Wednesday Worship with Jenson Metcalf

The Institute on Religion and Democracy hosted Jenson Metcalf of The District Church in Washington, D.C. on March 25 for our “Wednesday Worship” noonday prayer and luncheon. His sermon was on “Purity and Presence” about the woman who was healed by touching the hem of Jesus’s garment. The monthly gathering aims to foster Christian fellowship within the greater Washington area. IRD hosts prominent Christian leaders to deliver sermons, pray, and facilitate worship. Metcalf, Student Ministry Director at The District Church, spoke to the IRD staff and guests. Metcalf serves the church by discipling students from junior high to college to love, think, and act like Jesus. Born and raised in Arizona, he grew up ministering alongside his parents, who are pastors. He later attended and graduated from Southeastern University in Lakeland, Florida, in Theological & Biblical Studies. After graduating, Metcalf moved to Washington, DC, for a local church pastoral fellowship before getting hired at The District Church. Metcalf and his wife, Hannah, reside in DC. More than anything, Metcalf wants students in DC to know they are loved by God and love both God and their neighbor as a result. Video of the worship service can be accessed below via IRD’s Facebook page. The text is also below. If you are interested in joining IRD for worship, please contact Events and Outreach Director Sarah Stewart at SStewart@TheIRD.org. https://www.facebook.com/share/v/18FWGfB29Q/?mibextid=wwXIfr Purity & Presence It is a real joy and privilege to be here today. Thank you Mark for asking me to join you all and to the entire IRD community for welcoming me. I love the Gospel according to Mark. The greek and literary framing in Mark’s gospel is more clumsy than the others. It’s a bit off kilter, not as neat or polished and sometimes doesn’t necessarily use the proper grammar… and yet… the theological density is IMMENSE! One of the main literary devices Mark uses all throughout his gospel is what we call “intercalation” or what I like to refer to as the “Markian Sandwich.” You’ll notice throughout the writing that Mark will start a story and half way through it, the story is interrupted by another plot before returning to the original… sometimes there are sandwiches within sandwiches, like a biblical big mac. This section is a perfect example of the “Markian sandwich.” In Story 1: Jesus is asked to heal Jairus’ daughter. In story 2: Jesus heals the woman with blood. Story 3: Jesus goes and heals the daughter. In second temple Judaism, which is the context we find Jesus in, there were a plethora of reasons why someone would be considered unholy or impure. And according to the law, you could not enter into the temple to worship until you were cleansed, purified, and renewed, an extensive process–especially for women. When a woman would have her period, she would have to wait seven days after it ended before she could go to the temple, to make a sacrifice, to worship, and to stand in the presence of God. The same standard was made for those who came in contact with the dead. Just being in the same room as one required seven days of waiting and ritual cleansing sacrifice before you could step into the presence of the Most High God. Here the reader is confronted by two individuals barred from the presence of God. Not by their own will or volition, but by an uncontrolled, unchosen, state of being. A woman suffers for 12 years. And a 12 year old child’s life is cut short, by the unfair effect of sin and death in the world. Neither of them chose this life and neither could prove their holiness by their own strength. Nothing could heal them. We may see Jewish rituals of purity as archaic, but they did them because they took the effects of the fall of man seriously, of sin. They saw death as unholy because it is! As Paul says, the wages of sin are death. And the reason a woman’s menstruation was considered unholy is because losing blood was a sign of losing life, it was a sign of death. According to the law of the old covenant, the power of God’s righteousness was too much to bear if you were “unclean.” It sounds like insanity, but it was actually what God had instructed to his people. And yet, the woman and Jairus have no other option, but to touch God with dirty hands and ask the pure to touch the impure. Jairus’ request for Jesus to touch his daughter is insanity and yet, Jesus obliges. When the woman reached out for the hem of his cloak, she knew that anyone else would be barred from worship for at least 7 days, and yet… Jesus obliges…Jesus reverses the equation. When the unholy touch the most holy, Jesus makes the unclean clean. In Christ there is a great reversal of purity and presence. Instead of our soiled nature, dirtying Christ, his perfect nature transforms us. Instead of striving to make ourselves worthy of God’s presence, Christ makes himself present to the unworthy. This is a foreshadow of the scandalizing nature of the cross. How often we forget that the cross is not a nice religious symbol to hang around our necks, but an execution device used to dehumanize and degrade its victims. Jesus’ entire life and ministry was a reversal of the religious rites and ideals. It was a deconstruction, but an apocalyptic revealing of true redemption and healing. Jesus does not dismiss the law, he fulfills it. The ritual cleansings were meant as a tool for people to experience God, but they are no longer needed. This is an early foreshadow of the truth to come, that the people of God no longer have to strive for their own purity, race for sanctification, prove their own righteousness… God will do the work. God will purify, will sanctify, God will make right. “Proving Your Righteousness” “Your Holiness” “Your Status” or “Your Worth” is an old temptation constantly finding new wine skins. I’ve seen this playing out in Gen Z as I’ve ministered to college students for the last 3 years. The majority of the students in our college ministry are from Howard University. At Howard, there is a massive influx of spiritually oriented practice on campus. This is not limited to Christian faith, but spans the range of the religious landscape. There are cults that brand themselves as clubs, groups returning to ancient Egyptian spirituality, and humanistic endeavors merging religious doctrine that aligns with whatever values they have determined to be true. Students are not dismissing spirituality, but embracing it. Students that grew up in the homes of staunch atheistic homes are searching for meaning and identity beyond the secular doctrines. There are many speculations as to why this is happening. Why Gen Z has seemed to slow the increase of religious “nones” in our culture. Some think it’s due to covid, social media and the unprecedented access to the wider world, or the intensity of division around them. Though I’m sure those have played a role in the lives of Gen Z, I’ve noticed a recurring motif among the 50 or so college students who are a part of our ministry. They long for purity and presence. Maybe it doesn’t have as much to do with “the times”, but for the eternal story of the Gospel that we cannot make ourselves clean. And we can’t do that through ritual cleansing, or intellectual ascent or AI or money or looksmaxxing (anyone?) but through the simple act of reaching out to touch the hem of Christ’s garment. They long for an age-old truth that transcends generations. They are longing for the gospel. The world has lied to Gen Z that their power can be made perfect in their strength, but Christ heals our blindness to know that HIS power (true power) is made perfect in our weakness. Maybe we all have something to learn from Gen Z and the rising generations. Like the woman with the issue of blood, Gen Z has come to the end of itself. Like Jairus’ daughter, Gen Z is tragically young to experience suffering at this capacity. Sin and the wages of it are thrown in their face on a daily basis. They’ve learned that there is no ritual, crystal, cult, workout routine, social media fame, or manifestation that can purify the curse of sin. There is only a God on a cross. A God whose glory is not found in spectacle, but in tragedy. A God who is not impressed with our religion, but present in our desperation. A God who is not stained by our dirty hands, but purifies the sullied Will we learn the same? Will we resist the temptation to prove ourselves, to turn stones to bread, and feed on the bread of life, the bread that sustains? Amen. The post Wednesday Worship with Jenson Metcalf appeared first on Juicy Ecumenism.