Sermon: Odd Like God

Matthew 5:38-48; Leviticus 19:1-2

Odd like God

James Sledge                                                                                       February 23, 2014

There’s a Stephen Colbert quote about the US  being a “Christian nation” that shows up regularly on the internet. Unlike some internet quotes, this one is genuine. I know because I happened to be watching his show the night he said it. It was the very end of one of his hilarious bits, this one a Christmas piece that took on some comments by Bill O’Reilly about the right way for Christians to help the poor. In the course of the segment Colbert gets worked up over the possibility of Jesus actually being a liberal Democrat, leading him to the disturbing conclusion that it might indeed be necessary to take Christ out of Christmas. “Because,” he says, “If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn't help the poor, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we've got to acknowledge that he commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition and then admit that we just don't want to do it.”

Colbert offers a scathing commentary on the ease with which the label “Christian” is applied. In this case, he skewered conservative hypocrisy, but I think that his commentary cuts both ways. In fact, he might well have aimed his words at the church itself, saying something like, “If this is going to be a Christian church that expends most of its resources on itself and never risks its institutional life for those in need, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as self-centered as we are, or we’ve got to acknowledge that he commanded us to love our enemies, care for anyone who asks our help, and be willing to sacrifice ourselves for the sake of God’s new day and then admit that we just don’t want to do it.”

All too often, Christian churches have provided easy targets for those who label us “hypocrites.” At times we have even led people to believe that belonging to or going to church makes one Christian, regardless of whether their lives demonstrate Jesus’ commands.

I’ve actually heard sermons and read commentaries on today’s scripture saying that we don’t need to do what Jesus says. They suggest that Jesus gives us an impossible list of commands so that we will despair and turn to God’s grace and mercy. I’m a big fan of God’s grace and mercy, but I’m still quite sure that Jesus is serious when he calls us to love enemies, not resist the adversary who strikes us, and give to all who ask our help. He is serious when, as the Sermon on the Mount continues, he says that we cannot serve both God and wealth. He is serious when he says that what really matters is not whether or not we call him Lord, but whether we do God’s will.

Nothing in Matthew’s gospel indicates these teachings are not exactly what Jesus says they are. Jesus makes no apologies for the fact that following him is hard. And in the very last words he speaks in Matthew’s gospel, he commands his original disciples to go into all the world to make more disciples by baptizing them and by “teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you.”

Now some care is needed here. It is easy to make it sound as though Jesus tells someone being abused to stay and take it. It is easy to take Jesus’ words and create a faith community that beats up on those who don’t meet certain rigorous standards. But neither of these honor what Jesus is actually teaching: a way of life befitting a member of God’s kingdom, a life modeled on the one Jesus lived.

There was an elder in the church I previously served, a longtime member and leader in that congregation who took his faith very seriously. One time he came to me and wanted to talk about a new song we had begun using in connection with our prayer of confession, one that some might label “contemporary.” He was an older fellow and very traditional, so I assumed he was going to argue for a traditional Kyrie Eleison or such. Turned out, he was troubled by the wording of the song which went, “Change my heart, O God, make it ever true; Change my heart, O God, may I be like you.”

This elder believed that one should be reverent and deferential before God, and it bothered him to speak of being “like God.” I could appreciate that. There’s nowhere near enough awe and reverence in the church. Still, Jesus tells us to be perfect, like God. And in our Old Testament reading, God says much the same. “You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.” In other words, “Be holy, like me.”

Be holy. Be perfect. Be like God. That’s enough to scare anyone off. So why do both God and Jesus speak this way from the mountain top? “Perfect” seems especially problematic in our hyper competitive world that is forever telling people that they won’t measure up unless they have top grades, go to a great school, wear the best clothes, are thin enough or buff enough, make enough money, belong to the right group, and on and on and on. But Jesus isn’t speaking as the world speaks, and “perfect” may not be the  best translation. He is not talking about some unattainable, impossible standard that leaves us stressed out and anxious. He is actually talking about something more akin to maturity and completeness, about becoming the persons we are meant to be when we live the life we were created to live.

“Holy” may sound impossible, too, and it has all sorts of connotations of purity and religious sanctimony. But the word itself means to be set apart for special purposes. I once read an article that suggested a good synonym for “holy” is “odd.” Be odd like God. That sounds a little different, doesn’t it?

And Jesus tells us about God’s oddness. God gives the sun’s warmth to both the evil and the good. God sends life giving rain to both the righteous and the unrighteous, an oddness that we embody by loving enemies as we love our family, by refusing to react to insults and violence against us with violence of insults of our own.

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In the movie version of To Kill a Mockingbird, Bob Ewell is a white bully and drunk who falsely accuses a black man of abusing his daughter. At the racially charged trial that follows,  Ewell is humiliated on the stand by Atticus Finch, the defense attorney played by Gregory Peck. Enraged, he later threatens Atticus and tries to draw him into a fight. He taunts him, provokes him, and finally spits in his face. But Atticus will not take the bait.

I first saw the movie on television, somewhere in my middle school or high school years. In one of those seemingly random memories from youth, I vividly recall my father remarking when Atticus didn’t react after being spit upon, “That is what real courage looks like.” Perhaps, but compared to the Hollywood versions of courage I had seen, it looked pretty odd.

I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed, but Jesus was a pretty odd fellow himself, and he did everything he could to pass that oddness along to his followers, to us. Makes me wonder how Christian faith became so connected to the status quo and convention. How did we ever manage to depict Jesus as one who is conformist and normal? But with his words today, Jesus reminds us that he is neither, and he calls us to go against the grain, to be odd like God.

In the coming week, every single one of us will have multiple opportunities to practice such oddness. It may not be a scene worthy of Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird, but in our encounters with others, in the opinions we espouse, in opportunities to help others, in the words we choose to say, in our choices about how we spend our money, and more, we will have the chance to do as the world does or to act more as Jesus would, to be odd like God.

Oh, what an impression the church could make. Oh, what a better way we could demonstrate. Oh, what a difference we could make if we became known for such oddness.