Deaconess Marla Wood Kay’s sermon reflection on OASIS
Deaconess Marla Wood Kay has been participating in Oasis for the last year. Read her sermon which reflects on her experiences in downtown Akron on Wednesday’s outreach nights.
June 16, 2013 4th Sunday after Pentecost
Galatians 2:11-21, Luke 7:36-8:3 Marla Wood Kay
Grace and peace to you in Jesus’ name. Amen.
In the Spring, I resigned my full-time parish deaconess call at St. Paul in Sharon Center, and while I really miss the people, I’ve been enjoying going to different churches and taking in how they minister uniquely in their communities. I think it’s wonderful you have an outdoor service—it really allows people to see what you do—from a person who’s both a seasoned church worker and now an itinerant visitor, I’m surprised how hard it can be to go inside a church building when you don’t know anyone or what’s going on in there.
I grew up in Hartville, Ohio, my sister graduated from Grove City College, and I went my freshman year to Allegheny College in Meadville, so as you can imagine, I’ve driven up through here many times on my way out East. But even so, I guess I don’t really have a good idea of what Ravenna is about. Do you think of yourselves as a small rural town? A suburb or bedroom community? Or are you anything like Hartville? Embracing a change as farm lands get developed into allotments, where the older generations had different jobs and values than the younger ones?
I grew up in a safe, neat, farmland-turned-neighborhood, where there were a lot of kids my age bicycling and playing in the driveway when we were younger, and going off to sports and band practices when we were older. We were taught to do our homework, be polite, do your best, and we were assured that we would be able to become, within reason, what we wanted to be when we grew up. And I, like my friends, had pretty big expectations for what that was going to be, and I had all my ducks lined up in a row to make that happen. And then God laughed, and through a series of events too long to share here, I ended up in ministry as a deaconess. And if you don’t know what that is, it’s ok, most people don’t and I like to explain it. So just ask me after worship.
And while me becoming a deaconess was a concern to my parents at first—they wondered how I was going to actually make a living doing what they did on the side–following God’s call into ministry has ended up being the thing that saves me from a lot of trouble that I can get into, although not trouble in the way you might expect.
Ministry ended up pushing me out of the suburbs where I had been protected and raised with hardworking, middle class values, and sent me into the city, at first just for brief visits, where I got to know who the homeless were, beyond my image of a lazy, scheming panhandler that you had to ignore on your way into the city stadium.
Ministry sent me to Tokyo, Japan, where I lived for over two years and learned what it felt like to not be able to understand what was going on or to express myself well, and I learned what it felt like to be stared at for being different in public places. I also learned to deeply appreciate the gift of being welcomed and respected beyond what I deserved for what I was able to actually contribute.
Ministry invited me into the Cleveland Clinic for a year, where I did a year long Chaplain residency and I got a pretty good look at what disease and death does to people and families, in both the triumphs and defeats. Hospitals are places where all people, both rich and poor, both health conscious and reckless, both the believers and the non-believers, are mostly equalized. No matter what label of clothing you come in with, you end up with the same patterned gown, and all have to wait, worry, make difficult decisions and process hard news. I learned that we are not always in control of how our lives turn out.
Then, ministry took me back to the suburbs, but as a youth and family minister, I gained new insights on how suburban culture can have its downsides. I resonated with kids and parents with ambitions, who fill their schedules with many activities and have little free time to play or rest. Kids and families who have so much stuff, and with the shopping and the vacations and the hunger for more fun, often end up being bored or dissatisfied with last year’s model or fashion or been there, done that. Kids and families who often don’t have time to get together with other Christians, for worship, for learning, for getting to know each other, or for serving for much more than the one or two hours a week that Sunday morning requires, if that. Where music and video games and TV and smart phones create a constant noise that seems to drown out the quiet, still voice of God. Spiritual hunger is there, but it can get choked out somehow. I also through some hard circumstances learned that perhaps the suburbs are not as sheltered from the dangers of life as one would guess. And I know there is often a feeling of isolation and loneliness that rarely gets talked about.
Finally, in the last couple of years, ministry has called me to a new thing, something that I think holds great challenge and great promise. I live in the suburbs, in Wadsworth, and I drive into downtown Akron, not just for a quick service project to help and get back to my normal life, but to get to know a community of urban kids who gather in a Lutheran ministry called Oasis. These are kids–black and white and biracial–who come from all kinds of rough neighborhoods in Akron. They are kids whose communities are plagued by drugs, violence, and the kind of poverty that makes new socks a luxury. These kids often don’t have parents or other adults in their life to nurture them in healthy ways, to show them what love is, to be good role models and give them the life skills that they need to avoid the temptations around them and see their own giftedness and the possibilities that life holds. So Oasis becomes a family and shows them Jesus’ love. It introduces them to adults who care about them, helps them to achieve their goals, and surrounds them with the Holy Spirit where many are transformed into disciples of Christ.
Last Wednesday was the annual graduation party, and it was a big celebration as one youth is going to college, the first in his family, one woman graduated from the police academy, and others stuck it out and made it to their high school graduation. Like all the other experiences I’ve had, this experience is teaching me new things, the most important probably being that as a child of the suburbs, I need to be in community with these urban kids. I have something to offer them, and they have things to teach me about life, about God’s grace, about myself. That I’m not quite whole when I segregate myself in my comfortable, yet boring surburban neighborhood. That I need them to help me to be more fully me, even if it’s a me that I don’t fully know yet.
The reason why I bring all this up is because I need to explain all this in order to talk about today’s Gospel reading. You probably have heard sermons where the preacher asks you which character in the story you most identify with. Is it the Pharisee’s–the respectable folk? Is it the woman–the screwed up one who doesn’t belong at the party? Is it Jesus–the one who offers forgiveness and acceptance, who makes shock waves for taking a socially and religiously radical position? How about one of the partygoers, who are taking this whole scene in and figuring out if Jesus is the real deal, or just another fraud?
I think if I am to be honest with myself, as a middle class suburbanite, I have to identify with the Pharisees. If I were at this party, even by today’s standards when a woman letting her long hair down would not have the shocking effect that it would have had then, I would be shocked to see someone crying so openly and touching and kissing Jesus’ feet in this way. Imagine this happening to someone like Pastor Dan in the middle of a potluck dinner. It would definitely raise some eyebrows. And I would certainly question his judgment if he allowed it to continue, let alone praised her for her public show of affection. How about you? Would you be able to see her actions, if it were to happen here at St. Paul’s, as an act of love and thankfulness, or as something to gawk at and talk about on the way home in the car?
Maybe what’s shocking about this woman is not that she’s a “sinner,” whatever that means in her situation, but that she is so over the top in showing her feelings for Jesus for what he has done for her. Whatever it is, a simple thank you, or a nice song, or a token of gratitude given discreetly just won’t do. Jesus has so profoundly affected her that she is a blubbery mess right in front of everyone in the middle of a party. It’s just a little too much for me.
In a way, this woman reminds me of the Oasis kids. Not that they are doing anything like this woman is doing, not that they are sinners, even though of course we all are, but they remind me of this woman because they show up as is, with more of a “nothing to lose, here I am” attitude. They are just more out there than I am, that’s about the best way I can explain it. Where I and I think the youth from my suburban church walk into a room and evaluate, and instinctually decide how reserved to be, what we are willing to open up with and what we will hold back, these kids are, for the most part, more likely to lay it out there. Say what they think and do what they feel. And for those Oasis kids whose lives have been changed by knowing and trusting in Jesus’ love for them, they are not afraid to talk about it. One Wednesday night, Pastor Lisa was talking about the Holy Spirit and asked kids to spontaneously come up and talk about how their lives have been changed by the work of the Holy Spirit. And to my surprise, like five or six kids came up, unrehearsed, and on the spot shared their testimonies. I was shocked, but in a really good way. They weren’t blubbery like the woman, but they were the real thing, they knew the love of God and weren’t afraid to share it. It was awesome.
I guess my point is if it had only been Jesus and the Pharisees, and this woman had never shown up, it would have been a pretty forgettable party. Jesus might have done some teaching, he might even have had some clever, interesting stories that illustrated what he wanted them to understand. But it’s not until these two groups mix with explosive results that the power, and yes even shock of who Jesus is and what he can do becomes real. For those of us who are “respectable,” we need to meet and interact with people like these women, people who are willing to risk crashing the party to give praise and thanks to Jesus in a big way.
So that’s why I want to be a part of Oasis. Even though I’m not totally comfortable there, even though I don’t totally know yet what I have to offer, I show up as often as I can because I know that Jesus is at that party, and eventually, I want to be like that woman who has nothing to lose, who is willing to let my hair down, express my thanks and praise for what Jesus has done for me, even in a crowd, and not worry about who will be talking about me on the way home in the car.
So who is here at your party at St. Paul’s in Ravenna? Is anyone missing? Is it a place where being respectable is the thing, or can you risk letting your hair down, where you can be who you are even if that gets a little messy? The one thing I can say for certain, is that Jesus is here at your party, yet this time Jesus, crucified and risen, is the host of the party and is here to heal and save us all.
But some things haven’t changed since that dinner at Simon’s, because Jesus is still here to shake things up, to welcome those that might make us a little uncomfortable, to challenge our ideas that we have to be a certain way or do things the right way to be loved and forgiven by Jesus. Instead, St. Paul says it better than I can, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Thanks be to God for this great gift!
So go in peace, knowing that your sins are forgiven. And as we give thanks today for our heavenly Father and to our earthly fathers or other the other men who may have nurtured us, please pray for those young boys and girls who don’t know their dads, or don’t know a dad that is able to love them in a way that they should be loved. Pray for the youth and young adults who don’t know that Jesus loves them and has the power to bring them healing and hope in hard circumstances. Pray for ways that God might be calling you to invite them to the party here at St. Paul’s, or for ways that you might be called to go and show up at their parties. Who knows, you might be the shocking one who makes everyone in the room know how wonderful and extravagant and bold is the love of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
