Then we had yet another mass shooting, this time at an Episcopal Church in the diocese of Alabama.
And Russia has captured three American soldiers who went to fight alongside the Ukrainians to defend their nation against the Russian invasion. The Kremlin denies knowing anything about these three, but there's video evidence of at least two of the men in Russian custody. Russia's military is threatening to bring them up on charges of helping the enemy and sentencing them to death. If they should kill any of the Americans they're holding, including WNBA basketball player Brittney Griner, we would most likely enter the war, and that would be tragic.
Seems like a Legion of trouble to me.
Prayer: I speak to you in the name of our One loving, life-giving and liberating God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen. (PB Michael Curry)
Good morning!
And welcome to that extensive period in our church calendar called
“Ordinary Time.”
That just means that we’re not in a particular season such as
Christmas or Easter.
This a season for growth…growing and increasing in our faith…especially
in the mundane moments of our days on this planet.
Ordinary Time challenges us to lay our faith alongside our everyday
life…and work to have our faith in God inform how we live and move and have our
being out in the world.
And while we’re in “Ordinary Time” in our church calendar, we seem
to be living in what the Chinese call “Interesting Times” in our secular world.
War rages on in Ukraine with no end in sight.
We’re becoming more aware of the “clear and present dangers” that
threaten our communal life of democracy in this country.
Many of us are facing financial difficulties as inflation rises and
the cost of food and gas go up.
This heat wave poses threats to people, plants, and animals.
Politicians and pundits keep taking jabs and pushing the “othering”
of marginal groups in society.
And on the day before the sobering anniversary of the shooting at
Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston…a 71-year-old man pulled out a handgun
at a potluck dinner in Vestavia Hills, Alabama…and shot to death three people
at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church.
Their parish hall…a sight of joyous occasions…became a crime scene.
These seem to be our modern day “legion” we are contending with in
our world.
These are the things that continue to cause suffering and evil which
keeps all of us shackled in the tombs of our own misery…both individually and
collectively.
In our Gospel lesson this morning, we go with Jesus to the land of
the Gerasenes and meet a man possessed by many demons. Everything in this man’s
life is out of control. The demons have overwhelmed him and all-consumed him.
At times…it feels as if we are caught up in the same hell as that
man. Everything that’s happening in the world just feels out-of-whack and
off-balance.
The demons I’ve named…and maybe more that you can name…feel all
encompassing. And like the man in the tombs…it can seem as if we are powerless in
the face of all the brokenness.
We…like him…are hurting.
Jesus confronts these demons…and immediately they sense the power emanating
from him:
This Legion doesn’t have to ask, “Who are you?” Legion recognizes
Jesus as “the Son of the Most High God!” (Luke 8:28b)
Instead, Legion screams “What have you to do with me?”
This collection of demons is fearful and intimidated at the
presence of this Jewish outsider.
Jesus represents an unknown, a distinctly different way of being…who
is willing to come to the aid of a person shunned even by his own people.
Legion is face to face with a powerful force in Jesus and knows it.
Jesus demands the evil spirits to get out of him. The demons beg
not to be sent into the abyss…meaning the nearby body of water.
They plead: “Send us into that herd of pigs!”
Pigs, by Jewish standards, represent unclean things and so Jesus readily
exorcises this Legion into the pigs.
And even though Legion didn’t want to go into the abyss to its
destruction, the pigs run themselves over the cliff and drown in the water.
The once-possessed man is now clean, in his right mind, made whole
in every way.
This ought to be cause for celebration, right?
But then there are these bloated, floating, dead pigs.
The known Legion of demons is gone, but this exorcism has disrupted
the social arrangement and the economy of the Gerasenes.
When the people see what’s happened…they’re more upset by the dead
pigs than rejoicing in this one man’s freedom from the Legion that had kept him
separated from their society.
It’s almost as if the society would have preferred to live with the
Legion destroying this man’s life than to allow him to see and taste what it
means to be free of the demons.
As I consider the things happening around us…war, mass shootings, growing
tribalism fueled by special interest media and cynical politics…I sometimes
wonder if we would rather go on living with violence…than to confront it and
work to change things so that we all can experience freedom.
It’s that whole the “Devil we know” thing. There’s comfort in not
changing and remaining blind to the struggles people are facing. We can shrug
and move on when a tragedy hits some other community.
Jesus gains the upper hand on the demons in this passage when he
demands to hear their name.
Naming the things that are bogging us down…and keeping us from seeing
the Christ in each other…is the first step toward getting at the root of our
problems…both in our own lives and our society.
I hear people say, “America needs Jesus!” as if we don’t have
Jesus. Or that if we “had Jesus” we would instantly rid ourselves of the Legion
that has possession of us…and drive it into some…I don’t know…cockroaches.
It’s not that America needs Jesus; it’s that those of us who
profess a faith in Jesus as the Son of the Most High God need to take these
many weeks of ordinary time to discern, put our faith and our prayers into
action, and decide if we are done with accepting the Legion of ills that plague
us as a routine part of our lives.
Do we remain silent when we hear comments that demean and
dehumanize groups of people?
Do we keep insisting that nothing can be done about gun violence as
schools, churches, grocery stores, movie theaters, outdoor concert venues
become crime scenes?
Will we turn toward God and each other…or will we listen to other
voices that keep pulling us further and further apart?
Ordinary time in the church is our time to work toward real world
changes.
This is the time for us to grow up in our faith and put our faith
to work in the mission of making earth a little more like the reflection of
heaven.
We have seen how empowered the early apostles were to finally move
out of hiding in their upper room to confront the hostilities in their society.
Maybe we can’t preach like Peter or Paul, but we do have it within
us to be the light of Jesus.
Those of us who have experienced God…
have felt moved and stretched in our faith,
who have been baptized into the body of Christ,
and fed at the Lord’s table:
we must show up.
We must show the compassion and determination of a Jewish Jesus meeting
a Gentile demoniac.
Stand up to the legions in this society that try to separate us
from God and each other.
And in that oft-repeated biblical phrase: Do not be afraid.
So let us pray in these words from our opening hymn by James Weldon
Johnson….
God of our weary years,
God of our silent tears,
Thou hast brought us thus far on the way;
Thou who hast by thy might,
Led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.
Amen.
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