Two Rivers Pastoral Charge
February 24, 2019
Scripture: Luke 6:27-38
So shall we start with
the easy part of today’s reading, or the hard part?
The easy verse is
probably one of the best-known verses of scripture – a teaching that features
in all major religions, and is the foundation of much interfaith dialogue. “Do unto others as you would have them do to
you.” If you read the United Church Observer,
there was a recent article exploring this teaching from different religious
perspectives.
And this is a key
teaching from Jesus, linked with his teaching that we are to love our neighbour
as we love ourselves. And it is an
important teaching for living well together.
If everyone were to treat everyone else in the way that they want to be
treated, then the world would be a peaceful place indeed.
But Jesus’ teaching in
today’s scripture reading doesn’t end there.
Jesus gives us some much more difficult instructions to wrestle
with. Twice in this passage, he tells us
that we are to love our enemies. He says
that it’s easy to love people who love us back, but that isn’t enough. We are also to love our enemies.
So my question to you
today is, who is your enemy?
It’s a nebulous word,
“enemy.” It’s one that we can think about
in the abstract, but when we try to put a face to the word, it becomes a bit
more challenging. It might mean someone
that we don’t like; it might mean someone who doesn’t like us; it might mean
someone who is doing something we don’t agree with, something that is cruel,
something that we see as evil.
So who is your
enemy? Can you put a face to your
enemy? Can you love your enemy?
Can you love that
person who votes for a different party than you, someone who votes for that
party that you think is completely wrong?
Can you love that
teenager who bullies their classmates, in-person and on-line?
Can you love the
people who think that it’s OK to separate children from their parents and lock
them into cages at the border?
Can you love the
people who take advantage of those who are vulnerable; who abuse and assault
people knowing that “the system” won’t do anything to stop them?
OK Jesus – how can you
expect me to love these people? How can
you expect me to love people who do such horrible things? This is a hard teaching that you are giving
to us Jesus – do you really understand what you are asking us to do?
But when I think about
it, Jesus does understand what he is asking us to do. We are now less than 2 months away from Holy
Week. In just under 8 weeks, we are
going to gather for our Good Friday service.
We are going to hear about how Jesus was beaten and nailed to a cross
and left to die. And we are going to
hear about how Jesus, hanging there on the cross, cries out to God, “Forgive
them. They don’t know what they are
doing.”
Jesus knows what it is
like to love his enemies, to bless those who cursed him, to pray for those who
abused him. Jesus knows what it is like
to be merciful and to forgive. In a few
short weeks, Jesus is going to live in to everything that he teaches us today.
So where does that
leave us?
Because is we truly
believe that we are the Body of Christ in our world, that we are the hands and
feet of Christ, then we are called to live and act as Jesus did.
But the good news is
that we don’t have to do it alone. The
good news is that we have the Holy Spirit living in us, always transforming us
more and more into the image of Christ.
And the Holy Spirit, living in us, can help us to do things that would
be impossible on our own.
As the start of Lent
draws closer, our season of Epiphany is drawing to a close. This season of Epiphany has been a time when
we have looked for how Jesus was and is revealed in the world. We’ve heard the story about how the Magi
visited Jesus and recognized him as a king; the story of how Jesus was baptized
in the Jordan River and a voice from heaven proclaimed that he was God’s
beloved son, in whom God was well pleased; the story of how Jesus turned water
into wine; the story of how Jesus called his disciples and they recognized him
for who he was; stories about how he attracted crowds of people to him whenever
he taught.
All through these past
two months, we’ve had stories about how Christ was revealed to the world
through Jesus of Nazareth.
But I believe that
Christ continues to be revealed to the world today, through the Body of Christ,
which includes all of us here today.
Through what we do, and through how we live, we can reveal Christ to the
world around us. Epiphany continues in
the here and now. When the world sees us
forgiving others, the world sees Christ.
When the world sees us doing unto others as we would have them do unto
us, the world sees Christ. When the
world sees us turning away from violence rather than reacting or retaliating,
the world sees Christ. When the world
sees us loving our enemies, the world sees Christ.
Which brings us back
to our original problem. How can we love
our enemies? How can we love people who
do horrible things in the world?
I have to remind
myself that we aren’t told that we have to love the things that our enemies
do. In fact, so many places elsewhere we
are told that we are to speak out against injustice and oppression. But in this passage today, along with telling
us to love our enemies, Jesus also tells us that we are not to judge.
I find that
commandment a huge relief. I don’t have
to judge other people. I don’t have to
decide who is worthy and who is not. I
don’t have to decide who to love and who to withhold love from. I don’t have to judge, and Jesus tells me to
love everyone.
I want to end with a
passage from one of my favourite books.
I love the series of books by Madeleine L’Engle that begins with A Wrinkle in Time, and think that they
are so full of good theology. In the
second book, A Wind in the Door, the
main character Meg is put in a situation where she has to love someone who is
very unlikeable. Mr. Jenkins is the
principal at the primary school – he was unfair to Meg when she was a student
there, and now he is tormenting her beloved younger brother. He is abrupt, he doesn’t listen to others, he
is apathetic towards the students, he has no confidence in himself, and he
doesn’t tolerate anyone who deviates from what he thinks “normal” is.
And yet Meg has to
love him. Her first reaction is to say,
“If you mean you think I have to love Mr. Jenkins, you’ve got another think
coming.”
Meg then thinks about
the other people in the world she loves – her parents, her brothers, her best
friend. And then she remembers seeing a
kindness that Mr. Jenkins had done to her best friend. And in the end, she is able to truly see Mr.
Jenkins, beyond anything that he had done or hadn’t done, she is able to see
him in his full humanity, mistakes and all, and she says, “‘the only one… who’s
human enough to make as many mistakes as he does is you, Mr. Jenkins’ –
suddenly she gave a startled laugh. ‘And
I do love you for it.’ Then she burst
into tears of nervousness and exhaustion.”[1]
We are called to love
our enemies, to bless those who curse us, to pray for those who abuse us. It isn’t easy, but Jesus doesn’t say that it
will be. We are called to see everyone
in the world in their full humanity and love everyone. And the good news is that we don’t do it
alone – the Holy Spirit working within us, working to transform us into the
likeness of Christ, allows us to show Christ to the world.
Thanks be to God!
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