St. John’s Lutheran Church
25 June 2023 + Lectionary 12a (4 Pentecost)
Matthew 10.24-39
Rev. Josh Evans
Jesus doesn’t exactly hide the cost of following him. He puts it all out there. There’s no fine print here as he sends out his disciples “like sheep into the midst of wolves.”
Picking up right where we left off last week, Jesus continues to warn his disciples that this work is not going to be easy:
“You will be hated by all because of my name.”
“One’s foes will be members of one’s own household.”
They might even kill you…
And then, there’s that classic, perplexing zinger at the heart of today’s gospel reading:
“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.”
It hardly seems like a “good news” sort of gospel.
Even as Jesus tells his disciples not to be afraid, he also speaks of denial, division, and death.
Surely, there’s enough of those things in our world today.
Can’t we just move right to the sharing of the peace and get past the division? Not so fast, says Jesus.
***
This past week, the world was enraptured by the massive (and massively expensive) international rescue effort for five ultra-wealthy passengers trapped on a deep-sea submersible in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean…
…all the while overshadowing what is now objectively one of the deadliest incidents in the Mediterranean Sea: as a ship carrying an estimated 700 migrants has left dozens dead and hundreds still missing.
The disproportionate response and media attention between the two has been rightly criticized – drawing renewed attention to the stark divide between rich and poor.
It makes me uncomfortable – and admittedly ashamed – because the only reason I know about the latter story of hundreds of missing or dead migrants is because of the story of a submarine carrying five people that it has gotten linked to.
Where is the good news to be found?
***
The starting point is to first examine what we mean by “good news.”
What do we come here – to church – looking for every week? Familiar hymns we love to sing and a message that makes us “feel good”?
Theologian Debie Thomas puts it this way: “If ‘tender Jesus, meek and mild’ is what we prefer, then this week’s lectionary is not for us. If an unrisky religion is what we feel entitled to practice, we’ve misunderstood Christianity. If neither you nor anyone within your sphere of influence has ever been provoked, disturbed, surprised, or challenged by your life of faith, then things are not okay in your life of faith.”
In other words: Are we more interested in our comfort – or our salvation?
“Good news” must not be confused with “feel good.”
If we want “feel good,” there’s a televangelist for that.
The thing about “good news” is that it’s not “good news” if it’s not good news for those who really need it.
Good news, as Jesus announces to his hometown synagogue, is for the poor. It is release for the captives, recovery of sight for the blind, and freedom for those who are oppressed.
The good news Jesus proclaimed is a risky gospel. It will be divisive. It will be unpopular. It almost got him hurled off a cliff outside the synagogue in Nazareth.
***
Last weekend, our Sunday School class gathered for a first communion retreat. Together, we baked bread, painted communion chalices, and talked about this ancient meal we share every week. We learned that there is a place for everyone – a place for you – here at this table.
This morning, we now get a chance to celebrate with Maddie and her family as she receives her first communion. It is a good and wonderful thing to celebrate this milestone in faith.
There’s certainly an element of “feel good” to this moment – and there’s nothing wrong with that – but there’s also good news here. Real good news.
Here’s the part I didn’t go into during the first communion retreat:
What is it really that we come to this table looking for every week? What does this meal really mean?
Peruvian Catholic priest and liberation theologian Gustavo Gutiérrez puts it this way:
“Without a real commitment against exploitation and alienation and for a society of solidarity and justice, the Eucharistic celebration is an empty action … ‘To make a remembrance’ of Christ is more than the performance of an act of worship; it is to accept living under the sign of the cross and in the hope of the resurrection. It is to accept the meaning of a life that was given over to death – at the hands of the powerful of this world – for love of others.”
This is risky business.
I’m reminded of another liberation theologian: the Salvadoran archbishop, activist, and now saint Óscar Romero, who, in 1980, was assassinated while celebrating the eucharist – in a chapel I was privileged to visit myself just a few years ago.
Romero’s assassination wasn’t a random attack. It was the direct result of his risky and risk-taking dedication to the gospel – of speaking out publicly against the corruption and violence of the Salvadoran government.
Romero’s martyrdom is perhaps an extreme example, but it’s nonetheless an important reminder:
If this meal ends here, then we miss the point.
This is the good news we remember around this table:
That Jesus – who himself proclaimed good news for the poor and liberation for the oppressed – was willing to go as far as it took, even to the cross, compelled by a love that never ends:
The body of Christ, given for you.
And that Jesus invites us too into that proclamation and embodiment of good news:
Become what you receive: the body of Christ, for the life of the world.
***
Being a follower of Jesus is not always going to mean having a “feel good” life.
Jesus himself certainly didn’t try to sugarcoat it or tell us otherwise. It will be divisive. It will be unpopular. It might even mean getting a Pride flag or two ripped down or vandalized.
But the task entrusted to the followers of Jesus is too important to ignore: to proclaim liberation for the poor and the marginalized, to console the sick and the despairing, and to cast out every form of evil and oppression that harms God’s people.
And that is definitely a good news sort of gospel.
Pastor Josh Evans 