Getting lost

 

Luke 15: 1-10
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
September 11, 2022

Photo of dozens of white directional arrows mounted on dowels painted red that are pointing left and another arrow that is larger and golden in color raised above the rest and pointing right, against a red background.

Many people are feeling lost at times these days because so much is changing. The pandemic has shown us how our health can turn on a dime and that we who are able-bodied are only temporarily so. Those who are disabled have been mostly isolated these past two and half years. Yet many people carry on as though their actions have no impact on the 1 in 4 adults who live with a disability. Church is now both in-person and online for good, yet we are still figuring out how to have robust community in this brave new world. To repent means to change direction or purpose and right now it's not easy to know which direction to turn, what purpose beyond persistence.



How can we know the way to go when none of us have lived through times such as these before? How can a two-thousand-year-old story guide us through such wilderness? I think it helps to look at how a story has been misused and how that misuse influences our own thinking about those who are lost, who or what exactly is a sinner, what is repentance and forgiveness.



First, it’s important that we drop the negative attitude about Pharisees. When the word Pharisee is used as an insult it reinforces antisemitism. The Pharisees were the backbone of what would become rabbinic Judaism. Jesus was a Jew, a Pharisee, a keeper and teacher of the Law, who was debating with a few other Pharisees (not all of them) about how he interpreted the Law. It’s not unlike some evangelical Christians (not all of them) calling out a church like ours, saying we can’t be real Christians and welcome and affirm queer and trans folx. On the other hand, progressive Christians return the favor and argue with no love lost that you can’t hate and be a real Christian. And yet Jesus would say we’re all missing the point.



Tax collectors and sinners were not outcasts in Jewish culture and society. Tax collectors were seen as traitors of their own people because they worked for the Roman occupying force in their country. As for sinners, for the most part the gospels portray the rich and wealthy as sinners who have neglected the poor. A sinner is anyone who detaches themselves from the public good, who looks out for number one, their people, and not the community.



The way Luke sets up these parables, it appears we are told who to identify with—tax collectors and sinners—and who we are to turn away from—Pharisees and scribes. But Jesus doesn’t turn away from these Pharisees and scribes; he engages with them. In his parables he talks about seeking out the lost, a sheep without its flock and shepherd, without its community; a misplaced coin that when found inspires a party, inspires communal joy. He says to them, “When you lose something or someone, what do you do?”



Don’t just go find what is lost but leave behind everything else and get lost to find the lost. Don’t just look for the coin but turn the whole house upside down until you find it. Barbara Brown Taylor in her book An Altar in the World talks about the spiritual practice of getting lost. She writes, “God does some of God’s best work with people who are truly, seriously lost.” Take Sarah and Abraham for example, two people who were willing to get lost, that is, to leave behind everything that was familiar and go to a new home, without Google maps, without any idea of where they were going, with the only comfort that God would be with them.



The theme of getting lost runs through most of the Hebrew scriptures. Moses leads God’s people through the wilderness. The prophet Elijah gets lost in the desert fleeing for his life and it is there he hears the voice of God in a profound silence. God’s people are displaced through exile and again when they return to an unfamiliar home to rebuild. Jesus himself purposefully wanders out into the desert to be tested, to see if what he knows to be true can sustain him under the harshest of circumstances.

Photo of Eleanor Roosevelt with this quote: "We do not have to become heroes overnight. Just a step at a time, meeting each thing that comes up, seeing it as not as dreadful as it appears, discovering that we have the strength to stare it down."

The spiritual practice of getting lost helps us be in solidarity with those who appear to be lost but who are systematically excluded from community. A woman on hold for the better part of an hour to have her SNAP benefits restored only to be given a number to call that was not valid. Boston Children's Hospital receiving bomb threats because of disinformation regarding trans kids’ healthcare. Brown water in Jackson, MS; E-coli in the water in Baltimore, MD. Prisons filled with Black people for marijuana possession. Drug users stigmatized as addicts rather than survivors of trauma in need of help. The mental health crisis of children and teens, especially Black youth. 70 million people who have been groomed for fascism by a toxic sense of righteousness but also approximately 80 million people who did not vote in the last presidential election.



When nearly a third of voters in a democratic country do not vote, we know something has been lost. Some are not registered to vote, some are not interested in politics, even though politics affects every aspect of our lives. Mostly these are folx who are alienated and disengaged, who don’t think their vote makes any material difference. For many it doesn’t matter who the president is in an economy that is rigged against them, in a country that still cannot acknowledge its racism and White supremacy. Sometimes people are looking out for number one because no one else is.



So, getting lost also means decentering Whiteness. It means breaking the binary, smashing the patriarchy, defunding power and funding the vulnerable and disenfranchised. Getting lost means wearing a mask, getting vaccinated, participating in the public good of everyone. Getting lost means not expecting people to find us but the Church going out to find people in need of community like this one. Getting lost means becoming familiar with failure and failing forward, rejecting the shame and embracing the low point, especially when it sucks.

Poster of thick foliage and green plants with this quote by Thich Nhat Hanh: "To understand the suffering of others, we must first touch our own suffering and listen to it."

Getting lost is when we get to choose: is the universe for us or against us? At rock-bottom do we trust life? Trusting life is a spiritual practice all its own. And even if it appears the universe is against us, we get to choose to say, “So what?” Another rabbi from the time of Jesus, Rabbi Hillel said, “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?”



Ultimately, getting lost is about surrender. Surrender what we think we know. Surrender certainty. Surrender the map and start asking for directions. Surrender putting ourselves in charge and allowing the lost to lead us until we both are found. Surrender who we think we are and finding out who we really are. To paraphrase the poet Antonio Machado, Wanderer, there is no path. The path is made by the journey forward. Amen.

Benediction


Go forth into the world in peace.

Be of good courage.

Hold fast to that which is good

and render to no one evil for evil.

Strengthen the faint-hearted;

support the weak; help the afflicted.

Honor all people.

Love and serve God,

rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.

The grace of our Savior Jesus Christ be with us all. Amen.