Family Values?

Luke 14:25-33

September 8, 2013

            In the last few months a commercial aired that stirred up controversy with a capital C.  Some people got angry. There was backlash against the makers of the product.  People on the other side of the issue made sure that their voices in support of the product were heard as well. Nasty things from both sides were said on social media.  The response to the commercial seemed to highlight, yet again, how divided we are in our society.  So what product, what item sparked such passionate and even virulent responses from so many different people?  Was it something illicit or dangerous or somehow morally questionable? 

Actually, it was Cheerios.  You know Cheerios -- the breakfast cereal with the happy name.  Cheery – O!  Cheerios were a staple in my house growing up.  I loved Cheerios when I was a kid.  I still do.  The different varieties of Cheerios are great, but I’m equally content with basic Cheerios.  When my kids were little, we always had Cheerios on hand.  They were their first finger foods.  In fact one of my favorite Cheerios commercials even features a grandmother talking to her grandchild, who is sitting in a highchair eating … Cheerios. 

But what was it about this commercial that stirred up such a hornets nest?  One of the benefits touted about Cheerios is that eating them as part of a balanced diet is good for your heart.  So in this commercial, a little girl goes into the kitchen to ask her mother about this.  Her mother tells her that, yes, Cheerios have ingredients that can be heart healthy.  The little girl takes the box and runs off.  In the next scene we see the father, who’s been napping on the couch, wake up covered in Cheerios.  The commercial ends by going to a black screen with the word “Love” on it, and the Cheerios jingle. 

What’s so controversial?  The mother in the commercial is white.  The father is black.  The daughter is biracial.  While the backlash to this commercial took many forms, I think the underlying tension is based on two dangerous little words; family values.  The concept of family values has been a hot button issue politically and socially.  Certainly it has challenged people of faith.  Everybody claims to uphold the idea of family values.  I doubt that any of us would disagree that family values are important.  They are the lynchpin of our society.  I would suspect that no matter where someone might fall along the political spectrum, he or she would believe that family values are essential. 

But what exactly are family values?  That’s the tricky part, trying to define them.  There are so many different understandings of what makes a family.  That’s where we run into trouble, or so it seems.  We might agree that family values are important, but we disagree as to what the composition of a family should be.  Who should be counted as a family and who shouldn’t?  No matter what form our answer to that question would take, I think we could all agree on one thing – Jesus’s answer to family values in this passage is terrifying. 

Jesus does not espouse anything close to what we might think of as family values in these verses from Luke 14.  Instead, he seems to throw the whole idea of family values completely out the window. 

“Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.”

Whoever comes to me and does not hate father, mother, children, sibling, spouse.  If you want to be my disciple you have to hate family.  Hate?  While these words of Jesus might disturb us and make us uncomfortable, they would have shocked and outraged those listening to Jesus.  Judaism also espoused family values, but the understanding of family was not so much about what a family looked like.  Family values were found in the function of a family.  Family meant survival.  Family meant protection.  Their life and culture revolved around family.  There’s a reason why widows and orphans are lifted up as those who must be helped.  If you were a widow or an orphan, without family, you were vulnerable.  The family was the source of finances and the passing on of the skills necessary to survive in the world.  The family was where the rites and rituals of faith were learned.  The family was critical to every aspect of that society and culture.

Yet here comes Jesus telling them that in order to follow him, they would have to hate family.  I imagine many would have looked critically at Jesus, not just for saying these words, but also because he seemed to be living them out.  Where was Jesus’ family?  In Luke, more than in any other gospel, we learn about Jesus’ family; his mother, his father, his cousin John.  When we read the story of Jesus at age 12 staying behind in the temple, we read that he has made that journey not just with mom and dad, but with a large group of family.  Jesus was born into a family business, and any other son would have been home working in that business.  But Jesus left his family to travel the countryside, to preach and to teach.  Now he’s telling them to do the same.  While they might be inspired by his words, while they might really want to follow him and live in this community of God that he tells them about, now he’s telling them that they’re going to have to hate family to do so.  This is a much harder decision than they realized.

I think that’s the point.  Becoming a disciple, following Jesus requires a decision, and that decision is not easy.  Making the choice to follow Jesus, to be his disciple should not be taken lightly.  Jesus often used hyperbole, exaggerated language, to drive home the message he was giving, and I suspect that’s true to some degree in this passage as well.  But that doesn’t lessen his fundamental message.  Discipleship will cost you.  If you’re going to follow me you have to count the cost. 

He tells them, if a builder sets out to build a tower, he’s going to estimate the cost of building that tower before he starts.  Otherwise he’ll get the foundation poured, but he won’t have the means to finish the whole tower.  If a king is about wage war against another king, and the first king realizes that his army will be outnumbered, he’s going to send delegates to talk about peace.  So if you count the cost about other things, why wouldn’t you count the cost required in following me? 

I think the crux of this passage, of Jesus’ message, is that discipleship, following, requires sacrifice.   I don’t think Jesus hated families.  But he knew that making discipleship a priority meant that many things, including families, would have to be left behind.  Between his words about hating family and the way that builders and kings considered the cost of their endeavors, he also said this, “Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.” 

We have to remember that Jesus was not just meandering around the countryside, he was heading to Jerusalem.  He was going to the cross.  He knew it.  So as I’ve said in past sermons, there is an increased urgency to his words.  He’s going to Jerusalem.  He knows what sacrifice will be asked of him there.  If you want to follow him, you’re going to have to be ready to leave everything and everyone behind.  You’re going to have to be ready for the cost of that choice.  You’re going to have to be ready to sacrifice.  So before you say, “yes”, count the cost.

One of the commentators I read before writing this sermon said that sacrifice is not something we necessarily think about when it comes to church.  Often in the hectic pace of our daily lives, church and church activities is what is sacrificed.  This commentator pointed out that psychologists tell us that we value most that for which we sacrifice.  Perhaps, he mused, one factor in the decline of the mainline denominations is that we’ve made church and the Christian life too easy.  There’s no sacrifice in church for us to value.  I don’t know.  I’m not sure that would be the most popular evangelistic tack.  Come to church.  We’ll make your life harder.  But I think that what I found most powerful about Jesus’ words is that discipleship was not meant to be easy.  But it will be worth it.  There is new life to be found in discipleship.  I’m not referring to an eternal prize.  I think we focus so much on eternal life and what’s waiting for us after death, that we forget about life right now.  Jesus isn’t talking about how we get to heaven.  He’s talking about the content and the character of discipleship right now.  What are the marks of a life of discipleship?  It’s not easy.  There will be sacrifice.  There will be a cost.  You may have to leave people behind, even the people you love the most.  But it will be worth it.

I didn’t have to hate my family to get to the point where I could stand in the pulpit today.  But I had to be willing to hate the belief that many of them had – that women had no business preaching.  I had to be willing to hate my grandfather’s belief that I shouldn’t be a minister because of my gender.  I had to be willing to hate my grandmother’s references to my sermons as the little “talks” I gave in church.  I know that there are others who have made far greater sacrifices than I ever have or will.  Certainly Jesus’ words also make me reflect on what sacrifices I should be making that I shy away from.  But I understand a little better the hate Jesus referred to.  I understand a little bit about the sacrifice and the cost he called them to reckon.

What do we as a congregation need to sacrifice for our discipleship as a community?  What crosses are we being called to carry?  What cost do we need to count?  I know that these aren’t easy questions, and they certainly won’t have easy answers.  But I also believe that it is here, together, where we will find the courage and the strength to seek out those answers, to make whatever sacrifices we’re called to make.  I know it won’t be easy, but I think it will be worth it.  Let God’s family, God’s children say, “Amen.”

Just Keep Swimming

(This article was printed in the September 7, 2013 Minister's Corner Column of the Shawnee News Star)

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us…”                 Hebrews 12:1 New Revised Standard Version

            “Just keep swimming.”          Dorie, Finding Nemo

            With all of the unsettling news that is constantly before us, it has been refreshing and inspirational this past week to read about Diana Nyad’s unprecedented swim from Cuba to Florida.  Swimming that distance meant over 50 hours in the water.  What’s even more incredible is that she made this swim at the age of 62.  I’m a bit younger, and I’m thrilled when I push myself on the elliptical.  Over 50 hours of swimming.  62 years old.  Incredible!

            But this was not Nyad’s first attempt.  At the age of 60 she went through the intense training necessary for the swim from Cuba to Florida.  After her first attempt, she gave a TED talk in which she describes what happened on that initial try.  She was swimming strong.  She was physically and mentally ready.  But well into the journey, she was stung by a box jellyfish.  The box jellyfish is the most venomous of all the ocean’s creatures.  The body’s first response is excruciating, burning pain.  After that paralysis begins to set in.  But she kept swimming.  Her team’s EMT who was in one of the boats surrounding her jumped in to help and he was also stung.  He was a young man in excellent physical condition, but the pain of that sting was so debilitating he was flat on his back, trying to give himself epinephrine shots so he could then help her.  A medical team from Florida arrived hours later and made a floating ICU around her.  She kept swimming.  She swam until she was stung again.  She accepted this would be a staged swim and got out of the water.  However the effect of the stings on her body was too much and she abandoned her attempt.  Her words; she failed. 

            As inspiring as I found her description of that first swim, what I found most powerful was the why.  Why did she decide to do this in the first place?  She turned 60 and she wasn’t happy about it.  Those first 60 years had gone by in a blink of an eye.  In the 1970’s she had broken swimming records, but hadn’t swam competitively since.  Even with her successes, she realized that she had spent a majority of time in negative thinking.  She focused on her failures and her mistakes only.    

            Around this time her 82 year old mother died.  In addition to dwelling in the past, Nyad now dreaded the future.  If she died at the same age as her mother, that was only 22 years away.  What would she do with the rest of her life in time that was fleeting?  She set a goal, she created a dream.  That dream was so big, so challenging it would push her to be fully present in her life.  There would be no time for negative dwelling in the past or worrying about the unknown of the future.  Chasing this dream would be the hardest thing she could undertake.  As Nyad observed, the sport of swimming is like life.  You face endless obstacles.  But (my paraphrase) do you sink or do you just keep swimming? 

            The author of Hebrews had a different kind of race in mind in this first verse of chapter 12.  It was a race of faith with the goal, the prize being eternal life.  No matter what obstacles or challenges the world throws at us, we have to persevere.  We have to keep running this race, knowing that we are running toward God with Christ as our example and “pioneer.” But I think the underlying message of this verse and of Diana Nyad’s  accomplishment is hope.  Hope isn’t just something that comes to us.  We must persist in hope.  We must persevere in hope.  We have to cling to hope even though every other voice out there may tell us we’re nuts to do so.  Hope requires powerful persistence.  Hope requires being willing to dream something so big, so different from what reality seems to be that it seems impossible.  We read throughout scripture that the abundant life God wants us to have is going to be radically different than our expectations.  The kingdom is not what we think it will be.  What may seem impossible to us is always possible for God.  So we persist in hope.

            Concluding her talk, Nyad paraphrased the poet Mary Oliver; what will we do with our one wild, precious life?  We have been given a wild, precious life.  How will we live it?  Will we live a life of persistent hope and seemingly impossible dreams? Will we live a life of courage, trusting that God is with us in every step of this race no matter the obstacles?  Will we live a life abundant in compassion, mercy and love?  What will we do with our wild, precious life?

                                                                                               

The Cool Table

Luke 14:1, 7-14

September 1, 2013

            There’s something about moving through a cafeteria line, holding onto one of those green plastic trays that sends me into a slight panic.  It doesn’t matter who I’m with or where I’m eating, for a moment when I turn from the line and scan the dining room I freeze up a little inside. 

            I’m sure that much of this largely due to the introvert in me.  There’s something intimidating about having to walk up to a group at a table and join them.  But I also suspect that much of my dread comes from my childhood and facing the school lunchroom.  Any hierarchy that seems to exist in a school comes out in full force in its lunchroom.  The kids at the top of the school food chain had a table of their own.  That was known as the cool table.  No matter how cool you thought you were, in order to sit at the cool table you had to be invited by one of the other cool kids.  Sitting down without an invitation and being told there wasn’t room was even more embarrassing than dropping your tray in front of everybody. 

            Even though I wasn’t a social pariah in school – I had plenty of friends and I was basically well-liked – that fear of the lunchroom and the cool table was well established in me.  Junior High was the worst.  By the time I got to high school, I stopped worrying about the cool table because basically I abandoned the lunchroom altogether.  I either sat outside for lunch or went to another hangout spot on campus.  When I was old enough to have friends who were allowed to drive and had cars, and on the rare occasion when I had a car, I left school for the lunch hour. 

            The hierarchy of the lunchroom meant that where you sat and who you sat with made a difference.  It was important.  It signified your status in the school.  It showed your classmates that you either belonged or you didn’t.  It was silly.  It was superficial, but when I was a student, it was very, very, very real.  The reality is that, even though we don’t like to admit it or talk about it, the hierarchy of the lunchroom doesn’t end with school.  The cool table mentality still exists.  Some people belong at the top of that hierarchy and some don’t.  Some people get an invitation and some don’t; and woe to those who try to join without one.  Sadly I think the church has been one of the biggest culprits of this.  Even if those of us sitting in the pews don’t see ourselves as members of an elite group or club, the cool people at the cool table, those outside the church doors often do.  If you’ve ever visited a church and been asked to change seats because you’re sitting in a member’s exclusive seat, that’s the cool table mentality at work. 

            At first glance it may seem that Jesus is promoting that kind of mentality in the parable he tells in today’s passage.  Luke’s gospel emphasizes meals more than any of the others and this passage is no exception.   Jesus is attending a meal at the home of a Pharisee.  As the first verse points out, he was being watched closely.  That may have been because some of the religious leaders were waiting for a chance to back him into a verbal corner.  Some may have been watching him closely because everything he seemed to do was radical.  He healed on the Sabbath.  He forgave people of their sins.  He spoke and taught with an authority no one had ever witnessed before.  What would he do next?  So they watched him intently.

            Jesus was also watching carefully.  He observed the guests who came to the meal and how they chose their seats.  There were places, seats of honor, where only the most distinguished guests could sit.  Taking one of those seats when you didn’t belong or weren’t invited would have been like trying to claim a place at the cool table.  If the host came and asked you to move, you would have left that seat in disgrace. 

This was not some arbitrary quirk.  The culture at that time was one of honor and shame; much like a school lunchroom.  Where you sat at a banquet signified not just how cozy you were with the host, but your status in society.  It was a hierarchy.  There were some on top, some in the middle and many at the bottom.  At first Jesus may seem to support that idea by encouraging people to take a lesser seat.  But was he?  Or was he pointing out to them that those who sought to put themselves at the top of the food chain or at the top rung of the social ladder, were the ones who would be humbled.  “For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” 

Another aspect of this honor/shame culture was that there was an agenda behind every invitation.  You didn’t invite people to a dinner for the heck of it.  You invited someone who could do something for you, just as you might be invited for the same reason.  You invited someone who just by being in your home raised your place in the social realm.  It was about give and take.  I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine.  There was an agenda.  I imagine that agenda was so ingrained in people that no one thought much about it.  But once again Jesus made them think about it. 

“When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid.  But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.”

Don’t invite someone who will repay you.  Invite those who can do nothing for you.  Invite those that would be despised at any other banquet in town.  Invite those who have no way to return the favor and when you do you will be blessed.  You may not be repaid now, but you will be in time.  You will be repaid at “the resurrection of the righteous.” 

Think about the people we serve at our community meal each month.  They are poor and crippled and lame and blind.  They don’t add to our membership or our budget.  But we serve them anyway.  It’s the right thing to do, and yes, I feel good each month when I work at the meal.  But more importantly I think the community meal is a vivid reminder to me that whatever place I may hold or think I hold in our society doesn’t matter.  It doesn’t matter.  A place of honor here doesn’t count in the kingdom.  It’s not about my status. It’s not about the seat of honor I think I deserve.  It’s about how I treat other people.  It’s about seeing other people not through the lens of status, position or class, but as children of God.  It seems to me that when Jesus warns the guests about assuming the seats of honor at the table, the distinguished guests he was referring to were not the people in power at the time, but the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind. 

This past week marked the 50^th anniversary of the March on Washington and Martin Luther King, Jr’s “I Have a Dream” speech.  I’ve watched that speech and listened to that speech and read that speech countless times.  But each time I hear it I am struck anew at the depth of his message.  It was a speech about Civil Rights, but it was more than that.  It was a speech about the injustice of segregation and the mockery it made of the so-called American Dream, but it was more than that.  It was about a vision of a beloved community.  It was a dream of every single person, regardless of color, class or creed being welcomed at the table.  That speech was a mirror for the country.  Gazing into it we saw how far away we were from that beloved community, that banquet table of grace.  Dr. King reminded us that when some of us aren’t free to come to the table, none of us are truly free. 

The parables Jesus told are a mirror.  They were a mirror for those he spoke to directly.  They are a mirror for us as well.  I don’t see it as mirror in which those of us on top are necessarily shamed or scorned, but we see in the reflection that often the things we think are important – places of honor, status, etc. – don’t matter in the kingdom of God.  They don’t matter at God’s table.  When we see that, when we recognize that the superficial and external don’t matter, we come one step closer to that beloved community.  We see that the cool table, the truly cool table, is not our table, but God’s table.  It is the table where all of us find a place.  Let all God’s children say, “Alleluia! Amen.”