Synod 2014: Opening service - Sermon
Text of the Sermon by Rev. Claudio Pasquet, pastor of the Waldensian Church in San Secondo di Pinerolo (Turin)
«Jesus called them together and said, “You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”» (Mark 10, 42-45)
The disciples are at crisis point. As often happens, this is the result of a request for power and prestige. James and John have asked to become, after Jesus, the most important within the group when he has won the victory, What exactly the victory is about they have not yet understood, but that isn't important. Even despite Jesus' warnings they are ready to be up at the front.
The other disciples are indignant and mercifully Mark does not tell us whether this indignation is out of a sense of justice or rather because they don't want to be considered less important or have less power than the other two.
There are many human ways in which Jesus could have dealt with this crisis. By not treating it as important at all, “With all that there is to do! We need to go to Jerusalem and you are wasting time with this nonsense?” By siding with the majority, telling James and John off and emphasising their mistake, or the opposite, by standing by the two of them and recognising their ambition and encouraging them. Another reaction would have been to dominate the group, reproaching them because they really didn't understand at all and asking them just to blindly follow him, their leader. Underestimating, taking sides or looking down in judgement. These are all temptations which we humans find ourselves easily caught up in when faced with a crisis – problems in our small congregations- the economic, social and political issues which trouble our world.
But not Jesus. He has a different strategy. He calls them together the Bible test says. The Lord, concious of the role the community of the disciples, knows that above all He needs to reinforce the cords that bind them together. Not by ignoring the crisis, even if in our secular and busy world it seems that He is wasting time. But by calling them together He is proposing a source of strength which the Lord continues to extend to His own, yesterday and today. A formula, a way of living our faith which cannot and should not be left out of the practice of being a community.
In this Synod how much are we aware that the Lord is calling us togther? Or have we come with fixed ideas which we want to pass on to others come what may? How much time and energy, how many brothers and sisters have we lost from our congregations because some want to impose themselves on others, because we continue to judge each other and are no longer driven by a sense of Christian vocation and community. How many useless discussions have there been, resulting from differences of opinion. which fail to consider the need to be the Church together?
Let me tell you a story from my experience. A number of years ago whilst trying to explain to my Catechism group the importance and the beauty of the Protestant system of Church assemblies I made them come as a group to a Church meeting. The next lesson, after what I considered had been a good and lively meeting, what I heard was, “but what is so special about a few old people arguing.”
Let's rediscover that throughout our Christian lives, Jesus is there, prepared to waste His time to call us together. This I believe is what our community life together and our faith needs. We need to hear the Lord calling us. We need to be aware of the fact that we are and we “do” church because the Lord is with us, wanting to call us around Him, not to say that any one person in particular is right or wrong, not to tell us off for what we have failed to understand but to show us that there is always another way.
Jesus stops in order to rebuild the community, He calls the disciples together and He does this so that they can listen to something new that He wants to teach them.
And again the Lord surprises us. He doesn't start with Scripture but with the world. “You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them and their high officials exercise authority over them.”
Are you hungry for power and victory? Look around you. The leaders of the nations, tyrants, emperors are all trying to quench their thirst for these things. You know all this happens at a price. Look round and you will see the consequences of this greed on individuals and on populations. It is the leaders of the nations who have made finance more important than health, society, and employment for young people. It is the leaders of the nations who in God's name want to impose their religion on others using terrorism and violence. It is the leaders of the nations who want to continue to dominate the weakest in society, discriminate against women, destroy the ecosystem all in the name of social progress – that never seems to happen.
These are the leaders of the nations and you want to imitate them?
Jesus is extraordinary! He has the courage to denounce the evils of the world, showing the disciples that they are also responsible. What they want is similar to what they often criticise and claim to renounce. Because denouncing the things that shouldn't happen, blaming politicians, leaders (the Tavola) and pointing the finger at others who are responsible, is something we are all good at. We are champions when it comes to blaming our neighbour and absolving ourselves. In our world finding who is responsible, the scapegoat, is becoming big business and overwhelming or courts of justice.
Jesus turns to those in his group and says to them and to us, “Is this what you want?” Judging others but not ourselves. Falling into a spiral of false moralism in which other always make mistakes but we are okay, even if we are doing the same things.
No. “Not so with you.” Look out because here is a small key which opens the door to great hope. Jesus does not say, “It will not be like this with you” nor “It should not be like this with you.” He says it is not like this with you, now, in this moment, in this group! And this is because Jesus is there to spur them on, to remind them that there is another possible road to take and that they are already on that road. The same road that we, brothers and sisters, have taken, the road of dicipleship. Despite being sinful people, charmed by the world, power and injustice, we are on this road with Jesus. Every so often He stands still, stops us, calls us, His Church to come to Him, together and shows us another way. Christ's invitation to life in His group, in His Church, with different human relationships which we often forget but which never disappears. “Not so with you.”
This has reappeared many times in the history of Christianity.
When everyone considered torture, the death penalty and other forms of cruelty just and God's will, we should admire our Taborite brother Nicola Biskupec who wrote in 1433, “Noting how the great masters indicated at the time of the Law of Grace lesser punishemnts than the death penalty for the punishment of sin, I want the judges to behave like fathers, not tyrants when punishing offenders. Not keeping to the judgemental practices of the Old Testament, nor to human laws which are clearly discordant with the law of the Gospels, but considering how Christ acted and the practices of the early Church. I confess that seeing as I cannot give a man who has been killed his life back, I will never take delight in such killing, nor easily will I ever agree to the death of anyone else.”
“Not so with you.” Do we wnat to prove these words true in our community life, in our Church meetings, our Synods? Or do we do nothing? But at what price? By ignoring good sense? A close friend of mine, a member of one of our city churches was told by his children, none of whom go to church anymore, “we spent our youth listening to you and Mum talking about Church, the problems amongst the different chuch members, complaining about the others and about the Pastor who wasn't the right person for the job, about organising church meetings... what is the point of it all?”
Certainly faith is about denouncing the evils of the world, injustice and the wrongs of society. But faith is also a neverending attempt to “build” the church as John Calvin put it. Those who preach that we should distance ourselves from the world and not get involved in spcial issues have never had much success amongst us. Indeed through such things as our work with migrants, our institutions for the young and old in need, the New Poverty (food and clothing banks) we are deeply involved in society. Many of us, pastors and lay people, work hard and daily to make sure our church esists and has a presence in our towns,
Besides this however faith is, above all, about consciously belonging to a group of people who are called by Christ. And belonging to this group, we know that we belong totally to Christ himself. This is the far horizon that we risk losing sight of in our churches. And if we lose sight of this, power, prestige, attempts to dominate other become important again and our lives change direction.
It is with joy today that we consecrate a Deacon in our Church, not a minister. I don't want to talk about a vocational crisis but why do so many young people, above all those who have grown up in our churches, refuse to think about becoming ministers. Is it not also because we do not know how to present strong community models where you can feel and live the centrality of Christ? Where “Not so with you.” is something which sensitively involves everyone and is not simply a slogan or worse an illusion?
Christ is deeply human. He knows that we are full of desires, including the need to excel. He knows that we need somewhere to use our gifts. He doesn't deny us this but asks us to use our gifts differently, “whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all.” What gifts do you have? Don't use them to squash your neighbour but to lift him/her up. Do you want to be first? Stretch out your hand to give not to receive. Our freedom as Christians is great enough to allow us to critise the sensible rules of the world, even the “natural” rukes which mean the weakest have to give way.
We know the evils of the world, wars, which even today threaten us and which are like terrible tumorous growths – called power, prestige and money.The only cure for these are service and solidarity. More than ever before today we need to feel that we are challenged to run the race of service. As Christians we have often been on the sidelines of service, but a voice, even if at times quite faint calls out to remind us that this is God's will! Listen to how modern this sounds, “If you do not forgive you will not be saved. No one should kill, nor hate anyone, we must not scoff at the cripple, nor the simple, the poor nor despise the foreigner who comes from another country because in this world we are all pilgrims but since we are all brothers we must all serve God. This is the new law which Jesus Christ has called us to observe.” Great new version! It can be found in the Nobla Leçon written by medieval Waldensians in 1400.
But is all this possible? Is it possible that the practice of the church has to be constantly called to Christ? Is it possible that the ethics of the Church must always call us to service?Yes but only if it always has as its base, its theology the fact that, “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and give His life as a ransom for many.”
In the face of powerful men who throughout history have always said, “let's arm ourselves and you go.” In the face of politicians who expect others to make sacrifices they are not prepared to make themselves, Christ is different! He is different because He went first and alone, right to the end. He is different because the only sensible and useful sacrifice He made alone.
Please excuse the simplicity of the following comparison. When I was young I loved walking in the mountains. It was one thing to find new paths but quite another to follow where someone from CAI had already gone ahead marking the correct route with painted signs on the rocks. Now you couldn't get lost and eventually you would arrive at the top because someone had been there before you. The pathway of service and of the Church has been opened up once for all by Christ and leads to eternal life.
There is nothing to invent, just a way open to follow. The sequela much loved by Bonhoeffer is possible because Christ has suffered what needed to be suffered to open up this pathway of service for us. And He did this once for all. His suffering, his life offered as our ransom, Christ has done all that needs to be done.He does not need rivals, earthly rperesentatives or more deaths or suffering. We don't need to cultivate any mysticism of personal suffereing even if the secular world likes to think of Christains in this way.
Many years ago I had an operation and just before the first anaesthetic injection I was told “you will just feel a little pain” The doctor in charge, not having really understood what my strange job was, but having sensed that it was something to do with religion replied, “Go ahead doctor because if he suffers now he will gain in Heaven.” I was still concious enough to add, “not us doctor...but perhaps the opposition.”
Yes the world wants Christians to appear like sad images of suffereing and pessimism (and in our church we are often good at this). There is this great misunderstanding, especially in Italy: Christians must suffer. No, Christ died so that Christians can serve. He offered His life so that we, in service, can help others, not so we can destroy each other, poison our community life by loading others with feelings of guilt.
The Church, our faith, all that we do and are – all rests on Christ. When, at the end of this story of a community in crisis He pronounces the words, “to serve and give His life as a ransom for many.” He opens up a horizon of infinitie possibilties to His church. Those of judging the wrongs of the world, of trying to correct them through service and not with power, by feeling that we are not alone in what we are trying to achieve.
Christ is there , is here, He waits for us when we trip up, He teaches us about the world and our vocation and above all He tells us, Go, the road is open, I opened it up and no one can close it.”
Amen
August 24, 2014