Proper
11 2015 (Year B)
Father Adam Trambley
July 19, 2015 St.John’s Sharon
HOSA Recognition
This morning’s gospel reading is particularly appropriate
for our recognition today of student leaders from Laurel Technical Institute’s
chapter of the Healthcare Occupations Students of America. I didn’t choose the passage, but it came up
for this week based on our church’s three-year cycle of scripture
readings. In it, we see Jesus teaching
and healing, which speaks to the work of our HOSA students, as well as to what
all of us are called to do in our own ways.
Saint Mark describes how Jesus was trying to get away on a
retreat with his friends, but the crowds figured out where he was going and got
there first. Jesus was so charismatic,
so amazing, so sought after, that he got into a boat on one side of a small
lake, and people calculated where he was going and ran around the lake on foot
to meet him on the other side. Then,
when Jesus arrived, he didn’t call for his security guards or get spirited away
by helicopter. Instead, he looked at the
crowd that had just gone to great lengths to invade his space, and he had
compassion on them. He saw that the
people surrounding him were like sheep without a shepherd, and he began to
teach.
When Jesus saw this great crowd, his first impulse was to
see them as children of God who were lost, and he wanted to help them get back
on the right track. He didn’t see them
as annoyances that interrupted his “me” time with the boys. He didn’t see them as obstacles to whatever
his special evening plans were. He
didn’t see them as potential twitter followers or as consumers he could sell
“Jesus Christ Palestine Tour 33AD” t-shirts to in order to fund his next
ministry initiative. Instead, he saw
this loud, sweaty crowd, gathered hundreds of years before the invention of
deodorant and dandruff shampoo, as people to love and to serve, so he loved
them and served them. They were like
sheep without a shepherd so he decided to shepherd them.
What does it mean to be like sheep without a shepherd? Without a shepherd, sheep don’t know how to
find the grass the feeds them – they can’t make a living. Without a shepherd, sheep don’t know how to
find water that refreshes them – they can’t find real meaning in life. Without a shepherd, sheep can’t figure out
how to stay together successfully, so each one goes their own way where the
young and the very old can’t be protected and the predators pick them off one
by one – they can’t form healthy flocks.
But Jesus wants his sheep to have all of those things, so he taught
them. He
instructed them on how to live a good life, how to live a holistic life, and how
to live as part of a family and a community that is in right relationship with
God and with each other, and with themselves. He taught them where the good
grass is, where the streams of refreshing water are, and how to take care of
each other. He taught them the spiritual
truths that provide the practical instructions on how not to get lost on any
level. He gave them the instructions of
a good shepherd.
At LTI and other schools at various levels we learn some important
lessons to help us keep from getting lost, like the practical skills necessary
to succeed in a chosen profession and how to make decisions that will assist
those we work with. We should take time
every now and then to be grateful for the teachers and others who have formed
us in ways that help us get to the green grass, and if we are studying now, we
should probably pay attention.
But we also know that some lessons can only be learned
outside of an academic environment. We
all need wise mentors and other experienced shepherds to help us learn all of
the lessons that Jesus would teach us. Sometimes,
if we are going to find our answers, we may even need to throw our lives into
the questions, running around the lake on foot to be ready for Jesus wherever
we can meet him. Finding answers from the
people who know and follow Jesus and then listening to what they tell us can
take real work on our part. But I’m sure there were people who didn’t run
around the lake to find Jesus that day, and when they finally got home they
still didn’t know where the good grass was, where the cool waters were, or how
to live a life that was good for their families, their neighbors, and
themselves. Finding and being found by
the Good Shepherd is worth the effort.
After we hear that Jesus taught the crowds, we read about
Jesus miraculously healing people. Many
of you are or are going into health care professions, and you know the importance
of healing. Jesus is the great
physician, the ultimate healer. In fact,
he is so divine that when people even touched the hem of his garment they were
healed. I’m not sure how you code
garment-hem-touching on an insurance reimbursement form, but that wasn’t really
Jesus’ primary concern. While today,
miraculous healing still take place through prayer and the direct ministry of
Jesus Christ in our lives, more often God brings healing through the wisdom and
skill of healthcare professionals. The modern
medical work of healing remains a practical outworking of Jesus’ saving love,
and the study of any healthcare discipline is a noble calling.
Healing, however, is goes beyond just medical treatment of
physical cures. In Jesus’ day, the sick
were often removed from society in any number of ways, whether because of
inadequate symptom management, or fear of contagion, or just plain old fear of
people who were different. By healing
people, Jesus recognized that they were human and had the same dignity and were
worthy of the same love as everyone else.
When Jesus healed people, they got better physically, but he also
restored them to their families and their communities. Where Jesus went, people were able to live
the lives God intended for them.
Those of you in HOSA have been engaged in this deeper level
of healing your community, even as you have been studying to provide specific
medical care. This commitment is really
why we are recognizing you today. You
have helped poor people receive their first family Christmas portrait. You have inspired the creativity of children
and cared for them in other ways at Waterfire and the New Light Christian
Education Center. You have helped raise
money for the local library so that people from all walks of life can have
access to books and the internet and other means of education and betterment. You have provided safe places to sleep at
night for children lacking basic necessities like beds. And you have assisted numerous other people
in numerous other ways, some of which we will hear about later and some of
which will probably never be known except to the people whose lives you’ve
touched. You have engaged in the divine
work of healing, and it matters. In a
few minutes we’ll have a few formal presentations, but for now let me just say
that on behalf of the wider community, St. John’s is very grateful for your
work, and we are privileged to have worked alongside you and are honored to
have you with us this morning.
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