See Luke 19:28-40.
The image of the statue, ropes twined around it, mid-topple, framed by blue skies and crowds of people--- this image is etched in my mind, as are vague memories of tanks rolling through town, so many American flags, and the unbridled triumph in the voices of politicians. This triumphal entry, on April 9, 2003, was fed to us as the signal of the USAmerican victory over an evil-doer. The staged Marine-led toppling of the statue of Saddam Hussein in Firdos Square in Baghdad was narrated to us as a triumph of democracy and goodness and hope. And yet, here I am ten years later, listening to reports of cancer and murder and suicide and I can't seem to find that democracy and goodness and hope we were promised as the statue fell.
Our pro-war propaganda machine tells us that this is how we bring about freedom: tanks and toppling. But there is another Triumphal Entry we celebrate this week that tells us something different. It tells us that God's victory arrives not on a tank but on a lowly colt. It tells us that people shout for joy not because of deeds of military might, but the deeds of power they saw in healing miracles. It recognizes that the one who comes in the name of God comes not in a military uniform but as a political agitator for peace. Jesus came into Jerusalem on the back of a colt promising a different kind of victory, a different kind of freedom than that proclaimed in the ten years since the USA invaded Iraq.
People recognized that difference and it scared them. Some of the Pharisees in the crowd commanded Jesus to stop. On Friday, we will remember the consequences of Jesus' triumphal entry, a crucifixion that resembles more the day to day suffering of Iraqi civilians and abandoned USAmerican veterans suffering from PTSD. And yet, too many of our churches will forget the connections this Holy Week, forget the roots that extend into our own times, tell ourselves that the story we remember is a spiritual story that demands nothing of us but "belief." So I urge you this Palm Sunday to pray. Lift up the cause for peace in Iraq in your congregation's sharing of prayer concerns. Educate yourself about the ongoing struggle in Iraq--- just because the USA has declared the Iraq War over does not mean that the mess and terror of war has been alleviated. And, of course, our government wages war and supports war in many other countries too.
It is our responsibility as Christians to remember Jesus' entry in Jerusalem and the lessons it teaches us of freedom and peace this Holy Week.
---
Shannon Sullivan serves the Deer Creek Charge, a two-point charge in the Baltimore-Washington Conference. She is a graduate of Drew Theological School in Madison, New Jersey, and blogs at You'll Never Guess What the Heathens Did Today.
Showing posts with label peace. Show all posts
Showing posts with label peace. Show all posts
Saturday, March 23, 2013
Thursday, September 22, 2011
No justice? No peace.
A sermon on Luke 13:10-17
by Sarah Hedgis
There are some stories in the Bible where I find myself connecting with a character—really seeing myself in that person, in how she thinks or what he feels. In today’s story of the healing of a crippled woman on the sabbath, I feel an unexpected and, more importantly, a dreaded connection with the indignant synagogue leader.
If we transport this story to our own context, as a seminarian I could very well be the synagogue leader. In fact, I encounter this story in a very different way than I did before starting seminary. Now I must admit that Jesus is not exactly the ideal person to invite to your synagogue or church. The stories of Jesus disrupting services all around town linger in my mind more than they did before. I even experience the opening verse differently: “Now we was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath” (13:10). It sounds like a pretty good opening sentence. As readers, we feel like we have arrived just in time for the action. Except when I hear this line now, I think, “We’re almost done! Nothing has gone wrong yet! Maybe we’re in the clear.”
Then the next verse, “And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years.” What was once a line of suspense is now one of panic. I steal a look over at Jesus and I see his eyes locked on someone in the crowd. “Oh no.”
Before I know what’s happening, the long-time crippled woman (I mean, how did he even see her in the crowd?!) is standing straight and praising God. Then I hear the echoes of a reprimand linger in the air, the reprimanding reminder that “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the Sabbath day”—I try not to gasp when I realize the voice ringing in the air is my own, the finger pointed at the woman and Jesus is attached to my hand, my arm...to me.
In some ways, the perspectives of the healed woman and the synagogue leader are completely different. When we hear the story, one is good and one is bad. One is open to God’s healing and the other is not. One is honored and the other is shamed.
Yet, I go back to the moment when these two characters meet, when they’re lives really intersect. I cannot get over what it must have been like when the woman realized she was standing upright—realized that she was no longer looking at the feet but into the face of Jesus.
Our story in Luke is nestled in-between parables describing the Kingdom of heaven growing or rising up, and the woman’s healing has this same movement. She was once hunched and bent and bound but is now healed, freed, and straightened. Seeing the world in a way—from a perspective—she had long given up on, the woman takes her first glimpse at the kingdom of God...and it is anger.
The NRSV uses the word indignant to describe the synagogue leader’s reaction, a word that just feels mean, and is defined as expressing displeasure at something considered unjust, offensive, or insulting. After 18 years, the woman is finally seen, but she is seen as offensive. After 18 years, the woman can finally see, but her first sight is the synagogue leader and Jesus engaged in an argument.
Is this really the kingdom of God?
It is in this moment that both the woman and the synagogue leader connect—in her vulnerable visibility and his enflamed indignation—in this moment, both wish that Jesus had not come into their synagogue. And we, as the readers, feel the tension! It only intensifies as Jesus responds with a teaching that solicits cheers from many in the crowd and causes shame for the others who are named his opponents.
And the story ends here—in division and conflict. Jesus keeps moving to Jerusalem, and we remember that he is moving us towards and preparing us for the kingdom through the cross. We look back to make sure Jesus did not take a wrong turn, read from the wrong cue card, or forget to resolve the problem that lingers over us in Luke 13:17. But when we look back, we see just one chapter before-our-story these words: "Do you think I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!" (Luke 12:51). And again we wonder, "Is this really good news?"
Last Friday I went to Woodruff Park with several other Candler students to walk with and for Troy Davis, a name I think we have all become familiar with over the last few days. I squeezed into the crowd and started toward Ebenezer Baptist church. While we were walking, many of us sang and chanted together. After a short silence, I heard someone start a chant that I recognized. "No justice?" he cried— "No peace!" we responded. The first time I heard this chant was when I was working with Interfaith Worker Justice last summer. We were marching with Hyatt hotel workers who were on strike, and I heard that same exchange: “No justice?” “No peace!” It made my skin crawl. This is too threatening, I thought. The language is too strong. It’s probably offensive to the management!
When I heard it last Friday, it did not sound like a threat or an offense or even an angry outcry. It sounded, well, true. There cannot be real peace without justice. There can be silence without justice, forced silence or accepted silence. There can be politeness without justice and smiles without justice. There can be perfectly good worship services without justice. There can also be unnoticed burdens and unexamined routine without justice. But there can’t really be peace without justice.
"No justice? No peace!" It is a truth that also sounds a lot like Jesus' teaching about watering oxen and donkeys on the sabbath. They both have meanings that are easy to recognize but hard to hear, hard to look up and see, and hard to accept. Yet, it is the only teaching Jesus offers. Regardless of our ease or difficulty, the kingdom of God will not settle or be compromised, even when we all wish that it might.
The kingdom of God rejects compromised teachings upheld by paraphrased commandments that point to routine instead of reason. “There is no peace without justice,” Jesus says to the synagogue leader who cannot understand why Jesus could not wait one more day to heal the woman.
The kingdom of God rejects compromised peace that settles for pleasing the majority or the most powerful when there are those left unseen and uncared for. “There is no peace without justice,” Jesus says to the woman who is starting to doubt whether her healing was worth all of the trouble it is bringing to those around her.
The kingdom of God rejects compromised justice that settles for peace-through-revenge and offers this false promise of comfort to those who suffer. “There is no peace without justice,” Jesus says to those who would match a devastating death with an additional devastating death.
I attend a Faith and Justice small group at my church. Yesterday, our leader sent out an email about Troy Davis. He wrote, "It is ironic that this controversial execution has been scheduled to occur during the Wednesday evening "church hour" in a state that prides itself on its Baptist/Methodist religious heritage. So as Troy takes his final steps, and then is put to death Wednesday evening in Jackson, Christians in many places, including here in Decatur, will be gathered to go about our usual and sundry activities of food, fellowship, prayer, and study. I doubt that many people of faith in our state would rise to cheer for an execution. But for the most part, we will simply 'sing louder,' allowing ourselves to ignore what we would prefer not to have to know. In that isolation, we may fail to be a witness for God's promise of redemption and command of love."
When I started preparing for this sermon on Monday morning, I imagined that we would be celebrating another glimpse of the Kingdom of God on earth—another story about how God refuses to compromise over the lives of God’s children. But last night Troy Davis was killed, and once again we fail to be God’s witnesses; we ignore what we would rather not know; we compromise, we settle.
But the kingdom of God does not. And this is the good news.
That amidst the division, conflict, fear, and shame that we bind ourselves in through our rejection of the kingdom of God, a rejection that affects us all, from the praising woman to the ashamed leader . . . amidst all this, there is still—there is always—one uncompromised promise: "No justice? No peace."
Closing Prayer: God of love, giver of life, you know our frailties and failings. You know our compromises. Give us your grace to overcome them, keep us from those things that harm us and others, and guide us in the way of salvation through Jesus Christ, our uncompromising Savior and Lord.
---
Sarah Hedgis is a 3rd-year Master of Divinity student at Candler School of Theology. She is originally from Rome, Georgia but now calls Atlanta home. At Candler, Sarah works for the Office of Worship and serves on Candler Coordinating Council. Sarah loves Hebrew Bible/Old Testament and exploring how the stories of our traditions and the stories of our lives interact.
by Sarah Hedgis
There are some stories in the Bible where I find myself connecting with a character—really seeing myself in that person, in how she thinks or what he feels. In today’s story of the healing of a crippled woman on the sabbath, I feel an unexpected and, more importantly, a dreaded connection with the indignant synagogue leader.
If we transport this story to our own context, as a seminarian I could very well be the synagogue leader. In fact, I encounter this story in a very different way than I did before starting seminary. Now I must admit that Jesus is not exactly the ideal person to invite to your synagogue or church. The stories of Jesus disrupting services all around town linger in my mind more than they did before. I even experience the opening verse differently: “Now we was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath” (13:10). It sounds like a pretty good opening sentence. As readers, we feel like we have arrived just in time for the action. Except when I hear this line now, I think, “We’re almost done! Nothing has gone wrong yet! Maybe we’re in the clear.”
Then the next verse, “And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years.” What was once a line of suspense is now one of panic. I steal a look over at Jesus and I see his eyes locked on someone in the crowd. “Oh no.”
Before I know what’s happening, the long-time crippled woman (I mean, how did he even see her in the crowd?!) is standing straight and praising God. Then I hear the echoes of a reprimand linger in the air, the reprimanding reminder that “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the Sabbath day”—I try not to gasp when I realize the voice ringing in the air is my own, the finger pointed at the woman and Jesus is attached to my hand, my arm...to me.
In some ways, the perspectives of the healed woman and the synagogue leader are completely different. When we hear the story, one is good and one is bad. One is open to God’s healing and the other is not. One is honored and the other is shamed.
Yet, I go back to the moment when these two characters meet, when they’re lives really intersect. I cannot get over what it must have been like when the woman realized she was standing upright—realized that she was no longer looking at the feet but into the face of Jesus.
Our story in Luke is nestled in-between parables describing the Kingdom of heaven growing or rising up, and the woman’s healing has this same movement. She was once hunched and bent and bound but is now healed, freed, and straightened. Seeing the world in a way—from a perspective—she had long given up on, the woman takes her first glimpse at the kingdom of God...and it is anger.
The NRSV uses the word indignant to describe the synagogue leader’s reaction, a word that just feels mean, and is defined as expressing displeasure at something considered unjust, offensive, or insulting. After 18 years, the woman is finally seen, but she is seen as offensive. After 18 years, the woman can finally see, but her first sight is the synagogue leader and Jesus engaged in an argument.
Is this really the kingdom of God?
It is in this moment that both the woman and the synagogue leader connect—in her vulnerable visibility and his enflamed indignation—in this moment, both wish that Jesus had not come into their synagogue. And we, as the readers, feel the tension! It only intensifies as Jesus responds with a teaching that solicits cheers from many in the crowd and causes shame for the others who are named his opponents.
And the story ends here—in division and conflict. Jesus keeps moving to Jerusalem, and we remember that he is moving us towards and preparing us for the kingdom through the cross. We look back to make sure Jesus did not take a wrong turn, read from the wrong cue card, or forget to resolve the problem that lingers over us in Luke 13:17. But when we look back, we see just one chapter before-our-story these words: "Do you think I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!" (Luke 12:51). And again we wonder, "Is this really good news?"
Last Friday I went to Woodruff Park with several other Candler students to walk with and for Troy Davis, a name I think we have all become familiar with over the last few days. I squeezed into the crowd and started toward Ebenezer Baptist church. While we were walking, many of us sang and chanted together. After a short silence, I heard someone start a chant that I recognized. "No justice?" he cried— "No peace!" we responded. The first time I heard this chant was when I was working with Interfaith Worker Justice last summer. We were marching with Hyatt hotel workers who were on strike, and I heard that same exchange: “No justice?” “No peace!” It made my skin crawl. This is too threatening, I thought. The language is too strong. It’s probably offensive to the management!
When I heard it last Friday, it did not sound like a threat or an offense or even an angry outcry. It sounded, well, true. There cannot be real peace without justice. There can be silence without justice, forced silence or accepted silence. There can be politeness without justice and smiles without justice. There can be perfectly good worship services without justice. There can also be unnoticed burdens and unexamined routine without justice. But there can’t really be peace without justice.
"No justice? No peace!" It is a truth that also sounds a lot like Jesus' teaching about watering oxen and donkeys on the sabbath. They both have meanings that are easy to recognize but hard to hear, hard to look up and see, and hard to accept. Yet, it is the only teaching Jesus offers. Regardless of our ease or difficulty, the kingdom of God will not settle or be compromised, even when we all wish that it might.
The kingdom of God rejects compromised teachings upheld by paraphrased commandments that point to routine instead of reason. “There is no peace without justice,” Jesus says to the synagogue leader who cannot understand why Jesus could not wait one more day to heal the woman.
The kingdom of God rejects compromised peace that settles for pleasing the majority or the most powerful when there are those left unseen and uncared for. “There is no peace without justice,” Jesus says to the woman who is starting to doubt whether her healing was worth all of the trouble it is bringing to those around her.
The kingdom of God rejects compromised justice that settles for peace-through-revenge and offers this false promise of comfort to those who suffer. “There is no peace without justice,” Jesus says to those who would match a devastating death with an additional devastating death.
I attend a Faith and Justice small group at my church. Yesterday, our leader sent out an email about Troy Davis. He wrote, "It is ironic that this controversial execution has been scheduled to occur during the Wednesday evening "church hour" in a state that prides itself on its Baptist/Methodist religious heritage. So as Troy takes his final steps, and then is put to death Wednesday evening in Jackson, Christians in many places, including here in Decatur, will be gathered to go about our usual and sundry activities of food, fellowship, prayer, and study. I doubt that many people of faith in our state would rise to cheer for an execution. But for the most part, we will simply 'sing louder,' allowing ourselves to ignore what we would prefer not to have to know. In that isolation, we may fail to be a witness for God's promise of redemption and command of love."
When I started preparing for this sermon on Monday morning, I imagined that we would be celebrating another glimpse of the Kingdom of God on earth—another story about how God refuses to compromise over the lives of God’s children. But last night Troy Davis was killed, and once again we fail to be God’s witnesses; we ignore what we would rather not know; we compromise, we settle.
But the kingdom of God does not. And this is the good news.
That amidst the division, conflict, fear, and shame that we bind ourselves in through our rejection of the kingdom of God, a rejection that affects us all, from the praising woman to the ashamed leader . . . amidst all this, there is still—there is always—one uncompromised promise: "No justice? No peace."
Closing Prayer: God of love, giver of life, you know our frailties and failings. You know our compromises. Give us your grace to overcome them, keep us from those things that harm us and others, and guide us in the way of salvation through Jesus Christ, our uncompromising Savior and Lord.
---
Sarah Hedgis is a 3rd-year Master of Divinity student at Candler School of Theology. She is originally from Rome, Georgia but now calls Atlanta home. At Candler, Sarah works for the Office of Worship and serves on Candler Coordinating Council. Sarah loves Hebrew Bible/Old Testament and exploring how the stories of our traditions and the stories of our lives interact.
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