Fools For Christ's Sake (Sunday, August 18)

 Fools For Christ’s Sake (Sunday, August 18)

The Word of the Day is “foolishness.” In our daily scripture study of 1 Corinthians 1:10-11, Paul counters those who are causing divisions in the congregation because they claim superior wisdom. To the contrary, the apostle states that these troublemakers are not wise in the ways of the Lord at all. He states, “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power (1Corinthians 1:17)  Instead Paul states the message he brought to the congregation was the foolishness of the cross (1 Corinthians 1:18). Today we explore what it might mean to live according to the foolishness of the cross by referring to the example of the “Fools for Christ.

In his writing on his childhood, Leo Tolstoy talks about the visit of a strange man,  a man named Grisha. From his 50^th birthday on, Grisha took to some strange behavior. He wore tattered clothes and a short staff that he kept tapping. He wandered about visiting convents, giving away little icons, and uttering strange things that people took as prophecies. And he was barefoot summer and winter.

Some called him an idiot; others called him a “holy man.”   But Tolstoy recalls that he appeared at his boyhood home one day and it started an argument between his parents. His father called the man “lazy.”  His mother said that anyone who went around barefoot and prayed all the time and refused to live a comfortable life was not lazy.

 Grisha was an example of what is called a “Holy Fool” in Russia and other Orthodox lands. Holy Fools acted strange and yet that strangeness often had a purpose. The Holy Fools exposed the pretentions and hypocrisy of the “high and mighty” and pointed out the people who liked to appear to be righteous because they followed all the rules and yet did not have love or joy in their hearts.

Paul’s theme of the “foolishness of the cross” suggests that those who venerate the cross and follow the way of the cross are really “holy fools.”  Oh, we may not go around barefoot in the winter mumbling strange things. But we believe a message that, for all the world, seems foolish. In chapter 4, St. Paul says, “We are fools for Christ’s sake!” (1 Cor. 4:10). What he is saying is that he and those who glory in the cross believe in a message that is foolishness to the rest of the world.

 And it is! The cross teaches forgiveness instead of revenge, love instead of hate, humility instead of pride, compassion for others instead of looking out for oneself. It teaches self-giving instead of self-serving.

 And what seems to the world like death is turned into life. What seems to the world like defeat is turned into victory. What seems to be weakness turns out to be strength. What seems to be the worst thing that ever could happen is turned into the best thing of all. By the cross, salvation has come into all the world. By death, death is defeated, and by resurrection, eternal life is offered to all humanity.

 And so, the cross stands in the middle of time and history as a scandal. Like the pagan rulers of Rome, people will ridicule it. When mocking doesn’t work, they will try to bury it. But the cross will keep reappearing, as it did in the day of Constantine. It will come back to show the way of life in the midst of the ways of death of the world.

 It has happened repeatedly in church history. The church gets too comfortable. It forgets that its message is different than what the world wants to hear. It forgets that its teaching seems the height of stupidity to those who want success in this world. It adapts to the ways and wisdom of the world.

The apostle Paul said, “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) The Apostle John said, “Do not love the world or the things in the world” (1 John 2;15) because it and its lusts are passing away. And the Apostle Peter said we are “strangers and pilgrims on the earth”  (1 Peter 2:11).

 The church often forgets this. It gets comfortable. It begins to believe that by their own goodness people can live the good life and that this good life will last forever. But this “goodness” of worldly success does not mean righteousness. It means “good enough.” Being nice (most of the time), staying out of trouble, saying you’re sorry—that’s good enough. And look how “good enough” we are! We are decent, upright people. Look how successful we have become!

 But then we have this Gospel: God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty” (1 Cor. 1:27)  At the end, when all is said and done, when the Judgment comes, THEN where will all this “good enough” be? Where will all the clever people be? Where will all the wise people be? Where will all the scribes, the highly educated people of letters and fine arts be? Where will all the church leaders and members who adapt themselves to the world be?

 If they would be judged by their own standards, then perhaps they would show how clever, how wise, and how highly educated they are. BUT… God has revealed that no one will be judged by his own standards.  In eternity, you will not get to make your own laws, your own rules, your own standards of measurement. In eternity the Lord Jesus Christ reigns. He is the Ruler and Judge and His ways not the ways of the world.

 In the end, we will be all be judged, and we will all come up short. That is not the word of humans. It is the Word of God. “There is no one who lives and does not sin.” That we hear at every funeral and every Memorial service. The Word of God and Holy Tradition agree that we will have no defense before the dread Judgment seat of Christ—NO defense except, the Cross, “the foolishness of salvation to everyone who believes” (Romans 1:16) When we lift up the cross in the highest honor, we set this saving foolishness before our  eyes

 For Reflection

 Whenever the church adapts itself to the world then we need some “holy fools” that will do some outrageous things to show that the way of the Christian is different than the way of the world. Holy Fools like St. Francis of Assisi who gave us everything –gave even the clothes he was wearing back to his father--to live a life of poverty and compassion. People like St. Innocent of Alaska who gave up a promising career in the church in Russia to serve in faraway in Alaska and the Far East. Holy Fools who live by the grace of God, who serve others in love, and who do not care when others think of them.

 If the way of the cross is foolishness, then we are called to be “Holy Fools.”  What about it? Are we ready to follow the example of Paul and our Lord Jesus Christ? That’s the question that the cross puts before us today.