Preaching today at Saint Paul's Lutheran Church, Rye Brook, N.Y.
‘My father made your yoke heavy, but I will add to your yoke; my father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions.’ So the king did not listen to the people. (I Kings 12:14-15)
Looking back nine centuries before Christ was born, we find Israel in the midst of a leadership crisis.
A vain and narcissistic leader repudiates the wisdom of his predecessor, rejects good advice, acts tough, makes threats, and tears his country apart.
In the political placidity of 2019, we can only wonder what that must have been like.
No doubt leadership problems predate recorded human history, as far back as when an ambitious Cro-Magnon convinced his followers they would eat better if they hunted rather than gathered and led his people to be massacred by an defensive mastodon.
Indeed, leadership problems are an appropriate topic for reflection as we observe the 502nd anniversary of the Reformation.
In October 1517 the leader was Pope Leo X, who got it into his head that he had power over the destination of souls when people died. Leo also saw a business opportunity in that power. As he faced mounting debts over the reconstruction of Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome, Leo raised funds by selling indulgences to sinners to minimize the time they would spend in Purgatory.
That made Martin Luther see red. A mercurial monk, priest, and theology professor, proclaimed the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Luther declared that individuals are saved by the grace of God, and no paper signed by the pope or a bishop could open the gates to heaven.
Can we all say Amen.
Clearly this theological insight is worth celebrating today. Because of what Martin Luther declared, Christians are liberated from the task of seeking out Jesus, of pleading with Jesus to come into our lives. When people ask us, “Have you found Jesus?” Lutherans may reply, “Jesus has found me!” And nothing we can say, do, or not do can repel the grace that saves us.
One would think that revelation would have settled the question of salvation for all time, and today we would be celebrating 502 years of Christian harmony.
But Leo X quickly realized there was no financial profit in grace. And far be it from our Protestant and Catholic ancestor to sit in a quiet pub to discuss hermeneutical differences over a stein of beer. Instead, they formed armies, fought battles, and blood flowed for the next, 200 years.
The German Peasant’s War of 1525 was an uprising by persons at the bottom of the social scale who were inspired by Luther’s message of the priesthood of all believers. Luther abhorred violence and he condemned the peasants’ bloody uprising, while harsh suppression by the authorities left tens of thousands dead.
The Massacre of Saint Bartholomew’s Day in 1572 was the most notorious episode of religious violence of the Reformation era. On August 24, 1572, in the midst of celebrations of a marriage between a Catholic princess and a Protestant king, at least 2,000 French Protestants were murdered on the streets of Paris.
The Thirty Years War (1618-1648) left parts of the German-speaking lands utterly decimated – some areas lost between a quarter and a half of their population. The episodes of violence associated with both Protestant and Catholic troops in the war were legendary, and stories spread across Europe.
Another sad outcome of the reformation was war against non-Christians. The “reconversion” of Spain to Christianity, and the expulsion of the Jewish and Muslim populations of the peninsula were hugely significant acts of symbolic and practical violence. And, beyond both 1492 and 1517, as Spain and other European nations acquired overseas empires, they also began to convert and subdue indigenous peoples, leading to the genocide of the people who populated the Americas before Europeans came.
Did Martin Luther really understand what he was starting 502 years ago?
For millions, his efforts to reform Christendom created more pain than gain. For many Christians, especially Anabaptists, Luther’s movement was often lethal.
Here’s a Reformation story, which Anabaptists still tell:
In 1569 in Holland, a Mennonite preacher named Dirk Willems was arrested by his Lutheran neighbors for practicing the heretical custom of adult baptism.
After 1500 years of quarrelsome Christianity, the Lutherans had a pretty good idea what God wanted them to do with heretics: burn them at the stake.
According to The Martyr’s Mirror, Willems escaped from his captors one winter night and sprinted across the frozen hillocks. The Lutherans were losing sight of him and one pursuer took a shortcut across a frozen pond. But the ice broke beneath him and the Lutheran fell into the frigid water, writhing helplessly.
Willems turned to see the man’s distress and made a fateful decision. He ran back to the pond and pulled the man out of the water. The other pursuers caught up with him and carried Willems back to the jail, where he was promptly burned at the stake.
Today the awkward tale of Dirk Willems is rarely told in Lutheran confirmation classes but it’s worth keeping in mind. Otherwise we might be tempted to celebrate the Reformation as a beatific highpoint of Christian progress.
But the truth is, if Luther had his way, he’d have nailed a few Anabaptists to the Wittenberg door, too. And Jews. And the Pope. The defacing of the Wittenberg door was the ominous prelude to decades of burnings, beheadings, torture, and other primitive forms of hermeneutical discussion.
Luther, who spent much of his life hiding from Catholic assassins, would have readily immolated the odd Mennonite or Jew whose theology he found abhorrent. Fortunately for persons in those groups, Luther usually dissipated his anger through vivid insults which you can use even now to add salt to your Twitter tweets. In the unlikely case you are feeling angst, you can express it in Luther’s words on your cell phone. Download the Luther insult generator - http://ergofabulous.org/luther/
and tweet away.)
Luther was complicated. Among other things, he was a bona fide prophet. God spoke through him with blinding clarity.
But Luther also spoke for his imperfect human self, and on those occasions he was often wrong. He was a typical sixteenth century European Christian who bristled with anti-Semitism and xenophobia and he bristled brisker than most. Had his glowering imperfections been less obvious, his followers might have elevated him to the demigod status of Joseph Smith or Mary Baker Eddy.
Luther’s point was that with God’s grace, salvation is achieved by faith alone. That was a revolutionary revelation that relieved a heavy burden from sinners who saw themselves struggling futilely to please a vengeful God.
Salvation by faith alone is God’s message to us, and it’s too bad Pope Leo couldn’t see it. It’s also too bad that the reformers themselves sometimes lost sight of it. Fifty years after Luther published his theses, some of his Lutheran descendants got the idea that faith and grace only worked for Lutherans, not Catholics, not Anglicans, and certainly not Anabaptists. Luther himself, a confirmed churl, despised Anabaptists because of their adherence to believer’s baptism. Dirk Willems was not the only one to pay the price of Lutheran arrogance. These were the horrid hermeneutics of the Reformation.
But times change and we Christians are no longer immolating each other. Today Pope Francis warmly embraces Lutherans and Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York (who knew he was a Luther scholar?) acknowledges “the church needed reforming” in 1517. One can even see the day in the not-too-distant future when Lutherans and Catholics will share the same communion elements of bread and wine at a common table.
The ideal result of the Reformation will be when Lutherans and Catholics share a common priesthood, but that day seems far off. Most Lutheran communions ordain women as priests and bishops, and the otherwise progressive Pope Francis has declared that will not happen in his reign.
So for those who believe it is essential for the church to embrace the gifts of all who are called to ministry, regardless of gender or sexual orientation, there is still reforming to be done.
As we look forward to the perfect unity of a reformed church, it may be good to keep in mind that Reformation has always been imperfect, often brutal, and slow to embrace the insight that Luther saw in his more gracious moments: that persons are redeemed by faith, not dogma, and by God’s grace, not priestly intercession.
True reformation may be a long ways off, but by God’s grace it will come.
Like the long, slow moral arc of the universe, the arc of reformation bends inexorably toward unity.
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Reformation leaders caricatured above above:
1. John Wycliffe (1328-1384) was an English scholastic philosopher, theologian, Biblical translator, reformer, priest, and a seminary professor at the University of Oxford. He became an influential dissident within the Roman Catholic priesthood during the 14th century and is considered an important predecessor to Protestantism.
2. Martin Luther (1483-1546). Here I stand, I can do no other.
3. Jan Hess (1369-1415) was a Czech theologian and philosopher who became a church reformer and an inspirer of Hussitism, a key predecessor to Protestantism and a seminal figure in the Bohemian Reformation.
4. John Calvin (1508 – 1564) was a French theologian, pastor and reformer in Geneva during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism
5. Argula von Grumbach née von Stauff (1492-. 1554) was a Bavarian writer and noblewoman who, starting in the early 1520s, became involved in the Protestant Reformation debates going on in Germany.
6. Marguerite de Navarre (1527-1549. American historian Will Durant wrote: "In Marguerite the Renaissance and the Reformation were for a moment one. Her influence radiated throughout France. Every free spirit looked upon her as protectoress and ideal .... Marguerite was the embodiment of charity.
7. Kartharina Von Bora Luther. (1499-1552) Katharina von Bora, after her wedding Katharina Luther, also referred to as "die Lutherin", was the wife of Martin Luther, German reformer and a seminal figure of the Protestant Reformation.
8. Marie Dentière (1495-1528) was a Walloon Protestant reformer and theologian, who moved to Geneva. She played an active role in Genevan religion and politics, in the closure of Geneva's convents, and preaching with such reformers as John Calvin and William Farel.
Mark 3:20-35. The crowd thought Jesus had lost his mind.
Why? Because he was hanging around crazy people? Or because he was acting like he thought he was Jesus?
The Jesus delusion is not unusual among schizophrenics. “I have three Jesi,” my spouse’s seminary suite mate reported during her clinical pastoral education cycle at a mental health facility.
There was an episode in the third season of M*A*S*H in which a bombardier’s head wound led him to believe he was Jesus. The officer presented a gentle wisdom and loving empathy so convincing that some soldiers in the 4077th began to believe he was who he thought he was.
As the story unfolded, many M*A*S*H viewers thought the unfortunate Captain Chandler reminded them more of their personal Jesus than Jeffrey Hunter or Max Van Sydow, who played (or, perhaps, overplayed) Christ in two Technicolor extravaganzas. In this episode of M*A*S*H, psychiatrist Sidney Freedman denied so vociferously that Captain Chandler was Jesus that one could almost hear the cock crowing. But of course the doctor was right. This burned out bombardier could not be the Lord.
Or could he? As the episode climaxes, Corporal “Radar” O’Reilly, holding fast to his childlike faith, asks Captain Chandler to bless his teddy bear.
One reason the delusional Captain Chandler was so convincing is that he acted the way we think Jesus should act: loving, tender, caring, welcoming, giving, wise. Even if these attributes were delusions, what could be the harm? I suspect most shrinks would prefer a Jesi or two on their rounds than someone who thinks he’s Ed Gein or Jeffrey Dahmer.
But the line between sane and nuts gets blurred when it involves delusions of Jesiosity. Everyone from the Apostle Paul to Thomas à Kempis urged us to imitate Christ, and for many of us that means we must be loving, tender, caring, welcoming, giving, and wise. Most of us quickly discover that being Christ-like is not easy because we are painfully aware that we not anything like Jesus. Or, to put it another way, we are miserably sane.
Even so, most of us are egotistical enough that we don’t dismiss our godlike potential entirely.
We humans are endowed with egos strong enough to persuade us that we are creatures of colossal value in the firmament. This is a good thing. As we grow up, all of us experience at one point the ontological epiphany that we are unique, that there is only one me, that no one else in creation is like me. The only thing that keeps most of us from growing megalomaniacal is the discovery that we are far from perfect – a revelation reinforced by parents, peers, and pastors who bestow upon us the gifts of guilt and feelings of inadequacy. It makes you wonder who is crazier: the Captain Chandlers whose wounded brains but undamaged egos nudge them across the Twilight Zone where they see no compelling evidence that they are not Jesus? Or the rest of us guilt-stricken neurotics who fixate on our failings and see nothing at all that is holy about ourselves?
It’s too bad if some of us are crippled by shame and remorse. All of us know we are not perfect, that we have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Those who believe the universe has made special dispensations for them will either be disappointed or doomed to a lifetime of sociopathic chimera.
In the third chapter of Mark we see Jesus’ friends and family fretting that he is out of his mind, and they try to whisk him away from the crowds before he causes further embarrassment for himself or for them.
Of course, Jesus knows he is not out of his mind. But it makes you wonder: how did he know for sure?
The crowd is simultaneously fascinated and horrified that Jesus is casting out evil spirits from demoniacs. The people are awed he has the power to do it but they do not know where it comes from. When they last saw him back in Nazareth, this exorcist was only Jesus Bar Joseph, the carpenter, the familiar local boy who, though perhaps a little eccentric, seemed unlikely to have special powers or a unique relationship to God. If Jesus the local boy is casting out devils, the crowd fears, it can be for only two reasons: either he has lost his mind or the Devil is playing with him.
Jesus is of course annoyed by the crowd’s ignorance and announces that it is by God’s Spirit, not Satan’s, that he displays such power against the Underworld.
But it’s not hard to understand how the crowd reached its ignorant conclusions. How do any of us know for sure whether the convictions of our minds are thoughts from God or constructs of the devil?
Indeed, how did Jesus know?
In The Last Temptation of Christ, Nikos Kazantzakis’ 1953 novel that has spent most of its existence as a banned book, the fictional Jesus resists the crazy notion of his messianic calling and desperately evades it. God is forced to drag Jesus into service with sharp talons dug into his scalp. Apparently, Kazantzakis believed the whole idea of incarnation was so mad that a sane human would resist it. As the schizophrenic Professor John Nash concluded in A Beautiful Mind, the only way he could function as a rational human being was to summon the will to ignore his delusions and pretend they weren’t there.
Happily, history has resolved most of these issues for us. Jesus was born to be the Messiah and he knew it. When God spoke to him, Jesus the Incarnation recognized God’s voice and never doubted it. And even in Kazantzakis’ novel, Jesus did not succumb to temptations to abandon his role, including the last temptation, which was to avoid death on the cross.
The crowd that gathered around Jesus in Mark 3 thought he was out of his mind because he wasn’t acting the way they expected Jesus to act. But Jesus was acting the way God expected him to act, which suggests it was the crowd’s attitudes, not Jesus’ behavior, that were barmy. Just about everyone on the scene that day – the crowd, Jesus’ brothers, the Pharisees – piously asked themselves, What Would Jesus Do? And everyone came up with the wrong answer.
That’s helpful to keep in mind the next time you’re tempted to WWJD your way through a problem. If you think you can think Jesus’ thoughts, you may be wrong. You may even be crazy.
“What would Jesus do” – WWJD – was the theme of a late 19th century novel, In his Steps, by Charles M. Sheldon.
The book – still a popular gift to the newly born again – opens with the visit of an indigent man to the home of a minister. The minister, busily preparing his sermon, listens impatiently to the man’s pleas for help before shutting the door in his face. On Sunday, the poor man stands in front of the pulpit and confronts the congregation about its lack of compassion to persons in need. Then he collapses and, days later, dies.
Driven by guilt and remorse, the minister tells his congregation, “Do not do anything without first asking, ‘What would Jesus do?’” The rest of the book traces a picaresque trail through the different answers individual church members believe they get to the question.
I first read the book in 1966, and even then the WWJD decisions of its characters seemed highly selective, if not dated. One character, Rachel Winslow, receives an offer to sing professionally for a “very large salary” and spurns it to spend the rest of her life in the church choir. In my experience, some of the best sermons I’ve heard have been preached in musicals, so Rachel’s decision strikes me as absurd.
Even more inexplicable to me is Edward Norman, editor of the local Daily News, whose WWJD inquiry leads him to reject a front page story: a report of a prize fight at the local resort.
I don’t know what this Christian editor was thinking, but his decision would have given the managing editor I once worked for – an upstanding Episcopal layman – a myocardial infarction. Regardless of one’s opinion about professional pugilism, there is just so much wrong with Editor Ed Norman’s smug and arbitrary decision to kill a major story: the rebuffing of thousands of readers who had a right to read it, the arbitrary quashing of the First Amendment, the needless threat to the newspaper’s revenue base and the concomitant jeopardy to the financial wellbeing of its employees and their families. I could go on.
The problem with asking what Jesus would do is that the answer is always filtered through what YOU would have Jesus do, and you never know if your thoughts stem from brilliant moral insight or undiagnosed psychosis. For myself, I believe that if George Bush had asked WWJD, he would never have started wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; and if Barack Obama asked the question he wouldn’t have sent drones to obliterate terrorists along with the innocents standing next to them. And if Donald Trump asked WWJD, he’d do the honorable thing and resign.
But – as hard as it is to imagine Jesus starting wars or launching drones – I want to stop short of speaking for him. There are just too many examples of people whose WWJD conclusions are based on ignorance, bigotry, stupidity and madness. One Baptist pastor believes Jesus would burn the Qur’an and consign Muslims to Hell. Another Baptist pastor would barricade Gays and Lesbians in separate pens until – being unable to reproduce – they would die out. Still another Baptist pastor (we’re seeing a trend here) encourages parents to slap little Johnny silly if he acts effeminate. And let’s not overlook Pastor Fred Phelps of Westboro Baptist Church who pickets the funerals of war heroes with posters emblazoned, “God Hates Fags.”
What a reversal of scripture. Jesus must shake his head at these guys and mutter, “They have gone out of their minds.”
As we take another look at these 15 verses in Mark 3, what do we see? Jesus is casting out demons – casting the crazy out of people he meets along the way. But more people come along whose crazy takes the form of ignorance, bigotry or family mortification and they have the temerity to think Jesus is the mad one.
But Jesus sets them straight – and offers a timely warning:
“Truly I tell you, people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.”
Theologians have argued for centuries what you have to do to blaspheme against the Holy Spirit. Probably Jesus was reminding them how dangerous it was to suggest that the spirit within him is “unclean.”
But there are other possibilities that could also be seen as blasphemy.
Among them: telling yourself and others you know What Would Jesus Do when you don’t know what the hell you are talking about.
Amen?
