The Path of the Righteous Man…

The Rev. Brad Sullivan

Emmanuel Episcopal Church

November 22, 2020

Proper 29, Christ the King, A

Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24

Ephesians 1:15-23

Matthew 25:31-46

The Path of the Righteous Man…

“The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness. For he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon you.” 

That’s from the Quentin Tarantino movie, Pulp Fiction, and it was said by the character, Julius, a hit man played brilliantly by Samuel L. Jackson.  I gotta say I hear some echoes of Jesus’ story of the judgement of the nations in Samuel L. Jackson’s speech from Pulp Fiction.  To the righteous, Jesus says, “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world…,” whereas to the unrighteous, Jesus says, “You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels…”

The way of the righteous man is great and good and beloved of God.  The way of the wicked, the tyranny of evil men?  God seems rather less than pleased with that part, and I love the idea of Samuel L. Jackson’s character Julius as the king, in Jesus’ story declaring to the unrighteous, “…depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”  There’s something kinda delicious about that.

I’m not entirely convinced, however, that the image Jesus had in mind with this story was of a hitman with a 9mm scaring the daylights out of the unrighteous before they met their end.  I don’t know that Jesus told this story so that we hearers would be perpetually afraid of some almighty hitman standing over us telling us we didn’t do a good enough job of loving each other.  

Fear of doing enough good for God was actually the kind of crazy religiosity Jesus was telling this story against.  Unlike angry hitman God or a god who wants a bunch of crazy religiosity that would make us pure enough, or good enough, or religious enough for God, Jesus is showing us a God who is not concerned with our purity, sinlessness, or religiosity.  Jesus is showing us a God who cares most deeply about how we treat each other.

Now there is some fear present in the story, and it is meant to be present.  Maybe less Samuel L. Jackson as Julius the hitman and more Samuel L. Jackson as Mace Windu, the Jedi Master, telling us we’ve been removed from the Jedi order.  Like the Jedi who were supposed to care for others, the point of this story is that those in Jesus’ kingdom are meant to care for others.  

When we don’t, when, as we heard in Ezekiel, we push against each other; scatter each other; take those weaker ones, get what we want from them, and cast them aside, then it seems only right that the king would say, “leave my presence.”  Jesus wants us to take seriously the idea of being removed from his presence as a natural consequence of not caring one whit about each other.  

Jesus told this story in the way he did, with that element of fear in it, so that we would recognize our propensity at times not to care that much for others, and that we would also recognize the great value and importance of those around us.  Further, in telling the story the way he did, Jesus is hoping that we would hear his words and then strive to be those “who,” as Julius said, “in the name of charity and good will, shepherd the weak through the valley of darkness.”  

See, that’s the kind of king Jesus is.  As our king, Jesus wants us to see the importance of people all around us and seek to walk to the path of the righteous one, shepherding one another, caring for each other, and lifting each other up.  That’s life in God’s kingdom.  Not with God as an angry hitman, and not with God as a king who, quite apart from all of us, tells us we better be pure enough, or good enough, or religious enough for his liking.  In Jesus’ kingdom, when we don’t treat each other as we want to be treated, that’s when we are blaspheming God.

Notice that, as king, Jesus is not far away from us on some high and lofty throne but is instead always present in his kingdom among his people.  “Lord, when did we see you naked and clothe you or hungry and feed you?”  “Whenever you did it to the least of these, you did it to me.”  Jesus is always with us, walking among us.  The king of all creation is with us at all times and in all places, even during the crazy of 2020 with continued COVID-tide.

Where is Jesus, our king, during all this pandemic crisis?  Jesus is working shift after shift at the hospital, risking infection, caring for patients.  Jesus is lying in hospital beds, sometimes recovering, sometimes dying.  Jesus is working insane hours trying to teach children both online and at school.  Jesus is those children, crying amidst all the chaos and loss of play and interaction, children in desperate need of hugs and soothing baths, and words of comfort from loving adults.  

Jesus is the grocery store delivery driver working for little and risking his own health so that others can stay home and be safe.  Jesus is all those who can stay home and are staying home, going stir crazy, so that they’ll contribute as much as they can to stop the viral spread.  Jesus is the people working for a vaccine, and Jesus is the people who have lost all hope, knowing the vaccine will come far too late for them keep their livelihoods or gain back anything of the everything they’ve lost.  

Jesus is the former tenant who lost her job due to the economic downturn, couldn’t pay her rent, and then lost all of her possessions as she was evicted from the apartment with her belongings left on the curb.  

Jesus is all of the weary and downtrodden, the hungry and hopeless, the sick and suffering.  Jesus told his story so that we would see Jesus in all of these people.  Jesus told his story so that we would see the least around us and and think to ourselves, “My king,” and then treat them as such.

We’ll never be transformed if we aren’t willing to walk into the tomb.

Brad Sullivan

5 Lent, Year A

April 2, 2017

Emmanuel, Houston

John 11:1-45

We’ll never be transformed if we aren’t willing to walk into the tomb.

Thinking about the raising of Lazarus from the dead got me thinking about death and the fear of death, and that got me thinking about Star Wars.  To be fair, most things do, but fear of death is a recurring theme in the Star Wars saga.  In Star Wars there is something called “the Force,” an almost divine-like force that some people can tap into and use to perform great feats and do great good.  There are others who can tap into the force, but use it selfishly.  The way they use the Force is called The Dark Side, and through The Dark Side, they bring about great evil.  The tragic hero of Star Wars, Anakin, is one of these good force users, but he is particularly afraid of death and the death of those he loves.  So when he receives a vision of his wife dying, he is terrified, and he seeks the advice of the wise, old Master Yoda. 

Anakin explains this vision of death, and Yoda says, "Careful you must be when sensing the future, Anakin! The fear of loss is a path to the Dark Side."

"I won't let my visions come true, Master Yoda," Anakin replies.

Yoda says, "Rejoice for those around us who transform into the Force. Mourn them, do not. Miss them, do not. Attachment leads to jealousy, the shadow of greed, that is."

"What must I do, Master Yoda?"  Anakin asks.

"Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose."

Sadly, Anakin didn’t really take Yoda’s advice and through his fear of death and loss, he ended up acquiring great power through The Dark Side and became an embodiment of evil, the infamous Darth Vader.  Anakin was unwilling to face the tomb, for his life and the life of those he loved, and so he became and brought about the very thing he feared.  

Now most of us aren’t going to become an embodiment of evil because of our fears, and yet Yoda’s advice still applies to us.  “Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose.”  Jesus said something similar in his teachings about not worrying and about losing our lives.  Don’t worry about what you will eat or what you will wear, Jesus taught.  “Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.” (Matthew 6:34)  Worrying, he taught, won’t change anything or help you in any way, but it will make you afraid and miserable.  Closely tied to not worrying was Jesus’ teaching about our lives.  He taught us to let go of that which we fear to lose.  “For those who want to save their life will lose it,” Jesus said,  “and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.”

How much of our time is spent, like Anakin, “sensing the future”, worrying about some possible future catastrophe?  How much of our resources are spent trying to stave off death?  We fear, we worry, and we take actions that are guided by our fear and our worry of death and loss, and those actions usually bring about greater death and loss. 

Jesus would prefer that we let go of that which we fear to lose and trust instead in him.  That’s what he showed us in his raising of Lazarus from the dead.  When Lazarus was deathly ill, Mary and Martha sent for Jesus, and Jesus apparently had every intention of healing Lazarus, but only after he died first, right?  Jesus waited around and let Lazarus die before he healed him, and he did so for two reasons:  one so that people could see that he, that God, has power even over death, and two because it was very important to Jesus that people believe in him.

Jesus waited around till Lazarus was good and dead before deciding to go to see him in Bethany “so that [he], the Son of God [would] be glorified through [Lazarus’ death and being raised from the dead].”  See, just before this story, Jesus had been in Jerusalem and had given sight to a man who was born blind, a miracle so great that no one had ever heard of anything like that ever happening before.  Many who did not see Jesus actually perform this miracle, however, did not believe that Jesus had done this, and later, many of them even tried to kill Jesus for claiming to be God’s son. 

So, Jesus left Jerusalem, went away across the Jordan River and then received word that Lazarus was sick.  When he arrived in Bethany which was very close to Jerusalem, with Lazarus already dead, many Jews from Jerusalem were there mourning with Martha and Mary.  Ok so, we don’t know if these were the same people who tried to kill Jesus, but they were from the same place where those doubts and death threats had come.  In fact, Jesus’ disciples were afraid of going so near to Jerusalem, believing that they were going to be killed, since last time they were there, people tried to kill Jesus. 

So, Jesus returned to Bethany to show people from Jerusalem not only a healing, but to show them that he had power to raise the dead back to life.  Jesus wanted these people to believe in him.  It was important enough to Jesus that people believe in him, in fact, that he waited for Lazarus to die and risked being killed in order to show that he truly was God’s son, and those who saw believed.

So why was it so important to Jesus that people believe in him, that he would risk so much?  Because Jesus wanted to heal them too, and believing in him was the healing they needed.  They needed to believe in him who is the light and life of all creation.  They needed to believe in his power over death.  They needed to believe that his teachings were true, that they could let go of that which they feared to lose, and trust in him.  Jesus wanted them and us to believe in him because Jesus knows what our worries and fears bring us when we follow after the ways of our worries and fears. 

Ultimately, our worries and fears bring us to The Dark Side, to Darth Vader.  Consider when we don’t trust in Jesus and don’t follow in his teachings.  Times when we have been hurt and we don’t let go of that hurt, we don’t forgive, and we cause greater strife.  Times when because of our hurt and our perceived righteousness, we retaliate and cause further harm.  Consider how much suffering is caused by our epic battle with death.  How many are killed in order to protect the lives of others.  Consider the suffering caused by our battle with all kinds of death:  physical, emotional, relational, death of goals, dreams, etc.  How often do we try to stave off and prevent death at all cost, rather than accepting death and trusting our lives and our deaths with Jesus?

Trusting in Jesus, believing in him, means letting go of that which we fear to lose.  Trusting in Jesus means being willing to face the tomb, trusting in resurrection, in Jesus’ power over death.  That’s a lot of trust because even trusting in resurrection, we don’t know what’s going to happen.  Trusting in Jesus, we need to let go of that which we fear to lose and accept death in order to be transformed. 

A couple I know and gave some counseling to was limping along with their marriage basically on life support.  Their marriage was dead, but neither was willing to face that truth.  Finally, one did, but rather than simply say, “ok, let’s get divorced,” this person said plainly what their marriage had become and did raise divorce as a possibility.  That was a bit of a shock to the other.  So, together they began facing the tomb in which their marriage had gone.  They looked at what was causing the death of their marriage.  They looked at what they each of them were afraid to lose, what each of them had to place into the tomb in order for their marriage to survive.  They worked together, and they both allowed some things to die.  Some of their dreams of what they wanted their lives to be died.  Some of their visions of what they thought marriage should be died.  Through those deaths, they found new life.  Through their willingness to enter the tomb, their marriage was transformed.  They found new life, resurrection, by letting go of that which they feared to lose and entering the tomb.

See, what Jesus ultimately wants for us is transformation.  That is why it is so important to him that we listen to him and believe in him.  Jesus wants us to be transformed into light and life, and we’ll never be transformed if we aren’t willing to let go of that which we fear to lose and walk into the tomb.  If we trust in Jesus and believe in him, then we can accept and face our deaths.  We can enter the tomb and be transformed.

I Am One With The Force, and The Force Is With Me.

Ok, so having seen "Rogue One" twice now, I can definitely say my favorite line in the movie is, "I am one with The Force, and The Force is with me."  (Admittedly, "It's high...It's very high."  is a close second - thank you Alan Tudyk!)  Fear not, there are no spoilers below!

In the film, a blind, former [servant of a Jedi temple] is also a man with deep faith in The Force.  He believes all things are connected through The Force, and he proves to be not only a fearsome warrior, but also a wise companion, friend, and guide.  His faith in The Force guides him through the darkness, removing his fear, as he continually seeks to align his will with that of The Force. 

Sound familiar?  For anyone who is a disciple of Jesus, it sounds very familiar (although, we have our faith in, you know, Jesus).  For me, watching this film and hearing the blind man's repeated prayer, having faith in Jesus is having faith in The Force.  Not that I'll be able to use a lightsaber or move things with my mind.  Rather, the belief that all of life is connected, that we can navigate through the darkness of life by aligning our wills with that of the creative force which made and binds all things...for me, that creative force is Jesus. 

In the last couple of days, I've been praying the prayer from Rogue One.  "I am one with The Force, and The Force is with me."  At first I was thinking "Jesus" when saying "The Force", and later, I began saying "Jesus" rather than "The Force".  I'm not a big fan of taking everything cool and trying to Jesusize it (usually in an effort to make Christianity cool for some unknown others).  In this case, the prayer from the movie and the idea behind it fit well with my faith in Jesus (and seemed cool to me, being the big Star Wars dork that I am). 

So, "I am one with Jesus and Jesus is with me" has become my new prayer.  It's been a helpful and empowering refrain while engaging in the daily struggles of life, that I am one with all that is, and the creative force behind everything is with me.  The prayer has brought me peace and a more continual desire to be a force for peace. 

...imagining myself as a blind guardian with a bow staff doesn't suck either. 

May The Force be with you.

Brad+