PROPER 20B – Proverbs 31:10-31; Psalm 1; James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a; Mark 9:30-37 –

20 September 2009 – A sermon given by The Rev. Peter A. Munson for St. Ambrose Episcopal Church, Boulder, Colorado

Honoring and Serving Women and Children

INTRODUCTION – The Centaurus Invitational

A week ago yesterday I found myself at Waneka Lake in Lafayette for the Centaurus Invitational. It’s a 5K high school cross country race, hosted exceptionally well by the cross country coaches and parents of Centaurus High School. I was there to cheer on my daughter, Hannah, who runs for Pomona High School, and also because the Pomona coach asked if I could help with keeping split times for all the Pomona runners. As an added bonus, I got to see our own Torie Weprin take fourth in the girls’ varsity race, and see some other St. Ambrose youth – Aaron Eck and Reece Jenkins – run quite well.

One of things I noticed at the meet was that at all four races – Varsity girls, Varsity boys, JV girls, and JV boys – the loudest and most sustained cheers rang out for the individuals who came in first and for the individuals who came in dead last in their particular races. The runners who come in last are often almost twice as slow as the winners, coming in 15 minutes or more after them. And sometimes the last-place finisher is two or three minutes behind the next-to-the-last finisher.

But the last place runner at the Centaurus Invitational was never at the very end of the pack. Because in every race, there was a bicyclist – a Centaurus parent – in the front of the race pacing and directing the lead runner, and a bicyclist riding behind the slowest runner. There is a heap of service, respect and honor wrapped up in what these bicyclists do, whether they see what they are doing in those terms or not. The one who came in last in every race was the bicyclist, a bicyclist who was watching out for the least and the last.

I am always on the lookout for kingdom stories. And here we have one: This service provided by these parents on bicycles, one of whom was our own Dan Weprin – this is what the kingdom of God looks like.

THE SCRIPTURES

Jesus heard his disciples arguing, as they walked toward Capernaum, about which one of them was the greatest. And when they got to their destination, he asked them about it. “What were you arguing about on the way?” (Mark 9:33) And they were silent. He gathered the twelve together and said, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then he spotted a child running through the home and he said, “Psst! Hey Sarah, can you come over here for a minute?” And little full-of-energy three-year-old Sarah came into the circle of these 13 men, wondering what was up, and Jesus wrapped his arms around her, and said to the disciples, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” (Mark 9:37)

When you welcome a child, you welcome God. That’s what was happening a week ago yesterday. Sure, the children were older. But as they were being welcomed and escorted on bikes and cheered for, God was being welcomed. Even if some of the spectators didn’t realize it, God was being welcomed.

And now I shift for a moment to today’s lesson from Proverbs. It is an ode to a capable, wise wife. We might read or hear these words in 2009, and think, “How quaint! How outdated!” And yet, in the entire book of Proverbs, wisdom is personified as a female, as the feminine. And so the last words in Proverbs “provide a fitting conclusion to a book that begins with Woman Wisdom.” (Note on Proverbs 31:10-31, The Harper Collins Study Bible)

THE PLIGHT OF WOMEN AND GIRLS

I look at the general plight of women and children in the world today, especially woman and girls, and its pretty clear that in large parts of the world, Jesus’ words about women and children have fallen on deaf ears, and his actions – the way he actually gave women and children the time of day, and loved them – have often been ignored.

I am currently finishing up the book A Thousand Splendid Suns, by Khaled Hosseini, who also wrote The Kite Runner. This novel will break your heart. It’s about Afghanistan over the last 30 years, but it’s especially about the women and girls of Afghanistan. In recent years, especially when the Taliban was in power, girls were not allowed even to go to school, and a woman could not step outside without being accompanied by a man. A high school girl running in shorts and a spandex top, out in public? Sometimes there is a huge disconnect between life in our country and life in other countries, but especially so for women and children.

One of the ways you keep a country down, it seems to me, is to oppress the women – put the fear of God into them and abuse them and strike them and rape them and hide them and treat them worse than you would an animal. And the girls, well – just keep them ignorant, and give them no hope for a decent future.

This is about as far from the kingdom of God as you can get. And it has nothing in common with girls running right before or right after the boys, and dads riding along until the very last boy - and the very last girl - has finished the race.

As a parent of both a son and a daughter, I am proud to live in a country where Hannah can have the same dreams for her future that Zach has for his. At the same time, I would be lying if I were to say that I weren’t more worried about Hannah going off to college than Zach. There is still the ugly reality of men’s violence against women, even in our country. And it is certainly the case that if both Zach and Hannah decided that they wanted to take a trip around the world, there would be many more countries where we’d have to tell Hannah, “No, honey, don’t go there.”

THE GOSPEL

What makes the gospel the gospel is this: when the world says, “This is the way it is: Men get to call all the shots! Only men can be great! Only men can speak. Only men can be seen in the village square. Only men can be priests and pastors and bishops. Only men can lead companies. Only men can lead a nation.”, the Son of Man comes along and says, “That’s bull. Whoever welcomes (loves/respects/honors) one such child (or woman) in my names welcome me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

Or, as James put it in today’s other lesson, “But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy.” (James 3:17)

Whether you think of that as feminine wisdom or masculine wisdom or divine wisdom - which I don’t believe is either masculine or feminine, but probably some whole and holy combination of the two - we need more of that. We need much more of the wisdom from above.

MICROLOANS

I’ve noticed something in recent years. When in comes to getting the most “bang for the buck” in struggling nations, when it comes to investing in the local people so that they can do things for themselves and bring progress to their communities, one thing that is really working is microloans. They are called that because the loans are often less than $500, often even $100 or $200. What I’ve noticed, too, is that more and more, these loans are being made to women, for something like a sewing machine or for the smallest amount of supplies for starting a bakery or for buying a few farm animals. The default rate on these loans is less than 1%. Time and time again, these women demonstrate initiative, wisdom, and business acumen, and when they make money, they invest in things like their sons and daughters going to school.

These are also kingdom of God stories. And when you and I give $100 or $200 to an organization like Episcopal Relief and Development, we can be a part of these kingdom success stories.

CONCLUSION

Take a look around for a moment. Take a good look at who is here today. And then close your eyes for a moment, and imagine this as a church with only adult males. I’m guessing it’s almost impossible for you to do that, because a church could never be that and still call itself a church. And God, what a boring, awful church that would be!

So… to all the woman and children who are here today, and to all the woman and children who are part of this community, I say “Thank you.” Thank you for your presence. Thank you for your energy. Thank you for your faithful service. Thank you for your leadership. Thank your for all your gifts, freely shared. Thank you for your questions, and your perspective. Thank you for your love, and for your peace-making.

Thank you for your wisdom.

And to all the men who are here today, and who are part of this church, thank you for demonstrating the wisdom that is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. Thank you for welcoming the women and children of this parish, in word and in deed.

Let us not forget what we are privileged to have here - in this church, in our community, and in this country. And let us not forget that, as Christians, we are called to strive for justice and peace among all people.