Establishing Order
Pentecost 12 Proper 17
Fr. Tim Nunez
Establishing Order
My grandmother used to tell me, “Don’t frown like that too long or your face might get stuck,” and, “If you don’t eat your bread crusts you won’t grow curly hair.” Now, while neither of those is literally true, they hold truth. Going around with a sour face can easily lead to more frowning because people read our facial expressions and react to them. This can be a real problem if you suffer from “resting grumpy face” as I do. And not eating the crust of bread is at least wasteful and sometimes misses the best part.
Our Old Testament reading today is, I think, the shortest one I’ve ever heard. Its wisdom is clear. When you are under authority, don’t push yourself forward, rather let the authority call you forward. That’s not always true in every circumstance, sometimes initiative and assertiveness are good, but it is generally true that self-promotion comes off badly. The leader of the Pharisees should know this proverb and, frankly his guests should have as well. Yet, they clearly miss it.
This proverbial wisdom is on one level simply wise, age old advice. Jesus echoes it rather directly.
The fact that people had struggled with it for over 1,000 years at that point, and no one knows how long it might have been floating around before that, is worth noting. A thousand years and it still had not sunk in, and here we are 2,000 years after that and many of us are still struggling with it. And much of the world hasn’t even heard it.
We don’t know where Jesus is in this passage. We don’t know who exactly the Pharisee is or any of the other people. Apparently none of that is critical but the lesson is, and with Jesus it takes on a larger and deeper meaning. Remember what Jesus is always preaching and teaching about: The Kingdom of God. In Jesus, the Kingdom of God has come near. This is a Kingdom parable.
In the Kingdom, God is the One whom we want to approach. N.T. Wright puts it this way, “The real meaning is to be found in the warning against pushing oneself forward in the sight of God[1].”
Honestly, I wish that was a really big problem today. I don’t see a lot of people trying to show off to God. People do continue to show off to each other and to the world in general. The truth is that whenever we are asserting ourselves, it is really about our egos. God wants us to approach him, but not with our elbows nudging others out of the way and especially not out of the arrogance that our works can pin God down.
It really comes down to whether or not you live as though you are under authority. If it’s just you, then all you have to work out is the timing of our moves toward advancement. Here is some further ancient wisdom from Psalm 51, “The sacrifice of God is a troubled spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” (Psalm 51:18 BCP 657)
It really comes down to 2 questions, which we find on pages 302 and 303 of the Book of Common Prayer:
Question Do you turn to Jesus Christ and accept him as your Savior?
Answer I do.
And
Question Do you promise to follow and obey him as your Lord?
Answer I do.
We ask those two questions at Baptism and reaffirm them at Confirmation because accepting Jesus and his victory over sin and death is one thing. Following him as Lord is another.
When we accept the one, it is like accepting the wedding invitation. That’s good. We’d much rather be in the room and at the feast than not. But Jesus is teaching us that if we stop there, it is incomplete. The ego still has to submit to the will of the Father and embrace him as Lord, true Lord over all we are and do.
Two applications of this come to mind. The first is addressing our tendency to busy-ness. We have lots of responsibilities and possibilities in life. We all have different capacities of ability, time and so forth that change over time. What can you do? What should you do? I don’t know. I’m happy to help you think that through but it is really a matter of prayer and discernment. And prayer should not be a matter of last resort when we are at our wits’ end. It’s our first resort, or should be. In some respect maybe we feel like we should do our best before bothering God. No. He wants us to bother him first.
The second is to look to this very simple yet deep parable as a tonic for anxiety. But I also see and hear about a lot of people with general anxiety issues despite life being very good in most respects. Others whose circumstances produce a lot of anxiety. I want to be very clear that some people have and/or need medical attention for anxiety. I am not undermining medical advice or treatment.
But I believe that at any and every level of anxiety, an active pursuit of God’s leadership and direction helps with anxiety. I find that true in my own life. It frustrates me that a few months down the road I may well find myself all wound up about something and at my wits’ end and will need to remind myself about this very point.
If your life feels disordered, follow Jesus and he will put it in order and in perspective.
AMEN!
[1] Tom Wright, Luke for Everyone (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2004), 175.