[Chloe, submissive, ashamed, cowering at our “No-o-o-o.]
It’s a powerful image this week as we gather around the story of the woman who was bent down, pushed down for 18 years.
The text says it was a physical ailment, but the people of that time and the many people today too, believe that our physical ailments can be manifestations of much deeper spiritual ailments — stress, pent-up anger, bitterness, shame…
And the way those religious leaders were used doing business, there’s no question in my mind that they spoke to the people in tones similar to how we would sometimes speak to Chloe when she had misbehaved: “No-o-o-o.” And that woman cowered physically for 18 long years (half a lifetime for most in those days). Can you imagine?
We religious ones — we church people — had better be careful how we speak to those who are not in and of this religious establishment...because that imposition of shame, I’m afraid, is not outdated. (Pew Research study about a few years ago: top words associated with the word “Christian” — judgmental, hypocritical, anti-gay). Ever experienced church shaming...if you haven’t been to church in a long time, or don’t believe the right way, or break church rules? Have the Pharisees ever pressed down on you or someone you know? (Please don’t ask someone, upon return from a long absence from church: “Where have you been?”)
As soon as we get up on our high horses about church or spirituality or religious practices or the non-religious, and push others down — the one we follow and call Jesus has no time for that. We see it in our Gospel here. We can do the same thing with the Sabbath...
There’s an amazing reversal in this Gospel from Luke — very characteristic of Luke. Holy flipping. Jesus takes the poor and the lowly, sick and the sorrowing, the outcast and the stranger, the weak and the bent down...and Jesus raises them up, reverses their status. Think of poor, young Mary; the 10 lepers; the Samaritan. Jesus takes them and raises them up, does a holy flipping of their place in the community.
And Jesus takes the proud and the strong, the rich and the showy, the arrogant and the judgmental…and he brings them down. The text today says, “he puts them to shame.” The one who’s ashamed is lifted up, and the one who is used to shaming others is brought down.
In other words, Jesus has no time for compassion to go by the wayside. Whenever mercy is not being shown, Jesus steps in. Our God is a God of mercy and compassion — showering down on us and on this world like an ever-flowing stream. And woe be to the one who’s getting caught up in judging and shaming others, especially the weak and the lowly, the sick and the forgotten. It’s like Jesus has this radar for judgmental and powerful types. And he hones right in on them, and he eats with them, and he teaches them. He stays with them.
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I think we all have our moments in both camps, don’t we? Sometimes we are pressed down with shame and pain, including in our self-obsession, unable to stand up straight and look around to see our neighbors in need. (Luther’s definition of sin: self curved inward.) Can’t see anyone else...
And other times, oh, we can see others just fine: We can see them mis-behaving, we can see them being lazy or irresponsible, or not going to church, or not being Christian enough — basically not being as good of people as we are.
Yeah, we’re not curved inward, we’re out and up in everyone else’s business. And failing to take a deeper look at our own lives and souls. I think we all have moments in both camps.
And that’s where Jesus moves in. He levels us when we’re full of ourselves, pious, hard-working, little “holier than thou’s”. He says, “Hey, cool it, let it go, come down here with us.”
Maybe there’s someone in your life for whom your good judgment on them seems perfectly appropriate, but your anger and frustration with them is so overwhelming, you’re so high up on your horse, you’re so right...That’s when Jesus steps in and says: “Hey, breathe; come down here with me.”
Jesus brings the temple leaders down, he shames them, and in so doing perhaps there’s even a hidden gift there. “You guys are getting so obsessed with the law — the Sabbath, in this case — that you’re starting to use it as a weapon.” Remember: they were only defending the Sabbath. Nothing wrong with that. (We’ve just finished a whole book here in Adult Ed, which defends the Sabbath.) Author talks about it there too, actually: How we can skew the Sabbath (and actually miss the absolute gift that’s there). When the keeping the Sabbath becomes a weapon or a burden and not a gift, Christ steps in. When the Bible is used as a weapon, not a gift, Christ steps in, and says, “Where is mercy, where is compassion, where is the radical welcome I proclaim?” I wonder if there’s any way Jesus was actually giving a gift to those high-and-mighty religious leaders, even if they failed to see it right away. And Jesus brings us down too — has no patience for our lack of compassion and mercy-showing toward our neighbor. Jesus steps in to crush our pride, to lift up those we have hurt, and to restore community. This text about the woman’s ailment, about the Sabbath, is about restoring community. (The 10 C’s are about community!)
Thank God. There is forgiveness for the sinner, for the proud and the arrogant, and the rich, and the nosey; there is forgiveness for the judgmental and the cruel. Thank God, because I can live up there sometimes.
And there is hope for us when we’re pressed down. When we’re bent so low by life. Burdened by sorrow and pain, spiritually crippled, physically pressured, hurting and longing for a better day. Jesus steps in and gives us healing and peace. Jesus steps in and calls us, names us, what we are: “Daughter of Abraham, son of Sarah, child of God, stand up straight. Look around. You are set free of what ails you.”
Jesus comes to you this day, friends in Christ, Jesus arrives in this place in wheat and wine, water and Word, and offers us new life, a new day. The resurrection is real. You have been raised up with Christ, buried with him and therefore raised with him — not just after you die, but right now. God has turned the world on its head, through Christ Jesus! We are given new life this day, and even you are free of your ailments — free to live in hope, free to live in trust that God is with us, that God forgives us, and that nothing can separate us from the love that God has for us. We no longer have to shame others or cower (like Chloe) in fear, for we are children of God, released to live as the people that God has molded us to be in this world, for this world. Alleluia! AMEN.
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