Scripture text: Mark 3:31-35
In the movie “Kingsmen: The Secret Service,” the supervillain (played by Samuel L. Jackson) comes up with a scheme to eliminate the excess population of Earth. He will transmit a signal across all cell phones and wireless devices that will cause the whole human race to revert to a more primitive animalistic state and we’ll all turn on one another like the barbarians that we are.
Truth is, if you really want to see that in real life, you don’t need a superweapon or a mad scientist scheme. All you really need is a newspaper headline, the more controversial the better.
I have a number of friends who, anytime there is a news report about some guy molesting kids, they jump in predictably with commentary about it. “We need tougher laws to deal with these predators.” Ok, that’s at least a reasonable reply to these sorts of crimes, but that’s as reasonable as it gets. “We should castrate these people.” “We should hang them up by their own entrails.” “We should bring back medieval torture for these people. Our system is too lenient.” “We should lynch them outside of town and leave their bodies hang for all to see.”
At times, I wonder when some representative of the Spanish Inquisition is going to stand up and say to these folks “Woah, dude, you need to chill.” I understand their fervor, their passion. Many of them are survivors of sexual abuse themselves, so I can get why they feel so strongly about this.
But then news breaks this week about a particular reality TV family who has some very ugly skeletons in their closet. Josh Duggar, the eldest son of the “19 Kids and Counting” clan, has been accused of a half-dozen or so episodes of molesting his younger sisters and other girls while he was a teenager. When news of this broke, I turned to Facebook and to that cadre of people, fully expecting to hear all manner of horrific punishments that this Duggar fellow has now merited for these heinous acts.
Instead, I got crickets. *chirp* *chirp* Not one word.
You see, not are these folks survivors of sexual abuse, but they are also nearly all conservative Christians. And it’s one thing when it’s someone out there, some other, who does these horrific crimes. But when it’s one of our own, that’s different. You want to see human beings at their most primitive. Here they are. When we’ll excoriate people for all manner of sin, but when it’s one of our own, one of our tribe, one of our family, we’ll bend over backwards to make excuses for them.
It’s all a conspiracy. It’s not really a crime. He’s one of us; He can’t be guilty.
We do this all over the place. One of my favorite quotes is from Robert E. Howard about the human capacity for barbarism, about how civilization is unnatural to us and when push comes to shove, we’ll revert to the barbarian within us in a heartbeat. Well, here’s what that looks like. Truth does not matter. Fact is ignored. The severity of the sin becomes irrelevant. When it’s one of ours, one of our tribe, one of our people, sin ceases to matter. The tribe must be defended at all costs.
Take these recent police shootings for instance. Absolutely, that 12-year old boy deserved to die...because he was playing in a park. He merited to summarily executed without judge, jury, a trial, or any other form of due process because.... Or that man needed to be strangled to death for the heinous capital crime of selling cigarettes on the street without tax. Or that other man needed to be gunned down while running away because he was afraid of the vicious crime of being late on a child support payment. Clearly, each and every one of these people was a vicious threat to society that deserved to die...because they aren’t part of the tribe but the people who killed them are.
You look at it objectively and it gets truly ridiculous. The nonsense we’ll spew to defend our own. But this is what we do.
Let me tell you about my friend Greg. Widower, father of four, three girls, one boy. When his wife was in her last months, dying of cancer, he moved in with family to help take care of her and the kids. Well, it turns out one of the family members living in the house took a shine to the girls and began to touch them, began to molest them, began to violate them, began to rape them. When Greg found out, the family pleaded with him. Don’t tell the police. You know how so-and-so is. It’s just a bit of fun. Well, Greg did go to the police and so-and-so did go to jail for what he did. And Greg’s family hasn’t spoken to him since. He broke ranks with the tribe and that is a sin that will not be ignored. Murder, rape, child abuse, those don’t matter. Sweep them under the rug. Break ranks? Unforgivable.
The tribe is all that matters. The truth irrelevant. Facts don’t matter. Doing what is right: very very dangerous.
Contrast all this to what Jesus does in our Gospel lesson today. It begins as innocuous an encounter as one will find in the Bible. A messenger comes to Jesus and relays that his family is waiting outside. “They’ve come from Nazareth to see you. They’re here.” It’s probably a scene that many of us will be a part of this summer as absent children, siblings, and parents travel on vacations to come visit us.
But then Jesus does something very profound with this simple encounter. When this announcement is made, Jesus then turns to the assembled crowd. “Here are my mother, brothers, and sisters.” He proclaims. “They who do the will of my Father.”
Jesus is telling us the tribe is a lot bigger than we think it is. Jesus is telling us the family includes people that we might otherwise exclude.
The atheist who gives a cup of cold water to a thirsty girl. He does the will of the Father. The gay man who cares for the sick in the hospital. He does the will of the Father. The wealthy socialite who provides shelter for the homeless. She does the will of the Father. The dead-broke fast-food worker who uses part of his paltry salary to share his meal with someone who has nothing. He does the will of the Father. They are part of the family, Jesus says. And if they are, who is not?
The primitive human divides themselves from others. These are my people and those are someone else. My people are good and those people are bad. But Jesus calls us to see the whole of humanity as one tribe, one family, and that we are all brothers and sisters to one another. One family together in the same broken world.
Christ himself makes no distinctions. He did not come to the Earth to save only part of it. The covenants are clear. The promises are for ALL the families of the Earth, for ALL the people. His death and resurrection were not conditional upon which tribe we belong to. It is not conditional on being American or white or straight or wealthy or poor or even Christian. There are many who do the will of the Father who are beyond these boundaries. Many who we will be very surprised to see when we get to heaven, but God has granted them a place. Why? Because they are his children and they are our brothers and sisters. All one tribe. All one family. United by God. Amen.
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