Sermon for the Twenty Fifth Sunday after Pentecost. 16 November 2014. Cast out Fear In 1959 the Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz published a novel called Children of Gebelawi. The novel is set in 19th century Cairo, in an alley. Gebelawi is the alley, the place where they live, but Gebelawi is also God. The inhabitants of the alley belong to the three great monothesistic religions: Christianity, Judaism and Islam. Across several generations there are struggles in the alley, not so much between the people of the three religions but between those who seek peaceful coexistence , freedom and hope on one hand and the thugs who attempt to control their lives with violence, brutality and fear on the other. The thugs were a veiled description of forces which Mahfouz saw in the society around him. Some people complained about the book when it was first published but it was when the novel was released in an English translation in the 1980s and the depiction of the brutal nature of some religious extremism began to be read outside of the Arabic reading world serious persecution against Mahfouz arose. Members of the Muslim Brotherhood recognised the nastiest characters in the novel as reflections of themselves, depicted as opposing even God! Mahfouz had already upset these extremists when he spoke out against the fatwa which called on Muslims to kill Salman Rushdie because of his writing, in particular his powerful novel about partition in India and Pakistan, Midnight’s Children. Mahfouz made it clear that he did not agree with Rushdie’s ideas, but he defended the right of free speech. In 1988 Mahfouz was awarded a Nobel prize for literature. The rest of the world, beyond the extremists, recognised that he had a powerful message which was eloquently shared. In 1994 an assassination attempt outside his Cairo home left Mahfouz in pain and unable to write for more than a few minutes a day. But he kept writing. He refused to give up. He would not give in to fear. It was in Children of Gebelawi that Mahfouz wrote these memorable words. “Fear does not prevent death. Fear prevents life.” When fear overcomes us, when it takes charge, life stops. Michael Leunig touched on the same basic tension, the same essential need to choose in his poem ‘Love and Fear’. There are only two feelings. Love and fear. There are only two languages. Love and fear. There are only two activities. Love and fear. There are only two motives, two procedures, two frameworks, two results. Love and fear. Love and fear. Leunig The cartoon which accompanies this poem shows individuals trapped in boxes. It is Leunig’s sad comment on our society that we are more driven by fear than love, and that traps us. It makes us less than we can be, less than we have the capacity to be. We meet the same challenge in today’s gospel reading (Matthew 25:14-30). This evocative and memorable parable is so rich (as the best parables are) that it can be immersed in many situations and circumstances and its flavour will infuse them bringing a deeper aroma, a richer piquancy, a more complex and inspiring taste, even though some of those uses (it can be argued) do not do justice well to the overall message of the gospels. It is used often in stewardship campaigns as a reminder to take out the financial wealth entrusted to us and use it to bring glory to God. It is used to give stimulus to a Protestant work ethic. Matthew places this parable here as one of four parables interpreted as associated with the second coming of Christ. This gives urgency and an edge to the idea that we are going to be judged and held to account for our actions, even the way we have spent the money in our hands. In some interpretations it seems to be about works, not grace. ‘Pay up, give to the church or go to hell, with weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth!’ Am I exaggerating? I have met people who have left the church who fled with words in their ears which sounded frighteningly like that! We need always to be careful how we use everything entrusted to us, even – especially – the words of the scriptures! The placement of the parable in a slightly different version in Luke’s gospel (Luke 19:12-27) has emphasised for some the financial aspect. In Luke the parable comes just after Jesus’ encounter with Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus meets Jesus and gives away a lot of his money. What a great stewardship image to hold up! Come to Jesus, find faith and pay up! Yet if you put aside the financial aspect of the stories even the story of Zacchaeus picks up a deeper message which is there in the parable which was our gospel reading today. It is about facing fear. There are two choices. Love and fear. The story of Zacchaeus is not about the money. It is about a man facing his fears. It is about a man discovering the opportunity to live. Look at the parable. The two slaves who doubled their master’s money are just the backdrop. What is said and done and the master’s response to both is almost identical. An interesting twist is that it has been suggested that even if they had tried but lost the lot, if their get rich quick and double the investment schemes had collapsed spectacularly they may still have received the same generous response from the master. It wasn’t about results. It was about their attitude and faith. If that seems shocking then welcome to the world of God’s grace! The key to the story is facing fear. It is about how we live in the space we are in, now. The third slave was driven by fear and that was his downfall. The third slave took no risks. The third slave buried what was handed over to him. He let his fear overwhelm him and that fear prevented life. “The greatest risk of all, it turns out, is not to risk anything, not to care deeply and profoundly enough about anything to invest deeply, to give your heart away and in the process risk everything. The greatest risk of all, it turns out, is to play it safe, to live cautiously and prudently.” (John M. Buchanan, Feasting on the Word) We were thinking recently about saints, inspiring people, those who touch our lives and help us to find a different way of being and living. The most inspiring are risk takers, people facing their fears and stepping beyond them. I would even say that inspiration and risk taking are intricately intertwined. For example, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and many others who faced the fear of death to stand up for truth in the face of Nazi darkness. People who step outside the box and refuse to live small lives. People who take the talents and use them. This is not just about actions. It is about attitude which flows into actions. It is about faith and it cuts to the heart of who we are and why we are here. John Buchanan, commenting on this parable, wrote: “For most of us, religion, our personal faith, has not seemed like a high-risk venture. In fact, it has seemed to be something like the opposite. Faith has seemed to be a personal comfort zone. Faith, many of us think, is about personal security, here and in the hereafter. Faith, we think, is no more risky than believing ideas in our heads about God and Jesus, a list of beliefs to which we more or less subscribe intellectually. Faith, we think, because that is what we have been taught, is getting our personal theology right and then living a good life by avoiding bad things. Religion, we think, is a pretty timid, nonrisky venture. Here Jesus invites us to be his disciples, to live our lives as fully as possible by investing them, by risking, by expanding the horizons of our responsibilities. To be his man or woman, he says, is not so much believing ideas about him as it is following him. It is to experience renewed responsibility for the use and investment of these precious lives of ours. It is to be bold and brave, to reach high and care deeply. So the parable is the invitation to the adventure of faith: the high-risk venture of being a disciple of Jesus Christ.” Of course we will recognise that for many the facing of their fears, taking risks and being bold has cost them their lives. That is what happens. Life is changed, one way or another. Not facing fears, not acting, not taking risks is a choice to die. “Fear does not prevent death. Fear prevents life.” When we want to see how to live more deeply the first question to ask may well be ‘what are we afraid of?’ The greatest treasure which has been placed in our hands is our capacity to let go of fear and to be bold. This speaks directly to the questions we need to face again soon as a parish about how we use the resources entrusted to us here. Will we be bold? Will we face fears and take risks? Or will what has been placed in our hands be buried? The choice is ours and the parable speaks across 2000 years directly to us. Paul Mitchell
Posted on: Sat, 15 Nov 2014 20:54:38 +0000
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