Lent 2 Luke 13.31-35 Lament
 Listen to Bishop Cliff's Lent 2 ReflectionWhen Jesus was warned that Herod wanted to do him in, Jesus had what to us, might be considered a strange response. “Go and tell that fox for me that I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow but on the third day I must finish my work.” If ever there was a demonstration of power, it is seeking after someone’s life to deprive them of it. Jesus is responding to Herod the murderous king with a powerful message which should have made Herod shiver and fear for his own good.
Anyone who has kept chickens or grew up around farms where a small number of chickens might be kept for household egg consumption will know that foxes are smart and vicious. They kill for the sake of killing itself. Their cruelty to vulnerable birds is legendary because anyone who has had a fox get into the hen house will know that there will be very little left of the flock if they are not chased away. There will be only death left behind.
Jesus response to Herod is both smart and cutting. When Jesus tells that he will be casting out demons and performing cures he is announcing that he will be demonstrating the power of life, which is something that Herod cannot do. Where Herod wants to play the man by being powerful and dealing death - Jesus will simply respond by pouring out life on those who have been captive to a form of death - possession and sickness. To put it another way...Jesus is sending a message to the vicious old fox that there is a hen coming to the fox house. And this hen knows how to deal with death merchants like Herod.
Knowing that he must die, Jesus also knows that he must get to Jerusalem in order to die there. Jerusalem is the fox house to which the hen must go to confront the wicked, vicious fox. The lament over Jerusalem goes that much further in spelling out an extension of the image of Jesus as a mother hen: “ How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!”
Lament is an integral part of a healthy spiritual life. We must be able to come before God and be able to lay at his feet the failures and sins which we cannot bear. But lament is not a common thing these days. We don’t really know how to lament like former generations could. We don’t weep loudly like come cultures do when we grieve. Maybe it is our buttoned-up nature or reserve. Maybe it is a desire to avoid facing the need for lament. If Modernity has taught us anything about lament, it is how to lament the sins of others, not how to lament our own. In this too we need the disruptive grace of God to sweep in and help us to face the fox house in all our lives. We could all use a little less Herod and a lot more Jesus in our world; less death-dealing and more life-giving. Jesus reminds us that to do this, we may need to become, like him, a hen in the fox house.
Yours faithfully, Bishop William G. Cliff
XIII Bishop of Ontario
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