Göttinger Predigten
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6. Sunday of Epiphany, 02/13/2011
Sermon on Matthew 5:21-37, by Luke Bouman
Matthew 5:21 "You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, 'You shall not murder'; and 'whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.' 22 But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, 'You fool,' you will be liable to the hell of fire. 23 So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, 24 leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift. 25 Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are on the way to court with him, or your accuser may hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison. 26 Truly I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny. 27 "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall not commit adultery.' 28 But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell. 31 "It was also said, 'Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.' 32 But I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. 33 "Again, you have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, 'You shall not swear falsely, but carry out the vows you have made to the Lord.' 34 But I say to you, Do not swear at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, 35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. 36 And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 Let your word be 'Yes, Yes' or 'No, No'; anything more than this comes from the evil one.
Rule Changes
John wondered why the other kids didn't want to play with him. He loved games. But he didn't understand that winning, while fun, wasn't the point of playing them. He wanted to win every game. When he was losing, he would often adjust the rules in his favor, so that he could win. When the other kids argued with him about this, he would always resort to his trump card right away.
"I called it first," he would say. There was an unspoken rule that whoever makes the call first gets his way, and John was a master of the first call. It didn't occur to the other kids on the block to call "no changes" as the rules were first announced. So they would lose whenever John was playing. It was unfair, and everyone, even John, knew it. But winning was more important to John than "fairness." As for the other kids, they gradually drifted away. They quit gathering in the front yards. They began inviting one another into this back yard or that, sometimes posting a sentry at the gate, specifically to let John know that this was an "invitation only" play date.
John finally asked one of the other kids what was going on, and he received the snippy reply that they didn't like him changing the rules all the time and they wanted to play without him winning every game. John stalked off, fuming. Why couldn't he change the rules to suit himself? Other kids had done it. Why shouldn't he be allowed to win if he wanted to? He thought of it the idea first. He should be able to do what he wants.
God's rules
There have been folks throughout time who want to change God's rules, too. There may be many reasons for this. Maybe we don't like how strict they are, and we want to relax them, or at least some of them. Maybe we want to enforce only certain rules to let the people we like into the community of faith and keep others waiting at the gate. Perhaps we are just trying to adapt the rules to keep up with society.
But in our Gospel text for today, relaxing the rules in any way, is not what Jesus is about. If anything, he is intensifying the rules. This is jarring to the ear. Perhaps we are conditioned to see Jesus as relaxing the rules, which he certainly did in regard to the Sabbath in other places in the Gospels. We want to hear Jesus telling us about love and acceptance. So these words in today's Gospel come as quite a shock.
Jesus seems to change the rules, but not to let us off the hook. These rules are interpreted and intensified. We might avoid actual murder, but Jesus points out that hatred and scoff will lead us to the same punishment in the end. The language becomes so intense that Jesus is advocating cutting out eyes and cutting off limbs, if those members of the body are causing us to sin. Does this seem a little extreme to you? It does to me.
Jesus is going out of his way to suggest that we do not get to change the rules to make it easier for us to win the salvation game. In case we don't get the message, Jesus then tells us that the rules are so difficult to follow that no one could possibly avoid the punishments of "hell" so prominently mentioned in this text. We are all in the same grave situation, and that situation is leading us nowhere good.
I think this is particularly instructive to those, in this day and age, who want to use the rules as a measuring stick for how faithful we are. Some suggest that if we follow the right rules in the right way we can win the salvation game. Jesus is having none of this. The first thing I get out of this passage is that no one can win at this game. We are not allowed to relax these rules. And keeping them is beyond us. All we get, if we try to play this game, is despair.
Beyond the Rules
Part of what is going on here is that Jesus is setting the people up for a new understanding. Following the rules is not something we escape, but it is also not the path to God. Jesus very presence tells us something interesting and unique about our relationship with God. It isn't based on our getting things "right". God comes to us while we are still getting things "wrong". God is committed to our existence by joining us in it. Jesus knows the things that can go wrong with community. Jesus also knows that it isn't our eyes or our limbs that cause us to sin. It is our very heart, our very nature.
What God has come to do in our midst is not set us on a new, better moral pathway. We would and do fail on that path as surely as we fail on any other. What God's comes to do is to put our hearts and lives to death. It is this, the precondition for resurrection, which will make all of the difference. We die to sin, and rise to new life. We do this in baptism. We do this every day of our lives. We will do it finally at the end of our lives. God does this in us, actually. We don't do it at all.
In doing so, God establishes relationship with us that is beyond our ability to keep one or another set of rules, no matter how intense or relaxed those rules might be. God is acting as a "game changer" in this particular sense. Not only is the outcome changed, but the game itself is abolished.
Even the rules themselves are re-purposed. We no longer follow rules to "win" something. Instead we begin to see that these rules are about how it is that we are able to live in community with one another. It is the need for us to win, to come out on top that drives our hearts to act out of selfish gain, to act for ourselves and not for the common life we share together.
When our hearts are exchanged, killed and brought to life again, we see a different reason to follow the rules: that we might reflect in community the care that God has shown to us. Thus, the hate and scorn that lie behind murder are banished with the act itself. Thus the need to require people to swear oaths to shore up their words disappears. Thus we learn to become communities of integrity and hope rather than communities of "everyone for themselves" and despair.
Perhaps in time, John will learn this as he deals with the other children. But it won't come because he has learned at all. It will come because the transforming power of the one who died and rose again has entered his life and created him anew. This is what happens to all of us. We can look at Jesus words in today's Gospel and despair. Or we can die to sin and be raised to Jesus' vision of new life and new community together. It isn't really a choice as much as it is God's ongoing saving action. And it isn't a game at all. God is deadly serious about it; serious enough to die, to experience the depths of hell, and rise again himself. If that doesn't change our games, I don't know what will.