The Ven. Richard I Cluett
October 1, 2003
Numbers 11:4-6,10-16,24-29 James 5:13-20 Mark 9:38-50
The readings today lay out a whole smorgasbord of possibilities. I can pick any one of Jesus’ sayings and spin those out (in a good kind of spin. I like to think) or I can take some of the injunctions in James, or the experience of Israel in the desert or the problems of leadership exemplified in Moses, or others…
But what intrigues me the most this week is the theme that goes through all the readings – the theme of discipleship. What is a disciple? Who can be a disciple? What does a disciple do? What does being a disciple of (to be specific) Jesus require of us?
For the last couple of weeks we have heard Jesus on the subject of being his follower: “If any would be my disciple, let him deny himself take up his cross and follow me.” And, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”
Today the disciples closest to him want to make Jesus a legal franchise. In order to be his disciple, you must fulfill certain requirements, pay certain dues, have a personal call or endorsement, be deemed by Jesus to be special and then be set aside for the special ministry and relationship of disciple.
Who can be a disciple, who can claim to be a disciple, who is allowed to serve as a disciple, who is authorized to function as a disciple in the name of the master? These are very old, time-honored, well-worn questions. They are from time immemorial. Whenever more than one has been gathered together these questions of authority and appropriateness of discipleship arise.
In the reading from the Book of Numbers, the question is raised. It is easy to concentrate on and make fun of the weeping of the people over having nothing to eat but manna. Actually, I think my personal translation of the Hebrew is not “weeping”, but “whining”. Or it is easy to identify with the plight of leadership shown by Moses, rather than the abundance that God provides for his people – all of them. The people are starving, God provides Manna. The task of leadership is too great, God provides 70 elders to be specially designated and authorized as helpers.
And not only that, God’s abundance is such that even if others, who have not been officially designated and set aside, feel called to do something on behalf of God’s providence, to care for God’s people, God empowers them, en-spirits them powerfully to do so.
Eldad and Medad are but two guys who feel called to do a good work. Joshua says, “Stop them. They are not authorized and empowered to do work on your behalf, God’s behalf, or on behalf of the welfare of the people.” Who do they think they are?! And Moses says in effect, “They’re doing that? Wonderful! It would be wonderful if everyone who believes felt moved to do such, empowered to do such, and then went ahead and did it. Wonderful!”
And then we jump ahead about 1400 years to the time of Jesus and what do we encounter? Exactly the same issue. Who is a disciple, who is authorized? This time it’s not about prophesying, it’s about healing, but the core issue is the same: who is authorized and empowered to do work on Jesus’ behalf, God’s behalf, or on behalf of the welfare of God’s people?
And Jesus says, “"Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. Whoever is not against us is for us. For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward.”
It is the nature of God, it is in the providence of God, it is the abundance of God that there be no dearth of work being done on behalf of the welfare of the God’s people, no limit on the workers, no arbitrary set of requirements or categories defining who is allowed to do a good work, who is appropriate, who is authorized and empowered to do work on Jesus’ behalf, God’s behalf, or on behalf of the welfare of the people. There is no limit, no requirement.
You cannot be too young, too old, too small, too large, too educated, too uneducated. You cannot be too poor or too rich. You cannot speak the wrong language. You cannot be the wrong gender, the wrong color, the wrong ethnicity, or the wrong age. You cannot even be too sinful -- or too pure. You cannot even be in the wrong religion to do a good work on Jesus’ behalf, God’s behalf, or on behalf of the welfare of the people.
All God asks, all God seeks is someone, anyone who will care for, work for the well being of God’s people. All God asks, all God seeks is the likes of you and me.
So the question becomes, "Are we who have been called and follow and do name ourselves as a disciple of Jesus: Jesus the Son of God, Jesus the Risen Christ, Jesus the friend of the poor, the outcast, the prisoner and the sinner, Jesus the reconciler… Are we who are his disciples doing any good work on Jesus’ behalf, God’s behalf, or on behalf of the welfare of God’s people? Personally."
Is this community of disciples, the Cathedral Church of the Nativity, feeding the hungry and housing the homeless? By our work are we proclaiming to the community around us that God’s abundance is for them? Can we look at our neighbors and see how well they are being fed, how comfortably they are being housed, how warmly they are being dressed, how well they are being educated, how often they are being welcomed as a direct result of our good work as disciples of Jesus?
One commentator writes that Jesus gives us a description, an example, of a discipleship that is “inclusive, attentive to the vulnerable, and diligent in recognizing those things that will lead one to stumble or offend…”
I recently heard about a conversation between a Christian and his Jewish friend who was speaking of his experience of Rosh Hashanah. The friend pointed to this reflection:
*Rosh Hashanah: ruminations
The day has come
To take an accounting of my life.
Have I dreamed of late
Of the person I want to be,
Of the changes I would make
In my daily habits,
In the way I am with others,
In the friendship I show companions,
Woman friends, man friends, my partner,
In the regard I show my father and mother,
Who brought me out of childhood?
I have remained enchained too often to less than what I am.
But the day has come to take an accounting of my life.
Have I renewed of late
My vision of the world I want to live in,
Of the changes I would make
In the way my friends are with each other
The way we find out whom we love
The way we grow to educate people
The way in which the many kinds of needy people
Grope their way to justice?
Worthy ruminations for our own discipleship, I think. Am I, are we, signs of God’s abundant care of God’s people?
Blessed is someone, anyone, who comes in the name of the Lord.
*from The Wings of Awe, A Machzor for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, B’nai B’rith Hillel Foundations, Washington, D.C., with thanks to Mark Harris at Preludium
