February 19, 2006: More Misfits
Mark 2:1-12, Isaiah 43:18-25, Psalm 41
Eileen Parfrey       Springwater Presby.

In the late 1970s, with all us kids out of the house and earning livings, my dad was finally able to go back and finish his coursework and dissertation for a PhD. I helped him by typing parts of his dissertation, which was about the de-institutionalization of developmentally disabled adults. That was when I first heard the exotic word, "ombudsman." At first, I thought it meant someone who fixed squeaky doors, leaky faucets, and faulty light sockets. What I came to realize was that an ombudsman was someone who knew the ins and outs of a system well enough to stick up for people who couldn't manage the system on their own.

A lot of us could use an ombudsman at one time or another, someone to shepherd us through strange and challenging situations. Decoding the hospital admissions policy the day of your surgery. Figuring out what Medicare will pay for. Tracking the county's allowable expenses for your disabled adult child. Posting bond or applying for a restraining order. Filing taxes. Helping you find your classrooms the first day in a new school. There are lots of everyday situations that ordinary mortals find downright intimidating. Some things are designed to scare you off. Being poor, for example. It's hard enough, struggling with food stamp applications and unemployment and subsidized housing eligibilities. But there is often an invisible sign at the door that reads, "Leave your pride here." And the bureaucrats think speaking loudly to clients will clarify the regs. There oughta be more ombudsmen. People like the four folks who carried the paralytic in today's story to Jesus for healing. Not just to the door. When they saw the crowds, they figured an alternate route to Jesus was in order. Savvy. Gutsy. Persistent.

Yeah, but how many of us are willing to tear off a roof? Even for a very good friend? This is where it is helpful to not read scripture too literally. Remember that saying, "Give a man a fish and he eats for a day; teach a man to fish and you've . . . lost him for the weekend?" No, no. That's let's-go-to-the-beach. I mean what they say at Heifer Project. Give a hungry person a quart of milk, but they'll have to come back again tomorrow. Give a hungry person a bred heifer and teach them how to care for the animals and they've got milk every day and the start of a herd and a small business and the kids will be able to go to school on the proceeds of the cream and they can give an animal to a neighbor who will . . . You get the picture. That's the kind of ombudsman Christians are called to be. Roof-clearing that makes sense. A hand up, not a hand out.

Pretty soon it's about more than the person you helped. The first thing I learned on mission trips was that poverty had a name and a face. It was hard to think of "those people" as illegal immigrants back home, because I knew parents who left their kids all week with grandma while they worked in El Paso. NAFTA was more than a treaty because I'd comforted pre-schoolers as they sat by the church fence at night, crying for their mothers trying to earn a living across the river. I learned that hope comes in small pieces. I can't change immigration laws or economic oppression. But I can repair the school so kids can go to kindergarten. I can help a teenager learn computer skills so she won't have to work in a maqila and ruin her eyes before she's 25 when she's thrown away by the bosses because her cheap labor is no longer productive.

One year we asked the pastor of the church in Juarez what his congregation thought of these gringos coming down to work on the church and in the neighborhood. He said, "It's like Jesus. God could have sent a check to save us, but instead he came himself." The barrio is filled with heartbreaking stories, but we don't need to travel to Juarez to hear stories just as heartbreaking. Estacada and these hills are filled with them. Part of our call to Christian discipleship is to allow our hearts to be broken when we hear of the suffering of others.

No one disputes the validity of broken hearts. But our response is not supposed to stop there. Our Session, Mission Study and Mission Outreach Committees are listening for the "what next" of God's call to us. They are trying, as much as possible, to get all of us-the entire congregation-involved in that listening. You may have participated in one of the four discernment gatherings last fall. You may have responded to questionnaires or telephone conversations. You may have participated in last week's brainstorming session. This community call to discipleship will have a bearing on our lives as individuals.

Because, what we promise in our baptismal vows is that we will "try to be like Jesus." Like God, we could send a check. In fact, we need to send checks. Money is a technicality that enables a lot of things to happen. Financial stewardship is a spiritual discipline that has more to do with our personal relationship with God than it does paying the church's bills. But if we leave our answer to God's call at a broken heart and writing a check, we're not fully living into our promise to try to be like Jesus.

The only time I remember Jesus praising someone for giving money was the widow who gave her teeny tiny offering of two mites-her entire livelihood. There is more to discipleship than "We sent them a check." Ripping off the house roof to get their friend to Jesus is an enacted parable for a discipleship of mission. Sure, collect money. But don't just send it. Bring it. Bring your self. Because, unless we ourselves are engaged in the mission, unless we put our bodies on the line, it's like putting salve on a paralytic. It smells nice and maybe it even relieves the pain for awhile, but nothing will change. No one will get up and walk under those conditions. And Jesus does say, "Your sins are forgiven." After that happens he can say, "Rise."

When we bring our selves in mission, we form relationships. It's a lot harder to think of people with disabilities as "them" when they consistently beat you at Yahtzee and can name all the moons of Pluto (and you can't). It's harder to be disgusted about "them" hanging out at bus stops late at night, when you realize that's how this person gets home from a job wiping tables at Burger King-the job they are so proud to hold. It's harder to be indignant about "those people" buying prepared food with food stamps-food more costly per unit than food from scratch. It's harder to think "they ought to know better" when you know they're cooking over a campfire at McIver Park, their current home for this 30 day period. Buying an extra jar of peanut butter is personal when you see the kids at the Resource Center put that jar in a box to take home.

Because you know "those people" by name, and because you know their courage, you can have hope, you can do something to change their situation. What if, instead of just putting beans in the red tub, what if you taught people simple, nutritious ways to cook them? What if you threw in your favorite fifteen ways to make a can of tuna feed four? You might make some new friends. You might learn some new coping skills. You might demonstrate justice to one person. And you might write your legislators about summer lunches for kids who only get to eat at school. Something might change.

Just a thought. It might be call. Discipleship that moves from "send" to "bring." Mission that makes new friends. Maybe even friends on whose behalf we are willing to remove the roof. It might be call.

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