Luke 13:31-35
Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of our hearts, be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our strength, and our redeemer. Amen. (Psalm 19:14).
We hear in the Gospel that Jesus refers to Herod as
"that fox" (Luke 13:32).
This is a symbolic reference to 'the fox in the hen house'; Herod is the fox, and Jesus compares himself to a mother hen who defends her chicks, even to death.
Unless you lived on a farm or spent summers there, you probably have little or no experience with chickens and hens. Your experience is probably limited to freshly packaged meat at the grocery store or cooked and ready to eat from the Colonel at KFC. In Jesus' time, however, everyone knew chicken's behavior. They were raised in the backyard for thousands of years, or even in the house. They had watched hens react to impending threats. When a fox first comes into view, the hen starts to bring her chicks under the shelter of her wings. If the fox gets too close, the hen launches an attack against the fox, willing to sacrifice her life for her brood.
Jesus tells us that God's love for us is like that.
"There have been so many times that I wanted to gather the children of God together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings." (Luke 13:34)
Even though Jesus knows that these very children will be the ones who will betray, persecute, and eventually crucify him, he still wants to gather us under his arms as a hen does chicks. That love is eternal!
Have you ever spent any time watching geese and ducks? I get to do that every morning when I take my walk. Canadian geese who make the Scioto Mile their home have up to ten goslings in the spring. The female will gather her little brood together when anyone approaches and move them further out into the river. If I get closer for a better look, she goes into attack mode – hissing and moving toward me and sometimes coming onto the bank to come after me. She wants me to notice her and encourages me to get as far away from her goslings as possible. She draws attention to herself to protect her offspring. And if a Canadian goose has ever attacked you, you know she means business!
Jesus' love is so great that his all-consuming passion is to sweep us up into his protective arms. And although there are others in pursuit of him, primarily Herod and the Pharisees, Jesus stays true to what his love compels him to do. He protects his flock with single-mindedness.
He must remain in Galilee a little longer, and then, he is headed to Jerusalem, where he will sacrifice himself for all God's children.
This image of God as a female or one with motherly instincts can be disturbing for some. It is counter to what we've heard and known since we were young. Most of us have been raised with a patriarchal view of God; we regularly use the male pronoun in place of God. We think of God as all-powerful, all-mighty, all-knowing. Those images tend to reinforce His maleness image. But here, in this passage of Luke, we have another image – Jesus as a mother hen, with all her love and passion for her children, gathering them under her protective wings.
And I ask you, isn't that image more helpful in assisting us in understanding what God is really like?
One of the many traits of Jesus is that he is a man who can do anything - walk on water; turn a couple of fish and a few loaves into a feast for thousands, even raise the dead. But in today's Gospel lesson, Jesus states He cannot make us love Him - He cannot control human will.
Jesus has tried to gather this flock many times. He will later walk out of a tomb, but he can't walk into our hearts today without permission. We have to be willing to accept that love and willingly come together under his wing.
The well-known preacher Barbara Brown Taylor says, "Jesus won't be king of the jungle in this or any other story. He will be a mother hen who stands between the chicks and those who mean to do them harm. She has no fangs, no claws, no rippling muscles. All she has is her willingness to shield her babies with her own body. If the fox wants them, he will have to kill her first."
I love the image of family and community from the picture of a mother hen gathering her chicks under her wings. Not only are you safe when you are gathered close to the Lord, but you are not alone! You have the Lord, but you also have those with whom you are gathered. There is unity and togetherness. We are all sharing in the Lord's comfort together.
I suspect anyone who has loved someone deeply and knows they can't shelter them from harm's way understands the pain in Jesus' lament. His desire cannot overpower our will. Jesus is powerless to do that.
We have to be willing!
This is Jesus' wish, Jesus' invitation — to a community of love and belonging under His wings, knowing the safety and protection of such a place which then invites you to imagine and live into the person God has called you to be.
But He cannot force us to come into God's love and protection.
The last four words in Luke 13:34 –
"If you are willing."
"How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing." (Luke 13:34)
are some of the most powerful words in the Bible, then
… and now!
"I will love you and shelter you like a mother hen protects her chicks ...
if …
(and only if) …
we are willing".
Are we going to make the same mistake as those in Jerusalem and NOT let Jesus gather us under his wing?
Are we going to seek shelter in the loving arms of Jesus?
He is calling! Will we answer?
Let us pray:
Gather us, Mother Christ.
Gather us in from our fears and doubts.
Hold us under your tireless wing,
shield use from hungers that wander,
guard us from flighty desires.
Save us from the evil we would suffer
and the evil we would do.
Gather us with all your children,
those we love and those we do not,
for we shelter together, but alone, wander.
Mother Christ, keep us by your covering side,
tender us at your nursing breast,
close by you wherever you go,
so that even up Golgotha's hill,
bearing the cross with you
I am under your wing,
under your wing. [1]
Amen.
[1] Pastor Steve Garnaas-Holmes, “Gather Me”, Unfolding Light (adapted)
Delivered at Saint John's Episcopal Church, Columbus, OH; 13 March 2022
