Matthew 9:35-10:8<\/p>\n\n\n\n
June 12, 2005<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are times when we feel we are harassed and helpless. Our list of prayer concerns sometimes is so long that I miss praying for someone. Instead of being uplifted, you feel more burdened than when you first came to church. We are uncertain about a dilemma at the office; our children got into trouble; a loved one dies; we are faced with a life-threatening disease or accident; we don\u2019t see how we can pay our bills; a loved one goes to Iraq\u2014the list of such troubles goes on and on. Feeling harassed and helpless is not the kind of feelings you want when you come to church. But we feel that way sometimes, don\u2019t we?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As a way of survival and maintaining some semblance of control and order in our lives, we try to avoid these troubles. You say, \u201cPastor, where\u2019s the good news? We came to be lifted up, not to be depressed!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But when we read today\u2019s scriptural lesson, we identify with those who are harassed and helpless. We\u2019re the ones who have diseases and get sick. We think we are filled with unclean spirits and demons in the night. We think about dying. Depressing? Have I harassed you enough and made you feel helpless?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Summoning Disciples<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n We can see ourselves in these scriptures as those harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. But there\u2019s another way to reading these verses. We are the disciples summoned by Jesus and given authority over unclean spirits to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The point of Matthew\u2019s scriptures is that inasmuch that Jesus called the twelve apostles: \u201cfirst, Simon, also known as Peter, and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon of Cananaean, and Judas Iscariot, the one who betrayed him,\u201d God is calling each one of us to be apostles and disciples too. Too often we come to church thinking that we are the sick and lame, lost and confused, diseased and dying when we are seen by God to be the ones to heal and cure every disease and every sickness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The church at its best reaches out to the harassed and helpless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus went about to all the cities and villages, teaching in the synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and sickness. This means that he went beyond his own circle of members and friends. He reaches out and embraces the great crowds of people who are \u201charassed and helpless.\u201d These people must have been down and out and quite different from the people he was used to seeing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But Jesus still saw them. He didn\u2019t see the labels that people use to define people. There were all kinds of groups: Pharisees and Sadducees, Roman soldiers, guards and functionaries; political zealots; religious ascetics; social outcasts, including leprosy victims, tax collectors, harlots and the poor; widows and orphans, not to speak of the mass of ordinary folk. He didn\u2019t stereotype people into boxes. He only saw them as people who were harassed and helpless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe harvest is plentiful,\u201d he says, \u201cbut the laborers are few.\u201d Jesus is telling us that when we look out into the world and really saw people, not labeling people and disregarding them from our sight, there are a whole lot of people to embrace and to cure every disease and every sickness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus gives his followers the authority they need to cast out demons and cure disease, and sends them out to find \u201cthe lost sheep of the house of Israel.\u201d He knows that the disciples will experience inner personal growth only if they engage in outer missionary action. So Jesus shoves them out into the public square with the command to \u201cproclaim the good news of the kingdom, cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, and cast out demons.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Today we ask ourselves: Are we the \u201charassed and helpless\u201d or are we the disciples ready for the command from Jesus? Today you might be feeling harassed and helpless, but let me say to you that when you engage in missionary action, you will be renewed and restored. \u201cThe harvest is great,\u201d Jesus says, are you ready to go out into the fields to engage people for the Lord?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Three Ways for Harvesting<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n If we follow Jesus\u2019 way, we can learn three things from this text. First of all, we can start by seeing the people\u2014\u201cWhen he saw the crowds.\u201d You might say, this is a no-brainer. We\u2019re not blind, we can see. Yet, clearly, the church has a long history of not being able to see the harvest, or the need, that is in their very communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some local churches are functioning in a survival or maintenance mode, and cannot seem to get to the \u201cmission\u201d mode. We\u2019re too busy taking care of ourselves to begin thinking of taking care of anyone else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So we don\u2019t see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We don\u2019t see people in Chinatown who live in these SROs\u2014single room occupant apartments or the homeless who sleeps in front of doorways and are gone by the time we arrive at church or the street youth who have tagged our church and probably yanked the street pole out of the sidewalk or needy people outside of our community whom we know nothing about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When we don\u2019t see the gaping hole of need, we can\u2019t fill it with the name of Jesus. We can\u2019t announce the good news of the reign of God to people who need to hear the good news, because we don\u2019t see the people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus saw the people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There\u2019s a church in Southern California that just completed a large addition to accommodate their growing congregation. Soon they discovered that 250 housing units were going in right behind them\u2014they will share a property line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When this news was made known, the pastor had two conversations within a three-hour time period. The first individual said, \u201cWe need to build a fence so their kids don\u2019t wander onto our property.\u201d The second person asked, \u201cDo we have the money to build a sidewalk and steps to our church so their kids can come to our programs?<\/p>\n\n\n\n We can\u2019t see people when we build fences. Jesus saw all kinds of people and every person who interrupted him he came to them. God calls us to build sidewalks so that everyone who is harassed and helpless can come to our programs. One theologian declared that the church is the only institution that exists primarily for those outside its membership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The second step to following Jesus is that we need to get sick! When Jesus saw the people and how harassed and helpless they were, it made him sick to his stomach. \u201cWhen he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n To be moved with compassion is something that happens way down in the pit of our stomachs. The root of the word, \u201ccompassion\u201d is \u201cvital organs\u201d or \u201cbowels.\u201d To be moved by compassion is to be churned to the core of one\u2019s physical being, guts and all. Empathy, pity or sympathy simply doesn\u2019t carry the same meaning as to suffer with. Seeing these crowds in need made Jesus physically ill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When was the last time we were so burdened by the needs of others that it made us ill? If it\u2019s been a long time, or never, it\u2019s because we\u2019ve withdrawn from the world\u2014we have cocooned, sheltered, protected ourselves from the outside world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Maybe the last time was the tsunami in Asia when we saw helpless people struggling to survive in that horrible disaster. We were so moved with compassion that we gave generously to the One Great Hour of Sharing Offering. But when the news subsided, we were not sick anymore and went back to watching our high definition TVs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The final step we can do after seeing people, getting sick in our guts, is to assess the need. Jesus saw the crowds and said they were harassed and helpless. Our today\u2019s usage of these words, \u201charassed and helpless\u201d do not do justice to their original meanings. To be harassed means that the crowds have been \u201cflayed\u201d or \u201cskinned\u201d or more literally it means that they have been \u201ccast down\u201d or wounded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In other words, Jesus saw the need was severe. It was as bad as a \u201csheep without a shepherd\u201d or a body without a head. The image we have of a lost sheep is of this little lamb silently huddling in a small crevice. Sheep without a shepherd are not quiet sheep. They are making a lot of obnoxious noises. Sheep without a shepherd are not happy sheep. They\u2019re confused and anxious. Sheep without a shepherd are hungry sheep. They need someone to lead them to green pastures and still waters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So there are a lot of people out there beyond our front doors. Most of them don\u2019t look like us. Many of them are harassed by the misfortunes of life and helpless from getting well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There is serious hurting out there. Their souls feel like they\u2019ve been skinned alive. They\u2019re raw sensitive. They need some good news.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Christ\u2019s Hands<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n If we want to become Jesus\u2019 disciples, he summons us like he did with the twelve. Before we are equipped to go out into the harvest, we must first present ourselves to Jesus. He is the only one who has the power to equip us for the harvest. Jesus gives us the authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And sometimes, the people who need to hear the good news of the kingdom are the people who are the closest to us\u2014the lost sheep of the house of Israel. There are for sure lost sheep overseas, but there are also lost sheep right outside our front doors. There are for sure lost sheep in our workplaces, but there are also lost sheep maybe in our own households.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When we see the people and how harassed and helpless they are, we are moved to compassion. God wants us to be his eyes, his hands, his disciples to proclaim the good news of the kingdom curing every disease and every sickness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There\u2019s a true story that happened in London after the bombings during World War II. The bombs that dropped on the city struck and destroyed buildings of every kind: office buildings, factories, apartments, homes, museums, government buildings, churches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Soon after the war was over, a group of German students, through kindness and love and a deep desire to return Christian love to those who had lost so much, volunteered to go to London to help rebuild an English cathedral that had been severely damaged by German bombs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As work progressed, they became greatly concerned about the large statue of Jesus Christ, whose arms were outstretched and beneath which was the written inscription from Matthew 11:28, \u201cCome to me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The student volunteer workers had great difficulty trying to restore the hands, which had been completely destroyed. They worked and worked and tried and tried, but nothing seemed to successfully replace Jesus\u2019 outstretched hands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Finally, after much work and much discussion, they decided to let the hands of Jesus remain missing and they changed the written inscription to read: \u201cChrist has no hands but ours.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus told his disciples to travel light so that we can spend less attention on the pain in our neck from carrying all our baggage and more attention to the voice of the One who is with us to the end of the age. Let us go from this place and be Christ\u2019s hands coming to the aid of everyone who is harassed and helpless. Let us become instruments of Christ\u2019s peace bringing love, hope, faith to all those who are harassed and helpless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Indeed the harvest is plentiful, and we stand here ready to proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let us pray.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Merciful Lord, forgive us when we have thought more about our own needs and wants and have forgotten how so many of your children are in need of your mercy and grace. In the crowded ways of the world, call us to become living instruments of your peace, your hands to care and heal. Teach us once again that when we care for the least of these, we are caring for you. We pray in Christ\u2019s name, Amen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Matthew 9:35-10:8 June 12, 2005 Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco. There are times when we feel we are harassed and