Worthy of trouble

 

Mark 5: 21-43
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
June 27, 2021 – Open and Affirming Sunday

Before I begin, the story I am about to tell involves judging someone based on their ability, weight, and appearance. If you do not understand why I am warning you ahead of time, you probably haven’t been judged, or didn’t know you were being judged, based on any of those factors. It hurts to be judged, to have others assume things about you based on a standard about which you had no say, which excludes you from what others deem as “normal” and worthy.



Recently I started hiking with a group of people as motivation to get me hiking more. The organizer hikes every day but the rest of us show up with varying frequency. One morning this week, while we were waiting for a few folks to arrive, one woman said she had seen two people, presumed to be partnered, riding their electric bikes up a hill that she and her husband had, in her words, “busted their butts on” while these two just glided merrily along. Another woman in the group chimed in with a knowing nod of her head, saying that she and her husband had seen a “chunky” kid on an electric scooter and that he would be better off if he actually used his legs and worked the scooter.



And me, having been a little chunky most of my life, I didn’t say a word. I looked over at another woman in the group who has to walk slower and a shorter route because of her knees and wondered what she was thinking. No one said anything for a good ten seconds or so. Silence isn’t deafening. It’s loud and clear and it can do violence to the soul and the mind, if not also to the body.

This is what empire has done to us. The ways of empire are so insidious—competition, comparison, capitalism—we don’t even realize it or break the silence when we’ve excluded someone from grace or compassion. When is it worth our trouble to understand someone’s backstory, that maybe an electric bike makes it possible for both partners to ride together, that the speed of an electric scooter can bring joy to a child, that all bodies are beautiful because of the unique and precious gift they hold?



Having a body, a heart, and a mind makes us all theologians. We all ask questions of ourselves and the universe, why me, why do I feel this way, why do I look this way, what’s wrong with me, why am I this way, what’s the purpose of my life, am I “normal”, do I belong? Pride Month, Black History Month, Women’s History Month, the Equality Act, human rights are about the right for all of us to self-determine what our lives will look like without the narrow confines of ableist, cisheteronormative, White, Christian patriarchy that dominates our culture, our healthcare, our education, our laws, and our economy.

By the standards of his day, a girl on the edge of death and a woman who suffered from hemorrhages for twelve years were not worthy of the trouble Jesus took to heal them. The same could be said even today as children are trafficked and abandoned and crossing borders by themselves, as non-binary and trans youth are not affirmed and legislated against, as Black women have a higher maternal mortality rate, as Black transwomen continue to be murdered. When the girl’s father receives word that she is dead, the people say to Jairus, why trouble the Teacher any further? The woman who had been bleeding for as long as the girl had been alive sounds like too many stories we’ve heard about someone who’s been to one doctor after another, none of whom really listened or saw who they really are, all the while taking their money but offering them no relief or answers. Why trouble the Teacher any further indeed. The crowd kept so many people anonymous, but Jesus insisted on seeking her out. Where others assumed death, Jesus said, “Do not fear, only believe.” “Don’t listen to them. Trust me”. Jesus was one who was willing to disrupt his life without condition.



How do we discern when someone is beyond help? Who decides who and what is family and who do we care for? Why are some people deemed worth the trouble while others are not? Why do some folks get more chances or sympathy while others must prove themselves? Why do we think we must receive some sort of return on our investment in a human life? And why are the rules set up to be more cruel than compassionate?

This is where empire thinking enters in: competition, comparison, capitalism. We’ve monetized everything we could possibly do to help someone. We’ve monetized human lives, thus dehumanizing them. We have turned healthcare into a market that competes and actualizes our self-interest rather than a system of care for everyone. When we talk about value and worth, we often place conditions and requirements on what is valuable, what is worthy. We do not want to create a dependence, but we are already so dependent on a broken system designed to give us everything we have. When we read scripture, we see ourselves as part of the crowd, not as the Romans, as Israel, not the Egyptians. And then there’s the powerful question that still gets asked, consciously or unconsciously: what’s in it for me?

It’s a favorite scripture but it is one that should also convict us. The prophet Micah explained that God has shown us what is good, what is valuable, what is worthy, what is required of us: to act justly and to love mercy, to go humbly with God. Henri Nouwen wrote, “To pray, to listen to the voice of the one who calls us the ‘beloved’, is to learn that that voice excludes no one.” Dean Emilie M. Townes of Vanderbilt University wrote, “it’s what we do every day that shapes us and says more about us than those grand moments of righteous indignation and action.” In a speech-poem written for Yale’s Convocation, she later said: “the everydayness of listening closely when folks talk or don’t talk to hear what they are saying, the everydayness of taking some time, however short or long, to refresh ourselves through prayer or meditation, the everydayness of speaking to folks and actually meaning whatever it is that is coming out of our mouths, the everydayness of being a presence in people’s lives.”



Whoever the spiritual genius was that came up with unconditional, undeserved, unlimited love must have been on the losing end of things, must have known what it felt like to have conditions placed on the things love gives us. We need a Source of unconditional love, a love that loves us first, so when we are on the losing end of things or when we acknowledge we are part of the system that imposes that on others, we can find the strength to manifest that love in ourselves and then share it freely with others. Safety, courage, acceptance, affirmation, respect—we have made these universal needs things people must earn. And yet this church is the place where we say, “No matter who you are or where you are on life’s journey, you are welcome here”. And not only that but we are willing to disrupt our lives for you and for each other.

Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg tweeted just before she signed off for Shabbat this past Friday: “You don’t need to serve to be worthy of love. You don’t need to create to be worthy of love. You don’t need to do to be worthy of love. You don’t need to offer to be worthy of love. You are already worthy of love, now. As you are. Without conditions.” In the ways we love and serve in this world, may we make it so. Amen.




Benediction – enfleshed.com



Go forth: neighbor, sibling, sage,
caregiver, comrade, confidant,
soul-friend, Drag Mother, grandparent,
godchild, foster child, inner-child --
lean into the lushness
of your own belonging, that you might
widen your web of chosen family
through ordinary acts of Love.