Waiting for the Lord -- and People
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For June 27, 2021:
Waiting for the Lord -- and People
by Mary Austin
Psalm 130
Opal Lee has celebrated Juneteenth all her life, and she has long wanted the rest of the country to celebrate this holiday, too. Last week, Mrs. Lee, now 94, stood next to President Biden as he signed the legislation making Juneteenth a federal holiday.
In 2016, at the age of 89, Mrs. Lee decided to walk from Texas to the White House, hoping to meet with then-President Obama to bring attention to the Juneteenth holiday. Her family, concerned about her health, persuaded her to take a shorter walk, and she ended up visiting the cities that invited her to their Juneteenth celebrations. “Growing up in Marshall, Texas, Lee said the day was treated like other holidays, with food, music and baseball games. “It was pure festival,” she told CNN. Lee merely wanted to share the holiday, widely recognized by the Black community in her state, with the rest of the country, she had said, as some states had not yet formally acknowledged the historic day. “I just thought if a little, old lady in tennis shoes was out there walking, somebody would take notice,” she told NPR at the time.”
Mrs. Lee echoes the voice of the psalmist, calling out for remembrance and redemption of the past. “Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD. Lord, hear my voice! Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications!” the psalmist insists. The psalmist understands that forgiveness and justice are slow work, and that in waiting for God, we find hope. The waiting is filled with action to align our hopes with God's.
Those who have wanted a national observance of Juneteenth, as part of a larger call for racial justice, have waited — and while waiting, brought the nation’s attention to this holiday. Celebrated for years in Texas and parts of the South, Juneteenth is now part of the national calendar.
In the News
In the movement to make Juneteenth a national holiday, Mrs. Lee and others built on the power of the holiday for those who knew it, and on the impact of recent tragedies. “After George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police in May 2020, Lee saw a nation galvanized. The month after Floyd died, millions across the country marked the holiday, prompting Lee to believe that change could come. “We can’t let the swell of support just simply disappear until the summer rolls around again,” she wrote in the petition that was quickly gaining signatures. “We have (to) make sure Congress follows through with their commitment to honor the lives of those who came before us…” Congress answered her call,” as both houses passed the Juneteenth legislation.
The holiday was celebrated this year with extra joy and awe, and yet there’s a call for more.
The national observance of Juneteenth is cause for celebration…and more. Episcopal priest Dorothy Sanders Wells notes that Juneteenth is also a call back to unfulfilled obligations. “Juneteenth speaks not only to the suppression of the truth of emancipation, but to all of the unfulfilled promises of Reconstruction, when Black people believed that freedom would have meaning. Instead, the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution that abolished slavery, granted citizenship, afforded due process, and guaranteed the right to vote to African persons on this soil gave way instead to a legacy of segregation and Jim Crow laws that mandated separation — separate schools and learning, separate neighborhoods, separate entrances into public buildings, separate seating on public transportation, separate public accommodations. Race massacres — from Memphis, in 1866 to Tulsa, in 1921 — saw the destruction of Black-owned homes, businesses, schools and houses of worship. After the election of the first Black senator and congressmen — all from the South, during Reconstruction — voting rights were suppressed, and many brave and faithful persons gave their lives just in order for Black persons to be able to cast their votes in public elections — a right that was given in the 15th Amendment.”
Jayne Marie Smith writes for Sojourners that the delay in freeing enslaved people in Texas was because “Lincoln’s executive order was meaningless to the rebellious states unless and until the Union army arrived to enforce it…American history books teach that the Civil War ended in April 1865 at the Appomattox Court House in Virginia, but that was just a military surrender by the outnumbered Gen. Robert E. Lee. Battles were still being waged, including in Texas.” The might of the Union army was required to enforce the liberation that was already true. She adds, “The spiritual side of me thinks of the Apostle Paul’s description in Romans 7:19 of the ongoing battle inside of him between good and sin. Bodily, as an African American, I feel this battle waging outside of me, too; in the United States, this battle waged all around me, ever ongoing, invisible, but impactful. Both spiritually and in my Black American existence, I recognize that no one in rebellion adheres to authority without the presence of that authority.”
We have yet to catch up to the promise of the new holiday.
In the Scriptures
The psalmist cries out to God for redemption, and the cry moves from the individual level to the national. Knowing that God offers forgiveness, and an overdue reckoning, the psalmist waits. The writer speaks out of the depths of some form of suffering, and we find an answering echo of our own suffering, both individual and communal.
The psalmist is confident that God is present in this depth of sorrow, and in the brighter future to come. God is the one who redeems, without fail. Even when God seems to delay, hope is not wasted. God’s word sustains the waiting.
Moving from an individual lament to the need of the whole community, the writer shifts to a national framework. “O Israel, hope in the Lord,” the writer demands, and we might voice the same hope for our nation.
In the Sermon
The Juneteenth holiday is the result of the hard work of many who hoped for national acknowledgement of the day’s importance. The sermon might look at the places where this hope was denied and delayed before it finally came to life. How did Mrs. Lee and others who labored for the birth of this holiday hold onto hope? How did they see future gains emerging, and stay hopeful in the face of pettiness, prejudice and ignorance?
Or, the sermon might look at Juneteenth as a platform for examining where we are now in the movement toward racial justice. Even though the holiday is past for this year, it gives us a place to reflect on our progress toward racial justice. We can hear the words of the psalmist as a lens for our own country. The psalm proclaims that it is God “who will redeem Israel from all its iniquities.” We can trust that the same is true for our nation, and the sermon might reflect that spirit of humility and hope. Where do we still need God’s transforming power?
Observing Juneteenth as a national holiday should be understood as a beginning, not an end. Dr. Theon Hill, a professor at Wheaton College, challenges, “We get to the point where we realize making a holiday is cheap. The hard work of racial justice is much more difficult and requires a much deeper level of commitment. And our fear says, “Don’t give me a national holiday and expect it to be a substitute for racial justice.” But certainly appointing national holidays are aspirational as much as they are celebratory.” Dr. Hill adds that there is a danger in national holidays. Our “holidays also have the unique ability to almost rewrite our history and romanticize it and sanitize it so we become cheerleaders for a pure America, an untarnished America. For many who are on the underside of our societies, that America that you’re celebrating never existed.” Where does the creation of this holiday call us to see our own nation as clearly as the psalmist does his?
The Rev. Dorothy Sanders Wells, a Black woman, suggests additional reflection for all of us. She writes, “It’s not “Happy Juneteenth” for me. I am not celebrating. For me, this is a day of prayer: I am praying for all who live in the shadows and the margins, all who continue to be discriminated against, all who continue to be profiled and unjustly accused. For me, today is a day to consider the ways in which any of us might be beacons of God’s light and bearers of God’s love, and tellers of God’s truth — that we are all made in the image and likeness of our God, and that we are all beloved of our God. For me, it is a day to reflect on ways that lawmakers, the Church, and others have needed to learn to stand not in opposition to freedom but in solidarity with the oppressed. For me, it is a day to begin conversation with a neighbor to learn more of that person’s story and the lens through which that person sees the world.”
As God’s people, we call out to God in all seasons of pain, trusting that God is listening and already at work. We await God’s redemption, as individuals and as a flawed community. We watch for progress, waiting “for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning, more than those who watch for the morning.” Even when our watching is rewarded, the work of faithful hope and principled action continues until our lives match God’s redemptive vision.
SECOND THOUGHTS
Invisible Suffering
by Chris Keating
Mark 5:21-43
When Heidi Ferrer, an acclaimed television screenwriter, died early on May 27, 2021, she’d been suffering from the effects of Covid-19 for more than a year. The 50-year-old writer from Dawson’s Creek died by suicide, just a day after her birthday. She started feeling Covid symptoms in April, 2020.
“I worried like everyone else about safety,” she wrote on her blog. “I wiped down groceries, wore my masks. I thought I was safe, I thought that my family was protected — that I did everything right. But the monster was real, and it came for me.”
Ferrer hesitated to reveal her struggles with long-haul symptoms. She learned about the sufferings of others from around the world, including Amy Watson, a mother and preschool teacher from Oregon who first coined the term “long hauler.” (Let’s send a shout out to early childhood educators!)
(Watson and others are promoting support groups and research about long-haul Covid on the website C19recoveryawareness.com. Diana Berrent, who describes herself as the ‘canary in the Covid coalmine,’ is another advocate whose group Survivor Corps is active in creating grassroots solutions.)
What Ferrer discovered is that many Covid suffers were showing up in emergency rooms confused by what was happening in their bodies. “They were often gaslighted,” she wrote, “sent back home, told they were just having ‘anxiety.’”
Ferrer embodied a growing global population of patients. Like the woman who reaches for the hem of Jesus’ garment in Mark 5, they have endured “much under many physicians.” Searching for cures, expending resources, they lean toward possibilities of cure while other growing worse.
Long haul Covid is a real thing. The suffering continues unabated, and relief is often elusive. On her website, Ferrer described the illness as a “roulette wheel” of horrors. Of the some 50 most common symptoms of long-haul Covid, Ferrer reported having at least 27.
Ferrer pushed herself to find hope, even in the darkest moments of despair. She remained resolute that Covid wouldn’t beat her, and often posted hints of her unfailing optimism. In the end, however, her husband said, she decided to “leave this world on her own terms before her condition grew worse.”
A study published in February in the Journal of the American Medical Association’s Network Open showed that 27 percent of Covid survivors ages 18-39 had lingering complaints between three and nine months after testing negative for Covid. That percentage is slightly higher for middle aged patients and more than 43 percent for elderly persons.
Another study of 230,000 recovered Covid patients found that about one in three were suffering long-term neurological illnesses. The symptoms emerge like the aftershocks of a tremendous earthquake, pummeling patients and puzzling doctors. A few of the long list of symptoms include muscle aches and pains, joint pain, ongoing or recurring fever, muscle cramps, shortness of breath, tightness in chest, brain fog, tinnitus (ringing in ears), insomnia, among others.
Research is beginning to document wave-like patterns of illness or symptoms among long-haulers. Some doctors suggest that the waxing and waning of symptoms could be the result of damage to either blood vessels or major organs. Or it could be a lingering of the virus. Or it could be persistent inflammation. There are more questions than answers at this point.
“Some people are chronically sick from day one,” said Survivor Corps founder Diana Berrent. “For others, you think you feel better and then you’re hit by another wave and another wave.”
“The good news for people who are experiencing symptoms in waves is that the waves do seem to get milder over time, at least anecdotally,” said Berrent. In addition, there are reports that receiving the Covid vaccine may also ease lingering symptoms.
The layering of these symptoms forms a sandwich of suffering, with each layer adding mystery and agony for patients. They suffer anonymously among the hoards of Americans rushing toward the illusionary pandemic finish line this summer. Like the woman reaching toward Jesus, they yearn for relief with only the slightest hopes of being healed.
The healing of the woman in Mark is also a sandwich of sorts. The woman’s bold action splices the story of Jesus raising the daughter of Jairus, a leader of the synagogue (Mark 4:21-24, 35-43). Both parts of this sandwich are couched in terms of Jesus extending compassion to the women, both of whom are named as daughters of Israel. Both stories offer reminders of the healing God offers to those who suffer.
Scholars have often emphasized that the woman’s touching of Jesus was improper and a violation of social mores. Yet Warren Carter (Mark) notes that there are no indicators that such an action was taboo or a violation of purity codes. Carter holds that such interpretations are driven by a “spatial dualism” that simplistically reduces women in Mark’s world to household duties while privileging male hegemony. This reading also assumes the false spatial dualism that is evident in the claims about “purity.” (Carter, Mark, Wisdom Commentary Series, p. 237 Liturgical Press, Kindle edition.)
Rather, the woman’s long-suffering is evidence of how her condition had marginalized and oppressed her. Those who struggle with chronic illness can identify with the frustration of having sought solutions from countless providers. Those who suffer from long-haul Covid or other debilitating conditions will find themselves tracing the woman’s movements. Straining against the crowd, they push through layers of insurance paperwork and byzantine medical networks in hopes of a cure.
“If I but touch his clothes,” finds its modern equivalent in “If I can get an appointment...” or “If I can get their attention.”
The disciples marvel at what has happened. The crowds are pushing against him; how can he know that someone has touched him? Yet the miracle, as far as Jesus is concerned, is that despite her suffering, the woman has persisted. Faith propels her forward, pushing her out of the closet of her anonymity.
Do not judge Heidi Ferrer’s sad struggles, for they are reminders of the immense toll exacted by suffering. Ferrer’s suffering was unfathomable. Like the woman in Mark’s story, Ferrer battled and pushed through her disease. Having watched her own teenage son fight back from a debilitating spine condition, Ferrer knew the warp and weft of suffering. Her story, like the story of the anonymous woman in Mark, is a story of resilient faith pushing against layers of resistance.
Such faith clings to the threads of hope, actively pursuing the healing God intends for all.
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Dean Feldmeyer:
Mark 5:21-43
Hopeless because we said so
In the gospel lesson for this day, Jesus is confronted with and overcomes two cases that are, by human standards, hopeless.
Some things that we experience in life seem hopeless for no other reason than we have chosen to make them so.
In the first round of the PGA Palmetto Championship golf tournament at Conagree Golf Club in South Carolina, PGA Tour Pro, Mark Hensby was assessed a 10-stroke penalty that put him out of the tournament. That’s two strokes each, for five holes, that he played with the wrong ball.
Turns out, Hensby was hitting putts on the practice green with fellow player, Pat Perez, before their turn to tee off. Apparently, when it was time to collect their golf balls and report to the first tee, Hensby accidentally picked up one of Perez’s low-spin balls and put it in his pocket.
On the 4th hole, Hensby hit his shot into the water and he grabbed a new ball from his bag. Five holes later, he noticed a small, black dot on the ball and asked his playing partner what it represented. He was told that it was a low-spin ball and Hensby immediately realized that even though it was the same brand as his, this particular ball wasn’t his as he didn’t play low-spin balls.
As is the custom in golf, he notified the officials of the innocent mistake but there is no grace in the PGA rules for innocent mistakes. Nothing could be done. His case was hopeless. He was assessed two strokes for each hole he played with the wrong ball, a total of ten strokes that put his final score at 84 instead of a respectable 74.
Realizing that making the cut was impossible, Hensby withdrew from the tournament.
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
Hopeless because we said so, 2.0
This spring, Ikeria Washington and Layla Temple, two African American teens, were named the valedictorian and salutatorian at West Point High School in West Point, Mississippi. For a while.
Then, a few days before commencement, they were told that they would have to share the dais with two white girls who had been named co-valedictorian and co-salutatorian.
Turns out the school district uses two different metrics to determine class standing. One is grade point average (GPA) where the grades are averaged and the students with the highest averages are named valedictorian and salutatorian. The other method is called Quality Point Average (QPA) where Advanced Placement (AP) classes are weighted higher than regular classes in determining grade averages.
Ikeria and Layla had higher QPA’s because they took several AP classes. The two white girls, who took no AP classes, had higher GPA’s.
AP students and their parents have argued that (1) if GPA is the only determinant, that an A in Calculus is the same as an A in gym and students are, thus, rewarded for taking easier, non-challenging classes, and (2) if the valedictorian and salutatorian were white, none of this would have been brought up.
The school district has responded that while they are sorry for the confusion, rules are rules, and there’s nothing they can do.
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
Kindness cancels hopeless
For Daverius Peters, his Hahnville High School graduation ceremony was the biggest moment in his life up to that point. Unfortunately, he was going to miss it because of his shoes.
When he arrived at the Boutte, La. convention center in his purple cap and gown, he was stopped at the door by a school official and told that the black, leather sneakers with white soles that he was wearing did not meet the dress code that required dark dress shoes. He would have to find shoes that met the code if he wanted to participate in the ceremony that was only moments from beginning.
In a panic, with no time to get a new pair of shoes, Daverius looked around and spied John Butler, a paraprofessional educator and his mentor. He ran over and explained what was happening. Mr. Butler tried to reason with the school official who was guarding the door but the person was adamant. Wrong shoes, no graduation.
So, he took off his size-11 loafers and gave them to Davarius who normally wears a size-9. The audience wondered why people down front were giggling as Davarius shuffled across the stage and why Mr. Butler was attending the event in his stockinged feet.
After all was made clear, there were many pats on the back for both men and Mr. Butler has promised to meet with the school board to discuss easing up a bit on their graduation dress code.
* * *
2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27
Famous eulogies real and fictional
Many scholars consider this passage from 2 Samuel David’s eulogy for Saul and Jonathan. Is it? If we compare it to some famous eulogies from history and fiction, it may be.
Winston Churchill is reported to have said that the role of a eulogist is “to render the deceased so good as to make him unrecognizable to even his closest friends.”
Some great fictional eulogies from literature would have to include:
1. Mark Antony’s speech in Julius Caesar — The “Friends, Romans, Countrymen” speech begins as a memorial honoring Julius Caesar and concludes by turning the crowd against his assassins.
2. Casy’s words for Grandpa in The Grapes of Wrath — During the Joad family’s trip from Oklahoma to California during the Dust Bowl, Grandpa dies, and Reverend Casy is asked to speak a few words over his buried body. His speech begins, “This here ol’ man jus’ lived a life an’ just died out of it. I don’t know whether he was good or bad, but that don’t matter much. He was alive, an’ that’s what matters.”
3. Narrator’s words for Charlotte the Spider in Charlotte’s Web — While there is no funeral for Charlotte, the narrator offers these words: “It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both.”
Eulogies from movies might include:
1. Captain Kirk’s eulogy for Spock in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan — The heartfelt speech includes the line: “Of all the souls I encountered in my travels, his was the most human.”
2. Walter and the Dude eulogize Danny in The Big Lebowski — Played for laughs, the script has Walter trying to return Danny’s ashes to the “bosom of the Pacific Ocean.” Instead, a breeze causes the ashes to fly back, covering the Dude’s hair, face, and sunglasses.
And speaking of playing eulogies for laughs, probably the most popular and well-remembered instance of this would have to be the Chuckles the Clown episode of the Mary Tyler Moore Show.
* * *
2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27
How to write a eulogy
I don’t imagine that David ever read Jessica Campbell’s article, “How to Write a Eulogy,” on Legacy.com, but his eulogy for Saul and Jonathan certainly checks all of her boxes:
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
It only gets worse
Mark recounts that the woman with the hemorrhages suffered for 12 years, enduring much from many physicians and spending all of her resources to no avail. While we tend to think of this as an ancient malady, there are still diseases which stupefy modern science.
The web site Live Science offers these among many:
AIDS — 25 years since it was first identified, there is still no cure for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome.
Alzheimer's Disease — Alzheimer's is a degenerative brain disorder that manifests differently in each of its sufferers. The exact cause isn't known and there is no cure.
The Common Cold — Even with an estimated one billion cases in the United States every year, doctors still know very little about the nose-running, cough-inducing cold, whose root causes number in the hundreds.
Pica — People diagnosed with Pica have an insatiable urge to eat non-food substances like dirt, paper, glue and clay.
Schizophrenia — Experts consider this the most puzzling of mental disorders, one which robs the sufferer of the ability to logically distinguish between reality and fantasy and has no defining medical tests.
Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease — One version of this rare brain disorder is better known "Mad Cow" and can be contracted by eating contaminated beef and develops in most patients for reasons doctors have yet to figure out and cannot prevent.
* * * * * *
From team member Quantisha Mason-Doll:
Mark 5:21-43
Take Hold Of Your Faith
Our gospel reading finds us tackling difficult issues that make some people uncomfortable. The discussion of bleeding and women’s menstruation has always been a taboo topic within polite society. Yet this is a story that shows a woman in a position of agency and power over her own identity. The woman with the issue of bleeding takes agency for herself and her own well-being in a society that would deem her an outcast. She self-actualizes healing. She is a person that identifies one chance, one opportunity to be made whole and she does not hesitate to act. The good news of the gospel is found in her action and Jesus’ re-action. Her healing is an act of justice and power exchanged between humans and the manifestation of the divine. The theologian Paul Tillich argues this point best in his work Love, Power, and Justice: Ontological Analysis and Ethical Applications (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1954) that acts of justice are the “form in which the power of being actualizes itself” (56) under the principle of love (57.)
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
Adequate Health Care is A Divine Right
Adequate health care needs to be understood as a divine right afforded to all who require it. This is one of the rare moments when we as modern readers are offered insight into the thoughts and motivations of a person seeking divine aid from Jesus. Special attention should be paid to how the woman with the issue of bleeding is said to have suffered more at the hands of doctors, whose goal should have been healing. It is of no surprise that this healing narrative can easily be paralleled with the ongoing Covid-19 global pandemic. The irony of the woman’s suffering even until this day. Even though we modern people have made vast advancements in medical care there are still disparities in care provided. These medical disparities tend to fall along the socioeconomic standings, race divides, and gender. Studies have shown what the Covid-19 pandemic has made clear: medical racism and moral assumptions influence the way medical professionals provide care. See “On life, death, and pain” and/or “COVID-19 And Health Disparities: Insights From Key Informant Interviews”
The celebration is Jesus’ acknowledgement and affirmation of this woman’s faith. That withstanding, this healing narrative is a call to discernment on how we can better provide care for the wide diversity of God’s creation.
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
Sometimes You Have To Risk Everything If You Want A Miracle
Isabel Godin des Odonais was an 18th century South American woman who, after being separated from her husband for twenty years, was the sole survivor of a harrowing journey across the Amazon with the goal of reuniting her with her love. Biographers assert that it was her faith in God and the love she held for her partner that were the deciding factors in her survival. I cannot help but think of Isabel’s story paralleling the story of Jarius. Often his story is glossed over because the woman with the bleeding issue takes precedence. Here is a man that is labeled as a leader of the synagogue willing to risk his status, power, and privilege for the barest chance at a miracle. Risk taking is a stressful venture, yet there comes a time when one must throw caution to the wind and place all of their trust in their faith. This healing narrative would have us understanding that miracles, moreover, miracle making, is an active process that requires a kairos (καιρός) moment to initiate or make space for the divine will to be made manifest.
* * *
2 Corinthians 8:7-15
Take Stock Of What You Have And Act Accordingly
As a country the United States is facing a difficult time that in some senses will make or break our country as a whole. The margins between rich and poor are ever widening and hyper individualistic mentalities are starting to become the new social norm. It is easy for us to fall victim to the American ideology of picking yourself up by your bootstraps or the self-made man. The plight of people less fortunate than ourself tends to be a topic that is greatly talked about yet rarely executed well. Care for the poor and disenfranchised has become a proformative action that is a box to be checked. There is also the reality that there are those who fall in the middle. They are not quite rich enough to live a life of luxury yet they are not poor enough to be confronted with the realities of what it means to be poor as a US citizen. In respect to the last two years, financial situations have changed drastically. The second letter to the Corinthians is call in some sense to action. The author leaves it open to interpretation: you have not been commanded to act though the suggestion is made. We are being asked to take stock of all that we have and plan accordingly. In my own life the work of Rev. William Barber II has been a driving force for moral discernment and education on how to better advocate for our human family.
See more about Barber and The Poor People's Campaign here.
Also, check out Jeffrey D. Sachs opinion piece on how a third Reconstruction could end American poverty.
* * * * * *
WORSHIP
by George Reed
Call to Worship:
One: Out of the depths we cry to you, O God.
All: Let your ears be attentive to the voice of our supplications!
One: If you, O God, should mark iniquities who could stand?
All: But there is forgiveness with you, so that you may be revered.
One: Hope in God with whom there is steadfast love.
All: In God there is great power to redeem.
OR
One: God comes to be made known among us.
All: We welcome the presence of our God.
One: When we are in need, God is with us.
All: We rejoice in the strength of our ever present God.
One: God wants us to be the divine presence for others.
All: We will bring God’s love and grace to all.
Hymns and Songs:
Amazing Grace
UMH: 378
H82: 671
PH: 280
AAHH: 271/272
NNBH: 161/163
NCH: 547/548
CH: 546
LBW: 448
ELW: 779
W&P: 422
AMEC: 2026
STLT: 205/206
Renew: 189
It Is Well with My Soul
UMH: 377
AAHH: 377
NNBH: 255
NCH: 438
CH: 561
ELW: 785
W&P: 428
AMEC: 448
There Is a Balm in Gilead
UMH: 375
H82: 676
PH: 394
AAHH: 524
NNBH: 489
NCH: 553
CH: 501
ELW: 614
W&P: 631
AMEC: 425
This Is a Day of New Beginnings
UMH: 383
NCH: 417
CH: 518
W&P: 355
Hope of the World
UMH: 178
H82: 472
PH: 360
NCH: 46
CH: 538
LBW: 493
W&P: 404
Jesus, the Very Thought of Thee
UMH: 175
H82: 642
PH: 310
NCH: 507
CH: 102
LBW: 316
ELW: 754
W&P: 420
AMEC: 464
I Love to Tell the Story
UMH: 156
AAHH: 513
NNBH: 424
NCH: 522
CH: 480
LBW: 390
ELW: 661
W&P: 560
AMEC: 217
All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name
UMH: 154/155
H82: 450/451
PH: 142/143
AAHH: 292/293/294
NNBH: 3/5
NCH: 304
CH: 91/92
LBW: 328/329
ELW: 634
W&P: 100/106
AMEC: 4/5/6
Renew: 45
Leaning of the Everlasting Arms
UMH: 133
AAHH: 371
NNBH: 262
NCH: 471
CH: 560
ELW: 774
W&P: 496
AMEC: 525
Sing Praise to God Who Reigns Above
UMH: 126
H82: 408
PH: 483
NCH: 6
CH: 6
W&P: 56
Renew: 52
Great Is the Lord
CCB: 65
Renew: 22
Cares Chorus
CCB: 53
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELW: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day/Collect
O God who is always present as our help and strength:
Give us the vision to see you with us each day
no matter what that day brings to us;
through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We praise you, O God, because you are the one who is always with us. You provide us with the help and strength we need for each day. Help us see you in the midst of all that which is going on day by day. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
One: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins and especially the ways in which we fail to look for God’s presence in our lives.
All: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. Even though you have created us as your children and filled us with your own Spirit, we feel alone and abandoned. We talk of faith but we quickly forget to rely on you. Forgive us our shortsightedness and call us back once more to you. Amen.
One: God is our help and strength and never forsakes us. Receive God’s grace and share it with others, especially those who find little grace from this world.
Prayers of the People
Praise and glory to you, O God, the one who sustains all creation. Your love is the foundation of all being.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. Even though you have created us as your children and filled us with your own Spirit, we feel alone and abandoned. We talk of faith but we quickly forget to rely on you. Forgive us our shortsightedness and call us back once more to you.
We thank you for all the ways you are with us each day whether we are aware of your presence or not. We thank you for those who make your grace known to us by their actions of care and love. We thank you for your Spirit that dwells within us and among us to guide us and comfort us.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for one another in our need. We pray for all your children who feel the burdens of life pressing down upon them. We pray for those who are ill, those who are dying, and those who mourn. We pray for those who struggle with the meaning of lives or the emptiness of broken relationships.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ who taught us to pray together saying:
Our Father....Amen.
(Or if the Our Father is not used at this point in the service.)
All this we ask in the name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
Children’s Sermon Starter
Talk about places you go for help. If you are sick you go to the doctor. If you need food you go to the grocery. If you need someone to play with you go to a friend or sibling or parent. It is good to know there are people/places where we can get help. God is always with us and we can always turn to God for help.
* * * * * *
CHILDREN'S SERMON
Healing God
by Katy Stenta
Mark 5:21-43
Here are two stories of Jesus healing a woman and a little girl. The little girl is probably about 12 years old and is dying, and the woman has been sick for 12 years. The one healing interrupts the other, but Jesus is still able to heal both of them.
One of big leaders of the Hebrew faith at the time came to Jesus and when he saw him he fell to his knees and said, “My little girl is dying, please come and lay your hands on her so that she can live.” Jesus went with him.
Then on the way he felt a touch.
He felt a bit of his healing power leave him.
So Jesus asked “who touched me?”
His disciples said “What do you mean, everyone is touching you!”
But again Jesus asked, “Who touched me?”
And a woman, who had been bleeding for 12 years said, “it was me.”
Jesus said “Daughter your faith has made you well, go in peace.”
Then some others came to the leader Jairus and said they were sorry, his daughter has already died.
Jesus said “Do not be afraid, believe.”
And Jesus went into the house with Peter, James and John.
He came back out and said “Do not cry, the little girl is just sleeping.”
He called out to her “Talitha, Come” which means little girl got up.
And she did.
Wasn’t that a great story about how loving Jesus is? He is able to heal both people, he doesn’t have to choose. He doesn’t even get mad when he is interrupted. I am so grateful that we have a God who interrupts healing, with healing.
Dear God,
Thank you
for taking the time
to heal us.
Remind us
to reach out
when we are in trouble.
Be with us, we pray.
Amen.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Immediate Word, June 27, 2021 issue.
Copyright 2021 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
- Waiting for the Lord — and People by Mary Austin — The psalm proclaims that it is God “who will redeem Israel from all its iniquities.” We can trust (and hope) that the same is true for our nation.
- Second Thoughts: Invisible Suffering by Chris Keating — Just as the woman in Mark’s story pushes through the crowd in search of healing, long haul Covid patients struggle to find hope.
- Sermon illustrations by Dean Feldmeyer, Quantisha Mason-Doll.
- Worship resources by George Reed.
- Children's sermon: Healing God by Katy Stenta.
Waiting for the Lord -- and Peopleby Mary Austin
Psalm 130
Opal Lee has celebrated Juneteenth all her life, and she has long wanted the rest of the country to celebrate this holiday, too. Last week, Mrs. Lee, now 94, stood next to President Biden as he signed the legislation making Juneteenth a federal holiday.
In 2016, at the age of 89, Mrs. Lee decided to walk from Texas to the White House, hoping to meet with then-President Obama to bring attention to the Juneteenth holiday. Her family, concerned about her health, persuaded her to take a shorter walk, and she ended up visiting the cities that invited her to their Juneteenth celebrations. “Growing up in Marshall, Texas, Lee said the day was treated like other holidays, with food, music and baseball games. “It was pure festival,” she told CNN. Lee merely wanted to share the holiday, widely recognized by the Black community in her state, with the rest of the country, she had said, as some states had not yet formally acknowledged the historic day. “I just thought if a little, old lady in tennis shoes was out there walking, somebody would take notice,” she told NPR at the time.”
Mrs. Lee echoes the voice of the psalmist, calling out for remembrance and redemption of the past. “Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD. Lord, hear my voice! Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications!” the psalmist insists. The psalmist understands that forgiveness and justice are slow work, and that in waiting for God, we find hope. The waiting is filled with action to align our hopes with God's.
Those who have wanted a national observance of Juneteenth, as part of a larger call for racial justice, have waited — and while waiting, brought the nation’s attention to this holiday. Celebrated for years in Texas and parts of the South, Juneteenth is now part of the national calendar.
In the News
In the movement to make Juneteenth a national holiday, Mrs. Lee and others built on the power of the holiday for those who knew it, and on the impact of recent tragedies. “After George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police in May 2020, Lee saw a nation galvanized. The month after Floyd died, millions across the country marked the holiday, prompting Lee to believe that change could come. “We can’t let the swell of support just simply disappear until the summer rolls around again,” she wrote in the petition that was quickly gaining signatures. “We have (to) make sure Congress follows through with their commitment to honor the lives of those who came before us…” Congress answered her call,” as both houses passed the Juneteenth legislation.
The holiday was celebrated this year with extra joy and awe, and yet there’s a call for more.
The national observance of Juneteenth is cause for celebration…and more. Episcopal priest Dorothy Sanders Wells notes that Juneteenth is also a call back to unfulfilled obligations. “Juneteenth speaks not only to the suppression of the truth of emancipation, but to all of the unfulfilled promises of Reconstruction, when Black people believed that freedom would have meaning. Instead, the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution that abolished slavery, granted citizenship, afforded due process, and guaranteed the right to vote to African persons on this soil gave way instead to a legacy of segregation and Jim Crow laws that mandated separation — separate schools and learning, separate neighborhoods, separate entrances into public buildings, separate seating on public transportation, separate public accommodations. Race massacres — from Memphis, in 1866 to Tulsa, in 1921 — saw the destruction of Black-owned homes, businesses, schools and houses of worship. After the election of the first Black senator and congressmen — all from the South, during Reconstruction — voting rights were suppressed, and many brave and faithful persons gave their lives just in order for Black persons to be able to cast their votes in public elections — a right that was given in the 15th Amendment.”
Jayne Marie Smith writes for Sojourners that the delay in freeing enslaved people in Texas was because “Lincoln’s executive order was meaningless to the rebellious states unless and until the Union army arrived to enforce it…American history books teach that the Civil War ended in April 1865 at the Appomattox Court House in Virginia, but that was just a military surrender by the outnumbered Gen. Robert E. Lee. Battles were still being waged, including in Texas.” The might of the Union army was required to enforce the liberation that was already true. She adds, “The spiritual side of me thinks of the Apostle Paul’s description in Romans 7:19 of the ongoing battle inside of him between good and sin. Bodily, as an African American, I feel this battle waging outside of me, too; in the United States, this battle waged all around me, ever ongoing, invisible, but impactful. Both spiritually and in my Black American existence, I recognize that no one in rebellion adheres to authority without the presence of that authority.”
We have yet to catch up to the promise of the new holiday.
In the Scriptures
The psalmist cries out to God for redemption, and the cry moves from the individual level to the national. Knowing that God offers forgiveness, and an overdue reckoning, the psalmist waits. The writer speaks out of the depths of some form of suffering, and we find an answering echo of our own suffering, both individual and communal.
The psalmist is confident that God is present in this depth of sorrow, and in the brighter future to come. God is the one who redeems, without fail. Even when God seems to delay, hope is not wasted. God’s word sustains the waiting.
Moving from an individual lament to the need of the whole community, the writer shifts to a national framework. “O Israel, hope in the Lord,” the writer demands, and we might voice the same hope for our nation.
In the Sermon
The Juneteenth holiday is the result of the hard work of many who hoped for national acknowledgement of the day’s importance. The sermon might look at the places where this hope was denied and delayed before it finally came to life. How did Mrs. Lee and others who labored for the birth of this holiday hold onto hope? How did they see future gains emerging, and stay hopeful in the face of pettiness, prejudice and ignorance?
Or, the sermon might look at Juneteenth as a platform for examining where we are now in the movement toward racial justice. Even though the holiday is past for this year, it gives us a place to reflect on our progress toward racial justice. We can hear the words of the psalmist as a lens for our own country. The psalm proclaims that it is God “who will redeem Israel from all its iniquities.” We can trust that the same is true for our nation, and the sermon might reflect that spirit of humility and hope. Where do we still need God’s transforming power?
Observing Juneteenth as a national holiday should be understood as a beginning, not an end. Dr. Theon Hill, a professor at Wheaton College, challenges, “We get to the point where we realize making a holiday is cheap. The hard work of racial justice is much more difficult and requires a much deeper level of commitment. And our fear says, “Don’t give me a national holiday and expect it to be a substitute for racial justice.” But certainly appointing national holidays are aspirational as much as they are celebratory.” Dr. Hill adds that there is a danger in national holidays. Our “holidays also have the unique ability to almost rewrite our history and romanticize it and sanitize it so we become cheerleaders for a pure America, an untarnished America. For many who are on the underside of our societies, that America that you’re celebrating never existed.” Where does the creation of this holiday call us to see our own nation as clearly as the psalmist does his?
The Rev. Dorothy Sanders Wells, a Black woman, suggests additional reflection for all of us. She writes, “It’s not “Happy Juneteenth” for me. I am not celebrating. For me, this is a day of prayer: I am praying for all who live in the shadows and the margins, all who continue to be discriminated against, all who continue to be profiled and unjustly accused. For me, today is a day to consider the ways in which any of us might be beacons of God’s light and bearers of God’s love, and tellers of God’s truth — that we are all made in the image and likeness of our God, and that we are all beloved of our God. For me, it is a day to reflect on ways that lawmakers, the Church, and others have needed to learn to stand not in opposition to freedom but in solidarity with the oppressed. For me, it is a day to begin conversation with a neighbor to learn more of that person’s story and the lens through which that person sees the world.”
As God’s people, we call out to God in all seasons of pain, trusting that God is listening and already at work. We await God’s redemption, as individuals and as a flawed community. We watch for progress, waiting “for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning, more than those who watch for the morning.” Even when our watching is rewarded, the work of faithful hope and principled action continues until our lives match God’s redemptive vision.
SECOND THOUGHTSInvisible Suffering
by Chris Keating
Mark 5:21-43
When Heidi Ferrer, an acclaimed television screenwriter, died early on May 27, 2021, she’d been suffering from the effects of Covid-19 for more than a year. The 50-year-old writer from Dawson’s Creek died by suicide, just a day after her birthday. She started feeling Covid symptoms in April, 2020.
“I worried like everyone else about safety,” she wrote on her blog. “I wiped down groceries, wore my masks. I thought I was safe, I thought that my family was protected — that I did everything right. But the monster was real, and it came for me.”
Ferrer hesitated to reveal her struggles with long-haul symptoms. She learned about the sufferings of others from around the world, including Amy Watson, a mother and preschool teacher from Oregon who first coined the term “long hauler.” (Let’s send a shout out to early childhood educators!)
(Watson and others are promoting support groups and research about long-haul Covid on the website C19recoveryawareness.com. Diana Berrent, who describes herself as the ‘canary in the Covid coalmine,’ is another advocate whose group Survivor Corps is active in creating grassroots solutions.)
What Ferrer discovered is that many Covid suffers were showing up in emergency rooms confused by what was happening in their bodies. “They were often gaslighted,” she wrote, “sent back home, told they were just having ‘anxiety.’”
Ferrer embodied a growing global population of patients. Like the woman who reaches for the hem of Jesus’ garment in Mark 5, they have endured “much under many physicians.” Searching for cures, expending resources, they lean toward possibilities of cure while other growing worse.
Long haul Covid is a real thing. The suffering continues unabated, and relief is often elusive. On her website, Ferrer described the illness as a “roulette wheel” of horrors. Of the some 50 most common symptoms of long-haul Covid, Ferrer reported having at least 27.
Ferrer pushed herself to find hope, even in the darkest moments of despair. She remained resolute that Covid wouldn’t beat her, and often posted hints of her unfailing optimism. In the end, however, her husband said, she decided to “leave this world on her own terms before her condition grew worse.”
A study published in February in the Journal of the American Medical Association’s Network Open showed that 27 percent of Covid survivors ages 18-39 had lingering complaints between three and nine months after testing negative for Covid. That percentage is slightly higher for middle aged patients and more than 43 percent for elderly persons.
Another study of 230,000 recovered Covid patients found that about one in three were suffering long-term neurological illnesses. The symptoms emerge like the aftershocks of a tremendous earthquake, pummeling patients and puzzling doctors. A few of the long list of symptoms include muscle aches and pains, joint pain, ongoing or recurring fever, muscle cramps, shortness of breath, tightness in chest, brain fog, tinnitus (ringing in ears), insomnia, among others.
Research is beginning to document wave-like patterns of illness or symptoms among long-haulers. Some doctors suggest that the waxing and waning of symptoms could be the result of damage to either blood vessels or major organs. Or it could be a lingering of the virus. Or it could be persistent inflammation. There are more questions than answers at this point.
“Some people are chronically sick from day one,” said Survivor Corps founder Diana Berrent. “For others, you think you feel better and then you’re hit by another wave and another wave.”
“The good news for people who are experiencing symptoms in waves is that the waves do seem to get milder over time, at least anecdotally,” said Berrent. In addition, there are reports that receiving the Covid vaccine may also ease lingering symptoms.
The layering of these symptoms forms a sandwich of suffering, with each layer adding mystery and agony for patients. They suffer anonymously among the hoards of Americans rushing toward the illusionary pandemic finish line this summer. Like the woman reaching toward Jesus, they yearn for relief with only the slightest hopes of being healed.
The healing of the woman in Mark is also a sandwich of sorts. The woman’s bold action splices the story of Jesus raising the daughter of Jairus, a leader of the synagogue (Mark 4:21-24, 35-43). Both parts of this sandwich are couched in terms of Jesus extending compassion to the women, both of whom are named as daughters of Israel. Both stories offer reminders of the healing God offers to those who suffer.
Scholars have often emphasized that the woman’s touching of Jesus was improper and a violation of social mores. Yet Warren Carter (Mark) notes that there are no indicators that such an action was taboo or a violation of purity codes. Carter holds that such interpretations are driven by a “spatial dualism” that simplistically reduces women in Mark’s world to household duties while privileging male hegemony. This reading also assumes the false spatial dualism that is evident in the claims about “purity.” (Carter, Mark, Wisdom Commentary Series, p. 237 Liturgical Press, Kindle edition.)
Rather, the woman’s long-suffering is evidence of how her condition had marginalized and oppressed her. Those who struggle with chronic illness can identify with the frustration of having sought solutions from countless providers. Those who suffer from long-haul Covid or other debilitating conditions will find themselves tracing the woman’s movements. Straining against the crowd, they push through layers of insurance paperwork and byzantine medical networks in hopes of a cure.
“If I but touch his clothes,” finds its modern equivalent in “If I can get an appointment...” or “If I can get their attention.”
The disciples marvel at what has happened. The crowds are pushing against him; how can he know that someone has touched him? Yet the miracle, as far as Jesus is concerned, is that despite her suffering, the woman has persisted. Faith propels her forward, pushing her out of the closet of her anonymity.
Do not judge Heidi Ferrer’s sad struggles, for they are reminders of the immense toll exacted by suffering. Ferrer’s suffering was unfathomable. Like the woman in Mark’s story, Ferrer battled and pushed through her disease. Having watched her own teenage son fight back from a debilitating spine condition, Ferrer knew the warp and weft of suffering. Her story, like the story of the anonymous woman in Mark, is a story of resilient faith pushing against layers of resistance.
Such faith clings to the threads of hope, actively pursuing the healing God intends for all.
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Dean Feldmeyer:Mark 5:21-43
Hopeless because we said so
In the gospel lesson for this day, Jesus is confronted with and overcomes two cases that are, by human standards, hopeless.
Some things that we experience in life seem hopeless for no other reason than we have chosen to make them so.
In the first round of the PGA Palmetto Championship golf tournament at Conagree Golf Club in South Carolina, PGA Tour Pro, Mark Hensby was assessed a 10-stroke penalty that put him out of the tournament. That’s two strokes each, for five holes, that he played with the wrong ball.
Turns out, Hensby was hitting putts on the practice green with fellow player, Pat Perez, before their turn to tee off. Apparently, when it was time to collect their golf balls and report to the first tee, Hensby accidentally picked up one of Perez’s low-spin balls and put it in his pocket.
On the 4th hole, Hensby hit his shot into the water and he grabbed a new ball from his bag. Five holes later, he noticed a small, black dot on the ball and asked his playing partner what it represented. He was told that it was a low-spin ball and Hensby immediately realized that even though it was the same brand as his, this particular ball wasn’t his as he didn’t play low-spin balls.
As is the custom in golf, he notified the officials of the innocent mistake but there is no grace in the PGA rules for innocent mistakes. Nothing could be done. His case was hopeless. He was assessed two strokes for each hole he played with the wrong ball, a total of ten strokes that put his final score at 84 instead of a respectable 74.
Realizing that making the cut was impossible, Hensby withdrew from the tournament.
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
Hopeless because we said so, 2.0
This spring, Ikeria Washington and Layla Temple, two African American teens, were named the valedictorian and salutatorian at West Point High School in West Point, Mississippi. For a while.
Then, a few days before commencement, they were told that they would have to share the dais with two white girls who had been named co-valedictorian and co-salutatorian.
Turns out the school district uses two different metrics to determine class standing. One is grade point average (GPA) where the grades are averaged and the students with the highest averages are named valedictorian and salutatorian. The other method is called Quality Point Average (QPA) where Advanced Placement (AP) classes are weighted higher than regular classes in determining grade averages.
Ikeria and Layla had higher QPA’s because they took several AP classes. The two white girls, who took no AP classes, had higher GPA’s.
AP students and their parents have argued that (1) if GPA is the only determinant, that an A in Calculus is the same as an A in gym and students are, thus, rewarded for taking easier, non-challenging classes, and (2) if the valedictorian and salutatorian were white, none of this would have been brought up.
The school district has responded that while they are sorry for the confusion, rules are rules, and there’s nothing they can do.
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
Kindness cancels hopeless
For Daverius Peters, his Hahnville High School graduation ceremony was the biggest moment in his life up to that point. Unfortunately, he was going to miss it because of his shoes.
When he arrived at the Boutte, La. convention center in his purple cap and gown, he was stopped at the door by a school official and told that the black, leather sneakers with white soles that he was wearing did not meet the dress code that required dark dress shoes. He would have to find shoes that met the code if he wanted to participate in the ceremony that was only moments from beginning.
In a panic, with no time to get a new pair of shoes, Daverius looked around and spied John Butler, a paraprofessional educator and his mentor. He ran over and explained what was happening. Mr. Butler tried to reason with the school official who was guarding the door but the person was adamant. Wrong shoes, no graduation.
So, he took off his size-11 loafers and gave them to Davarius who normally wears a size-9. The audience wondered why people down front were giggling as Davarius shuffled across the stage and why Mr. Butler was attending the event in his stockinged feet.
After all was made clear, there were many pats on the back for both men and Mr. Butler has promised to meet with the school board to discuss easing up a bit on their graduation dress code.
* * *
2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27
Famous eulogies real and fictional
Many scholars consider this passage from 2 Samuel David’s eulogy for Saul and Jonathan. Is it? If we compare it to some famous eulogies from history and fiction, it may be.
Winston Churchill is reported to have said that the role of a eulogist is “to render the deceased so good as to make him unrecognizable to even his closest friends.”
Some great fictional eulogies from literature would have to include:
1. Mark Antony’s speech in Julius Caesar — The “Friends, Romans, Countrymen” speech begins as a memorial honoring Julius Caesar and concludes by turning the crowd against his assassins.
2. Casy’s words for Grandpa in The Grapes of Wrath — During the Joad family’s trip from Oklahoma to California during the Dust Bowl, Grandpa dies, and Reverend Casy is asked to speak a few words over his buried body. His speech begins, “This here ol’ man jus’ lived a life an’ just died out of it. I don’t know whether he was good or bad, but that don’t matter much. He was alive, an’ that’s what matters.”
3. Narrator’s words for Charlotte the Spider in Charlotte’s Web — While there is no funeral for Charlotte, the narrator offers these words: “It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both.”
Eulogies from movies might include:
1. Captain Kirk’s eulogy for Spock in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan — The heartfelt speech includes the line: “Of all the souls I encountered in my travels, his was the most human.”
2. Walter and the Dude eulogize Danny in The Big Lebowski — Played for laughs, the script has Walter trying to return Danny’s ashes to the “bosom of the Pacific Ocean.” Instead, a breeze causes the ashes to fly back, covering the Dude’s hair, face, and sunglasses.
And speaking of playing eulogies for laughs, probably the most popular and well-remembered instance of this would have to be the Chuckles the Clown episode of the Mary Tyler Moore Show.
* * *
2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27
How to write a eulogy
I don’t imagine that David ever read Jessica Campbell’s article, “How to Write a Eulogy,” on Legacy.com, but his eulogy for Saul and Jonathan certainly checks all of her boxes:
- A eulogy should be between 5 and 10 minutes (750-1500 words, 1-2 typed pages) long.
- Gather memories — your own and those of family and friends.
- Organize your thoughts
- Write a first draft.
- Review and edit.
- Practice giving the speech.
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
It only gets worse
Mark recounts that the woman with the hemorrhages suffered for 12 years, enduring much from many physicians and spending all of her resources to no avail. While we tend to think of this as an ancient malady, there are still diseases which stupefy modern science.
The web site Live Science offers these among many:
AIDS — 25 years since it was first identified, there is still no cure for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome.
Alzheimer's Disease — Alzheimer's is a degenerative brain disorder that manifests differently in each of its sufferers. The exact cause isn't known and there is no cure.
The Common Cold — Even with an estimated one billion cases in the United States every year, doctors still know very little about the nose-running, cough-inducing cold, whose root causes number in the hundreds.
Pica — People diagnosed with Pica have an insatiable urge to eat non-food substances like dirt, paper, glue and clay.
Schizophrenia — Experts consider this the most puzzling of mental disorders, one which robs the sufferer of the ability to logically distinguish between reality and fantasy and has no defining medical tests.
Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease — One version of this rare brain disorder is better known "Mad Cow" and can be contracted by eating contaminated beef and develops in most patients for reasons doctors have yet to figure out and cannot prevent.
* * * * * *
From team member Quantisha Mason-Doll:Mark 5:21-43
Take Hold Of Your Faith
Our gospel reading finds us tackling difficult issues that make some people uncomfortable. The discussion of bleeding and women’s menstruation has always been a taboo topic within polite society. Yet this is a story that shows a woman in a position of agency and power over her own identity. The woman with the issue of bleeding takes agency for herself and her own well-being in a society that would deem her an outcast. She self-actualizes healing. She is a person that identifies one chance, one opportunity to be made whole and she does not hesitate to act. The good news of the gospel is found in her action and Jesus’ re-action. Her healing is an act of justice and power exchanged between humans and the manifestation of the divine. The theologian Paul Tillich argues this point best in his work Love, Power, and Justice: Ontological Analysis and Ethical Applications (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1954) that acts of justice are the “form in which the power of being actualizes itself” (56) under the principle of love (57.)
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
Adequate Health Care is A Divine Right
Adequate health care needs to be understood as a divine right afforded to all who require it. This is one of the rare moments when we as modern readers are offered insight into the thoughts and motivations of a person seeking divine aid from Jesus. Special attention should be paid to how the woman with the issue of bleeding is said to have suffered more at the hands of doctors, whose goal should have been healing. It is of no surprise that this healing narrative can easily be paralleled with the ongoing Covid-19 global pandemic. The irony of the woman’s suffering even until this day. Even though we modern people have made vast advancements in medical care there are still disparities in care provided. These medical disparities tend to fall along the socioeconomic standings, race divides, and gender. Studies have shown what the Covid-19 pandemic has made clear: medical racism and moral assumptions influence the way medical professionals provide care. See “On life, death, and pain” and/or “COVID-19 And Health Disparities: Insights From Key Informant Interviews”
The celebration is Jesus’ acknowledgement and affirmation of this woman’s faith. That withstanding, this healing narrative is a call to discernment on how we can better provide care for the wide diversity of God’s creation.
* * *
Mark 5:21-43
Sometimes You Have To Risk Everything If You Want A Miracle
Isabel Godin des Odonais was an 18th century South American woman who, after being separated from her husband for twenty years, was the sole survivor of a harrowing journey across the Amazon with the goal of reuniting her with her love. Biographers assert that it was her faith in God and the love she held for her partner that were the deciding factors in her survival. I cannot help but think of Isabel’s story paralleling the story of Jarius. Often his story is glossed over because the woman with the bleeding issue takes precedence. Here is a man that is labeled as a leader of the synagogue willing to risk his status, power, and privilege for the barest chance at a miracle. Risk taking is a stressful venture, yet there comes a time when one must throw caution to the wind and place all of their trust in their faith. This healing narrative would have us understanding that miracles, moreover, miracle making, is an active process that requires a kairos (καιρός) moment to initiate or make space for the divine will to be made manifest.
* * *
2 Corinthians 8:7-15
Take Stock Of What You Have And Act Accordingly
As a country the United States is facing a difficult time that in some senses will make or break our country as a whole. The margins between rich and poor are ever widening and hyper individualistic mentalities are starting to become the new social norm. It is easy for us to fall victim to the American ideology of picking yourself up by your bootstraps or the self-made man. The plight of people less fortunate than ourself tends to be a topic that is greatly talked about yet rarely executed well. Care for the poor and disenfranchised has become a proformative action that is a box to be checked. There is also the reality that there are those who fall in the middle. They are not quite rich enough to live a life of luxury yet they are not poor enough to be confronted with the realities of what it means to be poor as a US citizen. In respect to the last two years, financial situations have changed drastically. The second letter to the Corinthians is call in some sense to action. The author leaves it open to interpretation: you have not been commanded to act though the suggestion is made. We are being asked to take stock of all that we have and plan accordingly. In my own life the work of Rev. William Barber II has been a driving force for moral discernment and education on how to better advocate for our human family.
See more about Barber and The Poor People's Campaign here.
Also, check out Jeffrey D. Sachs opinion piece on how a third Reconstruction could end American poverty.
* * * * * *
WORSHIPby George Reed
Call to Worship:
One: Out of the depths we cry to you, O God.
All: Let your ears be attentive to the voice of our supplications!
One: If you, O God, should mark iniquities who could stand?
All: But there is forgiveness with you, so that you may be revered.
One: Hope in God with whom there is steadfast love.
All: In God there is great power to redeem.
OR
One: God comes to be made known among us.
All: We welcome the presence of our God.
One: When we are in need, God is with us.
All: We rejoice in the strength of our ever present God.
One: God wants us to be the divine presence for others.
All: We will bring God’s love and grace to all.
Hymns and Songs:
Amazing Grace
UMH: 378
H82: 671
PH: 280
AAHH: 271/272
NNBH: 161/163
NCH: 547/548
CH: 546
LBW: 448
ELW: 779
W&P: 422
AMEC: 2026
STLT: 205/206
Renew: 189
It Is Well with My Soul
UMH: 377
AAHH: 377
NNBH: 255
NCH: 438
CH: 561
ELW: 785
W&P: 428
AMEC: 448
There Is a Balm in Gilead
UMH: 375
H82: 676
PH: 394
AAHH: 524
NNBH: 489
NCH: 553
CH: 501
ELW: 614
W&P: 631
AMEC: 425
This Is a Day of New Beginnings
UMH: 383
NCH: 417
CH: 518
W&P: 355
Hope of the World
UMH: 178
H82: 472
PH: 360
NCH: 46
CH: 538
LBW: 493
W&P: 404
Jesus, the Very Thought of Thee
UMH: 175
H82: 642
PH: 310
NCH: 507
CH: 102
LBW: 316
ELW: 754
W&P: 420
AMEC: 464
I Love to Tell the Story
UMH: 156
AAHH: 513
NNBH: 424
NCH: 522
CH: 480
LBW: 390
ELW: 661
W&P: 560
AMEC: 217
All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name
UMH: 154/155
H82: 450/451
PH: 142/143
AAHH: 292/293/294
NNBH: 3/5
NCH: 304
CH: 91/92
LBW: 328/329
ELW: 634
W&P: 100/106
AMEC: 4/5/6
Renew: 45
Leaning of the Everlasting Arms
UMH: 133
AAHH: 371
NNBH: 262
NCH: 471
CH: 560
ELW: 774
W&P: 496
AMEC: 525
Sing Praise to God Who Reigns Above
UMH: 126
H82: 408
PH: 483
NCH: 6
CH: 6
W&P: 56
Renew: 52
Great Is the Lord
CCB: 65
Renew: 22
Cares Chorus
CCB: 53
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELW: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day/Collect
O God who is always present as our help and strength:
Give us the vision to see you with us each day
no matter what that day brings to us;
through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We praise you, O God, because you are the one who is always with us. You provide us with the help and strength we need for each day. Help us see you in the midst of all that which is going on day by day. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
One: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins and especially the ways in which we fail to look for God’s presence in our lives.
All: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. Even though you have created us as your children and filled us with your own Spirit, we feel alone and abandoned. We talk of faith but we quickly forget to rely on you. Forgive us our shortsightedness and call us back once more to you. Amen.
One: God is our help and strength and never forsakes us. Receive God’s grace and share it with others, especially those who find little grace from this world.
Prayers of the People
Praise and glory to you, O God, the one who sustains all creation. Your love is the foundation of all being.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. Even though you have created us as your children and filled us with your own Spirit, we feel alone and abandoned. We talk of faith but we quickly forget to rely on you. Forgive us our shortsightedness and call us back once more to you.
We thank you for all the ways you are with us each day whether we are aware of your presence or not. We thank you for those who make your grace known to us by their actions of care and love. We thank you for your Spirit that dwells within us and among us to guide us and comfort us.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for one another in our need. We pray for all your children who feel the burdens of life pressing down upon them. We pray for those who are ill, those who are dying, and those who mourn. We pray for those who struggle with the meaning of lives or the emptiness of broken relationships.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ who taught us to pray together saying:
Our Father....Amen.
(Or if the Our Father is not used at this point in the service.)
All this we ask in the name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
Children’s Sermon Starter
Talk about places you go for help. If you are sick you go to the doctor. If you need food you go to the grocery. If you need someone to play with you go to a friend or sibling or parent. It is good to know there are people/places where we can get help. God is always with us and we can always turn to God for help.
* * * * * *
CHILDREN'S SERMONHealing God
by Katy Stenta
Mark 5:21-43
Here are two stories of Jesus healing a woman and a little girl. The little girl is probably about 12 years old and is dying, and the woman has been sick for 12 years. The one healing interrupts the other, but Jesus is still able to heal both of them.
One of big leaders of the Hebrew faith at the time came to Jesus and when he saw him he fell to his knees and said, “My little girl is dying, please come and lay your hands on her so that she can live.” Jesus went with him.
Then on the way he felt a touch.
He felt a bit of his healing power leave him.
So Jesus asked “who touched me?”
His disciples said “What do you mean, everyone is touching you!”
But again Jesus asked, “Who touched me?”
And a woman, who had been bleeding for 12 years said, “it was me.”
Jesus said “Daughter your faith has made you well, go in peace.”
Then some others came to the leader Jairus and said they were sorry, his daughter has already died.
Jesus said “Do not be afraid, believe.”
And Jesus went into the house with Peter, James and John.
He came back out and said “Do not cry, the little girl is just sleeping.”
He called out to her “Talitha, Come” which means little girl got up.
And she did.
Wasn’t that a great story about how loving Jesus is? He is able to heal both people, he doesn’t have to choose. He doesn’t even get mad when he is interrupted. I am so grateful that we have a God who interrupts healing, with healing.
Dear God,
Thank you
for taking the time
to heal us.
Remind us
to reach out
when we are in trouble.
Be with us, we pray.
Amen.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Immediate Word, June 27, 2021 issue.
Copyright 2021 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
