June 14, 2020 - Second Sunday After Pentecost

Second Sunday After Pentecost

Exodus 19:2-8a; Psalm 100; Romans 5:1-8; Matthew 9:35--10:8 [9-23]

June 14, 2020

Adapted for print from transcription.

Well, hello, Shepherd Friends. Here we are on this Second Sunday After Pentecost. And so what that means for us in terms of readings this week and going into the future, is that we're back in the Gospel of Matthew. A reminder about the lectionary; we're in lectionary Year A, which is really focused on the gospel of Matthew. The lectionary works in a cycle; Year A, B and C. So again, how that breakup works is Year A is focused on the gospel of Matthew. Year B covers Mark, and Year C is Luke. Then the gospel of John is kind of interspersed throughout the years.

So here we are back in the Season After Pentecost, and the Second Sunday of Pentecost is where we find ourselves today. And the gospel actually picks up earlier than the gospel that we heard last week. So this week we're hearing from Matthew's 9th and 10th chapter. If you pay attention to what we send out each week in the E-Blast, you may have noticed that I cut our gospel a bit short today, but I think as you listen to that gospel, and maybe if you take the time to look at the fuller version of that gospel, you'll see that you're getting just enough of that gospel to have a good idea of what it's about and where it's going, especially after hearing from Matthew's gospel last Sunday, upon which we celebrated the feast of the Trinity.

So what all of our readings are really connected to this week is this idea of identity. And I say that you're going to hear from the gospel of Matthew a bit, but really, we're going to hear from the gospel of Matthew for the next 19 weeks! And in our second reading today, you heard from Paul and from the book of Romans. We'll be hearing from the book of Romans for the next 13 weeks. So we'll have plenty of time to talk about Romans and where Paul is going. Suffice it to say that in all of our readings, if there was one theme for this week, it would be a priestly people, but specifically dealing with our identities; our identities as children of God, as beloved, as priestly people. So in the book of Exodus, we hear Moses saying that we're called to be a priestly kingdom and a Holy people. A priestly kingdom, and a Holy people.

So again, instead of saying, “H O L Y,” I always like to look at it this way; “whole” like “holistic.” We're called to be a whole people, or maybe just acknowledge that we're already a whole people, and in many ways, it's just uncovering that wholeness of who we were made to be. And there's many of you are probably saying, wow, we feel like we're anything but whole during these days with so much going on in the world. But again, we're also hearing from Paul in the book of Romans, that we're sent out. Exodus says we're sent out to be a Holy people, but Paul and the book of Romans tell us that God's love is poured into us through the Holy spirit. And then in our gospel today in Matthew, we hear that Jesus sends us out.

In this week's Lectio Divina group, somebody pointed out (and hopefully this is something that you picked up as I proclaimed this reading), that the gospel writer in the story that we hear today is kind of going narrow. You might think, “Wait a minute, this isn't exactly what Pastor Rock preaches when he talks about the gospel!” Matthew's gospel today says to ‘go out, but go out nowhere among the Gentiles.’ And ‘enter no town of the Samaritans.’ So just a reminder that the Samaritans and the Gentiles were another race, really. And these early Christians, this Christian movement; they’re still identifying as Jews. And that's actually who the gospel of Matthew is authored to: this early Christian movement.But again, we're reading the whole book, so we're very lucky to have a sense of what this entire gospel is about, and more importantly to know the end of the story. However, at this point in chapters 9 and 10, we hear this very narrow view. And as the gospel continues, and we get up to chapter 28, which we heard from last week, we'll see that we're being sent to all the nations.

But what I think is really important to circle back to in terms of this narrowness or this narrowly focused piece of the gospel that we hear today, is that the gospel is something that's being unwrapped. It's being unwrapped before us. It connects to this UCC idea that “God is Still Speaking.” God is still speaking and breathing new life and calling us into new ways of being to live out this kindom that Jesus is talking about. So, where does that leave us for today? Again, just a reminder that last week, for Trinity Sunday, we heard from Matthew's 28th chapter somewhere around, I think, verse 19, where we hear that we're being sent to all the nations.

Again, as we hear these stories, it's important to read ourselves into these stories and to know that it is us that continue to be sent out to be that loving presence, the presence of the divine in our world. One of the things that you've probably heard me quote before is something that in my family, was attributed to my great grandfather. Now, I’m not sure whether he said it or not, but it's something that I quote on a regular basis, and that is “It’s important to work yourself out of a job.” And so in this 9th and 10th chapter, we see that Jesus, early on in his ministry, is passing this idea on to his disciples, and onto us today, of how important it is to work ourselves out of a job. And then at the end, we also hear that this is “volunteer work,” which I love! A lot of pastors, professional pastors, professional ministers, or professional clergy people today don't like this verse in Matthew's gospel, because it's maybe an affront or an attack on professional clergy in the church.

But what we hear is is that you receive without payment. Give without payment. So just a little bit about today's gospel (I did want to make today short, so I'm going to try to do that), we have Jesus saying, “as you go, proclaim the good news.” Well, what is the good news? That's a question that many of us often ask as we read and reread scripture; what is the good news?

It tells us, right in the next verse, “the kingdom of heaven has come near.” That's the good news. And so with everything that's going on in our world today, in the midst of all of these systemic problems, we are seeing glimpses of a new kindom. We are tearing down old ways of being, and so new ways of being are being revealed. And so when we hear this idea of kingdom, we translate that as kindom today to be more inclusive in terms of what Jesus was talking about in this Jesus movement, and what it means to be a Jesus people in the world today. So… the kingdom of heaven has come near. What does that kingdom look like, and what are we called to do, and how are we called to live in this kingdom? Well, our story today from Matthew tells us, yet again, we are to cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, and cast out demons.

Now, we can think a lot about that, specifically in today's world. And I want to leave you with those thoughts. What does it mean for us as disciples of Christ? Again, we hear a narrow reading today of, ‘go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans,’ you know, so this is early in Matthew's gospel, where it really is held that there is kind of a boundary of who the gospel's for. But knowing that in chapter 28, we're going to hear this good news, this healing news, this transformational news; curing the sick, raising the dead, cleansing lepers and casting out demons. This is for everybody. So it starts off as very narrow and goes wide. It really is good news for all people.There's so much among us that's sick. Not only our institutions. We may be asking, what can we bring healing to? Where are we called to bring healing to our sick world, but also to ask the question, what does it mean to raise the dead today? What things in our lives do we need to raise the dead, maybe a relationship?

What does it mean to cleanse the lepers? I had an opportunity this week –for those of you that follow me on Facebook, you may already know this– I had an opportunity to join five other of our clergy friends from around the Valley through VIP, and we had an opportunity to meet with Governor Ducey, virtually, and it was exciting. We didn't have a children's message this week, but if you remember my children's message, the camera points into my living room into this area where I do this filming, and so Ernie and I were kind of sharing that it was kind of weird to think that Governor Ducey had been in our living room!

But that aside, you know, what are the things that we need to cure in our society? Who are those that we need to cure in our society? Who do we need to raise from the dead? You know, it's easy to think about all of those in society that are forgotten, you know, so we met with Governor Ducey this week to specifically advocate on behalf of those 42,000 individuals that we incarcerate as a state.

Arizona is one of the states that incarcerates the most people. The United States is the highest in terms of the number of people that we incarcerate. And so those folks are very vulnerable right now, as we struggle with the Coronavirus, and you know, many of them are at risk, just by being incarcerated in one of those facilities. So the state came out and said that they would be testing all staffing, and so VIP met with Governor Ducey to advocate on behalf of our brothers and sisters who are incarcerated in our state, and to ask that they also receive testing in those facilities. And we look forward to continuing that conversation with him and meeting with him as faith leaders from throughout our state. But specifically, when we talk about cleansing the lepers, I instantly think about all of those that we incarcerate. All of those that we've deemed unfit in society; the poor, the homeless, anyone that we put into some type of category. You know, these Jewish Christians actually put Gentiles and Samaritans into a separate status category. And you see that this is why Jesus says ‘go nowhere among them.’ And so what we're seeing in today's story is this author of Matthew kind of setting the tone to prepare us in chapter 28 to go out to all people to cast out demons.

I feel like the last 14 days have been about casting out demons; the demons of racism, the demons of violence. Going back to this idea of identity, the gospel that we hear today; these are reminders of our identities as the baptized, as all people, that we are called to be a Holy People. As early as Exodus, this is an ancient call, an ancient awareness that we are called to be Holy, to be whole, to be priest. As I've shared before, in our baptisms, we are called priest, prophet and King.

How do we do that today? I recently attended (again, virtually), the Christian Buddhist dialogue for North America through the National Council of Churches, and one of our Buddhist friends reminded us of this Thich Nhat Hanh quote that I hadn't thought of for many years, and that quote is, “One Buddha is Not Enough.” I think this is the message that we hear as disciples of Christ today. That one Christ is Not Enough. Well, where are those places in society? As we look around, we see many places in society today. We might see some of these same things happening in our lives in terms of broken relationships.

So look at the big picture. Look a little narrow too. We're looking at our world. We're looking at our country. We're looking at our state. And then we're looking at our personal lives. How do we apply this gospel today? How do we proclaim the good news that the kindom of heaven has come near? Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.
Peace and love my friends. You are missed.

Amen.

Peace be with you, 

Rock+

Rev. Rock R. Fremont Jr., Pastor
Shepherd of the Hills UCC 
(480) 280-6598 Mobile 

"That they may all be one." John 17:21