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Calvary
Episcopal Church
Memphis, Tennessee
June
24, 2001
The Third Sunday After Pentecost
Who Do You Say That I Am?
The Rev. G. LaRue Downing
Gospel:
Luke 8:26-39
(This
sermon is also available in audio.)
Before
this week, none of us, I would guess, had ever heard of Andrea Yates,
the thirty-six-year-old mother in Houston -- such a tragic, overwhelming,
unspeakable act of violence against those children. Yet, it is not just
the death of those children that is so overwhelming; it's that Andrea
Yates and her family could be right here in our midst.
Do we have
the courage? Do we have the kind of care and compassion, the kind of creative
silence, that will allow us to hear even the words that are not spoken?
The words of despair and hopelessness -- words that reach for community
-- words that yearn for relationship.
Behind everything
that we do, I want to suggest, is this question, this pregnant question,
this eternal question, this timeless question that Jesus asks us today:
"Who do you say that I am?"
Most of you
are probably familiar with the wristband or the necklace or the bumper
sticker that has the phrase, "WWJD." What would Jesus do? I've
always been uncomfortable with that phrase. I don't mean to offend, for
some of you may have it on your very wrists this morning, but I want to
suggest that the question leads us to only half of the truth. What would
Jesus do is an important, historical, didactic kind of question, but it
is not the question. I would suggest that we move from the exterior
(What would Jesus do?) to the interior, with the question this morning:
"What do you say about Jesus?" Not just what he would do, but
ask, "What would I do in response to the Jesus, the God of this community?
What if Andrea
Yates had been a part of our church school, or with our youth group on
the trip to Chicago? Do we ask the question? Can we allow the kind of
room to explore in depth who this Jesus is? "Who do you say that
I am?"
A piece of
poetry that I read recently points in the direction that I am trying to
go, and raises the question I am asking for us this morning. The poem
is titled, "It Does Not Interest Me," and it was written by
Oriah Mountain, Dreamer, Indian Elder. Here are a few excerpts:
It doesn't
interest me what you do for a living.
I want to know what you ache for, and
if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing....
I want to know if you can sit with pain,...
I want to know if you can be with joy,...
I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine,
and still stand on the edge of a lake and shout to the silver of the full
moon, "Yes."...
It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have...
I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.
If
Andrea Yates or Tim McVeigh had been a part of our community and asked
you, "What sustains you from the inside when all else fails?"
What would you have answered? Whatever event or tragedy of hopelessness
and helplessness has lodged in your mind, ask yourself that question.
What
I want to suggest is the degree to which we pay attention to the question
that Jesus asks us this morning: "Who do you say that I am?"
The degree to which we can ask that question over and over and listen,
listen to the question behind the words or listen to the question behind
the silence. "Who do you say that I am?" "I want to know
what sustains you from the inside when all else fails." Let that
question be your companion as we pray and sing and laugh and cry in this
community, Calvary Church.
And
now under God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit,
be ascribed as is most justly due all majesty, dominion and power,
this day and evermore. Amen.
Copyright
2001 Calvary Episcopal Church
Gospel:
Luke 8:26-39
Then they
arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. As
he stepped out on land, a man of the city who had demons met him. For
a long time he had worn no clothes, and he did not live in a house but
in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he fell down before him and shouted at
the top of his voice, "What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the
Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me"-- for Jesus had commanded
the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For many times it had seized
him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he
would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds.) Jesus
then asked him, "What is your name?" He said, "Legion"; for many demons
had entered him. They begged him not to order them to go back into the
abyss. Now there on the hillside a large herd of swine was feeding; and
the demons begged Jesus to let them enter these. So he gave them permission.
Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd
rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned. When the swineherds
saw what had happened, they ran off and told it in the city and in the
country. Then people came out to see what had happened, and when they
came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone sitting
at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid.
Those who had seen it told them how the one who had been possessed by
demons had been healed. Then all the people of the surrounding country
of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with
great fear. So he got into the boat and returned. The man from whom the
demons had gone begged that he might be with him; but Jesus sent him away,
saying, "Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you."
So he went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done
for him. NRSV
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