Sermon Lent 2C
We start our gospel reading today with something a bit surprising: Some Pharisees came and said to Jesus, “Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.” We often see clashes between Pharisees and Jesus, so it seems a little odd that here they are trying to protect him. They want him to get out of town, and certainly not continue to Jerusalem where things will get REALLY ugly.
It’s always bothered me that Christians tend to demonize the Pharisees. This gospel reading is immediately followed by Jesus going to the house of a leader of the Pharisees to have dinner. There are several other occasions when Jesus has positive interactions with Pharisees: when a Pharisee named Nicodemus comes to visit Jesus in the night, or most poignantly, a Pharisee named Joseph of Arimathea who requested Jesus' body from Pilate and prepared a tomb for him.
And today the Pharisees are trying to protect Jesus. But he doesn’t exactly heed their warning; indeed, he bites back at them: “Go and tell that fox for me, I’m busy!” I read that this is one place in the bible where Jesus’ humanity really comes out. He’s aggrieved, annoyed and touchy. I happen to love ‘cranky Jesus’.
“I’m busy! Casting out demons, curing people today, tomorrow and the day after. Then I have to get on the road to Jerusalem because that’s where prophets go to die.” Sounds like an emotional teenager whining about everything!
He moans: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it.” But listen to this tender change of tone: “How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!”
He’s called Herod a fox and now he longs to be a mother hen protecting her babies from the fox in the hen house. Apparently, when a hen encounters a predator, she gathers her chicks beneath her wings, then bares her chest to the fox to sacrifice herself and save her babies. I love this very female image of our protective Lord, keeping us safe beneath sheltering wings.
Jesus wraps up this conversation by saying, “I tell you; you will not see me until the times comes when you say, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.” Soon, this will be chanted on Palm Sunday as Jesus enters Jerusalem on a donkey.
Today we are in chapter 13 in the gospel of Luke, but way back in chapter 9, after the transfiguration, Jesus sets his face to go to Jerusalem. Jesus has been all over Galilee and beyond, and now he’s on a mission. But it’s a full ten chapters of Jesus’ journey before he gets there. This gospel is right in the middle of that long journey when he declares he is still determined to meet his fate in Jerusalem.
Why does Luke spend so much time chronicling Jesus’ actions on the road to Jerusalem? After all, the telling of Jesus’ death and resurrection is the central story around which our entire faith evolves.
David Lose writes:” …if you slow down and pay attention to these ten chapters, it’s impossible not to notice that no matter how determined Jesus may be to get to Jerusalem, he nevertheless takes time along the way to heal those who are ill, to teach his disciples and the crowds who follow him, to engage his opponents, to bless children, to restore to the community those who have been pushed to the side, to liberate those held captive to spirits that would rob them of abundant life, to share stories about God’s unending love, to argue for persistence in prayer and the pursuit of justice, and to lament all those who refuse God’s embrace and cling instead to the protections and prizes of the world.”
Jerusalem matters. The cross matters. The resurrection matters. But Jesus’s actions on the way to his death matter too. I’ll confess something slightly blasphemous: I am a follower of Christ, not because he died for my sins, not because he rose from the dead, I follow Christ because his life shows me how I hope to live.
What Jesus does on his way to his death matters. The same is true for us. How we live each day, standing up for those who are lost, greeting our neighbors, comforting the grieving, including the excluded, welcoming the stranger… these things matter. They may feel like small gestures, but they might also deeply affect others.
God works his miracles through each of us. Our little lives in this far corner of America are our vehicles for bringing about God’s kingdom. Never underestimate the power you each hold to change the world. Right now, some of us are feeling particularly helpless in the face of titanic changes in our world. What do we do? Send postcards? Write letters to the editor? Protest?
Well, Kevin and I are picking up trash. That’s our Lenten discipline, the same as last year. Want to feel great about yourself? Pick up some trash! It’s a small gesture that makes a bit of difference in the world.
Jesus set his face on Jerusalem, where he knew that he would be killed. Maybe this is how we know that Jesus is indeed God. After all, no other human being knows the time of his or her death. Jesus knows and boy, is he busy helping, helping, helping people.
Now think about this: how would you live if you knew the day of your death? I’ve thought about this a lot. My late husband had AIDS, and at the time, no one survived that disease. So, we knew that he would die and that he probably didn’t have much time. I guess this sounds really depressing but despite the fear and sadness of this time, there was also an intense need to make the most of each day. Our two best friends also had AIDS. What I remember most about that time is how hard we laughed when we got together.
Jesus teaches us how to live when we are on the road to our own personal Jerusalem. There’s a saying attributed to a Buddhist teacher named Jack Kornfield that I love that applies here: “The trouble is, you think you have time.” Life is short. Live it like Jesus.
Amen.