A Sermon for the Second Sunday in Lent
The Rev. Patricia Gillespie
Genesis 22:1-14
Psalm 16
Romans 8:31-39
Mark 8:31-38
When I was a little girl I hated the story of Abraham and Isaac. How could a father decide to sacrifice his son? What kind of God would ask a father to do that? What if God decides to test my parents? In a self-protective bit of childish wisdom I decided that God just wouldn't do that or God could not be God.
Long before I ever heard of biblical criticism I decided someone must have got the story wrong, or maybe Abraham heard wrong.
But the story doesn't go away. Now, with children of my own, I still don't like the story. I rage at Abraham: How could you! Did you need so badly to prove your great faith that in meek obedience to God you turned against your own son? How can this be the same Abraham who earlier argued with God.
God thought of destroying a whole city for its sin but Abraham asked God to spare the city if fifty righteous people could be found in it and God agreed. . . . But that wasn't enough for Abraham: "Uh, God you know I'm only dust and ashes, but what if we were just five short of fifty . . . . Now don't be angry, Lord, but what if there were only forty? . . . ."
Abraham talked God into sparing the city if only ten righteous people were found, Yet when asked for the life of own his son, Abraham simply gives in without any protest at all.
I just don't understand.
When I finish with Abraham, then I rage at God: Maybe it's okay for you to ask someone who loves you to give up their own life, but how could you ask someone to take the life of another, especially their own child!
But the story doesn't go away. Here it is again this morning: God calling out "Abraham!" Abraham answering "Here I am." And God asking for the sacrifice of Abraham's son.
And then we hear other stories where it seems that God asks for some pretty awful stuff: In Romans people are asked to undergo persecution and death for Christ's sake.
Then Mark tells us that Jesus calls us to take up our cross, to deny ourselves, even to lose our lives.
God, God, must you ask for so much? It makes me think that Paul is correct when he writes "If God is for us, who is against us?" With friends like that, who needs enemies?
Just as I once worried about God testing my parents as Abraham was tested, now I pray that God will not decide to test my faith.
(A VOICE in the distance) "PAT! PAT!"
Uh, I think she went thatta way! Oh. . . . Well, perhaps you mean some other Pat -- they've got a lot of them just down the road at Emmanuel Church. And, anyway, there are lots of wonderful, capable people around here. They'd do a much better job than I. I'm really not worth your notice, thank you.
Whether it is God calling or Char calling about Vestry business, Or Steve calling about an evangelism project that's really a pretty typical response.
Most of us don't cry out "Here I am!" and 'just do it' as Abraham did. We all have our excuses. Look at all those people in the Bible:
God calls Moses and Moses says, "Nobody listens to me. Why don't you send Aaron!"
God calls Jeremiah and Jeremiah protests so much that he is known as "the whining prophet."
God calls Mary and even she objects, saying, "How can I have a son when I haven't known a man?"
Not many of us take up our crosses readily.
But the story doesn't go away: God keeps calling, "Abraham!" and Abraham keeps saying "Here I am." then he gets right up first thing and does it. It's almost as if he expected it.
Well, of course he expected it. Offering their children as sacrifice was what all his neighbors did for their gods. How could Abraham do anything less for God?
Certainly our God, the God of gods, must ask for and receive more than all those other false gods. If not, we'd be ashamed of our God. Abraham needs to prove that God deserves more than the lesser gods. So he takes up the knife to kill his son. . . .
But the story goes on. Again, a voice calls "Abraham, Abraham!" The response is the same, "Here I am." But the message is new: "Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything with him; for now I know that you fear God."
The Lord, thank God, does not ask for sacrifice but for faith, for the fear of God.
Abraham, like Peter, had set his mind on human things rather than God's things. Ritual sacrifice was the culturally correct human way to submit to a greater power. But it is not necessarily God's way. As the prophets will later remind us, God desires mercy and obedience rather than sacrifice.
It seems that God's ways are seldom what we expect. God's ways are surprising and new.
Just look at poor Peter. In the passage that precedes this morning's gospel reading Jesus has just asked Peter THE BIG QUESTION: "Who do you say that I am?" And, for once, Peter gets it right: "You are the Messiah."
Imagine Peter's excitement: His own rabbi is the one who will save the people. Jesus, his own Jesus, will be the Victorious King! But then the God of Surprises turns the story around and Jesus begins to teach them: This Messiah will not be the expected victorious king, but he will suffer, be rejected, and die.
No wonder Peter objected. That the Messiah could be treated so shamefully was unimaginable. Why, we'd be ashamed of a Messiah like that.
Peter expected a victorious Messiah he could be proud of. Abraham expected a powerful God who demanded sacrifice.
Beware of those expectations, my friends. Be aware of the God of Surprises.
Some of us like Abraham may expect that God will ask us to do difficult and painful things. Some of us like Peter may expect that God will do wonderful things for us.
Surprise! Abraham, who expected the painful, received the wonderful. Peter, who expected the wonderful, received the painful. What kind of crazy God is this anyway?
"Those who want to save their life will lose it and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it." "Take up your cross and follow me."
The Cross sends us this mixed message of life and death. There is a cross at the Abbey next door to my home that embodies this paradoxical surprise. It hangs over the altar, like ours here. If you sit with the congregation you are faced with a bright resurrection cross, a symbol of Life. If you sit with the monks, back sort of where our choir sits, you face a crucifix with a broken, bleeding body, a symbol of Death. Yet it is one and the same cross.
When you reach out to touch the Cross, you cannot cling to one side without taking hold of the other as well -- Death and Life together. This is the mystery of the cross--the sacrament of death and life. It is the power of the cross.
If you would follow the Messiah, take your mind from those expected all-too-human things and set your heart on the divine surprise. Deny yourself, let go of your expectations, and take up your cross.
Abraham denied HIMSELF. What Abraham was prepared to offer to God was not the sacrifice of another. For Abraham, Isaac was a part of himself --in fact, his very own life; his son was the only immortality that he knew. Holding the knife over Isaac, Abraham chose his own death and was given life. The story is an image of the Cross.
Deny yourself, let go of your expectations, take up your cross and follow.
But remember, we are ASKED--not required-- to take up the cross. Just as the cross was Jesus' own free choice we also must be free to choose or the mystery of redemption is absent.
Suffering that is not freely chosen is not redemptive. Suffering as a result of oppression and abuse is not what God asks of us. That is not the Good News of the Cross.
Mark's Gospel is clear that it is not simply losing one's life that saves life. It is losing one's life "for [Christ's] sake and for the sake of the gospel" that gives life. Deny yourself, let go of your expectations, freely choose to take up your cross and follow Christ.
God knows what your cross may be. We all are faced with a cross, sometimes several, large and small. We may not all be tested as dramatically as Abraham or Peter, but still there are voices calling asking us to bear a burden for Christ's sake.
Maybe it is the Voice of the one of our church ministers calling to ask for your help. Maybe it's the voice of a lonely friend, calling to ask for the gift of your presence with them. Perhaps it is a quieter voice inside asking that you offer some of your time for prayer.
Those of you who are parish ministers in this congregation are called to accept burden and blessing of the cross of church administration.
These calls can all seem like burdens, especially when what we are asked to sacrifice is our own precious time.
Sometimes it is difficult to imagine the other side of our own crosses, the life beyond the death. But the power of the Cross is that every cross, when freely accepted for Christ's sake, holds within itself both life and death.
We may see only one side of our cross yet God touches us with both sides of that cross-- the death and the life, the suffering and the joy, the burden and the blessing.
Take up your cross knowing that in accepting it freely you will be touched by the power of God's love.
As a people touched by the power of the Cross we are assured that neither death, nor life, . . . nor things present, nor things to come, . . . nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.