Sunday, November 11, 2007

Living the Questions....

A Reflection on Luke 20:27-38, Proper 27C

One New Year's Day, in the Tournament of Roses parade, a beautiful float suddenly sputtered and quit.

It was out of gas.

The whole parade was held up until someone could get a can of gas.
(C. Neil Strait, Minister’s Manuel, 1994, 315).

The irony is, the float was sponsored by and represented an oil company. A primary symbol of American Society, the status quo, fails…

Which is both funny and thought provoking….

Our vestry meets 10 months out of the year on the second Thursday of the month. We begin every meeting with a Bible study, usually pondering the Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday. In this Bible study we ponder the reading from the perspective of three questions. The first time we read it through we listen for what word or phrase stands out for us. Our response, usually after a few minutes of bewildered contemplation, is the sharing of a few words.

So for instance, at the vestry meeting on Thursday we contemplated today’s Gospel, and we heard things like:

“all of them are alive;” or

“Some of the Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to Jesus and asked him a question…”

We don’t explain why the word or phrase stands out. We just say it, the sign of the Spirit speaking to us. Then we read the lesson a second time, using another interpretation of scripture…

This time we are listening to what the passage is saying to the people of "Small Church." Then we read it a third time listening to what the Spirit is saying to us, the vestry, the leaders of "Small Church."

Each time we read it we use a different interpretation. Usually we use the New International Version, The Message, and the one we use on Sunday morning, The New Revised Standard Version. Each version offers us a slightly, or radically, different understanding of the lesson.

So, each read through is from a different interpretation pondering different questions.

These help us to enter into the reading in ever deeper ways.

We begin our vestry meeting with scripture so that we can shape and form the work we do in scripture and prayer.

Now, it’s true that some nights the reading “speaks” to us in fairly clear terms. But other nights, like last Thursday’s vestry meeting, the reading seems obtuse – we are getting nothing out of it.

And I don’t help. I don’t jump in and unpack the reading. I don’t add commentary on what the “Scholars” say about the reading. I let us wallow in it and muddle through the confusion. Because often that is when and where the Spirit will speak to us.

We went through the first question and then second with very little ability to engage in the reading and gain any insight.

Gosh, we thought, this is a tough reading. What we “hear” Jesus saying about the resurrection is just not what we want to think.

We want the resurrection to be about being with our family and loved ones.

We want the resurrection to be about living again, about new life.

We want the resurrection to be about hope.

Then, suddenly, we had some insight. One of the vestry members suggested that the reading was not really what it seemed to be about. It isn’t about marriage and it isn’t about what happens in the resurrection. Sure, marriage is used as the example, but with the intent of pointing us elsewhere.

The message is pointing us to stop thinking about things in the same old way. The point of the reading is that we should not be satisfied with the status quo. We need to be careful about choosing things that allow us to remain in our comfort zones.

The kingdom of God is about a new thing…

So, marriage is a prime example of what is “normal” in our society. This is true even as 50% of all marriages end in divorce. And it’s true even as many people refuse to get married.

The common mind of our society is slightly suspicious of anyone in power or authority who has not been married.

Think about, for instance, what it might be like to consider for President a person who was not married, never had been. Or was divorced? The Sunday night soap, Brothers and Sisters is looking at this very issue.

It goes against our standards of what is “normal,” what is “trustworthy.”

So the vestry member was on to something.

The reading was not about marriage, but about the status quo…

In this reading marriage is a metaphor for what we know, what we are familiar with, what feels “normal”. We need to stop worrying about how able we are to maintain the normal way of life. The kingdom of God is not about maintaining the status quo.

Jesus has come to do a new thing.

We need to stop sweating the small stuff that locks us into, and limits us to what we think is normal.

Jesus is telling us we need to learn to think outside the box.

In Jesus’ day the Sadducees were just beginning to think about resurrection, about what happens after we die.

Then and now many people think life just ends when we die.

But this Gospel conversation about the resurrection explodes this idea. Blows it wide open. But again, just like this reading is not about marriage, it is also not about resurrection.

It is about God and how we understand our lives as a people of faith.

When Jesus speaks to the Sadducees he is saying that their rendition of reality is stifled; he offers an alternate view of the after life as a way of pointing us to understand our lives today.

Jesus offers them a way of thinking outside the box.

As he always does Jesus takes their question and turns it upside down.

Have you read Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet?

In it an aspiring poet from America writes the famous poet Rilke in Germany with questions about his art. In one of his replies, Rilke writes,

“Love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language.

Live the questions now.

Perhaps then someday far in the future, you will gradually...live your way into the answer.”

So, what Jesus does is offer them a revelation of “uncertainty.” By Jesus telling them this version he shakes loose the version of known reality and offers up a radically different one…

True, the one Jesus offers may be more filled with questions than certitude.

But, that would be the point.

What does life look like if we think out side the box?

What does life look like if we stop seeing the differences in the color of our skin?How many times do we use skin color as a way to describe someone?

“there was this African-American….”

“She is an Hispanic…”

“He is Asian…”

Rarely do we feel inclined to say, “That white guy?” Because white is normative…

I hope we see the irony in the events of our Diocesan Convention.

We spent Friday afternoon debating the merits of supporting people of color.

We considered the need to make anti-racism training up front and center in our diocesan budget and in the lives of our parishes. The resolution on this issue passed with very little dissension.

We spent a good amount of time debating the merits of asking General Convention in 2009 to rescind resolution B033. This resolution, passed in the final moments of General Convention 2006, makes a statement about who we will confirm as Bishop in the Episcopal Church.

We argued thoughtfully about why we need to rethink this. Why we need to find ways to fully embrace our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters and welcome them into the church.

It was an amazing afternoon. The Episcopal Church at its best, struggling to think outside the box. Struggling to embrace a wide berth of what can be possible and normative.

And then the very next day we elect the white guy as our Bishop.

Now. Don’t misunderstand me.

He will be a fine Bishop.

But hear what I am saying in the context of our debates at convention on Friday. We say one thing, but when it comes to action, we move right back to the status quo. To what feels safe and good and right.

Someone at convention asked me, "Do I think our new Bishop will be an agent of change?"

"Sure." I said. "Just like Persell has been able to be an agent of change in this Diocese. But to the world around us, the people who do not really know the day to day stuff of our church, we present once again, a "normal" face. This is who we see as Bishop. In essence the same person who has been elected Bishop the last eleven times."

Living the Gospel is hard work.

And it’s not about the small stuff.

It’s about changing our paradigm of what we think is normal.

It’s about thinking outside the box and following Christ into a new thing.

It’s a cry for us to look carefully at all the ways we get stuck in racism and sexism.

As human beings we slide so comfortably into what feels normal. I do it all the time!In biology we learn that living systems always seek homeostasis. We actively seek to find what we know as “normal.” It’s in our DNA to do this.

But, Jesus seeks to point us in a new direction.

Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to Jesus and asked him a question...

How is it that, in our world today, "we" are the Sadducees?

Naturally, we want the things that feel safe and comfortable. We live in time of radical change and upheaval. It's only natural that we want to be comfortable and "normal."

But, Jesus tells us we need to push back against this. We need to look carefully at what we think is safe and normal.Because eventually the very things we hold up as the status quo run out of gas.

We need to live with the questions.

What is safe?

What is normal?

What does Jesus call us to do?

We need to let the questions sit in our beings and wrestle with our souls and give us sleepless nights like the one I had last night.

“Love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language.

Live the questions now.

Perhaps then someday, far in the future, you will gradually...live your way into a new answer.”

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