Tag: inadequacy

“People like me aren’t allowed to become pastors”

On By J. Barrett LeeIn SermonLeave a comment

Sermon for the third Sunday of Easter

Click here for the biblical readings.

Parents, in my experience, have a way of knowing us better than we know ourselves. I know this because I am a parent and because I have parents.
Much to my chagrin, my parents have often been able to finish my sentences, predict my next move, and see a part of my personality that I thought I had hidden well.
I felt particularly cornered one day when my mother aptly pointed out that I suffer from an “over-active conscience”. Little things, small errors in judgment that most people would be able to let go, bothered me to the point of needing to confess to someone. On one such occasion, my father interrupted my tirade of self-loathing to give me one bit of advice. “Son,” he said, “go easy on yourself.” To this day, that’s some of the best advice I’ve ever received.
These scrupulous tendencies in myself brought me to the point where I disqualified myself from serving as a minister in the church. Even as I attended seminary, people would naturally ask me, “Are you planning to pursue a career in ordained ministry?” I would respond, “People like me aren’t allowed to become pastors. And that’s a good thing!”
Because of this experience, I think I have a pretty good idea of how St. Peter felt at the beginning of today’s Gospel reading. This story comes to us from the end of John’s gospel, after Jesus has been raised from the dead. Peter was certainly present for the events which took place around Easter Sunday, but the last time he played a major role in the plot of this story was on the night when Jesus was arrested. Earlier that evening, Peter had expressed his unwavering loyalty to Jesus in no uncertain terms. By the next morning, Peter had publicly denied that he even knew Jesus. He did this, not once, but three times.
This was no minor misstep for Peter. In doing this, he turned his back on his faith; he rejected everything he had come to believe about God through Jesus. But more than that, Peter had also turned his back on his closest friend at a critical moment. According to ancient near-eastern custom, Peter’s infidelity had violated Jesus’ honor. Jesus would be expected to demand vindication for such an offense. Perhaps Peter thought of those words which Jesus had spoken earlier, “Those who are ashamed of me and my words, of them the Son of Man will be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of his Father and of the holy angels.
So Peter was probably not all that surprised when at Jesus’ first appearance after the resurrection, his friend did not address him directly. I can imagine Peter, in his crushing guilt, believing that his denial had purchased his exclusion from the ranks of apostles. He had been reduced from the role of leader to that of spectator. When Jesus commissioned his apostles, saying, “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” I can see Peter, sitting in a far corner of the room, relieved to see Jesus, excited for his friends, but also sad for himself. I can even imagine Peter saying the same thing I did, “People like me aren’t allowed to become pastors.”
After the events of Easter, Peter has to decide how to get on with the rest of his life. It made perfect sense for him to return to fishing, the only life he knew before Jesus. I find it interesting that six other disciples accompanied Peter in his return to the maritime business. I like to imagine that they went along as Peter’s social support system. Maybe they were hoping to shake Peter out of his paralyzing guilt so that he would come and join them as they sought to preach the Good News about Jesus to the ends of the earth.
Peter, hoping he could forget the past (or at least put it behind him), was finding his old job to be a hollow pursuit on multiple levels. We read that his nets kept coming up empty.
I think this is a comment about something more than the fishing conditions at the Sea of Tiberias. I think we, as the readers of this story, are getting a glimpse inside Peter’s soul at that moment. The fisherman’s life to which he was returning seemed empty and meaningless after his experience of traveling with Jesus. I also imagine that it must have been hard for Peter to work those same shores, remembering the day he met Jesus on that very spot, when Jesus used his boat as an impromptu pulpit.
In this sad moment, the risen Christ makes a sudden reappearance. Jesus encounters Peter in the midst of his daily routine and brings two gifts. First, he brings Abundance. Like the symbol of emptiness, this miraculous catch is a sign to Peter that he is about to find that which he was really seeking (and here’s a hint: it isn’t fish).
As they are gathering the nets, one of the disciples, the one “whom Jesus loved” (identified as John by most biblical scholars), turns to Peter in realization that this catch was no ordinary coincidence. “It is the Lord!” he says. In this moment, John is acting like a true pastor by pointing out God’s presence and activity in Peter’s life. This, by the way, is how pastoral care works. It’s not a clergyperson’s job to tell people what to think or “bring God into their lives,” but to walk with people through the triumphs and struggles of daily life and help them determine for themselves how God is already at work there.
Peter responds to John’s observation immediately. But he does something quite unusual: he puts his coat on just before hopping into the water. I don’t know about you, but I find it’s much easier to swim without being fully clothed. But, like the nets, I take this to be a statement about Peter’s internal state-of-being. He doesn’t want to feel so exposed in front of the one he has let down. Like Adam in the Garden of Eden, Peter wants to cover himself because he feels ashamed. Too often these days (even in the church), God’s children fall victim to this mentality. They assume there is something about themselves that is unacceptable, so they duck and cover. Hiding in the closet, they wear the mask constructed for them by society’s expectations. But, as we will see in a moment with Peter, Jesus has this uncanny ability to pierce the veil of our shame with his love.
Which leads me to Jesus’ second gift: Jesus appears bearing the gift of Acceptance.
When Peter and the disciples finally make it to shore, they find breakfast waiting for them. This is evocative of Jesus’ meal-sharing ministry, which got him in even more trouble than his teaching and healing. Sharing a meal with someone was a powerful statement in the ancient near-east. Eating with someone signified one’s total acceptance of the other person into the family unit. By feeding the multitudes and dining with outcasts, Jesus makes a statement about the scope of his radically inclusive love. In this passage, that love is extended to the disciples, even Peter. By sharing a meal, Jesus is effectively saying that he has rejected Peter’s rejection of him.
Once breakfast is over, Peter is finally ready to come face-to-face with Jesus and talk about the painful events of that night. Jesus uses his words like a surgeon’s scalpel: cutting ever deeper, exposing the source of the pain in order to heal it. It is not an easy soul-surgery for Peter to endure. Jesus asks Peter three times whether Peter loves him. One time for each denial. Each time, Peter affirms that he does love him and Jesus replies, “Feed my sheep.”
Instead of enacting vengeance upon Peter, Jesus asks him to take care of that which is most precious to him: this new community of believers. In verse 16, Jesus uses the term “Shepherd”, which is “Poimaine” in Greek, and will later be translated into a Latin term that is very familiar to us: “Pastor”. Jesus doesn’t punish Peter, he ordains him!
Jesus says to Peter, in effect, “Do you really love me, Peter? If so, then I want you to take that love and give it to the people who need it the most.” Peter now stands before Jesus as a healed and restored person. The shameful hurt of denial has been replaced by the warm embrace of love.
History tells us that Peter did, in fact, take up this call. Peter stands out as one of the great pastors in the early days of the Christian Church. We have stories and letters in the New Testament that bear witness to this fact. I think Peter walked away from that meeting with a newfound faith in the power of love to set things right. In fact, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Peter had this encounter in mind when he wrote to a group of churches years later, saying to them, “Above all, maintain constant love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins.”
I went to seminary declaring, “People like me aren’t allowed to become pastors.” I said it as a joke, but my sarcasm was a thin veil covering my felt sense of shame and unworthiness. But it happened that as I heard Jesus’ words to Peter, “Feed my sheep”, I began to notice a new desire rising up within me. I realized that I wanted to feed Christ’s people with his Word, Sacraments, and love. I am being transformed by God’s
radically inclusive love, even as I try to give it out. Like Peter, I find myself being transformed by the warm embrace of a love (God’s love) that covers a multitude of sins (my sins).
I don’t know where you are this morning, in relation to this powerful, transforming love of Christ. Maybe you feel like there is something inside of you that you have to hide from the world? Maybe you feel like you’ve committed some unforgivable sin and Jesus has finally turned his back on you? Maybe you feel the crushing burden of doubt or guilt? If that’s you this morning, I want to encourage you with this Gospel passage. Jesus is coming into your life now with his gifts of abundance and acceptance. He is not coming to punish you, but to heal you and, finally, to commission you into his service.
Maybe you’re here today and you’ve already experienced that healing love of Christ firsthand? If that’s you, then I want to encourage you to take it with you into the world. There are many of our sisters and brothers who are still bound by chains of guilt, fear, and despair. Jesus is calling you this morning to follow him into those dark corners of the world, bringing with you the light and the warmth of his love. One need not be a pastor in order to feed Christ’s hungry sheep. Each of us, regardless of age or occupation, has a call to ministry. There are hurting people who stand in desperate need of love in your own family, neighborhood, and community. Your co-workers, clients, and supervisors need it. If you are still in school, look for that fellow student in the cafeteria or playground who always eats or plays alone. If you are retired, look among your friends and neighbors. None of us has outlived God’s call on our lives. For as long as there is still air in your lungs, God still has plans for your life.
Jesus has a lot of love to give and the hurting people of this world desperately need it. Let’s learn to accept that love for ourselves and then pass it on.
Come on people, let’s feed some sheep.

The Whole Truth: Working With Feelings of Inadequacy

On By J. Barrett LeeIn SermonLeave a comment

Sermon for the fifth Sunday after the Epiphany.

Delivered at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Coldwater, MI

Click here for the biblical readings.

One of the many things I love about our liturgy in The Episcopal Church is our lectionary. For those who may be newer to our church: the lectionary is a cycle of prescribed Scripture readings that repeats every three years. Whether you attend St. Mark’s, Coldwater or St. Stephen’s Church in Durham, North Carolina, every Episcopal congregation in the country will be hearing the same readings that Sunday. I think that’s a neat way for us to stay connected to each other.

The other benefit of our lectionary is that it gives us a very thorough and robust diet of Scripture to mentally digest during our Sunday worship. Each week, we have four readings: one from the Hebrew Scriptures (a.k.a. the Old Testament) or the Acts of the Apostles, a Psalm, an Epistle, and a Gospel. The fact that we read so much of the Bible in each service keeps us preachers accountable to the whole witness of Scripture and prevents us from preaching the same sermon, over and over again, based on our favorite few verses.

My usual practice for sermons is to pick one of the readings in a given week and focus my message on that particular text. Most of the time, that helps me stay focused and allows me to delve deep into one reading, rather than trying to force a connection between all four readings. This week, however, I’m going to break my usual rule.

When I was looking over the readings for this Sunday, a repeated theme jumped out at me from three of the four readings. That theme is the felt sense of inadequacy. I found the theme of inadequacy in the readings from Isaiah 6, I Corinthians 15, and Luke 5.

In our first reading, the prophet Isaiah experiences a mystical vision of God during a time of political upheaval. The passage begins: “In the year that King Uzziah died.” The death of a king was always a fraught period in the ancient world. The power vacuum left by the former king was often contested by rival claimants to the throne. The people held their breath while they waited for the administrative dust to settle. They probably wondered things like, “What kind of ruler would this new king be? Would he uphold their sacred traditions? Would the people have peace and prosperity during his reign?”

It is during such a time of upheaval that Isaiah writes, “In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne.” I think that detail is significant: the old king was dead, but the throne was not empty. The people may have felt uncertain about the immediate future, but their ultimate destiny was secure, not because of their political leaders, but because God remains eternally on the throne of the universe. This is a thought that can continue to comfort us today.

In the midst of this vision, the prophet Isaiah is overwhelmed by the sight of divine glory. He says, “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the king, the Lord of hosts!” Standing in the presence of God, Isaiah is overcome by the felt sense of his own inadequacy and insignificance.

St. Paul, writing to the Corinthians in our Epistle reading this morning, talks about experiencing a different kind of inadequacy. He writes, “I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.” For Paul, his experience of inadequacy comes from the guilt he feels over his past actions. Earlier in his life, Paul had been part of a systematic attempt by the authorities to wipe out the Christian faith. He had hunted and killed Christians in the same way that Nazi officers had gone door-to-door in search of Jews during the Holocaust. To imagine what Paul must have been feeling, imagine a Gestapo officer ripping the swastika armband off his uniform and asking, “What have I done?” Paul’s felt sense of inadequacy says to him, “What you’ve done is so horrible, so irredeemable, you can’t possibly hope to play any part in God’s plan for this world.”

In today’s Gospel, St. Peter (a.k.a. Simon) experiences his own sense of inadequacy when Jesus borrows his boat to use as a pulpit. After the sermon, Jesus tells Simon, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.” Simon, a career fisherman taking advice from a carpenter, is skeptical at first, but eventually goes along with the suggestion. When the nets come back up, overfull to the point of breaking, Simon is dumbstruck by someone who knows how to do his job much better than he does. As an amateur guitar player, I’ve had that experience when listening to professional musicians who can play circles around me. Whatever skill or talent you may have, you’ve probably met someone who is much better at it than you are, and felt completely inadequate. Simon, when he saw how full the nets were, fell down on his knees and said, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!”

All three of these biblical figures, Isaiah, Paul, and Simon, experienced a felt sense of inadequacy because of the enormity of their situation, shame for their past actions, and the limitations of their own abilities.

In that sense, they are not that different from you or me. Who among us has not felt overwhelmed by the state of the world? Who among us has never felt regret for our past actions? Who among us does not occasionally get overshadowed by a talent much greater than our own? All of us have been there, at one time or another.

The conventional wisdom of pop psychology and self-help books encourages us to repress these feelings of inadequacy by “staying positive” and allowing “good vibes only” in our thinking. The problem with this approach is that, if we ignore the voice of inadequacy, it just shouts louder than before. We end up self-sabotaging our lives, jobs, and relationships in our attempts to prove that voice wrong. We transform ourselves into egotistical poseurs or delicate wallflowers in our efforts to numb the pain that says, “You’re not good enough.”

The Gospel, on the other hand, offers us a different solution than the one suggested by the strategy of repression. In Isaiah’s case, an angel takes a burning coal and presses it to his lips, the very part of himself that he had bemoaned as “unclean.” Fire is a blacksmith’s tool that has been used, since ancient times, to purify metal and temper steel. The angel says to the prophet, “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” In Simon’s case, Jesus calls the man into a new and deeper dimension of his profession, not as a fisherman but as an apostle. “Do not be afraid,” Jesus says, “from now on you will be catching people.” In Paul’s case, the experience of God’s grace leads him to find his identity, not in the sum of his past mistakes, but in the unconditional love of God. Paul writes, “By the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain.”

The Word of God transforms the inadequate feelings of Isaiah, Paul, and Simon, not by ignoring or going around them, but by embracing and moving through them. The voice of our inner critic tells the truth, but not the whole truth, about who we are in the eyes of God. God looks at us with unconditional love and teaches us how to view ourselves with compassion, courage, and curiosity. Each and every one of us is greater than the sum of our mistakes, inadequacies, and feelings of overwhelm.

There is, deep in our heart of hearts, a calm center where Christ sits on the throne, seeing and guiding all with wisdom and love. This calm center is who we truly are. As we sit next to Christ on the throne, he teaches us how to see ourselves and our world as he sees it. Using the tools he gives us in our spiritual exercises, we grow in self-awareness and self-compassion. In time, that inner transformation begins to leak outside and influence the world around us. Under the influence of grace, the concerned citizen becomes a prophet, the Nazi persecutor becomes a theologian, and the fisherman becomes an apostle.

This is the work of God’s amazing grace in our lives. If we let it, God’s grace can change the way we see ourselves and lead us out from there to change the world. Amen.