Cat Goodrich
Faith Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, MD
February 28, 2021

What Does It Mean to Follow?
Mark 8:31-38

 

My sister-in-law, Kate, once accidentally ran a half-marathon.  Or almost.  How does someone do that, you ask?  Good question.  One explanation is that she’s just that kind of person – in good enough shape to be able to pull it off.  But really – she was planning to run a few miles of a marathon with a friend who was racing, to encourage her along the way.  She hadn’t registered and wasn’t wearing a number, so she ended up getting kicked off of the course by a race official. She’d expected, I think, to catch a ride back to her car, so where she left the course was miles away from where they’d parked. By the time she finally jogged back to the parking spot, she may as well have run half the race.

 

Blisters, aching legs – Kate was pretty sore the next day.  It usually takes at least a couple of months to train for a half, and her usual long run was six miles – not 13.  If she’d known what was going to happen, she probably would not have agreed to follow her friend.  But by the time she had to leave the course, she didn’t have much choice.

 

I wonder if the disciples knew where they were heading, and what was in store for them in Jerusalem before Jesus made this prediction.  Up to this point, they’ve seen him heal countless people.  Cast out demons.  Eat with sinners and tax collectors.  Challenge unfair religious rules, rile up the scribes and provoke the priests.  He has shown them what he was about, but he hasn’t done any explicit teaching about where his ministry was leading.  Not till now.  And the teaching… its not what they want to hear.  They can’t even believe it.  So Peter rebukes him.

 

Peter has just confessed him to be the Messiah –the promised one, who would save Israel from its enemies.  The prophets promised a military victor anointed by God to overthrow their oppressors and uplift the poor.  Peter’s right, Jesus is the messiah, but not that kind of messiah.  That isn’t what he came to do.

 

Jesus offers liberation, absolutely.  He heralds a coming kingdom.  But the freedom he promises is not without risks.  In fact, he goes on to tell them that he must suffer, be rejected, and killed before rising again.  To the disciples, this is unbelieveable.  Their savior couldn’t be executed!  Why would they allow that to happen – much less follow him on the path to destruction?

 

What the disciples don’t yet understand is that by predicting these awful things, Jesus is just telling the truth.  Some amount of suffering is inevitable for those who challenge oppression, because people with power do not give it up easily.  You know this: the proverbial blood, sweat, and tears of any campaign.  The weary days, the long nights.  We who have the courage to stand up for love and justice in a world full of fear and greed have a fight ahead of us.  Jesus is just telling it like it is, and then he issues a challenge – those who wish to be his disciples must deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow him.

 

Jesus says some confounding things, doesn’t he?

 

What do we do with this here and now, in the 21^st century US?  It’s an incredibly challenging statement.  The culture in which we live is self-centered.  Self-indulgent.  Individualistic.  People with money in this country can have anything we can afford delivered to our doorstep within 24-48 hours. Deny ourselves?  Why would we ever want to do a thing like that?

 

And I know, and surely you do, too or can imagine, how this passage has been abused, mis-used, misinterpreted to justify all sorts of terrible things: to keep people in abusive relationships, to justify the enslavement of human beings, to maintain all sorts of injustices, suffering is called just a cross to bear.  So much so, that many feminist and womanist theologians reject the cross completely.  Suffering doesn’t save us.  Love saves us.  The life and work of Jesus, acts of kindness, liberation, and mercy are salvific, not the violence of the cross.  Not suffering.

 

Still, this crucial teaching – deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me – appears in all three synoptic gospels.  We who wish to follow Christ at some point must try to understand what he’s calling us to do.  Matthew Meyer Boulton’s commentary on this passage has helped me.  He says, Jesus does not tell us to seek out a cross.  Instead, Jesus says take up your cross.[1]  This assumes the truth that all of us will or have experienced some amount of suffering – we don’t have to seek it out, suffering finds us.  No matter where or when we live, no matter who we are brokenness, loss, and pain are part of life.  People we love will die.  We will make mistakes and have to deal with the consequences.  We do not always get what we want.  Our bodies are fragile, our resources limited, the systems in which we live are bound by sin.  Suffering is inevitable.

 

Students of Buddhism know that one of the Buddha’s foundational teachings is the four noble truths. The first truth is that life is dukkha, suffering. It just is.  The second truth is that suffering comes from want, from craving the things we don’t or can’t have. The third, that we can find release from suffering by letting go, emptying ourselves.  And the fourth, the way to do that is by following the path of moderation, meditation – called the eight-fold path.  (forgive this simplistic summary).  It’s not hard to see how the Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh could write a book called Living Buddha, Living Christ.  He has said, “on the altar in my hermitage are images of both Buddha and Jesus, and I touch both of them as my spiritual ancestors.”[2]  There is much that resonates between their teachings.

 

The past year has taught us more about selflessness and suffering than we probably ever wanted to learn.  We have stayed home to stop the spread and flatten the curve.  We’ve forgone visits and bypassed holidays and milestones with those we love to keep them safe and well.  Those of us who are essential workers have risked our own health and the health of our families to do our jobs.  We’ve seen friends and family members get sick, suffer, and die, many of them alone.  We’ve seen the rise of the share economy and mutual aid groups delivering food to people’s doorsteps and checking in on elderly neighbors.  We’ve rationed toilet paper and used gallons of hand sanitizer and learned to mask and double mask.  We understand now, perhaps better than ever, what it means to sacrifice what we want for the common good.  To limit ourselves, so that everyone can thrive.

 

Life as part of a community of faith teaches us these things, too.  I can remember a conversation I had with a college student in my last church.  At the end of a community meal, as folks were packing up and leaving, he seemed to be looking for someone, bobbing around, walking out and coming back in.  He was usually a pretty laid back kid, so urgency was out of character for him.  I asked him, “hey man, you okay?”

“I’m fine,” he said, “but we gotta find Mr. Burt so we can get out of here.”

“Why?”  I asked.  “You have somewhere else to be?”

“No,” he said with a grin, “but if we stay much longer, we’re going to have to clean up all this mess.”

 

I laughed, because it was true.  And you know what?  They did help: clearing plates, folding chairs and tables, sweeping food off of the floor.  They even walked me to my car to make sure I got there safely.  Because this is what we do for one another.  We show up.  We pitch in. We trust that many hands make light the work, and so we work together for the good of the community, offering what we can to help out.  It seems like not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, that a couple of college students gave some time to clean up.  But it’s these small choices that build our capacity to take larger risks when they present themselves.  To show up, to speak out, to stand together.

 

The Dalai Lama, spiritual leader of Tibet who has lived much of his life in exile and has seen many of his people killed and oppressed by Chinese government, observes, “… suffering helps [us] develop empathy and compassion for others.”[3] Life in community builds compassion.  It gives us a chance to do what Peter did: to listen to others speak the truth of their experience. To hear and understand how that truth calls us to action.  To go places we might not want to go.  To run the race that is before us even if it is far longer and harder than we imagined it might be.  To take up our cross and follow him all the way to Jerusalem, to confront the powers and principalities, all the way to Calvary, all the way to the empty tomb.

 

 

 

[1] Boulton, Matthew Meyer, “Cross Purposes: SALT’s Lectionary Commentary for Lent 2,” February 23, 2021, https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2018/2/20/cross-purposes-salts-lectionary-commentary-for-lent-2

[2] Hanh, Thich Nhat, qtd. In “About Living Buddha, Living Christ 20^th Anniversary Edition,” Penguin Random House, https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/352224/living-buddha-living-christ-by-thich-nhat-hanh-introduction-by-elaine-pagels/

[3] Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Douglas Carlton Abrams, The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World, Penguin Random House: New York, 2016, p. 242.

 

Cat Goodrich
Faith Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, MD
February 14, 2021

 

Transformation
Mark 9:2-9

 

My mom was a high school English teacher, which means that she is a purveyor and teller of stories, and not one to hold back from offering advice.  Having learned a thing or two about human nature from life and as an avid reader of fiction, she loved to advise me with stories – fables with morals that could not be missed.  A favorite of hers goes like this:

 

A man was walking along a forest path, deep in the woods, and snow began to fall.  Looking up at the grey sky through the trees and seeing the flakes begin to settle on the branches, he picked up his pace a bit, not wanting to get stuck out in the cold.  As he hurried along the path, hopping over roots and rocks, he heard a voice call out “– excuse me, can you help me?”

 

Looking down, he saw a snake slithering beside the path.  He jumped, because he noticed the snake’s sharply angled head and the pattern on his back and knew for sure that the snake was poisonous.  Edging over to the other side of the path, the man said, “I’m sorry, did you just speak to me?”

 

The snake’s tongue darted out, tasting the air as he lifted his head and said, “why yes, I did.  See, it’s cold and getting colder.  I’ll freeze to death out here if I don’t get back to my den.  But you’ve got that coat on with those big pockets.  If you could just slip me in there and carry me a little ways down the path, you’ll save me and I’ll be forever grateful.”

 

The man hesitated, feeling torn.  He didn’t want to be bitten by the snake, for then he would surely die.  But he didn’t want to ignore the snake’s plea and leave the animal to die, either.  As he weighed his options, the snake said, “Come on, please, just carry me a little ways.”

 

So the man gingerly picked him up, and slipped him headfirst into the pocket of his coat.  They walked quickly down the trail towards the edge of the woods when the snake finally poked his head out of the man’s pocket and said, “Stop!  Here!  This is it – you saved me!”

 

And when the man, eager to be rid of the snake, stuck his hand in his pocket to pull him out, the snake bit him.

 

The man swore and tossed the snake to the ground, crying in anguish – “How could you do that?  I helped you!  Why did you bite me?”

 

The snake slithered toward a hole in the roots of a tree and shrugged his shoulders and hissed, “you knew I was a snake when you picked me up.”[1]

 

The moral of the story: When someone shows you who they are, believe them.  Believe them.

It may not surprise you that the national news has reminded me of this story lately, especially coverage of the impeachment trial this past week.  And I think my mom would tell it to me as a way of helping me navigate the twists and occasional disappointments of building friendships and relationships when I was young, learning who and how to trust.

 

This story comes to mind because this is both Transfiguration Sunday and Valentine’s Day, and I’m thinking about change, and trust, and love, and our capacity for all of them.

 

Today we remember the dramatic revelation of the divine Christ on a mountaintop.  Until this point in Mark, Jesus has been making his way through Galilee, teaching and healing and challenging the death-dealing powers and practices that shut people out of communal life.  This mountaintop encounter is a turning point.  When Jesus and the disciples head back down the mountain, they turn toward Jerusalem and begin the descent into his final conflict with Rome and the religious leaders.  Here at the edge of Lent, we, too, are turning toward Jerusalem, to make our own journey toward the agony of Gethsemane and the darkness of Calvary, the pain of Christ crucified and, eventually, the joy of the risen Christ.

 

But before that, here, on a mountaintop, God’s glory is revealed in Christ.  Seeing this transformation, Peter, James, and John should have no doubt about who he is, and what he came to do.  And yet, they seem to have a hard time believing it.  I would, wouldn’t you?  Can you imagine their utter shock and DISbelief?  The text tells us they were terrified when they saw Christ change before their very eyes, from the man they knew into a glorious shining creature – no longer quite human –

heavenly to behold

terrifying to witness,

his robes dazzling white,

accompanied by Moses and Elijah – the law and the prophets, right there with him.

All three of them, shining brightly, radiant.

 

Scripture says that’s how it was with Moses, too, after forty days atop Mt Sinai, enveloped in a cloud of mystery, working out the details of the ten commandments with the one true God – he came down glowing.  Had to wear a veil to shield his face after so much time in the presence of God.  Radiance is one of the most common descriptors of what it’s like to see God – so bright, it’s like looking at the sun.

 

When have you seen someone and thought to describe them as radiant?  People on their wedding day are often glowing with excitement and love.  Expectant or new parents.  Babies can be radiant, and so can happy children.  An old woman’s smile.  A person teaching about something they care deeply and passionately about, just shines, don’t they?  Comes alive in a new way?  Seems like love leads to radiance.

 

One of my first times out with Dary, I remember standing with him, waiting for the T at Charles Street in Boston.  It was a bright spring day, on a raised platform, open air.  There was an older woman there, waiting also, who was blind.  For whatever reason, when the train came, she seemed hesitant to get on, and Dary went over and helped guide her onto the train.  It was a small thing, really.  But it stayed with me.  When someone shows you who they are, believe them.

 

The word transfiguration itself means a complete change in form or appearance – Jesus the man, transformed into a shining deity.  It’s not clear from the text how the change happens… if the Spirit brings this change upon Jesus, or if for some reason the disciples simple are able to see Christ’s true self for the first time. The message is clear: Christ is both human and holy, divine.  But I don’t know if the disciples are able to comprehend what that means… if having been shown his true identity, they believe their friend is indeed the human manifestation of God.  I wonder, once the vision goes away and the disciples head back down the mountain, what changes for them, having seen this.  Has anything really changed at all?

 

Moments of transcendence, of radiance, are fleeting.  When we experience them, how does it change us?

 

J Phillip Newell, a peripatetic prophet of the Iona Community, says that Christ came into the world to awaken our inner memory of God.  We’re all made in the image and likeness of God, we just have to be able to recognize it: to see other people as the bearers of God’s love and light.   And when we are able to see that, nothing really changes, but everything is different.

 

I always had a tough time accepting that story that my mother told, which I know she told from a place of love, wanting to protect me.  But I want to think the best of people, to give others the benefit of the doubt, to resist painting someone with too broad a brush and writing someone off completely.  If the resurrection teaches us anything, doesn’t it teach us that we are capable of change?  I believe people change all the time.  All the time, I hope we are getting better, wiser, more kind, more loving, more creative.  Resilient.  Maybe the transfiguration shows us that just as Christ changed outwardly, we disciples can be changed inwardly –when we see the world through his eyes, our hearts expand, helping us see all people worthy of love and belonging.

 

So, when someone shows you who they are, believe them – but also trust that God is still at work in them.  We all have the capacity to change.

 

My hope is that our eyes will be opened this week, to see the radiant beauty of Christ in the people and world around us, that our hearts will be opened to love him, our hands opened to serve him.  And that in so doing, we ourselves might be transformed.

 

 

 

 

 

[1] I learned in writing this that the fable can be either traced to or inspired a song written by activist Oscar Brown in 1963, and made famous by Al Wilson in 1968.  And, I was horrified to learn that the story was also oft used to drum up anti-immigrant sentiment by a former President on the campaign trail.

Cat Goodrich
Faith Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, MD
February 7, 2021

 

Serve, Rest, Repeat…
Mark 1:28-39

 

How is everyone doing?  There have been a flurry of articles lately pointing to the same truth: a lot of people are worn out.  In the Guardian, a journalist writes: “Pandemic burnout on the rise…”[1] and in HuffPost: “It’s not just you: A lot of us are hitting a pandemic wall right now.”[2] My favorite, in the New York Times, “Three American Mothers, on the brink,” part of a series called the Primal Scream, about parenting in the pandemic – the picture, a mom on a conference call in a makeshift office in her closet, while her three-year-old swings like a monkey from the clothing rack behind her…[3]

 

So how are you, really?  These articles all say we’ve been operating in a state of heightened stress for almost a year now, with excess cortisol and anxiety disrupting sleep, throwing us too easily into fight or flight mode, fogging our thinking and making us “emotionally zapped.”

 

We are at a pandemic breaking point, it seems – infections are falling, but they’re still higher than at any point prior to November.  We’ve either gotten sick ourselves, or known others who have.  Many of us have had friends or loved ones die.  460,000 dead in the US, more than 2.3 million worldwide.  Impossible to comprehend, really.  New, more contagious variants are spreading rapidly, calling for more caution than ever before.  The promise of the vaccine glimmers on the horizon, even as the snarled appointment system remains shrouded in mystery and supply is painfully limited.

 

The promise of Isaiah sounds pretty incredible, doesn’t it – you will mount up with wings like eagles, you’ll walk and not get weary, run and not faint?  Long-lasting fatigue and shortness of breath continue to plague many who’ve recovered from Covid – some of our number can say that’s true.

 

Some of you, I know, have gotten your first and even your second vaccination shots!  Thanks be to God, and to science!  You may be booking flights and making plans, or just feel a deep sense of relief, gratitude, and urgency for everybody else to get theirs, too.

 

You’ve seen by now, I’m sure, the expert being interviewed on a live BBC news program when his toddler bursts into the room – heard the reporter on NPR with her children in the background.  The line between work and home has blurred more than ever before, it’s part of pandemic life.  And this craziness, weariness, stress, and sadness, this pandemic is the lens through which I read the story about Peter’s mother-in-law, sick in bed with a fever.

 

And I’ve got to be honest with you, it riles me up!  I mean, this story really makes me angry.  Really, Jesus!  He heals this woman, literally, lifts her up out of bed and puts her on her feet and what does it says?  Immediately – it’s the gospel of Mark, so everything happens immediately – Immediately she begins to serve them.

 

This poor woman.  Sick in bed.  Head aching.  Body aching.  Shivering.  Then sweating like there is a fire in her bones.  Exhausted, delirious even.  What do you do when your fever breaks?  What do you do?  You sleep!  Finally, you can get some sleep!

 

But Simon Peter’s mother-in-law, she’s got a house full of fishermen and an itinerant preacher in her bedroom, lifting her up out of bed!  And her fever breaks, it leaves her at once.  But does she get to rest?  No, immediately she begins to serve them.

 

Now, I understand that their culture was different than ours.  Women had prescribed roles, and providing hospitality was a matter of honor for her family, there was not a choice for her.  But still.

 

Historical critical and feminist reads of the gospel have helped me see this story a bit differently. There are a few things I want to lift up.

 

It’s notable that the first real healing in Mark’s gospel is not a man, not a child, but a woman.  And even though we do not know her name, we know that in Biblical times, women were at the bottom of the social hierarchy – we were the property of men, and our job was to have children and serve the house.   Yet, here, in the oldest story of the life and ministry of Jesus – a woman is the first to be healed!  Not a homeowner, not a priest or a scribe.  A woman!  That’s not by accident.

 

It tells us that Jesus, the miracle worker, the one who teaches with authority, the preacher who called fishermen to follow him – he didn’t come to the politically powerful, the wealthy, the healthy, and the strong.  Jesus befriended the poor, and sought out those who were left behind and shut out: the sick, the mentally ill, prostitutes and tax collectors, women and children.

 

It is also significant that after she is healed, this woman, Peter’s mother-in-law, responds with service.  Remember, later in this gospel Jesus says: “I came not to be served but to serve.”  The word used here, diakonia, is the same word we derive the word deacon from.  So Peter’s mother-in-law was not just pouring tea!  She was the first true disciple, who understood the proper response to the coming of God’s kingdom – was to serve others with love.  She embodies the truth that each one of us has something to contribute.  And it’s human nature, isn’t it – to want to help others, especially if we ourselves have been helped.

 

I’ve served several downtown and urban churches, churches with strong outreach ministries, night shelters, and a lot of work with hungry folks and people experiencing homelessness.  Again and again, people who have received assistance come back and want to do what they can to help others.  Like Ashley – When I met her, Ashley was wearing an oversized tie-dyed T-shirt, pushing her toddler son in a big blue stroller.  A little disheveled, and worn out.  I learned she was staying at the YWCA down the street, a shelter for people escaping domestic violence.  The only reason she came to my church is because it was close, and there weren’t any stairs to navigate with her stroller, and we offered childcare during worship.  But she kept coming back.  And she worked hard.  And moved into an apartment on her own.  And when she could, she wanted to give back.  So for a time, she became the church’s shelter volunteer coordinator, recruiting church folk to cook dinner and stay overnight.  And often, she’d cook and serve and stay herself, dinner and dessert for 70+ people, with two kids under five.  Having done it with one child on my back and another beside me, I can safely say I have no idea how she managed.  She’s studying social work now, because she wants to help other women find their way to safety, to solid ground.  She wants to give back.

 

After Jesus heals Peter’s mother-in-law, Mark tells us they brought everyone who was sick or possessed, and the whole city was crowded around the door.  Everybody came to be healed.  And Jesus healed many of them.  But then, and this is what I want to lift up, then – Jesus took time for himself, time apart, to rest, to pray, and be restored.

 

For those who have hit a pandemic wall, the idea of time apart might seem like an impossible luxury.  But it’s necessary.  You cannot fill someone else’s cup if your well is dry!  Finding space, to pray, to be quiet, to listen and rest – is how we keep going.  The life of faith to which we are called is a dialectic of work and rest, action and reflection, service and sabbath.  One enables, enriches, and informs the other.  Jesus himself shows us, in this story and others, he models this rhythm of work and rest.

 

You know, one of the things I miss most in pandemic life is singing – hearing the sanctuary fill with music, our voices layered on top of each other, joy resonating up through the rafters.  Singing in a choir taught me something about rest.  Really!  There is magic that happens when many voices join together in song – the total is greater than the sum of its parts.  If I need to take a breath, I take a breath – the note continues, because the rest of the choir is singing it.  We hold the note for each other.  And singing in the congregation a similar thing happens –  you know, there are some hymns I just can’t sing all the way through.  Here I Am Lord is one, and How Can I Keep from Singing is another – they remind me of places I’ve been and people I’ve loved and I just get overcome with emotion and the words won’t come.  But when that happens, you keep going.  The congregation keeps singing, even when I can’t. We hold each other up.

 

So how are you doing?

 

If you need rest, please, say so.  Make time to rest.

 

If you need help, please, ask for it.  Say something.  Reach out.  There is no reason to suffer alone.

 

We are almost almost through this thing.  We can hang in for a little while longer.  Hear the promise of the prophet Isaiah: We will mount up with wings like eagles – walk and not get weary, run and not faint.

 

May it be so!

[1] Marsh, Sarah, “Pandemic Burnout On the Rise As Latest Lockdowns Take Toll,” The Guardian, 2/5/21, https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/feb/05/pandemic-burnout-rise-uk-latest-covid-lockdowns-take-toll

[2] Ries, Julia, “It’s Not Just You: A Lot of Us Are Hitting A Pandemic Wall Right Now,” The Huffington Post, 2/5/21, https://www.huffpost.com/entry/coronavirus-pandemic-wall-mental-health_l_601b3c9dc5b6c0af54d09ccb

[3] Bennett, Jessica, “Three American Mothers On the Brink,” New York Times, 2/4/21, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/02/04/parenting/covid-pandemic-mothers-primal-scream.html