[I’m on vacation for the month of July. But I’m still blogging. This isn’t a sermon or a reflection I’ve written with anyone in mind. Just thoughts that happen alongside the lectionary.]
This week: Proper 12A
“Have you understood all this?”
Every time Jesus asks this in the gospel, I try to answer for the crowds or disciples.
“No! We don’t!”
But each time, they say “yes.” And I want to shake my head.
“That just means we don’t know that we don’t know!” I say.
Of course, I can’t pretend I know what Jesus is thinking, but I imagine he’s laughing on the inside. “Sure you do,” he thinks. “Sure.”
Then he usually keeps going, assuming they actually are tracking with him. A kind of “OK then! Well, here you go!”
Jesus offers a fascinating take on how the Kin-dom will arrive. He says that scribes have been training for this: a great theological rummage sale. Picking out the stuff to keep and what’s to ditch.
We know rummage sales. The idea is as relatable as the precious pearl. But do we really get what Jesus is saying? That we aren’t looking for deals or profit? We aren’t going bargain hunting or upscaling.
It’s a lot more like the idea popularized by the late Phyllis Tickle. Christianity is in the midst of a rummage sale: picking what to keep and what to get rid of. Because we are forging a new way.
Change leads to change.
When things happen, we are changed. Circumstances are changed. As are trajectories, plans, hopes, and dreams. Life itself is changed.
Buying a business changes things. Moving, retiring, connecting with a new community. Even if it isn’t entirely new.
Perhaps the literal rummage sale will happen and we will be selling things. Literal things. Things we’ve used and appreciated. Or maybe we don’t really want to get rid of. Alongside things of which we can’t wait to rid ourselves. After all, things have a habit of outstaying their welcome.
A different rummage sale will happen anyway. Sorting the keep stuff from the trash.
And, of course, the psychological rummage sales. The relationships we keep and those we end.
Hello. Goodbye. See you later.
Social media messes with our rummage sales. Because we might not really ever say goodbye. We quite literally inhabit the same spot in the feed. Our digital selves have gone nowhere.
The urge to stay connected is strong, either way.
Or perhaps, at least the curiosity. I just want to know what you’re up to!
Is it right?
How certain we are that we track with it. That this is what He wants.
He compared the moment to giving up our fortunes for this pearl: that this is the nature of the Kin-dom.
It isn’t profit. Or profitable. On net, it might be loss.
Are we ready for that?
This is why I think we’re in the same boat as the disciples.
“Have you understood all this?
We nod along and say “you betcha!”
Because the point is the dream. The longing. The search.
Becoming and changing.
We shed our possessions, our obstacles, our stumbling blocks, and go.
Life is in the discovering.