Sermon: Who do you say Jesus is? (August 27, 2023)

Pentecost 13A
August 27, 2023
Matthew 16:13-20

INTRODUCTION

Today’s readings will reflect on the question of what it means to be a Christian, a follower of Christ, not just in the safety of the church community, but in the world. “Do not be conformed to this world,” Paul exhorts, “but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God.” It’s a tall order! It is so easy to become conformed to this word, and all of its division and brokenness, and to be influenced by so many worldly powers and persuasions instead of the Gospel we proclaim. Isaiah reminds us to remember where we came from, to find our footing in that. And in Matthew, Peter will make a bold claim about who Christ is, even against the backdrop of a city known for its political and worldly influence – making Peter’s declaration of Jesus as the Messiah, over and against even the powerful worldly leaders for whom Caesarea Philippi is named, all the more remarkable! 

Jesus will ask the disciples in Matthew today, “Who do you say that I am?” As you listen to today’s readings, ponder that question for yourself. Who do you say that Jesus is? Who is Jesus for you personally, for the Church, for our hurting world? Let’s listen.

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Altar to Pan in Caesarea Philippi 

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

“Who do you say that I am?”

 It’s such a simple question, made up of words even my rising 1st grader could read with ease. And yet it is also so weighty, and so very important. It’s so important, that this question is asked of every person seeking ordination in this synod when they enter the candidacy process. “Who is Jesus to you – not in fancy theological terms, but in words that are personal and meaningful to you. Who do you say Jesus is?” 

Well? What do you think? How would you answer it? 

It’s a question I would hope we could all answer with some conviction… and yet, I can also tell you that when I was first asked, by the bishop herself, I had three religion degrees and a year as a missionary under my belt, and I found myself a little bit speechless. I wasn’t sure exactly how to answer. Who do you say Jesus is? 

Perhaps part of the reason we struggle to answer this question is that we are not very practiced at answering it. We don’t very often exercise the talking-about-faith muscles. Perhaps we take a little too seriously Jesus’ enigmatic comment at the end of this text, not to tell anyone who he is! Please note, that this instruction was not meant to be a forever thing, just a “until after the resurrection” thing – you are allowed to talk about it now! And yet: we Lutherans have gotten pretty good at keeping Jesus a secret.

Professor Richard Ward tells a story about a time he was preaching in his home congregation, and his friend, who was a devout Jew, wanted to come and hear him. He hesitated and said, apologetically, “Well, I’ll be preaching about Jesus.” “So?” his friend asked. “Well,” he explained, “I’m afraid I would say something to offend you.” His friend retorted, “I’d be very disappointed if you didn’t preach about Jesus!” Then he went on, “Honestly, I don’t know why it is that my Christian friends are so afraid of talking about Jesus with me. I’m not afraid to talk about my faith with you!” 

Oof! I wasn’t even there, and I feel called out by that! I suspect many of us can resonate with it – we worry about talking too much about our faith with people who differ from us because… why? We don’t want to offend? We are embarrassed? We don’t feel we have the language to do it well? We’re afraid of getting something wrong? We don’t want people to associate us with that kind of Christians?

I think there is something to all of those reasons, but I’m interested especially in that last one. An opinion piece ran in the New York Times back in May entitled, “Christianity’s got a branding problem.” I was immediately intrigued by the title. We don’t normally think about religions having brands, but when we stop to think about Christianity in America, I suspect you can come up with some different types (or you might say, brands) of Christians, right? And while some are not so different from each other, others seem diametrically opposed to each other. For example, the sort of Christian I am, formed by the Jesus I believe in, would not be found in Charlottesville six years ago, carrying a cross and shouting anti-Semitic and racist hate speech. That's not my brand of Christian. I am not the brand of Christian who will thump my Bible to support views that advocate harming or disparaging other beloved children of God. I’m not the brand of Christian who doesn’t believe in science, the type who views the Bible as a scientific account of history. And so yes, I am afraid that when people find out I’m a Christian, they will think I am a brand of Christian with which I do not want to be associated. 

And therein lies our branding problem. Because as it is, the loudest Christian voices in our culture, the ones that dominate the news, are the ones from the extremes, the ones that seem to espouse more hate than love, the ones that seem full of judgment, the ones that cover up abuse. Meanwhile, the Jesus who is full of love and grace and forgiveness and mercy, who feeds and heals people without questioning their background, who reaches out intentionally to outsiders, even those of different races and religions… that Jesus isn’t getting so much play time in the culture at large! 

The conversation Jesus has with his disciples in today’s story is remarkable all by itself. But it is made even more remarkable when we realize where it is happening: in Caesarea Philippi, beside an altar to the pagan god, Pan, and surrounded by emblems of the power of the Roman Empire. The city is named for Caesar Augustus, who called himself “son of the divine.” So when Jesus asks, “Who do you say that I am?” the subtext there is, “Will you declare who I am, even in this place that is so counter to who I am? Will you declare who I am, even in the face of other powers, and other gods? Will you declare who I am, even though the prevailing view is different, and even makes your declaration somewhat dangerous to offer?” 

Boy, in that context, I’m not sure I could have been as brave as Peter! I’m not always brave enough even in my own, predominately “Christian” culture, at least in name, but full of other powers demanding my attention and loyalty, and declaring a brand of Christianity I’m not behind… I’m not always brave enough in the midst of all that to proclaim who I believe Jesus to be. Are you?

This is part of the reason we gather here each week, and hear a word of forgiveness, hear the life-giving Word of God proclaimed, and receive the sustenance and grace of the sacrament: it is to equip us to stand in our own Caesarea Philippis and confess who we believe Jesus is, for us and for this world.

I am not going to make you do that right now, at least not aloud, though I hope you will take some time to wrestle with the question, maybe journal about it or talk with a friend, maybe jot some thoughts down in your bulletin while you wait your turn for communion today. But I will answer the question myself for you, because sometimes hearing someone else’s answer can help us form our own.

Who do I say that Jesus is? It isn’t so hard to give the Sunday School answer: Jesus is the incarnate Son of God, the Savior and redeemer of the world. But these are big titles that don’t really resonate with my daily life, if I’m honest. So then I ask, “who is Jesus, and how does he show up for me personally, and why does it matter to me”? 

Jesus is my teacher, who shows me how to live, drawing my attention out of my own belly button and ever toward justice and compassion. Jesus is my friend, who listens to my prayers and needs. He assures me of love when I feel unlovable; he forgives me when I mess up; he shows me the way toward life and abundance, even when death and scarcity are all around. Jesus is consolation for the past, and hope for the future, and an ever-present help in whatever faces me right now. 

This is my answer for today – tomorrow it might be different – and that is also who Jesus is for me: knowing my needs as he does, he is there for me in whatever way I need him, even if I didn’t know I needed him in that way. (And sometimes, this is really annoying because they way I needed him was for him to say, “Johanna, you’re getting this wrong. Look in the mirror, will ya, and change your ways.” That’s really annoying! But I do need it!) 

Most of all, who I say Jesus is, is this: he is God’s relentless expression of love and grace, and the promise that no ending is the end, because through Jesus, new life is always possible. And this is the Jesus I will willingly proclaim from the housetops, even in the shadow of other demands and false promises. 

How about you? Who do you say Jesus is?

Let us pray… Dear Jesus, you are everything to us and for us, and yet still we often find ourselves unable or unwilling to express who you are for us. Embolden us, like you did Peter, to express who you are: the Messiah, the Son of the living God. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Full service can be viewed HERE.

Sermon: Learning how to learn (August 20, 2023)

Pentecost 12A/Lectionary 20
August 20, 2014
Matthew 15:21-28

INTRODUCTION:

Today’s readings urge us to question what, exactly, makes a person “good” or faithful or worthy of love and grace. More specifically, they bring up the question of whether one’s race or ethnicity, or their adherence to the law, is what wins them God’s favor. Isaiah makes a bold claim that God’s house “shall be a house of prayer for all people,” regardless of their foreign status. Paul’s letter to the Romans astutely points out that we are all disobedient, but that very disobedience is what makes God’s immense mercy such a gift. 

Matthew gives us two stories that illustrate this point in different ways. Once again, we are right on the tails of the last few stories – the death of John the Baptist, the feeding of the 5000, Jesus’ desperate attempts to get a moment alone to pray, and the walking on water. Now Jesus begins challenging some of the Pharisees on laws surrounding cleanliness. In short, he says: it’s not what you eat that matters, but what you say that defiles. 

From there, though, Jesus moves into a foreign country, Tyre and Sidon. This is a land of Gentiles, non-Jews, people outside of the children of Israel. Yet even in a foreign land, Jesus’ reputation precedes him, and a woman asks for help for her daughter. And well, Jesus doesn’t at first respond as lovingly as you might expect, in an interaction that has baffled commentators for generations. 

Judgment of others who are different is rampant in our world. As you listen, consider how these texts can help us to reflect on our own human condition, and what they say to our engagement with those who are different from us. Let’s listen. 

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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

I had the great pleasure this past week of spending a week of my allotted continuing education time at the Chautauqua Institution. Chautauqua is in many ways difficult to describe, but it is sort of like a summer retreat for people who love to learn, expand their minds, encounter new ideas, build community, engage with the arts, worship, and maybe also go boating or golfing or learn a craft. The Institute brings in world class performers and speakers (for instance, we saw the Houston Ballet, and got to hear journalist Bob Woodward this week, who famously covered the Watergate scandal, and 9 other presidencies for the Washington Post). There are also plenty of spaces to process what we are hearing. The four pillars of Chautauqua are Arts, Education, Religion, and Recreation, and the hope is that you leave a better person than you arrived. I think as far as I’m concerned, and my parents who went with me, that was the case this time!

It is a real delight to be with 1000 or more people for a week who are all committed to lifelong learning, and to letting themselves be confronted with ideas that rub against their own. With all the silos we create and find ourselves in these days, these opportunities are in too small supply. And I suppose I can see why: learning, though often a joy, can also be really hard, right? It requires some humility, even just to admit that there was something you didn’t know, something you had to learn. It’s one thing when you intentionally take a class on a topic you don’t yet understand, but I’m thinking about the times we have to learn through failure, or through encountering someone with a story or experience we hadn’t before considered, or through grief, or through having to apologize for a wrong we’ve committed, or through having to offer forgiveness to someone who has hurt us. This learning is often done begrudgingly at the time, even resentfully. Even if we come out the other side better for it, the journey there is often no picnic! 

This is such a foundational part of being human, though, isn’t it? From the moment we come out of the womb, we are learning, taking in new information. We are changing and growing and developing. To live is to change, after all! 

And yet, even though learning and growing is such a part of the human experience, I struggle with this Gospel text, in which Jesus appears to be, well, learning and growing! Here he is, the son of the omniscient God of life, and yet here, he seems off his game, as he first ignores, and then makes some crude remarks about a Canaanite woman who simply wants help for her ailing daughter. A dog, Jesus calls her, telling her that he has come for the children of Israel, not for Canaanite Gentiles like her. And this right after he’s said that it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles, but what comes out. Now if that doesn’t make your stomach churn… 

Scholars have wrestled with this interaction for centuries, trying to make sense of it. Luther suggested that the Canaanite woman heard God’s no, just as we often do, but she also heard the yes beneath it, and she had the faith to persevere until she got to that yes. Some scholars point out that God is allowed to change His mind sometimes – like He does with Ninevah after Jonah prophecies its destruction, or like when Moses convinces God not to destroy the Israelites after they made a golden calf and God was livid with them. So here, this woman makes a strong case, and God, aka Jesus, changes his mind. Still other scholars observe that this memorable interaction is the turning point in Jesus’ ministry, where his mission turns from focusing on the sheep of the house of Israel to the people at large – at the end of Matthew, Jesus will say, “Go and baptize ALL nations,” and this is the moment that shift begins. 

I suppose there is truth to all of these perspectives. But after a week of learning at Chautauqua, what I see in this interaction is that Jesus is showing us what it looks like to learn. I’m not saying Jesus himself had to learn from the woman – maybe he did, maybe he didn’t, I’m not making a statement either way about that. What I’m saying is that Jesus shows us how it can look to learn from someone who is different from you.

This is a part of being human, and it is one of the best and most difficult parts, and so I’m glad Jesus gives us some guidance here. I need that sort of support from the Son of the all-knowing God! 

Because I can tell you what I would want to do if publicly confronted by an idea different from the one to which I’d been holding dearly. I would immediately start thinking of excuses to save face. “Well, I didn’t mean that the way you took it.” Or, “I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night – you see, I was out walking on a tumultuous sea.” Or, I might be willing to admit that the calling out was justified, but then try to frame it in such a way that still allows me to have some power, like, “I’m sorry I ignored you – I was distracted by all the other things on my plate right now. You see, my cousin just died, and I just fed, like, 5000 people, and then there was this incident on the sea, and then the Pharisees were all getting on my nerves… Anyway, sorry I was short with you, I just have a lot going on.”

But Jesus doesn’t do any of this. And if I’m being honest, even though I know that I do that, I’d be really disappointed in Jesus if he did. If I were that woman in need, and he started feeding me all kinds of excuses and justifications, I would feel utterly unseen and unheard, which is often the far more painful offense. I mean, don’t you hate it when someone makes an excuse for hurting you? Like an apology that starts with, “I’m sorry, BUT…” It’s like saying, “Your pain, and our relationship, is not as important to me as is my own ability to save face and maintain my position of power here. My comfort and self-image matter more to me than your pain.” But Jesus doesn’t do that. He puts this woman, and the relationship, first. When the woman uses his own words (“even the dogs get crumbs from the master’s table”) to focus his attention on a part of his mission he had previously not addressed, his mission to those beyond the children of Israel, he hears her, and he sees her. He receives her objection with grace, recognizing that Canaanite lives do matter, just as much as those of the children of Israel. He even commends her for pointing it out! And, he heals her daughter. In this story, we get to watch how Jesus turns what could have been a very embarrassing moment for him, into an opportunity to change, and to expand his mission. 

We all have such opportunities, though we may not handle them quite as graciously as Jesus does. They happen when we make mistakes that hurt people, and when our narrow world view doesn’t allow us to see or hear the pain of a person in need (or, to impose our own version of their story upon them). They happen when we get stuck in doing things the same old way, and when we are faced with a reality of which we have been, willfully or not, unaware. Becoming aware of, or even being confronted with our own limited perspectives, and the mistakes we make because of them, can be a painful and uncomfortable experience, and it is about as human an experience as there is. 

And thanks to this story, we see that when Jesus, who was himself fully human, is confronted with a challenge to the way he had always done things, confronted with a new story, he doesn’t use it as a chance to double down and prove himself right. He uses it as an opportunity to widen his vision, and expand his mission. He uses it as a chance to change and grow – another beautiful, though sometimes very difficult and painful human experience. When faced with something new, Jesus adapts, and his willingness to do so shows us that God’s vision is bigger than we previously imagined – bigger, in fact, than even this gutsy Canaanite woman had imagined!

On our final day at Chautauqua, the preacher, Rev. William H. Lamar IV, preached on Revelation 21, in which God declares a new heaven and a new earth. This renewed earth, he proclaimed, is one in which pain and fear and death are no more – and that includes the pain and fear that sometimes accompanies having to learn something difficult, and the death of our previously held views. In the way that only a great black preacher can do, Rev. Lamar declared that this vision is God’s invitation to us to participate in this new world. Sometimes that invitation entails allowing ourselves to learn from the other, to suspend our usual focus in order to listen to someone’s story, and to change course and widen our mission if it means someone can better know God’s love through us. This takes great humility, and faith that is as great as that of the Canaanite women. Yet when we can do it, we and the world around us will find healing.

Let us pray… Dear Jesus, thank you for graciously showing us how to learn and grow when our “same old ways” are challenged. Grant us open minds and listening ears, that our new encounters would guide us toward your kingdom ways. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

Full service can be viewed HERE.