Deuteronomy 30:15-20, 1 Corinthians 3:1-9, Matthew 5:21-37
I believe I’ve said this before to start a sermon but I’m going to say it again! I do not like rules! Rules are not my friend and honestly, I believe rules are created to be broken! When I was two years old, I made up a really fun game. My parents weren’t too fond of this game and still share this story with a twinge of embarrassment every time they re-tell it. So, when I was two years old, I thought it was really fun to run as fast as I could into the wall. My dad would pick me up and say “Now, Laura you can’t run into that wall or you will hurt yourself.” But in my vastly complex two-year-old brain all I heard were rules that were meant to be broken so I continued time after time to run into the wall and find it funny! My dad says that there is no where in the house that he could put me that I wouldn’t find my way back to running face first into the wall.
I thought that this rule of “no running into the wall” didn’t need to apply to me as it was clearly fun, and I wasn’t getting hurt. That was… until the last time I ran into the wall after multiple runs at this fun game by dad picked me up and watched my eyes roll to the back of my head as I had just knocked myself out from too many runs into the wall. My parents are still mortified about the conversation they had to have at the hospital with the social worker as they attempted to explain that yes their two-year-old wouldn’t listen and yes that two-year-old willingly ran into the walls so many times that they were knocked out! The moral of this story is that I don’t tend to enjoy rules and often require that they have good reasoning before following them!
So, as you might imagine when I first read through our texts for today, I was mad! Look at all of these rules and requirements that seem to have no basis but to make peoples lives harder! I was so annoyed as I read rule after rule and command after command. In Deuteronomy we find these phrases: “I command you… If you do this… you will not survive… You will not live long… by obeying God’s voice.” And in the Psalm, “do no wrong… I will obey your statues.” 1 Corinthians, “you are still infants…nonspiritual” and last but certainly not least the Gospel of Matthew! “subject to judgement… subject to fires… pluck it out… cut it off… commit adultery… not to swear oaths… say what you mean!” This is some pretty harsh language. These rules that we read in our scripture this morning are not only harsh, but they probably condemn each and every person in this room right now!
I complained almost the whole week about these texts, just ask Pastor Julie! I struggled to find the good news in the midst of those harsh phrases, and I was not inspired by a list of rules set before me in four different ways. When I talk to friends who no longer attend church or meet people who are wary of church folk, they often say how condemning the church is or the Bible. How they or their friends aren’t welcome and when I read this text at face value, I can see why that is the feeling some folks hold about Christianity. Rules, and obeying, and commands in extreme ways! Ways that don’t seem to align with our culture today. None of this seemed like good news and it didn’t seem like these texts were life giving in any way.
After I got over being mad about these texts, I started to think about the context in which they were written. Whenever I get mad at the Bible it helps me to remember the context in which it was written and think about what might have been happening in society for such rules or laws to exist or be spoken. When our texts this morning are placed into context, I don’t find what is being said here so harsh after all.
When we talk about why Jesus came to Earth and died it is often said that Jesus came to fulfill the law not abolish the law. Now, being averse to rules I would have appreciated some abolishing to have happened, but I think there is something more at stake here when we talk about Jesus fulfilling the law. The law isn’t something that was and now we know nothing of it anymore but rather it has been fulfilled in life-giving ways. We know Jesus wasn’t much of a rule follower himself but there was a reason for that!
In Deuteronomy, Moses is setting up ways to live and keep land as he is preparing folks who have been in exile for years. They are preparing to return to a land they know very little about and Moses wants them to be as successful as possible. Moses doesn’t even want to run the risk that they might experience exile again so he offers some commands that will offer life instead of death and destruction.
Paul is writing his letter to new Christians in Corinth. Paul wants to ensure that this new Christian church is off to the right start, but he starts to hear that these new Christians are claiming to belong to Paul or Apollos rather than God. Paul urges these new Christians, through some harsh language, not to stake their claim on human beings but rather reminds them that we all belong to God not human beings.
And now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for! The gospel. As I said earlier this gospel text took me many days to understand and parse through. I didn’t understand what could be life giving in this law being set before us and why this law couldn’t just be abolished.
In my frustration with this text I called one of my seminary friends to hash it out with them. We began to talk about how great the sermon on the mount was going for Jesus! He was blessing people the society refused to acknowledge, he was telling us we are light and salt. I mean Jesus was really on a roll with some beautiful things! And then he should have just stopped! Why did Jesus need to keep going with that sermon?!? I am sure there are times when you have heard a sermon and thought, “oh that would have been a great ending place” and it just keeps going, right? Well, not here of course but other churches you’ve visited I’m sure!
But, should Jesus have stopped? As we first read this text it seems that Jesus takes this drastic turn from blessings to condemning and setting up harsh laws to live by. But this is how my friend and I visualized it. Jesus is walking around preaching his sermon on the mount and as he is preaching those beatitudes, he is looking each of those people in the eye. Blessed are you right in front of me for yours is the kin-dom of God. Jesus is looking at all sorts of marginalized and outcast folks in the eyes and telling them they are blest. Then he continues and says you all right here are light and salt! Then, off to the side of this mountain as Jesus is expressing these beautiful words there is a group of men saying, “Hey, Jesus! What about us!!” “Over here Jesus we want blessed too!” Jesus takes a deep breath and looks in their direction and says, “Oh don’t you worry I’m coming for you.” And that’s where we show up with this morning’s gospel text.
Now, you can trust me on this as someone who doesn’t like rules, but Jesus isn’t setting up these rules just for fun. He isn’t attempting to make life stricter but rather he wants you to live freely. Jesus is preaching against structures. Structures that were instituted by men without the concern of all people in mind. These rules set before us in this gospel text are not necessarily things people intentionally set out to do. We do not eagerly take people to court to seek justice. We do not get married with the intention of then being divorced. If our world was not so backwards, I bet we would not even have to swear oaths for we could just trust the word of all people. So, please hear me say, if you have been divorced and remarried you are not going to hell. If you have ever been to court for any reason, you are not going to hell. This text is often used out of context to condemn folks in the harshest way and that is so out of line with the intention of this text so please breathe deep knowing that you are always encompassed by the love of God even when the bible is misused!
Jesus is not condemning people to hell but rather calling out these structures as harmful and destructive. When we get to the basics of it Jesus is calling out unchecked male power. He is calling out the patriarchy. He is calling for structures that are more life giving. Jesus does not place the blame on the marginalized or those hurt most by these structures. He doesn’t tell women to dress more modestly rather he tells men to pluck out their eye and throw it away if they look lustfully at others. I think it is important to note in other translations it only names the man as an adulterer if he marries a divorced woman because in that time a woman without a husband has no power, no agency, no money, therefore men knew it would be easy to take advantage. Jesus was no stranger to the ways in which these structures he speaks of benefitted men and gave them power.
In our day and age these rules seem harsh and condemning but when we place them back into context, they are actually the same decrees we need today. We need Jesus on a mountain side telling men that their unchecked power is massively hurtful and destructive. We need Jesus on a mountain side saying, I see you “Me Too” movement and it isn’t your fault. We need Jesus on a mountain side calling out the patriarchy that holds on with an iron fist to age old structures of power and privilege. We need Jesus to break down these harmful structures and offer to us life-giving ways for he wants us to live life and live it abundantly. Let us choose life and success together knowing that “we are coworkers with God” and we can speak truth to power just as Jesus did on that mountain side. Amen.