Courageous Love: Finding Strength in the Midst

A sermon delivered at First Congregational United Church of Christ, Fargo, North Dakota, on February 2, 2025

Based on Luke 4:21-30, this sermon explores what it means to demonstrate courageous love in challenging times. Drawing on insights from theology, philosophy, and psychology, it examines how we might maintain presence and genuine encounter even in the face of opposition.

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"They got up, drove him out of town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff. But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way."

What a scene to imagine. One moment, Jesus is in the synagogue, and the next moment, the crowd is trying to throw him off a cliff. What could provoke such a dramatic shift from acceptance to murderous rage? More intriguingly, how does Jesus respond to this threat? Not with force, not with fear, but with a kind of centered presence that allows him to simply pass through the midst of them.

This reminds me of words written by French philosopher Albert Camus, who observed that even in life's most challenging moments, there is something invincible within us. Something that allows us to find love in the midst of hate and calm in the midst of chaos. "In the midst of winter," he wrote, "I found there was, within me, an invincible summer." We see this quality in Jesus today - this capacity for what I want to call courageous love.

The story begins with approval. The hometown crowd speaks well of Jesus, amazed at his gracious words. However, approval quickly turns to rage when Jesus challenges their assumption of special privilege. He reminds them that God's love extends beyond their boundaries – to a widow in Sidon, to a Syrian leper. Their rage is telling. It reveals how deeply we can resist love when it threatens our sense of specialness and our tribal boundaries.

This kind of courageous love has manifested throughout history in moments of great challenge. When Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. faced violent opposition, he maintained that "Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend." When President Kennedy navigated the razor's edge of nuclear crisis, he demonstrated that strength isn't about who can show the most force but who can maintain the courage to seek peace. As he once said, "Not all of us can be icons of history, but each of us can reach out to help our neighbor."

Psychoanalyst Viktor Frankl, having endured the unimaginable horrors of concentration camps, discovered that even when everything is stripped away - possessions, family, dignity - one freedom remains inviolable: the freedom to choose how we respond. Jesus demonstrates this same truth in our passage. When faced with a violent mob, he chooses neither flight nor fight but maintains his centered presence in love.

Even Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis and founder of psychology, examined the depths of the human unconscious and concluded that psychoanalysis is, at its heart, a cure through love. This points to a profound truth: that love isn't just a feeling but a transformative force. Whether in the analyst's office, on the streets of Birmingham, in the halls of power, or a hostile synagogue in Nazareth, courageous love has the power to pass through the midst of opposition while maintaining its essential nature, LOVE.

Think about Jesus in this moment. Like Reverend Dr. King, he responds to violence with non-violence. Like Kennedy, he finds a way through crisis without escalation. Like Frankl, he exercises the freedom to choose love even when surrounded by hate. He demonstrates what Hemingway meant when he wrote that "the world breaks everyone, and afterward, many are strong at the broken places."

Consider what Jesus does not do. He doesn't soften his message to maintain approval. He doesn't respond to rage with rage. He doesn't run away. Instead, he finds what Camus calls "an invincible calm" in the midst of chaos. He passes through.

The Greek word used here for 'midst' – mesos – appears throughout scripture in significant moments. The Spirit descends in the midst of the disciples. Jesus appears in the midst of them after the resurrection. God promises to dwell in the midst of the people. There's something profound about this divine capacity to be fully present in the middle of whatever is happening, neither running away nor fighting back.

Throughout scripture, we also hear the divine reminder: 'Fear not.' These words nearly always precede moments of profound encounter - with angels, with God, with transformative truth. As former first lady Eleanor Roosevelt reminded us, 'You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.'

Martin Buber, the great Austrian-Jewish existential philosopher, taught us that life's deepest meaning is found in genuine encounters - what he called the I-Thou relationship—not treating others as objects to be used or analyzed but as sacred presences to be met in their fullness. This profound insight deeply influenced both theology and psychoanalysis. Freud himself came to recognize that healing occurs through what he called "cure through love" - the transformative power of genuine human encounter within the analytic relationship.

What Buber called I-Thou and what Freud discovered as the healing power of relationship point to the same truth we see in Jesus's actions today. Even in the face of hostility, he maintains the possibility of real encounter. He doesn't reduce his opponents to objects of fear or hate - what Buber calls an I-It relationship - but remains present to the possibility of a genuine encounter. This is remarkably similar to what we strive for in psychoanalysis, and I aim to illuminate for student and patient alike: the courage to stay present with whatever emerges, to maintain the possibility of genuine encounter even in the face of resistance, fear, or even aggression.

Donald Winnicott, another pioneering psychoanalyst and pediatrician, spoke of creating a "holding environment" - a space safe enough for real encounters to occur. And I ask you all, isn't this what Jesus does as he passes through the midst of the crowd? He holds the space, he maintains a presence, and he neither retaliates nor flees. He simply creates, even in this hostile moment, a genuine encounter in the midst of them.

This is the kind of love our world desperately needs today. In the midst of polarization, we need love courageous enough to cross boundaries. In the midst of reactivity, we need love centered enough to maintain presence. In the midst of tribal thinking, we need love expansive enough to remind us of God's care for all. We need the courage to transform our I-It relationships - where we treat others as objects of fear, judgment, or utility - into I-Thou encounters, where genuine encounters become possible through courage and love.

Reverend Dr. King put it powerfully: 'We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.' This courage isn't the absence of fear - it's the willingness to show up anyway. To stand fast, as Clan Grant called and the Black Watch echoes, Stand fast! Courageous in love even when our knees are shaking. To maintain presence even when everything in us wants to run. To remain open to genuine encounters even when it would be easier to close ourselves off. As Ernest Hemingway wrote in 'A Farewell to Arms': 'The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places.' We become strong precisely by staying present in these broken places, these difficult encounters, these moments that demand courageous love.

When we fear, when we shy away, when we don't show up, or when we back down, we surrender the possibility of genuine encounter. We let fear transform potential I-Thou relationships into I-It relationships. But when we show up, when we greet one another in our fullness, when we spread light and love, when we encounter one another with courageous love - willing to be afraid but show up anyway - we participate in the divine pattern of presence in the midst. This ... is what Jesus demonstrates, what psychoanalysis discovers, what Buber teaches, and what our world so desperately needs: the courage to remain present for real encounters, even in the midst of whatever storms may come.

That "something stronger" dwelling in our midst isn't just an idea - it's the very presence of God's courageous love. It's Camus's invincible summer in our winter. It's what enabled Jesus to pass through the crowd. It's what empowered Reverend Dr. King to face water cannons with prayer. It's what allows us, even now, to stay present when everything in us wants to run.

The hometown crowd wanted to throw Jesus off a cliff for suggesting God's love extends beyond their boundaries. Their rage reveals a truth we still grapple with: how threatening love can be when it challenges our comfortable tribes when it calls us to genuine encounters with those we'd rather keep at a distance.

Yet, like Jesus, we can pass through– not by fighting, not by fleeing, but by finding within ourselves that invincible core of courageous love. We can speak truth, maintain presence, extend care - not because it's easy, but because love calls us to nothing less.

This is what courageous love looks like in practice: Standing firm when others would push us away—maintaining presence when others demand distance—speaking truth when others prefer comfortable lies—creating space for genuine encounter when others insist on walls.

As we prepare to gather at the communion table, we enact this courageous love in the most tangible way. Here, in the breaking of bread and sharing of cup, we practice genuine encounter - with our God, with each other, with our own deepest truths. Here, we remember Christ's presence in our midst, not as a distant memory but here and now as a living invitation to courageous love.

May we leave this table strengthened for genuine encounter. May we, like Jesus, learn to pass through the midst while holding onto love's truth. May we become not just recipients but bearers of courageous love - in our homes, in our communities, in all the places that cry out for genuine encounter. And may we trust that even in life's most challenging moments, there is within us something stronger than fear, something deeper than division, something more enduring than hate - the invincible presence of Christ's love itself. — Amen.

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Originally delivered as a communion sermon at First Congregational UCC, Fargo. The sermon draws on the works of Albert Camus, Martin Buber, Sigmund Freud, Donald Winnicott, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Viktor Frankl, and Ernest Hemingway to explore themes of courageous love, genuine encounter, and maintaining presence in challenging times.