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Dear Auburn Family and Friends,
When I was a teenager I had a poster in my room that I loved, and it was the tried and true platitude, “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” The optimist in me really connected with that saying! It seemed reasonable that as long as you are courageous enough, energetic enough, and willing to work hard enough, things will work out. You can make those lemons into lemonade!
I hadn’t taken into account what happens when you go to make lemonade and discover that your blender is broken, or you have carpel tunnel and can’t squeeze the lemons on your own, or you don’t have enough money to buy sugar to sweeten the deal. Sometimes, no matter how much energy, optimism, or good, old-fashioned values we have, we’re stuck with some lemons.
This dilemma points to a universal human question: what do I do when life keeps giving me lemons, especially when every lemon makes God seem farther and farther away. Where is God when we face challenge after challenge and loss after loss? What is the purpose of suffering and pain? These are questions many of us have asked in the past year and a half, and are questions we wrestle with all our lives.
The scriptures in Mark’s Gospel, chapter 6, verses 1-29, give us a glimpse into how Jesus himself handled life when he was faced with lemons. There are three parts to these scriptures, the first being Jesus’ experience in his own hometown. Jesus had been traveling, teaching, and preaching. He healed countless people and even raised a little girl from the dead. Jesus was clearly not the usual teacher and prophet. Jesus came to his hometown, where he hoped to continue teaching and healing the people who nurtured him through his youth. However, Jesus finds that the people are offended by his teaching and healing and do not welcome him.
I wonder if Jesus felt the sting of that rejection in an “I’ve just been handed lemons” kind of way. After all, he was rejected by the people he grew up among, the people he learned from and was nurtured by, rejected to the point that he could only heal a few of them, knowing that he has the key to eternal life but can’t save those he knows best. What lemonade can even Jesus make from that?
The third story in this chapter in Mark tells of the death of John the Baptist, an even worse blow for Jesus. John was Jesus’ cousin and friend who was killed in a horrible, public, capricious way by Herod. In just a few verses, Jesus lost a loved one and was rejected by his hometown. This is more than just being handed lemons. So how did Jesus handle this very human experience of heartache, loss, and God’s role in it all?
We see Jesus’ response in the second story sandwiched between these two losses. This middle story is brief and to the point: Jesus gathered his twelve disciples and sent them out, commissioning them to participate in his mission to heal a broken world. Jesus’ response to loss and sorrow was to focus even more deeply on his mission and purpose. He tells the disciples that if they are rejected as they travel and teach and heal, when they are dealt a hand of lemons, to “shake the dust of that place off their feet” and continue on, focused on their mission. Jesus responds to the challenges of life by focusing on God’s mission, sharing it with others, and staying firm in his faith. In this, too, we can imitate Jesus, remaining focused on our call to serve Christ even if circumstances make it difficult.
A few years ago, I found an even better poster than the one from my youth: “When people give you lemons, give them Jesus.” I love that. Jesus is our answer to those tough questions of what to do with lemons, with feeling distant from God, with challenge and heartache and struggle. Jesus teaches us to stay focused on his mission for us, to share it with others and to stand firm in our faith, trusting that Jesus will stand in the gap for us when we feel far from God.
I pray we remember and are encouraged by the truth that even if we cannot make lemonade, we CAN turn to Jesus. May we share Jesus with others, so that when people give us lemons, we give them Jesus.
In the Spirit of Christ’s Love,
Pastor Jenny
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