Fulfilling the Law - Epiphany 6A

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill it.”

I’ve been having some interesting conversations with #JTwitter lately. For those of you not on Twitter, #JTwitter is short for “Jewish Twitter” and is a loose community of folks who are Jewish according to the Law but who span a wide range of religious praxis. Some are atheists but who are “halakhic” Jews – halakhic meaning “according to the Law of Moses.” Others are very observant religiously and most are somewhere in between. It’s both a birthright and a faith tradition. This separates Judaism from Christianity as Christians have no birthright definition but rather a mystical definition of being “in Christ.” While I’ve had many Jewish friends and rabbis as clergy colleagues, I’ve gained an insight as to how difficult it is to be Jewish in a dominantly Christian culture here in America. Anti-Semitism is on the rise in our country and acts of violence, from vandalism of synagogues to the Tree of Life massacre, are tragically becoming common place; but there is also a more subtle and insidious form of anti-Semitism done when Christians appropriate Jewish symbols and rites for their own purposes. This is an act of supersessionism – the idea that what comes after supersedes what came before.

In the history of Christianity, there has always been a vein of supersessionist belief that Jesus came as the “new and improved” form of Judaism to supplant or supersede it. These ideas rise from our very own scriptures. Consider the way John’s gospel repeatedly speaks disparagingly of “the Jews” and how he sets up “the Jews” as those who killed Christ. In truth, when you read John with a discerning understanding of history and context, his use of “the Jews” (capital “J”) references only the religious authorities, it doesn’t mean the Jewish people as Jesus and his disciples were all Jewish. Misreading our texts has led to those who consider themselves Christians justifying pogroms, banishment and even the Holocaust. There is much of which we need to repent and repair.

That said, there is also some mutual misunderstanding regarding repentance and forgiveness. I had an interaction with a JTwitter member who said they studied with the Jesuits and came to an understanding that Christians “forgive by proxy.” Their understanding was that because we ask Jesus for forgiveness, he provides forgiveness and we Christians are let off the hook for making personal amends when we sin against another person. They offered how the Jewish faith differed because the Law commands personal moral accountability and that amends must be made directly not by proxy. I found this both a fascinating and deeply troubling insight! I shared how Jesus didn’t come to abolish the Law, but I could see how there is a strain (especially in more Protestant corners of Christianity) to believe that asking God’s forgiveness is enough and we can ignore the moral precepts of Torah. I also offered that Jesus taught against ignoring the Law and gave us clear instruction about making personal amends. Today’s readings underscore this message.

In the Apocryphal book Sirach (also known as Ecclesiasticus), we hear “If you choose, you can keep the commandments, and to act faithfully is a matter of your own choice.” This underscores the deep understanding of the Jewish tradition which comes to us through Jesus, that we are moral people with moral agency. We have choices to make. We can listen to God’s ways and choose them or not. As Christians, we do modify this somewhat in that we understand the power of Sin is a power outside our control which leads us away from God’s intentions. However, just because this is true does not utterly strip you and me of our moral agency and your obligation to make choices in keeping with God’s ways rather than follow human ways. We still maintain moral and ethical obligations to do God’s will and not our own.

Jesus even said, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.” We heard that sentence as the conclusion to last week’s Gospel reading but I think it really should be the opening to this week’s because it leads into Jesus’ teaching. Jesus constructs his teaching on the law with a contrast: “you have heard that it was said … but I say to you …” In each case he takes a point of the Law: murder, adultery, divorce, and swearing falsely. He quotes the conventional teaching but then pushes his hearers to go deeper. Let’s just consider one of these teachings: the one on murder. Jesus says we need to go deeper because it’s not just about overt, premeditated, bodily killing – it’s about carrying anger and resentments which murder relationships. He urges us to make direct, not proxy, amends with those with whom we are at odds. He flat out says we are not to approach the altar of God with our gift unless we’ve made peace with others. Consider this observation from author Michael Hardin, in “The Jesus Driven Life,” on this teaching:

…the way of the Kingdom of God means that the way we relate to everyone changes. Not just our friends, but also those we despise and those who can’t stand us. It is not easy to love the unlovely. When we are attacked, we attack back, when we are threatened, we threaten. Our natural posture is defensiveness. This is true not only on a personal level but also on a political one. Have you ever noticed that when someone attacks you it is always unjust but when you ‘attack’ another it is always just?... Jesus says that to be angry is the same as murder. When you get angry the first thing you do is to have this sort of inane conversation in your head. They said this, I will say that, they will respond thus, I will have that response, etc. Notice how you always win this battle!

Jesus says that the Christian life does not consist of these mental battles. Instead we are to make peace in every way for “Blessed are the peacemakers.” More than that, retaliation is not an aspect of Christian existence. When Christians (not people in general) are hassled or persecuted, it is not part of their calling to "get them back." Christianity is not a gang where if one member is suffering at the hands of rivals, it sends out its members to get the other gang. Instead we are called to "love our enemies." How different would the world be today, if so-called Christian America had, instead of announcing war after 9/11, offered forgiveness?

How different would it be? Jesus’ teaching reinforces our obligation to make hard, moral choices and live the Law at a whole new level. We dare not presume to shirk our responsibility to the Law by presuming God’s grace will automatically absolve us of wrongdoing. The twin cosmic powers of Sin and Death which doom us to annihilation have been broken through Christ’s saving work on the cross, but this does not give a Christian a “free pass” to do whatever they want and ignore the Law’s call to live reconciled lives. You and I are called to be more, to go deeper, and to do the hard work of laying aside our easily bruised egos and make peace with each other. This is our moral and ethical responsibility and call which comes to each of us through our baptism. Will we have the courage to “strive for justice and peace among all people and respect the dignity of every human being”?

The Games God Doesn't Play - Epiphany 5A

Epiphany 5A - Isaiah 58:1-9a, Matthew 5:13-2

Oh the games people play now
Every night and every day now
Never meaning what they say now
Never saying what they mean.

And they wile away the hours
In their ivory towers
Till they're covered up with flowers

In the back of a black limousine
La-da da da da da da da
La-da da da da da de
Talking 'bout you and me
And the games people play.

Some of us are old enough to remember this top of the pops 1969 song from Joe South, "Games People Play". It’s been my ear worm this week as I returned from the Gathering of Leaders conference in Albuquerque. Our theme this year was “Stewardship: Money in the Missionary Church” and we had a number of presentations about money following mission and the challenges of the 21st century. One of our members, the Rev. Paul Fromberg – rector of St. Gregory of Nyssa in San Francisco, gave a presentation that caused me to remember this song. In that presentation he talked about the human games God doesn’t play. What does that mean?

In an intersection between sociology and the Gospel, he talked about our assumptions as humans that how we live is how things have always been believing our current reality is eternal instead of recognizing how much is made up human stuff. We even confuse how we think it’s always been with God’s blessing – especially when the systems we invent are working in our favor. That got me thinking about Walter Brueggmann's work on the common good and how our belief in our human made up systems become closed ideologies. When we carry closed ideologies about how things are based on our experiences, members of a society can be very defensive when you challenge those ideologies. Brueggemann defines the work of a prophet as speaking truth to closed ideologies so their lies can be exposed, and the Holy Spirit can enter and remake us anew. One of the major human games we play is the money game. In America, our closed ideology is that our money game of capitalism has always been the way economic things are and it is the best economic system – even blessed by God.

The reality is capitalism is not “how it’s always been” – as an economic model humans made up! It’s only about 450 years old. Prior to that and overlapping its development was the system of barter and trade which was highly relational. The growth of capitalism as a dominant economic engine came in the early 16th century on the heels of Pope Alexander VI issuing the Papal bull “Inter Caetera” which initiated the Doctrine of Discovery. This doctrine provided the spiritual, political, and legal justification for colonization of lands not inhabited by Christians. As European countries colonized the world, they claimed land for exploitation and enslaved native populations all in the name of wealth and fueling a nascent capitalistic economy. Capitalism worked very well for the European conquerors, but it relied on the enslavement of Black and brown bodies for labor – and it still does. Even here in the United States, human labor trafficking is big business and the continued legal system of slavery of incarcerated persons allowed by the 13th Amendment in the Constitution has continued the disproportionate enslavement of African Americans and Hispanics.

Many of us are beginning to hear the term “late stage capitalism” as what we are experiencing now. It describes a form of capitalism where large, multi-national corporations are dominating the economic systems around the world and controlling more and more of the resources, to the neglect of people and the environment. Paul shared how this impacts his context in San Francisco where there is a huge homeless population while simultaneously the city has 30,000 vacant housing units. Those 30,000 vacant housing units are owned by corporations and absent owners who are disconnected from the community and don’t care about the neighborhood. In truth, capitalism is a human money game which one day will collapse. This money game is one God doesn’t play.

Now, some of you may be thinking I’ve gone from preachin’ to meddlin’ but I’m going to take a risk of going just a bit farther on the matter of our closed ideologies and talk about another game God doesn’t play: God doesn’t play our governance game of representative democracy. Right now, we are experiencing a period of deep anxiety about the future of our republic and whether our democracy will remain intact. We’ve all be raised with “God Bless America” and the belief that our democratic form of government is the best way of guaranteeing freedom. Well, I’m not so sure we are as free as we like to think we are. When I look around and see active, blatant voter suppression robbing people of their agency, that doesn’t look like freedom. When I see young people saddled with student loan debt that’s the size of a home mortgage and even with a good paying job, there’s no way they can pay off their student loans, that looks like economic oppression not freedom. When unarmed Black men are gunned down by police, that doesn’t look like freedom. When our elections are subject to foreign interference and their integrity not secured, that doesn’t look like freedom. When corporations are considered “persons” who can make huge donations and buy the candidate of their choice, that doesn’t look like freedom, or democracy for that matter. Democracy is a human made construct – it’s a game God doesn’t play.

Here’s one more: God doesn’t play the game of religious rituals that don’t change and transform us into doers of God’s will. Doing whatever we want and then engaging in religious rituals hoping God will bless us is exactly what Isaiah is talking about in today’s lesson from the 58th chapter of his prophecy. In relaying God’s voice, Isaiah tells the people:

“Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day, and oppress all your workers. Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to strike with a wicked fist. Such fasting as you do today will not make your voice heard on high.”

God is not playing human games. Fasting and the wearing of sackcloth don’t mean anything if we continue to follow our ways and ignore God’s priorities. It’s as true for us as it was for the Israelites. God doesn’t care if you go to church and take Communion if that isn’t changing you.

So what is God’s game? Isaiah lays it out quite clearly:

“to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?”

The righteousness of God has everything to do with relationship, regardless of the human money, political or religious games in play. Breaking down injustice, releasing the oppressed (no matter what the form of oppression is), feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless poor, clothing the naked, building relationships across our divisions – this is God’s game.

It’s the work we are called to when Jesus speaks of us being salt and light for the world. When Jesus speaks of the salt losing its saltiness, we have trouble understanding what he’s talking about. But in his day, salt was used as a catalyst in the community cooking ovens to keep the fires burning. When that salt’s catalyzing capacity wore out, it was taken out of the oven and thrown out. Jesus’ point is we are to be the catalyst to keep the vision of the kingdom burning and alive. Isaiah names the signs of the kingdom and God’s priorities, Jesus tells us we are to be the catalyst that ignites the work of the kingdom on earth no matter what human games surround us.

In Baptism, you and I were claimed and marked as Christ’s own forever. Each week in the Eucharist we are reoriented to offer our lives as living sacrifices to embody the signs and work of God’s game and not our own. God’s call to a different kind of fast in Isaiah is a call to fast from the human games that hurt, oppress and exploit God’s beloved. It is a call to trust we are beloved of God and that we have been given everything to be the catalyzing salt to bring the light of Christ to the world in real tangible ways for the healing of the world.

New Year, New Call, New Blog...

The wardens and vestry of Grace Episcopal Church in Brunswick, MD have called me to be their Priest-in-Charge ... effective December 1, 2011. Yes, beginning a new call right before Christmas was a bit like dropping into a perfect tube on Hawaii's north shore ... and hoping you don't get slammed into the coral below! BUT, all is well, Christmas is behind us and now in Epiphany-tide we celebrate the Light of the World coming into our lives.

My sermons from Grace are now being posted on their site - hence the new tab at the top! Come by and visit and see what we are up to ... and read some sermons while you're there.

I will keep this blog going with occasional postings but the weekly ones will be on Grace's site.

Pointing to Jesus - Advent II 2011

Is there a teacher you vividly remember? Was it the one who could keep you awake during those after lunch lectures? How about the one who believed in you when you didn’t really think you could master solving for x in algebra? I remember one … because he worked us like a dog! It was my freshman English teacher – Mr. Kurth at Edison High in Huntington Beach. I hated that class – I really did! I came to appreciate that hard work later, but in the moment it was no fun at all! He has us write what are now called “BCRs” or “brief constructed responses” every … single … night. And the BCRs were about the short stories of … Ernest Hemingway. Maybe it’s a chick thing, but I did not like Ernest Hemingway. I know his novels are different, but I just couldn't stand his short stories! They drove me nuts. He’d drop you into a scene like a commando landing behind enemy lines – no introduction, no back story, just PLOP! you fall into a boat fishing or in a duck blind or something like that. And I didn’t know diddly about fishing or hunting or running with bulls or any of that Hemingway stuff. I just didn’t get it! And you’d read these stories and just about the time you think you know what’s going on … POOF … it was done. No ending, no resolution … just as abruptly as you fell into the fishing boat, you were done … outta there … kind of like being raptured out of the story! And I’d be left thinking, “Whoooaaa! Wait a minute … what just happened?”

So in light of my history of reading Hemingway it may not be much of a surprise to you that Mark has never really been my favorite gospel. I gained an appreciation for it in seminary, but it always reminded me of Poppa Hemingway. Maybe Poppa learned his trademark abruptness from Mark. Mark throws you into the action right away … PLOP! … right into the wilderness with John the Baptizer – a “man’s man” who lives in the wilderness, wears animal skins, eats bugs and honey, and calls people to repentance. Just the kind of guy you’d invite to your next shee shee cocktail party, right? … yeah … sure …

John is a truth teller who paves the way for Jesus. But he’s the kind of guy that makes you uncomfortable. He asks hard questions. He condemned Herodias for divorcing Philip to marry Harod … and he lost his head for that one. But for some reason, Mark tells us that people from the big city, Jerusalem, and all the Judean countryside were going out to the wilderness to confess their sins and be baptized by John. In some ways this is a repurposing of the traditional Jewish mikvah bath – a ritual cleansing done before going to the Temple (and most often done by women who were routinely considered “ritually unclean”).

John’s baptism is about confession and repentance; but Jesus, the greater one who comes after John, does not talk about confession at all. In fact, this is the only time Mark uses the word “confessing.” Perhaps this is because John’s mission was to bring about confession and repentance in order to prepare the way. Our Orthodox sisters and brothers call John the "Forerunner" ("the Baptist" isn't his last name). As a forerunner, his role is to get people prepared for the coming of the Christ. Confession and repentance open the heart to hear the message of the one who is greater.

John’s role and ministry, according to Mark, were to prepare the way for Jesus. While John clearly has a strong following of all these folks coming from miles around to be baptized, he realizes the message isn’t about him – it’s about preparing for Jesus. He clearly points to Jesus when he says, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals.” John may be a rough character, but his heart is open and he knows his message is about something much bigger than himself. He knows it’s not about him!

Many years ago, my father warned me about believing my own "press." He told me there would be people who think I'm terrific and want to put me on a pedestal and others who would think I'm lower than dirt - neither are true - the truth is somewhere in the middle. John was clear - he didn't let the "press" about his ministry make him into an egomaniac. He didn't move off the message of pointing to Jesus.

John serves as an example to us in our ministry – and no, I’m not talking about a need to adopt the bugs and honey diet. Our ministry is not about us either … it’s about the one more powerful than us. We can lose sight of that because of our egos. Our need to be right, to have our egos affirmed, believing our own "press" or even going to the other extreme of believing ourselves unworthy or unqualified to minister on behalf of Christ – all of these point to ourselves and not to Jesus. John knows himself, his message, and his place – and all of his being is pointing to Jesus.

As we continue to prepare for Christ’s coming in our hearts, ask yourself – to what, or to whom, does your life point? Does it point to the one more powerful than you? In this season of preparation, we are invited to open our hearts through confession and repentance so that we might better be able to point to Jesus.

Advent 1 - 2011

Well, we’ve made it through Thanksgiving and survived the insanity of Black Friday. The world outside is now preaching a message of deep discounts on wide screen TVs, the “perfect gift” for Christmas, “every kiss begins with Kay,” buy this or buy that and life will be complete … and then you come to church and hear about stars falling from heaven, the sun and moon darkened … essentially the End of All Things. Sounds like “Captain BuzzKill” just reported for duty with a message of doom and gloom for all! Either Christians are the most dour and depressing people on the face of the earth, or perhaps … just perhaps … something else is going on – and I’m putting my money on the second option.

The first Sunday in Advent always … ALWAYS … begins with the end – the END of all things. This is a reminder that God is Alpha and Omega, the beginning and end, and it points to the paradox of our faith where the first is last and the last is first. Our Lectionary Year B which features the Gospel of Mark is no exception to this pattern. I think it’s unfortunate that narratives about the end of all things have been co-opted by elements of the religious right best known for rapture theology and the “Left Behind” series of books. They seem to have hijacked the whole message about the apocalypse to the point where it makes most Episcopalians shudder to think about it. Let me put it on the record that the rapture, also known as dispensational theology, is a creative and selective reworking of Scripture. It essentially teaches that the second coming of Christ will snatch up and take to heaven all the true believers and all children under 12, because evidently your twelfth birthday is when you start on the Road to Perdition. Then Christ will leave and there will be a 1,000 year reign of the anti-Christ – a time of terrible tribulation for those left behind. Then, after 1,000 years, Christ will come again and take up the survivors of the ordeal who now believe in Jesus – and for those who don’t … well there’s always eternal damnation. Now if you pick up your Bibles, I dare you to find anything in them which indicates there will be a “third coming” of Christ – it’s not there. We declare in our Eucharistic Prayer A that “Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again” – not “Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again … and then leave and then come again.” Rapture theology sounds like some kind of celestial escape plan which frankly is pure, unadulterated heresy. There … I’m on the record ... it's heresy.

We do need to take apocalyptic literature like Daniel, Isaiah, and Revelation seriously but we need to put it into some perspective. First, the word apocalypse is one that carries a sense of foreboding – and for those of us old enough to remember the movie, you’re probably envisioning helicopters and hearing the strains of Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries in your heads right now. It’s a scary word … right? But is it really? Apocalypse comes from the Greek word apocalypsos – which means “revelation.” Hmmm … yes, the name of the last book in the Bible is Apocalypsos tou Ioannou – the “Revelation of John.” It means that which is hidden is revealed. In fact, we could say that Jesus himself is an apocalypsos – a revelation of God’s self to a hurting human world. When we think of its real meaning, apocalypse loses some of its frightening connotations.

The second thing which can be troubling about apocalyptic literature is the certainty of those who adhere to rapture/dispensationalism that the images contained in these books are 100% speaking to our place, time and culture. As if these writers were somehow clairvoyant in their ability to predict the future and speak to it. I remember being in a youth group with a young man who attended a conservative evangelical college and he had the whole Book of Revelation figured out! All of the allusions and images were totally explainable in terms of current geopolitical realities … and the number of the Beast – “666” – was, in fact, representing ... the Soviet Union. I always wanted to ask him how that works now that the Soviet Union is no more.

You see, the writers of apocalyptic literature, and even Jesus, were not magically able to predict the future. These writers were not writing for us sitting here in the 21st century. They didn’t predict the European debt crisis, the Arab Spring, or the Green Bay Packers being 11 and 0 for the season (who could have predicted that?). These writers were writing for their own people, place and time – and addressing their current social situation. So what was going on when Mark wrote his gospel?

From its structure and word usage, it is very likely this gospel was written between 66 and 70 AD – during the time of the Jewish-Roman War. During this conflict, the Jewish rebels tried very hard to get the Jewish Christians to take up arms with them and fight the Romans – but the Jewish Christians refused. This refusal became a wedge between the early Christians and Jews. The Romans were expelled from Jerusalem and Galilee by the rebel forces until Emperor Tiberius ordered General Vespasian to put the rebellion down and put Jerusalem to the torch. Tiberius ordered the Temple destroyed – except for one wall for the Jews to grieve over (this is the Western Wall – or Wailing Wall – still standing today). Estimates are that up to a half-million people living in Jerusalem were killed by the Roman army and when the army was finished, Jerusalem lay in ashes and would be uninhabited for 40 years thereafter.

Why did the Christians not take up arms and fight alongside the Jewish rebels? Perhaps it was because the teachings of Jesus had warned them of false messiahs, false messages, and the danger of misplaced trust which we call Sin. Early Jewish Christians were not centering their worship in a place - they centered it in a person, Jesus Christ. And this serves as a warning to us today.

We humans have a tendency to project God’s favor or wrath into our own earthly causes quite liberally. And yet Jesus' life and ministry show that the divisions cause by earthly causes are not sign of the kingdom of God. We live in an increasingly polarized culture where people want to believe they are doing “God’s will” even when their very actions spread division, discord, and even hatred of anyone opposing their beliefs. Jesus’ ominous message tells us that war and division are not where we are to look for God among us.

Rather than viewing this Scripture as “doom and gloom,” I think we can view its message as one of hope – hope because it reminds us that the powers of this world do not have the final word. Jesus’ admonitions to “be alert” and “keep awake” are a call for us to be more keenly aware of the presence of God among us right now – often in places and people we don’t expect and certainly not in human conflicts. My daughters have spent the last few summers going on mission trips with Group Workcamps and the kids are advised to be alert for “God sightings” – those places where we see God’s presence or even those times where we’ve been Christ for another. As we prepare this Advent for the coming of Christ – Emmanuel, God with us, let us keep awake and be alert to where Christ is showing up right now, right here, right in our midst – and especially where we least expect it.

2011 - Feast of Christ the King

The end is here! No, not the “capital E - end of all things End.” Today is the end of the church year – the Feast of Christ the King – and we hear about sheep and goats. The bulletin cover today shows the icon known as Christos Pantokrator – Christ the All Powerful. This icon has been copied many times and the oldest known version of it is found in St. Catherine’s Monastery, Mount Sinai in Egypt which dates from the early 8th century. I chose this for the cover because it connects with our gospel reading today. Cover up the left side of Jesus’ face (his left, your right). Take a good long look – how would you describe the expression on Jesus’ face? Gentle? Peaceful? Kind? Now switch and cover the right side of Jesus’ face. Different, isn’t it? How would you describe the expression on his face now? Harsh? Angry? Notice which side evokes which expression – kind and peaceful on the right (where the sheep are) and harsh and angry on the left (where those goats are). This icon, in part, represents the separation of the sheep and the goats in today’s gospel text.

Now, what is up with the sheep and goats? Why favor the sheep? A friend of mine sent me this reflection from Rev. Fr. Victor Spencer who lives in South Africa:

One thing has always puzzled me about this gospel: why do goats get such a bad press from Jesus? I’ve lived in rural Africa for most of my life and know both sheep and goats well. A couple of comments in sermons suggest that sheep and goats are difficult to tell apart. I can only suppose that such comments are made by urban people who have never seen either in real life.

In fact, goats are superior to sheep: more intelligent, less suicidal, better milk, more self-sufficient, less diet-conscious. Sheep are silly creatures: run on the road in front of traffic, straying blindly and unable to find their own way home, starving while standing in long grass. So, in Jesus’ parable, why are the goats consigned to perdition and the sheep to paradise?

So, the silly sheep who are stupid and fumbling along without a clue are favored and the goats who are intelligent, self-sufficient and seem to have their act together are rejected. Where does this leave us?

From what Fr. Spencer has shared about goats and what our culture in America values (things like self-sufficiency and intelligence), it seems to me that most of us fall into the “goat” category, don’t we? The goats seem to represent the values of this world and the needs of our egos for self-sufficiency and achievement. This is the realm of believing that we can “make it on our own” and when we retrofit that belief onto our spiritual life, religion turns into some sort of “merit system” of doing the right things so we can earn “brownie points for Jesus.” The goat in each of us hears this teaching about “doing for the least of these” as a checklist of things we need to do (“Feed the hungry. Well I donated to the food bank. Check! Cloth the naked – yep, got that one too! I gave some gently used cloths to Goodwill.”). When we do that, we miss the whole point of this story!

Jesus doesn’t give us a checklist of “to dos” in this teaching. Instead, he wants us to set aside our own ego needs and humble ourselves to be with the hungry, naked, imprisoned, homeless, infirmed and dying. This is what the sheep do – remember they have little to nothing to bring into a relationship. They aren’t smart, they aren’t self-sufficient, their suicidal tendencies leave them in peril – they bring empty selves into relationships. It’s the sheep who have the humility to companion the last, lost, little, least and lifeless. The clever goats are so full of themselves there isn’t any room for the other … certainly not the other who is broken and hurting.

It’s taken me a long time to get this. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not bashing achievement and hard work – we need to work hard but perhaps we need to hold achievement a bit more lightly. That’s hard for me – I’m an eldest child and a one on the enneagram – which means I tend to be an insufferable perfectionist (and my husband can tell you I can beat myself up pretty well). What I am saying is that achievement, self-sufficiency and hard work are not the “be all and end all” of life. That’s idolatry and we’re really good at that in our culture.

My work in hospice really taught me a great deal about journeying with people and bringing nothing for that journey. What could I possibly do for a dying person? What could I possibly say? Nothing … at least initially. My patients taught me that just being with them was enough. I didn’t have to be smart or self-sufficient or have credentials and degrees … I just had to show up, hang out, and listen.

Dying people have the healthiest egos of anyone on the planet precisely because they’ve let go of them. They are out of the achievement rat race. They are no longer self-sufficient. That really hit home for me the first time I had to help our nurse change a patient’s diaper – yes, a diaper. We all recoil and think “Oh Lord, don’t let that happen to me” but I have news for you – unless you die suddenly, it will happen to you. We think it would be embarrassing or shame filled … but that patient (and many others thereafter) accepted my help with grace – even saying “thank you” when we finished our work. Achievement and self-sufficiency will pass away – grace filled relationships grounded in humility will not.

Jesus invites us into relationships grounded in humility. So don’t be tempted to think this teaching is another merit system of spiritual achievement or even a condemnation that you haven’t done “enough” for the least among us. Instead, see it as an invitation to go beyond achievement, leave self-sufficiency behind, and learn to be with the last, lost, little, least and lifeless. They have much to give you … but you can’t receive their gifts if you are already full of yourself.

Proper 26 - Year A - October 30, 2011

 "...do whatever they teach you and follow it; but do not do as they do, for they do not practice what they teach."

What in God’s Name is the Son of God thinking? In his teaching to the disciples and the crowds, Jesus tells them to listen to the scribes and the Pharisees and do as they teach but not as they do. This sounds like the old “do as I say, not as I do” admonition which, as any parent knows, is a recipe for leadership disaster. In fact, the phrase “do as I say, not as I do” was coined by 17th century English jurist John Selden in a work published after his death entitled Table Talk. In it, Selden is quoted as saying: “Preachers say: Do as I say, not as I do. But if the physician had the same disease upon him that I have, and he should bid me do one thing, and himself do quite another, could I believe him?” Selden’s question speaks to the importance of the congruity between words and actions.

Jesus seems to say that the Pharisees are not congruent in their words and actions – they do not do what they teach. However, the inference in scripture is that the Pharisees generally do follow their teaching – remember Paul reciting his credentials to the Philippians a few weeks ago? “As to the Law, I was blameless.” Scripture witness seems to show the Pharisees following the Law quite meticulously and in light of Jesus’ other accusations it is likely Jesus is talking about something else.

Jesus’ critique of the religious professionals of his day continues as he speaks of their practices which are being done to “be seen by others.” Actions such as making a big deal out of their religious garb (the phylacteries worn on the head and arms which contained the Shema within them and the fringes on their prayer shawls), taking the seat of honor at public events, and to have others treat them with respect. In essence, Jesus says they are doing this for the wrong reasons – they are self-serving and in it for their egos.

The ritual clothing and distinctive practices of the Pharisees were not inherently wrong. Phylacteries and fringes were intended to draw the mind and heart of an observant Jew back to God. In Roman occupied territory, not only were other religions present but the Romans encouraged a tolerant syncretism which would seek to incorporate the worship of the local deity or deities along side of worshiping the emperor and Roman gods. This syncretism shows up in our culture when people say things like “it really doesn’t matter what you believe because we all worship the same god.” The Jewish answer to that was “No, we don’t all worship the same god” and I would say this is true for Christians today too. So distinctiveness is not a mark of exaltation as being better than as much as it is a mark to help us understand who we are and whose we are – and to respect the very real differences between faiths and cultures.

Unfortunately, distinctiveness can be twisted into being a sign of “better than” whether we want it to be so or not. In the early days of the English Reformation, there was a huge debate about the use of vestments. Known as the “Vestments Controversy,” it pitted bishops who were against the “wearing of popish rags” against those who sought to preserve the traditions of the Church. Bishops who were against the use of vestments argued that the wearing of vestments caused clergy to inappropriately elevate themselves over the laity – an accusation which for some may be true. Bishops who supported the use of vestments argued that clergy were set apart for distinct service – no better than laity, but different than laity – and vestments were a sign of one’s service.

Jesus is teaching his disciples and the crowds about the issue of authenticity. His issue isn’t with the words, or distinctive practices per se – it is about the motivation behind them. If distinctiveness becomes a vehicle for exaltation, then our motivation is not of God. If titles become a means of exercising power over people instead of empowering others, then our motivation is not of God. If we are seeking the justification of our egos instead of setting them aside to serve others, then our motivation is not of God.

Our catholic tradition upholds the importance of self-examination. We do it every week when we confess our sins in worship. We also have the sacrament of reconciliation – also known as confession. Jesus’ teaching today is grounded in honest self-examination and repentance. This rite is important because it calls us to examine our words and actions but more importantly to examine our motivations behind our words and actions. Are my words incongruent with my actions? Are my words or actions based on what’s best for me and my ego or are they seeking the best for the community? Are my words or actions self-serving or God seeking? These are questions each of us must revisit over and over.

Jesus teaches us the paradox that those who are greatest are servants – or as Fr. Richard Rohr says in his latest book Falling Upward, “The way down is the way up.” Only when we let go of our ego need to be special and exalted by others will we be truly free to live for God and for each other.