Marsh Chapel Sermon Archive

By Marsh Chapel

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John 6:35, 41-51

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For our anniversary back in 2015, my wife and I stayed at a small resort on a finger lake in upstate New York. It was one of those places for us that we really only go to when special anniversaries come around. We had a splendid time. The place started as an estate for a wealthy family, was a monastery for 25 years, and underwent numerous renovations to turn into a hotel. It sits on the waters of Seneca lake and was built in the style of the Italian renaissance. At the time we went, the hotel offered guests the opportunity to see the lake on a nightly boat cruise. We went on the ride with one other couple and the boat driver. We spent the time chatting with the boat driver who made us feel that we belonged there. It was clear that he loved the water, the estate, and making guests feel welcome. He offered insights into what we were seeing and the two of us talked about church architecture. In short, he was an extremely hospitable guide focused on our comfort.

The next morning, my wife and I were waiting for breakfast. We looked at the wall and noticed pictures of some famous people who had stayed there over the years. As we looked through the photographs, we noticed that the boat driver was in many of the pictures. Through a simple Google search, we discovered that the man who drove the boat and made us feel so at home was a former owner of the estate. He and his family had lovingly restored and managed the property for decades. For years, they poured themselves into the estate, making it a beautiful and welcoming place for guests. At the time when we went, and still today, the man who drove the boat is the general manager of the hotel.

His love for the estate and for making guests feel welcome has stuck with me through the years. His kindness and non-ostentatious way of leading the nightly cruise was a bit of grace at a time when people tend to point toward themselves. It struck me, when I learned more about the man, that he was doing what I think makes him happy. I imagine there were other people who could lead the boat ride or interact with guests in such a personal way, but these interactions seemed to bring him genuine joy, so he made time to do them personally. There might have been other things he could have been doing, some of which other people might think were more important, but a trip over the fresh waters of Seneca lake with a genuine host stands as a moment of beauty in my memory. There is joy in doing what you love and in loving what you do. The whole trip, including the estate and interaction, was a reminder to search for beauty along with the good.

We have had to cling to such moments of beauty in the current state of things. We have lived off good and beautiful memories, waiting for new ones to be formed. We continue to wait with hope for a new season where COVID is the distant memory. In the meantime, though, we live in a state of paradox. We live in a time of trouble even while triumphs do exist. Perhaps, this paradoxical state can help us connect with a paradox from the Gospel of John. In a simplified manner, the paradox is, what is the relationship between those who believe and the world? Theologians are not in agreement as to whether this paradox is primarily pessimistic or optimistic. Do we reside in a irredeemable world fallen and marred by sin moving toward destruction, are do we live in a world loved by God seeking redemptive transformation? A similar paradox can be said of people and God, are people sinners in the hands of an angry God as Jonathan Edwards’ famous sermons says, or people for whom Christ has already taken on flesh to connect with the love of God?

On the one hand, the gospel account begins with a strong affirmation of creation and flesh through the incarnation of Christ, “The Word became Flesh and dwelt among us.” John 3:16 indicates that God so loved the world. Our lectionary passage today ends with sharing that the bread of life Jesus offers is given for the life of the world. This bread is identified with the flesh of Christ. These Johannine passages suggest an optimistic understanding of flesh and the world. They connect the incarnation of Christ with the love of God in the world. They are a reminder to search for good, truth, and beauty in the world because the life of the world is the flesh of Christ. They suggest a sacramental quality of flesh and the world which draws us closer to God and companionship with one another.

The Gospel of John also uses the world and flesh in pessimistic manners. It recounts that being born of the Spirit is different from being born in the flesh, priority is given to the Spirit in these passages. Heavenly things are more significant than earthly things. Late in the Gospel, Jesus says that he chooses disciples out of this world, indicating that they no longer belong to the world. He warns that the world will hate the disciples as it hates him and prays that they be, not of this world as he is not of this world…

Tension and paradox need critical faith, not pithy pietistic platitudes. The world and flesh, according to John are not straightforward. They should not be dismissed nor romanticized. It is clear the Gospel account is using the world and flesh in paradoxical and complicated manners. It can be the place of the incarnation, the flesh of Christ with which the love of God is directed, or a place of antagonism against Christ and Christ followers. Commentators note the multi-layered uses of flesh and world throughout the Gospel. The world offers many good and beautiful things, but the world also offers evil and ugly things. It is not within our power to obliviate the tension, so we need to find ways of navigating the tension.

To explore the tension, we might turn from literal language and literalized language to the language of metaphor. Metaphors help us navigate tension because they are built on the logic of tension. Metaphors hold concepts together by creating tension between a literal meaning and a figurative meaning. This tension does not make metaphors untrue, in fact, Paul Ricoeur argues that this tension allows metaphors to say things about reality that not would otherwise be possible. Through a figurative throwing together, metaphors disclose aspects of reality and being to us; however, this revelatory process requires constant tension. Once the tension of a metaphor is lost, the metaphor dies. So long as the metaphor lives, it requires people to interpret through the tension. Metaphors allow us to peer through glass to see dimly what one day we hope we see clearly.

The central metaphor of the scripture passage today comes from the mouth of Jesus multiple times. Jesus refers to himself as the bread of life. This is a rich metaphor and one that should be kept alive. It plays with the intersections between bread being a basic food for survival and Christ being foundational to the life of Christian faith. Jesus also emphasizes part of what it means that he is the bread of life by using the phrase Ego Eimi, I am. In doing so, Jesus reveals the intimate connection between himself and his father in Heaven who said “I am” when Moses encountered the burning bush. Christ also compares himself to the manna that fed Israel while they were wandering the desert. Jesus as the bread of life is a metaphor rich in nutritive potential for the world.

Bread provides sustenance and strength for daily living. In the ancient world, bread was a staple food for families and communities. It was not just an individual meal, bread was a common food that gathered people around a table. The modern world has lost some intimacy with food and eating in many places. You might be like me, I buy my food from a store largely unaware of where the food came from in the world or all the steps involved to get it to my table. Eating has largely become individualistic, but food reveals the interdependence of life and food systems show how interconnected life is. Farmers grow wheat which requires seed, land, and proper weather. Grain needs to be harvested and milled into flour. Flour needs to be kneaded into dough which needs to be baked. Modern food systems require shipping and processing at various stages as well. It needs to be distributed to places where it can be purchased by consumers before being eaten. Each step along the way is a part of the web of life which connects all of us. When Jesus says, I am the bread of life and willing gives his flesh for the life of the world, he inspires us to see the interconnected existence of faith in the world. He invites us to make good and beautiful ripples in the web for the life of the world.

I was on the wrestling team in high school and one day my coach had the whole team start running around the mats. He took to the strongest individual on the team and gave him a gallon of water. My coach asked him whether holding the water would be difficult and my teammate said no. So, coach gave him the water and told him to hold the jug out with his arm fully extended. At first, holding the water was easy and my teammate laughed at us as we ran circles around him. As time went on though, the simple task of holding water increasingly became difficult. If you have ever had to hold something for a long time without a break, you have probably experienced that the constant tension required to hold something increases the difficulty of holding over time. As muscles get tired, it feels like more and more strength is required to hold the same amount of weight. Right before holding the water became too much for my teammate, my coach handed the water to another member of the team who at first found the task easy. When he was worn out, a new team member took his place holding the water. The lesson, my coach instilled in us that day, was how even simple tasks done in isolation can become grueling over time. When we isolate ourselves from our team or the world around us, we carry burdens and tensions alone. When we remain open to engage in community and interdependence with others, mutual thriving can take place and tension can be shared across lives. By constantly sharing in the task of holding the water galleon, the whole team was able to ensure that no individual person carried too much on their own.

When Jesus said that he is the bread of life for the life of the world, I wonder if this type of mutual interdependence was on his mind. While Jesus is bread of life for me, and for you, he is also bread of life for us. The bread of life provides nutritive sustenance in and through the webs of life. Jesus as the bread of life is a common meeting place for us to engage with one another and the world in life giving manners. In many ways, this type of being seeks to make life hospitable for everyone. Because eating is so central to our existence, it is an apt location for hospitality. Jesus as the bread of life for the life of the world can be a metaphor of radical hospitality where all are welcome. All are embraced. All are given bread for the journey. It is a metaphor where tension exists but does not overwhelm any individual because all hold a part of the tension. In contrast to forms of hospitality which are largely transactional and monetary, Christ’s hospitality is free. The incarnate Word present with God in the beginning enters the world to offer reconciling hospitality. What a gift. The bread of life is a gift. And it is a chance to see good and beauty amid a tensive world.

If you have been following the Tokyo Olympics, you might have seen inspiring examples of good acts. Two stick out to me so far. The Olympics are a great display of human perseverance, skill, and strength. Sometimes though, it takes determination, hard work, and luck to win. Athletes often spend years training and preparing to compete. This past Sunday, 800 meter runners Isaiah Jewett and Nijel Amos got tangled and fell while seeking to qualify for the final race. The two men did not respond to each other with anger. Amos reportedly apologized and Jewett invited him to finish the race together. While standing up, the two men reach out and linked arms. Citing superhero’s as a source of inspiration for how he handled the episode, Jewett said, “And that was my version of trying to be a hero, standing up and up and showing good character even if it’s my rival or whoever I’m racing, or if anything happened, I don’t want any bad blood because that’s what heroes do: They show their humanity through who they are and show that they’re good people.”

Or maybe you heard the story of the high jumpers who were tied for first place, Tamberi and Barshim. After neither had completed the necessary jump to win, they embraced each other. In their embrace, they were told they had to keep going in a final jump-off. One of the two, Barshim, interrupted the explanation of the jump off to ask if they could just share the gold medal. They were told that they could and the pair immediately backed away from the man explaining the jump off. Barshim extended his hand to Tamberi who immediately took it and the two embraced again. You can see the pure joy on their faces when they decided to share the gold medal. It does not seem that sharing gold took anything away from the moment for them, in fact, it seems that sharing added value to their experience. Barshim said, “We just look at each other and we know, that is it, it is done.” The two competitors, met back in 2010 and have been friends since. Their friendship now extends to sharing the gold medal.

John’s Gospel tells us that Jesus is the bread of life for the life of the world. This bread continues to be available and expressed to us today. The most evident places are in Word and Sacrament but also in the hospitality of boat driver, wrestling teammates, and Olympians. Wherever there is goodness, the bread of life is present for the sake of the world. Where there is need, the bread of life is present waiting to be actualized. When we receive the bread of life, whether it be tasted as the bread of communion, heard through the Word proclaimed, or seen as goodness in the world, Christ’s transforming life is active and present. When we give the bread of life to others and for others, we become co-laborers with Christ.

Earlier I said that the bread of life metaphor plays with the intersections between bread being a basic food for survival and Christ being foundational to the life of Christian faith. I find that true, but the bread of life metaphor also invites us to see Christ in relationship with the world. Whether one sees the world primarily pessimistically or optimistically, Christ, the bread of life is given for the life of the world.

-The Rev. Scott Donahue-Martens

Ph.D. Student in Practical Theology: Homiletics, Boston University School of Theology

posted in Guest Preachers on 08.8.2021 at 11:00 am

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By Marsh Chapel

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John 6:24-35

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As this summer we reflect on what we have been through, over the last year and more, and as we meditate together upon the mighty themes of the Gospel, we might recall earlier intimations, earlier voices, which paved our way, cut our trail, made a space and place in grace for our own hopes.

In New England now over many years we have been given a gift from the sea.  The warm welcome and friendly spirit of your presence and care has been a guiding spirit for us, here along the Atlantic coast.  In fact, you have lived out much of what Anne Murrow Lindberg described in her little book about the ocean and the soul, Gift from the Sea.  She recommends, strongly, time spent on the shore.  She wrote some years ago: “The sea does not reward those who are too anxious, too greedy, or too impatient. To dig for treasures shows not only impatience and greed, but lack of faith. Patience, patience, patience, is what the sea teaches. Patience and faith. One should lie empty, open, choiceless as a beach—waiting for a gift from the sea.”

In thanks for these years of sea gifts, we bring you this morning a Gift from the Lake.  A fresh water gift to honor a salt water gift.  We spend our summers largely among grandchildren and their parents, alongside a fresh water lake, of which there are many in our land of upbringing, along the Erie Canal.  This lake region bears the distinction of having given rise to many women and men who heard and heeded John 6, who did not leave freedom, the self-correcting spirit of truth loose in the universe, to somebody else.  Its price of eternal vigilance they provided in very daily, very personal, very local, very immediate ways.  Today, as a Gift from the Lake, we bring some of these fresh water memories.  They may recall for us that, while there are always at of things wrong, there are also always a lot of things right.  Yeats feared that the center could not hold:  the falcon cannot hear the falconer; things fall apart; the center cannot hold. And yet, over time voices of spirit and life have emerged to hold, to hold us, together.  To hold us together as a country, as a culture, as a community.  In a time when, for some, mendacity and violence seem to have become tools in the political workbench, we can recall and broadly affirm that in and with a measure of faith, the center can hold, the center can hold, in country and culture and community.  Hear then of a Gift from the Lake.

This is the lakeside land of Hiawatha (“who causes rivers to run”).  Such musical names adorn this lakescape:  Canandaigua, Tioghnioga, Onondaga, Tuscarora, Cuyahoga.  The great native leader of the Iroquois showed in the 15^th century the critical need for union, for space and time in which to live together.  His leadership was focused on common space, on collegial relations, on counsel together, and so he is harbinger of all the examples of faith and freedom to come up along the Mohawk and the Erie Canal.

All your strength is in your union

All your weakness in discord

Therefore be at peace henceforward

And as brothers live together

This is the land of Harriet Tubman.  You may want to visit her home in Auburn, NY.  Her neighbor William Seward, also from Auburn, bought Alaska, considered at the time a folly, an “ice-box”.  Our 21^st century theological issue is space.  Tubman’s grand niece, Janet Lauerson, was on my church staff for a time in Syracuse on Euclid Avenue, after we both migrated down from the far north country, not far from the burial place of John Brown.  His body lies moldering under a ski lift near Lake Placid.  He and Gerrit Smith, founder of Peterboro, a community established for free slaves, a short 10 miles from our summer home, were not ‘compatibalists’ regarding slavery.  As Lincoln would later say, he felt those who most affirmed slavery should start by trying it for themselves.  Brown, Smith, Seward and others were the chorus before which Tubman could sing out the life of freedom, following the underground railroad.  Remember her wisdom:  “When I found I had crossed that line (on her first escape from slavery, 1845), I looked at my hands to see if I was the same person.  There was such a glory over everything...I started with this idea in my head, ‘There’s two things I’ve got a right to…death or liberty’…’Twant me, ‘twas the Lord.  I always told him, “I trust you.  I don’t know where to go or what to do, but I expect you to lead me, and he always did.”

You will expect to hear something of Frederick Douglass, buried in Rochester.  His burial plot is across the street Strong Hospital.  As one patient said, looking through the window, “it gives you something to think about”.  Douglass printed the “North Star” in Rochester, and through it developed a voice for a new people in a new era.  In the North Star, Douglass wrote: “ The whole history of the progress of human liberty shows that all concessions yet made to her august claims have been born of earnest struggle…If there is no struggle, there is no progress.  Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up ground, they want rain without thunder and lightening.  They want the ocean without the awful roar of its mighty waters.” Or maybe we should give the honor to his colleague Sojourner Truth, calling in the same reagon for voting rights a long while ago: “That…man…says women can’t have as many rights as man, cause Christ wasn’t a woman.  Where did your Christ come from?  From God and a woman.  Man had nothing to do with him!”

Susan B. Anthony did not leave the project of freedom to others.  I wonder what sort of dinner companion she might have been.  Her constant consort with governors and senators across the Empire state made her an early Eleanor Roosevelt.  My grandmother grew up in Cooperstown and graduated from Smith College four years before she had the right to vote.  My mother was born in Syracuse only a few years after full suffrage, and taught Latin.  My wife is a musician and teacher, my sister is a corporate attorney, many of my colleagues in ministry are female.  I scratch my head to imagine a world without their voices.  In the Episcopal tradition, Syracuse produced Betty Bone Schiess, one of the first women ordained to ministry in the Protestant Episcopal church.  One of the Philadelphia 11.  We study her now in Introduction to Religion.  One rainy day when my daughter Emily was 13 and had the flu, we met Schiess, at the druggist.  The pharmacist called her name.  I clamored over to investigate whether it were she, the famous Schiess.  “Who wants to know?” she replied.  As she left, after good banter, she turned in her slicker and totting an umbrella pronounced this blessing: “One day you will be a Methodist bishop”.  I thought at first she was addressing me.  But no, she was talking to Emily. Thank you, our daughter replied.  You may visit the birthplace of women’s suffrage, the one hundredth anniversary of which we have just past during Covid, and more broadly the advent of feminism in Seneca Falls, on the shores of Seneca Lake.  Anthony’s witness stands out among the witness of so many others:  your grandmother, your mother, your sister, your wife, your daughter, your pastor, Betty Bone Schiess, and so many others.  Who can forget the motto of Susan B. Anthony: “Failure is impossible” (on her 86^th birthday, 1906).  “Cautious, careful people, always casting about to preserve their reputation and social standing, never can bring about reform.  Those who are really in earnest must be willing to be anything or nothing in the world’s estimation.”

Sometimes the freedom train went a bit astray across this lakescape.  Exuberance can produce minor collisions and occasional wanderings.  When we get so focused on the speedometer that we forget to drive the car safely, then trouble arises.  That is, Woodstock 50 years ago paled by comparison with the communal experiments along the Erie Canal 150 years ago. The Shaker Community and the Oneida Community perhaps can bracket our discussion.  Under Mother Ann Lee, and starting in farm country near New Lebanon (Albany area), not far from Tanglewood and our BU musical program there, the shaking Quakers firmly addressed the matter of social distancing.  They required it at all times, except in the sacred dance of Sunday worship.  They forbade it.  Women and men came together only once a week, on Sunday morning, for ecstatic singing and dancing, hence their name.  This made church attendance somewhat more than casual liturgical observance.  However, the practice did not amplify the community itself: infant baptisms lacked the requisite infant, and so were infrequent.  Consequently the Shakers moved to Cleveland where they blended into Sherwood Anderson’s new Ohio, returning to the old ways of hard work, monogamy, and frugality.  In short, they became Methodists.   But hear again the beautiful Shaker tune:

Tis a gift to be loving

Tis the best gift of all

Like a gentle rain love falls to cover all

When we find ourselves in the place just right

‘Twill be in the valley of love and delight 

When true, simplicity is gain

To bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed

To turn, turn, will be our delight

‘Till by turning, turning, we come round right

Or you may want to read about the Oneida community in the book, Without Sin, the best review in our generation of their somewhat different experiment.  Also, along the Erie Canal the Oneida community set out to find heaven on earth, the end of all oppressions, and even the hope that, as John H Noyes read from Revelation, “death itself will be no more”.  And they abandoned any and all social distancing.  It would another three sermons to trace through the detail of complex marriage, stirpiculture, and communal life among the Oneida Community.Although I went to High School in Oneida.  They I do not recall a full lesson on the matter of stirpiculture, the heart of the Oneida experiment.  Three hundred in number at their greatest growth, the community produced bear traps and then silver, continuing, in some fashion, until just a few years ago.  Of all the utopian experiments, the Oneida project is the most fascinating.  After word got out about the doings and practices in Oneida, clergy in Syracuse banded together and ran them out of town, first to Canada and then to the Midwest.  Noyes died on the trip, and the community disappeared, except in some of  the silverware on your dinner table, in wedding gifts, and in many restaurants.  Let us remember the love of freedom, as Noyes expressed it, the aspiration to spirit and life, even if we cannot affirm his conclusion: “I am free of sin and in a state of Perfection”.

One last story in this Gift from the Lake.  Norman Vincent Peale, who began his ministry in Syracuse NY. When we were at Union Seminary in New York the faculty there, both regularly and rightly criticized the inadequate theology of his Marble Collegiate Church.  James Sanders sternly referred to this famed congregation as the “First Church of Marduke”, not an accolade.  Of course you know that for fifty years, a graduate of Boston University, and Ohio Wesleyan, and a proponent of the power of positive thinking held forth, without notes, from the Marduke pulpit.  His son in law, Arthur Caliandro, followed him, with notes.  You may not trust his theology.  I myself am a critic, schooled as I was in the dour, German realism of Tillich, Niehbuhr, and company.  You may find it too shallow.  Everbody has their criticism of Norman Vincent Peale.  Even Adlai Stevenson had gripes.  When attacked from the Marduke pulpit,  Stevenson defended his Christianity on the basis of the Apostle to the Gentiles, all this in 1956, and rounded out his peroration thus:  “Sir, I find Paul appealing, but Peale, appalling.”  You too may find Paul appealing and Peale appalling.  Yet as young man in Syracuse, University Church, hte found there a happy people.  He found there a positive people.  He found here a hopeful people, an optimistic congregation.  Why, they were so good to him that he relaxed and fell in love and married an SU coed, Ruth.  Our good friend Forrest Whitmeyer, a graduate of Boston Latin by the way, knew them both well.  It was that native buckeye spirit married to that native orange soul, and it produced the power of positive thinking, itself a form of faith and freedom not to be forgotten. Our daughter this last week affirmed her own commitment to the ‘power of positive relationships’. Well, it brought Norman to mind. The Peales, Ruth and Norman both, did not leave the project of freedom to somebody else.  It is biblical and within limits faithful to remember Peale’s seven most important words: “You can if you think you can.”   At least we could admit the contrary as true:  If you think you can’t, you probably can’t and probably won’t.

From the past, we may today receive a Gift from the Lake.  God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself.  The faith of Jesus Christ and the freedom of Jesus Christ we celebrate today.  Our forebears were disinclined to leave the pursuit of freedom to others.  They lived with faitht that the center could hold. They seized freedom in their own hands and by their own lives.  They did not wait on others.  They did not pause to seek a secret blessing.  They did not wait until some ethereal sign emerged.  They did not expect some magic insight.  They preferred deliverance to diffidence. Real love means taking historical responsibility.

In earshot of our Lord’s teaching, there awaits us every Lord’s day a personal question:  as a Christian man or woman, what are you going to do to continue to expand the circle of freedom, spirit, life and love in our time?  Where is your tribal council to create?  Where is your slavery to escape?  Where is your North Star to publish?  Where is your franchise to find?  Where is your libertinism to avoid?  Where is your hope to share?  When it comes to spirit and life, as announced in John 6, will you lift a hand?

In thanks for these years of sea gifts, we bring you this summer morning a Gift from the Lake.  A fresh water gift to honor a salt water gift.  Recall what Anne Murrow Lindberg described in her little book about the ocean and the soul, Gift from the Sea, whose title has inspired this morning’s sermon.  She recommends, strongly, time spent on the shore.  She wrote some years ago: “This is what one thirsts for, I realize, after the smallness of the day, of work, of details, of intimacy - even of communication, one thirsts for the magnitude and universality of a night full of stars, pouring into one like a fresh tide…I would like to achieve a state of inner spiritual grace from which I could function and give as I was meant to in the eye of God.”

So, dear friends, travel then with a little imagination…Imagine Eucharist at Marsh Chapel.  Stand to sing… Pause to reflect… Step out into the aisle… Look at and look past Abraham Lincoln and Francis Willard…Receive cup and bread, bread and cup… Kneel at the altar to pray… Stand in communion with the communion of saints…Here is the bread and cup of friendship…Imagine, a congregation reciting together a creed, a psalm, a hymn, a poem.  Imagine, if you are willing, a congregation currently in diaspora, but just now, by the word spoken and heard, a gathered and thus addressable community, you and I and all together

-The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel

posted in The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel on 08.1.2021 at 11:00 am

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By Marsh Chapel

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John 6:1-21

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       A few years ago, there was a common news trope that began “Millennials are killing.” Over the years, millennials have been accused of killing many businesses or industries. Exact dates range for classifying the millennial generation but millennials were born roughly between the early 1980s and late 1990s. For a while, it seemed that millennials were killing off an industry or product every month. Listen to just some of what millennials were supposedly killing, the restaurant chain Applebee’s, starter homes, the institution of marriage, napkins, cereal, golf, diamonds, department stores, football, oil, and American cheese. Most of the news articles that began with “millennials are killing” noted shifts in general shopping trends among the avocado toast-loving generation and made predictions from those trends. Despite the plethora of articles claiming these industries were being killed by millennials, most have continued or adapted.

Attached to the writings about millennials killing thing, were articles that made even grander claims about the millennial generation. Most of these articles were quick to point out supposed flaws in the rising generation. Articles lamented that millennials have a problem with authority, reject corporations and institutions, are addicted to screens and video games, and do not possess useful skills. These types of articles become a type unto themselves. They took off the same month I graduated college with a May 2013 cover story in Time Magazine titled “The ME ME ME Generation: Millennials are lazy, entitle narcissists who still live with their parent.” The article critiques the so-called participation trophy, entitled, feelings oriented, math averse, Iphone loving generation. At least, the author of that article did mention positive attributes of millennials and ended on a more rounded note. Other sensationalist articles went further lambasting millennial culture as destructive to civilization and predicted that a collapse was imminent. With all of the claims about the millennial generation, it is sort of a wonder that we have made it to 2021 given these dire assessments.

While it is true that millennials and the younger generations are different from their parents that has been the usual way of the world throughout history. Younger generations have a harder and harder time accepting the inherited ways of being and doing. It is also not uncommon for older generations to complain about younger ones. This tradition can be traced as far back as ancient Greece. The ancient Greeks had to walk uphill both ways to school in the snow, after all. We have all likely heard the phrase, “well back in my day we did it like this” or “when I was a kid, we played outside.” Generational differences are not easy to navigate. It can be hard for waning generations to see waxing ones. Older generations tend to have nostalgia for the way things were, especially when traditions or methods worked for them.

Younger generations sometimes have a hard time listening with empathy to the perspectives of those older. In the present situation, millennials have struck back with the phrase “Ok Boomer.” The phrase “Ok Boomer” on social media and news articles was employed in divisive manners to suggest that the boomer generation was out of touch with unfolding new realities. “Ok Boomer” is a way of dismissing the perspectives and insights of the older generation. It can be hard for waxing generation to engage with waning generations too. There seems to be a present generational cultural conflict. Like many conflicts, this one thrives by arguing on uncommon ground. Talking past each other results in more clicks, likes, and subscriptions than talking to each other. The unfortunate result though, is that strained conversations around dinner tables have gotten even harder, phone calls and zoom sessions have gotten shorter, work-place meetings and memos are accompanied by eyerolls, and apathy has ensued. When apathy reigns though, everyone loses. Even when there are significant difference that need to be addressed, generational conflict should not resort to apathy. Nor should it resort to a winner take all approach.

To my mind, much of the generational angst, on both sides, revolves around anxiety over the future and questions of authority. Many are anxious about the future of the environment, the economy, the world, faith, and a myriad of other areas. This anxiety is increased because many of the traditional houses of authority have fallen in the wake of the postmodern age for younger generations, while older generations can still meaningfully cling to them. Many of the sources of comfort and hope no longer speak transgenerationally. It is almost as if different languages are being employed which speak past each other. Little effort is made to translate across differences in mutual manners. The seams appear to be bursting as what holds us together lessens and what brings us apart grows.

There is still time though. We may be in a moment of crisis but moments of crisis have a way of bringing more out of us than we otherwise thought possible. There is time to listen across the age gap for mutual understanding and mutual care. There is time to stop reading sensationalizing articles that exist for profits rather than to inform. There is time to move past indifference toward mutual accountability that empathetically listens to the perspectives of others. There is time for fidelity and novelty. When novelty meets fidelity productively, genuine encounters can take place. Both novelty and fidelity are necessary ingredients to a well-rounded culture and to a well-rounded faith.

Fidelity reminds us that a core essence of knowledge and wisdom is passed down from generation to generation. Fidelity reminds us to heed those who have walked where we walk. Fidelity is a reminder that the God of those who have gone before us, is still with us today. Novelty calls us to consider the present moment with care. Novelty reminds us that we tread on unsodden soil that has never been walked before. Novelty calls us to consider the situation which fidelity arises from and speaks toward. Novelty listens to the new things that God may be doing by discerning through fidelity what God has done. Today, no matter what generation you are born to or feel you belong to, let us listen to ancient voices from scripture with fidelity and novelty together.

Turn with me and consider with me the story of David and Bathsheba. To understand the dynamics of this narrative, we need to understand a bit about King David. King David looms large in the biblical tradition. He is most remembered as the person who killed Goliath when no one else would fight the giant. Despite coming from humble origins, he is often considered the hallmark king of the United Israel. Most of the biblical writers look upon David with favor. I Samuel tells us that God anointed David king over Israel. David is said to be a man after God’s own heart. The biblical narrative tells us that God entered into an eternal covenant with David that his line would rule forever. Christians interpret this covenant from an Christological perspective. Jesus is viewed as the promised messiah in the line of David.

But the story recounted today, of David and Bathsheba, is not a story of triumph but one of terror. It is an instance of abuse of power, position, and sex. II Samuel begins this narrative by saying it was spring when kings would go out to battle. It seems that David, the mighty warrior decided to stay in Jerusalem. Instead of going out with his army, he sent generals in his stead and stayed behind. One afternoon, he saw Bathsheba bathing and sent men to bring her to the palace. Despite knowing that she was married and with no indication that she was given any choice in the matter, the texts says she was brought to David and he laid with her. She became pregnant from David’s actions. Again, with no indication that she was consulted, David devised a plan to hide the fact that the child was his by bringing Bathsheba’s husband back from battle. His hope was that Uriah would lay with his wife and think the child was his. Rather than be accountable to or for his actions, David attempted to create a situation where Bathsheba would have to live a lie for the rest of her life. Bathsheba would have been destined to wake up every day and pretend the child belonged to her husband. David offered gifts to Bathsheba’s husband, Uriah the Hittite, but the plan did not work. Uriah slept at the entrance of David’s house.

David questioned Uriah about why he would not go back to his house to be with his wife. Verse 11 says “Uriah said to David, ‘The ark and Israel and Judah remain in booths; and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are camping in the open field; shall I then go to my house, to eat and to drink, and to lie with my wife? As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not do such a thing.’” Uriah shows his character here, which is in direct contrast to David’s. He refuses to engage in the comforts of home when his brothers are on the battlefield. Uriah even made an oath not to do such things. What intrigues me about his oath is that he involves the king to give it a stronger sense of sincerity. Uriah does not say, as surely as I live I will do no such things he says, “As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not do such a thing.” Uriah invokes an oath as a servant of the King binding himself by life the King. Uriah trusts in David’s character but that trust is misplaced. David tries to get him to break his oath by getting him drunk and when that fails, he signs death papers.

David wrote orders to his general for Uriah the Hittite to be placed where the battle is most fierce and then for the army to be pulled back. The intention is clearly preserved in the last line, “Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting, and then draw back from him, so that he may be struck down and die.” I am no legal scholar, but the plan seems to amount to premediated murder to me, even if David is not the one holding the weapon. It seems that David got a little too used to killing on the battlefield and resorted to it as a means of disposing a loyal fighter. Uriah the Hittite who trusted David, was disposable to David. There may be a variety of reasons for why he was disposable but it intrigues me that the text preserves Uriah’s ethnicity. The text tells us so little about Uriah but it mentions multiple times that he is a Hittite. He is a Hittite, presumably from Anatolia or modern-day Turkey. We aren’t sure what he is doing in Jerusalem or what he is doing fighting for David, but his loyalty to David and his fellow soldiers is well attested in the text.

To David, Uriah was an outsider, a foreigner, someone David could more readily dispose of, perhaps, because of his status as a foreigner. No ancestral family would come looking for the body or asking questions about what happened. No protests on the street corners of Jerusalem. No chalk or candle vigils at the site of the murder. David sent him away to be killed and made the man carry his own death certificate. Cold, cold blooded through and through. In state sponsored killings, the state too often gets away free.

It is hard to sit with this David, especially when most biblical writers do not. Biblical writers gloss over these actions of David to emphasize the regal king. The story of David and Bathsheba is one that tends to be missed. Or, if it is told, it is an example of how even a great man like David can sin. It is often an object lesson on the potential pitfalls of lust and the importance of repentance. Bathsheba tends to be made out to be an opportunist, if not a seductress in these readings. These readings, like versions of history told by and controlled by the victors, gloss the perspective of victims. Rarely is this narrative considered from the perspective of Bathsheba as a real person and not an object of David’s desire. Rarely is this story considered from the perspective of a woman made a widower by a King who brought her out of her home multiple times. Rarely is this story considered from the perspective of a mother who lost her child or a husband who lost his life.

This perspective is hard. It stands in critical contrast to how much of the biblical narrative portrays King David; yet, it is a voice calling out to be heard. It is a voice that should no longer be neglected within our tradition and within history. These perspectives should not be ignored or silenced any longer. The negation of the oppressed, the drowning out of these perspectives, leads to cynicism and apathy. It leads to rejection of the structures which preserve powerful perspectives. The listening to the oppressed can lead to critical accountability. Critical accountability can be a source of change. Critical accountability may be what we need in this present age.

The younger generations are generally skeptical of power, wealth, privilege, and authority. While some of this extends from cynicism, part of it also comes from hope for more equitable ways of living. The cynicism is widely discussed and talk about. It is often a source of conflict but there is also the possibility of hope when accountability mediates cynicism and involvement. Cynicism is strong, hope can be stronger. There is strength left in the older generations for this critical accountability as a place of common ground with younger people. Novelty and fidelity are not without expression in pockets of the world, but the pockets need to be nurtured to grow. Critical accountability can be scary. It might look like challenging cherished notions and asking hard questions when it is easier to stay silent.

This summer, it is hard to remain silent concerning those people who face food and housing insecurity when we are in the midst of a billionaire space race. When some have billions to frivol away and others have little, questions need to be asked, especially when tax codes allow billionaires to avoid paying an equitable share. Wealth inequality needs critical accountability. This summer, we are also all too aware of voices crying out from unmarked graves on school and church properties. The church and history need critical accountability. This summer, we are too aware of what happens when systems and structures lack transparent accountability. Apathy and cynicism are the easy way out. Generational conflict that prevents meaningful change and dialogue serves no one. But, fidelity and novelty can meet in critical accountability through God’s liberating Spirit. This is a vulnerable place. It requires people and generations to be exposed to one another. To find common places to work together for common good.

Countries around the world, including Canada and the United State are undergoing a historical reckoning. This historical reckoning is looking at glossed over acts and policies of domination and violence that have been dismissed and covered up. While some chalk this up to generational or culture wars, it is actually an attempt to be honest about what occurred in the past and how it continues to impact the present. In the present time, we are tasked with assessing not only intent but also action. We are aware that words can be cheap and action can be costly. We assess not as judge and jury but as voices bearing witness to a Gospel seeking to be expressed to each time and place. The Gospel calls us to truthful telling and genuine justice. May we hear with fidelity and novelty for all.

-The Rev. Scott Donahue-Martens

Ph.D. Student in Practical Theology: Homiletics, Boston University School of Theology

posted in Guest Preachers on 07.25.2021 at 11:00 am

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By Marsh Chapel

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Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

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At the Boston University School of Theology, most students pursuing a Master of Divinity degree must take a course called “Contextual Education.” This course immerses the student in field education – in a faith-based setting like a church or a nonprofit. Our regular congregation members are familiar with these students. We have had many of them help lead our weekly services over the years and participated in their growth and learning while they were here. One unique thing about this year-long course is that there is a required learning component. Each student, when they develop their learning agreement with their site, must include a Sabbath practice which they will undertake at least weekly. Some choose a traditional spiritual practice, like reciting the daily offices of prayer in the Episcopal tradition; others choose to spend time outdoors, walking mindfully in their surroundings as the seasons change; still others may choose to undergo a true 24-hour sabbath in which they do not engage in schoolwork or take a break from technology.

The point of requiring sabbath as a learning opportunity is to remind students that their vocations will require a large amount of energy expended for others in ways not encountered in a traditional 9 to 5 job. Rest and rejuvenation is an essential part of all of our lives, but for those in helping professions in which handling the emotions and spiritual wellbeing of others is an essential part, care for the self becomes a critical part of maintaining balance and boundaries. I have had the privilege of supervising and mentoring a handful of contextual education students over the years that I have served as University Chaplain. I have found that Sabbath keeping has often been the most challenging assignment for students to remember and adhere to. This is not to say that all students struggle with this aspect – in fact, I’ve had some students who have found the “requirement” sabbath keeping as part of this course to be a natural fit with their Iifestyles. However, for those who struggle with this aspect of their learning, it’s not because they don’t want to take time to slow down and connect with something larger than themselves. Instead, it is usually tied to their feeling that they must be constantly busy or productive, or that the demands of graduate school, an internship, and/or working a job does not afford them the luxury of rest. Instilling this observance of sabbath is an essential part of training those who will go into ministry, but really is applicable to any person in any vocation.

Self-care and work-life balance have become common place buzzwords today. In the events of the past year, many of us have struggled to find moments of rest and replenishment, whether it’s because of the lack of a physical separation from our workspace, an increased workload, an inability to safely travel, or simply the weight of the world’s news that keeps us from finding rest. Some of us may have been able to achieve some semblance of this balance, building in new routines (walks, meditation, time for prayer) into our new schedule. In our own ways we discovered or rediscovered means of stepping away from the difficult challenges faced in the past year. We need a break. We need to recharge. We need a new perspective, a change of scenery, a stop.

Today’s gospel reading begins with Jesus reminding the apostles that maintaining rest is an important part of ministry. You may remember that a few weeks ago in our lectionary readings, Jesus sent the apostles out, two by two, to heal and teach others in the surrounding area. He sent them out without any provisions other than their staff, a tunic, and sandals, with the advice that if they were not welcome, they should just shake it off and go to the next town. The term “apostle” here is not referring necessarily to the “The Twelve Apostles” but rather is a generalized term related to the Greek “apostello” which means “to send out (with a message).” Therefore these are the people Jesus has sent out with a message of healing and repentance, to spread among the people. Apparently the apostles had been very successful in their apostello. Upon returning to Jesus, they were so sought after by the people who heard of their ministry that they had no time to even eat! Jesus directs the apostles that they are to go to a deserted place and rest for a while. The apostles listen to Jesus because he has directed them successfully in their ministry thus far. They have built a relationship of trust in Him and his teachings. He is a successful leader, a compassionate and good Shepherd.

Their rest doesn’t last long, however. Even though they’ve made passage on a boat to go to this secluded place of rest, the people who have heard of Jesus and his apostles gather in crowds and follow them along the shorelines. For me, this description invokes that famous beginning scene of “A Hard Day’s Night” in which the Beatles are trying to hide or outrun groups of teenage fans who are chasing them in hopes of touching or being close to them. In my mind I see people clamoring for Jesus with the group getting larger and larger with each town they encounter. A growing flock of people all driven in the direction of their shepherd. Unlike the Beatles, however, Jesus assesses the situation and decides that the proper thing to do in this situation is not to hide or try to outrun the people. Instead, he forgoes his rest and addresses those in need.

In all of our readings today, we have heard the theme of shepherding over and over again. In Jeremiah, the Lord warns against destructive shepherds who fail to lead the people on a path of righteousness and compares the people of Israel to “Sheep without a Shepherd.” In Psalm 23, we hear the familiar words of how the Lord acts as our shepherd, caring for and protecting us from evil. In the gospel, Mark compares the people on the shoreline with shepherdless sheep, echoing the sentiments of the Jeremiah text that they are in need of care and effective leadership.

Shepherding is one of the oldest professions. In the agrarian nomadic culture of the ancient Israelites, it was well known as an occupation for the poor. Shepherds are not farmers – while they may be tied to a farm eventually for the economic purposes of sheep (shearing and meat production) they are independent in their task of tending and protecting their flock. Being a shepherd is a tough job. It is all consuming at times, especially when lambing season comes. It requires care, fortitude, attention, and an ability to set boundaries.

We are familiar with the imagery of the Good Shepherd. In fact, looking at the back of the chapel as I speak right now, I can see Jesus depicted as the Good Shepherd in the large stained glass window above the balcony. In one hand Jesus holds a shepherd’s staff, outstretching his other hand to the congregation, inviting them in. To the left, a window depicting women and children who gaze upon him, and on the right a mixture of other adults adoring him. “Feed my lambs. Feed my sheep” it states above the images of the people. Jesus is the Good Shepherd because he loves and cares for his flock. We are reminded of the actions of a Good Shepherd in the text of

Psalm 23:

The Lord is my shepherd; I lack for nothing

He makes me lie down in green pastures

He leads me to water where I may rest;

He revives my spirit:

For his name’s sake he guides me in the right paths.

Even were I to walk through a valley of deepest darkness

I should fear no harm, for you are with me,

Your shepherd’s staff and crook afford me comfort.

You spread a table for me in the presence of my enemies;

You have richly anointed my head with oil,

And my cup brims over.

Goodness and love unfailing will follow me

All the days of my life,

And I shall dwell in the house of the Lord throughout the years to come.

The use of the term shepherd fits for the kind of work Jesus does. He provides his sheep with what they need (see the feeding of the 5,000 which is actually contained in the verses omitted from this week’s lectionary reading). He knows the appropriate actions in the appropriate season, including when to rest and when to be active. He shows his care through acts of healing and disregard for human-created laws that interfere with the work of God. He guides and sets boundaries through his teachings. He protects his flock from evil.  Even more than that, he knows how to tend to new flocks of sheep, even if he has never encountered them before.

I see today’s gospel lesson as the story of two flocks. The first is the group of apostles. This is the small flock with whom Jesus has developed extensive relationship. They have learned from him. They trust his words and actions. They have been entrusted by him to carry the power of healing to others and to share his teachings with the wider world with the knowledge that they will continue to follow him and return to him for their continued growth and strength. The second flock are all those people who have heard of Jesus and “recognize” him from what they have been told by others. They probably do not know the full extent of his teachings. They definitely do not know that he is the Son of God. Many of them probably know that he and his group of disciples heal people. That is reason enough for them to get excited and seek him out. Imagine how the stories shared about Jesus and his miracles must have sounded after they had passed from city to city, gaining momentum as his infamy continues. A miracle man who has healed many who were on the verge of death, or had no hope for healing is making himself available to others. No wonder they flocked to see him! These two flocks still need the guidance of Jesus, but their needs are dictated by their current relationship with Jesus. The first flock, Flock A let’s call them, composed of the apostles have different needs than Flock B, the flock of the sick and uninformed.

Flock B consists of those who have great needs. Remember they are the sheep without a shepherd. They have no one to care for them, to guide them. They are literally running themselves ragged trying to find Jesus to solve their problems. If you’ve ever seen sheep without the guidance of a shepherd or a sheep dog, or ineffective shepherding, you may not realize how quickly things can go wrong. Because sheep are a flocking animal, they travel in a large group. This helps naturally protect them from predators, but it also can make it very difficult to stop them once they all start heading in the same direction. Shepherds are effective in drawing boundaries for the sheep to ensure their safety – keeping them in the good grazing areas and protecting them from predators. Without even those basic needs being met, the sheep, while having some natural inclinations for self-preservation, are more likely to find themselves in unsafe conditions. Jesus sees that these people are in danger because they lack the guidance and care of effective leadership. Even though the disciples need rest, Jesus sees that the crises these people are facing is of utmost importance. The members of Flock B also need rest, in the form of existential calming. Rest will come for all. Love must come first.

Flock A is more like a domesticated flock. They have come to know and depend on their shepherd. They have had their basic needs met (well, with the exception of being so busy that they have no time to eat). Jesus recognizes that this flock, who has been consistent, has gone out to serve others, has done their best to serve God, needs a break. One, for obvious reasons of burnout – people cannot keep working efficiently without time away from their job. But secondly, a spiritual life is one of balance. It requires both activity and contemplation. While many of us may see our task as Christians to love and serve others, we must also have opportunities for spiritual refreshment in hearing the Word proclaimed, nourishing ourselves in holy communion, and taking time to connect with our Creator through prayer and meditation. On the flip side, contemplation without action is not a fully realized Christian life either. Faith should lead to good works in service of others. In a cyclical fashion, rest and action, contemplation and service to others, feed each other in maintaining a healthy balance.

The balance of our work and life, our spiritual activity and contemplation, our outwardness and inwardness is something explored by a wide variety of writers, but perhaps none better than the great agrarian poet and essayist and devout Christian, Wendell Berry. Berry, who owns a farm in rural Kentucky, advocates for the slowing down of life, a turn away from consumerism, of reconnecting with nature, of understanding the earth and all of its cycles. As a farmer, Berry has kept his own flock of sheep, although now in diminished numbers due to his age and ability to care for them. Berry has consistently written poems reflecting Sabbath practice mixed with his agrarian lifestyle for over 40 years. One such poem, number IX from 1991 entitled “The Farm” encapsulates the rhythm of farming life through Berry’s poetic lens. In this excerpt from two sections of the poem, Berry highlights the challenges of the daily work of tending sheep and provides reflection on the need for rest and quiet in a secluded place, not unlike the messages we heard in today’s gospel. He writes:

Near winter’s end, your flock

Will bear their lambs, and you

Must be alert, out late

And early at the barn,

To guard against the grief

You cannot help but feel

When any young thing made

For life falters at birth

And dies. Save the best hay

To feed the suckling ewes.

Shelter them in the barn

Until the grass is strong,

Then turn them out to graze

The green hillsides, good pasture

With shade and water close.

Then watch for dogs, whose sport

Will be to kill your sheep

And ruin all your work.

Or old Coyote may

Become your supper guest,

Unasked and without thanks;

He’ll just excerpt a lamb

And dine before you know it.

But don’t because of that,

Make war against the world

And its wild appetites…

To rest, go to the woods

Where what is made is made

Without your thought or work.

Sit down; begin the wait

For small trees to grow big,

Feeding on earth and light.

Their good result is song

The winds must bring, that trees

Must wait to sing, and sing

Longer than you can wait.

Soon you must go. The trees,

Your seniors, standing thus,

Acknowledged in your eyes,

Stand as your praise and prayer.

Your rest is in this place

Of what you cannot be

And what you cannot do.

But make your land recall,

In workdays of the fields,

The Sabbath of the woods.

We are not all shepherd-less sheep. We have the guidance, love, and care of our Good Shepherd. He has taught us the ways in which we can reach out to others and share the good news of his life and ministry, growing our flock, bringing in those who may be lost or shepherd-less. He sets boundaries for us, reminding us where the good places to rest are and taking care of us when we are most in need through our faith in Him. Just as we must find balance in the social and physical aspects of our lives, experiencing times of activity and times of rest, we must also strive to seek the balance necessary to feed our spiritual lives as well. In Jesus, the Good Shepherd, we can find that rest.

Rest is holy. Rest is sacred. Amen.

Wendell Berry, 1991:XI “The Farm” in A Timbered Choir: The Sabbath Poems 1979 – 1997, Washington, D.C. Counterpoint publishers, 1998. P. 137-138, 147.

-Dr. Jessica Chicka, University Chaplain for International Students

posted in The Rev. Dr. Jessica Chicka, University Chaplain for International Students on 07.18.2021 at 10:00 am

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By Marsh Chapel

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Mark 6:14-29

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I worked as a lifeguard at the Wesleyan church camp in Central New York for two summers during my college years. The days were filled with long hours of sunglasses and smelled of a mixture of chlorine and sunscreen. The teen week was always a rambunctious time, which recalled my memories of teen camp with my cousin at that very camp. On one particular day while lifeguarding during the teen week, a camp counselor was looking to impress someone or just had some extra energy and asked if he could do a flip into the pool. Flips were strictly forbidden, even diving was for that matter. The pool was not very deep and it would only be a matter of time before there was a mishap if flips were allowed. To my surprise, my supervisor, the aquatics director said that he could do the flip. This seemed out of character to me because I knew her to be someone who cared deeply about safety. She was a person of great faith. I recall many a “how is it with you soul today” greetings at the morning pool chemical test or a “what are you reading in Scripture” while vacuuming the pool. She turned mundane maintenance tasks into opportunities of spiritual companioning.

My heart started to beat faster when she gave the OK for the flip. My mind started playing out multiple scenarios, none of which were good. I ran through a mental checklist noting where gauze was for a nose bleed or the backboard if something really bad happened. I watched as the counselor took his steps backward to prepare his approach, teenage campers all cheering with glee. He started to run and leaped into the air. By this time, I was holding my breath and my body was ready to jump from the lifeguard tower. Up into the air he went and down into the water with a splash. It went fine. There were no issues. He pulled himself out of the water. The tension in my body released. I sighed with relief. My aquatics director looked at him and said, “That was a bit of grace.” “That was a bit of grace.” … She didn’t mean the flip was graceful. It was ok as far as flips go. There was nothing particularly bad or good about it. I think she meant that the bending of the rules was a form of grace. The acquiescence to play in an unusual manner due to the expectation of success was a bit of grace. No matter what the original intent was, I spent the rest of the day wrestling with the naming of a pool flip grace.

Just what type of grace is a pool flip? Was it, prevenient grace, the grace the comes before? Justifying grace, of forgiveness? Sanctifying grace of restoration? Cooperative grace which calls us to participate with God as conduits of grace? None of these types of grace fit. Grace. Unmerited favor, acceptance, forgiveness, restoration, hope, none of this matched my expectations or experiences of grace. None of it matched the books that I had read in preparation for ministry or the theology lectures my professors gave. But it was grace nonetheless. In the recesses of my being, this memory recalls an experience of grace that defies expectations and stuffy definitions. Do not get me wrong, I like the safe sometimes stuffy definitions that sit in stacks on shelves in libraries. I take joy in reading and the expansion that occurs through the gift of written language.

But, experience is often different from well-meaning definitions. Sometimes definitions obscure as much as they reveal, especially with something like grace. Sometimes definitions make it hard to see what is happening before our eyes. Sometimes, what is stuffy needs to be taken outside where the wind blows a little more freely. When the creative Spirit blows in or over or above our experiences, grace abounds in unexpected places. Can a pool flip be grace? Can the grace to play be a Balm in Gilead, a cup for the thirsty, food for the journey, or the courage to be? Try it sometimes and see. See if jumping into cool water on a hot day offers more than just relief from the heat. See if watching children take joy in play is a source of healing in a broken world. By grace, I hope it is so. Beloved, there is transforming freedom in recognizing when events are moments of grace. In our present age, we desperately need grace. To find this grace, to see this grace, even to risk being found by this grace may require us to search differently, to see differently, and to think differently. Beloved, there is orienting hope in being found by grace in unexpected places.

I have pondered the memory of the pool flip most recently as the father of a 16 month old. My son is at the stage where he loves to point at something and he waits for me to name it. Whether it is the animals on his placemat at the dinner table or trees on our walks, the pointing never seems to end. He points, I name, he points somewhere else, and I name something else. Because of COVID, this toddler has not traveled more than 25 miles from Boston, but he is soaking up the world around him. Recently, there has been the joy of recognition on his face more frequently. He sees a cat in a book and points to the cat in the room. On our walks, he remembers and points to the street grandma and grandpa stayed at when they came to visit. He is learning about the world and his place in it all the time. Occasionally, he even says a word or two.

I have come to enjoy the pointing and naming. When my son points, he does so with the trust that the words his mother and I say are correct. His understanding of the world and reality itself is forming through this naming. While it may seem a game to him at times, it is a game of ultimate importance. For eventually, the naming will be more complex. Terms like love, God, and grace will appear. I sometimes wonder, how will these be named for him? I can tell him what Calvin, Wesley, and Tillich said. I can read Cone and Thurman, along with creeds and confessional statements. I can provide a reading list that will keep him busy for years to come. But, these ultimate questions, these ultimate concerns cannot be fully understood through books and in minds, they also have to be experienced in life and in the heart. So, I have come to hope that as we move through life, experiences will come that can be named as grace. Experiences can come that reveal God’s presence in the now. Opportunities to humbly see God at work through people who bear one another burdens. Through people who take up the mantle of justice, faith, hope, and love. I also hope to see grace in other places like sunsets, ocean waves, and learning a new language. The joy of rapidly melting ice cream cones on a hot summer day or traveling to see family. The hope that a new day will come in times of trouble.

Naming and framing what is going on around us is a key part of understanding the world. But events do not come with labels. We are not given an omniscient Hollywood narrator who offers much-needed guidance and perspective. Surely, we are not empty-handed. We have the Spirit, Scriptures, and the wisdom of others as we interpret. We engage in competing interpretations of life and being.  Paul Ricoeur marks the time as one involving a conflict of interpretation. Who is to say whether a pool flip is just a pool flip or something more meaningful? How we interpret makes a big difference. How we respond matters to life and the world.

We bring many voices with us when we interpret events. Voices from the past, some good some not so good. We bring the echoes of favorite teachers, parents, good books, sacred texts, and hopefully the Holy Spirit. Faith communities are an important place where we learn to interpret with care and love for one another. Faith communities are a place where we name these realities for those around us. Just as my lifeguard supervisor expanded my understanding of grace, so can you. We might fumble through at times in our communal efforts to name grace but we fumble together. We tend to the sacred in our midst for the sake of our souls and for the sake of those around us. This is holy work. It is the work of actualizing the Gospel. The Gospel is not merely words on a page, it is experienced in the here and now as radically transforming love. It is experienced as the liberating love that allows all of Creation to co-exist in mutual care.

Mark wrote as one seeking grace in Jesus Christ, amid conflict. Mark wrote when newly formed traditions were in conflict and required careful interpretation. Mark wrote as one looking to discover Jesus and the continuing significance of the Christ event of Jesus. On the one hand, the situation is very different now, and on the other hand, the situation bears remarkable similarities. Throughout the Gospel account, various encounters with Jesus reveal his authority, power, and identity to those who met Jesus and significantly to us. In a very real way, the Gospel is addressed to us. We are not the original audience of Mark’s gospel account, but we are included in the original audience of the Gospel for the Gospel is addressed to all. It is not bound by space, time, or circumstances. The Gospel is a thread that runs the course of history, inviting us to see Christ. Inviting us to be with Christ. When the Gospel is unhindered by the confines of pages, its power to include us in God’s unfolding story is radically realized …When the Gospel is unhindered by the confines of pages, its power to include us in God’s unfolding story is radically realized.

Through grace, the Gospel draws us closer to Jesus and reveals to us the Christ. Mark records many significant encounters with Jesus in his Gospel account. Today’s Gospel story takes place after Jesus sent out apostles who preached and proclaimed healing. These apostles ministered in the name of Jesus and the word spread. The word concerning Jesus spread to the point that it reached the ears of the ruler, Herod. Marks says that Herod did not know what to make of it. It seems that some discernment went on to figure out with this guy was that people followed. Mark’s narrative portrays a conflict of interpretations. Perhaps because he was religious, some associated Jesus with the prophets of old, people like Elijah, others even claimed he was John the Baptist back from the dead. Same person, different interpretations. Mark’s story says that these people were asking just who this Jesus was. Presumably, they were trying to access what it meant for them. People in power generally do not like disruptions and variables in their equations. People in power have a stake in maintaining the status quo and Jesus was disrupting the status quo.

His association with prophetic figures tells us something about the people he hung around. Jesus was clearly an advocate for the poor and powerless. His association with prophetic figures tells us something about the message Jesus proclaimed, that he came to free those in need of freeing and heal those in need of healing. Rather than go investigate further, Herod and the people in power pontificated. People in power tend to believe they can name reality accurately, regardless of whether or not their assertions are true. We all have opinions and interpretations, hence conflict, but privilege and power afford undue dominance to certain positions. They said, he is Elijah, he is a prophet. He is John the Baptist back from the dead. Imagine that, Mark tells us that Herod believed that Jesus was his cousin raised from the dead. This would have been no small thing for Herod who ordered John’s head be placed on a platter. In a certain sense, Herod’s wealth and position of power impacted what he saw and what he was willing to see about Jesus. Herod looked at Jesus as a threat to the status quo.

When we look to Jesus, we also look from our own positions. This is not bad in and of itself, but it necessitates caution. Our positions are not the whole story. Schleiermacher says avoiding misinterpretations is a key to good interpretation. We have to weed out bad interpretations to arrive at good ones. Our voices are one part of a greater song. It takes care not to limit Jesus to our positions and to be open to expansion. We grow in grace with others and through others. Like grace, Jesus is more expansive than pithy definitions. Jesus avoids being domesticated by checkboxes, voter registration cards, and fill in the blank answers. Interpreting the significance of Jesus to our lives and in the modern world necessitates weighing through a conflict of interpretations. Mark and the Gospel accounts are helpful guides in this work. They are a witness to history and in history. They are a key part of our tradition. They are prototypes for naming the mysteries of God and grace in our time.

Along with Mark, let us also hear from former Dean of this Marsh Chapel, Howard Thurman’s, Jesus and the Disinherited. This work invites us to consider Jesus from the perspective of those with their back against the wall. Thurman used the phrase “backs against the wall” to talk about those in need. The poor, the sick, the oppressed, and the downtrodden. Those with their backs against the wall are in a very different position than Herod; therefore, when they look to Christ, they often see more than Herod did. Thurman was the grandson of American slavery. Thurman was the grandson of people who called Jesus friend, despite learning about Christ through white slaveholders and white preachers who used Christianity as a tool of oppression. Thurman knew a different Jesus and engaged in a conflict of interpretations to insist Jesus is among the disinherited.

Despite the harm done in the name of Christ, Thurman was unwilling to give up Jesus. Thurman rejected Herod’s definition of Jesus and those who used Jesus for harm. Thurman was unwilling to allow Christ to be defined by those who do harm, when he knew Christ to be a poor minority Jew who lived under military occupation. This Christ is the one who identifies with those who have their back against the wall because Christ had his back against the wall and continues to be with those who have their backs against the wall. Because Thurman was the grandson of American slavery, he saw something in Jesus that the powerful Herod could never see. Thurman looked to Jesus and saw life. He saw survival for the oppressed. Thurman looked to Jesus and saw existence itself as possible for those who are told day in and day out that they do not matter. For those who hear every day in a million ways that this world is not for them, Thurman heard a different melody from the mouth of Jesus. A song of Gospel love and liberation for all.

At times, I wonder with preacher Fred Craddock, whether it is possible to know the words of this Gospel song but to be singing the wrong melody. In the conflict of interpretation of Jesus, the words of the Gospel need to match the Spirit’s sacred melody for this time. We discern the words and melody together. Sometimes there is conflict in this discernment. Sometimes there is agreement. Let discern together for the sake of love and liberation for all. Let us listen for the Sacred Word to match the sacred melody in our time and for our time.

-The Rev. Scott Donahue-Martens

Ph.D. Student in Practical Theology: Homiletics, Boston University School of Theology

posted in Guest Preachers on 07.11.2021 at 11:00 am

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By Marsh Chapel

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Mark 6: 1-13

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So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent. Mk 6: 12

Winthrop

Out on the Massachusetts Bay, in the autumn of 1630, Governor Jonathan Winthrop spoke to frightened pilgrims, half of whom would be dead and gone before spring. One can try to imagine the rolling of the frigate in the surf, out on the Atlantic. One can feel the salt breeze, the water wind of the sea.  Not too very far from the nave of Marsh Chapel. The Governor is brief, in his sermon for the day: “We must consider that we shall be a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us, so that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a byword through the world”. A remarkable, truly remarkable warning, to our country, at the moment of its inception.

Lincoln

It is a cold day in early March, 1865. Four score and eight years after Independence, the nation has indeed become, as Winthrop prophesied in his Boston sermon, “a story and byword through the world”. 600,000 men will have died by the time Lee and Grant meet at Appomattox--approximately one death for every 10 slaves forcibly brought to the New World. This day in March, Mr. Lincoln delivers his own sermon, to the gathered and, we may assume, for once a chastened congress. It is Lincoln’s Second Inaugural:

“The Almighty has His own purposes…Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, ‘The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether’.

“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work that we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”

Into the next decade the state of Mississippi will spend 20% of its annual budget, each year, for artificial limbs. Lincoln himself will die within weeks of the inaugural.

A remarkable warning, a Presidential warning, a sermonic warning.

King

Now we witness another gathering, and we hear another sermon. A hundred more years have passed.  It is August 28, 1963, a sweltering day in the nation’s capital. Thousands of women and men have gathered within earshot of Lincoln’s memorial, and within earshot of his Second Inaugural.  By some measure they have gathered too within the reverberated cautions given by Winthrop out in our Boston Bay. They have come—maybe some of you were there—with firmness in the right as God gives to see the right, to strive to finish the work. A Baptist preacher captures the moment in ringing oratory: “I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down at the table of brotherhood.”

Remarkable, truly remarkable words.

Winthrop. Lincoln. King. 1630. 1865. 1963. These are three of the greatest sermons ever preached in our country’s history. Do we notice that not one of them was delivered in a church? Yet they all interpret the church’s Gospel.  They all apply the Gospel of Christ, and its ringing command in Mark 6, to the land of the free and the home of the brave. Winthrop. Lincoln. King. They believed in God’s presence. They trusted, through times of what can only be called terror, in God’s favor. And mostly, they thought  and felt and thoughtfelt and feltthought that persons, even they themselves, had roles to play in the divine human drama. They spoke in harmony with Jesus’ challenge:  So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent. They spoke in a way that awakened the hearer.

All three knew tragedy, as we have again this year with 600,000 souls gone to glory, as we have again this winter with mendacity and violence used to usurp electoral outcomes, as we have again this week, with another tower like that of the biblical Siloam coming down in Miami Beach, for whose victims and families we truly do grieve.  They warned of tragedy, they endured tragedy, they honestly acknowledged tragedy. What Winthrop prophesied, and what Lincoln witnessed, and what King addressed is to some degree our national tragedy still. Though there has been progress, we still judge, far too much, by the color of skin and not by the content of character. As my predecessor Dr Robert Cummings Neville well said, from this pulpit one Sunday years ago:  Probably the deepest issue in our society is racism, a poisonous stain that mixes evil into the very best of our inventive history of democracy and our love of freedom.

A Sermon on the Mound

But God has not left us, nor does God abandon God’s children. God works through human hearts, to bind up the nation’s wounds. It is the preaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ which can bring peace. The church has nothing better to do, nothing other to do, nothing more important to do, nothing else to do than to preach. So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent.

And some of the best preaching happens beyond church. Some is spoken and some is lived. Said Benjamin Franklin, teaching the two values he thought important—industry and frugality: “none preaches better than the ant, and he says nothing”.

Here is one saving story from which, over time, we may gain strength and insight for our common story, poetry and preaching. For what Walt Whitman said about poetry is doubly true for the Gospel itself: “The United States themselves are essentially the greatest poem…Here at last is something in the doings of man that corresponds with the broadcast doings of the day and the night…Really great poetry is always the result of a national spirit, and not the privilege of a polished and select few…the strongest and sweetest songs yet remain to be sung.” The strongest and sweetest songs yet remain to be sung.

Looking back forty years to Jesus’ ministry, our writer has in stylized memory recalled a powerful teaching moment. All the Gospels, including our text, were formed, formed in the white heat of early church life, when the hand of death threatened a frightened church, perhaps in Rome, perhaps in the year 70ce.

This is the meaning of a sermon, to wake us up from a death-like sleep, to take us out of the arms of Morpheus. With Mark’s frightened early church, we may again hear good news. Sometimes what seems like death—think of the Gospel last Sunday--is merely napping. For example, this holiday weekend, we may want to remember…

Branch Rickey

Next year we shall pass the 75^th anniversary of Jackie Robinson’s entrance into major league baseball.  Decades ago, the armed forces were still legally segregated. So were public schools. So, America in 1947, when a tee-totaling, Bible quoting, Republican, Methodist layman from Ohio, Mr. Branch Rickey, brought racial integration to major league baseball. Who remembers today this lone ranger type who spent much of a lifetime working for one transformation? Rickey was taught the Gospel in a church where there was to be no separation between a deep personal faith and an active social involvement. He was formed at a small Methodist school, Ohio Wesleyan, one of whose Presidents, Bishop James Bashford, peers down on us today from the beautiful stained glass of Marsh Chapel.  Rickey was one of those people who just never heard that “it can’t be done”. For thirty years, slowly, painstakingly, he maneuvered and strategized and planned—on the basis of an early trauma he witnessed coaching his college baseball team--and brought about the greatest change in the history of our national pastime. IT CAN BE DONE. Go to Cooperstown this summer and see the story unfold. It is well worth the three-hour drive. There is a sermon on the mound, not just on the mount but on the mound, preached in life, brought to voice through one lone Methodist, in one lone lifetime, in one lone sport, in one lone generation. Things can change for the better. IT CAN BE DONE. But you need a preacher, like Rickey: “I prefer the errors of enthusiasm to the reticence of wisdom”. “I prefer the errors of enthusiasm to the reticence of wisdom”.

Where is the Branch Rickey of American political culture?  Where is the Branch Rickey of honesty about January 6, of preparation for the next pandemic, of the continuing struggle with racism, of the challenge of climate? Where is the Branch Rickey of Wall Street? Where is the Branch Rickey to waken the church, including his own beloved Methodism and mine? Where is the Branch Rickey of the urban public schools? Where is the Branch Rickey of your neighborhood? Where is that secular saint who doesn’t realize it can’t be done? Where is the preacher of the next sermon on the mound? And where are the actual preachers of the next generation who will remember and hope, as he did, in grace and freedom?

Maybe one is listening today. Maybe you are she. Things can change for the better, when sleepers awake.

Twenty years ago I heard William ‘Bobby’ McClain, of blessed memory, a dear friend, a preacher of the first water, from this school and this city, an African American pastor, tell about growing up in Tuskegee Alabama. He grew up listening by radio to the team Branch Rickey fielded in Brooklyn.  He said, “When Jackie stood at the plate, we stood with him. When he struck out we did too. When he hit the ball we jumped and cheered. When he slid home, we dusted off our own pants. When he stole a base, he stole for us. When he hit a home run, we were the victors. And when he was spiked we felt it, a long way away, down south. He gave us hope. He gave us hope.”

Don’t let people tell you things can’t change for the better. They can. This country can work. We just need a few more Branch Rickeys.

And a few more sermons on the mound… And a few more sermons on the mound…

So, dear friends, travel then with a little imagination…Imagine Eucharist at Marsh Chapel.  Stand to sing… Pause to reflect… Step out into the aisle… Look at and look past Abraham Lincoln and Francis Willard…Receive cup and bread, bread and cup… Kneel at the altar to pray… Stand in communion with the communion of saints…Here is the bread and cup of friendship…Imagine, a congregation reciting together a creed, a psalm, a hymn, a poem.  Imagine, if you are willing, a congregation currently in diaspora, but just now, by the word spoken and heard, a gathered and thus addressable community, you and I and all together, able to prepare for the challenges, the harvests of the future, able to imagine and preach and live a kind of sermon on the mound.

-The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel

posted in The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel on 07.4.2021 at 11:00 am

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By Marsh Chapel

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Mark 5:21–43

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Two women.  One is a recognized adult, able to consult with professionals and spend money on herself.  One, at the age of 12, is just entering adulthood.  As happens so often in the Bible, we do not know either of their names.  One is defined by her illness – she is the woman with twelve years of hemorrhages.  The other is defined by her relationship with her father – she is Jairus’s daughter, child of one of the leaders of the synagogue.  She is further defined by the description of “little daughter” by her father and “little girl” by Jesus, even though in her culture she is now considered old enough to be married.  Finally, she is defined by the fact that she is dying from an unspecified condition; and indeed, she becomes further defined as “dead” during the space of this story.

These definitions carry a lot of weight.  Because she suffers from a flow of blood, aside from the debilitation, the challenges of blood flowing outside the body, and the increasing depletion of her resources and her hope, the older woman is ritually and thus socially unclean. And not just she herself is unclean, but anything she wears, anything or anyone she touches is made by her to be unclean.  This state of religious and social isolation has lasted for her for as long as the younger woman has been alive.  As for the younger woman, we have no idea of who she herself is, or what causes her condition, or how long she has been dying.  We only know that she is at the point of death, that her father and even Jesus do not see her as having moved beyond being “little”, and that she really does die.

Now this is a healing story, and both of these women are healed.  Miraculously so.  And, you may remember our explorations of other healing stories through the work of Sharon V. Betcher, theologian and disability activist.  She notes that the point of the stories of Jesus’ healing is not just the healings themselves.  The point is even more so the point of Jesus’ upending of the political and social realities of the time.   This upending comes in his preaching of the good news of the Kingdom of God having come near, and is revealed through Jesus’ own ministry, teaching, life, death, and resurrection.  Add to this that Mark is often referred to as the gospel of conflict.  Jesus encounters conflict with his own family, his disciples, the religious authorities, and demons.  Finally, there are themes particular to Mark that are very present in this story.  More than healing is going on here.

At the beginning of this story, both these women are in desperate straits.  The woman with the flow of blood is also bleeding money and is only getting worse on both counts.  The younger woman is dying and then is dead.  And this is where the audacity of the desperate comes into play.  When there seems to be no hope, desperate people will go outside their circumstances, outside propriety, even outside themselves.  They will go after what they recognize as new possibility and new life, they will go after what they really want.  The word “audacity” comes from the Latin word for “bold”.  The dictionary definitions are many, and almost seem to take sides: “Intrepid boldness”.  “Willingness to take bold risks”.  “Disregard for conventional thought, behavior or propriety”.  “Rude, disrespectful, impudent” behavior.”  It is not clear that the cultivation of audacity is a good thing.  But, when one is desperate, one may not care.

Certainly the woman with the flow of blood does not.  She, a woman, ritually and socially unclean, has heard of Jesus.  On the basis of this hearsay she pushes through a large and pressing crowd to waylay him on his way to somewhere else. She sneaks up behind him, and even though it’s only his cloak, she touches this man, a total stranger, just because.  Even after all the experts had worked on her to no avail and she was only getting worse, she touches Jesus’ cloak just because she knows that this will make her well.  And instead of lightning bolts, or people pointing fingers and yelling “rude” “disrespectful” “impudent”, instead of all this, immediately the flow of blood stops, and she feels in her body that she is healed of her disease.

“Immediately” is a big word in Mark.  It does not just indicate that something occurs quickly.   Immediately also marks a revelatory event that breaks into human experience with the new life of the Kingdom of God.  So this story does not stop with the woman’s healing.  Instead, Jesus immediately realizes that something revelatory has in fact happened.  He is aware that power has gone from him to another, and he starts looking around for whom this person might be.  Now the woman knows what has happened to her, knows that Jesus is looking for her.  So with honesty as well as fear and trembling, she confesses the truth of her audacity.  And Jesus calls her “Daughter” – he reinstates and recognizes her within her faith and her community as a Daughter of Abraham.  He commends her audacious faith, and blesses her with peace toward the enjoyment of her restored health.  She goes on her way, whole again with life and hope.  The odd thing is that the crowd, for all its pressing, does not seem to realize that anything has happened. And the disciples even question that anything has happened at all.

This all occurs as an interruption, while Jesus is on his way to someone else.  And even while he’s speaking to the healed woman, people come from Jairus’ house to tell Jairus that his daughter is dead, and that he, Jairus, should not bother “the teacher” any longer.  Jesus tells Jairus to not be afraid, and goes to his house anyway.  He dismisses everyone else except Peter, James, John, the child’s mother, and Jairus, who is now named “the child’s father” instead of “the leader of the synagogue”.  Jesus goes into the young woman’s room, takes her by the hand, and tells her, “Little girl, get up!”  And immediately the young woman gets up, begins to walk about, and soon will be eating something, restored to her family and her health.

Now we may wonder where the audacity is on the part of this young woman.  We do not know anything about her, or about what her affliction is, before she gets up, and we know nothing of her after she gets up from death except that she can walk and soon will regain more strength and health as she nourishes herself.  There is only one thing that she actually does in response to Jesus’ call.  Immediately, she gets up.  This is the revelatory event, that she gets up, that she answers Jesus’ call and comes back from death to life.

One of my mentors used to say that if the meaning of an event eludes us as a biblical event, we may understand it better if we relate it to events in our present day.  Now to do this with this event brings up some realities that may be uncomfortable about some of the manifestations of suffering and desperation.  So this is a trigger warning, so that if you want to you can walk around, get some water, or just skip this part.  Because we will never know about Jairus’ daughter, whether she died from a disease or an injury or what, and so it’s useless to speculate.  We will never know her reasons for getting up in response to Jesus’ call to return to life.  But Jesus says, for his own reasons that we also do not know, that she is asleep.  And if we do look to young people of our time who are moving into adulthood through the lens of that metaphor of sleep, we know that increasing numbers of them are experiencing clinical levels of enervating depression and anxiety.  There are real issues with alcoholism and other forms of numbing out as attempts to avoid dealing with the overwhelm of the world’s challenges.  Perhaps most significant is that the choices of death over life for this age group are at an all-time high.  The audacity of Jairus’ daughter, who has died, is that she returns to life, she gets back up.  And she gets back up in spite of the people who tell her father that she’s dead and he shouldn’t bother Jesus anymore, in spite of the people in her home who are not just grieving with her parents but are making a commotion of themselves, in spite of the people who laugh at Jesus as if he’s only a teacher who has gotten his facts ridiculously wrong, in spite of the people who seem just fine with her being dead and almost seem to want her to stay that way, the way they tell Jairus not to bother Jesus anymore and the way they ridicule what Jesus tells them is going on. Instead, the young woman listens and responds to Jesus’ invitation to come back to life.  She comes back for her own reasons, not her parents’ reasons, and not for the reasons of the people around her.  For her own reasons, that we will never know, she immediately gets up from death and walks around into new possibilities and new hope.

Two women.  Two revelatory events.  But even before the events, the two women already know who Jesus is and what his work reveals.  They respond to Jesus as even his disciples do not, as even the religious people around Jairus do not.  They are bold, they take risks, because they recognize that Jesus himself is the Good News of the Kingdom of God and he is that for them.  The secret that Jesus insists on is already out of the bag, and increasingly so as Mark’s gospel moves on.  The stories of these two women are not just healing stories, they are resurrection stories.  They prefigure Jesus’ own story, in which suffering serves as the catalyst for the audacity of the revelation of God’s presence and power at work in the world toward resurrection and hope. The conflicts in Mark are because his family, his disciples, and the religious authorities do not recognize Jesus for who he is or understand his work for what it does.  In Mark’s gospel, only the demons and the desperate recognize Jesus for who he is and what his work reveals:  the demons because they actively oppose his work and are terrified of what it will mean for them; the desperate because their suffering has become so great that it acts as a catalyst for  them to go outside of their circumstances, outside of propriety, even outside of themselves, a catalyst to take the intrepid, bold risk that what they recognize in Jesus is the way to a different circumstance of life and new possibilities.  The stories of these two women invite us this morning to learn from our own suffering – and Jesus knows we have had enough of it over the last year.  Because when we learn from our suffering and allow it to act as a catalyst for us to take intrepid, bold risks in faith, we can heal from our wounds and dis-eases, we can get up and meet our challenges, we can go for the life that we really want.  And we can receive God’s acceptance of our desperation, and we can receive God’s desire and power to help.

Now, in addition to the two women, there is another person is these stories.  This person is named – his name is Jairus.  He is an important man in his community, a leader both religiously and socially.  He is also a father, and it is in his love for his daughter that he discovers the audacity of the desperate.  His daughter – his “little daughter”, even though she is moving into adulthood – she is dying.  As far as we know, Jairus himself is healthy and content with his life for the most part.  Here his suffering lies in the fact that with all his importance, with all his leadership, he cannot stop his daughter’s death.  So for his daughter’s sake, he goes outside of his circumstances, outside of propriety, outside of himself.  He  takes the audacious, utterly improper risk for a man in his position.   He begs in public for his daughter’s life at the feet of an itinerant preacher who is already in trouble with the religious authorities.  His daughter is unable to come to Jesus herself, well, he will bring Jesus to her.  Because Jairus also recognizes Jesus for who he is and understands his work for what it does as the revelation of the power of God at work in the world toward the Kingdom of God.

And in Mark’s gospel, Jairus is not alone in his audacity of the desperate on behalf of someone else.  The others are part of the crowds who bring their sick and their children, and those possessed by demons both real and metaphorical, and a deaf person and a blind person, they bring them out to Jesus, from their homes and cities.  They chop a hole in someone’s roof to let their paralyzed friend down to Jesus inside when the crowd at the door would not let them through.  As a woman of another faith and nationality they argue with Jesus when he refuses to heal their daughter, and help him to change his mind and heal her anyway.  They love another person enough, are desperate about another person enough, that they will take the audacious risks to use their resources on behalf of these for whom they are desperate, to bring them to Jesus, and to ask, even to beg, for Jesus’ help on their behalf.  They too recognize Jesus for who he is and what his work does, and they help their loved ones to make their own decisions and take their own audacious risks at Jesus’ invitation.  In love and faith they find the audacity of the desperate to become allies, points of connection, and resources for those who at the moment do not have them or do not have enough of them.  Jairus’ story and the stories of these others invite us to consider:  what or who suffers enough, what or who we might love enough or come to learn to love enough, what or who for the sake of justice we might will ourselves to love enough in their suffering, that we might find the audacity of the desperate on their behalf.   That we might take the risks of becoming allies, points of connection, and resources for those who at the moment do not have them or enough of them, so that the power of God at work in the world for them might further be revealed, and they might expand their own decisions and their own audacious risk-taking at Jesus’ invitation.

It is perhaps no coincidence that this scripture comes to us in June.  June is a very full month.  It is Pride month for LGBTQIA+ folks.  Juneteenth is this year a national holiday.  And June contains Father’s Day, a complex commemoration of a complex and still-evolving identity.  But before the Month and the Holiday and the Commemoration, there were people, many of whom were people of faith, who found the audacity of the desperate.  They learned from their suffering, so that it became a catalyst for them to go outside their circumstances to take risks with intrepid boldness toward a new way of life in wholeness and freedom.  Those who saw their suffering, and became desperate on their behalf in love and justice, became allies, points of connections, and resources to support them and help expand the possibilities in their risk-taking and decision-making.  While there is still a long way to go, many people, like the two women in their time, have been healed into new life and hope through these movements toward wholeness and freedom, and their stories continue to this day to inspire audacious risks and to support hope that change is possible.

The audacity of the desperate is both a challenge and a gift.  A challenge, because we have to be desperate to find it, and then be desperate enough to allow our suffering to work as a catalyst for us to take audacious, risky action toward changing our situation with God’s help.  And the audacity of the desperate is a gift, because when we find it, for ourselves or on behalf of others, the audacious risks we take in faith will reveal God’s power at work in the world for us and for all those we love, toward our healing and the new life of possibility and connection that we most desire.  Thanks be to God for the audacity of the desperate.

-The Rev. Dr. Victoria Hart Gaskell, Minister for Visitation

posted in The Rev. Dr. Victoria Hart Gaskell, Minister for Visitation on 06.27.2021 at 11:00 am

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By Marsh Chapel

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Mark 4:35–41

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The text for this sermon is currently unavailable.

-The Rev. Dr. Karen Coleman, Chaplain for Episcopal Ministry

posted in The Rev. Dr. Karen Coleman, Chaplain for Episcopal Ministry on 06.20.2021 at 11:00 am

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By Marsh Chapel

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Good morning! We are at the beginning of that season that I never really understood as a child which extends all the way through the summer until we reach Advent: Ordinary Time. Growing up as a pastor’s kid, I always thought of this season simply as “the time after Pentecost.” I legitimately did not know that it went by another name. So, imagine my surprise when in my first year of seminary I stumbled across the terminology of “Ordinary Time” when learning the church calendar. How ridiculous, I thought. Who calls it “Ordinary Time”? Well, apparently a lot of people, including the Catholic Church, the Anglican and Episcopal churches, the United Methodist Church, and even my own beloved Lutheran Church. Ordinary time as a moniker just seems so…ordinary. I don’t think it accurately encompasses the journey we travel with Jesus and the disciples, learning about his ministry, his healing, his conflicts, and his connection to the world. The celebration of Pentecost shows us the dramatic effect of the Holy Spirit’s work in the world. This season is not one to merely proclaim as “ordinary”, but it continues to highlight the extraordinary work of the Holy Spirit through the life and ministry of Jesus.

One of the things today’s gospel lesson teaches us about is the importance of relationship in God’s kingdom. We learn about family, conflict, and the important role the Holy Spirit plays in joining us together and transforming us to form strong bonds rooted in God’s power. But to be fair, this story is a little all over the place – Jesus is trying to eat, people say he’s gone out of his mind, the Pharisees accuse him of being in league with demons, Jesus rebukes anyone who rejects the Holy Spirit, and he also emphasizes his relationship with his chosen family in the Holy Spirit over his family of origin. That’s a lot of ground to cover for a story that is only fifteen verses long and otherwise might be a simple story of an ordinary homecoming.

In any normal circumstance, a family would be excited to see their son or brother return after having departed on a journey. However, Jesus’ reputation precedes him. While on his journey he’s proclaimed new teachings about the good news of the Kingdom of God, casted out demons, healed people, invited disciples to follow him, hung out and eaten with the marginalized, broken Sabbath laws, and gained fame among other Galileans who do not know fully who he is but want to do God’s will. People in Galilee and the surrounding area are sharply divided on what Jesus’ words and actions mean in light of established customs and Jewish law. His own family does not understand what he is doing. Remember, the story of Jesus’ life and ministry in Mark does not begin with his birth but rather at his rebirth when he is baptized by John. Jesus’ supernatural actions and challenge to powers that be is not a known entity to his family before he heads out to do his ministry. No angelic announcement foretold who Jesus was and what he was meant to do. In fact, this is the only time that Mary is mentioned in Mark’s gospel – her role in Jesus’ life is greatly diminished in comparison to the other Synoptic writers. Jesus’ family, instead, think he’s gone out of his mind, not conforming with societal and religious norms as they have come to understand them.

I’m certain most of us can relate to that experience of young adulthood when you or your child left home for college or a job and came back home for the first time. I encounter this frequently in my role as a University Chaplain – that first Thanksgiving or winter break at home can be a challenge for many students. They have changed since they went to school – gaining more freedom, learning who they are and what they want to become in a new environment, encountering new people who have different backgrounds and experiences can shift attitudes and a sense of self. Parents may be surprised at this person who arrives home – students may have even done something to cause their parents question whether they have gone out of their mind. The instinct to protect a child is a strong feeling, as is the longing for the person who once was but now who has started to self-differentiate from their family. However, most of the time we adjust; we manage to keep our families together and accept that people grow and change as they get older, but not without some growing pains. These students may have even started to form their own “families” outside of their family of origin – those who support them through difficult times, celebrate in joyful times, and overall, just “get” them. The desire to connect with others and feel a sense of belonging is at the core of our being, and as we grow and develop into adults, our sense of self leads us to create new systems of support and care.

Returning back to the gospel, another group that has certain expectations of who and what Jesus should be also appears in the story at this point. The Pharisees from Jerusalem have also heard about Jesus’ actions around the Galilean countryside and have their own opinions of what is going on. While Jesus’ family might be trying to protect him in his perceived insanity, the Pharisees come with a much bolder accusation: “He has Beelzebul, and by the ruler of the demons he casts out demons.” To them, Jesus must be in league with evil forces because he is not following the religious laws they enforce. Jesus is not acting in expected or “ordinary” ways as a Jewish man or even teacher. Jesus rebuts their accusations by pointing out the logical fallacy of their argument – how can Satan cast out Satan? Truly it must take something or someone much stronger and different to “bind up” the strong man. Here, Jesus gives the Pharisees and the crowd an apocalyptic hint of his role in the world – to prevent the work of evil in the world and provide forgiveness.

We may be taken aback at what Jesus says next though. He draws a strict line between who is “in” and “out” in the kingdom of God. The good news is that most people are included in God’s kingdom – sins will be forgiven by a gracious and loving God. But, and this is a huge BUT, there is one sin that cannot be tolerated –blaspheming the Holy Spirit. God will not forgive those who commit this sin. It feels awfully weighty to us as the readers. We have come to expect that God forgives unconditionally. How can we reconcile these two claims? Also, how do we know if we are blaspheming the Holy Spirit if the work of the Holy Spirit is often a mystery to us? Perhaps the best way to think about this statement by Jesus is to place it in context of the Gospel of Mark. Presbyterian pastor James Ayers in his commentary on this passage urges that we see Jesus’ words here as a sort of tether that lets us know that the Holy Spirit is the force that can transform hopelessness into hope and can cause restoration in our lives. The only way that we truly be against God is to actively reject the Holy Spirit’s presence in the world. What we really must be aware of is that the power of the Holy Spirit continues to work on and with us to create our loving relationship with God. Jesus is laying the groundwork for what it means to be a part of God’s family.

With this knowledge about maintaining our relationship with the divine, we turn back to the conflicting realities of Jesus’ closest relationships. When Jesus’ family calls for him to come outside, he claims those he is inside sharing a meal with to be his mother and brothers. Is this a complete rejection of his biological family? Maybe. It is a definitive claim on the importance of the kind of relationship that Jesus calls us to cultivate in our lives. Jesus claims those who are doing the will of God as his siblings. In that moment, it excludes his family because they do not understand who he is and what he is doing.

Jesus wields his power in this narrative. It is not the kind of power that is most recognizable in Jesus’ time or even our own time – economic, political, or even physical – but is instead rooted in love, hope, justice, humility, servanthood, and restoration. In claiming outsiders from the rest of society to be literal insiders as members of God’s family, Jesus upends the expectations of what power should look like. In performing exorcisms and healing people, he restores right order and enables those who have been healed to be a part of society once again. He shows love to those who have been excluded, sees value in human life over the strictures of human laws, and identifies the humanity of those who have been deemed less-than because of their jobs, their status in society, or their physical or mental wellness. He is able to bind up the “strong man” because of his power of love and transformation rather than destruction. Jesus’ power is not rooted in fear or coercion, but in hope and love.

In this past year, many of us have spent a lot of time inside, especially in our homes. We’ve also probably gotten a great deal of quality time with our immediate families, or maybe with our chosen “bubble” of people. These are people that we trust. In the midst of a pandemic, there had to be a certain level of understanding about the appropriate behaviors and interactions for each of the members of our “immediate households” to maintain our health and wellbeing. We became vigilant about who was and wasn’t a close contact, redefining our physical relationship to others by only allowing certain people to share our spaces. Some of us have had time to reconnect with family members in new ways, while others have been physically separated from loved ones for extended periods of time.

Perhaps because we have had more time to think about or spend with our immediate households, we have come to recognize the importance of establishing and maintaining strong relationships with others. In this time of forced isolation from the outside world, we’ve also come to recognize the many ways in which our society is broken. COVID made us acutely aware of economic, racial, and other social inequalities that have been present for the majority of our country’s history, but which we have continually failed to address. In the early days of the pandemic, after our initial shock of having our lives upended, many of us vowed that we would never be able to go back to “normal” again in light of Black Lives Matter protests, socio-economic inequality, and growing divisions in our country. Some of us now had more time to really reflect on what was going on in the world around us and to decide how we were going to be more involved, less dismissive, and seek justice and restoration for others.

Now, in this new phase of the pandemic, where it is certainly not over but is at least on the decline in the United States, we are ready and eager to go back outside into the world. As mask restrictions lift and we begin to reunite with our friends (after, of course, we have been fully vaccinated) it might be easy to slip into our old ways of being. The busy-ness of life might return again and our care and concern for the greater socio-economic issues we were faced with during the pandemic may start fade into the background. We may slip into our own “ordinary” time where things go back to mostly “normal”. We may lose sight of the importance of the relationships we share not only with those in our “bubbles” but with the greater world. Certain aspects of the pandemic will leave their marks on us as we move forward, but how will we consider what this past year has meant to us in how we interact with our families of origin, our families of choice, and the surrounding world around us?

Many of us have a new clarity about the importance of relationships and not taking advantage of the time and opportunities to support and connect with others. Sometimes this kind of recognition can only come after we have lost something important. Dr. Don Saliers, American theologian and Professor Emeritus at the Candler School of Theology as well as father of Emily Saliers of the folk duo the Indigo Girls, summarizes our experience of the relationship of being a part of God’s family as this:

“Living out the form of discipleship Christ bids us follow means a new solidarity with all humanity.  It requires that we learn with him to weep with those who weep and to rejoice with those who rejoice. It asks us to live into the densities of human joy and suffering. It calls us to find ourselves precisely in our willingness to give up our self-absorption.  This is a demanding task, requiring a willingness to follow him into a new solidarity with God’s whole family.”

One may hear echoes of the great theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s claim of the Cost of Discipleship in Dr. Salier’s statement. While God’s family welcomes all, it also calls on us to be willing to serve others with an open heart without letting ourselves and our egos get in the way of justice and righteousness. God’s will, while grounded in love, does not mean that it won’t come without its challenges in enacting it in the world. It means standing up to oppression. It means crying out with those in pain. It means recognizing and responding to the needs of others, even if those needs infringe upon our personal wants. To live authentically into God’s will means being mindful of how our faith informs our actions and allowing that deep inward voice to guide us along the way.

Jesus, in his ministry and his teachings, demonstrates what it means to follow God’s will. The Holy Spirit acts on us to create faith within us and then we continue to strengthen that faith through hearing the Word of God and sharing the sacraments with one another. The Holy Spirit moves in us to bear the good fruit of our faithfulness in service and care for others. It motivates us to seek justice for those who are marginalized, to create wholeness where brokenness haunts many, to acknowledge the humanity of others, and to see how we are inextricably tied together with them. Our faith is in the one who redeems and makes us whole, and thereby we are called to share the power of Christ through our own words and actions.

This is not an ordinary time. These weeks after Pentecost are an extraordinary time to hear the Word and works of God through the body of Christ. Let us live into these “Sundays after Pentecost” with a renewed sense of being siblings of Christ and God’s children. Amen.

-Dr. Jessica Chicka, University Chaplain for International Students

posted in The Rev. Dr. Jessica Chicka, University Chaplain for International Students on 06.13.2021 at 11:00 am

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By Marsh Chapel

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Mark 4: 26-34

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Growth

Some big measures of the ice of contagion and the snow of infection and the wind of COVID have diminished.  For this we are thankful, and mindful, too of the actual and metaphorical powers of masks, of vaccinations, of protocols for distance.  The national pause for Memorial Day last week, including many memorials near and far, brought a sign of such diminution, if not the entire absence of cold and wind and the lingering feelings of ice and snow.

At our doorstep now the mystery of natural growth awaits us.  Some of faith and preaching is about the nature of ministry and some is about the ministry of nature and some is about both.  We are on the threshold of a new season, a season of natural growth.  Growth is a mystery.  All manner of growth is a mystery.  Ministry in and through this natural mystery is its own kind of mystery.

Somehow, together, we have weathered a hard and bitter fifteen months. Somehow, together, we have done something hard, together.   How shall we think of this?  What may we most want to remember, or not to forget, about this shared drama and trauma?  What has this hard, cold, shattering, shared experience taught us?  When someone stops you on the street, or over a meal, or on the church door step and asks, ‘What is your COVID story?’, how will you start off, and what will you say?  What is the first thing that comes to mind, and how will you put it?  I invite you to tell someone, sometime, or offer it in a meditative prayer, sometime, or write it down in poem, sometime.  Te invito.

Jesus taught in parables, teaching not without such, according to our Holy Scripture this Lord’s Day.  Some were parables of the mystery of growth, growth of the ministry of nature alongside the nature of ministry.  We are close today to the very voice of Jesus of Nazareth, in the parable served by St. Mark.  One example to stand for a dozen: so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.  Birds…of the air.  But…what other kinds of birds are there?  This is a Semitism, a sign of the Aramaic substrata of the passage, the closeness to the voice of Jesus, 2000 years later.  A mystery, too, this a mystery too.   Around us this coming month nature performs her ministry to our succor.  May this ministry of nature nudge us toward a fuller enjoyment of our own—in whatever walk of life—nature of ministry.  And the seed should sprout, he knows not how…

How shall we understand these holy words, ancient and potent?  We shall need to prepare for the work, for the work on these words, high and lifted up, in our Lord’s parable in St. Mark.  To get up high, we need a reliable scaffold.

Mark

Before you work high you build a scaffold to get yourself up there.  Over the past years, one of the most interesting church related figures, town by town, was the ‘steeple jack’, a person hired to go up high and fix things.

Steeple Jacks, famously and normally, do not use a scaffold. They use rope and pulleys, and they rightly earn a good salary. As one joked to me, sort of quoting Scripture, and speaking of the dangers of height, “Jesus said, ‘Lo(w) I am with you”. Meaning, he continued, ‘up high you are on your own’.

Our smaller churches hired Steeple Jacks for the minor tiling, shingling, painting and other repairs required of small church steeples on small steeple churches. One was squat enough (the church not the Jack) that he could go up by ladder.  Later churches had taller steeples. The trustees sometimes tried to get by with a Steeple Jack, every time repairs were needed, but most times, no, they needed to spend more. Once a section of copper plate fell off the steeple onto a University neighborhood street. Exposure, liability, act of God, randomness—these words appeared in sermons later that month.  Thankfully no one was hurt. Scaffolding went up the next week, and stayed up for several expensive days.

Both the interior and exterior spaces of churches require endless attention. As with care of the human body after a certain age, the motto for such care must be ‘maintenance, maintenance, maintenance’. Interior like exterior scaffolding also comes at a price.  (There are as you sense other sermons right here in the wings, as it were, which we will leave aside.  For now.)  Sure you prefer to change light bulbs and paint ceilings with a huge step ladder and a fearless Trustee or hired painter. Sure. But the higher the nave, the, well, I refer you to adage above. “Lo(w) I am with you”. Not high.   Even before any paint is spilled, and even before any long-lasting bulbs are replaced, there is work, there is cost, there is meaningful preparation.

Somethings similar is afoot in preaching. The preacher either swings in the breeze like a Steeple Jack, if the matters of interpretation are low fences, but, if the height is greater, scaffolding is needed.  What you see when the work is done, is the steeple repaired, the roof replaced, the paint (both coats) applied, the bulbs changed. But before all that there has been scaffolding up, so that the work could be done.  Today that is our work, to prepare for Mark.

 Scaffolds

We come this morning to the interpretation of Mark 4. Mark requires scaffolding. We cannot begin to work until we have someplace to stand. No light bulbs will be changed until we can reach the fixtures.  Come and help me a little with the scaffolding this morning.

As Mr. Cordts so ably reminded us last week, we know not who wrote Mark, only his name. He wrote for a particular community, whose location and name are also unknown. He even mentions by name members of his church, Alexander and Rufus (15:21). The book is meant to help a community of Christians. It is written to support and encourage people who already have been embraced by faith. While it purports to report on events long ago, in the ministry of Jesus, its main thrust is toward its own hearers and readers forty years later. So, it is not an evangelistic tract and it is not a diary and it is emphatically not a history.

You will want to know what we can say, then, about Mark’s community. If the community gave birth to the gospel, and if the community is the primary focus of the gospel, and if the community is the gospel’s intended audience, you would like to know something about them.

For one thing, the community is persecuted, or is dreading persecution, or both. Jesus suffered and so do, or so will, you. This is what Mark says. This gospel prepares its hearers for persecution. For another thing, the church may have been in or around Rome, or possibly somewhere in Syria. It is likely that Mark was written between 69 and 73 ce. For yet another thing, Mark’s fellow congregants, fellow Christians, are Gentiles, in the main, not Jews. He is writing to this largely Gentile group. He writes for them neither a timeless philosophical tract nor an ethereal piece of poetry. His is rather a ‘message on target’. Further, Mark’s composition, editing, comparisons, saying combinations, style and Christology all point to Mark as the earliest gospel (see, inter alia, J Marcus).

Pause over the word gospel. You have heard the word many times, and know that it means ‘good news’. It is an old term. You could compare it to ‘ghost’. Gospel is to good news as ghost is to spirit, you might say. Mark calls his writing a ‘gospel’. He creates something new. Mark is a writing unlike any other to precede it.  Any other.  Mark is not a history, not a biography, not a novel, not an apocalypse, not an essay, not a treatise, not an epistle. Examples of all these were to hand for him. Mark might have written one of any one of them. He did not. He wrote something else and so in form, in genre, gave us something new. A gospel. His is the first, but not the last.  That is the mystery of growth.  Seed scattered on the ground…the earth produces of itself…when it is sown it grows…

Mark is not great literature. It is not Homer, not Plato, not Cicero, not Shakespeare. Nor is the Greek of the gospel a finely tuned instrument. It is harsh, coarse and common. The gospel was formed, formed in the life of a community, as described earlier. Its passages and messages were announced as memories meant to offer hope. Its account of Jesus, in healing and preaching and teaching, all the way to the cross and beyond, is offered to a very human group of humans who are trying to make their way along His way.

That is, the Gospel is a record of the preaching of the gospel. To miss this, or to mistake this, is to miss the main point of the Gospel, and of the gospel. It is in preaching that the gospel arrives, enters, feasts, embraces, loves, and leaves. It is in preaching that you may hear—that you may hear today-- something that makes life meaningful, makes life loving, makes life real. It is in preaching that the Gospel of Mark came to be, as a community, over time, heard and reheard, remembered and rehearsed, as the story of Jesus crucified (his past) and risen (his presence). We should not expect narrative linearity, historical accuracy, or re-collective precision here. And in fact, we find very little. Let us put it another way around. Most of the NT documents are, in one way or another, attempts to remember, accurately, the nature and meaning of baptism. Well, Mark fits that description. What does it mean, here and now, to be a person of faith?

Two Marks

Let us put it this way.  Let us put up our scaffolding this way. Ours is a tale of two Marks. Is Mark a moderate critic or is Mark a critical moderate? How you answer will both depend on and indicate where you stand on the scaffold. Moderate critic, critical moderate? That is, across the length of his Gospel, is Mark actively criticizing others or is he carefully moderating, coaching if you will, the approach of others? Is the tone of the gospel polemic or irenic?  Granted there is both, when the chips are down, as they are today, which scaffold matters most?

Mark is clearly an apocalyptic writing, although clarity about this has only fully emerged in the last few generations. Mark expects the end of all things in his own time, and so the Markan Jesus so instructs his followers. In fact, Mark expects the culmination of all things, soon and very soon. To this coming dawn, Mr. Cordts so  poetically referred a week ago.  In this regard, and in regard to his understanding of the cross, Mark has some congruence with the letters of Paul. Given this apocalyptic perspective, is Mark a critic or a coach? Critic or coach?

The first option, Mark the moderate critic, was most piercingly presented almost forty years ago. First let me give you the outline of the planking in this part of the scaffold, and then let me tell you about the carpenter.

On this view, Mark combats, combats a view of Jesus that will not accept his suffering, his crucifixion. Long after the events of Calvary and Golgotha, spirited and strong people, singing a happy song, have caused the earliest church to forget their baptism, or its meaning. They expect ease, spirit, joy, and, soon, a conquering victory over all that plagues and persecutes them. To this, Mark says: ‘no’. To say no Mark remembers in delicate detail the story of Jesus’ passion, relying on a source, a document he has inherited. To say no, Mark pointedly shows the ignorance and cowardice of Peter, at Caesarea Philippi and in Jerusalem. To say no, Mark criticizes, diminishes the miracles of Jesus, letting them wind away to nothing as the Gospel progresses. To say no, Mark describes the disciples as dunces. They didn’t understand it and neither do you, he says. Mark stays within the fold of the inherited story of Jesus, the gospel of teaching and passion, of Galilee and Jerusalem, including our parable today.  But he does so as a moderate critic of those who are unrealistic about the suffering that continues, from which the gospel does not deliver, any more than Jesus had been delivered from the cross. Saved, yes, delivered, no. On this view, at the heart of Mark there is a bitter dispute in earliest Christianity about what constitutes discipleship, baptism, and Mark is out to prove his opponents wrong. As with the alternative, there is plenty of evidence to support this sort of scaffold.

One person who most powerfully presented this view is a dear friend. In fact, he was our immediate predecessor in our Rochester church.  Our eleven years in that pulpit immediately followed his seventeen. He is a Methodist minister who did his doctoral work at Claremont. It has taken some decades for the force and power of his argument to stand up and stand out in comparison to the work of others. Ted Weeden wrote: ‘Jesus serves as a surrogate for Mark, and the disciples serve as surrogates for Mark’s opponents…The disciples (in Mark) are reprobates’. (op cit, 163).

The second option, another scaffold, Mark the critical moderate, has in a way been present for a longer time, and, one could say, is still the more dominant, the majoritarian position. The culminating presentation of this position is in a two volume Anchor Bible Commentary.  The author was (once) on the faculty of Boston University School of Theology, Joel Marcus, now at Duke. On this view, things in Mark’s community are not so much at daggers drawn. There are differences to be sure, but the disagreements are differences among friends. The Markan coaching does not face strong spirit people, committed to an idea of the ‘divine man’. Mark is not so negative about miracles. The disciples are mistaken but not malevolent. The titles for Jesus are not so telling or convincing. The real trouble is not so much in the community itself (perish the thought), but outside, among the potential deceivers of the church. Hence, on this scaffold, Mark has the job of more gently reminding his hearers of the cross, of suffering, of discipline, of the cruciform character of Christianity, as a moderate, a critical moderate, but a moderate, a coach, more than a critic, a critical moderate.

We have a hard time imaging that our faith tradition was born out of serious conflict. It is like family stories. We really don’t like to imagine that our family tree is littered with broken branches, dead limbs, crooked roots, and Dutch elm disease. We like the picture of the Palm Tree, majestic and free. The second option appeals to our sense of pride in our Christian heritage. It is a more pleasing view. But the former, Weeden’s Mark, is over time the stronger scaffold, and what we need from a scaffold is not presentation but reliability, not beauty but strength.

Here is where my feet come down. Marcus appeals to my heart, what I wish were true or truer. But my mind trusts Weeden. Our passage today is a case in point.

From the vantage point of this scaffolding, the key verse this morning is 4:29: when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.  That is, there comes a time of completion, of testing, requiring not just coaching but also and more so warning.  Warning.  Listen this summer for the warning in Mark, more than the encouragement.  Listen for the critic not just the coach. The ministry of nature is meant to prepare us for the nature of ministry.  The parables of seed and growth are meant to prepare us for those challenging moments of growth that still lie ahead.  As individuals, and as communities, we prepare and need to prepare for the challenges, the harvests, of the future.  And, friends, there are serious challenges ahead.  There are riveting, sobering, critical challenges ahead of us in the country, around this globe, and in our churches, this year to come.  Challenges.  Challenges for you, your community, your nation, its constitution and its bedrock foundation of truth and freedom.  Listen for the warnings this summer in Mark.

Coda

And hear good news, in the ministry of nature and the nature of ministry.  The church is alive! The future is open! Love waits to fill the heart! The seed sprouts, we know not how.  Foretastes, all, of heaven. If the heavenly banquet has this menu, perhaps we need over these few earthly years to acquire a certain taste for certain things, faith and hope and love.  Just a little critical warning…

So, dear friends, then travel with a little imagination…Imagine Eucharist at Marsh Chapel.  Stand to sing… Pause to reflect… Step out into the aisle… Look at and look past Abraham Lincoln and Francis Willard…Receive cup and bread, bread and cup… Kneel at the altar to pray… Stand in communion with the communion of saints…Here is the bread and cup of friendship…Imagine, a congregation reciting together a creed, a psalm, a hymn, a poem.  Imagine, if you are willing, a congregation currently in diaspora, but just now, by the word spoken and heard, a gathered and thus addressable community, you and I and all together, able to prepare for the challenges, the harvests of the future, able to prepare for Mark.

-The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel

posted in The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel on 06.6.2021 at 11:00 am

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