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“Great Amazement”
James 2:1-10, 14-17; Psalm 125; Mark 7:24-37
Rev. Sandy Nuernberg
Oakland-Cambridge Presbyterian Church, Cambridge, WI
23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time -
Christian Education Week Begins!
September 10, 2006
The doors of our church opened
today, this Sunday morning and all God’s people, teenagers, children, adults of
all ages, greeted each other. Even a baby in the arms of a parent smiles at a
grandparent. This is, as we know it, one of the few contexts in our culture when
all ages are coming together in one place. Today, we celebrate one of our
missions of the church, the ‘shelter, nurture, and spiritual fellowship of the
children of God.’ These statements were brought to us in the early twentieth
century and are in our constitutional ‘Book of Order.’ It truly is in
‘great amazement’ that we celebrate today the beginning of Christian Education
programming in our denomination, everywhere in the nation.
Our texts today in Mark and in
James are similar in their context of what all is implied for these early
Christians, as well as for our one mission today; for it is emphasized in our
true being, the ways in which we are to live together as a community of faith.
It seems that the punch-line for each of us is that faith, if it is real faith,
leads to faithful living. Yes, we are to show our faith in the little acts of
daily living.
Of course, it sounds, oh, so
simple, but as we know, it is much more complex, isn’t it? For a closer look
these texts are seemingly in direct contradiction towards one another. And the
textual punch-line for me, is not even stated within either text. If, as
brothers and sisters, we are showing favoritism towards others, how can we have
faith in the Lord, Jesus Christ, who is the embodiment of truth and who never
ever included actions of favoritism in his earthly life? We must ask how this
can be?
The Mark text is a scene where
Jesus is actively healing the Syro-Phoenician woman’s daughter of any demons,
and then he miraculously cures a deaf man of an impediment in his speech; he
opened the man’s ears and allowed his tongue to speak. Think about it; Jesus is
active in his ministry among gentiles, non-Jews, people of not his cultural or
religious background, in gentile territory! It is significant that Jesus taught
and healed, exorcized, and preached in this geographic locale. There were no
boundaries to Jesus’ travel and teachings in Mark and his churches needed to
know that. There is no favoritism here but the presence of Christ’s action.
The James text is a scene similar
to a short play in which there are three parts; the rich and the poor living in
disharmony with one another, the law of loving one’s neighbor, and the climax of
all climaxes that ‘faith without words is dead! Partiality is a dastardly
offense and James wants his Jewish-Christian community, however poor, to know
that. It’s not the letter of the law–it’s your faith; it’s living a life of
goodness and action. I pondered, wowee, what texts to draw courage and
confidence from!!
But simple as it sounds, what we
learn and try to understand is that we aren’t partial to anyone, as Jesus was
not, and we love our neighbors as ourselves (v. 8). Love is the basis of action.
If we do these deeds, and are a part of these actions, we are not part of sin;
after all, that’s Jesus’ plan, isn’t it? Daa!! And if we have works we have
faith, because, faith, in Greek, means trust.....we trust in what God’s
plan is for us.
In my job at the hospital I had
contact with employees of every department, biomedical engineers, cleaning
staff, phlebotomists, doctors, nurses, and of course, patients. But one person I
truly enjoyed, yes, enjoyed being around when I worked evenings on week-ends was
Barb, our human resources cleaning staff; faithful, thorough in her job, and
remarkable disposition in knowing what pleased us. Most of all it was her quiet
gestures that I got to learn from her and we shared together. She is
functionally impaired in our culture as a deaf-mute, but I was quietly excited
to see her when I worked with her. She taught me sign language for “Hi, how are
you?”, “Are you having a good day?”, “I’m having a bad hair day”, and “I love
you, lots!!” She made our working areas spotless and I wondered and watched how
she picked up on our culture and its signals and signs, slang language and
shortcuts. I was in great amazement that it was her trust in our society to
include her in all she was and did for us, and it made me want to be near her
often.
The early Christians were trying
to seek and to cultivate who was rich and who was poor, just like we are
incensed with it today. And aren’t the poor the winners; their faith as heirs of
the Kingdom? These words are kinda forceful ‘faith without words is dead’,
aren’t they? The great amazement is that Jesus had to convince his disciples of
this truth, because they didn’t get it, even though they were literate and
influenced by Hellenistic ideas; just as we have to convince ourselves and
others of God’s truth. These early believers knew, just as we know, that the
word and activities of God are forever contradictory and controversial. The
great amazement is in the truth of the text, and how it plays out in our
everyday lives.
Recently, I read about the
twilight of the life of evangelist Billy Graham ( Newsweek, Meachim,
Jon, “Pilgrim’s Progress”, August 14, 2006. P. 37- 43), interestingly, born and
raised by Presbyterian parents! He talked of politics, old age and death, the
Scriptures. He has tried to maintain friendships with all people of faith, he
said, whether Islam, Buddhist, Jewish, Christian, Hindu, and after being in the
company over his 87 years of ten presidents. Perhaps not admittedly, it seems
that he has lead a controversial and contradictory lifestyle.
But what helped me understand this
amazing person was what he told his daughter, Anne Graham Lotz, ‘the primary
thing is, as Jesus said, to try to love God totally, and to love our neighbor as
ourselves (p. 38).’ It is, in a way, Graham’s last testament, as he argues that
the Bible is open to interpretation and he concedes that there are many things
that he doesn’t understand. He has changed his thinking of Christians
disagreeing on the details of Scripture and theology, and doesn’t enter into
partisan politics and culture wars, or opinions on stem-cell research. But he
loves to stay current in the news. I think he sounds Presbyterian, don’t
you?
The good news of the gospel for us
this day is that faith matters! Our faithfulness leads us to faithful living. In
our faith there is no favoritism or wavering, or guessing about the loyalty that
God has for us. God gave his Son, Jesus Christ, to die for the whole world, and
we are loved regardless of whoever we are and wherever we are. Isn’t it of
great amazement that the love of God, through Jesus Christ, is absolute and
unconditional? Our faith is the faith of ages in drawing us in relationship with
God and one another. In great amazement we can count on God doing God’s part; we
need only do our part in loving God and neighbor. AMEN.
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