Sermon: "When We Give Up" 8/27/06

“WHEN WE GIVE UP”
John 5:1-9
Faith United
August 27, 2006


My father had a lot of stories from his ministry over the years
but one story in particular was famous in our family
Dad was notorious for being complimentary
to the point of being ridiculous
My oldest brother, as a child, tells how he went along on a visit with my Dad
to the home of a woman who was bed-ridden
She looked terrible, she didn’t eat properly, she was in bad shape
and my father would always say to her,
“Millie, you’re looking great!”
Well, Millie never looked great….
But Dad told us Millie’s tragic story
When Millie was a young woman,
she went out for a ride with her husband
on a Sunday afternoon
Something ran out into the road, perhaps an animal of some sort
and her husband slammed on the brakes
causing Millie to be thrown forward and bump her head
It didn’t even cause a mark on her forehead,
there was no blood,
and after she recovered from the sudden surprise,
she rubbed her head and insisted her husband take her home
When she got home, Millie went to bed… and never got up
Doctors came to the house and examined her
insisting that absolutely nothing was wrong with her physically
She’d get mad and insist on getting yet another doctor
Millie spent her and her husband’s entire savings on doctors
till at the end of her life, they had nothing
Still, doctor after doctor, nurse after nurse, insisted
there was nothing physically wrong with Millie
and yet she refused to get out of bed… for 50 years
until she died of natural causes…
Nobody ever figured out exactly why Millie chose
to spend the rest of her life in bed,
but still my father would visit her faithfully and say
“Millie, you’re looking good these days!”
to which Millie would just shake her head, roll over
and groan….
We don’t know much about the man by the pool
We don’t know his name
but he was one among many that day, there by the pool
It was a holy place
Perhaps a bit like the spring at Lourdes in France
to which thousands make a pilgrimage each year
This was the Pool of Bethzatha, some translations call it Bethsaida
still others call it Bethesda
and I read somewhere that when Franklin D. Roosevelt
was driven through Bethesda, Maryland
upon hearing the name and knowing the story
of the healing pool in Jerusalem
He chose that site to build a hospital
Well, legend had it in Jesus’ time, that at certain seasons of the year,
an angel would descend and stir the waters of the pool
If someone immersed themselves in the pool
as the waters were disturbed,
it was believed they would be healed….
Sounds pretty superstitious to us, now
but they took it very seriously
and beliefs like that were very common back then
and still are in some places…
The ancient peoples also believed in the holiness of water
especially the holiness of rivers and springs
water was very precious
Because it wasn’t as easily accessible as it is for us
now, in the United States…
You can imagine how the congregation looked every day
at the healing pool…
The crippled, the arthritic, the paralyzed, the diseased,
the epileptic, the asthmatic, the weak, the broken
the hopeless, all gathered among the five porticoes
around the pool
day after day after day
To the sensitive soul, it was a miserable place
a massive display of human suffering and pain
Every day, the man came, just like the others,
how, we’re not sure,
but somebody must have carried him on his mat
and left him there to fend for himself
perhaps scoffing at his futile attempts
After 38 years, or even much less than that
you’d think he’d give up
why bother?
On the other hand, what else did he have to do?
If he had no friends, he was paralyzed
he had focused on getting well and that alone
for 38 years,
then what else was there in his life?
Some scholars suggest that the 38 years parallel
the amount of years the Israelites spent wandering in the desert
after having escaped Egypt
Some say the journey took 38 years
because the Moses was a man and wouldn’t ask for directions!
But this man with no name also lived in the wilderness
his life for 38 years
had been so empty, with no direction
day after day, hour after hour
waiting for healing that just didn’t come
I wonder, did Jesus recognize him?
If he’d been there for 38 years,
then perhaps Jesus had seen him before
on his visits to Jerusalem, even as a boy
It says Jesus knew that he’d been there a long time
maybe he did recognize him
But I wonder, why didn’t anyone have pity on him?
Did someone drop him off every day?
And if so, why didn’t they stay and dip him in the waters of healing and grace?
“Do you want to be healed?” Jesus asked
And it sounds like a dumb question, even a bit cruel
Would he be here if he didn’t want healing?
Would he keep coming somehow if he didn’t really
want to be healed?
“Sir,” he said, “I have no one to put me into the pool
when the water is stirred up,
and while I am making my way, someone else
steps down ahead of me.”
It’s painful---‘Sir,’ he says, ‘I have no friends to help me…’
His mat was there, the mat that he used as a bed
the mat that carried him for the last 38 years
but who carried the mat to this place?
And why didn’t anyone else, who brought sick loved ones to the pool,
why didn’t THEY help him get in the water?
Isn’t it true that sometimes we get so used to the way things are
that we no longer see what’s wrong with the picture?
“Do you WANT to be made well?”
The man never answered the question
He simply gave his excuse as to why he wasn’t well
why he still sat by the pool, still paralyzed by some unseen curse
He didn’t say “yes”
He just told Jesus what he had probably told countless others
It wasn’t his fault, it was always somebody else’s fault
that he couldn’t have a life, that he couldn’t be healed
After 38 years, I imagine he was very bitter about his lot in life
and so the question that Jesus asks is an honest one
“Do you WANT to be made well?”
Have you ever been stuck?
Stuck in a bad situation?
With an illness that takes all your strength—
whether physical or emotional,
a bad marriage, a bad friendship, a bad job….
and you see no way out?
It’s easy to just give up
say, well, it is the way it is, I have no choice…
maybe they were told they’d only live a certain amount of time
or maybe they was a family trait that was inevitable
or maybe they were told over and over that they were losers anyway
that they’d never amount to anything
She would always attract men that beat her
he would never be able to give up drinking
he would never get off welfare
never get an education,
never get a decent job
Why bother?
“Do you want to be made well?”
And there’s that voice in our heads sometimes
that says, “I’ll always be this way, I can’t change.”
“Do you want to be made well?”
Jesus asks the poor, paralyzed man laying on his side,
his eyes watery and bloodshot
staring into the pool that was so close,
and yet too far….
Did you notice, though, the man never asked for healing?
He didn’t even ask Jesus to put him in the water
to stay with him until the water was stirred…
Maybe Jesus knew something…
He knew that being healed would not be instantly wonderful
being healed would change everything
The man would have to see himself in a whole new light…
Not as a poor, helpless, invisible, neglected paralyzed man
but someone with the freedom to walk, to stand up and MOVE…
to DO something… to LIVE
Is that what really kept him out of the troubled waters of the pool?
Is that what kept him from asking for help?
What would it mean to his life for him to be healed?
…to stand up and WALK??
To look people in the eye, face to face
instead of always looking up at them from the ground?
It’s a good question for all of us…
“do you want to be made well?”
Is it worth it to you to be healed?
Especially when it will change everything?
The door will be open, the path made clear
No more excuses about why you’re unhappy or broken
or stuck…
If we’re given the freedom to walk, to stand up and move
then suddenly we have to take responsibility for what we do
and what we don’t do
It’s no longer someone else’s fault
“Do you want to be healed?” Jesus says
And the man doesn’t answer… it’s a big question
all he can see are all the reasons why healing isn’t possible for him
But Jesus says, “Stand up, take up your mat, and WALK!”
Jesus looks down at this shriveled man
laying on the hard ground
and tells him to do the impossible
Stand up…. take up your mat, and Walk!
Pick up the mat that has carried you all these years
and YOU carry IT
and get moving…
The man must have looked at him like he was crazy!
Perhaps Jesus was the first one to really look at him
to see him out of the many
to have the audacity and the compassion
to bluntly ask him,
“do you WANT to be made well?”
Immediately, it says, the man was set free
He stood up, something he hadn’t done in 38 years!
He took up the mat that he laid on, and that man… walked
Heads turned.. “isn’t that…?” “No, it can’t be..” “The man, lying by the pool….”
“But… how?”
Well, you’d think there would be an uproar, a cheer
A celebration
The man who was a permanent fixture by the pool
was now walking!
The one who people turned away from
because he was too painful to look at, too pitiful…
How did it happen? Certainly they clapped him on the back,
gave him a hug, lifted him above their shoulders
gave thanks to God for making the impossible possible!!
Well, no…
Actually, he hadn’t walked very far, didn’t even get any blisters
before some church people approached him and
said to this man-- who hadn’t walked for 38 years
who hadn’t carried anything on any day of the week
for 38 years---
The people of the church pointed their self-righteous fingers
and said,
“don’t you know that today is the Sabbath??
It is not lawful for you to carry your mat on the Sabbath!!”
and they waved their Bibles at him…
Being healed, being set free can get us into trouble
Other people don’t like it when somebody else gets a good thing
Well, the poor guy, in his usual form, said, “I didn’t do it!
That man TOLD me to! He told me to stand up
and take my mat and walk!”
Jesus had slipped into the crowd
not wanting to call attention to himself
and now the indignant and legalistic religious people
began to search for Jesus
And thus began the witch hunt for this prophet
who claimed equality with God…
who had the audacity to set people free on the Lord’s day
When someone is set free,
when someone gets new life,
chances are there’s somebody else who isn’t happy
Someone who can’t celebrate someone else’s liberation…
And what did the man do with his new life?
Did he appreciate it?
Did he ever say “thanks”?
Did he have more compassion for the disabled
and the suffering invisible ones in the community?
Did he look at them and remember what it was like
and reach out to help them GET UP?
After 38 years he must have felt pretty useless
and maybe he was…
No where does it say that he was grateful
no where does it even say he wanted to walk…
no where is there evidence that he was a man of faith
or cared to have anything to do with Jesus
after he made him walk…
so, did he DESERVE it?
Did he DESERVE to be healed?
Did he DESERVE new life?
Do any of us DESERVE it?
It’s not about us…
it’s not about who we are, or how faithful we are
it’s all about who Jesus is
And Jesus wants abundant life for everyone
even the person we don’t see anymore
who’s been sitting on his butt for 38 years
Is there something blocking your way?
Is there something keeping you from walking
or even dancing in the footsteps of Jesus?
Keeping you from having the life that Jesus wants you to have?
“Do you want to be made well?” Jesus asks
We may give up
on our world, on our children, on our institutions
we may give up on our own lives
But Jesus never gives up
“Do you want to be made well?” he asks
And before we can even answer
we may just find ourselves doing a dance step
we didn’t think we knew….

How Does Your Garden Grow?

July 17, 2006

I don't know anything about mustard seeds except the ones I have in my cupboard, which I don't think I've used since I made pickles about 10 years ago. (Do mustard seeds expire?) I've never had a reputation as a great cultivator of plants and living things. (Although Sarah is still going strong...I'm happy about that) I had a terrible reputation when I first moved into my own apartment, of killing houseplants. I just couldn't keep them alive. My college roommate, Marlene, got married and I was a bridesmaid. She gave the wedding party a houseplant each and said it represented her marriage. She wanted us to nourish the plants and be a part of nourishing her marriage through prayer. I told her if her marriage was the houseplant in my care, her marriage was doomed. The marriage is still going strong, the plant died a long time ago. Not long after the wedding, as I recall.
As a symbol of putting down roots, Larry and I decided to put in a garden for the first time in 14 years. Neither of us know a whole lot about gardening, despite the fact that I grew up in the Garden State (I'm still clueless as to how NJ got that nickname...). My church member, George-- who has defied death many times through prayers and just plain stubbornness-- tilled the area for us with his fancy little tilling machine. However, good ol' George assured us that nothing was likely to grow there on the "south side" of the house. (Nebraskans have a thing for identifying directions at all times. What IS that?) Well, we planted tomato plants, green beans, onions, cucumbers, lima beans, and yellow squash. Larry said that not all of it will come up, so we better plant extra yellow squash. I said just one packet of seeds. He said two. We planted two. After all, according to George, nothing was likely to grow on the "south side" of the house.
Jesus was really impressed with mustard seeds; how tiny they are and how they flourish into a pretty impressive plant. I, however, am impressed with yellow squash seeds. The garden... has flourished. George says our tomato plants look better than his, and he said it with a little indignation. But the squash?? Yikes. Every bit of it came up. I think birds could even make their nests in those squash plants and find shelter for their young. We have eaten squash every day for at least three weeks now. We've cut it up and frozen pounds of it, given away piles of it, and still it keeps growing. It's very important, we learned, to pick squash on time, lest you get fairly good sized yellow baseball bats, which are a little more difficult to cook. Sometimes I just stand at my kitchen window and look out at the garden... and giggle. I helped DO that! It is a small garden of prosperity. Abundant food. More than one little family can eat. By the time we get through the stuff in the freezer, I imagine we would have eaten yellow squash every possible way there is to fix it! People ask us what we did! I say, "we put the seeds in the ground!"
Meanwhile, the cornfields are full of corn that goes over my head. Everywhere we drive, there are acres and acres of corn, waving in the breeze. In Kearney, various farmers are selling sweet corn out of the back of pick-up trucks, along with watermelons, cucumbers, and I suspect: squash. Everywhere you look in rural Nebraska, the earth is producing of itself. Farmers are working hard out there in the 100 degree heat, as they have been for a long time, making things grow and beginning to gather the earlier harvests. We're eating fresh green beans, tomatoes and cucumbers and SQUASH that we had a hand in growing. Larry's ready to pull the squash plants, but I won't let him just yet. The plants are so tall and green and wave in the breeze-- when there is one. They make me look good; like I knew what I was doing. But all I did was put the seeds in the ground and put some water on it. The earth did the rest. I love Nebraska for a lot of reasons, but I love living where people are so close to the earth. Where the earth is a part of their everyday lives, and for so many, the way they make a living by the sweat of their brow. It's not an easy life, and it's certainly not a way to get rich, but the farmers I know do it not just because their parents did it, but because it's in their blood. It's who they ARE. They can't NOT do it. And people who live close to the earth tend to be a lot more real. They tend to have a respectable awe for life and death and the power of the weather. Here you see a storm building long before it ever gets to where you are. Or you can see where someone ELSE is having a storm that never comes your way. Lightening provides a pretty remarkable light show, right in our own front yard (which faces EAST, by the way). We ate the first tomato out of our garden tonight. Larry, Sarah Gene and I cut it in three pieces and celebrated the unique lusciousness of that first harvested tomato from our own garden. All three of us have worked in that garden; planting, weeding, watering, picking. No tomato could be more delicous.
I can't relate to what Jesus said about mustard seeds, because I've never planted one, and I'm not sure the ones in my spice rack would do anything. But I'm impressed with yellow squash seeds. A little tiny seed, with all that life potential in it, just waiting to be planted, watered, and given a home in the rich brown earth, to just let go and do what God intended it to do. Another thing I didn't know was that before a yellow squash becomes a squash, it is a big, bright yellow flower. The FLOWER turns into a vegetable that can be fried, steamed, put into casseroles, and made into patties. How cool is that?
I know that my it's not my gardening skills that is producing this bumper crop of vegetables. But it is awesome to participate in creation so directly! It is wonderful to plant a seed and see what God will do! So I try to apply that to everything else in my life. I'm just here to plant seeds, and watch God do God's thing. I can't do a whole lot on my own, I just use what God gives me and wait to see what happens! Pretty amazing when you stop and pay attention. And the harvest is delicious!!