I have heard that this is a Norwegian
town, and a Norwegian congregation. That's a bit on the funny side,
since I am Swedish, and we Swedes, well, we think Norwegians are
funny. Cute, and a bit silly.
Not, you know, the sharpest tools in the shed, so to say.
Where I come from, in
the extreme south in Sweden, we live right across Öresund from
Denmark. Constantly exposed to and used to the strangeness of Danes
and Danish, Norwegians become even funnier. We tell stories about
Norwegians. I thought I'd share one with you all:
A Swede, a Dane and a Norwegain decided
to compete in swimming. They found a good place, right across the
sound from Denmark where the sound is only about a mile wide, and
agreed to swim across. Whoever did it the fastest would be declared the winner.
The Dane got in first. He swam for his
life, thinking of all the good Danish beer that awaited him on the
other side. He was fast, really fast, and when he waded ashore, he
was sure he would be the winner.
The Swede was up next. He, too, thought
of all the good Danish beer on the other side, and swam faster than
ever before. When he saw the pier on the Danish side, he put in some
extra effort and managed to finish just a minute ahead of the Dane.
The two men sat on the pier and waited
for the Norwegian. But they waited and waited and waited, and finally
they became worried for their friend and got in a boat back to Sweden
to see what had happened. Back on the Swedish side of the sound they
found their friend in a deck chair, eating icecream in the sun.
”What happened?” they cried. ”We
were waiting for you!”
The Norwegian answered: ”Well, I
started swimming and the water was kind of choppy and rough and I got
tired. I almost made it over, but when I saw that pier, and the two
of you waiting for me, I realized I was too tired, so I turned and
swam back.”
Yeah, I know. It's a silly story. I
have heard the Norwegians tell these kind of stories about us Swedes,
which is funny, since they are obviously about them...
Anyway. The animosity between the
Nordic peoples has gone on for centuries. We used to fight each
other, and the part where I live used to be Danish. Norway was
Swedish until the start of the 19th century, and before
that it was Danish for a very long time. These days, we are not so
much enemies as siblings, constantly ribbing and teasing each other.
In very many ways, we are extremely alike. We almost speak the same
language, we almost look the same, we almost eat the same food. We
are Lutheran, and secularized, and have strong welfare states. But we
can't help teasing each other and sometimes even looking down on each
other.
The disturbing thing here for me, as a
Swede, is that Jesus is Norwegian.
You didn't know that, did you? I bet
you thought he was from Galilee, right?
The thing is, to the people of Judaea,
the people of Galilee was a little bit like the Norwegians to the
Swedes. Not the brightest, you know. A little less cultured. Some
weird customs, a bit on the strange side, even though the language
was almost like the Arameic the Judaeans spoke. Ate a lot of fish.
And this semi-barbaric, despised people was the one God chose for
bringing up Jesus.
Had it been today, there are surely
other peoples that would have been chosen. Maybe for us, in Sweden,
it would indeed have been Norwegians, but much more likely is that
Swedes of African or Roma descent could have been the ones. I am sure
all of you know who are the most despised and questioned people in
your country and your local community. And that is where Jesus would
be found. Because if there is one thing we can be sure of regarding
Jesus, it is that he does not chose to live with the popular crowd.
He chooses to walk right next to the sad ones. Right next to the
despised and oppressed and marginalized. And this gets a little bit
tricky when it's us who are the modern day Judaean self-righteous
Pharisees, right? Jesus is with the others, the annoying, disruptive,
un-orderly ones.
But Jesus would not be Jesus if all was
lost. God would not be God if there was but one chance to get it
right. And we would not be Lutherans if we could not embrance change,
and our own identity as both sinners and saints.
Jesus walks with us too. He came to
Zacchaeus and to the Roman officer. He talked to prostitutes and
lepers. He accepted a drink from a woman of another faith, and healed
the daughter of another. If we truly believe that he dies for all
people, then that means all. Norwegians too. And the only thing that
we need to do, he says himself, is to believe in him.
Easy.
About as easy as swimming back across
the sound when you're so tired you don't think you can make another
stroke.
To simply declare that one believes is
easy enough, but that belief has to be hardened and proven true. We
cannot and may not treat others badly. If we truly believe Jesus dies
for all, that means he dies for them too. That means, even worse,
that he is among the people that we treat badly.
Jesus is never ever on our side when we
oppress and despise other human beings.
There is a richness in our diversity, a
God-given opportunity for us all to cherish all aspects of life and
humanity. We are all one body in Christ. We have different tasks, but
to us all, without exceptions, is given the task to build each other
up in love until everyone has reached the kind of spiritual maturity
Paul speaks about in his letter to the Ephesians. A humble acceptance
of not being at the center of the universe, of not being the one
everything else measures up to. An acceptance of not understanding
everything, but trusting in God's love. Bearing with each other in
love, and knowing, deep in our hearts, that God is above all, through
all, and in all. Even Norwegians.
Because Jesus is Norwegian. He is
Swedish and Somali. He walks the mountain paths of the Rocky
Mountains, and the steep hills in Afghanistan. He speaks Spanish and
Korean.
One God, one baptism, one cup spilled
for all. And one bread with life for all.
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