A Handmaid’s Homily- 24th Sunday OT
When I was a child, I was enamored by Joan of Arc. I had a little green book of female saints on my bedside table that I would read before I turned off the light to go to bed, and the pages fell open to Joan’s story automatically because I turned to them so often. What impressed me from Joan’s life was her unfaltering ability to say yes to an extraordinarily difficult ask. She listened deeply to the way God was calling her and responded even in the midst of disbelief and persecution.
One evening after reading her story I threw off the blankets and pitter-pattered down the stairs to where my dad was sitting.
“Daddy,” I asked, “If I told you that angels came to me and told me God wanted me to do something, would you believe me?”
“Of course, Emma,” he replied, and then in a cautious tone, “Why do you ask?”
“Just wondering,” I said before I ran up the stairs and returned to bed.
What I didn’t realize at the time was that, aside from nearly sending my father into a panic, I wanted to be called to something, anything, greater than myself, and I wanted to know that I wouldn’t be alone if/when that day came.
Today, we see the theme of vocation in our readings. While we often hear the word vocation in reference to trade school or vowed religious life, it actually has a much deeper meaning in the world of spirituality. Its Latin root, vocare, means to call. Each of us has a vocation in life, a sense of meaning and purpose that calls us to use our gifts to serve a world in need.
To understand our vocation, we must first seek a contemplative and intimate understanding of our own selves. We must know who we are. In the Gospel today, we encounter the Messianic secret, a story which appears in three of our four Gospel texts where Jesus asks his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” When they reply that he is the messiah, he asks them not to tell anyone what they know.
This moment in our scriptures can be puzzling. We know that since it appears almost word-for-word in three books that is is significant. But, why would Jesus want his identity kept a secret? Some biblical scholars say that he is testing the disciples, making sure they understand who he is and what he is about to endure. Others point to a sense of humility.
When I read this text, I connect to Christ’s humanity. I hear him asking this question in a pleading tone, “Please, tell me what you see in me. What am I called to do in this life? My path will be difficult, and I need other people to see me, to believe that I can do it.” It is an existential crisis.
How often do we turn to our trusted loved ones and ask, “What am I supposed to do with my life? Where do I go from here?” We struggle and doubt ourselves constantly. Where will my career path take me? Am I really ready to be a mother? How can I make a difference in a hurting world? It is reassuring to consider the possibility that even God struggled with the calling to be God. We hear time and time again in scripture that Christ secluded himself after intense days of healing or preaching. He would climb a hillside or row out to sea for some time on his own. Maybe this wasn’t to recharge but rather to wrestle in stillness and silence with the path he felt called to in life.
We all need these times of contemplation to figure out who we are. Whether in solitude or in the company of beloved community, we must take time to understand what it means to simply be in our own skin. From there, we figure out what that means out in the world. We hear in James today that “faith of itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” It is not enough to encounter God within the caverns of our own spirits. Faith requires action.
More often than not, this action is countercultural. In Isaiah today, we hear, “I gave my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who plucked my beard.” On first reading, this text deeply troubles me. It reminds me of friends and family members who have suffered from relationship violence and how often scripture is used to keep women in situations of domestic abuse.
After praying with this text, though, I was left contemplating the line, “I have set my face like flint.” When flint is struck, the friction against it causes a spark. It is not malleable or soft. It does not bend or submit. The nonviolence to which we are called is not meant to be submissive. It is fire.
A couple of months ago, I heard a news story about a family who was hosting a barbeque in their backyard. Suddenly, a man with a gun jumped over their fence and waved the gun in the air. Slightly erratic, he took them all hostage on their own property. One of the family members yelled, “You stop that! What would your mother say?” which only enraged him more. Apparently, he was not on good terms with his mother. As his anger escalated, the grandmother walked up to him and said calmly, “You look hungry. Would you like something to eat?” He set down his gun, took a plate, and joined in their meal.
The grandmother’s reaction in this story was completely countercultural. She did not become aggressive or violent, did not resort to shame or retaliation. Rather, without succumbing to subservience, she responded in radical compassion. She stood her ground and protected her family in the most unexpected way. She set her face like flint.
Whether our vocation is as grand as Joan of Arc’s or as quotidian as the grandmother’s, we each have a calling to be a presence of radical love in our world today. This requires listening to the still, small voice within us and entering into the struggle when we are unsure what that voice is saying. It means that we must build sacred, trusted communities who can see our potential at the times when we cannot. We are called to set our faces like flint in our compassion as well as our justice.
