September 12, 2010
(Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost;
Proper 19)
(From The Lectionary Page)
Learning to Rejoice
When my oldest daughter was between about two and three years old, I regularly played a sort of memory game with her that I thought might also be enjoyable for me. I had a half dozen or so CD’s that I was familiarizing her with, mostly old rock & roll classics. I’d play one well known song from each, and teach her who sang it, and what the song was called. She learned that Buddy Holly sang “Peggy Sue,” that Elvis sang “Teddy Bear,” and so on. She had this kind of familiarity with a couple of Beatles songs, a Sam Cooke tune, and several others.
One evening, as Karen and I were sitting at the table paying bills, Samantha began handing us each little pieces of paper with a small sticker and a squiggly line down the center of each. She handed one to Karen, then one to me, then another to Karen, and to me again. I asked her what these were, to which she replied that they were our tickets. “Tickets for what?” “It’s your tickets to ride!” she joyfully exclaimed. She continued this activity a while longer. At one point, as she accepted yet another ticket, Karen attempted to redirect her. “Not now, Sami. Why don’t you find something to play with. Mommy and Daddy are busy.”
Sami looked surprised by this, and quite dejected. She walked over to me again so that I could see up close that she was wearing a sad face. I played along: “What’s wrong?” I asked. “Momma gots a ticket to ride…” She hesitated, and then as a huge grin formed on her face, she finished: “Momma gots a ticket to ride…but she don’t care.” Pause. Now, I don’t remember the first thing about the bills we were working on, or what our concerns were then, but I remember Sami’s part in it like it was yesterday.
There are a number of themes at work in this morning’s gospel from Luke. One of the more obvious is being lost and then found. But it is important to note that in each of the two illustrations Jesus uses, it is not simply being lost and then found that give the stories direction. Being lost and being found is the vehicle by which the stories proceed, but what is most fundamentally driving them is first, a person’s care and concern for the story’s object, for the sheep and the coin. The second follows from this – that is, rejoicing in the renewed presence of the other. These are “the goals toward which the stories move.”[1] And as with nearly all of Jesus’ teaching about God, the presenting challenge is that if this is God’s nature, it must be our nature to participate in it as we can.
The backdrop against which these stories are told is the grumbling by the Pharisees and scribes. They want evidence of repentance, before accepting such people. And this evidence needs to look like what they already know it to look like. But Jesus’ choosing of these particular stories to make his point, suggests to us, something about what is going on with them: they have unknowingly moved from wanting what God wants, to deciding what God wants.
The stories Jesus tells assume, that God is actively doing things in the world that we must see and respond to. In this instance, God is seeking. For anyone to assume control of God’s seeking, is really for that person to assume that, while God has sought, he is, in fact, no longer seeking. He must have stopped when he found us – sort of, left us in charge of the seeking. It’s highly self-centered, and it is quite simply bad theology. But it is bad theology that we all subscribe to, to some degree, at some time or another. We have to be reminded to look for God in the world. And when we do see something of what God is currently up to, we can’t help but remember that it’s not all about us. We can’t help but rejoice.
I wonder, if this is how Jesus dealt with the grumpy religious leaders of his day, how would he respond to those who want to burn the Muslim scripture in response to those they feel are outsiders? A Muslim leader in central Florida met this week, with the leader of one such group. Imam Muhammad Musri told the Koran burning pastor Terry Jones, that if he insisted on counting him as an enemy, he should also follow his own Scripture about dealing with enemies. “I think then you are to love me,” he told a silent Jones. Who here is lost, and who is found?
The present discussion in the Episcopal Church regarding participation in holy communion, might be informed by this passage from Luke. Should communion be offered to all who are baptized, or to simply to all – period. To hear the countless stories of God “finding” people, through their surprising acceptance at the table, may suggest to us, something about what God is doing, and something about our attempts to control God’s finding of the outsider. Of course, it’s more complex than that, but it bears remembering, that it’s never an easy thing to see something of this behavior in one’s self.
It’s also difficult sometimes, as we all know, simply to rejoice at all. Not long ago, I was pulling up to a stop sign, when I noticed a young father pulling a little girl down the sidewalk in red wagon. She was waving her arms in the air, looking up at the sky, smiling and singing. The father looked preoccupied, perhaps thinking about a problem at work, a bill that needs to be paid, or maybe about a sick mother. He was looking at those of us passing by, watching for traffic, and conscious of us watching the two of them. This father and his daughter were in the same place, but they also were not. She was rejoicing in the gift of life, and seeing her so happy made me forget about the market report I was listening to, and to smile as well. But I’ve also been that father, and sometimes still am. What was making his daughter so happy, were things the father had long since been acquainted with, and becoming accustomed to them, had ceased to look at. I frequently have to choose, and to choose again, what it is that will inform me most deeply. Not choosing simply means that it will be chosen for me. The bills and the stock report will take precedence over the rejoicing little girl.
Could it be, that we need to re-learn the art of rejoicing? When I am able look at the simple joys available all around me, and see them as gifts, from a God who thinks as highly of them as I do, I am at my most spiritually sound place. But it seems to take practice. It has to be intentional, before it can be habit. Even though he has become quite accustomed to it, I want the father of that little girl to force himself, for just a little while, to forget the bills, and for just a moment trust his sick mother to God. I want him to turn and see his little girl once more, and laugh out loud at what God is doing right next to him.
When I am in the habit of rejoicing in these things, I am more likely to respond with joy, rather than resentment, when God moves among the “undeserving.” It is then that I recognize myself as undeserving as well, and that person becomes a brother or sister, rather than the competition or the displacer.
All it seems that God is saying, is, “Look what I’m doing! Enjoy it with me!” Whether we can do this or not seems to be what determines who is lost, and who is found. If resentment of outsiders indicates lost-ness, then rejoicing in God’s simple gifts is the equivalent of our guiding compass. It is our ticket to ride. In just a few chapters beyond today’s reading, Luke will have Jesus telling his disciples that, “…whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” Therefore, Rejoice.
Amen.
[1] Bader-Saye, Scott. “Luke 15: 1 – 10: Theological Perspective.” From Feasting On The Word, edited by Barbara Brown Taylor and David L. Bartlett (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010) p 70 - 72
