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Proper 6

Matthew 10

40"Anyone who welcomes you is welcoming me, and anyone who welcomes me is welcoming the Father who sent me. 41If you welcome a prophet as one who speaks for God,£ you will receive the same reward a prophet gets. And if you welcome good and godly people because of their godliness, you will be given a reward like theirs. 42And if you give even a cup of cold water to one of the least of my followers, you will surely be rewarded."

Genesis 22

9When they arrived at the place where God had told Abraham to go, he built an altar and placed the wood on it. Then he tied Isaac up and laid him on the altar over the wood. 10And Abraham took the knife and lifted it up to kill his son as a sacrifice to the Lord. 11At that moment the angel of the Lord shouted to him from heaven, "Abraham! Abraham!"

"Yes," he answered. "I’m listening."

12"Lay down the knife," the angel said. "Do not hurt the boy in any way, for now I know that you truly fear God. You have not withheld even your beloved son from me."



"It is better to give than receive." Jesus: quoted by Paul in Acts 20.35

"The Lord loves a happy giver." 2 Corinthians 9.7

"For it is in giving that we receive." St. Francis of Assisi

"If you give, you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full measure, pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, and running over." Luke 6.38

"It is more blessed to give than receive; for example, wedding presents." H. L. Mencken

"Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys." P. J. O'Rourke

Google "giving" and you will surely receive plenty. I tuned to Google to discover the source of the first quote ("It is better to give than receive") only to find–to my horror–that these were Jesus' words. I say "to my horror" because I should have known the source of such a saying. I thought I had an out when I realized that it was an indirect quote (Paul quoting someone quoting Jesus) but that would be a pathetic excuse considering the quote from Luke 6 that says essentially the same thing: "If you give, you will receive."

All of this, of course, is to link to the Gospel lesson for today. In three short verses Jesus concludes his discourse on the practice of discipleship with a bit of a summary:

40"Anyone who welcomes you is welcoming me, and anyone who welcomes me is welcoming the Father who sent me. 41If you welcome a prophet as one who speaks for God,£ you will receive the same reward a prophet gets. And if you welcome good and godly people because of their godliness, you will be given a reward like theirs. 42And if you give even a cup of cold water to one of the least of my followers, you will surely be rewarded."

"If you give even a cup of cold water to one of the least of my followers, you will surely be rewarded." You would be amazed how thoroughly this quote finds itself in commentaries and literature around giving. This seems to happen for a couple of reasons: first, it functions as a shorter and more accessible summary of Matthew 25 (the sheep and goats passage) that ends "if you did this for the least of my brothers and sisters, you did it also for me." Second, it is visual, and resonates with a deep human longing for clean water.

On the second point, it is interesting to note some changes that have happened in the world of fundraising. The art-based biblical resource I use, "Imaging the Word" presents an all-too familiar picture to go with this passage: an aid worker, a young Caucasian woman, is holding a sickly looking Black child and helping him drink from a cup. At first glance this seems perfectly appropriate. As a matter of fact, many aid groups still present photos or video of starving African children as a key motivator for giving.

What we have come to realise, however, is that these images do more than motivate us to give, they reinforce a set of assumptions that we tend to carry around with us. In this case that little Black children are desperately poor and in need, and that white people from the north will step in and help. This picture has one other difficult flaw: the gloves. It is hard to imagine that assisting a child with a cup of water poses a health risk to the young woman, but it does reinforce the separation that exists between the two.

Yet another troublesome thing about the picture and the resource is how quickly we move to a place where we are the givers and it is others who receive. It is both our "comfort zone" and the way we most often face this question of giving and receiving. Our role, as people of privilege, and as people who want to appear and be regarded as successful, is to give. We give because we have. We give because we can. It is better to give than receive (we are told) and we have internalized this massage when you are the giver, you keep all the power.

This was not, of course, what Jesus was on about when he said it is better to give than receive. He has trying to create a new mindset, a new approach that runs counter to the desire to receive, acquire, possess, and cling to the things of this world. It was also a call to service, reminding the disciples that the spiritual journey they were on was not for them and their personal fulfillment, but rather for the sake "of the least of these." They were to give without thought of reward, a message that we have adopted and cling to for both practical and psychological reasons: practical because we need lots of givers and psychological because of that aforementioned need to be the giver rather than the givee. Again, givers have more power.

***

Abba James of the Desert: "It is better to receive hospitality that to offer it."

I don't think this is permission to be inhospitable. "Go away," you will say, "because Michael found this great quote that says it's better to receive hospitality that to offer it." Sometimes it pays to listen in church. Lets leave Abba James for a moment, listening to another voice as we try to discover why it may be better to receive that to give.

Henri Nouwen: "A lot of giving and receiving has a violent quality, because the givers and receivers act more out of need than out of trust. What looks like generosity is actually manipulation, and what looks like love is really a cry for affection or support."

Clearly giving is a dangerous game. There are issues of power and deep-seated need: there is the risk that we are trying to manipulate an outcome or fill some void because we want to imagine ourselves as a particular type of person. We may be giving in the hope that we will receive in return, a desire that will often go unfilled. A couple of other famous philosophers:

I'll give you all I've got to give

If you say you love me too

I may not have a lot to give

but what I've got I'll give to you

For I don't care too much for money

For money can't buy me love
Back to Henri Nouwen, he insists that it is only possible to give yourself to others without expecting anything in return when you have been "fully received." He says that it is "only when you know yourself as unconditionally loved–that is, fully received by God– can you give gratuitously. He goes further:

Giving without wanting anything in return is trusting that all your needs will be provided for by the One who loves you unconditionally. It is trusting that you do not need to protect your own security but can give yourself completely to the service of others. (p. 65)

It is better to receive than to give if in receiving we learn the true value of all the God-given gifts that surround us. It is better to receive than to give if it allows us to give up the desire to seek approval or earn affection through the giving of gifts. It is better to receive than to give if it fills our hearts with a sense of the Ultimate Giver of all that is.

***

I don't want the story of the sacrifice of Isaac to pass unrecognized. If I did sermon titles, I would call this one "The Sacrifice of Isaac's Pink Hair" and see if he gets the hint. That's not true son, I like your pink hair. Even a colourblind man can see and enjoy your pink hair.

The most common sermon preached on the "sacrifice of Isaac" (which is really a near-sacrifice), also sometimes called "the binding of Isaac," is a sermon about obedience to God. God said to Abraham "prove your stuff by giving up that which is most precious to you" and sure enough he was willing to do it.

In perhaps the most dramatic moment on scripture, the knife is raised high in the air, the reader begins to wince, and a voice says, "stop." The angel then says "Lay down the knife...do not hurt the boy in any way, for now I know that you truly fear God. You have not withheld even your beloved son from me."

Preachers can preach the "radical obedience" sermon because God didn't really want the sacrifice, they would say, because he stopped at the very last moment. The dramatic scene with the ram caught in the thicket is a handy substitute and the practice of human sacrifice came to a tidy conclusion.

Comforting, but not true. Read the last half of Judges 11, the story of the sacrifice of the little girl Mizpah, and you will see that the practice continued. Did God want this to happen? Was the little girl's father victorious in battle because he was willing to make such a sacrifice? It can't be. This would not be a God that I could love and serve. But scripture poses all sorts of challenges to us, and we read and try to understand.

The connection between Part A and Part B is Abraham's willingness to give, and how troubling this truly is. By the time he and Isaac set out on this trip, Abraham had received God's blessing on six separate occasions. Surely this was enough for Abraham to feel confident that all the promises would come true. Surely he could have said "wait a minute God, why this test, when you have already promised me as many offspring as sand on a beach." Perhaps God's response may have been "fair enough, Abraham. I wasn't really going to make you go through with it anyway." Abraham continued to try to earn and earn and earn when this may have been the moment when he needed to resist. Of course, many scholars argue that Abraham had no intention of going through with it, and that the clues are in the dialogue with the servants and his son.

***

Set aside the cup of water–important as it is–and imagine that the most important message that we need to hear is this:

"Anyone who welcomes you is welcoming me, and anyone who welcomes me is welcoming the Father who sent me."

When we are received, when we accept the gracious gifts of others, we are the Christ. When we are received, and when we accept the gracious gifts of others, we are received as completely filled with the God that deserves our recognition and praise. We bring God to others as we allow them to serve us and extend the gift of hospitality to us. In this way, it is better to receive hospitality that to offer it. We become divine messengers, tangible reminders that God in Jesus Christ is present in our world and walking our path still and yet, still and yet. Amen.

posted by michael jacob kooiman @ 4:02 PM 0 comments

Fourth Sunday after Pentecost

Cliffcrest United Church – 19 June 2005 – Michael Kooiman

Matthew 10

³⁴“Don’t imagine that I came to bring peace to the earth! No, I came to bring a sword. ³⁵I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. ³⁶Your enemies will be right in your own household! ³⁷If you love your father or mother more than you love me, you are not worthy of being mine; or if you love your son or daughter more than me, you are not worthy of being mine. ³⁸If you refuse to take up your cross and follow me, you are not worthy of being mine. ³⁹If you cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give it up for me, you will find it.

Romans 6

¹Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more kindness and forgiveness? ²Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it? ³Or have you forgotten that when we became Christians and were baptized to become one with Christ Jesus, we died with him? ⁴For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives.

⁵Since we have been united with him in his death, we will also be raised as he was. ⁶Our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. ⁷For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin. ⁸And since we died with Christ, we know we will also share his new life. ⁹We are sure of this because Christ rose from the dead, and he will never die again. Death no longer has any power over him. ¹⁰He died once to defeat sin, and now he lives for the glory of God. ¹¹So you should consider yourselves dead to sin and able to live for the glory of God through Christ Jesus.

When did parents begin to surrender all their power?  Listen in with me on the kinds of statements the contemporary parent will make:

Don't you think it's time to go to bed, honey?

You tell mommy what you want to eat instead.

Do you think that was a nice thing to say to your little friend?

You tell me what you think is an appropriate curfew.

It makes me feel sad when you use those kinds of words.

Come on, parents, wake up!  Kids need structure and limits, clear guidelines that they can internalise and draw on later.  And so, bed time is 7.30, you eat what is put in front of you, be nice to the other kids, curfew is 11, and no, I'm not sad at the use of those kind of words, I'm actually a little mad.  

All the educators in the room are cringing.  Perhaps I overstate.  There is, in fact, a balance to be found between the authoritarian ways of my parents and the "empowering" style of parenting that has emerged in recent years.  It is important to build a child's sense of self by allowing them to make decisions and have a say in what happens to them.  A child that is in the practice of making good decisions while a parent is with them is more likely to make good decisions when a parent is absent.  

Yet the power struggle between parent and child remains.  Even as we seek to find that balance between "telling them" and "helping them find out" there will emerge the clever child who seems to see through the whole enterprise and pose a challenge for the most conscientious of parents.  When my daughter was 6 or 7 (Hazel is now 21) she would misbehave and face a serious talk.  Just before her mother or I would begin to review whatever occurred she would break in and say, "don't tell me what I did wrong because you will make me feel badly about myself."  How do you discipline a child who continually outsmarts you?

***

³⁴“Don’t imagine that I came to bring peace to the earth! No, I came to bring a sword. ³⁵I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. ³⁶Your enemies will be right in your own household! ³⁷If you love your father or mother more than you love me, you are not worthy of being mine; or if you love your son or daughter more than me, you are not worthy of being mine.

Jesus had a unique take on the concept of family.  It is tension that we most frequently ignore, given that we most often imagine that faith and the importance of family go hand in hand.  We seem to pile up all the things that are good and important try to make them live together under the same room.  It seems like a really odd choice of scripture for Father's Day ("If you love your father or mother more than you love me, you are not worthy of being mine") but we follow a cycle of readings, so you could say that rather than choosing the text for today, the text chose us.

Jesus says a number of things about family, most of which remain jarring to the ear.  

"Jesus," they said, "Your mother and your brothers and sisters are outside, asking for you.”

Jesus replied, “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?”  Then he looked at those around him and said, “These are my mother and brothers. Anyone who does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.” (Mark 3.31ff)

As Jesus was speaking, a woman in the crowd called out, “God bless your mother—the womb from which you came, and the breasts that nursed you!”  He replied, “But even more blessed are all who hear the word of God and put it into practice.”(Luke 11.27ff)

Aside from making Jesus the master of the quick come-back, these passages underling the extent to which Jesus was calling his followers to a new way of being--a revolution--where the traditional ways of understanding the world were turned upside-down.  

The usual interpretation of Matthew 10 is that some within the family will accept Jesus and others will not, and therefore there will be interfamily conflict.  Dom Crossan suggests we look deeper.  Rather than see this as a "me versus family" picture, we need to reread the passage and find the point of division: "I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law."  

Crossan finds the lines of conflict between the generations.  It is not one member against others, but rather a conflict that undermines the traditional lines of power that existed between the first generation and the subsequent ones.  Jesus underlines this for us when he places the reader in the middle of this new struggle: "If you love your father or mother more than you love me, you are not worthy of being mine; or if you love your son or daughter more than me, you are not worthy of being mine."

In a world where power was vested in the leader of the clan, and lines of accountability and responsibility were clearly defined, Jesus entered with a new vision, one based on the principles of the Kingdom. "Forget family," he said, " even more blessed are all who hear the word of God and put it into practice."  His real family?  "Anyone who does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother."

***

Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it? ³Or have you forgotten that when we became Christians and were baptized to become one with Christ Jesus, we died with him? ⁴For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives.

  

We seem to regard baptism as a significant family occasion, spurred on, no doubt by the fact that we baptise mostly babies.  We gather around the font to bless and pray, and recognise the new life that has entered our lives.  This is all good and true.  What we lose when we imagine baptism as a family-oriented ritual is the power of the personal revolution that is happening.  A baptism sermon about death and babies is seldom welcome, and so we shift the focus to "christening" rather than baptism.  

If there were infant baptisms in antiquity, they were few in number.  Most baptised were adult believers, converted and immersed in the Christian life.  Baptism was something you accepted, much in the way you accepted Jesus into the fabric of your life.  Baptism meant dying to former ways of being, and rising to new ways of life with the risen Christ.  

In order to understand this more completely, it may be helpful to turn to someone that found Jesus in later life and understood the nature of making a new choice: C. S. Lewis

The Christian way is different: harder and easier.  Christ says, "Give me All.  I don't want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want you.  I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it.  No half-measures are any good.  I don't want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down.  Hand over the whole natural self, all the desire which you think are innocent as well as the ones you think wicked--the whole outfit.  I will give you a new self instead.  In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours. (Devotional Classics, p. 8)

This, of course, brings us back to family.  The shift from the power structure of clan to the radical equality of the Kingdom brings the whole tree down.  There are no half measures as we are called to leave behind family and become part of the clan that lives primarily to do God's will: to hear the word of God and put it into practice.  In many ways it gives greater meaning to the calling of the disciples, leaving family and job behind to follow Jesus.  

But there is more.  We are called to enter Christ.  We remember that this a revolution and not just switching from a family-family to a band of disciples-family.  We are to be one with Christ, buried with him, raised with him, and members of his body.  The only power we have is the power of knowing Christ, the power of proclaiming his life and his death and his resurrection.  We don't need or want the power of the clan or the group, but rather we want the power of God found in Jesus.

I want to conclude with a poem by an 11th century theologian name Symeon:

Then open your hear to him

And let yourself receive the one

who is opening to you so deeply.

For if we genuinely love him,

we wake up inside Christ's body.

where all our body, all over,

every most hidden part of it,

is realized in joy as him,

and he makes us, utterly, real,

and everything that is hurt, harsh, shameful,

maimed, ugly, irreparably damaged,

is in him transformed

and recognized as whole, as lovely,

and radiant in his light.

posted by michael jacob kooiman @ 3:04 AM 0 comments