Questioning Faith....

This week I was invited to speak at our local United Methodist Church as part of their Lenten worship series. I love these people - and there’s a really fabulous soup and dessert lunch after the service - so I said Yes.

And then I struggled with what to say, and how to say it. We were barely three days into a new war, dropping bombs and (many of us) struggling to make sense of what we were hearing and the images we were seeing.

I’ve identified as Christian since childhood. I cherish the teachings of Jesus, and I love the way he sees and forgives and includes and liberates and inspires and empowers. I’m steeped in the liturgy and hymnody of the church, and I’m grateful that they’re lodged in my very cells.

And…. And I struggle.

I struggle with the ways we Christians take shots at each other because of the ways we interpret scripture or authority or justice. I struggle with my own personal doubts and questions alongside my unquenchable thirst for the love that Jesus embodies.

I struggle with institutional stubbornness and bureaucracy. I struggle with systems that claim to follow the Prince of Peace while oppressing or excluding or bombing human beings.

I don’t wear a cross anymore because I don’t want to be mistaken for a Christian Nationalist. And I struggle with the fact that I struggle with that.

I struggle with grief and loneliness and hope and sometimes people make me want to throw things and drink a lot and use all the words I can’t say in polite company.

I struggle, more than a little bit, to know how to pray.

I used to think I understood faith and prayer and hope and justice - but now I struggle.

Which makes preaching hard. And important.

So, this week, I pushed my conflicted self into the pulpit and shared this story from the gospel attributed to Mark. It’s about two people who struggled a long time ago, and what happened when they both found themselves in the presence of Jesus, hoping for a miracle.

You can read one translation here: Mark 5:21-43

Confession: I don’t really like crowds – but I love people‑watching. Airports and train stations are fascinating to me: people coming and going, hurried and worried or excited and eager, some alone, some with others. Some look lost and confused; some look confident and cool. And I should tell you, my super‑power is eavesdropping. I love listening to bits of other people’s conversations in busy places. And I love stories that invite us to gawk and eavesdrop, and the Bible is full of these.

This story unfolds when a big crowd gathers at the lakeside in Galilee - a people-watcher’s dream.

A huge crowd comes out to see Jesus, curious, intrigued – they’ve heard about this guy - who calms storms, feeds multitudes, casts out demons. Some might be hoping to hear something profound; some, I suspect, just want to see what happens next.

But then two people show up – for them it’s about life‑or‑death.

There’s a man called Jairus – and there’s a woman, unnamed – and you’d think they have nothing in common. They’re at opposite ends of the social and religious community. The man has a big title and an important position; the woman has no name, no title – only a “condition”, a 12-year hemorrhage.

Jairus is a ruler in the synagogue, a religious authority with position, power, and prestige. He’s used to people listening to him, meeting his needs, getting things done. Jairus is “the man,” and everyone knows it. His 12-year old daughter is dying.

And then there’s this woman – nameless, faceless, with no status except “unwanted.” Everyone thinks they know where she belongs: “not here.” She’s been hemorrhaging for twelve years- four thousand three hundred and eighty days – as long as Jairus’s daughter has been alive. Twelve years of pain, exclusion, and isolation. She has spent everything on doctors and is worse, not better. She has no position, no power, no voice, no one to meet her needs.

And listen, it’s a dark kind of desperate to go to every doctor you can find, and not figure out what’s wrong. It’s terrifying and it’s lonely, and it destroys your resources and your energy and your hope. And then you can’t even be part of your community anymore. She’s banned, and silenced. She’s grasping, literally, for a thread of hope.

Jairus, on the other hand, has everything – except the thing that matters most. His little girl is dying, and all his power and influence can’t save her. So he does something a man of his status would never do: he falls at the feet of Jesus, he begs for help.

And if we even just skim the gospels we can surmise that Jairus probably doesn’t even like Jesus. The synagogue rulers weren’t really fans of this radical rabbi who kept insisting that God’s love is for everyone, this idealistic woke preacher who kept including the people they were used to excluding. The crowd might have expected an altercation, but no, - they watch a powerful man drop to his knees in desperation.

I’m guessing things got really quiet.

Here’s where the powerful man and the invisible woman show us – all of us – our common ground.

Yes, most of us have free will, we have personal agency, we have resources and connections and tenacity and maybe even a deep and certain faith. And - big and - sometimes, a lot of times, that’s not enough.

This powerful man and this silent woman show us a universal truth: sometimes – and more than we want to confess, we’re not in control.

Some of us have been Jairus. No matter how strong or successful or smart or connected or significant we are, when someone we love is suffering, we can’t fix it. We sit by hospital beds, or watch someone we love struggle with addiction, or a broken relationship, or a collapsed business. And we would do anything to make it better, but we can’t. All we can do is whisper is “If only… if only.”

Some of us might resonate with this woman’s story: the long seasons of pain or depression or grief, the isolation, the sense of being invisible, silenced, pushed to the margins. We long for someone to see us, to touch us, to say, “You matter.” We, too, whisper: “If only…”

Most of us, at one time or another, have been both. We’ve had seasons of despair, fear, and loneliness. We carry wounds or worries we can’t solve or fix by ourselves. And we’ve all loved someone who’s run out of options.

The simple reality is, like both of them, like everyone really -we’re limited. We’re limited and we’re vulnerable, and we live in a culture of making things happen – but we can’t always do that. We’re deeply in need of help beyond ourselves.

But here’s the good news: When we finally admit that we’re made in the image of God but we’re not God, something holy can happen.

For a long time, I thought this passage was about having enough faith – digging deep and mustering enough courage to approach Jesus, like Jairus does, like the woman does. If we just have enough faith, if we pray right prayer, then everything will turn out all right. And sometimes, it does. But sometimes it doesn’t.

In these last several years, especially, I’ve witnessed and experienced something deeper, more mysterious. The sacred truth is this, these words we said so clearly on Ash Wednesday: From dust we are created and to dust we will return.

Things don’t always turn out like they do in this story. Sometimes children die. Or illness lingers. Relationships don’t always mend. The hemorrhage doesn’t always stop. Not everyone gets the miracle. None of the people in this ancient story are still here.

So what, then, is healing? What is this story about?

Yes, the woman is cured of her bleeding, but that’s not where it ends. Jesus sees her, touches her, honors her; he calls her “Daughter.” He returns her to the community and restores her dignity. That’s far more than a cure; that is healing. That’s what love does.

Healing is more than curing. Curing is great - when the disease is gone, the problem solved, the crisis over. Ah, but the cure is always temporary. Healing – healing is when we accept that, even in our weakness, even in our hardest moments, we’re seen, we’re loved, we’re not alone. Healing is what happens when love reaches out and touches our deepest fear and our darkest shame and says, “You belong. You’re mine. And I love you.”

In this story, Jaiurus’ little girl is cured, she’s alive, and look at how tenderly Jesus does this. He takes her by the hand. He speaks to her in her own language: “Little girl, get up.” And then he tells them to give her something to eat. It’s more than a miracle; it’s an act of grace-filled, ordinary love.

I think if we asked Jairus and the woman at the end of that day what had changed, they wouldn’t just shrug and say, “Yeah, we got what we wanted.” I think they’d tell us that something changed, fundamentally. Jesus changed them. He changed their hearts, their sense of who they were, their understanding of God, the way they see other people now.

He showed them a love that does more than fix things; he made them whole. That’s what love does.

What if, this Lenten season - maybe even every season? - we let this story tell us the truth about ourselves and about God – that we are all, in different ways, weak, needy, broken, lost, ashes and dust – and that God meets us right here, exactly as we are - not to test us or interrogate us or shame us, but to embrace us - and claim us?

What if this isn’t a story about spectacular cures, but about a quiet, steady love that holds us when there is no cure? A love that walks with us through surgery and through hospice, through relapse and recovery, through depression and doubt. A love that may not change our circumstances but always changes us – to make us more tender, more compassionate, more like Jesus. Because that’s what love does.

This is the divine love the prophet Isaiah describes, speaking on behalf of Yahweh: “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name; you are mine… When you pass through the waters, I will be with you… You are precious and honored in my sight, and I love you.”

The gospel, the good news, is that we’re more broken and helpless than we dare admit, and we’re more loved than we ever dared to dream or hope, more than we can imagine.

And when we know this, when we let this form us, we learn to see differently – to see ourselves and other people as God sees us. We start to see ourselves in the powerful and in the invisible. We discover that we’re called to be part of this – to be involved in how God heals the world – by making sacred space for those who have been pushed to the margins, and by finding compassion even for those who seem to have it all.

What if, this Lent, instead of the traditional giving something up, or in addition to it -- we give ourselves – our hearts, our attention, our time, our kindness, and our resources?

What if we fell on our knees, confessed our brokenness, and let God be God?

Because here is the good news: Love is here, now – in this room, in this moment, out there in this messy broken and beautiful world – a love reaching for you, for me, for all of us — whether we feel powerful or powerless, faithful or faithless. That love may not always fix what hurts us. But it can heal us. It can make us whole – not perfect, not immortal, but wholly loved, wholly held, wholly accepted. Holy. That’s what love does.

If only. If only we would let ourselves be loved. If only we would let that love turn us into people who live and love like that.

Sometimes we don’t even know what to ask - but the Love that created us knows what we need.

Maybe we can even learn to be generous in sharing that love kind of love with others. Because that’s what love does.