Pentecost 4 C: Good News or Bad?

Posted by DJL on Jul 5, 2019 in Dear Partner | 3 comments

Luke 10:1-11, 16-20

Dear Partner in Preaching,

Not too long ago, while preparing a sermon, I was reminded of linguistic philosopher J. L. Austin’s book How to Do Things With Words, where he expresses the conviction that you know the meaning of a word or sentence not by what it says (our usual assumption), but by why what it does, by what impact it has on you.

For instance, imagine that I say, “The door is open.” Is that simply a statement of fact? Maybe. But what if you had just asked a question about why it was so warm inside even though the air-conditioning was on, and I said, “The door is open.” Then I’m not simply stating a fact but providing you an answer. Or maybe I say it with a kind of incredulity or even a hint of contempt in my voice – “the door is open” – and you realize I’m implying that a) your question isn’t too bright – anyone should realize that if you leave the door open when it’s 90 degrees outside it’s going to get warm – and b) you aren’t too bright for leaving it open. Or maybe I’ve told my kids several times that when the air conditioner is on, it’s really important to save electricity by keeping the door closed and I find it open once again and so say, with some annoyance in my voice, “The door is open,” and they feel both accused and guilty and at least one of them – hopefully – gets up to shut the door. Or maybe you and I are gossiping about a mutual friend – not that we’d ever do that! – and I whisper insistently, “The door is open,” to remind you that our friend might be just outside and to beg you to keep your voice down.

Do you see what I mean? Such a simple statement can mean so many different things, and the only way you know what it actually means is by paying attention to what it does to you – answer a question, imply you’re not that bright, remind you that you have forgotten to close it, or warn you that others might be listening. And that was Austin’s point: meaning isn’t nearly as much about what words say as what they do. For this reason, Austin spent most of his career tracing out different kinds of what he called “speech acts,” different ways that words do things: provide information, urge action, offer a warning, scold or insult someone, make a threat, offer a blessing, and so on.

I thought of Austin’s work while reading this week’s appointed Gospel passage, as in the opening verses of the tenth chapter of Luke, Jesus says and does a number of things that could be interpreted as either good news or bad, depending on how they impact you.

After this the Lord appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs to every town and place where he himself intended to go (1). Is seventy enough? Is it a large number? It’s much larger than the twelve disciples we’re usually familiar with, but about the size of the average mainline congregation, which we bemoan as terribly small and a sign of decline.

“He said to them, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore, ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest” (2). Crisis? Challenge? Or opportunity?

“Go on your way. See, I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves” (10:3). Words of warning or confidence or something else altogether?

“Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals; and greet no one on the road.” Caution? A trust exercise?

And so on.

So… what is Jesus saying? What does he mean? How might his instructions to his followers in the first century inform the lives of those of us living in the twenty-first? These questions get all the more pressing when it comes to the next verses:

Whatever house you enter, first say, “Peace to this house!’ And if anyone is there who shares in peace, your peace will rest on that person; but if not, it will return to you. Remain in the same house, eating and drinking whatever they provide, for the laborer deserves to be paid. Do not move about from house to house. Whenever you enter a town and its people welcome you, eat what is set before you; cure the sick who are there, and say to them, “The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ But whenever you enter a town and they do not welcome you, go out into its streets and say, “Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet, we wipe off in protest against you. Yet know this: the kingdom of God has come near” (6-11).

These words, particularly directed at the persons who do not welcome the disciples, sound ominous. So… is it blessing for those who offer hospitality and a threat or, worse, a curse to those who do not?

I’ll be honest, Dear Partner, I’ve always found this passage a little confusing. Is this good news or bad? This seems like an important question when there is so much emphasis on defining and claiming one’s identity – with new “identity words” being coined regularly – and when drawing lines between who’s in and who’s out has become something of a blood sport. How do we take Jesus’ words and Luke’s testimony seriously without falling prey to the temptation to define who we are in terms of who we are not or, worse, over and against others?

Two things help me find a way forward. First, the passage we read last week sharing the story of Jesus’ rejection of James and John’s violent response to the lack of hospitality shown Jesus by those living in the Samaritan village. Second, the ultimate word, both to those who welcome Jesus and his disciples and those who do not, is the same: “the kingdom of God has come near.” And that phrase, I think, is also best understood in terms not simply of what it says, but what it does.

Which brings me back to Austin. Providing information, answering a question, telling someone to do something, offering a blessing or warning. All these different kinds of speech acts, as Austin calls them, are present in the Bible. But the most common speech act in Scripture is not any of these but something quite different: making a promise. And I think the phrase “the kingdom of God has come near” is, ultimately a promise. Yes, it may call us to account. Yes, it may invite us to look more critically at how we treat others. But ultimately, it is the promise that, in God’s kingdom, identity is not something earned or asserted or fought over or claimed and gained at someone else’s loss. Rather, identity is something conferred as a gift, as we discover that we are – each of us and each person we encounter – God’s beloved children.

In God’s kingdom, it doesn’t matter where you’re from or what you have done. It doesn’t matter what nationality or race or gender or occupation or sexuality or age you are. It doesn’t matter where you were born or what economic status or influence you may have (or not have). These designations may be important to us, even at times useful on a day to day basis. But they just don’t matter all that much to God. So while all these descriptors and any others we can think of may describe us accurately, even at times helpfully or importantly to us, yet they do not define us. What defines us is how God sees us, as we discover who we are by remembering whose we are: God’s beloved child. And that, my dear Partner in Preaching, is always good news.

So perhaps the opportunity in front us this week is simply to remind our folks that we – and those who welcome us or not, those who affirm us and those who don’t, those who help us and those who refuse – that all of us are, together, God’s children. Which may just transform how we see ourselves and each other and give us the courage and compassion to share the word that, in Jesus, God’s kingdom has indeed drawn near.

Thanks for your good work, this week and always, Dear Partner, for you also are God’s child and, when you climb once more into the pulpit, God’s herald as well. And your work – and this, too, is a promise – will not be in vain!

Yours in Christ,

David