Who Needs A Cape To Fly
Hebrews 11:29-12:2
Rev. Kelley L. Dick
In the movie “Dead Poets Society." Robin Williams plays John Keating a high school English teacher at an all-boys private academy. He in, the movie was very committed to helping his students to take advantage of all life’s opportunities.
There is a wonderful scene in the movie when Keating leads his class out into the foyer of the building where old photographs of graduating classes from decades past cover the walls. As the boys study the portraits of the classes who had graduated generations before them, Keating remarks that the men in those pictures were just like them, full of hope and ambition. Keating asks his class, "Did they wait till it was too late to realize their full potential?"
Then he tells the class that if they lean in close they can hear a message from the men in these pictures. So they lean in and Keating whispers, "Carpe Diem. Carpe Diem. Seize the day, boys. Make your lives extraordinary."
Hearing this scripture makes me recall stories of people of faith. Stories about the Hebrew slaves escaping Egypt, crossing over the Red Sea like dry land! Or of Joshua and his forces surrounding the intimidating walls of Jericho, which came tumbling down, Rahab, who risked her own life to help Joshua's spies.
As their stories echo in my mind, stories of adversity, of justice, of truth and honor, I also see visions of myself as a child.
Fully complete with a magic wand, my gymnastics leotard, my sunglasses, and a cape made from a bed sheet. I wanted to save everyone in my school from everyone who was mean. I wanted to be a superhero.
Our culture loves superheroes. Many a research project has been devoted to studying them. There are quizzes to take to see which superhero is most like you, and even what your superhero name would be.
We have produced a variety of them: From the first known superhero in 1913,The Scarlet Pimpernell who was a master of disguise unsurpassed swordsman and superlatively quick-witted strategist who rescued many prisoners before the saw the guillotine.
We have Superman, Spiderman, Wonder Woman, The Hulk, Flash, Captain Planet, Super Grover, She Ra, Rainbow Bright, The Invincible and Powerpuff girls. I’m sure we could spend the rest of the worship service, naming superheroes. You don’t have to be a child to find superheroes fascinating. Many of the more recent superheroes movies are rated R, which implies that they are for adults. We all are just enthralled with these heroes
But why? They are make believe, right? These characters often wear silly costumes, have double lives, and work all of the time.
So what is it about them?? Are we captured by their superpowers?
Superman, otherwise known as 'The Man of Steel,' is 'faster than a speeding bullet' and able to 'leap tall buildings in a single bound.'
Spiderman has radioactive blood. He can climb right up the side of a building and swing on his super-strong spider thread.
Captain Planet and the Planeteers had magic rings that united them all across the world, to save the planet from destruction.
Maybe we like them because they use their powers to help others. They work against evil and help stop crime. Maybe we like them because they seem to always accomplish what they start in a timely manor.
Perhaps we like them because they are selfless, strong, and brave. Maybe we like them, because we wish we could be them, slip into a silly costume, put on our cape, slide down the mask, and make the world a better place.
When I was in seminary I was told by one of the Jewish Rabbis in town this story. Jill was raising her children in the Jewish faith of their father, Aaron, who was a plastic surgeon specializing in pediatrics. Jill’s son, Marc, was in Jewish nursery, when his teacher was talking one day about the great heroes of their faith – Moses, Samson, Joshua, Esther, Daniel, David, Debroah, and so on. The teacher compared the ancient heroes to our popular superheroes, like Superman, She Ra, and Wonder Dog.
The teacher continues on to say that even today we know some superheroes in our own lives, like Marc’s daddy who is a superhero because he helps children who have been hurt to be all fixed up again. Marc seemed anxious when he heard this comparison, and he came up to the teacher very quietly, tugged on her arm, and in a worried voice, said, "Teacher, my daddy can't fly."
This scripture is working very hard to encourage an early Christian community who had already endured persecution and hardship that they could thrive. This community had started to falter in its enthusiasm and faithfulness. They were tempted to go backward instead of forward, so the writer of this letter wanted to encourage them to keep on keeping on…and to draw inspiration from the great heroes of their faith. So the writer says names of people that this community would have known.
The writer now speaks people - who through faith, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in their deeds and strong in thief faith, and they endured, and accomplished great things by faith. By trusting in God’s purpose, they were superheroes.
Or were they? I think that's where Marc’s cautionary story is important. What makes these stories of faith so powerful to me and, I suspect, to people throughout the ages, is remembering that these folks were not superheroes, on the contrary they were normal human beings, flawed, weak, and sinful.
Rahab was a prostitue, Moses a coward, Abraham lied, Joshua was conniving. They are known not only for great deeds, but for other things as well: after all, if you haven’t read the story of Samson and Delilah, or David and Bathsheba, you should read two very passionate, scandalous stories of the bible. It’s a Hollywood Soap Opera or a romance novel in the Bible.
In our scripture, the author of Hebrews wants to encourage these early Christians, and still us today that these acts of faithfulness didn’t happen with out God. These acts of faithfulness didn’t require a certain IQ, or exceptional abilities; it didn’t require that the characters wore the right brand of clothing or drive the right kind of vehicle. Rather God was working through flawed, human people to do great things. Flawed, human people, who got discouraged, but trusted through faith that great things would be accomplished.
Yet, at the same time, the author of this letter doesn't want the readers to think that faith is measured by success or that good things happen only if you have enough faith.
So, the writer continues by describing others who had great faith, others who lived facing similar situations, as did the original readers of his letter.
He writes to provide encouragement, because theses people, were contemplating giving up. They were frustrated, tired, felt useless, and the write of Hebrews reminds them that then men and women before were in their shoes: 'Others were tortured, refusing to accept release…others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned to death, they were cut in two, the sword killed them; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, persecuted, tormented…they wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground.
These great ancestors of ours were flawed yet deeply faithful,
we must find strength in their stories when we have to run such a long, long race!
And the race is not always easy. Standing up for justice, caring for the hurting, embracing the angry, feeding the foolish not to mention caring for our own heart, and our own sense of value and worth is often very very hard. We often feel as if we are cut in many pieces, and persecuted and tormented. Sometimes we feel as if people are throwing stones at us because we believe in a God of Love, and sometimes that’s so far from what the rest of the world believes, that we often feel like the outcast, sitting on the sidelines, wishing we had superpowers, or at least a magic wand to make it all better.
But what does our scripture tell us? By faith normal, average, ordinary people did extraordinary things. People like us. Ordinary people who lived normal lives endured hardships, not alone, but with God. God chooses us, even though we may not choose ourselves. God chooses us and needs us to bring about God’s reign and peace upon the Earth for all people. God chooses us so that all may know of God’s love and grace. But it’s hard.
Ordinary people, not superheroes, not super humans, not anything other than Super Ordinary. Christian could be our superhero name. Ordinary by day, Normal by night, average in speed, average in might, but loved by the Grace of God, to achieve extraordinary things.
We don’t have a magic wand or a magic cape, but we have bread and juice, our power comes from the fuel of the meal. Okay so I know it’s a little cheesy, but it’s the truth. We are not super humans and we do not have magical powers. But who cares. Of all of the books of the Bible, The Letter of Hebrews is the most direct book about Jesus’ humanity.
The writer doesn’t want people to think they can’t accomplish greatness, or be discouraged, or downtrodden, because Jesus was human too.
So let's imagine that, as we warm up, train, get suited up, as we run the race, lap after lap, mile after mile, toward our ultimate goal – that far better country that we long for. We can picture that we're not all alone in this effort. No, we don't run this race in vain, and we don't run it alone.
According to this letter, we can take courage, find strength, seek inspiration, let our spirits be lifted by the assurance that we are surrounded by a "great cloud of witnesses" who are watching us and who are wholeheartedly cheering us on.
Here's the thing, though: that cloud of witnesses holds a lot more people than Barak, David, Gideon, and Samson, people who lived long ago and far away.
It holds people like Father Damien, a Catholic Priest who went to Molokai in Hawaii to minister to the lepers, and while he was there, he became one of them.
Then there’s Catherine of Seine, the great doctor of the church who wasn’t afraid to lecture the Pope and demand more for her people when she felt the Catholic church was out of line.
It holds Clara Hale Babcock first woman ordained to preach in the Christian Church Disciples of Christ.
Florence Nightingale who was born in the upper elite of England and wanted to work in a dirty, dingy hospital because she felt God was calling her to that place.
Dorothy Day created the Catholic worker.
She was shot at, jailed, investigated because people believed her to be a communist because she confronted the political rises and social forces. Yet, she lived to show that the radical gospel commandment of love could be lived.
Albert Einstein was labeled dull, dyslexic, and autistic. His handicap in language was obvious in school. Yet, he was brilliant in science and mathematics and he allowed these special talents of his to shine despite what his teachers thought.
This Hall of Faith holds so many people who have gone before us, whose shoulder we stand on, and people who were ordinary common folks. It holds the many names that come to your mind when you think of people who endured hardships, or whose picture do you see in the great Hall of Faith?
All of these people have 1 major thing in common. They used their ordinary abilities to achieve extraordinary results for humanity and do so, with God.
And friends, that’s what its really all about; people who inspire us to live more Christ-like lives. And through these people, both in scripture and in our own lives, we see faithfulness embodied; we see what it looks like in Human form.
As we hunger and thirst in this day for the coming of God's reign, for God's shalom, for peace and healing in the world – in places near and dear to us, like our homes and families and neighborhoods, and in places far away, like the Sudan and Iraq and Pakistan, we know that the race we run is long and hard, that wholeness is so often a faraway place. So much of the time, peace and justice are "things unseen," and yet faith, according to the author of this same letter, faith is the assurance of things unseen.
We may stumble; we may even fall, on our way, just like those heroes and saints long ago. But we know we're not alone, we can hear and feel the encouragement of those who have gone before, those who are still watching the race that isn't over yet.
Capes, wands, spell books, fairy dust are not really what’s needed. What’s needed is for us to remember that just like the men and women in our life’s story, they were ordinary just like us.
