Proper 17
Mark 7
14 Then he called the crowd again and said to them, ‘Listen to me, all of you, and understand: 15there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.’*
17 When he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about the parable. 18He said to them, ‘Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, 19since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?’ (Thus he declared all foods clean.) 20And he said, ‘It is what comes out of a person that defiles. 21For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, 22adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. 23All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.’
I’m not sure what has happened to children’s books. When I was a wee lad, not more that four, my favourite books included anything by the good doctor: “Hop on Pop” or a book with the wonderfully descriptive title “One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish.” I was also a big fan of P.d. Eastman’s “Go Dogs Go,” which involves various types of dogs driving quickly punctuated by a rather vain dog repeatedly asking “Do you like my hat?” To this day, when stuck in traffic, I will mutter “Go Dogs Go.”
A quick browse through the children’s section of Indigo reveals that disturbing changes have happened in the world of those three or four. Move over “One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish” because young readers are reading Taro Gomi’s bestseller book “Everyone Poops.” This seems like an unlikely trend, but there’s Wayne Lynch’s award-winning book “The Scoop on Poop” and Susan Goodman’s best-selling book “The Truth about Poop.” I hate to say it, but poop is hot now. Who knew?
It seems that the range of things deemed suitable for publication has expanded in recent years. While we were locked in a world of coloured fish and dogs in cars, the world changed. It may simply be that some enterprising author spent a few hours with a three-year-old and discovered what they are truly interested in, but nonetheless, the world changed. Or did it? Maybe we’ve just come full circle: let me explain.
This week’s reading from Mark comes to us, along with all the readings week-by-week, from the authors of the New Common Lectionary. Wise men and woman set down a three-year cycle of readings to cover all the best bits and ensure that preachers preach from a variety of books, not simply our personal favourites. We get a helping of four readings per week, often eight or ten verses each, sometimes edited for sense or flow.
One of the first jobs of the preacher is to assess the “cut” of the reading (does the beginning and ending make sense) and decide if any edits are appropriate. If something is omitted from the reading (as is the case today), does the omission weaken or strengthen the overall meaning of the text? Today’s answer is definitely weakens, so I put the missing verses back in, which also happen to be the heart of the passage:
17 When Jesus had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about the parable. 18He said to them, ‘Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, 19since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?’ (Thus he declared all foods clean.) 20And he said, ‘It is what comes out of a person that defiles.
Obviously the Lectionary authors haven’t read “Everyone Poops,” for why else would they omit the part of the passage that gives the best explanation of what Jesus is on about. It is common literary device, to allow some group or person to ask for clarification, and then allow the teacher to simplify and restate. In that way, Mark makes the disciples look foolish rather than you and me. But the lectionary people didn’t like all that sewer talk, so out came the scissors. Eugene Peterson doesn’t share any qualms with them, so he paraphrases the passage in a way that will surely make his friends smile:
Jesus said, "Are you being willfully stupid? Don't you see that what you swallow can't contaminate you? It doesn't enter your heart but your stomach, works its way through the intestines, and is finally flushed."
Peterson read “Everyone Poops.”
The argument here is the classic Jesus vs. the Pharisees on the topic of religious practice. They notice, to their dismay, that the disciples of Jesus aren’t washing their hands before meals, an important facet of ritual purity. They question the teacher (again, quite appropriately) on the behaviour of the students (disciples) and ask ‘what on earth are you teaching them.’ Jesus turns this into a teaching moment.
The days are gone, he argues, when the people of Israel need to worry about all of the old laws. And just as Peter will later hear a voice from heaven that says “Peter, kill and eat,” (while dreaming of forbidden creatures), Jesus is making a case for the same radical shift. His argument is one sentence long: “There is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.”
In other words, pious rituals matter less than pious actions or pious intent. Eating the wrong food won’t make you evil: but saying the wrong thing just might. Neither the hands nor the stomach are the seat of righteousness: it is the human heart. And the human heart is defined by choices: how we treat others (and what we do to ourselves).
Both Jesus and the Pharisees can agree on this much: The Law of Moses is primary, and their shared religion is an ethical religion. They simply disagree on the heart of the matter. For the Pharisees, the heart of the matter is what is commonly called “a fence around the law.” This means you go beyond the law in practice to further protect yourself from making a mistake. But for Jesus, this is too much. He wants to go in the opposite direction, with less law in order to emphasize some over others. When he blesses the statement 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and strength and mind’ and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself’ we know he is refining rather than expanding.
Looking for the heart of the matter, he gives his disciples a new list of things to avoid, a new list that supercedes pious rituals:
21For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, 22adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly.
I’m a big fan of lists. They come in ten’s and seven’s and four’s, but this is a new list, a list that doesn’t come directly from Sinai or Moses summary of the Law. There is some crossover, of course, but this is exciting new stuff.
So theft, murder, adultery, envy, and slander all come from the world’s most famous top ten list. This is definitely the bottom, relational part of the Ten Commandments, because he doesn’t list keeping the Sabbath or taking the Lord’s name in vain. Still important, but this day Jesus is more interested in how people treat their neighbours than the upper group.
Taking the rest, we could add fornication to the adultery commandment, deceit to the slander command, and cross off wickedness, which seems like the whole point of the conversation. That leaves us with licentiousness, pride, folly and avarice. Licentiousness is a great word, meaning disregard for the accepted rules. I encourage you to scream that at the next idiot who rolls through a stop sign: “I abhor your licentiousness!” He will be impressed with your word power. As fun an addition to the list licentiousness is, it is still little more than a summary of the whole discussion. That leaves us with pride, folly and avarice.
Pride, folly and avarice: An interesting trio. We know that the disciples were frequently foolish, something we learn throughout the Gospels. Now whether they were really that foolish, or just set up as a literary device was I mentioned earlier, it’s hard to tell. They certainly made mistakes and had silly discussions, so we’ll assume it was helpful to remind them to avoid folly. But pride and avarice, that was completely different.
Avarice (meaning greed) was something the disciples were in no position to worry about. They began in poverty and entered an itinerant lifestyle where all their needs were met, sometimes in the most miraculous ways. Greed was hardly on their radar, except to agree with their teacher when they met tax collectors and rich young men. And pride, pride was something they may have flirted with when trying to decide who was first among the group, but by-in-large they seemed to live with humility, caught in the divine light of the Son of the Most High.
No, I’m pretty sure the warning about greed and pride were meant for another group of disciples, say ten, twelve, or even twenty centuries on. I’m pretty sure that the people Jesus had in mind are standing in pulpits and sitting in pews at this very minute. Take Jesus warning about greed and pride and stand it beside “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous” and you see that he perfectly anticipated our age. Jesus said “all these evil things (greed and pride) come from within, and they defile a person.”
We follow in the way of Jesus, a religion of the law and of the heart. He give his friends instruction on how to live well and warned them to avoid more than a few things that would damage the heart. He taught what it means love your neigbour, and expanded this to include being good to yourself: what to avoid and what to reduce in order to make the heart pure.
And I think that Jesus warning about folly was likely a reference to himself. It was God’s foolishness that God should enter the world as a most vulnerable way. It was God’s foolishness that God experience temptation and heartache and pain with us. It was God foolishness that God be willing to put on frail flesh and die at our hands, and it is God’s foolishness that the cross should reconcile us to God for all time. St Paul said, “the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” God is saving us, from ourselves, every day: thanks be to God.
Proper 16
1 Kings 8
27 ‘But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built! 28Have regard to your servant’s prayer and his plea, O Lord my God, heeding the cry and the prayer that your servant prays to you today; 29that your eyes may be open night and day towards this house, the place of which you said, “My name shall be there”, that you may heed the prayer that your servant prays towards this place. 30Hear the plea of your servant and of your people Israel when they pray towards this place; O hear in heaven your dwelling-place; heed and forgive.
41 ‘Likewise when a foreigner, who is not of your people Israel, comes from a distant land because of your name 42—for they shall hear of your great name, your mighty hand, and your outstretched arm—when a foreigner comes and prays towards this house, 43then hear in heaven your dwelling-place, and do according to all that the foreigner calls to you, so that all the peoples of the earth may know your name and fear you, as do your people Israel, and so that they may know that your name has been invoked on this house that I have built.
The highlights of my work usually involve eating. This past week it was lunch with York Weston Community Services Centre, located just up the street. The meal was a lovely melange of wraps, salad and samosas, served with a very tangy sauce. I’m embarrassed to say it was my first samosa (I had two, so samosas), and I can definitely say I am a fan. Barbara and my new colleague Douglas were there too, but you will need to quiz them yourself on the meal, because I was too preoccupied with my samosas.
York Weston Community Services Centre is a new agency, involved primarily in settlement services and language instruction to new Canadians. They began working with the Sudanese community, and have now expanded their mandate to the many people who call Weston home. I was most impressed by their work with area youth, offering training, encouragement and a safe place to gather.
The massage that come through the presentation was sense of accomplishment, building a agency from the ground up, receiving community support and eventually federal government support. And there was also that understated joy—a most Canadian response—at helping others find a home here in Canada.
It occurred to me that the York Weston Community Services Centre is engaged in work that our congregations did in the early years. For Methodists and Presbyterians, we served the same function in the early part of the nineteenth century, providing a religious and cultural home for legions of newcomers, offering community and guidance to those starting a new life in Canada.
In the last century this meant ethnic congregations, as the welcoming ministry of our denominations shifted to specific language and nationality based churches. Newcomers could find a Korean or Cantonese or even Welsh speaking church, worship in their mother tongue, and receive the same support that agencies such as York Weston Community Services provide.
In this century, young as it is, there is another shift under way, from ethnic ministry churches to intercultural churches: the recognition that we are called to a new kind of diversity based on mutual respect and intentional dialogue about what we hold in common and what makes us different. It means no longer adopting the culture of the dominant group in a congregation but trying to be diverse. It means confronting our own assumptions about other people and trying to understand how they perceive us.
It is hard work. But here in Weston, it is vital work. And it comes with the biblical mandate that Jim read for us this morning. Let me read it again:
‘Likewise when a foreigner, who is not of your people Israel, comes from a distant land because of your name, comes and prays towards this house, then hear in heaven, and do according to all that the foreigner calls to you.
A minute of background. These words belong to Solomon, part of his prayer of dedication for the new temple: the culmination of his life’s work and the fulfillment of his family’s legacy. And for most of the extended prayer, we hear words that we might expect to go with royal pageantry and more than a little royal pride. Solomon has honoured the covenant first made with his father David, remained faithful, and earned the right to construct the temple. He has given God a magnificent house, and acknowledged the blessing of God’s presence.
And then he does two more things, one theological and one unexpected. The first is to pose a completely rhetorical question: “But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built!” His words point out a conundrum. Claim that God lives in the innermost temple, a God becomes very small. Acknowledge that even the universe cannot contain God, and suddenly a house of stone becomes superfluous. The solution: Solomon remembers God’s specific promise that “my name shall be there,” solving a theological problem and providing a descriptor that Rabbis and teachers still use: “The Name.”
The unexpected thing Solomon does is to honour the foreigner. One of the cardinal rules of biblical interpretation is look for the unexpected and pay close attention. The bible has been edited and reedited through the ages, and any idea or story that seems out of place and remains in the text has special value. In a religion under siege throughout most of its history, and a religion based on a strong sense of clan and identity, words such as ‘honour the foreigner’ have special import.
On the face of it, we could assume that Solomon is being polite. Jerusalem was a trading centre, an international crossroads, and acknowledging the foreigner was good for business. We might even extend this to an early form of pluralism, recognizing that some might be curious about the Most High and seek to approach the new temple. But Solomon seems to have a deeper understanding: beyond curiosity and tasting each other’s food, Solomon wants to acknowledge that other nations have a unique relationship to God, and that the words they pray find a home in heaven too.
When he comes and prays towards this house, then hear in heaven, and do according to all that the foreigner calls to you.
Solomon could just as easily asked that God hear only the prayers that fit the royal agenda, or the nascent religion, or the people of the city, but he prayed for more: he prayed that God hear the prayer, answer the prayer, and honour the foreigner in the midst of Israel.
What does this mean for us? In many ways, Solomon is making an early appear for an intercultural community. We have to assume that the prayer of a foreigner in a foreign land would sometimes be in conflict with the dominant culture. It would sometimes be a prayer for justice against the very people to set up this temple and call themselves the ‘chosen people.’ And yet Solomon prays that God hear these prayers too: even if his kingdom the source of lament.
Solomon, in his wisdom, has decided that honouring the foreigner (as a command) is more important that controlling the prayer life of others or trying to bar them from the temple itself. His prayer is intercultural because it truly honours the other and names their prayer legitimate, even if it is uncomfortable or may force some kind of change.
***
My morning began at about 4:20 when I woke from a deep sleep to have sounded like shouting outside. There is nothing like people on the street shouting “fire” to get the blood flowing. Over the next hour we watched the fire department put out the neighbour’s garage, and had an impromptu meeting with our neighbours. Once the crisis passed, the conversation turned to the early hour and broken sleep. My neighbour, Mohammed, said he was up anyway, having his meal, as Ramadan began yesterday. Somehow this led to a conversation about Sharia Law, and eventually taxation in Muslim countries. And it wasn’t yet 5 am.
It seems to me that any week that serves up Ramadan, the good work of York Weston Community Services, and Solomon’s unique prayer is filled with the Holy Spirit. Add the story of Suaad Mohamud, a Canadian stranded by her own government for three months in Kenya, and I begin to see the outline of a theme: In the years to come, here in Weston but across Canada, we are facing change. We will need to rethink assumptions, question longstanding patterns and honestly reassess how we have operated to date. We need to move from mono-culture and multi-culture to inter-culture: a place where we honour the hopes and prayers of everyone we meet, and give thanks to God for the gift of difference. And we need to pray for open minds, open hearts and open churches, and trust that God will answer.
Proper 15
1 Kings 3:3-14
3 Solomon loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of his father David; only, he sacrificed and offered incense at the high places. 4The king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there, for that was the principal high place; Solomon used to offer a thousand burnt-offerings on that altar. 5At Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream by night; and God said, ‘Ask what I should give you.’ 6And Solomon said, ‘You have shown great and steadfast love to your servant my father David, because he walked before you in faithfulness, in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart towards you; and you have kept for him this great and steadfast love, and have given him a son to sit on his throne today. 7And now, O Lord my God, you have made your servant king in place of my father David, although I am only a little child; I do not know how to go out or come in. 8And your servant is in the midst of the people whom you have chosen, a great people, so numerous they cannot be numbered or counted. 9Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil; for who can govern this your great people?’
10 It pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this. 11God said to him, ‘Because you have asked this, and have not asked for yourself long life or riches, or for the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself understanding to discern what is right, 12I now do according to your word. Indeed I give you a wise and discerning mind; no one like you has been before you and no one like you shall arise after you. 13I give you also what you have not asked, both riches and honour all your life; no other king shall compare with you. 14If you will walk in my ways, keeping my statutes and my commandments, as your father David walked, then I will lengthen your life.’
Summer brings frequent sightings of that most unusual creature: the casual politician. You can see them donning Stetsons at the Stampede, visiting northern places that would otherwise trouble even those who live in chili Ottawa, and even as close as my neighbourhood.
I’m not actually certain that Taste of the Danforth is the best possible place to show off party leaders, but Jack was doing his level best to engage the multitude who just wanted to be left alone with their souvlaki and baklava. Even the emergence of roasted quail, a new and disturbing trend at the festival, was more popular that the leader of the NDP.
A very cynical member of the Prime Minister’s Office calls these HOAG moments (Heck of a guy). Politician drops the dark suit and the sour look and heads out to do something fun and public: the more commonplace the better. If you can form a mental picture of a certain former president on horseback in Crawford, Texas, then you are another hapless victim of the HOAG moment in image management.
As clever as the latest crop of image consultants think they may be, they are far behind the author 1 Kings 3. Looking back on the reign of King Solomon it is hard to find something good to say, but they managed, and the passage becomes an exercise in historical image management, an important subset of the image business. More on Solomon in a moment.
For as long as there have been rulers and people to surround rulers, there has been a tendency to dress up the past. It is no coincidence that after James I and his Danish queen took the throne that Shakespeare wrote two new plays, one about a Scottish King and another about the Danish court. Fictional lead characters interact with historical ones, distant relatives of the royal patrons in the audience.
Beyond the arts, there is the work of generations of historians, assessing and reassessing each leader depending on their point-of-view and current popular thought. Some will point to important conquest, or sustained peace and prosperity. Others point to reform, or innovation, and failing all these, they will look for something else. It is unusual for any leader or king to be considered an utter failure—every one seems to have a champion eventually—and it is this fact that saves Solomon.
The tools to assess the success of a biblical king are found in the bible itself. Deuteronomy 17 is very clear: a good king must avoid a surplus of horses, a surplus of gold and a surplus of wives. Solomon failed on all three. He has a particular weakness for Egyptian horses (and chariots), enough that people wondered if he yearned for the old country. He had wealth in gold, but this was pale in comparison to his wealth in wives, numbering in the neighbourhood of 700. And many were foreign born, and brought with them foreign gods, and so you see the seeds of a disaster that would certainly come in time. At the end of his reign the kingdom breaks in two and the legacy of old Solomon is looking very bleak indeed.
Most of all, he seems saved by a baby. Do you remember the story of the baby? (Solomon adjudicated a dispute between two women, each claiming to be the mother. When he proposed simply cutting the child in half, the real mother revealed herself by renouncing her claim to spare the child).
So Solomon is wise, and his reputation spreads, so much so that foreign queens and kings seek him out as his fame grows. All his failings as king are overcome by his wisdom (the record makes clear), and ancient near-eastern image consultants can count a major victory in the person of Solomon.
That might be the last word on Solomon were it not for a small exchange in 1 Kings 3 on the real source of Solomon’s wisdom. It seems that Solomon was the most wise because he was wise enough to ask God for more:
9Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil; for who can govern this your great people?’
Like a three-wish person asking for more wishes, Solomon prays (in his wisdom) for even greater wisdom to rule God’s people. He recognizes that he is not fully up to the task, and turns to God in prayer and asks to be wiser than before.
And here we have a revolution in prayer. 1 Kings 3 continues:
10 It pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this. 11God said to him, ‘Because you have asked this, and have not asked for yourself long life or riches, or for the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself understanding to discern what is right, 12I now do according to your word. Indeed I give you a wise and discerning mind; no one like you has been before you and no one like you shall arise after you.
God has no doubt tired of the usual prayers of kings and rulers: ‘make me more powerful, increase my kingdom, lead me in battle, give me more sons, frustrate those who stand in my way.’ God has heard the selfish litany of too many, and this makes Solomon stand out even more: ‘give me understanding and discernment, nothing more.’
It seems that most of us resemble the other kings and rulers are less like Solomon in our prayer life: we tend to ask for the more direct and tangible things. There are the obvious ones, what Carmen calls the “Santa list” prayers of our childhood. Maybe a red bike, or a BB gun, or mutt under the tree. Later we seem to pray more for relief, ‘help me out of this tight spot, Lord.’ Later still we pray our worries—and while it never hurts to pray our worries—it makes more sense to find a way to worry less.
Solomon, wise king Solomon, has found a high form of prayer that God can commend to each of us: pray for understanding and pray for discernment. Pray that you can comprehend what you must do to live well, and pray that you have the capacity to make the choices that confront you each day. Pray for the understanding to see the world as it truly is: the sources of injustice and the places of pain. Pray for discernment to make the choices that will strengthen the fabric of our community and enhance our fellowship, and pray that we continue to seek understanding and discernment and never begin to trust only in ourselves.
And then, having prayed all this, pray to our Lord Jesus Christ, who set out his own prayer model recorded by John. I don’t usually give homework in sermons, but if you are flipping through your bible in the next while, read John 17, and the threefold movement of prayer that Jesus makes as he ponders his passion. He prays that in all that follows, he may glorify God. He prays for his disciples, soon to be on their own, and asks that God continue to bless them with the power of the truth. And he prays for us: he prays that we may know his presence and he prays that we ‘all may be one,’ the very words that appear on the crest of the United Church.
May God bless our thoughts and prayers, and fill us with hope. Amen.
