Not above his master

Posted by Fr.Stace on June 20th, 2008 filed in The Rector's Ruminations

Proper 7
Matthew 10

Jesus words this morning are meant to prepare his disciples for their lifelong work.  He has taught them about the Kingdom.  Now he is preparing them to take the kingdom into the world.  Remember his words, ‘the harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.’

Here is a quiz for you:
Which country has the Christian church with the largest attendance?  Korea
What is the dominant historic religion in that country? Buddhism
Which country has the Christian church with the largest seating capacity? Nigeria
What is the dominant religion of Nigeria? Islam
In what country is the largest Buddhist university located? US (Boulder)
Where is the largest Muslim training center? NY
Which country has the largest Jewish population? US
What country has the 8th largest Hindu population? US
Where is the world’s largest training center for Transcendental Meditation? Fairfield, Iowa

Things have changed…
We can look at the changes of our country as a bad thing or an opportunity for the greatest revival of the Christian faith in our history.

The United Nations declares June 20th as World Refugee Day and it is ironic that the gospel today is so applicable.  Few of us understand what it means to be persecuted but there are millions in our country now who are here because they have been persecuted for their faith or for other reasons.  They understand what it means to have to deny Christ or be tortured.
Listen to the words of Jesus just previous to this passage:
“See, I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. Beware of them, for they will hand you over to councils and flog you in their synagogues; and you will be dragged before governors and kings because of me, as a testimony to them and the Gentiles. When they hand you over, do not worry about how you are to speak or what you are to say; for what you are to say will be given to you at that time; for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death; and you will be hated by all because of my name. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next; for truly I tell you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.”

This is not our experience in the least.  We might have to see a bad movie about Christians or have to endure another Dan Brown novel or watch the 10 commandments get taken down in places, but normally we are unaffected by persecution.  We can worship without fear.  We can share our faith freely in most circumstances.  It may not be welcome, but we are rarely at risk of outright persecution.  But there are many who can understand what these words mean in the depths of their souls.

In Ethiopia this year, a number of men broke into several churches simultaneously and went after congregations with machetes.

In Iraq this year, there have been attempts to wipe out entire Christian neighborhoods.

In Burma, the government teaches that the problem with their country is ABC: AIDS, Hepatitis B, and Christianity.

Over the last 20 years the conflict in Sudan has been about the attempted genocide of black Christians, especially in southern Sudan.

I could tell you about Pakistan, India, China, Turkey and many other places.  Yet the faith grows and thrives in these areas more than anywhere else.  Persecution and hardship create Christians.  ‘The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church’ said Tertullian.

Many of the persecuted come to this country for safety.  Here is an amazing opportunity.

But I want to continue our reflection by getting to the heart of what Jesus is saying in today’s gospel.   Jesus tells his disciples:

“A disciple is not above the teacher, nor a slave above the master; it is enough for the disciple to be like the teacher, and the slave like the master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household!”

Beelzebub was tied to the prince of demons Baal Shamayim ‘the lord of heaven’ whom Antiochus the IV offered sacrificed to in the Jewish temple in 167 BC, an ‘abomination of desolation’ in Jewish thought.  Jesus said that his disciples would be equated with that kind of evil because of their belief in Christ, and they were.  They were all, but one, killed for their faith.
In many places in the world, there are Christians who are killed because those persecuting believe they are wiping evil from the earth.

We may never know that kind of hatred as Christians.  But there is a way of living that will put us at odds with every system of earth.

‘A disciple is not above the teacher, nor a slave above the master; a disciple will be like the teacher, the servant like the master.’

So what are the characteristics of the teacher and the master?

‘Taking a stand for Jesus’ in many of our minds means to take an issue and to try to convince the world that we are right about it through strong language.  We think that our faith and morality is a ‘point of view’ that needs to be pushed through public life.

There is some truth here.  We need to learn to defend our faith.  However, what is it about the teacher that we are not above?  In other words, what is it about Jesus that we cannot get around?  First he is above us as God.  He is Lord.  The kingdom is not a volunteer organization.  It is a kingdom with a king.

But the heart of what Jesus says, is that it is his way of life that we are not above.  If he loved, we are to love.  If he prayed intimately with his Father, so are we to pray.  If he fasted, so are we to fast.  If he hung out with tax collectors and sinners.  We are to hang out with tax collectors and sinners.  Where he showed mercy, so are we to show mercy.  If he gave his life for the world, so are we to give our lives for the world.  If he was persecuted, so must we be persecuted.  We are not above our teacher, our master.  Jesus words are the ultimate WWJD.   This is what it means to be a disciple.  How are we to live as Christians?  Jesus taught it, lived it, modeled it.  A disciple is not above his teacher, a servant is not above his master.

There are many reasons for the decline in many mainline denominations.  But I think there is something that is subtle yet important for us to look at in terms of our own Episcopal Tradition.  It is something that is in our DNA that we must overcome not only in terms of growth, but more importantly in terms of living the kind of life that Jesus asks us to live.

Perhaps you’ve heard this ditty:

A Methodist is a Baptist who can read.
A Presbyterian is a Methodist with money.
An Episcopalian is a Presbyterian with manners.

There is a reason (perhaps several) as to why Anglicanism is more indigenous in other parts of the world and more upper crust in our country, and that is the sentiment that is expressed in the ditty I just read.

The DNA of our church is that the Episcopal Church acts like the state church, (the National Cathedral is ours after all) it began and continued to be the church of the elite–politicians and the highly educated.

Now there is nothing inherently wrong with this pedigree.  However, underneath it is a contempt for those who are not of the upper crust.  I know that I am not telling you anything you don’t already know, of course.

When any old soul from any old place walks into a Roman Catholic Church anywhere in the world, they might be a little confused or they may not like it, but by and large, they ‘get it.’  There is liturgy and sometimes high church stuff going on.

Now, our liturgy is much better (in my opinion) because we have had liturgists skilled in the English language.  However, what is the common critique of our worship?  ‘I don’t know which book to use, I don’t understand things, it’s so complicated.’

But we’re no more complicated than Rome.  We would just rather you figure it out on your own.  If you are educated, welcome, if not, well….

There are two denominations that should not exist in our country but that are a reflection of our sins: the Methodist Church and the African Methodist Episcopal Church.

John Wesley based all of his preaching and teaching on three sources: the Church Fathers, the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer.  He was Anglican through and through, reared and ordained in the Church of England.  But Wesley was a different sort of guy.  He preached to the masses on horseback.  If he needed an altar, he would set one up in the prairie or by the river.  What got Wesley in trouble was not so much the illegal ordinations he performed (it was hard to find a bishop in the middle of nowhere), but because he was willing to go where the parochial church was unwilling to go, to the people: poor whites, Native Americans and blacks.

The African Methodist Episcopal Church was formed because blacks were not allowed to worship in white Episcopal Churches.  If you were black in colonial America you would not be welcome into an Episcopal Church, so the black folks went about things there own way.  To this day you will hear something like this: Blacks are Baptists, Hispanics are Catholic, they have their churches, we have ours.  (Unless of course, the black person or Latino happens to have wealth behind them, then, well maybe we can have one or two.)

Why am I spending time on this?  Because we don’t want anything to be a barrier between us and Christ, nothing.  When we decide to become disciples of Jesus we decide to live on the edge.  God could call us anywhere at any time for any reason.  I want us to be open to that.

If the nations come to us, God is doing something.  If you read about a country in the world that is in peril and your heart goes out, God is doing something.  I don’t want us to get back to ‘that upscale religion,’ but the kingdom life of Jesus Christ.

If he loved, we are to love.  If he prayed intimately with his Father, so are we to pray.  If he fasted, so are we to fast.  If he hung out with tax collectors and sinners, we are to hang out with tax collectors and sinners.  Where he showed mercy, so are we to show mercy.  If he gave his life for the world, so are we to give our lives for the world.  If he was persecuted, so must we be persecuted.  We are not above our teacher, our master.  A disciple is not above his teacher, a servant is not above his master.

Paul goes to great pains to describe the church as the Body of Christ.  This is his primary metaphor.  We are Christ to this world.  I close with the words of St. Teresa of Avila which was adapted into a song by John Michael Talbot.

Christ has no body now but yours
No hands, no feet on earth but yours
Yours are the eyes through which He looks
Compassion on this world
Yours are the feet with which He walks to do good
Yours are the hands with which He blesses all the world
Yours are the hands
Yours are the feet
Yours are the eyes
You are His body
Christ has no body now on earth but yours