Two different worlds but one God

In his parables Jesus invites the listener to be part of the story by relating explicit scenarios that were relevant to the listener’s world. These parables also serve as implicit invitations for them to see something else beneath in the narrative. From time to time Jesus would insert a clever device or provocative form of speech, i.e., an aphorism, in which a specific piece or element would prompt the imagination and become an indelible memory. And so it is in this week’s Gospel (Matthew 22:15-21). Jesus uses the coin to illustrate and memorialize in the mind’s eye of the listener his answer which typical of Jesus, was in the form of a question and asks, “what do you think?”

Over the centuries, many Christians have based their attitudes toward government on this passage. Some have thought that Jesus' statement establishes two separate realms, Caesar's and God's. This interpretation strikes many Americans as obviously correct, given our separation of church and state. In this historical context, Jesus’ words had little to do with taxation or political authority in general. Jews in the first century paid several taxes: tithes to the Temple, customs taxes, and taxes on land. Yet, the people were not questioning taxes but rather their question specifically was concerned with whether it was lawful to pay taxes to Caesar who as the emperor of Rome and the son of Augustus, represented the head of an imperial domination system, and was purported to be the “son of God.” In essence, even possessing the coin was tantamount to idolatry and a violation of the commandments. 

The President of the Lutheran Theological Seminary, David Lose writes that three of the most powerful words in the world besides "I love you," are "I don't know." To many of us in our culture, these words seem like an admission of failure. It’s as if our admitting any kind of ignorance somehow undermines the validity of our education and degrees. How could that be? But just maybe we don’t know and just maybe telling another person that we don't know provides them an invitation to share what they know or, sometimes even better, to join you in figuring something out. This becomes especially true when you pair those three words with four others: "What do you think?" Isn’t that what we do in our weekly Scripture Discussion?

So back to the question put to Jesus in our Gospel. It was a trap. Either way a yes or no answer would have gotten Jesus in trouble. "Yes" would have discredited him with those who found the imperial domination system unacceptable. "No" would have made him subject to arrest for sedition. So is Jesus saying that we owe nothing to a false God like Caesar and should reserve all things for the true God? Or is he inviting us to recognize that while we may owe the emperors of this world some things like taxes, we owe God other things, like our whole selves? Perhaps Jesus is inviting us to put aside our attachments and allegiance to the material and temporal things of this world that our coins can buy and invite our ultimate devotion to God? I don't know. What do you think? Or is Jesus advocating a retreat from the economic and political dimensions of our lives and helping us recognize that all of these things are part of God's “divine economy?” As such, is Jesus inviting us to set the stage for our transformation…by putting on the mind of God in all of our decisions in what we do, buy, and how we spend our time? The whole world is God's including us. What do you think? 

Many Are Called But Few Are Chosen

 

A few months back we received a hand delivered rather large 8 x 10 envelope by a private messenger service. Not recognizing the return address I was at first unwilling to accept the envelope, but noting the considerable expense of the courier service, I decided to accept it.

To our amazement, it was a strikingly beautiful embossed invitation to a private celebration along with an accompanying letter describing specific instructions as to travel and lodging. The invitation was to honor the Tony Bennett’s 91st birthday and lifetime achievements in music and art. Of course I thought it was a promo to lure us into buying vacation property. But then as I read the details covering the invitation, I realized that it was legitimate. 

Why us? I met Tony Bennett with his wife years ago at a nightclub in the City in which John Pizzarelli was performing. I became friends with John, a local boy whose career I had followed over the years. We spoke often of Tony and his ability to maintain his art, despite his advanced age I often said how I would love to have a one-on-one conversation with Tony about music and his career. But I never thought that we would have the opportunity.

The accompanying letter described our pre-arranged all expenses paid travel to and lodging in a villa in Florence. We were to provide our passport information to an intermediary who had scheduled our travel via private jet leaving and returning to Teterboro airport at a specific date and time. Information as to the celebration was private and confidential. As such we were asked to sign a security bond insuring our willingness to comply. No other communications were required or frankly permitted. 

Needless to say, we were excited at first but then began to wonder how we would fit in. While we had the requisite formal apparel required for the party, we began to wonder how we would interact with an elite jet set of luminaries, likely to be in attendance. I am usually not at a loss for words and can pretty much talk to anyone, however, I’m not a professional musician and would be out of my element rubbing elbows with people who, with the exception of my love for music, had little in common. And while we really love Florence, we realized we would have little time to ourselves and be somewhat confined to our designated luxurious villa with lots of strangers for 3 days. 

Needless to say we came come up with enough reasons (or excuses) and decided that it wasn’t worth it, so we regrettably declined the invitation, although we did sign the confidentiality agreement pledging secrecy. What would you have done if you were in our shoes? Most of our family and friends thought we were nuts for declining this once in a lifetime opportunity. 

Our readings in (Matthew 22:1-14) this week speaks of a different wedding. Jesus tells of a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son and invited everyone to attend. But they all declined. Hurt and insulted he sent his servants into the streets to collect anyone and everyone and see to it that they came to the wedding. One attendee came without being properly groomed or dressed and was thrown out. Throughout the gospels, Jesus makes curious comments about the marriage of heaven and earth and our being prepared for the event.

OK, our invitation to Tony Bennett’s birthday celebration, like Jesus’ parables, brings the question home: What would you do?

We are his stewards

 

In this parable (Matthew 21:33-46) the Pharisees were indignant at the thought that they might not be considered to be as good as they thought they were, elite and “they were entitled” by birth and dismissed anything that might challenge their place in Jewish society. How about us; do we sometimes think that we are entitled…just because we were born into a certain social strata? Let’s face it, as citizens of this great country we sometimes take our blessings for granted and live as though we “have a right to” and have somehow earned these blessings?

 It troubles me to see and hear the ongoing division in our country over resurrected hurts and even evils that have festered and continue to be perpetrated on people of color and those without voice. While we can’t undo the wrongs of the past and letting go of the past does not mean we bury it or forget it; we can’t. But by remembering its lessons we can grow going forward. However, can we do this mindfully, civilly in honest discourse with the ultimate endpoint, to change?  Too often the purpose of one cause or another is drowned out in self-serving noise and visual distractions that cause us to focus on unpleasant theatrics and unlawful demonstrations and not on solutions. Shouldn’t we first take stock of what we have, give thanks, and start from there? We are mere temporary resident tenants who are blessed to have been entrusted as stewards of the Master’s property and are expected to return it better than the way we found it.

And what about our churches, and here I refer to the practice of our faith and not the institutions? We act at times as though our religious practices are our own possessions to which we are solely entitled.  Like the tenants who lease the land, we are too busy tending to our own agendas and goals that we forget that the landowner is going to hold us accountable for what we have done with his land.  Rather than serving as stewards of God’s vineyard in the world we have sometimes behave as though the church is our private club.   

The kingdom of God does not work like a marketplace.  What we do in His kingdom does not exist to serve our own agendas.  But rather it exists to serve something much greater than ourselves.  Tending to His vineyard has nothing to do with yield.  We have no idea what that yield is or will be. Love like a fertile verdant garden, takes what we have and returns it more beautiful than before.  

In Matthew, Jesus describes the violent way the tenant farmers treated the servants and the landowner’s own son.  He then asks them how they think the landowner will treat the tenant farmer.  Thoroughly entrenched in their world’s ideology of violence and retribution, the Pharisees say that the landowner will bring those retches to a miserable end.  Jesus knows that this is not quite the whole story and tells them, “The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone.”  In other words, God is not about to give up.  No matter what violent acts are perpetuated against Jesus, the Father will see that the rejected stone becomes the cornerstone. 

The kingdom is not ours.  The kingdom belongs to God.  We who live in the kingdom must reside on God’s terms and not ours.  We are just stewards.  This good news is worth sharing!

 

What's Past is Past and ...

In Matthew’s deceptively simple parable (Matthew 21:28-32), Jesus invites his adversaries to look at the future, as one not dominated by the arguments and opposition of the past, but one that is open to the movement of God’s spirit to heal, revive, restore, and make all things new.

The chief priests and elders do not accept this invitation. They have too much invested in the past…their identity has been defined by their own man-made rules that they have assumed the “authority” to enforce. They have become dependent on their established identity and they refuse to trade that past for an unknown future. But look at those who are “down and out,” the dregs of society, the tax collectors and prostitutes, who discover that any identity created by their past does not have to define or follow them into the future; they eagerly grab hold of Jesus’ promise with both hands.

Throughout our readings of Matthew these past weeks, Jesus makes this same promise to us. We are forgiven solely because there is a forgiver. We are loved unconditionally; we cannot earn or lose God’s love. No matter what we have done, no matter what may have been done to us, the future is still open. Whatever hurt we may have experienced or done in the past is, ultimately…in the past. We do not have to allow the past to define our future or our identity. We do not have to drag our past around with us and take it out whenever we feel the need to linger in its memory. We are more than the sum total of all that has happened to us. The future is open. It may be difficult and seem almost impossible to let go of the past and walk into the future. After all, the past is a known entity; it’s familiar to us, whereas the future is so open…it can be scary. But when we meditate on and invoke the prayer of Thomas Merton, we know that we are not alone: l will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me alone. No, you will never leave me alone. (Partner in Preaching, David Lose, 9/22/14)

 

God, is this really fair?

The story from our Gospel this week (Matthew 20:1-16) is one that asks us to put on the mind of the poet and think in metaphor. On the surface it defies logic and the world of “fairness” in which we live. But man’s sense of fairness and God’s “justice” are not the same. Can we blame some of the gardeners for feeling that they were duped: “what’s going on here; we worked from dusk to dawn, and these guys arrive just before closing time and they get the same pay?  That’s not fair!” Who could argue with their logic? Think of it—if you tried to run a business on the basis of paying everyone the same rate, regardless of how well and long they worked, your business wouldn’t last very long and you’d have some very disgruntled employees.

Just as God’s forgiveness requires that we turn logic on its head and suspend our belief system of “quid pro quo,” likewise God’s realm of justice and peace defies our sense of fairness. God’s love has nothing to do with logic or fairness. These are all part of a human convention and a world based on rules, laws and logic.  There is nothing we can do to earn God’s love or his kingdom. In this kingdom, everyone receives the generosity of God’s grace, God’s unconditional love and God’s unfailing mercy.

David Steindel-Rast writes that “salvation” is homecoming. When love not power reigns supreme, alienation from ourselves, from all others, and from God is healed. The moment we realize we can never fall out of God’s love, we come to “ourselves” like the wayward son in the parable—to our true self at home in the God Household as a uniquely loved member of the family. And now we become catalysts for salvation of the whole world, its transformation from power and domination to service and love. Salvation—and this needs to be stressed—is not a private matter. (Deeper Than Words, Living the Apostle’s Creed, p56.) 

In a very real sense, we are all “eleventh hour workers.” 

That's Impossible...Exactly!

Peter: “So, Jesus, just how many times should I forgive? Like, seven?”
Jesus: (thumbs up, gesturing up) “More than that, my friend.”
Peter: “Ok, like seventeen?”
Jesus: “Not even close.”
Peter: “Wait, like twenty-seven?”
Jesus: “Keep going.”
Peter: “You’re kidding, right? Thirty-seven?”
Jesus: “Try seventy-seven times.”
Peter: “But that’s ridiculous! Impossible!”

Exactly!

We try to put a number on forgiveness, set contractual arrangements for it to take, establish parameters for when or when not to forgive. But, forgiveness doesn’t work like that.

For any discussion on this passage from Matthew (Matthew 18: 21-35) to work, it can’t be a generic advisement to forgive or a veiled admonishment if you don’t. Otherwise, the only thing we will experience is some sort of moral guidance or counsel… one more thing to do to be a good Christian. As if we don’t already have enough to remember. As it turns out, according to Jesus, according to God, forgiveness is not just a good idea when it comes to the maintenance of relationships and communities. Forgiveness is a theological necessity.

What do I mean? I mean that God knows exactly what happens when forgiveness is withheld; when it is deemed unnecessary; when it is rejected. Well, it means some pretty hard work on our part. Sure, isn’t that just what we would expect to hear? Perhaps we can begin by exploring various definitions of or quotes about forgiveness. Which ring true? Which seem right? And why? What truth about forgiveness is communicated that you can’t seem to find the words to express?

For example, “Forgiveness is not an occasional act, it is a constant attitude.” -Martin Luther King, Jr. Or, “To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you” -C.S. Lewis. What about -- “Forgiveness is letting go of the hope that the past can be changed”-- Karoline Lewis. These quotes, suggest a beginning step toward being able to name and articulate why forgiveness is critical for us.

The next step is a lot harder. I think for a discussion on forgiveness to ring true, we will need to go to places we would rather not frequent -- the times when we have not forgiven; the moments when we were not forgiven. What does it feel like, really feel like, when you can’t forgive or when someone cannot forgive you? What happens when forgiveness does not happen? How do you feel about the other? Yourself? On the other side, what does it feel like to forgive, to be forgiven? We have to be willing to enter into those spaces first before we can invite others into those same experiences. We have to be able to name them, describe them, because that's what will make the difference between a discussion that touches the deepest longing and need for forgiveness and a conversation that only skims the surface of our souls with trite reproach.

And, we haven’t even touched on what it means to forgive yourself.

If we are unable to enter the spaces and places where we can sense the gravity of forgiveness, then we will not be addressing the weight of this passage from Matthew. It won’t be easy, that’s for sure. But maybe then we remember what it means to have God forgive us. That should help a little.

Adapted from A Generous Forgiveness, Karoline Lewis, Dear Working Preacher, 2014

 

Forgiveness

 

 

 

When you're awake, the things you think
Come from the dreams you dream
Thought has wings, and lots of things
Are seldom what they seem
Sometimes you think you've lived before
All that you live today
Things you do come back to you
As though they knew the way

 Robert Capon Farrar tells us that God does not forgive our transgressions because we have made ourselves forgivable. There is nothing we can do to earn forgiveness. We are forgiven solely because there is a Divine forgiver who loves us unconditionally. There is nothing we can do to earn it or lose his love. (Matthew 18:21-35) 

Love is at the core of Jesus’ teachings and forgiveness is why he died and was resurrected. Why is it then that we have such a hard time forgiving? Is it because it’s so closely tied to memory and the human inability to forget? These two human behaviors are really mutually exclusive, yet we blithely say as if it’s even possible, “let’s forgive and forget.” No wonder we have a difficult time looking at personal hurt as Jesus did. He did not tell us to forget about it; he told us to see God in those who have hurt us and just let it go.   

We now approach another anniversary of September 11, 2001, an infamous day in our history, which for those of us living here in the Northeast, carries with it even stronger hurts and remembrances of those loved ones who lost their lives. We will remember them but can we “forgive and forget?” I don’t think so. Perhaps if we dwell on the memory of those loved ones we lost on that fateful Tuesday, we can begin or at least continue the process of forgiving. However, it’s easier said than done. To that end, I find the words of Anthony Padovano particularly comforting as we reflect on the importance of remembering:  

When we remember, we leave the present for the past. To say it better, we bring the past into the present and give it life alongside the tangible realities we are compelled to consider. In our memory of a loved one we choose to relate to him/her even though, since he is not present, we need not relate to him. Not physical presence but love leads us to live with this remembered person even in her absence. When the love is strong, the memory of this absent person may be dearer and more real than the reality of those who are present. Memory is sometimes the difference between life and death, between hope and despair, between strength for another day and the collapse of all meaning. Our memory of another confers the present upon him, gives him further life in our life, and keeps a moment of the past from drifting away or fading into death. We are fed and nourished by communion of life in which two lives intersect in memory and merge into common experience. No lover forgets. No beloved is forgotten. The memory of love is life; the memory of another becomes our selves. So when the communion of believers remembers Jesus, when the bride is alive with the thought of her Spouse, Christ is present. Jesus is brought into the present with his grace by the force of memory in the power of the Spirit…The gift of the Sprit is fidelity to the memory of life’s mystery and confidence in the mystery of its future.  (Anthony Padovano, Dawn without Darkness)