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Sunday February 10, 2008 "See How You Like It" Luke 6:27-31 |
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Location: Blogs Brad's BlogBrad's Sermons |
 | | Posted by: Brad Miller | 2/10/2008 11:41 PM | My parents had some weird ways of teaching us a lesson.
Take for instance a wintry evening when we were getting ready for dinner.
It was cold and snowy and dark outside and I had just come in from delivering newspapers. And I was not in a great mood. When I got home and went to put my bike away in the garage, there was a bunch of stuff blocking my bikes space; stuff that I recognized as my brothers.So I leaned my bike up against the side of the garage and went in the back door. When you walked in our back door there was a stairway to the basement on your left, and straight ahead were three steps that led up to the kitchen. I closed the door, and seeing that the basement light was on, I crouched down so as to be better heard in the basement. Then I bellowed to my brother, “Dale, get up here and move your junk in the garage. I can’t get my bike in!” At which point an answering shout came from the basement. “Dale’s not down here!” It was my sister’s voice. So, I kneeled down on the top step to the kitchen (I still had wet boots on, so I couldn’t walk up) pushed the door open and yelled, “Dale, get down here and get your stuff out of my way! I can’t get my bike in the garage and it’s freezin’ out there!” After a second came a reply shouted from the second floor of our house, “Hold your pants on, would ya? I’m comin’, I’m comin’.” Finally, my message had been received.Dale came tromping down, pulled on some boots and headed outside. I followed.
“I don’t know why you couldn’t just move this outta the way,” he said loudly.
“Why should I? You’d just yell at me for putting it in the wrong place, besides why should I do your work?“
“Oh grow up.”
“Make me.”
“Oh, shut up.”
“You shut up.”
And on it went.Finally, the stuff was moved, my bike was properly stored and we went into the house for dinner, more or less back to normal.
I hung up my coat, took off my boots, went into the kitchen where my mother and sister were finishing the preparations for dinner.
Suddenly my mother bellowed, “Erwin, get down here! How many times do I have to tell you dinner is ready!”Kay Lynn, Dale and I looked at each other warily. What the? My mother didn’t yell like that unless flames were visible or blood was spurting.
Just as suddenly from upstairs we heard a reply that fairly shook the house: “Well why didn’t you tell me sooner? I’ll be there in a minute!”
Now we were really shook up. My father was generally a very quiet man. You had to get him pretty riled up before he raised his voice, and being called to dinner did not fall into the category of things that would get him “riled up.”We heard him come down the stairs, yelling, “Who moved my shoes? Don’t you know to leave your hands off my stuff?”
My mother shouted back, “It’s not my day to watch your shoes. Can’t you just come in here so we can eat?”We had definitely entered an alternative universe. My parents were not big fans of volume and had let us know that on various occasions.The loud exchanges continued, even as my father came into the kitchen and we gathered around the table. When it came time to say the blessing, my mother couldn’t take it any longer. Suddenly she burst out laughing and my father looked at us kids with a wide smile on his face.
“You guys look like someone just shot the dog!” he laughed. My mother was on one of her famous laughing jags, the ones that end up with tears rolling down her face and no sound coming from her shuddering body.Finally, when she had pulled herself together, she looked at us all and said, “We just thought we would see how you liked it.”Properly chastised, we said the grace and had a more or less normal meal, with normal conversation, even as I was becoming more and more convinced that my parents were anything but normal. Which is a fact that I thank God for to this day.
In their way, they were trying to teach us about how we treat other people, and how our actions affect other people. In their way, they were giving us an object lesson on “the Golden Rule”. It’s in our scripture today, right there at the end, “Do to others as you would have them do to you.”It’s a pretty important lesson and this is a pretty important passage. In fact, I sometimes think we shortchange just how important this lesson is.
We rightly teach it to our children as a way to behave properly in polite society. We should be civil to one another. It really is a good yardstick for so many of our decisions and actions. When faced with a decision that affects other people, I still try to ask myself, “How would I feel if someone else did this and it affected me?”
This particular part of the scripture, what we know as the “Golden Rule” predates Christ. It shows up in some very disparate writings over the years: writers like Homer, Seneca, Tobit, Enoch, Philo and others all reference this sentiment in almost exactly the same way that Jesus does. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.That bothers some people. For some people, the idea that it wasn’t an original thought with Jesus makes it less important. Not for me: I think that makes it even more important. Having heard this before, Jesus thought it important enough to repeat to his followers. The weight it carries is definitely increased because Jesus said it. I really don’t care where he heard it. An important message is an important message is an important message.So why is it so important?There are two things to deal with here: first, how important it is to use the golden rule in “polite” society, and second, how important it is to use the golden rule in “hostile” society.Let’s start with the polite side first.There are some Christians who say that we should have nothing to do with “the world.” We should steer clear of the corrupting society we live in and find our counsel and our center in the community of Christ’s church. But we cannot ignore the outside society. We are called to continue the work of building God’s kingdom here on earth, and we cannot do that by cloistering ourselves away, as appealing as that may sound at times.
We are called to be in the world. We are called to be business people, teachers, civic leaders, laborers, doctors and nurses and caregivers, engineers, scientists, lawyers and on and on and on. In all those callings, the golden rule points us to promoting a society where people are respectful and civil to one another. Because if we lose our civility with one another, we lose any chance we may have of building a society that will ultimately look beyond it’s own individual interests to the broader interests of the whole of society. If we think only of our own interests, if we insist that our way is the right way, if we cannot communicate so that we truly hear each other, we are doomed.You may think I am overstating the case. It’s just a preachers way of getting our attention, you say. I don’t think so. I am truly afraid that the decline of civility in the 21st century is a very real problem for our society, for the church, for us.We need look no further than our political system. A system that is designed to work when people of differing viewpoints come together to thoroughly and thoughtfully deal with problems and possibilities that affect us. A system that puts the common good above the selfish interests of factions. We are dangerously close to achieving a political system that may find itself at an absolute standstill, unable to move, because they are unable to communicate, to hear, to be civil. It is not alright to say, “I respect my opponent but…” and have that but followed by half-truths and character assassination. The golden rule would come in handy right about now.Another place to look at where our lack of civility is heartbreakingly apparent is in
the church universal, the body of Christ. We have splintered into so many denominations it is hard to keep track.There are good reasons to have different denominations. Different people are touched by different forms of worship. Different people find God’s presence in the different forms of governance. Some people prosper when they are an active part of theological exploration. Some people prosper with the counsel of church doctrine developed over many, many years.But when church’s divide because they cannot hear each other, when they cannot accept certain kinds of people in their midst, when they cannot have a conversation about how God’s will might be interpreted differently by different people, when they cannot be civil to one another, when they would rather split apart than do the hard work of communication and reconciliation, I believe the only thing that is accomplished is to thwart the forward progress of God’s kingdom on earth.In both of these examples we are dealing with people who are more or less like us. They are not bad people. They are not evil people. They have just become the victims of the death of the golden rule. If we truly practiced the golden rule, we would have to listen to each other, because if we want to be heard, we must be willing to hear others.
Now, The first part of this scripture speaks to something completely different: how are we to live out God’s will in a hostile world?
Look what it says here: love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you; pray for those who abuse you; if they strike you, offer them another striking spot; if they steal your coat, give them your shirt and don’t ask for the stolen property back; if they beg, give.What would cause people to behave this way? These are charged words: hated, cursed, abused. How are we to respond?Jesus makes it clear in this text: do not reciprocate these types of actions; do not retaliate; in fact, do not act as if you are a victim at all: treat them as you would like to be treated. Love them. Be generous with them. Forgive them.I will be honest with you: for me, this passage has always seemed fraught with peril. How can I preach that we should passively let people take advantage us? Don’t we have rights?The fact is that our legal codes, from the Code of Hammurabai on down, to various degrees, have embraced retaliation as a way to achieve justice. We shouldn’t ever strike first, but once the strike has come, striking back is acceptable.But, the downside of this was put very eloquently by someone much wiser than me: the end result of an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth would be a society where everyone is blind and toothless.No, there must be a different way. But if Jesus is teaching us not to retaliate, then he must be preaching for us to act as passive, docile creatures, simply accepting the hate, the abuse, the victimization as the way things are. Isn’t that what it sounds like?
Maybe not.
Maybe Jesus is saying, there’s nothing passive about loving your enemy. There’s nothing passive about the golden rule. There’s nothing passive about being generous. These are in fact choices to ACT! Love, generosity, forgiveness are active, positive, essential elements of our Christian walk. And when we act this way, people pay attention. They want to know why we are acting that way. They want to know where our strength comes from. They want to know why we are loving, generous and forgiving. They want to know because they NEED all of those things.And the answer is straightforward: we act that way because God loves us, even when we are at our most unlovable.
God is generous to us beyond our wildest imagination, sharing with us the presence of Jesus Christ and with it the promise of life eternal.
God forgives us, even when we exhibit the worst behavior imaginable.
Why shouldn’t we act the same way? Maybe we could drive the point home a bit by saying, “Do unto others as God has done unto you.”As we enter this time of Lent, it is so very important that in our introspection and prayer we recognize that it’s not just about God and each of us as individuals.
It is, as the special music alluded to this morning, about a journey. It’s about a journey that is not solitary, but a journey that we share with scores and scores of companions. Some companions we love, some companions we are not real fond of, some companions who we do not even know. All are companions who share God’s world with us.It’s about how we honor God with how we behave in God’s world.
It’s about recognizing that just as we needed God’s presence and love and forgiveness and generosity, those people who are driven by hate and fear and abuse need God’s presence and love and forgiveness and generosity just as badly.
And it all starts with a simple proclamation: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
Let’s see how they like that.
Let us pray: It’s not easy, Lord. All this loving and forgiving. But even as we struggle to live out the life that our faith calls us to, we are in awe of what you have done for us. Know that the struggle we experience is precisely because you have been so generous with us, that we worry that we will not live up to your standard. Give us strength. Let us feel your presence. Help us to do unto others as you have so graciously and so lovingly done unto us. All this we ask in Jesus’ name. Amen. | | | Permalink | Trackback |
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