Year A Proper 26 2023 Belief and Inaction

Year A Proper 26 WEDNESDAY, 8 November 2023

St. James the Less, Episcopal, Ashland, VA

“Belief and Inaction”

Collect: Almighty and merciful God, it is only by your gift that your faithful people offer you true and laudable service: Grant that we may run without stumbling to obtain your heavenly promises; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Matthew 13:53-58

When Jesus had finished these parables, he left that place.

He came to his home town and began to teach the people in their synagogue, so that they were astounded and said, ‘Where did this man get this wisdom and these deeds of power? Is this not the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And are not all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all this?’ And they took offense at him. But Jesus said to them, ‘Prophets are not without honor except in their own country and in their own house.’ And he did not do many deeds of power there, because of their unbelief.

When I was out of seminary (this is back when I was in another denomination), my mom asked if I might consider applying to be the pastor of the church I grew up in. Without missing a beat I responded, “Nobody should go back to pastor a church where they changed your diapers.”

I was thinking of Jesus in this passage today, where he is rejected because people could not imagine him as his own person. They saw him through his brothers and sisters (whom they knew). And Jesus gives a very apt reminder, ‘Prophets are not without honor except in their own country and in their own house.’

Once people establish a frame by which they picture you, it is hard to think of you otherwise. Jesus was no different. They had heard the stories. They knew the rumors, but this passage is very clear. 

And he did not do many deeds of power there, because of their unbelief.

Their unbelief affected him. It is kind of like Santa in the movie, Elf. Santa’s sleigh could not fly without juice in the Belief-O-Meter. It just could not cut it.

Jesus could not either. There was no sense of awe in this passage. No wonder. No belief equaled no miracles.

Belief is about seeing in your minds’ eye what you know not to be reality.

If you cannot see it up here [point to head], then we [fan our hands] cannot see it made real.

We are living in an age when belief is under attack. We are encouraged to believe without questioning. Or we are belittled for trusting anyone or anything at all. You just cannot win.

I would like to think that people can get over their preconceived notions, but once the pre-judging (prejudice) comes in it can take years to get over it, if one ever does at all.

God works through our belief. Our faith is what is construed as righteousness as the Scripture tells us. If we have the faith of a mustard seed we can say to a mountain move, and it will.

In our age of disbelief and lack of trust, maybe the mountain our faith needs to move is the spirit of our age. Maybe? Amen