Twenty-Third Sunday after Pentecost, Proper26 Yr B Oct 31 2021

Twenty-Third Sunday after Pentecost, Proper26 Yr B Oct 31 2021

Ruth 1:1-18, Psalm 146, Hebrews 9:11-14, Mark 12:28-34

 

Jesus may have been asked the hardest final exam question ever. Which is the greatest commandment, and why, give examples, show your work, and cite your sources. 

 

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these. And we spend our entire lives trying to work this out. 

 

So today I want to tell you a story about how we got to this great commandment, consider this me showing my work and citing my sources. 

 

The Ten Best Ways story follows.

 

Desert Box

People of God

heart-shaped box with commandments

Mount Sinai

 

This is the desert. It is a dangerous place. People do not go into the desert unless they have to. There is no water there, and without water we die. There is no food there. Without food, we die.

 

When the wind blows, it changes the shape of the desert. People get lost. Some never come back.

 

In the daytime, the sun is so hot that people must wear lots of clothes to protect themselves from the sun and the blowing sand. The sand stings when it hits your skin. The sun scorches you by day. At night it is cold. You need many clothes to keep warm The desert is a dangerous place. People only go there if they have to.

 

(Put some of the People of God in the far-right corner. Arrange them in a circle. Also, place Mt. Sinai in the left hand corner of the Desert Box, the corner nearest you.)

 

The People of God went through the water into freedom. They were free! So Miriam led the dancing! 

 

Now that the people are free, they can go anywhere they want to go and do anything they want to do. So where should they go now? What should they do? Where will they go now? What is the best way?

 

God loved the People so much that God gave them the Ten Best Ways to Live. Sometimes these ways are called the Ten Commandments. 

 

(Show the heart-shaped box as you say this, but don’t open it yet.)

 

As the people traveled across the desert, they followed fire by night and smoke by day. They began to complain. Some even wanted to go back to Egypt. There was not enough food. There was not enough water. God helped Moses find food and water. Finally they came to the great mountain.

 

(Begin to move the people to your left. Mt. Sinai is in the lower left corner of the Desert Box, closest to you, so that most of the children can see what happens. Move the people carefully until they are all at the foot of the mountain.)

 

The people came close to the mountain, but they were afraid to touch it. Mt. Sinai was covered with fire and smoke. Moses was the only one who had the courage to climb up into the fire and smoke to meet God. 

 

(Move Moses up to the top of the rock. AS he moves up the mountain, hide the figure in your hand to show his disappearing in the smoke.)

 

When Moses was on top of the mountain, he came so close to God, and God came so close to him that he knew what God wanted him to do. 

 

God wanted him to write the Ten Best Ways to Live on stones and bring them down the mountain to the people.

 

God gave the Ten Commandments to Moses. Moses gave them to the people and they gave them to us. 

 

(Present the heart-shaped box, and then open it. Begin with the summary. One tablet says, “Love God.” The other one says, “Love People.” A third triangular piece completers the shape of a heart and says, “God loves Us.” As you lay these pieces flat in the sand, read them aloud.) 

 

Here are the Ten Best Ways. when we put the Ten Best Ways all together, this is what they tell us: Love God. Love People. God Loves Us. when we say “us,” we mean God’s love for each one of us as well as all of us together. 

 

(Place the tablets in a line behind “Love God”) 

1)    Don’t serve other gods.

2)    Make no idols to worship.

3)    Be serious when you say my name

(Place the fourth tablet in the middle because it tells us how to love both God and people)

4)    Keep the Sabbath holy.

(Read the next tablets slowly and place them behind “Love People.”)

5)    Honor your parents.

6)    Don’t kill.

7)    Don’t break your marriage. You know, when people get married they think they will be married forever. Sometimes that just doesn’t work out. 

8)    Don’t steal.

9)    Don’t lie.

10) Don’t even want what others have.

 

These are all hard. God did not say that these are the “ten easy things to do.” They are the Ten Best Ways. They are hard, perhaps even impossible, but we are supposed to try. They mark the best way – like stones marking a path. 

(End of story)

 

These ten best ways get translated into the Shema that Jesus repeats when questioned by the scribe, and it is extraordinary. This was not a new thing with Jesus. This love ethic is built into the law and the Ten Best Ways. 

What Jesus does is to restate the commandment. 

 

So now we wonder. This is where you participate. I wonder what it means for you, that the greatest commandment is, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. And that the Lord your God, the Lord is one.

 

We have been hearing from Mark for weeks now these stories of following Jesus. Following Jesus is about being healed from blindness, it's about seeing with new eyes. Following Jesus is about being baptized into the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Following Jesus is to walk with the poor. Following Jesus is to be in relationship with all of God's creation, and to protect the most vulnerable of God's creation. Following Jesus is to cast off the idol, to lay down that which is killing you. Following Jesus is to live one's life as if God matters. Amen.

 

6th Sunday after the Epiphany Yr A Feb 19 2014

Audio 2.16.2014

Our relationships matter to God. This part of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew's gospel really tells us that. Our relationships matter to God. Our healthy relationships, our broken relationships, all matter to God. God delights in you, and loves you unconditionally and desires the best for you in and through your relationships. So this passage is about how we treat each other in relationship. This is an extension of the ten commandants, which is about how God loves us and is in relationship with us, and how we treat each other. The Sermon on the mount, of which this passage we have today is a part, is the longest piece of teaching from Jesus in the New Testament. The whole sermon on the mount, is about how we treat each other. These words can help us create health and healing in our relationships. There is no hierarchy of sin here, breaking relationship is always painful and often tragic. These words remind us that all of our relationships are possible only with God's help.

To claim that our relationships matter to God is to claim two things. First, that this God who creates all that is seen and unseen, is truly the God who not only is God in our midst, but is also God who lived and loved and suffered and died, and who rose from the dead. This God is the God that is not only transcendent, the God who creates the heavens and the earth and all the universe, but also who is deeply and completely immanent, the God whose heart's desire is to be in relationship with us. Secondly, because it is God's heart's desire to be in relationship with God's people, you and me, God is doing something new in this incarnation. God is doing something new with the law and commandments. We hear that in this passage. No longer is it enough just to refrain from murder, or adultery, or lying, or any of the other sins not mentioned in this passage today. No longer is it enough to not do it, God is calling us to go beyond the law, and to be deeply and completely in relationship with God whose love wins.

The effects of turning away from God, the effects of our sin, the effects of missing the mark, are broken relationships, and broken relationships will kill us. Broken relationships and broken hearts kill us from the inside out. The effect of broken relationships are hearts that are hardened and no longer capable of love, compassion, mercy, justice. They are hearts no longer capable of beating. Well, you might as well cut out your eye, or lop off your hand for as much as your body is good for anymore. Do you see what's happening here? God's relationship with us, and our relationship with others is so important in this life that without them we may as well be dead, in effect, we are dead. 

And that has everything to do with how we respect the dignity of every human being with whom we come in contact. Surely first and foremost the human beings we live with, our partners in life, our children, our brothers and sisters, and all the people we encounter day by day. It also has everything to do with how we respect the dignity of those we know only by our common humanity. Those we read about in the newspaper, those we see on our screens in far away places, those who are in our own communities but must hide because of who they are. 

So I'd like you to call to mind one of the relationships in your live that is most important to you. One that is healthy and whole and good and sustains you regularly. Picture that person, that relationship. Think about what makes that a good relationship, why is it so important. Give God thanks for that person and the relationship you share. Now, call to mind another relationship that is important but has suffered some damage. Don’t try to figure out who was to blame for the hurt, but rather hold that person and relationship in prayer. Offer that broken relationship to God as an offering and as an arena of God’s help and healing. Think about what action you can take to move that relationship to greater health. And now pray with with me, Lord God of healing and wholeness, we offer this broken relationship to your care. Show us how to heal and be healed in this broken relationship, give us the words, show us the way, so that your love shows forth, our hearts may be healed, and world may be a better place. Amen.

In these days when our legislature is considering laws that discriminate, I am reminded of those who have gone before us, those who have spent their lives being loved by God, and loving others, those who have spent their lives not in fear of showing God's love to the world but proclaiming God's love for all to the world. Those whose hearts could have been hardened because to continue to love was not only difficult but dangerous. I am reminded today of the first black Episcopal priest, Absalom Jones, whose life we celebrate each year on February 13th. Absalom Jones bought his wife's freedom, and went on to buy his own freedom, and became a priest at the African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas. Absalom Jones was known for his abolitionist preaching, in God's kingdom, there is no owning another human, there is no prejudice, there is no bigotry. 

But of course, I'm preaching to the choir. You know these things, you do your best. Today I want to encourage you. I want to encourage you to take this love that wins even farther. Take it to people whose hearts have been hardened, and show them that it is love that wins, not hate, not prejudice or bigotry. Show them that Jesus took all that fear into his own body and replaced it with his love. Show them what eternal life looks like, it's not some reward after we're dead, it's the life God gives us, life fully lived before we're dead, it's a heart that is living and breathing and loving, not cold and hard. Show them that you will not live your life in fear of those who are different from you, but you live your life loud and proud for God's love.