Year C
\u00a02 Kings 5:1-3, 7-15c
\u00a0Psalm 111
\u00a02 Timothy 2:8-15
\u00a0Luke 17:11-19<\/p>\n\n\n\n
May the words of my mouth O God\u2026\u00a0 speak your truth\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We talked last week\u2026 about how faith\u2026 even the size of a mustard seed\u2026 is enough\u2026 because our lives\u2026 our work\u2026 our challenges\u2026 our successes\u2026 our formation\u2026 and maybe especially our growth into boundlessness\u2026 are lived out in concert with\u2026 and according to\u2026 God’s will for us\u2026 and we’ll be reminded about this again\u2026 when in our seven-week Advent\u2026 we direct our gaze to God’s plan for all of creation\u2026 before we allow it to move to the manger itself\u2026 but a little bit of faith is enough\u2026 because we continue to live and move and have our being\u2026 in God’s inescapable presence\u2026 and in God’s boundless love\u2026 and a little bit of faith is enough\u2026 because it allows us to use our free will\u2026 to choose to breathe in\u2026 to inspire\u2026 the Holy Spirit\u2026 and co-create God’s will for ourselves and for each other\u2026 or to hold our breath in the face of it\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But today\u2026 I want to talk briefly about entitlement and gratitude\u2026 and the way I want to do that\u2026 is to first share just a bit\u2026 of what Rabbi Jonathan Sachs said\u2026 years ago\u2026 when he spoke to the Bishops of the Anglican Communion\u2026 the Rabbi was invited to speak about covenant\u2026 but in order to do that\u2026 he also had to speak about contracts\u2026 and transactions\u2026 and ultimately\u2026 about transformation\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said that power and wealth generate contracts\u2026 agreements between two or more people who are pursuing their own interests\u2026 and there are commercial contacts which create economic markets\u2026 and social contracts which create the state\u2026 but a covenant is something entirely different\u2026 in a covenant\u2026 two or more people come together in a mutual bond of love and trust\u2026 to share their interests\u2026 and maybe even their lives\u2026 by doing together what neither of them could do alone\u2026 and that’s not the same as a contract at all\u2026 because while a contract is about interests\u2026 a covenant is about identity\u2026 while a contract is about transaction\u2026 a covenant is about relationship\u2026 and that\u2019s why\u2026 he said\u2026 contracts benefit\u2026 while covenants transform\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The lectionary has skipped over vv.4-6 in today’s reading from 2Kings\u2026 but what we’ve missed is this\u2026 Naaman’s king in Aram\u2026 Ben-Hadad II\u2026 has sent a letter to Israel’s King Joram\u2026 asking him to cure Naaman of his leprosy\u2026 and that’s why the king of Israel tore his clothes\u2026 and said\u2026 Am I God\u2026 to give death or life\u2026 that Ben-Hadad sends word to me to cure Naaman of his leprosy<\/em>\u2026 but Elisha intervenes\u2026 and asks Joram to re-direct Naaman to him\u2026 Naaman went\u2026 but expected Elisha to come out to meet him\u2026 and to wave his hand over his dis-eased skin\u2026 so he’d be healed\u2026 wave his hand\u2026 as though it were a magic wand\u2026 Naaman wanted something complicated to be done for him\u2026 perhaps something in line with his standing in the king’s army\u2026 but Naaman’s servants\u2026 those with no social standing\u2026 pointed out his stubbornness\u2026 his sense of entitlement\u2026 and they clarified that God works with our simple\u2026 small faith\u2026 and when we remember that 2Kings was written during the Babylonian Exile\u2026 this story may have also served as a way to emphasize God’s inarguable omnipresence\u2026 and God’s self-emptying humility and unpretentiousness\u2026 which can evoke wonder and gratitude in us\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because wonder and gratitude are antithetical to entitlement\u2026 to the contracted transactions which create power and wealth\u2026 and there’s nothing about wonder that’s possessive\u2026 it’s like seeing the aurora borealis\u2026 which we can’t own\u2026 or the new images from the James Webb telescope\u2026 which are beyond our reach\u2026 or a caterpillar becoming a butterfly and emerging from a cocoon\u2026 which transforms itself in secret\u2026 or a baby taking its first steps\u2026 which brings awe to our hearts…<\/p>\n\n\n\n In today’s Gospel\u2026 Jesus is in the borderland between Galilee and Samaria\u2026 he’s effectively in no man’s land\u2026 which also means he’s in every man’s land\u2026 and in a village\u2026 he encounters ten lepers\u2026 who keep their distance\u2026 because during that time\u2026 people lived in dread of leprosy\u2026 it gave some people skin which looked like a corpse’s skin\u2026 and nothing defiled a person\u2026 made them unclean\u2026 like death did\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n Pastor Martin Billmeier points out that Samaritans and Jews had a longstanding animosity going back hundreds of years\u2026 so ordinarily\u2026 nine Jewish men would not put up with a Samaritan hanging around with them\u2026 and the Samaritan would not want to hang out with them\u2026 but this dis-ease\u2026 leprosy\u2026 may well have been enough to create a common bond between them\u2026 and the word itself\u2026 loosely defined\u2026 described any skin blemish or eruption which looked suspicious\u2026 and which made one unclean\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n And so the lepers themselves are in the borderland between life and death\u2026 leprosy forced them out of community\u2026 which was to die\u2026 and as they cried out for mercy\u2026 Jesus simply told them to go and show themselves to the priests\u2026 and they were made clean\u2026 and it didn’t happen all at once\u2026 it was as they went\u2026 that they were made clean\u2026 at least clean enough on the surface level\u2026 that they could show themselves to the priests\u2026 at least clean enough that they could work again\u2026 be with family again\u2026 be in community again\u2026 but internally\u2026 they continued to be formed\u2026 though I wonder if the priests would have seen the Samaritan\u2026 affirmed that he too had been made clean\u2026 or if he was too much of an outsider for that\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Later on in Luke’s Gospel\u2026 after Jesus’ Ascension\u2026 in 24:51 it says\u2026 While he was blessing them\u2026 he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven<\/em>\u2026 Jesus didn’t bless them… and then stop\u2026 and then get carried up\u2026 his blessing continued\u2026 so I think we can safely infer that as we too continue along the way\u2026 the faith we have is enough to make us well\u2026 to open our hearts and minds\u2026 and that that process too\u2026 simply continues\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n The pandemic out of which we’re still emerging\u2026 has been\u2026 in some ways\u2026 like having leprosy\u2026 cut off from family out of fear of infecting them\u2026 from community\u2026 from church\u2026 having to work from home if we were able to work at all\u2026 some of us masking or keeping physical distance\u2026 even while many of us are still not fully healed from the trauma of the experience\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n So we find ourselves in a place of asking quite a wide variety of challenging questions\u2026 about the spiritual forces at work in the world around us\u2026 and how they inform the many facets of our lives\u2026 to know what drives and motivates us\u2026 and how we discern God’s will for us individually and collectively\u2026 to what\u2026 if anything\u2026 we are entitled\u2026 and for what we ought to be grateful\u2026 and determining the answers which will inform the direction our lives take\u2026 Biblical scholars point out\u2026 that the Bible uses the concepts of wellness\u2026 wholeness\u2026 and salvation\u2026 almost interchangeably\u2026 and being grateful and saying thank you\u2026 are at the heart of God’s hope for humanity\u2026 and God’s intent for each one of us\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Author Anne Lamott says her two favorite prayers come in the morning and at bedtime\u2026 after waking\u2026 she prays\u2026 Help me, help me, help me<\/em>\u2026 and before sleep she prays\u2026 Thank you, thank you, thank you<\/em>\u2026 her prayer reminds us of our dependence on God\u2026 reminds us that our journey continues\u2026 reminds us that it’s on the way that we are made clean\u2026 and that even the outcasts know that we need to return in gratitude to the One who heals and transforms us\u2026 and like the Samaritan\u2026 to give thanks\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Year C\u00a02 Kings 5:1-3, 7-15c\u00a0Psalm 111\u00a02 Timothy 2:8-15\u00a0Luke 17:11-19 May the words of my mouth O God\u2026\u00a0 speak your truth\u2026 We talked last week\u2026 about how faith\u2026 even the size of a mustard seed\u2026 is enough\u2026 because our lives\u2026 our work\u2026 our challenges\u2026 our successes\u2026 our formation\u2026 and maybe especially our growth into boundlessness\u2026 are lived out in concert with\u2026 and according to\u2026 God’s will for us\u2026 and we’ll be reminded about this again\u2026 when in our seven-week Advent\u2026 we direct our gaze to God’s plan for all of creation\u2026 before we allow it to move to the manger itself\u2026 but a little bit of faith is enough\u2026 because we continue to live and move and have our being\u2026 in God’s inescapable presence\u2026 and in God’s boundless love\u2026 and a little bit of faith is enough\u2026 because it allows us to use our free will\u2026 to choose to breathe in\u2026 to inspire\u2026 the Holy Spirit\u2026 and co-create God’s will for ourselves and for each other\u2026 or to hold our breath in the face of it\u2026 But today\u2026 I want to talk briefly about entitlement and gratitude\u2026 and the way I want to do that\u2026 is to first share just a bit\u2026 of what Rabbi Jonathan Sachs said\u2026 years ago\u2026 when he spoke to the Bishops of the Anglican Communion\u2026 the Rabbi was invited to speak about covenant\u2026 but in order to do that\u2026 he also had to speak about contracts\u2026 and transactions\u2026 and ultimately\u2026 about transformation\u2026 He said that power and wealth generate contracts\u2026 agreements between two or more people who are pursuing their own interests\u2026 and there are commercial contacts which create economic markets\u2026 and social contracts which create the state\u2026 but a covenant is something entirely different\u2026 in a covenant\u2026 two or more people come together in a mutual bond of love and trust\u2026 to share their interests\u2026 and maybe even their lives\u2026 by doing together what neither of them could do alone\u2026 and that’s not the same as a contract at all\u2026 because while a contract is about interests\u2026 a covenant is about identity\u2026 while a contract is about transaction\u2026 a covenant is about relationship\u2026 and that\u2019s why\u2026 he said\u2026 contracts benefit\u2026 while covenants transform\u2026 The lectionary has skipped over vv.4-6 in today’s reading from 2Kings\u2026 but what we’ve missed is this\u2026 Naaman’s king in Aram\u2026 Ben-Hadad II\u2026 has sent a letter to Israel’s King Joram\u2026 asking him to cure Naaman of his leprosy\u2026 and that’s why the king of Israel tore his clothes\u2026 and said\u2026 Am I God\u2026 to give death or life\u2026 that Ben-Hadad sends word to me to cure Naaman of his leprosy\u2026 but Elisha intervenes\u2026 and asks Joram to re-direct Naaman to him\u2026 Naaman went\u2026 but expected Elisha to come out to meet him\u2026 and to wave his hand over his dis-eased skin\u2026 so he’d be healed\u2026 wave his hand\u2026 as though it were a magic wand\u2026 Naaman wanted something complicated to be done for him\u2026 perhaps something in line with his standing in the king’s army\u2026 but Naaman’s servants\u2026 those with no social standing\u2026 pointed out his stubbornness\u2026 his sense of entitlement\u2026 and they clarified that God works with our simple\u2026 small faith\u2026 and when we remember that 2Kings was written during the Babylonian Exile\u2026 this story may have also served as a way to emphasize God’s inarguable omnipresence\u2026 and God’s self-emptying humility and unpretentiousness\u2026 which can evoke wonder and gratitude in us\u2026 Because wonder and gratitude are antithetical to entitlement\u2026 to the contracted transactions which create power and wealth\u2026 and there’s nothing about wonder that’s possessive\u2026 it’s like seeing the aurora borealis\u2026 which we can’t own\u2026 or the new images from the James Webb telescope\u2026 which are beyond our reach\u2026 or a caterpillar becoming a butterfly and emerging from a cocoon\u2026 which transforms itself in secret\u2026 or a baby taking its first steps\u2026 which brings awe to our hearts… In today’s Gospel\u2026 Jesus is in the borderland between Galilee and Samaria\u2026 he’s effectively in no man’s land\u2026 which also means he’s in every man’s land\u2026 and in a village\u2026 he encounters ten lepers\u2026 who keep their distance\u2026 because during that time\u2026 people lived in dread of leprosy\u2026 it gave some people skin which looked like a corpse’s skin\u2026 and nothing defiled a person\u2026 made them unclean\u2026 like death did\u2026 Pastor Martin Billmeier points out that Samaritans and Jews had a longstanding animosity going back hundreds of years\u2026 so ordinarily\u2026 nine Jewish men would not put up with a Samaritan hanging around with them\u2026 and the Samaritan would not want to hang out with them\u2026 but this dis-ease\u2026 leprosy\u2026 may well have been enough to create a common bond between them\u2026 and the word itself\u2026 loosely defined\u2026 described any skin blemish or eruption which looked suspicious\u2026 and which made one unclean\u2026 And so the lepers themselves are in the borderland between life and death\u2026 leprosy forced them out of community\u2026 which was to die\u2026 and as they cried out for mercy\u2026 Jesus simply told them to go and show themselves to the priests\u2026 and they were made clean\u2026 and it didn’t happen all at once\u2026 it was as they went\u2026 that they were made clean\u2026 at least clean enough on the surface level\u2026 that they could show themselves to the priests\u2026 at least clean enough that they could work again\u2026 be with family again\u2026 be in community again\u2026 but internally\u2026 they continued to be formed\u2026 though I wonder if the priests would have seen the Samaritan\u2026 affirmed that he too had been made clean\u2026 or if he was too much of an outsider for that\u2026 Later on in Luke’s Gospel\u2026 after Jesus’ Ascension\u2026 in 24:51 it says\u2026 While he was blessing them\u2026 he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven\u2026 Jesus didn’t bless them… and then stop\u2026 and then get carried up\u2026 his blessing continued\u2026 so I think we can safely infer that as we too continue along the way\u2026 the faith we have is enough to make us well\u2026 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