This past week I read Mississippi Sissy, Kevin Sessum's memoir about growing up gay in the American south. He was born in 1956, a time when church-going was central in most people's lives in Mississippi. I suspect it still is. In the book there are many references to Baptist and Methodist congregations with their fervent praying and spirited singing. Kevin describes his emotional response to a Billy Graham service televised into his grandmother's living room from London.
In the book the word Presbyterian occurs only twice. First, Kevin's grandmother says of his third grade teacher Mrs. Thompson, "[she's] just a little too distant for my taste." "[She] don't act right friendly enough, but that might be the Presbyterian in her." And later in the book, a mentor of Kevin says of another man that Kevin is exploring a relationship with, "Don't you hurt him. I think he must be Presbyterian. That's my theory, at least. He seems predisposed—predestined, whatever—to be a little tormented by his status as...resident sex symbol."
Presbyterians, then, come off as distant, unfriendly, and tormented. I thought about all that as I was reading and re-reading the two Bible passages we just heard. In the verses from John's Gospel a woman named Mary emptied a large container of expensive perfume, or perfumed oil, onto Jesus' feet and wiped his feet with her hair. Judas protested that the money used to buy the perfumed oil (about a year's wages) could have been utilized to feed the hungry or house the homeless. But Jesus accepted the act of extravagant devotion and praised Mary for it.
It would be easy to miss the connection between Mary's act of love and something that took place a few days later. Again Jesus was at dinner, this time with the twelve disciples. In the middle of the meal, Jesus got up, removed his outer garment and wrapped a towel around his waist. He proceeded to wash his disciples' feet and wipe them with the towel he was wearing. The verb for wipe is the same one for Mary's anointing and wiping Jesus' feet earlier. In the act of foot-washing, Jesus was doing more than giving an example of service and hospitality, although he was surely doing that. The writer of the fourth Gospel wants us to see that Jesus is acting in love, just as Mary acted in love a few days earlier. Again the theme of extravagance.
In Jesus' time it was customary for a host to offer a guest water and a towel upon arrival so that the guest could wash away the dust that covered his or her feet after walking the streets. If the host had servants, the host would have had a serving person perform the task of washing and wiping with a towel. Jesus' act of foot-washing was a teaching act, performed not before the beginning of the meal but in the middle of it as an expression of his love for his disciples, who are now his friends. He is both host and servant at the meal, extending to his friends the relationship he knows with God, which is characterized by extravagant love.
In the Epistle lesson, Paul writes that he has obtained education and status as an exemplary member of his particular community, but that he considers all that as excrement in contrast with the "surpassing worth of gaining Christ and knowing Christ." He says, "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection." I wonder what that sounds like to people who have been described as occupying "frozen pews" or more directly as "the frozen chosen." I know those terms don't apply here, but I wonder how you react to the extravagance of Mary and Paul, hers expressed in passionate action and his in passionate words.
Many of my parents' friends advocated "moderation in all things." And many of them lived by that standard. I tried it for awhile, but there was something in me that wanted more. When I was in college, I was invited to a friend's house for his twenty-first birthday celebration. It was an Italian family, very different from my Scotch-Irish one. For that occasion there were multiple appetizers, several pasta dishes, chicken and veal, birthday cake, ice cream and cookies, all kinds of wine, and finally coffee and liqueurs. People danced and sang, and everyone kissed and hugged the birthday celebrant—women and men, it didn't matter. For me it was an introduction to extravagance that I've never forgotten, extravagance of food for sure, but more important, extravagance of love. Something touched me deep inside.
Barbara Brown Taylor is an Episcopal priest, prolific author, and highly regarded preacher. I heard her preach last fall in the Riverside Church as part of the Fosdick convocation. I have read most or all of her published sermon collections, and they are outstanding. Her most recent book is entitled Leaving Church. In it she states that she is not leaving the Christian faith; she is leaving the church as a pastor. She is teaching religion at a college in Georgia. Reading her book, I had the feeling that Barbara Brown Taylor was burned out, burned out for reasons among which was the difficulty of sharing her exuberant faith with people who wanted a tamer version of it, one that would not spill over into extravagance of any kind.
In one of her sermons Barbara Brown Taylor writes this about the early Christians:
Easter had changed everything for them. They were all different. Things they had been afraid of did not frighten them anymore. They had found new strength in themselves, new wisdom they never knew they had.
This Jesus I have been telling you about is one surprise after another. You cannot second guess him. All you can do is love him and let him love you back, any way he sees fit. You want to know what you should do?
Walk into the river of death with him. Go under with him, and while you are down there let the current carry away everything that stands between you and him. Then, when all your breath is gone, let him give you some of his. Take his breath inside of you. Let it save your life, and when he rises, rise with him, understanding that your life is no longer your own. You died down there. You are borrowing his life now. Let someone make the sign of the cross on your forehead to remind you of that, and join the community of those who call themselves his body, because they believe his heart beats in every one of them.
That's powerful, isn't it? Especially from an Episcopal priest. But it echoes our two readings of this morning, both evocations of extravagant discipleship. I was especially struck by Taylor's description of the Church as people who believe Christ's heart beats in all its members. How do you feel about that? Do you believe Christ's heart is beating in you? Do you feel it? Have you ever felt it?
I know this is challenging stuff for a Presbyterian congregation in 2007. And I'm not interested in pushing the envelope too far this morning. But I will say this. Some people are totally turned off by the language of spiritual devotion, by talking about a personal experience of God as a living presence. If that's the way it is for you, you're absolutely welcome here. No pressure to change, no manipulation.
But if you would like to explore a more personal kind of faith, a way of experiencing God in a dynamic way, I suggest you ask for it. In whatever way you pray, ask God to be more real for you. Don't just ask once. Keep praying, keep asking, until something happens. You'll be in good company: Mary, who poured the oil on Jesus' feet; Paul, who pressed on to the heavenly prize; John Calvin, Joan of Arc, and God only knows who else.
Once you've experienced extravagant discipleship, you won't settle for anything less. And you can still be a Presbyterian.