A couple weeks ago, when I got to the office, I noticed that the pride flag hanging on the porch had been unceremoniously torn down. It’s not really surprising per se—I think it’s the second or third time it’s happened since I came to Ascension just under two years ago. But it was discouraging.
Your mileage may vary on this, but at least in the context of the Church’s witness, I don’t see the pride flag as a symbol of political agenda or partisan allegiance, but rather as an expression of our commitment to follow Christ’s Great Commandment to love God and our neighbor. The pride flag hanging on the porch of a church office is a small reminder that our true allegiance—to God’s reign of love—asks us to not only tolerate but embrace the gift of diversity, gathering the human family to be united in wholehearted devotion to God and pure affection for one another.
So seeing it ripped down was a discouraging reminder that testimonies to the importance—the necessity—of this unifying love will stir up opposition and hate from the world. But how do we respond to this opposition and hate?
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When I was a teenager, pretty newly emancipated and finding my footing a gay bar in town was vandalized in a similar way—the pride flag torn down and graffiti scrawled on the wall. I was young, and this was one of my first direct encounters with the callously anonymous hatred that is so easily spawned in a polarized world. And I remember standing outside with some others, voicing my feelings of discouragement and fear, when I got some advice from an older butch lesbian. (She was probably only in her 50s, but she seemed old to an 18 year old).
She said: “Kiddo, they’re gonna knock you down again and again. But when they do, you stand back up, dust yourself off, put your chin up, and keep on going.”
I have no idea whether that woman saw herself as part of God’s kingdom of unifying love transforming the world, or whether she was just trying to survive with dignity in a hostile society. But regardless, she was encouraging (and embodying) a posture—a gentle serenity—that we are called to embody when our proclamation of the Gospel is met with scorn and derision.
That’s a lot easier said than done! It’s hard to stand in the face of opposition and hate, to keep getting up when the world knocks you down, and to press on with a resolution that comes not from partisan resentment, but from serenity in love. Angry defiance and defensive polemic I can do. But a humble, open-hearted witness in the face of opposition is a lot harder to embody. The weariness and frustration that I heard so many of you express when I posted a picture of the shredded flag on Facebook speaks to how exhausting it can be.
We need more than our own willpower and resolve to stand firm in our commitment to love God and neighbor and to keep testifying to the power of that love to the world. Fortunately, though, we’re not left adrift in our search for guidance and strength as we respond to a world that rejects our testimony. That challenge is a theme that runs throughout Scripture, and just in our readings today we hear three different stories about how to faithfully approach our task of proclaiming God’s will and unifying love in the face of the world’s opposition and hate.
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We meet the prophet Ezekiel as he’s just beginning his mission. He’s just received a mystical vision of God in the heavenly throne room. And now he’s being sent to proclaim God’s will to his own people, Israel. But God warns him: they’re probably not gonna like it. They are an impudent and stubborn generation, whose ancestors rebelled against God and who continue to transgress against God’s commandments. God is sending Ezekiel to call his people back to God’s covenant with them, but it is clear from the beginning that they may refuse to hear.
And sure enough, as the rest of the book of Ezekiel unfolds, we see that it’s pretty unpleasant for the prophet, as he stands as a living testimony against the “scorn of the indolent rich” and the “derision of the proud.” But crucially, Ezekiel does not take this stand relying on his own power. “O mortal, stand up on your feet,” the heavenly voice commands him. Yet in the same instant the Spirit of God enters Ezekiel and sets him on his feet. Again and again throughout Ezekiel’s ministry, the Spirit continues to lift him up, speaking to him and moving him to speak. It is the Spirit that empowers Ezekiel to stand back up when the world knocks him down and refuses to hear.
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In our Gospel reading, we join Jesus in the midst of his ministry, as he sends out the Twelve two-by-two on their mission. Jesus’ message has been pretty roundly rejected in his hometown of Nazareth, and now he’s sending out his apostles to proclaim that same message themselves. But he sends them out in a way that leaves them incredibly vulnerable: “no bread, no bag, no money in their belts”—nothing except a staff, some sandals, and a single tunic to wear. We’ve just seen the kind of reception Jesus himself got, and now he’s sending his disciples out into the world, with no way to defend or provide for themselves if and when their proclamation of God’s kingdom is met with similar opposition from a world refusing to hear.
But as he sends them out, Jesus also teaches them how to respond to the scorn and derision they’ll encounter along the way: “As you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them.” Don’t angrily fight them or quietly resent them. Imitate Christ. Do as your Teacher has just done in his own hometown. Simply dust yourself off and move forward in your mission, letting that be a testimony against a stubborn generation who refuse to answer the call and obey God’s commandments with wholehearted devotion and mutual affection.
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And then we hear from Paul, who by this point is a pretty seasoned minister of the Gospel. He’s had some transcendent mystical experiences (not unlike Ezekiel). But he’s also been through a lot for the sake of the Gospel—for the sake of God’s love made known in Jesus. Paul has dealt with significant suffering and opposition in his mission: from a cryptic “thorn in the flesh” to the far-from-cryptic beatings, imprisonments, and humiliations. It would be easy for him to be stridently arrogant about his mystical visions and defensively resentful about his weakness and hardships. But that’s not what we see in the Apostle.
Paul is objectively pretty weak in the face of hatred and opposition, but in the midst of that weakness, God speaks to him and says, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” This promise fills Paul with a peculiar kind of confidence. It isn’t a confidence that just summons strength from within to press on with chin up. It’s a confidence that enables Paul to respond to the world’s contempt for the Great Commandment by lifting his eyes and looking to the Lord who gave us that Commandment in the first place and who gives us the grace to obey it day by day. Returning again and again to God’s promise, Paul is able to continue in his witness, relying not on his own ability to overcome weakness, but on Christ’s power dwelling in him, which is made perfect in his weakness.
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How do we stay serene in the face of opposition and hate? How do we keep going when our witness to the Great Commandment of love gets torn down, knocked down, or otherwise scorned? Well, we follow in the footsteps of Ezekiel, the Twelve, Paul, and a host of other ancestors in the faith. We turn to God and humbly ask for the grace of the Holy Spirit and the power of Christ to fill us—dwell in us—and speak to us, reminding us of God’s promise—a promise even richer than the wisdom given to me outside that bar:
“O mortal—O beloved child and disciple—as you call the world back to love both God and neighbor, you will be met with opposition and hate from a world that refuses to listen. And they will knock you down. But when they do, let the Spirit lift you up to set you on your feet. Shake the dust from your feet as Christ your Teacher did. Lift up your eyes to the Lord, whose grace is sufficient for you. And by Christ’s power, made strong in your weakness, press on to proclaim the Good News of Christ who calls the whole human family to be united in love.”