elsewhere: shake the dust off your feet and move on.

But James and John want those Samaritans to know JUST EXACTLY WHO IT IS they’ve snubbed.

Jesus doesn’t care.  Because his face is set to Jerusalem.

And James and John need to remember: this journey with Jesus is about love.  Nothing more AND nothing less.

Have you ever wanted to call down fire from heaven to destroy someone?  Someone who hurt you, or irritated you?  Maybe some pundit on TV that made your blood boil?

Sounds tempting, to be sure.  But Jesus reminds us that such is not the way of God’s peaceable realm.

As Jesus continues along, though, it’s hard to comprehend the boundaries of that realm.  He seems to be insisting that people do things that make no sense to us.

And I think the reason it makes no sense is because we are thinking in terms of being strictly a disciple.

#disciplelife sounds pretty good.  Follow Jesus.  Come to church.  Give to charitable organizations.

And I want to underscore, strongly: there’s nothing wrong with that.

But what Jesus calls these folks – and us – to is BOTH discipleship and apostleship.  And that’s where the discomfort shows up.

#apostlelife doesn’t sound quite as comfortable as #disciplelife.  Apostle Life means we are sent out, into the world, to tell people about Jesus.  For those of us who are introverts, this is our worst nightmare.  It might sound like we’ve unknowingly signed up for some kind of direct sales program.

But that’s not what “tell people about Jesus” means.

Recall the Gerasene man from last week who was possessed by demons.  Jesus didn’t tell him to “go tell people about me and get them to come to church next week.”

Rather, he said “tell what God has done for you.”  No coercion, no sales pitch.

And even in what Jesus says to each person who approaches him in this lesson, we see this interdependent rhythm of discipleship AND apostleship.  It’s the sort of reality check that urges people into a way of living life fully in the light and love of God.

My master’s thesis project in seminary looked at how our pattern and rhythm of worship – a form of discipleship – prepares us for apostleship.

I looked at each element of our worship.  Each element had two parts: discover and develop.  In Holy Communion, for example, we discover the concept of living in peace with folks with whom we share other tables…and we develop skills of sharing across economic barriers.

The discover part is the discipleship.  The develop part prepares us to be sent out into the world – as apostles.

It begins the process of pulling us out of our comfort zones, helping us to see the places in the world where we are called to bring the message of Jesus so that people might be freed.

As Paul says in our second lesson today: for freedom Christ has set us free.

And then we are drawn back into the center by the Holy Spirit.  Back to the center that is the gathered community, where we are again disciples learning at Jesus’ feet.  Where we are again discovering and developing.  Where we are again being formed and empowered to go and tell.

It is best symbolized by the mathematical symbol for infinity.  A figure 8 on its side – we are drawn into the center by the Spirit, as disciples of the living Christ; then sent out by the Spirit into the world, as apostles of the word and love of God.

Following Jesus is not a side hustle.  It’s a way of life.  While Jesus’ words to the two men with preexisting situations seem rather harsh, it is likely a use of hyperbole to make a point: following Jesus is an all-in venture.  We are not commanded to follow Jesus – we are invited.  And when we accept the invitation, when our faith and the Holy Spirit have led us to the place of stepping into the life of a disciple, the transformation begins – and we find ourselves hearing Jesus’ words “but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God” directed to us.

Going and proclaiming the kingdom of God is not a matter of memorizing a paragraph-long sales pitch.  It’s not about trying to entice people to come over to your way of worship or being church.

Rather, it’s about living faithfully in this world.  Recognizing the challenges before us in this world, and – as the late theologian Karl Barth recommended to preachers – “holding the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other.”

God does not mean for us to exist in some kind of alternate reality.  God wants us to be fully present in this world, proclaiming God’s love for all of creation.  Encountering the questions and issues of our day from a place of faith – not a place that runs off of pre-determined scripts, but a place that discovers how God intends us to live in the world and a place that develops the skills to make that happen, fully engaging with the world in the process.

This has been a turbulent week in many ways.  As a country, as a human family, as a planet – the stumbling blocks have been present.  Some devastatingly so.

But God does not mean for us to disengage from life.  God means for us to have life, and have it abundantly.  That is both gift – and challenge.  The gift of abundant life for us individually is a life of discipleship, of discovery.  Abundant life for all is the character of the peaceable reign of God, and we are called through developing apostleship to proclaim thatreign.

It’s not an either-or.  It’s a both-and.

For in that #disciplelife and #apostlelife, drawn together in the center that is community – we are transformed by Christ and set on the path of #abundantlife.

Maybe it’s not so scary after all.  And that’s a reality check I can get behind.

Amen.

Clarity of Vision

Jesus demonstrates what it means to not define a person by their issues – in this case, the man of Gerasenes possessed by demons.

Luke 8:26-39

²⁶Then they arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. ²⁷As he stepped out on land, a man of the city who had demons met him. For a long time he had worn no clothes, and he did not live in a house but in the tombs. ²⁸When he saw Jesus, he fell down before him and shouted at the top of his voice, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me”— ²⁹for Jesus had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For many times it had seized him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds.) ³⁰Jesus then asked him, “What is your name?” He said, “Legion”; for many demons had entered him. ³¹They begged him not to order them to go back into the abyss. ³²Now there on the hillside a large herd of swine was feeding; and the demons begged Jesus to let them enter these. So he gave them permission. ³³Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned. ³⁴When the swineherds saw what had happened, they ran off and told it in the city and in the country. ³⁵Then people came out to see what had happened, and when they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid. ³⁶Those who had seen it told them how the one who had been possessed by demons had been healed. ³⁷Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear. So he got into the boat and returned. ³⁸The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him; but Jesus sent him away, saying, ³⁹“Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.” So he went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done for him.

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Dear friends in Christ, grace to you and peace this day from God through Christ, who heals and frees and then sends us out to tell the story.  Amen.

Quite a story, this Gerasene episode.  A man tormented by demons and some pigs in the wrong place at the wrong time.

And for centuries, this story along with several others in Scripture has been interpreted to mean that anyone struggling with mental health issues is actually possessed by demons.

That stigma remains present and active today.  We use the word “crazy” without thinking how that use hurts others (I’m as guilty as anyone).  We might look down on those who seek mental health treatment or counseling.  If we suffer ourselves, we may do all we can to hide it from the world, because we will be seen as less-than.

Thankfully, progress has been made in recent years.  But we still have a long way to go before we are at a place where mental health is considered just as important for and deserving of care as physical health.

Which is rather peculiar, given the way Jesus both acts and responds in this story.  For Jesus is very much a man ahead of his time.

When this man comes to meet him as the boat reached the shore, Jesus did not address the man, but the demons.  Before the man even spoke, Jesus had commanded the demons to leave him.  When Jesus speaks directly to the man, he speaks to him not as “crazy” but as “beloved.”  “What is your name,” he asks him.  And we hear no other dialogue between Jesus and the man until Jesus is about to leave.

Jesus makes a point of separating the man and the demons when he speaks to them.  He does not conflate the two.

To understand why this is important, think about how we might use the word “demons” today.

There is a figure of speech in English about “our demons.”  Those might be the things that tempt us, the things that trouble us, or the things that keep us up at night.

And what usually happens is we start defining ourselves by our demons – which more accurately can be called our issues.

(I will side-note here that I can’t deny the very real possibility that a person can be overtaken by forces of evil.  It’s the only explanation for too much of the world’s history from ancient to modern times.  But today I want to take a different approach to this story.)

The way this story unfolds helps us to realize that Jesus sees this man as a beloved child of God, and the demons as that which torments him.  They are separate.  He addresses them separately.  By so doing, Jesus does not let the issues define the man; he lets the man define himself.

How many times, and in how many places in our world, do the issues a person struggles with end up defining them?  Determining their future?  Holding them back from living fully as God intended?

Maybe you’re familiar with Temple Grandin, the world-renowned animal behavior specialist who happens to be autistic.  She has become an expert in both fields by not letting her autism be the only thing that defined her – even in an age when some might have used it to lock her in an institution.

Her TED talk on neurodiversity, “The World Needs All Kinds of Minds”, has been viewed over 6 million times.  Dr. Grandin’s issues don’t define her, and yet they define her – in ways that continue to surprise others.

“But wait,” you might say, “Temple Grandin’s autism is not the same as this man’s demon possession.  This man scares people!  He runs around naked, lives in the cemetery caves, and sometimes runs screaming out into the desert.  How can you compare the two?”

While their diagnoses might be different, the common thread is this: both are beloved children of God.

Jesus sees this man in this way.  He does not let the demons define the man; he confronts them separately.  By sending the demons out of the man, Jesus restores him not only to his “right mind” but to the fullness of being a beloved child of God.

But the townspeople aren’t happy about this; they’re afraid.  An odd response to healing!  I wonder if this man represented something of a scapegoat to them; that they needed him to be that way so they could blame things on him.  If he’s now made whole, then that blame game has been yanked away.

And so they tell Jesus “you need to leave!”  Probably not politely, as would the butler on Downton Abbey.  The man then begs to go with Jesus.

And here’s where Jesus really instills the man with his true identity as child of God and his new purpose – telling what God has done both for him and in him.

If the man were to go with Jesus, he could tell his story, of course.  It might even draw a crowd.  But by staying where he’s lived?  He shares the story of God’s work in his life to a people who knew who he was before he met Jesus.

Preacher Otis Moss III speaks of this man as one who had been imprisoned in the basement of impossibility.  But when his shackles are loosed once and for all, and his identity as child of God is fully restored by Jesus, then he is in the penthouse of possibility.

His issues have been named – and in that naming, they begin to lose their grip on him.

So it is with us, dear friends.

When we name the issue, it begins to lose its control over us.  This is why we begin almost every worship service with Confession and Forgiveness – it gives us an opportunity as people of God to name the things we’ve done and the things we’ve failed to do, that together keep us imprisoned.

And God in Christ is already leaning in to forgive, before we’ve asked.

I think of folks who’ve struggled with mental illness for years, and finally were able to get into treatment of some kind.  They speak of being freed, of finding their way back to an understanding that they are beloved.

Theirs is not a situation that requires confession and forgiveness.  But the end result is the same – we return to God, the source of grace and mercy, who like the father in the story of the prodigal son runs out to welcome him.

Our God runs to welcome us when we decide that our issues will no longer define us.  Jesus restores us to wholeness because he’s come to bring that wholeness to all of creation.

And surely the Divine’s deepest hope is that we will come to the same place; that we will see one another as God sees us.

It may be the hardest thing Jesus asks us to do.  And so he accompanies us on the way, and gives us the strength to love one another as he does.

The best way I’ve found to think about this is how the Gaelic language works.  The Irish don’t say “I am sad” – they say “sadness is upon me.”

This simple shift reminds us that regardless of what may be upon us – sadness, joy, fear, delight, or even demons – we are always beloved children of God.

Amen.