A sermon by Senior Minister John B. McCall, September 27, 2009
Mark 9:38-50
James 2:14-18
I cringed a little as I read the Gospel lesson for today. It offended my sensitivities… maybe yours, too. I’d much prefer if Jesus would make his point in a more polite and genteel way, and remove the overly colorful language. Which, of course, was exactly why he spoke this way.
He intended to get the attention of all his listeners who wanted him to behave himself and act nice and just blend in with the shades of gray… so they could do the same. But his message was (and is) urgent: wake up! pay attention! Think of a bumper sticker that says “Well-behaved Saviors rarely make history!” That’s certainly true for Jesus of Nazareth. Had he been quiet and well-behaved we never would have heard of him. He came to teach his followers to redeem the world, one act of love at a time.
As we read this curious little story in the Gospel, it appears Mark dropped it into the center of several lessons about how Jesus cherished children and their place in God’s plan. But the story is obviously about discipleship. And here, when Jesus spoke of “little ones” he was likely referring to new disciples. Clearly this story is about what it means to follow Jesus, even in the face of the challenges and cost of true discipleship.
Like every other story about Jesus, this one puts a choice in front of his listeners. Sometimes implicitly, but here explicitly, Jesus asks us whether we stand with him or against him. He doesn’t ask us for long-winded explanations of how busy we are, or how difficult our childhood was. He doesn’t wait for us to explain there are soccer games on Sunday morning, or that it’s the only time to play golf.
Jesus says “do you stand with me? Are you able?” And then he waits for us to answer. And the answer is sometimes confusing because many of us have ambivalent feelings about discipleship. We know it’s good in theory but we also suspect it can mean hard choices.
The twelve “old disciples” who are featured in this story had sacrificed a lot to follow Jesus. They considered themselves dues-paying members of the team. So they were bent out of shape when a total stranger offered a healing – casting out an evil spirit – In Jesus’ name. “He’s not one of us, not authorized to use your name, Jesus. Tell him to stop!”
The unknown exorcist knew the Lord, at least by reputation, but the disciples didn’t know him and they wanted to silence him because he lacked the credentials they demanded. Maybe he hadn’t paid his dues. Maybe he wasn’t dressed in the right way, or looked a little rough. Maybe he didn’t have a proper education or didn’t follow the liturgy.
Whatever it was, they wanted him to stop. Jesus set the record straight: “anyone who offers a drink of water because you bear my name will not lose the reward.”
This is very important. Rather than looking at the unknown man as a stranger or enemy, Jesus saw him as an ally. This man was doing good and loving things in Jesus’ name. How could he be an enemy? Jesus saw this first and foremost. When he saw the man’s generosity of spirit any other issues fell into the shadows.
As I read this story Jesus said here that discipleship has two elements: the first is faith, the second is loving deeds. True discipleship is at the intersection of our faith and our loving deeds: expressing our trust in God by living as closely as we can to what Jesus showed us. True discipleship can be costly but there’s often a higher cost to doing nothing.
Faith is the first attribute of discipleship: faith in Jesus as the one in whom we see God revealed, and the very presence of God walking among us; Jesus, the one who was filled to overflowing with God’s will and purpose; Jesus, the one who is teacher, savior, and beloved companion along the path.
Faith doesn’t mean lofty theology or finely tuned turns of phrase. Faith doesn’t mean memorizing the commandments and laws in scripture. As theologian Marcus Borg has said: “You can keep the commandments and still be a jerk. But you cannot be in relationship with the living God without being continually transformed.”
Faith means you rely utterly on God as revealed in Jesus the Christ, knowing that God has always been trustworthy, is now, and will be forever into the future. This is where discipleship begins.
The second attribute of true discipleship is loving actions, good deeds, born of faith… doing the right thing for the right reason and always seeking to embody the love that God has poured out for you and for the world through Jesus Christ.
As we just read from the Letter of James:
“What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but do not have works? Can faith save you? If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill,” and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith.”
Discipleship is the intersection of faith with loving deeds. Let’s consider a couple of examples of those who have faith or loving acts but don’t exhibit both.
1) Consider, first, those who act lovingly but don’t have faith. Many people who have no sense of faith, of the holy or divine, still act out of deep compassion for others. Surveys make it clear that the old assumptions are fading. At one time religious people held the monopoly on mission and humanitarian service, but that’s no longer so. Lots of people act generously because of their human compassion without any sense of faith. I thank God for them, but that’s not discipleship. Discipleship is the intersection of faith with loving deeds.
2) Consider, too, those who have great faith in God and Jesus but who are unable or unwilling to act out their faith in their relationships. They live in virtual isolation from the world and are unable to engage the needs of another. The Letter of James tells us faith without works is dead. Excellent theology is not discipleship. Discipleship is the intersection of faith with loving deeds.
3) Then consider the third group, which to me is the most troubling. These are the people who claim great faith and deep biblical knowledge, and who act out their faith in significant ways, but who, tragically, are motivated not by love but by fear.
I can’t ignore the resignation this past week of Michael Heath, for 20 years the Executive Director of the Maine Christian Civic League, now called the Maine Family Policy Council. I won’t miss the reckless and mean-spirited ways Mr. Heath has labeled gays and lesbians and progressive Christians and so many others. I won’t miss the witch-hunts and the threats he used to intimidate people, all the time claiming the name of Jesus as his sole motivation. As Tevye said of the Czar in Fiddler on the Roof, “God bless him and keep him…. far away from us.”
Whatever we may call Mr. Heath’s angry rants, it’s not discipleship. Discipleship is the intersection of faith with loving deeds.
And perhaps you read that this past Friday Muslim leaders gathered on the steps of the Capital in Washington to “pray for peace and understanding between America and its Muslim Community.” Meanwhile some Christians have denounced the event, including one traditionalist Anglican who issued a statement saying the prayer service is “part of a well-defined strategy to Islamize American society and replace the Bible with the Koran, the cross with the Islamic crescent and church bells with the Muslim call to prayer… [Portland Press Herald, 25 Sept 2009, pg. A8]
Whatever we may call such small-minded public statements, they are not discipleship. Discipleship is the intersection of faith with loving deeds. The Letter of John 4:18 says even more simply:
there is no fear in love but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. We love because God first loved us. Those who say they love God but hate their neighbors are liars.
True discipleship is the intersection of faith with loving deeds. I can think of no better example of true discipleship than Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Lutheran pastor who was among the first to resist Hitler’s rise to power in 1933. He attended Union Theological School in New York City and then was ordained in Germany in 1931. He taught at the University of Berlin and was one of the founders of the Confessing Church movement that confronted Hitler’s atrocities and called on German Christians to do the same.
In 1938, Bonhoeffer was invited to teach at Union Seminary and left his homeland, but only for a while. He returned to Germany determined as a Christian to seek the higher good and to resist the horrors of the Nazi regime. In 1943, he become involved in a plot to assassinate Hitler and was arrested, tried and sentenced to death by hanging. He was executed in April, 1945, just a few months before the end of the war.
Among his greatest gifts are the legacy of several books, the most widely read being The Cost of Discipleship, published in 1937, and based on Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. He decried the cheap grace that so many Christians seem to desire – low-demand reassurance that being sincere is the essence of discipleship. He spoke of the costly grace of true readiness to sacrifice oneself for the sake of the larger good.
Our second hymn today, entitled By Gracious Powers was written by this great man in a German prison cell, held by the Gestapo waiting for his execution. I hope you’ll look it over again, where we read in the first stanza: “By gracious powers so wonderfully sheltered and confidently waiting, come what may, we know that God is with us night and morning, and never fails to greet us each new day.”
Lives like his, and so many others, show us the way to true discipleship – at the intersection of faith and loving deeds. As we seek to follow in the ways of Jesus, we pray together that God will remind us daily what we are to do, and in whose name we do it.
Amen.