7 Epiphany A – February 19, 2017

7 Epiphany A – February 19, 2017

7 Epiphany A     February 19, 2017
Luther Memorial Church     Seattle, WA
The Rev. Julie Hutson
Leviticus 19: 1-2, 9-18  +  Psalm 119: 33-40  +  1 Cor 3: 10-11, 16-23
Matthew 5: 38-48 

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer.  Amen.

          Jesus said “You have heard it said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, but I say love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you….for if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?”

I must tell you that preachers everywhere whose congregations follow the assigned readings from the Revised Common Lectionary have shaken our heads in recent weeks.  Jesus, in all that he teaches in the Sermon on the Mount, which has been our Gospel text for the past several weeks…and the prophets in the Old Testament readings seem to be speaking precisely to us at exactly this time in history.  A Baptist pastor[1] recently noted that when the prophet Micah brought this word from God:  You must do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God….it was in the very same week that an executive order tried to keep out refugees and immigrants and Muslims.   That was followed the next week by the prophet Isaiah bringing this word from God:  “Is not this the fast I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free?”  How can we hear these words against injustice and oppression and NOT relate it to current events?

And Jesus says that the ones who are truly blessed are not the ones with power, not the ones with authority, but the ones who are being pushed to the margins by those in power.  They are the blessed ones.  And then he goes on to say that those who insult others….who call them the so-called or the fake ones or the fools….they are liable to the hell of fire.

Come one!  For most preachers, including this one, it feels as though, in light of the texts, we are being compelled by the Holy Spirit to speak truth to power and love to hate in ways that might result in discomfort, at best, for everyone.  Because most preachers, including this one, work very, very hard to avoid partisan politics from the pulpit.  Now, there is a difference between partisan and politics and there is a difference between politics and justice.  Justice is always where Jesus lands.

So here we are today…. Jesus said “You have heard it said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, but I say love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you….for if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?”

How do we know who are enemies are?  Are they my Muslim neighbors, with their two little boys who play kickball in the cul-de-sac?  Is my beautiful, kind Muslim dentist my enemy?  This week we were told that the press is our enemy, but I know too many fine journalists for that to be the case.  And how do we even know if our friends are truly our friends?  It’s easy to be paranoid in these days.

When I was in elementary school I rode my bike to school many days.  One day, I was pedaling along when my front tire veered off the sidewalk and the next thing I knew, I was falling….hard.  And of course, this was before bike helmets, but I remember that my bright shiny Schwinn landed right on top of me and my sock somehow got stuck in the chain.  I was laying on the sidewalk, pinned under the bike,unable to get free enough to get out from under it.  At just about that time, I spotted my buddy and class mate….Jimmy McKinney….there in the distance, down the sidewalk, on his bicycle, headed toward me.  Thank goodness!  Jimmy was a good guy.  We played together at recess and we were in the same reading group.  He had red hair and a lot of freckles and he was nice.  Yay….Jimmy was coming to my rescue.  Well, I want you to know that Jimmy McKinney didn’t even slow down….he whizzed right past me on his banana seat bike with the big spoiler bar and yelled:  “Hey Julie!  I can see your underwear!”  From then on Jimmy McKinney was my sworn enemy.  Not that I’m holding a grudge or anything.

But suddenly, I began to wonder about all of my friends….I mean, who’s to say that ALL of them wouldn’t have just whizzed by on their bikes like Jimmy McKinney?  How did I know?  How could I determine which of my friends were really my friends when one of them had just proven to be a traitor?  It’s not like we can vet our friends, after all.

Imagine if I had decided that ALL of my friends, based on the actions of this one, were not to be trusted.  Imagine if I had labeled them all my enemy.  What a lonely and sad childhood I might have had.

I trust that you are keeping up with your pastor’s metaphor here.  We are in for a lonely and sad time of it if we suspect those we never have before and question our neighbors or our classmates or our friends.  Are they really who we think they are?

If this assignment isn’t hard enough….leaving us wondering how in the world we can love our enemies in an eye for an eye world….Jesus seems to make it doubly hard.  Be perfect, he tells us, as your Heavenly Father is perfect.  Yeah, right.  Here I am, decades later, still mad at Jimmy McKinney (I wonder if he’s on Facebook?) and Jesus tells me to be perfect?

What exactly does Jesus mean by that?  Well, to be exact, the word translated into English as “perfect” is telios, which actually means “end”, as in a means to an end or the end result.  An end as the ultimate and final purpose of a thing or a person.   The end game.  So, Jesus is actually saying:  Be that person God created you to be…before the world told you that you shouldn’t trust someone who looks different than you do or understands God in a different way than you do.  Be that person God set apart for love in the world before the world taught you about hate and distrust and paranoia.  Before we knew about walls to keep out the other.  Be that person God created you to be before your heart was broken or your body was disrespected or you were told that you weren’t really good enough after all.  Because none of that is true.  But we’ve forgotten that.  We’ve actually bought into the story that we aren’t to trust anyone….that everyone is out to get us or at least to ride by us and ignore us when we are hurt and need them the most.

Be the person God created you to be when you were created in God’s very image.  When God called you by name. When God promised never to leave you.

God never said it would be easy.  Neither did Jesus and that’s why we are given the gift of the Spirit.

For the Hebrew people, their religious leaders had a code they were to live by.  It’s found throughout the Hebrew Bible, or the Old Testament.  It’s important to remember that this holiness code was designed for a specific point in time.  It offers some guidelines that are simply not pertinent to these days:  like not wearing clothing made of mixed fibers, or not cutting your hair, or stoning your children when they disobey you…all found in the book of Leviticus, from which we read this morning.  But what we read today offered a glimpse of God’s desire for care of the immigrant, who would be the ones gleaning in the fields….taking what was leftover in the vineyards.  God says we are to leave enough of what we have for the poor and alien….literally the poor and the immigrant.  And we are not to defraud our neighbor or make fun of the disabled.  It’s right there.  And we are not to show preference to one set of people over another, but we are to treat everyone justly.  It’s right there.  You shall love your neighbor as yourself.  It’s right there.   You shall love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.  It is all right there and a preacher and a people ignore these words in these days at our own peril.

Beloved children of God….we were created and fashioned for love.  That is our ultimate purpose.  We are fashioned after the one who IS love.  And dwelling in love and living in love and abiding in love for all of God’s children, even our enemies, especially our enemies, moves us a little closer to being the people God created us to be.   People who love God.  Love ourselves.  Love our neighbor.  And love our enemies.

This is the good news.  The truly good news for this day and every day.  Thanks be to God and let the church say…Amen.

 

[1] Rev. Brett Younger  www.baptistnews.com