Christ Has No Body But Yours

Habakkuk 1:1-4; 2:1-4; Psalm 37

2 Timothy 1:1-14; Luke 17:5-10

We choose to live and love without expecting reward. We choose to have faith in God's love for us. We choose to have faith in what God does for us in Jesus Christ. We choose to have faith in what God can do in and through us even amidst all our faults and frailties.

"Lord, increase our faith!" Is it any wonder that disciples cry out, "Lord, increase our faith!"

Wars proliferate with nations and idealogues killing each other….and for what? They kill for the love of money and love of power. They kill after a desire for revenge and even after a lust for violence. Is there a way to make a difference? But our God says to us, "Blessed are the peacemakers" (Mt 5:9). “Lord, increase our faith!”

Displaced by poverty and war, refugees wander the earth searching for the “sea-washed sunset gates,” (Emma Lazarus, “The New Colossus”), the mother of exiles who might offer safety and welcome. We are overwhelmed and gripped with fear so we turn them away. But our God says, “I was a stranger and you welcomed me” (Mt 25:35). "Lord, increase our faith!"

Poverty and hunger, not in faraway places but right here in our communities, is a shockingly disgrace. One in six households with children and one in ten with seniors live with food insecurity. The disciples wondered where they would get enough food to feed the crowed, begging Jesus to send them away (Luke 9:12) but Jesus said, instead, “You give them something to eat.” “Lord, increase our faith!"

Racism, sexism, and homophobia plague our society; but in the face of the oppression that bigotry engenders we are nurture grievances and ignore reality. And then we grow weary, cynical in the struggle for justice and reconciliation. But our God says, "Love your neighbor as yourself" (Mark 12:31) and "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you" (Matthew5:44). "Lord, increase our faith!"

The disciples of Jesus, then and now, feel the weight of a broken world and the weight of Jesus’ calling. We wonder, “How? How will the work get done? How can I do it?” Some relinquish responsibility. Some accept more than they can handle. Some strive and labor, hoping that what we do will earn us a seat at the table of God. But Jesus says, "When you have done all that you were ordered to do, say, “We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done!” (Luke 17:10). "Lord, increase our faith!"

"Lord, increase our faith!" Is it any wonder that disciples cry out, "Lord, increase our faith!" What Jesus was teaching was difficult. What Jesus was asking was nigh on impossible. They were overwhelmed in light of the needs and challenges before them, ill-equipped and under-qualified.

Ever since the end of Chapter 9 of his Gospel, Luke’s Jesus has been teaching a difficult message. Indeed, the section in chapter 9 is a pivotal junction in Luke’s narrative and might prove informative in understanding the disciples’ plea here.

In Chapter 9, immediately following the Transfiguration, Luke has Jesus “set his face towards Jerusalem.” In brief, Jesus has been revealed as the new Moses and the new Elijah, and will now begin a new Exodos to eventually be “lifted up” on Calvary. Luke 9:51 (“When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem.”) functions as a programmatic element, not only in Luke’s geographical structure, but also as a foreshadowing prophecy of the coming narrative that will span the next nine chapters of Luke’s Gospel. But it’s not just about Jesus. Its’s also about his followers – about conversion and discipleship and about what it will mean to be the covenant people of God, disciples of Jesus even as he himself walks toward Jerusalem, Calvary, and the Cross.

Listen to what he tells them in Chapter 9:

• “Foxes have holes and the birds of the sky have nests. But the Son of Man has no place to lay his head…..” but, “Follow me.” (Luke 9:58-59)

• “Let the dead bury their own dead. But you go announce he kingdom of God.” (Luke 9:60)

• “No one who has grasped the plow yet keeps looking backward is fit for the kingdom of God.” (Luke 9:62)

It’s a tough message that will continue with great and wonderful demands. It is thus that we find ourselves with today’s story – part of a long, ongoing narrative of Jesus’ teaching on conversion and discipleship, acceptance and rejection. Look what comes in the four verses immediately prior to where our narrative picks up today: Jesus makes two important pronouncements, warning against causing “one of these little ones to stumble” (Luke 17:1-2) and demanding forgiveness when a brother or sister sins and repents, “even if he sins against you seven times a day….” (Luke 17:3-4).

And then there are the parables of the Good Samaritan, the Lost Coin & the Lost Sheep, and the Prodigal Son. There are the teaching examples with the rejection of the Rich Man and the acceptance of the “dishonest” manager. Is it any wonder that the disciples cry out, "Increase our faith!” I can relate. There is a lot to what Jesus asks.

And what does Jesus reply? "If you had faith the size of a mustard seed..." Some read this as a rebuke of the disciples’ lack of faith, reading here a conditional – an if/then statement. Others tend to see it as a gentle reminder, reading a causal – a because/therefore statement. I tend to follow the latter reading as if Jesus is saying, “You have the faith you need. With what you have already you can do the difficult things – you can uproot the Mulberry tree – and then you can do the impossible by planting it in the sea.”

Regardless of how one reads it, it seems clear that Jesus is telling the disciples that all they need is just a little faith. So what is it that they need?

In Luke, when Jesus speaks of faith it has to do with trust in what God can do through Jesus. Notice that the disciples are often chided for their failures of faith. But others, often outsiders, are praised and received as participants in their own healing because their trust in God is manifest through what they say and do. The Centurion in Luke 7 had heard about Jesus but he didn’t wait for Jesus to come to him. Instead, the Centurion sent servants and friends and when Jesus finally arrived he welcomed Jesus under his roof. The woman with the hemorrhage in Luke 8 doesn't quietly believe, waiting for some magic healing to occur. Instead, she puts herself at risk by breaking the taboos and the law, knelling by Jesus to touch the fringe of Jesus's cloak. The Centurion and the woman with the hemorrhage believed in what God could do and they acted on it.

That is faith – trusting in God's promise and putting it into action – doing what is asked by God, risking disappointment and failure but knowing that God will see you through. I'm reminded of the extraordinary response of the people of Mother Emanuel, African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina following the murder of their pastor and eight parishioners while at Bible study in the church basement. To the young man whose racist, violent hatred led him to gun down the same people who had warmly welcomed him, to that one, Mother Emanuel spoke words of forgiveness and called for mercy. This is an example of profound, mature, lived faith.

I fear that much Christian discipleship has become a bit domesticated. Being a good believer has come to mean we worship on Sunday, maybe we say our prayers at night, and we serve on committees when it's our turn. We do everything we grace and competence, of course, because we are Anglican after all. And maybe when we are finished we will get an acknowledgement in the bulletin. I think that we have domesticated discipleship because we know, deep down, that the life of faith is demanding. We find ways to avoid it or, at least, avoid its more radical claims.

In her book, Generation Me: Why Today's Young Americans are more Confident, Assertive, Entitled--and More Miserable than Ever Before, Jean Twenge advises millennials that the best thing they can do is to “get outside of themselves,” “to help others,” “to engage their community in a deep and honest way.” In quoting Drew, a 20-something, she writes: "Individualism and serving yourself are dead ends. Service to others and leaving a lasting legacy is really at the core of deeper human needs. Strong relationships and community keep us true to who we are and help us to see what our lives are meant to me."(Twenge, Generation Me, 238-241). A friend offered a reflection on Jesus words in the end of today’s Gospel reading, "Jesus isn't prepared to reward servant leadership because he believes it carries its own reward. This is the way that we become most fully human. This is the way that we fulfill our calling--how we become the very human beings God created us to be. Maybe it is its own reward, to be that which we have been created to become.”

I think that if we were to realize the power of the smallest amount of mustard-seed-sized faith that we have been given, we would understand that Jesus the Christ is at work even now through us, changing things. All around us. And our task is to get out of our own heads a bit, quit moaning about how hard life is, and stop asking for our faith to be increased. We need to live now with the faith that we have been given.

Jesus reminds us that even the smallest bit of real faith-trust in God-is what is needed. Teresa of Ávila put it beautifully in her poem “Christ Has No Body:”

Christ has no body but yours, No hands, no feet on earth but yours, Yours are the eyes with which he looks Compassion on this world, Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good, Yours are the hands, with which he blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, Yours are the eyes, you are his body. Christ has no body now but yours, No hands, no feet on earth but yours, Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassion on this world. Christ has no body now on earth but yours.

Our hands and feet and eyes are not manipulated like a marionette with Christ pulling the strings. Rather, just like every disciple from the beginning, we have a choice to make. And that means that we choose to live and love without expecting reward or even to see the results of our labor. It means that we choose to have faith in God's love for us. It means that we choose to have faith in what God does for us in Jesus Christ. It means that we have faith in what God can do in and through us even amidst all our faults and frailties.