Sunday, October 13, 2024
1.
Communion, you see, is both sacrament and invitation, eucharist and altar call. It’s both a sign of Christ’s presence and a choice we make to see him now, to hear him out, to follow his lead. It’s a sacrament because it’s a mystery, a gift, and beyond our control. It’s an altar call because it requires discernment and discipleship. “Each time you eat this bread,” Jesus says at the table, “do so in remembrance of me.” At his table, we are collaborators and friends, imagining and remembering his brokenness and his mercy, his death and his resurrection.
And somehow it is God’s intention, and it is our Christian task, to discern the presence of Jesus in the midst of these unconscionable hostilities and unimaginable losses. And let’s be clear. Christian faith shows no interest at all in nationality or national identity. These categories confer no particular blessing on one people or another. Jesus refuses at every turn to wrap his human body in one flag or another. Instead we must bravely, compassionately discern his ways in the midst of human suffering, in the cacophony of violence, and in the fog of war. All suffering, all violence, and all war.
Where is the one who counsels God’s people to love their enemies, to turn the other cheek, to put down their swords and study war no more? This is the question we ask, of one another, at the table and in prayer. Where is the one whose love is so unshakeable that he welcomes blow after blow after blow—rather than turning his own rage (justifiably, perhaps) on the high priests and foot soldiers who mindlessly punish him? If cheap grace treats Jesus as a generalized ideal, costly grace insists on finding Jesus in flesh-and-blood communities and the conflicts that tear them apart. If cheap grace says turn the other cheek whenever you can, whenever it makes sense, costly grace finds in Jesus another way of life entirely—a way shaped by nonviolence and lovingkindness though it brings us to our knees; a way devoted to peace even when it risks our reputation, our sense of balance, even our way of life. The gospel, my friends, is in no way cheap and convenient grace. The gospel is life and liberation, and costly grace: good news made plain in radical generosity and mercy.
2.
In a sense, the fellow who runs up to Jesus, in our text this morning, is looking for reassurance and comfort. Some measure of grace. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” And who can blame him? If he’s living through a season of Orwellian anxieties. If he’s living through another cycle of MAGA madness. If he’s unnerved by his own sense of powerlessness, maybe even his own sense of guilt or shame. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” There’s a version of Christianity, as we know, that reduces the entire gospel to just this. It asks only for acquiescence and requires no imagination. It demands fealty to creed and orthodoxy, but encourages no discernment at all. Say the right words. Join the right church. Sing the right songs. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” You go to his table to be reassured. Safe. Saved.
So that seems to be this fellow in the story, where he’s coming from, the angst in his heart.
And it’s so telling, so sweet and so telling, that Jesus looks at him, that Jesus sees him and acknowledges him, and that Jesus loves him. Indeed, that may be the whole point of this story, the lead buried in the first paragraph. Jesus looks at the dear fellow, the sincerity in his eyes, and Jesus loves him. Recognizes him. This story is in no way intended to shame this fellow, or us. That’s not the point. It’s in no way passed down through the ages to mark him as unloveable or beyond the reach of mercy and grace. Of this, my friends, there is no doubt: that Jesus has profound compassion, even infinite love, for those who are anxious and burdened by fear. For those overwhelmed by their own experience, or better their own perception of powerlessness and shame.
But still, the invitation that follows is costly and hard. Sell what you own, give to the poor, and then come, and find me. Then come, and follow me. “It is easier,” Jesus says to his friends, and somehow to the church in every generation; “it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”
The point, I think, of Mark’s gospel is this. That Jesus is embodied, that God is embodied, that the Divine is embodied in human communities, in suffering communities, in the very real bodies of the hungry, the detained and dismissed, the invisible and ignored, wherever and everywhere they are. Following Jesus has something to do with leaving privilege behind, leaving security behind, leaving wealth behind, to practice peace and mercy with Jesus, and then to seek honor and safety for Jesus. Where he suffers. Where he hungers. Where he wanders bombed-out cities and scorched-earth farms and flooded plains.
I have to believe that Jesus holds out hope for the fellow who goes away grieving. I have to believe that Jesus prays for him every day after, trusting, even believing that some seed has been planted in his heart, that some nagging faith will bring him back again. To follow in joy. To join the beloved community. To step into the suffering, and side with the poor, and protect the victims of genocide, hatred and war. Because it’s not in Jesus’ DNA to give up. On anyone. And that’s why, all these thousands of years later, we’re still reading this story.
3.
As you probably know, two weeks from Tuesday—with four friends—I’ll go to trial in Dover for a carefully considered act of civil disobedience and protest on Mothers’ Day weekend. We were arrested that day for refusing to leave Congressman Chris Pappas’ office after asking again for a meeting to discuss the Congressman’s support for billions and billions of military aid, the same aid that has fueled Israel’s destruction of Gaza; its bombardment of hospitals, schools, churches and mosques; and its genocidal campaign against Palestinian families there and in the West Bank. We’d sought that meeting for months, and to no avail. So we trained ourselves in nonviolence, Kingian, Gandhian nonviolence, we prepared ourselves for the consequences, and we sat down in the Congressman’s office. And we didn’t leave until police escorted us out (peacefully) at day’s end. We were arraigned in June, and we go to trial on the 29th of this month. Our penalty will undoubtedly be a fine of some sort—depending on the judge and how she sees our case.
To be clear, every one of Congress’ votes over the last year, and every shipment of lethal American technology, deadly American weapons is delivered in direct violation (we believe) of US and international law. Not only is it hideous and wrong to traumatize and slaughter civilians as Israel has for months now; it is an affront to our own commitment to the rule of law and international norms and commitments. As Ta-Nahesi Coates writes in a book that’s just out this month, the planes terrorizing Gaza’s children this year are American planes, and the bombs destroying their schools, homes and hospitals are American bombs. Neither political party seems capable of (or even interested in) calling Israel to account and ending this madness. So isn’t it up to us, people of conscience, practitioners of peace, to speak out and act up?
I want to say this morning that I’ve been moved, and challenged, by lively conversations with many of you around my involvement in that action in May. And what it means not only for me, but for us, for the church. I not only welcome those conversations—I want to insist that they are urgently necessary, faithful to our calling as the church, and essential to our own discernment of the gospel, costly grace, discipleship in our time. We can and we will disagree. We can and we will talk about it. It’s faithful to the great biblical tradition that we argue about things that matter. I believe that.
What I’m learning in all this is that love is costly, and faith requires some kind of risk and some kind of sacrifice on my part. In a lot of ways, today’s story is aimed directly at my heart. Jesus is speaking directly to my spirit. I am so very privileged in so many ways—professionally, clearly, as a clergy person; by virtue of my own upbringing and education, surely; and my American citizenship too. What right do I have to claim powerlessness in the world? What right do I have to insist on my own innocence when illegal wars are waged in my name and with my resources? The genius of grace is often to be found in shedding an old idea about powerlessness and despair, and choosing to risk instead a practice of loving resistance and human compassion.
And I think that’s a good bit of what Jesus is saying to the fellow in today’s story. Yes, there is love and grace and the deepest kind of joy in the universe; but you’ll have to choose that love over and over and over again. Risk embodying that love in hard spaces and difficult moments. Yes, we find meaning in togetherness and abundance in creation and the holy promise of God’s protection. Always and forever. But, again, you’ll have to set aside privilege and power to truly discover what that promise is and how it can change your life. And that’ll be hard.
Obviously, as you know, I have dear, dear friends in Palestine, and in Israel, and these friendships have made a claim on my conscience, a claim on my heart. Ghassan Manasra. Zoughbi Zoughbi. Rami Elhanan. Bassam Aramim. Usama Nicola. Robi Damelin. Omar Barghouti. Over nearly two decades now, their voices, their stories, their suffering in the midst of occupation and conflict, has come to settle heavily in my own soul. When I remember Jesus, as we do at the communion table this morning; when I break the bread to remember him, I am encumbered by their friendship, encumbered by their pain, encumbered by their dreams for peace and coexistence. In remembering them, I am remembering him.
You know, you can come to court with me on the 29th, observe the afternoon’s trial from the gallery. If you do, you should know that my mind, my heart will be fastened to their faces: Ghassan’s, Zoughbi’s, Rami’s, Bassam’s, Usama’s, Robi’s, Omar’s. Nonviolence, at least in my reading of the tradition, has everything to do with solidarity and love; it has everything to do with incarnation and hope. We do it together in accountable communities, as I did with my four friends in May; and we do it for one another. For flesh-and-blood friends, and unseen global siblings, who need us, who rely on us, who call on our courage and resistance.
You see, the incarnation is not exclusive to one people, or to one religion, or to one way of being in the world. Christian faith does not privilege any people over any other people—but instead cherishes the presence of God, the living presence of the divine, in every human life, in every human heart, in every human community. And then, and this is Jesus’ insight: we risk inviting that same spirit of love, that same God, to work through our own choices, our own faith, even our own bodies; to protest, indeed, the violence that dishonors God and disfigures God in war; and to imagine (then) a human community capable of choosing confession and grace, committed to the ways of reconciliation and peace, willing to set aside privilege and even safety to insist that God’s will be done. On earth as it is in heaven.
So again, this morning, as you take the bread in your hand—tiny, fragile and broken as it is—remember Jesus and imagine us as a community gathered very deliberately to embody Jesus’ vision, Jesus’ hope and Jesus’ teaching. Know that in that tiny piece of bread, and the cup of life that soaks it in juice, is God’s promise of peace to you and to all the world. It’s not a promise that saves us from the world, but a promise that free us to love, to cherish, to honor the world. Just as Jesus does. And then take that tiny piece of bread, and eat, and know that the promise is just the beginning.
Amen and Ashe!
As you probably know, two weeks from Tuesday—with four friends—I’ll go to trial in Dover for a carefully considered act of civil disobedience and protest on Mothers’ Day weekend. We were arrested that day for refusing to leave Congressman Chris Pappas’ office after asking again for a meeting to discuss the Congressman’s support for billions and billions of military aid, the same aid that has fueled Israel’s destruction of Gaza; its bombardment of hospitals, schools, churches and mosques; and its genocidal campaign against Palestinian families there and in the West Bank. We’d sought that meeting for months, and to no avail. So we trained ourselves in nonviolence, Kingian, Gandhian nonviolence, we prepared ourselves for the consequences, and we sat down in the Congressman’s office. And we didn’t leave until police escorted us out (peacefully) at day’s end. We were arraigned in June, and we go to trial on the 29th of this month. Our penalty will undoubtedly be a fine of some sort—depending on the judge and how she sees our case.
To be clear, every one of Congress’ votes over the last year, and every shipment of lethal American technology, deadly American weapons is delivered in direct violation (we believe) of US and international law. Not only is it hideous and wrong to traumatize and slaughter civilians as Israel has for months now; it is an affront to our own commitment to the rule of law and international norms and commitments. As Ta-Nahesi Coates writes in a book that’s just out this month, the planes terrorizing Gaza’s children this year are American planes, and the bombs destroying their schools, homes and hospitals are American bombs. Neither political party seems capable of (or even interested in) calling Israel to account and ending this madness. So isn’t it up to us, people of conscience, practitioners of peace, to speak out and act up?
I want to say this morning that I’ve been moved, and challenged, by lively conversations with many of you around my involvement in that action in May. And what it means not only for me, but for us, for the church. I not only welcome those conversations—I want to insist that they are urgently necessary, faithful to our calling as the church, and essential to our own discernment of the gospel, costly grace, discipleship in our time. We can and we will disagree. We can and we will talk about it. It’s faithful to the great biblical tradition that we argue about things that matter. I believe that.
What I’m learning in all this is that love is costly, and faith requires some kind of risk and some kind of sacrifice on my part. In a lot of ways, today’s story is aimed directly at my heart. Jesus is speaking directly to my spirit. I am so very privileged in so many ways—professionally, clearly, as a clergy person; by virtue of my own upbringing and education, surely; and my American citizenship too. What right do I have to claim powerlessness in the world? What right do I have to insist on my own innocence when illegal wars are waged in my name and with my resources? The genius of grace is often to be found in shedding an old idea about powerlessness and despair, and choosing to risk instead a practice of loving resistance and human compassion.
And I think that’s a good bit of what Jesus is saying to the fellow in today’s story. Yes, there is love and grace and the deepest kind of joy in the universe; but you’ll have to choose that love over and over and over again. Risk embodying that love in hard spaces and difficult moments. Yes, we find meaning in togetherness and abundance in creation and the holy promise of God’s protection. Always and forever. But, again, you’ll have to set aside privilege and power to truly discover what that promise is and how it can change your life. And that’ll be hard.
You know, you can come to court with me on the 29th, observe the afternoon’s trial from the gallery. If you do, you should know that my mind, my heart will be fastened to their faces: Ghassan’s, Zoughbi’s, Rami’s, Bassam’s, Usama’s, Robi’s, Omar’s. Nonviolence, at least in my reading of the tradition, has everything to do with solidarity and love; it has everything to do with incarnation and hope. We do it together in accountable communities, as I did with my four friends in May; and we do it for one another. For flesh-and-blood friends, and unseen global siblings, who need us, who rely on us, who call on our courage and resistance.
You see, the incarnation is not exclusive to one people, or to one religion, or to one way of being in the world. Christian faith does not privilege any people over any other people—but instead cherishes the presence of God, the living presence of the divine, in every human life, in every human heart, in every human community. And then, and this is Jesus’ insight: we risk inviting that same spirit of love, that same God, to work through our own choices, our own faith, even our own bodies; to protest, indeed, the violence that dishonors God and disfigures God in war; and to imagine (then) a human community capable of choosing confession and grace, committed to the ways of reconciliation and peace, willing to set aside privilege and even safety to insist that God’s will be done. On earth as it is in heaven.
So again, this morning, as you take the bread in your hand—tiny, fragile and broken as it is—remember Jesus and imagine us as a community gathered very deliberately to embody Jesus’ vision, Jesus’ hope and Jesus’ teaching. Know that in that tiny piece of bread, and the cup of life that soaks it in juice, is God’s promise of peace to you and to all the world. It’s not a promise that saves us from the world, but a promise that free us to love, to cherish, to honor the world. Just as Jesus does. And then take that tiny piece of bread, and eat, and know that the promise is just the beginning.
Amen and Ashe!
