Crossing over; about the murders in Charleston. June 21, 2015. The Rev'd Dr. Richard Smith

There are no words to capture the pain and anger and horror of what happened in Charleston this week. No words. I’ve read and listened to many words -- from the President’s to Jon Stewart’s to the New York Times’ to several pastors’. Their words, no matter how eloquent, all fall short of what happened, and I know mine will, too.

It would not be so hard if this were simply a matter of someone’s mental instability. But this is not mental illness. This is profound and ugly racial hatred.

It would not be so hard if this were simply an isolated case, a particular bad apple. But it’s not. This is part of a larger sinful fabric in which we are, each of us in one way or another, implicated. 

One Navajo scholar has lamented just how profoundly broken we are, how deeply this ugly sin of racism runs in our American DNA. He writes,  

Today I lament, I mourn over the life of each and every person that was violently taken in Charleston South Carolina. 

I lament that a 5 year old child was robbed of her innocence and forced to "play" dead in order to survive. 

I lament that today, the confederate flag is still flying in the Capitol of South Carolina. 

I lament the roots of dehumanization that exist within the founding documents of the United States of America; in our Declaration of Independence, our Constitution and our Supreme Court case precedents. 

[He’s referring to that document we’ll so proudly read across the country in a few days on the Fourth of July. Just a few lines after it so nobly proclaims that “All men are created equal,” it refers to Native Americans, the very people we slaughtered as we stole their lands and livelihoods, as “Indian savages”.]

He continues,

I lament that our nation continues to celebrate its racist foundations with holidays like Columbus Day, sports mascots like the Washington Redskins and the putting of faces like Andrew Jackson on our currency. 

I lament the deaths of Eric Garner, Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown and countless others. 

[We could add Amilcar and Alex who were killed by the police near our church.] 

I lament the words of our political candidates who promise to lead America back to its former "greatness", ignorant of the fact that much of America's "greatness" was built on the exploitation and dehumanization of its people of color. 

I lament that today the dominant culture in America is in shock because in the city of Charleston South Carolina one individual committed a single evil and heinous act of violence, while minority communities throughout the country are bracing themselves because the horrors of the past 500 years are continuing into their lifetime. 

I lament with every person and community, throughout the history of this nation, who, due to the color of their skin, had to endure marginalization, silence, discrimination, beatings, lynching, cultural genocide, boarding schools, internment camps, [immigration detention centers,] mass incarceration, broken treaties, stolen lands, murder, slavery and [the doctrine of] discovery.

Lamentations by a Native American at the profundity of the evil unleashed in Charleston.

Today’s gospel is about a crossing over. Jesus and the disciples are crossing a lake. A storm arises, and the disciples get paralyzed with fear. Jesus, in that terrifying moment, gives them a teaching.

And maybe that teaching can speak to us this morning, give us a sense of how to stand, how to speak and act in this time of our own crossing over.

For we as Americans are crossing over. The racial, cultural, and economic makeup of our country is changing dramatically. This crossing over arouses fear and exposes some of our worst features: profound racism and white privilege, the incarceration of innocent men, women -- and in the case of immigrants, entire families -- all the police shootings, the displacement of so many poor families and seniors from their homes, and, most recently the murders in Charleston.

It is a time of profound upheaval and change, and in this crossing over, we, like the disciples, now find ourselves in a violent storm. 

Many scholars say that Mark intended this gospel story to be a metaphor for his own community’s struggle at the hands of the Roman Empire: Rome is literally slaughtering them, destroying their culture, forcing them to worship Caesar, stealing their modest wages in heavy taxes to the Emperor and leaving them and their families impoverished. In that context, the hope of throwing off Roman oppression was stirring, the hope of crossing over to a new world more rich in possibilities for life. Could a storm be far off?

They were crossing over, and along the way a storm arose. And Jesus, as the story goes, falls sleeps. And the fury of the waves becomes too much, and so the disciples wake him, they shout at him “Don’t you care that we are being destroyed?”

Then, after he has calmed the winds and the waves, but before they reach the other shore, Jesus offers these trembling disciples some challenging words. 

In Greek these words are often translated, “Why are you afraid? Where is your faith?” But I think they are better translated, “Why are you so timid?” It’s a subtle difference. The Greek word here is the same one Paul uses, for example, when he writes to Timothy, “God did not give us a spirit of timidity. He gave us a spirit of power, and of love, and of a good mind.”

So in the very midst of the storm Jesus is challenging the disciples “Why are you so timid? Where is your faith?” This is no time for cowering, for being shy, for being cynically resigned as though this is just the normal way of things. This perilous, terrifying moment requires all the more boldness and all the more love. 

Just when all hell is breaking loose and they are losing everything, when they have nothing left to hang onto and God seems to be asleep and they feel so helpless and fear is in their throats, Jesus is challenging them not to be timid, but to live out of their faith. 

Their faith that, despite all evidence to the contrary, God will not leave them to face this violent storm alone. And that same God empowers them, urges them now, in the face of this violent storm and all this bloodshed and oppression, to stand boldly and to speak and live their truth. 

A couple of days ago in Charleston, several family members of the slain spoke to Dylann Roof, the man who killed their loved ones. After a number of them had spoken, the granddaughter of one of the victims said  “Although my grandfather and the other victims died at the hands of hate ... everyone's plea for your soul is proof that they lived in love.” And then she added with boldness and determination, “Hate won't win." 

This is how it works sometimes for followers of Jesus: In the midst of the storm, with all the hate and trauma and grief, with tears running down your cheeks, and your knees shaking, you live, speak, act not with timidity but with boldness, out of your faith.

“God did not give us a spirit of timidity. He gave us a spirit of power, and of love, and of a good mind.”

Could the teaching of Jesus in today’s gospel guide us in our current crossing over? What might it mean for you personally to live, speak, and act boldly at this hour?

Let me close with the words of South Africa’s Alan Boesak: “When we go before Him, God will ask, "Where are your wounds?" And we will say, "I have no wounds." And God will ask, "But why? Was there nothing worth fighting for?”