Seeds of Justice
Shake it Off: Organizing the Ones
Who Want to Be

Twenty-second Sunday After Pentecost • November 3, 2019
Reading: Luke 9 (adapted from The New Revised Standard)
Rev. Paul Fleck, guest preacher

We’re coming into what may be the most anticipated and yet most dreaded season of the year: No, I’m not talking about Halloween, Christmas, or even Tax Season… I am talking about Thanksgiving and the dreaded conversations over the meal about politics.

Come on, surely you know what I’m talking about… if you’re a progressive from the Bible belt the way I am surely you have some relative who is your polar opposite, the Archie Bunker-type who utters everything different from you politically.

They get under your skin.
They touch upon your flash points.
And you feel as if you have to convince them that you are right and they are wrong.

I’ve long since disabused myself of that notion.

Because the simple fact is, you aren’t going to convince them of anything except your own self-righteousness.

Now that does not make them any less wrong, make no mistake.

Now not everyone agreed with Jesus either.
We’ve got stories of him engaging in arguments with scribes and pharisees—holier than thou folks who just couldn’t be convinced that the kin-dom of God was at hand. That the kin-dom of God was within their reach. That they could be a part of life-giving and life-affirming ministry.

No, they were stubborn and hung onto their prejudices in an almost Archie-bunker like way.

Jesus often had occasion over meals to get in disagreements with them and tweak them (almost the way we do over Thanksgiving dinner with our stubborn relative). The beauty of Jesus, though, was that he didn’t allow the life-giving purpose of his ministry to get hung up on dinnertime disagreements. He was able to shake it off. And he told his disciples to do the same.

That’s what Luke 9 tells us today...

Luke 9

Up until this point of the Gospel narrative the disciples have been observing and listening: now it’s time for them to be sent out on their own and organize on behalf of the kin-dom of God.

They’ve seen Jesus reach out to the Roman centurion from outside of their community.

They’ve seen him reach out to a woman consider sinful by that society and another woman, a marginalized widow.

They are starting to “get it.” Or at least should be getting it.

They were going from that phase of learning to doing.

It’s an exciting time folks, we’re going from learning how to tie our shoes to taking steps out into the world.

This scripture is both prophetic and pastoral - he sent them out to proclaim the kin-dom of God,

and to heal - both - they’re viewed as separate things - 2 sides of the same coin

That persists throughout scripture - bringing good news and curing diseases everywhere - 2

things we’re called to do - be both prophetic and pastoral in our work

And they are told to rely on God in the process. Take nothing for your journey. No staff. No pbag, no bread no money. Not even extra clothes.

You are going to rely upon the hospitality of those receiving the ministry and the message.

So it makes sense that you can’t linger trying to convince the obstreperous and obstinate that your message should be resonating with them.

You’ve got to keep moving on!

This kind of message has resonated with me – and has fed what I have learned to do in my own life as an organizer.

Prior to my work at New York Justice for Our Neighbors I served as Pastor of Hamden Plains United Methodist Church in Connecticut, which is just to the north of New Haven where Yale University is located.

And, toward the beginning of the current administration when the immigration execeutive orders were coming out fast and furious, I worked with local clergy to organize congregations to be sanctuary spaces for immigrants facing deportation.

I was one of the co-founders of what eventually came to be known at New Sanctuary CT, 11 communities of faith across the state that would eventually come to successfully provide sanctuary for 8 persons and prevent their deportation.

And seven have come out of sanctuary successfully.

Indeed, if I may brag a bit, even Ravi Ragbir, Executive Director of New Sanctuary NYC commented that we had done physical, long-term sanctuary more and more successfully than their own organization.

What has really made a difference for me in organizing this movement in Connecticut was that I didn’t allow myself to get stuck on those communities of faith unwilling to provide sanctuary or get involved in the movement.

So I really hung on these words from Jesus about shaking the dust off my feet.

I had to be willing to move on.

Even when I knew that the refusal to provide sanctuary flew in the face of the theological principles and histories of some of these communities.

Because, you see, the stakes were too high for me to “get stuck” in the dust of a community unwilling to be organized.

I needed to organize and provide sanctuary for Ecuadorians and an Indonesian and a Pakistani couple.

The stakes were too high to get stuck on one community refusing sanctuary.

Does that mean I despise that community or deride it or fail to keep loving it? Not at all.

But, much like the investor unwilling to throw good money after bad, I simply wasn’t going to invest energy transforming those who didn’t want to be transformed.

The harvest, after all, is plentiful, but the workers are few.

How often have you continued to invest time in your life personally in something—whether it be a relationship, a marriage, or even tried to transform yourself—in a way that wasn’t productive.

How often have you needed to “Shake the dust off your feet” and move on to the next community or season in your life?

There’s a great saying in recovery ministry that “you hit bottom when you stop digging.”

Or I like to say, you can’t catch something nearly as effectively when it is running away.

And you cannot speak to someone intent on not listening

This principle is bigger than justice work - applies to all of life and personal fruitfulness.

Even applies to the way I relate to myself - sometimes I try to invest in things that are not producing

We seem to think we should work on our weaknesses instead of playing to our strengths

Yet every personal managerial consultant will encourage us to try to develop our strong suits.

One of my favorite Ted Talks was entitled “What Pro-Wrestling Taught Me About Confidence”

In it the speaker talked about his childhood fantasy about becoming a pro-wrestler. And he went into high school and started to become involved in the local circuit in Minnesota.

But he still struggled. He realized he wasn’t destined to be a buff, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson type of pro-wrestler.

And then he got advice from a seasoned person on the circuit.

You need to be yourself, only more.

Turn up the volume on who you are.

Thus was born Gator McGraw, a gold-lame-bikini-wearing, leather chaps-wearing, cowboy-hat-wearing big-bellied ball of orneriness. He played to the fact that his big belly flopped over the edge of that gold bikini brief. And he became a success on the circuit. A hit.

Pro wrestling taught me to be myself, only more so.

If one thing goes wrong, we focus on that one thing, even when everything else is amazing.

Gator McGraw was amazing, in his own way. And he shook the dust off his feet with respect to the ways he wasn’t amazing.

You have to be willing to let go, because if it was meant to be, it will come back - it may be hard to shake your feet and walk away because it’s a person or a place you love - but trusting that if it was meant to be, it will come back

I am beginning to disabuse myself of the notion that everyone’s going to love me…

There are some places that won’t accept me – whether or not that’s okay is for God to sort out - but I can’t get stuck there

If it’s not bearing fruit, walk another way

It doesn’t mean you hate, bear ill will, or even stop loving as you should.

It simply means you’ve got to shake it off.

In just a bit we’re going to celebrate a sacrament in the Church- Holy Communion.

And as a precursor to that we shake off things that have been clinging to us through the prayer of confession.

We acknowledge our guilt and sin; but we recognize that we get to shake it off and leave it behind through the word of grace and pardon.

What do you need to shake off today? What dust is clinging to your feet?

Let’s engage in this Sacrament of Shaking. Let’s shake off the sin and guilt that keeps us from being in true community.

May we, in the words of both the ancient words of Jesus and the oh-so-modern words of Taylor Swift, be able to “Shake It Off.”

Copyright © 2019 by Paul Fleck
All rights reserved.

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