Across the Pastor’s Desk, By Mark Boorsma

Eighteen years ago April Fool’s Day fell on a Wednesday in Lent. At that time I served a congregation in a 106-year-old building and we held services every Wednesday evening in Lent. For every service I would walk through the congregation, up to the front, then into the small sacristy where I would robe and then emerge to lead worship. Did I mention this particular service was on April Fool’s Day?

As I walked through the small crowd gathering to worship, nothing seemed out of the ordinary.  Some were chatting, some were praying silently and others were still making their way to be seated. I disappeared into the sacristy, put on the robe and then walked out to start the service.

Except that everybody had left.  I was looking out at a completely empty church.  Funny, I thought. This is a really good April Fool’s joke — they’ve all scooted out the doors and left me in here alone.  But their prank was even better than that. Actually, they were still there.  But everybody — even the oldest members for whom this could not have been easy or comfortable — had crouched down behind the pews so that I couldn’t see them. They all popped up like a room full of jacks-in-the-box and gleefully shouted “April Fools!”

What a hoot! It still brings a smile just remembering their great gag.

In the first chapter of First Corinthians, the Apostle Paul plays with the contrast between foolishness and wisdom and surprisingly compares the message about Christ to foolishness.  “God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.”

Paul says “the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” A redeemer nailed to a cross certainly doesn’t seem very wise, and we are left to wonder how that kind of “saving” can be effective. It’s like a rescuer who dies in the attempt — noble but not exactly successful.

In this presidential election year it seems like our would-be political “saviors” might just as well dress up as fools and court jesters. It’s hard to take their name-calling and mud-slinging seriously.  It reminds me of that Stealers Wheel song:  “Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, here I am, stuck in the middle with you.”

Paul recognizes in Jesus a better kind of foolishness.  Not utter nonsense, but the deeper wisdom of one who is willing to look like a fool as he takes responsibility for a whole world upon himself, and loves it deeply enough to move far beyond words, into self-giving dedicated action.

 

Mark Boorsma is the pastor at Ascension Lutheran Church in Albert Lea.