Are you “with Jesus”? Jesus assures his disciples that what matters is service, not status. Indeed, Jesus gladly welcomes the good work of a stranger, someone the disciples don’t even know … or recognized as following ‘us’.
Including in the kingdom, not sorting people out, is what Jesus is all about. The disciples fret over control of the power of the Spirit, but it flows where it will and will not stay put in any narrow channels.
Meanwhile Jesus warns that to cause anyone - a new believer, a child - to stumble or fall away from the grace of the Kingdom is a woeful and dangerous thing.
We are to discard whatever hinders us from fully living into the good news of the kingdom that Jesus brings.
Jesus uses extreme metaphors - eye, hand, foot - to wake us up and drive this point home. For it is not physical but moral injuries that hold us back, and parts of ourselves - our behaviors, our attitudes - that we clutch onto when we could be free if we gave them up.
Remember how quickly Blind Bartimaeus cast aside his begging cloak, or Matthew his tax tables, when Jesus called. Remember also how Judas clutched to the purse and his narrow idea of a Kingdom and a Messiah rather than opening to the new reality.
We hear in the letter of James that this Kingdom message is about more than individual behavior. The epistle exhorts us to remember we act as part of a community, in solidarity. Our prayers for one another, and our confessions of our faults - our sins - to each other, build up that unity, so much in contrast to competition or status-seeking.
Remember the warning to seek not too high a place at the common feast but take one even so low the host makes you move up? Remember how that heaven-sent host himself did not sit at all but served? That is the way to be great.
(The disciples come to report to Jesus two “unauthorized persons” are casting out demons in his name.)
One comic example of invoking status by invoking a name comes from the movie “Shakespeare in Love” where toward the end the censorious killjoy Mr Tillney - despite his title, Master of Revels - is seeking to shut down a shocking shocking display on stage of the theatre during a performance of “Romeo and Juliet”, and bellows out, once too often, “In the name of the Queen…”
Only to be brought up short by the sovereign herself, rising from her inconspicuous seat in the audience: “Have a care with my name, Mr Tillney: you’ll wear it out.”
Oh dear. Truly no man knoweth the day or the hour.
Better seek to serve than to be served, to understand than to be understood, to praise than to be praised, to obey the spirit of the law of love than to enforce the letter of the code of fear.
The passage from Numbers also exposes the unregulated quality of the Spirit Worrying Joshua is the discovery of two people actively prophesying inside the camp, that is, outside the circle of those present with Moses.
Joshua implores, “Lord Moses, forbid them!” But Moses ripostes, “Are you jealous?” and goes on to exclaim,
“Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets!”
Again, the work of God, the power of the Spirit, includes - not excludes - beyond our comfort, and often and beyond the control we desire.
I totally understand their concern, Joshua and the disciples, but keep in mind that the crazy fiesta of the Spirit at work happens in accordance with the will of God and the advent of his Reign.
When we pray “on earth as it is in heaven” do we expect it to go so far as this? How do we test it, feel confident that we are indeed “with Jesus”?
The radical welcome of the kingdom of God includes to all who do the work of mercy and justice , all who exercise a ministry of compassion.
“Whoever is not against us is for us.”
Nobody has a corner on the ministries of healing and liberation. None of us has a cause to “scandalize” - to lead astray, or reject, or make unwelcome - any “little one” that belongs to the Lord: child, newcomer, or stranger.
What we learn from the ‘unauthorized’ exercise of a ministry in Jesus’ name is that healing comes from faith and prayer, not some special power or status (part of the in-group).
God’s power is inclusive and open to cooperation, not restricted to an inner circle. It is a mighty force, and does not always go through the ‘proper’ channels … at least not ones we recognize.
What sets apart the followers of Jesus is their “saltiness” - their lives of purified righteousness, hindrances cleared away; their humility, service, hospitality to outcasts,
-- and the audacity and faith to claim even a crucified Lord. May we welcome him even as we open our arms to the least of his children, and the most audacious.
Amen.
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If any of you scandalize (put a stumbling-block before) one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea. (Mark 9:42)
So how are we doing? To ‘scandalize’ someone in the Bible context would be to cause them to fall away or turn aside from the embrace of the kingdom of God, to cause them to fall or stumble as they seek to walk the way of the followers of Jesus. Are we doing that - or its opposite? How are we doing, at welcoming and encouraging the ‘little ones’ - new believers, children, strangers - as fellow servants, among the beloved ones of our Savior?
These questions we ask ourselves both as individuals and as a church; and we even might push the question out into civil society, social organizations, work environments, casual encounters in the checkout line… just as we might confront any exclusive or rude behavior, especially toward those who most need us to speak up.
One of my favorite stories from the webinar I watched Thursday afternoon (September 25th 2021) from the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service was the experience one of their own case managers had when he and his family arrived at the Phoenix airport, as (UN vetted) refugees from Iraq. There were people standing there with banners, with their names on them, to welcome them. “I thought you said you didn’t know anybody here,” his wife said. It turned out these were their sponsors for resettlement.
That matches something that Steve Farley organized at Tucson International Airport a few years ago for people arriving from overseas. Here the banners read ‘Arizona Welcomes Refugees’ and local church people held them high.
Similar efforts continue here in southern Arizona through Lutheran Social Services and the International Rescue Committee.
Like many efforts to welcome the stranger or the unknown friend, these activities can be challenging to me, maybe to all of us, if we are not familiar with or regularly engaged in the activity.
As for me one of the joys of visiting the former convent on Country Club Drive, back when it was the host site for newly-released refugees and migrants, was going there with a young cousin from another state, who could see for herself what was going on, and meet a few people, volunteers and guests, rather than just seeing it through the lens of media.
Those are collective actions and sometimes there is a feeling of safe exploration beyond where one of us might go alone. It is, as a friend advised me when I first came to the borderlands, a good practice to begin by making friends.
When I meet you, Lord, in the person of a stranger, a child, one of your little ones, please welcome me and break bread with me, or share a human moment, that we might do justice, love mercy, and walk together on the pilgrim road to grace. Amen.
September 26 Lectionary 26 Pentecost 18
Numbers 11:4-6,10-16, 24-29. “Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his spirit on them!”
Psalm 19:7-14. “The law of the Lord is perfect and revives the soul…”
James 5:13-20. “The prayer of the righteous…”
Mark 9:38-50. Another Exorcist. Temptation to Sin. “Whoever is not against us is for us.”
Lutheran Church of the Foothills, Tucson. https://www.foothillslutherantucson.org/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNq_06k5yXw
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