They Expected Too Little

A Homily for the 14th Sunday of Ordinary Time

They expected too little of him and too little from him is what they got in return.

As one spiritual writer puts it: “We don’t see things as they are. We see things as we are.” So, the question this morning is a deceptively simple one: How are you?

The people of Jesus’ hometown were not bad people. They were simply people who had learned over time to “see little” and to not expect much from themselves or anyone else. At worst they may have been the kind of people we hear about in our reading from Ezekiel or the Psalm today: People who have grown Hard of Face and Obstinate of Heart… a people sated with contempt.

I worry sometimes that too many people live lives today “sated with contempt.” And if you are sated with contempt, contempt is all you’ll see. We all know the adage: Familiarity breeds contempt. Why is that? I believe it is because we think we know people too well and our eyes have become so lazy and tired that we can no longer see beneath what we think is there. We think how I see, what I see is how God sees and what God sees. We need to see beyond our thinking.

Perhaps we’ve even become too familiar with this gospel passage from Mark that we’ve become inured to the shock at the heart of it. Because in this little story of a backwater town called Nazareth, the people don’t just demonstrate contempt for one of their own, who they think they know all too well, but they also demonstrate contempt for God. Contempt for God’s never-repeating creative wonders and power. They looked at God literally to his face and rejected him because it was a face they thought they knew all too well.

And what is the result? Even Jesus can work no miracles among them because they’ve become hard of face, obstinate of heart and sated with contempt. They didn’t just see Jesus as they are; they saw God as they are and not as God is. When we see too little in others perhaps it is because we see too little in ourselves and far too little in our God?

So what might the remedy be? Well, the psalmist today serves as a good “eye doctor” for us. He writes: Lift up your eyes… fix your eyes on the Lord and he’ll free your eyes to see extraordinary wonders in ordinary circumstances. He’ll help you see beyond what you think.

And why does this matter? Because we need to stop being afraid of being surprised! I know it sounds like “bumper-sticker theology,” but God is a God of surprises! Simply because God is a creative force that is constantly making all things new. And when we see that creative newness, especially in the familiar faces and places that have perhaps, over time, sated us with contempt, then we open the door for a new vision and a new way of seeing reality that re-energizes hope and beckons us to take the risks that faith requires and makes life worth living.

As one poet writes: “When your eyes are tired the world is tired.” God wants to wake us up to a horizon further than we can see, a horizon further than we’ve settled for. But are we willing to be surprised? Are we willing to fix our eyes on a familiar face or a familiar place and allow God to let us see it as if we were seeing it for the first time? And allow ourselves to be surprised by the shocking and necessary reminder: There is always more than meets the eye. And when we let ourselves see the more we have the power to release the more. The more in our brother or sister, and the more at the very heart of God.

The people of Nazareth saw little in Jesus. So, Jesus in turn could do little for them, even though He is God! How we see has real power. We can settle into our familiarity that bloats us with contempt or we can take the risk to see not as we are but as God is and actually participate in opening up new possibilities in others and in ourselves.

So here is your homework assignment for the week ahead: Take some time to look at a much too familiar face or a much too familiar place and let God help you see it as if you were seeing it for the first time. And what you’ll be doing is opening up the possibility for more: More Hope. More Joy. More Life. And a whole lot less contempt.

Let us not be afraid to be surprised!