Persistent Resistance

You can listen to this sermon here

Readings:
Psalm                 Psalm: 119: 33-40
First Reading      Lev 19:1-2, 9-18
Second Reading 1 Cor 3:10-11, 16-23
Gospel                 Matt 5:38-48
                               

What I want to say:

We continue our journey into the sermon on the Mount, holding the beatitudes as our map and key. We listen as Jesus continues to reinterpret the law for the new time he lives in, applying the law to new circumstances and requirements. He does do in ways that invite people to be subversive and persistent in the joining God to bring to perfection/completions all God desires – the empire of heaven.

So how does that apply to people we dislike or who wronged us, or who we might describe as our enemy. And how do we act in the face of such people in a way that honours ALL that God invites us to

What I want to happen:

People to reflect on what God desires for our time, and how we join the work with persistence. Who inspires us in the life?

The Sermon

      1.    Introduction:

Here we are
A few days from Lent
The world a strangely different place after Gabrielle
So, this morning we pause
And continue listening to Jesus
reinterpreting law for a new time
his time
A time so different
from when Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus and Deuteronomy were written
There are new social customs and social structures
And over all that is Rome
with all their demands and rules
Rabbis still do this today
contrasting how Torah was understood
holding on to the kind of community Torah imagines
and offering what that might mean for today
how do we live the reign of God in our time and place?
What kind of community did Jesus imagine?
What does that look like today?

 
     2. The Story

Jesus returns from wilderness

where his identity has been sorely tested 

which we will hear next week at the beginning of Lent 

He hears of John the baptiser’s arrest 

and responds by returning to Galilee 

to the small fishing town of Capernaum 

where he teaches and heals 

Crowds come to him 

sick people 

poor people 

invisible and broken people 

crushed by Rome’s empire. 

Mourning the death of kin and neighbours

mourning their lives 

longing for another way. 

Jesus brings healing and hope in his actions and words. 

Eventually he calls some people who have been listening to him 

fisherman and others 

inviting them to follow

to embrace a new identity

a new way of seeing the world

a new way of understanding themselves

To be his disciple

And after a short while he gathers them 

up a hill 

overlooking their world 

all they had known of life 

with its grief and despair 

violence always lurking on the edge 

poverty defining each day 

Jesus looks around 

and gesturing at this world

where he has taught and healed 

He gives words to his deeds 

and says 

Imagine a world where we honour  

the poor 

the broken 

those who have lost hope 

How different would this world be? 

Imagine a world where the most important people are:

those who mourn,

the humble,

those who hunger and thirst for God’s justice,

the pure in heart,

the merciful,

the peacemakers,

those who are persecuted for the sake of God’s justice,


This is a world where all flourish
a community that gathers around all
where the common good is held as paramount
A world where the needs of the poor are met
Where they are treated with honour and respect
and given what they need to thrive

 

Imagine this world for a moment 

 

When we imagine THIS world
Live in this world
Allow this world to shape how we live
we are the salt disc of the earth oven;
helping heaven’s reign to bubble away
We are light
living so others will see God's goodness.
Living the world of the Beatitudes into being.

He continues

Don't think that my teachings replace or reduce the law and the prophets.
And don't think you can skip the details.
Details count.
But something more than the details is also needed.
Don’t get stuck on what the law just says
Get behind it
Find the intention
Live that
In doing that
You will align your whole self with what God desires.
And what does God desire?
This world just described
held in the beatitudes
This is the reign of God
The empire of heaven
So different from Rome’s empire
This is what the law and the prophets are all about

 3. He goes on 

But Jesus doesn’t stop there

He goes on 

He offers examples of what he has been talking about so far 

What he meant by 

“I say to you that unless your righteousness is greater than the righteousness of the legal experts and the Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

It’s important we hear that
Jesus in not offering a new law here
But like any good rabbi
he is offering a reading of the law based on everything he has just said
- based on the beatitudes
- and the world imagined in them
In his teaching he warns that when our relationship with each other are broken
when we fail to see the other as our sister or brother
when we place our own flourishing ahead of everyone else
then our community is not all that God desires
The beatitudes are not lived out
We open the door to exclusion
    belittlement
    violence
    sexual violence
    adultery
    murder
 

4.    Resist

All of which sounds reasonable
But life can be hard
What does all this mean in the harsh reality of living in their time
Of living in our time
When we are talking about people who do you wrong
Torah allows for justice – an eye for an eye and no more than that
limiting the punishment to the crime
avoiding endless spiralling cycles of revenge
But Jesus says even that is too much
Do not seek revenge
“Do not violently resist the evil doer”
How often we read that as “Be a doormat”
Jesus does not say “be a doormat”
Jesus does not say “put up with abuse and violence”
Jesus says
“Do not violently resist the evil doer”
Instead live in ways shaped by the beatitudes
Live God’s purposes for the human family
Resist
(As an aside, these words inspired Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi in their non-violent resistance)
If your master strikes you on the right cheek with the back of his hand
as socially allowed
which is seen as honourable way of disciplining someone
Resist
Turn your cheek so that he either has to hit with the palm of his right hand
Or with his left hand
Both of which will bring shame.

If a tax collector takes you to court to take your clothes because you have nothing else to pay with
Resist
Give him all your clothes and stand naked
His greed and lack of compassion will be exposed
He has brought shame on himself and his family.

And if a Roman soldier commands you to carry his bags for a mile
- As allowed by Roman law
Resist
Insist that you take them for two miles
Your day of work is ruined anyway
It will spare another.

And what about those we name enemies
Those we fear or loathe
Who are outside the boundaries of our community?
How do we act with them?
The law says that we are to love our neighbour
- Those like us
- Our family and kin
- Our whanau and hapu
- Those in our community
It is also said, (not in the bible anywhere) that we are to hate our enemies
But Torah and Jesus are having none of that
To live the beatitudes invites another way of being
another way of acting
“I'm telling you to love your enemies.
Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst.
When someone gives you a hard time,
respond with the energies of prayer,
for then you are working out of your true selves,
your God-created selves.

This is what God does.
He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless:
- The good and bad, the nice and nasty.
If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus?
Anybody can do that.
If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal?
Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.
"In a word, what I'm saying is,
Grow up.
You're kingdom subjects.
Now live like it.
Live out your God-created identity.
Live generously and graciously toward others, all other, ALL others,
the way God lives toward you.”[i]
Be persistent in living the beatitudes as God is persistent.
Be trustworthy as God is trustworthy.
Live love and reconciliation as God is love and reconciliation
Be complete therefore as your father is complete
in showing love to everyone

5.    Some Questions

Who inspires you to be persistent in living the beatitudes?

How are you persistent in living the beatitudes?

 



[i] Scripture quotations from THE MESSAGE. Copyright © by Eugene H. Peterson 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

 

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