***
Ministry & The Sacred
The first thing I think this passage reminds us of is the sacred nature of being in ministry. Of participating in the work of God. In Jesus’ going about through towns and villages in first century Judea and Galilee, Matthew describes him as engaged with three ongoing tasks: teaching, preaching and healing.
These are the same three tasks as at the start of the gospel, when Jesus begins his ministry in Matthew 4:23. And to these three tasks, Jesus commissions his Twelve in Matthew 10 and later in chapter 28.
But what is so sacred is not the tasks in themselves, but what each of them communicate. What they announce. Namley, the good news of God breaking in. The dawn of the new creation. A new, heavenly kingdom. One not marked by imperialism or political power, but the power of the Spirit. One where demons cower in fear. One where death holds no lasting power. One where sin and evil does not win. One where the risen Jesus is Lord.
It was through Jesus’ preaching, teaching and healing that people came to know for themselves the good news of this kingdom. The
heard, they
believed, and they
experienced.
Now ministry is hard work. Being committed to these tasks is not an easy endeavour. Many of our students training for ordained ministry come in with enthusiasm and gifts and skills, but have yet to experience the need for resilience, steadfastness and tenacity in parish ministry. Wherever you are, whatever your context: the challenges abound. There are some things you can’t readily learn until you are out there and facing it for yourself, though we do our best to prepare our students for that day!
But whatever the challenges of the work God has given us, the work we share, let us not forget the grace on offer to us. This is the work that our Lord
himself
did. Yet he has entrusted this selfsame work to us! We get to be bearers of God’s good news. Heralds of the work of God in this world. We get to speak of and share the work that God has done in our lives, our communities, our churches. It is a sacred trust that we get to participate.
***
Ministry & the Profane
But along with the the sacred, Matthew 9 shows us how ministry also leads us into encounter with the profane.
In the midst of the Word of God in human flesh proclaiming the good news in word and action, the holy encountered the unholy.
The profane.
Jesus sees with discerning eyes. He is surrounded and pressed upon by people who have been coming out to see him, to hear him, to be healed by him. And Jesus sees in them sheep without a shepherd.
Who are these lost sheep? They are the lost sheep of Israel. The lost of God's holy people.Sheep without a shepherd. This imagery resonates with Ezekiel 34 and its description of bad shepherds who have exploited their sheep, fed off of them and have become rich. These shepherds have left the sheep scattered and vulnerable to wolves and wild beasts. Where they should have been care, guidance and protection, there is devastation.
In Matthew, Jesus sees sheep who
have no one to care for them. People who have been ‘harassed’ and who are ‘helpless’. In my opinion, the English tranlsations are not strong enough here. These are not just
helpless, these are people who have been
thrown down to the ground. People who are, in some way, experiencing the gutter of life. In the Old Testament it is used to describe the dead whose bodies who have been cast down and left exposed: “but you are cast out, away from your grave, like loathsome carrion” (Isa. 14:19 )
Jesus sees sheep who have been cast down to the ground by those who have not wielded their religious responsibility well. Who are these people? The religious elite and those in positions of power.
And on seeing this profanity, Jesus has compassion.
In England, I think we underplay what this 'compassion' really means. We tend to avoid too much expression of feeling. We prefer the stiff upper lip. To avoid saying how we really feel. And yet here,
Jesus feels deeply. He emotes. It is not just his heart, but his guts that are moved (that's literally the connotation in the Greek). His body responds to the wounded and hurting bodies around him. Bodies that have carried too much for too long. Bodies crying out for care.
And we see this when we look around our world and some have taken the Lord’s name in vain.
I lived in the US for a decade and ministered there, and it was a shock to me to see the way in which religion can be wielded like a weapon. I was young and it was different from anything I’d ever seen before. I remember reading a book by Sean Palmer, a Texas-based pastor. In his book (the
Unarmed Empire) he talked about his own experiences in various churches, and I remember beginning to see and understand with new eyes as he talked about how so many men and women have become ‘victims of the discourse’ around them. In their needs and fears, their hunger and hurts, they’ve turned to religious leaders and preachers to provide the assurance they were looking for. And those religious leaders have provided a false sense of safety, based on apportioning blame and guilt, stoking division and hatred, rather than pointing to the reconciling and liberating power of the Cross of Christ.
I saw firsthand the consequences in ministry: damaged and broken men and women, who were fearful to believe the gospel because of their experience of church leaders who proclaimed anything but the love of God as revealed in Jesus. The same Jesus, who in Matthew 11 says his yoke is gentle and burden light. Who in Matthew 12 is described as bearing God’s Spirit, proclaiming justice and one who “will not break a bruised reed or quench a smoldering wick until he brings justice to victory.” (12:18-21)
It is
this
Jesus who stands, and sees, and is grieved by the profanity of where religious leaders have taken God's name in vain and laid burden upon burden upon God's flock. I believe as ministers of the gospel, people called to preach, teach and heal in God’s name, we are also called to look and to name the reality of the world around us—and most especially the harm done in the name of God.
***
Praying to the Lord of the Harvest
The level of need, even among those within the community of Christ, is vast. The fruit is there—like large succulent blackberries in my neighourhood—but so are the thorns that make the work so difficult. Yet in his compassion and understanding, Jesus neither rushes to nor runs from action. His empathy does not weigh him down into apathy or despair. The level of need doesn’t make him immediately grasp for a human solution that will never really live up to its promise.
Jesus instructions his disciples
to pray. And in particular, to petition the ‘Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into the harvest.’
Jesus’ response to the reality of human need is one that begins by turning to the One who holds it all in his hands. The Lord of the harvest. The one who holds the world and its needs, the community of believers and their hurts. That’s why I chose the Genesis 9 for our OT reading today. For it reminds us that God is already in a covenant relationship with the whole world through Noah. His purposes have always been against violence, death, harm and division. Against sin and its consequences.
To use the image of the blackberry bush: God as the Creator and Sustainer of all is the Master Gardener. He knows what branches need pruning. He knows which fruit is to be harvested—and which needs to be left a little longer.
None of it is missed.
So Jesus instructs his followers to turn to the Lord of the Harvest. To pray. We are ministers who are passing through. We are workers in God’s kingdom, He is the king. We ask for His help with the work He has given us. We work in His rhythm. It is only then, that Jesus turns to the work of sending out the Twelve.
***
I have not had the privilege of participating in this week that you’ve shared together in discussion about Anglicanism and its rich life and heritage in Africa. I hope and pray that your conversations, discussions, and mutual learning has enriched and encouraged, challenged and refined you this week.
And as you continue onwards from here into the work to which our Lord has called you, I pray that you might once again be grounded in that sacred message which we, by God’s grace, have been called to share and proclaim. The mighty treasure that is contained within our jays of clay, as 2 Corinthians says. And I pray we might have a renewed compassion and discernment such that we would not shy away from responding to the profane around us: from the lost sheep, hurting and wounded. And that, we would remember and grow into an ever deeper trust in the One to whom we can graciously turn to for help, for provision, for aid. For he is the One who is Lord and God of it all.
Amen.
******
Cover photo by
Nadine Redlich on
Unsplash
Blackberry bush photo by
David J. Boozer on
Unsplash
