Journeys: A preparation for back to Church Sunday

Love

Many years ago, a friend told me what she thought may have been the shortest sermon ever delivered. Apparently the preacher said simply:

“Jesus said we were to love one another. It was not a request. It was not a suggestion; it was a command. In the Name of …etc”

This shortest of sermons sits neatly alongside the story of the aged St John, who, according to Tradition, said:

“Love one another. That is the Lord’s command, and if you keep it, that in itself is enough.”

Love is the subject of this morning’s Gospel reading.

A casual reading of this morning’s Gospel (Matthew 22: 34 – 46) could land us in a real trap. It is a well known passage. We have heard it many times, and I suspect most of us know it so well we rather take it for granted. “What is the greatest Commandment? To love God and to love our neighbour as ourselves.” Love: the distinctive Christian message. Love: the answer to all the world’s problems. Love: the distinctive Christian contribution to the world’s well-being.

We know it well, and so we do not pause to savour the exchange between Jesus and the person who asked the question. This morning let us do just that. Try for a moment to let go of the story, the words you know. Journey in your imagination, and stand for a few minutes not in St Luke’s Church, but in the Temple courtyard 2000 years ago, and listen to the exchange with ears of the first century.

Both Mark, and Matthew whose account we read this morning, place this story on the Tuesday of Holy Week. Two days ago Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey. He has made a direct and successful challenge to the money changers and those who sell sacrificial animals, and has certainly made his presence felt.

Today, a crowd has gathered round him, and he is speaking to them, teaching them. Among those who have come out to observe and to listen are some of the leaders of the Jewish Establishment – the Sadducees and the Pharisees. They are worried. They need to know what he is preaching. Is his message seditious? Does it have a political edge? Is it dangerous? Could it bring Roman retribution? An uprising now would have disastrous consequences for the nation – and, just quietly, for them! Yes, the authorities are there; listening, and asking questions.

Matthew begins his account of the day in Chapter 21. and it is important that we see the broad sweep of the story. First, the chief priests and elders ask Jesus by what authority he is teaching – at least superficially, a genuine question to ask of someone gathering crowds in this place. Jesus parries, you will remember, by asking them whether the Baptism of John come from heaven, or from human origin? This is a question so full of snares that they dare not answer.

There are three parables, all dealing in some way with selfishness, and disregard for generosity. Then comes a question from the Pharisees – a potential trap, hoping perhaps to discredit Jesus in front of the crowd: Is it lawful to pay taxes to the Emperor. Again Jesus parries. He asks them for a coin; they produce one. Whose head is on the coin? The Emperor’s? Well, give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s. Give Caesar back his coin – and give God what is God’s. And what is God’s? Jesus does not say, but his hearers knew the implication; we know the implication: Everything belongs to God – “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof.”

Next it is the turn of the Sadducees, who pose a question about the afterlife. Since they don’t believe in the afterlife, this has to be another potential trap

And so, after all this build up, we come to the question in today’s reading: What is the greatest commandment? It is an important question. Though Matthew describes it as a trap, it is more than that. The person who asks it drives straight to the heart of the matter, for he is asking what is most important? What is central? What is the character of God? What does it mean to take God seriously? How do we respond to God?

It is almost impossible for us today, knowing the story so well, to catch the mystery, the suspense, between the asking of this question and Jesus’ response. What were they expecting? Instead of leaping to the answer we know, let us pause for a moment and consider the possibilities.

Perhaps Jesus will quote the first of the ten commandments: Have no other Gods before me. In a land of tensions, under foreign control by worshippers of other Gods, that would stir up a brew of trouble. The Romans don’t accept our God, and yet here we are, tolerating them in our country. Is this a call to arms? The Zealots would be pleased. Perhaps he’ll latch onto one or other of the Purity laws. Perhaps he believes we need to keep ourselves apart from the Romans, as the Essenes do.

But, Jesus did not follow either of these lines. Instead he answered with the Shema, the classic Jewish declaration of loyalty to God, which is found in the Book of Deuteronomy: “Hear O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all you heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” This was very well known. It was the text that Jews recited twice a day during morning and evening prayers; that they mounted on their doorposts and wore as phylacteries on their arm and head.

But Jesus did not stop here. He went straight on, adding a verse from Leviticus: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself” (Lev 19:18).

Jesus joined the two into one new, great commandment; one so well known to us that we can easily gloss over just how important, how radical, it is. Remember back to the question about taxes: Give to God what is God’s. These two exchanges belong together, for to love God above all else means giving to God what belongs to God: our heart, mind, soul and strength. These belong to God and not to Caesar. If God is the Lord, then the lords of this world -now as then - are not. Our true loyalty, our true focus, is God.

Luke, when he tells the story of this exchange, places it earlier in Jesus’ ministry – and follows it directly with the parable of the Good Samaritan to show who is our neighour. So to love ones neighbour means to refuse to accept the divisions that we can too easily see as “normal”: rich and poor, friends or allies and enemies, Jews and Gentiles, respectable and disreputable.

So Jesus’ answer to the question “What is the greatest commandment?” does not invite separation, or armed resistance, or exclusive behaviour. Instead, his response is centred in God. It is worshipful, open and inclusive. It is Love.

So, what is it that this new commandment requires of us? How do we live this commandment? How do we make it the focus of our lives?

Just as there are two parts to the commandment, two responses are called for. The first involves spirituality; a deliberate turning inward toward the God in us. This will involve examining our attitudes and our motivations, deepening our understanding and our response to God, bringing our minds and wills into harmony with the divine will. We will cultivate within ourselves attitudes, values and responses that are fair, peaceful, harmonious, generous and open. This inward search becomes a quiet revolution of soul; and is what it means to love God with all our being.

The second response is action: being prepared to do something; to stand up and be counted; to speak out; to give; to help; to be restrained in our wants; to work tirelessly in enterprises that promote justice and wellbeing; to cast our vision wider than our town and our country, so that we see all peoples of the earth as neighbours in need of love. The words that spring to my mind are those of the prophet Micah:

What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.

St John, in his old age, put it another way: “Love one another. That is the Lord’s command, and if you keep it, that in itself is enough.”

Love is Christ’s gift to us, and should be our gift to the world.