“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the
prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to
gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and
you were not willing!” (Luke
13:34)
Chickens
get a bad rap. I don’t have anything against them personally. In fact, I rather
like them—especially when they’re breaded and served with tomato paste and
parmesan cheese. But—alas for the poor birds—they’ve lately become something of
an issue here in America due to their proclivity to come down with the avian
virus, thereby leading to a rather disconcerting rise in the cost of eggs.
But
more humiliating still is the use of the word “chicken” in American slang to
denote cowardice. As the Gospel lesson for Lent 2, Year C (Luke 13:31-35)
indicates, lady chickens often show tremendous courage when their chicks are in
danger. A mother hen will open her wings and shield her brood with her own body
to protect them from a fox or other predator. If said rapacious carnivore wants
to eat baby chickens, he’ll just have to go through Momma first. He may get
her, but while she’s thrashing around the little ones might have a chance to
get to safety.
In
the Gospel appointed for this Sunday in Lent, some possibly well-meaning
Pharisees warn Jesus about King Herod Antipas who, it seems, has put our Lord
on his hit list. Jesus, like a good mother hen, isn’t about to be intimidated
by the jaws of the predator. He refers to Herod as a fox, and we must
assume he’s not using the term as a compliment like we did back in the ‘70’s.
He’s got Herod’s number, and he knows that Herod is just like every other
tyrant. He preys on the weak, he derives his power by being a puppet to a
foreign empire, he flaunts his disregard for the Jewish law, and he takes
revenge on anyone who speaks against him (as John the Baptist did). But he
doesn’t scare Jesus. Jesus has the poor and the sick to care for, and he’s not
about to turn tail and run until he’s done what he’s come to do. He almost
dares Herod to come and get him.
Herod
doesn’t, however. Jesus leaves Galilee and goes from the proverbial frying pan
into the fire—to Jerusalem, the very seat of power, where the prophets are
martyred by those who refuse to listen. There he will he stretch himself out on
the cross and cover with his own body the sins we’ve committed so we can be
rescued form the predatory teeth of our own selfishness.
Whenever
I read this passage and think of the self-sacrificing image of the mother hen,
I’m reminded of 27-year-old Victoria Leigh Soto, a first-grade teacher who gave
her life on December 14, 2012 at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown,
Connecticut. Victoria was one of six staff members killed along with twenty
young students by a deranged gunman named Adam Lanza. When the shooting
started, Victoria urged her students to hide in a classroom closet, a bathroom,
or under their desks. When Lanza entered the classroom, Victoria told him the
children were in the school gym. When some of the frightened children tried to
run from their hiding places, the gunman opened fire. The young teacher threw
her body over the students to shield them from the bullets and was killed.
Victoria
Soto’s story, her sacrifice on that horrible day, brings home to me the
sacrificial love made manifest on the cross of Calvary. The cross is a reminder
of how much God loves us. Our response to this love is our confession that
salvation is free, but discipleship can cost all we have.
I
often wonder why the composers of the Revised Common Lectionary pair certain
passages of scripture together. What does Jesus’ lament over Jerusalem have to
do with God’s promise to Abram? Or with Paul’s words to the Philippian church? I
suspect it might be that all three of these readings have to do with God’s abundant
care. Jesus expresses compassion for the sick of Galilee and equal
compassion for the arrogant and scornful of Jerusalem. Abram laments God has
not given him the dearest desire of his soul, but God assures him he will be
rewarded in the fullness of time and reckons Abram’s faith as righteousness.
Paul, writing from prison and knowing only too well the cost of his discipleship,
can still express God’s love to the believers and assure them that, as citizens
of heaven, humiliation will be turned to glory.
As
we go through the weeks of Lent—while this world seems to reel more insanely
out of control by the day—we citizens of heaven focus on the cross, rejoice in
the goodness God has already shown us, feel the protective wings around us, and
go forward in faith.
Thank
you for spending this time reading my blog. May God protect your going out and
your coming in from this time forth forevermore.
No comments:
Post a Comment