On Being Made Whole

A sermon manuscript for the Seventh Sunday after Epiphany - 

     focusing on Matthew 5:38-48.

“Be perfect.”

     Really? Wow.

          What a parting shot from Jesus today.

              “Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

All the turning-the-other-cheek

     and loving-people-that-hate-you business

          would have been quite enough, thank you, Jesus.

But now we have perfection to contend with, too.

     I have a dysfunctional enough relationship 

          with perfection already, Jesus,

               without adding you into the mix…

     Maybe we could skip that bit and just move on…?

Tempting as it could be to gloss over 

     such a startlingly impossible instruction…

          this very message is what I want sit with today – 

               being perfect…

And, while I have no desire

     to explain away how strong this language is,

          I do want to break it open just a bit as we begin…

     because our ears hear the word ‘perfect’ a little differently

          than Jesus’ audience probably heard it…

               and, I think the difference in significant.

The idea of ‘perfection’ to them

     was at least partly (even mostly) 

          about ‘wholeness’ or ‘completion’…

               and while we might think of perfection as

                    a perfect 10 at the Olympics or an A+ on an exam,

                         as never saying the wrong thing 

                              or having a bad hair day…

     Jesus is surely talking about more than that.

And if we think of ‘perfection’ as ‘wholeness,’

     I think we can reflect back 

          on the rest of what Jesus has just said to us

               in a different way than we otherwise might.

Jesus wants us to be whole, to be in community, 

     to live within God’s amazing love –

          This is what Jesus has been talking about 

               for this whole chapter of Matthew –

God’s dream of wholeness and of love for God’s whole creation.

And this week Jesus just really digs in…

     and really takes us to that uncomfortable place

          between where we are and where we hope to be…

And he names some very specific 

     and very broken relationships…

          and then he talks about ways of responding to them

               that are, frankly, very hard to swallow…

                    and even sound downright foolish.

I mean, at first, the command to turn the other cheek,

     to give up both coat and cloak,

           and to walk the second mile….

sound a lot like instructions to just 

     put up with being taken advantage of…

          like directions for being to doormat…

               or at worst an outright passive victim of abuse.

And the Jesus I know…

     I just can’t believe he would want us to do that.

But, there is at least one other way to interpret these texts,

     one that is consistent with the dream of wholeness

          that I want so much to talk about…

               but it requires a bit of historical background.

So hopefully, 

     those of you who have heard this before will indulge me

          while I describe a little bit of the cultural landscape

               in which Jesus preached these words…

…and we may find it ends up sounding pretty familiar, after all….

First, there was a very divided social order in this culture

     and certain behaviors 

          that communicated the stational hierarchy in place.

To strike someone in the most insulting way possible,

     an attacker would use the back of her hand…

          indicating that the one she is striking is beneath her…

               unworthy even to be touched by her palm...

                    as if it might be dirtied…

Second, many members of the lower class were day laborers,

     essentially indentured servants,

          and debtors’ courts commonly convened

               and confiscated a garment

                    as collateral against debts owed to land owners…

               since clothes were among the few possessions 

                    a laborer might have.

Third, the empire had imposed itself upon this local culture 

     in very particular ways.

          One such way was a law that anyone living in territory

               occupied and controlled by Rome was required

          to carry the pack of a Roman soldier up to a mile if asked.

(See, for example, the Interpretation commentary on Matthew 

     by Douglas R.A. Hare, pages 55-57, 

          or Jesus and Nonviolence: A Third Way 

              by Walter Wink, pages 15-27.)

So…considering Jesus’ words knowing these things,

     we can now realize that he is not only saying

          that we should not ever meet violence with violence

               (and, it surely seems that he is saying that).

    He also seems to be suggesting active forms of resistance

          to the social structures that empowered and privileged

               a select few on the backs of many.

In this world, to turn your cheek to your assailant is to say,

      “You may strike me, but I am not going anywhere,

           and if you will strike me again, 

               you will do so with the palm of your hand,

                     and acknowledge that I am not beneath you.”

To hand over both coat and cloak 

     to the one you owe an unjust debt is to say,

          “You can force me to serve you, 

               but you will look at me standing here,

                    nearly naked, and you will acknowledge

                         that you are depriving a fellow human being 

                              of dignity for your own gain.”

To walk the second mile 

     with a soldier of the invading empire is to say,

          “You can force me to carry this pack, 

               but I am not a pack animal.

                    I am here on my own terms.”

And not only that…to carry the pack further than a mile

     (the maximum distance allowed by the law)

          would actually open up the solider to punishment

               under the same law 

                    by which he was forcing your service…

               because he had you carry the pack 

                    farther than he was allowed!

Now, isn’t that all just delicious?

     This is not passive acceptance of abuse 

          but active resistance to it!

     This sounds like Jesus talking tactics 

          about how to stick it to The Man!

Or so it seems…

      You see, I was so delighted by these verses

          when I discovered this interpretation of them in college

                 that I sort of accidentally/on-purpose

                     forgot to keep reading what comes right after them.

     For me, 

          I can get so caught up 

               in my righteous indignation about injustice,

                    in my excitement about sticking it to The Man, 

                         that I can forget 2 pretty key things:

1) I’m part of the injustice, too. 

          Sometimes (maybe a lot of the time) I’m The Man.

               or I’m at least benefitting from unjust systems 

                    that are harming others…

2) We’re still talking about God’s dream of wholeness, 

          of unity, 

               of community...

      And there is no room for an “us versus them” attitude 

          in that dream…

      not even “me (or us) versus The Man”…

The remainder of Jesus’ speech about loving our enemies

     and praying for those who cause us pain…

          this is where the rubber really meets the road, I think.

Because, this is where he makes it clear 

     that the discipline of love undergirds

          every true justice-seeking act that is ever done…

               because without love we would never take such risks…

To sit at those lunch counters during the civil right movement,

     to refuse to speak on National Day of Silence, 

         to walk in a picket line…

     to turn the other cheek, to stand in front of a fire hose,

         to sit on the capitol steps, 

              to hand over the clothing on your back…

     These are all acts of extreme vulnerability…

In fact, they defy our very instincts.

     When we meet open conflict, violence, or opposition,

               every bit of us, from our guts to our toes screams at us

                    to either put up our fists and call up our fighting words

                         or to find the closest exit and make our retreat.

          Fight or flight. It’s how we’re wired.

And the only way to truly resist the way Jesus describes…

     The only way to neither fight nor flee…

          The only way to turn the other cheek to your enemy…

               is out of love…

      (Surely…you can be angry at the same time…

            We all know that it is possible to be angry at someone

                  and love them all at once, right?)

    

But the only way to stand in that impossible ground 

     between fighting and fleeing

          is to care enough about the one who strikes you to say,

               “No. This is not the way it should be. 

                    This is not who we are.

                         We were not made to be divided.

                              God has a different dream for our life together.”

To stand in the space 

     between fighting and fleeing from the adversary

          is to stand in the only space 
               where God’s dream is realized…

                    by staying painfully close and exposed 

                         to that which we fear…

                              with faith that it can be transformed…

                                   and made whole.

And we need to be honest: this is hard…even impossible…to do.

     What Jesus teaches about how the kingdom is to be born 

          into this broken world,

               is…so…hard...

                    and we hunger for it so deeply.

Jesus has laid out the path for how the kingdom will come,

          for what the fulfillment of the law 

               and dream of God look like…

 Jesus has even….astonishingly…

     invited us to be part of that hard work…

          even though we know 

               that we are not actually strong enough on our own

                    to stand in that impossible place.

     We know that we cannot make ourselves whole.

But we also find out that we don’t have to.

    Being whole 

          is never something Jesus meant us to do or be alone.

              Because the path to the kingdom

                   that Jesus has just laid out before us,

                        is the very path he himself is about to walk:

          He will turn his cheek to his beloved betrayer…

               whose kiss will bruise him more than any fist ever could.

         He will stand before a court

               and turn his accusers words back around 

                    to convict them…

                        shaming them not with his nakedness 

                              but with their garment of mockery…

                                   a king’s robe on a condemned peasant…

         He will walk the miles to the hill of Golgotha,

              and let the law do its worst.

         He will die in that impossible place

               between where we are and where we hope to be…

And…he will rise…and us with him…

     And death, division, and social station,

           ridicule, hatred and wounding…

               All will be answered in that impossible place

                    with a life that neither fights nor flees,

                         but loves in the face of every adversity…..

               And through his life and love we are all transformed

                    into the whole and perfect children of the kingdom

                         that we so deeply hunger to be.

Amen.