by Lauren F. Winner
Gospel Reading: Luke 7:1-0
For Sunday, June 2 , 2013: Year C—Lectionary 9 (4)
I usually think this story is about the Centurion, but this week I am noticing that in order for the Centurion to remain, as he famously does, “off stage” (not seen by Jesus directly), he requires a lot of cheerfully willing go-between, friends and acquaintances willing to carry the Centurion’s needs and the Centurion’s story to the Lord.
Jesus and the centurion are usually glossed as the key figures of this story, but maybe the communities of translators—those who translate the centurion’s needs and desires, those who speak of his character and his faith—are equally the heroes of this story. They prompt me to think about all the many ways that the threads that connect me to Jesus are often woven by friends. It is not just me and Jesus. It is me and Jesus and this community that helps me stay connected to Him.
Carried by Friends to Jesus in Prayer
Specifically, Luke’s tale puts me in mind of is the season in my life when my needs and my story were being carried to Jesus by my friends. Ironically, it was not my great faith that made this possible; it occurred during a season of very shaky faith, a season when my friendship with Jesus, not to mention anything that might be called my “prayer life,” withered. In hindsight I know that my faith life did not totally evaporate because like the Centurion I had friends faithfully carrying me to Jesus, over and over. My prayer life could later revivify precisely because of these friends’ prayers for me, when I could not, or would not pray. My faith was sustained in large measure because I had circles of friends translating my needs, and indeed translating me, to God.
Yes, this is a story of great faith, but it is also a story of great faith that takes its shape when the believer’s community connects the believer to the Lord. Even a man of such deep, surprising faith as the Centurion relied on his community to help enact that faith. Something similar probably goes for the rest of us too.
Not Just Prayer: Also, Politics
Of late, I find that need for community-in-the-Lord most profound when it comes to what we might call social witness, or perhaps what we just call plain discipleship, trying to bring about God’s kingdom little more in my own backyard.
I was at a rally last Monday, at the North Carolina legislature. It was a rally sponsored by the NAACP, to protest various pieces of legislation under considerations by our legislators, not least the repeal of a moratorium on our death penalty.
I hemmed and hawed about going to this protest. It meant schlepping to Raleigh in rush hour traffic. I had other things I needed to do. Et cetera.
In the end, a large part of what got me there was the community of other disciples who felt called to be here. I let their energy carry me a bit when I wanted to stay home and read. And once there, I remembered something that I almost always remember at protests: being there in community is itself energizing. This protest may have absolutely no impact on how any of those legislators vote—but it clearly had an impact on the hundreds of us who protested. We left renewed in our capacity and excitement to continue in the political work to which we feel called.
So this is another way that the community serves a key role in the nurturing of the life of faith: when you are trying to make the world look a little bit more like the world Jesus wants for us, you can be carried into that work by the company of friends.
Do I Reciprocate, and Translate Others to God?
I can list countless ways in which I am the Centurion (the parallel I mean is only positional; I would not flatter myself to claim his faith) who is being held to Jesus through communities of friends: through those who pray for me, those who protest with me.
But there is another list I should make: the stories in which I play not the centurion, but the friends, the legions, the elders. I should be able to tell you stories in which I have carried the faith and doubts and needs of others to the Lord.
I can think of a few stories. I have been known to pray for people. But I am thinking that list of stories is too short, and that what the tale of the Centurion is prompting in me this year is an impulse to pause and give thanks for those who have been translators in my own life, and the commitment to be a bit more intentional about taking up the role of the friends who reach beyond themselves to translate their friend to Jesus.
The Hardest Question
Am I taking my cues from the friends of the Centurion and going to God on anyone’s behalf?
Reverend Dr. Lauren Winner writes and lectures widely on Christian practice, the history of Christianity in America, and Jewish-Christian relations. Her books include Girl Meets God, Mudhouse Sabbath, Real Sex, a study of household religious practice in 18th-century Virginia, A Cheerful and Comfortable Faith, published by Yale University Press in the fall of 2010, and, most recently, Still: Notes on a Mid-Faith Crisis. Lauren is also a contributor to sparkhouse’s animate series for adult faith formation. In the midst of lecturing and writing, Lauren serves as a priest associate at St. Luke's Episcopal Church (Durham) and a member of the board of the Episcopal Preaching Foundation.
