1 Kings 18: 20, 21,22; Luke 7: 1-10; Galatians 1: 1-12

Questioning our allegiances

There is a story of Babe Ruth in the twilight years of his career, playing for the Braves I believe and striking out. He was booed by the crowd.  Suddenly a little boy, moved by the scene, jumped unto the field and hugged the babe’s leg. They walked off hand in hand. As much as the little boy loved his team, he loved Babe Ruth more.  The little boy had to make a choice of allegiances.  In the English premier soccer league there is a lot of that. Hated coaches from other clubs move over to the rival and they are not accepted because their allegiance is questionable. The same for players. But there in an interesting etiquette.  You know how soccer players celebrate vigorously when they score (because there aren’t that many goals), well they tend not to celebrate when they play against their old team for the first years or so. It’s a question of allegiances.   Our lectionary readings today deal with allegiances, but approach it from different angles.  In I Kings there is a question of allegiance to faith and worldview.  The people of Israel are living in a diverse context.  They have the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, but they also kind of believe in other gods. It’s like they are covering all the bases.  The prophet says you can’t do that.  What he might be saying is: “You will never be able to commit if you divide your allegiances.” Then there is the centurion who accepts Jesus’ authority. It’s a completely different perspective.  The centurion feels allegiance to his slave and he assumes the slave feels allegiance to him. The Centurion in his own mind is being responsible. He accepts Jesus as having authority also. As the Centurion himself has earthly power, so Jesus has spiritual healing power. Then there is Paul who speaks of serving God and having allegiance to the opinions of people.  Paul makes clear that he is not in the business of catering to people’s opinion, but that his allegiance is to God and God alone.

Clarence Jordan was a man of unusual abilities and commitment. He had two Ph.D.s, one in agriculture and one in Greek and Hebrew. So gifted was he, he could have chosen to do anything he wanted. He chose to serve the poor. In the 1940s, he founded a farm in Americus, Georgia, and called it Koinonia, meaning- “fellowship”- Farm. It was a community for poor whites and poor blacks. As you might guess, such an idea did not go over well in the Deep South of the ’40s. Ironically, much of the resistance came from good church people who followed the laws of segregation as much as the other folk in town. The town people tried everything to stop Clarence. They tried boycotting him, and slashing workers’ tires when they came to town. Over and over, for fourteen years, they tried to stop him. Finally, in 1954, the Ku Klux Klan had enough of Clarence Jordan, so they decided to get rid of him once and for all. They came one night with guns and torches and set fire to every building on Koinonia Farm but Clarence’s home, which they riddled with bullets. And they chased off all the families except one black family which refused to leave. Clarence recognized the voices of many of the Klansmen, and, as you might guess, some of them were church people. Another was the local newspaper’s reporter. The next day, the reporter came out to see what remained of the farm. The rubble still smoldered and the land was scorched, but he found Clarence in the field, hoeing and planting. “I heard the awful news,” he called to Clarence, “and I came out to do a story on the tragedy of your farm closing.” Clarence just kept on hoeing and planting. The reporter kept prodding, kept poking, trying to get a rise from this quietly determined man who seemed to be planting instead of packing his bags. So, finally, the reporter said in a haughty voice, “Well, Dr. Jordan, you got two of them Ph.D.s and you’ve but fourteen years into this farm, and there’s nothing left of it at all. Just how successful do you think you’ve been?” Clarence stopped hoeing, turned toward the reporter with his penetrating…eyes, and said quietly but firmly, “About as successful as the cross. Sir, I don’t think you understand us. What we are about is not success but faithfulness. We’re staying. Good day.” Beginning that day, Clarence and his companions rebuilt Koinonia.

Friends, our texts open our eyes to the question of our allegiances.  They reveal allegiance to institution (the centurion), to different gods and to the opinions of people. They all come out in the illustration about Clarence Jordan. We know those allegiances in our day and age, we recognize them.  We get overly attached to institutions, including the hierarchy of the Church, and mistake them for the Gospel. That’s how Protestantism was born then eventually we made the same mistakes.  We practice idolatry: we have different gods: money, status, power, image.  Most definitely we bow to the opinions of people. All of these endanger our healthy relationship to God. Friends, may we rediscover our allegiance to God.