Six and a half years ago I was at St. Paul’s church in Newburyport, MA, for the first time. I was in the process of interviewing for the position of Associate Rector, and Roger, the rector, had invited me to preach and celebrate at a Sunday service. This is not something you can have rector candidates do, but since rectors themselves have the final say over matters liturgical – including who preaches and who serves at the altar – sometimes candidates for other, non-rector positions will find themselves in the position I was in. Being at this church for the first time, as a try-out, one might say – they were getting their first sense of me and I was getting my first sense of them. They got the better end of that deal, since all I remember is preaching and getting the flowers to take home – daffodils, my favorite. Anyway, it was during Lent and the text I preached on was from the gospel, a traditional Lenten text, Jesus telling the disciples that he would be handed over, suffer and die. Peter, one of the twelve, does not react well to this news, and Jesus calls him Satan in response. So in my sermon I was talking about Peter, and in my treatment of him I did what I often do – take a step back and imagine some response to these biblical types in more contemporary language. Bottom line is, in the midst of doing that I referred to Peter as a bozo. I did get the job, but in the almost six years I served at St. Paul’s, they never let me forget that sermon. It’s just that Peter is such an interesting figure. At some point I’ll preach a sermon about him (and I won’t call him any names). And although Peter doesn’t figure directly in the lessons today, he was in my head as I looked at our lessons and thought about what we were supposed to take from them.
I’ll get back to Peter and explain what I mean, but I’ll tell you the connection now: partiality. We have this lesson from the letter of James this morning, and James comes down pretty hard on anyone who shows partiality. Here are a few phrases from James: do you with your acts of favoritism really believe in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ? Have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts? If you show partiality, you commit sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For judgment will be without mercy to anyone who has shown no mercy; mercy triumphs over judgment.
There are a few definitions of the word partial. There’s the obvious one, having to do with parts of a whole. There’s the innocuous definition, "markedly fond of," – liking one thing more, like chocolate over vanilla. And then there’s the definition that applies here: inclined to favor one party more than another; biased in favor of a person, group, or side over another. James comes down hard over those who favor - are biased in favor of, or partial to – rich over poor, for instance. And he’s also reminding his listeners that an attitude of partiality is not what God expects of us.
Then we’ve got today’s gospel lesson, which, although about several things, is also about partiality. What we have here are two healing stories, one about a demon being cast out of a little girl, and one about a deaf man. But the healing themselves are not the primary focus of the stories. Both of these stories are actually a response to, and a follow up on, what we heard last week. Remember in last week’s gospel, Jesus was criticized by the Pharisees because some of his disciples did not wash before eating; Jesus’ response (after calling them hypocrites) was to teach his followers that it’s not what is outside that defiles. It’s what’s inside the human heart that we should worry about. Which makes sense for today’s lessons, as we’re warned about partiality, this bias in favor of.
So in today’s two stories which make up our gospel lesson, the healing isn’t the major focus. In the second one, about the man who was deaf, the focus seems to be on the miraculous nature of the event, and the response of the people to Jesus. In the first story, about the woman who asks Jesus to heal her daughter, the focus is on their interaction and her status as a Gentile. And this is part of the second story too, though that may be less obvious. We are given a level of detail that we don’t often see in Mark, part of it geographic. We’re told several things in each story: Jesus was in the region of Tyre; we’re told the woman is a Gentile, and that her ethnicity is Syrophoenician. In the second story, we’re told that Jesus went by way of Sidon, towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. Right. So what? Well, what Mark is telling us – what Mark is highlighting – is that these people were Gentiles. That word is one that we hear often in the New Testament though we may not always think about its meaning; it’s from the Latin for nation, and it means, technically, a non-Jew. But the way it’s used in the gospel in our context highlights something beyond these two people’s religions. It indicates, in no uncertain terms, that they are outsiders. The way Mark tells this story of the woman and her daughter, the focus is not on the miracle itself but on her status as an outsider. Outside, outside, outside: that’s the point we are to understand. Why? Because what we see is Jesus interacting with these outsiders. We see Jesus engaging with these outsiders. We see Jesus healing these outsiders. We see Jesus telling us, with his actions, that he came not for one people, but for all people. We see Jesus expanding his mission, and calling all people to himself. We see Jesus, in the end, showing no partiality.
And that brings us back to Peter. Even though there are some very high profile stories about Jesus interacting with, engaging with, talking with, eating with, healing and teaching Gentiles as well as Jews, after his death and resurrection the early Christian community was not of one mind about this issue. There were bitter arguments about issues like table fellowship – should followers of Jesus, who became Jews to become Christians, eat with Gentiles? Should they associate with them? For a time if one wanted to follow Jesus, one first had to convert to Judaism – become a follower of the law. This created a two-tier system in the early church, those who believed in Jesus but weren’t Jewish, and those who believed in Jesus and were. And distinctions were definitely made between the two. The Apostle Paul was in the middle of these arguments; that he is called the Apostle to the Gentiles probably tells you which way he went. Here are a couple of things that Paul said about this issue. From the letter to the Romans, he says this: is God the God of the Jews only? Is God not the God of Gentiles also? Yes, of Gentiles also, since God is one. Paul goes on to say that God justifies both Jews and Gentiles on the basis of their faith. No distinctions here; faith in Jesus is all that matters. This is James’ position as well, though James is very clear that faith is both felt and acted; faith is what we have with our hearts and souls but also with our hands and our feet. How we act, how we treat others, is a clear reflection of our faith for James, as well as what we believe.
But what about old Peter? Peter comes down on the Jewish side rather than the Gentile side. Peter is a good Jew; he is a follower of the law; he keeps the rules and traditions of the faith. When we heard last week that ‘some of the disciples’ did not do the ritual washing before eating, they weren’t talking about Peter. The story about Peter that highlights this most clearly is from the Acts of the Apostles, chapters 10 and 11. We hear about ten verses of this story on Easter Sunday. Unfortunately, what we hear is such that it compares to hearing the punchline of a joke without being told the joke. We get the ten verses of this story which are essentially the punchline, but we don’t get enough to know why this matters. So here’s the story: It starts with Cornelius, a Roman soldier, one who believes in God but is not Jewish. An angel sends Cornelius to Peter. Cornelius doesn’t know Peter, so this doesn’t make all that much sense to him, but he listens to the angel and sends some of his men to go track Peter down. Meanwhile, Peter is in town; he’s up on a roof praying. In his prayers – his vision, what the text calls a trance – Peter, who is hungry, sees heaven opening and a sheet coming down; in this sheet are what scripture calls ‘4-footed creatures, reptiles, and birds of the air. A voice says to Peter, Peter, kill and eat. Peter says, no Lord, for I have never eaten what is profane and unclean. The voice – God’s voice – tells Peter, what I have made clean you must not call profane. Peter has this same vision three times. (Apparently he’s not that quick a study.) He wakes up, and puzzles over this vision. And is found by Cornelius’ men. They are invited in, given lodging; Peter and Cornelius find each other. And finally, it all clicks for Peter. He gets it. It all makes sense; his vision, his experience with Jesus, this man Cornelius in faith in front of him. This is what Peter says, what we hear every Easter Sunday: “Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to God.” Peter must have been preaching it that day, because the scriptures tell us that the Holy Spirit fell on Cornelius and his men who were listening, and that Peter recognized this and baptized them on the spot.
Truly I understand that God shows no partiality. Do you with our acts of favoritism really believe in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ? If you show partiality, you commit sin. Mercy triumphs over judgment. Jesus set out and went to the region of Tyre; the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. Truly I understand that God shows no partiality.
These are powerful words, reminding us what things look like from God’s point of view, rather than our human point of view. It puts me in mind of a hymn we sing, there’s a wideness in God’s mercy, like the wideness of the sea. And the words which are so important to St. George’s , our motto: A circle ever wider, and a people ever free. We see, through these stories, that when God has something to say about it, outsiders are no longer outsiders; even better, the categories of insiders and outsiders are abolished. This is the ideal. No partiality.
Now we know that we fallible human beings cannot fully manage to see the way God sees – looking only at faith, looking without partiality. We’ve shown that it’s not our best thing. It’s one of those things which is hard for us. But. But, we are not without hope. We are not without help. We have the best help there is, in fact. If we have the mind of Christ – if we are in Christ Jesus – there, we may have a chance. A chance to see as God sees. To act as God acts. To love as God loves – without partiality. Without making distinctions of the various kinds we do – of class; of race; of sexual orientation. Of ability; of education; of ethnicity; of language or accent. Of religion. Of any of the thousand ways we separate.
As Paul says in his letter to the Galatians: In Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith. As many of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourself with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek; there is no longer slave or free; there is no longer male or female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. Truly I believe that God shows no partiality. For when there are no more outsiders, when we manage to live and act and love without partiality, it is a sign of the reign of God. May that reign continue its coming, and may our actions help it along.
Amen.