July 10th, 2022

Sermon by Rev. Joel Crouse

Today, we are called to consider the wonderfully instructional parable of the Good Samaritan. In the gospel, a lawyer poses a question to Jesus: he seeks a guide for getting to heaven. “Love God, and love your neighbor,” Jesus tells him. To which the lawyer replies, “Define the word ‘neighbor’ for me.”

And so Jesus tells the story of the Good Samaritan. A man is lying injured in a ditch, after being robbed. A priest walks by, sees him, and crosses to the other side. A Levite does the same. Finally, it is the Samaritan, the outcast, who stops and offers aid. The Good Samaritan doesn’t only help the injured man to safety, but he pays, out of his own pocket, for his care. “Which of these was the neighbor to the man?” Jesus asks the lawyer. The answer is obvious: the stranger who showed mercy.

This parable always reminds me of an old experiment that was conducted with seminarians. I found the actual paper this week, published by two Princeton professors in 1972. It was a fascinating read. I had not realized before how closely the professors sought to duplicate the parable as a real-world test. They recreated the victim as he appeared in the gospel – slumped in a ditch, “somewhat ambiguous,” possibly injured, but also possibly drunk and potentially dangerous. They placed the victim on the path, so that the study’s participants were travelling from one place to another like our trio in the gospel.

And then they primed the seminarians. The researchers noted in their paper that Jesus seemed rather disdainful of the current religious leaders, that they were in it for themselves, so to speak, fussing more about rules than good works. So they gave the study participants a task: to give a speech, in a nearby building. For some of them, the speech was on their religious vocation – so they would be thinking about God. Others were specifically given the parable of the Good Samaritan as the topic of their speech. Still others were told they were late for their speech and had to hurry.

This is what happened – maybe you can already guess. Of the participants, the researchers found 40 per cent helped the slumped over person; 60 per cent did not. Of those, a sizable portion appeared not even to see him. The rest appeared agitated – as if they saw him but didn’t feel they could stop and help. It turned out that having just been read The Good Samaritan parable did not actually make a significant difference in whether or not people helped. What made the most difference was being in a hurry. One percent of the group in the most hurried category stopped to help. “Why?” the researchers asked. Given the agitation they felt about not helping, the researchers proposed it was “conflict rather than callousness” that was the factor. The participants were so worried about being late that they prioritized that over helping.

The reason why I think this experiment is so instructional is that we all want to be the Good Samaritan in the parable – and we easily disdain the first two, who see the man and turn away. But what if they were in a hurry? What if the priest had a sick person waiting for his ministry? Or maybe the Levite needed to get his child at daycare? Does that then justify their walking on? Maybe the Samaritan just wasn’t in a rush; he had time to help and so he did.

Perhaps it is more complicated – perhaps the priest didn’t want to get his hands dirty, and the Samaritan was a helpful guy. But the results of the experiment should speak to us: if hurry was the reason, then might it not be the same for us? We are a culture in a perpetual hurry; one that celebrates working long hours, having a full calendar, putting our kids in lots of activities. What opportunities to help are we missing because of these busy schedules? What might we see around us if we would just slow down?

I think it is perhaps not that simple. To see the world in slower motion, we must practice slowing down. A mindful person doesn’t miss what lies before them, does not step over the person in need.

But let’s not forget the nature of the Good Samarian’s assistance. He did not just pause and help the man out of the ditch. He stopped in his life and helped to his fullest extent – what’s more, he came back the next day to check on the victim. Whether he was in a hurry or not, he interrupted his life for a long period of time. And because he had no connection to the man, and indeed was considered a foreigner, he was unlikely to reap any benefit.

The Good Samaritan then worried not about human rules – the constraints of time, the demands of getting too involved, the rules that he might be breaking – he found a need and he responded.

In their paper, the two Princeton Professors quote a line from New Testament scholar Robert Funk: “The Samaritan does not love with side glances at God.” Rather, he loves the way God does – straight head, and all around, looking to go where he is most needed. Amen

July 3rd, 2022

Sermon by Rev. Joel Crouse

It is true that we are not Americans, but we live both in the sunlight and in the shadow of the United States, and it is a country that casts a long shadow. On the day the Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, and summarily stripped a half-century of constitutional right from 50 per cent of the population, in my house, and perhaps in many of yours, there was pain and fear and despair—even here in Ottawa, with a Prime Minister who quickly affirmed the right of women to choose. I heard that fear and anger, nonetheless, in the voices of the women I know, in the conversations that I overheard. It is the feeling of being trapped by an arbitrary act dictated by people (most of whom never risk having to make the same difficult decision) who have decided your life for you, who have infantilized you, as if being a woman makes you a child who has no right to her own decision. What’s more, the door has been opened to reversing rights for same-sex couples to love one another, to limiting the rights of couples to choose how, and when, and with whom to create their families. The tremors it created shook the ground here. And the voice of God was wielded like a sword. Which is precisely the opposite of what it is meant to do.

There have been plenty of times in my 25 years, now, as a pastor when people have recited the Bible not to me – but at me. But “This line,” they will say to me, “says this, Pastor. Doesn’t that make this person a sinner, or that choice a sin?” What is sad, by the way, is how much rarer it is for people to quote, at will, Bible verses as a gesture of love and acceptance. We humans certainly like to make good things into weapons, if we can figure out a way. Proof-texting is a fruitless exercise. Throw out one verse, another comes back at you. It is an exercise in mutually-assured confusion.

In seminary, I chose to write my thesis on why the church should marry same-sex couples. It is hard to believe that as a church of the gospel, we were talking about denying people love and kindness – and yet we were, and we still are, imperfect about it. As a cisgendered man, I came around to the rights of those whose gender was different from mine slowly, too slowly. There were many epiphany moments along the way, but, in seminary, one stood out. While visiting as a student pastor, I met two women living together, who were clearly a couple. But when I visited, even though I was there to help them, they pretended otherwise, they hid the truth of themselves from me. They did not trust me or how I might use God’s voice and power in their presence. And that, I felt, could never be. How can a pastor help anyone if they are afraid to show themselves? How can God’s voice be joyful if there is fear it will be used as a sword? How can compassion exist in a lie? Everything I understood about the gospel said it could not.

What does Paul say to the Galatians in his eloquent, pleasing speech in our second lesson? “Bear one another’s burdens, and in this way, you will fulfill the law of Christ.” How are we burdened? By being hated by others when we are different from them. By being judged by others when we make choices they decide are sins. Aren’t those among the worst burdens of human existence: hate and judgement?

How much worse they are when a law supports them.

As a minister, I often see people in their worst moments. They have experienced a terrible loss, they are trying to repair a life-changing mistake, they are wrestling with a difficult decision. In those very human moments – ones in which we all find ourselves – people need not law and doctrine, but compassion and kindness. They need someone to listen to them, to be there for them, to help guide them as they navigate what happens next on their own.

We are all lucky, then, as Paul says, that the law of Christ is not hate and scorn, but the call to bear one another’s burdens.

But Paul continues, reminding the crowd that they reap what they sow: “So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up.”

We have a stark lesson across the border: we can lose rights if we don’t pay attention. Society can go backwards. At a time when we face the threat of war, climate change, and growing financial inequity – we have to ask ourselves who wins when we are distracted, fighting, or worrying about a woman’s right to choose? It is not God, who loves us as we are, who hopes, as Paul says, that we will carry one another’s burdens. It is not the gospel, a message of compassion.

We have our directions from Jesus, in his lessons to the disciples in our gospel: “I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves,” he says. Go out, and persist; where you find like minds, embrace them; where you find differences, try to find common ground. In the face of uncertain success, when your feet are at their dustiest, and your bones creak, shake it off. For you must persist, always, to the next day.

We will reap what we sow. “So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up.” Amen

June 26th, 2022

Sermon by Rev. Joel Crouse

While reading up on the gospel story this week, I came across an excerpt from a book called The Power of Focus. The goal of the book was to teach people “how to hit their business and personal targets with certainty.”

Online, someone had distilled down the eight lessons. I want to give you a sampling of what they are. To improve focus, the writers propose the following behaviours. Number One: Take one day completely off each week. Two: Spend time with your family. Three: Before going to bed, think about what you want to accomplish tomorrow. Number Four: Find one thing to make your day better. Five: Take a nap. Six: Ask for help. Seven: Be persistent. And Eight: Keep your promises.

I love reading lists like this. They sound so familiar. Perhaps, we have heard them before?

Perhaps, in one version or another, they have been spoken by the same guy who is giving us the gears in this morning’s gospel.

Jesus is certainly playing Bad Cop in the gospel text. He is in a moment of his ministry when he is making discipleship sound hard. So hard, we might be squirming in our seats a bit.

Someone says to Jesus: I will follow you anywhere. And Jesus basically says, come if you want, but we’re pretty much homeless, and foxes live better than we do.

He encounters another person and extends an invitation. This person agrees, but can he first go and bury his dad? Jesus fires back: let the dead take of themselves, he says.

A third potential disciple says, “I’m coming; just let me go and kiss my family good-bye.” “Whatever,” Jesus answers. “No one who puts a hand to the plow and look back is fit for the [Reign] of God.”

Was Jesus being a bit of a heavy? Absolutely. But his point was clear: discipleship is hard. In his day, it meant leaving your family, giving up a home and a comfortable bed, facing uncertainty, including the risk of arrest and death by the authorities. It was not a decision to be made lightly. We have it easier, living in Canada. But in our day, as the teachings of Jesus become less prominent in society, being disciples of the gospel also has its challenges. It is easy to lose focus.

But keeping focus, staying the course, and persisting is what Jesus is talking about today. What happens to the person pushing the plow if they get distracted and look backwards? They till a crooked line, or maybe the plow runs into a rock and gets stuck. If you are always looking to the life you wish you had, how can you truly live the one you have chosen? Faith requires Focus.

The gospel is never so lacking in nuance, even when the words of Jesus seem to be. The gospel is meant to be read as a complete story, and in context, and by lifting bits here or there. We can read the whole thing on a Sunday, so I get to preach on snippets, on themes. Today, Jesus is talking about focus, but he is also telling stories that highlight, in another context, the benefits of being open to distraction. And there have been plenty of times when Jesus lifted up memory, and family connection, and an awareness of ourselves as being bigger than one moment, as important parts of faith.

But, in this instance, he is talking specifically choosing discipleship when it is tough to do so, about the importance of deciding to be all-in, so you don’t waver at the first sign of trouble. It was going to be hard for the group he was gathering during the time in our story; and it is hard for us today to stay on that plow, never looking back. When we falter in those moments, when our plow goes off-kilter, Jesus reminds us to stay focused on God, on the gospel. Don’t worry about unfinished business you cannot make better. Don’t worry about what you don’t have. Don’t worry about mistakes you made you can’t fix. Look to what you can make better now, to what you can fix now.

So Jesus is talking about a singular focus, like following with thought. He is referring to the kind of focus that gives us energy, purpose and direction. Focus is a trait to adopt so all the other parts of our lives are more content, have more meaning, more love and space. And so it is interesting to hear those 8 points mentioned in a business book about focus.

Because - what were they again? Take off the Sabbath, care for your community, pray as you look to the next day; do something good that brings you peace; practice mindfulness; be open to support and wisdom; have the faith to keep going; and, as much as you can, do what you say you will.

We don’t need to buy a book for those rules; they are written here in the gospel. They are principles of focusing on a life that serves a greater good, a higher calling. Do not look behind, Jesus says, so that you become stuck among the things you cannot change; look ahead, with intention, and live well and honestly. Focus on the gospel, Jesus says, keep your hands on the plow of the faithful, and your harvest will be large indeed. Amen.