Don't Forget The Arms

The Holy Gospel According to St. Luke, the 13th Chapter

Now Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.” But the Lord answered him and said, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?” When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing.

When you look at a cross… there’s one right there… When you look at a cross there are two parts to it.  There’s the… sorry for the technical lingo here… there's the uppy-downy part and then there's the crossy-crossy part.  Sorry about the crazy theological terms but, now you know.  

The thing is, that without BOTH parts, it’s not a cross.  Without the uppy-downy part it’s just a board and without the crossy-crossy part it’s just a post.  You need BOTH to make it complete.  THAT’s the essence of the lessons for today.  God created us BOTH to love God (the uppy-downy part) and to love our neighbors (the crossy-crossy part).  Unfortunately, since we’re human,  we mess up the uppy-downy part a lot and all to often forget Jesus's arms reaching out to the world on the crossy-crossy part as well.

Today’s first lesson has Isaiah upset with the folks at the Temple.  An hour at the Temple, some loose change in the plate and they were done, ready for the blessing they thought they had earned to plop out of some Temple vending machine… good luck, a clean conscience or a sweet business deal.  Isaiah let them know they weren’t done.  Trying to manipulate God isn’t how the uppy-downy part works and lying and taking advantage of the poor and ignoring the needs of your neighbor during the week isn’t how the crossy-crossy part works either!  

But this wasn’t just a problem in the time of the prophets.  In the Gospel, the leader of the synagogue yells at Jesus for healing a woman on the Sabbath when no work is supposed to be done.  Jesus reminds him here that caring for our neighbors… being faithful to the crossy-crossy part… is JUST as important as being connected to God in the uppy-downy part of our lives.  

But this isn't just a Bible times problem either.  This week I passed a church sign and it said, “The cross is God’s compass that points to heaven.”  A compass needle isn’t a cross.  It’s a post.  And this message ends up focusing only on the uppy-downy and completely ignores our neighbors.  It’s a “me and my Jesus” sort of spiritual faith that tragically forgets that Christ is most powerfully present, not in some spiritual, sweet by and by to come, but in the very physical elements of bread and wine and in Christ's arms on the cross reaching out to embrace the least, last and lost of our flesh and blood neighbors right here on earth.  

But this isn't just someone else’s problem either.  It’s also our problem.  When we decide to go to church on a Sunday, do we decide to go because of what WE need or expect to get from or give to God, or do we also come to church because someone here needs us?  When we talk about our liturgy, hymns, studies and programs, do we focus on what we want… or do we shape what we do here for our neighbor… for the person who sits on the other side of the aisle?

And when the plate comes around or we set up our online giving, do we give only as a spiritual response to God, or do we also give because… that person in the seat in front of you needs a physical, earthly, material seat to sit in?  Do we give also because that person right there needs a physical, real and earthly roof over this building with heat and light in which to come together with a bulletin, music, bread and wine and all the rest?

Giving because God has first given us all that we have… the earth and air and water and life itself… giving generously in a thankful response to all that God has generously done for us is absolutely correct, but it’s only half the story.  Giving also must include the crossy-crossy parts of caring for our neighbors in the nitty-gritty, bill paying reality of our earthly lives together.  

The uppy-downy part of our lives has been taken care of in the life, death and resurrection of Christ.  You and me… we’ll do life some days mostly alright and some days not so alright and every day as a mix of the two.  But no matter how we do life, God in Christ has made us right in that uppy-downy dimension.  No matter how that dimension of life goes, the consequence is God's unwavering love and eternal life!  

But the real life consequences of the crossy-crossy dimension are just as real.  When we feed our neighbors they get full and when we don’t, they go hungry.  When we show up, we’re available… available to share each others joys and burdens.  When we don’t show up we just aren’t.  When we give enough to keep the lights on and the heat going and the payroll paid, we have a place for us to be fed and cared for, a place to share our joys and sorrows and a base to reach out beyond our walls and work at changing the world.  If we don’t give enough, there’s a real-world, crossy-crossy, consequence to that as well.  

Both Isaiah and Jesus valued deeply the uppy-downy relationship we have with God.  Both Isaiah and Jesus also knew however, that the uppy-downy part was just that… a part of the whole God created us to be and for us to live into that wholeness, we must never forget the crossy-crossy parts and reach out our arms, like Christ on the cross, to care for the practical, earthly needs of our neighbors… the ones across the world, the ones in our city and the ones sitting in the chairs around us now.  May we always look at the cross and remember BOTH.  Amen.