"Tikkun Olam" , Ash Wednesday, Feb 10, 2016

Isaiah 58 Luke 10: 25-42 Our Call to worship this evening, “To not be hypocrites seeking attention, but instead act in faith” and Isaiah 58 which challenges the faithful that following rituals will not grant you faith, provide a difficult starting point. Simply because you were Baptized, or you presented your children for Baptism, or you were Confirmed and you sit quietly in the pew during worship will not give you faith or Eternal life. Isaiah 58 Verse 12 however names a Goal of the Ancient faith, all but lost to us. You shall be called Tikkun Olam! You shall be a Repairer of the Breach, you shall be a Restorer of the Streets to live in. When I was very young, I recall adults asking “What do you want to be when you grow up?” My oldest brother wanted to be a Farmer or Teacher, and became a Dean of Agriculture. The Second, from the age of three had Top hat and Cane and knew by heart the song from Pinocchio “Hi Diddly Dee, An Actors' Life For Me”. Our youngest brother's life literally was saved after running away from home, by a Guidance Counselor suggesting he take classes at the Vocational School in cooking, and now he is Executive Chef for three Restaurants in Park City. I knew I wanted to be like my parents, who had gone to Seminary and were leaders in the Church, but I also wanted to be different. They had come into brand new Suburban communities where nothing existed, and as Evangelists, they led the creation of Churches from nothingness. Where my own Calling has been as Tikkun Olam, to Repair the Breaches, to fix the infrastructure where needed, but you are not creating out of whole cloth, nor are you Changing for the sake of Change, making the church as you desire. Instead there is repair and reformation work in discerning what is foundational, what is the aura of the Angel of this Church, and what no longer works, what can we finally help people to let go of. Personally, I have been frustrated by the debates and Presidential campaigns, not because of the issues, Candidates or parties, but the explicit message that America today is broken, America has been beaten and robbed and thrown into the ditch on the side of the road. I too am angered and frustrated by those who have chosen to inflict pain and murder against their families, their community, our world. Our lives today are far from perfect, but rather than emphasizing the negative, we have witnessed people trying to make a difference in others' lives, feeding the hungry in our own community; providing more than shelter creating a home and family for those who can no longer live alone; making Health Care in a War Zone and providing healing to Malnourished children in a far off place of extreme poverty. As your pastor, I have witnessed countless couples trying to care for the special needs and problems of family and friends when planning for their own weddings. I have witnessed people volunteering their time and their interests, to make music for the glory of God, to offer healing and touch people where words and actions sometimes are not enough. Isaiah describes you will be Tikkun Olam not simply by obeying the feasts, or rituals, but when you remove the yoke of slavery, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, when you feed the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted. It is easy, and culturally acceptable to throw one another in the ditch, to throw America and our leaders in the ditch as bankrupt and left for dead. To be Tikkun Olam, to try to redeem and repair circumstance, to stand up for what you believe, is more than hard, it is counter-cultural and requires that you think through every assumption. Luke describes a Lawyer tried to put Jesus to the test, by asking “What must I do to inherit Eternal Life?” Being well educated in debate, Jesus turns the question around saying: “You are a Lawyer, what does the Law say?” And I find it interesting, the Lawyer quotes Jesus' answer of which is the most important of the Laws: “To love the Lord Your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and to love your neighbor.” But checking assumptions, the Lawyer then asks, “And who is my neighbor?” To which Jesus tells what has become the well known parable of the Good Samaritan. The parable has become so well known as to have lost its impact. The crowd at the time might have gotten caught up in the story, that a Megachurch pastor and a Presidential Candidate each walked by crossing over to the other side, expecting the third person to be a common man, a Judean or Galilean. In past years, I have described one of my favorite stories that on a Presbyterian Seminary campus, there was a scene planted. That on the day in which the Seniors were to take their Ordination Exams, the written exams like Boards, which determine the distinction between graduating with a Masters in Divinity degree and being eligible to be Ordained as a pastor, being told that the preaching exam would be on the Luke 10 passage, an actor walked across the quadrangle in a business suit, when suddenly he fell to the ground clutching his arm as if in a heart attack. The real exam being how many of the 100 Senior Seminary students would stop on their way to their exam, and not a single one did, several even stepped over his body. A decade ago, on the Upper west side of Manhattan, there was a true life story of a man who had a seizure and fell from the Subway platform onto the tracks below. On the platform was a construction worker named Wesley Autrey with his two daughters aged 4 and 6. Instantly, Mr. Autrey jumped down onto the Subway tracks with the collapsed man, when suddenly they saw the on-coming lights of the subway train. There was no time to get them both out safely, so Autrey positioned the man between the tracks, with his own body on top sheltering the man. Their bulk was large enough that grease rubbed off the undercarriage of the train onto Autrey's knit hat and coat. But when the train stopped at the platform, both were unharmed, and a voice cried out from under the train saying “There are two little girls up on the platform. Tell them Daddy is safe.” That is the story the crowd expected to hear, a moral story of a common man entering into the breach, coming to the rescue where others would not, but this is a parable told by Jesus. The third pedestrian in Jesus' parable was a Samaritan, who racially, ethnically was considered dirty, and feared as an enemy. Enough time has passed that Martin Luther King Jr is revered for his faith and convictions, though at the time much of America would not have agreed. We have come to a time where the film Selma wins awards for depiction of people standing up for their right to vote; where Martin's Letters from A Birmingham Jail describe advocacy for children; and he is remembered as a Nobel Peace Prize winner. But the night he was assassinated Martin had been in Memphis, TN. He was there trying to settle a labor strike of Garbage workers. The Garbage workers were not paid to have a lunch or dinner break, so had routinely taken to eating around the Garbage trucks. No one wanted to see this, so an ordinance had been passed that the Garbage workers had to be inside their trucks when eating. One day it had begun to rain, and the Cab of the truck was not large enough for four, so two of the men had crawled into the compactor bed to get out of the rain, when the mechanism malfunctioned and these men were killed. In the ensuing strike, the Garbage Workers wore signs that said simply “I AM A MAN.” Trying to understand where compassion and empathy, and a willingness to enter the breach come from, an EMT named Jack Casey told the story that he had had an abusive childhood with an alcoholic father, where he thought he would never want to help anyone, or care about anyone. Then one day, he was in Surgery, and the Trauma Nurse held his hand saying “Do not be afraid, I will hold your hand, and I will be right here.” When he awoke, sure enough she was still holding his hand. Casey described that there had been occasions as an EMT where his own life was at risk saving others, and what he had repeated to the people he was with was “Do not be afraid, I will hold your hand, and I will be right here.” But the part I am especially intrigued by this evening, is that over the years, you have heard me state repeatedly that context is important. What the Evangelist telling the story is trying to state differently than anyone else has ever stated is their placement of one story against another. Here, we always pay attention to the Parable of the Good Samaritan coming in response to the Lawyer putting Jesus to the test. But also in this same Chapter, Luke describes, “Now as they were on their way, Martha received Jesus into their house, and Mary sat at his feet.” So what do you imagine Mary heard?