September 5, 2021
/Proper 18
The Rev. Clint Brown
Exactly 529 years ago this week, an observer from outer space, roving over the North Atlantic with their telescope, would have spied (without being terribly impressed, I would imagine) three small sailing ships beating a westward tack somewhere to the west-southwest of the Canary Islands. We know that Columbus’s little fleet of caravels – the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria – were at that moment on a collision course with destiny, but if our space observer had stopped to remark about them at all to a companion, there would have been no reason to think they carried any special significance. They would not have known that, in the history of the world, never before had any ships yet attempted what these three were attempting, nor would they have been able to appreciate how consequential this would be for the subsequent history of planet Earth. In our minds, Columbus’ first voyage is the quintessential story of discovery, of braving the unknown despite the prevailing wisdom of the age. For us it is an object lesson for how without risk there is no reward, and how when nothing is ventured, nothing is gained. This is the way discovery has always worked.
And I mention this because I want to ask the question, “Where is Jesus?” in our Gospel lesson today. It turns out that, he too, is in uncharted waters, both in a literal and figurative sense. Figuratively, he has just shown his willingness to step outside the bounds of tradition, by challenging the scribes and Pharisees. Last Sunday, he debated with them about what constitutes cleanliness and asked, rightfully, what do the exacting and oppressive rules of tradition, the mere forms of religion, have to do with what really matters – the disposition of the heart? Jesus is opposing the tried and true and calling it to account, and, in so doing, staking a claim as a reformer. Like an explorer, to be a reformer is an uncomfortable place to be. Like an explorer, you find yourself far from home.
And now, in our passage today, we shift from the figural to the literal. We are told that Jesus has journeyed outside familiar territory to somewhere in the region of Tyre, gentile territory, a ways away from home base, so to speak, in order to have a little R&R; but what ends up happening, of course, is that “he could not escape notice” (v. 24), and now, in this place far from home, Jesus finds that he himself is the learner challenged by the faith of a foreigner, a Syro-Phoenician woman. Literally and figuratively, then, Jesus has stepped outside the known borders, and this reminds us again that dislocation is what sets the conditions for discovery.
And why is that? Why is finding that we are not in Kansas anymore so beneficial? Because dislocation makes us uncomfortable, and discomfort, as any educator will tell you, is the necessary ground for learning. To be a good teacher you have to push your students out of their comfort zone. You have to introduce enough stress that they are challenged and stretched, but not so much that they can’t cope with it and they give up. Learning happens at that place where you are forced to bend but not break.
As we study Scripture, this ought to be happening to us all the time, because the priorities and values of God’s Kingdom should feel foreign to us. If left to our own devices, they are unlike the ones we would choose. Did you hear the challenge of James today, when he called us out on our instinct – and “instinct” is the right word because it is like second nature to us – our instinct to show deference to the rich and powerful among us, paying more attention to the one wearing gold rings and fine clothes than to the poor man sitting under the overpass? Doesn’t it make more sense to pay attention to the one from whom I might expect some kind of return for my effort? I recognize myself in that calculus; I hope you do, too. But James is clear, isn’t he? The poor are richer because theirs is a faith that is sure of its need for God, and that is the true riches.
This disconnect between my values and my behavior is something that makes me uncomfortable…and that is the point. To achieve new understandings, I have to be brought to new spaces and places, and nowhere is this better captured than in the words of another famed navigator, seaman, and explorer, Sir Francis Drake, to whom there is attributed this marvelous prayer, with which I’ll close. It is called, appropriately, “Disturb us, Lord.”[1]
Disturb us, Lord, when
We are too well pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we have dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.
Disturb us, Lord, when
With the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.
Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wider seas
Where storms will show your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.
We ask You to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push into the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.[2]
[1] This prayer is notoriously difficult to pin down in terms of its authorship. For more on these difficulties, see Joshua Horne, “Francis Drake’s Prayer: Fact or Fiction?,” Discerning History (blog), November 22, 2014, accessed September 3, 2021, http://discerninghistory.com/2014/11/francis-drakes-prayer-fact-or-fiction/.
[2] Text drawn from Joshua Horne, “Francis Drake’s Prayer: Fact or Fiction?,” Discerning History (blog), November 22, 2014, accessed September 3, 2021, http://discerninghistory.com/2014/11/francis-drakes-prayer-fact-or-fiction/.