Isn’t that what Jesus said? Blessed are those who use all of their gifts
and talents to solve their problems? To achieve
the highest of heights?
Oh, wait – he didn’t?
Then it must be the prophets of the
Old Testament, right? The ones whose teachings Jesus himself clarified for us? They were the ones who told us: Remember the saving acts you have performed
for yourself!” Right? They told us to “Exercise
power, love determination, and walk with confidence” – didn’t they?
Oh, no . . . is it possible that we
have it all wrong? That we get it wrong every day?
Let’s take a look at what Jesus
really taught, then and today:
We have before us today a
well-known Gospel narrative, Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount. Jesus has hiked up a mountain, much as Moses
centuries before had headed up a mountain.
Now, when Moses trudged up the mountain to which God had called him, he
returned with the Ten Commandments. When
Jesus reaches his destination and begins to speak with his disciples, he, too,
has a great teaching to convey. His we
know as the Beatitudes. Words so
familiar to us that I think I can safely say that many of you barely heard them
a minute ago. So let’s listen again,
carefully, as though we’ve never heard them before, to just the first three of
these statements:
"Blessed are the poor in
spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
"Blessed are those who mourn,
for they will be comforted.
"Blessed are the meek, for
they will inherit the earth.”
What can these words possibly
mean? We could spend weeks on these and on
the rest of the Beatitudes, but today we
will drink only the smallest sip, take only the tiniest bite, of these
extraordinary words – but we will catch a glimpse of Jesus ‘s broad and
countercultural vision for our world.
(Countercultural, but not new, I
might add. Jesus adheres strongly to a
long Jewish tradition of what is often referred to as tikkun olam, “repair of the world” or “healing of the world.” If you look at our banners in the sanctuary,
one of them illustrates “Healing.” Our
mission statement says that we are about “offering forgiveness and relieving
hurt and pain,” and that we are “working to bring new life to barren places” –
in other words, we recognize that we, too, rely on the tradition of the
prophets and the teaching of Jesus. We
understand that we ourselves worship and serve in a long line of people called
to “repair the world.”)
Jesus’s vision and words, though,
seem to stretch those of the prophets to new degrees. Imagine those famous words of Micah as a
piece of fabric, stretching across the universe, the words that tell us to “do
justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.” Now imagine that fabric pulled and stretched
at the edges as Jesus proclaims how justice and kindness and humility are
accomplished: by poverty of spirit, and by mourning, and by meekness. And that those who live in those ways, the ways of poverty of
spirit and mourning and meekness, are blessed.
Does this sound like something you
want to sign up for? Poverty of
spirit? Mourning? Meekness?
Let’s think about that word “blessed”
for a moment. The Greek word, makarios, is often translated as “happy”
or “fortunate.” Hmmm. I want
you to take a moment, and speak with your neighbors at your table, and share
with one another the answer to this question: When have you felt most happy or
fortunate in life? When have you felt most blessed?”
[Pause.]
Now, how many of you came up with
times of blessing that had anything to do with meekness or mourning? Can you even describe what poverty of spirit
means? That’s a tough one!
As I considered this text, two
items popped up on my computer last Monday morning. The first was a family photograph – friends of
mine with their entire clan gathered for Christmas: mom, dad, six adult children,
five in-law children, and at least seven, maybe eight, grandchildren. They all live in the same general
neighborhood, they’re all strong and healthy, and the photograph exudes joy. We would all call that a depiction of blessing,
wouldn’t we? That picture was followed
by several others posted online by different families, vacationing on various beaches over
the past few weeks. They all look pretty
blessed to me ~ although, truth be told, I know well that tremendous sorrow is
concealed behind some of those eyes laughing in the sunshine. But on the whole – blessing, right? Warmth and sun and fun family times.
The second thing that appeared on
my computer was a quote from Etty Hillesum.[3] Esther, or Etty, Hillesum was a young woman,
a Jewish woman, famous for the diaries she kept during the German occupation of
the Netherlands in World War II and for the letters she wrote from a sort of
interim detention center. She was
eventually, along with most of her family, transported to Auschwitz, where she
died in 1943. In much of her writing,
she detailed her relationship with God during those tumultuous years. The quote which caught my eye is from a postcard
card she threw from the train to Auschwitz, which read in part, “We have left
the camp singing.” It was her last
communication to the “outside,” and it read more fully: "Opening the Bible
at random, I find this: 'The Lord is my high tower. We left the camp
singing."[4]
Does Etty Hillesum’s experience
sound like what we might term a blessing?
Etty Hillesum’s family was not headed for the beach, or even for a
family holiday photo; in fact, none of her family survived the next years. And yet she found blessing in a deep, rich
sense, in the presence and abundance of God even in some of the darkest days
humanity has faced.
Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are the poor in spirit.
Let’s think again what blessed
means. Homiletics professor David Lose
suggests that to be blessed is to “[feel] like you have someone’s unconditional
regard. It feels like you are not and will not be alone, like you will be
accompanied wherever you go. Being blessed feels like you have the capacity to
rise above present circumstances, like you are more than the sum of your parts
or past experiences. Being blessed feels like you have worth . . . “.[5]
To be blessed , in other words, is
to know deep in your bones that you are God’s beloved. Remember Tricia’s sermon on the baptism of
Jesus? You are God’s beloved. To be blessed means to know, regardless of your
exterior circumstances, that God is with you.
To know, whether you reside in a castle or in a prison, that God’s
abundant love enfolds you. To know,
whether you could have run five miles this morning or whether you need someone
else to help you get anywhere at all, that the one upon whom you ultimately depend
is completely faithful in granting you grace and peace. That’s what being blessed means.
And meekness? Mourning?
The poverty of spirit that encompasses them all?
Jesus is NOT talking about people
making lemonades out of lemons – although it’s certainly good to be creative
and resilient in the face of crisis. He’s
not talking about take-charge approaches
to life or achievement – although both a
take-charge attitude and achievement itself have their place.
He is telling us, instead, that
true blessedness, true happiness, is found in reliance upon God. Ultimate blessedness is found in poverty of
self, in emptying of self, in letting go of our own priorities -- in
recognizing that abundance is God’s to give, not ours to achieve. True blessedness is found in seeing that when
we mourn, or when we are meek – when we are gentle, when we defer to others – God
offers gifts of insight and compassion to us.
Like many of you, I’m sure, I’ve
had a lot of things happen in my life.
Not things I would describe as good, or blessed – no -- things I would
describe as bad, as terrible. Of course,
I’ve had many good things happen as well – but the bad ones, the losses, the
struggles – they make this broken ankle look like a piece of cake.
I won’t offer you platitudes about
those rough times. I won’t say things like “When a door closes, God opens a
window” or some of those other phrases that friends and I were groaning about just
last week. But I will say that some of
the most blessed times, some of the times in which I have most known the
enfolding love of God, have come about after and because of those times. Because I have survived certain kinds of
circumstances in my own life, I feel God’s grace accompanying me when I am
called to share similar situations in the lives of others. These are not situations I would seek, or in
which I expect to accomplish anything; they are situations in which I can do
nothing other than receive what lies before me and recognize those called to
let go of what they had thought was so important. Honor those who suffer and wonder and sorrow.
Stand in awe of those who give themselves over to the needs of others.
In a few minutes, we will be
celebrating communion – an event in which we are served by the one who
understood more than any of us do what it means to be broken, to be meek, to sorrow. Jesus was not making lemonade out of lemons when he healed the
sick. He was not proclaiming himself as
the highest achiever of all when he taught the crowds. He was, instead, establishing himself as the
lowest, as the servant of all, as the one who would die to conquer death, and
the one who through loss of life would bring new life. He was celebrating blessedness as the
abundance of God’s love for all of us.
He was enacting God’s command to us: to do justice, to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with our God -- as we
ourselves will re-enact in the meal we share this morning.
And so: let us have a blessed
morning together. Let us have a morning
in which we remember that we are blessed in many ways. We are blessed in the warm and wonderful
times we share with family and friends.
But we are even more blessed in those times in which we know God’s
presence in the face of our own emptiness, in those times in which we leave
singing. Amen.
[1] Alyce
McKenzie, “Have a Blessed Day!” http://www.patheos.com/Progressive-Christian/Blessed-Day-Alyce-McKenzie-01-27-2014.
[3]
People for Others, “We Have Left the Camp Singing.” http://peopleforothers.loyolapress.com/2014/01/we-have-left-the-camp-singing/
(2014).
[4]
Sue Gaisford, “Review of An Interrupted
Life: The Diaries and Letters of Etty Hillesum” 1941-1943. http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books-we-left-the-camp-singing-1114317.html
(1999).
[5]
David Lose. “Beatitudes and Blessing.” workingpreacher.org. http://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=3020
(2014).
