Sermons

Sunday Next before Lent
Sunday 26th February at 8am

Simon Cowling
Readings: 1 Corinthians 13; Luke 18. 31-43

Today's Gospel reading comes from the great central section of St. Luke that deals with Jesus' journey from Galilee to Jerusalem - well over a third of the whole Gospel. In this section there is much material that is only found in Luke: the parables of the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son are among these bits of material. But one of the things that Luke does have in common with both Mark and Luke is the description of Jesus speaking three times about his coming death and the third of these sayings, the one we heard today, is found towards the end of this central section of the Gospel. As usual, the disciples are rather clueless about what it all means: "they understood none of these things: and this saying was hid from them, neither knew they the things which were spoken."

It is of absolute significance that this inability of the disciples to understand what Jesus can possibly mean is followed by the healing of the blind beggar at Jericho. Twice the beggar calls out for Jesus to heal him, all the while being scolded by the crowd for his noise. But Jesus stops to ask what the beggar wants him to do for him. The beggar names this request, "Lord, that I may receive my sight.". And he is healed. The metaphorical blindness of the disciples is contrasted with the clear-sightedness of the blind beggar who recognises in Jesus an authority, a status, which gives solid ground to his faith that Jesus can heal him of his physical affliction.

The stories that surround this incident in Luke are of absolute significance also: earlier in chapter 18 the Pharisee and the debt collector - the former sure of his righteousness, the latter sure only of his sinfulness; Jesus blessing children whom the disciples try to turn away; the rich man who is confronted with the truth that wealth cannot provide a guarantee of eternal life; and at the start of chapter 19 Zacchaeus, the tax collector, small of stature but large in faith whom Jesus affirms despite his marginal status amongst fellow Jews who saw him as co-operating with occupiers. In all these stories Jesus' words and actions represent an inversion of conventional expectations of the time - about true righteousness, about the place and importance of children in the scheme of things, about the ultimate importance - or otherwise - of wealth and about befriending those whom the world sees as unclean or on the edge; and today's Gospel shows that the disciples proximity to Jesus did not make give them a better understanding of him than that of a blind beggar sitting on a Jericho pavement.

The power of Luke's Gospel, nowhere demonstrated more clearly than in the collection of incidents that surround today's Gospel, lies in his ability to pose questions to those of us who seek to follow Christ today. These questions are not necessarily about simple comparative attitudes to tax collectors, to wealth, to children and so on. I think, rather, that the questions are about confronting us with the stark reality that the world is still a place in which people are pushed to the margins, in which might is too often seen as right and in which those who are outside the formal structures of the church, the equivalents of the blind beggars, are frequently those to whom we, who see ourselves as on the inside, should listen most attentively in order to find what we are seeking, in order to have our faith and our discipleship affirmed by the one whom we seek to follow. Amen.

© St Edmund's Church, Roundhay