The Seventh Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 9B)
2 Corinthians 12:2-10 
Mark 6:1-13
All Saints’ Episcopal Church, Austin, Tex.

From time to time it is helpful to remember that when we gather here on Sundays we are doing so to read other people’s mail, nearly every week without fail during the second reading. Our passage from 2 Corinthians is the culmination of an argument Paul is making at the climax of at least the fifth letter of a back-and-forth exchange between him and his friends in Corinth; how many letters there are overall has been lost to history. We are hearing one side of the conversation, and we only have Paul’s version of events to try to reconstruct what’s going on. As best we can tell, Paul and his apprentice Timothy have visited the Christian community in Corinth twice for extended seasons of helping lead and nurture their new church, and in the time since his last departure there has been a rupture in the relationship. Other, more charismatic leaders have come into the community and led them astray, perhaps convincing them that Paul has taken advantage of them in some way and he is not to be trusted. Through this letter we call 2 Corinthians, Paul’s concern and care for his friends is tangible, it nearly leaps off the page as he pleads with them to remember things as they actually were: “Make room in your hearts for us; we have wronged no one; we have corrupted no one; we have taken advantage of no one.” (7:2)

Today Paul’s argument reaches its peak as he tackles directly the claims of the outsiders who have thrown the church in Corinth into disarray, who he derides as “super-apostles” who use their smooth words and charisma to boast of a special authority that comes from God’s private revelations to them—the original televangelists. And here Paul brings out his characteristic sarcasm to meet his detractors on the field. People love to give Paul a hard time for his sharp tongue, but I have long tried to imagine what other people would think of me if all they had to go on was a handful of emails I wrote in widely varying states of exhaustion. 

“Let no one think that I am a fool, but if you do, then accept me as a fool, so that I, too, may boast a little…. Whatever anyone dares to boast of—remember, I am speaking as a fool—I also dare to boast of that. Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites and descendants of Abraham? So am I. Are they ministers of Christ? Remember, I am talking like a madman—I am a better one!… It is necessary to boast, the situation demands it, even though nothing is to be gained by it, but since we’re here I will go on to visions and revelations of the Lord.” (11:16–12:1, lightly adapted) 

He speaks of someone he knows who has also received revelations from God (and who’s to say who he means, really?), but these are not what marks him as someone through whom God is working. Paul stops short of playing the same game as the people he is rebuffing: “But on my own behalf I will not boast, except of my weaknesses.” Elsewhere he concedes the point he is not skilled at public speaking, and here we gather he has some sort of limitation or disability. But instead of hiding his weaknesses or denying their impact, he brings his friends back to the basic theme that runs throughout all his work: the way of weakness. In one of his earlier letters to the Corinthians, Paul reminds them that our natural inclination is to seek salvation from ourselves through power or knowledge but instead God offers us Christ crucified: a scandal and utter foolishness to the world. God chose what the world considers foolish to shame those who are considered wise (1 Cor. 1). Time and again across the ages, God chooses to work through what we see as weak and of no account—in our own hearts and in the world—because God loves us too much to leave us where God found us. 

Throughout the Gospels, those in Jesus’ hometown are amazed at his teaching—they even recognize it as wisdom, from where they do not know—and yet Jesus is amazed to find that they are not moved to make any change. The compulsion to maintain appearances is too strong. The wisdom of the ages stands in front of them, and they choose the status quo. “He could do no deed of power there,” except among the weakest who put their trust in his message: “My power is made perfect in weakness.”

The word Paul uses for “perfect” carries with it the image of growing into maturity. In a few moments we will gather at the font with Aurora and Miles to initiate them into this upside-down way of being in the world, asking for God to give them “the courage to will and to persevere [and] a spirit to know and to love [God],” acting mightily in bringing them to a mature life in the way of Jesus. Children are some of the weakest among us, whom God calls us to cherish and protect as they move into a world where frailty and uncertainty is the name of the game. We will each of us promise to nurture this wisdom of the way of weakness in Aurora and Miles, as we recommit to it ourselves. Don’t say it if you don’t mean it! But if you do, even a little, God stands ready to work in and through you to give you the strength to do so. We will, with God’s help.

We live in a world that derides weakness and frailty, demanding shows of strength and independence; you only need look to this week’s headlines to find it. Instead, Jesus tells us the marker of a well-lived life is a life that is lived in close proximity to the weak, the vulnerable, and the expendable. Do you want to find God? Look to those who are at the mercy of everyone else. Look for the children, both the ones who have safe homes and the ones who don’t. Look for the lonely ones among you, who are not sure they are going to make it through the end of the week. Look for the woman on the side of the road who just needs something to eat and a safe place to sleep. Look for the people who have finally mustered the courage to tell you how the powerful are hurting them. Look for the creatures among us whose habitats are clogged by plastic, look for a planet that is choking to death on carbon, look for the bees and the plants, those weakest of things who need one another to support a livable planet for all the rest of us. Wherever you turn, whatever you do: look for the vulnerable, the weak, the destitute, the have-nots, and perhaps, Paul shows us, begin with the parts of yourself you would rather hide from view. It is there you will find God at work, even and especially in your own weak and weary heart. This way of weakness is a lifetime of laying down our shows of strength and our need to be impressive, instead choosing to rely on Jesus and each other when we fail. It is a way of life that requires honesty and vulnerability about how little control we really have in this world. Whatever weaknesses we know, the word that Paul received is a word for us all, all these years later as we read his mail: God’s grace is sufficient for you, beloved. God’s grace is up to the task, for God’s power is brought to maturity in weakness. 

This grace comes to us in utter weakness even now, unremarkable at every turn: in a bit of water, in a thin wafer and a drop of wine. God stands ready to show you the wisdom revealed by weakness and set your veins on fire with this strength. Draw near to God—weakness, limitation, shame, and all—and they will draw near to you. Come to the water, you who have wisdom and you who seek it; come to the Table, you who come here often and you who have not been in a long while. Declare and renew your allegiance to this way of weakness, this Christ who offers us nothing less than the healing and redemption of our souls and of the world.