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In yesterday’s reflection I took note of five distressing news accounts of violence I came across in the New York Times.  In that same copy, I was touched by another story that caught my attention.

City officials have long been attempting to clear the streets of Times Square of homeless persons.    Apparently at present there is only one such person remaining, a man known simply as “Heavy.”

“Heavy is the last member of what (city social workers) called the Times Square Seven, the only homeless people remaining last summer out of the dozens they had been placing in housing for years.  Of the seven, three men were regularly sleeping on the steps of churches.   All of them had been homeless for a long time – on average, 17 years.  One by one, the men were persuaded to accept housing.  Except Heavy. ..

“He has lived on the streets for decades.  Day after day, he has politely declined offers of housing, explaining he is a protector of the neighborhood and cannot possibly leave…

“According to neighbors and social workers, Heavy is a gentle presence, a quiet man who does not harass passers-by or panhandle aggressively.  They say he may be mentally ill, as many of the chronically homeless are.  An employee in a deli on Eighth Avenue said that he usually gave Heavy a few pieces of bread at lunchtime.  Neighbors give him hot coffee, loose change, and warm clothing in winter.

“’He is a sweetheart,’ said an 82 year old woman who gave her name as Nanny and stopped to talk near her home on 48^th Street, where she has lived for 44 years.  ‘He sees me coming and says, “Hi, Mommy,” and I say, “Hi, honey.”  And I give him his quarter, and I go on with my business.’”

Somehow the author of the article passed on the opportunity to cite the old song title and Boy’s Town reference, but I can’t.   “He ain’t heavy; he’s my brother.”

I was struck by Heavy’s insistence that he couldn’t possibly leave; he needed to stay around to protect the neighborhood.   Maybe Heavy is right; maybe he’s there to keep people connected to Jesus.

According to Matthew, just two days before the Last Supper  Jesus told the parable of the sheep and the goats, in which the sheep are told, “I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me,“ (25:35-36) and concludes with “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” (25:40)  Luke tells us that at about the same time Jesus marveled at a poor widow and the offering she made to the temple treasury of two small copper coins.   (Luke 21:1-4) About to die, Jesus points us to the little ones in our midst as signs of grace.

Lord Jesus, you continue to come to us disguised in the least of our brothers and sisters.  Slow us down to notice that which you notice, to be willing to both give and to receive, in this great tapestry of grace that is life.  Amen.

I picked up the New York Times today, and these are the news stories that jumped out at me, reminding me that the violence and oppression that Jesus confronted in Jerusalem are still very much in the world today:   

In Russia, two female suicide bombers killed thirty-eight people riding the subway. 

In Mexico, twenty-one persons were killed on Sunday in gang drug-related violence, including ten young people ranging in age from eight to twenty-one who were travelling together in a truck when they were attacked.

In Michigan, nine people were arrested and accused of planning the murder of a law enforcement officer.  They planned to follow this up with a bombing of the officer’s funeral caravan.  Members of a local militia, they had hopes of inciting an anti-government uprising. 

In Long Island, a trial is going on of a nineteen-year-old man accused of killing a thirty-seven year old Hispanic immigrant.  The accused was a part of a group of seven young men who were bored one evening and went out looking specifically for Hispanics to harass. 

In Massachusetts, nine teenagers have had charges brought against them for bullying  a fifteen-year-old girl.   Following three months of relentless harassment at school and in cyberspace, the girl took her own life.  

The old, old story of Jesus and his love is no less relevant today.  Arriving on his donkey, and with tears in his eyes, Jesus lamented:  “If only you had recognized the things that make for peace.”  (Luke 19:42)

Help us, dear weeping savior, to forsake the death-dealing ways of this world – the barriers we set up between one another —  the violence we commit, both seen and unseen.  Teach us how to be merciful as you are merciful.  Amen. 

Yesterday in worship we once again acted out Palm Sunday with the children. In preparation I got down some of the Christmas pageant costumes from the attic, which inspired me to incorporate more characters than I usually do.

I had two of the larger men of the congregation wearing Roman soldier armor and helmets. When I asked them who their king is, they improvised well: “Caesar!”

Most of the children dressed up as the disciples who stood at the side of the road. They knew who their king is: “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!” (Luke 19:38a) Their king is Jesus, played by six year old Mark, riding into town on a donkey, played by fourteen year old Ryan.

Four children volunteered to dress up as angels.

There are no angels described in the account, but they were surely there, unseen. I was struck by the fact that in Luke’s Gospel the words of the disciples welcoming Jesus to Jerusalem echo the words of the angels announcing to the poor shepherds the birth of the savior:
“Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!” (19:38b) As in his birth, Jesus comes to the little people, announcing a peace altogether different from “Pax Romana” — the peace established by soldiers waiting to crush any uprising. At the last supper Jesus would speak again of his kind of peace: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid. (John 14:25-27)

Luke doesn’t mention palm branches, but he does describe how the disciples placed their cloaks on the road for Jesus to ride over. And so our children took off the multi-colored pieces of fabric I had given them, making a rainbow of colors down the center aisle upon which Jesus could arrive.

Two thousand years later, Caesar is long gone, but the king who came to town riding on a donkey, welcomed by the little people, is still proclaimed King. “Teacher,” yelled some Pharisees present, “order your disciples to stop.” “I tell you,” answered Jesus, “if these were silent, even the stones would shout out.”

O God, help us to recognize the true king in the one who came to town riding on a donkey. Let us know the peace of heaven that it may break forth in this troubled world. In Jesus name. Amen.

A sermon preached on Palm Sunday, March 28, 2010, based upon Luke 19: 29-40.

I have become convinced that, for the most part, we have been kept from understanding exactly what was going on when Jesus arrived in Jerusalem on that original Palm Sunday.

For one thing, there were, in all likelihood, two processions that entered Jerusalem that that day. From the east side of the city came the one we are familiar with, consisting of a wandering preacher whose ministry up until that point had been exclusively in the towns and villages, the countryside of the Israel. He came riding a lowly donkey, and he was welcomed by peasants.

On the west side of Jerusalem, Pilate, the Roman governor, would have led a awe-inspiring military procession with cavalry on horses, helmets glistening, banners rippling, drums beating, the swirling of dust. This demonstration of military power was intended to intimidate the Jewish people with an explicit message: do not challenge this power or you will be crushed.

Pilate did not live in Jerusalem; he preferred the splendor of his palace down by the seashore, but he made a point of being on hand whenever the people over whom the Emperor had given him dominion were having a major festival.

And Passover was the greatest of all Jewish festivals. In those days, approximately 40,000 people lived in the city of Jerusalem; during Passover the population would briefly swell to 200,000 as Jewish pilgrims from all parts of Israel and beyond would descend upon the city. The potential revolutionary meanings of Passover could not have been missed by the Romans: the festival revolves around the ancient story of the Exodus, describing how the Jewish people had once been oppressed by another great political and military power, Egypt, led by Pharaoh, and how God with a mighty hand had delivered the people from the hands of their oppressors. Given the combination of the stirring themes of Passover and the crowds of pilgrims, if there was going to be an uprising against the authority of Rome, this would surely be the time for it to happen. You don’t get to be an empire without making a habit of being well prepared for all contingencies, and so the procession that Pilate led that day brought massive reinforcements of soldiers into the city.

A theology was on display that day with the Roman procession, one declaring Caesar as the son of God. All people within the empire were required to acknowledge his divinity and the authority of his kingship or be destroyed.

Jesus would have been well aware of this other procession, and in the light of it, his procession was something of a counter demonstration, which the Gospels clearly describe him organizing in advance. In a bit of street theater, Jesus comes riding not on an armored battle horse like Pilate, or Caesar, but rather a lowly donkey — the fulfillment of a prophecy in Zechariah (9:9 – 10), proclaiming not the Kingdom of Caesar, but rather the peaceable Kingdom of God.

Both processions that day converged in the vicinity of the Temple: the Roman procession would have found its destination in the garrison permanently stationed at Fortress Antonio, overlooking the Jewish temple and its courts. Jesus, Luke tells us, went directly to the Temple itself, pausing only to weep over the city and to lament the fact that they were unwilling to embrace the “things that make for peace.” At the Temple Jesus drove out those who were selling things there. Angrily he quoted from the prophets: “It is written, “My house shall be a house of prayer”; but you have made it a den of robbers.”

In doing so, Jesus sealed his fate: death upon the cross. In order to understand why this was so, we need to appreciate the place the temple held in ancient Jewish life. Over time, it had become the very center not only of their religious life, but of their economic life as well.

The Jewish law, with its complex system of 612 laws governing every aspect of daily life was pretty much impossible to keep, especially for the poor peasants who, unlike the Pharisees, did not have the resources required to devote themselves to the keeping of the Law in all its intricacies. The burden of the law meant that the mass of peasants were consigned to essentially exist in a constant state of sin and guilt. The Temple mediated not only God’s presence but also God’s forgiveness. It was the only place where the animal sacrifices required by the Law could be made that re-established a right relationship with God. And so the religious system of the day required that these poor peasants make annual pilgrimages to the Temple in Jerusalem in order to be released from the burden of their guilt — pilgrimages that they hardly could afford.

The massive arrival of all these peasant pilgrims brought an enormous influx of money to Jerusalem. Once in the city, pilgrims would need to exchange their forms of money for the local currency, for a fee, of course, in order to pay their Temple tax, as well as purchase the required animals — ritually unblemished, as required by the law. Hence, the presence of both the money changers and the merchants selling animals in the courtyards of the Temple, turning a profit at the expense of the poor.

And so you see, there were a whole class of people — thousands of establishment people, largely located there in Jerusalem — who lived off the system as it had evolved over the years. A tacit understanding had developed between the Romans on the one hand — whose only concern was that the authority of Rome not be challenged — that there be no rebellions — and the wealthy elite of Jerusalem on the other hand who profited so nicely from “the way things were.” Together they conspired to keep the status quo in tact, because it meant stability for the Romans and wealth and power for the Jewish authorities who lived at the top of the system that dominated the people.

The Romans were happy to turn over authority for collecting the taxes required to fuel their empire to the wealthy elite of Jerusalem, which, of course, provided yet another opportunity for those on the inside to turn a profit: Collect more than Rome required, and well, the extra would get to remain in their pockets.

Now here is something you may not have thought of before: the people who profited from this system were largely located in the big city of Jerusalem. It was out in the villages and in the countryside that the peasants lived, scratching out an existence off the land, suffering under the oppression of this system. And it was in the villages and countryside that Jesus’ ministry had exclusively operated up until this moment of confrontation when on Palm Sunday Jesus entered Jerusalem for the very first time.

And consider again what Matthew, Mark and Luke tell us was Jesus’ basic message from the outset: The kingdom of God is at hand; forgiveness is available, right now. You don’t have to travel all the way to Jerusalem; all you have to do is turn your heart to God who is merciful and begin a new walk with God.

To the peasants in the villages and countryside, this truly was good news, and they responded enthusiastically to his message. For those tied into the present system — the scribes and the Pharisees and the Temple authorities and the merchants whose business operated in relation to the Temple — Jesus’ message was a big time threat. There was a lot of money, a lot of power, at stake here.

You remember that time Jesus was preaching in the house in the village of Capernaum and they lowered the paralyzed man on the stretcher and Jesus said, “My son, your sins are forgiven”? You remember the reaction of the Scribes, invested as they were in the system: “This is blasphemy! Who can forgive sins but God alone!” The implication was, of course, that the only way God would forgive sin was by the whole grueling process of the pilgrimage to the Temple, which, curiously enough, meant money in the pockets of those who operated the system.

John the Baptist had preached something quite similar, announcing that forgiveness of sins were available through repentance — there was no need for the trip to Jerusalem. And you remember what had happened to him? He got beheaded. (Talk like that just can’t be allowed to go on.) This is what happens when you confront the system.

For some time, Jesus had been slowly making his way to Jerusalem. Everyone recognized that when Jesus arrived he would confront the very religious, economic and political system that existed at the heart of Jewish life, oppressing the poor both spiritually and economically while making the rich fat and happy, not to mention richer.

Jesus knew he would die in the process. He’d been telling his disciples, but they couldn’t hear him. They had hoped that when Jesus arrived in Jerusalem, God would intervene, bringing down both the religious elite and the Roman overlords. Given the power of God they had witnessed in Jesus’ ministry, it wasn’t an altogether unreasonable hope. After all, they were convinced he was God’s messiah and had witnessed extraordinary power in his ministry.

But Jesus came on a donkey, not a warhorse. This is a critical point. Although he came speaking truth to power, refusing to back down, he also came with a commitment to love the enemy and not to engage in violence. He saw clearly that you cannot fight evil with evil.

The most plausible theory for why the disciple Judas betrayed Jesus was that he was refused to follow Jesus in the way of non-violence. He recognized a critical moment with city filled with Jewish pilgrims filled with resentment for Rome’s domination. Judas figured that when word spread that Jesus had been arrested, the spark that would ignite the forest fire who had been struck. Tens of thousands would take to the streets and a violent revolution would be underway.

When Jesus was arrested the Gospels record that a disciple raised a sword to fight back, and Jesus admonished him to give up the sword. Jesus knew that those who lived by the sword would die by the sword.

In 313 AD the Roman Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity, and the Church suddenly found itself a part of the establishment, a position it would hold essentially up to the present. From that perspective, the original context of Jesus’ challenge to the establishment got obscured.

Too easily we call ourselves “Christians” without taking seriously the radical nature of his message that we are to both challenge the social injustice of this world, and love our enemies. It remains, however, the only path that leads to peace.

Walter Wink tells a powerful story of Jew following the way of Jesus in our modern society:

On a Sunday morning in June 1991, Cantor Michael Weisser and his wife, Julie, were unpacking boxes in their new home, when the pyhone rang. “You will be sorry you ever moved into 5810 Randolph St., Jew boy,” the voice said, and hung up. Tow days later, the Weissers recevied a manila packet in the mail. “The KKK is watching you, Scum,” read the nate. Inside were pictures of Adolf Hitler, caricatures of Jews with hooked noses, blacks with gorilla heads, and graphic depictions of dead blacks and Jews. “The Holohaux was nothing compared to what’s going to happen to you,” read one note.

The Weissers called the police, who said it looked like the work of Larry Trapp, the state leader, or “grand dragon,” of the Ku Klux Klan. A Nazi sympathizer, he led a dadre of skinheads and lansmen responsible for terrorizing black, Asian and Jewish families in Nebraska and nearby Iowa. “He’s dangerous,” the police warned. “We know he makes explosives.” Although confined to a wheel chair because of late-stage diabetes, Trapp, forty-four, was a suspect in the firebombings of several African Americans’ homes around Lincoln and was responsible for what he called “Operation Goodk,” the March 1991 burning of the Indochinese Refugee Assistance Center in Omaha. (He later admitted to these crimes.) And Trapp was planning to blow up the synagogue where Weisser was the spiritual leader.

Trapp lived alone in a drab efficiency apartment. On one wall he kept a giant Nazi flag and a doube-life-sized picture of Hitler. Next to these hung his white Klan robe, with its red belt and hood. He kept assault rifles, pistols, and shotguns within instant reach for the moment when his enemies might come crashing through his door to kill him. In the rear was a secret bunker he’d built for the coming “race wars.”

When Trapp launched a white supremacist TV series on a local public access cable channel — featuring men and women saluting a burning swastika and firing automatic weapons– Michael Weisser was incensed. He called Trapp’s KKK hotline and left a message on the answering machine. “Larry,” he said, “do you know that the very first laws that Hitler’s Nazis passed were against people like yourself who had no legs or who had physical deformities or physical handicaps? Do you realize you would have been among the first to die under Hitler? Why do you love the Nazis so much?” Then he hung up.

Weisser continued the calls to the machine. Then one day Trapp picked up. “What the f___ do you want?” he shouted. “I just wanted to talk to you,” said Weisser. “You black?” Trapp demanded. “Jewish,” Weisser replied. “Stop harassing me,” said Trapp, who demanded to know why he was calling. Weisser remembered a suggestion of his wife’s. “Well, I was thinking you might need a hand with something, and I wondered if I could help,” Weisser ventured. “I know you’re in a wheelchair and I thought maybe I could take you to the grocery store or something.”

Trapp was too stunned to speak. Then he cleared his throat. “Thart’s okay,” he said. “That’s nice of you, but I’ve giot that covered. Thanks anyway. But don’t call this number anymore. “I’ll be in touch,” Weisser replied. During a later call, Trapp admitted that he was “rehinking a few things.” But then he went back on the radio spewing the same old hatreds. Furious, Weisser picked up the phone. “It’s clear you’re not rethinking anything at all!” After calling Trapp a “Liar” and “hypocrite,” Weisser demanded an explanation.

In a surprisingly tremulous voice, Trapp said, “I’m sorry I did that. I’ve been talking like that all of my life… I can’t help it… I apologize!” That evening the cantor led his congregation in prayers for the grand dragon.

The next evening the phone rang at the Weissers’ home. “I want to get out,” Trapp said, “but I don’t know how.” The Weissers offered to go over to Trapp’s that night to “break bread.” Trapp hesitated, then agreed, telling them he elived in apartment number 3. When the Weissers entered Trapp’s apartment, he burst into tears and tugged off his two swastika rings. Soon all three were crying, then laughing, then hugging.

Trapp resigned from all his racist organizations and wrote apologies to the many people he had threated or abudsed. When, a few months later, Trapp leanred that he had less than a year to live, the Weissers invited him to move into their two bedroom, threechildren home. When his condition deteriorated, Julie quit her job as a nurse to care for him, sometimes all night. Six months later he converted to Judaism; three months after that he died.

Most people who are violent have themselves been the victims of violence. It should come as no surprise, then, to learn that Larry Trapp had been brutalized by his father and was an alcoholic by the fourth grade.

Loving our enemies my seem impossible, yet it can be done. At no point is the inrush of divine grace so immediately and concretely perceptible as in those moments when we lot go of our hatred and relax into God’s love. No miracle is so awesome, so necessary, and so frequent. (“The Powers that Be,” by Walter Wink pp. 172 – 175)

We may not find ourselves confronted with the sort of blatant violence that Michael Weisser contended with, but in our own way, we can follow Jesus, and in our own little corner of the universe, to speak truth to power, to love our enemies, and embody forgiveness.

So I’m sitting in my office late Saturday afternoon — the day before Palm Sunday — at a loss for what to write for my Lenten reflection. Scanning Luke’s Gospel, my attention is caught by a parable recorded only by Luke, that Jesus tells just before he enters Jerusalem. I decide I will write about the parable and start to type, when suddenly I hear the sound of voices out in front of the church. Looking out my window, I see what looks like a brand new black car pulled over at the side of the road directly in front of the church. A woman in the driver’s seat is yelling at the top of her lungs at a man sitting in the passenger seat. The only words I make out are, “You’re a liar; you’re a liar!” The man is looking away from the woman. Perhaps he sees me watching from out through my office window; I’m not sure, but he looks embarrassed. He says something quietly and gestures for the woman to drive on, which, angrily she does.

It occurs to me that most of us have been in that disturbed space that the couple was dwelling in; I am glad I am not there now.

So I turn back to the parable (Luke 18:1-8). It is introduced as being about the need of the disciples “to pray always and not to lose heart.” A poor widow faces some injustice in her life, and the judge with jurisdiction over her is described as neither fearing God nor having respect for human beings. Nonetheless, the widow keeps showing up at his doorstep, crying out, “Grant me justice against my opponent.”

At first the judge ignores her completely, but eventually he gets so worn out by her “continual coming” that he gives in and grants her justice.

It is a strange little parable, evoked in Jesus’ mind perhaps by the distress he was experiencing knowing that within a week or so he would be dying on a cross. The powers in charge in Jerusalem were not interested in the cause of justice nor willing to be humbled before God.

The little vignette I just witnessed reminds me that the world continues to be broken on so many levels.

Jesus concludes by saying, “And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them.”

When exactly this will happen, only God knows, but we are assured that in the end, our cries will be heard.

Jesus finishes up saying, “And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” — faith apparently like unto the quality manifest by the poor widow who refuses either to give in to the ways things are, or to give up hope.

Dear Jesus, as we ponder the brokenness of our lives and the injustice of this world, grant us faith — persistence in prayer and in action as we seek to do your will and wait for your kingdom. Bless the couple who appeared momentarily in front of your house, and every troubled soul, and bring the reconciliation to every broken relationship. Amen.

Yesterday we looked at the high and hard calling Jesus lays out in the Sermon on the Mount for those who would follow him.   Later on in Matthew’s Gospel a private conversation is recorded between Jesus his disciples.  Jesus first asks them what the crowds of people are saying about him.  Once they’ve given him the latest complimentary gossip, he puts them on the spot:  “But who do you say that I am?” (Matthew 16:15b)

Simon Peter boldly responds, “You are the messiah, the son of the living God.” This in turn evokes a blessing from Jesus, who declares that this insight came to Simon directly from God in heaven.   He calls Simon “Petros” (Peter), which means “rock”, and says that “on this rock I will build my church.” (16:18)

It’s a high compliment for sure; the only instance in which Jesus declared an individual to be “blessed.”   In the very next paragraph, however, Jesus calls Peter “Satan”; again, the only instance of Jesus calling a human being the Great Tempter.  Jesus was talking about how he had to suffer and die in Jerusalem, and when Simon Peter tries to persuade him that it wasn’t so, Jesus loses his temper:  “Get behind me, Satan!  You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” (16:23.)

Peter represents the church; you, me and the Pope. Though blessed and called to do Christ’s work on earth, we also are his betrayer.

The four Gospels vary quite a bit.   If you examine them, it will be obvious that Mathew, Mark and Luke come out of the same tradition.  Though they have significant variations in the way they tell the story, they have a great deal in common.  John’s Gospel, however, arises from distinctly different tradition, with relatively little in common with the other three.

There are very few stories that appear in all four Gospels, and as such it is all the more remarkable that the following story is recorded in dramatic detail in all four:   On the night Jesus is arrested, Peter lingers out in the courtyard as Jesus is taken inside the house of the high priest to be interrogated.  Apparently it is cold, and Peter draws near to a fire that the servants of the high priest have built.   In the shimmering light of the fire, three separate times Peter is recognized as a follower of the man arrested inside, and each time Peter denies any knowledge of Jesus.

It’s pretty shameful, and you might think that the story would have gotten edited out of the Gospels somewhere along the line.   After all, if Peter represents we who would follow Jesus, we don’t come off too well, to say the least.  Apparently the Holy Spirit was determined that the church not have any “skeletons in the closet.” It’s not that we don’t have “skeletons”; it’s just that they belong out in the open for all to see.

It’s only out in the open that the shame can be healed.  In AA they have a saying, “Your only as sick as your secrets.”

Loving God, we would bring out of the shadows our shame and guilt, that we might know the new beginning your forgiveness creates.    In Jesus’ name.  Amen.

The Lord’s Prayer is found in a section of the Gospel of Matthew known as the Sermon on the Mount (Chapters 5 – 7). Pressed by crowds of people, Jesus goes up on a mountaintop. He is joined there not by “the crowds” but rather by far smaller group of people who would aspire to his disciples.

Matthew is conjuring up the memory of Moses going up on the mountaintop to receive the ten commandments by which the Hebrew people were to live by. Jesus is portrayed as the “new Moses,” and the sermon he gives from his mountaintop describes what the lives of those who follow him should look like. Jesus doesn’t pull any punches in saying that what he expects out of his followers goes far beyond what Moses required.

It would be a gross understatement to say the sermon is challenging. Among other things, Jesus says that feeling angry is no different from being a murderer, and having lust in our hearts is the same as being adulterers. He says if someone smacks us on the cheek we are to turn the other cheek so they can smack that one as well. Love and pray for our enemies, he says. He assumes we’ll be helping poor people, but makes a point of saying that we should do it secretly so nobody will praise us. He says to live like the birds of the air who neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, trusting God to provide for the present day. He says we’re not allowed to judge anybody.

Jesus recognizes that all this stuff is contrary to the way things work in this world, and that if we manage to do so in such a way that people start persecuting us, we should consider ourselves blessed.

Throughout the history of the church theologians have debated what Jesus was trying to say with this sermon. Some have said that he really meant what he said, and if you’re not serious about trying to live this way, you shouldn’t be calling yourself a “Christian.” Others have argued that Jesus was calling attention to the fact that we all fall far short of the glory of God — that it’s impossible to “be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect” (5:48) — and that in the end our only option is to humbly throw ourselves on the mercy of God.

Either way, the sermon on the mount should give us pause when we are tempted to easily identify ourselves as “Christians”, and in particular, when the impulse arises to pass judgment on those who don’t so identify themselves.

Lord Jesus, from that mountaintop long ago your words ring through the ages, humbling us still. We know we have stumbled time and again in our attempts at following you; nonetheless, we long to be your disciples in the present age. Teach us your way. Amen.

Suffering is an inescapable part of life. Its forms are varied; there is physical pain, grief, betrayal, loneliness, addiction, injustice, and the anxiety that arises before the mystery of death. What has been the shape of suffering in your life?

If we ponder our own experience and that of people we know, we see that suffering has the potential of either reducing or extending the dimensions of our soul. We can become bitter — increasingly closed-in on ourselves. Or we can discover new capacities for compassion and appreciate in new ways what truly matters in life. We can probably see instances of both in our own stories. Sometimes the short term effect of suffering is to shrink and the long term effect is to stretch our lives. Patience is required to see the bigger picture.

A characteristic that sets Christianity apart from other religions is that it has at the center a savior who suffered. As the apostle Paul puts it, “we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles.” (1Corinthians 1:23)

The possibility arises in the Christian faith that our experience of suffering can be “sacramental”, that is, it becomes an opportunity to be in fellowship with Christ who also suffered. It can put us in solidarity with all other people who suffer.

Lord Jesus, you took up your cross as an act of supreme love. Where we are compelled to suffer, may we reach out to you, that we, too may allow your light to shine in the darkness. Amen.

Luke tells us that upon arriving in Jerusalem, Jesus wept over the city, saying, “If only you had recognized on this day the things that make for peace!” (Luke 19:42) Forseeing the destruction lying in the city’s future, Jesus’ heart broke, moving him to tears.

I wonder if Jesus had second thoughts at that moment regarding the offers made to him by the devil out in the wilderness?   The devil had tempted him with the power to run rough-shod over peoples’ freedom.   Knowing where the people were headed, do you suppose Jesus might have been tempted once more to avail himself to that power to try and force the people to do “the things that make for peace”?

But alas, it is not possible.  You cannot force people to choose the path that leads to life.   You can only do your best to show them the way, and then hope and pray they choose the path for themselves.

There is this awful paradox expressed in the story of Jesus going to the cross:  The all-powerful one — the creator of heaven and earth — is powerless to make us respond with love.  The all-powerful one is reduced to weeping like a baby in response to the beloveds refusal to embrace the love.

Anybody who has ever watched someone they love heading down a destructive path knows what Jesus felt at that moment.

Bad choices bring repercussions. The people of Jerusalem chose apath that would bring about the destruction of the temple, when the Roman armies besieged the city in 70 AD.  The prodigal son ended up penniless and destitute.  But beyond these repercussions, God patiently waits our return home.

Back on the first of the 40 days of Lent, we said that one of the fundamental themes of Lent is simple patience.   What would it mean for us to mirror the patience of God in our lives?

Loving God, we confess our refusal to embrace the things that make for peace.   We marvel at the tears of Jesus, and your divine patience with us.  Help us to learn how to follow in the way of Jesus.  Amen.

There is this perplexing little exchange that takes place between Jesus and a rich man as Jesus makes his way to Jerusalem.  In response to the man addressing him as “Good Teacher,” Jesus replies, “Why do you call me good?  No one is good but God alone.” (Mark 10:18)

Jesus’ words undermine one of our most basic assumptions; specifically, that there are “good people” and “bad people” in this world, and life is largely about living in such a way that we get to be counted among those who are “good.”

But no one is good, says Jesus, referring, apparently, to even himself.

So what did Jesus mean by this?

To be “good” in the sense that Jesus is referring to here is to be pure — essentially incapable of evil.   Only God is good in this sense.   We human beings are capable of doing some pretty awful things.

As their conversation proceeds, it becomes clear that the man would have been confident of his place among the “good” people.  He informs Jesus that he has kept the commandments.  In response, Jesus says something that has bewildered people for two thousand years:

“You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”  (Mark 10:21)

This instruction given to this particular man needs to be understood in the context of his assumption that he is, in fact, good.  Jesus is inviting the man to discover that he’s just like every other poor slob.

When life is comfortable; when, for instance we have enough money so that we don’t have to worry about paying the bills or going hungry and homeless, it can be easy to convince ourselves that we would never do anything overtly cruel or mean-spirited — that there is only goodness and light within.

Take away the conditions that put us at ease, and we will likely discover that we are quite capable of all kinds of evil.   And though we may pride ourselves for the hard work we put in to establish the comfortable conditions we enjoy, the truth of the matter is that most of what we enjoy came to us as a gift, also known as “grace.”

“There but for the grace of God go I.”

Or to put it another way, “No one is good but God alone.”

Lord Jesus, help us to yield up our arrogance so that we don’t need to go through a great fall to discover that we are, in fact, just another sinner saved by grace.  Grant us humility to go with you to the cross.  Amen.