Reverend Dr. Marilyn Sewell

First Unitarian Church
Portland, Oregon

December 17, 1995

"So I tell you, ask--it'll be given to you; seek--you'll find; knock--it'll be opened for you. Rest assured: everyone who asks receives; everyone who seeks finds; and for the one who knocks it is opened."
Luke ll: 9-10

My mother was a devout Catholic, and so my first understanding of Jesus came from her. She took me and my little brother and sister--dressed to the nines--to the Church of the Sacred Heart. My Jesus was a statue: he was a kind-looking man with a large crimson heart that seemed a sign of his never-ending love. I would kneel there each Sunday in my white Sunday dress, and looking upon me would be this Jesus of the living heart with the gentle eyes that saw all that I was and all that I could be. His wounds were there, but somehow they never seemed connected with real blood or the violence of his death. He was an icon, not a person like me.

I left my mother's home when I was nine, and went to live in North Louisiana with my father and his parents. I tried hard to be a good Catholic, but amidst doubts I could not escape, I left the church and became a Southern Baptist, the faith of my grandparents. There was no statue to look at, and no crucifix in their church, but in Sunday school there were pictures, pictures of a sweet-looking shepherd with blond hair and blue eyes, holding a sheep and smiling down at some little children. The minister preached with great power and intensity, and his message was that Jesus came to die for my sins so that I could be saved from the fires of hell. I had a problem with that on two counts: hell seemed an unlikely invention of a God of love--and then how could anyone else make up for wrongdoing of mine?

Theology aside, the church itself remained the central institution in my life: it offered love and nurture to me as a child and as a young adult. But there came a time when the Baptist church could no longer stretch wide enough to take in what I was becoming. Searching for new friends and a new church home, I ended up at the Unitarian Universalist church. I didn't know much about the church, but I was a renegade, and there were lots of other renegade types there, too, and so I was accepted--no, I was more than accepted, more than tolerated: I was celebrated. It was a wonderful feeling.

But could I bring Jesus with me? I had read scripture for years and had learned to love and admire the Jesus I saw there. He was a man of passion and courage and wit and daring. But could I bring him to a Unitarian Universalist church? One Sunday when I was leading worship, I mentioned Jesus. I read from the Bible. And some people were upset. I was surprised. We could read from the Tao Te Ching, from Native American myth, read Zen koans, and chant--but for some reason, some people couldn't handle Jesus. I understand that now--some of us have left the churches of our childhood because of what those churches did with Jesus, and so any mention of Jesus brings up pain and discomfort. I understand that--and yet I'm not willing to give Jesus away to the fundamentalists--just like I'm unwilling to give the Bible away, or the flag. Jesus remains a figure of immense power and persuasion, arguably the most influential figure of Western civilization. What can we learn from him?

First of all, it's important to understand that Jesus was a Jew. He grew up in Nazareth, a hill town in Southern Galilee, about 100 miles north of Jerusalem. Most of his neighbors would have been farmers, and he may or may not have been a carpenter, since the term carpenter was used metaphorically to mean "teacher." He probably attended school from ages 6 to 12 or so, where his main text would have been the Torah (or Hebrew scripture); and he almost certainly went to the synagogue, where he heard scripture read and prayers offered. As a faithful Jew, he would have recited the Shema when he got up and just before he went to bed: "Hear O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might." He likely participated in the Jewish festivals and went on pilgrimages to Jerusalem. This is about all we know about Jesus before his public ministry.

I say it's important to understand that Jesus was a Jew because many Christian people do not acknowledge that fact. Some believe, quite mistakenly, that Jesus started this new group called the Christians, who were in opposition to the Jews, and that in fact the Jews killed Jesus. Such misunderstanding has been the source of much anti-semitism in the Christian church. I am reminded of the story of a seminary professor who was trying without very much success to explain to his class that Jesus was a Jew. Finally one young man, exasperated, said, "Well, maybe Jesus was a Jew, but surely the Blessed Mother was not!" The truth is that a small group of elite Jewish leaders who were collaborating with Rome in the oppression of the Jewish people found themselves threatened by Jesus and conspired to have him killed by the Roman authorities. But Jesus himself was a faithful Jew and came as a charismatic prophet to the Jewish people.

We know so little about him. Will the real Jesus please stand up? The Jesus Seminar is a group of scholars trying to answer that question. One of those scholars, Marcus Borg, lives here in Portland and teaches at Oregon State University. His book Meeting Jesus for the First Time [Marcus Borg, Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time. HarperCollins, 1995. Many of the ideas and examples contained in this sermon were suggested by this book.] is a reader-friendly explication of who Jesus has come to be for him. He, too, moved through a childhood and young adulthood of doubt--about the very existence of God. Then through a series of what he calls mystical experiences in nature, he began to see the earth as "shining with a radiant presence." He began to define God as the sacredness at the center of existence, as "the holy mystery that is all around us and within us." One doesn't so much believe in God, as one experiences God, Borg believes.

Borg sees the historical Jesus as a man who was grounded in the Spirit, whose experience of the Mystery was central to his life, was the source of his power and his wisdom and his courage. In every culture, in every era, there are people of the spirit, says Borg. They may be shamans or warriors or healers--but what they have in common is that they are conduits for the holy. Jesus was in a Judaic tradition of spirit persons, along with Abraham, Moses, Elijah.

Jesus was regularly referred to as Rabbi, or teacher, but Jesus was not interested in teaching morals or ethics--he was interested in teaching a way, or a path of transformation. His teaching involved a radical critique of his culture. He taught through parable, a short story that turns on paradox. A parable never comes straight at the listener, but invites him into a different system of reality. Conventional wisdom is turned upside down, and listeners are brought to question what they had accepted without question. How could a Samaritan, a despised person, be good? How could a Pharisee, a prominent religious figure, be considered impure? How could the Kingdom of God be "like a grain of mustard seed," very tiny. Besides, mustard was considered a weed. How can the Kingdom of God, something very great, be like that?

Jesus challenged conventional wisdom again and again. Conventional wisdom said that the family was primary. Indeed, it was the primary social and economic unit: one's identity came from the family. But Jesus said his ministry would bring division within families. To a prospective follower who said, "Master, let me first go and bury my father," Jesus responded, "Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead."

Honor was a pivotal value. People sought not just social status, but the regard that was due a person of that status. So much behavior was directed to the end of preserving or displaying honor. Jesus, however, mocked those who sought places of honor at a banquet or in the synagogue. He said those who are last shall come first.

And it was not just his teaching that was radical and shocking, it was his behavior, as well. Proper religious leaders in Jesus' day, including his mentor John the Baptist, engaged in solemn fasts--but Jesus and his disciples were known for their eating and drinking. Jesus' enemies called him a "glutton and a drunkard."

Religious leaders were not expected to associate with the riff-raff--but Jesus was charged with "eating with tax collectors and sinners." Tax collectors were among the worst of the untouchables, and a sinner was someone who was impure. The Jewish social system was replete with purity laws, and society was structured in levels of purity. Your status depended somewhat on birth in the social order. And how well you observed the purity codes of dress and eating and worship. Lack of physical wholeness was considered impure, as well as abject poverty. All Gentiles were considered impure and unclean. Men were thought to be more pure than women, and childbirth and menses were sources of impurity.

Jesus's attitude toward women was unprecedented. In this culture, women had no power or stature. They could not be witnesses in court, or initiate divorce. They could not be taught the Torah. Respectable women could not go out unescorted by a family member. Jesus, however, allowed Mary to enter a public place and wash his feet with her hair. He had women traveling with his itinerant group. They were the ones most visible at the cross. Women played leadership roles in the early church, and some wealthy women financed the movement itself.

Jesus challenged the social structure by inviting all to the table. Literally, he took food with women, untouchables, the poor, those whose bodies were broken or maimed, as well as some people of high social stature who found his message compelling. All were welcome. And the welcome table was metaphorical, as well. All were welcome at God's table. The shift was from one of purity to one of compassion. What matters is what kind of heart you have, not what kind of rules you follow.

Jesus challenged all that was held to be sacred and precious--the family, honor, religious truth, the path to goodness, the very structure by which people knew they were valued. Instead, he asked people to change their hearts. He spoke a lot about the heart. In fact, in the original Latin and Greek, to believe meant to give one's heart to something, to give the very self. He asked no less than that--to give yourself to the Spirit. Forget correctness, forget honor, forget your vaunted goodness. Give yourself away.

Jesus's death was probably predictable. His cousin John had been beheaded without much ado. Some sort of execution could have been expected. Jesus's social vision assaulted the strictures of the Mediterranean culture of his day. But surely his way would challenge us today, as we move to discriminate, to gain power over others, to blame those in need as impure or inferior. The religious and political authorities understood that this popular peasant leader with his talk of love and justice could topple their house of cards. And so they did away with him.

If it is true, as I believe it is, that each of us has a divine spark within, surely it must be said of Jesus that he was more deeply aware of his divinity than the rest of us. How would our lives be different if we dared to acknowledge that divinity? Is that too frightening to consider? In the beautiful film Jesus of Montreal , we see what happens when someone identifies too closely with the message of Jesus: crucifixion can still occur.

And yet we must remember that there are all kinds of deaths. And the most devastating is the death of the spirit. Our culture kills the spirit by telling us that the only reality is that of the material world. It tells us that there is honor in riches. It tells us that some deserve to be respected and others don't, and the difference is merely the color of their skin or their sexual orientation. It tells us that image is better than reality. It invites us to join the race, but doesn't tell us that we'll arrive at the end breathless, having gained nothing but regrets. What if we agreed to give up the world as our center of security and identity? What if we decided to give ourselves to the Spirit, not holding back, not wondering what if, not letting fear control us? How would our lives be different? What would compassion compel us to do, to be?

And how would this institution, this church, begin to shift and change? Diversity might become more of a reality, for all would be welcome at the welcome table--working class people and people of color and people with disabilities. Members would see themselves as ministers and would minister to one another and to the stranger who walks through our door needing warmth and care. Our social justice program would involve the whole congregation. We would give generously out of the abundance we feel, and so canvass would be no problem. We would come to church for many reasons, but we would understand that the heart of the matter is not the music or the educational programs or the sermon, but the heart of the matter is our relationship to that Other through which we live and move and have our being.

That Jesus that I first knew as a child, the Jesus of the passionate heart, is with me still. I understand that love is at the center, that compassion must conquer culture. I do not believe that Jesus will save me from my sins, exactly. I do believe, however, that I need to be saved, saved from my sense of honor, my pride, my fear, my righteousness. I do believe that Jesus came to show me how to leave those things behind and how to open more and more fully to the leading of the Spirit in my life. And I do believe that liberation will come with relinquishment. So be it.
Amen.

Copyright © 1996, Reverend Dr. Marilyn Sewell. All rights reserved.