In the name of God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Amen.
What
does it mean to be a Christian? That, I realize, is a big question. But it
seems that we who gather on a Sunday morning in the name of God ought to be
able to answer that question. I suppose the simplest answer is “Being a
Christian means believing in the triune God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”
But then we might ask, “what does it mean to believe,” and we’re right back
where we started – struggling to articulate what our faith is all about. Both
our readings from Leviticus and Matthew offer some insight into how we might
coherently understand our faith and what it means to be Christian.
In
Leviticus, God speaks to the people through Moses, saying “You shall be holy,
for I the Lord your God am holy.”
This is echoed by Jesus’ words in Matthew – “be perfect, therefore, as your
heavenly Father is perfect.” As a point of clarification, the word “perfect”
does not, in this usage, mean to be without error. Rather, think of it in terms
of finding the perfect tomato – one that is mature, ripe, full of flavor. This
is not a call to perfectionism, rather it is a call to be as fully developed in
our faith as possible. And the word used in Leviticus, “holy,” means to be
different, or set apart.
This
call to holiness, or “set apartness,” is what we see going on in Matthew. Jesus
instructs his followers by offering them an antithesis to the ways in which the
world works. “You have heard it said… but I say to you…” In Leviticus, the same
dynamic plays out in the form of a series of statements about the ways in which
the faithful are to differentiate themselves from their surrounding culture.
So, perhaps, a response to the question “What does it mean to be Christian?” is
“To be Christian is to be different.”
It’s
not news that Jesus was revolutionary – that’s why he collided with the
powers-that-be and was killed. Jesus’ message here, and throughout the Gospel,
is “don’t conform, reform.” In the language of the Gospel, it’s a message of
“repentance.” And remember, repentance does not mean “saying sorry,” but rather
repentance means that you have a change of heart, that you see things in a new way,
that you go in a new direction. Our Christian faith isn’t content to leave us
where we begin, but rather draws us deeper into the love and grace of God. As
we turn towards God, it means that we will turn away from other things.
Consider
Jesus’ first example – “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and
a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if
anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants
to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well.” This is a radically
different way of being in the world. Non-violence is not something that comes
naturally to most of us. Someone hits you, and we react with fight or flight,
not by offering the other cheek. Someone takes us to court for damages, we
either fight it or settle the case, we don’t say “Here, take more than you were
asking for.” If we stop and think about Jesus’ words, we realize just how
preposterous they really are.
In
a seminal book for my understanding of discipleship, Resident Aliens, Will Willimon and Stanley Hauerwas write
“Cheek-turning is not advocated as what works (it usually does not), but
advocated because this is the way God is.” There’s an important refrain in the
reading from Leviticus – after each statement, God reminds us “I am the Lord.” This isn’t divine ego stroking,
like a boss who constantly has to remind everyone how important she is or how
he is in-charge. No, God is not making an authority claim by repeating “I am
the Lord.” Rather, that refrain
makes a claim on us. It reminds us that we are God’s. God created us, redeems
us, sustains us. We belong to God; thus, we ought to act like it. So don’t
steal, because God doesn’t steal. Don’t defraud your neighbor, because that’s
not what God’s people do. Don’t have hate in your heart, because God is love.
Don’t strike back against your oppressors, because God is peace.
To
our American sensibilities, this seems out of sync with reality – maybe a nice
theory, but this isn’t how the world operates. You might say “I’m not
interested in a religion that turns me into a doormat or a punching bag.” And
that’s a valid concern. Jesus doesn’t tell us these things because they are
obvious or easy. If Jesus had said “Love your friends and family, for they are
good people” and stopped there, would anyone have paid attention to him? Would
the world be any better off by that message? Probably not. Loving your friends
comes naturally, but not your enemies.
It’s
actually a rather subversive move – as it robs our enemies of their power over
us. If you hate your enemy, your neighbor, your boss, then they have immense
power over you. They are able to infect you with anger, they are able to steal
your focus from other things, they are able make you act contrary to the way
that you want to be. The way to rob them of this power isn’t by returning evil
for evil, smite for smite, snub for snub. Rather, the way to counter them is
with love – to say “I’m not going to let you to cause me to stumble.”
When
someone treats us violently, a response of retaliation or more violence does
nothing to bring about the grace of God. But a non-violent response exposes the
depravity of their violence towards you. There’s a reason why Jesus is at the
center of our faith, because through his response to his violent death, he
showed us a better way than “an eye for an eye. Hauerwas and Willimon write
“The Cross is not a sign of the Church’s quiet suffering submission to the
powers-that-be, but rather the Church’s revolutionary participation in the
victory of Christ over these powers.” Turning the other cheek is not an act of
submission, rather it is an act of revolutionary defiance.
One
note of caution, there is a difference between non-violent resistance and
abuse. The Church has a sad history of enabling abusers by telling people,
often women, that somehow domestic violence is holy or acceptable. It is not.
There is no shame at all in getting out of an abusive relationship.
So what might it look
like if we are to be holy, to be different in this world? The first step is to
recognize the brokenness of the world, which we often call sin, and the way of
love and grace given to us by God, which we often call salvation. If we didn’t
know any better, we might think that it is perfectly acceptable to make sure
that we have plenty before others have enough, we might think it is okay to
return an eye for an eye, we might see power as being the one with the biggest
stick. Start being different by trusting that love is stronger than hatred,
that Resurrection overcomes death, that victory comes not through strength but
sacrifice.
But then the time comes
for us to put this belief into practice. Again, Hauerwas and Willimon write
“The challenge of the Gospel is not the intellectual dilemma of how to make an
archaic system of belief compatible with modern belief systems. The challenge
of Jesus is the political dilemma of how to be faithful in a strange
community.” In other words, in a world where violence is normal, where
selfishness is advantageous, how do we act differently? How do we act as if God
is the Lord?
As Jesus says, loving
your friends is easy, and not radical, even the tax collectors do that; loving your
enemies is holy. Who are your enemies? And I don’t ask as an abstract question
– who are the people that you can’t stand? Maybe a politician, maybe an
estranged family member, maybe a co-worker? Consider how you might start loving
them.
This, I know, is hard
work. It’s hard work because treating those well who treat your poorly is just
so counter-intuitive. But more than that, it makes you vulnerable. No one is
made vulnerable by hate, but love opens you to risk. It has been said that “The
Cross is what happens when you take God’s account of reality more seriously
than Caesar’s.” When you choose to live without fear, to be quick to love, to
be ready to forgive, sometimes you will be taken advantage of, sometimes you
will be ostracized. Faith in God will make you different, and as we all know,
our society doesn’t generally treat difference well. We like predicable
conformity, we like when people play by the rules, we like things that fit into
pre-established categories. I am under no illusion that being holy, that being
different in the name of God, is easy. And that is why we need each other.
One of the refrains in
the theology of Hauerwas is “The role of the Church is to be the Church, not to
transform the world.” There a many laudable dreams that we might have for our
world – an end to global hunger, the disarmament of nuclear weapons, equal pay
for equal work. These are fantastic things to hope for, but they ought not to
be our goal. Rather, our goal is simply to be the Church. And if we can get
that right, or at least more right than we currently do, then those other
outcomes will follow.
We can be the Church by
focusing on worship. Our culture is so full of idols that we don’t even see
them anymore – power, money, prestige, technology, the list could go on and on.
What worship does is to put something else in front of us, it puts us on the
right track. Worship reminds us of our radical equality before God, worship
roots us in community, worship orients us to something bigger than ourselves,
worship gives us a healthy dose of mystery to make us more humble. If we can
commit ourselves to gathering Sunday in and Sunday out, to prioritizing Sunday
worship above all else, to making daily prayer a part of our life, then we will
become part of a rhythm of life that is different than the world. We can become
holy by making sure that our schedule allows us to encounter holiness through
worship.
Another practice that I
commend to you is the Sacrament of Reconciliation, sometimes called Confession.
This Lent, I will be in the Chapel from 4-5pm on Wednesdays offering the
Sacrament of Reconciliation. The practice of confessing your sins and having a
priest pronounce the forgiveness of God is a very holy act. And by holy, I do
mean different. We live in a culture where most people cannot admit wrong
doing, where we carry around our mistakes and burdens that weigh us down, where
we think that we’re supposed to figure it out alone. Reconciliation is a corrective
to that, and I personally find it to be liberating and hope-filled.
A few notes on
Reconciliation – as I said, I’ll be in the Chapel from 4-5, if I’m in a session
with someone, there will be a sign on the door, just wait in the Library which
is right next to the Chapel. The Sacrament lasts about 10 minutes. If you’d
like to schedule a time where we can talk for longer than that, you can always
contact me and we’ll find a separate time to allow for more conversation. The
subjects of Reconciliation can be varied, whatever you seek liberation from and
forgiveness for. And what happens in Reconciliation stays there. I will never
bring up any topic that you mention, I will pray that I might forget what you
tell me as soon as you leave the Chapel, and I resolve to only pronounce God’s
forgiveness, not to judge you or see you any differently.
The Sacrament of
Reconciliation is part of what it means to be the Church, to be holy, to be
different. It is to take a serious look at our lives, to humbly ask for
forgiveness, and to encounter the grace of God. Reconciliation offers you the opportunity
to leave your sins in the past, to make a fresh start, to unburden yourself of
things that you’ve been carrying around in your conscience for too long.
Reconciliation involves the revolutionary claim that you make mistakes, and yet
are still deserving of love, that you wish to live a holier life, that the Lord is your God. I hope and pray that
many of you will avail yourself of this opportunity in Lent and encounter the
grace and holiness of Reconciliation.
Being a Christian means
being different – focusing on love, focusing on God, focusing on grace. In
being different, we find the salvation of God – the liberation from all that
keeps us from fully grasping the abundant life that God intends for us. May God
give you the resolve, the courage, and the grace to be different. Amen.
