Love Thy Neighbor VI

Matthew 5:28-38

Some of our neighbors do not have our best interests in mind. They want what we have or hate us for reasons we may not even know. They be the result of false information, personality differences, history or who knows what. Again, with a high priority of reconciliation, Jesus gives a teaching that is counter-intuitive (against what our natural reactions would be), difficult and absolutely crucial for his day and ours.

"An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth", a principle for measured retaliation for those who do wrong is mentioned three times in the Old Testament law: 1) Exodus 21:23-25 in the case of a woman who is struck so that she miscarries, 2) a violent attack in Leviticus 24:17-21, and a law suit in Deuteronomy 19:17-21. Note Leviticus 24:19-20:

"Anyone who maims another shall sufffer the same injury in return; fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; the injury inflicted is the injury to be suffered."

As a guiding principle this makes sense. It's positive role is to keep people or the law from retaliating in more severe measures. It's negative role is one of deterrence, so that people count the cost before they do harm to another. But the limit of such a philosophy is best expressed in Broadway hit, The Fiddler on the Roof, when Tevye, the lead character says, "Eye for an eye and a tooth for tooth...and the whole world will be blind and toothless!" Measured retaliation, while better than increasing retaliation, still sets off a retaliatory cycle fed by hatred and revenge. The one who strikes on the right cheek is making an insult, likely with a backhand. Instead of retaliating, you offering him the other cheek. In the case of the extra coat and the extra mile, it is doing more than required. He also teaches to give the beggar what he/she wants. Against all of this, we raise questions. People will take advantage and abuse our generosity. Yet, Jesus wants to get us past fairness and doing "the right thing" or the legal thing to a higher righteousness, built on love and reconciliation.

"Loving our enemies" just follows. The Old Testament doesn't say that we should hate our enemies. That's just good old folk theology. Loving those who will love us back doesn't give us our distinctive edge in the world, loving our enemies does. We speialize in turning enemies into our friends, just as God in Christ has done for us.

Jesus concludes with "Be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect." The point here is that you could be Pharisaically perfect and still fall short of the God Standard. When you combine this standard with John's discussion of "perfect love", you arrive at one of the distinctive beliefs of United Methodists, the doctrine of Christian Perfection. Every pastor who seeks ordination is asked, "Will you be made perfect in love in this life?" We were expected to say yes. A "no" or a "no answer" would disqualify us for ordination. It is a question that still gives me pause. The perfection spoken of is not the absence of misjudgments or mistakes. It does refer to a point in our life where we no longer sin. In John Wesley's sermon, "The Scripture Way of Salvation", he explains it as a possibility in this life. He claims to know some who are perfect in love but never claims it for himself. I cannot say I have ever known someone who was perfect in love, though I can think of many who were close. It is nigh impossible for me to imagine myself perfect in love. My sinfulness is still painfully obvious. But I do believe in the power of God's grace more than the power of my sin. So I say yes. The more important question in ordination follows: Are you pursuing after being made perfect in love? That one is a much easier to answer, but just as challenging. But the call to Christian perfection is not just for preachers. It's for you, too.

I John 5:1-21

Remember that loving and believing are the two main themes of the letter. John now returns one last time to theme of believing. It is our faith in Christ that helps us overcome the world. Again, John strains to prove the reliability of our faith, offering the Spirit, the water and the blood as his witnesses.

After encouraging them in their prayers, John has an interesting section on "the sin that leads to death." While we are not sure what this sin actually was, some preachers and scholars have connected this with "the unforgivable sin." In Luke 12:10Jesus says,

"And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven."

I used to think that I had committed this sin because there was a time when I in my mind had thought something profane in regard to the Holy Spirit. While I was on tour singing, a friend said to me, "I've struggled with this one, too. But the truth is that as long as you have faith in Christ and want to follow him, you cannot have committed that sin." I realized then that I had allowed the devil to slip in and take away my assurance that Christ was still in my heart. I believe it was no small coincidence that I was able to open up to God filling me with the Holy Spirit shortly thereafter.

Looking back, I now realize this is not so much about thoughts and speech, as it is rejecting the Spirit's call on us to follow Christ. We can reject God so much that eventually we become cold to God's promptings. But just as I have never known somebody who was perfect in love, I can never say that I have known a person had committed the unforgivable sin or "the sin that leads to death." As long as there is breath, there is a chance for people to accept Christ. Those who were leading the people astray in John's day did not believe the Jesus was God's Son and did not believe that he was God in the flesh. They were rejecting who Jesus was just as those who rejected Jesus and the prompting of the Spirit in Luke's gospel. John was saying that they were playing with fire, eternal fire.

Verses 18-20 have much in common with the Christian perfection discussion earlier. At Annual Conference, it is a tradition that we sing a hymn entitled "And Are We Yet Alive." The fifth verse sings,

Then let us make our boast
of his redeeming power,
which saves us to the uttermost,
till we can sin no more.

As Christians we are called to take sin seriously, both our sinful deeds and the sinful attitudes that are beneath them. As brothers and sisters in Christ, we are called to both encourage one another and hold each other accountable for our sinfulness. Just as we have made faith a private matter, we have done the same with sin. The result is that we end up stuck in our private sin and brokenness, with no way out. There is a huge assumption here that must not be ignored, namely, that the person who holds us accountable is someone who loves us like Christ does (loving us just as we are and loving us too much to let us stay that way).

The final word from John is to stay away from idols. I hope we are self-aware enough to admit that the temptation to idolatry, to place our faith and our love for something or someone else higher than our love for God, is a challenge for all of us. See you Sunday.