Sermon text - Invited into Blessedness

Exodus 20:1-20

Invited into Blessedness

James Sledge                          World Communion-October 2, 2011

Even in a world where less and less people attend church or participate in any sort of religious community, most people know about the 10 Commandments.  They may not be able to name them, but they’ve heard about them, seen pictures of tablets with Roman numerals on them, perhaps with Moses holding them.  And they've likely heard of the court cases over whether or not the commandments can be displayed on public buildings. 

Now I have no interest in talking about the proper boundaries between church and state, but I do think that dragging the 10 Commandments into our culture wars both trivializes and misunderstands them.  I hear people say that placing the 10 Commandments on a courthouse wall is appropriate because they’re the basis for our civil law, but that only makes me wonder if they’ve have actually read them.  Only three of the ten correspond to laws that we enforce.  And our culture is grounded on violating some of them.

24/7 is a big catchphrase in our society.  Factories run 24/7 because it’s inefficient to shut down.  Some stores and restaurants stay open 24/7, and those that do generally advertise that fact proudly.  And even those who do attempt to keep Sabbath still expect stores, movies, gas stations, and places to eat to stay open for them.  We can’t even imagine a society where everyone stopped and rested for a full 24 hours.

And if we have subverted Sabbath with our 24/7 culture, we have actually made coveting a cornerstone of our economy. 

Every day we are bombarded with advertising, much of it designed to make us covet.  Our economy depends on convincing enough of us that we need more and more, that if our neighbor has newer and better stuff, we should want it.  And we should be willing to go into debt, worry constantly about money, work more hours, and become stressed out so that we can have it.

The fact is that the 10 Commandments are not primarily a set of rules for a well run society.  That societies need laws against stealing and murder, and to insure that justice is based on the truth is so obvious that all sorts of folks have figured this out.  Cultures that never heard of the 10 Commandments had rules against murder, theft, and false witness.

No, what is distinct about the 10 Commandments is not a few commonsense laws.  It is the different sort of society envisioned in those other commandments.  Like the Kingdom Jesus proclaims, the 10 Commandments describe an alternative community very different from the world that we live in.

This radically alternative community is perhaps best seen in those opening commands about other gods, idols, and misusing God’s name.  These commands do not form the basis for any civil law.  Rather, they stand as an alternative to the distorted cultures and societies that we humans construct.

“God bless America.”  The phrase is spoken regularly by politicians left and right.  It was a hugely popular song during World War II and still is today.  On the face of it, asking God’s blessings on our nation seems perfectly appropriate.  But while I do hope God blesses America, I’m sure that in our asking, we frequently transgress some of those opening commandments, perhaps all of them.

If that startles you, I’m not surprised.  Many of us assume that the first few commandments are not that hard to keep.  After all, we don’t live in a world where there are that many god choices.  No temple to Baal or Zeus or Artemis down the street, and the only idols many of us have seen are in museums.  And while language has gotten a lot coarser in recent years, many of us try not to take God’s name in vain.

But in fact, these opening commandments are about where our ultimate trust and loyalties lie, and who we think is really in charge.  In the world where the 10 Commandments are given, “other gods” were about hedging your bets, insurance.  Many Israelites thought they could worship Yahweh, and still offer a little something to the local fertility god just to be on the safe side, to insure that the grain would produce.  We don't put much stock in fertility gods, but we know all about hedging bets and insurance.

For ancient Israel, idols were often a part of this insurance, but the prohibition against idols isn’t just about other gods.  It prohibits images of any kind, including ones of Yahweh.  Yahweh is not like other gods.  Yahweh will not be managed or used.  Yahweh will not be packaged and brought out when needed.  Yahweh remains mysterious, unpictureable, undomesticated, wild and free.  Israel can only conform to Yahweh, not the other way round. 

Taking Yahweh’s name in vain emphasizes this.  Our translation gets much closer to what the Hebrew actually says.  “You shall not make wrongful use of the name of Yahweh your God.”  This issue here isn’t foul language.  It is seeking to enlist God in our causes.  But this God will not be enlisted.  Yahweh will not bless Israel or curse her enemies to suit Israel’s plans, nor will Yahweh bless America or curse our enemies to suit our plans.  Yahweh is not on call.  Rather Yahweh calls Israel to find new life according to God’s plans.

In the same way, Jesus does not follow along with us, promising to bless us or make things go well for us because we believe in him.  Rather, Jesus invites us to follow him along a way that the world thinks foolish, a way of self-giving that loves the neighbor, even when that neighbor is our enemy.  He invites us to join him in the way of the cross. 

I think I’ve shared with you before something my wife has posted on our refrigerator door.  It’s a quote the singer Bono used at a Washington, DC prayer breakfast some years ago.  "Stop asking God to bless what you are doing.  Get involved in what God is doing because it is already blessed.”

In the 10 Commandments, in the call of Jesus, we are invited into the blessedness that God is already doing.  It is not a blessedness that easily conforms to our plans or desires.  It is a blessedness experienced in Sabbath, in the realization that the world is safely in God’s hands and will not spin out of control if we stop and truly rest, if we disconnect, if we become quiet and still.  It is a blessedness that comes in aligning our lives with God's promised new day, with the hope of a new, restored world, a world we enact at the table. 

At the Lord’s table, all are invited: the well, the sick, the poor, the stranger, the American, the foreigner, every race, family, and tribe.  At the table, all are one; all are guests; all are welcome.  At the table, Jesus is our host, and he does not honor the divisions of the broken world that we construct.  At the table, all boundaries between us and them disappear. 

This table is the promise that God will not leave the world to our foolishness nor be drawn into our petty schemes.  Instead God graciously invites us into something wonderfully new, a transformed world governed by love, a world where the Holy Spirit reshapes us so that we become like Christ.  Come to the table; come from east and west, north and south, from every land, race, and culture.  Come to the feast.  Come and be made one in Christ.

Spiritual Hiccups - Choosing and Unchoosing

I vaguely remember a children's song based on today's gospel reading.  It had a line that repeated several times.  "The wise man built his house upon the rock..."  And there was a corresponding line that went, "The foolish man built his house upon the sand..."  I can remember the catchy tune, but I'm pretty sure the lesson of the song was lost on me.  Oh I heard that you should build your house on rock and not sand, but I'm not sure I made any real connection to faith.  Object lessons and metaphors are generally lost on concrete-thinking children.  Of course I'm not sure all that many adults have bought into Jesus' message.  We may sing of Christ as our solid rock, but we are sometimes quite good at ignoring what he says is a solid foundation, to hear his words and act on them.

It isn't that we don't want help from Jesus finding something solid and dependable in life.  Many of us crave a sense of stability and certainty.  We live in a world where many of the things we've counted on seem unsure.  Everything is changing, and not always for the better. 

Jesus certainly offers us plenty of specifics.  Today's reading is the conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount, and in it Jesus has clearly laid out how we are to live, teaching on everything from personal piety to money to forgiveness to the law to judging others to putting God first in our lives.  He says that actually doing his teachings will anchor our lives firmly, but in our day, it is easy for Jesus' teachings to get lost in a dizzying array of other voices and choices.

Americans have long been big on individualism and have valued making our own choices.  Nonetheless, the number of choices now facing us are mind boggling compared to 50 years ago.  There used to be an old joke about getting phone from the phone company (the only place you could get one way back when).  It went, "You can have any color phone you want as long as it's black."  I didn't have any choice about going to church as a child, or as a teenager for that matter.  And the culture I grew up in worked pretty hard to limit the other available choices on a Sunday morning.  The stores weren't open, the movies weren't showing, no sports were played, and you would get dirty looks from your neighbor if you cut your grass.

I have not desire to go back to those "good old days,"  but we do face a difficulty that some previous generations did not.  To choose Jesus we have to unchoose some other things, many other things actually.  And we live in a culture that constantly tells us we can have more and more, that we should have more and more.  Our TVs get hundreds of channels.  We flip around with our remotes trying to watch multiple shows at one time.  And the TV manufacturers are trying to help us, bringing out new models that show two, three, four programs at once.

Even when we want to follow Jesus, so many other things beckon us.  I'll take home a book I know I should read but then I don't want to miss that TV show, and I need to get to bed and rest but Colbert is on.  And I need to spend more time in prayer but another email just came in on the smartphone, and I need to check in on Twitter and Facebook or I might miss something. 

Parents over-schedule their children in sports and enrichment activities because they are afraid that those children might miss out on something valuable, on something they could need.  But Jesus talks about narrow gates and hard roads, about living in a particular way, which of course means not living in some other ways.

I sometimes wonder if a problem people have with Christianity is less that they don't want to choose Jesus, and more the realization that they don't want to unchoose all those other things.  Yet every choice requires unchoosing other options.  To choose one person as a spouse effectively eliminates millions of other possible choices.  Choosing to have children means to unchoose some other possibilities.  (Though we all know people who attempt to ignore these realities, who keep dating after they marry or take infant children with them to bars, fancy restaurants, and sporting events.)

I wonder if some of us aren't so frazzled all the time because we know well how to choose, but we've become very unpracticed at unchoosing.  No wonder our lives sometimes feel like they're falling down around us.  I wonder what things I need to unchoose in order to get my life on solid ground, on a firm foundation.

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Spiritual Hiccups - Walking the Walk

There is a quote from comedian Stephen Colbert making the rounds on Facebook today.  If you don't know Colbert, his Colbert Report features him of the host of a half hour comedy/"news" show where Colbert parodies conservative talk show hosts.  But while he feigns being an avowed, right-wing reactionary, in reality he is much more moderate.  And he is also a devout Catholic not afraid to let his faith make an appearance on the show (though often found in the opposite of the ridiculous things his character says). 

The line on Facebook was from a show a while back, and it 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."

Perhaps quite appropriately, today's gospel reading features Jesus saying, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.”  It seems that "believing" in Jesus, if it does not lead to a changed way of living, does not count for much in the new day Jesus says he will bring.  At least according to these words, we can believe as hard as we want, but if we don't do God's will along with it, Jesus will say to us, "I never knew you; go away from me, you evil doers."

We Protestants have championed grace and faith over works to the degree that we sometimes act like what we do doesn't matter at all.  Jesus clearly thinks otherwise.  God's grace does claim us no matter what we have done, does invite us into restored relationship through no merit of our own.  But God's love and grace are given to us to draw us into a loving relationship with God where we will quite naturally show our love and gratitude in return.  If we truly love God we will want to please God, and will make efforts to do so.  But if we are simply "believing in Jesus" because we think it will get us something, we've missed the point entirely.

I suspect that some of the malaise and decline of traditional churches comes in part because there has not been enough evidence of new life, of walking the walk, for people to see much point in church.  I know a lot of long time church members who ring their hands a great deal over the declining number of people in the pews.  And being paid by people in pews, I confess to a certain amount of anxiety about this as well.  But if our congregations are not walking the walk, not doing God's will in the world, I don't know why God would not just leave us do our little thing, and pour out the Holy Spirit on those congregations and gatherings that are actually helping people find new, restored, Spirit-filled life as the living body of Christ in the world. 

God is working God's purposes out, but God does not need my denomination or yours to do so.  The body of Christ will still thrive, but it will be found wherever the faithful answer Christ's call, are equipped by the Spirit, and seek to do God's will in the world.  And the hope of God's coming Kingdom will continue to shine in the darkness.

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Spiritual Hiccups - Can God Rise Up?

“Because the poor are despoiled, 
   because the needy groan,
     I will now rise up,” says the LORD."

 Can my God "rise up?"  Can yours?  Or is my God simply a concept, a hope, a distant giver of blessing and perhaps life after death, but not a God who can rise up and defend the poor or correct wrongs?  Given some of the things sometimes attributed to God, such as Pat Robertson saying God sent an earthquake to Haiti as punishment for a deal with the devil, many Christians are understandably reluctant to see God actively at work in the world.  But what, then, can our God do?

If many modern Christians have little sense that God could or would act on the world stage, I'm not certain if that is the fault of the Church or of God.  Certainly the Church has contributed mightily to notions of a God interested in little more than our status when we die.  Certainly the Church has neglected Jesus' teachings on the Kingdom and our call to form people to show that Kingdom to the world.  But God can be awfully hard to spot at work in the world.  It is not surprising that very few people, even avowed Christians, are expecting God to act on behalf of the poor and needy and punish those who have neglected them.  I'm pretty sure the poor and needy would come in for a lot better treatment if people really thought God was paying attention on that count.

Of course this isn't simply a modern issue.  Perhaps we do find it easier to see God absent because we can understand the science behind earthquakes or hurricanes, but the fact is that people in biblical times were not so different from us in thinking God had taken a vacation.  The Old Testament is full of accounts where the rich and powerful lived with no worries about God stepping in and stopping their exploitation of the poor.  Sure, some of the prophets warned them that God's patience was running out, but no one had seen God do anything to back up such warnings in a long time. 

To be honest, I don't know why God acts - or more often doesn't act - in the manner often seen in the Bible and in our day.  If I were God, things would be different, but obviously I'm not.  And surely God knows what God is doing.

So what does faith look like in times when we have trouble seeing God at work in the world?  Is it simply a personal, interior thing?  I know folks who assume so.  Is it simply a matter or getting my beliefs in order so that I'm "saved," meaning that my name is on the heavenly guest list?  I know quite a few folks who think so.  Or is faith the assurance that God will act in God's time, and so living in expectation of that time?  As Jesus when he promises that God will grant justice to those who cry out, "And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?"

Do we believe that God can rise up, that God can stir Godself and correct and restore a broken world?  And if we do not, what exactly do we believe in?

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Spiritual Hiccups - Worry, Anxiety, and Priorities

We live in anxious times.  People are worried about the economy.  They are worried about terrorism.  They are worried about partisan gridlock focused always on the next election and rarely on doing what is good for the country.  And I have observed something over the years.  We are rarely at our best when we are worried and anxious.  We become reactive and lose some of our capacity for thoughtful decision making.

One of the interesting places this can be seen is in small, dying church congregations.  The closer a congregation gets to death, the higher the anxiety tends to be.  And while this worry may provide an incentive to do something, observation and research have shown that the closer a congregation draws to death (similar things can be said of many other institutions), the more difficult it becomes for it to do the things that might help it revive.  When a congregation gets anxious and worried about survival, its actions tend to exacerbate rather than cure its crisis.

Jesus seems to think that worry comes from a lack of faith.  It is the product of chasing after things that cannot really give meaning and life, or it is an inability to trust that God will provide.  Our culture has worked very hard for decades to create the first kind of anxiety.  Much of the advertising aimed at Americans is designed to create anxiety, an anxiety that will be alleviated if only we purchase this product or that.  But as soon as we buy into this, we're hooked.  There is always one more product, or a newer and better version of the one we just bought.  And of course our very economy itself is now dependent on this anxiety cycle.  It requires ever increasing levels of consumer spending to sustain itself.

I wonder what Jesus would say to us if he came today?  The people he spoke to, telling them not to worry about what they would eat or drink or wear, lived in a more subsistence economy, with most people more focused on daily bread than on building wealth or deciding between a 40 inch or a 52 inch flat screen TV.  And what does it mean for us when Jesus says, "But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well."?  Will we get our new TV if we focus more on God's work?  Or do we stop worrying about TVs altogether when we are focused on building the world God envisions?

I do enough worrying of my own that I have a hard time answering such questions.  So perhaps I should simplify things by instead asking what it would look like for me to strive for God's kingdom and righteousness, and letting the other stuff sort itself out. 

Think how freeing that might be, to find a driving purpose in life not set by advertisers and not designed to hook us into a never ending cycle of consumption.  Think how good it might be to measured on nothing more than our faithfulness to God's cause.  Think how freeing from stress it could become content with God' provision.  I wonder if I can do more than think about it.

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Sermon audio - Remember Who You Are

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Sermon text - Remember Who You Are

Philippians 2:1-13

Remember Who You Are

James Sledge                                       September 25, 2011

Mohandas Gandhi, the famous Indian leader who led a non-violent campaign against British colonial rule in his country, is often quoted.  I see his quotes pop up on Twitter and Facebook with some regularity.  “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.”  “An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind.”  And here is another, “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” 

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.

The quote from Paul and the one from Gandhi seem incompatible.  If Christians have the mind of Christ then how could we be so unlike Christ.  And yet there is a ring of truth to what Gandhi said.  Too often, we Christian do look very little like Jesus.  Too often no one would see us and think they had caught a glimpse of Jesus, even though that is precisely what it means to wear the name “Christian.”

When you meet people from another country or culture, especially when it is a place you have never been, you are likely to draw some conclusions about that country or culture based on the people you meet.  The same is true when we Americans travel abroad.  The way American tourists act in foreign countries gives the people there an impression of what America is like. 

Gandhi was not a Christian, but he lived in a country that had been ruled by Christians for hundreds of years.  What he saw clearly had not impressed him all that much.  But Gandhi had bothered to learn about Jesus from the Bible, and so he realized that he liked Jesus very much.  It was Jesus’ followers that bothered him.  It reminds me a bit of the funny but troubling movie and book by Dan Merchant, Lord, Save Us from Your Followers.

In his letter to the Philippian Christians, Paul is pretty clear what it looks like when we have the same mind that was in Christ Jesus.  We do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, we regard others as better than ourselves, we worry about other people’s needs more than we do our own.

I’m not sure we need Paul to tell us this.  If we know the story of Jesus at all, we know that he cared little for earthly possessions, that he spent much of his time caring for others, that he hung out with the bottom tier of society, that he warned over and over about the dangers of wealth, that he was non-violent and called his followers to love their enemies and “turn the other cheek,” that he gave himself for others even to the point of death on a cross, and he called his followers to embrace this self-sacrificial way of the cross.  We know all of this, so why don’t we look more like Jesus?

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.

I suppose one possible reason that we’re not more like Jesus is that it seems to us an impossible task.  If Jesus was sinless and perfect, what chance do we have to be the same?  I don’t think Paul expects the Philippians or us to become sinless or perfect, yet it is clear he thinks we can become very much like Christ.  And this is not simply a matter of us trying harder.  Rather it is about the new life that comes to us in Christ.

When Paul urges the Philippians saying, “If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, make my joy complete,” he is insisting that encouragement in Christ, consolation from love, and a sharing in the Spirit are indeed available to us.  The word translated “if” in our reading is a Greek form implying that this is indeed true.  Some translators even prefer to render what Paul writes, “Since there is encouragement in Christ, consolation in love, sharing in the Spirit,” and so on.

And this isn’t the only interesting translation issue in our verses.  When Paul quotes an early Christian hymn about the nature of Christ who did not regard equality with God something to be exploited but instead emptied himself, he introduces it with that phrase, Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.  But this could just as well be translated, Let the same mind be in you that you have in Christ Jesus. 

Given the way Paul often speaks of how we become something new in Christ, I actually think this the more likely translation.  Paul is not urging the Philippians or us to try harder to be like Jesus.  Instead he is calling them and us to live out who we actually are.  The good news that Paul declared long ago to the Philippians is they have become new people in Jesus.  They have died to sin and be reborn to new life.  God is now at work in them, enabling them both to will and to do the things that honor God.  Paul is not simply giving a motivational pep talk.  Rather he is urging them, and us, to remember who we truly are.

I was at a pastor’s conference a few weeks ago, and in one of the presentations they played a clip from the Disney movie, The Lion King, my pick for the all-time best Disney animated film.  If you've never seen it, the story revolves around Simba, the cub of the lion king, Mufasa.  Simba is heir to the throne, but Mufasa's brother Scar, the villain in the story, hatches a plot where Mufasa is killed and Simba is convinced that he is to blame for his father’s death.  Racked with guilt, Simba runs away into self-imposed exile, leaving the pride to the evil rule of Scar. 

In the clip played at the conference, Simba’s old girlfriend comes to plead with him to return, to take his place as king and overthrow Scar before it is too late.  Simba resists, but with help from Rafiki, a mandrill who is a kind of priest, prophet, and wise sage, he has a vision of his father.  Voiced powerfully by James Earl Jones, Mufasa tells his son, "You have forgotten who you are, and so you have forgotten me... Remember who you are." 

Emboldened by the promise that his father Mufasa dwells inside him, Simba, no doubt with fear and trembling, returns to take his rightful place.  Remembering who he is and what that calls him to be and do, he restores the lion kingdom back to the peace and harmony it knew under Mufasa.

When I watched that movie clip, Mufasa’s words to his son grabbed me and would not let go.  "You have forgotten who you are, and so you have forgotten me.”  I could not shake the sense that this was spoken directly to me.  It was as if Jesus was speaking to me. “You have forgotten who you are, and so you have forgotten me.”  And if we have forgotten who we are in Christ, no wonder Gandhi says, “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians.”

Of course the good news is that correcting this situation is not about us mustering up tremendous courage or remarkable fortitude and commitment.  Correcting this situation is instead about remembering.  Remember that in your baptism you were joined to Christ and the Holy Spirit now dwells within you.  Remember that in Christ the power of sin over you has been broken, and you are able both to will and to do that which honors God and reveals Christ to the world.  Remember, God is at work in you.  Look inside yourself, and remember who you are!

Spiritual Hiccups - My Heart Is Appalled

This morning's paper is filled with good news.  The struggling economy has moved scores of people below the poverty line, with African Americans particularly hard hit.  That same struggling economy shows little signs of life.  And late last night, the state of Georgia executed a man named Troy Davis.  Executions have become run of the mill in recent years, garnering little media attention, but significant questions about the actual guilt of Troy Davis thrust this case into the media spotlight.

As I take all this in, and as I read more articles about how "fixing" our national and state budgets will lead to big cuts in programs affecting those already hit hardest by this economy, I find myself resonating with this morning's psalmist. 

  Therefore my spirit faints within me;
        my heart within me is appalled...
  Answer me quickly, O LORD;
        my spirit fails.
  Do not hide your face from me,
        or I shall be like those who go down to the Pit. 

Sometimes I wonder where God is in all of this.  Where is the God who other Psalms insist rescues the oppressed, executes justice against the wicked, and delivers the needy?  Where was God as Troy Davis was killed last night?  If Davis was truly innocent, my question only burns more.  Where was God?  Which recalls another death penalty case nearly 2000 years ago where an unjustly convicted man cried out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" quoting yet another Psalm.

I take some small comfort in Jesus' promise that God's blessing and favor are on those who "hunger and thirst for righteousness," who are pained by the injustices of the world and long for something better, but it is very small comfort.  I do not feel much blessing from God this morning. 
  Answer me quickly, O LORD;
        my spirit fails.

Answer me please, O God.

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Spiritual Hiccups - Understanding Life

I've been out of town a couple of days because of the untimely death of a cousin of mine.  He wasn't religious at all, and so there was no funeral as such.  People did speak at the funeral home visitation and again at a celebration held at a bar.  The owner closed down for the night and provided food and drinks for all who came; I'd guess more than 200.

My cousin was not a long time resident of this town, and this made the huge outpouring of love for him all the more pointed to me.  Quite a few people spoke about meeting him when he went out of his way to help them out in some fashion.  On one occasion he even fished a woman's keys out of a port-a-Jon. 

As such stories were shared, I found myself thinking about Jesus' words on the judgment of the Gentiles in his final public teaching from Matthew 25:31-46.  In these verses, Jesus seems to be speaking about how outsiders are judged by whether or not they fed the hungry, cared for the sick, welcomed the stranger, etc.  Jesus insists that in so doing, these people from outside the faith community ministered to Christ himself.

I was still thinking about how my non religious cousin had really found a home and community in these last years, how his life seemed to be more of a calling, when I read Paul's words in this morning's epistle reading from 1 Corinthians. Paul seems to be clarifying instructions from a previous letter that have been misunderstood.  "I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral persons — not at all meaning the immoral of this world, or the greedy and robbers, or idolaters, since you would then need to go out of the world."  He goes on to talk about how it is only those who call themselves Christians that Paul expects the community of faith to shun for behavior not in keeping with biblical law.  They are not to judge outsiders.

Yet it seems to me that we Christians are forever getting Paul's instructions backwards.  We pass judgment on the world while ignoring the patently un-Christian behavior of those in our churches, including our own.  Paul finds it particularly mind boggling and horrendous that Christians would sue one another in court rather than working out differences within the community of faith.  When's the last time you heard of people with grievances against one another asking a pastor or church governing board to mediate a settlement and reconciliation?

I'm not sure where I'm going with all this.  I'm still struggling with feelings of loss and grief at the stunning loss of my 47 year old cousin who was also a husband, father, brother, son, uncle...  It also gives me pause regarding my own mortality, my own relationships, and so on.  But at times over the last few days, I was struck by the notion that my cousin understood and "got" life better than I do. 

I am fully convinced that being "in Christ" is about being as fully human as possible, as true to what it means to be alive as is possible.  Yet I regularly see people outside the Church who seem better at being alive and human than I am.  Surely that has to say something to me and to the Church. 

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Sermon Text - It's Not Fair!

Matthew20:1-16 (Exodus 16:2-15)

It’sNot Fair

JamesSledge                                       September18, 2011

Perhapsyou saw the news story a few weeks ago about a Youngstown man who filed alawsuit seeking a share in the lottery winnings of some of his co-workers.  It seems this fellow has been part of poolwhere workers combined their money to buy lottery tickets, but he was out witha back injury the week the pool bought a ticket that was a $99 millionwinner.  According to the lawsuit, themembers of the pool had an unwritten agreement that they covered for each otherwhen someone was not at work.  But onemember of the pool insisted that it was a putup your money and you’re in, don’t and you’re not sort of setup. 

Isaw a TV news story on this where a reporter asked people to comment on thelawsuit.  Almost all those interviewedthought the fellow didn’t stand a chance in court. “Fair is fair,” onesaid.  “He didn’t put anything in and sohe doesn’t deserve any of the winnings.”

Alot of us have strong feelings about things being fair and right.  We know they often aren’t, but we want themto be, and so we react when we think someone is doing something patentlyunfair.  I think the people in that newsstory thought the man suing his co-workers was trying to pull a fast one, tryingto get something that didn’t rightly belong to him.  But I suspect if it could be proven that hisfriends had promised to cover for him while he was out of work and had thenlied about it, well then people would have a different view of things.

Whatis fair?  What is the fair amount oftaxes that someone should pay?  How muchmore can a CEO make compared to factory worker at the same company and it stillbe fair?  What sort of punishment forcriminals is fair?  Is it fair for acollege to consider that a student came from a disadvantaged home and schoolsystem in its admission standards?  Is itfair when a wealthy person or a corporation is represented by teams of the bestattorneys in court while a poor person has to rely on a barely-out-of-law-school, public defender?  What is fair?

Andis it fair for someone to work hard all day long at his job and then watchsomeone else who only worked one hour get paid the same as he does?  That is the fairness question that seems tobe posed by the parable Jesus tells.

Isuppose the Matthew includes this parable in his gospel as a word to his Jewishcongregation made up of folks who have tried to follow the Law all their livesand have now embraced Jesus as their Jewish Messiah, but also a congregationthat is increasingly adding Johnny-come-lately Gentiles to its number.  Like the parable of the prodigal son in Luke,this parable speaks to those who have tried to be faithful for the long hauland now find it difficult to celebrate with those who are latecomers.

ButI’m not sure this parable is really about fairness.  Rather I think it is about an entirelydifferent sort of community, an entirely different sort of reality, somethingMatthew calls the kingdom of heaven, his very Jewish way of saying “kingdom ofGod.”

Thiskingdom has nothing to do with going to heaven. It is about an alternative to the empire of Rome and the ways of theworld.  I think we sometimesmisunderstand Jesus when we assume he is talking about our getting into heavenrather than the ways of this alternative kingdom, this alternative world.  And this world seems not to have books orbalance sheets.

Manyof you know that the scripture readings for each Sunday in our worship comefrom a lectionary, a list of readings for each Lord’s Day.  The particular lectionary used byPresbyterians breaks from some older lectionaries in that it does not alwaystry to connect the Old Testament readings with those from the New.  When we are not in a special season such asAdvent or Lent or Easter, our lectionary tries to read the Old Testament on itsown, with some continuity.  And so overthe summer we’ve moved from Abraham to Jacob to Joseph and now to Moses and thestory of the Exodus from Egypt.  Ourreading today about manna in the wilderness is not meant to comment on thegospel reading, but I think they have a great deal to do with one another.

Goduses Israel’s time in the wilderness to form them into a different sort ofpeople, a people who are meant to mediate God’s presence into the world.  When they come into the land of promise, theyare supposed to live in a manner and construct a society that embodies what Goddesires for the world. 

Oneof the lessons of wilderness is an absolute dependence on God.  When God provides manna for the people, it isliterally “daily bread.”  It is enoughfor today, and no more.  Other than theexception of gathering a two day supply in preparation for the Sabbath, mannacannot be stockpiled.  No one gets moremanna by burning the midnight oil.  Noone has a freezer full of manna because she works harder than others.  All have enough, but no one has more thanenough. 

Thisis a very different world from the one Israel left behind in Egypt, and forthat matter the world we live in.  InEgypt’s world and ours, there is not enough to go around, and so we must allstruggle to gain our share.  And we mustdo more than that.  We must accumulateextra so that we will be secure, so that we do not find ourselves wanting.  We do not dare pray for daily bread and trustthat this will be enough.  But in thewilderness, Israel must.

Theequality that comes from this mutual dependence on God is a radical one, andone that does not sit well with a human drive to take care of ourselves, toprovide for ourselves.  We are proud ofbeing able to provide for ourselves and family, or perhaps embarrassed if wecannot do so.  And I think some of ourconcerns about fairness arise from this.

Noticewhat those workers in the vineyard say when they raise the issue of beingtreated unfairly.  “You have made them equal tous.” 

Ina world of not enough, where we must struggle to secure our share, making equalsof those who do not struggle as hard as we do is a threat.  But not so in the wilderness.  Not so in God’s new dominion.  Not so in a community shaped by love and dailybread. 

Becausewe are familiar and comfortable living in our world, we are prone to think thatGod’s world is a lot like ours, only better. But Jesus says otherwise.  God’skingdom is shaped by love, not competition. It is a place of abundance, not scarcity where I must secure my share,and in the process prevent others from having enough, precisely how developedcountries like ours relate to third world countries.  No, the abundance of God’s kingdom features aradical neighborliness, a love that will not let another go without.  It is a bit like a loving family, only withoutany of the baggage that sometimes comes with families.

Decadesago, I heard a story about a family whose second child was born with specialneeds.  These special needs demanded agreat deal from the child’s parents, and her older sister began to feelneglected, even though her parents went out their way to not to do so.  Children learn quickly the ways of ourworld.  They realize that there is notenough to go around, and they had better struggle for their share.  And so the older sister complained that itwasn’t fair that her little sister got all the love and attention. 

Herparents listened to her.  They madedoubly sure they were not neglecting her. They explained once more why they had to spend so much time with hersister.  And then they showed hersomething about love.  They lit a candleand said, “This is our love.”  Thengiving her a candle they lit it saying, “We give our love to you, but our loveis still here.  We give our love to yoursister,” lighting another candle, “and we still have just as much love left togive.  We have more than enough love forboth of you.”

God’slove is exactly like that.  And the worldGod imagines is built on love like that. Imagine an entire community, an entire world built on such afoundation…  Maybe that’s why Jesus couldtalk about it only in parables.