ungrateful guests, 10.9.11

Matthew 22:1-14
1Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: 2“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. 3He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come. 4Again he sent other slaves, saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited: Look, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready; come to the wedding banquet.’

5But they made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business, 6while the rest seized his slaves, maltreated them, and killed them. 7The king was enraged. He sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. 8Then he said to his slaves, ‘The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. 9Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.’ 10Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad; so the wedding hall was filled with guests.

11“But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe, 12and he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?’ And he was speechless. 13Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 14For many are called, but few are chosen.”
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Before we dig into today’s parable, would someone remind us of the parable we talked about last week?

We talked last week about how the Bible pictures the church as the bride of Jesus, so it fits that the wedding of the king’s son would be a good image for the coming of God’s Kingdom.

This parable follows last week’s parables that show Israel’s leaders rejecting God’s calling. Here, instead of abusing the landlord’s servants who came to collect rent, the invited guests reject, beat and kill the servants who come to tell them that the wedding feast is ready.

We recognize why the tenants might act how they do. Greed makes sense as a motivation and we can see how the story fits together, even though we share the landlord’s anger when his servants suffer injustice. The “bad guys” in today’s parable don’t make sense to me. Their violence towards the king’s servants doesn’t get them anything. It seems impulsive, almost sadistic. They not only don’t care about being invited to the wedding feast; they seem to have something against the king who invited them and go out of their way to reject his message.

Like last week’s parable Jesus tells this parable because of the situation around him. Let’s start with the easy part: who is the king in the story? Right, God is the king and we’re talking about God’s kingdom as a wedding feast. Who are the guests who were invited but refuse to come?

Why do you think they refuse?

Who are the people the servants finally gather into the feast?

How do you imagine they feel about being there? What would it be like to be invited into God’s wedding feast?

The amazing thing about our faith is that every day we are invited into God’s kingdom, God’s feast. Whenever we read scripture or come to the communion table or spend time with God in prayer we hear that invitation again.

We’ve been invited to the feast not because of anything we’ve done right or wrong; remember, the servants bring good and bad people in off the streets. We are all invited to the feast of God’s kingdom and because we hear that invitation and enjoy the banquet we also become servants and invite others to the feast as well. That’s an amazing opportunity, a grace-filled invitation.

teach us to number, 10.23.11

Deuteronomy 34:1-12 1Then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho, and the LORD showed him the whole land: Gilead as far as Dan, 2all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the Western Sea, 3the Negeb, and the Plain — that is, the valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees — as far as Zoar. 4The LORD said to him, “This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants’; I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there.” 5Then Moses, the servant of the LORD, died there in the land of Moab, at the Lord’s command. 6He was buried in a valley in the land of Moab, opposite Beth-peor, but no one knows his burial place to this day. 7Moses was one hundred twenty years old when he died; his sight was unimpaired and his vigor had not abated. 8The Israelites wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days; then the period of mourning for Moses was ended. 9Joshua son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom, because Moses had laid his hands on him; and the Israelites obeyed him, doing as the LORD had commanded Moses. 10Never since has there arisen a prophet in Israel like Moses, whom the LORD knew face to face. 11He was unequaled for all the signs and wonders that the LORD sent him to perform in the land of Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his servants and his entire land, 12and for all the mighty deeds and all the terrifying displays of power that Moses performed in the sight of all Israel. Psalm 90 (NIV) 1 A prayer of Moses the man of God. Lord, you have been our dwelling place throughout all generations. 2 Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God. 3 You turn people back to dust, saying, "Return to dust, you mortals." 4 A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night. 5 Yet you sweep people away in the sleep of death— they are like the new grass of the morning: 6 In the morning it springs up new, but by evening it is dry and withered. 7 We are consumed by your anger and terrified by your indignation. 8 You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence. 9 All our days pass away under your wrath; we finish our years with a moan. 10 Our days may come to seventy years, or eighty, if our strength endures; yet the best of them are but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away. 11 If only we knew the power of your anger! Your wrath is as great as the fear that is your due. 12 Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom. 13 Relent, Lord! How long will it be? Have compassion on your servants. 14 Satisfy us in the morning with your unfailing love, that we may sing for joy and be glad all our days. 15 Make us glad for as many days as you have afflicted us, for as many years as we have seen trouble. 16 May your deeds be shown to your servants, your splendor to their children. 17 May the favor of the Lord our God rest on us; establish the work of our hands for us— yes, establish the work of our hands. Matthew 22:34-46 34When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, 35and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. 36“Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” 37He said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38This is the greatest and first commandment. 39and a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” 41Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them this question: 42“What do you think of the Messiah? Whose son is he?” They said to him, “The son of David.” 43He said to them, “How is it then that David by the Spirit calls him Lord, saying, 44 ‘The Lord said to my Lord, “Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your feet”’? 45If David thus calls him Lord, how can he be his son?” 46No one was able to give him an answer, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions. -------------------------------------------- “Teacher, which commandment is the greatest?” It’s a good question for the Pharisees then and for us today. Of all the commandments, all the reminders, all the guidance God gives for our life, which is the most important? People have asked that questions in lots of different ways. For the Pharisees, who saw faithfulness to God largely in terms of following the commandments carefully this makes sense. Ethical Philosophers ask roughly the same question in other words: “How does one live well? What is the good life about?” Other philosophers might ask the question another way: “What is the meaning of life? Why are we here?” It’s a question that naturally sits deep in our souls. We have a sense that there is a point to this journey called life and we long to know what it is. Jesus’ answer echoes in our soul as well, partly because of its simplicity and partly because we know it is true. Love God with everything we’ve got and love our neighbor as ourself. It’s simple and it makes sense. Simple doesn’t mean easy though. Maybe the clearest way we know these are commandments is that we know we don’t live up to them all the way. Love God with all your heart and soul and mind. Boy, that’s a big one. Still, it helps that God wants us to use every part of our being to love. In other words, we’re not supposed to shut our brains off when we turn our heart to God. That love is practical and embodied too; we’re not just brains focused on God, but people who find our emotional and spiritual center in God. The trouble with Jesus’ answer is that it’s easy to fret about whether we love God enough or not. It’s easy to worry about whether our emotional connection with God measures up. I’d offer two approaches to that issue. On the one hand love doesn’t grow from worry; love grows from being loved and knowing it. That’s one way reading scripture nurtures our faith. When we spend time with the Bible we read again and again how much God cares for us. We hear stories of God’s calling and concern; we hear songs of praise and stories of relationship. Whenever the other stories leave me wanting more I think about Jesus. In particular I think about the garden and I think about the cross. Jesus worried about himself; he was afraid of facing the pain of betrayal. He didn’t want to be arrested or beaten or hung on a cross. He prayed to God hoping there might be another way, but knowing in his heart that there probably wasn’t. The path he had chosen, the path of being with the outcast and lost, of healing no matter what and choosing relationship over rules led unavoidably to the cross. Jesus knew where his path was leading. He told his disciples several times during their journey to Jerusalem that he was going to his death. He could have turned back, but he didn’t. Jesus loved us too much to shy away from the cross. When I think about Jesus, Son of God and God in flesh choosing day after day to keep walking towards the cross I know Jesus loves me. I know God loves us. I know it not just with my mind, but deep down in my heart and soul, and my heart fills up with love in return. I want to follow God, not because I’m worried about judgment or hell or wrath, but because I remember what God has done for me. Loving our neighbor doesn’t always have the same reciprocity. Sometimes our neighbor doesn’t love us; sometimes our neighbor doesn’t care about us at all. It doesn’t really matter; our calling is clear. When we have a choice between two actions, we are called to choose the more loving one. When we have to choose between caring about someone else or ignoring them, we choose engagement. When we see a coworker hurting we comfort them, regardless of whether we get along otherwise or not. When we see someone hungry, we feed them, like we’re doing at Cameron this afternoon. Love is the chief commandment and guide for our life, but sometimes we need more specific guidance. For that we have the rest of the commandments as well as the history of the church. Notice Jesus doesn’t say loving God and our neighbor replaces the other commandments. He says instead that those are the first two commandments and from them everything else hangs. The commandments give detail and shape to how we put our love into action. Some of those commandments change and others stay the same. We don’t need to avoid reaping the edges of our fields as Exodus commands; for one thing most of us don’t have fields. But that commandment is about providing for the poor, which is part of loving our neighbor and is very much still a requirement for membership in the church of Christ. At its core and in its details, living well is about loving God and loving our neighbor. Our readings also reflect on the limits of our life. Moses was an incredible follower of God and a dedicated leader of Israel. Following God, he led the people out of slavery and through the desert to safety and new life on the other side. Despite all his efforts, God doesn’t allow Moses to go into the land to which he led Israel. It seems harsh, and in some ways it is, but it is also the way life often is. Many of the important things we work on in our lives won’t be finished before we die. Like Moses we will have to trust that others will continue the work after we’re gone. We can work for justice, but we probably won’t live to see equality and fairness prevail completely. We strive to make the educational system work for all our kids, but the undertaking is so great that the struggle will go on beyond our lifetimes. Human life is temporary and fragile: like Moses says in our responsive Psalm, we are like new grass that springs up in the morning and withers by the end of the day. The fact that life is temporary and that many of our projects will not be finished in our lifetime doesn’t mean we shouldn’t take on challenges. The time God gives us on the earth is precious so we need to find the right balance between work and rest, between commitment and letting go and between good stewardship and generosity. Moses prays that God would teach us to number our days so we can acquire wise hearts. That means we have to realize our mortality to value our time properly. The sooner we realize that our time may be short, the better use we will make of the time we have. At the same time we don’t want to let our mortality worry us so that we cling to our days with white knuckles. We’re also called to make time to enjoy the journey and those on the journey with us. That’s part of why God commands us to remember the Sabbath by stepping away from our work. We want to number our days, but not obsess over their limitations. The work we leave unfinished when we take our last breath is holy and, while we won’t see it finished, someone else may pick up where we have left off. I’d like for you to gather in pairs and share with your partner something important to you that you worry about not completing. Now share what your next step might be to release your worry to God, to trust God to take care of your goal when you have to let it go. Then your partner will pray for you to trust God and give up your anxiety while staying committed to your calling. Then switch. The key is to trust that God is in charge. Our attitude should be one of calm urgency. Urgent because our time is short and the needs around us are great, but calm because we are not alone in our efforts. The stewardship pledges we dedicate today are a good symbol of our calling. Our time and our money are limited and the need is great. We commit part of what we earn, and part of who we are to the work of the church. Much of that work will not be finished in our lifetime: people will still be hungry, the building may still need work, some people will still not know Jesus. But others will pick up where we leave off. So we number our days and our dollars, we commit our treasure and our labor to the Lord, and we let our calling to love God and our neighbor shape the time we have on this earth, knowing that we are part of something bigger than ourselves. Thanks be to God.

Caring for God's vineyard, 10.2.11

Philippians 3:4b-14

^4bIf anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more: ⁵circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; ⁶as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.

⁷Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ. ⁸More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ ⁹and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith. ¹⁰I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, ¹¹if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

¹²Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. ¹³Beloved, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, ¹⁴I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.

 Matthew 21:33-46

³³“Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a watchtower. Then he leased it to tenants and went to another country. ³⁴When the harvest time had come, he sent his slaves to the tenants to collect his produce. ³⁵But the tenants seized his slaves and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. ³⁶Again he sent other slaves, more than the first; and they treated them in the same way.

³⁷Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ ³⁸But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him and get his inheritance.’ ³⁹So they seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. ⁴⁰Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” ⁴¹They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.”

⁴²Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the scriptures: ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes’? ⁴³Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom. ⁴⁴The one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls.”

⁴⁵When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they realized that he was speaking about them. ⁴⁶They wanted to arrest him, but they feared the crowds, because they regarded him as a prophet.

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            Ok, so let’s start with this story Jesus tells. What’s the problem in the story?

How does the owner of the vineyard try to resolve it? What might some other options have been for the owner?

What’s the outcome?

Now, Jesus doesn’t just tell this story at random. Matthew tells us that the chief priests and scribes figured out that Jesus told the parable about them. Let’s think that through.

If the parable is about the religious leaders, who are they in the parable?

What does the vineyard stand for?

Who is the landowner?

What does it mean that the religious leaders refused to give the vineyard’s produce to God? What would that produce be? What are they doing instead of giving it to God?

What servants does God send to convince the religious leaders to share their bounty?

How do the leaders treat those messengers?

Why do the leaders kill the son? What are they trying to accomplish? How do you think that’s going to work for them?

What might it mean in this context for God to give the vineyard to others?

This gives us one great image of the church. In fact, several great biblical images for Israel work really well for the church. It’s important for us to remember that we in the church join God’s story; we don’t replace Israel. God and Israel have an ongoing story that is in conversation with our story. The stories are related, but not identical: we can’t live Israel’s story and neither can they live ours.

So the vineyard is one great image of the church from the Bible. What would stewardship look like in that image?

There are many images of the church in scripture and others we can come up with on our own. Each image focuses on some aspects of the church and may leave out others. Even though we all might have images that speak to us more than others, it’s important to know that no one image tells the whole story, so we can learn from each other.

Institutional religion?

Matthew 21:23-32

²³When he entered the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him as he was teaching, and said, “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?” ²⁴Jesus said to them, “I will also ask you one question; if you tell me the answer, then I will also tell you by what authority I do these things. ²⁵Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?” And they argued with one another, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say to us, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’ ²⁶But if we say, ‘Of human origin,’ we are afraid of the crowd; for all regard John as a prophet.” ²⁷So they answered Jesus, “We do not know.” And he said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.

²⁸“What do you think? A man had two sons; he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’ ²⁹He answered, ‘I will not’; but later he changed his mind and went. ³⁰The father went to the second and said the same; and he answered, ‘I go, sir’; but he did not go. ³¹Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you. ³²For John came to you in the way of righteousness and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him; and even after you saw it, you did not change your minds and believe him.”

Philippians 2:1-13

¹If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, ²make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. ³Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. ⁴Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. ⁵Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,
⁶   who, though he was in the form of God,
          did not regard equality with God
          as something to be exploited,
⁷   but emptied himself,
          taking the form of a slave,
          being born in human likeness.
     And being found in human form,
⁸        he humbled himself
          and became obedient to the point of death —
          even death on a cross.

⁹   Therefore God also highly exalted him
          and gave him the name
          that is above every name,
¹⁰  so that at the name of Jesus
          every knee should bend,
          in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
¹¹  and every tongue should confess
          that Jesus Christ is Lord,
          to the glory of God the Father.

¹²Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; ¹³ for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

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One of the things we notice when we read the Bible is that there are different voices in it that often tell the story a little differently. We see this especially in the Gospels: there are four Gospels and each writer has a distinct style and writes with different audiences and issues in mind. The big picture is the same because they are all telling the story about Jesus, but they sometimes tell that story very differently.

Sometimes we feel threatened that the differences in the stories weaken the overall story. We want to know what really happened or try to fit the pieces from each Gospel into an overall history.

It’s more fun and productive to read each story on its own and get to know the different personalities of the Gospels. John is the most different from the others with a beginning at the moment of creation and a mystical writing style. Luke has a special eye for the outsider including women, gentiles and the poor. Mark is the shortest account, crisp and to the point with a keen sense of conflict between Jesus and the leaders right from the beginning.

Matthew is longer with more focus on Jesus’ teaching and on building a church. He seems less concerned with the conflict between Jesus and the religious leaders, which is a major theme for Mark and John throughout the Gospel.

In Matthew Jesus spends most of his ministry away from Jerusalem. When he teaches and heals he encounters religious leaders, who Matthew calls Pharisees and “teachers of the law,” occasionally accompanied by Sadducees. These leaders and Jesus argue and sometimes the Pharisees ask Jesus questions “to test him,” but the conflict isn’t the main focus and we don’t hear anything from Matthew about the leaders plotting to kill Jesus.

Along the road, Jesus predicts his death three times before he reaches Jerusalem. In those predictions he says the people who will kill him are the chief priests and elders in Jerusalem, so we know that Jesus expects deadly conflict with the religious leaders in Jerusalem. Once Jesus gets to Jerusalem he encounters those leaders. We don’t hear much about Pharisees anymore; instead Jesus argues with the chief priests and elders and the conflict between them becomes more important and more dangerous.

That doesn’t mean the religious leaders have already made up their mind when Jesus arrives; it just means Jesus knows where the story is going. Knowing that, Jesus goes into the city quite aggressively. His entrance into the city on Palm Sunday is a royal procession where he pretty explicitly claims to be the Messiah. Then he goes right to the temple and starts turning over tables before leaving the city to spend the night in Bethany.

The next day Jesus goes back to the temple to teach. That’s when the chief priests and elders start asking him questions. They ask what gives him the right to turn things upside down in their place of worship.

forgiveness (9.11.11)

Matthew 18:21-35

²¹Then Peter came and said to him, “Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” ²²Jesus said to him, “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.

²³“For this reason the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. ²⁴When he began the reckoning, one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. ²⁵and, as he could not pay, his lord ordered him to be sold, together with his wife and children and all his possessions, and payment to be made. ²⁶So the slave fell on his knees before him, saying, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’ ²⁷And out of pity for him, the lord of that slave released him and forgave him the debt.

²⁸But that same slave, as he went out, came upon one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii; and seizing him by the throat, he said, ‘Pay what you owe.’ ²⁹Then his fellow slave fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’ ³⁰But he refused; then he went and threw him into prison until he would pay the debt. ³¹When his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their lord all that had taken place. ³²Then his lord summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked slave! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. ³³Should you not have had mercy on your fellow slave, as I had mercy on you?’ ³⁴And in anger his lord handed him over to be tortured until he would pay his entire debt. ³⁵So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

Romans 14:1-12

¹Welcome those who are weak in faith, but not for the purpose of quarreling over opinions. ²Some believe in eating anything, while the weak eat only vegetables. ³Those who eat must not despise those who abstain, and those who abstain must not pass judgment on those who eat; for God has welcomed them. ⁴Who are you to pass judgment on servants of another? It is before their own lord that they stand or fall. And they will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make them stand.

⁵Some judge one day to be better than another, while others judge all days to be alike. Let all be fully convinced in their own minds. ⁶Those who observe the day, observe it in honor of the Lord. Also those who eat, eat in honor of the Lord, since they give thanks to God; while those who abstain, abstain in honor of the Lord and give thanks to God.

⁷We do not live to ourselves, and we do not die to ourselves. ⁸If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord; so then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. ⁹For to this end Christ died and lived again, so that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living.

¹⁰Why do you pass judgment on your brother or sister? Or you, why do you despise your brother or sister? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. ¹¹For it is written, “As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me,
          and every tongue shall give praise to God.”
¹²So then, each of us will be accountable to God.

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            We’re not really going to dig into this Romans passage very much because we’re pretty good about accepting differences of opinion here. But I do want to lift it up for a moment because it’s one of the most important things about faith in community. We are not all the same. We have different strengths and weaknesses; we even have different beliefs.

            Often we grow in our faith and understanding through study with other people who see things a little differently, but there is no point in getting upset about those differences.

Paul would be quick to point out that there are limits to this; there are false teachings and dangerous ideas in the church that can hurt our faith and our witness to God’s love. But most differences of opinion in the church are not worth arguing about. Instead of worrying about what someone else believes, we should focus on how we can be better, more faithful disciples of Jesus. If the Presbyterian Church could learn this lesson we would be much stronger, more joyful, and better witnesses to Christ’s redeeming love.

Jesus reminds us that the heart of community is forgiveness. Matthew is more interested in how the church functions than the other Gospels are; probably because he writes somewhat later than Mark. So here he’s talking about forgiveness within the church, but the lesson goes further than that.

            Jesus hopes we will be incredibly persistent in forgiving each other. Frankly, I can’t think of anyone in any church I have forgiven seventy seven times. Long before we get to that point we’ve usually put our guard up so forcefully that the other person can’t wrong us anymore. But that’s not what Jesus has in mind. Jesus expects us to keep forgiving and forgiving; to keep opening our heart to other people whenever they ask us to forgive them.

            Reasonably enough, we worry about getting hurt or taken advantage of. We worry someone will pull something over on us. That’s not Jesus’ concern, but then look at Jesus’ example. The leaders of his faith rejected, accused and tortured him. His closest friends abandoned him; one even betrayed him. And he must have known that many of those he died to bring home to God would turn away too.

Still, instead of carrying a grudge, Jesus carried a cross. Instead of leaving us wandering on our own, Jesus keeps looking for us with a love that simply won’t give up. Jesus is our Lord and our example; while we won’t ever measure up to his forgiveness, we are called to follow in his footsteps.

love and conflict

Matthew 18:15-20

¹⁵“If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one. ¹⁶But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. ¹⁷If the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.

¹⁸Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. ¹⁹Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. ²⁰For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”

 Romans 13:8-14

⁸Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. ⁹The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet”; and any other commandment, are summed up in this word, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” ¹⁰Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.

¹¹Besides this, you know what time it is, how it is now the moment for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; ¹²the night is far gone, the day is near. Let us then lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; ¹³let us live honorably as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy. ¹⁴Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

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Paul gives us two very practical guidelines for faithful living in this short passage from Romans. The first is love and the second is living like it’s daytime. Paul says when we love each other we fulfill the law. That’s because real love demands a lot from us. Paul’s guidance is simple, but it is also challenging. It’s not that the commandments go away, but if we follow where love leads we won’t even have to think about the commandments.

            Imagine love as a road we drive on. The law, the traditions, the rules we grow up with are the guard rail bordering the road. The guardrail will keep us on the road, and sometimes when it’s dark and the road is hard to see we need the guidance of the reflectors on the guardrail. But most of the time we don’t want to be close enough to the guardrail to count on it. We follow the road; not running into the rail comes naturally.

            The commandment tells us not to commit adultery, but the fact that we love our neighbor and our spouse means we wouldn’t do it anyway. If we love our neighbor not only will we not violate their marriage, we’ll go out of our way to strengthen and support that marriage.

             Love isn’t usually glamorous. It’s everyday stuff like changing tires and cleaning up after ourself. It’s making sure we do our fair share of the work and leave enough for others. Love starts with respect and honesty and sometimes includes self-sacrifice. Hailey gave a great example of sacrifice a couple of weeks ago, which is really an example of love. She talked about standing up for people being picked on and stepping in to break up a fight. Love sometimes means saying “no” to things that are wrong.

            That’s where things get tricky in community. It’s easy enough to be a loving community when all that means is being friendly at coffee hour. Things get challenging when love demands questioning a brother or sister’s actions. Things get challenging when we think someone is following a self-destructive or immoral path. That’s where we move from Paul to Jesus in this morning’s readings.

            We had a fascinating discussion last month at our session meeting about scripture and about church discipline. The idea of church discipline makes many of us very uncomfortable. We remember that Jesus teaches us not to judge each other, and we know that we are not perfect ourselves. Who are we to tell someone else what to do?

Not conformed, transformed (8.21)

Exodus 1:8-2:10

⁸Now a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. ⁹He said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are more numerous and more powerful than we. ¹⁰Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, or they will increase and, in the event of war, join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land.”

¹¹Therefore they set taskmasters over them to oppress them with forced labor. They built supply cities, Pithom and Rameses, for Pharaoh. ¹²But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread, so that the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites. ¹³The Egyptians became ruthless in imposing tasks on the Israelites. ¹⁴and made their lives bitter with hard service in mortar and brick and in every kind of field labor. They were ruthless in all the tasks that they imposed on them.

¹⁵The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah, ¹⁶“When you act as midwives to the Hebrew women, and see them on the birthstool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, she shall live.”

¹⁷But the midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live. ¹⁸So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this, and allowed the boys to live?” ¹⁹The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.”

²⁰So God dealt well with the midwives; and the people multiplied and became very strong. ²¹And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families. ²²Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, “Every boy that is born to the Hebrews you shall throw into the Nile, but you shall let every girl live.”

¹Now a man from the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman.²The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw that he was a fine baby, she hid him three months. ³When she could hide him no longer she got a papyrus basket for him, and plastered it with bitumen and pitch; she put the child in it and placed it among the reeds on the bank of the river. ⁴His sister stood at a distance, to see what would happen to him.

⁵The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river, while her attendants walked beside the river. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her maid to bring it. ⁶When she opened it, she saw the child. He was crying, and she took pity on him, “This must be one of the Hebrews’ children,” she said.

⁷Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?” ⁸Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Yes.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother. ⁹Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give you your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed it. ¹⁰When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and she took him as her son. She named him Moses, “because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.”

Romans 12:1-8

¹I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. ²Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God — what is good and acceptable and perfect.

³For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. ⁴For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, ⁵so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. ⁶We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; ⁷ministry, in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; ⁸the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness.

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Living sacrifice

Spiritual worship

Discuss

What does it mean to be conformed to this world?

How does that look in your life?

What does it mean to be transformed by the renewing of your mind?

What kind of transformation might God be trying to work in you?

Pray for your partner during the week for God’s transforming power.

There are all kinds of forces in the world that shape us. The way we grow up, our family influences, the people we work and study with, all have an impact on who we are and what we value.

Some of the forces that shape us are obvious and others are much more subtle. Advertising, for instance, is obviously designed to get us to buy whatever is being advertised. The more important and subtle result of the constant stream of advertising is to make us want things in general.

It doesn’t make any difference for our souls if we buy Coke or Pepsi, but it does matter that we crave bottled sugar so much that we forget God’s gift of clean water. It does matter that we spend so much of our time and effort pursuing things that God and our neighbor get only leftovers of our time, energy and money. It does matter that we fret about having enough when eleven million people in the Horn of Africa are at risk of starvation.

There are forces in the world that want us to want things for ourselves and to fear other people. There are forces in the world that are happy about conflict and division. There are forces in our world that want us to believe that our rights, our possessions, our comfort, our desires are the most important things.

God calls us not to be conformed to this world. God calls us not to take the shape of the warped, deformed values around us. God calls us to stand apart, to be different, to take a different form, a different shape. God calls us to be transformed, to take a new shape.

Actually, it’s not such a new shape. In the beginning God made us in God’s image: in the image of love, community, compassion and mercy. Through greed and fear and sin we’ve been bent out of shape. God calls us back to our original shape through Jesus and his cross-shaped love. God calls us to be transformed; to be made new.

That transformation is about a change of mind and heart, a change God brings about inside us when we give up control. In that transformation we learn to discern and discover God’s will for our lives and for the world. It’s not usually an immediate change, but it takes place through prayer and community and ministry. We’re transformed by following God, especially when that’s not the easy thing to do.

Shiprah and Puah give us a great example of not being conformed to the world. Pharaoh gave them a direct order to help kill the Israelites. They could have been conformed to a society that taught them that Israel was a threat, that those foreigners living among them were dangerous and sub-human. They had probably been exposed to that message all their lives in different ways and now that message was reinforced by the command of the most powerful man in the world.

But they were not conformed. Instead of being afraid of Pharaoh, they trusted God. Instead of fitting into hatred, they were transformed by courage into instruments of salvation. They were renewed in love and a small corner of the world was changed for the better.

How is God trying to change you? How will the love of Christ renew your mind?

Thanks be to God.