Sermon for the Thirteenth Sunday After Pentecost
August 26, 2007
Isaiah 58:9b–14
Psalm 103:1–8
Hebrews 12:18–29
Luke 13:10-17
Lectionary 21
Proper 16
Year C
I.N.I. (In the name of Jesus)
People of God at Christ the King:
Sunday morning together, our communal time of Sabbath, is a gift to you and to me. We are freed from daily routine. We are freed from time constraints (I say to you who watch the clock on Sunday mornings, take off you watches!). We get to remind one another of the goodness of the Lord. We get to break open the Word of God. We get to eat and drink the abundant mercy of Christ.
At least once every week, on Sunday, we stop what we are doing, and bask in God’s forgiveness, joy, steadfast love, and good counsel. At least once every week, on Sunday, we stop what we are doing, and take in the gift of one another as brothers, sisters, and companions on life’s journey, sharing peace, singing communally, praying for one another and for the needs of the world, welcoming strangers who become friends. Sunday Sabbath, though it may mean many other things, should be about the gift of time.
In today’s gospel reading, didn’t Jesus remind those who were tripped up about his “work” of healing about Sabbath as gift? What happens to those keeping Sabbath in the gospel? Listen….
At the weekly gathering in the synagogue, as God’s people were immersing themselves in reading and singing, gathering, and praying (just as we do), while Jesus himself was holding forth front and center (as he should be), here enters this curved character. [walk bent over] The dear broken woman’s own body made the letter “C,” which stands for curved!
In her misshapen identity, Mrs. “C” was signaling the universal human condition that blocked us from looking up and out, we are trapped by so many demands that time itself becomes the oppressor. [walk bent over] This phrase could be our mantra, “so much to do, so little time!”
Nod your heads if any of these phrases preoccupy your time, your doing, and your thinking:
We have to get ready for school.
We have to make so much money.
We have to get everything right.
It’s hard to fit it all in.
Nod your head if you agree that we are immersed in a society that spends inordinate time and resources in worshipping itself, whether it is
glorifying fame
worshiping wealth
getting one over on someone else
having the latest and greatest gadget
having the latest and greatest clothes
having access to anything and everything 24/7
This seems to put us all out of shape, and catches up in what ancient theologians called our biggest problem incurvatus est. We are all curved into ourselves. Whether you can see it in our bodies or not, we are all curved into ourselves. In the Gospel story one woman blares out the universal problem because she feels it, she is weighed down with it, she knows that for eighteen years she has been looking down on everything, and this Sabbath is no different!
Jesus frees Mrs. Curve from her misshapen identity, so that she straightens her bent-over “C” to a “Y,” hands upraised in praise and prayer, arms held open to give and receive welcome, eyes looking outward to recognize the gift of the time and place of Sabbath.
On that same Sabbath, in that same synagogue, there were others who didn’t know that they were also shaping the world with the letter “C,” constricting and constructing time as a universal “do’s and don’t’s” list. Like many here who nodded our heads, they were so interested in getting things right, and fitting things in, that time itself became an oppressor and Sabbath as gift became lost. Jesus, front and center (as he should be), reminded those listening that the Sabbath’s center is all about freedom from oppression, and if at minimum you would see to the needs of your own immediate circle (like getting your livestock water), then look at Mrs. “C” and declare and rejoice in her new freedom! [arms up]
Sunday mornings, and other Sabbaths like them, are all about free time. Free time. Time for Jesus to be front and center, and to straighten out misshapen identities of “C’s” into “Y’s.”
Annie Lamott, pithy modern interpreter of the human condition, rejoices in the weekly gathering of God’s people as she writes “Why I Make Sam Go to Church.” Sam is her son. St. Andrew is her church.
Sam is the only kid he knows who goes to church…. He rarely wants to. This is not exactly true: the truth is he never wants to go. What young boy would rather be in church on the weekends than hanging out with a friend? It does not help that I always pack some snacks, some Legos, his art supplies, and bring along any friend of his whom we can lure into our churchy web. It does not help that he genuinely cares for the people there.
You might think, noting the bitterness, the resignation, that he was being made to sit through a six-hour Latin mass. Or you might wonder why I make this strapping exuberant boy come with me most weeks, and if you were to ask, this is what I would say:
I make him because I can. I outweigh him by nearly seventy-five pounds.
But that is only part of it. The main reason is that I want to give him what I have found in the world, which is to say a path and a little light to see by. Most of the people I know who have what I want—which is to say, purpose, heart, balance, gratitude, joy—are people with a deep sense of spirituality. They are people in community, who pray, or practice their faith….
She concludes…When I was at the end of my rope, the people at St. Andrew tied a knot in it for me and helped me hold on. The church became my home in the old meaning of home—that it’s where, when you show up, they have to let you in. They let me in. They even said, “You come back now.”
--Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies (New York: Anchor Books, © 1999), pp 99-100
People of God at Christ the King: Sunday mornings together, our communal times of Sabbath, are a gift to you and to me. May we provide a time and place that is truly free, and freeing, eating and drinking the abundant mercy of Christ. You come back now.
I.N.I.
The Rev. Timothy J. Keyl, Pastor
Christ the King Lutheran Church
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