July 1, 2018
Texts: [Full texts printed after the message]
Wisdom of Solomon 1:13-15, 2:23-24
Psalm 130
2 Corinthians 8:7-15
Mark 5:21-43
To remind us of what we just heard, I want to repeat a line from each one of our readings. Lines that really jumped out at me:
Book of Wisdom: God does not rejoice in the destruction of the living
Psalm: You changed my mourning into dancing
Epistle: Whoever had much did not have more, and whoever had little did not have less
Gospel: Talitha koum. She should be given something to eat.
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Oh! I love these readings. Maybe it’s because I am such a tactile person. Each of these readings is so deeply human and so deeply physical. What’s more human than dying, mourning, dancing, the struggle for justice, and rising and eating?
It is one of the richest gifts that God has created us to be incarnate. In the flesh: Smelly, hungry, squishy humans. God does not rejoice in the destruction of the living. God does not rejoice in the tearing down of the body. God transforms mourning into dancing.
What does this mean for death? The first reading comes off sounding as if death is this solely diabolical thing. And yet when we look at all the lectionary scriptures as a whole story, it is clear that God, Jesus, the Spirit are there and present with us in our dying. Death. And certainly resurrection. How can God transform our mourning into dancing, without first joining us in the mourning? God is with us in the flesh, incarnate, touching that bleeding place. That place within us that seeps out our life energy, sometimes over the course of years and years, a whole lifetime.
There is tremendous body awareness in the gospel reading. Jesus: to know that despite all the people crowding around him is able to sense when his power flows. The hemorrhaging woman: to sense the immediate difference in her healing. Notice as I reread the gospel the amount of physicality strung throughout. Try to place yourself in the reading and notice the sensations around you.
Mark 5:21-43
5:21 When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered around him; and he was by the sea.
22 Then one of the leaders of the synagogue named Jairus came and, when he saw him, fell at his feet
23 and begged him repeatedly, "My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be made well, and live."
24 So he went with him. And a large crowd followed him and pressed in on him.
25 Now there was a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years.
26 She had endured much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse.
27 She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak,
28 for she said, "If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well."
29 Immediately her hemorrhage stopped; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.
30 Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, "Who touched my clothes?"
31 And his disciples said to him, "You see the crowd pressing in on you; how can you say, 'Who touched me?'"
32 He looked all around to see who had done it.
33 But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told him the whole truth.
34 He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease."
35 While he was still speaking, some people came from the leader's house to say, "Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further?"
36 But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the leader of the synagogue, "Do not fear, only believe."
37 He allowed no one to follow him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James.
38 When they came to the house of the leader of the synagogue, he saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly.
39 When he had entered, he said to them, "Why do you make a commotion and weep? The child is not dead but sleeping."
40 And they laughed at him. Then he put them all outside, and took the child's father and mother and those who were with him, and went in where the child was.
41 He took her by the hand and said to her, "Talitha cum," which means, "Little girl, get up!"
42 And immediately the girl got up and began to walk about (she was twelve years of age). At this they were overcome with amazement.
43 He strictly ordered them that no one should know this, and told them to give her something to eat.
Let us tap into that gift of awareness. Let’s see what our bodies are trying to teach us. So often we spend our days up here, in our minds. Not only in our thinking/mind space, but we also spend our energy feeding that part of ourselves. Richard Rohr says that one of the most prevalent addictions we have in the Western world is “thinking.” Thinking. Developing our minds certainly isn’t a negative thing in and of itself. But it can destroy us if we neglect the other pieces of ourselves. I think the biggest danger that lies in spending a disproportionate amount of energy on our thoughts is that that is where fear lies. That is where the boxes live to separate and categorize people. It’s very hard to dehumanize when we are abiding in our bodies and too easy to do so in our minds.
The suffering of the hemorrhaging woman sounds like a story that could have taken place today. A woman’s body suffering at the hands of doctors, only making it worse. It’s so easy for me to imagine this woman sitting in a doctor’s office today, a woman of color, poor from trying to care for her body, no one listening to her, so much waiting, maybe an immigrant, maybe sick from a lifetime of oppression. All that’s left for her is to crawl on the ground in hope of touching some man’s cloak tassel.
It reminds me of Ta-Nehisi Coates’s book Between the World and Me. For those of you who haven’t gotten a chance to read it, in it he writes a letter to his son. He urges his son to remember that as much as racism is a thing of the mind, it is a danger to his physical body. Slavery was the buying and selling of bodies. His body is vulnerable for being a black young man in the United States, and to forget that would be to put his life at risk. It’s his body, the vessel of everything else, at risk.
If we shut out the wisdom of the suffering bodies among our one body, how are we to heal? How will we ever come to a place where, “Whoever had much did not have more, and whoever had little did not have less”? Unless we meet the mourning, meet the bleeding.
I am currently in my own mourning. A piece of me is bleeding. Many of you probably remember Walton Schofield, a core member in my L’Arche home. You probably remember him because of his “disruptive” purr noise that he would make when he would come with us to church. Or maybe some of you might remember the story I told of Walton a couple of years ago when Alfonso and I co-led a teaching. And many of you probably know that Walton died in January. January 18th.
I’ve been trying to find ways to describe who Walton was to me. When I was talking to my sister on the phone yesterday, my sister described him as my soulmate, and it’s the most apt description I’ve found so far. Walton was my person, and I was his. The day that Alfonso and I flew out to begin our travels, Walton unexpectedly went to the hospital. And just a couple of days later, he died. Many of you have lovingly asked about Alfonso and my trip, and it’s impossible to think of these past few months without including Walton’s passing. Every day after Walton’s death felt like my mind and my heart were slowly mourning. I was blessed with so many opportunities to share stories about my beloved friend. I received emails with words I deeply needed from witnesses of the realness of our reloationship. It was as if the top half of me (mind/heart) could process in such needed and healthy ways, whereas my body still hadn't arrived back home where I could mourn.
Every day since my return to DC, my body is beginning to join in the grief. Walton was the place I felt most safe, most at home, most reminded of my belovedness. I saw myself as God sees me, when I was around him. I pray that everyone on this earth has someone who does that for them. And every day as the stresses and anxieties and doubts of everyday life come crashing in, the desire to be near my dear friend is even stronger. And the pain of not having him is real. Not just something I can shut down in my brain. But real pain in my gut, a heaviness in my body. I am sure so many of us have experienced loss in our bodies. And it’s not pretty or romantic. Nor can it be rushed. I guess that’s part of the reason we spend more time up here then down here. We can exert fairly impressive levels of control over our minds, and ways of thinking. Whereas our bodies seem to be this mystery. Doing things we can’t control, our sleep and hunger leading us. I often wish I had a button I could press that would spit out some reading of what my body was trying to tell me.
So why does Jesus walk into a room of a dead little girl, and announce she is sleeping? What does this have to do with us?
It seems the story is never over. Over and over and over again, there is new life after death. It seems like Jesus is telling us, “Wake Up!” “Expect new life!” “Get the food ready!” We cannot stay paralyzed in despair. Even after twelve years of bleeding out, there is still radiant and radical hope.
This reading has always been very special to me. I remember hearing it as a little girl, and thinking, “wow! He’s talking to me! God is asking me to wake up! ...and even better, he wants people to feed me!” And every time I hear it again the words, “Talitha koum” cry out to me in a new way. I surrounded myself with the words; I painted it on my wall. I was gifted with a painting of it. I was given a mug with the words on it. I have it written on my guitar. Over and over again I need to hear the words “Talitha koum”. Little girl I say to you arise. I need the reminder that there is hope. That that piece of us that we believed to be dead, is actually asleep, and just really needs some nourishment. There is that beloved little child within us that Jesus decides is important enough to still come to visit even after they are pronounced dead.
So often in prayer the place where I feel most myself before God is as a little girl. A small child. God’s little beloved one. It’s what I felt like when I was around Walton. It’s the image that I come back to when I lose sight of who I am. It’s where I feel the strongest, most capable, most creative, most trusting, most adventurous, most free.
A few years ago I wrote a song that brings me back to that place. I invite you to listen and as you listen, I invite you to take notice of your body. Take notice of what has bubbled up within you. Perhaps a lifelong hemorrhage or a sudden death within yourself that needs to touch a cloak with hope or be fed a delicious meal. Hear God inviting you to expect new life.
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Little Girl Song
In the morning when you rise
Let me be your sunlight
The hunger in your belly and the lamp at your feet
So you my face in every person you meet
Come my darling play with me
Skip those rocks and climb that tree
Come my darling lay with me
Watch the clouds drift into the sea
And those days when the sun doesn’t shine
Know that through the rain you’ll always be mine
The moon to guard you and protect
The stars to help you reconnect
Full Texts:
Psalm 130:
1 Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD.
2 Lord, hear my voice! Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications!
3 If you, O LORD, should mark iniquities, Lord, who could stand?
4 But there is forgiveness with you, so that you may be revered.
5 I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in his word I hope;
6 my soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning, more than those who watch for the morning.
7 O Israel, hope in the LORD! For with the LORD there is steadfast love, and with him is great power to redeem.
8 It is he who will redeem Israel from all its iniquities.
Wisdom of Solomon 1:13-15, 2:23-24
1:13 God did not make death, and he does not delight in the death of the living.
14 For he created all things so that they might exist; the generative forces of the world are wholesome, and there is no destructive poison in them, and the dominion of Hades is not on earth.
15 For righteousness is immortal.
2:23 For God created us for incorruption, and made us in the image of his own eternity,
24 but through the devil’s envy death entered the world, and those who belong to his company experience it.
2 Corinthians 8:7-15
8:7 Now as you excel in everything--in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in utmost eagerness, and in our love for you--so we want you to excel also in this generous undertaking.
8 I do not say this as a command, but I am testing the genuineness of your love against the earnestness of others.
9 For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich.
10 And in this matter I am giving my advice: it is appropriate for you who began last year not only to do something but even to desire to do something--
11 now finish doing it, so that your eagerness may be matched by completing it according to your means.
12 For if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has--not according to what one does not have.
13 I do not mean that there should be relief for others and pressure on you, but it is a question of a fair balance between
14 your present abundance and their need, so that their abundance may be for your need, in order that there may be a fair balance.
15 As it is written, "The one who had much did not have too much, and the one who had little did not have too little."
Mark 5:21-43
5:21 When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered around him; and he was by the sea.
22 Then one of the leaders of the synagogue named Jairus came and, when he saw him, fell at his feet
23 and begged him repeatedly, "My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be made well, and live."
24 So he went with him. And a large crowd followed him and pressed in on him.
25 Now there was a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years.
26 She had endured much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse.
27 She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak,
28 for she said, "If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well."
29 Immediately her hemorrhage stopped; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.
30 Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, "Who touched my clothes?"
31 And his disciples said to him, "You see the crowd pressing in on you; how can you say, 'Who touched me?'"
32 He looked all around to see who had done it.
33 But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told him the whole truth.
34 He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease."
35 While he was still speaking, some people came from the leader's house to say, "Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further?"
36 But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the leader of the synagogue, "Do not fear, only believe."
37 He allowed no one to follow him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James.
38 When they came to the house of the leader of the synagogue, he saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly.
39 When he had entered, he said to them, "Why do you make a commotion and weep? The child is not dead but sleeping."
40 And they laughed at him. Then he put them all outside, and took the child's father and mother and those who were with him, and went in where the child was.
41 He took her by the hand and said to her, "Talitha cum," which means, "Little girl, get up!"
42 And immediately the girl got up and began to walk about (she was twelve years of age). At this they were overcome with amazement.
43 He strictly ordered them that no one should know this, and told them to give her something to eat.