Journey with a Hen

March 4, 2007 Luke 13:31-35

Preacher: Vicar Anna Rudberg

Two weeks ago Pastor Tim Seitz led us in a wonderful reflection about the Transfiguration and the importance that the actual journey--a difficult mountain hike---played in the impact of that story. Last summer I had a chance to experience that first hand when I visited Ostrog Monastery in Montenegro. I knew the monastery to be a holy place for the people of the region, but I didn’t really know what to expect. So I was surprised when I piled off the bus in a low river valley only to find the monastery nowhere to be seen. “Gde jest?—Where is it?” I asked a fellow pilgrim. “There,” he pointed to what appeared to me to be a very small white dot up a very steep mountain slope. Several hours and about 6 miles later we emerged hot and dusty, scratched and sore, onto a ledge where awaited a veritable paradise. Cool and ancient, the monastery beaconed us to enter and be refreshed. Inside, we found paintings and candles and pools of water where thousands of pilgrims before had washed their tired feet. It was only later that I reflected on how much the power of that experience was formed not just by the monastery itself but the ardor and struggle of the journey.

Our passage today also circles around the idea of journey—as both figuratively and literally the passage focuses on movement towards the story’s inevitable end. And how appropriate is the metaphor of a journey for us now, just as we as a church enter into our Lenten journey, a liturgical period of forty days approaching Easter.

The remarkable thing about this scripture passage, though, is that it is not just we who are on a journey through Lent towards the hope and future of Easter, but that Jesus is also making this journey. He too is preparing, taking stock of his relationships, considering what he’s accomplished and what he still hopes to accomplish--knowing that his time on Earth is running out. And that gives me hope. That Jesus understands our struggles because he’s lived them. Here we see him—worrying and considering--walking his own journey of Lent towards an ending he is determined not to avoid.

The imagery of “journey” inundates this passage. In the verses just before our scripture for today, Luke has described that Jesus is going from “one town and village after another, teaching as he makes his way to Jerusalem.” It is somewhere in Galilee, mid-way on his journey, that the things described in this passage take place.

For Jesus, this is a journey which he is not completely happy to make. And actually, we have the chance to get a strong sense of how Jesus feels because almost the entire passage is Jesus’ own words. He is hidden not behind a parable or a complicated allegory--it is Jesus speaking as himself. And because of that, you can sense his emotions even more clearly—his sadness, his regret. You can sense it in the way he says “Jerusalem, Jerusalem”-- a tinge of reproach in his voice. Exasperation, even regret. “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, I want to love your people and you’re just not letting me.” Who is he talking to? Who is not letting him love? The passage isn’t clear, but the result is—Jesus is deeply regretful that the thing he wishes most, what he “has so often desired” is being thwarted.

For me, the most powerful aspect of this passage is that these intense emotions are all deriving from love—a love for US. And not just any kind of love, but perhaps the most powerful love we can feel in this world- the love of a parent for her child. Jesus feels sad in this passage, not because people have disobeyed him, not even because he knows they are going to kill him, but because the people haven’t given him the chance to love them as he wishes he to, with a love that is warm and tender and soft. He feels frustrated because he wants to love us.

I just love how Jesus chooses to describe this love. There’s a lot of great love images in the Bible—the love of a father for his prodigal son, the love of a shepherd for his lost sheep, the love of a woman for her lost coin, but the one in this passage just about takes the cake.

It is certainly not what the people of the time expected—he does not describe himself as a powerful elephant, a lion--the king of beasts, or a sleek leopard. No, Jesus describes himself as … a hen. He looks at us… and loves us… and thinks carefully about the kind of relationship he would like with us… and says, “I want to be your mother hen, and you to be my chicks. And I want to open my wings and you could come run under them, and I could keep you warm and safe and dry and loved.” It is a love that is tender and motherly. It is a love that worries herself sick over us.

Now I spent a lot of time on my family’s farm growing up, but we never had any hens. So I was happy to live in Poland two years ago with a family who had chickens. Now you don’t have to be around hens very long to see they love their chicks. The way they will sit and sit on those eggs is a paradigm of hope. And those hens look at their eggs and listen. You know, hens can actually hear their chicks chirping inside the egg before they hatch, and they learn the individual cluck of each chicks and the chicks learn the special cluck of their mother before they are even out of their shell. And that’s the sort of love Jesus has for us—as individuals in all our uniqueness. The kind of love that a mother has for her own children. That gut-wrenching, instinctual, you-are-stitched-into-my-soul kind of love. Jesus is willing to die for us. That’s powerful love.

A mothering hen is not just loving, she is also vulnerable. Earlier in our passage Jesus says Herod is like a “fox.” Now I don’t know how much experience you have had with hens, but the hen-fox relationship is not a pretty one. During my brief foray into hens we had only one fox encounter but it made me realize how awfully vulnerable hens are. When Jesus calls Herod a fox, and just seconds later describes himself as a hen, he is giving a graphic example of the very tragic reality of his situation. Jesus doesn’t self-describe himself as a mother bear, who also deeply loves her cubs, but actually has a chance of surviving a predator’s attack. No, Jesus chooses the metaphor of a helpless hen, defenseless but fearlessly loving his chicks--us.

For that is what he is—vulnerable, but fearless. When the Pharisees warn him about the imminent danger, does he run, does he try to protect himself? No, he looks at them with sad, loving, resolute eyes and he says ‘Tell that fox for me, ‘Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work…. And I must be on my way to Jerusalem. Jerusalem, where they kill prophets and stone those who are sent to it.” Jesus knows he will be killed. And in the face of danger, he takes the choice of love, to cure and heal and to push onward in his Lenten journey toward the cross.

For this is what it is, a Lenten journey. Jesus is looking ahead at his fate and he’s deeply considering where he’s at, what he’s accomplished. “How often I have desired to gather you together,” he says. But it hasn’t worked out like that. And why not? “Because,” he explains, “you were not willing.” Who was not willing? Perhaps Jerusalem, perhaps the Pharisees, but perhaps it is the people… “us.” The hen makes her special clucking noise and the chicks… scatter or obstinately refuse. Because it is us who has the choice—Jesus waits, wings outstretched, inviting, no, hoping we’ll crawl underneath safe and secure, but it is us who must choose our path and uswho must turn our footsteps towards him.

So this passage isn’t just about Jesus’ journey, it is also about our journey. About our choice and our freedom. Jesus only offers a powerful example of what a Lenten journey can be. It can be a time to pause, to assess our place and our relationships. To take a stand for what we believe in. To open up to the disappointment and regret we have in our lives and consider it. To not shirk from the sadness and pain.

In this Lenten time Jesus invites us to dig into the disappointments and regrets of our life… but he also promises that we don’t have to remain there. Because Lent is a journey, not a destination. In this passage Jesus is sad. He is regretful and pained, but he is also confident that the story doesn’t end there. Just as he knows that in Jerusalem awaits a cross, he also knows that in Jerusalem awaits an Easter morning and an empty tomb. He may invite us to dig into the pain and disappointment, but to do it with the confidence of delayed joy. Because just as we know the hurt, we also know the hope: the promise of a place where there is no hurt or pain or regret. This doesn’t mean Jesus skips the difficult journey there. Just like my pilgrimage to Ostrog Monastery, the journey is part of the destination—the scratches and bruises, the tired feet and parched lips are as much a part of the experience as the refreshing water and cool shade of the monastery.

And that is the wonder of Lent, that we have a chance to walk in this path where Jesus has led. Not just in these 40 days, but in our lives. For isn’t that what Lent is? It is a symbol of a journey we make towards Easter. And what is our yearly Easter if not a small foretaste of that great Easter we each will one day know, when it is us who will die and rise again to God.

In our passage Jesus is pained to think that despite his greatest hopes, his people have not come to him as chicks would to a mother hen. Instead, he dejected admits “and I tell you, you will not see me again...” But the story doesn’t end there. Instead he continues—“you will not see me again until the times comes when you say “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.” You see, the invitation remains open still. And the choice remains ours. We are free to always say those words and Jesus will be there, the mother hen, wings open wide, welcoming us home.