Love Your Enemies…No Exceptions

These past few weeks our gospel readings have been focusing on Jesus’ beatitudes: 

Those challenging, yet somehow comforting portraits of what God’s promised Kingdom looks like.

Who can debate the stunning beauty of Jesus’ words?

Blessed are the poor in spirit…for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven

         Blessed are those who mourn… for they shall be consoled.

                  Blessed are the meek… for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are the peacemakers… for they will be called children of God.

Well you get the picture here.  A picture of an alternative future: 

A future marked not by poverty and oppression

–    but by justice and shalom –

A future where no one is ever in need again…

A future in which those who work for peace enjoy the most intimate identity with their creator – children of God.

In his big sermon, which goes on for two chapters in Matthew’s gospel, Jesus tells us that

We are “salt” – meant to preserve life.

We are “light” – meant to venture into dark places.

Jesus even dispels the old nursery rhyme “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never hurt me”, by telling us that not only can words hurt me, but they can and they WILL kill me!

Okay.  I get it:  Jesus gives us a beautiful view of a transformed future, but not first without pushing our comfort zones. 

Over twenty years of preaching Jesus and I’ve come to expect a bit of this.  I’ve even become accustomed to having my faith furniture moved around from time to time, but what I’ve never been able to get completely used to is what Jesus tells us this morning:

Every single time I hear these words, I get tripped up and stumble.  It’s like I can’t walk and chew my Jesus-bubble gum at the same time when I hear these words.   Just when I think I have him all figured out, Jesus not only pushes my comfort zone, but proves once again that he will neither be tamed nor domesticated and his message of the Kingdom will not be watered down.

“You have heard it said, love your neighbors and hate your enemy.  But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your father in heaven”

Hold on Jesus.  You mean to tell me that if I don’t love my enemies, I’m not a child of God?   Folks I’m looking for the escape clause here:  I’m looking for the place right after this verse, where Jesus says, “I’m just kidding.  Go ahead and hate your enemies, you’re better than them anyway”.

Or, “Love your enemies?  That’s just some out of this world ideal that I don’t possibly expect you to live out.  Carry on, business as usual…”

But he doesn’t say that.  And that’s what trips me up every time.

Tell me that I need to love my enemies because hatred and negativity is bad for my mental and physical health.

Tell me I need to love my enemies because spending energy hating them gives them power over me.

Tell me I need to love my enemies because it proves who is the better person.

Tell me to love my enemies because God will reward me for being the better person.

Tell me to love my enemies because, as Paul points out in one of my favorite texts on this subject, Romans 12:20, being kind to my enemies is a way to "heap burning coals on their heads." Now that's motivating!

But Jesus doesn't offer any of these common sense motivators with regard to non-retaliation or love of enemies. This is the only motivation we are given: we are to practice non-resistance when personally insulted and to love our enemies because that is in keeping with the character of God. 

If we are looking for practical, positive motivations to act in these odd and counter-cultural ways of Jesus, there are no words that can convince.

There is just the most extreme of sketchy scenes. He who taught us the prayer "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us," during his life prays "Father, forgive them," as he hangs dying on a cross. 

I guess that’s what gives Jesus the authority to not back down on that love of enemies thing:  Whether they be enemies on the other side of the world, or the person you can barely even look at on the other side of the church pew.

Jesus is not looking for more members here at Incarnate Word.  If I’m reading my Bible right, he’s looking for more disciples.  Those who will follow with every fiber of their being:  Those who will hold nothing back in following Jesus into the places that challenge and confront our assumptions about God and about the world God loves.  Those who will follow Jesus across all boundaries into a world addicted to hate and vengeance offering an alternative vocabulary of love and forgiveness.

In this “stand your ground” world where I can preemptively attack you before you attack me, every single one of us who would be called child of God, stands under a different mandate:  Given by the One who uttered words of forgiveness while hanging on a cross of hate:  “Love your enemies.  No exceptions”.

In the cross of Christ, God did not settle in to a comfort zone.  God did not offer the escape clause that says this cross-thing is just theoretical.

In the cross of Christ, an instrument of torture and hate was transformed into a symbol of love.

In the cross of Christ, God’s holy imagination stopped at nothing to shatter boundaries with overwhelming love:  Love for all….

In light of the cross, from which love was poured out in abundance, how can we do any less?

Let us pray:

“Gracious God, your Son called on you to forgive his enemies while he was suffering shame and death.  Lead our enemies and us from prejudice to truth; deliver them and us from hatred, cruelty, and revenge; and in your good time enable us all to stand reconciled before you; through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.  Amen” (ELW p.80).

A Look to Sunday’s Sermon

“You have heard it said, love your neighbors and hate your enemy.  But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your father in heaven”

Hold on Jesus.  You mean to tell me that if I don’t love my enemies, I’m not a child of God?   Folks I’m looking for the escape clause here:  I’m looking for the place right after this verse, where Jesus says, “I’m just kidding.  Go ahead and hate your enemies, you’re better than them anyway”.

Or, “Love your enemies?  That’s just some out of this world ideal that I don’t possibly expect you to live out.  Carry on, business as usual…”

But he doesn’t say that.  What I discover instead is that Jesus won’t be tamed and his message of the Kingdom will not be watered down.  And that stops me dead in my tracks every time.

Pastors’ Secrets...

"So here’s what your minister wishes you understood. Give it a read, give it some thought and give him or her a bigger hug than usual tomorrow morning.

Our greatest fear is irrelevance.

It’s not losing our jobs, hurting your feelings or accidentally saying the F word during a sermon.

Those fears are there. But they are nothing compared to the nagging fear that what we say and do is making zero difference in your life.

That you are only showing up to church because of habit, or obligation or mental illness. That we are laying ourselves bare to write and deliver a sermon every week that nobody is hearing. 

If your pastor has made an actual difference in your life ever, by word or deed or example or friendship, take some time this week to let him or her know, in as much detail as you can. You cannot imagine how far that will go.

We are mama’s boys. 

Apologies to the female pastors, this one’s just about the guys. I’ve read studies that higher than 80 percent of male pastors say they are much closer to their mothers than their fathers.

This has a lot of implications, and it explains why we’re more likely to play an instrument than fire a gun, have coffee with a friend than watch a game, read a book than restore an old Mustang. It also means that nobody in the church gets our attention as much as the old ladies, who can make or break our day with a kind word or a disapproving scowl.

When you’re dealing with your male pastor, keep in mind that he’s more likely to speak the language of nurture over discipline, collaboration over competition, forgiveness over punishment. These aren’t things he learned in seminary, these are things he learned in diapers.

She or he sees you when you’re sleeping.

Some people in the pews think there’s a two way mirror between them and the pulpit, that they can see the pastor but the pastor can’t see them.

Wrong. We see you yawn, look at your phone, whisper something into your wife’s ear. Sleep.

Which is fine. If we’re boring, it’s not your fault, it’s ours.

But just be aware that we see you, and that if you can manage to at least look like you’re a little more interested, it might actually feed some energy back to us and give us more zing. Energy goes two ways.

We think about quitting a lot.

Behind closed doors, most ministers talk about moving on with regularity.

The job is hard in a way that people who’ve never done it cannot understand. Not physically, or even mentally. But emotionally, it can wreck you. I don’t fully understand why, although I have theories.

But just know, when you’re choosing how to interact with her or him, that your pastor is probably hurting and tired and wishing she or he could quit. And that, in most cases, the only thing keeping him or her there is a sense of love and obligation to you. Be gentle, sensitive and grateful for that.

We envy people who can be themselves.

We wish we could cuss or mess up without it making headlines. We wish we could be enthusiastic about a hobby without people raising their eyebrows about how much time and money we’re spending on it. We wish we could make angry political remarks on Facebook.

You know, all the things that you feel free to do all the time.

You want us to be human, but not too human. Believe me, we know. And it’s probably for the best that we are charged with setting a good example, it makes sense. But just know, we sometimes envy your freedom to just be yourself.

We are often spiritually starving.

Probably the most closely guarded secret among pastors is how spiritually empty many of us are.

Like a worker at the chocolate factory who no longer likes the taste of chocolate, or the prostitute who gets no pleasure from sex, we deal with spiritual matters so much that they often no longer have much meaning for us.

Worship, for us, is a program that must be organized and executed. It’s work. It’s not for us. It’s for you.

And then, when we’re not ‘on,’ often the last thing we want to do is something spiritual. Because it reminds us of work.

We can’t read the Bible without thinking of sermon ideas. We can’t pray without thinking of leading prayers. We can’t meet with other church people without talking shop. So we’d rather play golf, or watch TV, or anything else.

Which ultimately leaves us empty. Not everyone, not always. But often.

We are sinful, no different than you. 

We don’t just think about sinning. We aren’t just tempted to sin. We commit sins.

The same kind you do. Believe it.

But also understand that this doesn’t make us less qualified to talk to you about sins, but more.

If you’ve ever sat in the pew and heard a pastor rambling on about temptations and sin and thought, “Whatever, there’s no way she understands what I’m dealing with,” think again. It’s very likely that she does, first hand. And that what she’s saying comes from her own life, not just from a book.

We are lonely, because it’s hard to trust. 

Pastors often have trust issues.

As well they should. All pastors have heard stories about Reverend so-and-so who confided in someone in his church about his addiction to whatever, only to have that person tell the elders about it, which ultimately got him fired.

It happens. We know it does.

So every time we interact with you, even if it’s in a prayer group or some very intimate setting, we’re not 100 percent open. We can’t afford to be.

It’s not your fault, it’s not our fault, it’s just a bad system that doesn’t allow pastors to be as human as it should. You can’t fix that, but you can have understanding and compassion for the man or woman who loves and serves you week after week, who counsels you and hears your confessions, and yet often has nowhere to go to get the same healing and relief.

Ministry is a hard job. 

Sometimes it’s said as a joke, sometimes it’s said in anger, that ministers don’t work very hard. That it’s a cushy gig.

If that were true, I doubt I’d know so many ministers who have quit, swearing never to return, including myself.

The best way I can think to explain why ministry is hard is to compare it to being the parent of a young child. From the outside, it might not look like a lot of ‘work,’ but from the inside, it’s the most exhausting thing you’ll ever do.

Because it’s not just about the amount of things you do, it’s the total emotional drain of it. It’s worrying all day every day about the people and programs you’re in charge of, being on call and not ever feeling really free to be away, feeling like you live in a fishbowl with hundreds of eyes watching you all the time and never really knowing what they are all thinking of you (unless they complain, which some of them do with regularity).

It’s caring for people to the point that you have nothing left for your own family when you get home, yet expecting that they show a certain spiritually-put-together face to the church (because the church expects that). It’s often feeling empty, yet pretending to feel full. It’s presenting yourself and your work to hundreds of people, several times a week, for evaluation, and often getting no feedback except ‘constructive’ criticism.

And after all of this, after years of this, it’s looking out at the people in your church and seeing little or no change. Ministry is very hard, albeit perhaps in a different way than your job is hard.

We are more sensitive than you probably think. 

Most ministers I know have one or two people in their congregations who send them stinky emails weekly, and another 10 or 15 who can be counted on to complain about things about once a month.

Then, of course, there are a handful of the angels, who hug and love and say encouraging things every week.

But guess what. The people who complain are far more thorough and specific and persistent than those who encourage, and they are the voices that keep us up at night feeling bad about ourselves, wondering if we suck at this.

Most ministers have skin that is way thinner than their congregants think it is. We have to be open and sensitive to you, because it’s you we are charged with caring for. This means that the things you say to us can reach far deeper inside than they could otherwise.

If you need to criticize your minister for something, please just be aware of this. Tread carefully, and with a lot of love and appreciation for her vulnerability. We are not above correction. Nobody is. But please make the extra effort to wrap it in as much care as you can.

We care about you more than you can imagine. 

The best moments of being a pastor for me, by far, were the times the ministers would gather for staff meetings and talk about the week ahead.

Did we discuss worship and youth outings and air conditioning and budgets? Sure, for maybe 20 minutes.

And then for three hours we’d talk about the people we were serving, what’s going on in their lives, and how we might help them.

I always wished the whole church could be in those meetings and just see how much these people care, how much their hearts break for them, how much time and emotional energy they spend wanting to help them.

Those meetings are my most sacred memories of church, because those were the moments when I saw men and women who had every reason not to care, to phone it in, to even be resentful. And yet, in spite of all of it, at the end of every day, they still cared, sometimes to the point of tears.

You might have no idea how much.”     

                                                ~Mark Love. 

Blessed is the Superbowl?

So today is the day.  Today is the day that millions of people have been waiting for.  Millions of dollars have been spent and millions more will be by the end of the day.  Today cholesterol counts will climb.  For today is Super Bowl Sunday – I’m sorry – “Big Game” Sunday.  I believe there might be copyright restrictions on the term “super bowl”.  Today prayer lines to the Almighty will be overrun with Broncos and Seahawks fans all pleading for holy victory over their enemy.

If today is anything like last year, by days’ end 1.25 billion chicken wings will be consumed.  Along with 15,000 tons of chips.  Oh and pizza?  How does 27 million slices of pizza from just Pizza Hut and Dominos alone sound?

It all sounds harmless and kind of fun doesn’t it?  All those wings, chips and pizza.  Unless of course a different number applies to you.  It’s all well and good unless you are one of the 47 million Americans dependent upon food stamps to put food on your table, or one of the more than 35 million Americans (mostly veterans) who are currently homeless.

Here are some little known numbers you may be interested in, if you think that the football game on TV tonight is just a football game:

A level three suite rental at MetLife Stadium:  $899,270

Average cost of a new home:  $340,300

Average price of a ticket to the Superbowl:  $4,084

Average weekly salary:  $831

 

30-second television commercial:  $4 million

Total ad revenues at tonight’s game:  $300 million

By the way, that money would educate 272,727 kids for one year in this country.

Last year 3.9 million pieces of new furniture were purchased for the big game.

Meanwhile many of the 1.6 million Americans who have just lost unemployment insurance run the danger of not having enough  money to put food on the table, and are even at risk of not having a home to put furniture into.

Oh and by the way, if you are someone who believes that by praying to God, your team will win, or you believe your team is cursed by God or that God somehow determines the outcome of games, you are 1 in 2 Americans.

 Now don’t get me wrong here.  I love a good football game.  I love the sounds of helmets on helmets.  I love the acrobatics of spectacular end zone receptions.  I love when quarterbacks get hunted down and sacked for major yard loss.  Then there’s the good old fashioned “Flea Flicker”.  Who gets tired of that?   And yeah, I even enjoy pizza, wings and a couple bottles of beer.

But what I don’t believe is that God cares one little bit about a game’s outcome.  In fact given Jesus’ placement in 1^st Century Palestine, it is quite possible that Jesus doesn’t know squat about football.

Judging by this morning’s opening sentences of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, it would appear that Jesus’ values are light years away from the rough and tumble, muscular ethos of Superbowl football teams.

This morning we discover that Jesus doesn’t care who’s going to Disney World after the game tonight.  Instead he embraces the weak, the powerless and the vulnerable.  You know:  The losers!

 Blessed are the poor in spirit – you know those who are broken spiritually and economically and have lost hope.

Blessed are those who mourn – those who suffer the emptiness and pain of hearts that have been shattered. 

Blessed are the meek – those who are gentle and refuse to use power over others.

Blessed are the merciful – those who willingly surrender their privileges for the well-being of others.

Blessed are the persecuted – those who refuse to give up their quest for justice and truth resulting in the loss of their rights, wholeness or dignity.

Blessed is the one-fourth of Newark’s population living below the line of poverty just outside the gates of MetLife Stadium tonight.

From Jesus’ words on that mountain top this morning, it becomes all too clear that those whom Jesus highlights are the ones we do not:  Those living out of our sight; under society’s radar.   Those living under the bleachers and out by the dumpsters.

This Blessing stuff is pretty important to Jesus:  Perhaps the most important.  Why else would Matthew make it the first of Jesus’ teachings?  As we see here this morning and throughout Matthew’s gospel, like the Old Testament prophets of old who held God’s people to a higher standard, Jesus is all about challenging the status quo:  reaching out to those living at the margins of the world while exposing and challenging those living in society’s center to love God and love their neighbor:  In other words, challenging us to re-order our priorities.

My purpose this morning is not to vilify the Superbowl or its aficionados.  Neither is my purpose to dump a keg of ice-cold Gatorade over get-togethers with family and friends this evening.

But I believe that Jesus invites us this morning to look at what we value and what our culture values and then put that template up against what God values.

And what does God value? 

From what I can tell, It’s not the “win” column.  In our winner-take-all way of understanding things, it would make a lot of sense if Jesus had come as a superhero, kicking butt and taking names, showing everyone how strong God is by winning at our game.

But instead, at the cross we see how strong God is by voluntarily losing at our game.  There on that torturous cross of death, Jesus willingly becomes the biggest loser in human history.  All so that you and I have life.  And with that life a new perspective.  With that life  a new heart poured out in love for God and all the world:  Especially the poor in spirit, the meek, those who mourn, the outcast …. Well you get the picture here.

Where the outcomes of things are involved, I am not by nature a betting person.  But in this case I’ll make an exception.  Tonight I will not be betting on either Denver or Seattle.  The God of Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, the Prophets, John the Baptist and Jesus could care less.  Instead the promise upon which I’ll be putting my bets, is that all who are broken, hurting and forgotten are in God’s heart.  And there in God’s heart of love we all win.  Every single one of us!

Amen.