Rev. Betsy Aldrich Garland
March 8, 2009
Mark 8:31-38

Saving Our Lives

The Revised Common Lectionary is the three-year cycle of scripture readings for the church year that are widely used across Christendom.  On the first Sunday in Advent – the beginning of the church year – we started Year B.  Every three years, churches all over the world have read the relevant texts in our Bible.  This is where the “In preparing for next Sunday, it would be helpful to read...” texts listed in your bulletin each week come from. 

An advantage of the lectionary is that clergy are not just preaching on their favorite texts – or the easy ones.  Sometimes when I run into Fr. Brice at the Bread and Blessings program downtown, we compare notes on how we preached on Sunday’s text.  There is more than one story in every Bible story.

Usually the readings from the Hebrew Bible, Psalms, Gospels and Letters seem to have a common theme.  I can read them and see why the scholars put them into the same Sunday.  Sometimes, however, it’s a stretch to find the connection.  Sometimes it’s a stretch to find the meaning for us.  Sometimes it’s a stretch to connect the Bible story with our story.

In today’s gospel lesson, Jesus is teaching the disciples about the necessity of his suffering, death and resurrection. Jesus challenges both the disciples and the crowd... “to deny themselves and take up their cross and follow [him].”  And Jesus continues with this curious saying,

“For 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. 

For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life?”

A riddle.  Jesus often seems to be talking in riddles.  We know that the disciples don’t understand him, perhaps because his message was so counter-cultural and out of “sync” with the people’s expectations of a messiah.  So whatdo you suppose this “saving” and “losing” conundrum is really all about? 

It is significant that Matthew and Luke, writing for different audiences, repeat this saying of Jesus, pretty much word for word, an indication that it probably was an authentic saying that was passed down in the early church.   In other words, it’s not an idea that some industrious monk inserted when he was copying texts in the Middle Ages.  We need to take it seriously.

On first reading, we might assume Jesus is saying that those who keep their distance from Jesus and play it safe with the Roman authorities and the religious leaders of the day will save their skin on the one hand – but deprive themselves of a life that matters on the other.  As Jesus says to Peter, “For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” 

On a deeper reading, we might consider that a life lived for oneself alone is no life at all.  Much of the spiritual hunger in our society is caused by too much attention to “self” and not enough to the “other.”  We spend more and more on material goods in an attempt to fill up the gnawing emptiness and grow only more lonely and desolate.  When we are wrapped up in ourselves, we die.

Now, lest you think I’m advocating for sackcloth and ashes, let me say that I think it’s not what we have but the use we make of what we have that matters.  When my mother was in her 90s and needed more support, I moved in with her and sold my house.  Because I needed a new car, I used some of the proceeds to buy a Toyota Siena.  It was the most highly engineered car I had ever owned.  It was a driving machine!

On my way back from Newport Toyota, I realized I was wearing a white tee shirt with green footprints on the back and big blue letters on the front that read, “New England United Methodists Walking With the Poor.”  And I said to myself, “What’s wrong with this picture?”  Right then I promised myself that I would use this van for ministry.  And I did.  It was perfect for taking elderly members of the church on a picnic to Beavertail, for transporting a homeless family to a
shelter, for taking the confirmation class to New York City. 

At the clergy retreat two weeks ago, we considered such pre-Lenten questions as, “What do we most care about?”  “If we had just one day left to live, how would we spend it?”  “What would we be willing to die for?”  If you had one day left to live, would you spend it at the office?  Or with people you love?  My first thought was that I would die for my children, but I had to ask myself, then, why did I work so much when they were little?  Why didn’t we go on more hikes, and play more games, and eat dessert first?

Crises bring out the life choices in us; force us to take stock of our relationships; make it possible for us to save our lives. 

Consider the uncertainty that Edgewood church has been through these past several months....  The questions about whether, or not, Bary will return.  The questions about process.  The questions about the Conference.  The questions about the deacons.  From my vantage point as the interim minister, I see our deacons moving ahead with a vision for this church that is captured in this statement of faith by Bible scholar Ann Weems.1  See if you can find Edgewood Church here.  It reads like this:

We believe in God, in Jesus Christ, in the Holy Spirit, and in you and in me.

We believe the Holy Spirit works through -- ministers, clanging cymbals and silence, noisy children and loud music, choirs and banners, touching and praying, spontaneity and planning, faith and doubt,  tears and laughter, hugging and kneeling,  dancing and stillness, creativity and giving, words and listening, holding and letting go, thank you and help me, Scripture and alleluias, agonizing and celebrating,  accepting and caring, through you and through me, through Love.

We believe God's Holy Spirit
lives in this community of dancing, hand-holding people
where lines of age and politics and life-styles are crossed.
We believe in praising God for life.
We believe in the poetry within each of us.
We believe in dreams and visions.
We believe in old people running and children leading.
We believe in letting go and new beginnings.
We believe in the Kingdom of God within us.
We believe in rested souls.
We believe in love.

Who among us would not want to be here, to be a part of such a community of faith?

Yes, of course, Bary’s resignation will be the loss of someone you love, and a loss of his gifts for ministry, and a major change for this church.  It will take some getting used to and living into.  That’s okay and to be expected.

Might we, however, with the passage of time, open ourselves to the future?  To see this crisis as an opportunity to clarify our values?  A time to strengthen our relationships as a congregation?  An opportunity to discover what we most cherish?

Might we, in the losing of Bary, Edgewood’s pastor for 18 years, save our corporate church life for new mission and ministries in the wider world in this new day?  May it be so!

Amen.

1 From Reaching for Rainbows, adapted by Terry Hershey.