Year B
Proper 29; Pentecost 20
MP: St. Mary the Virgin, St. Paul the Apostle; EP: Holy Trinity
October 22, 2006
Focus text: Job 38:1-7, (34-41), Mark 10:35-45

One day, when I was small, Mom took my brother, Fred, and I to the office of the Speaker of the House at Province House. Her name was the Hon. Marion Reid. I had never met anyone with a title before. We walked into this huge old building in downtown Charlottetown—even had to sign in--down a very old hallway with great big granite slabs and pictures of VERY important men on the walls. Some I even recognized from pictures I had seen in books. We stopped at a very old, dark oak door, so heavy my seven year old arms could not open it. When we walked in and saw leather chairs in the reception area, I was afraid to touch anything (I had just had ice cream). Fred and I actually stopped fighting and even whispered. We were in complete awe.

When the Speaker walked into the reception area, we thought we were meeting the queen. She was a beautiful woman in her 50s, impeccably dressed. She stood for a moment, Mom stood up, and then her face lit up. Next thing I knew she was giving Mom a great big hug and they got very excited. Mom was friends with ROYALTY? This woman approached me and said hello, and I remember wondering if I should curtsey. She had seen me looking at the oranges in this beautiful huge fruit bowl and said I could have one!! Wow. An orange from this regal lady. What a gift.

During the visit, she had commented on my hair and asked if I had read Anne of Green Gables. Mom had taken us to see the musical and I loved it! She picked up her phone and quietly made a request. When our visit came to an end, she gave Mom a huge hug, and one for each of us, too, and told us we were welcome anytime. When we went out to the reception area, her secretary handed me a roll of shiny paper, two posters of Anne of Green Gables from PEI Tourism. This woman had the power to just call someone on the phone and just give me two beautiful shiny posters. Just like that! And a friend of Mom’s too. I was in awe of this woman, and all of a sudden, Mom became more impressive, too, just because she was friends with Madame Speaker.

The impression of power is an incredible thing, isn’t it? And being in the presence of someone with that innate confidence that comes with power, you could easily believe anything they say. There is a charisma about them.

Or, power can be very frightening. If you have ever been in a situation where your power has been taken away from you, encountering power again can be terribly scary. I can recall working for women who were incredibly abusive to their staffs. It took a long time for me to trust a woman in power again.

The kind of power that comes from God’s mouth in our reading from Job can be comforting and attractive, or it can be very frightening. In some situations it is a comfort to know that there is someone, even if it is way out there, who is in charge, in control, knows the inner workings of the universe and can make thunderbolts at the snap of a finger. If that kind of God is on MY side, I can never go wrong, can I? And I never have to worry, because it is all God’s will in the end.

But when things do go horribly wrong, like they do for Job, that kind of God doesn’t take us very far. That is when we begin to ask, “Where is God? How could a good God make me suffer like this?” Just like Job does here. The God of Job is an omnipotent God, and Job wants answers. Why me? I’ve always been good. Being told, “you are on a need to know basis” doesn’t seem to cut it, does it?

We often crave, like Job does, to understand what has happened. But in hindsight, when we do have some understanding, a little more power over the situation, we realize an important truth…understanding does not make the pain go away.

We have all been in this situation. You have had a million things go wrong all at once, and you call a friend or a parent. And all you want is someone who will say, yes, I’m here. But instead…you get Dear Abby. Well, why don’t you just…? That’s when I start to cringe. And I’m sure you all have a phrase you just hate to hear at those moments. “It’s all God’s will” is one that is, thankfully, moving out of our church’s thinking. But we have all given that advice, too. There is a power that comes with being able to give advice. Do what I tell you to do, and it will all go away.

This is the kind of power, James and John are looking for. Jesus is on his way away from this world, and someone has to make sure the sick get healed and the loaves and fish get multiplied. If the other disciples won’t step up to the plate, why not James and John, two who dropped everything to follow Jesus?

And note one very important thing about this text. The disciples get all bent out of shape, but Jesus doesn’t. He doesn’t judge their behaviour or reveal anything underhanded about their motives. They are called the sons of thunder, but Jesus does not accuse them of being power hungry, although they are often portrayed that way. The lesson here is not, “it is wrong to seek power”, but to understand what power in the Kingdom of God actually is. Jesus asks James and John to walk alongside of him. Jesus asks them to share in his suffering, but Jesus is also willing to share his cup with his disciples. He does not withhold anything from them. He even shares his glory on the cross with two thieves.

This is how God exercises power. Instead of being far above changing circumstances and making choices on a whim, the Creator of the universe chooses to walk alongside of us, sharing the cups we drink. God took the form of a stonemason, son of an unwed mother, ostracized in his hometown. Fred Craddock writes, "To be Christian is to cease saying,
"Where the Messiah is there is no misery" and to begin to say "Where there is misery there is the Messiah." The former statement makes no demands; the latter is an assignment." God’s fingers could snap and there would be no more misery, but then God would not be with us. And we are nothing but empty shells without God.

Now in my jaded adult life I know that anyone can get an Anne poster by calling the Department of Tourism, and the Speaker of the House is NOT royalty (although Marion later became PEI’s Lieutenant Governor and is well loved and respected on the Island). Absolute power—power exercised from a lofty ivory tower—eventually crumbles. “But it is not so among you,” Jesus says. The power to cry in times of tragedy, to scream out in anger knowing that God’s heart breaks in tragic loss and God is angered by injustice. That is the power of the Kingdom; that we walk into misery because that is where God is.