Sunday, 22 September, Trinity 17:
Wisdom 1:16-2:1, 12-22, James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a and Mark 9:30-37
If you were following the gymnastics at the Paris Olympics, you might have noticed that Simone Biles was seen wearing a diamond pendant in the shape of a goat.
Biles commissioned it from jeweller Janet Heller because she’s called the GOAT - the greatest of all time.
Why is she known as the GOAT in gymnastics? A journey of greatness for sure - with a record breaking number of medals and with five skills named after her, reflecting the difficulty of her routines.
She has wowed fans and inspired generations with a greatness not only recognised in those gold, but also her dedication, perseverance and vulnerability.
Back in 2020, she experienced the “twisties”: losing her sense of where her body is in space: ‘it doesn’t feel comfortable’ she said on a podcast, praying she’d land on her feet; it felt like ‘fighting my body and my mind to do these tricks’ she continued.
She put her twisties down to stress and psychological factors: saying that the pressure ‘feels heavy… it’s like the weight of the world on your shoulders and I’m very small, so I feel like, at times, it’s very overwhelming… I have to focus on my mental wellbeing and that’s what I did’.
Whatever criteria we might have for greatness, no one can escape vulnerability and disappointment, loss, hurt and frailty.
In today’s gospel, Jesus subverts much of what human beings have aspired to or honoured as ‘greatness’: wealth, position, fame, privilege and power. Those things are as seductive today as they were at the height of the roman empire.
On the road, Jesus once more talks of his betrayal, suffering, death and resurrection. Once more, the disciples did not understand the sacrifice that radical love for the world entailed.
Rather than ask, they argue and bicker amongst themselves. Jesus’ question is met with silence. Yet he knows their hearts and inclinations: rivalry and status has distracted and consumed them.
Rather than rebuke them, Jesus speaks to them of a way of love which lays aside self interest; of humility and service which reveals the dignity of being human.
He doesn’t just speak to them, he shows them. Embracing a child he presents them with a reminder of our vulnerability; of moments when we feel insignificant; of the time we rely on others for nurture and protection.
In doing so he shifts from argument and silence to welcome; he shifts from the concern for greatness and power to the demands of love, offering an image of how we draw near to God, and God draws near to us.
The human beings we are, like the children we were, and the children we know, are not perfect but we were, and are beloved. Any nursery or play ground will have its share of tantrums as well as giggles, as we make sense of who we are and how we relate.
Children - like us - can be wilful and obedient, bored and curious, funny and serious, creative, kind and cruel. They are also astonishingly openhearted; they can be particularly at risk of harm, in need of care.
Jesus’ words remind us why seeking to be a safer church is part of our vision: all of us might be vulnerable due to age, health or circumstances; but the needs of children and young people will always be a concern as they grow into maturity.
They need the safe embrace of communities who listen to them and protect them from misuse of power; where their physical needs are met and their emotional well-being is nurtured.
They need us to ensure their dignity as they become more fully themselves. Sometimes, as adults, we need to pay attention to that child within us too. Noticing what we nurture and delight in; or where we need that embrace that heals harm or restores confidence.
Sometimes, as human beings, we feel overwhelmed or under pressure; things feel heavy and we feel small; we might lose that sense of where we are - mind and body fighting.
We experience something like the ‘twisties’ in our life triggered by grief or anxiety, disappointment or uncertainty, change or things beyond our control.
Then perhaps the way Jesus embraces the child reminds us of our way back; allowing us to land on our feet again; to embrace both our vulnerability and our dignity in love.
First, there is something about the place of imagination. Jesus had invited the disciples to imagine a world where power is not coercive, but expressed in mercy; in compassion, or suffering with; a world where love wins over death.
They can’t make that leap. They tip back into arguments about status and greatness but that’s the logic they know. Resurrection seems too revolutionary.
So Jesus nudges them to open their hearts and minds to the possibility of something more, to the promise of risen life. Dare they have the fearless wonder of a child? Dare they imagine beyond the limits of what they know and reach for the newness, beyond darkness and dazzling to one equal light (as John Donne puts it).
Second, there is something about curiosity and being willing to ask questions. In speaking of the future, Jesus is inviting the disciples into a more intimate relationship with him and into a deeper understanding of the love he embodies.
The disciples were afraid to ask when they didn’t understand. But to ask is to show courage and to risk revealing what we don’t know. Questioning and learning is a process of increasing our capacity to act wisely. It’s more than acquiring knowledge - it's about how we relate to God and one another.
Jesus sits with the disciples. He is fully present with them - enabling them to open up the space to be curious and to begin to reimagine what the future might hold. For a moment they can stop competing with each other and striving for power on the world’s terms. In that moment they are embraced by the one who is enough.
All that Jesus taught - and who he is - was foreshadowed in the book of wisdom. The writer names the unsound reasoning of those who are led away from God’s ways; who summon death by words and deeds which are without charity.
Reproach comes to them in the one who calls himself a child of God. The righteous one is an inconvenience to them, opposing their actions.
God does deliver this beloved one from condemnation, shame and death; and in opening wide his arms on the cross, this beloved one embraces and delivers us too.
And therefore, we are invited to lay aside bitter envy and selfish ambition, as James tells his hearers. Boosting in earthly claims to greatness is a tricksy and devilish game of disordered power.
We know, whether it’s a playground squabble or workplace bullying, that conflicts arise out of those inner cravings: wanting what someone else has or asserting our power or status.
The alternative is much more attractive: gentleness, peace and mercy in our dealings with others. James reminds us that our life together is to be marked by leaning into the divine not as an abstract idea, but as something that changes how we treat those who need our care.
Loving devoid of self-interest is a glimpse of God’s ways on earth. For that we rely the grace of God - the Spirit which is around and within us: praying in and through us that we might be given to all good works.
It’s a practical wisdom cultivated as we draw near to God and God draws near to us. As we embrace the vulnerable we find ourselves welcoming Jesus and the One who sent him.
If we want to see God, then we look at the faces of those who are socially invisible or need advocacy and protection; to be curious about those who are different and to hear their stories; to be truly present with the other, seeking their well-being, helping them to find their feet.
We are to see in the child and the childlike, the children we were and the children we welcome, something of God’s heart.
After all, God revealed Godself in a speechless infant; power made perfect in weakness. The one who in whom our restless hearts find their rest. The one whose embrace invites us to gather around one table, sharing one food and serving one world.
© Julie Gittoes 2024
