Pentecost +20
NB: some help from workingpreacher.org commentary on the lessons for today.
In the Temple courtyard a group of men crowd around Jesus. “Who gave you the authority to do the things you do, and why do you act like you expect us to listen to you?” they demand.
As I listened to the news the other day I heard a reporter ask a loaded question to one candidate for the US Presidency. They scoffed at their opponent in their response, a terse “they don’t have the authority to do that.”
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Authority and power. In our societal mindset the two are irrevocably attached to each other. Having power gives you authority. Having authority gives you power. From our first experience as children to our last drawing breath we see ourselves captive to a particular set of ideas, an invisible framework that gives us a sense of place in society and an awareness of those both above us and below us.
“There are two kinds of people in the world,” goes the old saying, “those born with a taste for power, and those born with a craving for it.”
At election time we listen to various interest groups try to exert their authority at various levels of government. When they achieve something we compliment we feel powerful with them, and if they fail we fall with them, losing something of our image of power and influence in a political and economic system that seems often geared towards those with the most – be it power, money, influence, or sex.
But by whose authority do we even pretend that we exercise solemn governance over our own lives, that we are, in effect, self-made individuals charged with the task of, to blindly paraphrase the Apostle Paul, “work[ing] out our salvation with fear and trembling.”
1500 years of church history has ingrained in us an idea of the kind of authority wielded by the world-wide church. “All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me,” spoke Christ in Matthew 28, “go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptising in the Name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” The church can sometimes be big on authority.
Really, at some level, many of us still come to be married in the church as a means of ensuring that because the vows are exchanged “in the sight of God”, someone will whack us with a big stick if we break them.
But why doesn’t that kind of authority seem to work with Jesus? In the Gospel lesson for today the leaders, the religious authorities come to Jesus with the big question: “what in the holy name of God do you think you’re doing!?”
They come prepared to counter all claims of human authority with their own, God-given power. They are the Temple leaders; they are the be-all and end-all of their faith. As far as the local status quo is concerned, the religious buck stops with them; there is no authority higher. They’re James Dobson and Benedict XV combined.
What they are not prepared to accept is the possibility that Jesus’ authority actually comes from elsewhere. Not just from someone or somewhere else, but from a source so vast as to be unimaginable. What they are not prepared to accept is that Christ’s authority, in fact, came from heaven.
So his question in response to them catches them off guard. The question about John’s authority is, in fact, the same question that the chief priests and elders just asked Jesus himself. Their response, then, is dedicated towards preserving their own authority in public rather than risk a damaging public scene. This could be an excerpt from the current news – a political or religious leader embarking upon damage control in an effort to save face.
So just where does Jesus get his authority? What, exactly, does he do with it? He could argue with the priests – throw their own theology back into their faces, throw some God-dust around and get with the miracles again.
But he doesn’t. Instead, Jesus tells a parable about relationships, and how they play out in world. A story about authority lived in love, care, deference, and respect; not in violence and struggle.
For if we trust that Christ’s authority is, indeed, from heaven, then we partake in a mission in our world that is wholly unique.
It is unique in that it does not seek power in this world – not through the means with which we have been taught to acquire it – but in that our Christian mission in the world relinquishes power in bringing Christ to the world, just as Christ gave up power in bringing himself to the world (through emptying himself, as in Philippians 2:7).
This is a power and an authority given and received in love. It is not a sharing or granting of authority – as in the parable of the two sons, the father simply says “son, go and work in the vineyard today” – it is a call to submission and obedience to a mission that is greater than our desire for church and denominational survival.
The mission we are called to asks that we abandon our competitiveness and quest for influence, and instead work to embody Christ’s transformation and reclamation of the world.
To be disciples of Christ, who embody his love for the world, and who accept upon ourselves the authority to help bring care and healing to a broken world. That kind of authority can change the world, because it is an authority that is given and received in love.
If you have trouble visualizing this, consider this: anyone who has had small children knows one thing for certain. Those of you without small children will maybe one day experience this; those of you without no doubt know just how lucky you are.
Life with small children, babies really, is governed by one simple rule. All authority in the family – decisions about where to go, when to go, how to get places, and who to see – is given to the member who can not as yet change their own underpants or eat, as it were, solid food.
Certainly, you can choose to ignore that child. Play loud music, wear earplugs. But because you love that child you acquiesce that authority. In turn, the authority given to you is for the well-being of that child.
It’s in this context that Christ reminds us in Matthew 19 to “let the little children come me…for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.” That kind of authority belongs to the powerless. It is authority that has its foundation in love and its action in grace. The best way that I can illustrate this is through a rite that is familiar to everyone here.
Today, as part of our worship service we will welcome Keiran Patrick Macintyre into the family of God through the sacrament of Holy Baptism. In a rite that has been repeated endlessly since the first Christians gathered in houses to hear one another, he will be washed in water. The Words will be spoken over him, and he will be marked forever with cross of Jesus Christ.
In the very words of our baptismal liturgy, he will be given new birth, cleansed from sin – the very enemy that still stalks us today – and will be raised to eternal life.
And when he dies, (God willing many, many years after me), the sign of the cross will be made over his body and the family assembled will be reminded that as he was united with Christ in death – for baptism as much as anything symbolizes being buried and raised again – so he too will be united with Christ in the Resurrection.
The authority granted through Christ is the authority to know that, in spite of whatever legalistic steps we mask it in, baptism is and remains at its heart the opening verse of a love song that is sung to us for all the days of our lives. It is a song so much a part of us that its chorus is in our waking and sleeping and our life passages form its verses. It ends with all things in time – but when God will make all things new in the world that new creation, in turn, will sing of the grace of God through Jesus Christ.
So it is my prayer for Keiran Patrick that he may be one of the blessed in this life who embrace that love received through his baptism and sing a love song right back to God, as he walks with Christ Jesus.
I pray that authority he experiences is love given and love received, and that he may grow up and live in a world trembling with the anticipation of a new creation. For this is the promise of God given to him. This – this -- is the promise of God given to us all.
May this be so among us. Amen.
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