Exodus 19:
2-7
NPMC
Psalm
100
5 Pentecost
Romans 5: 1-8
June 15, 2008
Matthew 9: 35 – 10: 8
Anita Retzlaff
God’s circle of compassion: from helpless to whole
Grace and peace to you from God the Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ. For Christians Sunday is the weekly celebration of the resurrection. To that celebration today we also add the celebration of fathers and fatherhood. As we pause for a moment of silent prayer and meditation on this Fathers’ Day may we give thanks for the love of fathers, our own fathers, other’s fathers whom we have known as a strong influence in our lives and the one of many images of God as father and nurturer. Let us pray. (pause) God, father of compassion and grace, hear our prayers and bless our open hearts as we give ourselves in prayer to you. AMEN
It has now been two weeks since I returned home from our European excursion touring sites of the 16th century Reformations. I discovered many interesting details and learned some very significant things along the way. I will try to communicate some of these experiences to you in the months to come and someday invite you to view a few of the 650 pictures that I took. The time away was a blessing and a delight and I am thankful to you all for this rich, rich experience.
One central focus of my pilgrimage in Europe was to review the history of individuals who made huge sacrifices for their understanding of the faith, people like Martin Luther, Ulrich Zwingli, John Calvin, Menno Simons, George Blaurock, Felix Manz. As we stood on the edge of the Limmat River in Zurich, Switzerland three weeks ago both Mennonites and Lutherans together we acknowledged the martyrdom of the first Anabaptist, Felix Manz, at the hands of other Protestants. And we gave thanks for each other as we pondered past history. It was a profound moment of reflection and grace. We were able to stand side by side, at peace with God and at peace with each other – Lutherans and Anabaptists - sharing in the hope of the God of love.
The apostle Paul, a man who also took great risks for his understanding of the faith reminds us in Romans that all of us stand in the grace of God whether it is by the Limmat River or right here as we worship together this morning. Such peace comes to us because God has a plan for our lives.
Well I hope you are awake now. If you are expecting me to outline the ways in which God plans something like terminal illness or family discord or loneliness to teach us a lesson and help steer us toward repentance; that is not the kind of plan I envision God has for us. I do not imagine that God plots out a strategy, plans every movement and decision we make or handles us like puppets on strings. The plan of God for us is rather like a circle of compassion, a movement of the spirit that first compels us to know our need of God and upon experiencing the healing effect of God’s love in our lives we move naturally into situations where we share love with others and tend to those in need. God-given gift comes around full circle. We have need of God. We find peace in God’s ways. We are drawn to others. That is God’s plan for us. We find it in our reading from Matthew this morning.
Have you ever stopped to think about why Jesus goes from village to city to countryside teaching and preaching? Does he do it because he thinks he has to or because it’s the right thing to do or because he has to be nice to people? Why would Jesus take it upon himself to spread the word of hope, heal diseases and call out demons from people’s troubled souls? Why?
Jesus doesn’t carry out this tireless ministry for personal reasons, to be liked, to make the grade or to achieve status and fame: quite the opposite. He has no need to assuage his conscience; he undertakes his ministry because he believes he is doing the work of his Father, God. Jesus brings the kingdom close to people, brings people close to God because that is his calling from his Father. So Jesus teaches: gives people a foundation on which to build a solid relationship with God. He instructs, catechizes, expands people’s understanding of how God works.
Jesus not only gives instruction he also gives hope and that is a different thing yet. To offer hope is to give a new lease on life, not just important information. It is to inspire others to believe that there are always other ways of looking at things and new and wonderful realities even in the midst of unpleasant, hard experiences. It’s the difference between instructing a child on the merits of composting and actually taking the child into the garden, feeling the soft rich earth and imagining that rather smelly pile of kitchen refuse slowly turning into dark soil that sustains the growth of vegetables, fruits and flowers. Hope is the promise of growth, of peace even in the midst of turmoil, destruction and impending death. Paul reminds us that hope does not disappoint.
So Jesus teaches the foundations of the faith and he speaks hope to those who are harassed and helpless, but he also does something else. He defies death by pronouncing health where before people experienced only defilement and ostracism. Those who are ill, have leprosy, are labeled as demon-possessed and those who have died: all these are considered ritually unclean and out of the reach of God’s love, actually separated from God. And Jesus turns that notion on its head. He heals diseases. He makes people feel whole. The dead are no longer lost in nothingness but raised to a new relationship with God forever. In defiance of the religious understanding of the time Jesus takes staggering risks as he ministers to the “lost sheep of Israel.”
Jesus has compassion. Like a loving father, he has compassion for his people. For Jesus sees their true state: harassed by the religious system of the day, blame heaped upon them for their infirmities and diseases, lost souls without hope. So through his teaching, preaching and healing Jesus bridges the gap between those caught in helplessness and a God who desires intimate relationship not distance. We think of our good friends who lie in hospital beds at this moment Stella Dyck and Ben Fast and we are comforted that in all things and through every ordeal God is present with compassion, for compassion means to “suffer with.”
And so the circle of God’s compassion, God’s plan, comes round to us. For we listen to what Jesus asks of his disciples and we place ourselves with them in Jesus’ presence. The harvest is plentiful. In other words, there are many, many harried and helpless souls out there who need the compassionate word of God spoken to them by those who already know of God’s grace. You know where this is going. Jesus summons his twelve disciples and gives them authority to cure and to pronounce health just as Jesus himself does. He empowers his students (for that is what disciple means) to engage in his ministry of compassion. And as you have expected me to say by now, Jesus empowers us to do the same. That’s the plan.
As the circle of God’s compassion continues along its course, twelve disciples authorized by Jesus to speak life into dead places, these twelve are now correspondingly renamed “apostles” and that implies something in addition to student disciple. Apostle comes from the Greek word apostellw which means to send or send out. The students of Jesus go out, are sent out, to their own people, the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And isn’t that the way it so often goes? This time the students of Jesus newly authorized to go and do God’s work are sent into their own hometown. They are not sent to the Gentiles or to the Samaritans. They are sent to their own people who share the same religious background and are part of the same religious tradition. I would think it would feel something like a student teacher approaching Ray Fast, former Director of Education of the Saskatoon Public School system and saying, “Excuse me Dr. Fast but I have something new to teach you. I think you missed something fundamental throughout your career and I am here to tell you what you didn’t understand.”
In a sense that is what we are called out to do. We have the audacity, actually the authority, to walk alongside others and dare to expose the ways in which they and all of us are lost and helpless. We are not sent to pronounce judgment or to think we know better but we are instructed to walk with and suffer with those who are in distress and dis-ease. In our places of work and leisure we do meet people who are struggling with all kinds of life issues. Imagine that a word of hope from you might help in a significant way. At the feet of Jesus we have received the gift of compassion and we complete the circle of God’s compassion by sharing what we have come to understand about the love of God.
Just as we kneel in the rich soil of a composted garden and share the expectations of growth and abundant life we seed hope in the hearts and minds of those who yearn for the peace of God. Our words are important. Our relationships are important. We have been taught and sent to speak the death-defying words, “The kingdom of God has come near.” Go, live in the grace and mercy of God. The circle of God’s compassion is completed in you.
Prayer - In you O God we find our rest and our hope. You have sent us to proclaim this good news to those whom we meet every day. Give us courage to suffer with and journey with those who need us. Strengthen those in our community who face illness and death. Compassionate God, bring us all together under your soft wings of mercy. AMEN