A sermon on Isaiah 58:9b-14 and Luke 13:10-21 

Some of you may be familiar with the TV show Space Invaders. It is a lifestyle show in which presenters Peter Walsh, Cherie Barber and Lucas Callaghan transform the homes and lives of those who have found themselves in mess and clutter.

I imagine most of us know someone who has trouble letting go of stuff. Who like to keep things just in case. You never know when you might need it. You never know when you might get around to fixing it. You never know when it might have just the part that you need.

Letting go of stuff can be hard.  I know many of you have decided to downsize to an apartment in the past year or more.  Some of you are considering downsizing.  It can be hard when all your furniture, all your ornaments, all your pictures will not fit in a downsized place and that is even if you don’t really have much clutter.

Sometimes we get really invested in our stuff.  Sometimes this translates to the church as well.  No doubt you are aware of congregations who could not part with particular items from their church property.

According to Peter Walsh from Space Invaders “It’s never about the stuff.”  He says “We tell people’s stories, we tease out what’s happening in people’s families, we help people explore why their lives are stuck through their stuff. And people’s stuff has incredible power for good or for ill.”

Let’s explore a scenario:
Imagine your church building is very tiny and there is not a lot of space to move about easily. Your pews are solid oak and were carved by a famous cabinet maker. The pulpit is exquisite and the communion rail and table were given by the mother of the church secretary in memory of her deceased husband. A new family has moved into the community with a severely disabled adult child: they are life-long worshippers and care very tenderly for the child at home. They wish to bring him to church in his very large and complicated wheelchair but there is no place available to put it. Will you get rid of something to allow this young man to worship with you and if so, what?

What is more important the stuff and all the memories and relationships of the past or being a place of welcome, inclusion and the potential for new relationships to be built?

It is not the stuff that is important but the people, the relationships.  Surely, we would better honour the memory of any who contributed to the building and furnishing of a church by being the church than being a museum.

Normanhurst’s multi-purpose worship space indicates those involved in creating this space had a good idea of what really matters.

It is not just physical stuff that can get us stuck unable to move forward. And we can be just as good at justifying why we should not have to let go of things as we are at justify why we should not have to change our ways of doing things and what the right thing to do is. We can be very good at giving reasons why we should not have to make changes.  That others should adapt to the way things are here, the way we do things.  That if they come, they should be like us and do things our way. 

This is not a new problem.  Take our gospel reading for example. Have you ever wondered why Jesus didn’t just wait one day before healing this woman?  We are told that she has been bent over for 18 years – over 6,500 days what difference would one more day make?

Let’s try and understand it from the perspective of the temple leaders by listening to this reflection written from a temple leaders perspective:

“How dare he? How dare this Jesus try to set aside God's Law - and centuries of our teaching too - just like that? Just because he says so it's suddenly all right to work on the Sabbath. How dare he say that?

And it's not as if he only said it - he did it as well. I mean, that woman he healed... we all know her. We all know she's been bent over like that for eighteen years. What difference was another few hours going to make? Why didn't he say to her 'Come back tomorrow, dear. Then I can help you. But not today. Not on the Sabbath.'

God made the world in six days then on the seventh day he rested. Yes, God rested – and that was how the Sabbath began. I can't see that there can be any arguing with that. It's how God wants things to be.

Pah! It's typical of what's wrong with this country. Here we are, God's chosen people, ruled over by heathens. The Romans say we can worship how we want and can do as we like, but no self-respecting Jew can accept Roman laws and Roman rulers. The Lord is our ruler and his Law is what we live by – every last letter of it. We can't afford to let our standards slip or we'll end up as heathens too.”

Sabbath-keeping, of course, was one of the ways that Jews defined themselves and kept their identity even over long centuries of living in exile and diaspora, living as strangers in a strange land. There were no other people that had a weekly day of rest, so Sabbath was one important way to maintain Jewish identity.

By Jesus’ time, the Sabbath law was interpreted differently by different Jewish sects. There was an ongoing debate among rabbis and other teachers of the law—What could you do and not do on the Sabbath? What constituted “work”? Lighting a fire to cook? Taking your livestock out to pasture?

The list of types of forbidden labour does not discuss healing. Rabbinic authorities agreed that lifesaving intervention was permitted on the Sabbath, but were divided on whether healings of non-life-threatening conditions, such as a withered hand or the orthopedic disease that had afflicted this woman for years, should be healed on the Sabbath. Some interpreters would attest that miracle-working ought not be forbidden. 

Jesus clearly locates himself within the debate at the less stringent end of the opinion spectrum.

In Jesus’ view, since the Sabbath law commemorates and celebrates Israel’s liberation, it ought to be a day for enacting — not inhibiting — present-day.  Jesus insists that the bent-over woman be “set free” and “released” from her “bond”.

The set lectionary reading for the day was meant to end with verse 17 but I extended the reading because it does not really end there.  Jesus continues to explain his actions with some parables about ‘What the kingdom of God is like?””

It is like a tiny mustard seed that grows into a tree for sheltering birds, or like yeast that leavens bread for provision and fellowship. Like this bent-over woman who seems to be small and insignificant the seed and the yeast become a means to further God’s kingdom.  Through God’s loving and transforming power the bent-over woman can stand straight and tall like the mustard tree that grows so tall and strong that the birds of the air can make nests in its branches.

The Kingdom of God is like the yeast that spreads through a whole batch of flour making it all leaven. God’s work of liberation, of redemption spreads like the leavening. But like waiting for dough to rise or for a tree to grow it takes time.

Just before the passage we had read, Luke records a parable in which Jesus’ vineyard owner says, “For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none”. The owner wants the tree to fruit – Jesus enters the synagogue immediately following this parable.

The fruit of God’s Kingdom takes time to be produced but little by little the fruits increase – the harvest increases – God keeps showing up, drawing the circle just a little wider creating a spiral that includes more and more people – liberating more and more and unleashing a divine horizon that causes rejoicing over the breaking of every human bondage.

This woman was bound by her infirmity;
this synagogue leader was bound by his concern for the rules.
Neither could live in perfect freedom.
Both were subject to and restricted by rules, traditions, expectations –
intended as helpful signposts,
guiding and protecting,
but liable to become blunt instruments,
coercing and binding.
How easy it is to turn a useful tool
into a fearsome means of destruction.

Before we condemn the Jewish leader for being trapped by an obsession with the law and tradition, we might want to ask ourselves how well has the church been embracing God’s widening circle of freedom? God’s expanding spiral of liberation and redemption?  Are there traditions or theological ideas that we hold dear that disallow full participation from others?

The Bible has been used to justify slavery.

The Bible has been used to subjugate women and to justify the non-ordination of women

The Bible has been used to deny the sacraments to divorcees

The Bible has been used to justify racism and to promote white supremacy despite Jesus being a Middle Eastern man of colour

The Bible has been used to justify discrimination against LGBTIQ+ people

The Bible has been used to justify belief that God’s creation; animals, land and waters are for us to use and abuse rather than for us to serve.

Christian fundamentalism is based on sheer unswerving adherence to the Law.  I believe that fundamentalism betrays the true meaning of Christianity – which is to love, love, love; grow, grow, grow; heal, heal, heal.  But for some Christian fundamentalists compliance with their religious laws is so important they lose any sense of fairness, justice or compassion.  Obeying the Law, following a very narrow way of reading and understanding scripture becomes an obsession – the only thing which matters.

Maybe God is working beyond the church and showing up to widen the circle of liberation and redemption growing that ever expanding spiral – Could God be at the centre of liberation’s widening circle in things like – the abolition of slavery – in changing attitudes to sexism – in changing attitudes to divorce – in changing attitudes to racism – in changing attitudes to First Nation’s people – in changing attitudes to LGBTIQ+ people – in changing attitudes to differently abled people – in changing attitudes to human induced climate change

The church has often been slow to embrace this ever-widening spiral of liberation and redemption.

One of the side effects is that many people have turned their back on Christianity claiming it is too legalistic, too hypocritical or just not appropriate for the twenty-first century.  

At a time when the Christian religion is too often portrayed as narrow minded and exclusive we have an obligation – and an opportunity – to model the true principles of Jesus’ love and healing as we spread love and widen the spiral to be truly inclusive.