“My joy is gone, grief is upon me, my heart is sick.” This lamentation of the prophet Jeremiah
which opens our Old Testament lesson might as well be, in our moment in time,
the common lament of our nation, indeed, the world over. A despair has spread throughout the land, and
we, with Jeremiah, cry out, “the summer is ended, and we are not saved.” Our poor people hurt, they mourn and are
dismayed…and we feel their pain, if only a small part. “Is there no balm in Gilead?” No physician to heal us?
Yes,
there is! And today’s readings point us in the direction out of this mire in
which we now find ourselves.
“First of all, then,” writes Paul to Timothy, a disciple
trying to pastor a congregation threatened with division because of the
spreading of a false teaching, “I urge that supplications, prayers,
intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone, for kings,” all would be
kings, “and all who are in high positions, so that we may lead a quiet and
peaceable life in all godliness and dignity.”
There is no way out of the mess we now or ever will find ourselves in
without prayer. But, you may say, it’s
time for action, not prayer. And St.
Paul would say, and I with him, your action will ultimately fail without
supporting it in prayer. And notice the
types of prayer Paul lists here: first, supplications…we need to really pray…to
cry out…to even beg…not just to knock on the door but to bang the door down
till we get what we want; next, prayers…this refers to the opening of your
heart and expressing to God your deepest longings and desires; third,
intercessions…praying for others, not just yourself…not just your own family,
your own clan, church, or political party, but also for the other; and lastly,
thanksgivings…appreciating all the gifts from God even when you’re in the mire…and,
maybe, that come to us because of it.
And Paul instructs Timothy to direct these prayers to those in
authority, presumably that they may have the wisdom and godliness to act and
lead according to God’s will and protect the community from the false teachings
that are threatening to divide the community and lead people away from the truth. In light of this instruction, if we really
want to realize the kingdom of God and create peaceful societies, the people we
need to be praying for the most are those with the authority to affect the most
change. This means praying for our
president, our congress, our local government officials, our bishops, rectors,
and religious superiors…naming them before God and engaging ardently in these
four prayer forms on their behalf. This
means praying for Donald Trump, praying for Vladimir Putin, praying for
Benjamin Netanyahu, and praying for whoever it might be that you despise the
most…who you believe is afflicting the most harm on the human family or on any
part of God’s good creation. There is a
place for prophetic protest, indeed. But
beware of the prophet who doesn’t pray!
Jesus’ parable of the dishonest steward gives us a second
pointer out of the mire. There’s no need
to get bogged down in the details of the story which can be admittedly
confusing. But the moral of the story is
clear: Jesus praises the person who is shrewd, who is a good steward in the
little things, who is responsible and faithful even when no one is looking, and
who, most of all, guards against the lure of wealth but lives for “true riches”
with undivided devotion. Now, if there
is a message that cuts through lies, this last one is it! Exorcise the demon of greed and much of the
sickness in the soul of our societies would be healed instantly.
But
Jesus’ teaching here is about much more
than greed. It’s about something more
positive. Jesus, somewhat shockingly,
praises the ingenuity of the steward who got himself into trouble through his
wasteful handling of his master’s property.
How much more should the children of light, Jesus says, act shrewdly, or
be astute in their judgment of what matters most! This is a teaching against the complacency
and lack of creative will of those who would follow Jesus in the path of
discipleship. If we are serious about
ushering in the kingdom of God and building peaceful societies, it will require
much more than wishful thinking or hoping the other team fails. It’s not something we can just “manifest.” We are called to act intelligently, quickly,
skillfully, and creatively. It requires
the total investment of our energies.
Jesus’ plan for the way out of the mire is also about building
character: “Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much.” This is about integrity . . . that quality of
life that is free of guile and deceit.
At a time when we have our fair share of leaders with such little regard
for integrity, to say the least, it is all the more urgent that we take great
care to build up a new generation of honest, faithful, humble citizens who see
the corruption of character as the corruption of the soul of our society.
And
Jesus’ most severe warning is reserved
against those who have made their money their god: “You cannot serve God and
wealth.” Not only does greed destroy
societies, but it does so because, like corrupt character, it destroys the
individual soul. By making things
our security, we create sick souls and societies built on sand. Give it enough time, and it will
crumble. And in order to keep the
illusion alive, we get sucked into the vortex of amassing and hoarding stuff,
buttressing up our fragile ego on a lie…and promoting lies to protect our
fragile ego. To such…especially to such
leaders, Jesus draws a clear line:
Choose this day whom you will serve… “You cannot serve God and wealth.”
And
the final lesson our readings teach us about finding our way out of the mire is
the most important of all. “There is one God,” Paul writes to Timothy, quoting the
Shema, adding, “there is also one mediator between God and humankind, Christ
Jesus, himself human, ‘who gave himself a ransom for all’….” More than anything said before, this teaching
cuts through the lies of the false teachings spreading like a disease
threatening Timothy’s community.
“There is one God….” The
import of such a statement is the same import we find in Jesus’ saying in Luke:
You cannot serve God and wealth…or God and anything else. The foundational truth of Judeo-Christian
faith is the supremacy of God over all creation, especially over human life who
has the freedom not to serve the one God. As long as we walk on this earth with
duplicitous allegiances, trying to serve more than one master, we will remain
fragmented, divided, and stuck in the mire.
But when we harness all the energies of our will upon the transcendent
source above our miry existence, the pathway out of it opens up before us.
And
“…there is also one mediator between
God and humankind, Christ Jesus, himself human, ‘who gave himself a ransom for
all….” Jesus is held up here by Paul as
both instrument and exemplar of our salvation.
As instrument, he is the hand of God reaching into the murk to drag us
out of it. And in so doing, reveals that
the heart of God is not one of condemnation but of mercy and compassion, not
hesitating to get dirty for the sake of the one in need. But as exemplar, Jesus shows us what our
lives must become if we are to cut through the lies that threaten to keep us
stuck in the mire. Jesus is the example
of one who allowed himself to be possessed rather than to possess. He knew where his true, personal wealth and
security were found. He took total
responsibility in all the aspects of his life and was faithful to his call to
the end, no matter what it cost him. He
saw clearly who his God was and who he was in his God. And when the tempter came to test him with
lies, his intimate knowledge of God gave him the grace to swat them down one by
one. His oneness with the one God, a
life possessed rather than possessing, is what constituted his freedom to love
with such abandon and gave to the world a new way of being in the world. This is our way out of the mire…and this is
the bar we should set for ourselves and to which we should call our leaders to
account.
So,
while there is certainly a place for the lamenting Jeremiah in our lives, let
us also make sure that we give a place to the praying Paul and, most
especially, to the loving and sacrificing Christ. Let us pray, and let us look to Jesus, our
mediator, who, for our sake, never tired of giving of himself, and, in so
doing, pierced through the darkness of the lies and illusions that greedy
living foments and revealed the truth upon which we can stand firm to find our
way out of the mire: living lives of mercy and stubborn compassion. It is the same truth now as it has been for
the past two-thousand years…admired more
than lived. It’s now time to live it…to
live it with great integrity and fidelity…rising above the miry filth of greed
and selfish ambition…and through the sacrificial giving of ourselves through
the one who gave of himself…with dirty hands, to become a ransom for a world in
need.
