SERMON Challenging Change

Pentecost 14(B) (proper 18) (Lectionary 23) (2009):

Isaiah 35:4-7a, Psalm 146; James 1-17; Mark 7:24-37

Eight years ago this coming Friday, on September 11, 2001, things changed for all of us. Things were different. We were different.

In light of the unspeakable horror of what happened on that Tuesday morning eight years ago, some of the changes have been comforting. While we might complain, none of us really minds the extra delays in getting on a airplane or the annoyance of taking off one's shoes or being restricted to 3 ounces of carry-on liquids or gels contained in one quart Hefty bags.

Other changes that have occurred since 9/11/2001 are, however, far less comforting. While still decried, racial and religious profiling has become common practice. And because it has, innocent persons from the Middle East or Asia -- or with Middle Eastern or Asian ancestry -- as well as American Moslems have been incarcerated, separated for extended periods of time from their families and livelihoods, solely because of their skin color and appearance or religious affiliation. Distrust of foreigners generally is on the rise. Would we be having the current debate on immigration rights if 9/11 had never happened? Arguably not.

Far from being in any sense comforting, some of the changes since 9/11 make us extremely uncomfortable. The wide scale use of torture to extract confessions is a change has shocked most of us. The 2004 report of the CIA's inspector general that was finally released (but still edited) last week detailing the "enhanced interrogation techniques" used by the CIA would have been unthinkable before 9/11. As would have the use of the federal material witness statute to arrest and detain, isolate and torture innocent persons for investigative purposes.

Whether we are comforted or conflicted or disturbed as a result of these changes, we are different because of them. And challenged by them. And that's not only true for us as Americans now, post 9/11. Consider what we just heard.

We just heard Mark's account of Jesus' first foray into gentile territory. According to Mark, Jesus goes to Tyre (in today's Lebanon) to get away from people. He is found in the house where he is hiding by a gentile woman, a Syrophoenician woman, a pagan, whose daughter is possessed. This is Jesus' first encounter with a gentile. And it is challenging. Anything but comforting.

The woman could not be more respectful. She bows at his feet. She begs him to exorcize her daughter. In Mark's gospel, Jesus cuts to the quick in refusing her and says, "Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children's food and throw it to the dogs." There is much more in this statement than meets the eye.

"The children" here are the Jews, the children of Israel. Jews like Jesus and the disciples. The word "dog" was a derogatory word for gentiles. Really derogatory. Like the N-word would be for us. The fact that, unlike the author of Matthew, the author of Mark has Jesus use the diminutive for dogs -- "puppy dogs" is the English equivalent -- does not soften the insult. It is an enormous insult. Anything but politically correct. And in that insult, Jesus is saying, "I am here to take care of Israel, not gentiles, like you."

Jesus has stereotyped gentiles -- not unlike stereotyping of some Israelis of Hizbullah today. Not unlike the racial profiling and distrust and hatred of migrants by some people in our country today.

So what changes things?

The release of the CIA's inspector general's report on "enhanced interrogation techniques) and the investigation announced by Attorney General Holder may change things (if they haven't already). But for Jesus it is something else. Actually, two something elses.

The first is confrontation. The Syrophoenician woman confronts Jesus with his challenge. Respectfully calling him "Sir" (kyrie in Greek), she responds, "Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs." As one commentator notes:

The woman proves she can give as good as she gets. She is equal to the game of challenge and riposte. She is the only person in the Gospels who proves to be a good match for Jesus' wit.

That fact is not lost on Jesus. He responds with the equiv alent of "touche!" (Pilcher 1995, 125)

"For saying that," he tells her, "you may go -- the demon has left your daughter." And it has.

But it is more than the Syrophoenician woman's confrontational persistence and wit that shatters Jesus' stereotype and changes his mind. The stereotype is shattered and his mind changed because she speaks the truth. Even he has told her, "Let the children be fed first," not "Let the children of Israel be fed exclusivelv." Righteous gentiles were always part of the Jewish vision of God's reign. Jesus knows that because he knows that in proclaiming the coming of God's kingdom he is proclaiming shalom, the wholeness of all creation, a wholeness where, in the words of Isaiah that we hear this morning,

[T]he eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer,

and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy . . . . waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert;

            the burning sand shall become a pool, That wholeness of all creation will include the exorcism of gentiles like Syrophoenician woman's daughter. It will restore to full community individuals like the deaf Jewish man with the speech impediment. There is an in-breaking of the kingdom to come when Jesus exorcizes the Syrophoenician woman's daughter and restores the hearing of the deaf man with the speech impediment. Jesus knows that. That's what he was about.

But is he comfortable with gentiles?

The historical Jesus probably had little, if any, contact with gentiles. One guesses that the comfort level was not high. Even so, Jesus changed. And, because he changed, the early Jewish Christian church reached out and embraced gentiles -- and it did that even though that meant overcoming stereotypes and deeply held convictions about gentiles. Gentiles like us.

And that makes us feel comfortable. And maybe think that addressing the disturbing changes of post 9/11 is all we have to do.

But it is not. Just as it isn't for the church being addressed in James. There the church is allowing a late first century politician to come into its religious assemblies to lobby against the current administration. (We know this, by the way, because only members of the senatorial class were allowed to wear gold rings and "fine clothes" is shorthand for the white togas senators wore. From other sources, we know that there was conflict between the emperor and the senators when James was written.) In any event, the politician is being given preferential treatment because he is rich.

The author of James rightly makes that community feel uncomfortable because it is discriminating against the poor. Because it has forgotten that kingdom of God is about wholeness and inclusion. That author calls for change. He asks:

"If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill,' and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that?"

 The answer is, "None."

As church, we are, like the church addressed in James, the body of Christ in the world. We are about justice. About healing. About wholeness. About shalom. And all that involves continuous change and ongoing inclusiveness.

And that is what Wicker Park Lutheran Church does so well. It is what our LVC volunteers will be intentionally doing this year. And the reason we do this and do it so well is because, in all that we do, we are grounded in the reality and relationship with a God who, in the words of today's psalm,

made heaven and earth, the seas, and all that is in them; who keeps his promise forever;

who gives justice to those who are oppressed, and food to those who hunger.

[who] sets the prisoners -free; ... opens the eyes of the blind; . . . lifts up those who are bowed down;

. . . loves the righteous; . . . cares for the stranger;

. . . sustains the orphan and widow, frustrates the way of the wicked.

Because of that God and by that God's grace, we are called to change and be changing. To be confrontational and confident. Challenged and challenging. Even conflicted and sometimes confused. And, yes, in all of that, we are comforted, comforting, and, in both, comfortable. For that we give God our thanks. Amen

September 6, 2009

Ruth VanDemark, pastor

Wicker Park Lutheran Church

Chicago