HUMILITY BEFORE THE LORD

A sermon by George R. Pasley

James 3:13-4:10

Mark 9: 30-37

Let me tell you a story about two people. It is a true story and I read it this week in Neil White’s memoir, “In the Sanctuary of the Outcasts.”

I’ll begin the story with Ella, an African-American woman who by all accounts was the lowest of the low.

Ella was born in Abita Springs, Louisiana, shortly before 1920. She went to grade school at a segregated one room school and one day a doctor came to give vaccinations to all of the children.

When he came to Ella, he noticed oval spots on her leg. The pigmentation had disappeared from the spots, and when he pricked the spots with his needle Ella didn’t feel anything.

The next day a white man drove up to the school in his truck. He was recognized by one of Ella’s classmates, who called him “the bounty hunter.” He had a pistol on his belt and a large, crudely lettered sign in the back of his truck.

Ella’s school teacher led her out to the man in the truck, who pointed to the back of the truck.

Ella climbed in. The truck was equipped for transporting livestock, and Ella peaked out through the slats and watched her teacher, her school and her classmates disappear into history.

The man drove to the shack where her sharecropper family lived. The man took the sign out of his truck and began nailing it to her house.

The sign said QUARANTINE.

Ella’s father heard the sound of the hammer. He came in from the fields. Het took Ella out of the truck and told the man, “She’s my daughter.”

The man said, “She has to go.”

Ella’s father said, “She’s my daughter. I’ll take her myself.”

The man said, “Be there in three days, or I’ll be back to get her.”

The family killed a chicken that night and had their last dinner with Ella. The next day, Ella’s father drove her to Carrville, home of the leprosy hospital. Ella was confined there by law. She never saw her family again.

Now called Hansen ’s disease, Leprosy was greatly feared and highly stigmatized. Leprosy patients were shunned, mistreated, and hidden away. Once they were gone their families never spoke of them again, out of fear. Even in death many were put in unmarked graves, or with an alias on their tombstone.

Ella was never allowed to marry, never allowed to have children- in fact, she may have been mandatorily sterilized. She lived the rest of her life in the institution at Carrville, hidden away on a remote bend on the Mississippi River. For decades she was not allowed to leave- a life sentence, as it were. When patients finally were allowed to leave, Ella had no place to go, and she was used to the place, so she called it home, and stayed.

In the early days, visitors were not allowed. The fear of contamination was too great.

Ella never finished school.

Ella never had a job.

Ella received medical treatments, but the doctors also used her for medical experiments.

Ella eventually had both of her legs amputated.

When she was nearly 80 years old, she met Neil. Neil credits her with changing his life.

Neil came from a different world than Ella.

Neal graduated from Ole Miss, and he was in the publishing business.

He was on the vestry at his Episcopal Church, and sometimes presided over communion when a priest was not available.

Neil had power lunches with some of the wealthiest men and women on the Gulf Coast.

Neil took his family to expensive restaurants.

Neil wore neatly pressed shirts, expensive suits, and $300 Italian shoes.

Neal had ambitions to be somebody important, somebody who made a difference in his community, somebody who was recognized and remembered.

Neil liked to do things that helped people who needed help.

But Neil met Ella when he was sent to prison for an 18 month term for check-kiting.

Neil had lost millions of dollars that had been entrusted to him by investors, some who had invested money they could not afford to lose.

“God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

Neil was sent to a minimum security federal prison, but he was afraid- and even angry- when he discovered upon arrival that the prison was also home to almost 200 Hansen’s Disease patients.

Nobody ever asked the patients how they felt about having half of their hospital turned over to the Bureau of Prisons.

Nobody every asked them how they felt about sharing their home with convicted felons, some of whom were in prison for violent crimes.

Nobody ever asked them. The decision was made without thought to their safety, dignity, or emotion. After all, even in the 1990s, they were the lowest of the low.

Prisoners worked in the cafeteria.

But Neil was afraid to touch places the patients had touched.

Some of them offered him their hand, but he was afraid to shake.

But Neil treated them better than most of the prisoners.

The patients were so low they were feared, ostracized and ridiculed by convicted felons.

The patients were lower than the embezzlers, drug dealers, tax-cheats and mob bosses.

Neil hoped he could start his life over again some day.

He hoped he could once again hold his head up in public.

Besides, he reasoned, he wasn’t as bad as the other prisoners. He was in for check-kiting. He hadn’t physically hurt anybody nor done anything dangerous.

At least that’s how he felt.

But he was treated like everybody else.

He lived in an assigned room, and there was no door on the room.

There was no privacy.

He waited in line to use the phone.

He wore only prison uniforms, which were not ironed except when he paid another prisoner to iron them.

He was not allowed to use or keep cologne.

The list went on and on.

But worst of all, he was ashamed.

God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

Even so, he counted the days until his term was over and his penalty paid. He anticipated starting his life over again, raising his two young children, and doing something that he could be proud of- until late one night, when his wife told him over the phone that she was filing for divorce.

He had thought he had lost everything he could lose, but suddenly he knew how wrong he was.

Now he had lost the three things he loved most.

He had friends in prison but he couldn’t tell them. When he tried, the first person he told replied, “Man- you is in jail. What did you expect?”

There was nowhere to go for privacy.

Nowhere to go and have a good cry.

Nowhere to go for some silent prayer time.

Nowhere to go and nobody to turn to- except for Ella.

But this is the way it happened- Ella found Neil.

She saw his face and knew.

“Sit yourself down,” Ella said, touching the table.

These are the words Neil used to describe what happened next:

“I slid down into a chair next to her and told her about Linda leaving me. I told her I would never again live in the same house with my children. I stretched my arms on top of the table and put my head down. Ella turned her wheelchair to the side and reached for my hand. Her palm felt cool and smooth. Her skin smelled like flowers. For nearly seventy years, Ella had suffered, and seen, heartbreak beyond anything I could imagine. She had been torn from her family and imprisoned as a child, but she offered me comfort without judgment or comparison. Ella sat with me, her hand on mine, in silent vigil.” (Neil White, “In the Sanctuary of Outcasts,” p. 162)

“God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

Ella had turned her disease into something sacred. Ella had found peace in submitting to her Lord and savior, and it was that peace she shared with Neil during all the remaining months of his prison sentence. On his last day of prison, Neil knew he wanted to find a church like his experience at Carrville- “a place where the parishioners were broken and chipped and cracked. A place to go when (he) needed help. A place to ask forgiveness. A sacred place where people were not consumed with image or money.” (p. 303)

That’s what God’s Kingdom is like, exactly as Jesus prescribed:

Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, "If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all." He took a little child and had him stand among them. Taking him in his arms, he said to them, "Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me."

Let it be so with us.

In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Amen.