Proper 14A August 7, 2011 FEAR NOTHING Life can be stormy. And scary.

Christ says to us what he said to his first disciples, Take heart; it is I; do not be afraid (Mt 14:27 NRSV). Life can be scary not only because of earthquake fire, flood and storms at sea but even more because of the terrible things people do to each other. The things people with power have done to people without power led our founders to devise a democracy with power distributed among several levels and branches of government with checks and balances. It makes for messy policy making but none of us would wish to replace our system with a dictatorship. Ancient kings powers were untrammeled and applied mercilessly. Ancient people assumed that God was like their kings. No wonder they projected upon God a savage intent. No wonder they feared God. Even today, some people's root response to God is fear. No wonder that the first words out of God's messengers mouth need often be "Dont be afraid; I won't hurt you". The story of our Lord's birth is punctuated with this greeting. When the angel appeared to John the Baptist's father, he said, "Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard" (Lk. 1:13). Not long thereafter, Gabriel is saying "Do not be afraid, Mary, for God has been gracious to you..." (Lk.1:30 NEB). Nine months later, shepherds abiding in the fields saw an angel and "they were sore afraid, but the angel said, `Fear

not; for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people'" (Lk. 2:10 KJV). Our Lord's calling his disciples had to be cushioned by reassurances. After Jesus had directed him to the miraculous catch of fishes and Simon Peter realized that he was in the presence of the divine, he "fell at Jesus' knees and said, `Go, Lord, leave me, sinner that I am!' ... `Do not be afraid,' said Jesus to Simon; `from now on, you will be catching men'" (Lk. 5:10 NEB). Jesus was once asleep in a boat when a storm blew up. His disciples "woke him, saying, `Save, Lord; we are perishing.' And he said to them, `Why are you afraid, O men of little faith?'" (Mt. 8:25f RSV). Later in the same Gospel is this mornings story: another storm at sea, Christ walking on the turbulence to them saying, Take heart; it is I; do not be afraid. Peter gets out of the boat to meet him but he became frightened, and beginning to sink he cried out, Lord, save me!. Christ also responds to such a cry. He caught him saying, You of little faith, why did you doubt? (Mt. 14:28-31 NRSV). The antidote to fear is faith. A consistent theme of Jesus' exhortation to his disciples was "Trust God. Fear not". But people do terrible things to each other. Men especially have done terrible things to women as the Battered Women's Shelter of any large American city will attest. Historically, women, being the more vulnerable sex, have been more cautious as well. None of the women who followed Jesus made the bold declaration Peter did: "Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death" (Lk. 22:33 RSV). But in the event, Peter deserted Jesus. Some women, on the other hand, did not. Matthew tells us that "a number of women were ... present [during the crucifixion], watching from a distance; they had followed Jesus from Galilee and

waited on him. Among them were Mary of Magdala, Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee" (Mt. 27:55f NEB). The women were witnesses to it all. They saw the doleful procession wend its way toward Golgotha, saw the nails being driven, the victims being hoisted aloft to hang by the nails in their wrists. They got to hear the screams, the taunts of the crowd, the cry of dereliction. They did not hear God. God was silent on Good Friday. God does not speak until Easter. Mary of Magdala and the other Mary, the witnesses, who have seen it all and heard it all, who have been faithful unto death and beyond death, come now to the tomb to anoint Jesus' body. They find instead a messenger of God, his clothes snow white, his face like lightening. He delivers his message: "You", he said, "have nothing to fear. I know you are looking for Jesus.... He is not here; he has been raised again. ... Tell his disciples..." (Mt. 28:5-7 NEB). As the two of them hurried away, suddenly Jesus was there in their path. "Do not be afraid" (Mt. 28:10 NEB), he said. The message of the Resurrection the founding event of our faith, without there be no Christian faith, no church and we would not be here this morning -- is the same message Christ proclaimed throughout his ministry: trust God; fear nothing. The fearsome Roman state which stood unchallenged astride the Mediterranean world, was not only incapable of keeping Christ in his tomb, it also could not prevent news of the resurrection, and its implications, from spreading to the city of Rome itself. Paul of Tarsus took his gospel there. The threat of death, Rome's stock in trade, availed nothing against this saint who said

"it is my eager expectation and hope that ... with full courage now as always Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain" (Phil. 1:20f RSV). They could kill him, and did, but they could not intimidate him. A century later the Romans hauled the aged bishop of Smyrna before a tribunal and told him to curse Christ or die. Polycarp replied: "Eightysix years I have served him and he never did me any wrong. How can I blaspheme my king who saved me? ... The fire you threaten burns but an hour; ...do what you will" ("The Martyrdom of Polycarp" Early Christian Fathers, The Westminster Press, Philadelphia. Pages 152f). Fourteen hundred years later, Martin Luther put it like this: "The body they may kill: God's truth abideth still, his kingdom is forever" (hymn 687:4), his kingdom and those who dwell therein, Christ himself first of all, then those who live in him. All those who condemned him, the scribes, the Romans, the crowd, were silenced long ago. Christ comes among us still, encouraging us to cast all our care on him who cares for us, to dread nothing but the loss of him. Trust God he says; Fear nothing. The one who first brought us the news was Mary of Magdala. But perhaps you do not accept her witness. The disciples did not. Women were considered unreliable witnesses; their testimony was inadmissible in court. It is typical of God to choose such a one as his prime witness. But then too Mary was the first to find Christ because she was first to seek him. And perhaps it was she rather than any of the men, whom we call the disciples, who came to his tomb, early, while yet in the dark, yet unaware that the tide had already turned, the victory already won, hell despoiled and death destroyed, it was she who came with a

love beyond hope and a loyalty beyond despair because it was she, and none of them, whom Christ had healed of seven demons. Whether he were king of Israel or not, whether he was the savior of the world or not, he had already been her savior. But in order for that healing to have happened, she had to have trusted him enough to begin with to submit to his touch, had faith in him enough already to allow his power to enter her. So it was that Mary of Magdala came to the tomb to anoint a dead body and found instead a living Lord. If you doubt her testimony then see for yourself. Do as Mary did. Trust Christ so far as to allow him, invite him, to enter your life. Submit to his touch. Espouse your soul to him. Soon you will not need others to tell you, Christ lives. You will soon be telling them, "Trust God and dread naught."

Sam Todd August 7, 2011 Proper 14A Genesis 37:1-4, 12-28 Psalm 105:1-6, 16-22, 45b Romans 10:5-15 Matthew 14:22-33 Hymns 7, 608, 383, 388 1415 words