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Delivered at the United Church of Jaffrey.
July 8th, 2018
Nothing
Take nothing.
Nothing.
Go out…
but don’t take anything…
Nothing…
with you at all.
This is what Jesus tells his disciples to do.
When this morning’s lesson opens, it tells us that Jesus
called the twelve and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. He ordered them to take nothing for their journey
Well almost nothing…. He says they can take a staff and sandals, but that’s it.
no bread,
no bag,
no money in their belts;
This is not a philosophically difficult concept to understand…
Its pretty simple
Go out, don’t take anything with you…
Its simple
But it is a challenge.
A simple challenge
What would it be like to go out, carrying nothing at all…
I suppose I would be walking, because
my driver’s license is in my wallet
which I did not bring.
And for that matter, my car keys are also sitting, neglected, on the kitchen counter, wondering why I left without taking them along.
“He won’t get far…”
That’s what my car keys are saying.
And as I make it around the first bend in the road, it occurs to me that the area in and around Galilee and Jerusalem is pretty small compared to the United States of America.
My feet mention this to me, in an indignant tone.
Its all very well for Jesus and his disciples, to go around on foot. Getting around rural New England on foot takes a lot longer than going from town to town in Galilee.
On the other hand, I have a nice paved road to walk on, whereas Jesus and his disciples walked from town to town on dusty roads that moved through an arid landscape.
It would have been nice if Jesus had let the disciples take some water with them.
Water, after all, is not a luxury — its a necessity.
Forget the staff. I would gladly trade the staff for some water. We can’t survive long without water — especially if we are traveling through a dry land.
But no.
No water.
As I think about being thirsty, I realize that the instructions that Jesus gave to the disciples tells them not to take anything with them — it does not prohibit them from getting what they need along the way.
So if necessary I can get myself some water, right?
Just when I am about to heave a sigh of relief, I remember… I have no money.
“Take nothing” means — no money.
This is all very disorienting.
Its not what I’m used to.
If I want something, usually I just buy it.
But now, since I have “taken nothing” with me — which includes money — I have to fend for myself like a wild animal.
A wild animal…
Isn’t that interesting!
I never thought about it before, but it just occurred to me that foxes don’t actually have waistcoat pockets.
I often think of foxes as having waistcoat pockets — because I grew up looking at Beatrix Potter illustrations — but no — wild animals, like foxes, cannot carry anything around with them in their waistcoat pockets —because they don’t have waistcoat pockets.
The only way a fox can carry something is in its teeth.
For every living thing on our planet — with the exception of one silly looking primate with opposable thumbs — this “take nothing” is way a of life.
The only way of life.
For me, not having something is unusual.
But for every other creature on this blue planet, having something is the novelty.
So this “take nothing” rule is bringing me back to a kind of wild state of being.
A state of being that forces me to depend only on my own inner resources and strength of will to find and consume the necessary food and water I need to survive.
I stop and look at the summer trees that are overhanging the road.
All these living things… all the birds in the canopy…all the small woodland creatures hiding in the old stone walls — they are all like the disciples of Jesus…
…they are all living “take nothing” lives.
Could this be why Jesus asked his disciples to “take nothing?”
It could be.
Thought about in this way, “take nothing” is a certain kind of spiritual discipline.
Was Jesus trying to get his disciples to connect to a state of being that is more essential to our natural existence on this planet?
Could be.
Take, Take, Give, Give
But as I rummage through my memory of this area, in search of a source of water — a stream or a lake — I am confronted with another problem.
I don’t like the idea of drinking from one of the local streams.
I definitely don’t want to drink from a puddle, or a pond.
I fear getting sick.
I am concerned about either drinking some industrial chemical, or imbibing a parasite from the feces of a wild creature.
I suspect that Jesus and his disciples probably had this problem too.
They may not have had to contend with industrial pollution in the way that we do, but I bet they had sewage issues in their waterways.
So if I can’t buy water, and I don’t want to drink it from a stream, what other options do I have?
Since I can’t buy water, I may have to simply ask someone to give me some…
This is interesting too, isn’t it.
“Not taking” might mean depending on myself, like a wild animal — or it might mean depending on others — almost like a child.
As adults, we live our lives by “taking” things.
We “take” things that help us to become competent and efficient at caring for ourselves and our loved ones.
For example, I use a computer to help me write. This writing helps me do my job, preaching to you this morning. This, “doing” my job, in turn, allows me to pay my mortgage and feed my kids.
Take, take, take. Give, give, give.
Mine is not a “take nothing” life.
Mine is a take and give, take and give life.
But now, as I am on my “take nothing” adventure, I am in the uncomfortable position of having to admit to another person (whoever I am asking water from), that I cannot take care of myself, and I need their help.
“Take nothing” makes me vulnerable.
“Take nothing” is another way of saying “need everything.”
Since I am not carrying anything, I have become dependent on other people’s goodwill.
As uncomfortable as this is … it is also a well known spiritual discipline.
Many monastic communities, in many religions, depend upon the local people for food.
In Thailand — the place of my birth — the Buddhist monks can be seen walking the streets everyday with their bowls, begging for food, and it is a well known cultural practice to give food to them.
Giving food to Buddhist monks is, in fact, one of the ways that Buddhist lay people show their faithfulness and build up good karmic virtue.
Could this be why Jesus asked his disciples to “take nothing?”
It could be.
Thought about in this way, “take nothing” is a certain kind of spiritual discipline.
Was Jesus trying to get his disciples to create community by practicing a kind of spiritual humility?
Could be.
Except
As I walk along, thinking about this business of creating community, I realize something else.
I think that Jesus did want us to create community when he sent his disciples out and told them to “take nothing…”
But the whole time, as I walked along, and I was thinking about “take nothing” I’d missed a crucial part of Jesus’ instructions.
He did not tell his disciples to go out and “take nothing.”
He told his disciples to go out “two by two” and take nothing.
So, in effect, the disciples were not “taking nothing.”
They were “taking” each other.
Which is what Jesus was all about.
We “take” each other. That’s what we do when we are in community.
We “take” care of each other.
We “take” responsibility for each other.
And when we ”take nothing” except each other — we remove all the distractions that an get in the way of developing a true friendship.
A true partnership.
Finally — “taking nothing” except each other, affirms a central truth about being human.
And that truth is this.
Ultimately, we don’t need much.
We need water.
We need compassion.
And that, we can give to each other.
No need to take anything.
Amen.