Accustomed to Failure

Accustomed to Failure--October 14, 2016

"But Peter said, ‘I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk.’ And he took him by the right hand and raised him up; and immediately his feet and ankles were made strong. Jumping up, he stood and began to walk, and he entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God. All the people saw him walking and praising God, and they recognized him as the one who used to sit and ask for alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him." [Acts 3:6-10]

Which is scarier--failure, or success?

Of course, our gut reaction is to say that failure is what we are afraid of.  We hold back from daring new things, conventional wisdom says, because we are afraid of messing up, getting it wrong, coming in last, or being labeled "losers."  We are afraid, we tell ourselves, of failing.

But sometimes, I think we are actually more frightened about what would happen if God's Spirit and God's power really were let loose in our lives--and if we succeeded in seeing God move through us.  Because if God's power really is available... and if God really can and does work through people, then we aren't off the hook for letting God work through us on any given day.  If God's power really is still at work in the world, and if God really is at work, moving and healing and changing and directing, then we can't just shrug our shoulders in defeat when we look at the brokenness of the world and say, "Well, there's no hope for any of it... let's call it a day."  If God really is alive and at work among us, then we will have to be prepared for God to work through us... today.

I'll be honest here. This story from Acts with Peter and John healing a man in the Temple is unnerving to me, and I think that what makes me anxious is that their command to the man to be healed actually heals him.  And frankly, even bracketing out all the potential abuse of this story by snake-oil selling would-be faith healers on television who take advantage of people, I am scared the reality that Peter and John do not fail and actually bring healing into this life.  And it scares me precisely because it means that Luke would have us believe that the living God is actually doing things through his people to bless and restore the broken.  It means that God might well work through us, through me, through you, through our congregations and other people's congregations, in tangible, real, even wondrous ways.  And to be honest there is a part of me that would feel much more comfortable if I could just resign myself to thinking that there was nothing I--or we--could do to really bless the lives of others.  We can sympathize when others are sick or hurting, but it is difficult to imagine that God might actually heal someone through our praying--whether in a way that seems right on the spot as in this story, or behind the scenes.  We can feel guilty about our piles of stuff when others have nothing, but it is difficult to imagine that God might actually bring relief for those who go without through our actions to share. 

And there is a part of us that doesn't mind hearing stories about others being healed or mended or welcomed or satisfied in miraculous ways like this story from Acts, but we wouldn't know what to do with such a wonder if it happened in our midst—if it violated the order of our liturgy (It's not time for people to be healed--it's time for the offering!, we might say...) or was not printed on the official calendar (We can't have the poor raised up on Wednesday--we've got a meeting scheduled then!). 

I will be truthful: it may sound odd, but there is a part of me that is just more used to failing—to praying for healing to happen in the name of Jesus, only to see no miracle, only to see people still hurting.  We are all used to days when we braced ourselves for sorrow, for disappointment, for loss.  We are afraid to take a story like this one from Acts too seriously, or else we might dare to think God will be moving mountains and working wonders among us today... and we are afraid of how our comfortable routines in life would be overturned if God started moving in a new way.  And I don't know what I would do with myself to see healing actually take place in ways I could see.  I don't know what we would do with ourselves if we saw God actually working through us, whether it defied our sense of the laws of nature, or whether it was the day-by-day wearing away at evil through our witness. 

We may be afraid of failing, but it is in some ways a familiar, comfortable fear—and perhaps we are even more afraid of recognizing that God may well transform the world through us.  And since we do not have the control over whether our faithful risking will yield "success" or "failure," the question put to us today instead is whether we are willing simply to risk, and leave in God's hands what the results look like.  Theologian and writer Charles Ringma says, "God can hardly use the careful."  That seems to be a piece of this story: Peter and John are willing to risk the possibility that God will actually work through them to heal this man.  And they are about to get into big trouble for it, too—risks are not always only difficult on the "before" side as we wager and wonder what will happen. 

"We are divided and hurting in this country," we hear people say--or perhaps we have said it ourselves.  "We are drowning in a sea of despair when it comes to the drug crisis in our area," we say with our heads shaking.  We are getting more and more accustomed to violence in the news, as though there were nothing we could do about it but lament that "things aren't like they used to be."  All those troubles of our common life these days may make us anxious, but it is the well-worn fear of what we are used to.  It is, so to speak, the devil we know. 

But could we dare to believe that God is neither imaginary nor sleeping, and that God really does have it in mind to heal the world?  And could we dare to believe that God is up to that kind of work on this day--even on a regular Friday?

Whatever this day brings in it, it is filled with opportunities for us to risk letting God work through us—never because we need God to be oh-so-impressed with our accomplishments, and never in order to "get in" to God's club, but simply because that is what followers of Jesus do.  How might we risk today—and how might the living God actually use your words, your prayer, your kindness, your welcome, your listening, to heal someone else today in the name of Jesus of Nazareth?

Good Lord, we are just a bunch of scaredy-cats, to put it nicely, when it comes to your work among us and through us.  We are afraid of failing and we are often just as afraid of succeeding. So take both out of our hands and place instead in them simply the call to be faithful, and to let judgments of success or failure rest in you, you who save the world in the failure of the cross.