The Waking Dreamer: 2021

Monday, December 20, 2021

Just As He Promised

Luke 1:39-55[1]

I think it’s safe to say that we all know what it’s like to feel “lowly” at times. In our culture, we’ve been taught to view ourselves as unique, one-of-a-kind, and special. And that’s true. God created only one of you, and he did so for a purpose. We all have something important to do in this life. Unfortunately, we may never know just what that is! The “daily grind” of our lives can easily overshadow all of that and leave us feeling very “ordinary.” Some of us may even wrestle with feeling like we’re worthless. Life has a way of obscuring just how important each and every one of us is to God and to one another. We can all feel pretty “lowly” at times.

Many of us begin life with “big dreams” about what we will do and be in this world. One of the tasks life confronts all of us with sooner or later is accepting that we may never see all of those dreams realized. We have to come to terms with the hard truth that at some point it is in our best interest to let go those youthful dreams. That doesn’t mean that we have to “settle” for a life that is “less than.” It means accepting the life we have, in all of it’s apparent “commonness,” while at the same time recognizing that we remain uniquely important. Although our lives may feel very ordinary to us, we can embrace the routine and commonplace in the assurance that God did indeed create each of us uniquely, and that we all have something important to do in this life.

Our Gospel lesson for today reminds me of this challenge. Mary, who was a peasant girl from a small backwater town in the middle of nowhere, finds herself in the position of being chosen by God to do something I think we would all agree was important: she would give birth to the boy who would grow up to be the man who would fulfill God’s promises to her people, along with all the peoples of the world! More than that, Mary’s pregnancy put her in a dangerous situation. She could have easily been suspected of doing something that the people of her village would have considered offensive enough to have her stoned to death!

And so it is that Mary calls herself God’s “lowly servant girl” (Lk 1:48, NLT). I’m sure she knew what it was to feel “lowly” simply because of her status in life: she was a young woman in a world where women had no rights. She was one of the common people, with no power or position in Jewish society. Even at a young age, I have to think she may have questioned what the meaning of her life might be. She had good reason to be “confused” and even afraid when the angel Gabriel told her about the special task God had chosen her to carry out. Despite her fear and confusion, she had the faith in response to Gabriel’s assurance that “no word from God will ever fail,” to answer “I am the Lord’s servant; May your word to me be fulfilled” (Lk 1:37-38, NIV).

And so when Mary visited Elizabeth, she blessed Mary because of her faith “that the Lord would do what he said” (Lk 1:45, NLT). Elizabeth had a much different position in Jewish society as the wife of the priest Zechariah. But as a woman who had passed the age of childbearing without having any children, she lived with a unique kind of shame herself. Although it was unfair, the “blame” for not bearing children was heaped on the women of that day. And yet, there she was, filled with joy over her own child, and not only recognizing Mary’s great faith, but blessing her for it. I think Elizabeth’s affirmation was probably just what Mary needed!

And so Luke tells us that Mary burst into a song of praise to God. She praised God for being merciful “from generation to generation,” in other words, always and forever (Lk 1:50). She praised God for “lifting up the lowly” and “filling the hungry with good things” (Lk 1:52-53). She was not only thinking about the wonderful thing God was doing through her, but also the joy that had surprised Elizabeth as well. There they were, two women whom many in that day would have looked down on as “unworthy,” celebrating the goodness and mercy that God had shown them.

But more than that, Mary had the faith and insight to recognize that what was happening through her was meant to benefit her people, and also all the peoples of the world. She said that what was happening was a matter of God keeping the promise he made to Abraham. You may recall that promise: God would give to Abraham and Sarah so many descendants that they would become a great nation (Gen 12:2). And the purpose of all of that would be that “in you all the families of the earth will be blessed” (Gen 12:3). St. Paul saw that as a promise of salvation for all people (Gal 3:6-9). And Mary’s song celebrated the faith that God was doing just as he promised in and through her.

I think our Gospel lesson is a good reminder that God delights in accomplishing his work through the most unlikely people. It’s hard to imagine anyone being more “lowly” than Mary was. She had no rights, she had no power or position or privilege. But God had chosen her to bear a son who would bring salvation to all people, just as he promised. I think there’s a lesson in this story for all of us. No matter how “lowly” or “ordinary” we may feel, God has put each one of us in this life for a reason. As one Presbyterian pastor put it, “God has something he wants to do through you, right where you are.”[2] When we feel “ordinary” and wonder what our lives are worth, we can remember that God does his best work through “ordinary” people like us. And he will use each and every one of us complete the work of bringing salvation to the world, just as he promised

[2] Adapted from Rev. Richard Halverson’s benediction.

Monday, December 06, 2021

The Way of Peace

Luke 1:67-80; 3:1-6[1]

This is the season when we look forward to “peace on earth.” But peace doesn’t come easily, and when it does, it can be fragile. If the price of freedom is eternal vigilance, then the price of peace is eternal sacrifice. There is a cost to peace, and that cost is our pride. In order to maintain peace, we have to be willing to humble ourselves. We have to be willing to admit that we may be wrong. We have to be willing to recognize that whatever resentment we’re holding may be a direct result of what we’re thinking or doing. Peace doesn’t come easily, and when it does, it takes work to maintain it.

Throughout history, “God’s people” have looked to God to make things right, to establish his peace and justice, and to bless them with salvation. But time and time again, God’s answer to his own people has been “the way of peace they do not know” (Is. 59:8). Even those of us who make it our intention to learn God’s ways, to follow God’s will, and to serve God’s purpose in this world find ourselves struggling with peace. We take things personally that we have no business doing. We get our feelings hurt when someone makes a comment or does something that we take the wrong way. If we are going to live our lives in “the way of peace” it means we constantly keep learning what it means to choose peace over bitterness.

According to Zechariah, that was precisely the role John the Baptist would fulfill: he would guide people back to the way of peace. Zechariah was a man who was looking for the fulfillment of God’s promise. He lived his life in faith and hope—faith in the promises made to the ancestors and hope that God would be faithful to fulfill them. And when his son was born and his tongue was loosed, Zechariah sang a song of praise to God for fulfilling those promises. The specific way in which Zachariah saw this promise fulfilled was in the birth of his son John as a messenger to “prepare the way for the Lord.”

By fulfilling the promise to give him a son, Zechariah saw God as fulfilling the promise to redeem Israel. He calls it “the oath that God swore to our ancestor Abraham” (Lk 1:73). As you may remember that oath included blessing “all the families of the earth” (Gen 12:3). In Zechariah’s song, he foresaw John serving as the messenger of the coming Lord by bringing the people “knowledge of salvation … by the forgiveness of their sins” (Lk. 1:77). He would effect “the dawn from on high” through the “tender mercy of our God” that would bring light to those who are in darkness as well as “straightening their feet” into the way of peace (Lk. 1:78-79).

John’s mission was to prepare a people for the Lord to come and bring peace to them. His “preparation” for them was to call them to repentance. Luke’s Gospel tells us elsewhere that when John saw the crowds coming to be baptized by him, he turned them away, calling them a “brood of vipers” (Luke 3:7)! In order for them to experience the salvation of the Lord they would have to “Bear fruits worthy of repentance” (Lk. 3:8). In the words Luke quotes from the prophet Isaiah in our gospel lesson, for the people to experience God’s salvation, that which was crooked must first be made straight (Lk 3:5-6).

John was reminding them and us that repentance is more than just feeling sad or sorry for the fact that we may have done something we regret. Real, heartfelt, life-changing repentance is like trying to break a bad habit. As we all know, that rarely happens overnight. In some cases, it takes months and years of concerted effort to change our behaviors. What makes repentance so hard for us is that we have to take a hard look at ourselves: our self-indulgence, our need to control others, and our tendency to harbor bitterness and resentment.

But the “way of peace” goes further than just recognizing our shortcomings. It takes us to the point of being willing to do something about them. We have to choose to change in order to return to the way of peace. And then, in order to preserve peace, we have to put forth the effort—sometimes again and again—to maintain peace. The “way of peace” is not an easy road! It’s a hard road that takes humility, the will to change, and the strength to continue to make the necessary sacrifices. But if we would live in the “way of peace,” that’s where we start.

The way of peace is especially hard this year because so many of us are filled with fear and even anger over all the tumult and uncertainty going on. But the way of peace is a way of bearing the burdens of others rather than throwing stones. The way of peace calls us to stand for God’s justice against all the wrongs in this world. There are times when that means calling out those who are taking advantage of others, as John the Baptist did. There are other times when that means being willing to yield even when we know we’re right, as Jesus did. The thing about both of these paths to peace is that it cost John and Jesus their lives. That’s the sacrifice it takes to follow the “way of peace”: being willing to give up our lives for others.

During Advent, we look forward to the day when “all flesh shall see the salvation of God” (Lk 3:6), the new life promised to all. We look for the promise that “the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together” (Isa 40:5). As we trust in those promises and continue to hope that God will be faithful to fulfill them, our faith and hope lead us to repentance. As the prophet said so long ago, we must “make straight” all that is not right in our lives and in our world in order to live in the “way of peace.” That way is a hard one, because the price of peace is the willingness to sacrifice ourselves for others. But that hard “way of peace” leads us to life.

[1] © Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, Ph. D. on 12/5/2021 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

Monday, November 29, 2021

Freedom is Near!

Luke 21:25-36[1]

It doesn’t take any great insight to observe that we are living in a time when things are not as we expected them to be. While some scientists warned us that a global pandemic was on the horizon, most of us didn’t pay much attention. I surely didn’t! The problem is that when life doesn’t go the way we expect, it can feel like chaos. There are a few personality types who actually thrive on chaos, but for most of us it causes stress and fear. And some of us may find ourselves “shutting down,” so to speak. We may find it difficult to keep doing our normal everyday tasks. Trying to get through the day may feel like we’re wading hip-deep in molasses!

There are a lot of reasons why different people react to uncertainty in different ways. But there are some things that are true for all of us. For one thing, our brains are hard-wired to respond to anything we perceive to be a threat. Fear can creep up on us when we least expect it, and once it gets hold of us, we can have a hard time thinking straight—literally! Another factor is that most of us have a lot of expectations about the way life is “supposed” to be. They can be so deeply ingrained in us that they become like “scripts” for life. And when life doesn’t “follow the script,” our expectations can be like chains that bind us. Unfortunately, I’d have to say that these uncertain days have revealed that we are all less “free” than we would like to think.

Jesus addressed the uncertainty of his times in our Gospel lesson for today. As we’ve mentioned before, the situation in Judea was unstable and even chaotic. Although the Romans appeared to be firmly in control, there was a constant undercurrent of resentment and even rebellion among the Jewish people. There actually was an underground group who made it their goal to assassinate Romans and Jewish leaders who were perceived to be traitors to their people. All of this would boil over into an all-out war within a few decades, and the result would be Jerusalem destroyed. Eventually, the Jewish people would be expelled from their land and prohibited from living there.

I think Jesus’ disciples must have been aware of what was going on. While they may have hoped that Jesus might be the one to lead them to overthrow their Roman oppressors, the fact that they couldn’t predict the outcome of any of this led them to ask Jesus for reassurance. They asked him to tell them the “signs” as a way of making the stress and uncertainty more “manageable.” After all, we’re not so afraid of what we can predict. But Jesus didn’t give them any signs. Instead, he told them that the world in which they lived would continue to be as uncertain and unpredictable as ever. If they wanted reassurance, they would have to look beyond their expectations and their fears.

As we saw a couple of weeks ago, Jesus answered his disciples’ desire for reassurance in an unexpected way. He told them there would be “distress among nations” due to their “confusion” (Lk 21:25). He said that people would “faint” from “fear” and dread of “what is coming upon the world” (Lk 21:26). But he urged them not to give in to fear and dread. Rather, he said, “Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near” (Lk 21:28). “Redemption” is a word that might not use every day. But Jesus was talking about freedom—from the Romans, from their fears, from everything that kept them from living fully.

It may seem like a strange response on Jesus’ part. But I think Jesus was pointing them to something beyond the everyday affairs of life that they could “manage.” He pointed them to the day when he, the “Son of Man” would come “with power and great glory” (Lk 21:27). And as our lesson from Jeremiah reminds us, the promise is that he would come to do “what is right and just” so that the people would live in safety (Jer. 33:15-16). That’s the kind of “redemption” or “salvation” Jesus promised: that one day he would come with God’s power and authority and would set right all the wrongs and set free all those who live under oppression of any kind. And he reminded them that this promise would be kept, saying, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away” (Lk 21:33).

It may seem odd to be talking about these things in Advent. The coming of Christ to set right all the wrongs may seem like dreaming of what lies on a distant horizon. We might wonder how this helps us find freedom in the midst of the uncertainty of our times. While it’s always helpful to be aware of our fears and expectations and the way they affect us, we don’t have to let them define our lives. I find that when I shift my focus away from my expectations and my fears to faith in the God who has promised not only to send us a savior but also to be our savior, I feel much less troubled by the surprising ways life can twist and turn. That kind of freedom is always available to us.

More than that, however, this is the season to celebrate the birth of the one who made the very promises we have based our lives on. I think the scripture readings for this season point us forward for a reason. Just as certainly as Jesus came to be “God-with-us” in the manger so many years ago, so he will come with God’s power and authority to fulfill every promise. When our fears overwhelm us because of the chaos of our days, we need a way to help us feel more grounded. One of the ways we can do that is to put our trust in the promise Jesus made, that our freedom is near. And when we doubt that we can remember that his words remain true forever!

Wednesday, November 24, 2021

He Shall Reign Forever

Daniel 7:13-14; John 18:33-38[1]

One of the challenges of holding on to our Christian faith, hope, and love in times like these is that it may not seem to do much good. We are surrounded by images of what passes for “power” in this world, and it doesn’t seem to have much to do with faith, or hope, or love. In our world, power is defined by the ability to force others to do your bidding. That can take the form of troops and tanks and bombs. Or it can take the form of “arm-twisting” intimidation. All too often, power comes from having enough wealth to “buy” people to do what you want. The way power works in our world has very little to do with faith, or hope, or love.

We’d like to think that there was a time when we were more wary of that kind of blatant abuse of power. But if you read history carefully, you find that there have always been those who were willing to do whatever it took to wield power simply for their own benefit. While we criticize those who did so in the past, we can be infatuated with those who do so now. The notion that it would be “cool” to “have that much power” can be found in the minds of everyone from children idolizing their heroes to aging politicians clinging desperately to the last remains of their fading influence.

The situation wasn’t much different in Jesus’ day. The Jewish people lived under the control of the Roman empire. And whenever anyone tried to buck them, they had the most powerful army in the world to put them back in their place. Roman Governors like Pontius Pilate didn’t hesitate to unleash the legions on unarmed crowds of men, women, and children to keep a firm grip on their power. The Jewish people also lived under the control of their religious leaders. Then as now, while there were many who were sincere, it seems that there were plenty who were willing to abuse their position to manipulate the people and to maintain their own position and wealth.

That’s the background for the scene in our Gospel lesson for today. After making a show of interrogating Jesus, the “chief priests” brought him to Pilate to have him executed. Although they could have had Jesus stoned to death, they wanted him crucified by the Romans. They used their influence over the people to force Pilate to do their bidding. They “played their hand” shrewdly, publicly claiming that if he didn’t execute Jesus, the “king of the Jews,” Pilate would be disloyal to the Roman emperor. As if they cared about that!

And so Pilate’s private interview with Jesus was about true power. Of course, Jesus was bound, at the mercy of the Jewish religious leaders, on trial before the Roman governor. I think Pilate’s question, “Are you the King of the Jews?” would have been dripping with irony, because by all appearances Jesus had no power whatsoever. But Jesus said, “my kingdom is not of this world,” meaning that his authority was completely different from Pilate’s notions of power. In fact, later when Pilate remarked over Jesus’ failure to recognize his power, Jesus answered, “You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above” (Jn 19:11).

I think Jesus was talking about something that was beyond Pilate’s grasp: the power of God’s kingdom that would never end. It’s likely that Jesus was drawing on the visions in the book of Daniel. There, God’s kingdom is likened to a great stone “cut out, not by human hands” that crushed the powerful empires of the world (Dan 2:34). In our lesson for today, Daniel’s vision of four beasts represented four kings whose power would be taken away and replaced by “someone like a Son of Man” who would establish God’s kingdom that would never end (Dan 7:13-14).

Although Pilate had no clue what Jesus was talking about, I would say that Jesus was giving him a lesson in real power. Pilate had bought into the image of power through force, through intimidation, and through wealth. But Jesus had a much bigger image of power. He knew that the true power in this universe is the reign of God. It’s one of the basic affirmations of the Bible, and we heard it in our lesson from Psalm 93: God has always ruled as king, despite all appearances to the contrary. And as the Book of Revelation reminds us, one day, “The kingdom of the world” will become “the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he will reign forever and ever” (Rev. 11:15). God’s reign is the true reality behind all the appearances of power in our world, and one day it will be fulfilled “on earth as it is in heaven.”

I think we need that kind of “bigger picture” to help us through times like these. When all we see reinforces the appearance that power in this world comes from force, or intimidation, or wealth, it can be discouraging to those of us trying to live out our Christian faith, hope, and love. But the Bible gives us a different image of power: it’s the image of the all-powerful God who created all things in the beginning. It’s the image of the God who entered this world in the person of Jesus to redeem us all with the power of love on the cross. It’s the image of the power of new life defeating the power of death on Easter Sunday. It’s the image of Jesus reigning over all the “powers” in our world at the right hand of God even now. It’s the image of that reign fulfilled one day “on earth as it is in heaven.” And the promise is that “he shall reign forever and ever”! When we understand where we come from, to whom we belong, and who ultimately defines our destiny, it helps us to face the challenge of our times.

Monday, November 15, 2021

Faith, Hope, and Love

Mark 13:1-13[1]

Whether we are aware of it, I think the events of the past year and a half have triggered fear and even panic in many of us. Much of what we knew as “normal life” before Covid has changed. From school to work to shopping to entertainment to church to family, the “foundation stones” of our lives have been shaken and, in some cases, toppled over. All of this leaves us wondering if things will ever be the same. Even those of us with the strongest faith can find ourselves dealing with fear and even panic over what the future holds. And panic can make our commitment to Christ, and with it our faith, hope, and love seem to evaporate into thin air.

Sadly, times of great change and the fear and panic they inspire have done just that to many good people. Some have provoked panic with their cries that “the end is near!” Great change, panic, and cries of “the end is near” seem to go together historically. Many of us here remember the “Y2K” scare twenty years ago. Due to concerns of a massive glitch in the system, the fear was that most of the world’s computers would crash at 12:01am on January 1, 2000. This was supposed to have affected everything from banking to power to our homes to the food supply. Of course, that date came and went, just like all the other “end is near” moments throughout history. All the fuss was for nothing.

Believe it or not, our Gospel lesson from Mark relates to this. The reading for today is the introduction to a whole chapter that addresses the fears that were going around Judea in those days. What we need to understand is that the Jewish people had lived under the rule of foreign powers for centuries. It shouldn’t surprise us to know that they resented and resisted those powers. By the time the Romans came on the scene in the century before Jesus was born Judea was like a powder keg. And there were several who tried to “light the fuse” to overthrow the Romans through violent revolt. Most of them claimed to be the “messiah,” which was the equivalent of crying “the end is near” in that day.

That was the backdrop of Jesus’ conversation with his disciples. In response to their admiration of the temple in Jerusalem, Jesus made a prediction that probably would have shocked them. He said, “Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down” (Mk 13:2). The Temple not only represented the place where God was thought to dwell, it was the core of the Jewish faith and the Jewish nation. For the temple with its massive buildings to be “thrown down” would have been the equivalent of saying “the end is near!” That was the only setting in which they could imagine such a catastrophe.

So they asked Jesus, “when will this be, and what will be the sign that all these things are about to be accomplished?” (Mk 13:4). They were asking him for “the inside track” so they would know what was going to happen and when. But Jesus didn’t indulge them. Instead, he simply told them that there would continue to be upheavals and crises that would seem like everything was coming to an end, just as there had been all along. Nation rising against nation, earthquakes and famines, and other disruptions like them have been around throughout the history of the world. But Jesus told them not to give way to panic because these things “do not mean that the end has come” (Mk 13:7, TEV).

Instead, Jesus called them to persevere in following him through all the hardships they would face. And he didn’t hesitate to warn them that they would certainly face hardships if they followed him. They would be “handed over” to the authorities and called on the carpet for their faith. Even members of their own families would betray them. Jesus warned them, “you will be hated by all because of my name” (Mk 13:13). A quick survey of the book of Acts confirms that these things actually happened to the first Christians. But Jesus promised them, “the one who endures to the end will be saved” (Mk 13:13). Rather than giving in to fear and panic, Jesus called them to persevere in their faith and continue to follow him.

I think it’s easy to understand why there are people who may look at what is happening in our world and think that the “end is near.” Some have lost careers and homes and family members to this pandemic. When it seems like all the foundations of our lives are crumbling, it’s easy to panic. When we give in to fear it’s incredibly difficult to practice the faith and hope and love that define what it means to follow Jesus. Instead we withdraw, we disconnect from the community of disciples, we lose faith, and along with our faith we lose hope. When we let panic overwhelm us, it’s hard to live out our faith by loving God and loving others.

But that’s why Jesus calls us not to give into panic, especially in times of great change. In fact, he said that if we respond to the upheavals of this life by holding fast and staying the course, it will offer a “testimony” to those around us (Mk 13:9). When it seems like the foundations of our world are crumbling, and we don’t know what the future holds, we can trust in the one who holds the future firmly in his loving hands. That faith can help us hold on as well to the hope that no matter how hard things may get for us, God will turn it all to good one day. And our faith and hope can give us the courage to put love into practice. Instead of withdrawing into the fears and suspicions panic provokes, that’s how we “endure to the end”: through faith, hope, and love.

Monday, November 08, 2021

With All Your Life

Mark 12:38-44[1]

There’s an old saying that says “you can’t judge a book by it’s cover.” Of course, in reality we do that all the time. As a veteran book shopper, I can tell you a thing or two about the way bookstores arrange their books. The best sellers are the ones with their covers facing out so that everyone can see them easily. Then there’s the artwork and design. Selling books is a business, after all, and a lot goes into making a book look “good enough” to buy. I must confess that a book’s cover may attract my attention at least at first. The real truth is that we judge a lot more than books by their “covers.” We do it with people all the time.

But one of the lessons of Mark’s Gospel is that it’s not always the people who put on a show of being “religious” who actually put their faith into practice. In fact, many of those who would have been considered the “spiritual leaders” of that day turned out to be cruel in real life. Many of them fell under Jesus’ criticism of putting on a “show” of being godly. In fact, in Mark’s Gospel, even the twelve “Apostles” failed to grasp the most basic things Jesus was trying to teach them. Instead, it was some of the most unlikely people who demonstrated their faith by what they did. It is these “unlikely people” who serve as the examples for true faith.

In our Gospel lesson for today, we see one of those “unlikely” people: a widow who gives an offering that would have been barely noticed by most people. Mark says that while Jesus was watching the crowd, “A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny” (Mk 12:42). Now there’s a translation problem here. What she gave was probably worth more than an actual penny is worth today. But even so, it wasn’t enough to buy food for a single meal. Perhaps we might say it was the equivalent of a dollar in our terms. It wasn’t going to make or break the Temple treasury!

By comparison, Mark tells us that “Many rich people put in large sums” (Mk 12:41). We don’t know exactly what kind of container held the offerings, but apparently it was something that would have been very public. And since money in that day consisted of coins, it would have been obvious to all present that they had given a lot. But Jesus wasn’t impressed with their large gifts. He said it this way: they “have contributed out of their abundance” (Mk 12:44). They gave what was convenient to give. They gave what may have been “pocket change” to them. They gave what they wouldn’t miss. They made a show of being “religious,” but that’s all it was: a “show.”

To reinforce that point, Jesus says this widow gave more than all the rest! On the surface of things, that might sound like a contradiction. They gave “large sums” of money, while what she gave was virtually worthless. And yet, what makes the difference for Jesus is that “she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on” (Mk. 12:44). What she gave may have seemed pointless to those who put in so much, but she gave everything she had. It may not have been “more” in terms of the actual amount, but it meant a lot more to her than what they gave meant to them.

There’s actually a play on words going on in this verse. In one sense, “all she had to live on” would refer to all the money she had. But the original word is bios, and it could also be translated “her whole life.” When you consider that we’ve just talked about Jesus’ agreement with a particular scribe about the greatest commandments, I think this comment takes on added significance. While the scribe in our lesson last week knew that the greatest commandment was to love God with your whole life, this widow put that into practice. By offering her last two coins to God she loved God “with her whole life.”[2]

It might seem unlikely that Jesus would notice this widow and her gift, but in Mark’s Gospel, it’s unlikely people like her who set the example for the rest of us. The woman who suffered from hemorrhages broke taboos to seek out Jesus, and her faith became the example for a leader of a synagogue (Mk 5:21-43). A woman who was a foreigner came to Jesus and refused to take no for an answer when she sought healing for her daughter (Mk 7:24-30). The blind beggar named Bartimaeus cried out to Jesus for mercy, and he kept crying out even when Jesus’ own “followers” tried to shush him (Mk 10: 46-52). And this widow gave all that she had as a demonstration that she loved God with all her life.

As we approach our stewardship commitment for next year, I think all of this can help us. In the first place, the Bible teaches that everything we have and everything we are belongs to God. But none of us can afford to give all that we have to God. While this widow did that, there were social support programs in place that would have assured she didn’t go hungry. Secondly, the fact that what she gave was virtually worthless indicates that it’s not the actual amount that you give, it’s what it means to you in terms of demonstrating your commitment to love God. St. Paul said it this way, “Whatever you give is acceptable if you give it eagerly” (2 Cor 8:12, NLT). That last part points us to a third lesson: whatever we give, what honors God is that we give it “eagerly” or “cheerfully” (cf. 2 Cor 9:7). When we give generously, not only of our possessions, we love God with all our lives.

[2] Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark, 590.

Monday, November 01, 2021

At the Center

Mark 12:28-34[1]

It’s hard to avoid the truth that most of us live our lives with ourselves at the center. We may choke on the very words if we try to say it out loud. I think that’s one reason why we have always used the “younger generation” as the scapegoat for our selfishness. But the truth of the matter is that humanity has always lived with themselves at the center. Even when we do something to help someone else, we often do it for approval or simply to feel good about ourselves. Of course, there are those among us who rise above this and truly serve others. But if we’re honest we have to admit that they are the exception that proves the rule.

Although we prefer to locate “selfishness” in someone else, anyone else, it’s something we all have to deal with if we are going to try to follow Jesus as his disciples. That’s why week after week we gather here and confess to God, to one another, and to ourselves that we live with “self” at the center of our lives. That’s one of the basic definitions of the “sin” we try to confess together every week in worship. Our confession is not only an attempt to acknowledge that we all fall short. It’s also a way of trying to reorient our lives with God at the center.

That’s what our Gospel lesson for today is about: the question of what it looks like to live with God at the center of our lives. The question comes at the end of a debate that the religious leaders had been carrying on with Jesus, hoping to make a fool out of him in front of the people who followed him. One torah scholar asks him which of God’s commands was the “first,” or most important. You may find it surprising that I don’t believe this scribe was trying to trip Jesus up. Mark says he asked this question when he saw that Jesus answered “well” those who were antagonizing him. I think the scribe noticed that he was “on the same page” with Jesus, and so he was genuinely curious about how Jesus understood the heart of what God wants from us.

It was no coincidence that Jesus chose love for God and love for neighbor in reply. The “first” commandment came from the Shema, which was and still is the heart of the Jewish faith (Deut 6:4-5): “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one;you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength” (Mk 12:29-30). And the “second” commandment (Lev 19:18), “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” is part of a summary of God’s mandates in Leviticus called the “holiness code”. It’s called that because its theme is “you shall be holy for I the Lord your God am holy” (Lev. 19:2). While we assume these two commands go together, what we should understand is that it’s very likely Jesus was the first one to put them together like this.

But in one sense, Jesus wasn’t really breaking any new ground here. These two “great” commands reflect a fundamental framework of faith that runs throughout the whole Bible. It begins with the fact that God loved the family of Abraham and Sarah, and chose them to be a blessing to all the families of the earth. This is called the “covenant” in the Bible, and it speaks of a relationship that God established in his grace and mercy. When we miss the fact that everything else is based on God’s love, we can get on the wrong track about God and about what it means to live with God at the center of our lives.

The next part of that framework is that the Bible insists that those who have experienced God’s love, those who are fortunate enough to live in a relationship in which they know that God loves them unconditionally and irrevocably, will respond by loving God so much that we will put God at the center of life. That’s what it means to love God with all your heart. We may find it surprising that the way to do this is by following God’s ways, by putting God’s commands into practice in our everyday lives. We get confused about this because we think a life of obedience somehow earns for us the right to God’s love. But that’s not it at all. We live this way because we know God loves us, not to gain God’s love.

The next step is that we who love God in this way will demonstrate it by the love we show others. This way of loving God by loving others isn’t just about how we feel about people. It’s about what we do. And the Bible gets very practical, very specific, and very down to earth about what that looks like. We love others when we show them mercy and justice, when we treat them with dignity, respect, fairness, compassion, and kindness. We love others when we feed the hungry and welcome the stranger. That whole framework, responding to God’s love by loving God in such a way that we love others is what living with God at the center of our lives looks like.[2]

I’ll be the first to admit that living this way isn’t easy, and it isn’t something we learn quickly. I find that the farther I go in my journey toward discipleship, the more aware I am of how I fall short. The lure of trying to satisfy our own desires is one that can be incredibly difficult to recognize, and even more so to avoid. But I don’t think that God expects us to be perfect in this life. I think the point is that we take seriously the call live in a relationship with God, a relationship that is grounded in God’s love for us. The way we do that is by loving and serving God through loving and serving others. That’s what living with God at the center looks like, and it’s a challenge that takes a lifetime to master.

[2] Cf. Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, 4.1:54-66, where he maintains that this has always been God’s intention against all efforts to “break up” this “one covenant” of grace into a series of different “covenants.” He disputes the “federal theology” of Johannes Cocceius, whose ideas are probably best known today in the “Dispensationalism” of Tim LaHaye and Hal Lindsay.

Wednesday, October 20, 2021

Can You Drink the Cup?

Mark 10:32-45[1]

I think we as a people have a hard time with suffering these days. For decades, we have tried to keep suffering “at arm’s length.” And to some extent we’ve tried to remove it from our experience of life altogether. But suffering remains a part of life, and trying to avoid it only makes it worse. Other societies recognize this and accept suffering as a “normal” part of life. When it comes, they grieve as we all do, but they don’t make it into a “catastrophe” that “should” not have happened. In a very real sense, our efforts to distance ourselves from suffering only make it worse when it comes knocking on our door.

There was a time when things were very different. Our ancestors who settled this land lived with hardships that even the strongest of us cannot fathom. My great-grandfather’s family consisted of nine siblings originally. Four of them died as children. That was simply one of the aspects of life for many families in that day. But they were proud to make the sacrifices they did because they knew that they were building a better future for their children and their children’s children. And we used to celebrate the sufferings they endured and honor them for the sacrifices they made. It’s hard to do that when we think that what’s “normal” is to avoid suffering in life.

In our Gospel lesson for today, Jesus tries to tell his disciples for the third time that he is going to undergo great suffering. And for the third time, their response reveals that they really don’t understand at all. This time it’s James and John, two of Jesus’ “inner circle” of disciples. They asked Jesus to do for them “whatever we ask of you” (Mk. 10:35)! Their request is truly astounding. They ask for the privilege of sitting at his right and left hand when he came in his “glory.” James and John, like the rest of the disciples, still thought that Jesus had come to restore the glory of David’s kingdom in all its might, wealth, and prestige. Even though Jesus had just warned them again that he was going to be condemned and beaten and killed, they simply could not hear that.

Jesus answers their request with a question of his own: “Are you able to drink the cup that I drink?” (Mk 10:38). He knows that he means the “cup” of suffering that he is soon going to undergo. They rather casually say, “We are able” (Mk 10:39)! In response, Jesus makes a rather ominous statement: “The cup that I drink you will drink”! They don’t realize it, but he’s trying to tell them again that if they want to follow him on the path that will lead him to the cross, they too must expect to suffer. In fact, Mark’s Gospel reminds us later that the ones who wound up on Jesus’ “right and left” were the two “bandits” who were crucified with him (Mk 15: 27)!

Although their request for “places of honor” was inconsistent with Jesus’ life and completely out of place in God’s kingdom, Jesus tries again to teach them. He had already taught them that if they wanted to follow him they must “deny themselves” (Mk. 8:34) and “lose their lives” for his sake (Mk. 8:35). He had also already taught them that “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all” (Mk. 9:35). Now he tries to teach them again that “whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant,and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all” (Mk 10:43-44). If they want to follow Jesus, they must be prepared to give themselves away as servants and even “slaves” of all (Mk. 10:44). More than that, they had to be prepared to “drink the cup” of suffering as he would.

And to reinforce the lesson, he once again pointed to his own destiny, that “the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Mk 10:45). As the scripture lesson from Hebrews reminds us, Jesus “learned obedience through what he suffered” (Heb 5:8), that is, by giving his life on the cross for the sake of us all. Following him would entail no less for them. It would mean giving themselves away for others. It would mean being willing to “drink the cup” by sacrificing themselves and even suffering for the benefit of others.

We used to believe in that in our society. In fact, we had a saying for it: “From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required.”[3] There was a time when we believed that the more you had, the more advantages you could count, the more you were expected to serve. The more opportunities you were handed, the more you were expected to give yourself away for the benefit of others. That seems to have gone by the wayside these days. It seems we’re more concerned about what’s in our own best interest rather than making sacrifices for others.

But maybe it’s time we try to recover the commitment to serve others sacrificially, following Jesus’ example.[3] Jesus suffered and died for us, so that we might have new life now, and a hope for a future. And he calls us to drink the same “cup” of suffering and sacrifice that he did. I guess the question we all have to face is “can you drink the cup”? Are we willing to “learn obedience” by what we suffer for the sake of others just as Jesus did? That’s the path Jesus walked, and he calls every one of us to that same path. He calls us all to drink the cup of suffering and sacrifice for the benefit of others. Being willing to do so as Jesus did is what it means to follow him.[4]

[1] © Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, Ph. D., on 10/17/2021 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.

[2] Although President John F. Kennedy was famous for quoting this verse, it originated with Jesus (cf. Lk. 12:48)! See Mark Liberman, “The Tangled History of a Mangled Maxim,” http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives /004100.html.

[3] Henri Nouwen, Here and Now, 101, calls it, “the way of downward mobility, the descending way of Jesus. It is the way toward the poor, the suffering, the marginal, the prisoners, the refugees, the lonely, the hungry, the dying, the tortured, the homeless.”

[4] Cf. Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark, 498: “servanthood and the cross are linked in the life and death of Jesus” and therefore also in the lives of those who follow him.

Monday, October 11, 2021

Who in the World can be Saved?

Who in the World Can Be Saved?

Mark 10:17-27[2]

Sometimes it seems like people either take salvation too seriously or too lightly. There are those who think that what it’s all about is securing your eternal destiny, and you just have to say the right words or go through the motions of the right rituals. As long as you get your “weekly dose” of God, you’re good to go. Then there are those who seem to think of salvation as an “impossible dream” or an “unreachable star.” No matter what they do, they seem to think that salvation is a goal that they can never attain. As with most things in life, I would say the truth lies somewhere between those two extremes.

If you’ve been following the last few weeks’ sermons, you may be wondering who could ever live up to the challenge of following Jesus in the life of the kingdom of God. Jesus has called us to “take up our cross” and “lose” our lives for his sake (Mk 8:34-35). If we want to follow him, we are to become “last of all and servant of all” (Mk 9:35). Jesus warns us in the strongest terms against causing others to stumble in faith or stumbling into sin ourselves. He has made it clear that following him means taking seriously our relationships. And this week, Jesus confronts the challenge that wealth poses to faith. We may well be wondering, “Who in the world can be saved?”

Our lesson from the Gospel of Mark is a familiar one: a wealthy man comes to Jesus and asks him “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus’ answer probably seems strange to us: “You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; You shall not defraud; Honor your father and mother’” (Mk 10:19). Those of us with ears more attuned to St. Paul and who have “cut our teeth” on the Reformed version of the Christian faith would find it difficult to think that you “inherit eternal life” by keeping the “commandments.”

I think what we have to understand is that Jesus’ answer is framed in a particular way of viewing obedience to God. Everything Jesus says about obeying God has to be interpreted through the “two great commandments”: “you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart” and “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Deut 6:5; Lev 19:18). Of course, I’m not sure that makes things easier for us. I’ve always said that it’s much harder to love God and love others—truly—than to keep a list of rules that relate to our external behaviors. But the idea that we are called to love God and love others may help us make sense of Jesus’ answer. I believe his point is that when we do so, it will show up in the way we live our lives.

But that’s only part of the problem with our lesson for today. The other part is that this man responded to Jesus by saying “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth” (Mk 10:20)! We might be tempted to think this guy was only fooling himself, but Mark’s Gospel tells us that “Jesus, looking at him, loved him” (Mk 10:21). I think this man was sincere in what he had asked and in his response to Jesus, and Jesus saw that. But we all have our “blind spots,” and unfortunately this man’s blind spot was the fact that he “owned much property” (Mk 10:22, NASB).

I don’t think it was an “accident” that Jesus told him to sell all he had and give the proceeds to the poor. You may have noticed that Jesus included the commandment “you shall not defraud” along with the others from the Ten Commandments. In the Bible, hoarding wealth at the expense of the poor constituted “defrauding” them. And the fact that this man owned “much property” directly violated Scripture. In that day, no land was to be permanently sold; every fifty years, in the “Jubilee” year, it was to return to the family that owned it originally. But in Jesus’ day, all the land was owned by wealthy people like this man. That meant that there were many families who had been “defrauded” of their property. This was the “blind spot” in this man’s profession of obedience to God.

We might think this was just a matter of this man’s relationship to his wealth. But Jesus goes on to say, “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” (Mk 10:25)! This seems to apply more broadly than just one man’s attachment to his property. Throughout the Gospels, Jesus makes it clear that wealth is a serious obstacle to “loving God with all your heart.” There’s something about our possessions that can “possess” us. If we aren’t careful, wealth has a way of taking over our heart and our life.[2] But selling all that we have and giving it away isn’t a very practical option for us. That’s why disciplines like hospitality, generosity, stewardship, and simplicity have always been part of the Christian life. The best way to ensure that your possessions don’t possess you is to give away enough of them that you notice it.

With all that we’ve heard from Jesus, our lesson for today might lead you to ask with Jesus’ disciples, “Then who in the world can be saved?” (Mk 10:26, NLT). I think it’s a natural response to Jesus’ deeply challenging statements about what it means to truly follow him. And we might really despair, wondering if anyone can ever live up to all that Jesus demands of us. But Jesus’ words to his disciples apply to us as well: “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible” (Mk 10:27). If we’re trying to “inherit” eternal life by our own efforts, we will always fall short. But as we seek—however imperfectly—to love God with all our hearts and love our neighbors as ourselves, we have the assurance that “for God all things are possible.” God can do surprising things in our lives and through our efforts.

[2] Cf. Joel Green, Theology of the Gospel of Luke, 148: “Wealth becomes a master if it is not mastered.”

Monday, October 04, 2021

From the Beginning

Mark 10:1-12[1]

Human relationships are wonderful and complicated, mainly because we humans are wonderful and complicated. This applies to marriage, if for no other reason than it involves two human beings trying to live together. We bring all that we are into a marriage, and that can lead to a wonderful union. But because a marriage involves two flawed and broken people, that’s not always how it turns out. Some think of this in terms of what’s “right” and what’s “wrong,” as if these things are clear-cut. I’ve found it more helpful to look at human relationships, including marriage, from the perspective of what’s “healthy.”[2] The fact is that there is a wide spectrum between what’s “healthy” and “unhealthy,” with a lot of room in between.

There simply is no “one size fits all” approach to human relationships, and that applies to marriage. In our setting, we believe that marriage is about love. That’s not always been the case historically. From ancient times, marriage constituted a contract between two families that involved property and wealth. In other cases, marriage was primarily about having children and extending the family name. The meaning of marriage has changed and developed throughout history. And, for better or for worse, it is still changing and developing today.

In our Gospel lesson for today, Jesus responds to a challenge from “some Pharisees” who were trying to “test” him. More likely, they were trying to trip him up and catch him saying something they could use against him! We should understand that their question about divorce was not a sincere one! They rather casually assumed they had the right to divorce their wives. And they cited Moses as “allowing” them to do so, quoting from the book of Deuteronomy. But Jesus attributed this to the “hardness” of their hearts, or their stubborn insistence on going their own way rather than obeying God. I think we should notice that while the Pharisees assumed they were shining examples of moral purity, Jesus reminded them of their own sin!

But more than that, Jesus challenged them to go beyond what Moses “permitted.” He pointed them back to God’s original intention for marriage “from the beginning of creation” as expressed in the book of Genesis: “a man shall … be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh” (Gen. 2:24). Jesus concludes, “So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together let no one separate” (Mk 10:8-99). Here Jesus makes the biblical ideal clear: marriage is intended to be a permanent relationship that lasts for a lifetime.

The Pharisees appealed to Moses, so in order to reinforce what he was trying to say to them he went to the Ten Commandments. Jesus applied the commandment against adultery to the issue of marriage and divorce. I think what we must understand here is that Jesus wasn’t addressing every possible situation involving divorce. He was confronting a situation in which men casually assumed they had a right to divorce their wives without any concern for their well-being. He challenged them to take marriage and divorce much more seriously. More than that, Jesus made both husbands and wives accountable to each other, which was groundbreaking in that day. Even Jesus’ disciples assumed they had the “right” to divorce their wives.

We have our own assumptions that may make it difficult for us to hear what Jesus was trying to say. Many have taken what Jesus says about remarriage after divorce and used it as a “club” against hurting people. But the reality is that we all fall short of the ideals set for us in the Bible. That’s true whether we remain married or have been divorced! No one perfectly maintains an ideal relationship![3] Again, it seems clear: divorce and remarriage is not what God intended “from the beginning,” but that doesn’t mean every situation involving divorce and remarriage is “sinful.”[4] We can already see an effort to address the complexities surrounding divorce and remarriage in the New Testament. Jesus himself mentioned infidelity as a basis for remarriage after divorce (Mt 5:32). And Paul allowed believers from Corinth to remarry if an unbelieving spouse wanted to divorce them (1 Cor 7:15). Neither of these situations were the ideal, but that doesn’t make them “sinful.”

In this day when the meaning of marriage is changing dramatically, it’s especially important for us to uphold God’s intention for marriage “from the beginning”: a life-long relationship of mutual respect, friendship, and care. But not every marriage turns out like that and sometimes divorce happens. Divorce is not an “unforgivable sin,” and it doesn’t mean that God is finished with you. We believe that God can bring good out of all kinds of things in this life, and we should not think of divorce as an exception. While we uphold God’s intention for marriage, we must also recognize that we all fall short, and therefore it’s just as important that we apply the biblical ideal with compassion, particularly toward those in our family of faith who may have to endure the heartbreak of divorce.

[2] Cf. The Book of Order 2019-2021 W-4.0601, p. 106: “Marriage is a gift God has given to all humankind for the well-being of the entire human family.”

[3] Cf. “The Westminster Confession of Faith,” ch. XXVIin The Book of Confessions, p. 178, where it is acknowledged that due to the “weaknesses” of married partners it can happen that “the marriage dies at the heart and the union becomes intolerable.”

[4] Cf. Shelby Spong, Living Commandments, 80: “there is a very large area between what we would call ideal and what we would call immoral.” Cf. also John Calvin, Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists Matthew, Mark, and Luke, vol. 2, p. 384. Although Calvin only grants divorce on the grounds of infidelity, he does recognize that “though Christ condemns as an adulterer the man who shall marry a wife that has been divorced, this is undoubtedly restricted to unlawful and frivolous divorces.”

Monday, September 27, 2021

Stumbling

Mark 9:38-50[1]

I wasn’t much of an athlete when I was growing up. I tried playing football, basketball, and baseball, but I just wasn’t very good at any of them. My problem was that I had two “left feet” and I was “all thumbs.” I wasn’t fast, and I didn’t have much in the way of ball-handling skills. So I didn’t even make the basketball team, I didn’t try out for baseball, and in football they stuck me on the line. On the other hand, I was in the marching band, and I did play the trombone, both of which require a level of coordination. And I loved riding my bicycle even then. But in most of the sports that were available, I seemed to be constantly stumbling.

The truth of the matter is that we all stumble through life in many ways that we’d rather not admit. As much as we’d like to be able to present to the world an image of someone who “has it all together,” that’s not really the truth about any of us! We all fall short of the “perfection” we’d like to be able to achieve. We all have times in our lives when, despite our best efforts, we stumble. There have been times in my life when it seemed like all I could do was stumble! I would say that what’s important is not whether we stumble, but what we do when we stumble. Picking ourselves up and starting again can be difficult, but that’s how we learn and grow.

Our gospel lesson for today presents us with some potential “stumbling blocks.” Part of the problem is that we who try to take the Bible seriously can find it difficult to handle it when the Bible uses metaphors, analogies, parables, and other figures of speech. It’s especially difficult for us because we are working with words on a page. We can’t see the expression on Jesus’ face to help us understand when he’s using a figure of speech. We use them all the time, and our language would be much the poorer if we didn’t! But because we are used to our cultural metaphors, we understand them. It’s much more difficult when we’re dealing with the metaphors from a very different time and place.

So, for instance, there have been some who believe that Jesus meant it literally when he said that it’s better to cut off your foot or your hand or tear out your eye than to stumble into sin. But most of us recognize that Jesus didn’t mean it that way. A one-handed person can still be a thief. As we saw a few weeks ago, sin is something that comes from the heart, not from any particular body part. John Calvin observed that Jesus was using “an exaggerated form of speech” to make the point that we should make every effort to avoid sin.[2] We might wonder whether Jesus would actually “exaggerate” like this. But if we do it, why shouldn’t he? The challenge for us is to figure it out. I think the Bible can help us if we will pay close attention.

Another difficulty this passage presents us has to do with Jesus’ warning about stumbling. He begins with the image of being drowned in the sea with a huge stone around your neck (Mk 9:42). I think in this case it’s pretty obvious that Jesus is describing a fate that one would do anything to avoid. But we can get confused when he talks about going to “hell,” “to the unquenchable fire” (Mk 9:43). The word in the original is actually “Gehenna.” It was a familiar term in that day that referred to a valley near Jerusalem that was a burning trash dump filled with decaying bodies and rotting garbage. So I think we should not be surprised that Jesus would use an image that people of his day would find shocking as a warning against causing others to stumble or stumbling ourselves.[3] Jesus wasn’t speaking literally about the afterlife, he was painting a word picture to make a point: do everything you can to avoid this!

Another way to avoid stumbling here is to pay attention to what Jesus is getting at. His point is that, just as we would make every effort to avoid either of the “fates” he describes, so we should do everything possible to avoid either causing someone else to stumble, or stumbling ourselves. In the first place, he’s talking about the effects of his disciples’ thoughts of “greatness” on believers who might be vulnerable to stumbling in their faith. But Jesus also urged his disciples to beware of all possible temptations to stumble themselves. In both cases, I think Jesus made such a big deal about it because when we cause another to stumble we diminish them, and when we stumble we diminish ourselves. That’s something Jesus wants us to make every effort to avoid.

When I was younger, thoughts of practicing yoga as a “sport” were the furthest thing from my mind! Even though I’ve practiced yoga for ten years, I still “stumble” with some of the balance poses we do. The fact is that I still stumble in life as well, even though I’ve been working at this Christian thing for over 45 years! While Jesus uses strong language to warn us against stumbling, I don’t think he was demanding perfection. I think he was trying to impress upon us how important it is to avoid diminishing ourselves or someone else by our actions. We all stumble at times, but thankfully, as the Psalmist says, “though we stumble, we shall not fall headlong, for the Lord holds us by the hand” (Ps. 37:24).

[2] John Calvin, Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists Matthew, Mark, and Luke, vol. 1, p. 291.

[3] Cf. Calvin, Commentary on a Harmony, 285-86.

Tuesday, September 21, 2021

The Least of the Least

Mark 9:30-37[1]

In our world, we celebrate “the best of the best.” And it’s a good thing to recognize the commitment, dedication, and diligence that goes into seeking to do something well. But since not everyone can be “the best of the best,” the rest of us may find ourselves wondering where we fall in the “food chain” of society. I think even young children among us can grasp that to some degree “losing” is really not “okay.” So it is that many of may spend our lives trying be the “best” at something. Life, however, has a way of taking us on journeys that we don’t expect. Even when we work hard, apply ourselves with dedication, and make sacrifices, we all sometimes find ourselves on the “losing” end.

I would say that the fact of the matter is that there are a lot of people in this world who are dealing with loss of one kind or another. Many are dealing with multiple losses at once. The irony of life is that those who have lost the most usually have the most to teach the rest of us about how to live. They approach life with serenity, contentment, gratitude, and even generosity. When it comes to knowing how to really live, the “least of the least” tend to do it far better than the “best of the best.” Perhaps that should make us all stop and think about how we measure what is “best” in life!

Our Gospel lesson for today brings together several episodes related to this theme. It begins with Jesus, whom Peter has already confessed to be the Messiah, telling the disciples again that he is going to be killed. As I’ve mentioned before, in their minds, Messiahs don’t get killed; they conquer and liberate their people from their oppressors. Messiahs usher in the Kingdom of God on earth. The idea of a Messiah being killed simply made no sense to them. I think when the Scripture says, the disciples “did not understand what he was saying” (Mk. 9:32), it may be an understatement!

It’s almost surprising that, right after Jesus gives the disciples this shocking news a second time, they began to argue about “who was the greatest” (Mk. 9:34). Mark doesn’t specify the greatest at what. He simply says they were arguing about who was the greatest. Set alongside Jesus’ prediction of his impending death, that in and of itself seems out of place. Matthew’s Gospel brings the problem into sharper focus: there they asked Jesus outright, “Who is the greatest in the Kingdom of God?” (Matt. 18:1). It seems they were dreaming of having the places of honor when Jesus ushered in the “kingdom” they were expecting.

Jesus’ answer to them makes it clear that they had missed one of the most important lessons he tried to teach them: “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all” (Mark 9:35). And to emphasize the point, Jesus seeks to correct his disciples’ misguided ambition by embracing a child. 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” (Mark 9:37). We tend to view that as something “tender,” because that’s the way we see children. As I’ve mentioned before, that wasn’t always the way children were treated in that day. In many cases they were simply mouths to feed and hands to be put to work as soon as possible. Many children were the “least of the least” of all in that day.

But Jesus not only said to embrace the children, he also told his disciples they had to become like children in order to enter the Kingdom of God (Mk 10:13-16). Again, we take a “sentimental” approach to this by thinking he’s talking about the trusting nature of a child. But I think the disciples would not have found the idea of becoming like a child very inviting. A child was someone you could treat however you wanted, and nobody would be the wiser. Many children were among the most vulnerable, the weakest, the lowest, and the last of all. They were among the “least of the least.”

Jesus told his disciples that following him meant serving others, not seeking greatness. And just in case they didn’t get the practical implications, he took a child and said that the way they treated that child was the measure for their service. I think this is Mark’s version of Matthew 25: “as you did it to the least of these you did it to me” (Mt 25:40). The true test of one’s character is how you treat those who cannot “report” you to anyone. But service in the kingdom of God not only means caring for the “least of the least,” it also means taking our place among them. I’d say that’s no more welcome to us than it was to Jesus’ disciples.

It goes against the grain; it’s about as contrary to our way of life as you can get. But while we spend our efforts seeking to be “the best of the best,” Jesus calls us to give up those ambitions and devote our lives to serving others. I think there’s still room in that call for us to do what we do with commitment, dedication, and diligence. One of our ordination vows calls those who would serve the church to do so with “energy, intelligence, imagination, and love.” As I mentioned last week, Jesus demands the best we have to give. But we must offer our best in full recognition that Jesus also calls us to a path that leads us not only to care for those who are most vulnerable in society. It also leads us to take our place alongside the “least of the least.” It’s a path of “downward mobility,” if you will. The path Jesus calls us to walk is one that takes us to places where we offer the best we have to give not for our own enrichment but for the benefit of others, especially the “least of the least.”

The Waking Dreamer