Friday, April 19, 2013

Saying and Doing

I am off to Ohio for a session with the West Ohio Conference Lay Academy all day on Saturday, so I am trying to get this bible study done early.  Otherwise it would be late.  Or not done at all, and we can’t have that.  Can we? No, of course not.  The stars would fall out of then sky if I didn’t get this done.  The planet would stop spinning on its axis, mountains would be uprooted by the suspension of the laws of gravity, rivers would change their courses, cows would give birth to two-headed calves, and all the dogs would stop barking at once.

On the other hand, who would notice?  Not about the mountains and stars and two headed calves.  Though I would notice if the dogs stopped barking, might even be worth risking a suspension of gravity if the dogs wouldn’t bark at every thing that saunters down the path out our back door.  I mean come on, that squirrel doesn’t even care that you guys are going crazy in here.  That shake of its bushy tail is from laughing at you.  Get a clue!

Sorry, where was I?  Whose day would be ruined?  What catastrophe would occur? Who would notice if I didn’t get this done?  Well, I would notice.  It’s a commitment I made.  It is something that I do.  And while it might not matter in the greater scheme of things whether or not this was done, and I have missed some weeks for a variety of reasons, it still seems like honoring the commitment is better than relying on whims of the moment.  At least to me.  And maybe to Jesus.

I’ve wrestled with the passage chosen for this week, as have many others.  It is a part of the Sermon on the Mount, that great work we are listening to this Eastertide.  And yet it is a low point in a high point focused message.  Easily overlooked, and we mostly do.

In order to get through the whole Sermon in the weeks, I actually assigned a very long passage to this Sunday.  There is an internal coherence to the verses.  The sermon title I chose to tie them all together is “A  Faith of Our Doing.”  The Sermon on the Mount is where Jesus told us what life was like.  Not just the Christian life, but life.  And it involves doing, as well as being, as well as believing.  It is found in how we treat one another, in how we honor our commitments, in how we live in community.  A lot of good stuff, radical sometimes, but good stuff nonetheless.

Yet this section begins with what some might call a bit of a downer.  With something like legalism. Or does it?  Take a look.

"Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.  18 For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. 19 Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.  20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.  (Mat 5:17-20 NRS)

Did they hope that Jesus would say “no more law”?  Is that why this phrase got thrown in there?  I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the issue.  Jesus saw in some of his followers this tendency to a “whatever” kind of existence.  “Whatever feels good.”  “Whatever works.”  “Whatever sounds like a good idea, as long as no one gets hurt.”  That’s all.  That’s the law we have to worry about.

I don’t know if that was the problem or not.  But since Paul had to deal with folks who thought that way, it wouldn’t be a leap to think Jesus did too.  And so do we.  Maybe even in ourselves. 

If the law was there to keep folks in line until Jesus came, then we do we still need it?  Come to think of it, wasn’t there a desire to get rid of the law even older than Jesus?  Didn’t Ezekiel say something about that.  About not worrying about the law, but following our hearts?  Yeah, that sounds better to us.  “Use the Force, Luke.”  It is the subject of many movies, just follow your heart.  Doesn’t matter what everyone is saying, just follow your heart.  As if the heart is a better moral guide than any law.  Or that we don’t want to just be obedient to a law, we want to feel it - the rightness or wrongness.  We want to go with our gut.

That’s what we figure Jesus would do, since he was always on about love.  It sounds so much more emotive than legalistic.  Jesus came to set us free from bondage to sin, from bondage to the law.  Didn’t he?  Then why does he say, I’ve not come to do away with the law?  That not one letter, not one stroke of a letter shall pass from the law?  (Personally, I like the King James Versions “jot or tittle” - it sounds even more exacting.)

I have not come, says Jesus, to abolish the law, but to fulfill it.  What does that mean?  Does it mean that he comes to obey all the law so we don’t have to?  Does it mean that he comes to show us how important following the law really is?  Or, dare we hope, does it mean that he renders it unnecessary? 

Well, yes!  And no.  I think that what he meant was that as an external force that fences us in to behave in certain ways, the law is now done.  That is the bondage that we are being set free from.  That coercive, oppressive, keep folks in their place kind of idea that is just ripe for abuse on all sorts of levels use of the law is no longer in place and is in fact a contradiction of the message of the gospel.  That’s the yes in the rendering the law unnecessary. 

But there is still a need for the law.  But from a different direction.  Go back to look at what Ezekiel was saying. (Ch 11:19)  He wasn’t advocating doing away with the law, he was suggesting that God wants to bring it closer.  He didn’t propose that it be posted in the court houses or on the church lawns.  No, he wanted it written in our hearts.

Jesus doesn’t want the law to work outside in, he wants it to work inside out.  He came to fulfill the law, means he came to live it out in front of us.  He came with the law written on his heart.  He came motivated by God’s law - the same law he describes as loving God and loving neighbor.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus then proceeds to tell us what such a law does for human community.  From verse 21 Jesus defines law at work in the community. The law of love, he says, shows no hostility (5:21-26); the law of love is not predatory (5:27-30), the law of love honors the commitment of marriage (5:31-32), the law of love is unconditionally truthful (5:33-37), the law of love does not retaliate (5:38-42), the law of love extends to the enemy (5:43-48).  And then in Chapter 6, Jesus tells us that this law of love applies to worship in the community as well.  It applies to God and neighbor, both.

Law as law, as words, even spoke words, even believed words, doesn’t serve us at all.  But law as lived out in human community and in worship is transforming.  It makes us who we were created to be.  It makes us whole.  Jesus doesn’t want to do away with the law, he just wants us to live it.

Or better, he wants it to live in us.  To live through us.  As he lives in us and through us.  Because, Lord knows, we need the help.

Shalom,
Derek

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