Fifteenth Sunday After Pentecost
Proper 17, Year C
Church of the Apostles
Sermon
The Rev. Cynthia P. Brust
August 28, 2016
Thomas Merton wrote, “People may spend their whole lives climbing the
ladder of success only to find, once they reach the top, that the ladder is leaning
against the wrong wall.” Everyone climbs ladders leaning against a variety of
walls.1 Most of these we scale intentionally, like education or developing a talent,
running a marathon, working at a job we love, accomplishing something in life –
good worthy goals.2 Some ladders we climb with more avarice: to get to the top
no matter who we step on; to receive all the acclaim we can – after all we
deserve it; to seek higher and higher income levels and positions of power. Some
ladders we climb just because we never chose another one or because life
throws such curve balls we stay on the ladder onto which we’re thrown. The
rungs of these ladders include addictions, laziness, complacency, distrust,
insecurity, self-absorption, or an unquenchable need for affirmation.3 Current
research demonstrates that a rapidly increasing number of individuals are
rejecting the wall of faith and the Church – a significant percentage simply won’t
approach that ladder and a substantial number of those raised in the Church are
no longer affiliated with any Christian expression of faith.
No matter what, we are climbing a “ladder” in some direction, leaning
against some wall. And if we’re honest – none of these ladders or walls I’ve
described deliver happiness or satisfaction. Why is it that the people we consider
highly successful are so often miserable? They built their ladder against the
1
David Anderson, Finding Your Soul, http://findingyoursoul.com/2012/08/when-the-ladder-of-successleans-against-the-wrong-wall/.
2
http://successify.net/2014/03/18/ladder/.
3
Ibid.
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wrong wall!4 The issue is that we humans have a skewed view and measure of
success; we may define and measure it in different ways, but there is a common
denominator:
We strive to make and ensure our own success!
And from that beginning point, we are guaranteed to climb and climb and
climb…against the wrong wall. It may sound simplistic, but this is really
Jeremiah’s basic message: “People – you’ve climbed the wrong ladder leaning
against the wrong wall; you’ve backed the wrong horse, barked up the wrong
tree.” Choose your favorite idiom, but the bottom line is this:
Judah squandered her rich inheritance and promises.
Today’s Old Testament and Psalm readings hit hard on this theme. As we
discussed last week, in Jeremiah’s 40-year span of ministry, Judah experienced
“the best of time and the worst of times” and the “worst” won out when the nation,
including her kings and religious leaders chose to forsake Yahweh. In today’s
passage, the Lord first confronts the sin of previous generations. He reminds His
people of the way they should have honored him, but chose instead to follow
their own ways.
Thus says the Lord:
What wrong did your ancestors find in me
that they went far from me,
and went after worthless things, and became worthless themselves?
… my people have changed their glory
for something that does not profit”
The people and their appointed leaders traded glory for that which is worthless –
traded the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob who led them out of bondage
through the desert into the Promised Land for idols of Baal. Jeremiah sums up
Judah’s offenses in his time this way:
my people have committed two evils:
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Ibid.
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they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water,
and dug out cisterns for themselves,
cracked cisterns that can hold no water
Forsaking God for worthless idols is self-explanatory, but let’s flesh out this
cistern analogy. The scarcity of springs and rain in Israel made it necessary to
collect rainwater in reservoirs, but the limestone used to line cisterns was fragile
– even a small fissure in the walls could drain a large cistern overnight. God is
condemning neither the construction of cisterns, nor the collection of water
necessary to survive; rather He is condemning the peoples’ prayer to, and
dependence on, false gods and their human knowledge and ability. They had
rested their ladders against the wrong wall, eschewing God and embracing their
own agendas and desires in their own ways.
The Psalmist outlines the consequences of forsaking, giving voice to
Yahweh mournful words…
I gave them over to the stubbornness of their hearts, to follow their own
devices.
Oh, that my people would listen to me!
…and he expresses so very poignantly how it could have been – how God
intended things to be: "Israel would I feed with the finest wheat and satisfy with
honey from the rock”.
Thanks be to God, the love expressed here…this divine intent and promise
would not return to Him void, but it would take His intervention to fulfill the Law
and the prophets. As we move to the Gospel reading appointed for today, I want
to pause and ask you to think about the Incarnation. You might expect me to
focus on the salvific implications for us, but instead, this morning, I want to
emphasize the incredible humility and sacrifice required for God to become flesh
and dwell among us. Think for a moment not on the sacrifice of His death, but
the sacrifice of His taking on human life and setting aside all the glory of the
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heavenly realm to do so. This perspective is important for grasping the full
meaning of our passage from Luke.
For some unknown reason, we begin at chapter 14, verse 1 and then the
lectionary skips verses 2-6 which recount a healing; in fact, it is a remarkably
similar to the story from last week when Jesus healed the crippled woman,
breaking Sabbath law and irritating the leader of the synagogue. It’s another
Sabbath, and this time Jesus has been invited to have dinner at the home of a
“prominent Pharisee.” On the way he encounters “a man suffering from an
abnormal swelling of his body,” often translated as “dropsy.” Knowing how
closely the Pharisees are watching Him, Jesus beats them to the punch, asking
them if it is lawful to heal on the Sabbath. My guess is that this group had heard
about or perhaps even witnessed how Jesus shamed the leader and
congregation who challenged Him, and they remained silent. As He did for the
woman, Jesus healed the man and explained or justified the action by reminding
those watching that they would rescue livestock and children on the Sabbath.
The inference, of course, is – how could one ignore this man’s need? What a
way to start a dinner party!
Once in the house, Jesus “…noticed how the guests chose the places of
honor,” and took advantage of a teaching opportunity. In a parable, he describes
the excruciating embarrassment of one who chooses a perfectly positioned seat
at a dinner table only to be moved by the host to a lesser place, making room for
a more honored guest. The point, Jesus says, is: “For all who exalt themselves
will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted." He then
adds practical, but counter-cultural, advice about entertaining: Don’t invite
“friends, your brothers or sisters, your relatives, or your rich neighbors” who are
sure to return the favor; instead, He said, “invite the poor, the crippled, the lame,
the blind.” Why? Because in so doing you will be blessed.
Remember what I said last week about Jesus’ laser focus on His mission?
And what is that mission? Yes – to proclaim and inaugurate the Kingdom of God.
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Just as He did in healing the crippled woman and the man with dropsy, Jesus is
using the circumstances in which He finds Himself to demonstrate and to teach
the nature of the Kingdom and it’s antithesis to the nature of the fallen world.
Listen to the Lord’s closing words: “Although they cannot repay you [by
increasing your social engagements or status], you will be repaid at the
resurrection of the righteous.” Jesus is not simply calling for humility and warning
against self-serving motivations such as an undignified jockeying for places of
honor, He’s defining the Kingdom of God – it is a Kingdom above all others; a
Kingdom that shatters the status quo of lives and societies; a Kingdom that
extends hope for redemption to all peoples and nations so that there is “…neither
Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for all are
one in Christ Jesus;” a Kingdom that sets us free from bondage; a Kingdom that
is unshakable and eternal. I think He intends to communicate something like,
“Forget dinner parties at the country club, folks – I came to offer you freedom
from sin, evil, suffering, and death; I will come again to give you resurrection
bodies, eternal life, a new heaven with a new earth, and life everlasting!”
There is an additional message here – one that is very important, but
somewhat nuanced. Jesus’ parable about the dinner party teaches us that
Kingdom life is first and foremost a call to follow Him, to model our lives upon
Him, to imitate Him. Just as He humbled Himself, and in sacrificial love, put aside
His glory to take on human flesh and the Cross, so we are to seek not power,
position, self-indulgence, personal agendas, financial security, or social status;
no, we like Jesus are to seek and serve those who through birth, circumstance,
or their own actions find themselves in need – those who are in a physical,
emotional, mental, and spiritual desert with no water in sight. We are also called
to reach out to those who live in a self-achieved paradise that is but a mirage; we
are called to reach out to those who believe that they have all the answers and
reject anything but the wall overlooking here and now, not seeing the cracked
cisterns whose water has long drained away.
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If the Gospel helps us understand the Kingdom perspective, this morning’s
passage from Hebrews offers some practical implications of that perspective –
what it looks like to live our Kingdom values, to be Christ-like. The example
Jesus set is echoed in our Hebrews passage: “…let us continually offer a
sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that confess his name. Do not
neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing
to God.” But the writer of Hebrews gets even more specific:
• Let mutual love continue.
• Show hospitality to strangers,
• Remember those who are in prison… and those who are being tortured,
• Let marriage be held in honor by all, and keep marriage pure
• Keep your lives free from the love of money
• Be content with what you have
Such a framework for our lives sounds daunting, but I believe we need to
embrace it as an incredible privilege, one of the advantages of living the
abundant life Jesus promises – not abundant as consumerism defines it, but in
abundant hope and in loving, authentic ministry in His name, for His sake. The
first step is to undertake spiritual self-assessment and make needed adjustments
in our lives. Where are our ladders leaning? Are we, like those at the tower of
Babel, climbing for our personal gain and fame? Are our ladders on walls of
acquisition where he or she who dies with the most toys or money wins? ///
Or…are our ladders at the foot of the cross where the first are last and the last
first – where we like Jesus put everything of earthly value aside for the sake of
the Kingdom? What is God calling us to give up or take on, to sacrifice?
Today’s readings provide more negative/sin examples of how not to live
then anything else, and so I turn to our Collect of the day for a four-fold charge
for as Jesus’ disciples and witnesses. Note that each of these four is found in the
midst of a prayer – they are petitions and require the work of the Spirit to make
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them a reality. Our part is surrendering. I’m asking you to hold onto this week’s
bulletin, cut out the collect, and put it somewhere you will see it each and every
day. I want these words to be the cry of our hearts as a congregation, for it is
only as we surrender and the Spirit fulfills these petitions in our own lives that we
can be agents of change in anyone else’s life. So each day, I want us to pray that
God, in the name of Jesus and by the power of His Spirit, will…
1. Graft in our hearts the love of His Name;
2. Increase in us true religion;
3. Nourish us with all goodness;
4. Bring forth in us the fruit of good works.
If the “love of God” – His name and His nature are “grafted in our hearts,” we
have a built-in deterrent to forsaking Him. Instead, we will cling to and remember
what He has done through the ages and what He is yet to do. When we pray for
“true religion,” the focus is worship, formation, and practicing an incarnational
presence. It is moving beyond head belief to a personal and corporate faith that
makes us salt and light in the world. True religion cannot be grasped, attained, or
increased through our own efforts, but is be formed as we grow more and more
into the likeness of Christ.
What does it mean to be “nourished by goodness”? First we are nourished
by goodness through the very real presence of God among us – encountering
His perfect goodness feeds us. We are nourished by goodness in our personal
devotional lives and spiritual practices and in our corporate worship. We are
nourished in goodness through the sacrament of bead and wine, body and blood.
We are nourished in goodness within community – comforting and holding one
another accountable. And finally we are nourished in goodness through serving
others with absolutely no thought or expectation of what’s in it for us. That point
provides a nice segue into petition four – for God to bring forth fruits of good
works in us. Our service isn’t a burden of duty but rather a gift of love
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expressed through word and deed, which fills us with joy. Fruits of good works
are by-products that overflow from a changed heart – we will be able to do no
other. The first three petitions change us from the inside out so we can bear fruit
of a transformed life.
Last week I urged us to respond to those in bondage immediately – to
confront evil and be instruments of freedom whenever and wherever needed, just
as Jesus did. This week, I have the same sense of urgency, but from a different
angle. A specific phrase in the Merton quote leapt out at me: “People may spend
their whole lives… their whole lives only to, discover too late that they’re
climbing the leaning against the wrong wall.5 Sisters and brothers, that’s
haunting! We have been given a rich inheritance and promises for abundant life
here and for eternity. May we faithfully invite others to explore and find the right
ladder on the right wall – the wall of faith lived out in a community of faith. We
begin by sharing in word and deed the Good News of – the joy and perfect hope
– of the Kingdom of God. COTA is not for everyone, but share who you know us
to be: a place to find love; a place to belong before you believe; a place
committed to serving this city; a place with a heart for the Kingdom. Invite them to
follow Jesus and then come and see!
Amen? AMEN
5
Anderson.
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