Pentecost 18A (Lectionary 26A)
October 1, 2023
Ezekiel 18:1-4, 25-30
Philippians 2:1-13
INTRODUCTION
Since last week, a lot has happened in the Gospel of Matthew. Here’s what we skipped: Jesus has triumphantly entered Jerusalem on a donkey, to cheers and waving palms. He has gone to the Temple, and turned over the tables of the money changers in a fit of righteous anger. Now we are on Monday of Holy Week (we’ll stay in Holy Week for the next several Sundays). When the Gospel reading begins with the elders and chief priests asking where he gets the authority to do “these things” – well, these are the things they are talking about! And the question, really, is warranted – Jesus is making a real scene, as he overturns tables and structures both literal and figurative!
Today’s epistle, Paul’s letter to the Philippians, is a beloved text, where Paul quotes one of the earliest Christian hymns. In it, Paul is writing to a church community that is experiencing some tension and fears, and he is offering some guidance for overcoming that division.
Finally, Ezekiel. Ezekiel was a prophet to the Israelites who had been deported to Babylon by King Nebuchadnezzar. They are feeling pretty grumpy, assuming they are being punished for the sins of their parents. “Not fair!” they cry. But God’s words through Ezekiel tell not of punishment, but of great mercy: “you are not suffering because of the sins of your parents,” he says. “You have the chance to live, and that’s what I want for you. Turn toward the Lord, and you will not die, but live.”
Today’s readings are about walking the walk, not just talking the talk. As you listen, consider what keeps you trapped in old ways that bring death, and how God might help you to turn toward life. Let’s listen.
[READ]
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
I got a lot of comments after last week’s sermon, in which I claimed that grace is not fair, because it is by definition a gift that we don’t deserve and did not earn. Several people said they’d be chewing on that in the days to come. Me too! Believe me, just because I preach it doesn’t mean I have fully grasped it myself! I mean, I know we need to live in grace, trusting God and God’s ways. I know that often when we are so focused on what is fair and what isn’t, it doesn’t actually lead us into anything productive. And I know for me, when I complain about something being unfair, I am usually doing just that – complaining, and hoping someone else will do something about it.
I know these things. But simply accepting that life is not fair is not the same as living in grace. Because while focusing on fair and unfair is often unproductive, grace is anything BUT unproductive. Grace implies a call, a call to live into the gift that God has given us.
Has anyone ever received a gift that required or encouraged you to take some action? Maybe a beautiful set of paints, or a sewing machine, or a musical instrument, that encouraged you to become a painter, a seamstress, a musician? When I was 16, I became friends with the principal oboist of the New York Philharmonic. It’s a long story, and one that I will happily share if you’d like to know, because it is the very best story I’ve got. But for now, sufficed to say that as our friendship began, this man arranged for me to receive an expensive, professional oboe as a gift. I didn’t ask for it, I didn’t deserve it, but he gave it to me. So you’d better believe I started taking my oboe playing more seriously! I started taking lessons, I joined a very fine youth orchestra, and I went off to college to major in music. His gracious gift didn’t come with expectations or strings attached, but having received it, I was moved and inspired to use that gift for good things. A gift of grace has that power.
Ok, so where does our deeply ingrained sense of fair and unfair fit into all this? When we perceive something to be unfair, a little flag starts to wave that shows us “something is wrong here!” It shows that there is something more and better to seek – even, there is the possibility here of justice. Now when I say “justice,” I don’t mean the justice we often associate with the law, in which everyone gets what is coming to them, punishment for their crime. I mean a society that is just, in which everything is ordered according to God’s will, and not human intentions that are so riddled by sin, conceit, and selfish ambition. A society in which everyone has access to food and clean water, clothing, and affordable housing. A just society is one in which everyone is treated with love and respect, compassion and sympathy.
This call to seek something more is apparent in Ezekiel’s words this morning. The children of Israel are lamenting that they, having just been sent by the enemy Babylonians into exile, are being punished for the sins of their parents. “It isn’t fair!” they lament. (There’s that red flag!) But God assures them that they are not being punished for their parents’ sin, but only for their own. The good news is, that means they have the agency to make a change. Sure, they could continue in their ways, but this is a path that leads to death. Instead, he urges, choose the path that leads to life. “Reject the ways of sin,” God beckons, “and get yourselves a new heart a new spirit!” Make a change! Let that sense of unfairness urge you to action toward a more just world, in which the poor are fed, clothed, and sheltered, and people act honestly and faithfully! Turn away from evil ways, then, turn toward just ways, and live!
It sounds so simple. So why don’t they do it?
Why don’t we?
I have a colleague who several years ago discovered the many health benefits of eating a plant-based diet. He read a book that outlines how eating vegan can actually reverse the damage that is already done to people’s hearts that causes heart disease. Knowing that heart disease is the number one killer in America, he couldn’t understand why anyone would NOT want to do this. “You could live!” he said. “Changing your diet in this way could make you LIVE instead of die. Why won’t people take that seriously!” Now I’m not making a morality judgment on eating meat (I know, steak is delicious!), but the sentiment here is not unlike the message apparent in our lessons today. You could live, if you only turn toward the life that it is in God – for Christians, the life that is Jesus Christ. Turn, and live. So why don’t people do it?
I eat mostly vegetarian at this point, thanks to my vegetarian husband and daughter, but I don’t know that I could do a fully plant-based diet, for two reasons. One, is I really like cheese and eggs. I really enjoy eating them! The other is, so many of the recipes I know how to make use cheese and eggs, and it sounds exhausting to have to learn how to cook a whole new way. I suspect the reasons we have a hard time turning toward God, “turning, then, and living!” are similar. 1) Sinful behaviors are often easier and sometimes more fun, and 2) we simply don’t know how, because the law, that is, what we can read here in Ezekiel, may show us what we need to do, but it does not give us the power to do it. Metaphorically speaking, it tells us to a eat plant-based diet, but doesn’t come over and show us how to cook a gourmet veggie-and-grain feast. So, when God urges us to get new hearts and new spirits… how do we even do that?
This, of course, is where Jesus comes into the picture. God saw what a difficult time we were having with the whole obeying God’s law thing. Things seemed clear enough, fair enough, but humans kept on falling short. Enter Jesus. In his 30-some years on earth, Jesus showed us what justice looks like. It looks like repentance, like turning toward God. It looks like love, like unqualified service, like selfless giving. It looks like all those things Paul lists in our lesson from Philippians – like encouragement, consolation, sharing in the Spirit, compassion and sympathy, like doing nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regarding others as better than ourselves, looking not to our own interests, but to the interests of others. These are the things that we strive for when we strive for justice, and the things we realize, when we detect unfairness, are not present in the world around us.
So, Jesus shows us how to do and live these things, and we are grateful… but even such a perfect example does not give us the power to actually do them. And this is where we come back to grace, that unfair gift of God – because Jesus did not only show us how to live. Jesus was not only a really good example. If that were all Jesus was, then we might as well follow anyone else who ever lived who was a nice person. My mom is a nice person and a good teacher – we could follow her.
But no, Jesus did more than teach and show us how to live. By the grace of God that allowed Jesus to die on our behalf so that we could live eternally, we are also energized, enabled, and empowered to live a life of faith. Grace gives us that power. The love of God gives us that power. And, when we inevitably fall short, grace also catches us, sets us back upright, and gives us what we need to try again.
And so just as Paul outlines for us some of the characteristics of one who lives in grace, he also urges us to be of the same mind as our Savior who empowers us by his love. “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,” he urges. The same mind, the same mind that became a part of us at our baptism, when we were washed clean of sin and death, when we received the power of the Holy Spirit, when we were marked with the cross of Christ forever. “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus … for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”
Let us pray… Energizing God, we know that our choices do not always lead to life, but we do want to turn toward you! Enable us to do so, to turn and live, so that we might be empowered to bring about justice in the world. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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