Full service is HERE. My congregation did several things to acknowledge and celebrate my 10th ordination anniversary, and made me cry a lot, so... they are pretty great. The end of the service they did a slideshow of pics from my ordination and my ministry with them. They included a hymn that my dad wrote (the text) for his own ordination and I used at mine, and I wept through the whole thing. Plus flowers and cards. So sweet. I'm blessed by them! Okay, here's the sermon.
Pentecost 14B
Sept. 2, 2012
James 1:17-27
Mark 7:1–8, 14–15, 21–23
INTRODUCTION
Last week we finished the Bread of Life series in John, and this week we are back to our previously scheduled programing: working through the Gospel of Mark. Mark’s style is very different from John’s – straightforward, raw, less poetic and theological, and fast-paced. Today, Jesus doesn’t mince words in accusing the Pharisees of keeping all manner of purity laws, even as the real impurity lies in their hearts. All those laws – which are not bad in themselves – are no good if we forget the most important commandment of all: love God and your neighbor as yourself.
Deuteronomy will celebrate the value of God’s law as a way to guide us in a godly life, keeping God’s covenant with us. And today we also begin 5 weeks in the epistle of James, and today James will give some sound advice about what love of neighbor might actually look like. Listen carefully – it feels awfully contemporary to me!
Whether you love rules (as I do!) or bristle at them, hear in today’s readings that there is grace in God’s law, as it always directs us toward a fuller and more loving life. Let’s listen.
[READ]
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
In the 1997 film As Good As it Gets, Jack Nicholson plays the role of Marvin, an obsessive-compulsive author of romance novels. He lives alone, but spends his days writing about love and romance, avoiding cracks on the sidewalk, and avoiding touching anyone. He also spends a fair amount of his time insulting everyone he comes in contact with – his gay neighbor, the Jewish patrons of his favorite restaurant, especially those who dare to sit at his favorite table. He also proves to be the world’s worst listener – unless a conversation is directly concerning him or his needs, he checks out.
The other thing that occupies his time each day is completing his hand-washing ritual. His medicine chest is full of row upon row of bars of antiseptic soap, individually wrapped in cellophane, never before touched by human hands. During his daily hand washing ritual, he goes through several bars of soap. He swipes each bar only once across his palms before discarding it and unwrapping another, in between rinsing his hands in water so hot it nearly raises blisters.
Hateful words that wound others, but impeccably clean hands. It brings new meaning to Jesus’ words to the Pharisees this morning regarding their own hand-washing ritual: that it is “not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth that defiles.” I’ve been reflecting on this all week, and wondering how true it is. I mean, some things that go into a person’s mouth legitimately defile, right? Drugs? Too much alcohol? Too much fatty food? Surely we can place blame on those external things that enter our bodies. And while we’re at it, there are actually a lot of external things that affect us, that defile us and our behavior. Right?
And it’s not just physical things that we can point to. We humans, graced with 8 fingers and two opposable thumbs, are quite adept at using those fingers to point outward. I know that the first thing I want to do when I get angry is point my finger at the thing that made me angry. “He said that! She did this! My anger is justified, because that person did something to harm me! Surely, I am not the one at fault here. Surely the blame lies elsewhere!”
I hope by now you are squirming in your seat, realizing that there is something wrong with all this. Looking at our texts today, there are at least two things wrong with this. The first one comes from James. “You must understand this, my beloved,” he writes. “Let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God's righteousness.” When we are busy pointing our fingers elsewhere – blaming other people, our circumstances, or even our troubled childhood – it is difficult to listen. But James tells us to be quick to listen – let that be the first thing you do! Be slow to speak. Don’t say the first thing that comes into your head, even if you believe it to be true. And be slow to anger. And here’s the kicker: “for your anger does not produce God’s righteousness.” When someone does something that angers us, we’re probably not prepared right away to say even something that is true in a way that produces God’s righteousness, because we have not yet taken the time to listen. And as Jesus points out, it is what comes out of our mouths that defiles us.
And that brings us to the second point: when we are finger-pointing at everyone and everything else, we miss the point that Jesus makes, that it is less about the external things, the things that go in, the things that affect us from the outside, and more about our own hearts. When we are slow to listen and quick to anger, we have not taken the time to take inventory of what is really going on in our hearts. James warns us that those who hear the word but do not do it “are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like.” And we’re certainly guilty of that sometimes, too, aren’t we! We know in our heads how important it is to check out what logs we might have in our own eyes before we point out other people’s specks. But when we look in the mirror, and we don’t like what we see, how tempting it is to just turn away, to ignore it, and to go back to finger-pointing. We look in that mirror and realize, “I was in the wrong about that,” or, “That is something in my heart that I need to deal with,” but then we think, “Oh that’s too hard, or too painful.” And admitting that vulnerability is perhaps the hardest thing of all.
So how do we do it? How do we be the Christians James challenges us to be, who not only hear the word but also do it, and who are willing to look in the mirror and not forget what we see? How do we be the Christians Jesus describes, whose hearts are pure and righteous enough that what comes out of our mouths does not defile, but rather builds up the body of Christ?
Well, it’s hard. And it takes some intention. And it takes a lot of prayer. It starts with, as James says, listening. Listen to the other side of the story. If your anger is with another person, try to put yourself in that person’s shoes, and really try to understand him or her. I don’t mean make guesses or assumptions, and certainly not accusations; I mean really try to imagine where they might be coming from, why they might be behaving the way they are. Try to feel what they are feeling. This can feel nearly impossible when the other party has hurt you deeply; it must be done with care and self-awareness. But once we can feel what the other person feels, and make that effort to understand them, it becomes easier to find a way to love and have compassion for them.
But don’t stop there. Do the same thing for yourself. We do that, as a part of our liturgy – we examine our hearts every Sunday as a part of our confession. But I mean spend more than 30 seconds on it. Ask yourself, why do I feel the way I do? What is going on in my heart, my defiled heart, that has made me say or want to say something unchristian, or to act in a way that does not produce God’s righteousness? What is the emotion beneath the first emotion I feel? Reflect also on what does our anger produce in the end. Does it defile? Not always – sometimes anger serves an important purpose, like protecting us from danger. But when it does defile, when it is left to fester in our hearts for too long, sitting like a rock on our hearts, and it comes out hurtfully sideways – whom or what does it defile? Ask God in prayer what alternative to anger would produce God’s righteousness in any particular situation.
This is not easy. And I know some anger is more complicated than others, and it’s not always so simple as all this, and sometimes you need, for your own safety, to listen first to yourself and your own needs before you can even begin to listen to someone else’s. But it is all worth the effort, and more often than not, that love and compassion can be found in some way or another, and we can truly find a way to forgive others, as God has promised to forgive us each and every time we fall short.
Here’s a challenge for you, that is at least one step down this path that Jesus sets us on: this week, let’s all look for healing words. Maybe a parent saying something loving to a child, or someone saying something unexpectedly kind about someone else. And while you’re at it, try to offer some healing words to the mix yourself. When someone starts gossiping about someone else, putting less than the most positive construction on your neighbor’s actions, find something positive to say about that person. When you want to say something mean to or about someone, say a quick prayer: “God, let my words be your words.” Or as the Psalmist writes, “May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable to you, O God.” If we could all make a habit of doing this small thing in our daily interactions with people, training ourselves to live healingly rather than angrily, I believe that we will feel true compassion, true love. We will come closer to understanding the deep love that Christ has for us, that made him willing to come all the way to the cross to express that love.
Let us pray… Dear God, keep us from accusing others and excusing ourselves; keep us from pointing out the faults of others while passing over our own; keep us from blaming others and ignoring our own deep need. And strengthen us to help, defend and love one another. For you love and came for all of us. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen
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