As chaplain for the Hospice of the Eastern Upper Peninsula, I have been called to visit with patients and their families when they are dealing with end- of- life issues. In the course of our conversations, I talk about life as a journey. From the moment we are born we begin a journey that brings us into relationship with a variety of people. We begin by interacting with our parents, siblings, extended family, and friends. As we grow that circle of people we are in relationship with enlarges through involvement in church, school, work and many other activities. When people recall all these relationships, their life story emerges. Soon we our conversation turns into a life review of all the events and people who have journeyed with them over the years to the present day. Our gospel lesson is about our relationship with those people we meet and the choices we make as they become a part of our journey through life.
We create a precious trust when we enter into a meaningful relationship with others … with God, with our family and our circle of friends, people at our workplace, and certainly within our faith community. In many ways this lesson is one of the most difficult texts for us to understand. But it is one we shouldn’t dismiss. This is not one of those if-you-read-it-in-the-original-Greek-it-sounds-better kind of texts. There is no way to get around this lesson. We just need to go through it, get to the very heart of it, and by doing that we will get a glimpse of the heart of God.
Matthew puts the Ten Commandments right in front of us; you know that ancient collection that most of us would prefer to ignore or, at best, think of as The Ten Suggestions. But Jesus turns up the weight of these commandments as we listen to this powerful commentary on what it means to live as a citizen of God’s Kingdom.
Jesus says I shouldn’t murder anyone, but also I shouldn’t be angry. He says don’t have sex with someone I am not married to, but also don’t even have lustful thoughts about another person. And he says don’t divorce. So does this mean men and women sitting here right now who are divorced are not on Jesus’ team anymore; that they can’t be followers of Jesus? Could he mean that when I get angry, I’m no longer fit to be a disciple? No it does not mean that at all! And as far as dismembering ourselves, I don’t think Jesus really wants us to pluck out our eye or cut off our hand. No! Jesus uses these extreme measures to make sure we realize the seriousness of what he says. It is an acknowledgement that we all make mistakes. We all have gone the wrong way. Everyone has at one time for another. And, yes, God is saddened by this. But God does not want the discarded members of your body; God wants your intact heart. God will not cast you aside. God will never stop loving you. God is always ready to forgive and embrace, and to let you know that you are a beloved child of God. Discovering our failure to love as God loves is not a cause for despair. No – it is a call back to God, into the arms of God, who loves and strengthens us, and sends us out to love again.
So what do we do with these words? What do we do with Jesus? You know something; it would be a lot easier to deal with Jesus if he did not care so much about us; but he does care. If he was distant and far off – he would not unsettle us so much. But this Jesus we have won’t leave us alone. And I think that is the point of this lesson. When you read the New Testament, you come across a lot of debates Jesus had with people who had come up with some pretty clever ways to keep God in a box. They had taken the teachings and the stories and poetry of the Hebrew Bible and boiled it down to a bunch of rules. Of course, not everyone in Jesus’ day did this. But some of them did. Just like some of us do today.
A sign of the times in which we live is that most people want to be their own clergyperson. They do not want any religious middle man looking over their shoulder. They want to form their own relationship with God without any interference by the guy or gal who wears a clerical collar around their neck. In short, they want to be the final authority on what is right and wrong. Many people are convinced that all they need to do is live by this simple creed: Love Jesus and do whatever you want.
My brothers and sisters in Christ, we live in a broken and fallen world. For us, by our own power, keeping such commandments seems impossible. Therefore, I want to suggest to all of us that the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount are not only commands. They are also promises. They are promises that God’s grace is at work in us exactly in those places where people try to turn away from anger and toward reconciliation. God’s grace is at work in us when people stop treating other people as objects of sexual desire. These teachings are promises that one day the world will be a place where all people can live in peace and love and justice with one another.
I would challenge you to think about the law of God not in terms of doing a certain number of impossible things, but in terms of being in the right relationship … with God and with those around you. I am talking about respecting your neighbor, controlling your anger, modifying your drive for personal fulfillment so that you might be an instrument for strengthening the community in which you live during your journey through life. We are all on this journey called life; some trips are longer than others, some take us over rocky roads. But whatever the length of time you have, whatever the condition of the road you are on, know that God’s love is always with you if only you let God out of the box and allow God to be your companion for the trip.
The beauty of the Sermon on the Mount is not that it places before us the model of the perfect Christian life we ought to live or even to challenge us toward an unattainable goal. No, the beauty of the Sermon on the Mount is that it brings us face to face with Jesus Christ. For when we know Jesus, we discover how we should live for others and with others in this world. Amen.