Mark 9: 30-37
A Sermon Preached by the Rev. Dr. Howard W. Boswell, Jr.
Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time, September 20, 2009
Kenmore Presbyterian Church
Kenmore, New York
I borrowed the title of today’s sermon from a book by Brian D. McLaren and Tony Campolo. Many of you know Tony, because we’ve used three of his video discussion series, Carpe Diem!, Curing Affluenza, and Christianity at the Turn of the Century. A prolific author and well-known speaker, I’ve heard Tony a number of times. I’ve never heard Brian McLaren, but I consider him in the same class as Tony.
I came to know McLaren’s work through the emerging church movement of which he is one of the leaders. I understand the emerging church movement to be an attempt by contemporary Christian leaders to ask the kind of questions I’m posing in this sermon series, “What is Jesus doing today? How do we follow his lead in our world?” If you want an introduction to Brian McLaren, I invite you to read his books, A New Kind of Christian or A Generous Orthodoxy. If you’re like me, his creativity and commitment will capture you.
Adventures in Missing the Point has a disturbing subtitle, which explains the entire book, “How the Culture Controlled Church Neutered the Gospel.” McLaren and Campolo consider a variety of issues, asking, “Do you ever look at how the Christian faith is being lived out in the new millennium and wonder if we’re not doing what we’re supposed to be doing? That we still haven’t quite ‘gotten it’”? They express how I feel most of the time!
Yet, “not getting it” is not a new experience for followers of Jesus. I learned from a friend who works in publishing that you cannot copyright a title, so if I ever publish a book of sermons on the Gospel of Mark, I have my title, The Original Adventures in Missing the Point! Some time, read the Gospel of Mark from beginning to end. It’s the shortest gospel and you can read it in an hour. Focus your attention on the disciples when you read it and you’ll find out what I mean. In Mark, the disciples are dense! They don’t get it and often miss the point!
Our passage from Mark provides ample evidence of what I mean. After Jesus asks them who people say he is and who they believe he is, after he tells them in no uncertain terms he will undergo great suffering at the hands of the religious authorities and die and be raised, after he tells them to pick up their cross and follow him, after they see him transfigured with Moses and Elijah, after he casts out a demon from a boy, after all of this, he takes them back to Galilee, back to where it all began, by themselves, away from the crowds. Away from all distractions, he teaches them again, “The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.” That is what Jesus is doing as they are on the way, the way to Jerusalem, the way to the cross.
Now, let’s put this scene into terms we may understand. Let’s say the person we love the most in the whole world, our mother or father, our husband or wife, our child, our sister or brother, whoever calls us or, even better, says to us, “Sit down, please, I have something to tell you. I’ve just come from the doctor and it’s not good…” This scene suggests a fraction of the impact of Jesus’ words on his disciples. Like us, they don’t know what to say, how to react. Like us, they don’t understand what he means and fear asking him to explain. Like us, they’re silent before the prospect of death.
Yet, they miss the point of what Jesus says, as we do, all too often. After hearing him predict his passion a second time, what do the disciples discuss as they make their way home to Capernaum? Do they consider what God might be doing in all of this? Do they question what it means for them as followers of Jesus, what difference it makes in how they live their lives? No, when they arrive at Capernaum and enter the house, Jesus asks, “What were you arguing about on the way?” On the way to Jerusalem, on the way to the cross, in face of the betrayal and suffering of their Master and friend, what were Jesus’ disciples arguing about: Who was the greatest? They show some wisdom by keeping their mouths shut, because something in the way Jesus asked the question and what he said next convinced them they didn’t get it, they missed the point, yet again!
So, what were they supposed to get and what point did the disciples miss? For that matter, what are we supposed to get and what point do we miss? Whenever Jesus sits down, he takes the position of a teacher. I imagine that he sighs deeply, shakes his head, disappointed that we don’t get it, we miss the point of being on the way, his way. He tells his disciples, then and now, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Later, in Mark 10, when he has to explain himself yet again, after James and John ask him to give them good seats in the kingdom, Jesus will make it plain, saying, “For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.” Yet, now, what does Jesus do? He takes a child in his arms and tells us, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”
Too often, when we hear these words of Jesus, we take the edge off of them by focusing on fond memories of childhood. We don’t realize a child in Jesus’ place and time was a non-person, the very embodiment of vulnerability and powerlessness. We don’t realize in our place and time, some children are treated in the same way. To welcome the child means to take what some call “the one down position,” to seek to serve, rather than to be served, to question our culture’s concept of status and power.
I finally decided to buy Adventures in Missing the Point, after I read one paragraph from Brian McLaren’s reflections on leadership online. He writes,
I admit it: I spent most of ‘80s and early ‘90s wishing I could fulfill the CEO model of Christian leadership. CEOs made it. They were unflinchingly confident, powerful, knowledgeable, larger than life. I admired such CEO-model leaders in Christendom, I attended their seminars, and returned home wildly inspired and mildly depressed.
I wondered whether Brian read my journal from the same time! Even today, when I read books or attend seminars by the CEO types, I still feel “wildly inspired and mildly depressed.” I want to be like them, but I cannot quite measure up. I want their kind of success and status, but it eludes me. Yet, I don’t get it and miss the point! Ministry is not about success and status. It’s not about the effective management of an organization, though that’s important to me. Ministry is about following Jesus on the way and leading others on the journey!
Listen: I know some of you wish Kenmore Presbyterian Church could be the church it once was. You wish the pews could be filled with doctors and lawyers, educators and executives, as it once was. You think that it’s important to return to that kind of status, that measure of success, that type of power, or else, it’s not worth it. Let me respectfully submit to you: You don’t get it and you miss the point. Kenmore Presbyterian Church began its life as a mission, a Sunday school to welcome children in Buffalo’s Northside. You’ve been at your best, when you did not ask how the church could serve you and meet your needs and the needs of your family, but when you asked how you could serve one another, your neighbors in need, the larger church, and the world. I appreciate how long some of you have been members. I applaud your faithful presence and leadership. I hope you understand seniority does not excuse you from service nor does it give you permission to place yourself before others for we are all stand on the same level before the cross.
To follow Jesus today means all of us must follow his lead. We cannot afford to miss the point he taught his disciples on the way for we walk the same way. Christianity is not about the accumulation of power. Whenever it has been, it’s been at its worse. The power of the gospel has been rendered impotent by its acceptance of culture’s definitions of success and status. Instead, whenever the church asks how it may walk with Jesus “in lowly paths of service free,” it has been most effective and had its finest hours. Its adventures were in pursuit of the point, its purpose for being, to be the living presence of Jesus, proclaiming his love and placing itself in service to the world. Amen.
©2009 Howard W. Boswell, Jr.
Continue reading about What Is Jesus Doing?—“Adventures in Missing the Point”
Mark 8:27-9:1
A Sermon Preached by the Rev. Dr. Howard W. Boswell, Jr.
Twenty-Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time, September 13, 2009
Kenmore Presbyterian Church
Kenmore, New York
Last week, I began a sermon series, “What is Jesus doing?” Since it was Labor Day Weekend, some of you weren’t here, but I want you to understand what it’s all about. Most of you know WWJD?—“What would Jesus do?” Last week, I said we need to ask a different question, today, “What is Jesus doing?” Since we believe he’s not trapped in distant history, we must seek him as a present mystery, because he calls us everyday to follow him. During this sermon series, we will look at stories from Mark’s gospel and ask two questions. The first question will be in two parts. What is Jesus doing in the passage before us? And what does it suggest he might be up to in our world today? The second question will be, “How can we follow his lead?” Today’s passage suggests these questions still remain and a lot rides on how we answer the second one.
Nearly every New Testament scholar will tell you Mark 8:27—9:1 stands at the center of this gospel. Seven and a half chapters come before this passage and eight follow it. 310 verses precede it and 343 come after these thirteen verses. The British New Testament scholar, Morna D. Hooker calls Mark 8:27—9:1, “the watershed.” Watersheds determine the direction of rivers and streams. We use the term to describe important moments after which nothing is ever the same. Watershed is an apt description for this moment in Caesarea Philippi. Before it, Jesus has been in Galilee, teaching and healing. From here on, Jesus will be on his way to Jerusalem, to the cross.
At this moment, what is Jesus doing? Well, first, he asks his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” They offer three popular opinions: John the Baptist, Elijah, or one of the prophets. I suspect it would be helpful, if we knew what the word on the street about who Jesus is. If Jesus were to enter Kenmore Presbyterian Church, he’d ask who our family, friends, neighbors, and co-workers consider him to be. What do you think? Who do people say Jesus is, today?
Then, Jesus turns to the disciples and poses a harder question: “But who do you say that I am?” I’ve imagined this scene in my mind many times. I see the disciples, digging at the ground with their toes, coughing nervously. They aren’t sure how to answer. They have their suspicions, but no one’s willing to commit, until Peter blurts out, “You are the Messiah.” Now, I can imagine this scene, because I’ve experienced it, here and elsewhere. Whenever I teach Confirmation or lead a youth group, whenever I facilitate adult education or lead workshops, when we turn to Jesus, one of two things happen. Either people become very quiet and want to keep their opinions to themselves or, like Peter, they express what everyone else thinks, but no one’s willing to say.
I think it’s not enough for us to say Jesus is Messiah or Lord and Savior or even Son of God, today. While we may accept all of these things as true, we often say them without thinking, because we’ve always said them. Let me ask you: Do you know what it really means to say Jesus is Messiah? Do you know what it implies to call him Lord? If Jesus is Savior, from what has he saved you? If Jesus is Son of God, how do you deal with what can only be called the scandal of that statement? You see: To say Jesus is the Son of God means God chose to express Godself in this unique way. How do you deal with such particularly in a pluralistic world? So, let me ask you to consider a question I ask every Confirmation Class, a question I consider critical for anyone who claims to be a Christian: “Who is Jesus for you today?” Yet, I invite you to define what you mean when you say he’s Messiah, Lord, Savior, or Son of God. Better yet, don’t use those words at all! How would you tell an unbelieving friend what he means to you without using religious language?
Yet, we’re not alone in our lack of understanding. Even Peter didn’t really, fully grasp what he said, when he called Jesus, “the Messiah.” Probably, Peter had a political or military savior in mind, who would come and conquer the Romans and kick them out of Palestine. I think that’s why Jesus told the disciples to keep quiet. While they had the answer, they still didn’t know what it meant.
So, what is Jesus doing next in our passage? He explains to the disciples what it means to be the Messiah. He tells them what awaits him in Jerusalem: “The Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.” This image of what it means to be the Messiah doesn’t mesh with Peter’s plans, so he pulls Jesus aside and tells him off. Jesus rebukes him, saying, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things, but on human things.”
I believe we’re in Peter’s position, because we set our mind on our own agenda, not God’s. We have a hard time with suffering. It doesn’t fit our view of how religion works, but doesn’t it fit with how things are? Doesn’t the thought that the Son of God emptied himself, took on human form, and suffered for our sakes give us hope that our Father in heaven hears our cries and knows what we’re going through? I believe in our world today, Jesus still walks the way of the cross, still suffers, so that we may know we’re not alone in our pain.
Yet, knowing who Jesus is and what he does leads us to the second question, “How can we follow his lead?” Jesus gave a direct answer to his disciples and the crowd he called over, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.” Those words remain our call as Christians today. Our founder, John Calvin summed up the Christian life like this:
We are not our own; therefore neither our reason nor our will should predominate in our deliberations and actions. We are not our own; therefore let us not propose it as our end, to seek what may be expedient for us according to our flesh. We are not our own; therefore let us, as far as possible, forget ourselves and all things that are ours. On the contrary, we are God’s; to him, therefore, let us live and die. We are God’s; therefore let his wisdom and will preside in all our actions. We are God’s; towards him, therefore, as our only legitimate end, let every part of our lives be directed.
The German martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer stated the same thing, when he said succinctly, “When Jesus calls a man, he bids him come and die.”
How can we follow Jesus’ lead, especially in a culture where self-denial is an alien concept? What do we say to family, friends, co-workers, and neighbors, who have no use for organized religion? Recently, I read an article in the Buffalo News about how people are losing their religion. It sounded familiar, because USA Today reported the results of the same survey in March! Let’s watch a video from CNN, as they reported on it:
Well, our money says (Hey, camera 2) “In God we trust,” but apparently fewer Americans are taking that as their personal motto. A new national survey released today reveals the dramatic shifts in belief and a rise in the number of people who chose non-belief. Check out these results from an American Religious Identification Survey on USA Today.com. This is our first map right here and this is actually a change in percentage of folks that claim to be Christians. Look at this. It’s up only in two states, right here, Louisiana up at 8% and Rhode Island at 2%, but in every other state, it’s down, look at that, all the way down 20% in Texas and you thought that Texas was the Bible Belt!
Then, there’s this other map. This is what really grabbed our attention. This is how many people don’t claim any religion. In every single state, it’s up. Vermont 21%, all the way down, lowest percent, 2% there in Arkansas. Now, why are people saying this? Why are these numbers so high? Apparently, according to Barry Cosman is a co-author of this survey and he said, “More than ever before, people are just making up their own stories of who they are.” He went on to say, “What they’ve told him, ‘I’m everything. I’m nothing. I believe in myself.’” He also said as he did this survey, people said that religion has become a fashion statement, not a deep, personal commitment for many. Pretty interesting. We wanted to bring you that survey and the reasons behind that.
Now, some of you may hear these words as bad news, maybe even the death knell of religion in America! Well, I hope so and I say, “Thank God!” Those who leave the church or who won’t darken our doors say, “Religion has become a fashion statement, not a deep, personal commitment for many.” That’s been the problem with mainline Christianity for years: It’s more about keeping up appearances than accepting Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior and allowing him to set the agenda in our lives! I’ve said it before and I will say it again, Jesus did not come into the world to found a religion, he came to earth to forge a relationship. I’ve seen a slogan I can accept, “Christianity is not a religion. It’s a relationship!” It’s a relationship with the God whom we know in Jesus. It’s relationships with other disciples in fellowship. It’s relationships with our neighbors, caring for the poor, the lonely, and the sick of body, mind, and spirit, and telling them our story, the story of the difference Jesus makes in our lives. It’s relationships with the world, as we work for peace and justice, as we feed the hungry and free the oppressed, as we proclaim reconciliation to God and among all peoples, through Christ. Unless we make a deep, personal commitment to Christ, until we pick up the cross and follow Jesus everyday, our faith remains a mere fashion statement, disposed of as easily as last year’s fad. Jesus still summons us, “Will you come and follow me, if I but call your name?”
©2009 Howard W. Boswell, Jr.
Continue reading about What is Jesus Doing?—“The Question Still Remains”
Mark 7:24-37
A Sermon Preached by the Rev. Dr. Howard W. Boswell, Jr.
Twenty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, September 6, 2009
Kenmore Presbyterian Church
Kenmore, New York
Today, we begin a sermon series, “What is Jesus Doing?” It represents a real passion for me, so I want you to share with you what sparked my enthusiasm, as we start. As the nineteenth century drew to a close, people believed they could bring God’s kingdom to earth by alleviating social injustice and poverty. Churches created social service agencies and worked for real change. This movement came to be called the Social Gospel and gained popular expression in the classic book by Charles M. Sheldon, In His Steps. Sheldon preached the chapters of the book at an evening service for youth at First Congregational Church of Topeka, Kansas, where he served as pastor. The book followed ordinary church members and their pastor, who promised to ask one question before they made any decision for a year, “What would Jesus do?” The book became a bestseller and remains in print today.
As the Twentieth Century entered its last decade, a youth group in Holland, Michigan ran across Sheldon’s book and began to ask, “What would Jesus do?” They created a bracelet, which many people wore with the letters—WWJD. It quickly became a fad among many Christians. I even used the bracelet and the question for a Lenten Sermon Series, both in Niles and here. We read and discussed Sheldon’s book.
As the first decade of this new millennium comes to an end, I believe we need to ask a different question. You see, “What would Jesus do?” has become a cliché. Worse, it’s a punch line with people asking, “What would Jesus drive?” or “What would Jesus buy?” It spawned imitations, as people wondered, “What would Chuck Norris do?” or a personal favorite, “What would Johnny Cash do?” Besides, asking, “What would Jesus do?” assumes we know what he did. Average people in the pew really know very little about Jesus’ life and teachings. They tend to know a few stories, but few have ever really read even one gospel all the way through.
Yet, increasingly, I believe a better question may be, “What is Jesus doing?” If we believe God raised him from the dead and he sits at God’s right hand, which we confess in the creeds of the church, then he’s not trapped in distant history. Instead, we must seek him as a present mystery, because he calls us everyday to follow him. So, during this sermon series, we will look at incidents from Mark’s gospel and consider two questions. The first question will be in two parts. What is Jesus doing in the passage before us? And what does it suggest he might be up to in our world today? The second question will be, “How can we follow his lead?”
Now, as we read Mark 7: 24-30, I would imagine many of us wondered, “What is Jesus doing?” The encounter with the Syro-Phoenician woman does not show Jesus at his finest hour. She came, asking him to cast a demon from her daughter. We can’t believe how he responds to her desperate cry for help, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” It sounds so rough, even racist.
As hard as it may be to understand, what Jesus says is rough and even racist. We will have a hard time making this image fit with the Sunday School song we learned,
Jesus loves the little children.
All the little children of the world.
Red or yellow, black or white,
They are precious in his sight,
Jesus loves the little children of the world.
Yet, when we consider what Jesus is doing, we need to remember Jesus was fully human. He was a Jew, who learned about who was in and who was out at his mother Mary’s knee.
While some scholars want to suggest Jesus was only pretending, others want to offer economic or social reasons for what he said. Yet, when this woman approached Jesus, she broke at least three rules. First, as a woman, she was not to approach Jesus with such a request. A male relative should have made her case. Second, as a Gentile, she was unclean. Finally, she was too assertive, which doesn’t fly too well even today. When people come to the church to ask for help, we expect them to grovel a little and explain their need, so that we can assure ourselves they deserve our help.
Another thing bothers us about this encounter: Jesus changed his mind. This woman could think on her feet, so when Jesus calls her a dog and refuses to help her daughter, she doesn’t skulk a way like a dog who’s been beat. Instead, she says, “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” She had Jesus there. Just before this passage, Jesus debated with some scribes and Pharisees over what makes someone unclean, saying, “Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?” He made all foods clean, but then he said, “It is what comes out of a person that defiles.” What came out of the woman’s mouth was from her heart— an honest cry for help. What else could Jesus do, but answer her faithful request and cast out her daughter’s demon?
So, what is Jesus doing in our world today? I think he still hears the cries of those we consider outsiders. Yes, Jesus was only human, born into a particular culture, raised with certain beliefs about who’s in and who’s out, but he learned God intends to transcend our prejudices. What’s more, God used Jesus to tear down “the dividing wall of hostility,” as Paul puts it in Ephesians 2. Jesus continues to confront us to learn with him what the Syro-Phoenician woman taught him, even the dogs under the table deserve to eat the crumbs. He wants us to grasp what he sees from God’s right hand— “They will come from east and west, and from north and south, and sit at table in the kingdom of God.”
So, if that’s what Jesus is doing in our world today, how can we follow his lead? What steps do we need to take to be his faithful disciples, who learn to expand our ideas of who’s welcome at this table? Well, first, let me give you a little worksheet from Roy Oswald’s book, Making Your Church More Inviting. It asks you to rate which people would get a warm welcome, a less than warm welcome, or no reception at all here. I want you to use this worksheet as a way to identify who the Syro-Phoenician woman may be for you. To whose cries may Jesus want you to listen?
Second, this passage made me think about the people we have a hard time welcoming. Ask any church what they need to do, they will say, “Get new members!” Then, they will usually say, “We want young families.” What it really means is we want those like us or at least those who are as we were when we started out. I find the problem in a toast I heard once, which I’ll clean up only slightly, “Here’s to us and those like us! Darn few left!” Did you read the article in Thursday’s Buffalo News, which suggested that many folks are leaving religion for a variety of reasons? One of the main reasons may be we don’t make them feel welcome. We expect them to conform to our ideas of how Christianity is. We forget that Christianity is not about religion, it’s about relationships.
I think two groups in particular don’t fare well in the church: those with mental illness and those who have disabilities. We tend to demonize those who suffer from mental illness, rather than seeing them as those who need our compassion, our voice, and our welcome. We tend to avoid those with disabilities, because we don’t understand them. Our church remains inaccessible to many people. Jesus wants to open our ears to hear their cries and our mouths to speak for them, saying, “Ephphatha! Be opened!”
©2009 Howard W. Boswell, Jr.
Continue reading about What is Jesus Doing?—“It Takes All Kinds”
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