Healing Legion in the Name of Jesus

Healing Legion in the Name of Jesus

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, O.A., Rector

St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas

June 19, 2016;  Proper 7, Year C, Track 2

Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

(Luke 8:26-39)  Jesus and his disciples arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. As he stepped out on land, a man of the city who had demons met him. For a long time he had worn no clothes, and he did not live in a house but in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he fell down before him and shouted at the top of his voice, "What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me" -- for Jesus had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For many times it had seized him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds.) Jesus then asked him, "What is your name?" He said, "Legion"; for many demons had entered him. They begged him not to order them to go back into the abyss.

Now there on the hillside a large herd of swine was feeding; and the demons begged Jesus to let them enter these. So he gave them permission. Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.

When the swineherds saw what had happened, they ran off and told it in the city and in the country. Then people came out to see what had happened, and when they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid. Those who had seen it told them how the one who had been possessed by demons had been healed. Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear. So he got into the boat and returned. The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him; but Jesus sent him away, saying, "Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you." So he went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done for him.

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As Jesus crosses a boundary, leaving his homeland of Israel and entering the Gentile territory of the Gerasenes, he is confronted with a wild man—naked and homeless, unclean, living among the dead, violent and uncontrollable. The man reacts, afraid and defensive at Jesus' approach. Yet Jesus is the approach of loving compassion.

Jesus seeks to understand him. "What is your name?" That is a profound question in antiquity. In ancient days a "Name" is a deep word. It carries both a sense of one's identity and of one's vulnerability. To share your name with another is to reveal something of your inner essence, and to allow the other some degree of power over you. A name is not to be revealed lightly. To know the other's name is to have power over them. The name of the Hebrew God was never spoken aloud except by one person on one day in the year. The High Priest, alone on the Day of Atonement, would enter the inner sanctuary of the Temple and speak the holy name of God, trembling. Name carries power and identity.

"What is your name?" Jesus asks. The answer: "Legion." The wild man is complicated, his troubles complex, his afflictions myriad, entangled, multiple, knotty and tortuous. But Jesus willingly seeks to understand him, to know him, to be in relationship with him, to know his name, and to bring the power of the name of Jesus—loving-compassion and wise coherence—to let the power of the name of Jesus bring healing to Legion's complex troubles.

One week ago another mad man with deadly capacity acted with shocking and tragic violence. Since then we have been trying to understand who he is and why he did it. His name is Legion. He said he pledges allegiance to ISIL, but in the past identified with al-Qaeda and Hezbollah, who all fight each other demonically in Syria. He showed little religious practice but said co-workers teased and taunted him because he was Muslim. He was abusive and controlling toward his spouse. He struggled with his sexual orientation. The message he heard from his culture and his religion condemned in extreme terms what his soul and body told him was core to his true identity. Like so many others in his situation, he turned to suicide. He killed his own image in a murderous-suicidal rage and did so in a way that he might hope to be regarded as a hero and martyr with eternal rewards and earthly renown among those of his allegiance who otherwise would have thrown him off a building. His name is Legion.

In Luke's story, after the frightening appearance of the wild man and after all of the demonic violence of the swineherd, the man now free is found sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind.

But change is hard. The people were seized with fear, and they begged Jesus to leave. The healed man wanted to go with him. But Jesus told him No. "Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you." Returning home, his active, creative intelligent presence in his community could now become a catalyst to overcome fear. "So he went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done for him." "Perfect love casts out fear." (1 John 4:18b)

Our parishioner David Lewis' grandson Jesse was killed three-and-a-half years ago at his elementary school in Sandy Hook, Connecticut. David's daughter Scarlett started the "Jesse Lewis Choose Love Foundation" to let her son's death become a catalyst for healing. Last December President Obama signed federal legislation sponsored by Scarlett's friend Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal to support social and emotional learning for children from pre-K through grade 12. Scarlett's team tested a curriculum this year at an at-risk school in Waterbury, CT, and David calls the results "a miraculous thing." He says, "Kids have a basic need for love, and they accept love when we bring it to them." The Foundation is creating a free curriculum that will teach children the skills to choose love by building their capacity for courage, gratitude, forgiveness, and compassion: social and emotional learning. Love, casting out fear.

Around the country many people are responding to the Orlando shootings with the kind of love that casts out fear. It will take great courage, gratitude, forgiveness and compassion to bring healing love to the legion of complex issues and human circumstances that this shooting raises into our corporate consciousness.

I pray for more understanding and more love for our LGBTQI neighbors. Last Monday night this room was the fullest I have ever seen as people packed every space here and overflowed into the Guild Hall and out on to East Avenue, expressing their grief and their solidarity. There was much love in this room.

I pray for more understanding and more love for our Latino neighbors and the whole immigrant community, as we respond in compassion for the victims of the Pulse nightclub shooting on Latino night. Can't we face the legion of issues and passions and complexities that underlie our broken immigration system with the wisdom and love that Jesus gives to us?

I pray for more understanding and more love for our Muslim neighbors who are again grieved and slandered by the evil actions of one who claims their name but acts contrary to the spirit of the Quran and the true religion of Islam. Muslims are suffering too.

I am encouraged by the work of a New York priest who is a colleague of mine in the Order of the Ascension. For the past three years a group he co-founded has been studying guns by interviewing soldiers, the police, and gun owners. They've reached out to gun manufacturers and visited a gun show in Europe to learn some continental techniques. Last April, working with police and gun owners, they organized the first smart-gun technology show in the country. Last week they met with congressional aids in Washington to share their free market proposals that are also friendly to gun owners and can make safer guns a real option. His group is bringing some wisdom and coherence to an issue whose complexities are Legion.

Our problems are legion, but we can face them courageously with loving compassion and wisdom.

At your baptism you were given a new identity, a new name. You were made children of God, grafted into the Body of Christ. Your name is Jesus. In our day, Jesus will bring loving compassion and wise coherence to Legion only through us. It is our calling and our identity to invoke the name and power and presence of Jesus. It is our job to ask of the madness, "What is your name?" and then to listen and understand. We are to be courageous in relationship to whatever confusion faces us. We are to bring to our day the loving compassion and wise coherence that is the power of the name of Jesus. I pray that the name of Jesus will again bring healing to Legion's complex troubles, though us. In the Name of Jesus. Amen.

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The Mission of St. Paul's Episcopal Church is to explore and celebrate

God's infinite grace, acceptance and love.

For information about St. Paul's Episcopal Church and its life and mission, please contact us at

P.O. Box 1190, Fayetteville, AR 72702, or call 479/442-7373

More sermon texts are posted on our web site: www.stpaulsfay.org

Click the “Video Online” button to watch full services and sermons live-streamed or archived. 

"Do You See This Woman?"

"Do You See This Woman?"

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, O.A., Rector

St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas

June 12, 2016;  Proper 6, Year C, Track 2

Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

(Luke 7:36-8:3) One of the Pharisees asked Jesus to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee's house and took his place at the table. And a woman in the city, who was a sinner, having learned that he was eating in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster jar of ointment. She stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began to bathe his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair. Then she continued kissing his feet and anointing them with the ointment. Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw it, he said to himself, "If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him-- that she is a sinner." Jesus spoke up and said to him, "Simon, I have something to say to you." "Teacher," he replied, "Speak." "A certain creditor had two debtors; one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he canceled the debts for both of them. Now which of them will love him more?" Simon answered, "I suppose the one for whom he canceled the greater debt." And Jesus said to him, "You have judged rightly." Then turning toward the woman, he said to Simon, "Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has bathed my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little." Then he said to her, "Your sins are forgiven." But those who were at the table with him began to say among themselves, "Who is this who even forgives sins?" And he said to the woman, "Your faith has saved you; go in peace."

Soon afterwards he went on through cities and villages, proclaiming and bringing the good news of the kingdom of God. The twelve were with him, as well as some women who had been cured of evil spirits and infirmities: Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out, and Joanna, the wife of Herod's steward Chuza, and Susanna, and many others, who provided for them out of their resources.

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This woman makes me nervous. I grew up in a polite home. There were things you just didn't say at the table. There were so many things you just couldn't do at the table. Crying was one of those. If you needed to cry, you left the table. And in all the years of sitting at dinner tables, in my polite homes or in the homes of other similarly polite friends, never has a woman come to our dinner table, washed a diner's feet with fine ointment and tears, wiping and drying them with her hair, weeping and openly displaying powerful emotions and deep, vulnerable feelings. People like that just don’t show up at my dinner parties. I don't know what I would do if that happened. I probably would be just dumbstruck, as it appears the host Simon is in this story.

I think I can understand a bit of what Simon may have been going through. As Luke sets the story, we are early in Jesus' ministry. Jesus is stirring up some notoriety in some of the villages. He has received mixed reviews in his hometown Nazareth, where some were amazed at the authority of his speech. But there were others who were offended that he performed no miracles, and he even seemed to insult his own people, talking about the ancient prophets Elijah and Elisha performing miracles for the benefit of foreigners. There are stories circulating about Jesus' healings and exorcisms in Capernaum, and stories from other villages where he supposedly cured a leper and a paralytic. Back in Capernaum it was said that he healed the Roman Centurion's slave and raised a widow's only son from death.

His teaching was inspiring some. "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who are hungry now, …who weep now… But woe to you who are rich, …[and] full. …Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is what their ancestors did to the false prophets." Bold words. Challenging teaching. Is Jesus the real thing? Or is he just another in a long string of religious charlatans? Simon wants to know.

Simon is a member of the party of the Pharisees. Most of us would be comfortable with the Pharisees. They were the nice, polite, proper people in town. They were the religiously observant, like us. After all, we're the ones in church today, aren't we? Not like those other sinners in Fayetteville, doing Lord-only-knows-what out there. Simon was like us; a good person. A curious person. He heard about the new, controversial rabbi, so he invited the young teacher to dinner. In a nice, comfortable setting around a richly laden table, Simon and his friends could get to know the new rabbi, ask him questions, decide where Jesus fits in the scheme of things. Is Jesus worthy of acceptance and respect, or is he false, flawed, unworthy. It is a night for discernment.

So everyone was in their proper place. Simon, the host. His excellent friends, respectable people worthy of the table of an important Pharisee. And the object of interest, the oddity – Jesus, the new, young rabbi who was making waves. I imagine they thought that this dinner might be Jesus' opportunity for his big break. If he made a good impression on this group, he could improve his reputation and maybe even gain some important patrons. It was probably not an oversight that Simon and his domestic staff didn't offer to wash Jesus' feet. Jesus was more like the night's entertainment than the guest of honor. So they settled in to the various courses of food for a promising evening.

And then the nice, respectable comfort of a well-ordered dinner party got upended. The woman with the alabaster jar. Unnamed, unwelcome. Luke describes her as "a woman in the city who was a sinner." It wasn't hard for her to walk in. Great meals in those days were held in an open courtyard, easily seen and easily accessed. A meal like this was a public event. And the guests reclined in a leisurely manner around the table, so their feet were extended behind them. She walks right in, keels beside Jesus, pours fragrant ointment over his feet and lets down her hair. Scandalous behavior! Especially in the Middle East with its careful customs protecting inappropriate touch and the covering of women's hair.

Imagine the scene as she kisses his feet and caresses them with her hair. I'll bet the conversation stopped cold. It began to feel uncomfortably hot in there. Some of the diners reached for water, or wine. Did they look? Or did they avert their eyes? You know, Jesus never made things easy on people. I can imagine him catching Simon's eyes and fixing his gaze on his host as this woman weeps and kisses and wipes his feet.

Simon's carefully prepared party has devolved. He's angry. Now he knows; Jesus is no prophet. If he were, he would have known what kind of woman this is. No prophet would allow such outrage.

Essayist Debi Thomas says, "Simon needs Jesus to remain 'a prophet,' and the woman to remain 'a sinner.' His own identity – 'a Pharisee' – depends on every other identity at his table remaining fixed. But this is exactly what the woman unhinges when her body enters the room. With her hair, her tears, her touch, she forces each guest back into his own skin. With her more perfect, more radical, and more offensive hospitality – a hospitality attentive to mind, soul, and body – she confronts everyone in the room with their common humanity."[i]

Jesus challenges Simon:  "Do you see this woman?" No, Simon has never seen this woman, except within his comfortable categories of identity. Simon? Pharisee. That woman? Sinner.

"Do you see this woman?" Jesus challenges Simon. Look at her! She is just like you! Except that she is capable of loving extravagantly. "Do you see this woman?" She is just like you! Except that she is full of the extravagant freedom that comes from rejoicing deeply that you are forgiven, loved and free. "Do you see this woman?" She is not just a category in your comfortable schemes of Pharisee, prophet and sinner. She is God's own beloved child, and she feels it deeply enough in her bones that she can express her loving gratitude extravagantly in her body. Simon, you can't do that, can you?

No, I can't do that either, Simon. I'm an Episcopalian. We do things decently and in order. God bless us.

But I hope I can see that woman whenever she appears to us as she does in so many guises in our 21^st century. I hope I can see her, and not just leave her in those categories of judgment that blind me, those identity boxes that we put others into, those identity boxes that we put ourselves into. I hope that when I see her I can smile and be glad at her extravagant expressions of passionate gladness, and not just be embarrassed or judgmental.

And one more thing. As I pray and as I live, I hope I can express in my quiet, Episcopalian way some of the passion that I know is there in my body – the passion of gladness for the forgiveness and love that makes us all free.

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[i] http://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/1002-what-the-body-knows

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The Mission of St. Paul's Episcopal Church is to explore and celebrate

God's infinite grace, acceptance and love.

For information about St. Paul's Episcopal Church and its life and mission, please contact us at

P.O. Box 1190, Fayetteville, AR 72702, or call 479/442-7373

More sermon texts are posted on our web site: www.stpaulsfay.org

Click the “Video Online” button to watch full services and sermons live-streamed or archived.