Naken Before God Sermon, 10/14/12

Naked Before God

Nancy Waldo

Ginter Park Baptist Church

Richmond, Virginia

October 14, 2012

Here is our Gospel passage for this morning:

Mark 10:17-31
10:17 As he was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, "Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?"

10:18 Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.

10:19 You know the commandments: 'You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; You shall not defraud; Honor your father and mother.'"

10:20 He said to him, "Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth."

10:21 Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, "You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me."

10:22 When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.

10:23 Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!"

10:24 And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God!

10:25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God."

10:26 They were greatly astounded and said to one another, "Then who can be saved?"

10:27 Jesus looked at them and said, "For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible."

10:28 Peter began to say to him, "Look, we have left everything and followed you."

10:29 Jesus said, "Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields, for my sake and for the sake of the good news,

10:30 who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age--houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields with persecutions--and in the age to come eternal life.

10:31 But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first."

 When I first read the lectionary readings for today, several weeks ago, a theme jumped out at me, which became the title for this sermon.  Please, be comfortable, we are all going to keep our clothes on here.  But I saw this Gospel passage in a new way, when I read it in company with Psalm 22 and several other texts.  I’m not going to include all of the texts, but the one which became the lens for this sermon was from Hebrews 4:13:  “And before God no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom we must render an account.” 

In this Gospel passage, the rich man, one who has kept all the commandments since his youth, kneels before the “Good Teacher.”  Jesus does not accept the label “Good Teacher,” for “no one is good but God alone.”  So there is a challenge right at the beginning of this story.  Jesus, whom we believe came directly from God to be human with us, does not accept this title bestowed on him.  It is a shock to us that not even Jesus, our example of what it means to be God’s child, can be called good.  Or maybe his objection is not so much about being evaluated by others as being good, but about what it means about one’s identity when someone other than God attaches a label to us?

The rich man kneels before Jesus, and this is an important detail, because we see elsewhere in the New Testament (and in our world today) that rich people get to live by different rules than those who are not.  They don’t have to wait in line, they get the best seats, they wear the best clothes every day.  They certainly don’t have to kneel very often to ask questions. When Jesus tells him to “go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor,” he is unable to let go of the material goods that the world uses to define him, the identities that tell him who he is.  He is not free to follow Jesus because he is clinging to those identities.  Jesus loves him anyway, even as the man turns away in shock and grief, and Jesus shows his deep understanding of how hard it can be to trust and depend on God when we have other resources on which to rely.  “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”

Jesus’ disciples found this very difficult to understand, because they knew how important it was in their time to have material resources in a world without any “safety nets.”  Not having money, not being able to earn enough to support your family and pay your taxes, meant you might have to sell yourself or your children into slavery, or for women, that you might have to sell your body to strangers, or that you might be homeless and begging by the side of the road or at the temple gate, completely dependent on the willingness of those more fortunate to share with you what you need in order to stay alive.  It meant losing the sense of security that comes with having enough money to know that you would always be able to pay your bills.  Selling all of one’s possessions to give to the poor would mean you would also become poor, that all the things that made you comfortable and defined you in the eyes of the world would be gone. 

The disciples knew about these implications of what Jesus was asking this man to do, and they wanted credit from Jesus for their own sacrifices, the things they had given up in order to follow him.  I think they also wanted assurance that they would be OK every day and forever, but following Jesus did not and does not mean that we know for sure that we will always be safe, comfortable, well-fed, medical needs taken care of, respected and seen as valuable, productive and responsible members of society.  I’m not sure how reassuring it was for them to hear Jesus say that those who leave everything, including family, for the sake of Jesus and for the sake of the good news, will receive hundredfold—but with persecutions…  He is reversing the world’s criteria for honor and respect, for rank and privilege, and all that it means to be “first.  And in the next paragraph, Jesus foretells his death and resurrection for the third time.

In Psalm 22, which Jesus quotes as he is dying on the cross, after having been shamed, flogged, spat upon, naked and his clothes the stakes in a gambling gave, in pain, thirsty, we hear the pain of not sensing the presence of God, not being able to do anything to escape from suffering, feeling abandoned even by God and desperate for relief. Being faithful to God does not include any guarantees of safety, comfort, needs met, honor from society, or even a constant sense of feeling God’s care and love.  But even in that much pain, the psalmist alternates between expressing suffering and expressing trust in God to rescue, provide and comfort. Prayer moves us from understandable focus on our situation to focus on who God is and what God does because God loves us.  When Jesus prayed this psalm, he was at the end of the journey of trusting God wherever God led—and then a new journey began, within the hearts of those who love him. 

What is the Good News for us in this passage?  How would focusing first and foremost on our identity as beloved children of God change how we live?  How we do church here at Ginter Park?  How we participate in the Body of Christ worldwide and through all time?  I am not advocating that we reject the identities and roles that we associate with being who we are as members of family, church, work, citizens.  They serve necessary purposes.  But we stay in touch with that primary identity through spiritual practices of worship, prayer, community, trust and study that can help us to live with and from the belief that you and I, and all of our brothers and sisters are God’s before we belong to anyone or anything else.  This is our solid foundation for all that we do and say, how we function in the world in ways that demonstrate that God is important to us.  We can find freedom in being faithful, in remembering always that we are first and foremost God’s beloved children, created in God’s image, for God’s purposes.

I love to imagine what might happen to New Testament people after their encounters with Jesus.  We never hear any more about this man, as we never hear about many of the people Jesus taught or cured.  In this case, I wonder if he went away, full of grief that lasted longer than the time it took him to disappear from the story, and kept thinking about what Jesus had asked of him.  Maybe he kept thinking about what drew him to kneel before Jesus, his hunger for assurance of eternal life, and about the shock he felt when Jesus told him he needed to give up everything that made him who he was in the eyes of the world.  Maybe the grief kept haunting him, changed how he felt about all that he had. 

We hear many stories about people who work very hard, even obsessively, to amass great wealth and power, and then one day they realize that they have accomplished everything they set out to do—and they feel empty, lonely, and recognize that maybe they were looking for the wrong thing.  One story in our Christian tradition is that Francis of Assisi, who grew up in a very wealthy family, and who is described as enjoying all the pleasures of his time, Italian food and wine, the music, rich friends, and fancy clothes.  But the sight of a beggar moved him to give away to a beggar all the profits of his day in the market, all that he got for selling expensive cloth on behalf of his father.  As you can imagine, his father was most definitely NOT pleased when Francis came home without any money and told him why.  Eventually, the conflict between the two of them reached the point where his father took him to court and tried to force him to abandon his inheritance, reminding Francis that even his clothing belonged to his father.  In response, Francis took off all of his clothes (in court) and threw them down in front of his father, claiming that from then on his only father would be “Our Father in Heaven.”  And no, I DON’T recommend taking off all of your clothes in court…but when God calls to your heart and you do things that people around you don’t understand or approve of, you are naked before God as Francis was before the judge and his father.

Maybe the man in our Gospel story reached the point where he recognized that following Jesus, even if it meant getting rid of all that he owned, was worth any sacrifice.  Maybe he didn’t. But I’d like to think that after he had a chance to think about it, his heart drew him to that extravagant gesture of letting go of all the identities that come with wealth.  Maybe when he heard about Jesus’ death and resurrection, or the events at Pentecost, when so many were filled with the Holy Spirit and the church was born, he thought, “maybe it’s not too late to follow that man” and his life changed forever, one step at a time.  Maybe the encounter with the love of Jesus, however long it took him to realize it, changed his heart and his understanding of who he was, and his love for God and keeping his focus on Jesus carried him through the physical and social discomforts he surely felt as he sold his house, emptied his bank accounts, and said goodbye to all that he had been until that point.  We will never know for sure, but I like to think that this encounter was the beginning of his story, not the end. 

Another man discovered that all his fame, all his successes as a professor, writer, speaker in demand all over the world, did not make him satisfied, got in the way of his spiritual life, made him cranky and depressed and unhappy.  Henri Nouwen was a Dutch priest who wrote many books, taught at Harvard and Yale, was in great demand as a speaker, and otherwise looked like a huge success, far beyond what most priests or ministers ever accomplish.  In the early 1980s, he started sensing that God was calling him in a new direction, and that led him to resign from his position at Harvard and become a caregiver for severely “differently-abled” adults, at a L’Arche community first in France and then in Canada. 

He wrote about how difficult it was to let go of his fame, the admiration, praise, and respect as he learned how to take care of Adam.  He learned from Adam and the others what it means to live as a beloved child of God when you are completely vulnerable, unable to protect or care for yourself.  But his hardest, deepest struggle was the question, “Is Jesus truly enough for you, or do you keep looking for others to give you your sense of worth?...The struggle to become a full member of a community of faith has proved to be a struggle to let go of many idols along the way and to choose again and again to follow Jesus and him alone.” In one of his prayers, he says,

Dear God, I am so afraid to open my clenched fists.  Who will I be when I have nothing left to hold on to?  Who will I be when I stand before you with empty hands?  Please help me to gradually open my hands and to discover that I am not what I own, but what you want to give me.  And what you want to give me is love, unconditional, everlasting love. Amen.

In one of the devotionals that I receive by email, this quote from Julian of Norwich, a 14^th-15^th century woman who received visions of Jesus and spent the rest of her life writing about them has touched my heart deeply.  She is quoting words that she heard Jesus saying to her:

You must learn to understand that all your deficiencies, even those that come from your past sins and vicious habits, are part of my loving providence for you, and that it is just with those deficiencies, just the way you are now, that I would love you.

Therefore you must overcome the habit of judging how you would make yourself acceptable to me. When you do this you are putting your providence, your wisdom before mine. It is my wisdom that tells you, "The way you are acceptable to me, the way I want to love you, is the way you are now, with all your defects and deficiencies. I could wipe them out in a moment if I wanted to, but then I could not love you the way I want to love you, the way you are--now."

Please pray with me.

Beloved Lord, your love is so big, so deep, so wide, and always there for us.  Help us to accept that we are your beloved children, that we don’t need to earn your love by how successful, productive, competent, or intelligent we are.  Help us to remember that you love each of us, all of us, just as we are in each moment.  Help us to know that we belong to you first, because your love teaches us to be fully human, created in your image and growing to be all that you want us to be as witnesses to your love.   Sometimes you ask us to go through things that we don’t understand, that are scary and hurtful.  Give us courage to follow you wherever you lead us, trusting you at every step of the way.  Forgive us when we fall short, and help us to accept your forgiveness and to forgive ourselves.  In the name of Jesus, the one who showed us just how much God loves us, Amen.

Walking in the present moment

Today (Friday, June 15) is a glorious day and my morning walk around my neighborhood was such a joy.  I am trying to be mindful and "in the present moment" as I walk, noticing the birds and squirrels and feeling the cool breeze in the sun as I walk.  It's not easy being mindful when my mind is so full of plans and thoughts and ideas.  I think I am being mindful and then I notice that I'm walking without noticing anything around me.  Oops!  Back to the present moment--for a few seconds, anyway.

Brene Brown (one of my favorite teachers) says the opposite of being busy is PRESENT.  I think she is right.  The busy-ness that is so prevalent in today's culture can sometimes become part of identity, a proof of one's value in the world.  It can also mean that there are many activities that we enjoy and want to be part of. So I ask myself when I start feeling rushed, does busy-ness deplete me or nourish me today?  What is it doing to my need for space to breathe into God, to reclaim my soul for a bit from the many demands for my attention?

I have been practicing coming back to the present moment in different ways for many years--and it is still so hard to stay present to myself and God for more than a few seconds.  I find that wiggling my toes helps re-ground me where I am--Try it!

Glimpses into a New Reality--Indigent Health Care

My health insurance ended on November 30, 2012.  At my age (any age, really), not having health coverage is pretty scary, but right away, a friend (timing by God, I am sure) gave me information on how to get into a local health care system for people with no insurance.  Silly me, I didn't think this would take long....nor be so hard.  I am learning about a reality a lot of people deal with all the time and for long periods of time.

I was accepted, but there are no "new patient" appoinments until February at the earliest and maybe not until June, I was told to go to the Emergency Room to get my maintenance presecriptions filled until I can get an appointment.  Again, silly me, I didn't think it would take more than a couple of hours--but it took over six.  And I was told that I need to access a "free clinic" system to get a primary care doctor since I have some conditions that would be better managed with "continuity of care."  "Call first thing tomorrow morning," the very nice women said.

I agree that I would prefer "continuity of care," since some of the things I am dealing with should really be monitored by blood work every few months.  But when I called the "free clinics" this morning, the first one told me they weren't accepting patients from the system I was accepted into.  The second discovered that I am not actually in that system, but in the "Indigent Care" system, so all my medical needs need to be taken care of by the first system.  When I called that system, that was confirmed, and I "just need to keep calling, ma'am."

I got three of my four prescriptions--for this month, anyway.  But one isn't available (although I may be able to get it another way), and now I know I will have to go back in less than a month unless an appointment opens up.  I am not complaining here, becauseat least I have some access to health care, but I also learned a whole lot from being part of this new (for me) reality.  There are a whole lot of people who deal with this difficult process all the time for their entire families...and you can't work on a day when you have to try to get health care or prescriptions because it will probably take all day...and if you can't work and have children, you may have to take them with you to sit in waiting rooms where they may be exposed to other people's illnesses, because you almost certainly can't afford child care.  But it's the only option you have to get care for illnesses that will only get worse and even life-threatening if they are not attended to--and you had better not lose your temper during the process, or leave because you can't stand waiting (one person did that), or you may not get the care you need...you certainly will not be treated with respect by (some of) the security guards who are there to keep everyone in order...quiet and complacent.

But the scariest thing that happened, that really brought all this home to me, was when a grandmother, whose granddaughter had wheeled her in to get prescriptions (minimum 3-hour process if you are lucky), started having seizures, BIG ones that almost put her on the floor.  Her granddaughter started screaming for help, "This is a HOSPITAL, for God's sake, DO something."  She seemed to think that we in the waiting room should be able to do something, even though most of us had no idea what to do.  Thankfully, there were a couple of women who knew how to hold the grandmother and keep her from biting her tongue or hitting her head on the glass behind her.  But in this hospital, less than two blocks from the emergency room, it took more than 20 minutes before EMTs showed up.  I didn't see any of the several different security guards who came one at a time to look at the situation do anything (but maybe I just didn't see them...).  Two doctors showed up (one from Allergy and Immunology) but they didn't appear to do anything, and an off-duty nurse started helping make the grandmother more comfortable.  So this grandmother could have died there in the waiting room of the Ambulatory Care Pharmacy...the staff didn't seem to know what to do, so maybe there are no procedures for when someone in a waiting room full of sick people has a medical emergency.  They certainly didn't seem adequate....

So:  I am grateful that I was well enough and had the time that it took to get my prescriptions filled.  And I am praying for that grandmother and her family, that she will get the care she needs.  But my eyes were also opened WIDE to a reality I had never personally encountered before, only heard about.  As far as I know, I will have to keep dealing with this for the foreseeable future--but most of these people do not have much if any hope of EVER getting health insurance, so this is their only hope of getting care.  I don't know if there may be something I could do to help, advocate, or alleviate any of this.  But I did feel that I needed to write this blog, because most of the people I know are probably as unaware of this reality as I was.  If you have any suggestions or resources, I would sure like to know about them.

Feeling Good/Feeling Bad...or All About God?

I have been saying (and praying) for years for God to be first in my life, in prayer and in action.  I know that God has put this desire in my heart and brought me a long way on the journey that never ends.  But I have been struggling for quite some time now (or many years, but only fairly recently has God been drawing my attention to it) with a flip-flopping that I am not happy about.

There have been many times in the past, when my spiritual life has been particularly intense, that sometimes I back off from intimacy with God (but God always draws me back...eventually). Lately God has been bringing to my awareness something that has been going on for a long time.  When I feel most available to and "used by" God in prayer or in spiritual direction or in helping someone do something or in posting a blog or any other action that I feel good about, then I back off, distance myself from others and even from God, and certainly from feeling good about what has occurred, sometimes even sabotaging the delight/pleasure of the moment to the detriment of my health and/or sense of wholeness.

It feels to me as if my "old self image" (of being broken by abuse) is determined to cancel out who I know God has been creating me to be, my “new self in Christ” (2 Corinthians 5:17). I believe this is a cleansing of the old self image(s), and I do have a deep sense of God working even in the sabotaging. And as I look back over many years of spiritual journey and healing, I see how God has worked even in the lowest places of my life, including destructive behaviors and much sabotaging. So I can only pray for God continue drawing me into being free/available for service as and when God pleases. I know I cannot even make willingness happen, only pray for and respond when I have it, and pray and be gentle with myself when I don't.

And as I have been writing this, I have realized that "feeling good" about something God has done is my ego judging, just as much as is feeling bad about distancing behaviors. I want my life to be all about God instead of "all about me." I know that because I am human (and definitely not my Creator!), I will never “do it” (spiritual life, housework, blogging, service, or anything else) to my perfectionist standards.  Letting go of perfectionism and of constantly evaluating/judging what is good or bad is a long process, very freeing, but even that is not in my power to make happen.  And accepting that, as offensive to my ego as that is, is also something with which I need God’s help.  I surrender, God!

Justice Spinning (Casey, Amanda, Memphis Three, Troy)

I've been thinking a lot about our "justice system" as the media have covered the cases of Casey (and Caylee), Amanda (and Meredith), the Memphis Three and Troy (and the police officer he said he didn't kill).    It seems to me that we have come a long way from being able to trust that our justice system is actually discovering truth and dealing out just consequences for proven actions.  The media coverage of these cases (including social media) seems to have taken on a role in influencing the outcomes of trials, and certainly the lives of those accused whether acquitted or convicted.  And certainly money and access to media  seem to have become important in the eyes of the lawyers, judges, and jurors.  Family members and friends and people who had opinions spent enormous amounts of money, time and energy to free those they said were innocent;  law enforcement and the justice system spent enormous amounts of money trying to prove they were guilty, all in the name of justice.

I am puzzled by Meredith's family continuing to insist that Amanda and Rafaele murdered Meredith, saying that they still believe that Meredith was killed by these two (and not Rudy Guede who is in prison for having killed her).  I am puzzled by Mark MacPhail's widow continuing to insist that Troy Davis killed her husband, even though so many of the "eyewitnesses" have recanted their testimony.  I am puzzled by the death threats against Casey Anthony after her acquittal. I am puzzled by so many of us having opinions about the innocence or guilt based on our intuitions about these cases.  I know that I was participating by following these cases.  And I know that I often have opinions about situations based on my perceptions and intuition.  So I'm not claiming to be outside the problem here.

Obviously I cannot know whether any of these were indeed innocent of the crimes for which they were tried (and in Troy's case, for which he was executed).  I prayed that Amanda (and Rafaele) would be released if they are innocent.  And I hope they are....but I find myself hesitant to say I know they are innocent.  Yet I would rather they be released if they were guilty than imprisoned if they were innocent.  And I believe that God knows the truth, perhaps even more deeply than they do.

Our human justice system appears more and more to be distorted by  money and competing interests and media influence.  "Lady Justice" no longer seems to be blind. I do know people who have been acquitted justly, but I also know people who have been convicted and punished unjustly.  But overall I find myself (and I'm not alone), not trusting the justice system, not trusting politicians (most of whom are lawyers....), not trusting government or the political process.

Our concept of justice has evolved from earliest understandings that truth must be discovered and actions must have appropriate consequences, for the sake of the whole community.  We say that God is just and fair (but also merciful, thank You), and that is very important to our understanding of who God is and why we can/should trust God. My trust in God is sometimes challenged  in the light of evil I see done and inherent in our power structures.  We no longer (in  most countries) require "an eye for an eye."  But when we see boundaries violated in ways that come under the jurisdiction of the law, we hope for truth and just punishment.

Yet does our justice system function to provide that?  Some of the time, yet, but we hear so many stories of prisoners who learn new ways of violence from other prisoners, and of abuses and suffering.  We hear about tremendous profits from human trafficking, fraud, outrageous bonuses, drugs, slave labor and poor working conditions, and about other wrongs like bullying that is not stopped, domestic violence, disproportional incarceration of African-American men, and many other wrongs,  I am sometimes tempted to despair when I see so much injustice, and so much apparent distortion of values and power and uses of money.  I also have to look at ways that I benefit from or participate in abusive systems of power and systemic damage to the environment, the economy and to justice.  But I always come back to remembering that I believe God to be both just and merciful, more powerful than human systems, able "by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than we can ask or imagine," (Ephesians 3:20) and I am renewed in my commitment to "do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God (Micah 6:8).

Why is sharing my writing so scary?

I love to write, and I do write a lot.  But I am hitting some resistance about writing and "publishing" my blog on a regular basis.  I feel big waves of fear when I think about publishing some of the short pieces I have written, or the books that are in my head to write.  It really feels like sharing my writing is the spiritual equivalent of taking my clothes off in public. 

I have read that lots of writers feel this way, and I have read writers talking about this.  Natatlie Goldberg say "we have to look at our own inertia, insecurities, self-hate, fear that, in truth, we have nothing valuable to say."  (Writing Down the Bones)  And that is hard, a lot like the degrees of difficulty of pursuing the spiritual life.  But I have come to believe that no matter what awful things are in my heart, God loves and accepts me just the way I am--although always challenging me to keep growing into new life.  So I guess I am afraid that "my readers" won't approve, like what I have to say, really "get" what I want them to hear.  Hmm, looks like a control issue to me. 

I wonder if letting my words go out into the world, for whatever purpose they serve, is somewhat analogous to what happens when I pray, that God responds not so much to what I ask for as by revealing to me what changes in me need to happen in order for me to keep growing.  So I pray and I listen; if I publish, I may hear criticism or dislikes that will challenge me as a writer.  Maybe writing without ever publishing is like only praying petitionary prayers and never listening for what God has to say?

I am going to publish this blog, right now!  (Well, after I proof it!)  I am not sharing this in the hopes that people will say "there, there, you're a fine writer," but because this is where I am struggling spiritually. And I am hoping that putting this out for anyone to read will help me begin to let go of my fears of being naked in publish (but I promise, I WILL keep my clothes on1).

Nugget for Reflection - The Prayer of Silence

Companions,

The wise tell us that God abides

In silence.

That God speaks in the silent serenity

of the heart.

Let us not speak of silence,

Rather, let silence speak to us

of God.

 

Together,

let us enter through the door of serenity,

the silence of our hearts.

 

The chatter of our tears, our angers, our anxiety,

the chatter of our desires and curiosity,

of our projected plans and unfinished work

falls away in serenity

and makes space.

An open space

to a new heart,

Created in the silence of prayer.

Created in the prayer of silence.

 

A heart that is free,

peaceful, quiet, and calm.

A heart that is one.

 

A heart so large and wide

that it embraces the God of all and the all of God.

The God who in silence speaks all languages.

The God who in silence speaks in all creatures.

The God who in silence speaks one word.

The God who speaks of Love.

 

Source: Benedictine Monks of Weston Priory