Keeping Your Eyes on Jesus
Stories
Contents
“Keeping Your Eyes on Jesus” by Peter Andrew Smith
“Continuing the Work” by Frank Ramirez
Keeping Your Eyes on Jesus
by Peter Andrew Smith
Luke 9:51-62
“This is unacceptable.” The woman opened the bags Kim handed to her over the food bank’s counter. “My kids are hungry and you expect me to feed them with this stuff?”
Linda peeked out from the back where she was putting bags together.
“The food in each bag is nutritious and healthy,” Kim replied calmly. “There are also recipes on the card to help you prepare meals and stretch any leftovers.”
“How dare you assume I don’t know how to cook!” The woman raised her voice. “I was cooking at my grandmother’s knee when you weren’t even thought of, young lady.”
“Then you may not need them but we put the cards in all the bags because not everyone is as fortunate as you to have experience cooking meals from scratch.”
“There should be more in these bags.” The woman glared at Kim. “You need to give me one more.”
Linda came out from the back with another bag. “Here you go, Kim.”
Kim took the bag and placed it on the shelf behind her with the other prepared bags. Linda retreated to the back under the glare of the women.
“Good, I need another bag,” the woman said.
Kim shook her head. “Two per family. We need to make sure that everyone who needs help gets help. I gave you enough to feed a family of four for three days.”
The woman stomped her foot. “Well, I need more.”
Kim stood firm. “You are welcome to come back next week but that is all we can give you today.”
“You church people say you are doing good but you’re wasting food.” The woman looked at the other people waiting in line at the food bank. “You’re throwing it away on drug users and prostitutes instead of hard-working people like me just trying to feed their kids.”
Kim took a deep breath. “If there is nothing else there are other people waiting.”
The woman stared at Kim and then snatched the bags and stormed through the door. No one said anything in the food bank line.
Kim reached behind her and placed another bag on the counter. She smiled at the next person.
“So how can we help you today?”
When Kim closed the door and flipped the sign from ‘open’ to ‘closed,’ Linda came back out to the front.
“I don’t know how you do it,” Linda said.
Kim sat down on a stool and rubbed her feet. “What do you mean?”
“I’d have given that angry woman an extra bag just to keep her quiet.”
Kim waved at the empty shelf where the bags had been stacked. “If we had then someone else would have hungry kids tonight.”
“How do you keep so calm and collected?”
“She’s hungry, frustrated, and probably embarrassed. The only real thing I could do was be polite to her.”
“I thought she was going to get mean when she started to talk about other people.”
“That would have been a problem because we can’t have that here.” Kim shrugged. “But as long as she was just frustrated I was patient with her.”
“How do you not lose your temper?”
“Sometimes it’s not easy.” Kim looked off in the distance. “I’m sorry to say a couple of times when I started here I did get angry when people were upset. Was Judy working here when you started?”
“No.” Linda shook her head. “I’ve heard of her but I’ve never met her.”
“She told me something that helped me the first time I lost my temper. She said that when we meet someone really difficult we need to remember that Jesus sent them to us for help and we need to treat them as someone who is special to Jesus.” Kim smiled. “And she said when that isn’t enough we need to remember that when the disciples wanted to call down fire on the village for disrespecting Jesus that he told them no.”
“Wow.” Linda thought for a moment. “Does that help?”
“I find it does. If we keep our eyes on Jesus we won’t get distracted by our anger or pettiness and we don’t let anything stop us from following Jesus where he is leading,” Kim said. “I also find it important to remember we are doing more than simply feeding people at the church’s food bank.”
Linda looked around and frowned. “What else are we doing?”
“Each day we’re showing the people who come here the way God calls us to act and live, we’re reminding them that they are children of God, and we’re sharing grace with them by what we give and by how we receive them.”
Linda thought about that for a moment. “Wow. That really changes this place doesn’t it?”
Kim nodded. “Grace changes this place and it changes us and the people who come here.”
* * *
Continuing the Work
by Frank Ramirez
2 Kings 2:1-3, 6-14
As they continued walking and talking, a chariot of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them, and Elijah ascended in a whirlwind into heaven (2 Kings 2:1-3, 6-14).
The image of Elijah riding the chariot of fire is a popular image for children’s Sunday school lessons, but how many hymns do you know to go with that story? Or at least use that image?
If you're English you know of at least one — known generally as "Jerusalem," or by its first line "And did those feet in ancient time." The poem was written by William Blake (1757-1827) , a printer, a poet, and a painter whose work was largely unknown during his lifetime, and yet is now considered one of the most influential artists and writers who ever lived. His paintings of themes from Revelation and the prophets are especially popular.
Blake had written an epic poem titled "Milton: A Poem in Two Books," which was published in 1808. The work of setting up a book could take years, and four years earlier Blake set the type for one of the first pages of that work, a preface that contained the now famous poem that uses the image of the chariot of fire. The poem is based on the legend that Joseph of Arimathea, who, after the death and resurrection of Jesus, was supposed to have taken the cup used by our savior at the Last Supper with him to England when the Christian faith was first brought to that island. According to that legend, a much younger Joseph of Arimathea accompanied an even younger Jesus to England during that time between his visit to the Temple when he was twelve (as related in the Gospel of Luke) and when he began his earthly ministry around the age of 30. There is no reason to think either of these legends is the least bit true, but it's a reminder of how many people think of the life of Jesus intersecting their own lands.
Blake's hymn pondered whether Jesus had indeed walked on English hills — hills that were now blighted, according to the poet, by manufacturers who were oppressing their workers and displacing the people of the land. He challenged himself and others to rethink the claim of the chariot of fire in England, and to work ceaselessly to turn his native land into a new Jerusalem.
And did those feet in ancient time,
Walk upon England's mountains green:
And was the holy Lamb of God,
On England's pleasant pastures seen,
And did the Countenance Divine,
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here,
Among these dark Satanic Mills?
Bring me my Bow of burning gold;
Bring me my Arrows of desire:
Bring me my Spear: O clouds unfold!
Bring me my Chariot of fire!
I will not cease from Mental Fight,
Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand:
Till we have built Jerusalem,
In England's green & pleasant Land.
The poem was virtually unknown for about a century, but during World War I it was published in an anthology of poems titled “The Spirit of Man,” and was promoted to raise morale as British troops suffered terrible losses. The anthology’s editor, Robert Bridges, then asked composer Sir Hubert Parry to write music for it. The song was hugely popular, and over time became an unofficial national anthem. Suffragettes sang it as part of their campaign to get women the vote in England. Though not precisely a hymn, it was sung in English, especially as part of Saint George's Day worship services and processionals. It is often sung at soccer games, and was the opening hymn for the 2012 Olympics in London.
In the story from the 2 Kings Elijah is taken up to heaven in the chariot of fire, but Elisha is left to continue the work. With that in mind, here is a more Americanized version of the hymn that is available for use. It calls to mind our heritage of slavery, and still unsettled matters that have not been resolved, acknowledging that prophets, not only ancient but modern, rode that chariot to their heavenly home (remember the spiritual "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot"?), but we are still challenged to work for the prophetic justice that those prophets spoke of.
And Did Those Slaves....
And did those slaves who tilled the field
Upon this continent of dreams
Still sing their hymns and in their hope
Prove in your love your Spirit will not yield?
And did the workers oft oppressed
Entangled and entwined in schemes
Find in their faith a means to cope
Until their wrongs were some time redressed?
Lord live in all who cry to you
As slaves afar or in our land.
Let freedom ring, salvation true,
From eastern shore to western strand.
We will not rest while justice waits
Not while these chariots of flame
Bear prophets safe to heaven's gate
And challenge us to name our shame.
("And Did Those Slaves" is set to that tune, Jerusalem, which can be found online or in some hymnals, and permission is given for congregations that subscribe to Sermon Suite to use it.)
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StoryShare, June 30, 2019, issue.
Copyright 2019 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
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