blessings - a sermon

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Proper 22B,

Our life is a little different now than in Jesus' day. We are moving at a faster pace, we are more likely to be dependent upon technology, and we seem to find it harder to be truly together - to connect with each other. We fear for our children at school, we wonder about the cruelty of circumstances, the awesome destruction of nature.

Our lives seem so far away from the time of Jesus that this Gospel lesson hits with a discordant clang - sounding out of tune and out of time. But let’s look at this lesson closer.

Jesus has been traveling, continuing to teach the growing crowds of people who followed him wherever he went spread. Jesus had healed the blind, deaf and lame; he had cast out demons and been transfigured in the presence of his disciples. And Jesus had taught and taught and taught some more. He had spoken with passion about the Kingdom of God, about the nature of sin, about the cost of discipleship.

He had spoken with love and joy and welcome to sinners, to all who recognized they had fallen short of their Creator’s ideals, with a message of hope, of repentance and new life. Again and again, Jesus had taught those who came to hear the lessons of God’s love for them, about God’s desire that men, women and children learn to live without fear, God’s desire that they become lamps through which divine love might shed light on all who knew them.

Over and over, as word of his teaching spread, the religious establishment stepped forward out of the crowds to trip Jesus up. “Teacher, is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” Well, of course, they knew it was lawful - Moses had said it was. But they asked anyway.

Jesus turned the question back to them. “What did Moses command you?” “Well, Moses said it was okay, that a man could divorce his wife anytime he wanted to.” “Why?” asked Jesus “Why would Moses say that - knowing that in the creation stories God created Adam and Eve as equals, as partners and as the image of God in the world?” The religious authorities had no answer. Jesus refused to be tricked into betraying the will and desire of God in favor of the letter of the Law. “I’ll tell you why - because of your hardness of heart; because God knew that your sin would require this.” (Katherine Merrell Glenn)

The two parts of scripture - the story of Creation and the Law of Moses about divorce - are both from God - but they answer different questions about the relationship of humanity with God. God created Man and Woman to be together in harmony - and because of sin they often cannot stay together. Marriage and family life, like being a community of faith together - is hard work. And sometimes we fail.

That is reality - and that reality reminds us all - whatever our personal relationships - married or divorced, single or living in committed companionship - we are all sinful, all burdened with the hardness of heart that Jesus spoke of.

Remember the second part of the reading? Jesus is welcoming the children . There Jesus is reminding the disciples NOT to prevent those in need of healing from coming to him. AS we are all burdened with hardness of heart, all sinners in need of grace and mercy, all children dependent upon God's grace - this part of the passage should give us hope that in God - we, too, find the forgiveness and love that rebuilds us and makes us whole again.

For I believe it is in human relationships that we can discover God’s love (I stress this with the confirmation students as we study the 10 commandments – we are made to be in relationship) It is in the relationship between man and woman, yes, but also between father and son, mother and child, friend to friend, and yes, even pastor to people and fellow church member to stranger – that we discover ourselves, and that we uncover the will of God for his people.

A couple of years ago, you may remember the tragic shooting of the Amish children in Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania. Maybe like me, you too, were moved by the witness of the Amish who not only turned to care for each other of their community but who also spoke of the necessary care for the family of the criminal, of the murderer. A grandfather looks at the body of his granddaughter and says to his nephew - "we must not think evil of this man." (CNN)

They see that forgiveness - the acting out of forgiveness as an integral part of the Christian Discipleship, right up there with pacifism and simplicity. They say they will take food to the murderer's widow - knowing that the sharing of the table is a powerful symbol of forgiveness. They express, in community, the depth of the power to transform - that faith in God can bring.

Here, in our community, we symbolize that movement -
from hardness of heart, from the necessary reality of our human brokenness
- to forgiveness, to remake human bonds
- with the words and the bread and the wine. With the words of forgiveness and reconciliation - and with the action, of coming forward to receive this body, this blood, this holy presence of the One who forgives.

At almost all of our worship services we offer the “peace”- it most properly belongs after the confession and before the meal. It is in the action of saying "peace be with you" to your neighbor, to your family, to your enemy - that we enact the forgiveness God commands of us. Jesus asks us to reconcile with our brother or sisters before we come to give our gift, before we come to the table. (Matthew 5:23)

So when I say 'Peace be with you" and you reply - "also with you" - you acknowledge my humanity, and turn to your neighbor, and in Christ's name recognize and reconcile with that neighbor.

Our God knows us well, knows we have hard hearts, and offers us forgiveness and offers to teach us how to forgive.

In this way we remember that we pray to be forgiven our trespasses (sins) as we forgive those who trespass (sin) against us.

For we, too, are always invited back to the banquet at our father’s house, always offered the power of the washing of the water and the eating of the meal. We, too are the little ones, welcomed and blessed by the Son of God.