Blessed

(Scriptures: Micah 6:1-8 Isaiah 58:1-12
I Corinthians 1:18-31 Matthew 5:1-20)

One of my challenges growing up was my eyesight – as long as I can remember, I’ve been very nearsighted, blind as a bat nearsighted. When I was very young, anything more than a foot or so away from me was a blur. Peoples’ eyes and mouths looked like empty sockets. When I threw a ball or a frisbee, it went out of focus so quickly that I thought it just disappeared, vanished into another dimension. Of course, if someone threw the ball back, the ball would magically appear out of nowhere about a foot away from me, usually far too late for me to catch – in fact, the ball would usually bonk me on the head. Which may explain a few things about me. It wasn’t until I was in grade school and realized that the other kids saw things on the blackboard that I couldn’t see, that I got fitted with my first set of coke-bottle thick glasses. And all of a sudden, with glasses on, I could see so much more. Peoples’ faces were so much more pleasant to look at, with different eye colors and bright shiny teeth. I could see all the way from one end of the playground to the other. In a way, that was both a gift and a challenge – on one hand, it was like a whole new world opening up before my eyes; on the other, I no longer had my lousy eyesight as an excuse for why I couldn’t catch a ball.

This morning’s gospel reading begins a series of readings from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. Today’s reading, of course, is from the Beatitudes, that familiar part of the sermon on the mount that begins, “Blessed are the poor in spirit” and goes through a series of “blessed” statements – blessed are those who mourn, the merciful, the meek, the peacemakers, the pure of heart, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, those persecuted for righteousness’ sake, and so forth. It’s one of those passages of Scripture that, because it is familiar, is easy to overlook when we read it – “move along, nothing to see here”. Or we might smile a bit if we remember one of the Monty Python movies from a few years back, which depicted some folks seated at the edge of the crowd straining to hear Jesus’ words, as they thought they heard Jesus dispensing such pearls of spiritual wisdom as “Blessed are the cheesemakers, blessed are the Greek…..”

I would caution us to resist the temptation to dismiss the beatitudes as “old hat – been there, done that” – and to listen to them with fresh ears, as if hearing them for the first time. For they point us toward a new way of living as a disciple of Jesus, a new way of living that turns the wisdom of the world upside-down.

You don’t need me to tell you that the ways of the world don’t bear much resemblance to the way of life advocated in the Beatitudes. While the Beatitudes may resemble something we might tell small children – play nice, share your toys, don’t boast, you better watch out, you better not cry, you better not pout, I’m telling you why…. – by the time we’re through childhood, we realize the world has a very different set of beatitudes – “blessed are the strong, for they shall crush the weak; blessed are the merciless, for they shall get their way…..blessed are the litigious, for they shall win big settlements; blessed are the aggressive, for they will push their way to the front of the line – on television and radio, certainly, blessed are those who stir up public anger, fear, and distrust, for their audience will grow and multiply.” The wisdom of our society says to look out for number one - that once you’ve got your share of the pie, or maybe even more than your share, the rest of the world can go to perdition. In fact, the Beatitudes are a direct challenge to the ways of the world, a series of reversals of everything the world tells us.

If we think about what it would mean to live our lives by the Beatitudes, we may come to the conclusion that to be a follower of Jesus means to be a sap, to be a doormat. And we’d be wrong. Jesus has no need of doormats. In fact, the last thing Jesus wants is for us to cave in to the world’s way of doing things. Jesus wanted – and Jesus wants – his followers to model a different way of living from that of the world – to be counter-cultural. In the words of our Gospel today, we are to be salt and light, driving out the forces of decay and darkness. But we can’t be salt and light if our lives are indistinguishable from those of our neighbors.

It would be wonderful if the church could model the beatitudes, provide a demonstration of what a society based on the beatitudes would look like – but often there’s little to distinguish the church from the rest of society. The theological conviction that our salvation depends on God’s grace alone, that we cannot add anything to God’s grace or do anything to help earn our salvation – a true statement in itself - for all too many Christians is distorted into a license to ignore Jesus’ teachings on how we should live, Jesus’ call for our lives to contrast with those of our neighbors. For many, even salvation itself becomes a matter of selfishness – I’ve prayed a little prayer for forgiveness and have gotten my free pass into heaven – my ticket to paradise has been punched - and so I can abuse those around me all I want. It was to these that Gandhi was reported to have said, “I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

Both of our Old Testament readings – Micah 6 and Isaiah 58 – speak to this issue. In both of these readings, the chosen people are complaining that, though they’ve been so “faithful”, so “devoted” in their religious observance, God does not respond.
“Day after day they seek me and delight to know my ways, as if they were a nation that practiced righteousness and did not forsake the ordinance of their God;
they ask of me righteous judgments, they delight to draw near to God. "Why do we fast, but you do not see? Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?" God, can’t you see how religious, how very faithful we are? But God responds that their “religious devotion” is selfish: “Look, you serve your own interest on your fast-day, and oppress all your workers. Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to strike with a wicked fist.” Sounds like many “good Christians” who go to church on Sundays and make everyone around them miserable from Monday to Saturday. Micah tells what God wants: “He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” And Isaiah gives many vivid images of what God wants;
“Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them,
and not to hide yourself from your own kin?
Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up quickly;
your vindicator shall go before you,
the glory of the Lord shall be your rearguard.
Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am.”

As hard as I may try to tell myself that my relationship to Christ is a private matter, between Jesus and me, Micah and Isaiah tell me – tell us - that we cannot be in right relationship with God if our relationship with our neighbor is broken. God doesn’t want God’s people to live in compartments, loving God on Sunday and abusing neighbor Monday through Saturday. Rather, we are to live with integrity, being the same person every day of the week, letting our faith direct our actions every day, not just on Sunday. Love of God and love of neighbor – the two great commandments – are inseparable.

Our reading from I Corinthians reminds us the wisdom of God is foolishness in the eyes of the world. In a sense, because of the power of sin in the world, we see life as if in a funhouse mirror – our priorities distorted out of shape – sort of like the blurry, distorted world I saw before I got glasses. Passing things like power and possessions are magnified all out of proportion, and eternal qualities such as justice, mercy, and hospitality shrink to almost nothing. We’ve lived in that distorted, funhouse world all our lives. If we’ve based our lives on that funhouse mirror image that the world gives us, when Jesus holds up the Beatitudes as a mirror to show how twisted up our lives really are, and how much better they could be and should be, the picture Jesus shows us may look out of shape, ominous, threatening. But if we are one of those Paul describes in I Corinthians – one of those perhaps not well-schooled in the wisdom of the world, not a mover and shaker in society, not coming from a prominent family, not apt to be profiled on “Wealth TV” or “Lifestyles of the rich and famous” – we are those most open to hearing God’s call. The foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom.

The last verses of Matthew’s Gospel may give us pause: Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." This sounds like an invitation to try to work our way into heaven, to earn our salvation, but that’s not where Jesus is coming from. The righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, can only be a gift from God, not something of our own creation, the gift of God’s spirit described by Paul: "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him"— these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.” On the other end, when God gives us a gift, we’re expected to make use of it.

“No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.” May we here at Emanuel not use our many challenges as an excuse to hide our light under a bushel, but boldly be a lampstand from which God’s light can shine in this beloved neighborhood of Bridesburg in which God has set us. Amen.
******************
Please join us on Sunday morning at 10 a.m. at Emanuel United Church of Christ. We're on Fillmore Street (just off Thompson). www.emanuelphila.org