“A New Day”
Karen Sloan 14/06/2020
Reading - Pentecost 2: 18 June Matthew 9:35 - 10:1
9:35 Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and curing every disease and every sickness.
9:36 When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.
9:37 Then he said to his disciples, "The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few;
9:38 therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest."
10:1 Then Jesus summoned his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness.
…………..
So we have been focussing today on new beginnings, or what opens up when we open up. Hopefully during the time we have not been meeting you have had a few new beginnings, I know that you are all much better at technology now than a few months ago!
I have also been having a few new experiences, one being a locum hospital chaplain a couple of days a week. Now before you panic, it is only a locum and it ends in June, but it has been challenging and intense but enjoyable all at once. That old paradox again.
As many of you know who have been chaplains, you meet people at their most vulnerable, people who are sick, have had an out of the blue diagnosis, people whose loved ones are dying or they themselves are or people whose lives have suddenly been thrown into turmoil.
It’s often a surprise to me how much they share with a complete stranger, even one who belongs to the hospital.
The other day I had a particularly challenging moment, when I went to see a young woman who was having a crisis in mental health. Because of what was happening in her life, she had fallen into a pit of depression, and could see little light in the future without the woman that she loved. What was also problematic for me was that she had had an upbringing in the church, a fairly fundamental one at that, and so her situation was also challenging her ideas of God and where to find him. She wasn’t worried about the gender attachment, by the way.
The first question she asked me, was “did I believe in God”, and when I responded positively, the next was, “well where was he when she needed him most!” Right, that was a pretty confronting introduction to the situation.
While these where her initial questions, its what lies beneath that counts. She was going through a terrible time, but I think there are sometimes many layers to us, and that in times of crisis our old hurts, our old insecurities are also exposed. Where I do belong, am I good enough seems at the heart of lots of pain for people, and seemed to be for her. Sadly, often made worse with a church background.
While I don’t think my interaction with her was all that helpful, as after a while she needed more medication and a cigarette outside, there were a couple of things we shared that may have planted a seed. One was that the God we both believed in was a God of love, not judgement, even if we are gay and have tried suicide. Another was that sometimes when we can’t find God, God comes disguised as those that bring care and compassion to us. They bring the loving presence and acceptance we need in times of heartache and grief. When things seem really dark, and we can’t find that comforting spirit.
It was a sobering encounter, about the darkness and the absence of a light in that darkness. The visit took a long time, and I didn’t get to see her again, but she seemed like she had an inner strength that may help her through.
When I think back on my encounter, I also think how far we have come as a society and how far we need to go. While there is still much stigma around conditions that are related to our minds, rather than our bodies, we don’t today think of someone with a metal illness as being demon possessed, or having to have those demons driven out. We have many ways of helping that doesn’t include an exorcism.
So when I looked at the reading from Matthew set for today, I couldn’t help but cringe just a little, either though I know it was written in the first century not the 21st. And by someone who was writing for a Jewish audience and when mental illness was understood as a form of demon possession.
But having said that I don’t want to discard it either, because it actually has much to say to us as Jesus followers here and now. And what I think I brought to my patient, limited as it was.
When, in the reading, Jesus commissions his disciples to cast out demons and to heal all sickness and all disease”, he does it with a compassionate and loving heart. As Bill Loader says, “his ministry is their job description. They are being authorised to love. They were being authorised to liberate people from the powers which oppressed them, either physical or spiritual”. Jesus didn’t send his disciples out to build a new church, but to proclaim the kingdom of God was at hand. And to do it with words only if they had too, a reminder of the famous statement by St Frances of Assisi. “Preach to everyone and if all else fails you could even preach with words”.
Actions mattered, how they treated other people mattered.
So forget for the moment about the ancient ideas about illness, and rather as Bill says, lets get in touch with the demons and powers that are alive today that lead to “chaos in an individuals soul and in a community”.
We have seen them all over our newspapers and on our tv screens these past few weeks. And I have seen it at the hospital. Things that cause chaos in the individual and in our society. It has been writ large.
Some of our demons are isms, racism, sexism, consumerism, individualism, and an obsession with power and violence. And a fear of the unknown. Some of our demons cause us to ostracise and marginalise based on race, colour, gender, religion or sexual orientation so that there is an us and them equation going on instead of we. Many are left floundering, and almost drowning in a society rich in resources.
Our modern demons can often send us into a spiral of decline, where we end up working too hard or not at all, lack close relationships, become isolated and alone, excluded from the community at large either by accident or design, and with feelings of being inadequate and unworthy. Where we choose violence, alcohol and drugs to deal with our issues, and end up hurting the people who love us the most.
How do we find healing? How does a society find healing.
When Jesus sends his disciples out in the 1st century, he is sending us out in our own time as well. We hear him say, go out and be me, go out and carry the God presence found in all of us, and in Jesus, to others. Be my hands and feet, my love and compassion, my acceptance, my hope. But sometimes also be my challenge to the status quo when the status quo is unjust. Jesus is asking us to challenge the systems that produce our demons.
When I sat with my young woman, I know that’s what I was trying to do. Bringing what Jesus would have brought to the situation. Love and acceptance, comfort and compassion. He may also have brought food, but for me that was a bit tricky.
So many have been doing just this during the isolation, the enforced quarantine, caring for others, in their street or neighbourhood or in their hospital. In many places, using music, food and love.
And what about the black lives movement, from the USA to here in Perth. Again you can hear Jesus calling his disciples forth, to speak up for those marginalised, and oppressed. Not with violence but with peaceful demonstrations, by both old and young. I know those that follow Jesus and who seek a more inclusive loving society will continue to work and act for reconciliation and renewal. Even when the tv screens are silent.
For it’s a call that doesn’t disappear, whether we are 8 or 80. I saw that yesterday when we did a small local protest at Floreat Uniting for the Black Lives Matter movement.
So the kingdom of God will not be brought about by just words, even if we wish it so. But rather by each one of us acting in ways that support and nurture others.
As we start a new day as a church community let’s remember, that every day is a new beginning, and a chance to get it right. And it’s out in the world where the followers of Jesus should be practising .
Amen