Knowing Ourselves Through Jesus (Oct 12)

Readings, 2 Timothy 2:8-15 and Luke 17:11-19
Image, René Magritte, La reproduction interdite, oil on canvas, 1937. 
 
You may have heard it said: we are mysteries to ourselves. That is to say, just as we cannot know everything about another person, that other people are not transparent to us (we cannot stop them in time, lift them up and observe them from all angles inside and out) we are also not transparent to ourselves. We are somewhat inscrutable even to ourselves. We act in ways that surprise us, we feel in ways we cannot properly put into words, our desires shoot out in baffling directions, we cannot always predict our reactions, we – as Saint Paul so immortally described – do not always do the things we love, but the very thing that we hate. “Know thyself” the old adage goes… “not so easily done” we might respond.
 
I’ve been reading some Saint Augustine for my studies. Augustine, the fourth century African theologian and Bishop of Hippo, is perhaps known most for his Confessions. Among its themes, Augustine suggests that to work out who I am, I need to be speaking and listening to God. Augustine shares the sense that the self is not-transparent, not able to be examined or narrated with any finality as even the appeal to our own memory is a shaky rather than stable exercise. But this recognition does not render impossible the understanding of a sense of self, instead, “once we have recognised how obscure we are to ourselves we somehow see that only in relation to the infinity of God can we get any purchase of the sort of beings we are.” (Rowan Williams, On Augustine, p. 4)
 
That is to say, we need to present ourselves before God in order to get a handle on who we are. To begin the task of self-discovery we do what is instructed in the second letter to Timothy: Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, a descendant of David—that is my gospel. It is Christ, after all, who is faithful when we are faithless, because while we might not know ourselves, Christ cannot deny himself. Such is the surety of Christ’s self, that even when we waiver and are faithless, Christ can only be who he is: with pure steadfast consistency, and Christ is the faithful one of God, the saviour of the world, in whom we live.
 
Today’s gospel reading helps illustrate these points. Jesus, travelling toward Jerusalem, encounters a group of lepers. What follows -up to the point of their departure - is entirely in keeping with the religious customs of the Judaism of Jesus’ day. It is what happens next that is surprising:
 
As they went, they were made clean. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. Then Jesus asked, ‘Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?’ Then he said to him, ‘Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.’
 
We note that the lepers were not made clean in Jesus’ presence, but, somewhat mysteriously, while they were on their way to present themselves to the priest. The Samaritan saw the change and turned back praising God and giving thanks to Christ. I have some questions: do you think he is the only one to turn back because he is the only one who thinks to thank Jesus, or because he is the only one to notice being made clean? Does he turn back because, as a foreigner, he is not expecting a warm welcome from the priest? What do we make of the fact that the one who turns back and receives commendation from Jesus, is the only one who disobeys his direct command? And, finally, what does it mean for Jesus to say to him that his faith has made him well, when he – like the others – were already made clean before and despite their decision to return and honour Jesus?
 
Perhaps the nine who pressed on did not notice they had been made well. Perhaps so accustomed to their affliction and its resulting isolation they struggled to see themselves anew, struggled to notice that new life could break in through old wounds. Soon enough they would arrive before the priest and their change would be revealed, but it can be hard to recognise changes in ourselves. If we take this as possible, then perhaps the reason the Samaritan is able to notice that he has been made clean, is the same reason he turns back to Jesus, and the same reason his faith has made him well… it is that he has gained purchase on who he is because he recognises that he came face to face with the infinity of God. With this newly established point on his compass the Samaritan can recognise both that he has been made clean and who he owes this blessing, and in so doing a new faith has been awakened in him. This faith is not what makes him clean, but it is what makes him well, in that it gives him a clearer more dazzling picture of himself, because he has a clearer more dazzling picture of what God is doing through Jesus Christ. 
 
How might we come to do the same? Present ourselves before Jesus Christ, and relate ourselves and our quest for self-understanding to him? It is significant to the story that the one who turns back is the Samaritan, a foreigner. This continues a theme developing in the gospel of the surprising capacity of outsiders to recognise the significance of Jesus – a recognition that is often set in contrast of the inability of Jesus’ own people to recognise him as their messiah. And what this theme, and particularly this instance, reveals for us is that proximity, familiarity, and a sense of privilege obscure us from recognising our need for Jesus, and in turn, obscure our understanding of ourself.
 
That is to say that part of why the Samaritan recognises what has happened is because of his outsider status. Because of the animosity he has faced, because the usual sites set apart for the encounter of God and God’s people have been closed or hostile, he is open to seeing a new thing, open to having his religious life reoriented, open to recognise the inbreaking of something new. The lesson for us is that proximity and familiarity can muffle the sense of unrecognisability of the self. A life lived on the inside, comfortable in our religious status, can in turn settle the sense of ourselves. We can come to believe that who we are can be known and defined perhaps through a label, or an association, or by reference to our own character, beliefs, actions. The fallout of such a settled sense of the self, of settling on a view of ourself as good, or elect, or churchly, is that we can neglect the need to continually orient the self in relation to Christ. Because this orienting act is never complete, it is ever occurring in the act of repentance, taking up our cross, and following Jesus. Ever occurring in the act of presenting ourselves before Jesus Christ as one approved by him.
 
Recognising the finiteness and incompleteness of any label, or any self-attained sense of self, and in resolving to gain a sense of purchase of ourselves in relation to the infinity of God, keeps us open to the peculiar movement of the Holy Spirit which can disrupt the familiar and allow us to see in the strange and the new the workings of God. Our worship seeks this kind of ever occurring reorientation of the self to Christ. We disrupt our sense that we can know and control the full motivation and effects of our works in the act of confession. We disrupt the sense that we have no more good news to hear through the act of the proclamation of the Word. We disrupt the sense of ownership and obligation through the act of offering. We disrupt the sense of our self-sufficiency through coming to be fed at Christ’s table. We disrupt the sense of our limits through the act of sending. And across the week in our response to the call to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with our God in our service to and solidarity with our neighbour we disrupt any sense of self that is not interdependent with creation and dependent on God.
 
In baptism we confess our identity is known only in Christ: If we have died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with him. And so let us commit together, to the collective work of continual reorientation of who we are in relation to the heart of our faith: Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, a descendant of David—that is my gospel.