Sermons and thoughts on faith on Scripture from my time at Old Presbyterian Meeting House and Falls Church Presbyterian Church, plus sermons and postings from "Pastor James," my blog while pastor at Boulevard Presbyterian in Columbus, OH.
Wednesday, September 27, 2017
Sunday, September 24, 2017
Sermon: Imagining a New Reality
Matthew 20:1-16
Imagining a New Reality
James Sledge September
24, 2017
I
was still in elementary school Elvis Presley’s movie career ended, but his
movies ran on television regularity when I was growing up, and I probably saw
most of them. I can’t say that I recall very much about them. Elvis didn’t
really make cinematic masterpieces, but there is one that made a bit of an
impression on me.
I
don’t remember the name of the movie or the larger story line, but I do
remember a court hearing where an unscrupulous child welfare worker tries to
take away the adopted children in an odd, extended family where Elvis is a adult
son. Most vividly I recall two, young, twin boys among these adopted children. I
didn’t remember their names, but thanks to the internet, I now know they were
Eddy and Teddy.
In
a recurring gag, these boys have to share a candy bar. I could have this
backwards, but we’ll say Eddy would always break the bar in half, but not
actually in half. One piece was always significantly larger. Naturally Teddy
noticed this inequity and complained about it. At which point Eddy would bite
the extra length off and hold the two pieces up again, satisfying Teddy that he
was now getting an equal share. Near the movie’s end, Teddy figures out he’s
being scammed. And during the court hearing, when Eddy pulls the trick yet
again, Teddy grabs the two pieces from him, bites off the extra length himself,
and hands one of the now equal parts back to Eddy, with the judge as an
astounded, sole observer.
Now
I have my doubts that any real child would have taken as long as Teddy to
figure things out. In my experience, issues of fairness are pretty high on
children’s radar from an early age. “That’s not fair,” is a common childhood
lament, and most parents have to deal with the “fairness” issue from time to
time.
Did you ever wonder why children become
so concerned over whether or not a sibling of friend got a bigger slice of cake
or a bit more ice cream? If I have a tasty slice of cake, why does it really
matter if anyone else’s slice is a little larger? Why is this a fairness issue?
Sunday, September 17, 2017
Sermon: Absurd Love - Absurd Community
Matthew 18:21-35
Absurd Love – Absurd Community
James Sledge September
17, 2017
The
problem of needing to know more about a scripture passage’s context in order to
understand it has showed up so frequently of late that I wonder if we don’t
need a Bible version of that real estate adage, “What are the three most
important things in real estate? Location, location, location.” Except our
answer would be “Context, context, context.”
Take
today’s reading. It’s not a stand-alone parable. Our verses are the final
lesson in a larger set of teachings, the last big teaching moment Jesus has
with his disciples prior to Jerusalem and the cross. That says something about
their importance. And because Matthew uses private moments with the disciples for
Jesus to speak directly to the Church, that says something about how important
these words are for us.
There
is an interesting ebb and flow in these teachings. They start with Jesus saying
that we must become like children to be part of God’s kingdom, that those who
are humble like a child are called greatest in the kingdom. Jesus then shifts
from actual children to “little ones,” a phrase that speaks of those new to
faith. Here the emphasis is about how terrible it is to cause a little one to
stumble, and about the great lengths we must be willing to go to avoid
stumbling ourselves. Jesus goes on to say how important these “little ones” are
to God, telling the parable of a shepherd who leaves the ninety-nine sheep to
find the single lost one.
Jesus
then shifts gears, insisting that this community also be a place that holds its
members accountable. He lays out a method for confronting those who sin. Meet
privately first. If that doesn’t work, a few members should speak to the
person. If that fails the entire congregation gets involved, and finally, the
offender is to be cast out.
It
is in this context of holding community members accountable that Peter speaks
in our reading this morning. Quite likely Peter is thinking of the elaborate
process Jesus has described of confronting offenders alone, then with a few
members, then before the congregation. Perhaps Peter has in mind some difficult
folks he worries will abuse this process. They’ll cause trouble and resist
correction until they’re on the verge of being thrown out. But later they’ll go
back to their old ways, and the process would start over again. Surely there
have to be some limits to this. “Is seven times enough, Jesus?”
Monday, September 11, 2017
Mixed Feelings
Like most Americans born prior to the early 1990s, I can recall where I was and what I was doing when I first heard that an airliner had struck one of the twin towers in New York City. Now comes another 9/11, and people are remembering. My Facebook feed is filled with posts of pictures labeled "Never Forget," tributes to first responders and those who died, and calls for God to bless America.
I must confess that I experience mixed emotions as I remember. Some 9/11 memories are horrific and terrifying, but they are not the cause of my mixed feelings. It is important to remember failures and sufferings in order to prevent their happening again. My jumbled feelings are more about what happened in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.
Take the frequent refrain of "God Bless America." I hope God does bless America, but in a 9/11 context that request often seems to include an unspoken corollary. "And curse our enemies." We might well expect God to be against those who commit horrendous acts of terror, but that's different from God being pro USA. As a verse from this morning's psalm says,
The LORD is good to all,
and his compassion is over all that he has made. (Ps. 145:9)
The God becomes a flag-draped, star-spangled God, we have abandoned the God of Jesus, of the Bible, and embraced a tribal idol.
On a more positive note, many recall the days after 9/11 and wistfully remember the pause in the bitter partisanship that has come to dominate American politics and life. For a brief moment, the shared crisis overcame division. In similar fashion, the desire to help recent hurricane victims can momentarily bring disparate folks together in common cause for good.
Our coming together post 9/11 did feel good, but it had an element not found in response to natural disasters, an enemy. Having a common enemy can be tremendous unifying force. Osama bin Laden was as much the enemy of Democrats as he was of Republicans, of liberal as conservatives, and the threat he posed dwarfed the enmity between political parties, making it seem trivial for a time.
Sometimes we humans seem to need enemies. They provide an "against" by which to define our group, and enemies are often a more powerful, unifying force than anything our group is "for." Fear is a powerful motivator, and enemies merit fear. But fear is also a great manipulative tool, especially when used to inflate a true enemy or even to create one where none exists.
Following 9/11, some felt the need to make an enemy out of all Islam. It made things simpler, neater, and for Christians it had the added benefit of making our group the "good guys" and theirs the evil enemy. Creating such an enemy proved so compelling that many embraced the idea despite a complete lack of logic of facts to support it.
Enemies, especially those deemed mortal enemies, lose their humanity to some degree. Their deaths become necessary, even a good thing to be celebrated. When all of Islam becomes the enemy, the death of civilians ceases to matter so much. The same thing happened with Nazis and Japanese during WWII. Wholesale slaughter of civilians was seen as acceptable.
I wonder if Jesus' commands us to love our enemies because he wants to undermine our ability, our apparent need and desire, to demonize "the other." If we took Jesus seriously and truly saw our enemy as another neighbor to love, how might things look different? Put another way, if America actually were a Christian nation, how might our post-9/11 response have been different?
And so, on 9/11, I will engage in somber remembrance and reflection. I will mourn for those who died, for those who continue to die from terrorist attacks, and for the many more civilians who have become "collateral damage" in our war on terror. I will hope for lessons learned that may prevent future 9/11s, and I will pray for peace in the world. And I will wonder if the world, or Christians for that matter, will ever actually embrace the way of Jesus.
I must confess that I experience mixed emotions as I remember. Some 9/11 memories are horrific and terrifying, but they are not the cause of my mixed feelings. It is important to remember failures and sufferings in order to prevent their happening again. My jumbled feelings are more about what happened in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.
Take the frequent refrain of "God Bless America." I hope God does bless America, but in a 9/11 context that request often seems to include an unspoken corollary. "And curse our enemies." We might well expect God to be against those who commit horrendous acts of terror, but that's different from God being pro USA. As a verse from this morning's psalm says,
The LORD is good to all,
and his compassion is over all that he has made. (Ps. 145:9)
The God becomes a flag-draped, star-spangled God, we have abandoned the God of Jesus, of the Bible, and embraced a tribal idol.
On a more positive note, many recall the days after 9/11 and wistfully remember the pause in the bitter partisanship that has come to dominate American politics and life. For a brief moment, the shared crisis overcame division. In similar fashion, the desire to help recent hurricane victims can momentarily bring disparate folks together in common cause for good.
Our coming together post 9/11 did feel good, but it had an element not found in response to natural disasters, an enemy. Having a common enemy can be tremendous unifying force. Osama bin Laden was as much the enemy of Democrats as he was of Republicans, of liberal as conservatives, and the threat he posed dwarfed the enmity between political parties, making it seem trivial for a time.
Sometimes we humans seem to need enemies. They provide an "against" by which to define our group, and enemies are often a more powerful, unifying force than anything our group is "for." Fear is a powerful motivator, and enemies merit fear. But fear is also a great manipulative tool, especially when used to inflate a true enemy or even to create one where none exists.
Following 9/11, some felt the need to make an enemy out of all Islam. It made things simpler, neater, and for Christians it had the added benefit of making our group the "good guys" and theirs the evil enemy. Creating such an enemy proved so compelling that many embraced the idea despite a complete lack of logic of facts to support it.
Enemies, especially those deemed mortal enemies, lose their humanity to some degree. Their deaths become necessary, even a good thing to be celebrated. When all of Islam becomes the enemy, the death of civilians ceases to matter so much. The same thing happened with Nazis and Japanese during WWII. Wholesale slaughter of civilians was seen as acceptable.
I wonder if Jesus' commands us to love our enemies because he wants to undermine our ability, our apparent need and desire, to demonize "the other." If we took Jesus seriously and truly saw our enemy as another neighbor to love, how might things look different? Put another way, if America actually were a Christian nation, how might our post-9/11 response have been different?
And so, on 9/11, I will engage in somber remembrance and reflection. I will mourn for those who died, for those who continue to die from terrorist attacks, and for the many more civilians who have become "collateral damage" in our war on terror. I will hope for lessons learned that may prevent future 9/11s, and I will pray for peace in the world. And I will wonder if the world, or Christians for that matter, will ever actually embrace the way of Jesus.
Sunday, September 10, 2017
Sermon: Wearing Jesus
Romans 13:8-14; Matthew 18:15-20
Wearing Jesus
James Sledge September
10, 2017
The
first church I served as a pastor was in Raleigh, North Carolina. It was part
of New Hope presbytery, and I served on the presbytery’s mission committee. One
of the issues facing us was a call to participate in a boycott of the Mt. Olive
Pickle Company.
The
cucumber growers in eastern North Carolina used immigrants in the “quest
worker” program to harvest the crops Mt. Olive used to make pickles. These
migrant workers moved from place to place, following the harvest seasons up the
coast. The wages were low, and the conditions in the camps that the growers
provided were often appalling. But the workers had little recourse other than
to return to their home country.
The
boycott emerged through the efforts of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, or
FLOC. They wanted to Mt. Olive to buy only from growers who paid a decent wage
and provided minimal working and living conditions. But Mt. Olive said they
couldn’t do that. They did not buy cucumbers directly from the growers. In a
system that seemed to serve little purpose other than to provide for such an
excuse, growers sold cucumbers to grading stations that in turn sold to Mt.
Olive. They could then say, we don’t deal directly with any growers. How can we
tell them what to do?
And
so FLOC called for a boycott. The National Council of Churches, which many
mainline denominations belong to, got on board, and so New Hope Presbytery’s
mission committee met with representatives from FLOC, Mt. Olive, and others in
order to make a recommendation to the presbytery about whether or not to join
the boycott.
We
held a Saturday event in the town of Mt. Olive, at Mt. Olive Presbyterian
Church, where various folks spoke for or against the boycott. One of the
stronger voices against was the pastor at Mt. Olive Presbyterian. Pickle
company managers and executives were faithful members there, and their pledges
kept the church going. This, he claimed, meant the church had no right to
criticize their employer. The denomination, he said, had no business judging
their employer or them. They were people of faith who supported their church.
What right did the church have to turn around and criticize their means of
earning a living?
The
presbytery didn’t agree and ended up supporting an, ultimately, successful
boycott. But Americans often do view faith as a private matter of the heart,
not open to judgment, even from the church. This idea showed up in last year’s
presidential election. Pope Francis commented on a proposed border wall, "A
person who thinks only about building walls... and not of building bridges, is
not Christian.” Candidate Trump fired back. “For a religious leader to question
a person’s faith is disgraceful. I am proud to be a Christian. No leader,
especially a religious leader, should have the right to question another man’s
religion or faith,”[1]
I
suspect a lot of Americans, even ones who don’t like President Trump, tend to
agree, but Jesus and the Apostle Paul do not. Jesus makes clear in today’s
verses that the faith community should confront members who live contrary to
his teachings. It is to be done as kindly as possible, seeking reconciliation
and restoration, but it must be done. Previously, in his Sermon on the Mount,
Jesus said that calling him Lord does not matter if you don’t do God’s will. “By
their fruits you will know them,” he says. That raises an interesting
question. What is it that Christians are known for?
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