Pente V - Year A -- June 15, 2008

The Reverend Robert G. Walker     

I find it very interesting that Matthew wrote over a third of his Gospel narrative about the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ before he ever got around to naming those twelve individuals who were  Christ’s disciples.    But then, maybe naming them wasn’t all that important, because the list in other Gospels has some names in common with these, but not all.  Maybe naming the persons was not nearly so important as naming the mission for which they were called.  “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet,” said Shakespeare, so a mission done by any whose names were obscure would still be the mission.

Matthew calls these people “apostles,” but elsewhere they are referred to as “disciples.”  The word “disciple” comes from a word that means “student.”  They were still in the best seminary of all when they were studying at the feet of Christ Himself.  But they were also called “apostles,” both here and elsewhere in the writings of St. Paul.  The word “apostle” comes from  words that mean “sent forth,” and that truly defines the tasks that were theirs.  And I firmly believe that it is a transgenerational task, because it is our task, too.

I’m possibly playing a little loose with a word here, but bear with me.  When we were baptized, we were ordained into a ministry of sharing  the Good News about Christ’s sacrifice on our behalf on Calvary’s Cross, and sharing about  His being raised from the dead to give us the promise of eternal life in Him.   And, that IS Good News, and it needs to be shared with the whole world.  It’s a bit like the child who said to her mother, “Mama, Jesus is struck on that Cross.  How do we get Him unstuck?”  We get Him unstuck by being His hands and His voice and His messengers.  That’s what Christ laid before His disciples who were to be His apostles in what we know as the Great Commission of Matthew 28:  Go to the ends of the earth, baptizing in the Name of the Triune God, and we also have the promise of His being with us for all of eternity.  In the 5^th chapter of Romans, in the lesson appointed for today, Paul reminds us that “…while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”  Those are comfortable words, to borrow a phrase.

But so what?  Is that all there is to this Christian life, knowing that God has loved us beyond measure, and that we have all sorts of assurances that that love continues even beyond our imaginary limits?  I don’t think so.  We are receivers of God’s love and all that that brings to us, yes.  But we are also called to be givers.  We give out of gratitude for that love that we have received, and I’m not talking just about money.  But sometimes, we have to be reminded that we are called to be givers, because sometimes our own personal agenda gets in the way.

One thing that seems to have a lot of commonality in Episcopal prayers in diverse places is the clause, “…and keep us ever mindful of the needs of others.”   That’s a really powerful phrase, because it can open so many doors for us.  We can look around our own community and see that there are homeless people and hungry  people and people who have no hope right here in our own neighborhoods.  We may even see that there are people around us here who are suffering from various degrees of stress and who could use an arm around their shoulder.  We here at Holy Comforter have more than filled an ark for the Heifer Project because of our concern for people in other parts of the world who are suffering some of the same things that we can see right here in Alamance County.  Yes, the doors are opened wide when we ask God to keep us mindful of the needs of others.  Sometimes, we might not want all of those doors to be open, but they are, nevertheless.  But are the needs only physical? 

Let me tell you about Terrell.  This is a story that I heard told by Pastor Larry King, the former Lutheran campus pastor at Bowling Green State University in Ohio, so I can’t take credit for it.  The story is set in about 1950 or so.  Terrell was a strapping young man of about 23, but he had a rather severe learning disability, so that he had the mental capacity of about a 4 or 5 year old.  Terrell lived with his mother, a “single mom” in today’s jargon.  His mother was a hard-working waitress in a small restaurant that was located not too many miles from their home.  While Terrell was limited, he nevertheless was able be at home alone during the day, and he wasn’t in school.

Their home was on the outskirts of town, and it was located on a straight stretch of road that had a T-intersection right in front of the house.  The road that formed the T-intersection, though, began at the top of a high hill, and it ran down through curves and then joined the straight road down below.  That geography plays a major role in the story, because the road from the top of the hill to the bottom was an ideal place for kids who rode bicycles to have the ride of their lives.  And that happened with some frequency.

There were two boys, Billy and John, who would regularly ride down that hill with the wind in their faces, and their hearts really pumping with excitement.  But Billy and John also had a personal agenda, and it wasn’t a very nice one.  It was an agenda that tried to make fun of large but handicapped and childlike Terrell.  Sometimes children can be cruel, and we all know that. 

I’m sure we have some former smokers here who are old enough to remember when Lucky Strike cigarettes had a sales campaign that simply used letters.  They were “LSMFT,” which was an acronym for “Lucky Strike Means Fine Tobacco.”  When Billy and John would ride their bicycles down the hill, as they got close to the T-intersection in front of Terrell’s house, they would shout as loudly as they could, “LSMFT,” but their meaning of the acronym was “Lord, Save Me From Terrell.”  The boys would usually ride down the hill in the afternoon after they had gotten home from school. 

One Friday, though, the teachers had a workday, so there was no school.  Billy and John decided that they would ride down the hill and shout their LSMFTs in the morning.  With no school, they might even be able to do it several times that day, and each time, they would make fun of Terrell.  It must be said that they were a bit afraid of Terrell, because he was large, and if he caught them, they didn’t know what he might do.  Something else that they hadn’t counted on this Friday was the fact that there was other traffic at this time of day.  That made a real and unexpected difference.

Billy and John started their descent.  As they picked up speed, their excitement increased.  Down and down they went, adjusting to the curves, and having the time of their lives.  Just as they approached the bottom of the hill and began to make their turn onto the straight road, what should they see but the mailman on his bicycle moving along right where they needed to be.  A major crash was imminent, unless they did something, so they both steered into Terrell’s front yard and into some bushes that were there.

Fortunately, the bushes stopped them without incident, and the postman was spared, but as Billy and John began to pick themselves up, there was Terrell, standing over them like a giant.  They were very afraid, until they heard Terrell say, “I knew you’d come.  I knew you’d come.   My mom told me what the letters mean.”  That statement added to Billy and John’s fears, because they knew the letters for them stood for “Lord, Save Me From Terrell.”  So Billy, rather tenuously, asked, “What did your mom say?”  And Terrell said, “She told me that they stood for ‘Let’s Stop and Make Friends with Terrell.’”

Are others’ needs only physical?  Is it possible that naming the mission is more important than naming those who will carry out the mission, because we have all been called by name and claimed by God in our baptism.  What does our gratitude for the Good News of the gospel call us to do? 

Amen.