Did you notice
all those eruptions of violence and judgment, division and fire in the various
scripture we heard this morning?
It’s gory stuff;
heavy stuff.
And it’s the
middle of August, when those of us who aren’t on vacation probably want to
be.
If you’d asked
me, I would have picked a different gospel for today. Maybe “consider the lilies” or maybe one of those parables
with a feast in it…
But the angry or
dangerous elements show up in everything we read today, because there’s
destruction, wrath, and judgment seeded all through the Bible, “Old” Testament and “New.”
So perhaps, even
in August, the church -- and beyond the church, the whole family of God – is
not meant to be a comfortable place.
Which is, of
course, exactly what Jesus is talking about.
Not about
whether we like the music, have cushions for the pew, or other physical
comforts in worship, but about how seriously following Jesus is going to get us
into dangerous, stressful, painful situations,
not maybe, but
definitely.
I’ve come to set
fire to the earth, Jesus says.
Don’t think I
have come to bring peace; no, I bring division! The kind of division that
happens when you bring an ax or a sword down on something. Families will be divided.
Unpredictably. Unevenly. Don’t
you people understand what’s coming????
It’s so clear to
Jesus, and he seems frustrated that we
don’t always see it, too.
His first
disciples, the crowds who followed him for healing and miracles and rousing
preaching, all of them expected him to fix the system.
All of them
expected the Messiah they had waited for to get rid of the foreign invaders,
and bring back the golden age. To
bring security and assurance in daily life and in our relationship with God.
That last isn’t
much different from what a lot of people are looking for in the church
today. Including me, often. And maybe many of you.
It’s probably
perfectly normal to want assurance, comfort, and stability in our relationship
with God, not to mention our daily lives,
and if we
Christians advertised ourselves as firestarters, disrupters of the peace, and
guaranteed to spilt up your family, would you
have joined? Or stuck with it?
Maybe.
Maybe.
Because even if
we are comfortable in church today, we have to take seriously the disruptive,
dangerous power of Jesus, and of the gospel, and the kingdom of God.
You can’t – really
cannot – overthrow injustice and establish righteousness in a few tidy steps
with no one getting hurt.
Just look at Egypt. And most of their
neighbors. Look at Iraq.
You can’t feed
the poor and heal the sick without pissing off a LOT of people and groups with
deep, entrenched, real power. Look
at the fights over “Obamacare” and the gutting of real help for hungry
Americans in this summer’s “Farm Bill.”
You can’t love
your neighbor as yourself without tripping over a lot of fears and
prejudice. Look what happens when
people start identifying with Trayvon Martin or George Zimmerman.
Look what
happens when gay and lesbian people want to be married, and serve openly in the
military, and bisexual and transgendered people want equal protection under the
law. That’s hardly been a love
fest in this country, no matter what it looks like on Pride weekend.
All those things
divide families, often violently.
They disrupt
peace and security, sow stress and distress, and spark fires that are
metaphorical and real.
And they’re all
the gospel.
The gospel is
dangerous.
Jesus is, too.
And it’s not a
bad thing if we leave church today alert, and wary, and looking over our
shoulders, instead of comfortable and secure.
Because justice,
healing, equity, and love are incredibly disruptive, but we need them.
We need them,
the world needs them, more than security, or power, or wealth.
And God needs this. God needs you and me to
want God’s kingdom enough that we can see the disruption and distress coming, and
leap forward to welcome that kingdom anyway.
This week I
heard the story of Viola Liuzzo on the radio. She was a white woman active in the NAACP in Detroit when
she heard about the voting rights march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. She told her husband, “This is
everybody’s fight,” kissed her children, and drove south.
At the end of
the march, she was driving others back to their Alabama homes, when a car full
of Klu Klux Klan members tried to force her off the road, then shot her in the
head.
She was the only
white female protester killed in the civil rights movement.
And that was
only the beginning of the division.
Her family were
hounded in their neighborhood, for being “nigger-lovers.” One daughter had to change schools, and
the family needed armed guards for years.
Vicious rumors
about Viola spread, locally and nationally – an attempt to divert attention
from the FBI informant with the Klan members who shot her.
Her husband
turned to alcohol; the children moved away, at least one with post-traumatic
stress disorder.
Justice and
equity are dangerous.
Healing, hope,
and fierce love for our neighbors are some of the most disruptive forces on
earth.
Because they
scare people who are used to our broken world, and power doesn’t like change.
That’s what
Jesus said to his followers so many years ago, and to us today.
The gospel is
dangerous.
And we need to
embrace that.
Two years ago,
Viola Liuzzo’s daughter Sally moved back to Detroit, to the place where she
lost her mother, and was driven out of school, because, she said, “There’s a
lot of work to be done in Detroit, still.”
She wants to
help the world remember her mother the way she does, loving and loved,
determined and purposeful,making a real difference, marching toward the dangers
of justice, equity, love, and healing, because those gifts, those gospel gifts,
matter more than all the disruption they cause.
Sally
Liuzzo-Prado remembers a conversation with Martin Luther King III, son of a
much more famous civil rights martyr, at the dedication of the Civil Rights
Memorial in Montgomery.
She told the
reporter: "He pulled me
aside, said, 'I wanted you to know something: 30 years ago, my dad couldn't be
in this ballroom. And today you and I are here together, and it's because of
your mother.'”
She’s never
forgotten that.
And we can’t
forget, no matter how comfortable we feel in church or in life, that our faith
is about fire, disruption, stress, and division;
justice, equity,
healing and love.
Dangerous, every
one of them. And they belong together.
This is the
gospel of the Lord.
Thanks be to
God.
Excellent. Thank you, Emily.
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