Jesus gives grace and calls us to the way of salvation - 6th after pentecost

The holy gospel according to Luke (9:51-62)

⁵¹When the days drew near for Jesus to be taken up,

       he set his face to go to Jerusalem.

       ⁵²And he sent messengers ahead of him.

              On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him;

                     ⁵³but they did not receive him,

                            because his face was set toward Jerusalem.

                            ⁵⁴When his disciples James and John saw it, they said,

                                   “Lord, do you want us to command fire

                                          to come down from heaven and consume them?”

                            ⁵⁵But Jesus turned and rebuked them.

                                   ⁵⁶Then they went on to another village.

⁵⁷As they were going along the road, someone said to him,

       “I will follow you wherever you go.”

⁵⁸And Jesus said to him,

       “Foxes have holes,

       and birds of the air have nests;

              but the Son of Humanity has nowhere to lay his head.”

⁵⁹To another Jesus said,

       “Follow me.”

       But he said,

              “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.”

              ⁶⁰But Jesus said to him,

                     “Let the dead bury their own dead;

                            but as for you,

                                   go and proclaim the reign of God.”

⁶¹Another said,

       “I will follow you, Lord;

              but let me first say farewell to those at my home.”

       ⁶²Jesus said to him,

              “No one who puts a hand to the plow

                     and looks back

                            is fit for the reign of God.”

The gospel of the Lord.

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Today’s Jesus is all about the tough love!  I might even go so far as to question his family values—no burying parents or even saying good-bye to family?  He just takes off and expects everybody else to drop everything and hop on board.  This doesn’t seem like the same Jesus who cast out the demons called Legion last week.

And in some ways he’s not the same.  We’ve jumped from last week’s healing of the Gerasene man with the demons past Jesus’ transfiguration—the turning point in his ministry at which he, as we hear reiterated today, sets his face to Jerusalem.

In the first half of Luke, Jesus gathers his followers and disciples and they journey with him, witnessing the healing and wholeness he creates for individuals and communities, including feeding over 5000 people!  This is the hope and trust we have in Jesus, the love and forgiveness we receive freely from Jesus.

But now, in the second half of Luke, his call to follow him is not so easy.  Now Jesus is going to confront the powerful in Jerusalem.  Now following Jesus will not be for the faint of heart.

Jesus has “set his face to go to Jerusalem” and he is on a mission; nothing will stop him.  He sends folks ahead to prepare the way and the village of Samaritans doesn’t receive him.  Yet he is bound and determined and keeps going as the path is clearer without that stop.

James and John, also known as the sons of Thunder, don’t quite see eye to eye with Jesus on this.  They are as true to their name as they are off-base on their response.  They ask Jesus, “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” 

Where the village that doesn’t receive him fails, this woefully misguided question does succeed in stopping Jesus in his tracks.  He turns and rebukes these sons of Thunder.  Bringing fire down on this village that has cleared the path for his continued journey doesn’t fit with Jesus’ mission.  Bringing down any violent condemnation doesn’t fit with God’s plan.

Even as Jesus is headed to Jerusalem to call the powerful to account, he is not going to condemn them, but to call them to repentance, to turn from their ways that lead not to life but to death.

Jesus’ road is a particular road and while he still focuses on compassion for the marginalized and outcast, Jesus is clearer in the challenge those of us with power and privilege will face in following him.  Because, there is joy and deep meaning to be found in following Jesus, and there is sacrifice and discomfort. 

Part of the shift in Jesus’ focus is a reflection of the difference between receiving God’s forgiveness and true salvation, which goes deeper.  The first half of Luke is the embodiment of God’s grace.  Just as Jesus moves about bringing healing and wholeness to those with and without the faith to ask, God’s forgiveness and love is free to all of us.  That’s why it’s called grace.  It’s the easy part of this life of faith, because it is entirely dependent on God, not us.  It is the thing that pulls us and the other disciples into following Jesus, realizing the healing and wholeness that he brings.

Salvation is a different step along the journey of faith and, like Jesus in today’s gospel, it is both more urgent and more difficult for many of us.  Rev. Lura N. Groen describes salvation, stating, “salvation is about living in right and good and loving relationship with God, your human siblings, and all creation, in a joyful, whole, holy relationship. And if we don't do the work, it is literally, functionally impossible to be in that relationship.”

Salvation, especially as we experience it in the gospel of Luke, goes deeper and happens right now—here on this earth in each moment.  And it happens in community.  Salvation has to do with how we are in relationship with each other and we can’t be in right relationship with each other when our actions and inactions harm others.

As M encouraged us a couple weeks ago, we need to examine our place in the world, to question if we love the systems and institutions we are a part of more than the neighbor whom Jesus calls us to love.  As we follow Jesus we also question the systems set up in this culture, economic, political, and social ones.  Jesus calls us also to question whether these systems help care for the oppressed and marginalized or further oppress and marginalize those we’ve deemed as “other.”

Rev. Groen points out that “… [we] won't experience true salvation without repenting of [our] racism and sexism, without being forgiven, without the work of transforming [our] heart and [our] life.”

It is no simple task.  Salvation requires our participation and our self-examination.  When we need our hair cut, do we have any trouble finding someone who knows how to handle our hair?  Like M reflected, when we go to a store, are we treated with more respect and less suspicion than we would if our skin were darker or we spoke another language?  When we are out with our loved ones, do we feel anxious or hesitant about holding their hand as some still do in today’s culture?  When we walk down the street in a city, do we think about if how we are dressed will be used as an excuse for harassment?  When we enter a building, does it have a ramp for wheelchair access? These are some of the questions raised when we follow Jesus and seek salvation.

In today’s gospel, Jesus names his own reality as one who is oppressed.  As he says so eloquently in today’s gospel, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Humanity has nowhere to lay his head.”  When we take a new step in faith, we step toward the oppressed Christ who is crucified in all those who are oppressed and marginalized throughout the world. 

And in this process, the Holy Spirit frees us from the façade of privilege that we carry.  We no longer have to be perfectly put together.  We no longer have to hold our emotions stoically inside.  In calling us to follow as Jesus’ “face [is] set toward Jerusalem,” Jesus gives us the opportunity to stop trying to look good, to stop putting store in what our culture demands of us, and instead Jesus invites us to risk being in relationship with those different from us, to risk our own sense of security, and to risk messing up—being imperfect and awkward.

As we as a community of faith set our faces to the farms this summer, Jesus invites us as well into the risk of broken Spanish, of attempts to communicate and build relationships, of wondering what it is like to live in a country with a language different from the one we grew up with, of sharing food and corn hole competitions, even when we mix up words like hombres y hombros—men and shoulders.  And in all of this Jesus is already on the farms with the folks there, waiting for us to arrive and walking with us on the way.

Jesus has set his face to Jerusalem, his mission is clear, his love and forgiveness abounds for each of us, and his call is to follow him. 

To follow Jesus into a sometimes scary place of vulnerability, into a difficult way of non-violence, resisting our urges to demonize others, trusting that even in messing up we are growing in relationship with our neighbors and through those relationships, growing also with God. 

Jesus’ way is difficult and it is the way of life.  Jesus leads the way and accompanies us throughout, so that we are never left behind or alone.

Thanks be to God.

Jesus doesn't leave anyone for dead. Ever. - 5th after Pentecost

The other reading referenced is Galatians 3:23-29.

The holy gospel according to Luke (8:26-39)

²⁶Then Jesus and the disciples arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. ²⁷As Jesus stepped out on land, a man of the city who had demons met him. For a long time he had worn no clothes, and he did not live in a house but in the tombs.

²⁸When he saw Jesus, he fell down before him and shouted at the top of his voice, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me”— ²⁹for Jesus had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For many times it had seized him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds.)

³⁰Jesus then asked him, “What is your name?” He said, “Legion”; for many demons had entered him. ³¹The demons begged him not to order them to go back into the abyss.

³²Now there on the hillside a large herd of swine was feeding; and the demons begged Jesus to let them enter these. So Jesus gave them permission. ³³Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.

³⁴When the swineherds saw what had happened, they ran off and told it in the city and in the country. ³⁵Then people came out to see what had happened, and when they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid. ³⁶Those who had seen it told them how the one who had been possessed by demons had been healed.

³⁷Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear. So he got into the boat and returned. ³⁸The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him; but Jesus sent him away, saying, ³⁹“Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.” So the man went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done for him.

The gospel of the Lord.

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This last week has been awful.  It is a hard week to be me and to preach.  This sermon is so hard and so complicated. 

47 years ago this month transgender women of color protested brutality and attacks on who they were in a gay bar called Stonewall and from that protest, a movement grew so that throughout the country and the world parades and marches are celebrating the lives and worth of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual, pansexual, and Two Spirit people.

Last Sunday a man with weapons in his car was stopped before he could arrive at and attack the Los Angeles Pride Parade.  The night before, last Saturday during the night LGBTQ+ Latinxs were targeted and killed in one of few spaces that are supposed to be truly safe.  Bars and clubs like Pulse in Orlando are sanctuary for LGBTQ+ communities and that sanctuary was defiled as bullets rained down on beloved children of God.  Throughout the week, we have continued to hear of threats of violence and graffiti directed toward LGBTQ+ people.

This sermon is hard because in light of all of this, I don’t know who is who in today’s gospel.  It would be easy to preach on Galatians and proclaim us all united in Christ, that our differences aren’t as important.  But it’s not true.  Our differences are important.  Our diversity matters.  God cherishes our differences.  And difference matters because it is precisely the “difference” of being LGBTQ+; of being Latinx, that was targeted last week at Pulse in Orlando and that has been targeted over 200 times in the last six months with anti-LGBTQ+ legislation throughout this country.

But who in our gospel is the Gerasene man, possessed by so many demons that they are called “Legion”?  The one the rest of the community has chained up and left—literally as though he were already dead to them—in the tombs?  Are the demons the evil? Or is it the chains—the exile imposed? 

Chains of division and demonization, of othering,

            of claims about splinters in their eye, not seeing the planks in our own. 

Chains of silencing and refusing for so long

            to name homophobia, transphobia, and racism as sins. 

Chains of blame—

            to blame Muslims for this act of terror that is decidedly “American,”

bred by fundamentalist faiths and fearful and hateful rhetoric and policies,

            not by Islam. 

Or are we, the church, the one possessed by the demons of racism, homophobia, transphobia, and islamophobia? Are we the ones who are chained up, living in death possessed by these demons we don’t know how to banish?

Are we the community, terrified that Jesus has exposed our exclusion, the brokenness of a community that casts out those we don’t understand, those we are afraid of? Are LGBTQ+ communities that community?  Afraid of or rejecting the church that could tear us apart, in its possession by demons that lead not to life but to death?

I honestly don’t know who is who.  Maybe because I am both.  I am this church that struggles with our legacy of racism, homophobia, transphobia, sexism, islamophobia and so many other systems of discrimination.  And I am queer.

During my second year in seminary, in 2011, a group of ELCA bishops visited our seminary, as different ones do each seminary each year. 

During their visit, when asked how they would support women, LGBTQ+ people, and people of color as new pastors in their synods,

            the bishops were so bound in chains from fear

                        that they had no words of comfort, support, or encouragement for us—

            they could only defend a need to “protect” congregations

                        from queer people like me. 

I was devastated. We were devastated.

That weekend, a group of us went to SideTrack, a gay bar in boystown in Chicago, for Show Tunes night.  It was there that I found sanctuary.  It was there that my whole being was affirmed.  It was there that I was supported as a queer person.  Last week that sanctuary was attacked.

So, I don’t know who we are or where we fit             in this story, except that Jesus shows up anyway.  Jesus comes to Gerasene on purpose.  Jesus meets the one possessed by demons.  Jesus goes to the one left out, rejected, sent to live in the place of the dead.

Jesus was at Pulse last week, telling people to leave and run and then staying with those who could not leave, holding them in his arms, crying with them, being crucified again and again and again.

Jesus was at Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston last year.  Sitting in Bible study and sending people running when shots rang out, and then staying with those who could not leave, holding them in his arms, crying with them, being crucified again and again and again.

And Jesus is with those who brave the Rio Grande, the Straights of Florida, and the Sonoran Desert of Arizona for a better life, hope, a chance to live.  Jesus is swimming and walking with them, urging them to safety, and then staying with those who can go no farther, holding them in his arms, crying with them, being crucified again and again and again.

Jesus shows up in those places where people and communities, like the man from Gerasene, are bound by chains and where we bind each other with chains.  Where we claim demon possession and where we are possessed.  Jesus shows up and exposes the injustice and names the evil. 

And Jesus begins the scary process of healing, because the whole community is broken when one person is bound by chains,

            when one person is sent away,

                        when one person does not belong.

We are all broken. 

And yet Jesus comes to our brokenness and recognizes us. 

Jesus claims us as beloved and as we work to follow Jesus,

            Jesus sends us to Proclaim the healing and wholeness,

                        to glorify God even in our new and scary reality.

Jesus breaks the chains that bind the Gerasene man possessed by demons

            and the chains that bind us. 

Jesus shows up at gay bars and Bible studies;

            in deserts and rivers;

                        in bread broken and parades marched;

            with rainbows and love and hope for a new way

                        and a new world where all live,

                                    claimed as family. 

Because Jesus doesn’t leave anyone beyond hope. 

            Jesus doesn’t leave anyone for dead. Ever.

Thanks be to God.

heartbreak

My heart broke twice today.  Once before worship and once on the way home and it is still broken.  Before worship, I learned of an act of domestic terrorism on my people.  A gunman killed over 50 people and wounded more in the largest mass shooting in this country last night.  What some people didn’t say is that Pulse, the club the man opened fire at is a queer club in Orlando, Florida.  My heart broke.  And yet, from the start, this has been labeled an act of domestic terror. 

Before worship I had no news of the attacker.  It was weird to not hear any details apart from gender about this man and yet to know that it was being considered domestic terrorism.  During worship we prayed for the victims of the domestic terrorism last night and we prayed for the victims of domestic terrorism almost a year ago at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina.  June 17th of last year a terrorist who is a member of mydenomination opened fire on a Bible Study.  This was not called domestic terrorism by much of the media and much of the country, but that is what it was.  In Charleston, the shooter was white.

After worship, as I looked at the reports, I found out that the shooter was Muslim and claimed to be attacking for ISIS.  My heart broke again.  That is why it was called domestic terrorism from the start.  It is an act of domestic terrorism.  Not because the shooter was Muslim, but because that’s what the act was.  The attack on Mother Emanuel was an act of domestic terrorism also.

My heart is broken.  This is terrible and yet our own community is not allowed to donate blood for those who were injured.  Our own community is still barred from donating blood to the Red Cross even as we are bleeding ourselves. 

Our own community is killed all the time.  Trans women of color, the originatorsof Pride Marches, the reason we celebrate Pride this month, face this threat in their own lives ALL. THE. TIME.  Now it is also hitting the places we go to be free, the mainstream.  To be ourselves and let our guard down.  This is not a new reality.  Maybe for some, but for many this is one more thing in a daily reality of fear for LGBTQ lives, especially for trans women of color everywhere.

My heart is broken.  It has been for a long time.  

To those of you who are straight, cis folks, you get to be heartbroken with us and pray with us, but I also expect you to do something: Change the gun laws. Preach from the pulpit. Educate people about Islam and LGBTQ folks, especially those in the BTQ category. Be present at TDOR in November. Change blood donation laws. Give money to LGBTQ organizations (especially organizations from/for communities of color and BTQ folks). Confess, repent, receive forgiveness.