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That it may please thee to bring into the way of truth all such as have erred, and are deceived, We beseech thee to hear us, good Lord.

Mark 9: 38-50: (Anyone Not Against Us Is for Us): 38 John said to him, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name,[a] and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.” 39 But Jesus said, “Do not stop him, for no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. 40 For the one who is not against us is for us. 41 For truly, I say to you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you belong to Christ will by no means lose his reward.  42 “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,[b] it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea. 43 And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell,[c] to the unquenchable fire.[d] 45 And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than with two feet to be thrown into hell. 47 And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, 48 ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.’ 49 For everyone will be salted with fire.[e] 50 Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”

From Rodger: Some thoughts about Garbage in (our) Space:

Let me get the “confession” out of the way right now – I am a TRUE space geek… I remember exactly where I was on July 20th, 1969, when Neil Armstrong landed the Eagle on the Sea of Tranquility with only 25 seconds of fuel left in the Lunar Module descent stage. I remember exactly what it looked like watching a 12-inch black & white TV set on April 12, 1981, when John Young and Robert Crippen rode Columbia into the heavens for the first time. I can recall perfectly the cold January day in 1986 when we rolled a TV in the church office in Atlanta after one of my co-workers rushed in having heard about Challenger on his car radio. I knew what it felt like to stand in a bank parking lot in Titusville, Florida in the middle of the night on March 2nd, 1995 when Endeavour launched. To see the light of the solid rocket boosters about 3 seconds before feeling the rumbling thunder of the sound is something I’ll never forget. (And it was worth the long drive back to Jacksonville just in time to head to the office the next morning!) I don’t recall what I had originally planned to preach on for Sunday, Feb. 4th, 2003, but I do remember how long a day it was that Saturday, February 3rd, when I changed sermon topics and even re-did the entire Sunday bulletin with pictures already on the Internet when Columbia disintegrated during re-entry and exploded somewhere over Texas. Which I share simply to let you know that when it comes to space flight… I “Get It” – I think it’s worth every dime we’ve ever spent on it.

On Wednesday, August 24, 2011 A Progress Supply Ship was lost on its way to the International Space Station. It’s loss, without a space shuttle backup, meant that for the first time there were six people stranded in orbit with no reliable way to get them home. The investigation of the Soyuz rocket failure never came up with one, overriding, conclusive cause. But one possible reason that never gets talked about publicly could have been the cause. (Wait for it…) “GARBAGE.”

Yep, you heard that right. It quite possibly hit a piece of space trash. Believe it or not, that was the first question asked after the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003… And with good reason. Since we’ve achieved space flight we humans have been doing much the same thing we’ve been doing to the earth for far too long, and that’s what this stanza of the Great Litany is getting at. We have erred. We’ve deceived ourselves, never really thought about the truth of what we were doing in our short sighted lack of thinking. We spent decades in space throwing our trash out any old where without thinking about the consequences.

You might be shocked to know that there are more than 17 THOUSAND – yes, you heard that number correctly! – pieces of garbage in space… Garbage that’s moving at more than 15 THOUSAND miles an hour… Garbage that sooner or later is going to kill someone. Bits of metal and computer chips; hundreds of exploded rocket parts; nuts and bolts from repair missions, even tools and gloves.

Here’s a statistic for you: Any launch of any rocket – manned or not – has a 1 in 185 chance of being lost because of an impact with space garbage. Let me ask you: Would you bet your life on those odds? I’m not so sure I’d be willing to do that….

OK so what’s the point, right? Just this: Like I mentioned a moment ago… As soon as we humans achieved the capacity for space flight we began doing what we’ve done throughout our existence – we started throwing our garbage out and made a mess. Without the first thought given to how we’ll ever clean it up. We’ve unthinkingly lived out the truth that began this very thought today.

Our garbage is a problem. And not just in low earth orbit or in the county landfill. This is a POWERFUL metaphor. It reminds us that there’s also “garbage” our spiritual space. As a good Presbyterian who hasn’t totally turned his back on John Calvin, I’ll tip my hat to our depravity as fallen creatures here… We leave “garbage” behind us as we fly through our daily lives. And this “garbage” is just as deadly in some ways as the junk orbiting the earth.

That’s at least part of what Jesus is getting at in this rather disturbing discussion with his disciples. It’s kind of a review of discipleship, and Jesus is showing them attitudes and actions that can do damage to themselves and to others. As the lesson begins, John rather peevishly reports that an outsider has been using the name of Jesus without permission.” “Teacher,” he proclaims rather piously, “we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.” Pay attention carefully to what John said in verse 38. He said “US” – not “YOU.” The man wasn’t following them – the question of whether he was following Jesus never came up. That’s important.

Jesus has exactly the opposite opinion. “Do not stop him,” he orders; “for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. Whoever is not against us is for us.” (vv. 39-40)

“The disciples are shocked by this. After all, aren’t they the insiders? They have all made a significant sacrifice to hit the road and follow Jesus, and now he’s saying, “Whoever is not against us is for us?”” Enter one of the worst cases of space garbage Christians often leave behind them… Let’s call it the “Garbage of Exclusivity.” Remember, I’m speaking about garbage metaphorically, so let’s think about it in spiritual terms for a few minutes.

Spiritual garbage? Yeah, that term will work – and folks, it will trash up our lives faster than a leaking trashcan full of kitchen scraps. John and the others see themselves as the ONLY chosen ones, gatekeepers, guardians of faith and protectors of theology. They’ve got all the answers, so it’s their way or the highway. I don’t know if it’s just human nature, or if it’s the astonishing lack of spiritual maturity that is so prevalent today, or what, but this is probably the most common, and most deadly, garbage lying around. Give a church an inch, and it’ll leave a trail of garbage behind a mile long! If you don’t believe me… just do an Internet search with two words together… “Church…” and “Politics…” There in the something like 300 MILLION hits… I think you’ll see what I mean.

Here’s an example that’s been around for a while: For going on something like 20 years now there’s been a huge backlash in some Christian circles AGAINST the rock singer Bono. He’s been criticized for being a “free agent,” outside the church. Too many Christians say he fails to show respect for the culture of the church. He’s not a church insider, they point out, so who is he to be judging them? And yet for the past few decades Bono’s been doing amazing good in the name of Jesus – he’s just been doing it from the platform of late night TV, or in concerts where the attendance makes our pathetic Sunday stats in ALL of our churches makes us look like punters by comparison Can you see the similarity with the passage?

And I know… I know: Both Matthew and Luke quote Jesus saying the opposite, “Whoever is not with me is against me…” But we have to deal with the fact that either he’s contradicted himself here in Mark or there’s a reason for him saying the opposite: “Whoever is not against us is for us.”

And don’t miss a small but perhaps important thing: In Matthew and Luke Jesus says “ME.” Here in Mark he says, “US.” Of course we’re not to be against Jesus. But when he teams up with the church it becomes “US.” And then the last thing we can afford is becoming more exclusive than Jesus is himself – when that happens? We’re throwing garbage overboard that sooner or later is going to kill someone spiritually.

That’s the point: Garbage. Let’s try another: How about the “garbage” of insensitivity? Especially insensitivity to the emotional and spiritual needs of others?

In 1965, Ed White became the first American to walk in space when he left the Gemini 4 space capsule and floated outside. While he was outside the capsule, he lost one of his outer gloves. For a month after Gemini 4 splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean and James McDivitt and Ed White were safely aboard the U.S.S. Wasp, that glove stayed in orbit, flying about 17,000 miles an hour. In other words, for that month, Ed White’s misplaced glove because the most dangerous garment in history.

Now, granted, most of us don’t tend to lose gloves in space. But our insensitivity can easily become dangerous debris to others around us. And more often than not often this is directly a result of our exclusivity. Once we head down the road of exclusivity and then add on our insensitivity… next thing you know, anything outside of our own little universe either doesn’t matter or is a threat.

Why else would my hometown have over 700 different churches, most of them little groups here and there that don’t have a thing to do with one another? And I’m not talking about “Biggie” things here. It can be as small as one insensitive word. We throw one around without thinking about it and it becomes a flying piece of verbal debris that wipes someone out in our wake.

In 1999, a tiny speck of paint struck the Space Shuttle Discovery. It was almost too small to see, yet dug a pit into a cockpit window nearly a quarter inch wide and so deep that the window had to be covered with an aluminum safety shutter because the danger of that window failing was so great.

You ever notice how often this happens among us in this thing we call the Body of Christ? Spend some time at a Presbytery meeting (Or Session, Board of Deacons, Vestry, Diocese, Conference, you name it according to your own tradition). Whenever one of those “live” issues is being debated… That’s when you’ll see it. It happens more often than I like to admit but here it is… Someone throws off an explosive comment that wounds others and they don’t even notice. How often do we undermine and discourage others simply because we’re not paying attention to the junk we’re leaving behind us? Scripture tells us to build up one another. The Great Litany calls us to leave our errors behind and be brought into the truth; but how often do our words do exactly the opposite? That’s what I mean by garbage. And here’s the thing – I’m not just kicking us all around for the fun of it. The passage points out how easy it is to do – Jesus’ disciples had no idea that they were doing it backwards. The “err” part is easy for us broken humans. The journey along the way into truth is the hard part.

Spiritual Garbage… Try an experiment. Next time you’re right on the edge of “losing it…” over anything, large or small – it doesn’t matter what it is. Before you fall over the cliff and start throwing trash around? Stop immediately, back away from whatever it is that driving you over the edge and ask yourself, “Where am I, right here, right now, in my walk with God? What – at this moment – is the state of my spiritual health? Is it possible that my emotional state right now is more a result something inside me than of anything external?” If it is? Count on it… I’m dropping garbage all around me with without even noticing. What you learn might surprise you.

The Mir space station off-loaded more than 200 garbage bags in its first ten years of flight. At one point in 1996, this garbage, thrown out with little or no thought to the consequences, was the single most dangerous collision risk to the Hubble Space telescope. So maybe you’re thinking: “Well, I’m certainly not in THAT category!” Perhaps not. Maybe none of us are that bad. But it doesn’t take much to inflict horrible damage. And Jesus has harsh words for those who do: “it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea.” (v. 43)

Of course, Jesus knows this is stupid. We don’t need drowning, or amputations of “sinful body parts.” We need a heart transplant.

Let’s agree on this much. Good or bad, in the world we inhabit, each and every day, most of us spend our waking hours flying as fast as we can, traveling at speeds that often threaten to spin us out of control. Young or old, working or retired, life is simply too complicated. And there’s garbage all around us, most left in our paths for one of two reasons: we either didn’t stop or think about the danger it would cause, or we didn’t care enough not to throw it away in the first place. I don’t think the second possibility is the reason here. When the garbage from Mir threatened the Hubble space telescope, there was a simple fix to it – stop throwing the trash out the door. We’re often in the same situation. I think Jesus would tell us to stop and think about the garbage in (our) space – BEFORE we drop it overboard and it threatens all those around us.

Yes, this means learning new patterns. It means thinking before we act. It means going to more trouble than many are willing to do. It means adopting the willingness to leave our deceptions behind and embrace the truth we are all called into. Isn’t that what the call discipleship is all about?

We may not be able to clean it all up ourselves. But let’s clean our own space up. And hope others do the same. It WILL make a difference!

Amen.