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6 Epiphany, 02/16/2014
The New Rules or What?
Sermon on Matthew 5:21-37, by Walter W. Harms
How many of you can recite the Ten Commandments by heart? Good! At least a few of you know them, perhaps remembering them from Christian schools you attended or from another class you attended. If you don't know them all, then you know at least a few of them-ones like: don't kill; don't steal; don't disobey parents; don't commit adultery; and perhaps even, don't have any other God, but the real one.
It would seem that when you first hear the words of the Gospel for this Sunday in Epiphany, that Jesus is giving us a new set of commandments-stricter, more internal than external, and like the original 10, impossible to obey. So as with the original 10, we will try to forget about them, and do the best we can in life.
Does that sound like what you and I do? Probably. After all we are for the most part upstanding citizens who have never faced much more than a traffic fine, if even that. Any one here this morning, murder anyone? Anyone here ever been in jail or prison for doing something illegal, you know, like sniffing or smoking something or even smoking where you weren't supposed? Or worse? I would ask you to raise your hand if you had, but.....
So we are just going to love Jesus because he forgives everything bad, naughty that we do, think or say and then go and get on with life following what we hope will help us survive in a very difficult world today. After all it is a dog-eat-dog world, and we have to get our fair share of everything out there, even if it means being less than kind, helpful or generous. Right?
I didn't mention divorce because so many of us are divorced today, for a whole multitude of reasons that may or may not include adultery. And to mention what we all too often call or think about others would only seem silly, almost. Who hasn't called another driver a fool, a jackass, an SOB, crazy, simply railed at them or shot the finger at them?
I know, I know there are some of you who are just as nice when you drive as when you have the preacher over for dinner!!!
Who hasn't hated, despised, or put down someone? Who hasn't thought people of other races or countries are inferior to us?
Using God's name often in conversation has become part of normal talk. Using the name of Jesus Christ has become so normal that we hardly notice it anymore. We may not use God's name to swear to matters in ordinary life, but we do ask God to damn an awful lot of people.
So what is Jesus up to in these words, from that which we call the Sermon on the Mount? Is he attempting to call us to a higher moral standard? Is he trying to get us to behave better? Or what?
Let's look at the people's attitudes and behavior when he spoke these words. This is not a total resume, but it might help us understand Jesus better. Ordinary people struggled with life that was short and not very sweet. If they were religious at all (and we are talking about people who were Jews at that time), you knew God's law well. All men had studied it for years. They knew the rules and regulations well. At least once a year they were to go to Jerusalem and worship at the temple. Jesus did this, following the example of his parents whose "custom" it was to go to Jerusalem for at least one high festival a year (you know like Christmas or Easter!).
There were multiple rules for living, eating, resting on the Sabbath days and much more. If you failed in keeping these rules and commandments, you would go through a process to "get right" with God again. Fine! More than a few Jews had not only a difficult time following these regulations, but couldn't obey them because of work or health reasons.
But most Jews at Jesus' time thought that if they followed all these edicts from God through Moses, they would be fine, right or on God's good side.
Jesus simply annihilates any pretense that any of those people had or for that matter any of us who might think in any way that we are right with God because we are nice people, good citizens, tax paying members of society. On top of that, I would presume that many of us here today come to worship pretty regularly, pray once in a while, give some to church and public charities, are good neighbors, and are better than all those people we hear and see about on TV. All of that does absolutely nothing to get us on the good side of God.
These words of Jesus tell us pretty clearly that it's not the outside appearance that counts, but the inner heart of each of us that needs to be explored rigorously! And I mean a thorough vetting of the mind, emotions, attitudes we have toward God and others.
We don't want to do that, do we? Rather turn up the TV, keep the music going in our ears, play the games on our devices to avoid knowing how desperate we really are. We are empty of anything good. We loathe others and also ourselves. We intend to do good, but often simply pave the way to the hell we find ourselves in already!
I want you to know that all these very difficult statements from Jesus are not there to make us feel worse about ourselves, or others. The Law of God was given to show us simply how to live with Him and people in a pleasant way. But from the get-go, man has thought he knew a better way, and that way has always led to death, minor deaths, major deaths, wars, exploitation of others, and then physical death, followed by eternal, never-ending separation from any good who is God!
You and I are as helpless as a baby lying in it own excretion. Wriggling doesn't help, crying doesn't help-nothing helps!
This Jesus came not to abolish all of God's laws and commandments, but to do something that can only be described as preposterous from our point of view. That is one of the great surprises that comes to us during this Epiphany season. He came to keep all of these laws for us. He came to clean us from all "unrighteousness." He came to do away with all the deaths we experience by going into death and crushing the fear and power that death holds over us. He came to give us life NOW and give it to us in full measure. He came to give us existence beyond our short, very brief pilgrimage in this world.
And now he gives us the power of God himself. You and I have the power through our Baptism. If you are not baptized, see the pastor after this time! That power is God within you, his Holy Spirit. He will whisper to you in prayer and worship that all is right with you and God. He will tell you, in the times you think are your worst moral defeats, that you are God's workmanship, created anew through Christ Jesus and he will give you the power to do the good works he wants you to do.
Those "good works" will include loving others, forgiving others, helping others, control over your evil thoughts, words and deeds. Jesus' gift of his Holy Spirit will lead you to all righteousness. That is always the faith to trust Jesus has made us right with God who loves you beyond your best imagination.
That's what Jesus is up to in these words to us this day.