Live in the Daylight

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(The story was found in this thoughtful post. It's by Rabbi Zoe Klein and is a reflection on her trip to Ghana)

Ancients used night and day as opposites – because they had to – because they would be immobilized in darkness – some things couldn’t get done, and some things were more likely to happen – bad things. Both in cities and in rural villages, privacy was rare. The level of private lives that we enjoy is truly a modern invention – unheard of in ancient days. Not only would your family know you what you do, but so would everyone else.

If you were grasping after money, people would know it. If you squandered your money in food and drink, that would get around. If you were a married man, and kept a mistress, that would be known. If you were slacking off at work, if you were cheating, if you were going after the latest fad in exotic eastern deities - well, it would come back on your community.

Those early Christian communities understood themselves as living in spots of light amidst darkness – true worship among false idols, taking care to respect and honor their bodies instead of wasting away in sexual immorality and drunkenness, learning to treat others with kindness as beloved children of the Father God – all the differences between this new faith in Christ Jesus that stood apart from the foolish chasing after the whims of this god or goddess, this deal or that patronage.

“See how they love each other” was the statement. See how their visible lives reflect what they believe – see how their choices outline that love that enriches their lives.

Live as if you are in broad daylight, says Paul. Live as if your life is visible – not only to God – but visible in the open marketplace, to your neighbors. Live Love, he says. Live as if Love – true love of neighbor – were not a theoretical concept – but Live Love because Love has been made real to you.

That is what makes Paul’s faith different from any other religion of that time or now – Live Love because Love has been made real for you. Put on Jesus Christ, put on the armor of light – that is your new garment of Love. That’s the garment for Daytime, for living in the daylight, the garment of loving the neighbor as yourself. Notice that Paul does not abandon the commandments of Old Time, the Old Testament, but, like Jesus, he takes them further – sees in them the continuity – Love your neighbor as yourself.

Paul is quoting Jesus here – he is so close to the original tradition, so close to the words of Jesus. As Christ loved – so are you to love. And that love is not hidden, cannot be hidden. In the transparent world of Paul and Jesus – acting out of true love of the neighbor will be a clear sign that something is different here – it will be like night and day. ‘See how they love each other.’

Even when the community is broken – as is suggested in Matthew 18, when the community is broken by individual sin – the community acts in love – sin is identified, named, and gently brought to light – in effect, echoing the greatest commandment – love your neighbor as yourself.

For this community. Every Christian community, carries the life and love of Christ within it. So it is promised, and so it must be – no one can escape that. Each individual puts on Jesus Christ, but the community in concert, when we live and work together – must be understood as the Body of Christ – where two or three are gathered – doesn’t just mean it’s good to gather together, but that we have an obligation to consider what we are doing together in the light and mission of Christ.

Live Love – for weeks now the wisdom from St. Paul has been about Love – about Agape – the kind of open, giving, love-for-others – that marks and makes the Christian community. We show this love in serving our neighbors – yes, the picnic, yes, the afterschool program (still looking for volunteers, I’m sure), yes, the provision of space for programs, yes, the education of our own children and youth, yes, worship – but we also will be known for our own lives – for we live in day-light – we live in the open, we live in the eyes of God and each other.

The beginning of the Talmud asks the question: “Until what time can you say the evening Shema? (The prayer for evening and night-time) Can you say it even until dawn?
And if so, how do we even know what time that is? How do we know when the night is over and the day has arrived?

This classic question leads to this classic story: In which students try to answer this question for the rabbi. One says:” Rebbe, night is over and day arrives, when you can see a house in the distance and determine if that’s your house or the house of your neighbor.”

Another student responded: “Night is over and day arrives when you can see an animal in the field and determine if it belongs to you or to your neighbor.”

Yet another student offered:” Night is over and day has arrived when you can a flower in the garden and distinguish its color.”

No, no, no thundered the Rebbe. Why must you see only in separations, only in distinctions, in determining what something is not. No. Night is over and day arrives when you look into the face of the person beside you and you can see that he is your brother, she is your sister, that person is your neighbor. That you belong to each other. You see that you are one. Then, and only then, will you know that night has ended and day has arrived.
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