Wounded Healers: A Sermon for Proper 18

Today’s lessons from James and Mark are, in one way or another, a scriptural call for us to care for the least of these in our midst. James’ prophetic admonition that “faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead” has served as a call to action for generations of Christians. I think that most Christians understand that a significant part of our baptismal identity and calling is to serve and care for those who are in need. Some Christian individuals and some Christian congregations are more faithful to this call than others. But regardless of how well we have responded to this calling, I think that the question set before us today isn’t as much about if we should care for others as it is how we care for them.

In today’s Gospel lesson, Jesus models for us how we are to go about being healers in a broken world. Whenever we read about Jesus’ miraculous healings, we might, initially at least, find ourselves reacting like those who saw it with their own eyes, being “astounded beyond measure.” Yes, the casting out of the demon from the daughter of the Syrophoenician woman – and a long-distance healing at that! – was indeed astounding. And so was the restoring of the voice and hearing of the man who was dumb and mute. And so were all of Jesus’ healings – that is why we call them miracles! But I think that the takeaway from these miraculous healings should be more than simply saying, “There’s our proof. Jesus must have been God if he was able to perform a miracle such as this.” In these miracles is a model for compassionate healing.

If, through my own baptism, I am called to be a healer in this wounded, broken world, how might I do this? And what if putting my fingers in someone’s ears or spitting and touching their tongue doesn’t work as well for me as it did for Jesus? If I don’t have the miraculous healing powers of Jesus, can I still be a healer of the sick?

The answer is, of course, yes. Jesus wasn’t just a miraculous healer; he was a compassionate healer. In other words, Jesus’ healings were rooted and grounded in love. And the true miracle was the depth and breadth of Jesus’ love. And it is that love to which we are called to sacramentally respond. We are called to be outward and visible signs of Christ’s love and grace.

And so, through our baptisms in Christ, we are sent out, empowered by the Holy Spirit - with compassion…with love – to be healers in a wounded and broken world. But to use the image set forth by the great Dutch Catholic theologian Henri Nouwen, what if our call is to be wounded healers?

In his classic book, The Wounded Healer, Nouwen writes, “when the imitation of Christ does not mean to live a life like Christ, but to live your life as authentically as Christ lived his, then there are many ways and forms in which a [person] can be a Christian.”

This approach to being a Christian whose faith is alive and not dead opens up a whole new understanding of how we might engage in the sort of “good works” that James refers to in his letter. What if the call to be compassionate healers like Christ is more about being authentic in our vulnerability than being miracle workers? It was the Syrophoenician woman’s deep, vulnerable authenticity that had such a profound impact on Jesus, and led to the miraculous healing of her daughter. One might say that the miracle began with the woman herself, and her faithful, humble, and courageous dialogue with Jesus.

When speaking of our call to be wounded healers, Henri Nouwen asks, “Who can listen to a story of loneliness and despair without taking the risk of experiencing similar pains in [their] own heart and even losing [their] precious peace of mind? In short: “Who can take away suffering without entering it?”

And it is there that Nouwen touches on perhaps the way we can best serve as miraculous – yes, miraculous - healers in our broken world. The call to enter into suffering for the sake of someone else is indeed a miracle. The prophet Isaiah foretold the suffering of Christ when he wrote: “upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed.”

In other words, Jesus – the great physician – suffered the ultimate wound for us. He wasn’t too proud to be vulnerable, and open up himself as a living sacrifice for all of humanity. Later on in Mark’s gospel we will hear Jesus cry from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” I imagine that the demon-possessed; the deaf, mute, and blind; the hemorrhaging; and the paralyzed people whom Jesus healed and made whole also felt forsaken by God. And Henri Nouwen would say that the true miracle of Jesus’ healing is that he was able to “take away their suffering – and ours – by entering into it.

During the Prayers of the People today we will pray for Communities of Transformation – a ministry of Caring and Sharing in which Emily and I participate every Tuesday evening. We co-facilitate the Awaken class, which is “a small group of people who come together to explore life experiences, learn from each other and make some choices about our personal role in creating our future.” Those who serve as mentors in COT are not charged with “fixing” those who are seeking to make changes in their lives. Rather, we are to walk alongside them, bringing our full, authentic, vulnerable, beautifully broken selves to the group. We are called to be wounded healers, so that those who graduate from the program can themselves become wounded healers themselves.

So, Christ, the healer in whose name we bear witness in our own attempts to heal others was himself a wounded healer. And so are we. Our baptisms don’t inoculate us from the wounds that life will give us. Our baptisms serve as our call to faithfully, humbly, and yes, courageously – follow Jesus - the archetypal wounded healer - as we seek to bring his healing to others.

On highest holy day of the year for Jewish people - Yom Kippur - they recite the confessional, which says “Before a person is healed, he must acknowledge his illness. Before a person finds light, she must know her own darkness. And before a people is forgiven, it must confess its sins. We confess our sins and those of our fellows for we are responsible, one for another. Heal us Adonai, and lead us through darkness to light.”

I would add that before we can participate in the healing of others, we must acknowledge our own illness. Only then – when we join in others’ suffering - can we be an authentic, healing presence in the world, and participate in the healing journey from darkness into light.

So, in our efforts to take James’ advice and couple our faith with good works, we must remember that in healing ministries, it’s not about having miraculous powers to heal. It is about being in touch with our own wounds and suffering first. And then being willing to authentically into enter the suffering of others with compassion, love, and grace. Christ’s promise for us is that when we faithfully live into this calling, he will not forsake us. And as the Apostle Paul reminds us, [Jesus] died for all, so that those who live might live no longer for themselves, but for him who died and was raised for them.