Sermon
” Keep it Simple:
Go two by two and don’t overpack.
Go two by two. Take nothing but a staff: no bread, no backpack, no change of clothes, no money. Just put on your sandals and go… and shake off the dust off your feet when needed.
Jesus’ instructions to the Twelve might hit us where it hurts. Especially in this summer and travel time. Once again, I realized returning from vacation that I overpacked. I brought several extra shirts, socks and shoes that I never wore. I certainly did not only bring a staff, but I bought a lot of stuff.
I must admit that I have always been guilty of overpacking. Only when I was backpacking through Europe after High school, and had to carry my clothes, my sleeping bag, my tent and my belongings from place to place, on trains and buses, upstairs and now again – only then I actually did not overpack. But when I travel, I must admit I mostly overpack, just like I did this summer.
So, Jesus’ instructions this morning to his disciples truly hit my habit. I am overpacking. Whether I am going on a quick two-day trip or travelling through life, I seem to try to prepare for every possible contingency, all kinds of weather and every impossible disaster.
Surely, this passage from the Gospel according to Mark is more than a cautionary tale about our tendency to stuff our suitcases in the summertime or overpack our lives, homes with stuff and overindulgence.
This morning Gospel is a call to us as Christians to be disciples: to focus on the witness, the words and the Gospel to share and not the bread, the clothing, the money to heed. To believe in grace given to us: not a cheap grace but a costly grace that call us, compels us, changes us, challenges us to be, to do, to witness and to act. As the disciples of Christ.
“Jesus began to send them out two by two.”
I was reminded of a popular book some yeas back with the catchy title: “All I really need to know I learned in Kindergarten.” It is a book of short essays by American minister and author Robert Fulghum from1986.
The title of the book is taken from the first essay in the volume, in which Fulghum lists lessons normally learned in American kindergarten classrooms and explains how the world would be improved if adults adhered to the same basic rules as children, i.e. sharing, being kind to one another, cleaning up after themselves etc.
It was quite popular because it offered life lessons that were not only true, but simple and ultimately hopeful. And these lessons reminded us that sometimes we adults can get in the way of ourselves by making things too complicated. So Rober Fulghum reminded us of some simple rules like:
Share everything. Play fair.
Put things back where you found them.
Take a nap every afternoon.
And when you go out into the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands and stick together.”
These simple Kindergarten lessons might inspire us to identify the simple lessons from todays Gospel, on how Jesus wanted us to live as his followers. As disciples. Because sometimes we are Christians certainly also tend to make things too complicated.
As Jesus got ready to send his apostles out on their first mission trip, he gave them some clear instruction. In keeping with the Kindergarten philosophy, here are five lessons that Jesus teaches us today on how to live as his followers:
1. Don’t be a Christian alone. Go two by two.
2. Remember that Jesus is the Sheperd
3. Travel Light
4. Don’t get discouraged when you fail.
5. Don’t be afraid to tell the truth.
1.Dont be a Christian alone.
The first thing Jesus does is to pair his apostle up. Two by two. Like Kindergarten or a school trip, right? Or like “Hold hands and stick together. “
You might recognize this specific call to go two by two, when you open the doors to Jehovah’s Witnesses, two by two, - or when you encounter young Mormon men on their mission ship, two by two.
Throughout Jesus ministry when he calls disciples, the first thing he does is to make sure they are part of a community. We need each other. We need community to strive, to grow, to support, to protect.
To go two by two is safe, supportive and wise. We are not meant to be alone, not in our personal lives and not in our lives as disciples.
2.Remember that Jesus is the Shepherd.
“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go; therefore, and make disciples of all nations…” this the great commandment that gives us confidence and faith to go out into the world, because Jesus sends us. And he entrusts us with his work and word. And promises us that he will guide us with grace and forgiveness.
3.Travel Light.
Travel light means only packing and bringing what we truly need. Traveling light means we trust that when we are sent, we have what we need: words and prayers, witness and grace, honesty and dignity. Traveling light also means to focus on the necessary and needed – not on all the things that complicates the simple message.
4.Dont get discouraged when you fail.
Shake it off.
I could not help but thinking of Taylor Swifts signature song: “Shake if off.” which like a whirlwind has been running through the world.
Cause the players gonna play, play, play, play, play.
And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate.
Baby, I'm just gonna shake, shake, shake, shake, shake.
Shake it off, I shake it off.
When we fail, when we are misunderstood, when we are judged, we should shake it off. Shake the dust off the sandals and move on. That might be one of the most difficult things for us to do… to shake it off.
When people have offended us, misled us, misused us or ignored us. And many time the dust we need to shake off, is not their dust but our own dust that clings to us as self-righteousness, bigotry or fear.
Shake it off!
5.Dont be afraid to tell the truth
Our world is quick to offer false gods and false hopes. As believers, as Christians, we are called to point this out and point to Jesus as the way, the hope and the light.
We have just celebrated our Independence Day on the 4th of July with fireworks. But one of the truths is that we are not independent or free. We depend on each other. We are depending on our democracy. We are depending on civil rights, constitutions and decency as a people. We are deoendning on simple Kindergarten Rules and universal Golden Rules. And we are depending on God and called to live in creation with respect and care, with hope and love. The grace we are given is costly as we need to carry that Grace into the world and not just keep it to ourselves.
The wonderful prophetic voice of the poet Amanda Gorman calls us the live everyday learning and growing:
Every day we are learning.
How to live with essence, not ease
How to move with haste, never hate.
How to leave this pain that is beyond us
behind us.
Just like a skill or any art,
We cannot possess hope without practicing it.
It is the most fundamental craft
we demand of ourselves.
We cannot possess hope without practicing it.
This is how we are sent. With hope to be hope in a world that desperately needs hope.
The Costly Grace calls us, compels us, changes us, challenges us to go two by two into the world with word and witness. But most of all with hope.
Amen