Little and Big Thank You's
Pentecost 17b, Mark 9:30-37 (September 20, 2017)
One of the very first things that we attempt to teach children in our families and culture is to say, THANK YOU!
One of the most vivid memories of my younger childhood is having both my mother and my maternal grandmother encouraging me to say "thank you" loudly, clearly and joyfully to any individual or group who did anything for me, my family, my school or my congregation. Sometimes such encouragement took the form of exhortation like, 'Now after supper at your friend's house, Tim, don't forget to thank your friend's mom for the meal." At other times the encouragement to say thanks would be passed in the form of a directed question. Upon receiving a gift as a small child my mother would give me her look and ask, "What do you say, Tim?"
THANK YOU was the only possible response.
Maybe you can identify.
Being able to frequently say "thank you" has stuck with me for nearly 60 years.
Still, I catch myself sometimes not being very thankful. Can you identify?
I now commute from South Surrey. People race through the lanes marked by flashing yellow – while the rest of us wait within the lines of obedience but are bypassed. I have this angry mental monologue. "Is their time more important than my time?" To be sure this question has some validity. I may be on the way to the hospital or to make funeral arrangements or listen to someone who is suicidal. But in my anger and frustration with people who bully their way to the front of the line I miss out on so many other realities. Such as: what an amazing place this is – ocean, rivers, mountains, the sun setting, peeking out between the clouds, the moon rising. I also miss out on experiencing such blessings as how privileged I am to have my own car. While I lived in Turkey very few people had personal vehicles. We walked everywhere. Perhaps I was healthier then. Still, it's a gift to be able to drive your groceries home instead of carrying them under your arm. Then there are grocery stores. Wow! Fresh food, frozen food, vegetables and fruit, meat from all over the world. How lucky – no, HOW BLESSED WE ARE!
How can we express our heart-felt thank-you to those who tilled the field, to those who worked aching hours to plant, pick or harvest the fruit – to those who worked long hours to bring it to market?
And that's not even mentioning – the homes we live in, the hospitals and schools we have access to – and all of the people who make all of this possible, whom we don't see but whom we often take for granted – from teachers, to nurses, to cleaning people, to builders, to - well, the list goes on and on and on. THANK YOU. We can say thanks with our voices. But how we might say THANK YOU in other ways?
The early disciples are just beginning to realize that Jesus is up to something – something big, something important! Hungry people are being fed. Sick people are being healed. The disciples observe this happening all around them. Somehow - Jesus is doing this. It's really good!
Even as this happening Jesus says other things that are beyond their understanding. "The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again."
Why will this happen to this One who is doing so much good, who is so young? The disciples don't understand what he is saying. They are afraid to ask him. No kidding! Do we understand him? Can we ever get it, that we betrayed and betray Jesus, that we killed and kill him? How can we ever get "it" – that He does rise from the dead?
On so many levels this all feels . . . SO WRONG!
God in the flesh, betrayed and killed by people? Where is the good, the purpose of that?
Then, there is this stuff about the third day and him being raised. It sounds . . . so good. We want it, we need it, to be true. But – let's be honest! We've been around the block. We are not Sunday School kids anymore. We have suffered our own trials, endured our own losses. We've been part of failed relationships. We've betrayed and we've been betrayed. We have watched loved ones become ill, even die. We know death. WE know death's power.
So, if God is God – and Jesus claims to be God, why would God allow God's self to suffer, to be brutally executed? Why, indeed?
Why would this god in the flesh, Jesus, allow himself to be so alone and in so much pain?
Sometimes being alone, being all on your own, is very difficult. Or, as my adult kids would say, it sucks! And yet, this is part of the human experience – at times being alone on this journey.
The Son of man can identify. Not only that – but He suffers and dies to embody the ways He welcomes us – wherever we are, whatever we have or haven't done, regardless of how we think or feel about ourselves. He stretches out His arms to suffer and die on our behalf. That's what those words spoken every Sunday during the Eucharist are about, the body of Christ FOR YOU, the blood of Christ, FOR YOU! The body and blood of Christ are given up for ALL PEOPLE.
I can't and don't understand this. Yet, I often do glimpse THIS GRACIOUS MARVELOUS WELCOME.
This welcome may be what Jesus is trying to show us when he places a child in the midst of the disciples. Children at that time were among the most vulnerable persons alive. And yet, Jesus takes that one into his arms. Then he tells his early followers and us that we are to welcome all such ones. Indeed by doing so, we also welcome God, the Father, the Creator of the universe!
Through Jesus' life, death and resurrection we are welcomed by God despite what we have done or haven't done. There is absolutely nothing we could ever do to deserve such love and forgiveness, such new beginnings.
How shall we respond? How are we responding? How can we respond, here and now, this week?
Might we give THANKS? Thanks with our lips: thank you God! Thanks to others who show us in so many different ways God's welcome. Drop them a note. Call them up. Pass on our thanks with what God has entrusted to us - ourselves, our time and our possessions – to be shared and invested in others so that they too CAN KNOW THAT THEY ARE WELCOMED AND LOVED BY GOD.
As Jesus says when we do it to the least of these (by our standards) - we do it unto him.
Dear people - there are so many questions, we don't and can't have the answers to. Why do so many become ill? Why are so many poor, hungry, without safe water or access to health care or education? To be sure there are systemic reasons. But even beyond these, there are mysteries.
We are called to welcome, to help, the hurting, the vulnerable, the lost, the lonely, those who are told they do not belong. God does such for us! And God calls us to go and welcome likewise!
Our lives can be little and big thank you's offered to the God who continues to create the universe, who suffers and dies with all who are suffering and dying but who also on the third day rises again. Because Jesus lives and welcomes we too can live and welcome. May we so live, for Christ's sake. Amen.