“What Is Truth?” (John 18:28-40)

     The next time I stand in this pulpit, it’ll be the new year.  No . . . not that new year, but the new church year, the cosmic year of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Next Sunday is the first Sunday in Advent, when we’ll begin our tense anticipation of the Savior’s coming.  This Sunday is the last of the calendar – Christ the King Sunday – when we sum up Jesus’ life by declaring just who and what he is.  And the lectionary readings explore what it means to be king, to wield power, what it means for humans, and what it means for Christ.  In Samuel, we read the death-bed words of King David, where he admitted that when the spirit of the Lord spoke through him, it was not he who spoke, it was the Lord who spoke through him . . . and what God said was that David ruled in the fear of the Lord, wholly within God’s provenance and will.  And the Psalm appointed for today, Psalm 132, makes it clear that his dynasty is contingent as well, dependent upon the good graces of God.  “If your sons keep my covenant and my decrees that I shall teach them,” God says, “their sons also, forevermore, shall sit on your throne.”  The survival of David’s heirs on the throne is conditioned upon the grace and favor of God.

     Our Gospel reading looks at power as well, both political and theological, and what it means to say Jesus is King.  You will of course recognize it as part of the trial of Jesus by Pilate; many scholars think it’s John’s finest hour as a writer – it’s been studied in literature classes as a model example of dramatic irony.  John has structured the story into seven dramatic scenes, each one taking place on one of two “stages,” either inside Pilate’s headquarters, unclean for the religious authorities, or outside its doors, on the portico.  And the entire story revolves around Pilate moving back and forth between his governor’s headquarters – where Jesus is – and outside, where the religious authorities are, but – ironically – Jesus is not.  Talk about your shuttle diplomacy.

     But first there’s a prologue: the religious leaders – whom John calls “the Jews”  – take Jesus from the chief priest to Pilate’s Roman headquarters, but they themselves don’t enter it, to avoid ritual defilement.  The Passover’s the next day, and if they are ritually unclean, they can’t celebrate it, and so our drama begins with a picture of the religious leaders of the day, clearly bent on destroying Jesus, but unwilling to sully themselves by going into the unclean building.  So you can picture the scene: bearded and resplendent scribes milling around out on the front porch, muttering to one another in the early morning sun, up against stony, impassive columns, their shuffling presence versus silent Roman power . . .

     Scene One: They won’t go in, so Pilate comes out, standing on the porch . . . he surveys them for a few minutes, long enough to let them know who’s in control – and it’s not them, not these hick-country-bumpkin scribes and councilmen – and then he speaks: “What accusation do you bring against this man?”  But the religious authorities don’t really answer him, do they?  They just assure him that Jesus is a criminal, or else why would they have given him over to Pilate?  And note what this does . . . it asserts their authority – implicitly, at least – over and against the Roman overlord . . . it’s like “we’re the Sanhedrin . . . would we have handed you over to them if he wasn’t guilty?  We think not!”

     But Pilate’s having none of it – he’s not governor for nothing – and so he says “why don’t you judge him yourself?”  Why bother the Roman might and authority with your puny little problems?  And here’s where the truth is revealed: “We can’t put him to death,” they say, and by doing this, they reveal their agenda . . . they wanted Jesus dead, but they couldn’t – or wouldn’t  – do it themselves.  Just which one of those – couldn’t or wouldn’t – has been the cause of some debate.  Some think that the Sanhedrin wasn’t allowed to sentence criminals to death, but others think they were currying Roman favor . . . but for whatever reason, it caused Jesus to be executed in the Roman style – by crucifixion – rather than stoning.  And John tells us that this brings to fulfillment prophecies about the way he will die.

     And by interrupting the story with commentary, he’s making a statement right up front about the entire proceedings: all the machinations of the religious authorities, all the maneuvering about by Pilate, the cold-political power play, all are in the service of God’s agenda, not theirs . . .

     Scene two: Pilate goes back inside, where Jesus is, and right away asks him: “Are you the King of the Jews?”  And this serves immediately to show the intertwined political and religious agendas in Palestine, and that Pilate was well aware of the threat Jewish messianic hopes posed to the Roman government.  And so he asks him, straight out – “Are you the King of the Jews?”  And as always in John’s gospel, Jesus answers with another question; “Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?” Like “did you come here on your own, or did yo’ mama send you?”  It’s insulting, insinuating, and it points up once again that Pilate may not be as in control as he thinks . . . but Pilate’s reply shows his contempt of the Jewish people “I am not a Jew, am I?”  and he asks him again: what have you done?

     And once again, Jesus doesn’t answer directly, but goes straight to the heart of the matter . . . Pilate’s worried about some rabble-rouser stirring up the peasants, and Jesus tells him the truth: “my kingdom” – and here a better translation might be “kingship” or “reign” – “my rein’s not from this world . . . if it were from this world, then you’d have to worry, my followers would be fighting, there’d be bloodshed . . . but as it is, my kingship is not from here.”  And we’re immediately reminded by these familiar words of Jesus telling his disciples “I am from above . . . not of this world” And so we know his kingship, his rule, his power is from God above.

     But Pilate doesn’t know that, and he doesn’t understand – “So . . . does that mean you’re a king?”  He’s single-minded, only interested in one thing, whether Jesus is a threat to him and his rule or not.  And all this talk about this world and the other are like water over the bridge . . . “so lemme get this straight – are you a king or not?”  And Jesus in effect tells him: You’re the one worried about that . . .  you say that I’m a king . . . I was born for one thing, and that’s what I came into the world to do, to testify – in Greek, to martyr – to the truth. . . . and anyone who belongs to that truth, anyone who is of that truth, listens to my voice, understands what I am saying.

     And Pilate, in his arrogance, in his single-minded pragmatism, wouldn’t know truth if it bit him on the nose, and he doesn’t seem to care, either, and our scene ends with his cynical “What is truth?”  And he turns to go back outside, to the waiting religious authorities.

     And in scene 3, we see his ultimate mastery of the machines of political control and intrigue . . . “I find no case against him,” he says “But!  But . . . you have a custom, that I release someone at Passover – do you want your King?  Do you want me to release the King of the Jews?”  And here he shows his contempt for them, taunting them by calling Jesus their king.  But the religious authorities take the bait – and after all, it gets them what they want as well – they take the bait and choose to release Barabbas, and thus sentence Jesus to die.

     And in that moment, as Pilate is symbolically outside, separated from Jesus, he’s with the religious authorities spiritually as well as physically.  We can see the full irony in the whole situation, as he who scorns the country-bumpkin temple officials,  he who asks in contempt “What am I, a Jew?”  shows that the answer, symbolically at least, is yes.  He indeed is one of the religious authorities as far as the Kingdom of God, he is no different: he does not belong to the truth, does not listen to Jesus’ voice . . . just as he is outside of his own headquarters, he is outside the reign of God, which is from above, not from this world.

     And what is the heart of this difference?  What is the way in which the rule of God, the kingship of Jesus Christ differs from that of the world?  The key is in Pilate’s behavior, in his very pragmatic handling of the whole affair . . . the first question out of his mouth is “Are you the king of the Jews?”  By which he means “Are you a threat to Roman rule?  Will you lead a rebellion, an uprising of the Hebrew people against me?”  For Pilate, king is synonymous with violence, with sedition, with holding onto power by whatever means possible.  As governor of Judea, stand-in for Emperor Tiberius, he knows no other kind of king than what he represents . . . for him, kings scheme and maneuver, put down armed revolts with Imperial shock troops, and order the crucifixion of political prisoners . . . that’s why he concludes that there’s nothing to charge Jesus with.  It’s not out of the goodness of his heart, not the result of some religious conversion . . . Jesus says his reign is not from the world . . . if it were, his followers would be using violence to keep the religious authorities at bay . . . it’s when he hears that, that Pilate knows that Jesus is no threat.

     Pilate’s reign, his kingship, if you will, is based on menace, on violence, and it’s maintained by soldiers with bow and spear and sword, and the threat of Imperial invasion.  Jesus’ kingship, the Kingdom of God, is based on non-retaliation, on non-violence, on the command to Love the Lord your God and your neighbor as yourself.

     Pilate asked “What is truth?” and turned and walked outside, away from truth, away from the king who came to testify to that truth . . . and by that symbolic action, he showed he did not belong to that truth, and he joined the religious authorities, he joined the people who were willing to commit violence – to execute political prisoners, to go to war –  to maintain their power.  Like  Pilate, I think we all make the choice: do we belong to the truth?  Do we hear Jesus’ voice?  Do we serve the violent leaders of the world, who talk about what great Christians they are, what men and women of God, and then use violence to preserve their power?  Do we support them with our votes and political contributions?  Or do we really follow Jesus, the innocent lamb who refused to use violence even to save his own life?  We cannot follow both.

     This is Christ the King Sunday, and it behooves us to remember what that means . . . it’s not Christ the Mighty Warrior King Sunday, not Christ the Lawgiver and dispenser of punishment Sunday . . . neither is it Christ who-bombs innocents to protect the national interests Sunday, or Christ who lies and cheats to stay in power Sunday . . . on the contrary, it’s Christ the King under arrest and interrogation Sunday, Christ the innocent victim Sunday.  It’s Christ the King being held hostage Sunday and Christ the King soon to be beaten and crucified Sunday . . . that’s whose Sunday it is, folks, and that’s the king we follow.

          Anybody who tells you different, who tells you that Christ – who is God after all, who is love, after all – wants us to go use force and violence to preserve our stuff – or even our lives – isn’t talking about any Christ that I know . . . the Christ I know loved the world so much that he came to earth, emptied himself of power, and became a martyr for truth, so that we may be set free.  Amen.

“Apocalypse Now?” (Mark 13:1-8)

It seems like “apocalypse” is a subject of endless fascination for us humans: the is Greek in origin, and it means “revelation.”  Our biblical book of Revelation, which of course was written in Greek, was originally referred to as “The Apocalypse of John,” because (a)  it is of the literary genre of apocalypse and (b) it was written by somebody named John, imprisoned we think on the Greek island of Patmos, which is actually closer to modern-day Turkey than to mainland Greece. Apocalyptic literature, apocalypse as a genre, was very popular in the few centuries surrounding the birth of Christ, and the Bible contains some fine examples of it, most notably Revelation, but also a few chapters in the Book of Daniel and a chapter each—give or take a few verses—in Matthew, Mark and Luke, of which this morning’s lectionary reading is a part.

By classic definition, apocalyptic literature is written in extremis; that is, it’s written as a reaction to extreme conditions, or in anticipation of those conditions.  That is certainly true of Revelation: it was written, we think, as a reaction to all that went on in the second half of the first century after Christ, which included most notably the invasion of Jerusalem by the Romans and the destruction of the Temple, including its desecration, to use apocalyptic language, by the placing of the Emperor front and center instead of the Lord God almighty.  For Jews, the destruction of the Temple—it happened in 70 AD—was an event that was cataclysmic, far more so than would be the burning of a church for us.  The Temple was the center of religion for them, and equally important, the center of their culture and civilization.  God was literally thought to reside there; if the Temple wasn’t in Jerusalem, then neither was God.

 Of course, apocalyptic literature is written today, isn’t it?  Pam and Mike and I went to see the film Zombieland  when it first came out because, well, we like a good zombie flick, and it is set in the time after the zombie apocalypse, which will occur—behold!—because of our general environmental meddling and bad hygiene, which allows some kind of bacteria to get out of hand and turn a significant portion of the populace into, you know, zombies.  In at least a slightly higher literary vein, Cormac McCarthy’s novel The Road is set in the times after some unspecified conflagration, and follows the travels of a father and son across the blasted landscape.  It won the  Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, which I can assure you that Zombieland did not, even though it’s a lot more fun, and shows how apocalypse has come up in the estimation of human culture since the first century AD.

It also shows how the definition has shifted: it originally meant “revelation,” as in the revelation of a final cataclysmic battle between the forces of light and the forces of darkness, with the forces of light inevitably winning in the end, that will nevertheless end civilization as we know it.  Thus the naming of the literary genre.  Now, in our popular usage, it refers to the ultimate battle itself, or the ultimate conflagration, that ends our culture and technology and et cetera.

There’s another species of modern writing about things apocalyptic that most of us are familiar with; though it’s not apocalypse in a classic literary sense, it nevertheless trades on and profits from our fascination with all things apocalyptic every bit as much as Zombieland and The Road.  The most well-known example at present is the Left Behind series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins, which has 13 volumes in the original series and 3 or 4, now, in the prequel series, Before They Were Left Behind. But the apocalyptic craze of the latter half of the 20^th century all started with a guy named Hal Lindsey, who wrote a certain book that started the entire end-of-century popular Christian fascination with the end times.

Lindsey was educated theologically at Dallas Theological Seminary, after batting around as a tugboat captain, and went to work for what was then called Campus Crusade for Christ and is now simply Campus Crusade.  In 1970, he co-authored The Late Great Planet Earth with a ghost-writer who in later editions would receive author credit.  It was published by Zondervan Press, a Christian house associated with the Southern Baptists, and though a great many similar books had come before, the book’s breezy style and clear exposition of very complex ideas ensured it was a major hit amongst Christians.  Then, in 1973, it was picked up by Bantam, the first such book to be published by a secular publisher, and sales went through the roof.  When it was all said and done, The Late, Great Planet Earth had become the number one nonfiction bestseller of the 1970s, with over 9 million copies sold.  Its successor, The 1980s: Countdown to Armageddon spent 20 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, to the general consternation, no doubt, of the New York Times.

The Late, Great Planet Earth and its sequel attempt to come up with a coherent set of predictions about the end times from the complex, highly symbolic, and often contradictory apocalyptic literature in Daniel, Revelation and the gospels.  Using a literal interpretive lens, they assign players on the contemporary world stage—both nations and individuals—to roles within the book of Revelation.  For example, the Soviet Union was the bear, and guess who was the eagle?  Guess who were the good guys?  And although Lindsey wouldn’t let himself get pinned down to exact dates, his reading of the apocalyptic passages in scripture convinced him that the end was near, and that it would probably happen sometime during the 1980s.  And I don’t know if you noticed, but that didn’t happen, and so he set about revising his prophecies, sharpening them up to try to make them more accurate and—just incidentally, of course—sell more books.

What makes people go ga-ga over apocalypse?  I myself, as an impressionable youth, spent many an hour discussing Lindsey’s book, and I even went with a college group to hear him speak.  Why do we spend millions of dollars on the enterprise, along with expending a large chunk of our lives reading about and talking and fulminating about the end times?  I think part of it is a simple, innocent desire to know the future, to know that despite what it looks like in the present—and nobody would doubt the prevalence of wars and rumors of war in the last part of the last century—things will come out in the end, that good will win over the forces that beset us, that God will win in the end.

But there’s a darker side as well, and it’s shown in Lindsey’s activities since it became apparent that he was, uh, a little off in his predictions.  At present, he holds forth on Trinity Broadcast Network, at his own expense, still prophesying, pointing out signs he thinks might be significant, such as whether Israel signs some particular treaty or not, and railing against the forces of the anti-christ.  Forces such as liberals, and Barack Obama, for example.  Now you may or may not agree with them politically, but most of us would hardly call align them with the anti-Christ . . . but Lindsey does, and the dark side of apocalyptic literature, and our tendency to pore over it, is that there always is a dark side, and it tends to consist of whomever we don’t like.  The apocalypse is often an excuse to demonize our enemies.

The Left Behind series shows this clearly: in the latter books, where the end-war—which some call Armageddon—is fairly under way, the books depict Christ melting the faces off of unbelievers, of slaughtering them on a great white steed, millions of them.  When questioned by interviewers how they could reconcile this with a God who the Bible says is love, and with God’s Son who is called the Prince of Peace, they shrug their shoulders and say: “Hey, I didn’t write it, it’s in the Bible.” 

Perhaps this is why the Bible itself takes something of a dim view of expending a lot of time and effort trying to figure out when it will all end.  Paul tells the people of the church at Thessalonica, in his first letter to them, that regarding the end times—what he calls the “times and seasons”—they don’t need anything written to them, because they themselves “know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.” And he uses the Jewish-apocalyptic term “day of the Lord,” from which our concept of the Kingdom of God evolved.

Paul isn’t very keen on worrying too much about when the second coming is going to be; as he says, it’ll catch us unawares, it’ll come like a thief in the night . . . he just tells his congregation members to keep awake, by which he means “keep ready.”  You never know when it’s going to happen, you never know when it’s going to come.

In the so-called “little apocalypse” part of which we read today, Jesus says much the same thing.  First he predicts the destruction of Jerusalem—and he was right on the money about that—and the “desolating sacrilege”—i.e., the emperor, who sets himself as equal to God—which will come and occupy the temple, and then he says “Of course, you’ll see the signs like when the fig tree gives off its tender shoots you know that Summer is near.  And after those days”—after the destruction of Jerusalem, but note that he doesn’t say how long after—“after those days, people will see the coming of the Son of Man.”  Which, of course, is he himself.  But, he warns, “about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only God.”

So it’s not surprising that Hal Lindsey doesn’t know, or Tim LaHaye, not even the Son knows, Jesus says, not even he knows, only God. Sorry Charlie, but that’s the way it is.  And why should we waste precious time and money and talent pursuing something that we aren’t meant to know in the first place?  Why should Christians spend millions of dollars on books purporting to tell us something we aren’t going to know in the first place?  Why should we spend millions of hours running after something, millions of dollars and talent that we could spend doing what is important, like, oh, I don’t know, spreading the Gospel, feeding the hungry, and healing the sick?

But there’s one other thing I’d like to point out before we leave the subject . . . and that’s the whole thing about God being in the wholesale slaughter business.  Jesus talks about what the end-timers call the “tribulation,” at least a bit, and while some—including me—interpret that as mostly about the Roman invasion and destruction of Jerusalem, note that whatever it will be, God will not be responsible.  The God of love, the God who is equated with love, is not responsible.  “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom,” he says.  “They will hand you over to councils, you will be beaten,” but not once does he say that it is God who will do it.  Go on, read all of Chapter 13 after we’re done.

Unlike Jenkins and LaHaye and Lindsey, Jesus does not blame God for our propensity toward war and destruction, for our inclinations to kill those we disagree with, of slaughtering those who stand in the way of getting our way.  Now, as in the past, it’s convenient to blame God, to project our own deadly fantasies upon the God who is the exact opposite of death.  God is a God of forgiveness, a God of peace, and God’s son the Prince of Peace.  Though I don’t know how, and certainly don’t know when, of that I am assured:  In our God there is no revenge, no slaughter, no violent retribution.  Our God is Life, and we are the children of Life.  Amen.

“Scribes, Part II” (Mark 12:28-34)

Last week we saw Jesus describe some scribes, and he did it this way:  “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets! They devour widows' houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers.” Remember?  They sound like pretty unsavory characters, don’t they?  Devouring the domiciles of widow, grabbing the best seats in the house—maybe knocking over one of said widows in the process—and saying those exhausting prayer, that have everybody reaching for the caffeine, for one of those 5-hour Energy Drinks, just to keep awake for it.  And when Jesus gets to the end of that list, he passes judgment: “They will receive the greater condemnation.”

But his week we see a very different view of scribes, one scribe anyway, and notice that in the text, it’s the episode before the last weeks, and in fact, in the lectionary it would have come last week, but I switched it around so that we’d be reading the widow’s mite on consecration Sunday . . . and I kind of like it here, though,  It’s like we’re going from a generalization to a specific, as if we’re saying: “Yes, scribes can be slimy, but there are always exceptions  . . .”  Or to put it theologically, grace is for anyone, there is nobody who cannot be saved, no matter how hypocritical, no matter what kind of evil things they might have done, which is surely good news for all of us . . .

But it’s important to place today’s passage into a greater context:  Jesus is contending with some of the learned of Palestine, but not just any learned, he was contending with Pharisees, Herodians and Sadducess (oh, my!), three dominant parties within Judaism of the day.  They’re like Republicans and Democrats and, oh, maybe Libertarian, and they contend with one another—and with Jesus—over theology, over their vision of how we relate to God.  It’s also important to realize that what they were doing with Jesus wasn’t unusual, it was the way that Jews of the day disputed with one another, the way they sharpened their beliefs.

Not that it wasn’t dangerous for Jesus, you understand . . . if he gave the wrong answer, he could have been apprehended—the most famous example of this lot was the question about paying taxes: if he said it wasn’t right to pay taxes, he’d have been in trouble with the Roman contingent.  If he’d said that you must pay taxes, it wouldn’t have set well with another contingent, who believed that it was an act of sacrilege to pay taxes to the Roman overlords.  And so when he gets out if it with a cunning answer—asking them (a) to produce a denarius and (b) tell him whose face is on it—the answer he gives in reply impresses the dickens out of the scribe . . .

And he sees that Jesus answered well, and he asks him an important question – Which commandment is first, which commandment is greatest of them all?  And by answer, Jesus recites the Shema, that we read a few minutes ago in Deuteronomy 6 . . . “Hear O Israel: The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.  You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength . . .” and with this answer, Jesus shows that he’s square in the middle of Jewish tradition, because of course this is the command, the one that is nailed in the doorways of the home of every observant Jew.  They take literally the command to write it on their doorposts.  By naming the Shema, Jesus shows that it’s not the God of the Assyrians or the Sumerians or Egyptians you’re supposed to love, it’s not just any old God, but a very specific God, the one God, the God of Abraham, whose name they know, who brought them up out of the land of Egypt, and out of exile in the land of Babylon . . .  And they’re to love this God, this one God, with all of their heart and soul and strength – and Jesus adds mind to the command in Deuteronomy.  With our whole kit and kaboodle, they – and we – are supposed to love this God, this God who is one, this God who stands alone.

And even though the scribe asks only for one, Jesus adds a second instruction: “‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”  And here’s where we modern Christians need to be a little careful . . . we like to think that the love command is unique to Christians, that what somehow separates the Old Testament from the new is this emphasis on love . . . but “love your neighbor as yourself” is straight from the Old Testament – Leviticus, as a matter of fact.  But what’s interesting is how Jesus links the two . . . love the Lord your God . . . love your neighbor as yourself.  One and two, as if they are intertwined . . . as if one rolls from the other, like an ever-flowing stream.  Is love of neighbor possible without the love of God?  Is love of God probable, is it there without the love of neighbor?

One day, it’s been a decade or so now, a friend called and told me that she had found a new spiritual path . . . she’d been through some major stuff, some major heartache and pain, over the years before that.  We used to go to the same Presbyterian church in Mississippi, but after her life blew up, she hadn’t gone back there much . . .  it’s not that the pastor wasn’t compassionate, she was, it’s not that the congregation’s wasn’t caring, they were.  But whatever Rachael needed, she’s didn’t get it there.

She told me about her new spiritual direction, guided by some of the thinking of Christian Science, afraid that I’d disapprove, but I was  thinking that this poor woman had gone through so much that whatever kind of peace she could find was all right by me, and she described it as based on love, radically loving one another . . . that the path to spiritual maturity lay in loving everyone . . . and I thought “that’s not so bad”  but as I listened I realized that she wasn’t saying much about the other side of the equation that Jesus offered.  She wasn’t saying much about the “Love the Lord your God” part.  She did mention coming into greater communion with God, and that the end of the spiritual pathway is a mystical union with God, the kind of ideas that have been present in Christian spirituality for millennia, but she didn’t say much about loving God . . .  and any spiritual director will tell you that cultivating a love of God is one of the major goals, if not the goal, of a spiritual life . . . prayer, even intercessory prayer, is not so much to get God to do something, but to get us to a more mature, loving relationship with the Divine.  And from that love, a love of self and neighbor will naturally bloom . . .

So then are we to wait for some future-level of love for God before we can start loving our neighbor?  Should we say to our neighbors “Sorry, I just don’t love God enough yet, come back later?”  As Paul would say, of course not!  Love is a verb, not just a feeling, it’s an action . . . we are commanded to love, and love by doing . . . Jesus lists the commands in order, he doesn’t predicate one on the other . . . we’re supposed to do ‘em both.  To paraphrase James, love without works is dead . . . warm and fuzzy feelings and fifty cents will get your neighbor a cup of coffee . . . love is housing the homeless, love is healing the lame, love is setting-free the captives, bringing good news to the poor.

      And I think that in our story, the scribe – that embodiment of status quo religion – gets it!  You’re right, he says – and he calls Jesus Teacher, just like the rich young man, and just like James and John, a title of respect – Teacher, he says, you’re right: you’ve said a mouthful: ‘God is one, and beside him is no other’ and you should love this God with all that you are, all your heart and understanding and strength . . . and to love your neighbor as yourself”. . . and then he makes an intuitive leap, he says more than Jesus did: “this is much more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”  And for a scribe – an authority on the Jewish religion – to say this is remarkable, and just as he saw that Jesus answered well, Jesus can sees that he answers wisely . . . this is much more important, the scribe says, than our entire religious program – built as it was on sacrifice – and in response, Jesus says: “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

      The whole contraption of Hebrew religion, its whole apparatus built upon burnt offerings and sacrifice . . . they were in the shadow of Temple mount, where grates in the rock channeled the blood of slaughter off the mountain, where the greasy smoke of sacrifice stained the air, and for this scribe, this Temple officer, it must have been a bombshell, a revelation, and for him – and Mark’s readers – it’s like he’s saying that loving God and your neighbor is greater than religion itself . . . and Jesus just smiles, ‘cause he sees that the man speaks wisely, that he understands it:  “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”  And it was so outrageous – yet so indisputably true – that all the other scribes and Pharisees around him were dumbstruck, no one dared ask him anything else.

I read recently that “Religion is for people trying to stay out of hell; spirituality is for those who’ve been there.”  And our friend Rachael has been there and back, and she’s seeking a measure of depth and a meaning for her life . . . and she’s not seeking it in the church . . . our version of sacrifices and burnt offerings, our church-night suppers and Sunday-morning hymn sings and preaching don’t seem to be cutting it for her . . . and the question is “why not?”  why aren’t damaged people coming to us to be healed?  I know, I know . . . some are.  But many more are going in the direction of pop spirituality, of popular forms of Buddhism or Taoism or stuff like that . . . why aren’t the mainline churches attracting the damaged people, or just those hungry for spiritual direction?  Could it be that we’re not – and here I’m talking about the church as a whole – could it be that we’re not satisfying Jesus’ love equation, that we’re not providing the tools to grow spiritually, to love God with all our hearts and mind and strength?  By the same token, could it be that we’re not exhibiting the love for one another – much less our neighbors – that Jesus would have us do?  Rachael was a member of the community, a Christian in the fold, and yet she’s no longer going to any church.

      You hear it all the time, from people who used to go to church but do so no longer . . . people who’ve been hurt by an unloving glance, by an unkind remark . . . they call it hypocrisy, they say we talk a lot about love, that love is the mark and measure of our faith . . . and yet we show precious little of it inside the walls.  Oh, we’ve got a lot of rules – we don’t do this, or we do that but not this other, or you’ve gotta do this before you’re really a Christian – and we’ve got a lot of ritual – stand up, sit down and say these words.  But as the scribe knew, love is greater than all of it, greater than all the sacrifice and Sunday School, all the bible study and pot luck offerings, greater than glorious worship and even the worship committee is love.

      You say “But Pastor . . . it’s only natural that in here we’re just like we are out there, and that our there, we’re like everybody else . . . we can’t help ourselves, we’re only human, it’s too hard.  We’re on the road to God, but we’re not there quite yet,” and I say hallelujah!  that’s it exactly . . . we’re on the road . . . with Jesus, on the road with God . . . that’s the miracle of grace, the Good News for modern man.  We can’t do it ourselves, but we don’t have to.  That’s the beauty of it, the grace of it: for God so loved the world, that God gave us God’s only Son, who sent us the Holy Spirit, who will be with us, and teach us how to pray, teach us how to draw closer to God and love God – and our neighbors – as ourselves.  Through prayer and study – both of which the Spirit bestows on us, if we ask – through prayer and study, we grow closer to God, and closer to what we were created to be – loving members of Christ’s body on earth.  Amen.

“Mighty Mite” (Mark 12:38-44)

The story of the Widow’s Mite is one of the most well-known in the New Testament, and it gets drug out about this time every year for stewardship season.  It’s so iconic that the Lectionary obligingly places it at about the time churches are working up their budget.  The word “mite” comes from the King James Version, there were no coins called that in Jesus’ day, but there was a “mite” in 16th Century England.   The Greek word that is rendered in  our translation as “small coins” is lepton, which means small in Greek . . . they were minted in vast numbers by one Alexander Jannaeus, King of Judea from 103 until 76 B.C.E.  There were so many of them made that they abound even today, and you can pick up a couple of widow’s lepta on the internet for $20 or so.

You can even find fine widow’s-lepta jewelry, a fact in which I find a certain irony, because the widow of this tale certainly couldn’t afford such a thing . . . she was poor as a church mouse.  If two lepta were all she had to eat on, she must not have eaten hardly at all . . . together, the two were worth about the same as a quadrans, the smallest denomination of Roman coin, which I guess is why the our translation says they’re worth a penny.  Almost all the paintings of the story—like this one—show her with a child, but it’s not in the text, either here in Mark or over in Luke.  I guess it’s to increase the pathos of the scene, as in “look, she’s got a child, for gosh sake . . . are those rich folks heartless or what?”

Actually, pathos is probably the least of what Jesus is going for here.  Widows—along with orphans—are stand-ins for the poorest of the poor in first century Palestine.  Whenever Jesus—or another storyteller—says “widow” or “widows and orphans” we’re meant to think of a whole class of people, a whole substrate—the people whose backbreaking labor supported the few at the top, the few like the scribes, the story of whom our lectionary (rightly) includes in the passage.  They like to wear long robes—a symbol of wealth and piety—and walk walk around the marketplace and be greeted with respect . . . I can see them now, the most learned men in Judaism, cruising through the stalls like ships of state, giving the queen’s wave . . . Jesus says to beware of these folks, don’t get tangled up with them . . . they go to church on Sundays, and sit at the best pews, and say wonderful, sonorous prayers—almighty Creator, we come to thee humble and full of wonder, and thank you for all with which you have blessed us—and then on Monday they go to work and foreclose on that single mom, or pick up a piece of  “distressed property” from an out-of-work dot-commer, or cut another couple thousand jobs ‘cause profits are down—got a fiscal responsibility to the stockholders, you know  . . . and the widow is an icon, a placeholder, an avatar for the poor of the time.

And Jesus said beware of them, because they will gut you like a fish, they are only concerned with themselves . . . they will callously discard you, foreclose on your house at the drop of a hat . . . but I wonder if that’s the only reason . . . could Jesus mean that we’re to beware of people like that because if we get tangled up with them, if we do business with them, we’ll become like them?  There seems to be something of that sense about it, else why would he tell us what fate awaits them?  Why tell us that they will receive a greater condemnation if he’s not warning us not to be like them?

The scribes are engaged in the time-honored practice of compartmentalizing their religion and their secular life, separating them out so that they do not conflict.  It’s convenient that way: their beliefs don’t have to infect how they live their day to day lives.  Even though Jesus is very clear about what awaits those who deal harshly with the poor—we can only imagine what “the greater condemnation” entails—we Christians, just like the scribes, are very good at not letting that sort of thinking get in the way of making money.

Well.  Just as the scribes can be considered an object lesson for a certain type of behavior—beware!—so can the widow, because conveniently, here comes one, one of the very embodiments of the poor and exploited . . . and has this widow had her house devoured lately?  Has she been swindled out of it, or just couldn’t pay the mortgage?  Whatever has happened to her, we know she doesn’t have a lot, cause as we saw, those two lepta aren’t worth much.  And while Jesus and the disciples watch, rich folks come along and put a lot of money into the pot, doubtless after looking around to make sure the right people are observing them, but the widow puts in those two lepta, worth together a Roman cent, the last penny she has.

Who do you identify with in this story?  If you say “the widow, of course” I say “Not so fast” . . . I know who I identify with, and I squirm when I think of it.  As you can see, I haven’t missed many meals, and my family’s always had some kind of health insurance.  I can go out and buy triple-mocha decaf lattés, if I want, and see a movie if I want, and I can even buy a book or a DVD once in a while.  I know on what side of the equation I belong, and it isn’t with the down-trodden.  But to be fair, if I can’t identify with the widows and orphans, I can’t identify exactly with the scribes.  I mean, I haven’t devoured any widows’ lately, I haven’t foreclosed on any single mom's houses . . . I give to charities, volunteer my time for those less fortunate . . . and that’s probably where a lot of us are, we’re not bad people, in fact we’re good people, especially by our society’s standards . . . so if we’re not widows and orphans, and we’re not really those hungry scribes, who are we in this passage?  Well . . . we’re us, that’s who we are, we are ourselves . . . and there really was no counterpart for us in those days, there was no middle class . . . we have disposable income and leisure time, but most of us are hardly rich . . . but we do support the rich, don’t we?  We buy their products, we shop for bargains, we drive the great, consumer engine that produces the Ken Lays and Bill Gateses . . . we are the consumers, and we have the power to change things, if we would . . .

Jesus calls over the disciples – he doesn’t say this to the crowds – he calls them over, and the disciples know that this is a teaching, because he begins with the words “Truly I say unto you” and the Teaching goes “this poor widow has given more than all those contributing to the temple, for they all contributed out of their abundance” – and other translations here call it surplus or money they could spare – “but she had put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”  In other words, the rich put in from their disposable income, from money they could spare – and remember, only they had it – while the widow gave all she had to live on.

Whoa!  All she could live on!  What is that supposed to mean?  Surely not what it says, not the plain sense of it, surely not that we're supposed to give all we have . . . Ah think ah’m gonna be faint . . . but that's what Jesus says, and we could mince words, we could parse it and claim that Jesus didn't actually say that everyone had to give everything that they owned, only that because she did, her gift was more important, we could try to interpret it away, but the essence of the teaching remains the same: the widow was being more faithful by giving two measly pennies, because they were all she had, than the rich who gave huge sums.

The psalmist writes: the earth is the Lord's, and all that is in it . . . Paul speaks of our lives – of our lives – being bought for a price, which is the life and death of Jesus Christ . . . this widow's giving shows that she knew this fundamental reality beneath all of stewardship: everything we have, all our money, our houses, even ourselves – is not our own, it belongs to God.  Sorry, folks, but it's true . . .  all the money we'll ever earn, all our stuff, everything, is the Lord's.

The rich, who gave only from what they could spare, their disposable income, held themselves up against God, they balanced their own selves, their own needs with God's.  And holding your needs, your money – indeed yourself – up in balance with God is idolatry, plain and simple, and God doesn't like an idolater.

We might say that this notion that all belongs to God is the first principle of stewardship, and the second is this: who’s on first? The answer of the rich, who gave only from what they could spare, was clear: they came first, not God.  They held themselves in higher regard than the Almighty.  The widow showed – by very drastic action, designed to drive the point home – that (1) everything belongs to God and (2) with her, God came first.  In the Old Testament, where the notion is first seen, a tithe is to be the first fruits of the labor of the people of God, in other words, the stuff off the top.  Whenever they got the harvest, or money from selling, their goods, they gave first to God, and they gave the most choice, un-blemished goods, the before-any-other-tax-or-expenditure cream off the top.  Then they fed themselves.

      And that is the idea historically behind a Christian tithe as well . . . it's a before-tax, before anything else offering to God . . . And we like to think of it as a gift, as if we're being generous, as if it entitles us to be first in line, or have a greater say in how things are run in the church, but it's really not.  After all, how can we gift God with something – our time, our money or our selves – that belongs to God in the first place?  That’s a principle the widow knew all too well.

And there you have it: the story of the Widow’s Lepta, the Widow’s mite.  And I would not presume to tell you all how much to give, that would be a kind of judgment, and that of course is up to God.  But it’s important to give something, ‘cause we’re all adults here: we all know that it costs money to run the church, and that those costs go up every year.  So prayerfully consider how much God is leading you to give, and drop your pledge into the basket this Consecration Sunday, or fill out the form online.  Amen.