The Right Questions

John 6:1-21

When John tells us stories about Jesus, he’s usually very intentional about pointing out that Jesus has this divine foreknowledge of what’s about to happen, and this morning’s story is no exception. John tells us that Jesus knows exactly what he’s going to do about the big crowd who come chasing him to see wonders. So it bugs me a bit that Jesus very particularly nudges the disciples and us into thinking about the situation as our problem, an unsolvable dilemma, when he asks Philip, “Where are we going to buy bread for all these people to eat?”.

 

Now, the right answer to that question is that it’s actually the wrong question. The feeding of this hungry crowd is never going to be addressed by going out to a shop and purchasing food.
No disciple – not Philip then, not you or me now – can get these people fed by staying within the conventional lines of where food comes from and how it’s provided.
But Jesus’ question specifically frames the problem in conventional terms. And Philip answers him in those terms – outlining the immense, unbudgetable expense of even trying; even purchasing a token bite of bread for all those people.

 

And now, I think, John’s got us, his readers, where he needs us.

The problem is clearly unsolvable. It’s too big.

It’s like so many – so many – of the problems: the hungers, the injustices, the slow-building disasters, (the weather) that surround you and me from day to day. Some of them urgent and personal; others looming and global, all of them problems that need solving, and are absolutely too big for me, for you, to address.
So many painful global and local situations where we can’t imagine being able to make even a token difference.

 

Many of us recognize the kind of situation Philip is confronted with here, even if none of us have ever personally been suddenly made responsible for catering for five thousand guests we didn’t invite.

 

And then the very next thing that happens is: “here are five loaves and two fish”. Here’s a boy with roughly a meal for a single family.

Among five thousand people.

But among all those thousands of people, how did this one small meal come to Jesus?

 

Has Andrew been trying to solve the meal problem himself? Did he survey the crowd, the region, his fellow disciples… then bring back to Jesus the only thing he could come up with – one kid, with his family’s dinner?

 

Or did that one boy come up out of the crowd on his own?

Did he bring his loaves and fish because he saw the crowd and thought Jesus needed help with the hungry people?

Or did he not even think about the crowd, but brought his meal to Jesus because he thought Jesus might need a snack?

Or because he wanted to just get closer to this extraordinary, holy man?

 

Whoever took that initiative, this moment in the story when the five inadequate loaves and mere two fish appear is a ringing triumph of hope.

Hope not in the sense of “I hope someone can fix this”, but hope that’s a maybe below-conscious-thought experience of the world as possible, rather than hopeless.
Hope that looks not at the impossible size of a problem, but looks at what’s right in front of me, of you; at what happens to be in our hands or within reach, and says “what do I want to do with what I have?”

 

And in this case “I have lunch; I want to bring my lunch to Jesus” turns out to facilitate a miracle.

A miracle of abundance so overwhelming that the leftovers could feed many families well.

 

(I don’t know if the clean-up team was holding up those baskets of leftovers in awe, ready to put them in a museum, or preserve them as holy relics.
Or whether – like after shared meals at Trinity – they were asking around pleading to find folks who would take a basket of leftovers home with them.
But the fact that the leftovers were too abundant to be ignored matters to this story. To making sure you and I know that God doesn’t work small. No “just enough” solutions for Jesus; abundance is God’s first answer to our needs.)

 

I wonder what you and I have among us, right now, that might be the material for a miracle of abundance if we brought it to Jesus.

I wonder what ordinary things are in your house and mine (or your car or desk drawer or wherever things get stored) that might miraculously multiply in Jesus’ hands.

Wonder what ordinary experiences and ideas or even dreams are in the hearts and lives and minds gathered here, that might turn out to be the starting point of extraordinary transformation – for needs we might not see, as well as for impossible problems in front of us – if offered to Jesus at the right moment.

 

So it might be worth looking at the food in your pantry or refrigerator this week, or at your grocery budget, and asking yourself “what do I actually want to do with this? Who do I want to share this with?”

Maybe you’ll find yourself feeding hungry strangers through the multipliers at a local food pantry; maybe you’ll be feeding your own hungry soul, or someone else’s, by a meal you invite a friend – or someone you want to be friends with – to share with you.
Or discover an unexpected pocket of God’s creative delight and abundance by putting ingredients together in a way you hadn’t before.

Some miracles are small and hyper-local.

Many good and holy things aren’t miracles at all.

But sometimes – just sometimes – looking at what’s in your dinner basket puts you in the right place to watch God do the most impossible, glorious, extravagant acts of care and love and power.

 

We want – we need – to be people of hope. People who look at what’s right in front of us, what’s ordinary and ours, and wonder what God might do with it. Practicing that wondering also helps a lot to avoid David’s approach that we heard about this morning, when he looked at someone who wasn’t his, and asked “how can I get that for myself?” The only abundance that comes from that question is abundance of grief and guilt.

 

So it’s worth practicing the holy questions, as we look at what’s around us.

Maybe this week you might look at the tools of your trade or hobbies – whether those are a keyboard, a pen, a camera, a set of power tools, an expert’s education, a mindset for asking questions, the trust of your colleagues – whatever you use to do your job, or to be creative, or care for yourself or others.

Practice looking at what’s in front of you – so ordinary you might not notice it until you try – and asking “what do I want to be able to accomplish with this?
What problem do I wish this could solve?
Who would I be glad to share my skill, or time, or knowledge, or tools with?
How could I bring this laptop, pile of reference books, circular saw, family car, scalpel, whatever, to Jesus?”

 

I don’t know what might happen when we do that.
I suspect that the boy with the fish and loaves had no guess what Jesus might do next.

 

But I suspect it’s worth finding out.

I know it’s always worth the time to wonder.

Because that’s hope.

Hope that lives and acts and breathes and strengthens us, wherever we find ourselves. Hope that makes the world possible.

Hope that lets God be God, and lets Jesus make us miracles.

The Rest We Need

Mark 6:30-34, 53-56; 2 Samuel 7:1-14a

Imagine it this way:

You’ve just finished a massive project – in which you had harrowing adventures, arguments, triumphs, late nights, working through the weekend.  You finally land the thing – the report is in, the construction done, the new venture launched, whatever. You’re ready to celebrate, to tell the stories, laugh, cry, finally get a solid night’s sleep. And as you come up for air into “normal” life it turns out that normal is actually so busy, and so full of people who want your attention, that you can’t even eat.

 

And Jesus says “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.”
Oh, yeah, I’m ready for a rest, Jesus. (Personally, I don’t like camping, but) a place with no cell reception, and no people grabbing for my time and attention – sounds like a wonderful idea.

I need a vacation.
A retreat.
A real rest.

 

So you get in the boat with Jesus, you sail or row together to the quiet and undiscovered place where you can pause, and breathe, and be still.

 

And you get out of the boat, and land right back in maybe even more chaos than you left.

 

It’s not just that your phone dings with emails and texts; your whole office is right there, with all the clutter from your desk, the printer that only works right one time out of four, and every person who’s sent you a meeting request in the last two months right there in person.
Every single family responsibility, the camp paperwork, the lab tests to schedule, the meal planning you don’t have time for, the fixture that keeps burning out lightbulbs, and every neighbor or friend-of-a-friend who has been trying to sign you up for their cause or project or group is right there, too.

 

And they are all screaming for Jesus’ attention as well as yours.
And you look at Jesus.

Who gets out of the boat; looks at the clamor all around that has run to get in front of you – and you watch his eyes fill with overwhelming love, and his shoulders and his mouth get that spark he gets when people want to listen to him, and he just goes up to the biggest rock on shore and sits down and starts to preach.

And you know you’re never getting that peaceful wilderness retreat, or even a nap.

 

I’m so tired right now, thinking about it.

 

This isn’t exactly what happens to the disciples and Jesus in Mark’s story today, but it’s exactly how I feel every time I read this story.

So tired.

And so disappointed that this one time when Jesus says “Let’s go away for a bit, and rest,” the very next thing Jesus does is plunge himself and us into another busy, needy, demanding crowd. So the “getaway” looks just like the chaos of work and home.

(Except that the snacks and restrooms are now endless miles away.)

 

I know that’s not the only way to read this story.

But I can’t be the only one who sometimes turns to Jesus in need of a little spiritual rest and renewal only to find Jesus or the church jumping right into Doing More Good Work Right Now.

So that residual tiredness itches at me every time I read this story. And makes it harder for me to see what else is right there: the joy of a crowd of people who will go anywhere and do anything to spend time with Jesus, with God.

Makes it harder for me to rejoice in the way Jesus is ready for anything, all the time.

 

Until I read this morning’s David story.

The one where David is finally settled and resting at home after a bunch of conquering and consolidating and claiming a city of triumph for himself and God. And David gets the idea that maybe he should help God get all settled and resting in that same city. And God says, “Heck no. Not a chance, buddy.”

 

God gets Nathan the prophet (who also thought building a settled house for God sounded like a great idea) to tell David “No. God is God on the move.”

My home is where my people go, God says. I belong on the move, flexible. I make a safe place for my people to settle, not the other way around, because I belong, I am at home, wherever my people need me.

 

This speech, this vision, is about God’s freedom, God’s liberty and flexibility and accessibility – God’s access to everywhere, and everyone’s access to God.

God chooses, sometimes, a physical place or object to convey God’s presence to God’s people, but it is always about God’s ability to be close to us, not our need to settle God down. It’s about God’s insistent desire to be wherever God’s people are, go wherever God’s people go.

 

It’s an implied promise we have to love, because it’s a promise about God’s insistence on being there wherever we find ourselves in need of God. It’s why the stories of God and God’s people are full of those moments when God absolutely shows up when one or more of God’s people is in the wilderness – anywhere where we are separated from our resources, our friends, our security, our comfort, our choices.

This rejection of David’s plan to build a nice house for God is about God’s freedom to be where we need God to be – and to be with us wherever we happen to go, to keep us company in all the ordinary places (and daily tasks).

 

And I think that’s what Mark’s Jesus story is about, too.

That story about the overwhelming crowds of people rushing out to a wilderness to get ahead of Jesus, and of Jesus immediately responding to them (no matter how tired you and I are at that point in the story), is a story about Jesus’ freedom. About God’s inexhaustible, unlimitable liberty. About God’s deep desire to be wherever we are, without walls or boundaries or delay. And – importantly – about God’s delight in exactly that. In being with us.

 

And maybe – maybe – there’s the rest I’m looking for, the refreshment and renewal I’m longing for, when I read this story and shrivel up at the notion of eager and demanding crowds finding me on retreat.

 

Maybe in that wilderness, those weary, overworked apostles of Jesus found themselves resting in the delight of God. Renewed by the tide of God’s own freedom, sweeping them into the vibrant life-giving, renewing presence of the Holy because of the chaos of people there, not in spite of it.

Maybe their hearts were refreshed and fed by that powerful presence of God that comes over people when Jesus preaches. Maybe their souls were soothed and revived by the endless waves of healing that Jesus poured over the crowds who come to him, a restorative power so abundant that merely briefly touching a fringe of cloak is enough to pour out all the healing power you might need.

 

Maybe this crowd scene is exactly the rest, the renewal, the restoration Jesus intends for those early apostles,

 the renewal, rest, and restoration God intends for you and me when we pour ourselves into God’s work.

Maybe God’s delight in being with us is what our hearts and souls and minds and bodies need, when all our own tasks clamor around us.

 

Maybe we need a vacation, yes.

And maybe at the peak of our need for rest – and maybe every day – we need even more the refreshment of God’s joy in the whole of humanity; God’s delight in being with us. Always.

No Heroes

2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12-19; Mark 6:14-29

There are no heroes in these stories.

Not in the David story today, not in the Herod story we just read.

There are bright moments, there are strong characters, there are tragedies and travesties and triumphs. But no actual heroes.

 

Herod’s story is just blatantly a Bad Example story. I don’t think Mark would want us to look for heroes in this story of the gratuitous, unnecessary murder of a prisoner, and its lingering sludge of guilt, resentment, and fear.

I think Mark tells it to us so that we can understand the politically and emotionally fraught environment in which Jesus and his disciples are working, as Jesus sends them out in pairs to heal and share good news.

 

But for all of our immediate clarity that beheading God’s prophets for personal gain is Obviously Wrong, this story is full of opportunities to get it right, and of people who want to be the hero of their own story, if not of God’s story.

 

Mark tells us plainly that Herod’s wife is holding a grudge and ready to destroy John.  But what we don’t know is if she’s convinced herself it’s the right thing to do to protect her husband and the country from a scandal that’s pulling focus away from actual governing, to make the messy situation she was dragged into somehow “better”. Or if she knows it’s wrong and doesn’t care.

Mark doesn’t give us any motivations for Herod’s daughter. So she, too, might be out for revenge – or she might be just trying to please her parents, keep peace in her family and maybe get some obvious recognition of her talents and her value – motivations familiar to many of us from our own adolescence or young adulthood.

 

And Herod – well, he’s obviously a man who does the politically expedient thing at every decision moment. But once he did the politically expedient thing of silencing his critic John by arresting him, Herod gives himself space for wonder, or curiosity, or hope. He makes time to listen to John’s preaching, in prison, intrigued by what John has to say about God, about being aligned with God. Herod’s made this little space, in his politically expedient life, for an exploration of holiness and faith and awe.

And then, confronted with the dilemma of either keeping his personal gateway to awe and hope, or looking strong and decisive in front of his politically sensitive guests – and proving himself to be a man who keeps his word, who can be trusted to do what he promises – Herod makes the clearly wrong choice to kill John, for reasons that look right, or right-ish to him in the moment.

 

And, well, I recognize that impulse. I recognize that kind of decision.

Not that I’ve ever had to decide whether someone lives or dies, but I know that I – and maybe you – have often had to make decisions where I choose something I know isn’t exactly right, or wise, because I want to keep a promise. Because I want to be a good friend, or because I have responsibilities and it seems like doing a kind of wrong thing now will make more important good things possible later.

I know that more than once in my life, I’ve sacrificed some of my own chances to get closer to God for some “good of the group”, or to some real or imagined responsibility.

I know how natural it is to fail to do the heroic thing, when choosing the wrong thing for some right (or right-ish) reasons – or the right thing for the wrong reasons – seems to make things easier, or simpler, or some kind of better, in the moment of decision.

And still, I’m glad I see in this story that glimpse of Herod’s wonder, and hope, and seeking out of faith, even if it’s shut down by the end of the story.

 

David’s story, as we heard it today, showcases the welcoming of God’s presence and power in the life of God’s people as the ark of the covenant – the physical manifestation of God’s presence – is brought into Jerusalem. It’s a story that should be a hero’s celebration, and one that shows us David’s genuine ecstatic joy in the presence of God.

But the ecstatic joy of holiness is deliberately smudged in the story, becoming a cause of marital strife: Michal’s bitter embarrassment and wounded pride dimming and weighing down David’s uninhibited (and possibly a bit thoughtlessly extravagant) celebration.

 

And, hidden in the bit of the story that’s left out to keep it short enough for reading in worship today, are the tragic flaws of fear and self-interest and cowardice, and maybe a little greed, that are the undertones of this bright celebration.

Because David goes – as we hear – to fetch the ark of God to mark God’s victory in establishing a stable kingship in Jerusalem – and to keep David’s own promises, as well as God’s.
And then – as we don’t hear – David promptly drops the ark of the covenant like a hot potato when it turns out that all that concentrated power of God can actually kill someone who isn’t paying attention to the live-wire danger – even if he was just trying to help.
Instead of taking steps for safety and care, David parks that powerful ark on the nearest person who can’t say no and zips back home to stay safe from God’s raw power.

All this ecstatic dancing and sacrificing and generous citywide celebration only happens after David is told that the person he dumped God’s ark on seems to be prospering from the presence of God, and David thinks he’d better get that prosperity for himself and his people.

 

I recognize all this, too.

I recognize my anxious caution around the side effects of too much God zapping my comfortable safety; I recognize the impulse to get someone else to check it out first before committing myself and people I’m responsible for.

I recognize – and maybe some of you do, too – a little embarrassment, sometimes, about having gone too far, been too enthusiastic, too Jesus-y for the context. And I’m definitely familiar with the impulse to care about what other people will think, instead of just setting myself free to enjoy the presence and holiness of God’s power and love.

And still, I’m glad we see that moment of unfettered, unembarrassed, probably excessive celebration and joy in the presence of God – get to let that resonate in my heart for a moment, too – as I recognize all the messiness around it.

 

I know – deep in my heart I recognize – these stories with no heroes in them. With flawed anti-heroes doing some right things for the wrong reasons, and lots of wrong things for what look temptingly like right reasons. I know them as my story – much more familiar and recognizable in my daily life than stories about the healing of the uncurable, the feeding of hungry thousands, the resurrection of the dead, or visiting angels, or enthusiastic crowds seeking holiness and renewal.

 

I admit I’d find the story of God more attractive without these detours into unnecessary murder, or the footnotes of embarrassment and cowardice. I prefer to read stories with heroes and happy endings; like to imagine myself into those stories when the story I’m actually in is as messy as human life usually is.

But when I read these stories today, and I stop and think for a minute, I realize how much it matters (to me, to us) that these stories – these stories without heroes – are a part of God’s story.

 

Because God’s story is never just about God.

God makes God’s story always – always – about us.

About people of God who make the wrong decisions when trying to make the right ones; people of God who make the right decisions by accident or for wrong-ish reasons.

 

People like me, like us, make the arc of God’s story messy and unclear, and often confusing or difficult to read and re-tell. But when we read it, when we re-tell it, when we make God’s story about us part of our story about God, we get a chance to recognize how these stories without heroes are stories full of the presence of God, full of grace and generosity, wonder and hope, holding holy space right along with the tragedies, and dancing joy right along with the embarrassments.

 

Because God doesn’t always need heroes.

But we – hero, anti-hero, bystander, sinner and saint – we always need God.

And God goes on keeping us in the story.

Looking Weak

2 Corinthians 12:2-10; Mark 6:1-13

You don’t want to look weak, do you?

 

You wouldn’t want to look like a loser. Like you can’t go head-to-head with the other guys, with anyone else.

Don’t want to embarrass yourself in front of everyone, by looking weak, do you?

 

That’s the sort of theoretically “yes or no” question that only has one right answer.

If I’m asking you that, it’s because I want you to say “no.”
No, I’m strong! I’ve got this!

 

It’s true in workplaces and personal relationships and sports and entertainment and academics and – in a very noticeable way this week – in media and national politics. 

We are not supposed to look weak.  Supposed to hide our uncertainties and limits and frailties, supposed to project fitness, success, power and strength.

 

At least, we’re supposed to do that if we want to win. Occasionally you can build a franchise of “lovable losers”, or bumble your way to the comedic top, but that’s usually expensive and doesn’t work for most of us.

 

You and I, as ordinary people, are expected to want to win.

Expected to want to look strong, competent, healthy, and successful.

It’s fine to get your trophy for participating, but at work, at school, at sports, on the internet, well, you wouldn’t want to embarrass yourself by looking weak.

 

Unless you’re Paul.

Paul the apostle (who pretty much never shuts up about his qualifications) stands up today in front of his friends in Corinth – the friends he’s about to lose because there’ve been other apostles visiting who look smarter and stronger and cooler and more visionary and powerful than Paul. Paul stands up today and says, “yeah, I want to look weak. I want to be weak. (You wanna make somethin’ of it?)”

 

Paul does not do an incredibly good job of letting go of the need to look strong (“I don’t want to boast about my spiritual power and visions, but I totally could boast if I wanted to,” he keeps telling us.) But I think he is actually sincere when he says “I am content with weaknesses for the sake of Christ”. And that he’s deeply honest when he says “I will boast more gladly of my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.”

 

I believe that at the end of the day, Paul actually does want people – his friends in Corinth, you and me – to see where he falls short, where he can’t do it all (in spite of being just as good and really better than those johnny-come-lately “super apostles” visiting Corinth thank you very much). Because he wants us to see that where he fails, Christ makes whole. That the healing and salvation he can’t win for himself or for us are set free by his defeats and our broken promises; that the joy and love we can’t earn or hoard or buy with our own power bubble up out of our dead ends and failed efforts.

 

Paul doesn’t like being weakened – having this “thorn in his flesh” he talks about. He doesn’t like being broken – who among us does? But he is, I think, in love with the revelation he receives while complaining about his weakness. That Christ tells him “my grace is sufficient for you; power is made perfect – is completed – in weakness.” That where he, Paul, fails, where he is weak, God is strong – stronger than ever, stronger than all our weakness needs.

 

So he tells his friends in Corinth, tells us, the great revelation that where we fall short, we make more room for God. Our weakness is the space that is filled with the strength of God’s power and glory and love.

 

Which is GREAT.

But also hard.

 

Because while God’s power and love and glory and strength is always there, the part where we – you and I and Paul himself – actually make space to receive it is…challenging.

 

I think that’s a bit of what’s going on in Nazareth in Mark’s story today – how when Jesus comes home to Nazareth he can’t do any “deeds of power there” – because his neighbors don’t have any space for divine displays and miracles.
They’re not able to embrace the shortfall in their knowledge of this Jesus – what they knew about him as a kid should be enough, they think.  We already know all about this guy, they seem to say.

And when they think they’re enough – when we think we’re enough – we don’t make room to experience all the more that God has to offer.

We settle for our basic competence, instead of reaching for the extraordinary possibilities of God’s power.

 

So Jesus just heals a few people – a few people whose weakness is unquestionable are filled and made whole with God’s power – and moves on. Moves on to where there’s more room for wonder, more need and more hope – and sends his friends out to do the same. Not forcing God’s glory into people and places that don’t have room for it, but healing and freeing those whose weakness makes room for God’s power.

 

I wonder – this week, as I read these stories – I wonder how often I  haven’t made room for God’s power. How often I’ve neglected my weaknesses, how easily I forget to fail – and how many miracles I might have missed as a result.

 

I wonder how often I’ve assumed, like the neighbors in Nazareth, that I know enough about Jesus already, and blinded myself to the possibility that there’s more love and glory and good news to be revealed.

 

I wonder how often we as a community forget, or miss, or overlook those weaknesses and failures that make space for God to overflow.

 

And I wonder what would happen if I, if you, if we embraced those deficiencies in our community, those defeats in our personal lives, as the places where the love of God comes breaking through our habits and defenses to make us whole.

 

I don’t know.
I haven’t mastered this yet – in fact, I’ve barely started! I’m just as well trained to fail at failure and be bad at weakness as Paul the boasting-about-not-boasting apostle ever was.

Maybe you’re already good at failing into the power of God, or losing your way into a miracle, and I can learn about it from you.

But I’m starting to yearn for the rich glory of weakness that Paul almost manages to describe to us – but has to leave the completion of our understanding to God.

Starting to be glad I can’t do it myself, because there is so much more that God will do.

 

I’m starting to hope – just a little, awkward, floundering hope – for the joys of defeat, of failing our way right into a miracle, together, as the beloved people of a God who loves nothing more than to heal the broken, and give more – so much more – than we could ever win.

 

Starting to want – almost, sometimes – to look weak, after all.

What about you?