We commenced worship with a reflection on anger based on the lectionary texts with the anger of Amos at unjustice calling people ‘summer/rotten fruit’. We mixed it with the angry rant of Psalm 52 and sung the Hillsong classic, ‘Shout to the Lord’ alongside Marcus’ ‘angry version’.
Ministry of the Word
It wasn’t quite Melania Trump at the GOP Convention but, as referenced, Marcus basically preached Nadia Bolz Webber’ sermon on Mary and Martha with his own set of tragi-comic examples particularly around church cleaning rosters and vacuuming; driving in Footscray and family dinners run by his 82 year old mother in law…
the punchline…
….”Forgive them for they know not what they do.”
We never do, really, for all the bluster, activism, rosters, consultants and models, all the work at political correctness and confected ,shame based, media moralistic outrage about cultural preferences, all the time!… If I’m honest, a lot of the time as people, from Federal election campaigns to cleaning the house, we/I never seem to know what we are doing and sometimes we think the Bible is going to solve that for us…that a story like Jesus’ visit with Martha and Mary is going to give us a clear moral lesson so we can know what we are doing. And when we think we’ve got it down we can begin to judge the actions of others and we literally lose the plot.
So maybe choosing the better part isn’t about choosing between action and contemplation, or choosing to work hard OR rest at Jesus feet; the Christian life has always been a combination of the two. Maybe the better part is not judging the actions of the other through the lens of your own personality. Because when we do so it is just a distraction from the main thing – and this story around which we gather…this MAIN THING, can never be taken away because it is always forming who you are, and, like water on rock, this liturgy, this work of the people, slowly and sometimes imperceptibly shapes us into the glory of God.
Friends… The story is why I’m here… amidst the vacuuming AND the preaching and the whole damn catastrophe!
The liturgy/ work of the people isn’t taking part in some roster filling meritocracy for Jesus, or some quaintly quirkily diverse archaic social club meeting in a heritage Melbourne suburb. It’s to remember our story and more than that, to invite and allow that story to shape our story and that by the power of the spirit we may become that story. Friends the story of God and God’s people will stand. And unlike the next roster and so much that passes as work in life, that story will not be taken away. Amen.
Benediction
A short reflection on being sent; getting outside; meeting others; public space and Christendom architecture… basically overview of social media buzz on the politics/ phenomena, good and bad, of recently launched Pokemon Go!
At this table tonight we connect our bodies with a good but broken creation, groaning and yearning for redemption (romans 8)
we acknowledge that we gather on the land of which the Wurundjeri have been custodians from time immemorial. (acts 17:26-27)
We acknowledge the season of deep winter known by the Woiwurrung as Waring (Wombat) season.
This cold time of the year we look for the caps being shed from the buds of deciduous trees;
The breeding of echidnas;
birds active in early mornings competing for nests.
We remember traditional owners who during this season camped aways from flooded river flats on uplands in bark willams (shelters),
where they were able to eat . . .
koalas, possums, wombats, and grubs from the trees.The roots of the browning water plants and tubers. Fragrant nectar and fruits which came from the BURGILBURGIL and BULAIT bushes.
Welcome Winter: God, come heal our earth.
Dear God,
Let us be present in this season of deep winter.
The sun has turned away from us and the nest of summer hangs broken in a tree.
Life slips through our fingers and, as darkness gathers, our hands grow cold.
It is time to go inside.
It is time for reflection and resonance.
It is time for contemplation
Let us go inside.
Amen.
(adapted from Geoff Wraight, Westgate Baptist Church)
These reflection questions were spread among the various tables…
ROBBED!
People can be robbed of much more than material goods…Time, love, attention, trust, acceptance…
Do you feel like you have been robbed of anything? Who by?
Have you robbed someone else of something?
Can you forgive your ‘robber’?
Can you forgive yourself?
Forgiveness can rarely be of human making, and is rarely a single event or moment. What would you like from the ‘innkeeper’ as you continue on your journey through life?
DITCHED
What if you are the person in the ditch, and God is the “Good Samaritan?”
In the story the ‘enemy’ brings life to the person left for dead. The person who cannot help herself, who has nothing to lose, who can’t even refuse help, is saved by someone usually scorned and derided. Perhaps, at different times, you see God as your ‘enemy’ and as your rescuer?
In what ways, if any, do you see God as your enemy?
In what ways would you like God to be your rescuer?
What ditch are you lying in?
Jesus did not come to rescue the healed…he came for the broken, offering to get in the ditch with us, and making us the promise of being put into a right relationship with God.
NEWS-BOARD
To ask ‘Who is my neighbour?’ is to ask ‘Who can I exclude?’ ‘Who can I leave out?’ ‘Who am I not responsible for?’ Examples of exclusion and inclusion surround us every day.
Tear out any newspaper article, heading, picture or text that sums up a plea from someone who needs a neighbour. Someone who is excluded in some way.
Stick it on our Newsboard.
Read what others have chosen.
Can you act as neighbour in any of these situations? Can you include someone who would otherwise be excluded? Pray for those who can; pray that someone will.
NEIGHBOUR-ED
Reflect on a recent situation where someone ‘became a neighbour’ or acted as a neighbour to you, or to someone close to you. How does this feel? Were you surprised? Why, or why not?
How did you respond? Could you or should you have acted differently?
Do you find it easier to be a neighbour or to be ‘neighboured’?
‘In the Kingdom of God mercy is always a surprise.’
EVERYBODY NEEDS GOOD…
The point of Jesus’ interaction with the lawyer was to have him see that , ‘Who is my neighbour?’ is the wrong question. The right question is ‘ Who sees me as their neighbour?’ In other words, ‘Who needs me to be a neighbour to them?’ Who needs me to show mercy, compassion, understanding, acceptance, practical help toward their situation? The initiative comes from the need, not my response.
Are you aware of a person or situation that needs your merciful neighbourly response? Maybe you need that from someone else? Could you use a neighbour at the moment? How will you seek one out?
PAYING FOR CARE
What reasons may the Samaritan have paid the innkeeper to care? For what reasons might you give time or money to charity or be an inn keeper; paid to care?
How do you feel when corrupt officials, warlords or racist bureaucrats stop that happening? What keeps you going?
The story Jesus told isn’t about doing good works, or following a good example. It’s a story about doing what is right because it is right. It’s about identifying with the loser and sacrificing your best for the lost , the least, the little and the almost dead (Robert Farrar Capon’s litany). It’s about losing your life and somehow in doing that, according to Jesus, finding the meaning of your life.
How do you feel about these tensions and stuggles?
HARD CHOICES
There is no reason given in the story to think that the Levite and the Priest were morally corrupt, or self- centred, or too busy to notice what was going on. They were probably good, respectable people. They saw the situation, but were caught between their duty to the people they served, and to the victim. They knew if they touched the injured man they would not be able to carry out their own scheduled duties of service to others in temple worship. They would be considered ‘unclean’.
I don’t think the story is about putting the Samaritan’s response above those of the Priest or Levite. It’s about getting the lawyer to understand that his view of ‘neighbour’ was too simplistic and narrow. Too black and white. Jesus doesn’t condemn anyone’s choice.
Service, community development, being a neighbour, offering love can’t be defined with words; they are worked out in the messy, compromising, risky reality of difficult and often conflicting choices.
Do you feel pulled in this way in your personal life or work circumstances?
How do you maintain you integrity? How do you ‘love yourself” in these situations?
Talk to God about the impossibility of the situations you face. Remember the similarly difficult choice God faced with Jesus and the cross. Know that you are not condemned by God for your choices.
IDENTIFICATION
The main characters in the story are—Jesus, The lawyer, The victim, The robbers, The priest, The Levite, The Samaritan, The Innkeeper.
What do you identify most with?
Do you know why this is?
Is this identification something you are happy with or wish was different?
Prayers For Others
We cried How Long O Lord in response to violence in the United States and Dallas in particular using the Over the Rhine Song Idea #21 (Not to Late)
We prayed for the Guardians of the Flemington Road Lemon Scented Gum (Facebook link here). Whether you’re a local who love’s the 110 year old gateway tree of Melbourne or would prefer another lane for traffic there is no denying the passion these locals have for our neighbourhood and its flora and fauna including possums, lorikeets, honey-eaters and galahs we witnessed in this powerfully symbolic tree at this weeks protest meeting.
2. Meditatio: What is The Word for me? Voice words and phrases from the gospel text aloud.
3. Oratio:
What does The Word make me want to say to God or to others? You are invited to make a statement or prayer
The Pax Romana was a great and glorious time for the elite few. For the rest of the world, it was a time of fear and trial. There are voices in our world who want to restore British sovereignty or “make America great again.” These movements will, without a doubt, benefit elite subsets in each nation. But, as Christians, we are called not to ask whether we will be on the side that benefits from or suffers from this imposed greatness. Rather, we are called to ask how to serve the only Great One, who sends us “like lambs into the midst of wolves” to bring a different kind of peace.
God’s peace is a peace founded on life, rather than death. On relationship, rather than enmity. On engaging in and accepting mutual hospitality, rather than building walls of division.
– Rev. Amy Allen
Jesus continues by counseling his advance team to practice the gift economy: “Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals…” (10.4). What a scandal this is to our global capitalist system of scarcity and debt! They/we are simply to trust that there will be people of “peace” who will provide food and shelter for wandering strangers, like Abraham and Sarah did (Gen 18.1-8; cf. Hebrews 13.1-2). The disciples are expected to announce that they come in the name of peace, offering it to those whose houses they enter (Lk 10.5). If there is no one of peace there, the disciples must themselves, however, remain “children of peace” (10.6, Gk, huios eirēnēs).
– Sue Ferguson
“As Christian’s we tend to think that evangelism is really hard…Jesus shared the gospel in a relaxed manner, he didn’t harass or harangue people so neither did he expect his disciples to… A person of peace is someone who welcomes you, receives you, listens to you, serves you, responds to you… The invigorating thing about the Person of Peace strategy is that it stops mission being yet another thing we cram into our busy lives… it can easily become life giving even for those of us who are reserved.”
– Mike Breen
4.Contemplatio / Vocatio :
Rest in The Word. Silent reflection.What does The Word call me do or be?
Psalm 30
Marcus framed the Psalm with a short intro. on the witness of holocaust survivor and Nobel Prize winner Elie Weisel who died this week and the Hebrew Bible story of the healing of Naaman the Syrian…
This week we started our 11 week series on the journey narrative in Luke’s Gospel called The Ridiculous Journey. We read a passage called Life is complicated by Rich Nelson…
“Life is complicated and cannot easily be reduced to a set of formulaic, simple answers. Anyone who says otherwise is either naive or a huckster. Life is also entirely too short to screw around and waste it. So we should be wary of anyone who walks up to us one day and says, “Hey, why don’t you just walk away from your entire life, leave behind all your family, friends and your stable job, and come follow me.”
How much more suspicious we should be if that person is a complete stranger who looks like he doesn’t have a dime to his name. Frankly, the only sane thing to do would be to politely excuse yourself and get away as fast as you can. Even if he turns out to be completely harmless, we’ve all got too much to do to waste our time following after a starry-eyed dreamer on a ridiculous journey. At best it will be a fun distraction. At worst it will get us killed.
So why is it that so many people did just that? Dropped their nets and left their old man standing in the boat with a ton of fish. He told a man to sell everything they had and give it to the poor. He told another man to skip out on his father’s funeral. One left the empire’s money on the table and just got up and chased after him, a nobody from nowhere. In the end, this wayward leader was executed as a heretic; and, many of the people who chose to follow him eventually were killed too. They should have seen it coming from the start.
So who in their right mind today would listen to a story like that from centuries ago and say, “Okay, sign me up! I will die too.”
Crazy people, that’s who! If you choose to take a pass on the whole following Jesus thing, know I completely understand! Life’s too short to waste it on such a ridiculous journey.
But, I have to admit that there’s something about his story that continues to draw me in.
And this story still has the same attraction for some of the wisest, most beautiful souls I have ever met. So either we are all crazy together (entirely possible), or maybe what’s crazy is not following him. Maybe going along with the predominant cultural narrative that says it’s all about:
• “getting ahead” of others (as if life is a zero-sum game),
• amassing enough wealth so we can “live comfortably” (as if all the money in the world could shield us from pain and tragedy),
• and “making a name for ourselves” (as if it won’t be forgotten eventually wheneven the letters of our tombstones wear away)…
Maybe buying into that story is actually even more ridiculous. And if there’s a chance that this Jesus guy knows a better Way than that, then maybe it’s worth considering it as a viable alternative.
It’s crazy, I know. But for some reason it’s the only thing that makes sense.”
We watched a video of Father Greg Boyle, known for his work with inner city youth, talking about an Ignatian spiritual practice called The Two Standards which envisions “see[ing] Jesus standing in the lowly place … not saying anything …” He made a distinction between a Jesus who points us to the lowly place and one who stands there silently saying nothing. He suggests the Jesus Strategy includes standing outside the circle precisely so the circle will widen. By doing so, we force the choice that “Either you include them with me or you won’t include me either.”
Marcus then led a reflection on Ignation practice of The Two Standards. You can find the original medieval text of the meditation here. The purpose of the exercise is to get an interior map for discernment. The metaphor used in the exercise itself is a medieval battle scene between the forces of Jesus and the forces of Satan. The ‘standards’ are the banners of each. The one making the exercise is invited to consider the different tactics used by each camp as we discern the journey’s of our own lives.
Reflecting on a contemporary imagination exercise of the two standards led by Byrne, Mags Blackie suggests the purpose of The Two Standards – it is to find the symbols which represent the Two Standards in our own lives.
The image I have held since that weekend, is reminiscent of Byrne’s but it has a personal twist. For me the image of Satan is a well dressed business man. He is serious, organised, and controlled. The image of Jesus is a surfer dude in board shorts.
The image is a powerful one for me – because my temptation is to take myself a little too seriously. To take a little more responsibility than I should. And taking this road paralyses me. It is the path to unfreedom, to constriction, ultimately to destruction.
Being able to evoke this image as a tool for discernment has been tremendously useful. It has given me a handle to cut through the subtle deception.
We are not tempted by things we know to be inherently destructive. There is always some lure, some attractive disguise. This image speaks to my own pet temptations, the things I will fall for.
What are the images you use as your touchstones for discernment? What are The Two Standards you use?
Psalm 77: We riffed on Psalm 77 with a Wade in the Water refrain with an intro that referenced the Elijah /Elisha mantle passing, the Exodus and the African American slave experience . Harriet Tubman used the song “Wade in the Water” to tell escaping slaves to get off the trail and into the water to make sure the dogs slavecatchers used couldn’t sniff out their trail. People walking through water did not leave a scent trail that dogs could follow.
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