Got Backbone?

The story is told that the famed fictional detective Sherlock Holmes and his somewhat bumbling sidekick Watson went on a camping trip.  They had retired for the night when this conversation ensued.  Holmes says, “Watson, look up, what do you see?”

Watson replies:  “I see a fantastic panorama of countless stars.”

Holmes inquires:  “And what does that tell you Watson?”

Watson answers: If I were an astronomer, I would deduce there are millions of galaxies and potentially billions of planets. It seems reasonable that intelligent life may exist out there.

If I were an astrologist, I would observe that the planet Saturn is in the constellation of Leo.      As a keeper of time, I would determine that it is approximately a quarter past three in the morning.If I were a theologian, I would surmise that God is a great and intelligent creator who fills the heavens with glories untold. If I looked with the eyes of a meteorologist, I would predict that the black sky combined with the low humidity portends a beautiful day tomorrow. What does it tell you, Mr. Holmes?

Holmes replies: Watson, you fool, once again you have missed the obvious -- someone has stolen our tent!

Indeed, it’s not as easy as it may seem to recognize the obvious, to observe that which is before our eyes, and make connections to things evident.One reality that the gospels make abundantly clear is that the historical figure of Jesus had a profound influence and a lasting effect on people. People of all walks of life who encountered him were never the same again.  Their lives were changed.  And true it is to this day.  True it is to this day.

I believe that’s the obvious lesson in the gospel stories, the incidences where Jesus heals -- the giving of sight to the blind, the exorcism of demons, the restoration of leprous flesh, the loosening of tongues that could not speak, and ears that could not hear – were ancient ways of saying that Jesus not only preached a good sermon, but brought lasting transformation to people’s lives.

She appears in the local synagogue, as if from nowhere.  Luke says, “just then,” as if suddenly, mysteriously, from the dark shadows, from the corner pew behind the stone column she appears.  No one much notices her, no one pays her attention.  The ushers didn’t see her come in. 

We don’t know here name. She may have been a Gertie or a Lizzy, an Anna or an Abigail, but we don’t know.  Was she married, single, a widow?  Was she a childless woman or a mother of many?    

And what caused her to become bent over and unable to stand up straight?  What caused her affliction?  Was it a delayed congenital defect, a bad gene inherited from her mother or father’s side?  Or was her disfigurement caused by movement related to repetitious labor, the kind of affliction that arrives after years of bending over to wash her family’s clothes, or the clothes of her neighbors that she took in to makes ends meet?  Or did she suffer from decades of harvesting crops that grew close to the ground?  Or was she bent over simply because she was a woman in a man’s world?  Or perhaps she was bent over because of the rocks the children threw in her direction.  Or maybe she was bent over because of the weight of a heavy emotional burden that she alone had to bear. Whatever the cause of her condition, it was not going to be cured with a couple aspirin and a heating pad.         

Many questions, but no answers.  It seems likely that people knew her simply by her condition, by her affliction, rather than by her person.  Without stretching the point, we could conclude that she was what others said she was.  Deformed.  Crippled.  Challenged.  Someone to be pitied, slighted, ignored, written off.  She wore the label that others chose to pin on her.

Labels do come in handy, don’t they?  Labels help us to manage life.  Labels facilitate mental organization.  If I can draw lines around people and put them in boxes, then life begins to make sense.  I can confidently order and arrange the world.

If I can call her an alcoholic or nothing more than a drunk; if I can think of him as shiftless and lazy and a good-for-nothing; if I can label someone a redneck or a religious radical, a fundamentalist or a conservative or a liberal then I don’t need to know their name.  I’ve already figured them out by reducing their personhood to a single characteristic.  It could be skin color, or race, or ethnicity.  I can reduce a person to his addiction or to her orientation, to one’s street address or upbringing or job title.      

If as a nation we imagine all Muslims to be terrorists, and if Muslims imagine all Americans to be infidels, then we see no need to know each other beyond those caricatures. If an Israeli can reduce every Arab to being a trespasser on the land of Abraham, and if Arabs can reduce Israelis to being Satan’s occupiers then we’ll never get beyond the mess that is the Middle East today.  

This is the truth of the gospels:  Jesus never summed up an individual by reducing that individual’s personhood.  Jesus connected with people.  When he saw suffering, he saw a suffering person. Jesus had not the slightest inclination to call her by her condition.  Rather, he calls her “a daughter of Abraham.”  

You remember Abraham, the great-great-great granddaddy of Israel.  The one to whom God made extravagant promises: “You shall be a great nation and by you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” Jesus calls her a daughter of Abraham. She’s not a victim anymore and not one who wears the derogatory labels of the world.  Jesus heals her, though I’m not sure how.  For that matter, I’m not sure how Jesus heals anyone. Luke says only that she stood up straight.  For the first time in eighteen years, she threw her shoulders back and could finally reach the top shelf of the kitchen cupboard.  She got backbone.  She got healed.

There’s no mention of her faith or the potency of her prayers.  She didn’t ask to be healed.  She didn’t grab Jesus’ robe as if it were a magical garment.  She didn’t fall at his feet and grab his ankles demanding a cure.

All we can surmise is that in the presence of Godliness, this woman regains her dignity, she finds her full personhood, she is given back her identity, and she no longer has to wear the labels the world pins on her.  She stands up straight.  More than the healing itself, she is made whole. 

I believe that’s the business we’re in, this church, this community of faith.  We are in the healing business.  Every person who walks through those opened bronze doors, every person who finds a place in these oak pews, whether you arrive bent over or hung over, care-free or burdened with cares; whether you have an advanced degree from grad school or you’ve never finished high school; whether you are married or single, gay or straight, partnered or partnerless, we are in the healing business. 

If we need to break the rules from time to time, as Jesus did, and make the determination, as Jesus did, that not every tradition is a sacred one, then we shall do so, boldly, lest we miss the opportunity to offer healing to all who seek it – to all, regardless of color, race, ethnicity, family of origin, background or baggage.

Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay were the first to ascend the 29,035-foot peak of Mount Everest. Since their feat in 1953, over 2,700 climbers have reached the summit of the world’s tallest mountain.  Last year, David Sharp was added to that distinguished list.  The 34-year-old engineer from Cleveland did manage to reach the summit’s peak on his own, however, he ran out of oxygen on the way down.  But that wasn’t the only tragedy.  As he lay dying, forty climbers passed him by. Forty climbers, eager to claim the bragging rights, and too eager to achieve their own goals to take a chance of using up their own oxygen on a stranger passed him by.  David Sharp froze to death.

Even in houses of worship people die for want of the human touch, for want of some attention, for want of healing.  Singer and songwriter, Ken Medema, said it like this:             

If this is not a place where tears are understood,                                                                                  Then where shall I go to cry?                                                                                                                And if this is not a place where my spirit can take wings,                                                                 

Then where shall I go to fly? . .                                                                                                              So if this is not a place where my questions can be asked,                                                                   Then where shall I go to seek?                                                                                                            And if this is not a place where my heart’s cry can be heard,                                                               Then where shall I go to speak?