You and I are called-out and sent as God’s anointed in the world, anchored on the moving foundation of God’s love in Christ; and even death can’t stop such a church.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 21 A
Texts: Isaiah 51:1-6; Romans 12:1-8; Matthew 16:13-20

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

Listen to me, you people who pursue righteousness, Isaiah says.

Listen, you who seek the God-Who-Is. You who long for God to take the beauty and wonder that we see every day in the creation and apply it to the barrenness and devastation we also see in our world, apply it to our society and culture and life together on this planet. Listen, Isaiah says: to find that, look to the rock you came from, the quarry from which you were cut. The Rock that is your God.

Then God’s voice takes over: Listen to me, God says. I will bring salvation, deliverance, justice as a light to all people. What you hope for, I will do, God says. This is the rock our hope stands on.

And today the Son of God seems to repeat that promise. The rock on which I build my church, says Jesus, God-with-us, is so strong nothing can prevail against it.

But Jesus may be seeing it differently.

Jesus speaks of the “church,” the ecclesia, literally “the ones called out.” He says the gates of Hades cannot prevail against such a called-out community of God’s people. Hades to the Greeks is like Sheol to the Hebrews – not a place of punishment, just the place people go when they die. So Jesus says here the church will be sent to the very gates of death itself and break them. The church is moving, according to Jesus.

So, we are built on a rock, the trust we share with Peter that Jesus is God’s Christ, God’s anointed. But we’re not supposed to huddle up as church in our fortress on that rock, defending ourselves there. To be church is to be called out and sent. So we’re on the offense here, riding on a moveable foundation – the rock of our trust in God’s Anointed One – to bring God’s light and love and healing to the places of death and shadow and pain in this world.

To do this, Paul says God will transform you for this work, if you allow it.

Paul urges, “don’t be conformed to this age,” and that makes sense. If you and I are called out and sent into the suffering and pain of the world to bring God’s healing and restoration, we have to be different than what causes that suffering and pain. It does no good if we’re sent out and act in ways that perpetuate oppression, violence, suffering, the death we are sent to break through. We need to be different.

And that’s the hope: you can be transformed by God in Christ. So can I and all who follow Christ. Be transformed, Paul says – it’s not something you do, it’s done to you by God in Christ. Be made different, Paul says. Let God make you into Christ. And you will be part of God’s restoration and healing as Isaiah sees.

And every single transformed child of God is needed, Paul says.

You and I, and all anointed to be Christ in the world, are all part of one body, the Church. The called-out ones.

But we’re also all different, and that diversity is gift and blessing. To bring about the restoration God promises, it will need all kinds of people, all kinds of gifts. This is a world-changing plan.

So, Paul says, God needs people with compassion. And God gives some that gift. God needs people who are good at encouraging. God gives some that gift.

God needs people who are prophetic, who hear God and speak that word. God needs people who can teach, people who are generous in their giving, people who are able to minister to others. And God gives all those gifts, as needed for the plan. And many more gifts are needed, and are given – Paul’s list is only partial.

So our diversity, your difference, is critical, absolutely necessary to the plan of healing all things.

Now, we don’t hear it today, but this calling out and sending is a difficult path.

We only heard the first half of this Gospel story and the first half of Paul’s proclamation to the Romans. Next week we’ll hear the next parts of both. Next week Jesus will say he will suffer and die to break the gates of death, and asks all who follow to be ready to take up their lives of love sacrificial, too. Next week Paul will put a shape to the transformed life, a life of self-giving love, of honoring others, of peace-making. All very challenging, all costly.

Peter’s problem with this suffering path is evident next week. But we all have those moments where it seems too much for us to handle. So remember it’s fully part of what today’s readings call us to be and do.

For now, though, hear the joy.

You who pursue righteousness, who seek the God-Who-Is, rejoice. God is restoring and healing all things. Through your transformed mind and heart, and your specific gifts and calling. Through mine. Through all God’s anointed Christs in the world. And the gates of death can’t stop this – no oppression, no evil, no structures, no systems – nothing can stop the called-out anointed ones who bear Christ in the world.

And maybe you’ve realized what this also means – if the gates of death can’t keep out this love in this life, they’ve got no chance to stop God’s love in your death or mine. This promise of God we trust is also the foundation that moves with you through your death into the life that is to come. So you never need to be afraid.

Because nothing harmful can prevail against such transformed servants of God, against the love of God in Christ Jesus that is moving out into the world for the life of all things.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

You have a voice, God hears you and will answer; but everyone else has a voice, too, all are welcome, so you’ll want to get on that path.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 20 A
Text: Matthew 15:(10-20)21-28

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

This is absolutely clear and certain: from very early in the Church’s life, the mission was to all people, Jews and non-Jews.

It began with Jesus, God-with-us, who reached out inside and outside Jewish boundaries, and it continued in the early Church with the ministries of Philip and Paul, and then beyond. This wasn’t without conflict and tension. Many of Paul’s communities struggled to live into this multi-cultural life in Christ. The Jewish Christian leadership in Jerusalem needed convincing. But from nearly the beginning, the mission was to all people on earth.

The question is, when did Jesus know that? Luke and John suggest this was the plan from the start, John reaching back to the creation itself, Luke foreshadowing it before Jesus’ birth, and making it clear in Jesus’ first sermon. But Matthew and Mark seem to see it differently. Before this, there’s a healing of a centurion’s servant in Matthew, and in both Mark and Matthew a Gentile demoniac is healed. But the mission is overwhelmingly to the Jewish people so far.

Only Matthew and Mark tell today’s story, and it feels like a turning point. In their narratives, this is when Jesus truly embraces a new path, re-focusing the entire Christian mission in the world.

Which means this woman is the one you really need to be looking at.

She’s Canaanite, not Israelite. She’s definitively outside every boundary Jesus and his followers have. She has no standing with them, no voice, no power, no reason they should heed her. Yet she’s heard enough of this Jewish rabbi that she knows this man might have an answer to her desperation over her daughter’s mental and spiritual health. So she comes and asks for help.

First Jesus seems to ignore her. Then, when the disciples want her sent away, he appears to affirm them, saying, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.” In effect, “she’s not my problem.”

But she won’t have that.

2,000 years before “and yet, she persisted,” Matthew anticipates that bravery. He starts verse 25: “But she came.” She came? She was already there. Which means after verse 24 and Jesus’ declaration, the disciples started moving her out of Jesus’ presence. But she came. Pushed them aside. Did what she had to do.

She claimed her voice, her right to ask. And in response, Jesus uses an unmistakable racial slur, saying you don’t take children’s food and give it to dogs. You don’t need to grasp ancient idioms to hear how horrible and indefensible that is. It would be just as insulting and awful for anyone to compare human beings that way today. And people do that today.

But she came. Even when Jesus called her a dog, this marvelous, beautiful woman claimed her voice again, said, “fine, call me a dog. But even dogs get crumbs.” And she broke Jesus. For the second and last time in Matthew, Jesus praises someone’s faith, and once again it’s a Gentile. Second time’s the charm, because now Jesus is changed. She reminds him of his love for all God’s children, and that she herself is a beloved child of God. He hears her. He heals her daughter.

And the floodgates open.

From here, Jesus immediately continues around the north side of the Sea of Galilee, in Gentile territory, and does all kinds of healings and exorcisms. Then he feeds another huge crowd, this time 4,000 or more, all Gentiles. The abundance of God’s bread of life is now for all the world.

She started that. She might be the most important person in the history of the Church. And if you’re troubled by Jesus’ language, and you should be, please note the very rare thing Jesus does: he hears the powerless person and changes his mind and direction. The insult, the rejection of someone who isn’t his concern, people in power do that all the time. But Jesus listens, and this woman changes his mind. And the world was never the same.

There are two things to note:

First, if you’ve been marginalized, oppressed, your voice has been disregarded, she’s your hero.

If people’ve ignored you, your gifts, your thoughts, your opinions, if your suffering or experience has been discounted because of who you are, or because you were raising inconvenient and threatening things to people in power, this woman says, just keep coming.

Claim your voice. Ask your question. Tell your truth. Even if followers of God’s Christ push you away, ignore you, marginalize you, even if God seems to, don’t let them. Be the one of whom the narrator says, “but she came.” Because God will hear you, and you may even change God’s mind. Your voice counts, you count, and you are beloved child of God.

But if you’re a follower of this Christ, God-with-us, learn from this.

If you’re following Jesus, and wish he’d send away all the people with inconvenient voices, all who don’t believe as you do or think as you do or look like you or act like you, watch Jesus carefully here.

If you’re tired of people saying they’d like you to use different language to refer to them, tired of people calling you privileged, tired of people talking about their suffering and saying they experience a very different world than you; if you’re tired of those saying they don’t feel safe with the same police you’ve always trusted; if you wish all these voices would go away so you could just be with Jesus, watch Jesus very carefully here.

Because this is where God-with-us takes a fork in the road. And that path is going to lead further and further away if you miss the turns he makes.

The road of Christ divides here, whether it was new to Jesus or always the plan.

The Triune God who lived among us as Jesus, the Incarnate One, and now lives among us as the Holy Spirit in each of us, is also living and moving in all people. Because all people are God’s children, not dogs.

This is the mission. And the one you’re following is going on this divergent road. Along with all those voices that are inconvenient and challenging, with all those who change God’s mind from time to time. There’s every reason in the world to follow Jesus on his fork in the road and absolutely none to stay in the other direction. One way leads to life for you and for all. The other leads to death, because there is no hope or love or joy on it.

And remember: the good news is for all. Even if you’re worried about taking this diverging road, even you can come to God, claim your voice, and be heard. Because you, and all, are beloved children of God.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

What if we sang the Magnificat in a way that we didn’t have winners and losers, but all at the same level of God’s grace and love, all fed, all sheltered, all whole?

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The feast of St. Mary, Mother of Our Lord
Texts: Luke 1:46-55, Isaiah 61:7-11

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

What if Mary’s not singing about winners and losers?

What if God’s reign isn’t a competition? What if the Magnificat is not a call to revolution that puts new people in positions of dominance and power-over, but something else?

Even for those of us who delight in Mary’s song, who on this Tuesday night have come to worship the Triune God and to remember and honor the young woman who bore God’s Son into the world, even for us, so much a part of our western culture’s addiction to success and winning at all costs, it’s a struggle to hear Mary in any other way than winning and losing.

So we hear Mary’s song as a blast against all who are on top. Turn the world upside down, God. Knock down the mighty. Throw away the rich. Let other people run the world, and punish those who get pushed off their high seats.

But what if that’s not what Mary’s singing? What if God’s reign isn’t about making new winners and new losers, but about something much more profound and beautiful and even a little scary?

Most western theologians see the Magnificat as revolutionary.

But some women theologians, many from oppressed and marginalized cultures, sing a different song when they sing with Mary. They remind us that oppression damages both the oppressed and the oppressors, and simply reversing those roles only continues the abuse and suffering. Just with different people doing it.

What we hear from these voices is that God is bringing through Mary and her son a new world where all are on the same level. All fed. All blessed. All secure. A world where the common good is the ideal. One female theologian has called Mary’s song the “Great Equalizing,” rather than the “Great Reversal.”

Maybe if we heard Mary this way, we might truly find the joy that vibrates through her song. The joy Isaiah gets from God causing righteousness and praise to spring up before all nations.

It turns out this is what Mary’s son taught, too. That should count for something.

Her boy said that all God’s law was fulfilled in loving God with all you have and loving your neighbor as you love yourself.

Loving your neighbor as you love yourself. If you live in a culture like ours which promotes and rewards selfishness and self-centeredness, do you see how radical such a call is? Whatever love you have for your status, your life, your world, your family – have that for your neighbor. (And who is my neighbor, you ask? Well, Mary’s son told you that pretty clearly, too.)

Mary sees a world shaped by love of neighbor, a love for each other like what you have for your own life. Where you can’t bear eating when someone you love is starving. You can’t stand living in a house when so many you love can’t afford one. You can’t stomach earning more than you need to live while others you love work their hands to the bone and still see their children suffer.

Everything Jesus teaches shows he’s not interested in shoving some people into the dirt and lifting up others. He feeds thousands with a few loaves and fish, regardless of their ability to pay. He offers God’s love to rich insiders and destitute outsiders. He saves his anger for those religious teachers who know God’s priorities, but crush God’s people, laying unfair and unshared burdens on them. And even those he invites to join the common good of love for all.

Those of us who are rich aren’t off the hook in this way of singing. But it’s different.

The dirty secret to hearing Mary’s song as overthrowing those on top is we conveniently ignore this overturning in our daily lives. There’s a dissociation between what we think Mary sings and how we actually live in the world and hope the world will be. That’s because most of us with privilege don’t like the idea of being cast to the ground. Singing Mary’s song this way becomes a lie, because if we’re honest, we don’t want that revolution.

Now, if God’s reign is truly a great equalizing instead, there’ll be changes, too. Changes we’ll feel and know and experience. So we might resist them, too. But if it’s not about winners and losers, what might happen if we let the common good, this dream of God, change us for the sake of all?

Take taxes. Even the most magnanimous of us are happy to take whatever tax breaks we can. And yes, government leaders need to spend tax dollars wisely and carefully and avoid corruption.

But what if we boldly proclaimed our support of our taxation, because it led to the good of all? Instead of complaining, or letting others dominate the nation’s stage declaring as an absolute truth that all taxes are bad, all government is bad, what if we said, “we’re glad to share. We’ll share more. And we need to work together.”

Because here’s a truth about Mary’s song. If every congregation in Minneapolis started a food bank, we’d still have starving people. If every congregation in Minneapolis bought a house and refurbished it and rented it out affordably, we’d still have thousands homeless.

But if we change a law that makes wages fair, or housing affordable, or school meals free, we can affect the lives of thousands, even millions. If we build housing and infrastructure with our taxes, if we support those who dismantle unfair housing practices and the embedded racism in our structures, if we insist that our cities not create gangs of armed soldiers to enforce our prejudice and ease our fear, but rather officers who truly protect all – starting with the most vulnerable – if we do all these things, it will cost us. Cost me. Cost you.

But I won’t be a loser. Neither will you. Those of us who have so much won’t be thrown away. We’ll come down to a level that’s sustainable for all, workable for all. A common good, no winners, no losers. Just a holy grace that Mary so beautifully sees.

But remember: Mary says God is doing this.

So does her son. We can hesitate and resist moving toward this reign of God. We can actively work against it. We can try our best to live into it. But God is doing it. God’s Spirit is moving in this world to make it happen.

Through those who teach us to listen and sing differently. Through all who live in the gracious “yes” that Mary modeled, and bear God’s life into the world. Through all who follow Mary’s Son in the path of love of God and love of neighbor. God’s promises are going to happen, Mary says. So, do you want to be a part of all this joy?

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen