Sermon Seeds: Belonging

Sunday, September 29, 2024
Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost | Year B
(Liturgical Color: Green)

Lectionary Citations
Esther 7:1-6, 9-10; 9:20-22 and Psalm 124 OR • Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29 and Psalm 19:7-14 • James 5:13-20 • Mark 9:38-50
https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts/?z=p&d=77&y=382

Focus Scripture: Mark 9:38-50
Focus Theme: Belonging
Series: Here I Am…Deconstructing (Click here for the series overview.)

Reflection
By Cheryl A. Lindsay

Gatekeepers show up everywhere. They may function as security and protection as they bar those who threaten the safety of those within their boundaries. They may serve as hospitality, ensuring that participants know where they are going and when they should be there. Gatekeepers also maintain standards ensuring adequate preparation and accountability measures are in place for access to positions of responsibility and power.

No one wants to take a flight with a pilot that has not been tested for aptitude and fitness. Physicians, educators, and lawyers among other professions must be certified and licensed to work in individual states even if they have demonstrated competency through educational credentials. Athletes must meet certain medical standards in order to compete. Gatekeeping can help establish trust and promote positive outcomes, establish and solidify effective structures and assignments, and foster accountability and effective practices.

And, gatekeepers may become overzealous. Those charged with moderating power can become enamored of the power they wield and weaponize it for their own purposes. Those who hold others to account may forget that they too are subject to the helpful limits and necessary boundaries that facilitate good relational dynamics. The teacher who bullies their classroom, the police officer who thinks they are above the law, and the preacher who projects their preferences rather than proclaim the gospel provide just a few examples of the abuse of power to demean, demote, and damage those vulnerable to the gatekeeper’s influence.

Then there are self-appointed gatekeepers who take it upon themselves to preserve boundaries, lines, and boxes beyond their responsibility, authority, or expertise. They seek power they do not have over others who often have even less. The self-appointed neighborhood watch person who minds everyone’s business but their own comes to mind. The people who call the police because someone is doing something that makes them uncomfortable, even if that is simply existing, provides another example of out of control gatekeeping. Some take on the mantle of gatekeeping by claiming individual ownership of common resources like a preferred seat on Sunday morning, arbitrary criteria for leadership, and manufactured stories that stereotype entire people groups.

While the gospel narrative offers a powerful example of the lure of gatekeeping for the early disciples, perhaps societal stances toward immigration provide one of the strongest contemporary realities of gatekeeping as a force for evil. The recent demonization of Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio has wrought a devastating impact based on repeated lies for political gain. The truth is that, like many small cities in the Midwest and particularly in Ohio, Springfield invited the Haitian immigrants to settle there for their mutual benefit. The town received an injection of a new labor force to meet the needs of the private manufacturing sector, and the people received economic opportunity. Both benefit and the entire community flourishes.

But some gatekeepers seek to block the truth most of all. That’s impetus for banning books, for questioning the veracity and integrity of our elections, and for lying about Haitian immigrants in particular and immigration from regions south of the United States in general. Gatekeepers often use fear as the strongest fence by “othering” difference rather than celebrating it as the intentional and purposeful gift of God.

The disciples’ concern about someone they do not know casting out demons seems inexplicable…except gatekeeping. My sister is a physician, and often when there are large gatherings like a conference or public performance, someone may have a medical emergency. The call comes for a doctor, nurse or EMT to assist. Her professional code and personal commitments oblige her to respond. I’ve witnessed her respond to crises caused by everything from simple fatigue to a stroke. Rarely is she the only one, so those who come forward do a quick survey to determine who is the most qualified to lead at that moment. That is effective and helpful. Every so often, someone will try to limit who comes forward before they have a chance to ascertain the situation or the skills needed to address them. That’s the worst of gatekeeping. For the person who has a crisis desperately needs help not power struggles hindering their recovery.

The person who needs deliverance does not care if the disciples have approved of the one who facilitates their liberation. Imagine trying to stop someone from being restored? John even notes that the person casting out demons did so in the name of Jesus. In other words, this person was effective in doing what Jesus was training them to do when they were not; therefore, they must be stopped—the worst of gatekeeping. Jesus quickly corrects their gatekeeping impulse:

The question of how broadly to tolerate those who labor “in Jesus’s name” is elaborated in response to John’s blunt declaration: “Teacher, we saw a certain man casting out demons in your name, and we forbade him, because he does not follow you” (9:38). At the level of first-degree narrative, the reference may simply be to believers who do not belong to the Markan community, or to non-Christian wonder-workers, who, like the sons of Sceva, used the name of Jesus to perform exorcisms (Acts 19:11–20). Again Jesus’s reply expresses opposition to the kind of narrow construal of who Jesus’s “followers” are, as exemplified by the Twelve: “Do not forbid him. For no one who performs power in my name is also able to speak evil of me; for whoever is not against us is for us. For whoever gives you a cup of water in [my] name because you belong to the messiah, amen I say to you will not lose his reward” (9:39–41). The inclusivism of Mark 9:40—“whoever is not against us is for us”—is inverted in Q: “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters” (Matt. 12:30; Luke 11:23; however, cf. Luke 9:49–50, which preserves Mark’s inclusivism). There is an added layer of irony in the disciples’ disdain for the unknown exorcist’s activities in the light of their own failure to exorcise the boy with a deaf-and-dumb demon in 9:14–29 (cf. Boring 2006, 282). The pericope is reminiscent of the instructions on how to treat Christian visitors in the Didache, an ancient book of church order (ca. AD 100), which contains lengthy instructions on such matters and illustrates the kinds of issues facing the traveling missionaries of Mark’s time, as well as the question of how to deal with believers unfamiliar to the community.
Mary Ann Beavis

The way of Jesus is acceptance and expansive welcome. That’s belonging. We’re so used to gatekeeping that creates obstacles to entry that the simplicity of belonging to the kindom can be confounding.

I frequent a personal care service provider (spa) that has recently implemented a membership option for discounted services. The only condition is that you have to schedule at least one service in each calendar month to maintain your membership. On my first visit after the new program was put in place, the owner asked if I understood it. I said yes, but my only question was did I need to sign up for it. No, he replied, you just have to show up.

The kindom of God belongs to all who show up for it. If you don’t oppose it, Jesus insists, you are part of it. And Jesus, who also claimed, “I am the Gate” should know.

Here we are deconstructing…belonging.

Reflection from Voices of People of African Descent
The 33rd General Synod adopted a Resolution to Recognize the United Nations International Decade for People of African Descent (2015-2024). As part of its implementation, Sermon and Weekly Seeds offers Reflection from Voices of People of African Descent related to the season or overall theme for additional consideration in sermon preparation and for individual and congregational study.
Through giving to each other we learn how to experience mutuality. To heal the gender war rooted in struggles for power, women and men choose to make mutuality the basis of their bond, ensuring that each person’s growth matters and is nurtured. It enhances our power to know joy. In A Heart As Wide As the World, Sharon Salzberg reminds us: “The practice of generosity frees us from the sense of isolation that arises from clinging and attachment.” Cultivating a generous heart, which is, as Salzberg writes, “the primary quality of an awakened mind,” strengthens romantic bonds. Giving is the way we also learn how to receive. The mutual practice of giving and receiving is an everyday ritual when we know true love. A generous heart is always open, always ready to receive our going and coming. In the midst of such love we need never fear abandonment. This is the most precious gift true love offers—the experience of knowing we always belong.
Giving is healing to the spirit. We are admonished by spiritual tradition to give gifts to those who would know love. Love is an action, a participatory emotion. Whether we are engaged in a process of self-love or of loving others we must move beyond the realm of feeling to actualize love. This is why it is useful to see love as a practice. When we act, we need not feel inadequate or powerless; we can trust that there are concrete steps to take on love’s path. We learn to communicate, to be still and listen to the needs of our hearts, and we learn to listen to others. We learn compassion by being willing to hear the pain, as well as the joy, of those we love. The path to love is not arduous or hidden, but we must choose to take the first step. If we do not know the way, there is always a loving spirit with an enlightened, open mind able to show us how to take the path that leads to the heart of love, the path that lets us return to love.
— Bell Hooks, All About Love: New Visions

For Further Reflection
“We are all strangers in a strange land, longing for home, but not quite knowing what or where home is. We glimpse it sometimes in our dreams, or as we turn a corner, and suddenly there is a strange, sweet familiarity that vanishes almost as soon as it comes.” ― Madeleine L’Engle
“Perhaps home is not a place but simply an irrevocable condition.” ― James Baldwin
“That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you’re not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong.” ― F. Scott Fitzgerald

Works Cited
Beavis, Mary Ann. Mark (Paideia: Commentaries on the New Testament). Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011.

Suggested Congregational Response to the Reflection
This sermon series invites us to explore the call to Christian discipleship and to examine our response. Consider the gatekeeping that occurs within your faith community and develop a path forward that facilitates belonging.

The Rev. Dr. Cheryl A. Lindsay, Minister for Worship and Theology (lindsayc@ucc.org), also serves a local church pastor, public theologian, and worship scholar-practitioner with a particular interest in the proclamation of the word in gathered communities. You’re invited to share your reflections on this text in the comments on our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/SermonSeeds.

A Bible study version of this reflection is at Weekly Seeds.