Weak Wisdom 2 Corinthians 12:2-10

Transcription

1 Kevin Gardner-Sinclair 11:00 service Wilshire Baptist Church July 8, 2018 Dallas, Texas Weak Wisdom 2 Corinthians 12:2-10 Geri Scazzero was fed up, so she looked at her husband Pete, and said, I m not leaving you. I m leaving your church. I just don t respect you as a pastor anymore. Fifteen years prior, Pete planted New Life Fellowship Church in Queens, NY, in the most culturally-diverse zip code in the United States, and today New Life draws members from 73 different nationalities. While New Life flourished, one of Pete s protégées, who Geri sensed was toxic, led an underground campaign against him as Senior Pastor. Geri tried to tell him, but he wouldn t listen. For Pete, the son of Italian immigrants, loyalty ran deep in his veins and he couldn t imagine his beloved associate stabbing him in the back after all these years. The day came, and his associate led 200 members away to start a new church, which would itself die within a few years. Despite countless warnings, Geri didn t say I told you so; she steeled her spine and said, I m not leaving you, but I m leaving our church, because I don t respect you as a pastor anymore. Over the next few years, this experience of pain finally got Pete and Geri talking, providing the conversational catalyst to process ignored emotions and heal family wounds. Looking back, Pete told my class a few weeks ago, Nothing I had been taught in American Evangelical Christianity had given me the tools to handle such crisis: to name my emotions, process my family history, and own my own weakness and vulnerability. Pete learned, just like the Apostle Paul in our text today, that there was a thorn in his flesh that wasn t going anywhere. No amount of procrastination or success could pluck the prickle 1

2 from his life. You don t get to choose your family, and you can t rewrite your past. You can, however, discover that what the world considers weakness, in God s wisdom becomes a source of great power. As Christ tells Paul, My grace is sufficient for you. My power is perfected in weakness. The early church was a hot mess. I mean, we get a couple of chapters in Acts where everyone is getting along, breaking bread, praying and learning together, sharing so that there isn t any need, and then by Acts chapter 6, boom! Cultural conflict around food distribution starts popping up between the folks from Jerusalem and the folks who MOVED to Jerusalem. The Apostles delegate and create the job of deacon (which in Greek means table server). The deacons job was to oversee meals and make sure everyone gets a fair share, especially those who have migrated to Jerusalem to join the Jesus movement. This is why deacons are the servers during the Lord s Supper still today, and make sure nobody hoards the gluten-free crackers and grape juice. They are watching y all! This tension between the local Believers and those who immigrated to Jerusalem will continue to plague the church for decades and will become a central justice issue for the Apostle Paul in his mission to bring the Gospel to the Gentiles. Without Paul, we non-jewish Gentiles might still be worshipping Odin or Zeus! Our hymns would be a little different: O Gods Our Helps in Ages Past, Oh, How I Love Hermes, When I Survey the Wondrous Yggdrasil? (Any Thor fans out there?). They just don t have the same ring to them. Without Paul s repentance from his life of prejudice and violence, 2

3 we Gentiles might not know the name of Jesus. This thorn of Paul s past forced him to look his own sin and past self in the eye: his hatred of Gentiles and followers or Jesus; his bigotry; his racism. But, what Paul does NOT do is try to water down and rewrite his own history: Well, I didn t really HATE those people, I just systematically used my power to silence them, and occasionally I stoned people to death. But it s okay; I m actually one of the good guys now. No, Paul beat his breast until his final breath, confessing, I am the chief of sinners; I carried a letter of execution, then was struck blind by Jesus, so I could finally see myself for who I really was: a violent, bigoted monster. Paul tells his story three times in the book of Acts. My old pastor used to say that s because he probably told it three thousand times until his martyrdom. Paul s story was the story of what God had to do to get his attention! His failures, his weakness, his vulnerability is what made him worth listening to. We don t know exactly what Paul means when he says, thorn in his flesh, in our text today. The Message translates it as disability, but what we know is that this personal weakness denied him any delusions of strength and superiority. His vulnerability robbed him of the luxury of whitewashing his past and ignoring his desperate need for God s grace. Paul s weakness was precisely the place where God s wisdom came alive in his theological imagination. And here is where the trouble begins in 2 Corinthians. Wherever Paul went to preach, after he left town, another group of preachers would show up, and preach that Paul gave them an incomplete Gospel. To truly be saved, Gentile converts must be 3

4 circumcised and observe Torah Law. Paul mockingly calls these legalistic Christians the Super- Apostles, and they are the recipients of his scorn in 2 Corinthians. My friend Harry Wooten at Royal Lane Baptist Church calls these kinds of folks Varsity Christians. I m sure you know a Varsity Christian or two! The Super-Apostles were a group of Christians who taught that without becoming observant Jews first, they could not become followers of Jesus. Makes sense, right? Jesus was Jewish. Circumcised on the eighth day. Went to the Temple and synagogue. Possibly wore the cloak of a Pharisee. Probably didn t eat bacon. But on Pentecost, the Church is liberated by the Spirit, not bound to the letter of the Law anymore, and BOTH Peter and Paul receive visions confirming the freedom from the Law found in Jesus Christ. But how many Christians over how many centuries continue to shackle themselves to the Law? Maybe they eat bacon and do paperwork on Saturdays, but we remain convinced that faith is about rules rather than relationship. We become originalists about the Bible, and we just want to talk about what Paul said, rather than do what Paul did. Paul became the Apostle to the Gentiles. Paul opened the floodgates to let people of every color, culture, and community into the Church of Jesus Christ. And this work of inclusion was never done, because as soon as he would hit the road, along came the Super- Apostles saying, Actually, Christ s crucifixion and the Holy Spirit are not enough. You still have to observe the Law and get circumcised. I guess they never read prophet Micah, wondering what rituals must he do to appease God, and God roars back, I have told you what to do mortal: do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God. 4

5 The prideful Super-Apostles praised their personal holiness, celebrated their strict observance of the Law, preached purity from the infestation of these Gentile vermin. They spewed racism and legalism long before it was cool. If they were alive today, they would make great pastors in First Baptist Churches all across America. But, throughout the biblical narrative, we see power subverted and perfected in weakness. The Hebrew slaves escaped Egypt. David beat the giant Goliath. Jesus told Peter to put away his sword before dying a criminal s death on a Roman Cross, then is raised from the dead proving that hatred and death cannot defeat the God of Love and Life. Vulnerability is precisely where God s power manifests. God s wisdom is hidden in our weakness. Brené Brown, professor of Social Work at the University of Houston, broke the internet in June 2010 when her TED Talk, The Power of Vulnerability, was published. It now has over 35 million views. As a self-proclaimed perfectionist, she explains how destructive these patterns of perfectionism are for humans. We are hardwired for striving and struggle, connection and belonging, but we continue to believe that we are not enough and that we have to fight for our seat at the table, rather than welcoming others, as if God can t create enough daily bread for us all. So, we either numb the pain with food, or pills, or pursuits of perfectionism, rather than receiving the grace of wisdom discovered in our weakness and vulnerability. Brown closes her TED Talk with this simple call to look at our own pain, just like Pete Scazzero had to look at his family history, just as Paul had to look at his previous life of violence. 5

6 Take a deep breath and say, I'm just so grateful, because to feel this vulnerable means I'm alive. In 1921, at the height of his political potential, Franklin Delano Roosevelt developed a wretched fever which would last for days. After his fever broke, he lost the use of his legs. Stricken with polio, which is now almost eradicated by vaccination, FDR spent almost a decade trying to regain the use of his limbs. Trips to the Florida Keys, with hopes that the salty waters and sunbeams of the Gulf might conjure some healing, ended in despair. During this dark night of the soul, on a trip to a little town named after his wife Eleanor s grandmother, FDR visited the mineral springs of Bullochville, Georgia, 70 miles south of Atlanta. FDR fell in love with this rustic hideaway and felt refreshed by the 90-degree mineral waters feeding the springs. He spent two-thirds of his inheritance, $195,000 in 1925, to buy the town which he renamed Warm Springs, where he founded the Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute for Rehabilitation. It is still in operation today, helping generations of people with physical disabilities find rest and rehab. Polio attacks the young primarily, so Warm Springs was filled with children with disabilities, who in the 1920s probably didn t think they would ever have a life of dignity and worth. But, they would show up, and here was this man, this laughing giant, greeting them by name from his wheelchair with legs clasped in steel braces, suffering through the same illness as them, and exercising side-byside with them in the warm mineral waters of Warm Springs, Georgia. One little girl tells her story in Ken Burns documentary, The Roosevelts. She was warmly welcomed by President Roosevelt, asking, What is your name little girl? She replied, sheepishly, 6

7 Suzanne. The President said, Suzanne, that is such a pretty name, but I would like to call you Suzie. Would that be all right with you? Little Suzanne said, Okay Mr. Roosevelt, if I can call you Rosy. He cracked up, and, from then on, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt became known by his friends suffering from physical disabilities at Warm Springs as Rosy. A picture of confidence in vulnerability. Power perfected in weakness. in its demands and not very fulfilling in its success. We all bear the scars of shattered hopes and dashed dreams. We all carry wounds from our fathers and mothers and try to hide our vulnerability from one another. I know I have. We all live in this tension, and it is precisely out of that weakness where God s great wisdom will shine, because God s power is made perfect in weakness. May God s wisdom teach us to be thankful for the thorns. Amen. The prolific, conservative writer George Will said of the 32nd President, It is tempting and probably true to say that polio gave FDR the gift of empathy. There was no suffering that he could not in some sense relate to. And also, just as the irons were clapped on his legs, the steel entered his soul by having to fight through the constant pain of therapy that was unforgiving 7