2nd Sunday after Pentecost: June 10, 2012

2^nd Sunday after Pentecost: June 10, 2012

Mark 3:20-35

Preacher: Pastor Carrie B. Smith

*Many thanks to Anna Carter Florence and her book "Preaching as Testimony" (Westminster John Knox Press, 2007) for introducing me to the story of Jarena Lee. Thanks also to Dr. Craig Satterlee for his Logjam Appointment which provided the inspiration for this sermon.*

Grace and peace to you from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Jarena Lee was born in Cape May, New Jersey, on February 11, 1783. She was most likely born to free parents, but at the age of seven her family’s poverty meant she was hired out as a servant and would not see her family again for fourteen years. This was effectively a legal form of slavery, and an all-too common African-American story of the time.

As a result of these difficult beginnings, Jarena struggled with depression and feelings of abandonment her whole life, but in 1804, at the age of twenty-one, she moved to Philadelphia to gain a fresh start. Her first order of business was to find a place to worship, and that she did, at the African Methodist Episcopal Church headed by Pastor Richard Allen. Upon finding her church family, she wrote, “This is the people to whom my heart unites.” 

But just three weeks into her time at the A.M.E. church, Jarena experienced a strange thing. Just as the preacher was beginning his Sunday sermon, Jarena writes:

“That moment, though hundreds were present, I did leap to my feet and declare that God, for Christ’s sake, had pardoned the sins of my soul…For a few moments I had the power to exhort sinners, and to tell of the wonders and of the goodness of Him who had clothed me with His salvation. During this time the minister was silent, until my soul felt its duty had been performed, when he declared another witness of the power of Christ to forgive sins on earth, was manifest in my conversion.” 

Now a parishioner leaping to her feet in the middle of a sermon would certainly get our attention today here at Bethany, but in 1804 there were some very good reasons why this would be more than odd—most notably, the fact that Jarena Lee was a woman.

If a man had leaped to his feet in such a manner, one might have expected him to be called in to the pastor’s office, perhaps taken under his wing and nurtured into an assistant preacher. But women were not only forbidden from being preachers in the year 1804—they weren’t even allowed to speak in church. This event, therefore, was for Jarena and her church community nothing more than an exciting anomaly in an otherwise normal Sunday worship service. No one called Jarena into the pastor’s office. No one recommended seminary or suggested she call the candidacy committee. No one took her seriously, because Jarena was a woman, and of course, God doesn’t work that way.

A few years later, however, in 1811, it happened again. Jarena writes:

“On a certain time, an impressive silence fell upon me, and I stood as if some one was about to speak to me, yet I had no such thought in my heart.—But to my utter surprise there seemed to sound a voice which I thought I distinctly heard, and most certainly understand, which said to me, “Go preach the Gospel”! I immediately replied aloud, “No one will believe me.” Again I listened, and again the same voice seemed to say—“Preach the Gospel; I will put words in your mouth, and will turn your enemies to become your friends.”

This time, Jarena began to seriously doubt her sanity. Maybe this was Satan speaking, and not God! After all, there were exactly zero “lady pastors” in her life to act as role models or mentors. Women preachers were as unbelievable as unicorns or the Cubs winning a World Series. How could she be certain this was God calling her? Just to be sure, Jarena went in to visit her pastor, Richard Allen.

Pastor Allen listened carefully as Jarena explained that God had called her to preach. And then he coolly commented that “the Discipline knew nothing at all about it—that it did not call for women preachers.” Call it tradition, call it church authority, call it “good order”, but for Jarena Lee, the answer was, “God doesn’t work that way.” 

So Jarena went home and did what many a frustrated woman preacher has done: she married one instead. Sadly, just six years later her husband, the Reverend Joseph Lee, died, leaving her with two small children. And Jarena couldn’t ignore the call any longer.

So she went back to visit Pastor Allen, and this time he granted her permission to hold “prayer meetings” and to “exhort” but of course never to preach. Why? Because, of course, God doesn’t work that way.

But one Sunday in worship, the preacher stood up and read the text from Jonah and then—in Jarena’s words—he seemed to “lose the Spirit.” So Jarena leaped to her feet and interrupted the preacher. 

“I told them I was like Jonah; for it had been then nearly eight years since the Lord had called me to preach his gospel to the fallen sons and daughters of Adam’s race, but that I had lingered like him, and delayed to go at the bidding of the Lord…During the exhortation, God made manifest his power in a manner sufficient to show the world that I was called to labor according to my ability, and the grace given unto me.”

When she sat down, Jarena braced herself to be thrown out of the church or at least publicly reprimanded. Instead, Pastor Allen stood up and told the congregation that God had changed his mind. He now believed that Jarena was indeed called preach! And really, what choice did he have? There she was: a unicorn; a preaching woman right there in their midst. 

After that day, Jarena went on to become the first woman licensed to preach in the A.M.E. church (a full 150 years before the ELCA, by the way) and to have a thirty year preaching career. She was also only the second African-American woman to have a book published—a book in which she chronicles how she "travelled two thousand three hundred and twenty-five miles, and preached one hundred and seventy-eight sermons.” God does work that way, it turns out.

Jarena Lee’s story highlights the way we so often get caught up in our judgments about how God can and does work in the world. It wasn’t too long ago that our denomination said: “Women can’t preachers! God doesn’t work that way!” And yet here I stand—along with Angela and Mary Carol and a host of other female Lutheran preachers who came before us. 

Women’s ordination is generally a non-issue for us today, but there are certainly others we get hung up on. 

Gay people can’t get married! God doesn’t work that way.

You can’t just welcome everybody to communion! God doesn’t work that way.

You can’t just feed people, because they’ll keep coming back! God doesn’t work that way. 

You can’t heal people on the Sabbath, Jesus! God doesn’t work that way.

You can’t send fishermen to cast out demons, Jesus! God doesn’t work that way. 

You can’t forgive everyone, all their sins, Jesus, and in such a dramatic and public way! God doesn’t work that way.

Most often, of course, when we say “God doesn’t work that way” what we really mean is “the church doesn’t work that way” or “our culture doesn’t work that way” or “our government doesn’t work that way”…or, if we’re honest: “I don’t feel comfortable when God works that way.”

This is what is happening in the scene from Mark chapter 3 which we heard this morning. Jesus was surrounded by the crowds, who were so eager to see him he couldn’t even find time to eat. He was healing people right and left, even on the Sabbath, and even when they were unclean. He was eating with tax collectors and sinners. He was silencing demons and teaching with authority. But others were uncomfortable with Jesus working like this. In fact, his family heard the rumors that he was out of his mind, and they showed up to haul him home. 

And the scribes—well, the scribes were like the pastor and other church authorities who told Jarena Lee “our discipline doesn’t call for woman preachers”. The scribes took one look at what Jesus was doing and said “God doesn’t work that way. This must be Beelzebul. He’s obviously possessed by a demon!” In other words: “You’re making us uncomfortable, Jesus.”

And Jesus’ response is one that should make us sit up and take notice.

There are many sins which we humans might consider to be unforgivable. And yet Jesus has said that the one thing God cannot forgive is blaspheming against the Holy Spirit—which, contrary to what I thought when growing up, has nothing to do with spouting four-letter words. Blaspheming against the Holy Spirit, as seen in this Gospel passage, is denying the work of God. Blaspheming against the Holy Spirit is what happens when we take a look at who Jesus is healing, who God is forgiving, who God is calling to preach the Gospel, or how the Spirit is moving in a place and among a people and say: “Nope. God doesn’t work that way. That must be Satan.”

Jesus directed these strong words to a people who thought they knew everything.  This was very bad news for the scribes and authority figures who thought they had the power to decide how God works and when. For there he was, standing before them: Jesus, son of a carpenter and Son of God; Jesus, healer of our souls; Jesus, friend of the friendless; Jesus, our brother; Jesus Christ, our Savior, come to set the captives free. 

And this Jesus, crucified and risen, reveals to us the Good News that God does indeed work this way:

God forgives beyond our deepest hopes.

God heals against anyone’s rules. 

God creates family where we least expect it. 

God saves us from our own judgments.

God seeks out the lost.

God makes a way out of no way.

God is still speaking—and still shattering our expectations.

Wherever we see healing, wholeness, forgiveness and reconciliation rising out of judgment, fear, and brokenness, we see Jesus Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit, and we can say without a doubt, “Yes, indeed God does work that way!”