Why is Jesus So Harsh?

This past week I was coming home after a full day of Bible Club, distributing grocery bags and Table Church and my neighbor was standing on his porch asking, ”Can I have communion and can you tell me the gospel reading for Sunday?” He has missed Table Church and was going to be away Sunday.  It had been a long day and frankly I was tired. My first response was to say the gospel was Matthew 5 on killing, adultery and divorce and that I didn’t have any communion at home. Yes, I know I really did say that at first.  

I’d traveled long that day. I really didn’t want to turn around and walk back to church and get the communion ready and walk back again... About one whole minute later, I popped back outside and said-“ I’ll be right back.”  I went back and got wine and wafers and as I came back, he apologized if I had gone to any trouble. But really, how many people are so focused on Jesus that they would even ask? It seemed necessary. And it was for both of us.

I set up communion in the dining room and started reading this gospel lesson from Matthew. As I read it frankly all I could imagine was someone hearing it who needed some good news and it's murder, adultery, divorce, hell fire. It’s harsh. And I almost felt like I needed to resolve it in some way. So I talked a little about how sometimes as a parent and even before that as a child there have been the “hard conversations” where the niceties get stripped away and we tell people straight up truth not only about love but owning our actions. And how all the rules we had for our kids were about showing them how to live in life and love. Our “law” wasn’t about creating a game no one could win. The words themselves might sound harsh but they have a purpose. That sounded good.

Then I pointed out that it’s easy to hone in on the sexy words of divorce or adultery or the fierce words of murder where lots of judging happens and say- well I didn’t do THAT! But Jesus is speaking about things much more broadly- the ways we are all somehow drawn into the scope of words that kill, promises broken, lives shattered ad hearts that are grieved. Not just where we are victims but actors. And you know, when Jesus puts it that way, it’s pretty hard to be judgey. We want to believe that our relativism or comparison strategies count. It stings to be reminded that none of us is who we were created to be or even wanted to be. And that sounded good too.

Well, then I suggested that the good news is there is more to the story- that though we cannot live up the law, God’s grace in the cross is the last word.  And although that’s true it kind of fell flat.

Luckily I think he wasn't listening to that. Because he was emotional and said hearing those words from Matthew were just what he needed. He had felt someone was a little insulting and sarcastic, so he had been a little salty back. Reflecting later he realized that the other person might not have understood and he needed to make it right. He wasn’t focused on “just get to the grace.” He was focused on the ethics. And it really wasn’t a terrible thing he’d said, but he looked for a time to work together with this person where they both volunteer to have a conversation to clear the air and tie up loose ends.

And then he shared that it felt good to do that. Hearing Jesus’ words about our ethics, affirmed not just what he had done but to keep doing it. Keep choosing to transform something rather than just let it go. We really do need that accountability. This is what Jesus is getting at. One scholar I know says, following Jesus means doing what Jesus says which is MORE demanding than other paths. And it is about community. Just appealing to grace won’t cut it.

And I think I played the grace card because I felt guilty about my earlier words.

We can opt for recognizing and trying to gloss over our human failure but Jesus goes to the root- our motive and attitude matter. And the justice and righteousness of which Jesus speaks- God’s transformative will-demands confronting and changing the status quo in all of us.

When we do not live this way, we are not participating in the completion of God’s purposes.

The law is not about pleasing God, it’s what’s given for our life- all of us. More than a negative goal of avoiding sin. But a positive one of discovering and following what is God’s will. The sting we feel is not that God’s being harsh, its our experiencing the potential for pain and destruction our brokenness brings and seeing our role.

All the examples Jesus gives show that destructive expressions kill. Angry thoughts, words of contempt, insults, public shaming, emotional abuse, disgrace. Choosing to demean and discard. We want to hear these are not as bad as killing. But we know in our hearts how these destroy and cause loss of life. Even when we think it’s a little thing, we are sacrificing each other in ways that harm more than we know and break our connectedness.  God calls us to keep each other focused by giving us this community.

When we are not reconciled in relationships we find life lacking. But the work of tending relationships is not convenient. The story of leaving the sacrifice imagines journeying 80 miles to do something only to turn right around and journey back the same distance and another week to participate in mending a rift. Much farther than a block. That’s how far we should go to avoid allowing bad in relationships to remain unresolved. Or risk someone feeling lost altogether.

It shows the importance of relationships to God and what Jesus shows is what God gives for us. For life. We don't find life in the comparison strategies or relativism we want to rely upon.  Even in what lots of people gravitate to- the part about divorce. Jesus is speaking to protect dignity so that no one is demeaned or cut off. In Jesus’ day marriage was a male prerogative in which destructive behaviors included victimizing women to abandoning them for things as simple a thing as spoiling a meal. Jesus proclaims that destructive behaviors undo the “One flesh-ness” of marriage. Even here, no matter how we try, none of us perfectly escapes times we undo the one body-ness of many relationships in some way.  

And living with perfection is beyond our grasp.

This is where Jesus continues to come to show us and lead us into new places and to offer forgiveness. In seeing our brokenness then we grasp the power and love of the cross. And the strength to try again to live into the ethics of the kingdom. Where we show and experience God revealed. Together. In all our thinking, speaking and living. Even the simplest words.

My neighbor didn’t need to share his experience with me- he could have kept it to himself. He shared because he had a need. But it wasn't for me to make Jesus more palatable. He  and I needed to hear Jesus say again that doing the hard work of relationships was holy and that God’s word, communion and fellowship are where continually we meet the God who promises to lead us not into temptation or the destruction of evil, but into the kingdom. My neighbor said at the end that when he is away from church too long, he can feel it. That he needs it. We all do.

And the other day he saw I was stressed and called out, “Pastor,  just remember Matthew 5. “

 

Words for Beginning Being Bound Together

Another one of the September sermons- sorry they are out of order. This was the first sermon I preached as the newly called pastor on September 4, 2011. My goal was to connect this week's sermon to the followibg week which was September 11th. At the end of the two weeks, we incorporated the Litany for Healing and Forgiveness which allowed us to begin important work together while honoring emotions of the transition :


Here we are on our first “official” Sunday together in ministry. God has bound us together. This is exactly the sense of binding of the community that Matthew is speaking of. Both this week’s lesson and next week’s offer us teaching that fits together as we hear God’s words about living as a bound community of believers amongst ourselves and in the world. As we wrestle with the desire to have community, to be with others, we also know that community can be a funny thing. It seems so simple to say we’re all here because of the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. I don’t really want to take my first Sunday with you to talk about “cutting loose.” But I know that in our collective lives together it doesn’t take long for us to be on different pages about what it means to be God’s people and how the community should act. Somewhere along the line, though God has brought us together, we will find ourselves at odds. Yet being those who follow Jesus’ words about fellowship challenges us to a new discipline of caring for each other even when we are injured or offended, and being trained to binding and loosing ourselves to repent and to forgive through Christ. Since our journey is just beginning I’m not aware of any tension between us. This may be the best time to talk about how we might respond- a time when we are not feeling tense.


In every community, there will be occasions for tension. Perhaps in times when God is challenging us in new ways that test our limits, or places where we have to wrestle with what faithful living will mean. Moments when we are asking ourselves. “What do we hold onto and what do we let go?” In these moments, there will be potential for conflict. Just saying that word can make us uncomfortable. In our lesson, Jesus speaks of those places we need to address sin, repentance, and reconciliation. Conflict is not sin. Conflict in and of itself is simply that co-existence of two ideas that are not in agreement. Conflict is not sin.

Our responses to conflict however often are. Today we hear Jesus’ teaching on the notion of how to resolve the pain that behaviors cause in the community. And the starting point to keep in mind is that everything each of us does affects our community. This is countercultural. Our world says “Have it your way.” Jesus calls us to consider that what we do and say is about more than our individual wills. Then we’re called to live out our life in relationships with God and each other in all of the messiness. And to always strive to reconcile. When someone feels wronged we’re encouraged to embrace a series of steps. But first, here is what we do not hear-


We do not hear, "when you are wronged, talk about it with others while excluding the person who has caused the hurt."


We do not hear, "ignore what has happened."


We do not hear, "try to solve it for someone else using the indirect model. "


None of these leads to reconciliation.


Reconciliation is about our collective and perpetual re-establishing of community as the Body of Christ. Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his book, Life Together, notes that being the Body of Christ means not only being with those whom we consider devout and earnest and worthy, but also with those who are decidedly the OTHER- those with whom we don’t want to be community. Reaching out, drawing back together and binding these as well. Walk toward that person, and if your own words do not bring reconciliation, take other believers to be there as the witness of what God desires. Even in the worst case scenario where we find ourselves unable to reconnect, the words we hear next have a different meaning and focus than our world would give. “Treat that person as a tax collector, or a Gentile.” These are negative labels. The world would interpret this to say,”cut that person loose. Kick them off of the island, walk away and don’t look back.” But Jesus says, this person is now your mission- you'll have to start over from scratch, confront him or her with the need for repentance, and offer again God's forgiving love" . As one of my seminary professors has said, this approach doesn't deny the reality of sin or minimize the differences we actually have, but it does remind us as Christians, that our core principle is unity based on God's love, not exclusion based on someone else's sin.


The three steps of Jesus teaching are about helping the person who feels wronged to be directly connected to a process of re-connecting, repentance and forgiveness. And while repentance is a necessary component, its goal is not about wanting to wield the hammer of divine law, but to open up the possibility of divine forgiveness to those who Jesus called the lost sheep worth going to the ends of the earth to restore. SO while in our life together we may at times need to let go of ideas, we are not asked to let go of people. We’re told to banish the strife, wounding and pain that lead to death, by naming it and then breaking open God’s grace in its place. We have been brought out of death into life through grace, to be God’s instruments of this grace for God’s ultimate purpose-proclaiming salvation and bringing love.


In all of our living together the center of our existence when we are gathered is not ourselves, but Christ. Christ redeemed us, delivered from our sin, and called us to faith and eternal life. Christ continues to be the center and the mediator of our lives. Christ is the only way we can live in peace. And centered in Christ is the only way we stay bound to each other in the life God intends. Christ is who we meet in prayer to be our guide for all our days.


When we gather in His name, in prayer and community, THERE is the power of God’s love for our lives and our world. When we can acknowledge that this love is what we have in common, it might not only be a good step for us in our life together a community of believers, it is indeed what we will need to work for a more peaceable and just world for all. AMEN






(seminary professor quote: Rick Carlson)