God Here and Now
26 July 2020
Proper 12A
Said Mass on the
Labyrinth 8:00 a.m.;
Said Mass with Sung
Antiphons Live Streamed from the Nave 10:00 a.m.
Parish Church of
Trinity Ashland (Oregon)
The
Rev. Fr. Tony Hutchinson, SCP, Ph.D.
Genesis 29:15-28; Psalm
105:1-11, 45b or Psalm 128; Romans 8:26-39;
Matt 13:31-33, 42-52
God, take away our hearts of stone,
and give us hearts of flesh. Amen
What would the world look like if things were as they ought to be, if God were truly in charge, right here, right now? Jesus regularly asked himself this question. He tells parables to try to get at the matter. We heard several today: the Mustard Plant, the Yeast, the Hidden Treasure, the Costly Pearl, and the Dragnet.
What
would it be like if God were truly in charge, right here, right now? The people
around Jesus gave various answers: The Sadducees and Herodians said things were
already as they ought to be. The
Essenes argued that the world would not be set to right until their kooky
little sect had conquered the world by force of arms in apocalyptic
struggle. The Zealots thought it would come through violent revolt
against the Roman occupiers. The
Pharisees taught that it lay only in personal piety, scripture study and
prayer, and putting a fence around the law so as to separate Jews from gentiles
more and more.
Jesus’
parables give a different answer. They
grab you and throw you for a loop—demand a change of perspectives and
expectations.
God
here and now, in charge—It’s like a mustard plant: a tiny seed that produces
a huge plant, growing in unusual places, unplanned, apart from human
control. It does not measure up to
the usual images for God’s kingdom—vineyards, olive trees, or the great cedar
tree, which in Ezekiel shelters the wild birds in its branches. For
Jesus, the birds seek shelter in a huge weed.
God
here and now, in charge—is like a woman who stirs in a couple of tablespoons of
yeast into three measures—about fifty pounds—of flour. With a little time, that huge amount of dough
is raised. God in charge is not the
pure, unleavened bread kosher for Passover, but the impure bread of
ordinary life. God in charge is not the
holy work of male priests, but the ordinary domestic work of women!
God
here and now, in charge—is like a peasant working someone else’s field who uncovers
a treasure hidden there. Excited, he reburies it, and then scrapes together
everything he has so he can purchase the field and its contents. The field worker, not the land-owner, finds
the treasure: usually only those getting their hands dirty in work are the ones
who know its details enough to recognize its surprises. This is not about legal title, but finders,
keepers. No matter how hard it is to
scrape together the necessary capital to buy the field, the peasant does it since
his glimpse of the treasure was so wonderful.
God here and now, in charge—is like a drag-net that catches all sorts of
fish. It is not selective or discriminating. It works below the
surface, hidden, and catches everything it touches. St. Matthew,
ever on the lookout for ways to regularize some of Jesus’ more “anti-religious”
statements, has added the comment about sorting good and bad fish on the
shore. But Jesus’ original point was
that God in charge is overwhelmingly inclusive, and uncontrollable.
God
here and now, in charge—is like a jewel merchant who finds the most perfect pearl
he has ever seen. Like the peasant, he sells everything he has in order
to purchase the prize. Not only dispossessed field hands can find a
treasure. Those accustomed to trading fine things can as well.
Maybe even the religious, maybe even the pious and observant—those who are
often the butt of the jokes found in Jesus’ parables—may yet encounter God, and
be permanently changed. But the cost for them is just as high as
for the dispossessed.
Jesus’
parables of the Kingdom emphasize the presence of God in everyday life—glorious
messy everyday life. They stress the utter strangeness of God in what we
are used to. In these stories, we
encounter abundance, joy, the fulfillment of human desire and the turning of
tables on the oppressor. We have heard these parables so often,
we don’t actually listen to them.
So
here are some parables I have written to make the same shocking points Jesus
intends in his.
God
here and now, in charge is like a woman who buys a dollar lottery ticket. Not
expecting to win, she doesn’t even check the results for a few days. But when she does, she learns she has not
only won, but won big: 10 million dollars. She is so shocked she falls down and can’t talk
for a few minutes.
God
here and now, in charge is like a man who gets a bad tattoo. After several
years of being unhappy every time he sees it, he goes into a tattoo parlor and
asks if they can fix old, bad tattoos. One of the artists is an expert in
repair and redesign, but it costs a lot. The man gets excited, and goes and
refinances his house to get the money together. After many hours of pain
in the chair, the man looks at the magic the artist has wrought, using the old
defective ink-work as ground for and part of a larger piece. The result
is beautiful, much better than even what the man had originally imagined when
he got the first tattoo. He is so happy
with it that he constantly tries to find occasions where wear short sleeves so
he can show it off.
God
here and now, in charge is like a woman in the process of a nasty divorce.
Her abusive husband has hired the better lawyer, and she is about to lose
almost everything. But in sorting through things that the husband
couldn’t be bothered to look at, she finds the old coin collection he inherited
from his father a few years after their marriage and which he has never
bothered to even look at. She notices a couple of coins that look rare
and checks up on them. They are worth more than all their other assets
combined. So she says nothing, puts the coin collection on her ledger in
the agreement, which the ex-husband signs happily. She never has to worry about finances, or he
abusive ex, again.
God
here and now, in charge: abundance, surprise, and a call to joyfully give up what
alienates us from God and from each other.
I
invite us all this week in our prayer and meditation to ask how we think things
would be if God were truly in charge and things were as they ought to be. Picture it, savor it. Listen to Jesus’ parables of the kingdom, and
let us use our imaginations to try to come with some of our own. And may we pray for the joyful abandon to
turn away from the things in our hearts and lives that keep this vision from
being realized. May we pray and live,
“your kingdom, your will be done, on earth as in heaven” and know the abundant
joy of God coming here and now, fully in charge. May we live the
happy news that Jesus proclaimed.
In
the name of God,
Amen.
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