19. Sunday after Pentecost, 10/23/2011

Sermon on Matthew 22:34-46, by Carl A. Voges

The Passage

"But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. ‘Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?' And he said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.'

"Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them a question, saying, ‘What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he?' They said to him, ‘The son of David.' He said to them, ‘How is it then that David, in the Spirit, calls him Lord, saying, ‘The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your feet?

If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son?' And no one was able to answer him a word, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions."

[English Standard Version]

"For our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive, but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts." [1 Thessalonians 2.3f.]

In the Name of Christ + Jesus our Lord

As we make our way into Lord's presence this morning, we may be thinking of Lutheran church structures who are highly concerned about their image and impact, leading them to adopt the skillful and attractive ways of the world. Or we may be conscious of the various directions of the country in which we live and the persons who want to lead us. Or we may be bumping up against those pastors and parish communities who have lost sight of the hard-nosed reality that their ministry is not about them, but it is about the Lord who rescued them from sin, Satan and death through the Son's crucifixion and resurrection.

Addressing such thinking and giving us another perspective is the following sketch of the world's life as intended by Lord God. He meant for all its people to be living in and with him. This intent started unraveling with our first parents (Adam and Eve). Their attention got caught with another life (the one offered by this world) and they took it. That life looked very attractive, but, behind the attraction, there was a huge hole that was created - there was no Lord God!

Drawn into that life and trapped by it, our first parents (and everybody since then) has tried to fill that hole with their own gods, gods that stream from an overwhelming concern for one's self. We are born with that concern and, if there is no intervention, we die with that concern. This sketch reveals that we were created to be obedient to the Lord God and to live in him, but the world's life warps that obedience so we end up living for and in ourselves. That's why we can read of a person's Memorial Service in a church and find out that the chief speakers are not an ordained pastor, but former students of that person!

This basic sketch describes the first reality in our lives as Lord's people. The second reality is the Life poured on us when we were baptized. Baptism's Life frees us from the trap of obedience to our selves and resets us in obedience to Lord God. These two realities and the transformation from one to the other are described in today's Gospel.

Remember that we are still in the days between Passion Sunday and Maundy Thursday of Holy Week. Jesus is still being tested by the Jewish leaders. The Pharisees have gathered together because they have heard that Jesus silenced the Sadducees. The silencing occurred just before this passage. The Sadducees, who did not believe in the resurrection, had wanted to know which husband the woman would have after being married seven times. Jesus pointed out that there is no marriage in the resurrection!

The Pharisees determine to come after Jesus from another angle. They have one of their members (he's described as a lawyer, not as we understand the profession today, but as ateacher of Law, the Torah) ask Jesus a question to test him. One wonders if this teacher already knew what the Law's great commandment is. Jesus responds that it is love for the Lord God with all one's being that is the great and first command (he quotes Deut 6.5). He goes on, stating there is a second command like it - loving neighbor as oneself (he quotes Lev 19.18). Jesus points out that all the Law and the prophets (the entire OT Scriptures) depend or hang on these two commands. Note that there is no response from this lawyer, this teacher of Law (Torah)!

Jesus then goes on the offensive. He asks the Pharisees two questions - What do you think about Messiah? and Whose son is he? Pharisees did believe in a Messiah, but their belief was rooted in their own thinking. They thought the Messiah would swerve the world's life into their understandings.

Remember that the Pharisees had sought to maintain the Lord's Life in this world by expanding the Ten Commandments into six hundred thirteen of their own! For example, they thought they could please the Lord God by adding thirty-nine stipulations to the Third Command about keeping the Sabbath Day holy. They had worked relentlessly at this expansion to prevent another Babylonian Exile! The Pharisees did believe that the Messiah would be David's son (his descendant) and they give that answer to Jesus.

So our Lord asks them another question - How can David then, in Spirit, call his son Lord? Jesus quotes Ps 110.1 (a shadowy reference to Jesus' ascension, following his crucifixion and resurrection). Jesus continues the questioning - If David calls the Messiah Lord, how is he David's son? Jesus' questions silence the Pharisees, like the Sadducees earlier they are unable to respond. Matthew then states that they are not able to speak a single word and that they do not dare to ask him any more questions.

Remember that we are in the days between Passion Sunday and Maundy Thursday of Holy Week. What happens now is that the Jewish leaders intensify their plotting against Jesus so they can murder him.

As we let this passage penetrate our lives, we notice a structure in it. The Jewish leaders test Jesus, assuming that he will do things their way. Their tests fail, revealing that Jesus does things his way. Their failures make them even more determined to kill him, something they are able to do on Good Friday.

What is going on in this structure is a struggle between obedience as the world gives it and obedience as the Lord gives it. With the Pharisees obedience to one's self wins out with disastrous consequences for that self. With the baptized it is a struggle that keeps surfacing as we travel from our Baptisms through our own deaths into eternity.

There is problem, though, with this observation - we prefer to avoid that struggle! That's why so many of us who are baptized fall into the routine of living in and by the world while waving at the Lord God now and then (we don't want him to forget who we are!). Such avoidance comes to us instinctively. That instinct shows up whenever there is something wrong with our bodies or minds. If we have the option of adopting significant changes in our lifestyles or taking pills, most of time, to be honest, we'll go with the pills!

Our Lord would prefer that we not avoid the struggle between obedience to him and obedience to our selves. This non-avoidance can reveal itself in a couple of ways. One is when people contribute to the relief of disaster victims and conclude they have established a line of credit with the Lord God! But this non-avoidance can also occur when people take part in community programs offered by various churches, leading them to believe they have earned numerous points with the Lord God! In both examples people have been doing these things apart from the worshiping of the Lord God and this is where their actions stumble. We cannot press on the Lord God the way we do things and assume that they are his ways!

In today's Gospel Jesus wants us to see that disaster is waiting for those people who keep insisting that things have to be done their way. Our Lord wants us to see that Life, real Life, is waiting for those people who recognize that things only get done the Lord's way.

Thus he baptizes us into his crucifixion and resurrection. He wrenches us out of the life given us by the world and plunges us into the Life that comes from eternity and runs on into it. He makes it possible for us to love the Lord God with all that we are and to love the people around us as much as ourselves.

The Greek word used to describe that love is agape, the love that is unique to the Holy Trinity. This love cannot be created by us nor can we substitute our versions of it. This love is a gift, one we do not deserve. But the Lord gives it to us relentlessly and faithfully through the holy places of Baptism and Forgiveness, Scriptures and Supper.

The Lord makes it possible for us to love the Lord God with all that we are as well as to love the people around us as much as ourselves. He wrenches us out of the life given us by the world at birth and plunges us into the Life streaming from the Son's crucifixion and resurrection.

That's why so many of us are now imbedded in the routine of living in and by the Lord God while waving at the world now and then!

Now may the peace of the Lord God, which is beyond all understanding, keep our hearts and minds through Christ + Jesus our Lord.

Pr. Carl A. Voges
Columbia, SC
E-Mail: cavoges@bellsouth.net

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