Pentecost 6, Year C

I Kings 19: 15 - 21; Psalm 16; Galatians 5: 1, 13 - 25; Luke 9: 51 - 62

This homily was given by Fr. Gene Tucker at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon, Illinois, on Sunday, June 30, 2013.

"BASIC TRAINING FOR DISCIPLES”

(Homily text:  Luke 9: 51 - 62)
 

Every soldier worth his/her salt goes through basic training.  Basic training is meant to transform the individual from being a civilian into a soldier.  Part of the transformation process involves loosening the ties to home and familiar surroundings that were a part of life before becoming a soldier.

Basic training also gives the new soldier a sense of the army’s mission, and it strives to instill in the new soldier the focus and concentration that will be needed to do whatever mission or task comes along.

In today’s gospel passage, Luke describes Jesus and his band of recruits, the disciples and those who traveled with Him, as they are being formed into a band of soldiers who would eventually come to make up the Lord’s army.

We can look at today’s account as a sort of road march, as Jesus makes His way directly through Samaria on His way to Jerusalem.  Let’s recall that, normally, observant Jews of Jesus’ day wouldn’t go through Samaria at all, but would opt to take a western route along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, or an eastern route through the Jordan River valley, to get from Galilee to the city of Jerusalem.

But Jesus is determined to get to Jerusalem by the shortest and most direct route possible.  Luke’s language conveys the sense of urgency as he says, “When the days drew near for him (Jesus) to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem.”  The Lord is determined to accomplish His mission, which is the encounter with the ruling authorities in Jerusalem, where He will suffer, be rejected by those authorities, die and be raised again on the third day.  His singular focus on that mission demand that those under His authority also engage in a singular focus of their own, in order that the work that the Lord assigns to each one may be accomplished.

To do this, along the way, Jesus begins to make changes in the attitudes of His followers.  Looking at the text, we see three distinct training exercises that He engages in:

·        Lesson One:  People will be treated in an entirely new and different way:  “Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven and consume them?” James and John ask.  As we look at the text, we see that James and John make this comment in response to the lack of hospitality that the Samaritans had shown the group.  If we put ourselves in their shoes, we might imagine that we would react the same way.  That is to say, we might want to repay ill will with ill will, or lack of consideration with anger.  But Jesus rebukes these two disciples, rejecting their idea.  Why might this be so?...I think the answer is that Jesus knows that, eventually, the good news of what God is doing in the person of Jesus Christ will come to the Samaritans, who will receive that good news.  Recall that, in Acts 1:8, the Lord tells the disciples that they “will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” 

·       Lesson Two:  Travel lightly, and be ready to go anywhere:  Unnamed persons approach Jesus as He is making His way southward, and each encounter offers the possibility to see the important values that will be a part of this spiritual army.  A man comes up and says to the Lord, “I will follow you wherever you go,” to which Jesus replies, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.”  The point here is that being a part of the Lord’s army will involve a lot of time sleeping in the field, and moving wherever the mission demands going.

·       Lesson Three:  Ties to family and to home fade into the background:  Two others come forward, each one offering to follow, if only the Lord will allow them to take care of family matters.  The lesson here is that family relationships will fade into the background once one has taken up the oath of enlistment.

It is worth noting that the original disciples, those who would soon become apostles, led just this sort of itinerant life, cutting ties to familiar places and familiar people.  They left, in many cases, the areas where they had grown up and the people they knew and loved.

So the basic training that Jesus conducted on the road to Jerusalem would provide crucial survival lessons for these new soldiers of faith.

In time, however, as St. Paul and others traveled around the known world, establishing communities of faith here and there, it is clear that not everyone engaged in a wandering, itinerant lifestyle.  Established churches were made up of Christians who remained where they had lived.

In time, the local churches became the bases from which to carry out the Lord’s ministry, mission and work.  These bases were meant to equip and train the new Christians who were coming into the Lord’s service, and to sustain and support them as they carried out the business of proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ.

And, if we remember the Lord’s refusal to treat the Samaritans as enemies, we can see that this new force will be constituted for the purpose of spreading the good news that God has loved the world and the people in the world deeply.  This new sort of an army would be dedicated to the task not of destroying others, but to bring life in its fullest and best sense to everyone.

Today, the local church continues to be the forward-operating base from which the good news goes forth.  Its individual members consider their ties to the Lord to be the highest and most important calling, a calling that sheds light on all other callings and relationships.

Like the original disciples and the early Christians, we are called to “travel lightly” and to regard our ties to family and friends in the light of our relationship to Christ.  Only then will we be fit to take up the mission that the Lord has in mind for us.

AMEN.

Pentecost 5, Year C

I Kings 19:1-15; Psalm 42; Galatians 3:23-29; Luke 8:26-39

Given by Fr. Gene R. Tucker at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon, Illinois on Sunday, June 23, 2013.

 

"A STRING OF VICTORIES"

(Homily text:  Luke 8:26-39)
 

I confess to you all that I am a “news junkie”.  Every day, I need to watch or listen to the news casts.  I also read at least two newspapers every day (yes, I realize that is a more and more rare practice among our citizenry these days!).

As I get my daily fill of the news, it amuses me to see the creative ways that writers describe sports events….Consider just a few ways these sportscasters tell us who won and who lost: 

• “The Mt. Vernon Rams defeated the Centralia Orphans last night.”  (OK, that headline is pretty tame, I’ll admit.) 
• “The Washington Redskins ‘KO’d’ the Dallas Cowboys at Redskin Park on Sunday afternoon.” 
• “The Washington Nationals ‘blew out’ the Philadelphia Phillies in an 11 inning game yesterday.” 
• “The Nebraska Cornhuskers ‘annihilated’ the Oklahoma Sooners in Lincoln last Saturday.”          
• "The New York Yankees ‘took total control’ of the Boston Red Sox at Yankee Stadium this afternoon."

(Please notice that I have carefully avoided the use of any imaginary headline involving the St. Louis Cardinals and the Chicago Cubs!)     

In sports, it is all about winning, isn’t it?  Alas, even among young people, the emphasis has shifted from learning good sportsmanship to winning, at all costs.

In our daily life, we are used to winners (and losers).

So it might be refreshing if we were to look at our Lord Jesus Christ, to see the ways in which He was victorious over every challenge, difficulty or obstacle which lay before Him.

These victories constitute a string of victories, whether the challenges fall into such categories as: 

• Accepted social customs and norms,
• Disease,
• Demon possession,
• The false teachings and poor leadership of the priests, the scribes, and the Pharisees, or even
• Death itself.

Just last week, we heard the account of the sinful woman who came to the dinner party that Simon, the Pharisee, had invited Jesus to attend. The unnamed woman was stuck in her social position (that of being a sinner, a person to be avoided at all costs), but Jesus loosed her from the bonds that kept her locked in the unacceptable category of being a sinner, and freed her from her sins, allowing her to regain her rightful place as a forgiven person in society.

Many times, Jesus’ victories make it possible for those who cannot help themselves to be helped….Diseases are cured, the lame walk, the blind see again.

And in today’s gospel reading, a demon-possessed man is freed from the control of the forces of evil.  So complete was this man’s helplessness that he was unable to even ask the Lord for help.

No condition, no challenge overcomes the Lord’s power to gain the upper hand, to secure complete and total victory.

Down through time, the Lord has made the power of His ability to get the victory available to all who come to Him in faith.  We see this in the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, which we are celebrating today…..

St. Paul, writing to the churches in Rome (Romans 6: 3 – 9) describes the process of baptism….summarizing his argument, he says that we are buried with Christ in a death like His.  And if we are buried with Christ in His death, then, St. Paul goes on to say, we shall rise in a resurrection like his to newness of life.

So today, Aaron Matthew Perdue becomes the world’s newest Christian.  As he descends into the waters of baptism, he dies to his old life, and rises to a new life in Christ.  He becomes an heir of all of Jesus’ promises, and especially the promises that carry with them the guarantee that Jesus’ victories are Aaron’s to claim as his very own inheritance.

Thanks be to God!

 

Pentecost 4, Year C

Proper 6:  I Kings 21:1-21; Psalm 32; Galatians 2:15-21; Luke 7:36 – 8:3
Given at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon, Illinois on Sunday, June 16, 2013.

“HOLINESS, SINFULNESS, CONDEMNATION, FORGIVENESS”
(Homily text:  Luke 7:36 – 8:3)

Today’s gospel reading, which recounts for us the occasion when a sinful woman anointed Jesus’ feet during a dinner party which had been given by the Pharisee named Simon, is all about holiness (God’s holiness vs. our conceptions of it), human sinfulness (ours), condemnation (God’s and ours), and forgiveness (God’s).

As we look at the account that Luke provides for us, we might not ask remember to ask ourselves just how it was that this woman had access to Jesus’ feet.  (I can’t resist saying, in connection with this aspect of the incident, that oftentimes when we read Holy Scripture, details that might startle us if we were to witness them in person sometimes “flatten out” when we focus on the text alone.)  If we imagine the scene in our minds, and roll the imaginary tape of the event across the eyes of our minds, we can see the scene pretty clearly.

Taken that way, the woman’s actions seem bizarre, don’t they?

Indeed, in our culture, and in the culture of the Jews of Jesus’ day, the woman’s actions were not only bizarre, but socially unacceptable.  Her actions were nothing short of scandalous.

Since the two cultures (ours and theirs) are different in this respect, we ought to unpack the social customs a bit.

First of all, when a prominent member of the community threw a dinner party, it was customary for people in town to “crash the party” by standing around the diners, either outside in the courtyard, or inside the room where the meal took place.  Being present allowed these gate-crashers (in actuality, they weren’t regarded that way in the customs of the time…these observers were quite welcome to be present) to observe the diners, to listen to the conversation among the diners, and to hear the riddles that were posed, one person to another, as Jesus did with the riddle of the two debtors.

Secondly, the diners reclined on pillows, on their left sides, and ate with their right hands.  Their feet would have extended outward from the area where the food was served.[1]  Since it was also customary for people to remove their sandals when they entered the house, it was easy for the woman to gain access to Jesus’ feet.

Now, we must note the ways in which the woman’s actions were regarded in the first century…..two aspects of her behavior would have caused great distress:  By letting down her hair in public, she was bringing shame to herself and to her heritage.  A woman didn’t uncover her head in public, period.  Then, by touching, caressing and bathing Jesus’ feet with her tears, she is acting in a way that would have been interpreted with sexual overtones.[2]  So, her actions on these two points constitute an affront to her, to the person who is the receiver of the actions, and to all present who witnessed them.

And, we must note, Jesus becomes ritually unclean by virtue of having come into contact with this sinful person.  (Remember that, in the Jewish culture of the time, in order to remain ritually clean, a person stayed away from all contact with persons and things that were unclean.)

At this point, we ought to turn to Jesus’ host, Simon, and his apparent disdain for the Lord. 

Notice, first of all, that Simon privately assesses Jesus’ character and capabilities as a prophet by thinking that, if Jesus only knew the lifestyle of the woman, he would not allow her to get anywhere near Him.

Secondly, as Jesus delivers His “slam dunk” response to Simon by contrasting the woman’s actions with Simon’s lack of hospitality (showing proper hospitality was a major concern of the culture of the first century), we can see that Simon had little regard for Jesus.  Moreover, Jesus destroys Simon’s ideas about His true identity by disclosing to him the fact that Jesus knew exactly what Simon had been thinking privately.  So not one, but two “put-downs” are present in Jesus’ response to His host.

The two main persons in this account stand before us as stark examples of human attitudes toward sin, holiness, condemnation and forgiveness.

Simon, the Pharisee, is all about being ritually clean, and about following God’s laws (the Torah) down to the last little detail.  He is also all about looking down on persons who don’t measure up to his ideas of what cleanliness and adherence to the law are.  It is easy to suspect that Simon probably thought that he was a pretty successful, self-made man, religiously.  The prevailing view that the four Gospels present to us of the Pharisees and their allies is that unclean persons will always be unclean.  By this view, unclean and sinful persons could never be regarded in any other way, no matter what steps to amend their lives were taken, no matter what actions were taken with regard to the requirements of the Torah to come into an acceptable state with God.  The view given to us by the Gospel writers of these Pharisees is one of total and complete hard-heartedness.

The unnamed, sinful woman has little to lose, religiously, and much to gain.  She’s already an outsider, a person to be avoided, a person to be scorned.  No wonder she risked further scorn and disdain by taking the actions that she did….she had little to lose.

Each week, we ask ourselves the question, “What does this reading have to do with my life and how I live it?”  After all, Holy Scripture doesn’t stand in isolation from the concerns and challenges of living in the day and time and place that we do.  Put another way, what happens in Church on Sunday morning is intended to make a difference in our conduct and attitudes, Sunday through Saturday.

So what lessons arise from today’s Gospel?

Perhaps the most obvious answer to this question is the possibility that Simon’s attitudes about holiness, sinfulness, condemnation and forgiveness are much more prevalent among God’s people than are the attitudes of the penitent woman.

This observation might deserve a bit of unpacking.

As human beings who are created in the image and likeness of God (see Genesis 1: 26), we are blessed with “reason, memory and skill” (as the Prayer Book puts it).  We have capabilities to think, to observe, to apply lessons learned in life to the living of that life, and to create.  All of these gifts are wonderful, God-given blessings, given to each one of us.

It’s tempting, therefore, to think that, because we can imagine, think and create, that we can bring ourselves into favor with God by our own actions.  “Pulling ourselves up by our own spiritual bootstraps” might be a good way to frame this attitude.

And, like Simon the Pharisee, we might direct our focus away from God’s concepts of holiness, sinfulness, condemnation and forgiveness toward our own conceptions of those values. 

We might imagine that, because we go through all the right motions, and do all the right ceremonies, that we have earned God’s favor.  Remember that doing the right “stuff” was the main focus of the Pharisees of Jesus’ day.  (I can’t resist adding that, for Christian who worship using liturgical forms, it can be a temptation to think that participation in the liturgy itself earns spiritual merit….of course, the truth is that the liturgy rightly serves the purpose of pointing beyond itself to the God who stands within it.)

Alas, for the Christian community, notions like these have presented challenges before…in the fourth and fifth centuries, the Pelagian heresy confronted the Church as its followers maintained that they had no need of God’s grace in order to receive God’s favor.  Pelagians thought of themselves as self-made Christians.  The Church rightly condemned those ideas.

However, if we set aside our human ideas and notions of what holiness and sinfulness are, then we can see that, from God’s perspective, we are – none of us – holy.  There is nothing we can do – except to ask for God’s forgiveness – to become righteous in God’s sight, and to receive that forgiveness.  For the truth is that, even our pride in our own accomplishments constitutes sin and creates a barrier to God’s mercy and grace.

May we see ourselves as God sees us, as persons who fall short of God’s standards of holiness in thought, in word, and in deed.  May we, like the anonymous woman in today’s Gospel account, seek forgiveness, setting aside our pride and our concern for what others might think as we do so.

AMEN.

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[1]   So the famous painting of the Last Supper is culturally incorrect.  Most likely, at that Last Supper, Jesus and His disciples would have reclined in a similar fashion, much as Luke describes in today’s Gospel account.

[2]   Because the woman’s actions had sexual connotations, she is often characterized as being a prostitute.  The text does not explicitly name the nature of her sins, however.

Pentecost 2, Year C

I Kings 18:20-29; Psalm 96; Galatians 1:1-12; Luke 7:1-10
A homily by Fr. Gene Tucker, given at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon, Illinois on Sunday, June 2, 2013.

“DOING OUR PART:  HAVING FAITH”

(Homily text:  Luke 7:1-10)

“…The prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up.” (James 5:15)

This short verse, lifted from the Letter of James, summarizes the account of the centurion’s faith in the Lord’s power to heal his servant.  The centurion shows steadfast faith, and the assurance that the Lord can do what he has asked.  The healing of his servant is the result.

Before we draw some conclusions for our own faith walk with God, let’s take a closer look at Luke’s account of the healing of the centurion’s servant.  Many fascinating details lie just under the surface.

First of all, we note that the setting for the incident before us is Capernahum.  Capernahum is on the northern coast of the Sea of Galilee.  After Jesus left his home in Nazareth, we are told that He made His home there.

Now, we come to the centurion.  A centurion, in the Roman army, was in charge of a hundred soldiers (hence the name for his rank and office).  We notice that this centurion is no typical soldier, for we discover that he is a lover of God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of Moses.  (We might call him a “God-fearer”, one of that class of persons who were Gentiles, but who had come to believe in the God of the Bible….we spoke about another “God-fearer” a few weeks ago, Lydia, the dealer in purple goods.[1]) This centurion has built a synagogue for Jewish worship.[2]  Moreover, this centurion seems to be aware of Jewish customs regarding associations with Gentiles, for as Jesus makes His way to the centurion’s home, the centurion sends some of his friends to Jesus, saying that he is not worthy that the Lord should come into his home (for that would lead to a condition of ritual defilement, for a Jew to be in a Gentile’s home).

The centurion’s high regard for God, for Jewish customs, and his respect for Jesus, all make for an unusual combination of attributes in a soldier who is also a Gentile.

The centurion’s actions stand in sharp contrast to the attitudes and actions of the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem and elsewhere.  Already, the scribes and the Pharisees are building their opposition to Jesus and to His ministry.  These authority figures regard Jesus with disdain and with suspicion.  Over time, their opposition and disdain will continue to build, leading eventually to the plot to kill Him. 

So it is worth noting that it is the outsider, the Gentile who was, perhaps, part of the Roman occupation army, who shows respect for the Lord and faith in the Lord’s ability to heal, qualities that many of the Jewish authorities lacked.

“Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof.  Therefore I did not presume to come to you.  But say the word, and let my servant be healed.”  (Luke 7:6b –7).  These are the words of the centurion, they are filled with respect and deference to Jesus, and a sure faith in Jesus’ power.

What is at work in this incident is the Lord’s power to heal.  The prayer of a believer for healing, which is supported by faith, is also at work.

Holy Scripture records many instances where a person’s faith was an essential ingredient in bringing healing and change.  “Go your way, your faith has made you well,” the Lord said to the woman who had had an issue of blood for twelve years. (Luke 8:48)

There is a mystery at work here, as these three ingredients come together:

·        God’s power to heal,

·        our faith in His ability to heal,

·        and our prayer to ask for healing.

Exactly how is it that the prayers of faithful people, offered in assurance of God’s ability to grant our request, makes it possible for the request to be granted?  Where does our limited human ability intersect with God’s power to bring about healing, to bring about changes in our situations or circumstances?

We can’t answer the question with precision.  As with all mysteries, especially those which involve God’s power and presence, we cannot know exactly how it all works.  But we do know that the prayers of faithful believers are part of the process of bringing healing and change. 

God’s granting of our requests is entirely dependent on the Lord’s divine will.  In all things, we know that God will answer our requests, one way or another, according to His will.  In all things, we can be sure that His will is best for us, even if, in the immediate circumstances, it may not seem to be best.

May we have the faith of the centurion, knowing that the Lord’s power and authority can accomplish more than we can ask or imagine.

AMEN.

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[1]   See Acts 16:11 – 15.

[2]   If the synagogue was located in Capernahum, some of its foundations can still be seen in a lower part of the synagogue that has been partially restored that was build sometime later on.