Prepare the Way of the Lord

Proper9C, Sullivan Park Care Center, July 7, 2013 by Annette Fricke

          

There are no parallels in the other gospels.  There is nowhere else in the New Testament with the exception that this story is a mirror image of the story where Jesus sends out his twelve disciples on a mission in Luke 9, a story that is found also in Matthew and Mark.   So why does Luke tell this particular story? I think we get a hint in Luke chapter 3, where Luke quotes Isaiah saying, “Prepare the way of the Lord.”  Although we may recognize that this is in reference to the vocation of John the Baptist, isn’t that also the purpose of the angels, the prophets, the twelve disciples and the seventy-some?

            In order to structure humanity’s daily living as well as the games or sports we play, we usually discipline ourselves with a set of rules.  We do this in order that  within the structures of society, we can lead a peaceful co-existence. Several years ago, I took a class on Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.  It is the story of a pub owner who creatively seeks a way to drum up business.  He has a brew or two with current patrons of another such establishment, all of whom are on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Thomas Becket. This is the rule: He decides that each of his fellow travelers will tell stories both to and from the shrine and whoever tells the best story, in his estimation, will receive a free meal at his pub, courtesy of the other travelers.  The idea of traveling with others in this poetic story is to provide companionship and entertainment to pass the time since they are on foot. Traveling together protected them from outlaws. But also, this group is focused on their journey to the shrine. They are going to the most popular shrine in England. When Becket was murdered local people managed to obtain pieces of cloth soaked in his blood. Rumors soon spread that, when touched by this cloth, people were cured of blindness, epilepsy and leprosy. It was not long before the monks at Canterbury Cathedral were selling small glass bottles of Becket's blood to visiting pilgrims. As with any such group of people, they are a sundry lot as they go their way. It appears to be a very accurate study of people who are characteristic of those who lived as contemporaries of Chaucer himself.

I see this same phenomenon in my own life.  Everywhere I have been there is this variety of people; they are on the committees, in the parishes, in the families, in the workplaces, in the skilled nursing facilities.  We are all seekers of healing in our lives.  Some of us seek that through God and others through other means. Some see it through the healing medicines and some by the comforting words of nurses or aids. And yet, there is always a challenge for all of us to get along with each other everywhere we go, because all of us are different people with dissimilar personalities and diverse ways of doing things. This even extends to the minutest details of how to make a bed, wash and fold the laundry, or set the table. Some think it should be one way and others another. Sometimes it becomes a matter of wanting a particular person to do a specific task because, simply speaking, that is the way a certain person wants it done.

            In Luke 10, we have a bare bones formula for how to go about on a mission trip preparing the way of the Lord.  It is all business.  They are to ask God for laborers for the harvest.  They are to venture out in twos. They are warned that this will not be an easy task. They are to pack lightly and not stop to greet anyone. They are to go with an attitude of peace and seek to stay where their peace is appreciated and understood. They are expected to eat whatever is placed before them. They will be among people who follow different food rituals than that prescribed by kosher law. They are to cure the sick and say that the kingdom of God has come near to you. Unlike Luke 9, it is not about the mission of the twelve disciples, the so-called inner circle of Jesus.  It is about the others who have also believed in Jesus.  Seventy or seventy-two represents the working of the Holy Spirit.  It is a mirror of the passage about Moses in Numbers.  It also is a number that represents all nations.  Therefore, it is a passage that means we also, empowered by the Holy Spirit, are to go on that same mission into the world to teach, preach, and heal as Jesus did because that is what it means to prepare the way of Jesus. Some will look at this text and say to themselves, “Oh no.  Not me.  This applies to the clergy.  I am just a lay person.”  But if we count ourselves out, how will the gospel be spread?  No; this applies to lay people, too.  And we also will be as surprised as the first disciples were as to what happens when we share the gospel.

            Of course, this is not the only way to go about spreading the gospel.  Even without this rigid structure, we each are called to do this in our daily lives at work and wherever we spend our time.  Despite the fact that there are many out there who do not believe in God at all or only marginally, there are ears out there that are receptive to the gospel.  I remember attending a social function in the church social hall, conversing with the visitation pastor a couple days after I preached a sermon and the church secretary approached me, tapping me on my left shoulder, asking for permission to quote part of my sermon. I turned around, intrigued by her query, because I barely knew her and she was not a member of our church.  I surmised that she had read my sermon because the manuscript had flown from her desk to become available to the congregation, but had no idea she would be touched by it. I was surprised that she had been struck by the phrase that we are all ambassadors for Christ.  In my mind, I was thinking---that is directly from Paul.  It’s nothing new.  I don’t understand what the big deal is. At the same time, I silently gave thanks for the working of the Holy Spirit in her life. As I thought more about what she said, I was secretly happy that she got it! I totally get the excitement of the seventy-some others about seeing the results of their mission. Jesus had told them about the harvest and they had seen, with their own eyes, the fruits of their labors.

            However, Jesus reminds them that the power he has given them is not what they should be happy about.  He said that we should be happy that our names are written in heaven—that the kingdom of God has come near to us. Think about it; the kingdom of God is known to us because someone, or more likely many someones, in our lives preached it, taught it, and brought us healing because of it as if directly from God. As Christians, we are never without vocation.  We are always both witness to and conduit of God’s grace. We are the body of Christ. Give thanks and remember that your names are written in heaven.

            From Teresa of Avila: “Christ has no body on earth but yours; no hands but yours; no feet but yours. Yours are the eyes through which the compassion of Christ looks out to the world. Yours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good. Yours are the hands with which he is to bless others now.” Go in peace to love and serve the Lord. Amen.

 

           

The Splanknidzomai of God

Proper5C, Sullivan Park Care Center, June 9, 2013 by Annette Fricke

In verse 13 of our gospel text, we read, “When the Lord saw her, he had compassion for her and said to her, ‘Do not weep.’  If we pay attention only to the second part of that verse, we get the impression that Jesus didn’t understand what was going on.  However, when we look at the first part, we know that Jesus does know and responds in a way that we might find difficult to understand.  Jesus had compassion for a non-Jewish woman whom he didn’t even know.  One rendering of this word that is translated into English, meaning compassion is this, "his heart was gut-wrenched" for her. That sense of being gut-wrenched is like having all of your insides mangled together, painfully pressing you to act.” At seminary, many years ago, we were taught that the culture of the area where Jesus taught saw this emotion as coming from the bowels or entrails of a person.  It is a visceral moment that originates from deep within.  It is much more than sympathy or pity as my Greek dictionary defines it. Notice that Jesus is not asked by the woman, but Jesus takes the initiative, reaching out to her in her grief.  They were a last surviving unit, just mother and son.  A mother alone in that society had no identity.  If we were to fast forward to the gospel of John, to the scene of the crucifixion, in John 19:26-27, we find the following words, “When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to this mother, ‘Woman, here is your son.’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Here is your mother.’ And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.” 

Luke is defining for us what kind of prophet Jesus is by a series of stories that illustrate it.  We are again reminded at the end of this chapter 7 in Luke where we are told, “Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them.”  In this case the dead are raised, but that is not the full import of this story or any of the other stories.  Healthcare in those days, above all, meant a restoration of relationship to family and temple worship.  A central function of Jesus’ ministry is to lead those whose lives have lost cultural meaning back to their proper purpose and direction in life. The death of a son is tragic enough, but for a widow it is double jeopardy since she relies on that male next-of-kin for her very livelihood. Jesus effectively saved her life by restoring her son to his life.

A woman named Julia in England had a son named George who, no matter what she tried, would not speak although she herself always kept trying.  He would cry and be agitated, wouldn’t smile or connect with her in any way.  She was unable to touch him or hold him. She suffered from years of gossip and cruelty by others. She had many tests done and he was finally diagnosed as having Asperger’s, which is a type of Autism.  But the diagnosis didn't leave her with any clues as to what she could do. She was still bewildered as to how to produce a normal emotional growth for her son. Then a cat suddenly appeared in their garden. The cat was bloody, so she told George that he had probably got tangled in someone’s fence or something. When George saw the cat, he amazingly spoke for the very first time in seven years saying in a high-pitched voice, “Baboo! Baboo!” She was so excited that she called everyone she knew in the phone book both friends and relatives and he continued to call, “Baboo! Baboo!”  He bounced around, taking down the Christmas tree and the decorations in celebration.  They became the best of friends and George’s life came alive. He had the cat eat at the table with him and whatever he ate, he gave also to the cat.  If he had fish sticks, so did the cat. One day, the cat rubbed himself against George and George asked his mum what the cat was doing.  So she said, “The cat is trying to show you that he loves you.”  George took that information and rubbed against his mother in the same way.  The gossip about the mad lady began again.  People outside the household wondered about her when they saw her son George  do the same as the cat, rubbing against her leg.  And then the cat suddenly disappeared for about three months.  The mother and her son were in Egypt on Holiday.  They received a phone call that the cat had been found, so the next day, they returned home.  The family that found him was actually about 80-90 miles from their home and invited Julia to tea.  She was lavished with a wonderful spread, and saying truthfully that it was all very lovely, but she was anxious to see the cat.  She was taken to a room.  They opened the door and out came the cat, named Ben by this time.  Ben jumped into her arms and would not let go.  She took the cat home to George and what a grand homecoming it was.  George was reunited and a few other cats were welcomed into the family as well.  Even though the mum had grown up with several cats and grew to have a distaste for them, the fur all over and the cleaning, this was the key to George’s growth as a human being and his happiness.  George is now nineteen years old and in college.  He still has his struggles relating to others, but thanks to the love of a cat and a mother, George is whole and healed. Healed does not always mean cured.  You see healed sometimes just means that things are in proper alignment or equilibrium.  They are balanced. They are restored.

Evil, sickness, and even death will continue but for this one day, the woman in the gospel lesson who grieved the loss of her son, had been restored to wholeness with society, and her family which had been taken away by death was once again renewed.

As we read in Psalm 23, "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil." The psalmist does not pretend that evil and death do not exist. Death lies ahead for all of us, saints and sinners alike, and for all the ones we love.

There are few other descriptions that I know that better describe the love of God in the actions of Jesus.  Jesus had deep compassion. What kind of prophet is Jesus?  The dead are raised. Jesus is the embodiment of compassion (splanknidzomai) and calls us to be the same.  God has always been and always will be there to strengthen us, no matter what our journeys may bring or where they may take us.  God sees what we need and fills that need. Blessed be God. Amen.