Earlier this month, I talked to you about Father Greg Boyle, the Catholic priest who founded Homeboy Industries in Los Angeles, providing gang members with jobs and the opportunity to turn their lives around. However, I didn’t tell you that, in his book, Father Boyle often mentions how he would ride his bike around town, through the housing projects, visiting people.
To some, this may not seem like a big deal, but since I am a bike-riding pastor, the detail stood out. Father Boyle doesn’t talk much about his bike riding; he just mentions it in passing, in a matter-of-fact sort of way.
If I ever have the chance to ask Father Boyle a question, I think it would be about his bike riding. Why did he ride a bike? How did it work out for him?
Actually, I may have the chance to ask him very soon. Father Boyle will be speaking here in Bixby Knolls in February, at the Expo Center on Atlantic, at an event sponsored by the Bixby Knolls Literary Society. I have a feeling I will ride my bike over to hear what he has to say.
Because, to be honest, riding a bike around town does not fit the image of a pastor that I grew up with. Sometimes it feels strange to ride my bike, especially if I’m going to a meeting of other clergy or visiting someone at home. The pastor I had growing up, the pastor who baptized me – well, I couldn’t even picture him on a bike. But I could picture him discussing churchy things while playing golf at the country club, or inviting folks to church while attending a civic organization lunch.
Me, I don’t play golf, and I can’t afford country club fees. I can’t afford a new car, either, which is one of the reasons I ride a bike. Good thing for me I enjoy riding my bike around. I will often ride it even when my family’s one car is available to me.
And so, partly because I’ve had to, and partly because I want to, I’ve forged a somewhat new image of a pastor; but that can be challenging when that new image doesn’t quite match the image of how I thought people thought a pastor should act.
Am I worrying too much about my image? Probably. But reading about Father Boyle on his bike has been good for me. It has affirmed this image for me. It let me know that even though some may think it strange or even crazy for a pastor to ride his bike around town as if he were a schoolboy, it was an okay thing to do … even if it didn’t fit the image of how I thought people thought a pastor should act.
As a young man living in a small village who was engaged to be married, Joseph had a very clear image of what he thought people thought he should be. He had a very clear image of how he thought people thought he should act.
The scripture says that he was engaged. Well, it was more like being in the first stage of marriage, really. Vows had already been said. Whatever legal status was bestowed on marriage in those days had already been bestowed. He and Mary were already married, technically; the match had already been made. But they were not yet living together.
When Joseph heard that Mary was pregnant, well, he wasn’t the only one who knew. Bethlehem was, after all, a little town, and in Matthew’s gospel, it is in Bethlehem that Joseph and Mary lived. They did not come to Bethlehem while Mary was pregnant; that’s Luke’s version of the story. In Matthew’s version, they were already there.
The news that Mary was pregnant created a difficult situation for Joseph. Certainly it was a blow to his image. (I know; it created a difficult situation for Mary, too; Luke talks more about that. But we’re in Matthew, and Matthew’s focus is on Joseph.) He – and everyone else in Bethlehem – knew that the child was not his. Mary had obviously violated the marriage contract – to put it nicely.
And so, it was clear to Joseph what he was expected to do. In his mind, there was a very clear image of what he thought people thought he should do. There was no “good” solution, but the “least bad” solution in society’s eyes was for Joseph to do it quietly, without making a big spectacle, showing respect and honor for the young woman who, I believe, he still loved.
I suppose he could have decided to stay in the marriage, but that the expectations were too strong. He and his family would have become outcasts. Everyone would wonder, as they saw him walking by: What kind of a person would marry a whore? No; society’s expectations were clear, and so Joseph made plans for divorce.
Well, how often do we make plans and do things because of society’s expectations? Not riding my bike, or hiding from colleagues the fact that I do ride my bike or sometimes take the bus is, I suppose, one example. Joseph divorcing Mary, even though he still loved her, is another example. We follow society’s expectations when we keep our faith hidden from public view, compartmentalized, not letting it interfere with our everyday life, or when we work so hard to maintain our status, our image, our reputation; maintaining a steady course despite the call we feel from God to do something radical, to live our dreams, to let Christ’s message of wholeness truly transform our lives and our world.
What would happen to our image if we did such things? What would people think of us? If only we had some affirmation, some reassurance, that what we feel called to do isn’t really as crazy as some might think it is. Or maybe it is crazy … but good, nevertheless. Maybe we are mad to follow our heart, to follow God’s call; maybe it’s true what Jack Sparrow said, that madness and brilliance are two traits that often coincide.
If only we had some affirmation, some reassurance, that the crazy lives we feel called to live are good and true, no matter what people may think.
Matthew wrote his gospel in the city of Antioch. He wrote it just a few years after the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem – the temple that was the symbol of strength and stability for the Jewish people. Its destruction was heartbreaking. With the collapse of the temple’s walls came the collapse of the entire Jewish world.
And then there was the persecution. The high priests were driven out and brutally executed. Everyday Jews lived in fear of persecution by the Romans.
It was even worse for the messianic Jews, those who believed that Jesus was the messiah. In addition to being persecuted by the Romans, they also faced persecution by other Jews. They were doubly persecuted. It was a time of tumult, chaos, and confusion. It was a time when they were afraid – deeply afraid – to hold on to the way they had been taught.
How they long for – how they needed – a word of affirmation, encouragement to do what they knew was right, no matter what the world around them thought.
Writing in the midst of all this, Matthew begins his gospel with a very peculiar genealogy. Family lines were customarily traced through first-born sons – it’s what was expected – but Matthew presents Jesus’ family tree, filled with second and third-born sons, illegitimate sons, a few daughters, and unconventional families, culminating in the birth of a messiah that certainly did not happen according to the way people thought things should happen. The birth of the messiah was not nice and neat; it was a messy affair, full of confusion and unconventionalities.
The fact that Jesus’ birthday took place this way was actually comforting to the Antiochians, whose own world, following the temple’s destruction, was confusing, and whose own faith required unconventional choices and lifestyles. The story of Jesus’ crazy birth was the affirmation they needed. It showed them that God is present in the crazy times, and amidst the seemingly crazy choices that our faith calls upon us to make.
Joseph himself got his own affirmation when the voice of God came to him through an angel that said: “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.” So Joseph stayed with Mary, and became father to Jesus.
However, that did not mean that things instantly became easy; quite the contrary. Joseph and Mary found themselves under threat of persecution. Their baby’s life was at stake! Their world had gone crazy, and was full of chaos and insecurity.
God told them to take their baby on a difficult journey to Egypt, and they obeyed. Once again, people must have thought they were crazy, to take their baby on such a trip – and to the land where their ancestors were enslaved! That’s nuts! And then, after that, they settled in Nazareth. Well, nothing good ever comes out of Nazareth, everyone knew that.
Every decision Joseph made was the opposite of what was expected of him. Every decision he made in this story of Jesus’ birth and infancy would have been considered crazy. Every decision took society’s expectations of him – took his image – and shot it to pieces.
And yet, God was with him.
This was exactly the story that the Antiochians needed to hear. It was, after all, their own story. With the loss of the temple and the persecution they faced as a minority within a minority, they found affirmation and assurance in the story of Jesus’ birth, which took place amidst similar chaos and confusion. They found affirmation for the crazy life they felt called to live, despite the chaos, and despite society’s expectations.
Well, today no one really expects you to follow the way of Jesus. Not with your whole heart and soul. Not with your whole life. It would be crazy to live like that; to turn the other cheek, to walk an extra mile, to give more to those who take from you, to sell your belongings and give the money to the poor, to forgive and even love your enemies, to seek the lower spot, to humble oneself, to associate with the lowly, to welcome strangers, to seek God’s kingdom first above all earthly kingdoms and even above your own personal needs … and to do so in the midst of a postmodern culture in which every pocket or purse contains a miracle of communication, in which Jesus is not talked about in polite conversation, and which is perhaps the most individualized, me-focused society the world has ever seen…. You would indeed have to be crazy to live like that, to follow the way of Jesus.
And yet, that is in fact how God calls us to live. It’s crazy, yes. It’s often difficult. It’s always counter to how society expects us to live.
Thank God for the gospel of Matthew, which affirms that the way of life we are called to follow is also good and blessed. How amazingly awesome it is to know that as you follow that sometimes difficult path, and as you live in our own chaotic world with its own ridiculous expectations, that God is with you through it all, leading you, guiding you, showering you with goodness and mercy all the days of your life.
No comments:
Post a Comment