Inner Life

 Boy, am I behind on posting. I feel like I've just emerged from a cocoon. I was at home for two weeks with Covid, a sinus and ear infection. Tuesday was my first day out of the house. Anyway, here is the sermon I preached on 9/1 at St. Timothy Lutheran Church. The text is Mark 7:1-8,, 14-15, 21-23.

 

Here again, we have Jesus and his conversation partners talking past each other. Last week, it was Nicodemus who could only understand physical things. Today, it’s the Pharisees and other religious leaders. They looked at the outward, while Jesus considered the inward, the heart. 

Let’s not be too hard on the Pharisees. They were, in fact, a reform movement within Judaism. The Pharisees believed every Jewish person could be a priest to God. They made the Jewish faith more accessible to the average person. 

They loved God’s law, seeing it as a great gift. The law is so important in Judaism that there is a celebration about its giving, called Simchat Torah. On this holiday, the children are given sweets to remind them of the sweetness of the law. 

That’s all good, but here’s the rub: The Pharisees had become so focused on the outward motions of the law, that they had gotten away from the God who gave it. 

Jesus cuts to the heart of the matter. Life is to be lived from the inside out, from the heart—not from the outside in—from actions that may or may not ring true with our inner lives. 

Jesus nailed the Pharisees with a quotation from Isaiah. HE did not argue with them, but instead let scripture do the talking, and that talk is harsh. It declares that they have ditched or abandoned God’s command, the very thing they prided themselves on. 

For those of you who read the e-ministry, you may remember the man I mentioned who has been working on weight loss and exercise. That is admirable and something to be proud of. But there is still something lacking in this man’s life. I cannot help but think, what about his inner life? Yes, develop the outer, but not at the expense of the inner.

Later, Jesus explains it all to the crowd, not the Pharisees. A prominent issue in the Middle East is the “evil eye,” here referred to as “mean looks” (v. 23). It is a “supernatural belief in a curse brought about by a [vengeful] glare, usually inspired by envy” (Hargitai, Quinn (19 February 2018). “The strange power of the 'evil eye'”. BBC). Because people worry about having the “evil eye,” you’ll see necklaces and amulets with an eye on it, to ward this off. The type we saw most frequently in Palestine had a hand, with an eye in the middle of it. 

So what does all of this mean for us? We don’t live in the Middle East. People don’t go around putting the evil eye on people. However, just as the Pharisees did, how often do we evaluate someone’s faith by what we see them doing? Now, I’m not saying the outer isn’t important. But what is important is that the outer reflects and pours forth from our inner lives. Martin Luther’s teaching was that we do not do good works to be saved, but that good works are a natural result of our relationship with God. 

Wherever God’s people have gone, they have done good. We may argue that much of the division in our world, the wars and such are caused by religion. What is left in the wake of many missionaries over the centuries are schools, hospitals and agencies to help others. 

Look around Jamestown. How many of the agencies here have or did have some church connection? People are being fed, clothed and sheltered by UCAN (United Christian Advocacy Network), St. Susan’s Kitchen, the Salvation Army’s Anew program for victims of violence. And there are many others. When we lived in Bethlehem, a few blocks from us was Bethlehem University, founded by Catholic missionaries. There was Caritas Hospital, founded by French missionaries. In the neighboring town of Beit Jala, was a girls’ school, Talita Kumi, begun by Swedish Lutherans. 

The purpose of such programs is to express the light of Christ from within. Just look at what our small church does. We have the ministry of Caring and Sharing, the Five Loaves and Two Fish ministry and others. When needs come up, we pitch in as we are able, for example, lids for the Love Elementary School. We may be small, but we’re mighty. It’s amazing all that we few are able to do. It’s because of the power of God working through us. We’re being turned inside out, so that the love of Christ in us shows for our neighbor. 

I came across this illustration of the heart of the matter in today’s gospel:

When clay becomes a pot, it must first have a center. As a potter spins, pushes, and pulls the clay into its final form, it can easily lose its center and become misshapen. Having lost its center, it fails to fully be what it is being created to be—a pot, a pitcher, a plate, a thing of beauty, a vessel for others.

Faith and religious practice have lost their center in today’s readings. Quoting Isaiah, Jesus calls into question “This people” that “honors me with their lips” but whose “hearts are far from me” (Mark 7:6). Some in the religious community have begun focusing on surface matters (the washing of hands, what one eats, the traditions of the elders) and have forgotten the core. What really matters is how one’s faith is expressed in mercy, in words and actions that build up rather than tear down the neighbor.

And so it is with us. We do not live as the people God has claimed us to be. Our lives lose their center. Our faith practices focus on surface things rather than the core. We fail to be what God has created and is creating us to be—vessels poured out for others… 

At the heart of the Christian assembly is Jesus—in word, in song, in prayer, in the neighbor, in water, bread, and wine. Jesus, who embodies forgiveness and mercy, is the heart. Again and again, life becomes misshapen. Again and again, the potter reshapes the clay. The splash of a watery cross, the taste of bread and wine: these things center life in Christ. God’s mercy washes over us. God’s mercy is implanted in us. God creates life anew; deformed hearts are reformed for works of mercy and love. (Sundaysandseasons.com)

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