A Communion Meditation
Presented by Rev. Merlin T. Batt,
Interim Pastor of St. Matthew’s
United Church of Christ,
At Maiden, North Carolina,
On the 26^th Sunday in Ordinary Time,
World Communion Sunday 

Scripture Lesson: Mark 9:38-50
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          Dr. William Muehl, a professor emeritus of preaching at Yale Divinity School, tells the story of seeing a crowd of children emerge from kindergarten on the day before Christmas. Each child bore in the hands a gift that had been made out of clay for parents.      

          On the way out to the parking lot, one little boy tripped and lost his grip on his gift. The little clay dish he was carrying had broken into a dozen pieces. Looking at the pieces of the ruined gift, he let out an anguished wail.

           His mother rushed toward him; and in an attempt to comfort the boy she said, “That’s all right, honey. It doesn’t really matter. It’s the thought that counts anyway.”

           Through his tears the little boy cried, “But, mommy, it does matter, it really does matter a lot!”

           There are many today, including even religious leaders, who respond to the moral decay of our society by telling people, when all is said and done, that their moral failures are really not so important. When faced with promiscuous behavior, infidelity in marriage, substance abuse, neglected and abused children, pornography, and so on, these leaders have been too willing to say reassuringly, “Don’t cry. It really doesn’t matter.” But in the long run, such reassurance robs people of their human dignity. Refusing to hold people accountable for the way they live their lives is to treat them as less than responsible human beings. 

          No one could ever accuse Jesus of failing to hold people accountable for the way they live their lives! Even a casual reading of the Gospels makes this point, and here in today’s passage from Mark, the point is made with unmistakable clarity, for here we have Jesus speaking to his disciples as they make their way to Jerusalem for the final time. This is what Jesus says to them,

          If your hand causes you to stumble (that is, to sin), cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell…” 

Using such bold and graphic language, Jesus got their attention, and no doubt he has ours, too! It’s not a frequent theme in the Gospels, but here undeniably Jesus speaks about hell. 

          Now, I’ve been to hell twice and returned both times! Maybe I should explain! Twice I have led church groups to tour the Holy Land. And both times I stood on the ancient wall of Jerusalem and looked toward the southwest, toward a valley called in Hebrew ge ben hinnom.  The Bible tells us that this was a place where rebellious and unfaithful Israelites once offered up their children in sacrifice to the pagan god Molech. Thus it was forever condemned by King Josiah as an eternally unholy place. Many centuries later, in the time of Jesus, ge ben hinnom was used as a garbage dump by the residents of Jerusalem. Smoldering rubbish, acrid smoke, bones, and decaying carcasses filled the detestable, rotten-smelling valley.  

The Hebrew name for this wasteland, ge ben hinnom, when translated into Greek became gehenna, and from the Greek word we get our English word hell. So, you see, this smoldering, disgusting garbage dump outside the walls of Jerusalem is the place Jesus had in mind when he said that it would be better to be missing some part of your body than to have your whole body thrown onto the rubbish heap of Gehenna/hell. It was Jesus’ way of getting our attention.

You see, Jesus believed there was a war on, a war between good and evil – a war which was taking place on the world’s stage, as well as in the depths of each and every human soul. And he wanted his disciples to know, as he wants us to know, that we can’t just drift along doing whatever we feel like (in spite of what some tell us today). Jesus used such shocking images to make us aware that our behavior has consequences, both for the present and into eternity.  

          Jesus wants us to know that our God-given lives are precious, but that they can have a stark, hellish quality to them when we make bad moral choices and we persist in them in spite of being warned. Jesus wants us to know that there’s a war on, and that we must be armed against temptation to do evil. Too many times through history, his dramatic words have been misunderstood as if Jesus were recommending self-mutilation, when in fact he is calling for self-discipline. He wants us to treasure our lives and not let them slide into destruction simply because of some aspect of our lives that we find difficult to control. 

          Friends in Christ, there’s a war on. To be faithful to Christ in the midst of it we need to come to the Lord’s Table to receive Holy Communion. For here we find spiritual nourishment. Here, by God’s grace, we find forgiveness of our sin. Here we find strength to make necessary changes in the way we live. Here we find power to resist temptation. Here we find support to live the life to which our Lord has called us. 

          Welcome to the Table of the Lord! 

Let us pray:

O great Savior of the world, Lord Jesus Christ, you hold us accountable for the way we live our lives and so honor us as responsible human beings. We hear your words of warning, and with the help of your Spirit we would live according to your Way. Now at your invitation and by your grace, we come to your Table to be nourished for faithful living. Amen.