17th Sunday after Pentecost
Grace be to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Jesus is leading his disciples across Galilee and back to Capernaum. On the way, the disciples get into a discussion. Once they arrive at the house, Jesus asks them: “What were you guys arguing about?”
It reminds me of many a car ride when my children were young. I would be driving the family minivan, while the three kids would be having a lively discussion in the back. When we got home, I would ask them: “What were you discussing?’
“Nothing!” was the usual response. They felt too embarrassed to tell me the topic of their conversation.
Likewise, the disciples do not want to tell Jesus. They remain silent. Jesus asks them, “What were you arguing about along the way?” and they don’t say a word. I picture them looking at their feet or their fingernails or the sky, anywhere but at Jesus.
They don’t want to admit that they had been talking about who is the greatest. Right after Jesus told them again that he would be betrayed and killed, they wonder who is the greatest. Right after Jesus reveals how vulnerable he will become, they debate positions of greatness.
The disciples live in and are shaped by a culture where status is everything. Where you are on society’s totem pole determines the kind of life you can lead. Everyone is constantly trying to advance their own standing. That breeds a competitive spirit. One is always comparing one’s own standing with that of someone else.
Don’t we do the same thing? Our lives are terribly competitive. Sports, politics, college admissions, housing market, beauty pageants – wherever you look in life, we compete with one another.
The church is not immune from this. Last Sunday I attended the installation service of the new senior Pastor of Christ Lutheran Church at Baltimore’s Inner Harbor. That church is absolutely gorgeous, built in the style of a British cathedral. Beautiful stained glass casts colored light on a long chancel area with wood-carved choir benches on either side and a high altar with precious paraments.
For the installation, the congregation had pulled out all the stops: brass quintet, vocal soloists, choir in festive robes, gospel procession with torches, big floral bouquets, and a bulletin that looked like it was professionally printed. It was amazing!
As I was lining up with fellow pastors for the procession, I remarked on all that. And then I said, “Show-offs!” I said it as a joke, but if I am honest there was a bit of envy in it, as well.
That morning Zion, our church in Baltimore less than two miles from Christ Lutheran Church, had held two worship services, one with 12 and one with 15 people in attendance. Now here was a sanctuary as packed as COVID would allow. I was wistful, jealous.
That jealousy is born out of our tendency to measure greatness in numbers. Bigger is better, so we are taught. And it is easy to buy into that way of thinking. As James warns us in our reading today, that kind of envy and craving leads to conflict and disputes. It also leads to fear.
The disciples are afraid. Jesus is telling them that he will be killed soon. What is that going to mean for them? What will their future be like? When will this happen? How will they survive? How will they go on? Jesus’ announcement causes them anxiety about an uncertain future.
That is something we can definitely relate to. Anxiety about an uncertain future has been our state of being for 18 months. Even before the pandemic we had a lot to worry about, what with political tension and racial unrest and the global climate crisis causing ever more extreme weather events. COVID then notched that anxiety up to new levels.
When we here at Calvary were finally able to gather for worship again, we had hoped people would joyfully be streaming back into our pews. When we held our Sunday school kick-off last week, we expected to see oodles of kids we had not seen in a while. When we put out the appeal, we thought all our old volunteers would step up to support our ministries again, plus a few new ones who realized during the shut-down just how important the church community is to them.
Alas, none of that happened. Our worship attendance is half of what it was before COVID. Few of our children came to Sunday school. Our volunteers are exhausted because too few of them carry too much of a load.
Fear is beginning to set in among our people: fear for the future of our beloved congregation; fear that we might not be able to continue our cherished ministry to this community; fear that it won’t ever be like it was before COVID.
We are worried about the future, just like the disciples. We are worried because we compare who is coming to church now with who was coming before. We are comparing our numbers with the numbers of the church down the street which has food trucks to feed the crowd after worship. We look at the numbers and we don’t look great at all, and we are scared.
In their fear about their future, the disciples wonder who is greatest. Jesus addresses both of their fear and their question about greatness with an object lesson: He takes a little child and places it in their midst and hugs it. Then he says to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”
To grasp the full meaning of Jesus’ lesson, we need to understand that people back then did not share our modern-day attitude towards children. Little children like the one Jesus is hugging were a burden on their families because they used up family resources but couldn’t contribute anything yet. Children had no rights, no self-determination, no standing in society at all.
Welcome such a child, Jesus says. Welcome such people from the margins of society. Welcome such a person who cannot contribute anything back to the community. Welcome someone like that and you welcome me. Welcome someone like that and you welcome God into your midst.
In the midst of fear and anxiety and uncertainty, Jesus says: focus on one thing. Serve one person, one cause, one ministry. Forget about numbers, forget about being great, and just focus on this one service you can give. And you will encounter God there.
This is a lot like what Jesus says in Matthew’s gospel: What you have done to one of the least of these, you have done to me.
In Jesus, God became incarnate, became a human being. In the human beings God sends into our lives, we still encounter Jesus, we still sense the presence of God, we are still blessed with moments when the Holy Spirit showers us with peace beyond human understanding.
James writes today: “Draw near to God and God will draw near to you.” One way we draw near to God is by serving God’s people, especially people in need, people on the margins.
One pastor told me of his ministry among the homeless. It is not an easy calling, for sure. But it does offer him glimpses of God’s nearness again and again. Like the day after a fire in the neighborhood had destroyed an apartment building and displaced several families. One of the homeless men came to the pastor and gave him $2.83 for those families. It was probably all the cash he had. God was near in that moment.
This past Tuesday we held a memorial service for a woman named Patty. Patty had developmental issues, and she had no family. Her caretaker brought her here to every Top of the Hill luncheon, to every mother-daughter-banquet, to every Christmas market. Patty loved it here and was welcomed here and cheered us all with her indefatigable joy. In August she died. On Tuesday, we laid her to rest in our memorial garden, and over 20 people came to pray for her and cry and comfort one another. It was a beautiful, uplifting moment that brought God near. We had welcomed a child of God from the margins of society, and as a result we felt the power and love of God sustain us.
Professor Karoline Lewis points out that in the Gospel according to Mark, the keyword describing discipleship is not ‘believing’, but ‘following’. We see that in today’s story. That day, the disciples struggled with believing. They were filled with anxiety and fear; they were worrying about being great; they were too ashamed to tell Jesus what they had been talking about. They were not exactly filled with faith.
But the followed. They followed Jesus to Capernaum; they came when Jesus called them into the house to listen to him some more; they will continue to follow Jesus, all the way to Jerusalem and beyond. Often they are afraid; often they are confused; often they are clueless; but they keep following. And because of their faithful following, they will see Jesus rise and the church emerge and the gospel spread.
There are days when our faith and hope are on low tide. Worry about our numbers, about our future, about our beloved faith community dampen our assurance. My hope is that we keep following Jesus anyway. That we keep showing up when Jesus calls us. That we keep serving the people on the margins. That we take advantage of the LEAD passions exercise and the Small Bites groups to grow in understanding and fellowship. That we take up the discipleship challenges to learn how to incorporate faith into our daily lives.
That in our welcoming, our inviting, our serving we draw near to God so God will draw near to us and sustain us during these challenging times. Amen.