14PentecostProper17, September 2, 2012, Sullivan Park Care Center, by Annette Fricke

            I attended the funeral a week ago last Saturday of my mother’s best friend from childhood.  As it turns out, she was also the great friend of many others and the little church of both her childhood and mine was as full as any Christmas pageant presentation I had ever seen there.  The pastor who has been there for some years now, as well as the previous interim, always asks people before they die or their relatives after their death, what their favorite verse or passage from the Bible is.  Some people are actually able to pinpoint what theirs is, but for the rest of us, we have many favorites.  I can actually see where a person can find certain passages to be particularly meaningful. Other people will actually tear apart someone else’s choice.  I know that a couple of priests where I worship do not care for the book of Job.  I personally like that book and I like it because Job is not afraid to question even God and yet also knows that even though his understanding of God may be lacking, still stands in awe of God and God’s creation and what God has done with that creation.  On Wednesday of last week, the church I attend does not commemorate the beheading of John the Baptist, but chose the contribution of John Bunyan, moved from Friday.  I personally have never read the work that he is most famous for, “Pilgrim’s Progress.”  Just like John the Baptist, John Bunyan was jailed for preaching the gospel.  Why?  It was because John Bunyan was not licensed to be a preacher in England. He was not licensed to be a preacher in England, because at the time you had to belong to the Church of England.  He, in fact, refused to attend Church of England services and was actually a member of a Baptist congregation. And here I stand before you in the same manner: I am not licensed to preach.  I am in direct conflict with the authority of the church and yet also doing what the church has said is a proper ministry.  I am a baptized child of God and at least according to the Gospel of Matthew, it is the ministry of every baptized Christian to go out into the world in the name of Christ, preaching and teaching and baptizing.  I read in the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer on p. 855, “The ministry of lay persons is to represent Christ and his Church; to bear witness to him wherever they may be; and, according to the gifts given them, to carry on Christ’s work of reconciliation in the world; and to take their place in the life, worship, and governance of the Church.” But also, “The priest’s prayer on page 562 is appropriate only for rectors of parishes, vicars of missions, hospital chaplains, and other priests having similar canonical charge.” I had friends that joined Lutheran campus ministry as unordained pastors who the church later decided that they needed to ordain in order to fulfill the functions of that particular ministry.  The Church, both Protestant and Catholic is now in great flux as it decides whether or not to maintain the long held hierarchical tradition handed down to us throughout the generations. The church now celebrates the person of John Bunyan, who at one time was considered an itinerant and illegitimate preacher. I think John the Baptist would also have been seen by the Jews as an itinerant and illegitimate preacher, yet both of them have done what all Christians are called to do and that is to point others, both believers and non-believers, to Jesus Christ. That is our mission as Christians and has always been our mission as Christians.  But how that has taken shape in the Church has, in fact varied throughout history. However, Jesus tells us that time and again, just as he does in this gospel reading assigned for today: we are to point to him and what he has taught us.  Jesus also bucks the Jewish tradition and laws by stating that we are called to follow the commandment of God, not the traditions of humanity. The reading that the lectionary devisers have coupled with the gospel from Deuteronomy echoes this sentiment.  We are to follow the law of God, neither taking away from it, nor adding to it. There was once an early Lutheran leader in this country who believed that if you feel called by God to be a pastor, you should be a pastor.  It doesn’t matter what this or that person or congregation thinks. Jesus is highly critical of the rules of the Pharisees and seeks, it seems, more than anything else, to put everybody on a level playing field.  All are equal in God’s sight.  All were created in the image of God.  None of us is better or worse than anyone else.  All of us, even Job, must realize our humble position before God in order to be put right with God.  We do not make the rules; God does. But if you do not follow the rules that people have placed before you, you can be truly out on a limb and sometimes that means that you may be feeling that you are all alone to face the world, that perhaps only God is your true friend.  To that, I will quote one of my friend’s daily morning favorite: “But now thus says the Lord, he who created you, he who formed you, Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; And through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you: For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior." ~ Isaiah 43: 1—3.  There are times in our lives when we will have trials that will cause us to become discouraged or even depressed about our situations in life.  There are times when we need to be reminded that God still cares for us and will see us through every storm, wind, or tempest however great and overwhelming it may seem at the time. God will preserve us in both this life and the next. Almost every single great hymn in Christianity has been written by those who have been through huge storms in their lives, but their faith in God has brought them through to calm waters time and time again.  There is no magic pill or magic formula, we will always have storms, but we can also always rest assured that God is still at the helm of our boats and will calm those storms, however unbearable they may seem at the moment. 

            This specific text from the Gospel of Mark is a difficult one for us to understand except from a non-literal rendition.  It seems to be written from a Gentile perspective.  Gentiles are being brought into Christianity, but do they need to observe all these laws of the Jews in order to be faithful to Christianity?  If we are to read v. 19 in this chapter, we find that Jesus declared all foods to be clean. Yet we live in a world where the Jews remain following a Kosher diet and some Christians follow a no meat diet and others believe that vegetarianism is the common sense way to be and remain healthy.  Jesus tells us that we can do what we want with our food and cleanliness is something we follow, not for the ritual, but hygiene purposes.  At the same time, it is not up to us to point out to others what we see as the folly of food practices in others.  What Jesus is teaching is not new.  We see it in the Old Testament text for today, we also see it in Jeremiah.  Jeremiah also declares in chapter 31: 33, “But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me.”  The notions that obedience to God must come from the heart, and that the disobedient heart is the source of all wicked actions that take us far from God, are at the core of the Old Testament prophets.  The gospel in Jesus’ words for us is that God wants our heartfelt response, our full-hearted obedience. “…for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.”  Amen.