Year A - Proper 21, October 1, 2023
Humble Hearts & Obedient Spirits
To honor the Glorious Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Be humble and obey: That is not a popular sentence in post-modern society. There are few global contexts in which it would be felt as a loving, nurturing request.
Imagine when it has been said to you – whether in childhood or as an adult – and recall your emotional reaction: resentment, frustration, offense, resistance, exasperation, fear, maybe anxiety. Our American identity is particularly averse to embracing either concept: humility is weak, and obedience is an affront to rugged individualism.
In my experience with human lives and emotions, it is rare our instinct is to “be humble and obey.” Yet, in today’s passage from Matthew, Jesus instructs his disciples to embrace that difficult demand. Christ’s parable of the two brothers expects sons to be respectful to their father without question and to fulfill his bidding immediately.
Reading Matthew’s Gospel account, we see Jesus consistently challenge worldly authority. He regularly commits civil disobedience against Roman restrictions, thwarting systems of injustice and oppression. Jesus pushes back, hard, against religious hypocrisy that abuses scripture to keep the powerful in power and the wealthy in secure ease. …and, he walked away from his foster father’s trade – violating cultural norms of family structure. He rejected his family’s demands to end his teaching and healing. From one perspective, Jesus of Nazareth was lousy at obeying authority.
Jesus insists on humility, in others. Today we hear the religious authorities demand Jesus explain his authority to teach and heal. Wouldn’t a humble man respect their station and years and simply answer? Not our rabbi from Nazareth, no he throws the question back at them.
One chapter ago Jesus reprimanded the apostles James and John for wanting to sit at his right and at his left in the Kingdom. Over and over Jesus reminds us the first shall be last and the last shall be first. He praises people in poverty, in a low social station, the meek, the least of these, children, and women: our Savior has the most affection for outsiders, people who are oppressed or shunned.
Yet, he is the ultimate insider and let’s everyone know. Where is the humility in accepting the titles Son of God, Messiah, Holy One?
Paul’s letter to Christians in Philippi can be our lens for the life and teaching of Jesus. Here Paul insists humility and obedience are necessary to the Christian walk. He points to Christ’s actions, “…being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross. Therefore God also highly exalted him.” (Phillipians 2:7-9) It is before the Divine Progenitor that Jesus is humble and he is obedient to the will of that same loving, immanent, and almighty God.
Be humble and obey: in the parable, we find a story about God and the people of God. The father is the Almighty Law-Giver and Creator. The two brothers are people in religious power and religious outsiders, shunned by those leaders. The work the brothers are sent to do is the mission of God. The explanation of the parable Jesus describes criminals and notorious sinners who repent as faithful, while hypocrisy by the leaders is sinful.
To be humble and obey according to the example of our Savior Jesus requires wisdom to discern our calling and boldness to accomplish it. We are humble in prayer, worship, and study seeking communion with Christ as we are woven into His Body working for the kingdom of God.
We are obedient to that calling as individual Christians and as an institution of the Jesus Movement. Embrace Paul’s checklist of action here in Philippians, encourage one another, give consolation, show love, compassion, sympathy, and unity.
By humble hearts and obedient spirits, we will spread the Gospel and change the world: “for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (Philip 2:13) Amen.
Dean Vanessa Clark+