Staying Sick, Getting Well
Sermon by The Rev. Wallace Adams-Riley
Rector, St. Paul's Episcopal Church
June 20, 2010 - The Fourth Sunday after Pentecost
Due to technical difficulties, no audio recording is available of this sermon.
Sermon Text
Dear God, take my lips, and speak through them;
take our minds, and think through them;
take our hearts, and prepare them, Lord,
prepare them as you see fit.
Amen.
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The other day a young man came to me with a question:
He said, "Help me, here. I want to ask you something. My brother and I have been arguing over whether or not the story of Adam and Eve, well, whether it is to be taken figuratively, or whether it is to be read as, you know, real; as history."
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I tried to explain to him, gently, how I believe the story is richer and more powerful if taken, not as a literal record of history, but, instead, as a figurative story about humanity; that the profound nature of the story has to do, not with two particular people, but with universal human experiences (innocence, temptation, disobedience, alienation, and so on).
Unconvinced, he persisted; and we talked on:
He talked of how Abraham saw Adam and Eve as real people; and how, if Jesus took Abraham at his word; then surely we should too.
I asked him why he thought Abraham saw Adam and Eve as real people.
We talked on.
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He seemed to enjoy the intellectual game of it, if it might be called that; at the same time, I sensed that he was also interested in something deeper.
Eventually I had to go (my wife and children were waiting for me at home); and so, before leaving him, I took a moment to stress to him that I very much appreciated and respected that he took scripture seriously; that that was a truly great thing.
And then, before going, I told him that I hoped he would, if anything, take scripture even more seriously.
Even more seriously.
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The thing about literalism is that it purports to hold the Bible in the highest regard, higher regard than any more metaphorical or mythological reading of scripture; and literalism even prides itself on that. However, in reality, to confine the interpretation of scripture to only a strictly literal interpretation is, in truth, to trivialize it, to settle for one dimension, while we could have three, or four, or twelve.
In a word, to settle for the literal is to surrender depth; to surrender depth in the mistaken belief that a greater clarity will be gained; when, in truth, it is only in the depths that any dependable truth is found. Only in the depths will we find truth worth staking our lives on.
To take scripture seriously, then, is to let the Spirit take us wherever the Spirit would take us; as we listen; as we read and reflect; as we mark, learn, and inwardly digest the ancient, holy stories; trusting that the same Spirit that inspired those stories is at work now; in our minds and in our hearts; guiding us into yet deeper, and fuller, truth.
As Jesus said: the Spirit of truth will lead us into all truth.
And no better time a year to remember this than the present, the season following Pentecost, when we celebrate the outpouring of the Spirit of God among God's people.
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So then, where would the Spirit lead us; where would the Spirit lead us when considering, when meditating upon, when praying upon, today's Gospel story; the story of "Legion," a story that, on the face of it, is not very 2010, shall we say; the story of a man possessed with demons, with so many demons, in fact, that he would take his name from the legion, the basic unit of the Roman army, which would have somewhere between 3000 and 6000 foot soldiers, with cavalry to boot.
That's how spiritually unwell he is; that's how spiritually ill he feels.
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So then, what do we make of this talk of demons, and demon possession?
I mean, surely, just as there was no real Adam and Eve, surely there are no real demons? Right?
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Well, perhaps it depends on what we mean by "real."
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Are we willing to take scripture seriously enough to consider and, I mean, really consider, what that might mean: what it might mean for someone to be so spiritually unwell that it's as though they are under enemy occupation; that it's as though they themselves, in their own person, had become a crowded house of spiritual dysfunction?
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Or better yet, are we willing to bring it a little closer to home: Are we willing to consider what spiritual tensions there might be at work in our own lives tensions, energies, pathologies, whatever language would be most apt, a spiritual unhealth at work in our lives that can, at times, take on such force that the word "demonic" just might be in order.
Indeed, perhaps to speak of them as "demons" might help us face into the reality of what we allow to go on in our own hearts and minds, and lives:
Demons of fear. (Perhaps they are the most numerous.):
Fear that our finances won't hold together; that it's all going to come undone.
Fear of change.
Fear of being alone.
Fear of humiliation.
Fear of death.
The demons of fear are, indeed, legion.
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There are others, of course.
Demons of scarcity, always telling us that we don't have enough; always telling us that we need more.
Demons of bitterness, of resentment.
Demons of negativity, of sourness, of chronic complaint.
Demons that whisper to us that we're not good enough, and that we'll never be good enough.
Demons; they are legion.
But, of course: that's not where the story ends.
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Jesus commands the demons to come out of the man; and they obey him.
And the man is then found to be "in his right mind," as Luke says.
Formerly wretched and crazed, he is now well; he is whole; he is at peace.
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And what do the local people do, in response to this powerful act of deliverance, of liberation, of healing?
They tell Jesus to hit the road thank you very much.
Liberation, deliverance, healing can be scary stuff.
Sometimes we'd rather keep things as we've known them; even if, even if: they've been - well, pretty awful.
As they say, "better the devil you know...."
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"Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear."
And so Jesus did: he moved along, looking for others who wanted to be liberated; others who wanted to be delivered; others who wanted to be healed; others who wanted to be set free.
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If we have the courage to take the story of Legion seriously, not literally, but seriously, then it'll mean asking ourselves what in us keeps us from being in our right mind; what keeps us from being the person God would have us be. ‘Cause truth is, it's about calling forth those demons; sure; but, the bigger story is that it's we ourselves who are being called forth called forth, into health; into wholeness; into maturity; into responsibility; into the fullness of who God calls us to be.
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This is God's desire for each of us: to be delivered; to be in our right mind; to be whole and well.
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The question is: what's scarier: staying sick, or getting well?
