| "The Church of the Prophetic Edge. I mean "Church" not as in "Presbyterians," or "those with a particular denominational identity," but as in "Christ-like community", and "vigorous followers of Jesus." I mean "Prophetic" not as in "dreamy," or "focused on the future," but as in "confrontational," and "contesting the current corrupt order of things in the name of God." And I mean "Edge" not as in "superiority," or "holding the advantage," but as in "sharpness," and "cutting through the crap." The Church of the Prophetic Edge-vigorous followers of Jesus willing, in the name of God, to cut through the crap, in order to confront and contest the current corrupt order of things. That's what Christ is calling this community of faith to be. In our First Lesson, Moses promises his people that, in the future, God will continue to raise up prophets like him-who fearlessly speak the sharp-edged word of God and courageously perform the kind of acts that liberate others from the forces of evil, just as Moses himself had spoken and acted when he was leading the people of Israel out of their bondage and slavery in Egypt. Well, among the many things that Jesus was, Jesus proved to be a prophet like that, a prophet in the mold of Moses, a person with a sharp prophetic edge, and we, his followers, are called to keep that sharp prophetic edge of Christ's honed and active today. Now, the setting for this morning's Gospel episode, which inaugurates Jesus's public ministry, is both a sacred time-the weekly sabbath, a day of rest from labor, when people are free to gather for prayer and study-and a sacred space-the synagogue, where persons engage in such communal prayer and study. Jesus strides into the synagogue on this sabbath day, and the conflict is engaged. Through the presentation of his distinctive teachings, Jesus confronts the established order of religious authority. And those assembled there are "astonished," for the authority with which Jesus teaches is not at all like that of the scribes-that is, like that of the custodians of traditional biblical interpretation. The challenge to the scribes presented by Jesus's teaching is more than just the challenge of differing content. It is fundamentally the challenge of differing authority. It raises the issue: "Who's in charge here, anyway?" Jesus's teaching sets on edge the teeth of those scribes present and alarms all the others under their influence. But just then Jesus is himself confronted, confronted by an unclean spirit that has taken possession of a man, a spirit that, as Mark portrays it, represents all the powers and forces of the cosmos that are arrayed against Jesus, arrayed against the reign of God that he embodies and is bringing near. The spirit cries out, "What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: 'the holy one of God.'" You see, this spirit is all too aware of the challenge posed to the corrupt order of things by Jesus, by this one who has come like a mighty prophet, like Elisha of old, who was also called "'īsh 'elohīm qadōsh" (2 Kg 4:9), "a holy man of God." As Mark understands it, the struggle between Jesus and the unclean spirit exposes for everyone to see what is really at stake here in the struggle for authority between Jesus and the scribes. For Jesus's subjugation of the unclean spirit, his freeing of this man from the grip of that which opposes God-this is a prophetic act, a sign that dramatizes Jesus's intent to liberate people from the false authority of any who misrepresent God. Did Jesus heal this man? Yes, he certainly did. But did Jesus's action also go beyond that to have a much wider meaning, and purport, and consequence than simply the healing of a particular person in need? Yes, it certainly did that as well. For this exorcism signified Jesus's prophetic confronting of the corrupt social order and religious establishment of his day. It set in motion a mighty contest of powers and worldviews in which Jesus asserted his alternative authority over the powers of this world, and Jesus emerged ascendant. This prophetic act by Jesus, this sign in which he cut through the crap and confronted the corrupt order of things in the name of God, had the same kind of larger-than-life symbolic power that other prophetic actions closer to us in time and culture have had. Take, for example, Martin Luther, the founder of the Protestant Reformation. On one level, his posting in the town of Wittenberg of 95 theses for debate was simply the act of a monk posting a note on a door, just as Jesus's exorcism was on one level simply the act of a healer restoring wellness to a man. But on a far deeper level, Luther's deed was a prophetic act that asserted an alternative authority to the social order and religious establishment of his day, a sign on behalf of God that launched a revolution to liberate people from the false authority of those who were misrepresenting God. So, too, on a far deeper level, Jesus's healing of that spirit-possessed man was such a prophetic act, a sign on behalf of God, that launched a revolution challenging the social order and religious establishment of his day. Or take, for another example, Martin Luther's namesake, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the fulfiller of 20th-century America's Civil Rights Movement. On one level, his kneeling and praying in the face of police dogs and water cannons was simply the act of a black person seeking justice. But on a far deeper level, Dr. King's deed was a prophetic act that asserted an alternative authority to the racist social order and corrupt religious establishment of his day, a sign on behalf of God that brought to fulfillment a revolution to liberate people from the false, oppressive authority of those who were misrepresenting God. Well, Jesus's healing of the spirit-possessed man had that same sort of deeper-level meaning. The symbolic acts of Jesus and of his followers Martin Luther and Martin Luther King, Jr. challenged, in the name of God, the corrupt structures of their contemporary society in order to liberate persons from the false authority of those who were misrepresenting God. And it is to this same kind of sharp-edged prophetic action that Christ is calling you and me today, to this same kind of action that is not dulled by the complicity of accepting or acquiescing to a status quo that is corrupt. And on what contemporary social issue is God calling the American church to speak out today with undulled prophetic edge? Well, is it not the issue of our government's desire to go to war? It was on April 4, 1967, nearly 36 years ago, that the above-mentioned Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. proclaimed from the pulpit of Riverside Church, here in New York City, his evaluation of the government's ongoing war in Vietnam. He called America the "greatest purveyor of violence in the world today." (Quoted in James H. Cone, Martin And Malcolm And America, p. 237) Many supporters of Dr. King's civil rights agenda told him to keep silent about the war, because he was alienating not only President Johnson but also his own financial supporters. But with a sharp prophetic edge, Dr. King replied: "I'm sorry, you don't know me.… I don't determine what is right and wrong by looking at the budget of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, or by taking a Gallup Poll of the majority opinion." (Quoted in Cone, p. 238) "Before I was a civil rights leader, I answered a call, and when God speaks, who can but prophesy? I answered a call … to tell the truth as God revealed it to me. No matter how many people disagreed with me, I decided that I was going to tell the truth." (Quoted in Cone, p. 240) And the truth that Dr. King felt called to proclaim was that "a nation that spends $500,000 to kill one enemy soldier in Vietnam and only $50 to get one of its own citizens out of poverty is a nation that will be destroyed by its own moral contradictions." (Cone, p. 240) Said Dr. King, "There is something strangely inconsistent about a nation and a press that [will] praise you when you say, 'Be non-violent toward [a brutal white southern sheriff like] Jim Clark,' but will curse you when you say, "Be nonviolent toward little brown Vietnamese children!" (Quoted in Cone, p. 238) "…cowardice asks the question, 'is it safe?' Expediency asks the question, 'is it politic?' Vanity asks the question, 'is it popular?' But conscience asks the question, 'is it right?' And there comes a time when a true follower of Jesus Christ must take a stand that's neither safe nor politic nor popular but … must take that stand because it is right." (Quoted in Cone, pp. 242-243) You don't have to have an IQ of 180 to discern the applicability of Dr. King's sharp-edged words from 1967 to the America of 2003. Dr. King's declaration that America is the "greatest purveyor of violence in the world today" finds an amazing resonance in the outcome of a website poll now being conducted by the European edition of Time magazine, a poll cited by Nicholas Kristof in his Op-Ed column for the January 31st New York Times. The question Time asked was this: "Which country poses the greatest danger to world peace in 2003?" And the resultant percentages for the first 318,000 responses were as follows: North Korea, 7%; Iraq, 8%, and the United States, 84%! Aren't containment and the deterrence offered by weapons inspection a far more Christ-like response to the evil of Saddam Hussein than a war that would kill thousands of innocent Iraqi children and adults, as well as hundreds of U.S. soldiers? Maybe you read the exchange in the Times occasioned by Joseph Loconte's Op-Ed piece on January 28th. It bore the title "The Prince of Peace Was a Warrior, Too" and suggested that Jesus would be willing to condone violence against Iraq. But let me quote from two answering letters to the editor printed in the January 31st Times. First, from the Reverend Bob Edgar, General Secretary of the National Council of Churches of Christ: "Jesus would be tough.… [But] he sought to forgive and redeem his enemies, even in a time of brutal oppression, steadfastly refusing to lead an insurrection despite pressure from some of his followers.… Jesus, by his example, would call us to find a better way than war." And then, from the Reverend Tom Reiber-Martinez of Summit, N.J.: "Much like the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Mohandas K. Gandhi, and Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador, Jesus went to his death believing that the nonviolent power of love was the only way out of the cycle of violence." The Church of the Prophetic Edge is, I believe, one that speaks today as a peacemaker, not as a warmonger. It is one that is willing actively to challenge, in the name of Christ, the authority of all those, including the government, who misrepresent God. May we, the members of Rutgers Church, lift our voices and deploy our bodies in ways that call America to return to the column of "peacemaking nations"! Our own Reverend Cliff Frasier, Executive Director of Presbyterian Welcome, housed on the third floor of our parish house, has certainly offered us an example of lifting his voice and deploying his body in stout prophetic witness to Christ the Peacemaker. Last fall, Cliff joined those who spoke and acted in opposition to the training ground for violence operated by our government at Fort Benning, Georgia. It used to be called the School of the Americas, until that name became too infamous. Now it is called by a name so long, cumbersome, and misrepresentative-namely, Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation-that no one can ever remember it. Anyway, soldiers and militia still come there from Latin America for training and then return to their native countries to carry on more efficiently the reigns of violence there. Last fall, in protest of our government's operating of this war facility, Cliff and a number of other peace activists committed a non-violent act of trespass onto army property. On January 28th, Cliff was sentenced to six months in a federal minimum-security prison camp for his Christ-like challenge to established authority. His term of imprisonment will begin in May. Were we as a congregation to display the same type of courage and conviction as Cliff Frasier has shown, then it might truthfully be said of us that we are vigorous followers of Jesus who are willing, in the name of God, to cut through the crap in order to confront and contest the current corrupt order of things. Then we might rightfully become known as a church with a prophetic edge. There is still time to speak out on the war issue by e-mailing the President at: president@whitehouse.gov, or by writing him at: 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Zip 20500, or by calling his telephone "opinion" line at: 202-456-1111, Monday through Friday from 9 to 5. Various anti-war demonstrations are being organized for the near future. The big one is scheduled for Saturday, February 15th. Speak to Cheryl Pyrch for more information, and plan to attend. Become an active part of Christ's Church of the Prophetic Edge. Let us pray: Amen |
Return to Sermon Archive