A Reflection for XIII Pentecost (Proper 16) All Saints’ Church, Southern
Shores, NC August 23, 2015 Thomas
E. Wilson, Rector
Placing
Trust
The question in your bulletin for meditation before
and after the service is “In whom or what do you place your trust?” In the
lessons for today we have four teachers who spend energy trying to teach people
about the reality they see and in which we all live. In this fourth week of the
Gospel story from John, the author continues Jesus’ explanation of what he was
doing when he fed the multitudes in the wilderness. When he fed the 5000, the
people saw a miracle worker who could help them get what they need to get their
“needs” met. Their question was, “I liked the food, but what else is in it for
me?”
In most of the 6th chapter, Jesus focuses
on his point that the food was not to meet the “need” of a hungry stomach, but
to give a taste of what life would be like if we could change the way we look
at the world and ourselves. If we exist only for what we consume, then life has
no meaning other than feeding the furnace of desire. Jesus is teaching them,
and us, that the meaning of life is in being connected to the power greater
than ourselves, which we, for convenience, call “God” and Jesus called
“Father”. This “being connected” is what
the translators call belief. The word in Greek that John remembers is “pisteuo”
which can mean belief, but it goes further beyond intellectual assent. It means
emptying oneself out so that others may be fed through you. One does not “have”
a belief but one lives into that belief by walking with God in a life of
integrity, compassion, justice, and mercy, as the Prophet Micah says, “What
does the Lord require of you to do but to do justice, love mercy, and walk
humbly with your God.”
“Belief”, in Jesus’ definition, is not a passive
thought but an action of entering into abundant life where one is totally
trusting in God. Many of the people in the throng leave because it is hard to
trust God - trusting does not answer the question of ‘What is in it for me? How
do I benefit if I give myself away to God?” The disciples come up to Jesus and
tell him that he has a marketing problem that frightens people away. Jesus
gives the disciples the opportunity to leave, but they have come this far
trusting that God has been walking with them.
But they are still shaky.
There is an old story that I heard a preacher tell
years ago, and I have heard different variations since then. I usually tell stories that have to do with
my own experience and stay away from stories about people who I do not know,
but here it is anyway.
There was a tightrope
walker who did incredible aerial feats. All over Paris, he would do tightrope
acts at tremendously scary heights. Then he had succeeding acts - he would do
it blindfolded, then he would go across the tightrope, blindfolded, pushing a
wheelbarrow. An American promoter read about this in the papers and wrote a
letter to the tightrope walker, saying, "Tightrope, I don't believe you
can do it, but I'm willing to make you an offer. For a very substantial sum of
money, besides all your transportation fees, I would like to challenge you to
do your act over Niagara Falls." Now, Tightrope wrote back, "Sir,
although I've never been to America and seen the Falls, I'd love to come."
Well, after a lot of promotion and setting the whole thing up, many people came
to see the event. Tightrope was to start on the Canadian side and come to the
American side. Drums roll, and he comes across the rope which is suspended over
the treacherous part of the falls -- blindfolded!! And he makes it across easily. He then makes the return trip blindfolded and
pushing a wheelbarrow! The crowds go wild, and he comes to the promoter and
says, "Well, Mr. Promoter, now do you believe I can do it?"
"Well of course I do. I mean, I just saw you do it." "No,"
said Tightrope, "do you really believe I can do it?" "Well of
course I do, you just did it." "No, no, no," said Tightrope,
"do you believe I can do it?" "Yes," said Mr. Promoter,
"I believe you can do it." "Good," said Tightrope,
"then you get in the wheel barrow."
Which brings us back to the question, “In whom or
what do you place your trust?”
The Psalmist for today tells of how the sparrow
finds her home in the Temple of the Lord and the swallow builds a nest next to
the altars where she may lay her young.
The birds of the air understand that the core of their being is bound up
in being present with God without pretense or prevarication. Therefore, in the
same way, the Psalmist ends the Psalm with the promise to those who walk with
integrity, “Happy are they who put their trust in the Lord.”
In the first lesson for today, Solomon, in his
prayer of dedication of the Temple as the National Shrine of the Religion of
the Kingdom, suggests that going to the Temple is not a replacement for walking
with integrity with God. He teaches his people that God is found, even by
foreigners, if they put their trust in God, and they can find Peace.
“In whom or what do you place your trust?”
Up until about 5 months
ago, Pat had a thirteen year old car. She
loved it, but she could no longer to put her trust in it, so we bought her a
new car and she trusts it - so far. Janis Joplin used to sing a song she wrote with Michael
McClure and Bob Neuwirth - “O Lord Won’t You Buy Me a Mercedes Benz”. If you watch car commercials, you
know that they appeal to us as symbols of freedom and justification which is
how the author Flannery O’Connor uses cars in her stories. In her novel Wise Blood, the hero Hazel Motes, who,
having bad experiences in the war is fed up with God, begins to set himself up
as a prophet against God, saying “I'm a member and preacher to that church
where the blind don't see and the lame don't walk and what's dead stays that
way.” He gets himself a beat-up car as a
mobile pulpit and proclaims, “A man with a good car doesn’t need salvation!” Of
course you know Hazel and his car will soon be parted three-quarters of the way
through the book.
“In whom or what do you place your trust?”
I have a credit card which I pay
off every month so I won’t have to pay any interest and which I use to earn
mileage points to be able to fly out to see my daughter. I trust my economic
system. However, last month on vacation as I was driving across Canada, I got a
text message on my phone from my credit card company. They wanted to talk to me
about six charges of all the same amount to a series of places in Italy.
Apparently someone had been able to hijack my information and was making
charges. It would be nice if nothing bad ever happened to us, but that is not
the world we live in. The writer of the Letter to the Ephesians passage for
today teaches the readers that trust in the Lord is a daily exercise and uses
those wonderful images of putting on the full armor of God for the protection
of our soul. The armor is not used for aggression but a daily stewardship of
the relationship of trust in God to withstand what Hamlet will later cite:
For who would
bear the whips and scorns of time,
Th' oppressor’s
wrong, the proud man’s contumely,
The pangs of
despised love, the law’s delay,
The insolence of
office, and the spurns
That patient
merit of th' unworthy takes,
“In whom or what do you place your trust?”
Placing Trust (Poem)
The
Lottery would be nice to win
but
not the Measly Million flaunt
but
higher than the Donald when
saying
whatever I choose to want
so never having to worry again.
A
Mercedes could be comfortable
always
trusting German engineering
to
always be real sure I am in control
for
all roads I ride on be domineering
never having to worry about my soul.
As
I clutch and squeeze out of that fear
of
watery trust slipping through fingers.
Imaging
old me, on empty heath like Lear,
railing
that more is never enough lingers
as I wonder who or what do I hold dear?
No comments:
Post a Comment