Grab On!

Mark 1:14-20

January 22, 2012

I’ve read this passage from Mark many times.  I’ve read many, many commentaries on it.  But no matter what, I could never get over the question, “how is it possible that all it took for the fisher-folk to leave everything and follow Jesus was for Jesus to say, “Follow me and I will make you fish for people.”  That’s it.  The text is very clear – the author seems to go out of his way to make the point – Jesus speaks this one sentence, and these four men leave everything behind – IMMEDIATELY – and follow him.

Most authors think this is a commentary on the power of Jesus as a religious leader, the faith of the earliest disciples, or both.  And the message is, if we really believed in Jesus, we would leave everything behind and answer the call when it comes –  because, of course, Jesus is powerful and we are supposed to be faithful. 

But I can’t get over how odd it is.  It just doesn’t strike me as real that it was SO easy for those earliest disciples.  At the very least, it isn’t helpful to me, because my experience is that it’s hard to follow the call of God – even when you think you know what it is.  And I actually think that’s okay.  It is hard.  We’re human and there are always complications when it comes to following God’s call.  There are difficult decisions, and things to weigh and trade-offs and competing values and goods – not to mention the whole issue of figuring out if you really know what God’s call is in the first place.  And I can only believe that those things that make it hard for us to follow God’s call were hard for people in the first century as well. 

Which leaves me with this nagging question: What was different? Why did the author of Mark present it this way?  Why make such a point of how immediately they followed Jesus with no questions, hesitation or even a word on where they were going and what they would be doing? 

Well, I guess we all have our ways of dealing with nagging questions.  Mine is to try to read my way into an answer.  So, I read this week about what was going on around the Sea of Galilee when Jesus began his ministry.  And I started to hear this story in a different way.

In the generation before Jesus, Herod the Great ruled the Jewish homelands under Roman sponsorship.  He was responsible for extraordinary and magnificent building projects in Jerusalem, including greatly expanding the temple.  And in Caesarea, another major city in Judea, he developed a world-class port.  You might think that was good for those in Jerusalem and Caesarea, but in fact whenever Rome gets involved in your local affairs – your economy and politics – you lose unless you are one of the elite.  Herod the Great was not trying to create jobs by starting government funded infrastructure projects.  He used slave labor and in order to fund his projects he increased taxes and his control over the local economy.  They only people he impressed were those in the Roman Empire.  The Jews living there were an occupied people losing their lives.

So Herod the Great took over the economies of major cities, but he largely stayed away from the fishing communities around the Sea of Galilee.  When Jesus became an adult, that all shifted.  Fishing was never easy.  In fact it was back breaking work for little gain.  Fishing villages were not gated communities with swimming pools.  They were hard working families who struggled with daily issues of having enough to make it.  But, it was just that:  communities of families working to make their subsistence living. 

Enter Herod Antipas – the son of Herod the Great – and a man who had serious daddy issues.

Around the time Jesus became an adult, Herod Antipas was dying to be as successful as his father in the eyes of Rome, and this obsession with living up to his father’s legacy seemed to make him particularly ruthless in his pursuit of wealth and fame.  He saw the Sea of Galilee as his opportunity.  He moved in and built the great city of Tiberius on the shores of the sea.  And, of course, to do this he needed revenue – so he commercialized the fishing industry, claiming ownership of everything from people’s boats and nets, to the labor.  Now, the fishers could not own their own equipment, and they were forced to sell their catch to Herod Antipas’ factories…and it wasn’t a fair price.  Fishing went from hard to impossible…from subsistence living to a life of abject poverty and effectively slave labor. 

It was no accident, historians say, that Jesus started his ministry at the Sea of Galilee with fisherman.  It was at the center of the clash between Roman oppression and Jewish peasants. 

So, when Jesus calls these first disciples, he wasn’t just a guy walking up to generally happy, content folks, saying “come on,” be my disciple, follow me and do what I say.  This is more like a person in a boat coming upon a bunch of people drowning in the ocean and saying, “here, quick, take my hand and I’ll pull you out.”  Jesus was “yanking” people out of the economic system that was destroying lives, families, religions, and the environment.  The Roman system was a soul-sucking, life draining, dehumanizing system that was drowning the fisherman.  Jesus walks into the midst of this, holds out his hand and says, “Grab on!”  Their response?  “Thank God!”  And immediately, they followed him.

Of course, this still leaves the question:  What did Jesus have to offer?  How do we know they weren’t being pulled out of the frying pan and into the pot?  As I read the gospels, I think Jesus offered people an alternative that included three major things:  a new economic and political system, community, and meaning.

This new economic and political system wouldn’t make people rich, it didn’t offer positions of power, and it certainly didn’t impress Rome, but it did place at the center the most vulnerable:  the poor, ill, ostracized, hated, and desperate.  This economic system fed you, gave you health care, housed you and loved you.  And politically, violence was rejected as a governing tool, or even as a means of protest against a violent regime.  Instead, politics would be based on trust, serving one another, and fighting over who should be least and last. 

Jesus also offered people a community, and it was not based on who you were except as a child of God.  Male, female, rich, poor, widowed, married, Greek, Jew.  People who didn’t fare well in a culture where your position in the family determined your status and well being found a community structured not around hierarchy, and prescribed roles, but around love.  People who were always on the outside because they were different, or ill, or despised, found a community where they were as valued as everyone else, seen only as a beloved child of God.  For those being drowned in the cultural norms of the day, this community was, in some cases literally, a life-saver.

Finally, Jesus offered a life of meaning.  Following Jesus was not a promise of an easy life.  These people were leaving the back-breaking work of fishing to join a ministry where you had no income, you traveled by foot and boat across dangerous lands and seas, you upset the powerful, and you cared for each person you met.  It was just as back-breaking.  But it did not break the soul.  It’s one thing to work hard for Herod, and another to work hard for God.  You were helping to make people whole, to heal them, to speak to them of love and grace, to take the yoke from their back, and to invite them to be a part of something transformative.  It was a life of purpose and meaning, even though it held no promises of riches or fame.

So, Jesus is offering a hand to people who are drowning, and he’s pulling them into a world that is life-giving.  Of course they followed – immediately.  That’s who Jesus was – he sought out the drowning.  He had a heart for people who were hurting.  Which makes me wonder:  In what ways are we drowning, and how can we be pulled into a world that is life-giving?  From what do we need rescuing? 

Some are drowning in the economic and political systems of our day.  Some of us, like the fishermen are at the losing end, suffering poverty, oppression, and facing a bleak future.  Others of us drown because we’re trapped in this system as the ones who oppress, or benefit off the misfortune of others.  We participate in things we know are hurtful to others and the creation, but we’re unable to extract ourselves because it is complicated, overwhelming, and scary. 

For others it’s not the economic or political system that threatens to drown us, but illness, or grief, or despair.  We’re awash in a darkness that has overtaken us, and not only can’t we see the light at the end of the tunnel, we’ve lost hope that the light is even there.  If someone came along and we thought there was even a chance they knew the way out, we wouldn’t have to be asked twice.  We would follow: immediately. 

However it is that you are drowning, the hope is you will see a hand reaching out to you, and you will hear a kind voice saying, “grab on!  I know a better way…a better way of life.” Now, it’s a nice, Christian thing to say that metaphorically Jesus extends the hand we can grab on to, practically that can be pretty tough to grasp, so to speak.  Luckily, thanks to the early disciples and all disciples that have come since – including all those sitting in this room right now – we don’t have only Jesus’ hand.  Jesus called the disciples to be fisher of people right alongside him.  We have many people who have already been extracted from the storms we have experienced and can show us the way.  We have people in solid boats around us who are ready to have us grab on and come into their boat. 

And those who have been through hard times and came out on the other side can help others in the midst of despair.  Those who have found ways to extract themselves from destructive systems we are still embedded in can help pull us out.  There are prophets, and friends, and churches.  All extending hands.  

For those of us who are drowning, we need to grab on and let these people pull us out.  For those of us who live, at least some of the time, in God’s realm, who have been pulled out, we need to extend our hands and call out to people, “quick, grab on, follow me.”  Together we can find new systems, life-giving community, and purpose for our lives, all because we are disciples of the one who came to show us the way.  Amen.

All Are Welcome

Galatians 4:4-7; Luke 2:22-40

January 1, 2011

I always find it a bit ironic when Paul’s letters are used by people in literal ways to impose a kind moral code on people, adherence to which determines your status as a Christian.  Paul fought his whole life to rid the church of exactly that way of thinking.  Though a man of his time and culture, though imperfect and quirky, Paul was at his core about inclusion and revealing a God of love and grace rather than law and judgment.  Galatians is one incredible example of this, and it would probably be good for all churches today to read and study Galatians on a regular basis.  The message it brings is powerful and compelling, calling on people of faith to end all divisions, real and imagined, that we might be one in Christ.

One of the central questions Paul is answering in this letter, our passage included, was whether or not the Gentiles could be included in the community of faith if they did not follow all of the commandments of the Torah.  The classic example of this was circumcision.  Were the Gentiles required to be circumcised before they could be a part of the covenant of Yahweh?  Paul emphatically argued that to require such a thing was antithetical to what he knew of God in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.

Because of this, Paul was often accused of “picking and choosing” from the scriptures what applies and what doesn’t.  In other words, he was neither a literalist nor fundamentalist when it came to interpreting and applying his scriptures.  The effect of this was not lost on the Gentiles.  They felt invited, welcomed by Paul into a life of faith…experiencing through his words and letters a God whose love transcended boundaries and rules.

In this sense, adoption was a wonderful metaphor for Paul to use when he talked about our relationship to God.  Adoption transcends traditional notions of love and what constitutes a family; this was especially true in Paul’s day.  Adoption was a radical notion for the Hebrew people – everyone thought of family in terms of blood relations.  In fact, biology was far more determinative of family than love was.  Among Jews, adoption was virtually unheard of because it had no practical value, and would undermine inheritance laws…it would confuse the system they depended on to understand their place in the world.

In the same way, they didn’t include those “outside” the Jewish family in the life of faith.  Circumcision was the sign of entrance into the community of faith, just as biology was the path of entrance into the family.  It was biology – physiology – that mattered, that defined your place in the world and status before God. 

Yet here Paul talks about God doing what was considered the unthinkable…adopting human beings!  People become a part of God’s family not through biology or physiology, not through rules and traditional definitions, but through the unmitigated love of God…a love that completely transcends such considerations as biology.

In other words, becoming a part of God’s family is not accomplished through following the legal code, or by being born Jewish…it is accomplished through love – a love we can see clearly in Jesus’ life.  Because Jesus was God’s child, and because Jesus is representative of all of humanity, we are God’s children.  Period.  As much as God loves Jesus – as much as God loves God’s self – God loves us, regardless of how religious we are, how closely we follow the religious rules.  Which of course means, God loves others as well – regardless of how religious they are.  All are welcome in God’s family.

We need to bring Paul into conversation with today’s religious folks – with us.  We need to recognize that Christianity (along with other religions, I’m sure) is capable of legalistic thinking and using the bible to justify such thinking.  We don’t talk about circumcision today in the Christian church, but we have our own versions of it:  Church attendance, pledging, reading the bible, professing Jesus as Lord and Savior, acting in acceptable ways.  None of these are bad – in fact, as people of faith who feel God’s love, we often feel compelled to attend church, pledge, read the bible, confess Jesus, and change destructive ways.  But sometimes, almost unwittingly, we turn these things into requirements instead faithful responses done joyously and in freedom.

We measure a person’s faith by whether or not they are in church.  We tell people they are not saved until they confess Jesus as Lord and Savior.  We say that if you are gay, or republican, or democrat, or if you doubt or question, or if you can’t articulate what you believe, then you are not a person of faith.  We may not say these things directly, but it’s what people often hear from the church.  Paul, by talking about God adopting all of humanity, was saying that our relationship to God does not depend on anything we do.  We are in a relationship with God because God chooses to be in relationship with us.

This makes complete sense to me:  I adopted Lydia, and that makes her my daughter – there is nothing she can do or not do to change that.  There is nothing about her status as my daughter that is dependent on her actions or beliefs or ethnicity or anything else in the world.  I didn’t adopt her because she is “good” or “moral” or “Christian” or anything else.  I adopted her because I wanted a child to love, no matter who that child was or what she was going to be. 

In the same way, God wants to be in relationship with all of humanity, and so we are adopted – all of us: Jews, Christians, Muslims, gay, straight, poor, rich, good, bad.  And nothing we do in this life or the next, will change the fact that we are God’s children…loved just as we love our children, biological or not.  God will draw people closer to the divine through love, just as my love draws Lydia closer to me, no matter what she does.  If I, or others, were to believe that because Lydia is not my biological child, she has to do something special to earn my love, that would be utterly offensive to us because of what we know and believe about relationship.

Now, it’s important to note that Paul certainly did not see the Gentiles as replacing the Jews as God’s favored people.  Not even a little bit.  In fact, such a thing would be unthinkable to Paul.  He was simply advocating that the religious folks of his day recognize that all are welcome in God’s family.  In fact, he saw a distinct role for the faithful Jews – he believed they were to be the ones who open their arms in welcome and show others what God’s love is like.  They were the ones who had known God all their life and could share that with others.

That’s why I love that this Galatians passage is coupled with the passage from the Gospel of Luke – which is an unabashed celebration of long-time faithful Jews.  These two people, Simeon and Anna, are life-long practitioners of the faith, which prepares them for this seminal moment.  They followed the laws, but were not bound by therm.  Their lives were shaped by traditional practices and rituals in such a way that the law did not confine them, rather it freed them – freed them to see God anew – freed them to see God in the present – freed them to see incredible possibilities for all people going forward. 

Simeon, a most faithful Jew who surely followed the law to the best of his ability, believed in the importance of the Torah, and performed all the rituals required of him, sees Jesus and in that moment sees how expansive God is.  Notice that he doesn’t say, “this child is the savior of our people, the one we have been waiting for, the redeemer of Israel.”  This very Jewish man, who has read the scriptures all his life, says that in Jesus he sees God’s salvation, which is “a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to the people of Israel.”  His faith led him to see that Gentiles were as much recipients of God’s goodness and grace as the Jews were.

We come to church each week, listen to the scriptures, take communion, sing praises to God.  And if in all that, all we come up with is a moral code that determines acceptance into our community of faith, then we are no Simeon or Anna.  All of these practices should only serve to expand our notion of what it means to be a part of God’s family.  All of these spiritual disciplines should serve to expand our picture and understanding of God so that when someone comes to our door we can recognize them as our brother or sister – without hesitation, without knowing anything about their behavior, religion, background, or what they have to offer us. 

Paul’s message about the Gentiles – his argument that they didn’t need to be circumcised in order to be a part of the community – is not that we are to shun our own faith tradition, abandon ritual, jettison everything we know that has brought us closer to God, any more than he was arguing the Jews should stop following the Torah, which – at its best – had connected them to God. 

We draw on those things to form us into people who can see and share the expansive nature of God with others, but they are not requirements necessary to make us children of God.  They are not requirements to impose on others.  These practices and rituals are what we have chosen because they do help us see and understand God.  They may or may not do that for others. 

The message for us is that we can choose to either require things of those who wish to bathe in God’s love, or dismantle the barriers at every turn.  We can choose to look at the life of Jesus and say to the world, “the God we know through this human life welcomes all into community and communion with the divine.”  We can choose to say, because of our faith formed through years of ritual and study, all are welcome in this place…whoever you are or wherever you are on your spiritual journey.  Amen.