Lectionary:
Luke 10:1-11, 16-20
It
is a standing joke that vicars drink a lot of tea, so much so that the question
“More tea, vicar?” is a recognised standard phrase or saying in the English
language. The practice of clergy, and indeed lay members of a local
congregation, to pay home visits to their parishioners derives, at least in
part, from Jesus’ instruction to some of his earliest followers, sent out ahead
of him, to enter a house and eat and drink whatever is set before them. In my
case, almost always, chocolate biscuits washed down with tea.
‘After
this the Lord appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs
to every town and place where he himself intended to go. He said to them, ‘The
harvest is plentiful, but the labourers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the
harvest to send out labourers into his harvest. Go on your way. See, I am
sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves. Carry no purse, no bag, no
sandals; and greet no one on the road. Whatever house you enter, first say,
“Peace to this house!” And if anyone is there who shares in peace, your peace
will rest on that person; but if not, it will return to you. Remain in the same
house, eating and drinking whatever they provide, for the labourer deserves to
be paid. Do not move about from house to house. Whenever you enter a town and
its people welcome you, eat what is set before you; cure the sick who are
there, and say to them, “The kingdom of God has come near to you.”’ (Luke
10:1-9)
‘Whatever
house you enter, first say, “Peace to his house!” And if anyone is there who
shares in peace, your peace will rest on that person; but if not, it will
return to you.’ This is Jesus the Jew, upholding the Jewish welcome: ‘Shalom aleichem’
‘Aleichem shalom,’ ‘Peace unto you’ ‘Unto you, peace,’ a blessing also
expressed by the Islamic ‘Salaam alaykum’ ‘Alaykum salaam’ and, in a weaker construction,
the Christian ‘Peace be with you’ ‘And also with you’. The person who speaks
expresses their readiness to make unity between themselves and the other: ‘Peace
unto you.’ By responding in the mirrored form, ‘Unto you, peace,’ the one who
responds does not merely acknowledge the first speaker’s desire, but affirms
that they, too, want this peace: they, too, are ready. And in their agreement,
that unity, which is of God and found in heaven, is brought into the physical
world. Or, as Jesus expresses it, “The kingdom of God has come near to you.”
This
nearness is to be found when people sit down together over food and drink, take
time to be together, to get to know one another. In the home, but, by
extension, wherever people might do this: wherever the community gathers,
socially.
And
with this, Jesus says, ‘kai therapeuete tous en autē astheneis,’ ‘and cure the
sick who are there.’
The
word ‘therapeuó,’ the root of our English word ‘therapy,’ means ‘I care for, attend,
serve, treat, especially of a physician; hence, I heal’ while ‘astheneis’
refers to those who are ‘without strength, weak, infirm, sick’. Jesus is
instructing those he sends to care for the infirm, which in our context would
include those who experience chronic social isolation, those who have become permanently
housebound on account of age or physical frailty, and those who are temporarily
without strength due to the devastating impact of bereavement. When I sit and
listen to a family tell the life-story of their loved one who has died, or an
elderly parishioner tell me stories of their childhood, I am curing the sick, one
cup of tea at a time. (Indeed, I share in the ‘cure of souls’—that is, the care
of persons—which is both my bishop’s and mine.)
But
we are not called to be patrons to our neighbours. Jesus sends out his
followers in vulnerability, ‘like lambs into the midst of wolves,’ without
means or resource, dependent on welcome and the hospitality of strangers. In
other words, there is a mutuality to this; one that requires of us that we let
go of power, that we relinquish being in control. The guest enables the cure of
the host as the host cares for—cures—the guest. We do not bring peace,
wholeness, to a household. We bring our desire to be at peace, to live in
wholeness, with our neighbour; and peace is made manifest between us when they
agree, and together we sit under the blessing of peace. We do not bring the
kingdom of God to our neighbours; we discover its nearness in their welcome.
And if the kingdom of heaven feels far off, perhaps it is because we have not
taken our sent-ness seriously, have put the onus on others to come to us
instead.
There
is nothing trivial about sitting with our neighbours, at their table. In fact,
there is almost nothing more important, which is why the lupine world will
throw everything it can at you to ensure you are simply too distracted or afraid
to do so. But your visiting, of even just one household (it is the commitment to
relationship that matters, not relentless superficial socialising), is making a
torn-apart world whole again. Go in peace…
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