HARD SAYINGS — DIFFICULT TRUTHS

James 5:1-20; Mark 9:38:50

5th Sunday of the Season of Creation, September 29, 2024

Rev. Dr. Ritva  H. Williams

Last Sunday we left Jesus standing with a child in arms surrounded by his disciples, proclaiming, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me” (Mark 9:37). Christ declares that this trusting little one  — weak and helpless, dependent and vulnerable, with no skills or accomplishments to boast about —  is “a sacrament of God’s presence.” God comes to us in, with, and through the least, the last, and the lost as we welcome and receive them in Christ’s name.

Jesus barely finishes speaking, when disciple John interrupts, “Ahem … Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us” (9:38). In the space of one sentence, we move from the sublime to the … rude and ridiculous …  John clearly has not been paying attention. Lost in his own thoughts, obsessed by the existence of this unauthorized healer using Jesus’ name, wanting affirmation, he interrupts Jesus.

Jesus shakes his head, closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and answers, “Do not stop him! … Whoever is not against us is for us.” This wasn’t the answer John was hoping for, but it is one we all need to hear. We are to adopt a broadminded attitude toward those who are not part of our of our own little faith community.  We are to graciously accept all whose perceptions and actions of healing, caring for and alleviating the suffering of humans genuinely conform to the character of Christ. 

Let’s return to the gospel reading. Jesus still holding the child — that lovely sacrament of God’s presence — warns the disciples about the consequences of harming “these trusting little ones.” What follows are some “hard sayings” — difficult truths — we need to wrestle with. To understand Jesus’ message we need to know two things.

 1. Ancient Israelites understood that all human beings, like God, think, speak and act. Hands and feet act out human thoughts and plans.  Eyes perceive the world through the lens of emotion filled thoughts emanating from the heart.  The human heart as we have learned from Jesus and James is the source both good and evil desires, loving and malicious thoughts. Here Jesus urges us to get rid of the perceptions, ideas and thoughts we use to justify harmful and destructive actions against “these trusting little ones.” And stop harming others. 

2. You might have noticed that in my reading of the Gospel, I used the word “Gehenna” instead of hell. Why? That’s what the original Greek says. Gehenna was not hell, it was a valley outside the city of Jerusalem. Long before Jesus, it was a place where human sacrifices were offered to a god called Moloch. Later the valley was used as a trash dump where fires burned, constantly fed by garbage. Jesus’ point is that our evil thoughts and perceptions, words and actions are so much garbage. If we don’t get rid of them, they will consume us.

The fires of Gehenna eventually came to represent spiritual purification, like refiner’s fire, burning away dross to reveal precious metal. I imagine the fires of Gehenna as akin to our modern systems of turning trash into usable fuel. As we get rid of the ignorance and confusion, bitter envy and self-ambition at the root of our harmful perceptions and actions, we release the spiritual energy that empowers us to heal and nourish “these trusting little ones.”

This is why Jesus says “everyone will be salted with fire,” and reminds us that “salt is good.” Yet salt can lose its saltiness by being watered down. Jesus wants us to be salty, to be true to who we are — humans created in God’s image — open to the Spirit that breathes in all of us without exception, and commit ourselves to bringing out the best in each other. 

Once again the Holy Spirit is working mysteriously through the Revised Common Lectionary (a collaborative project of many Christian churches) to present us with a gospel reading appropriate for this day when we remember and honor native children who suffered and died in residential schools. Although you and I are not personally responsible for creating that horrific system, it has been left to us to clean up the mess as best we can. To acknowledge the intergenerational pain and suffering, destruction of family and tribal relationships, and loss of cultural heritage. To do the hard work of getting rid of our own racial and religious supremacist perceptions, so that we can walk together with our native American, Black, brown, people of color, LGBTQIA+, differently abled neighbors into healing, wholeness, and peace. 

Let me close with this poem by Pastor Steve Garnaas-Holmes. It is called “Tear Them Out” (unfoldinglight.org)

Jesus is not just talking to individuals, but to all of us, to the body politic:
Cut off the social structures that cause us to hurt one another.

Root out the structures that cause us to stumble, that give us excuses to demean and abuse people, that make it easy to treat others unlike how we would treat Christ. 

Cut off the hand of greed and “getting ahead,” the worship of profit and the enshrining of the rich, the inviolability of large corporations, the placing of our comfort over the well-being of others.

Cut off the foot of militarism, violence, and domination that excuses our murder of children,
and the continual preparation to do so, that harms others to keep us “safe.”

Tear out the eye of racism and sexism, of xenophobia and the disparaging of the poor
that sees some people as less worthy, so we may ignore, imprison, exploit, or eliminate them.

We don't sin because we want to; 

we sin because certain “body parts” of our society  make sin seem right and good.
We haven't begun to repent until we tear them out.

ORANGE SHIRT DAY (explanation provided during the announcements)

As a congregation committed to the work of anti-racism, today we observe the 10th anniversary of Orange Shirt Day. This movement was started by Phyllis Webstad whose newly purchased orange shirt was stripped from her body the first day of school in 1973 and never returned.  The orange shirt represents all that was lost, including even their lives, by native children forced into Indian boarding schools.

In May 2022, the Bureau of Indian Affairs released the initial results of its investigation into federal Indian boarding schools. The report documents the establishment and operation of these schools from 1819-1970. The goal was to culturally assimilate native children by forcibly removing them from their families, communities, languages, religions, and cultural beliefs. These schools were overcrowded and lacked access to health care. All of the children were traumatized, victims of physical, sexual or emotional abuse, often malnourished and sick. Many died.

Of the 408 federal Indian boarding schools named in the study, 50% were affiliated with Christian religious organizations. The government drained trust funds created to steward Indian wealth deriving from the sale of their lands to finance the boarding schools. Courts ruled that the federal prohibition of funding religious schools did not apply to Indian treaty funds.

To-date BIA investigation has identified both marked and unmarked burial sites at 53 of these schools. 19 schools account for over 500 child deaths. These numbers are expected to increase as the investigation continues. Since 2022, the ELCA has established a truth-seeking and truth-telling taskforce to comb through the archives of its predecessor churches to discover when, where, and how Lutherans were involved in Indian boarding schools. (next week’s adult ed session)

Vibrant God, your creation explodes with the colors of the rainbow, your peoples reveal the beauty of diversity.Today we remember the children forced into Indian boarding schools. We lament the destruction of their dignity and self-worth. We mourn for their spirits crushed and futures compromised. We grieve the children who died. O God, help us tell the stories of resistance that make us stronger, build the bonds of solidarity to ensure “never again.”We pray in the name of the Christ who comes as a child among us.
Amen.