Practicing What I Preach
Seventh Sunday After Pentecost
July 23, 2006
I found myself in a very strange position last night: On what should have been a day of rest, I was at my kitchen table writing a sermon about how all of us should take a day of rest.
To quote the book of Luke (4:23): “Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself.” Or rather, “Deacon, practice what you preach.”
Now to be fair to myself, I will say that I’m just about always writing. So it’s not as if I had put it off entirely. If you see me pacing around the cloister outside, or strolling over to Java Jolt three times in an afternoon, it’s probably because I’m writing. A sermon, a newsletter article, maybe a letter to the bishop. You see, you don’t have to be at a keyboard or have a pen in your hand to be writing.
So I’ve been thinking about these readings all week—especially about Jesus teaching his disciples. But, well, words never seemed to get put onto paper. And wouldn’t you know that the message that was on my heart from these readings was about – time management. How about that!
Let's take a look at how that came to be. You see, in today’s Gospel lesson we are deep in the Gospel of Mark. The Markan Jesus is always on the run. He doesn’t stand around philosophizing like he does in the Gospel of John. He likes to cross from one side of the sea and back again. Crowds are always chasing him. Mark ties together the highlights of Jesus’ frenetic ministry with phrases like, “and then” or “suddenly” or “then he set out.” Just flip through Mark and you’ll see what I mean.
In fact, I highly recommend sitting down and reading Mark all in one gulp. I’m serious—I’m not asking you to read Numbers or Deuteronomy. This is the good stuff. It’s exciting. It’s filled with action. In it, Jesus never seems to stop. Mark shows us that Jesus is not an abstract idea but an active and moving part of our lives. Mark shows us that Jesus is not a philosophical theorem but a constant actor in the world. In Mark, Jesus did this and Jesus did that and boom boom boom – heal, teach, preach, then start again. Jesus as action hero.
It’s easy to get the idea from reading Mark that Jesus wants us to be the same way. What would Jesus do? Apparently, we should do this, do that, boom boom boom—and start all over again. Christian as action hero.
But I think that’s a faulty reading of Mark. Our Anglican tradition teaches us to be careful and interpretive readers of Scripture. Mark, as you know, was written in Greek—and not in a particularly sophisticated use of the Greek. The fast pacing of Jesus’ story in Mark may come primarily from the fact that Mark is telling the story in a simple fashion. Mark is simply giving us the good stuff, the most important stuff.
Mark was not putting together the encyclopedia of Jesus’ life. He was not writing a systematic theology of Christianity. No. He begins and ends by telling us just what he’s doing: Telling us the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. And giving us the “sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation.” Nothing less, but nothing extra. And to do that in 16 short chapters is to put us through the paces quickly. It’s no surprise that Jesus comes off as a whirlwind.
So as masterfully as Mark does all this, it may leave us with the mistaken impression that Jesus never stopped to rest. And that’s what this pericope—this little snippet of the Gospel does for us today. It reminds us that Jesus wanted to stop and rest. And that he wants us to do the same.
In chapter 6, from which we read to day, Jesus does two incredible things. He feeds the five thousand, and he walks on water. Exciting. Miraculous. But not in today’s lesson. This reading begins at verse 30 right before the feeding of the five thousand—but then skips over that miracle and skips over the miracle of walking on water. It skips over that picks up again when they get out of the boat at Gennesaret.
Let’s look at what does happen in today’s reading. There is much frenetic rushing about. “Many were coming and going and they had no leisure even to eat.” The people “rushed about that whole region and began to bring the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was.” The people are rushing. Not Jesus. Not the disciples. The people.
Jesus looks on these people rushing about and is filled with compassion. He is filled with compassion because they were like sheep without a shepherd. They were going about aimlessly, seeking a teacher, seeking a healer, seeking a leader. He was that teacher, but I find it interesting that he did not rush off to meet those who needed teaching. He was the healer, yet he simply waited for the sick to come to him. He was their leader, but he led by letting others come to him.
That’s not what it says to do in the management books. But Jesus was leading by example. Jesus was one with God and sought time for contemplation. Those who had not found God could not rest. Jesus knew that the spiritual man must take time to pray. Those without the Spirit did not know how to stop and pray. Jesus knew that time with his close, spiritual friends was important. Those who were alone in the world could only rush about, friendless.
Even though Jesus knew there was work to be done, he told his disciples, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” He did not say, let’s feed the multitudes first and then rest. He did not say, let’s have a miracle and then take a sabbatical. Importantly, he did not say let’s ignore our duties and do as we please when we please. No, he said, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.”
You see, Jesus was reminding his disciples of the ancient Jewish Law. That one should rest every seven days. To take a sabbath day was to honor the Lord, but it also was to replenish men and women. Back in Mark chapter 2, Jesus said, “The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath.”
The great Jewish theologian Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote a wonderful little book on this topic, entitled simply, “The Sabbath.” He says that God taught the world that Labor is a blessing, toil is the misery of man. In other words, work is a good thing. Too much work is a curse. This is part of God’s plan. Heschel says, “The duty to work for six days is just as much a part of God’s covenant with man as the duty to abstain from work on the seventh day.”
God created work—you remember Abel and Cain working on the farm— but God also created rest. A traditional Jewish teaching asks, “What was created on the seventh day? Tranquility, serenity, peace, and repose.” We always have been taught that the Sabbath and rest are vital parts of creation and of our lives, and Jesus was an exemplar of this ancient tradition.
Obviously, I work on the Lord’s Day. And so do many of you. Paramedics and nurses and police dispatchers can’t post “Gone Fishin’” signs on Sunday mornings. There are countless professions and businesses that demand labor in a modern economy—on Sunday here, on the Jewish Sabbath in Israel, on the Muslim Sabbath in Iraq.
So what do we do? Ignore the idea of sabbath if we can’t do it on Sunday? I don’t think so. I am required by my contract with St. Luke’s to take off 24 hours in a row, and Linda George does a good job of giving me a look if I come in on a day off. Last week, at a meeting of the clergy in Birmingham, a priest asked Bishop Parsley: “What are you doing to take care of yourself?” And he said he was conscious of taking quiet time with his wife, Becky.
Jesus and his disciples didn’t get that quiet time with each other, at least in today’s lesson. And we don’t always get the time we want, either. The crowds pressed in on Jesus. And for us, we try to stop but the phone keeps ringing, the babies cry and the pagers buzz and bills keep coming in.
But we try. We may not get an entire day for leisure. We may get a morning or a quiet lunch or, if we’re lucky, a nap on the couch on a Saturday afternoon. But that’s not going to happen by chance. It’s only going to happen and happen with regularity if we plan for it and put it on our calendars and tell people, “I’m busy Saturday afternoon.” Or, “I’m sorry, but I’ve got an appointment Thursday night.”
It might be an appointment with your husband for some quiet time, just the two of you. You might be busy going fishing with a friend. You might, just might, be taking time to read the Gospel of Mark, all at once in a gulp.
Whatever it is, do it. This is not some spiritual feel-good plan or New Age mumbo-jumbo. This is the Law of God from the time of the Prophets. This is the teaching of Jesus Christ from his word and example. This is about the gift of our bodies and, ultimately, about the care of our very souls.
Jesus asks us to come away to a deserted place all by ourselves and rest for a while. I’m going make an appointment this week to do just that. I pray that you will, too.
Amen.
July 23, 2006
I found myself in a very strange position last night: On what should have been a day of rest, I was at my kitchen table writing a sermon about how all of us should take a day of rest.
To quote the book of Luke (4:23): “Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself.” Or rather, “Deacon, practice what you preach.”
Now to be fair to myself, I will say that I’m just about always writing. So it’s not as if I had put it off entirely. If you see me pacing around the cloister outside, or strolling over to Java Jolt three times in an afternoon, it’s probably because I’m writing. A sermon, a newsletter article, maybe a letter to the bishop. You see, you don’t have to be at a keyboard or have a pen in your hand to be writing.
So I’ve been thinking about these readings all week—especially about Jesus teaching his disciples. But, well, words never seemed to get put onto paper. And wouldn’t you know that the message that was on my heart from these readings was about – time management. How about that!
Let's take a look at how that came to be. You see, in today’s Gospel lesson we are deep in the Gospel of Mark. The Markan Jesus is always on the run. He doesn’t stand around philosophizing like he does in the Gospel of John. He likes to cross from one side of the sea and back again. Crowds are always chasing him. Mark ties together the highlights of Jesus’ frenetic ministry with phrases like, “and then” or “suddenly” or “then he set out.” Just flip through Mark and you’ll see what I mean.
In fact, I highly recommend sitting down and reading Mark all in one gulp. I’m serious—I’m not asking you to read Numbers or Deuteronomy. This is the good stuff. It’s exciting. It’s filled with action. In it, Jesus never seems to stop. Mark shows us that Jesus is not an abstract idea but an active and moving part of our lives. Mark shows us that Jesus is not a philosophical theorem but a constant actor in the world. In Mark, Jesus did this and Jesus did that and boom boom boom – heal, teach, preach, then start again. Jesus as action hero.
It’s easy to get the idea from reading Mark that Jesus wants us to be the same way. What would Jesus do? Apparently, we should do this, do that, boom boom boom—and start all over again. Christian as action hero.
But I think that’s a faulty reading of Mark. Our Anglican tradition teaches us to be careful and interpretive readers of Scripture. Mark, as you know, was written in Greek—and not in a particularly sophisticated use of the Greek. The fast pacing of Jesus’ story in Mark may come primarily from the fact that Mark is telling the story in a simple fashion. Mark is simply giving us the good stuff, the most important stuff.
Mark was not putting together the encyclopedia of Jesus’ life. He was not writing a systematic theology of Christianity. No. He begins and ends by telling us just what he’s doing: Telling us the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. And giving us the “sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation.” Nothing less, but nothing extra. And to do that in 16 short chapters is to put us through the paces quickly. It’s no surprise that Jesus comes off as a whirlwind.
So as masterfully as Mark does all this, it may leave us with the mistaken impression that Jesus never stopped to rest. And that’s what this pericope—this little snippet of the Gospel does for us today. It reminds us that Jesus wanted to stop and rest. And that he wants us to do the same.
In chapter 6, from which we read to day, Jesus does two incredible things. He feeds the five thousand, and he walks on water. Exciting. Miraculous. But not in today’s lesson. This reading begins at verse 30 right before the feeding of the five thousand—but then skips over that miracle and skips over the miracle of walking on water. It skips over that picks up again when they get out of the boat at Gennesaret.
Let’s look at what does happen in today’s reading. There is much frenetic rushing about. “Many were coming and going and they had no leisure even to eat.” The people “rushed about that whole region and began to bring the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was.” The people are rushing. Not Jesus. Not the disciples. The people.
Jesus looks on these people rushing about and is filled with compassion. He is filled with compassion because they were like sheep without a shepherd. They were going about aimlessly, seeking a teacher, seeking a healer, seeking a leader. He was that teacher, but I find it interesting that he did not rush off to meet those who needed teaching. He was the healer, yet he simply waited for the sick to come to him. He was their leader, but he led by letting others come to him.
That’s not what it says to do in the management books. But Jesus was leading by example. Jesus was one with God and sought time for contemplation. Those who had not found God could not rest. Jesus knew that the spiritual man must take time to pray. Those without the Spirit did not know how to stop and pray. Jesus knew that time with his close, spiritual friends was important. Those who were alone in the world could only rush about, friendless.
Even though Jesus knew there was work to be done, he told his disciples, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” He did not say, let’s feed the multitudes first and then rest. He did not say, let’s have a miracle and then take a sabbatical. Importantly, he did not say let’s ignore our duties and do as we please when we please. No, he said, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.”
You see, Jesus was reminding his disciples of the ancient Jewish Law. That one should rest every seven days. To take a sabbath day was to honor the Lord, but it also was to replenish men and women. Back in Mark chapter 2, Jesus said, “The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath.”
The great Jewish theologian Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote a wonderful little book on this topic, entitled simply, “The Sabbath.” He says that God taught the world that Labor is a blessing, toil is the misery of man. In other words, work is a good thing. Too much work is a curse. This is part of God’s plan. Heschel says, “The duty to work for six days is just as much a part of God’s covenant with man as the duty to abstain from work on the seventh day.”
God created work—you remember Abel and Cain working on the farm— but God also created rest. A traditional Jewish teaching asks, “What was created on the seventh day? Tranquility, serenity, peace, and repose.” We always have been taught that the Sabbath and rest are vital parts of creation and of our lives, and Jesus was an exemplar of this ancient tradition.
Obviously, I work on the Lord’s Day. And so do many of you. Paramedics and nurses and police dispatchers can’t post “Gone Fishin’” signs on Sunday mornings. There are countless professions and businesses that demand labor in a modern economy—on Sunday here, on the Jewish Sabbath in Israel, on the Muslim Sabbath in Iraq.
So what do we do? Ignore the idea of sabbath if we can’t do it on Sunday? I don’t think so. I am required by my contract with St. Luke’s to take off 24 hours in a row, and Linda George does a good job of giving me a look if I come in on a day off. Last week, at a meeting of the clergy in Birmingham, a priest asked Bishop Parsley: “What are you doing to take care of yourself?” And he said he was conscious of taking quiet time with his wife, Becky.
Jesus and his disciples didn’t get that quiet time with each other, at least in today’s lesson. And we don’t always get the time we want, either. The crowds pressed in on Jesus. And for us, we try to stop but the phone keeps ringing, the babies cry and the pagers buzz and bills keep coming in.
But we try. We may not get an entire day for leisure. We may get a morning or a quiet lunch or, if we’re lucky, a nap on the couch on a Saturday afternoon. But that’s not going to happen by chance. It’s only going to happen and happen with regularity if we plan for it and put it on our calendars and tell people, “I’m busy Saturday afternoon.” Or, “I’m sorry, but I’ve got an appointment Thursday night.”
It might be an appointment with your husband for some quiet time, just the two of you. You might be busy going fishing with a friend. You might, just might, be taking time to read the Gospel of Mark, all at once in a gulp.
Whatever it is, do it. This is not some spiritual feel-good plan or New Age mumbo-jumbo. This is the Law of God from the time of the Prophets. This is the teaching of Jesus Christ from his word and example. This is about the gift of our bodies and, ultimately, about the care of our very souls.
Jesus asks us to come away to a deserted place all by ourselves and rest for a while. I’m going make an appointment this week to do just that. I pray that you will, too.
Amen.
posted by Michael+ at 11:03 PM
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