Emmanuel Episcopal Church
August 23, 2020
Proper 16, A
Exodus 1:8-2:10
Romans 12:1-8
Matthew 16:13-20
When We Serve Others, They Are the Messiah to Us
Y’all may have heard that there’s some sort of national presidential election thing coming up? A presidential election is always an important event, but there seems to be almost messianic fervor in this election, either for Trump/Pence or for Biden/Harris. This messianic fervor makes sense in a way; there’s a lot that is less than wonderful going on in our world right now: COVID-19, hurricanes, economic downturn, murder hornets. It’s little wonder that we want a messiah.
Neither Trump/Pence nor Biden/Harrisis, however, is that messiah, and as a side note, those who support either one of them are neither evil incarnate nor stupidity incarnate.
In our messianic fervor, however, we tend to view people that way. We tend to see some as the messiah and others therefore as the anti-messiah, or the little “c” anti-christ. We have a lot of deep and strong ire for those who support the one’s we don’t see as messiah, and unfortunately, we tend to act out of that ire and make the situation even worse. In our desires to fix everything, we can end up breaking things even more. Further, none of our little “m” messiah’s are going to actually save us all or fix everything, and deep down, we know this, and yet in the midst of chaotic and uncertain times, in our messianic fervor, we still want a messiah who will come and fix everything.
So, in the midst of our messianic fervor, who do we say the messiah is? Who do we way Jesus is? We say Jesus is messiah, and yet even Jesus did not fix everything the way we would want all of our little “m” messiah’s to do. There are still problems in the world and challenges for us to overcome.
Like us, the disciples wanted a messiah who would fix everything from their point of view, make everything the way they thought it should be. They probably wanted a messiah who would bring about and rule over a physical kingdom, squashing their enemies and ruling with them on top, always bringing about what they knew to be right. There would be winners and losers, those with power and those without power.
That’s not the kind of Messiah Jesus was or is.
An illustration of the kind of messiah Jesus is came in a picture I saw on a friend’s Facebook page last week. It was a picture of a sign posted in a church. The sign read:
“Warning: Articles of value should not be left on seats whilst receiving holy Communion.”
There were a variety of reactions to this church sign, and there were a couple of comments of, “Sad,” and “Well, that is kind of sad.”
The idea was, “How terrible that this would happen in a church.” “We’re supposed to be better than that.” “How could people who would steal be in a church?” Is a church in which, “articles of value should not be left on seats whilst receiving holy communion,” the kind of church of a messiah. Is that the kind of church Jesus had in mind when he said, “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it?” Why yes, I believe it is.
A couple of other comments on that picture of “Warning: Articles of value should not be left on seats whilst receiving holy Communion,” were:
We [the church] are a collection of screw ups...slowly transformed by walking together with Jesus...and we’re still a bunch of screw ups.
Another wrote:
I only want to be in a church where there’s a sign like this. It means all sorts and conditions of people are there to hear the gospel!!!
Still another wrote:
Too many times we want everyone else around us to be perfect.
We forget that a church is supposed to be a place where people come for healing, for hope, for redemption, for restoration, for love, [and] for grace
Sad? Absolutely not! …That church with that [warning] sign…[is] doing exactly what Jesus is doing: meeting people in their mess, in their imperfection and still loving them and giving them room to be transformed by the love and grace of Jesus Christ.
Room to be transformed by the love and grace of Jesus Christ, that’s what we need from our messiah, and that’s what Peter had in his walk with Jesus. He was transformed over years from a fisherman who kept on screwing up in his walk with Jesus, to the rock on which Jesus founded the church, who still screwed up from time to time. Peter learned that having a messiah didn’t mean he was going to rule or to be served, but that he was going to be healed and strengthened so that he could serve, so that he could be a blessing.
Who do we say Jesus is? Is Jesus the one who makes us perfect so that we can be around other perfect people? Nah. That’s not who Jesus is, and that’s not what the church is. The church is the broken, the beaten, the blessed, and the damned, people who need healing, gathering together for strength and support. The church is people who are imperfectly following Jesus and receiving his love and grace, to be healed and blessed in order to bless others.
Neither presidential candidate is going to do that. Neither is going to fix everything, and doing so is not what the messiah is in the first place.
You want to see the Messiah? Don’t look to the one who is going to fix everything for you. Look to those who help heal people in order that they may be a blessing to others. There are all kinds of ways we can heal each other. A kind word, a gentle touch. Having compassion on and sticking with people in their challenges. Sometimes it is helping others with their physical needs, or letting someone else help us with ours. Sometimes people are blessings to us when they help us see our own faults so that we stop viewing others as the problem.
If you want to see the Messiah, look to the helpers, as Mr. Rogers said, and if you want to see the Messiah, look to the ones whom you can help. Matthew 25:31-46 tells us that we encounter Jesus in the hungry when we help feed them. We encounter Jesus in the lonely and imprisoned when we visit them. We encounter Jesus in the sick when we help care for them. Being of service to others doesn’t make us the messiah. When we are of service to others, we encounter them as the messiah. When we are of service to others, we get out of our own minds, out of our own troubles and worries, and instead of being overwhelmed by our own challenges, we get to be a blessing. Blessing others helps save us.
Who do we say Jesus is? Who do we say the messiah is? The messiah is the one or the ones who heal us and save us often from ourselves, by drawing out of us the power we have with God to be a blessing to others. The messiah helps heal us and helps us to see each other as fellow messed up people in need of healing. The messiah helps us not to fix or change each other, but with God’s help to heal and bless each other, giving each other room and time to be transformed by the love and grace of Jesus.
