"Easy Answers" | The Rev. Heidi Thorsen | October 3, 2021

“Easy Answers”

Sermon Preached: Sunday, October 3, 2021 at Trinity on the Green

Proper 22, Year B: Genesis 2:18-24 | Psalm 8 | Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:5-12 | Mark 10:2-16

May I speak in the name of God, who is to us Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

I usually don’t show all my cards at the beginning of a sermon. I am going to break that rule today, and tell you a few things straight out. First: this is a sermon about divorce - because it is hard to read a passage like the one from the Gospel of Mark today without acknowledging the elephant in the room. Jesus speaks out against divorce, telling his disciples, “whatever God has joined together, let no one separate.” And yet, it is also true that many of us are impacted by divorce in deeply personal ways. Some of you are divorced, or have a loved one who is. Some of you, like me, might be the children of divorced parents. In my case, I would like to add that my dad, once an ordained Methodist minister, had his ordination revoked because of these exact Bible verses that we read today. These are the cards that I carry into the room, as we approach this text together.

I also have  another card up my sleeve, and that is the card that says, in big bold letters, “October is Stewardship Month!” And so, on some level, I will also be talking about stewardship today. In other words, I will not only be talking about the complicated topic of divorce, I will also be talking about the very complicated topic of how we spend our money.

Welcome to my sermon today! And welcome to Trinity on the Green!

I say these words somewhat ironically. And yet I also believe, from the bottom of my heart, that it is the calling of the church to be a place where we can talk about difficult subjects - including divorce, including financial issues. Jesus never turned to his disciples and said: “stop talking about difficult things!” Instead Jesus rebuked them for wanting to avoid difficult conversations, as we read about a few weeks ago in Mark Chapter 9. Jesus is constantly reminding his disciples - and us - that we have to be ready to have difficult conversations. We can’t ignore the complicated realities that we face every day. Instead we have to see them, we have to name them, and we have to support one another as we face these realities.

Now, as human beings, we don’t like complicated. We would prefer for things to be straightforward; simple. Perhaps that is another reason, beyond trying to test Jesus, that the Pharisees ask this deceptively simple question: “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” Based on the structure of this question, we might think the answer could be a simple “yes” or “no.” Instead, Jesus defies a simple binary. He responds first by asking a question in return, and then continues by referencing a story - the story of Adam and Eve in the Book of Genesis - as an ideal that people might aspire to. Jesus concludes his recap of the story with these well known words, “What God has joined together, let no one separate.”

For people who are more familiar with that Genesis story (which we read in part today), we know that sometimes things which were meant to be together are, indeed, separated. I’m not talking about Adam and Eve, who stay together throughout the story. Instead I am talking about the relationship between Adam and Eve, and the Garden. Human beings and the Garden were not meant to be separated. Humans were meant to live in the Garden - to till it and to keep it. And yet, sometimes things don’t go as planned. Adam and Eve are forced to leave the Garden, because they couldn’t abide by a simple “yes” or “no” commandment; and they leave the Garden into a world where there are very few simple “yes” or “no” answers. That is the world that we live in.

Jesus points towards this story of Adam and Eve as his answer to the question about divorce, as if to challenge the Pharisees’ binary view of the world. He does not say “yes” or “no” to the question. Instead, Jesus alludes to a story and challenges them to think more deeply.

Nevertheless, we human beings long for simple answers. It’s not just the Pharisees who are infected by this longing for simplicity; even the disciples want a clear answer. A little while later, after Jesus’ encounter with the Pharisees, the disciples approach Jesus in private to ask again about divorce. Clearly, they were not happy with the answer the first time around. Jesus gives them a different answer this time - one that seems even more definitive. He says, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.” These are harsh words - words that seem to come down hard on those who seek out a divorce, for whatever reason. And yet it’s important to note that Jesus - still - does not offer a simple “yes” or “no” answer. There is room, even in this, for further questions. There is room for asking, “what is adultery?” “What is marriage in the first place?” There is room for further conversation and different varieties of lived experience, if only the disciples kept the conversation going.

Jesus wants to move the disciples beyond a kind of “yes” or “no” mentality. I think that is why Jesus does something completely unexpected next - something that seems completely unrelated to their previous conversation, but is absolutely related to the kind of mindset Jesus wants to inspire in his disciples. 

The story continues like this: people around the disciples start bringing little children to Jesus, in order that he might touch them. The disciples are taken aback by this development, and speak sternly to them. It’s clear that the disciples are still striving for a world of clear-cut “yes” and “no,” a straightforward world with clear boundaries. Instead, Jesus chides the disciples for their narrowmindedness. “Let the little children come to me,” he says, “for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.

I love this passage, which feels like a breath of fresh air after all that prickly conversation about divorce. And I also love how Jesus teaches his disciples in this moment about the kind of simplicity that faith requires. 

Faith is not about “yes” and “no” questions; a black-and-white worldview; or simple answers. That is the kind of simplicity that the Pharisees and the disciples gravitate towards, and yet that kind of simplicity that is anathema to faith. That kind of simplicity belies the more complicated nature of the world that we live in.

And yet there is another kind of simplicity that is essential to faith. It is the kind of simplicity that we see most clearly in children. The kind of simplicity that is life distilled, rooted in curiosity and devotion. The kind of simplicity that is open to growth and change. It is the kind of simplicity that doesn’t accept simple answers, but like a child who questions their parent, continually asks why, how, what if, why? Jesus says, “Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” This is the kind of simplicity that helps us draw near to God - not the simplicity of easy answers, but the simplicity of growth and openness to change.

This Stewardship Season, as you consider what you might give towards our mission here at Trinity and the church beyond these walls, I invite you to consider what kind of church you are giving to. We are not the church of easy answers, straightforward rules, or clear-cut salvation. We are a church of holy questions; a church of mutual support; a church that seeks the kingdom of God not only in the future but also in the present, here and now. That is what we aspire to be, because that is what I believe Jesus taught his disciples. 

For example, I don’t believe that Jesus taught his disciples that divorce was unequivocally bad. Instead, I believe that Jesus taught his disciples that divorce is a very serious thing. I believe that Jesus taught us to use our whole minds and our whole hearts, whenever we make serious decisions about our relationships with each other. And I believe that Jesus teaches us to tend well those gifts that we have been given, including the gifts of our hearts. That is what good stewardship looks like, in the most personal way.

I encourage you to approach this Stewardship Season with an attitude of simplicity. Not the simplicity that demands clear answers, or a specific rule on what exact percentage of your income you should give. Instead, approach this Stewardship Season with the simplicity of a child. Approach it with wonder and curiosity about what God might grow in our hearts. Approach it with an openness to growth. When we approach the kingdom of God with the spirit of a child, we will surely be blessed.

I’d like to conclude with one of my favorite blessings - a Franciscan blessing (appropriate for this Sunday so close to St. Francis Day!). It may be familiar to some of you. I offer these words as a blessing for our whole church this morning:

May God bless us with a restless discomfort about easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships, so that we may seek the truth boldly and love deep within our hearts.

May God bless us with holy anger at injustice, oppression, and the exploitation of people, so that we may work daily for justice, freedom, and peace.

May God bless us with the gift of tears to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, or the loss of what they cherish, so that we may reach out our hands to comfort them and transform their pain into joy.

And may God bless us with enough foolishness to believe that we really can make a difference in this world, so that we are able to do, with God’s grace, what others claim cannot be done. Amen.