Face to face

Let’s start with a Bible story:

One sabbath [Jesus] was going through the grainfields; and as they made their way his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. The Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?” And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need of food? He entered the house of God, when Abiathar was high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and he gave some to his companions.” Then he said to them, “The sabbath was made for humankind, and not humankind for the sabbath; so the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath.”

Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there who had a withered hand. They watched him to see whether he would cure him on the sabbath, so that they might accuse him. And he said to the man who had the withered hand, “Come forward.” Then he said to them, “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent. He looked around at them with anger; he was grieved at their hardness of heart and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out and immediately conspired with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him. (Mark 2:23-3:6)

This was the gospel reading in church last weekend (June 3). I wasn’t scheduled to preach that weekend, but as is part of my life as a pastor, I read through the text prior to the weekend anyway. This text, plus the other texts for the day, were focused on sabbath, and that is where my mind and heart initially focused. But in church, when my fellow pastor read this gospel in preparation to preach on it, I heard anew two lines that I had never before thought deeply about:

[Jesus said to the religious leaders], “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent.

It occurred to me - for the first time in my life - that Jesus was asking this question not because he was looking for an answer, and not because he needed feedback before choosing to heal the man with the deformed hand, and not because he was super concerned with figuring out what you could or couldn’t do on the sabbath. Jesus is here to challenge faith out of the realm of rules and into the realm of compassion. Here, Jesus puts a face to human need. And challenges leaders in the faith to respond.

Let’s think on this a bit, shall we?

Jesus stands there in the synagogue, surrounded by religious leaders. These religious leaders are caretakers of the structures of the faith. They are the ones tasked with preservation of tradition. They are the ones who feel pressure to manage the status quo. They are the ones who know and respect the rules. I imagine them all as type-A personalities.

I imagine them this way because I see a lot of myself in them. I'm a first-born, type-A, INFJ. Rules are generally meant to be followed. Structure is good. Tradition can be beautiful. Stability is valuable. Change needs proper discernment and deliberation and should be slow and incremental.

And as a religious leader, I feel the pressure that I'm sure these religious leaders felt. Pressure to sustain tradition, even at the expense of future possibilities. Pressure to stay in step with what has historically been considered orthodox with regard to theology and interpretation of scripture. Pressure to manage an institution for the sake of its survival. Pressure to look inward, to narrow the field of vision to what we believe to be the limits of our status, our abilities, our resources, and our good will in the community.

Jesus stands there in the synagogue as a symbol of the conflict between the calling of our faith and our patterned deference to the old structures that have sustained our faith up until this point. Jesus stands as a symbol of the conflict between the needs of God’s good world and the demands of the institutions that we are leading or loving.

There in the synagogue, the religious leaders have an opportunity, just by following Jesus, to reclaim a radical faith and to reclaim the calling to justice inherent in all the law and all the prophets. In the face of this opportunity, they are reluctant and afraid. They can’t imagine what it would be like to waver from what is “expected” or “orthodox” or “the way things have always been” or “just the way things are.”

It's hard to break from the pack, right? It's hard to be a leader who veers off the established course.

I empathize with the religious leaders.

But this doesn't mean I condone their behavior.

What Jesus does, there in the synagogue, is confront them with the needs of the world around them.

Jesus wants to open their eyes. (And our eyes, too.)

Jesus identifies a man in the synagogue who has a visible need. A man who represents everyone who suffers in body or spirit, everyone who lives life compromised, everyone who is ignored or pushed aside, everyone who is in need.

He sets this man in front of the religious leaders. He literally pulls him into their field of vision. The religious leaders can no longer pretend that they didn't see him as he walked by, or pretend that they were too busy or otherwise occupied to notice him.

He puts the needs of the world back in front of their eyes and says, “now what are you going to do?”

When Jesus asks the rhetorical question, "Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to kill?" he's not asking a multiple-choice question. He's not legitimately wondering whether or not it is lawful to help someone on the sabbath. There is only one right answer to this question.

Jesus puts this man in front of them and says, “Here are the needs of the world. Right here where you can’t look away from them. What now, in faith, are you going to do about it?”

::crickets chirping::

The religious leaders are silent.

They stand there, face-to-face with someone who looks to them for hope. For healing. For justice. For restoration.

And they say nothing. They fidget and share glances among themselves. It’s the Sabbath, after all. Couldn’t this wait until tomorrow?

No wonder Jesus gets angry.

Think about everything that he represents, everything that he seeks to bring to the world: this Kingdom of God that he not only proclaims but embodies, a Kingdom not of the future, but of the now, a Kingdom defined by God working God’s all-surpassing love and justice and hope and healing through the hands of Christ and the hands of all who follow him.

And these supposed leaders of the faith stand there, silent. Because saying “yes” to the need would mean saying “no” to their old patterns of behavior. Saying “yes” to the need would mean saying “no” to their job security, saying “no” to a guaranteed life of status, and saying “no” to long-standing and honored traditions of their shared faith life.

Jesus is inviting them to say a new “yes.” Inviting them to be courageous. Inviting them to do the work of seeing needs and letting their hearts break in two. Inviting them to see their world all over again, to reclaim the heart of the their faith. Challenging them to weigh the calling of faith with the old rules of faith. Challenging them to see the calling of God beyond all of their usual excuses and their usual assumptions that “someone else will take care of it.”

Jesus is inviting us to say a new “yes.” Jesus has set the needs of the world in front of us:

Children, separated from their families at the border.
Refugees, fleeing war and violence and looking for a safe home.
Those homeless, fearful, injured, and grieving after volcanoes in the USA and Guatemala.
People of color living in a nation that is yet deeply divided by race.
High school students terrorized by gun violence who call for a new conversations.

Are we going to stand silent?

Are we going to cling to the old rules of sabbath? Are we going to push off the calling of our faith to another day? Are we going to hide behind the structures that keep us safe? Are we going to give sideways glances to one another, saying with our eyes “you do it...no you do it...eh...somebody else will do it....right?”

Or are we going to keep our eyes open, now that Jesus has helped us to see? And are we going to break both our silence and the old rules, to address the needs that are standing right in front of us? Are we going to make a choice no longer to ignore the needs which we have for so long pretended do not exist, or the needs that we shrugged off as not our problem?

“Here are the needs of the world,” Jesus says. “I have put them before you. You can’t miss them. Now, in faith, what are you going to do?”