Mid-Lent 5
Mt
5:43-48
4/9/14
I recently saw a figure that was
quite shocking. It is estimated that
since 2000, 1.3 million Christians have been killed worldwide because of their
faith. The majority of these have been
killed by those who belong to Islam – by Muslims.
In northern Nigeria, the terrorist
group Boko Haram is carrying out ethnic cleansing against Christians as they
attack villages and slaughter the inhabitants.
In Somalia and eastern Africa, Al Shabab executes Christians in the
public square. In Egypt Christians are
murdered and churches are burned. In
Syria, groups associated with Al Qaeda demand that Christians convert to Islam
or be killed on the spot. In Pakistan
mobs attack churches and the homes of Christians. In Iraq, churches are bombed.
The reports about acts of violence
by Muslims against Christians incites indignation at those who carry out such
barbaric acts in the name of a religion.
At the same time, the unrelenting flow of these kinds of stories does
have a numbing effect. It is important
that we are informed about what is happening to Christians around the
world. But, we can almost get used to
this kind of news – disturbing as it may be.
And then along comes a story like that
of Sadia Ali Omar. Sadia and her cousin
were executed by Al Shabab in Somalia because they were Christians. The residents of the village, including
Sadia’s own fifteen and eight year old daughters, were forced to watch as the
Muslims beheaded the two women. Sadia’s
husband had previously died, and so the brutal act has left the two girls as
orphans.
When we hear about something like
this – and it by no means an isolated incident – our natural reaction is
anger. The urge that rises up within us
is hate for those who could do something so vicious and horrible. But as we
listen to our text tonight from the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says that this
is not how it is to be for those who have received the saving reign of God. Instead
those who have received the unmerited and undeserved love of God in Christ
Jesus, share that love and forgiveness with others.
Our text this evening is the sixth
and final time that Jesus set up the contrast, “You have heard that it was said
… but I say to you.” Like the previous
five times, Jesus once again takes up an interpretation of the Torah that was
present in the Judaism of his day. He
takes it up and rejects it as instead he provides the true and full
interpretation.
In our text, Jesus begins by saying,
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your
enemy.’” Now the book of Leviticus says,
“You shall love your neighbor.” However,
there is no text in the Old Testament that says, “You shall hate your enemy.” We have here the clearest proof that Jesus is
taking up and correcting an interpretation of the Torah that was present in
Judaism at that time. There is evidence
that the Jews at Qumran who produced the Dead Sea Scrolls had a teaching of
hatred about those outside their group.
There were Jews in the time of
Christ who were saying, “You shall love your neighbor and hate your
enemy.” However, Jesus responded, “But I
say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you
may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the
evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.”
Jesus tells us to love our enemies
and to pray for those who persecute us.
We do this in order to be what God has made us to be. We do this to live as sons and daughters of
the our Father who is in heaven.
Now this is not how the world
works. In the world, if someone does
something to you, you get angry; you seek to get payback. You pay attention and look for an opportunity
to get revenge. The hope is not only that you can hurt the other person, but
instead to hurt them worse than that person hurt you. Of course, this action
often prompts and an even greater reaction by the other person, and so an
ascending spiral of anger and hate emerges.
This is the way of the world. It
is a way that still comes naturally for the old man within you. And it is often
a way that you find difficult to relinquish.
In our text, Jesus reminds us that
we are not the world. Instead, we
are people who have received the saving and transforming reign of God through
the work of the Spirit. We have received
the Gospel, and the Gospel turns everything upside down. It negates all our expectations about how
things are “supposed” to work.
On Sunday we will remember that
Jesus Christ entered into Jerusalem at the beginning of Holy Week. There, he
encountered opposition and hatred. And
yet, did Jesus react in anger and revenge?
No, he continued his way to the cross of Good Friday where he willingly
died for the sins being committed against him.
He died to provide forgiveness before God – forgiveness even for those
who tortured and killed him. He came to
share God’s love with those who don’t want to love God. And then on the third
day he rose from the dead. He showed
that the reign of God present in him overcomes all things – even death itself.
You have received this saving reign.
Next week on Saturday, at the Vigil of Easter we will together return to the foundational
reality by which this happened. We will
return to our baptism. St. Paul wrote
about baptism, “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into
Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by
baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by
the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.”
Through baptism you received the
reign of God. You shared in Jesus’
saving death and so now through the work of Spirit you live in Christ. You live in the newness of life that Christ
provides and so the Spirit gives you new ways of living. The sacrificial love of Christ for you
becomes the both the source for your life and also its guide.
Jesus says, “Love your enemies and
pray for those who persecute you.” After
all, you don’t need the Gospel to be able to love the people you like. Jesus says in our text, “For if you love
those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do
the same? And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than
others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?”
Yet to love your enemies and to pray
for those who persecute you, this is something that only God can work in you
through his Spirit. This is something that
only Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection for you can make possible.
Now contrary to our world’s sappy
sentimentality, love is not merely a feeling.
It’s not just a warm fuzzy inside of you that dissipates when harmed or
wronged. Instead, love is action. Love seeks to help and not to harm, just as
Jesus Christ loved us. Love prays for
the welfare of others – even those who persecute us.
We know that this is a
struggle. It is often not something that
we want to do. It is an action that
often does not match the feelings we have inside of us. And because of this
fact, the words at the end our text reveal our shortcomings. They reveal the fact that we are living in
the now and the not yet. Jesus says,
“You therefore shall be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
In ourselves we are not yet perfect.
But in Christ, we are. Because of the
death and resurrection of Jesus Christ we are forgiven and righteous. As those who are in Christ through the work
of the Spirit, when God looks at us he sees a saint. And it is by returning daily to Christ as he
is present for us through the Means of Grace that we receive the grace and
strength to live this way in the world.
The more we cling to Christ and his love for us, the more his love will
prompt us to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us.
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