Sermon 3/13/2022
Sermon 3/13/22
Luke 5:1-11
Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany
Year C
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Luke 13: 31-35
31 At that very hour some Pharisees came and said to him, “Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.”
32 He said to them, “Go and tell that fox for me, ‘Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work.
33 Yet today, tomorrow, and the next day I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed outside of Jerusalem.’
34 Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!
35 See, your house is left to you. And I tell you, you will not see me until the time comes when you say, ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.’”
Sermon
Focus: So much is out of our control
Function: Jesus shows us a God of solidarity
I don’t know about you, but I have never had the occasion to herd chicks. However, I found this metaphor that Jesus uses in the scripture very interesting, “How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!” I haven’t herded chicks, but I can definitely say that I’ve tried to herd cats. And unlike Jesus’s metaphor, I do mean this quite literally. My spouse and I have four cats that we got when they were itty bitty, so we’ve had more opportunities to train them than most people do with their pet cats. When we first started fostering them, my husband, Patrick, decided that he would like to train them to respond to a few commands. I thought this idea was insane. I was sitting on the couch in our tiny seminary apartment while he stood in the living room, attempting to call the cats in from the kitchen. I don’t remember what exactly I was doing, it was probably reading, but I do remember Patrick’s incessant calls of “kittens, come!” Nonstop. For like 20 minutes. Especially as someone with ADHD, this was incredibly distracting. Now, I will admit that he was somewhat successful. Our cats know a couple of basic commands, like “come” and “sit”. But if you’ve ever had a cat, you know that they listen when they choose to do so - so while these commands do mostly result in the outcome we desire, that is certainly not always the case.
When I read this scripture now, I like to imagine Jesus herding cats. It’s a pretty amusing thought. But you can tell in this scripture that even Jesus got frustrated sometimes. And while the stakes may not be as high for us as they were for Jesus - we probably aren’t receiving death threats from Herod as Jesus was - our wellbeing could be threatened by the idea that if we just try hard enough, are nice enough, say just the right thing… life will always go our way. We run around in so many directions, trying to herd cats into some imagined semblance of perfect formation. And so today, we are invited to pause our perfectionist tendencies and instead, let go. Let go of needing all things and all people to be “just so” and instead learn to dance with the unfolding of that which is not ours to control.
Our propensity for control is perhaps one of the most frustrating aspects of our human nature. So often, our desire for control and perfection - for particular outcomes - can keep us driven to exhaustion and distraction. Jesus knows he can only bring the message, not make the people accept it - as another popular metaphor goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.
A phrase beloved by many faithful Christians, “God is in control,” leads us to believe that everything happens for a reason. That God is at the steering wheel, directing our lives through the mountains and valleys of our circumstances. And yet, when we are faced with the suffering and challenges of life, we may find ourselves unable to believe in a God who is the architect of our pain. The book of Job is one way that the ancient Israelites made sense of their suffering. The evil one made a bet with God and as a show of strength, as a demonstration of Job’s unwavering faith, God allowed Job to endure incredible sorrow and pain. The loss of his worldly goods, the death of his family, the utter devastation of a life ripped apart, leaving only the torn remnants at his feet.
Some of us have endured similar pain - the loss of someone we love, a life-changing diagnosis, a career shift or job loss at the worst possible time… we know what it is like for our fragile human hearts to break… or the control of our life to be pried from our hands. And so we think, If we can’t control things, then surely God is in control of every little thing. But that logic doesn’t hold alongside a theology of a compassionate God, full of grace and love and mercy. I can’t believe in a God who gave my Grandaddy cancer as a test of his faith. I can’t believe in a Savior who makes bad things happen to good people. So where is God in our suffering?
One author of our devotional book for Lent, Good Enough, is Kate Bowler. Kate is a professor of church history at Duke Divinity School and she wrote one of my very favorite books: Everything Happens for a Reason (and Other Lies I’ve Loved). She also has a blog and a podcast, both of which I follow. In one blog post from 2017, titled “Has God Forgotten Texas,” Kate writes this in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey:
“Joel Osteen was in the news this week over media outrage that the country’s largest church had not been immediately opened to flood victims. The man famous for promises that God showers the righteous with blessings was drowning in calls to explain what the church would do when the rain falls on the just and the unjust. It was the great American theodicy all over again: what happens when no amount of bootstrapping or hard work or #blessed prayers keep the flood from your doorstep? What happens when you can no longer bear to repeat the well-worn phrase that everything happens for a reason? Support for those who are suffering the effects of this flood will have to begin where these theologies cannot. A frank admission– it will not be enough. We will never be able to restore every family to their home, every community business, or, God forbid, every empty seat around the dinner table ripped away by the waters.”
A few short paragraphs later, Kate writes about a psalm that was meaningful to her during her cancer treatment: Psalm 139. She says, “[Psalm 139] reminds us that we are all wonderfully and fearfully made with ridiculous specificity by God. The Psalmist knew our bodies, woven together in the depths of the earth, were to carry both devastation and joy. Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?
The Psalmist sings into the deep antiquity of God’s proximity. We have always wondered if we can be forgotten by God, if we can stray so far into darkness that even God cannot see and hold us. We have always belonged to a community of strugglers and doubters who wonder whether God knows our suffering or even cares. Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me, but even the darkness will not be dark to you. What I have learned in the course of these two years [of cancer treatment] is this: I can live in the space of not knowing why this horrible thing is happening to me, and still know I am held somehow loved by God.”
So moving back to our scripture, I want us to notice that while it begins with a warning from the Pharisees about Herod’s attempt to kill Jesus, it later turns into a reflection of who Jesus is and how he lived out his mission. “‘Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work.” The life and ministry of Jesus have always been about bringing the love, mercy, grace, and power of God into people’s lives in real, tangible ways. Jesus is a healer, even as he himself is wounded. He is on the road to Jerusalem, on a journey to the cross, and he is very aware of his path.
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it,” says Jesus. “And I tell you, you will not see me until the time comes when you say, ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord,” he says. We know what Jesus is referring to here - his celebratory entry into the city, cheerfully welcomed before he is betrayed and killed. God is present and among the people, willingly walking to his own execution. Jesus shows us a God of solidarity - a God who knows suffering, a God who cries out in anguish, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” And it is that same God who triumphs over tragedy - our God does not let death have the final word.
And so when our lives feel out of control - in the little things and the big things - we can be reassured that God is with us, at work and moving alongside us. We have a God who does not let us get swept away in the dance of devastation but holds us close and takes the lead. No matter where the dance may take us, we have the divine presence as our dance partner. And that means that we don’t have to be in control - we can simply allow ourselves to be held.
Amen.