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The Rev. Carol Wedell
September 27, 2009
OK, I've done it. I've joined Facebook - an online networking website. (You can blame Ruth Porten for telling me how fun it was to connect with people from your past.). I've located former college roommates and the youth minister who had such a major impact on my life. Quite fun! Feel free to invite me to be your facebook friend -- we have even talked about having a Church of the Western Reserve facebook group for the congregation and/or one for our youth.
The one strange thing that's occurred is that two men with whom I went to high school have invited me to be their friends. Truthfully, my memory of both of them is a little slim, but one of them was definitely in the "in" crowd. I definitely was not. As I looked through his list of "friends" and saw all of those names and faces from that crowd and did not see a single one of my high school group listed, it brought back all of those adolescent feelings of who was in and who was out. Yuck!
Some things never change. When our confirmation class met for the first time last week we talked some about the various groups of which they were a part. While they all mentioned a variety of different clubs, teams, etc... they also acknowledged that an "in" crowd still was around - more prevalent at some schools than others. Candidly, I am glad I am not back in high school right now! As a friend said this week, "I already lived through that once."
Our gospel lesson this morning is also about those who are in the "in" crowd and those who aren't. Jesus and his disciples are on the way to Jerusalem. Last week we heard the disciples arguing among themselves about who was the greatest. They just couldn't let go of that competitive streak (but of course, none of us here this morning are like that!). Now they are upset because someone had the audacity to use Jesus' name to relieve someone of a demonic possession without getting their permission first.
We need to understand that the issue of demon possession was extremely significant in Jesus' day. Many maladies - physical and mental, fell under that heading. It was one of the reasons Jesus' actions were so noted by the crowds. He exorcised demons with a single word. So if a person came along and could free someone possessed, one whose life was bound by an illness of body or soul, you can bet that the exorcist would not go unnoticed.
But the disciples are not so happy about this turn of events. To put it bluntly, they are ticked off. Competitive? Perhaps their emotions also include more than a bit of jealousy, as the disciples had found themselves unable to exorcise a young boy just a short while ago. How dare this unknown outsider work without the proper credentials! Who does he think he is? Why he hasn't gone to seminary or passed ordination exams or been questioned by the Presbytery.... We don't know if his theology is sound, or if his moral life is up to snuff.
Last week we were dealing with the individual egos of the disciples and now we are dealing with their group identity. They were in Jesus' inner circle. They had been with him from the beginning. They were more faithful followers than this interloper! This has to stop now!
Was the man taking the Lord's name in vain? No. Was he spreading false rumors about Jesus? No. Was he taunting the disciples, making fun of them? No. Was he hurting people? Was he teaching falsely? No, no. What was he doing? Exorcising a demon in Jesus' name. In Jesus' name he was offering healing and wholeness to those in need. Oh that we were so accused!
So what exactly was the problem? Why are John and the other disciples in such a tizzy? Because friends, he wasn't part of the "in" crowd. He didn't belong to their gang, to their group. He has moved in on their turf and they are not happy about it. Yup, he sure sounds dangerous, no good - a major problem. Better get rid of him!
The disciples were indignant. So they take their concern to Jesus, certain that he will stop this outrageous lack of proper decorum. What does Jesus say? Does he put this outsider in his place? Does he tell him to get lost, to go back to where he came from? No. He turns common understandings on their head yet again, "Those who are not against us are for us." What?
Essentially, Jesus' answer to the disciples is, "Don't worry about him. Leave him alone - he's OK. He may actually be helping to spread the good news! If any one is doing good in my name, they're with us."
2000 years later, we are still struggling with what to do with followers of Jesus who are not like us. I think of the Jehovah's Witnesses who knock on our doors convinced that only they have the truth about God. I remember a group who somewhat viciously attacked me as I was going into the convention center for General Assembly nearly 25 years ago - Presbyterian name badge clearly in evidence. Was I saved? Clearly, they didn't think that Presbyterians fell into that category!
Some of us get irritated that non-Catholics are not allowed to take communion, or that some Baptist churches insist that you have to be baptized their way in order to be a part of church. I remember a youth group from Minnesota who shared a mission space in Chicago with the youth group from Church of the Covenant. They made it very clear that they didn't think the Covenant youth were real followers of Jesus, because they didn't share the exact same beliefs they had.
The Rev. Dr. David Galloway tells the following story in a sermon on this text: One afternoon a rather obnoxious, loud Texan, known to my golfing buddies and me came up to my table at the 19th Hole and started talking loud, the only volume level he had, so loud that the attention of the room naturally turned to him. He bellowed at me, "You Episcopalians don't believe in the Bible, do you?!" Rather than take the bait, I just looked at him and smiled weakly, hoping he would pass on by like an East Texas thunderstorm.
He was referring to a recent decision by the church on some topic that was not to his liking. He went on, "David, I want to go to a church that is Bible-believing. Do you understand me? A place where the preacher is not trying to tippy-toe around the hard lessons of Jesus, a preacher who will lay it on the line, not try to water down the Gospel. I want a preacher who will be bold and put it out there, the full measure of the Bible, not hold back a lick. I want a preacher who will not let sinners slide and will call them out by name. I want the full Gospel. I don't want a preacher to pussy-foot around the message of Jesus."
I do not know where my response came from, but I heard it issuing forth from my lips after taking a long sip from my glass. "You want the full Gospel, Hugh? You mean the part about selling all you have and giving it to the poor?"
A pregnant silence fell over the room, after which Hugh responded, "Well, not that part!"
The room broke up in laughter. Hugh slunk out of the room as quietly as possible. Everyone was high-fiving me for having put Hugh in his place. "Way to go's" from Presbyterians, Methodists, Roman Catholics, Lutherans, and Jews. David had slain Goliath once again, and all was right with the world.
I went home that night particularly proud of myself and proceeded to tell the story to my wife. Mary, again a better Christian than I am, laughed at the story with that laugh that I had grown to love over the past 25 years. But then my partner asked the evident but avoided question: "David, what part of the Gospel do you avoid?"( "Getting Serious" the Rev. Dr. David Galloway, Day 1, 2006.)
It is so much easier to see the ways that other people are exclusive or think only they have the right answers. But no one has a market on cutting others out of our particular circle. We all do it. Think back to the question I posed to our confirmation class last week. What groups do you belong to? What clubs?
Take note of your reactions as I name various groups of people: conservative, liberal, Democrat, Republican, Socialist, pro-life, pro-choice, American, Russian, Fundamentalist, homosexual, Hispanic, Baptist, Vietnamese, Wall Street Executive, blue-collar worker, schizophrenic, Pentecostal, nerd, emo, jock, Union organizer. If you are like me, I would guess that you react affirmatively to some, and negatively to others. But we must take note: there are Christians who also fall in to every single one of those groups. In fact, our mission partner Olya, is both Russian and Baptist!
Or how about closer to home: those of you who wanted to build this sanctuary, and those who wanted simply to remodel the old. Even though that decision was made years prior to my arrival (and I've been here nearly 5 years), for some it is still a wall of division.
Like the disciples, we don't get to decide who is in and who is out. Matters of God's kingdom are not issues of control and having the correct label attached to us. It's about faith, never mind the nit-picky things, those things that Calvin labeled, "nonessentials." It's one of the reasons I am happy to be a Presbyterian. We don't claim to be the only way to do church - we're just one way. And we ardently affirm that people of good faith may differ. We don't need to challenge one another's faith simply because we disagree on a particular issue.
The fastest growing churches in the world are in Africa - independent churches, who aren't affiliated with any particular denomination or group. What do we do about them? Can we handle that degree of ecclesiastical freedom? Surely they are not operating "decently and in order!"
To stretch it even further, what do we do about the world's other religions - Judaism, Islam, Hindi, Buddhism, to name just a few. Are they outside of the circle of God's love?
One of my college professors, Dr. F. Dale Bruner is a renowned New Testament scholar and passionate evangelical Christian. I have never met a more ardent believer. He preached at my ordination and blessed "my liberal spirit," as he called it. At a conference several years ago, someone asked Dale if Jesus was the only way to God. I don't have his exact response, but the essence of his answer was this, "Jesus is the only way I know. But I'm not God." It broke my heart that some of his life-long colleagues decided that such an answer placed Dale "outside" the circle of "real followers." From my perspective, nothing could have been further from the truth.
The disciples were wrong about elitism in the kingdom, they are wrong here about exclusivity. Neither are features of God's way. Who is in and who is out is not a thing to be obsessing over, Jesus seems to say. It's not the point. It may not even be any of our business. It's for God to worry about - not us.
What it comes down to is understanding that being different does not equal being deficient. Any put-down of other disciples comes from our own insecurities - it says nothing about them. Our vision is simply not the same as God's. Presbyterian Elder and author Anne Lamott cautions us about too much certainty, observing the divide is never between people who believe different things, but between those who have different interpretations of the same thing. She writes: "You can safely assume you have created God in your own image when it turns out God hates all the same people you do." (As quoted by J. Shannon Webster, online, Midrash, 9/26/09; Bird by Bird: Instructions on Writing and Life. Random House, New York, 1994. p. 22).
So how can we tell who the real followers of Jesus are? Jesus means for relationships in the community of faith to be utterly different than those of the surrounding world. So imagine something different! What if the first aren't first and the last aren't last? What if there were no elders or deacons or pastors? What if the dividing lines aren't cast in stone? What if God's world is not so much about doors and walls and hall passes? Jesus tells us that whoever is not against us is included.
We can see real followers when kindness is done in Jesus' name or the demons of our day are cast out. (That's a whole other sermon, friends - I'll spare you for today!) Real followers care more about "the little ones" than about who is in or out. Or as Fred Craddock said 20 years ago, to be a real follower "means to be willing to empty your pockets for somebody else's children. I think it means to treat as father and mother those who are not really your mother and father. I think it means to claim as brother and sister people to whom you are not kin. I think it means to reach out and touch untouchable people...I think it means to sit at table with people who live far outside the social circle of some of our friends...It means to witness to Jesus Christ when evangelism is being laughed at everywhere. It means...to speak the gospel as though something were at stake.... I think it means that." (As quoted by Robert Elder, Fred Craddock, "The Last Temptation of the Church," Princeton Seminary Bulletin (November 1989), p. 198.)
By the grace of God, may we live as real followers of Christ!
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