3rd Sunday after Pentecost
This past week at the Monday morning Bible study, one of the participants brought up an article that she had read in the Washington Post. It was titled “The happiest, least stressful, most meaningful jobs in America”. It turns out that “[Agriculture], logging and forestry have the highest levels of self-reported happiness — and lowest levels of self-reported stress — of any major industry category, according to our analysis of thousands of time journals from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ American Time Use Survey.”
Now, of course, you didn’t come here today to hear about the happiness of Lumberjacks or the joy of logging, so why do I bother bringing this up? I bring it up because of something that comes up a little later in the article. According to the survey, “The most meaningful and happiness-inducing activities were religious and spiritual”. A little bit later on the author, Andrew Van Dam, writes:
“Like farming, recreation ranks high on both happiness and pain. And the two activities have one obvious thing in common: They take place outside. Preferably in nature. The slight pain is a sign of demanding physical exertion, and the price of getting outdoors.
With that in mind, we ran the numbers again, this time for the location of each activity. We found that while your workplace looms as the single most stressful place in the universe, the great outdoors ranks in the top three for both happiness and meaning — only your place of worship consistently rates higher.”
In fact, if you look at the actual chart, your place of worship as a place of happiness and meaning not only comes out higher than the outdoors, it actually occupies the number one spot.
The opening to Matthew’s account of the story of Jesus and his calling his first disciples is really a tale, not of two cities, but of two kingdoms. It demonstrates for us the call for loyalty and allegiance that are required to be part of the Kingdom of Heaven. The problem, of course, is that imperial Rome already lays claim to the lives, the labor, and the land of the people of Israel.
Matthew 4:12-13 reports that “Jesus heard that John [the Baptist] had been arrested.” So it would seem that John’s arrest is the catalyst for Jesus’ ministry, which spurs Jesus to move from Nazareth to “Capernaum, by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Napthtali.” Matthew underscores the occupation of the land by Gentiles by quoting Isaiah 9:1-2: “Land of Zebulun, land of Naphtali, on the road by these, across the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles—the people who have sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for this who sat in the region and shadow of death light has dawned.” After Jesus moves to Capernaum in “Galilee of the Gentiles,” he begins preaching repentance because the “kingdom of heaven has come near”. This theme gets fleshed out quite literally in the person of Jesus in the rest of the Gospel. For Matthew, there seems to be a connection between this vision of a restored Israel and repentance. Repentance is a prophetic call to return to God and follow God’s law.
Jesus encourages repentance because “the kingdom of heaven has come near.” By “has come near” Jesus could be referring to a shift in time. That is, God’s rule is near in that it will soon begin so people should prepare themselves. My personal understanding is that Jesus understood himself to be the embodiment of God’s kingdom, thus the nearness is found in proximity to Jesus. Either way, Jesus’ message is clear: God is acting in the world.
The language of “kingdom” puts God’s rule in direct opposition to Rome’s rule. So, repentance becomes more than just changing our ways. It’s also a call to choose one’s allegiances. The very thing that the two sets of brothers are asked to do when Jesus calls them in 4:18-22. When Jesus first sees the brothers Andrew and Simon Peter, they are fishing on the sea of Galilee. He says to them “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people” (4:19). He then sees two more brothers, James and John, in their boat with Zebedee, their father. They are mending their nets. Matthew 4:21 simply says “and he called them.” These brothers also immediately follow Jesus.
So, how is this choosing an allegiance? Dr. Warren Carter, Professor of New Testament at Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth, notes that these sets of brothers were likely under contract with the Roman Empire. “As brothers, and possibly members of a cooperative with James and John (4:21), they have purchased a lease or contract with Rome’s agents that allows them to fish and obligates them to supply a certain quality of fish.”1 Their actions in following Jesus were a disruption to the Roman system. It was a personal challenge on their part, to Roman power. By choosing Jesus, the brothers choose God’s rule over Rome. They choose God’s promise of abundant life over Rome’s policy of exploitation. They choose to join Jesus’ ministry in the Promised Land rather than to align themselves with the interests of the occupiers. Rome wanted the men to catch fish to advance their imperialist expansion. Jesus wants them to catch people for God’s rule, which as Jesus will demonstrate throughout the rest of the Gospel, is a rule of mercy and justice and plenty.
We think that we are far-removed from the situation of first century Palestine, but there are still many parallels. We live in a culture that preys upon our anxieties, our fears, and our uncertainties.
Our consumer culture relies upon and reinforces the perception that we, in and of ourselves, are never pretty enough, never handsome enough, never thin enough, never fit enough, never successful enough, never rich enough. In short just plain never good enough.
Our political culture continues to sew division and rancor between us: regardless of which party is speaking, it’s always the other party that doesn’t care about you, it’s the other party that’s in thrall to corporate interests, it’s the other party that doesn’t represent the real America. In short, there’s an entire half of this country that you can’t trust.
Our news culture constantly panders to the lowest, most lurid common denominator. The old adage is that if it bleeds it leads. As a result, we have members of Zion, for example, who are afraid to come to church on Sunday mornings. We have people from Calvary who are extremely hesitant to go to downtown Baltimore. After all, we all know how violent that city is. The news tells us that constantly. What the news doesn’t tell us is that the murder rate is the lowest it’s been in three years.
I still remember a story that Anke told me several years ago about one of the confirmation classes she was teaching. The young people were asked what they liked about Calvary. And one young woman responded, “It’s a safe place, where I can be myself.” This is a safe, sacred space. It’s reflected in our mission statement: As followers of Jesus, we are called to be an inclusive and compassionate community, where everyone is connected in relationship with God and each other to foster wholeness of mind and soul.
Do we even realize what we have to offer here? Do we understand the true depth of the need for, and therefore the incalculable value of what happens here?
“1There will be no gloom for those who were in anguish. In the former time [the Lord] brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he will make glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.
2The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
on them light has shined. …
4For the yoke of their burden,
and the bar across their shoulders,
the rod of their oppressor,
you have broken as on the day of Midian.”
The most valuable things we have to offer here are hope, imagination, and happiness. The anxiety and fear that possess us would have us believe that happiness, hope, and imagination are nothing; that they’re powerless; impotent in the face of fear and death.
So, we need to ask ourselves: “Why would God speak these words to a people whose land has been destroyed and occupied?” We need to ask ourselves: “Why would Jesus, ushering in the Empire of Grace, use these same words?” Isaiah and Jesus recognize the power of hope and imagination to bring comfort to those who are suffering, and to effect real and lasting change in the lives of people and the world.
The promise of deliverance is a tremendous source of hope! The hope for deliverance, evoked by powerful images, shapes people’s minds and hearts.
“1There will be no gloom for those who were in anguish. In the former time [the Lord] brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he will make glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.
2The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
on them light has shined. …”
Breaking into a time held captive by fear, these images capture our imagination. They help us to look up from our current circumstances and imagine that a world of peace, justice, and mutual love is, indeed, possible!
Without imagination; a vision of what life could and should be; we remain trapped in darkness. As children of God, we’re called proclaim visions of light shining in darkness, of joy even in times of sorrow, of compassion and love in a time when hatred and distrust reign supreme.
We might wonder what we’re doing here, because it’s so easy to be overwhelmed by the world. Isn’t it easier to hunker down and hope that we come out unscathed? Is that any way to live? Is that how you want to live? Is that how God wants us to live?
When Jesus went to Capernaum, he went to declare a new Empire! It’s God’s way of saying that it may look like Rome is in control, but you know the truth, and you must be the truth.
What does Jesus need us to be? A safe place. A place of healing. A place of peace. A place of reconciliation. A place of imagination and hope. A place that brings happiness to our lives and the lives of others, more effectively than any other place.
It doesn’t matter if the empire holding sway over us is the empire of Rome, our consumer culture, our political culture, or our news culture. If we allow any empire other than God’s to lay claim to us, we need to take hold of the promise of Christ and make it a reality in our lives.
We need to grab hold of the hope, the imagination, and the happiness offered by the promise of resurrection and allow them to shape and mold us. That takes courage. It takes strength. It takes fearlessness.
But that’s ok. Because in Christ, we have our courage. In Christ, we have our strength. In Christ, we can be fearless!
AMEN
1. Carter, Warren. Matthew and the Margins: A Sociopolitical and Religious Reading. Orbis Books: Maryknoll, NY (2000), 121.