Wrangling Over Words [Proper 23C - 2 Timothy 2:8-15]
The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson
2 Timothy 2:8-15
Wrangling Over Words
The great St. Francis, of Memorial Garden fountain fame,
famously once might have said, “Preach the Gospel, and, if necessary, use
words.” It’s a catchy saying – short,
punchy, memorable. And it is a saying
Episcopalians really want to believe a good saint actually did say because we
like that it justifies us not talking to our friends about Jesus. It’s like a saintly permission slip: St.
Francis said we don’t have to talk about God.
When I hear a good, popular quote like this one, I sometimes
wonder, “What inspired such a profound thought?” Like, there had to be something. I doubt St. Francis was just sitting at his
desk one day brainstorming sassy catchphrases and this was his aha moment. And so what was it; what inspired him? At first I thought, well maybe, St. Francis
was so impressed with the Christian deeds the Christians in his medieval village
did that he felt like, “We act so much like Jesus around here, we have made
sermons irrelevant.” Which, obviously, I
disagree with.
But then I thought, well I know a lot of Christians, and I’ve
never thought that. What if I am coming
at this thing from the wrong angle? What
if St. Francis wasn’t trying to inspire more good deeds, what if he was trying
to get his fellow Christians to stop talking?
If you think about it, the quote really works both ways. Maybe he heard two Christians berating each
other over politics or hymn preferences or altar flower placement and thought,
“Well, this isn’t helping…” Brothers,
have you considered charades?
Pope Francis, perhaps inspired by the very saint from whom he
borrowed his name, recently waged his own war on words. Speaking to a crowd of five-hundred Vatican
communicators, the Pope ditched his script and spoke off the cuff – which for
your sake, I will not do today. In that
improvised speech he took on an ancient foe of the Gospel. He rebuked a devious force of which he
personally claims to be allergic. In
those unprepared remarks, the Holy Father finally put adjectives in their
place, telling that crowd of communicators “to communicate with reality,
without sweetening with adjectives.”[1] The man would clearly struggle with Mad
Libs.
Now I don’t want you lovers of linguistic flourish to hold
this against the Pope. I don’t want this
sermon to encourage you to furiously tweet at the Pope to stay in his lane. I don’t want to give you the idea that Pope
Francis is overly preoccupied with grammatical, rather than spiritual,
concerns. In fact, his concern is
actually very spiritual.
He was addressing this tendency that Christians have of using
adjectives to qualify our nouns. So we
might describe ourselves as “true” Christians or “good” Christians rather than
simply Christian. And when we do that,
there tends to be this unspoken suggestion that other Christians are perhaps
not so true or not that good, or at least not as good as us. We, in the Episcopal Church, have sometimes found
ourselves on the wrong side of adjectives.
We have been described as “heretical” or “apostate” Christians by those
who have left our denomination, even by other members of the Anglican
Communion. And though I don’t like how
that feels, I suspect I too have been guilty of the same weaponization of
adjectives – whether used in retaliation against those same Christians or used
to dismiss the Christians who worship in big-box buildings.
Now, there is, of course, nothing inherently wrong with
adjectives. They can be quite lovely and
helpful and useful. The Pope’s issue is
when words get in the way of our Christian witness, when they obscure the Jesus
in our lives, when we use them to qualify our love or deny someone’s dignity. It is a frustration the writer of the second
letter to Timothy shares. He writes, to
the 1st century Church, “avoid wrangling over words, which, by the
way, does no good but only ruins those who are listening.” This was written two-thousand years ago; it
is still true. It is written to a Church
that, historically, has been far too often more interested in winning arguments
than winning hearts.
The world has changed some in the two-thousand years since
this epistle was written. Christians
still argue, of course, but modern wrangling is often more meme-based. The battle being fought all across this
nation is taking place on facebook news feeds and Twitter timelines: Meme wars
– which sounds like it would be the lamest Stars Wars movie. But it wouldn’t; it would be the second
lamest; it would still be better than The
Phantom Menace, obviously.
I was talking recently to a friend, a friend who has been
sharing way more of those political memes than I can really handle. And so I asked about it: why? What are you hoping to accomplish with these
memes? Turns out, he is frustrated with
his sister. And she posts liberal memes
on facebook. And they make him mad, so
he posts conservative ones that he knows she will hate. I don’t even think his sister knows they are
in a meme war. But I know it is not
bringing out the best in my friend. Because
he is a good person. But that is not
coming through on facebook because his posts seem angry and confrontational;
they make him appear harsh and uncaring.
And he is not. And, to make
matters worse, with each meme, the distance in his relationship with his sister
only grows. No one is winning in this
argument – even if someone does actually win.
So I told him: “maybe lay off the memes. You are not changing anyone’s mind with a
Kermit the Frog sipping tea. A picture
of Nancy Pelosi mid-yawn is not how you are going to make this a better world.” This is the 21st century version
of wrangling over words and honestly it’s kinda just ruining our lives, and
ruining our ability to be in relationship with other people, especially those
with whom we disagree.
The thing is: I know this, about my friend, when he is not on
the computer waging war, he is next door mowing his elderly neighbor’s lawn. Or he is at work encouraging his co-workers,
making other people laugh, treating people like people, with respect. When someone is struggling, he is the first
person to drop whatever he is doing to help.
He actually is making the world better.
He actually is showing people what the love of Christ looks like. Most of the time, when he’s not behind a
screen.
Which is really exactly what the author of 2 Timothy seems to
be getting at: stop it with the arguments, the bickering, the verbal jabs, and
just get to work, start living the way of love.
It’s like an honest concession.
We can’t control our tongues and so we need to let love flow through our
hands and our hearts. “Preach the
Gospel, and, if necessary, use words.”
That means, talking a little less. Listening a little a more. Losing some arguments. It is one of the best things that marriage
and ordained ministry have taught me: It is OK to lose an argument; sometimes
it is the best thing one can do; there are things that are much more important,
like people, like our Christian witness.
And, of course, loving a lot. Love
the people in your corner. Love the
people on your side. Love the people who
heart your memes. But also love the
people who think you are wrong. Love the
people who post weird memes that are clearly inaccurate. Love the people who mad face your posts. Love people – not because you want to but
because you are a Christian and that is what you are called to do. You can still challenge folks and disagree
with them and avoid them at parties and block them on social media, but love
people; remind yourself to love.
You are Christian; that is your most important
adjective. Jesus is in you, longing to work
through you, love through you, speak through you. You are the body of Christ in this
world. And so your words are not just
words; they are your witness. And, I
can’t believe I am saying this, from a pulpit, so are your memes.
The Pope suggests we speak to each other in a way that is
“austere but beautiful.” Can you imagine
that? Can imagine a world in which every
verbal exchange could be described as beautiful? Not edgy or irritated or annoyed or
condescending or hurtful, but beautiful?
I want that. I want a world like
that. And I know in this age of toxic
communication, that seems impossible, but maybe we could be the ones who try. One austere but beautiful word at a time, maybe
we could speak the world we want into being.
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