Lord of the Streets, Houston
October 6, 2024
Proper 22, B
Numbers 11:4-6,10-16,24-29
Psalm 19:7-14
Mark 9:38-50
All too often in life, God finds that people are fearful and terrible to one another, so God helps keep them apart. God gives them anger and resentment so they won’t come near one another. God gives them enemies and reasons to hate so they’ll be against one another and stay separated even more.
Then,
God finds that people are sad and alone, and it is not good that people are
alone, so God helps people deal with their loneliness. God makes all sorts of
things to comfort people and help them feel less alone.
- God makes cell phones with apps, and shows, and social media to keep people company, and the people loves their phones, and God is happy.
- God makes cars so people can drive from one place to another, and God makes the cars fun and sexy and customizable, and the people love their cars, and God is happy.
- God makes drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes so people will feel better about being alone, and the people love their drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes, and God is happy.
- God makes guns and knives for people to feel safe and protected, and the people love their guns and knives, and God is happy.
God makes all sorts of things so that people won’t feel so alone, and the people love their things, and God is happy.
That’s not exactly how the story goes in the beginning of Genesis, is it? We are often fearful and terrible towards one another, and we often do stay away from others. We do have anger and resentment, and we have enemies who we end up hating. We are often sad and alone, and we do often turn to things to help us feel better. We end up loving our stuff which helps us feal less lonely.
The problem is, none of that is how God actually wants things to be.
In the beginning, it wasn’t good that the human was alone, and to fix that problem, God made another human so that the human wasn’t alone. God didn’t make a bunch of things for the human to love to make the human feel better.
Lama said, “People were created to be loved. Things were created to be used. The reason why the world is in chaos is because things are being loved and people are being used.”
Yup. We make things to cure our loneliness, and then we often end up trusting in and loving those things, and just as often, we end up using people to get what we want out of them, treating people as things and things as people.
That’s part of what was happening when the Pharisees asked Jesus about divorce, folks were treating people as things. Specifically, husbands were treating their wives as things. See, women couldn’t ask for a divorce; only men could, and the reasons why men could ask for a divorce could have been just about anything. We argue too much. She doesn’t obey me as I’d like. Her cooking isn’t very good. Eh, she just ain’t doing it for me like she used to.
When men divorced their wives, they could just get another wife, trade up for a more desirable model. When women were divorced by their husbands, however, they were treated more like second class citizens. If this woman couldn’t please her husband, something must be wrong with her. She’d have a hard time finding another husband. Also, in that society, women weren’t all that free to enter the workforce, so many divorced women had to go live with family, or if they didn’t have any, they would often have to turn to prostitution to make a living.
So, men who divorced their wives tended to leave them with few options, prostitution being one of the only options. This same society, however, looked down on women who were prostitutes. See the problem here?
Why can’t we divorce our wives, Jesus? The Pharisees wanted to know. Because you are treating your wives like things, was Jesus’ reply, and women are not things to be used and then discarded when they are no longer desirable.
“…from the beginning of creation,” Jesus reminded them, “‘God made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh.”
Your wives, Jesus reminded them, are not your property. Your wives, Jesus reminded them, are nor less than or beneath you. Your wives, Jesus reminded them, are equals with you, one flesh with you, because in the beginning, when the human was alone, God created another human to be an equal partner and companion.
So, Jesus told them they could not divorce their wives unless their wives had been unfaithful. They were not to treat their wives as things to be used. Once again, things are meant to be used, not loved. People are meant to be loved, not used.
Now, in addition to Jesus talking about divorce and teaching people not to use others as things, Jesus then said to receive the kingdom of God like little children, saying, “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs”? It's a wonderful teaching, but what in the world does it have to do with anything that came before?
Well, just after Jesus taught the Pharisees to treat their wives well, and not use them like things, Jesus’ disciples saw people trying to bring some children to Jesus, and they tried to stop them. It was as though Jesus’ disciples were looking down on the children and saying, “Stay away, lesser people. Jesus is too important for you.” Jesus recognized their behavior for what it was, once again treating people like things.
Once again, wasn’t going to have that. Children, women, men, transgender, exalted, lowly, we were all made as beloved human beings, and we were all made to be partners and companions for one another. Whether in marriage or friendship, or in any relationship, we were made to love and cherish one another.
Using one another as though we were things fights against our very nature. Treating one another as things to be used and discarded, that puts us as though we were in God’s place, thinking we are so much better than another human being that we get to treat them as less than human. Not even God treats us that way. Who are we to treat each other that way? No wonder we’re lonely when we treat each other like that. Our cure for loneliness is one another, not our stuff.
So,
Jesus tells us to receive the kingdom of God as a little child. Receive the
kingdom of God as those who are dependent upon God. Receive each day as those
who trusts in God’s love. Receive each moment as those who place their love in
one another finding our truest selves in the people we love. When we do, we may
just find that we’re not as lonely. When we place our love in one another, we
may just find exactly what we’re looking for, the peace and unity of the
Kingdom of God.
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