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Sixth Sunday after Pentecost
July 16, 2006
Delivered by Reverend Sandra Stayner
Amos 7:7-15
Ephesians 1:1-14
Mark 6:7-13
Ordinary People, Extraordinary Purpose
Whenever a child is baptized in the church, he or she is presented with a candle. When I present the candle to the child I still use the words that the old priest who was my mentor taught me to say, from the 1928 prayer book: “Receive the light of Christ and let your good works so shine before men and women that your Father in heaven is glorified.” This little child, her body glistening from the baptismal water, his head still marked with the oil of chrismation, freshly marked with the sign of the cross on his head has already received a commission from God. Each child who is baptized into the church is sent into the world to proclaim the love of God. Before he was brought to the baptismal font he was an ordinary child, raised to new life in Christ he is given an extraordinary purpose in life. And it’s this call to live our ordinary lives with extraordinary purpose that I want to talk about today.”
Amos, the prophet from ….was going about his life as a shepherd, a “dresser of sycamores” when God tapped him on the shoulder and told him he had a mission to perform. No more following the flock, no more pruning trees, God had placed a call on his life. It came in the form of a dream. In the dream, the Lord was standing beside a wall with a plumb line (something that is used by builders to see if walls they are building are straight or not. “The plumb line I hold” Said God to Amos “Shows me that the people of Israel are not living up to the standard of my God, so they must be destroyed” was God’s reply. Amos was sent to tell God’s people that huge social change was required by those who were responsible for the unjust treatment of the poor. Indeed, the wicked rulers who had established such practices were to be swept away by God’s hand even though they called themselves his people. The simple shepherd from Tekoa was given the awesome task of calling his people to repent of their sin, and return to a just and loving life. And do you know what happened? The religious leaders of the Northern Kingdom were so threatened by the words of the simple shepherd that he had to flee for his life. It’s not always easy to be the bearer of God’s word, just as it’s not always easy to hear God’s word! But the prophet who spent the first part of his life following the flock and pruning trees was faithful to the extraordinary mission to which he was called by God.
In our New Testament reading today we see how the disciples who had been following him around, listening as he taught them about the kingdom of God, wondering at the incredible miracles he performed each day – blind men suddenly able to see, little girls once incredibly sick now able to run around and play, people who seemed to have demons in their heads released from the voices inside, were suddenly faced with an abrupt change of direction. Instead of following Jesus around, listening to his words they were now sent out in pairs to their friends and neighbors to share the good news of the kingdom, to tell them how God wanted them to repent of their sin and begin to live the life of caring and sharing they were always meant to live. These ordinary people, many of them simple fishermen, were given an extraordinary mission - to call on their friends and neighbors to repent and change their ways.
But what would such repentance look like? As I was looking into the scriptures for today I came across an article written by David Blumenthal, the professor of Judaic studies at Emory University, Atlanta, on repentance and forgiveness in the Jewish tradition. He says that “Teshuva” is the key concept in the rabbinic view of sin, repentance and forgiveness. I want to share with you some of what he says because I think it may offer us some insight into how we can take this concept of repentance much more seriously in our own lives. Almost all the Rabbis would agree that there are 5 elements to “Teshuva.”
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1. Recognition of ones sins, which Blumenthal says must include an act of ones intelligence and moral conscience – recognizing that such actions are more than just lapses of praxis and being prepared to analyse ones motives for sin as deeply as one can. Blumenthal takes the example of stealing “For example, stealing from someone must be seen not only as a crime but also as a sin against another human being and a violation of God’s demands of us within the covenant” (for Christians that would be the baptismal covenant.) “It also involves realizing that such actions are part of deeper patterns of relatedness and that they are motivated by some of the most profound and darkest elements in our being.”
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2. Remorse. Blumenthal says that remorse is the feeling of regret, sorrow for what one has done, perhaps also a feeling of alienation from God and from our fellow human beings. Remorse comes it seems to me, as we recognize the suffering or pain that comes as a result of our sinful actions.
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3. Desisting from sin – which obviously involves action on our part. To desist from sin is quite simply to stop a sinful action, to consciously respect whatever sinful thoughts and fantasies might be leading us into sinful activity and actively disengage from the actions which result.
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4. Restitution – which is the act by which we make good whatever damage has been done by our sinful activity – we might return something we have stolen, or seek to repair the damage done to someone’s good name because of what we have said.
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5. Confession – which in the Jewish tradition would include partaking in ritual confession, recitation of the liturgies of confession with specific personal confession. For us such confession might take place in our own conversation with God, or by participating in the rite of confession, or the rite of reconciliation as it is known in the Episcopal Prayer Book. Confession is important because it is something external to us. As we confess our sins to God or to a priest we are acknowledging publicly that something is wrong, something we intend to change.
If we are to take seriously the call to mission that is placed in our hands at the moment of our baptism, it seems to me that we have a responsibility to become much more serious about the need for repentance in our own lives, in our communities and in our society at large. Who knows! Perhaps things would have turned out differently for Ken Lay the CEO of Enron if one of his friends had been able to help him see the incredible greed and lust for power that was taking over his life, before he had destroyed the lives of so many people, including his own and those who were close to him.
Like Amos and the twelve disciples, we who are simple, ordinary folk are given the responsibility of taking God’s message of repentance to the people among whom we live, because repentance brings freedom, freedom to live in the peace and love of God’s kingdom here on earth. We are asked to engage in the liberation of people whose lives are bound by sin – not the Muslims or Hindus or Buddhists, or people on the other side of the world, but the people among whom we live, our own friends and family, and of course ourselves. As we read about wars and famine, sickness and disease let each one of us search our hearts to see how we can actively engage in writing the societal wrongs we see all around us. It will mean changing the way our lives are structured. It will mean opening our hearts to share with those who are in need. It will mean humbling ourselves in the presence of a Holy God who longs to liberate all who seek renewal for their lives.
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