Genesis 2:18–24
Psalm 8
Hebrews 1:1–4; 2:5–12
Mark 10:2–16
Year B
I.N.I.
Part of the preacher’s task is to wed the world of Scriptures with the world of today.
In today’s world, the divorce is about 50%. http://www. divorcerate. org/
More than 1 million children each year experience their parents' divorce. Less than 60 percent of American children live with both of their biological parents; about 25 percent live with their biological mother only; and about 4 percent live with their biological father only. The remaining 11 percent live with step-families, adoptive parents, foster homes, or with other relatives. http://www. answers. com/topic/divorce
I do not know the divorce rate in Jesus’ time. I do know that divorce was allowed, and I do know that in Jewish law, only men were allowed to divorce their wives, because like animals and children, women were considered possessions of their fathers until they were married, when they became the possession of their husbands. So when a husband divorced his wife, women had little recourse for getting on with their lives.
There were competing schools of rabbinic teaching that interpreted the law from Deuteronomy 24:1-4, which allows men to divorce their wives. The School of Shammai said that divorce should be granted only in extreme circumstances, such as in the case of adultery. Another, the School of Hillel, permitted men to divorce their wives for virtually any reason. Here is an account of these schools of thoughts from the Mishnah, a Jewish writing that interprets the law:
The School of Shammai say [sic]: A man may not divorce his wife unless he has found unchastity in her, for it is written, “Because he had found in her indecency in anything. ”And the School of Hillel say [sic]: [He may divorce her] even if she spoiled a dish for him, for it is written, “Because he had found in her indecency in anything. ”R. Akiba says: Even if he found another fairer than she, for it is written, “And it shall be if she find no favor in his eyes…. ”(quoted by Donald Juel in Mark (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress © 1990, p 138))
In today’s Gospel, the “test” that was presented by the Pharisees to Jesus was to see which school of thought he would land in. What came out was a third way, a “Jesus’” way, where the authority of the Torah is jettisoned in favor of the Genesis story where it states, “and the two shall become one flesh. ”Under God’s domain, the intent is that unity is paramount. Under the law, Jesus concludes, divorce is permissible because of our hard heartedness, our dried-up hearts. And further, as Jesus pursues his “way” of teaching, it is clear that Jesus is challenging easy divorce on either the side of men or women. In his response to the Pharisees, Jesus takes the initial question and the concept of marriage and divorce, largely an economic issues in the ancient world, and deepens them, taking the conversation to a place that the Pharisees would not have expected.
I can’t imagine anyone in this room agreeing that divorce should be easily done. I can’t imagine anyone in this room allowing only the one in the marriage relationship to be given cause for divorce at the expense of the other.
I know many of you and many in other circles of my life, single, married, widow or widower, male or female, gay or straight, who live with the experience of divorce. It devastates the landscape of the unity God intends. It dries up many hearts. We live together as those who have failed to fulfill the promises of fidelity, and are intertwined with brokenness in, and out of marriage, unions, and whatever social structures and rituals we have enacted. Victims fill these pews. Dried hearts come into our churches.
I don’t think there should be a litmus test for those who are worthy of admittance to our church community based on sexual orientation, marriage, or family. Simply put, the church welcomes all who seek new life in Christ, and the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the sacraments of grace are intended to be balm for healing. The image of church as moms and dads bringing their kids is impoverished if that is the only image. There is a phrase that troubles me that Sunday morning at 11 am is the most segregated hour in America. If that is true, as I think it is, than we must model the ways Jesus welcomed all manner of society into his circle as a model of the kingdom of God.
Like children, and women, divorcees.
In 1984, my worshipping community was 90% African-American, in North Philadelphia. The model for this Lutheran church where I served my internship was to minister to the neighborhood rather than run away from it. Here on 17th and Tioga Streets, crumbling rowhouses were inhabited by middle class folks, drug addicts, and “families” often led by only one woman. On Sunday mornings, we had to herd children away from the candy store across the street into our one-room Sunday school. About half our worshipping congregation were children under the age of 16, and we put many of them to work as acolytes. Kids with names like Tutubu, Maisha, and Katonya played on the front stoop of the vicarage, which was the third floor apartment of the parish house. These children knew Nativity Lutheran Church as a safe place, a place that offered love and acceptance, a place to play and make friends, a place where adults saw them as a sign of the kingdom of God.
The other half of that worshiping community was mostly women with just a handful of men. Juanita Brown almost single-handedly kept the church intact. You would find her weeding the flowers on a Tuesday afternoon. You would find her instructing the children in Sunday School on Sunday morning. As a 24 year-old Vicar, I would take refuge in her home cooking and wisdom of years. Juanita lived with her daughter and grandchildren. The men in that home, if there were any, were scarce. Juanita Brown’s tenacity, arms of welcome, and faithfulness showed that neighborhood and this intern a glimmer of God’s intent for healing a broken neighborhood and a broken world.
In 1987, at my wedding, my “best man” was a married couple, a seminary professor and his wife. Two years earlier, they were married after difficult divorces. The professor, who was also a musician, welcomed me into the ways of the seminary’s worship life and its choir. In my first year of seminary, he introduced me to the woman he was courting, and they both revealed the shattered marriages they had emerged from. On one occasion this professor even preached on today’s texts and announced how he was shamed by the brokenness of his divorce, while only knowing that God’s forgiveness through Christ would see him through. I rejoiced at this honesty in preaching. I was pleased to sing in a choir at his wedding. And I was proud to have this couple who had blessed Kari’s and my courtship to offer their love and blessing next to me as a groom.
The landscape of our lives is littered with fragile relationships that need tending. We come to Sunday morning and other gatherings of the church to declare that in Christ God has made us one. In his own broken body, Jesus asks forgiveness. In the meal we share, we declare God’s intention for unity through a single loaf and common cup. In the lives we lead, we seek to overcome division by modeling Jesus’ extending welcome to the least as a model of the kingdom. You are invited to eat and drink, that with all the hungry and broken in this world, you might find a place to belong the kingdom.
I.N.I.
The Rev. Timothy J. Keyl, Pastor
Christ the King Lutheran Church
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