Feb. 28 Sermon: Lent 2
Sermon for the Second Sunday in Lent
Holy Covenant UMC, February 28, 2010
Rev. Kate Hurst Floyd
Luke 13:31-35
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Humans love a good animal story. From the Ugly Duckling to the Three Bears, White Fang and Black Beauty, to Fipper and Mister Ed and Lassie, we can’t get enough. We read and watch and witness these stories with wonder and delight. We circulate them on the internet, sending mass e-mails to our friends at work with images of cute kittens playing with yarn and we even watch the Animal Planet. Perhaps humans are so drawn to these stories and images because something about the identity of animals gives us a glimpse into who we are and who we are not. We examine a species that seems so different from us, and thus learn about ourselves.
One of the most interesting stories about animals that recently circulated the internet is about a Poobah rabbit who started to behave like a dog. Specifically, he behaves like his fellow-pet, a cocker spaniel named Scout. The rabbit, named Poobah, and Scout, belong to a 12 year-old boy in Cornwall England. The rabbit had been in the family for several years and then they decided to adopt a dog. The rabbit and dog immediately bonded, and then the boy noticed that something strange began to happen:
Poobah refused to eat his dry rabbit food, and now only eats Scout’s wet dog food. Poobah rejects his rabbit treats, and instead stands on his hind legs and barks and begs for dog biscuits. He’s even taken to joining in on Scout’s games of fetch, retrieving the sticks and balls his owner throws in the yard. They both cuddle in the dog bed, and Poobah has asserted his alpha authority…Scout is submissive, as if Poobah is the leader of the pack. The rabbit has an identity crisis. The rabbit doesn’t know who he is and who he is not.
Our Gospel lesson today employs animal imagery, not of ducklings or talking horses or rabbits who behave like dogs…but imagery of a fox and a hen and some chicks….. As we encounter this story, it can seem more like we’ve entered a barnyard than a Scripture lesson. Particularly in an urban setting, we’re not familiar with foxes and hens and chicks; Jesus says strange words of Lament over Jerusalem, a distant city; and this happened 2,000 years ago. We wonder what this means and where Jesus can possibly be taking us. We read this story with awe and wonder, wondering what a context so different has to do with us, but we pay attention because something about it gives us a glimpse of our identity—who we are and who we are not.
Jesus is making his way towards Jerusalem, the city where he would be crucified. In the Gospel of Luke, Jerusalem marks the beginning and the end of the story, but most of Jesus’ ministry occurs outside of Jerusalem. In chapter 9, Jesus heads that way…towards Jerusalem, but also towards the cross, towards persecution, towards his death at the hands of the powers and the principalities of the day.
As he’s making this journey, going about his usual business of teaching and healing and feeding, he’s interrupted by some Pharisees. Now, usually the Pharisees get a bad rap in the Bible, they’re the bad guys, always challenging Jesus, pitted as the legalists against Jesus’ law of love.
But here, the Pharisees help Jesus out. They were a diverse bunch, these religious leaders, and some were quite devout followers of Jesus and spread the Gospel in the early church. Many Pharisees were actually supporters of Jesus. Well, in our lesson, a few Pharisees run up to Jesus, breathless, anxious and yell out to him in the middle of his teaching:
Get away from here! They warn him…For Herod wants to kill you. Run, they shout; hide, turn away from Jerusalem. Get to a safe place—a secluded mountain far away from people or out on the lake by yourself. Go take refuge in your mother Mary’s house, leave this dangerous ministry, flee from this perilous world. They think that they are doing a good thing, saving their teacher’s life.
We expect Jesus to be grateful for their urgency and the warning to flee; we expect him to seek safety and shelter. But instead, he looks at them, without so much as a thank you and says: Go and tell that fox that I am going about my business, and nothing he says to me with those sharp teeth and beady eyes will stop me from doing my work: I’m going to keep teaching and healing and casting out demons and feeding and loving all the way into Jerusalem. That fox doesn’t scare me.
Now, this is a bold statement for someone who immediately compares himself to a chicken—a mother hen. After this warning he cries over Jerusalem and says: Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing.
Jesus knows he’s heading to a place that will crucify him…a place where the violent powers of the world reign over God’s goodness and peace and mercy. There’s a long tradition in the Hebrew Bible of Jerusalem ignoring the will of God in favor of the foxy powers of the world: powers of cunning and predatory practices and sharp teeth.
And Jesus walks right into that foxes den as one who is a mother hen: one who nurtures and loves, whose wingspan includes all her chicks; as one who offers warmth and love and patience; unconditional love and nourishment for our journeys. As one whose identity is like a warm and welcoming mother. This mother hen won’t survive in a world governed by foxes….Jesus knows this, we know this. But Jesus refuses to stop being a nurturing mother hen just because the world is threatening. He could have put on some fox ears, sharpened his teeth, and played by the rules of predators. But instead, he looks at the Pharisees, and he says: My identity is as a mother hen, choosing to love my children, and that’s what I will be until the day I die. So I’m not going to turn into a fox or run away. I’m going to teach and heal and pray and feed and nurture my chicks.
What do all these animals have to do with us? Have to do with our own journey during Lent, as we walk towards Jerusalem? If Herod is a fox and Jesus is the mother Hen, then we are the chicks. The ones who try our hardest to follow Jesus, even when we fail at flying or wobble over along the way. The chicks come off looking pretty bad in the story, but we have some sympathy for the ones who scatter, who don’t stay with the mother hen…after all, who is going to feel safe with a hen when a fox is coming directly for you? Better to scatter, isn’t it? To flee to a safe mountain or hide in a distant shelter. We’re not so sure that those wings are enough to protect us.
When we live in a world that is ruled by the fox, it’s easy to believe that the mother hen is naïve. Easy to believe that love won’t win when the world is a violent place. Easy to live with the fear of death.
So we start to doubt our mother hen and we scatter….sometimes we live in fear of the fox, letting the world’s power and cunning control what we do; And more often than not, we begin to identify with the fox…after all, when the fox has the kind of power we fear and desire, we start to imitate his ways. We have an identity crisis.
We marvel at cute animals, saying silly rabbit, a rabbit who thinks he’s a dog….all the while, God looks at us with the same kind of absurdity, only this time mingled with heartache, and watches us, who are beloved children of God, act as if we were raised by foxes:
Like that Poobah rabbit, we stop feeding on the nourishment that’s meant for us and instead fill ourselves up on the fox’s food. In our world, that means we begin to feed on the world’s definition of success: believing that our worth is measured by how much we earn, how many hours we work, how productive we are, and what stuff we can accumulate.
We think the mother hen is naïve when she urges us to slow down, spend some time being rather than doing, and seek silence instead of stress.
The world throws us into a game of fetch, and we play along, believing that if we play by the fox’s rules, one day we may win. So we abuse the earth with cars and trash and CO2 emissions;
We live our lives in isolation, afraid to let anybody too close so they don’t see we aren’t perfect, we never let others see our scars, fearing we will be rejected.
And we begin to see ourselves through the eyes of the fox: measuring our worth by our outward appearance, our age, our employment or relationship status; We think the mother hen is naïve when she tells us we are beautifully and wonderfully made, worthy of love just as we are.
When the fox has his way, we seek our identities outside of Jesus Christ, and we look in the mirror and realize we no longer recognize ourselves. We have an identity crisis. For as Christians, we know what our true identity is always and centrally and primarily as beloved children of God. A God who preaches peace over power, mutuality over hierarchy, justice over oppression, and love instead of hate. Who creates in the image of goodness and mercy and grace.
We worship a God who knows the cunning ways of the world, and sent Jesus to offer us another way. Even when that other way led him to death, he refused to be afraid. He continued to teach and feed and heal and pray and did not let fear of the fox change his identity or deter his call. Neither should we.
For we worship a God who searches us and knows us, intimately. We follow a savior who always, always chooses us…with open and outstretched arms, no matter what we do, where we go, how far we scatter, Jesus always chooses us.
During Lent, we are called to ask ourselves: Are we choosing Jesus? Are we running towards those outstretched arms, wings of love and justice? Or are we letting the foxes of our world, full of fear and danger, control our actions? Change our identity?
If we fill ourselves up on the world’s power, we’ll find that we are empty and alone and scared. We lose sight of who we are and who we are not.
In Lent, we have the wonderful invitation to reclaim our true identities, to be driven by love rather than fear, and to come home to roost as beloved children of God. God who searches us and knows us. Jesus confronts the powers of his day head on, and we are called to do the same. To the eyes of the world, and certainly the foxes, this looks naïve. What kind of hen takes on a fox? Surely the hen will lose.
We have the advantage of knowing that the hen wins. Yes, she’ll die at the hands of the fox…of a world consumed with violence and brokenness. The fox believes he can kill hope by murdering the hen. But we know the rest of the story. We know that love and grace and mercy always have the final word. That nurture always trumps violence, and that life wins over death. The mother hen’s love is stronger than the fox’s sharp teeth. All we have to do is believe it, and live our lives this way.
The world’s naiveté becomes God’s triumph. And our identities are as those, who through the resurrection, with eternal life. May we live with this hope, sure in this identity, now and forever. Amen.
Tags: Kate
