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Tuesday, April 5, 2022

Anointed for the Journey


 

Lent 5C

St. Christopher’s, Garner Closing Service 4/3/2022

The Rev. Dr. Jim Melnyk: “Anointed For the Journey”



 
Mary of Bethany gets it. She figures it all out. And the men stand by dumb-founded and unable to comprehend. "Leave her alone,” says Jesus when the men around the table confront Mary, deeming her anointing of Jesus with costly perfume an unnecessary extravagance. “Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial. You always have the poor with you, and you will always have the opportunity and obligation to care for them; but you do not always have me."

Throughout all four gospels it seems the women are the ones who really understand Jesus – who he is and where he’s headed. They are the ones who understand that the messiahship Jesus proclaims will involve both blood and death before it ever reaches glory. In John’s gospel, Mary is the one who “cracks the Gospel’s messianic secret and, without words, proclaims to all who are present that Jesus is the Anointed one of God.”[1]

 In this moment Mary does for Jesus what he will do for his disciples on the night he is betrayed, and it causes confusion and consternation for everyone but Jesus. It is an extravagant act of love and discipleship on Mary’s part – caring for her Lord, and Teacher, and Friend. And perhaps it is Mary’s action this night in Bethany that prompts Jesus to later wash the feet of his disciples as a sign of servanthood and love. Wouldn’t that be cool – if Jesus got his Last Supper foot washing brainstorm from disciple Mary?

 Beth Sanders writes, “In this moment between the stench of Lazarus's four days in the tomb and the spicy scent of myrrh and aloes with which Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus will embalm Jesus' body, the sweet aroma of God's love is wafting in the air. It sticks in Mary's hair as she brushes it against Jesus' feet and fills the house wherever she goes. [And two thousand years later we still wrestle with the scandal of a God who would take on human flesh, kneel before us washing our feet, and die on a cross for the life of the world.] Has anyone caught a whiff of God's love on us 21st-century Christians lately?”[2]

 All four gospels tell us about a woman coming to Jesus to anoint him prior to his crucifixion. Each Evangelist tells the story in his own way. In both Mark’s and Matthew’s gospels an unknown woman opens an alabaster jar of costly nard and pours it upon Jesus’ head. In Luke’s gospel an unknown woman both kisses and anoints Jesus’ feet. Only John identifies the woman doing the anointing as Mary of Bethany.

 The details of the story are not as important as the meaning behind their actions. The women in all four stories perform an extravagant act of beauty and love toward Jesus, with much of what is taking place left to the imagination. What would cause the unnamed women, or even a good friend like Mary of Bethany, to jump into this scene with the boldness of a prophet – exercising a prophetic imagination that only Jesus seems to understand in that moment

 Her actions – her anointing of Jesus – carries with it a multitude of meaning. We’ve already mentioned the anointing of a body which took place before burial in the first century. We’ve also mentioned anointing as a messianic symbol. It is also a way of identifying and setting apart someone as a prophet, a priest, or a king – and the evangelists want all of these images to come to mind for the listener.

 By placing the story between the death, burial, and resurrection of Lazarus and the betrayal and death of Jesus, there is little doubt that John wants us to understand this act as preparation for the crucifixion of Jesus as well as the promise of his resurrection. The way, the truth, and the life of Jesus is the way of the cross and death – a way which leads us toward new life. When we choose to embrace Jesus of Nazareth as the way of life, we choose the hard reality of the cross as well. As Jesus reminds us seemingly moments after this encounter with Mary, “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”[3]

 The men in the room don’t get it. They only see waste on Mary’s part. Think of how many people could be fed with nearly a year’s worth of wages. Yet Mary’s lavish act becomes a poetic statement of the extravagance of Jesus’ love for the world. Mary, and the unnamed women in the other gospel accounts of this act, “convey truth where words would falter.”[4]

Mary’s act of deep abiding love foreshadows Jesus’ act of deep abiding love on the cross. As Presbyterian Pastor Jonathan Ryan puts it, “…the strange beauty displayed in the cross breaks open our containers of reciprocity, fairness, and symmetry. [In] the life and death of Jesus Christ, God pours God’s self out ....”[5]

 As the people of God gathered in Garner, NC bring to a close worship together in this beautiful space, it may feel as though the harsh reality of Holy Week and the cross is upon us this afternoon, rather than looming on the horizon. Yet there is a line in our funeral liturgy that reminds us that in death life is changed, not ended. And while this moment signifies an end to the reality that is St. Christopher’s, each person connected to this congregation is an integral part of the Body of Christ – life is changed, not ended.

 Mary reminds us of our need to be extravagant in our love toward God and our love toward others – even as we prepare to depart this space to join new faith communities nearby or far away. Each of you have the opportunity to bring the best of who you are to new places – enriching the Body of Christ there by your presence. Dare we risk embracing this moment, with all its grief and all its powerful memories, and understand ourselves to be anointed by God’s Holy Spirit to bring our own experiences and understandings of the Good News to new places? Dare we risk breaking open the alabaster jars of whatever we hold dear, to anoint the head and feet of Jesus by anointing those around us most in need of God’s love in their lives?

 Because that’s what this is all about… not only breaking out our containers of “reciprocity, fairness, and symmetry,” but also breaking open our containers of mercy, justice, hope, and love for all of God’s people. Because Jesus doesn’t tell the men in the room “you will always have the poor with you” as an excuse to give up out of frustration, or to see that brokenness as the way the world is meant to be.

 Mary, and the unnamed women in the other three gospels, point us to the extravagant love of God made known to us in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. They remind us that our love toward one another should be just as extravagant – just as loving – just as selfless – as the love shown to us in Jesus – because there will always be people in need of our loving response – and because we can act out that love wherever we journey. And as Paul reminds us in today’s passage from Philippians – anything beyond our love for God and our love for neighbor pales in contrast to that love. God has given to each of us a ministry of healing this broken world wherever we may find ourselves.

 As a symbol of God’s call to us, we have an opportunity to come forward in a few moments to receive the laying on of hands and anointing with oil as a symbol of God’s call to us, and as a symbol of God’s Holy Spirit alive and active in our hearts. Allowing ourselves to break open the alabaster jars of our hearts and pour out our love toward God, we find the will and the strength to pour out our love toward others, and help mend this world as well.



[1] Lorraine Ljunggren

[2] Synthesis Today, 3/9/2016

[3] John 12:24.

 

[4] Jonathan Ryan, “Questioning the Extravagance of Beauty in a World of Poverty” (Tikkun Olam – To Mend the World: A Confluence of Theology and the Arts) 88.

 

[5] Ibid, 91.

Sunday, August 9, 2020

Walking Into Mystery

 

Proper 14A; Matthew 14:22-33; St. Paul’s Smithfield, 8/9/2020

Jim Melnyk “Walking in the Mystery”

 

Okay – one last bit of humor from the pulpit: Have you heard the one about the minister, the Rabbi, and the Episcopal priest who go fishing? It was the Episcopalian’s first trip with his two interfaith friends. Well it seems that after setting up camp the three head out into the lake in their boat. After a while the Minister says, “Gosh, I forgot my pipe back in the tent. I can’t fish without my pipe, I think I’ll go get it.” He steps out of the boat, and walking across the lake, he gets his pipe and returns. A little time goes by and the Rabbi says, “We didn’t bring any sunscreen out here with us and I’m starting to burn. I think I’ll got back to the tent and get some.” And so he hops out of the boat, walks across the lake, and brings back the sunscreen. By now the Episcopal priest is both a bit intrigued and a bit intimidated. But like most folks, he doesn’t want to be outdone. So he says to his friends, “You know, I meant to bring some soft drinks and snacks with us, but I left them in my tent. I guess I’ll go get them for us.” He steps out of his side of the boat and immediately plunges below the water. The Minister looks at the Rabbi and says, “Do you think we should have told him about the stepping stones?”

 But seriously folks, there’s probably not one among us who, at one time or another, hasn’t struggled with their faith and felt guilty when it came up lacking. Each of us is on our own pilgrimage of faith – a journey that draws us deeply into the very heart of God. But such journeys are rarely easy. Much like W. H. Auden’s poetry mentioned this past Thursday for the Feast of the Transfiguration, we can often find ourselves passing through the Lands of Unlikeness and Anxiety along our journey to that moment when we will “dance with joy.”[1] There will always be twists and turns along the way. There are wild winds and tempestuous waves, there are dark nights, and lonely days for all of us as we struggle to make sense of life and faith – as we struggle to believe that life and faith are somehow inseparable – somehow a part of each other. And all the while, God journeys with us.

Consider, if you will, the disciples of Jesus and their particular journeys. How many wonderful, mystical events did they witness in their brief sojourn with Jesus? And yet, how difficult was it for them to remain faithful to their friend in the midst of their day-to-day life, let alone when the journey turned to Jerusalem and the Cross?

By the time we reach today’s lesson from Matthew’s Gospel the disciples have already been a part of a magnificent journey. They have seen things that none of us would ever imagine seeing, and yet they still cannot understand. Jesus has just fed over 5,000 folks, and his closest followers haven’t a clue. It would seem that someone with even a minimal understanding of Judaism might make the connection between Jesus offering the multitudes bread in that isolated place, and God’s gift of Manna to their Hebrew mothers and fathers who wandered in the wilderness. To top it off, Jesus comes walking out to the disciples in the middle of the night – walking out on the water – and they can’t believe it’s him – even after the previous days’ events. Who knows – maybe it feels just a bit too crazy for these fisher-folk from Galilee. Maybe everything’s moving a bit too fast, and they just can’t keep up with their teacher/friend who offers his own form of manna and who quiets the raging sea. Faced with the wonder of the Incarnate Christ, the disciples respond with disbelief and fear – that is, until Peter – being his usual brash, “act-now-think-later” self, leaps forward.

 And then even Peter, in all his enthusiastic zeal, when challenged by the realities around him, falters and then flounders in the waves. It is not the first, nor will it be the last, impetuous pronouncement of faith and following on Peter’s part – nor the last time he will struggle with his faith.

Perhaps, taking a page from Peter’s story, the greatest roadblock to our living faithfully along the journey is our own fear and our own disbelief. How can any of us expect to live up to the hopes and dreams emanating from the heart of God? We struggle to believe that Jesus could feed five hundred folks, let alone over five thousand. Quite possibly the problem stems from our 21st century world-view. Maybe, just maybe, we let ourselves live in a world that’s just a wee bit too literal, and not enough mystical, to allow God’s Spirit to move in our lives.

Those of you who were here for my first Sunday at St. Paul’s heard me preach about Jacob waiting alongside the river Jabbok as his brother Esau approached. Their relationship had been contentious ever since Jacob stole Esau’s birthright. Fearing for himself, as well as his family and his many possessions – and being unwilling to risk them in the confrontation with his brother – Jacob sends everyone and everything across the river for safety. I asked the question, “What are we willing to risk in the days before us and what are we going to send across the river in an attempt to keep it safe? Those of you who were here nine and a half years ago remember that the people of St. Paul’s were in the middle of a process of reconciliation and healing. The question, itself, was a risky proposition.

Those of us participating in the process stayed on the risky side of the river along with Jacob. And as he and his brother found reconciliation and healing so did we. To mix a couple of Biblical metaphors, St. Paul’s stepped out on the stormy sea and walked on water alongside our Lord. Those who have become a part of our parish community since those early days have experienced the fruit of that hard work, and have built upon it faithfully since. What a powerful story of God’s love and presence in our lives, my friends!

My sisters and brothers, we can walk on water. We can feed the multitudes. We can live with, and offer to this broken world, the hope and justice, the grace and peace, and the compassion and love of God in Christ Jesus. And that is the deeper truth of these stories. God actually does call us to break out the bread – to jump out of the boat – to leap into the fray – and follow the one we call Christ – however we can manage to imagine doing so. Author Tim Button-Harrison reminds us that “walking on water means stepping out in faith.” He goes on to write, “Walking on water truly means letting the Spirit of Christ determine our steps. Walking on water truly means the storms and the floods and disturbances of life do not finally define us, [rather, it is God who defines us].[2]

And the good news is that God doesn’t demand our success. God only asks that we be faithful – even if that involves our joining Peter in his cry as the waves thrash about our heads, “Lord, save me!” As St. Julian reminds us, “[God] did not say, ‘You shall not be tempest-tossed, you shall not be work-weary, you shall not be discomforted,’ But [God does] said, ‘You shall not be overcome!”[3]

Each of us is on a journey – a journey that draws us each ever deeper into the heart of God. Along all the twists and turns, Christ journeys with us. Amid the wild winds and the tempestuous waves, Christ journeys with us. Jesus stands before us with arms outstretched and says, “Come.” “What?” we reply. “Me, walk on water?” “No,” says Jesus, “Well, not literally, anyway. That was Peter’s deal. Just come. Walk with me. Hear my call and follow as best you can. That will be enough.” Remember that Jesus always journeys with us – even when we stumble or fall – because the “storm and the wind never cease their call.”[4] And we follow a Lord who stands with us and within us in all the storms, and the floods, and the disturbances of life, though not ruled by them.

So put on your walkin’ shoes and skip across a few waves. If we’re willing to follow the One we call Christ – if we’re willing to keep the eyes of our faith on the prize of Christ’s high calling – I promise you it will be the time of our lives.



[1] W. H. Auden, A Christmas Oratorio

[2] Tim Button-Harrison, Synthesis Commentary

[3] Enfolded in Love: Daily Readings with Julian of Norwich

[4] Tim Button-Harrison, Synthesis Commentary