Sermon from Sunday, February 19, 2017

Scripture Reading: Matthew 5:38-42

You know that you have been taught, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.”   

But I tell you not to try to get even with a person who has done something to you.   
When someone slaps your right cheek, turn and let that person slap your other cheek.   

If someone sues you for your shirt, give up your coat as well.   
If a soldier forces you to carry his pack one mile, carry it two miles.   
When people ask you for something, give it to them.   
Don’t refuse those who wish to borrow from you.

In the Sermon on the Mount and in his whole life, Jesus has a vision of how life on Earth can be, and how humanity especially -- we people, can be when we begin to realize and take seriously the unity we all have – the unity we all are together on the face of the Earth, as children of one God. 

What Jesus sees is more than just learning to get along, to accept and tolerate one another’s differences, and have everyone safe and secure in their own little area – inside the bounds of their own little circle. 

What Jesus sees is all the different pieces and parts of humanity actually coming together, inter-mingling, crossing boundaries and walls, connecting, learning from one another, and together growing into something new – a new body made up of all the different parts we are, all the different pieces coming together like the puzzle that we are so that we are able finally to see and enjoy the whole picture of what God has made us to be.

Jesus knows the things that divide us – culture and religion, age and gender, type of education, whether we are rich or poor, popular or lonely, our citizenship, our colour, whether we’re physically fit and able or not. 

Differences are always there.  It’s the variety of humanity.  Because how could the fullness and all the glory and truth of God be expressed in just one kind of person, be compressed into just one race or culture or gender or even religion?

But how can we start to live into this unity that we’re meant to be, and that we really are?  How can we cross the boundaries and take down the walls that so easily divide us into different groups and camps?

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus suggests some practical steps that can be taken.  They aren’t easy, but they are guaranteed to start opening the door on a new world – the kind of world and kind of people God intends us to be.

We’ve just heard one of the steps Jesus tells us to take:  “You know that you have been taught, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” 

What does that mean?

And doesn’t Jesus agree with it, as a rational, sane, safe way of living?

“But I tell you not to try to get even with a person who has done something to you.  When someone slaps your right cheek, turn and let that person slap your other cheek – your left cheek as well.” 

Let me ask you … if someone slaps you or hits you, what do you feel like doing?  What do you do in response?

How does Jesus’s way sound to you?  What is he saying we should do?

Walk away and hide?  Stay there and let ourselves be beaten up?

Let’s think about the details of what he says. 

First of all, his was a highly structured society in which people were divided in very rigid ways into hierarchic classes – each class having a different degree of dignity and respect attached to it, and each class knowing exactly how they could treat (or mistreat), and be treated (or mistreated) by, people in classes above or below them.

Now imagine being hit on right cheek.  In a world where most people are right-handed, this most likely means you are being slapped back-handed by the person hitting you – in other words, you are being struck the way a person of a superior class would strike a slave, servant, or someone beneath you, or even a dog.  And isn’t that what a lot of hurts, a lot of slaps, a lot of insults and injuries and attacks are about?  About someone feeling superior to another, and thinking the other person, their ideas and needs, their races or their religion, or just they themselves do not matter, do not count enough to be treated as equal?

Now think of being hit on the left cheek.  That would happen in a case where you are hit by someone you are dealing with face-to-face, as an equal, disagreeing about something, and the other person gets so angry they just have to slap you … so they raise their right hand and slap your left cheek.

So, what Jesus is saying is, if someone treats you as being less than them, and injures or hurts or attacks you as though they are superior … stand up, invite them to look you in the eye, be face-to-face as an equal, and if they still want to hit you in anger, well, that’s their business … but you at least invite them to see you as an equal, and you treat them as an equal.  They live by a rule of hierarchy and superiority, but you invite them into – you confront them with, and invite them into a new game, with new rules – the rules of equality.

I want to tell you a story about something that happened last September in Edmonton.  Jesse Lipscombe is a black actor and entrepreneur, who was shooting a video about his love for downtown Edmonton, promoting the city, when he was interrupted (while shooting) by a man in a car stopped at a nearby intersection yelling racial slurs at him from the car – used the n-word a few times, yelling out “The … are coming!  The … are coming!!”

What would you do?

-          yell back, attack?

-          sue, lay charges?

-          ignore, walk away?

What Jesse did (I saw it in the video) was to walk, not run to the car where it was stopped for a red light.  The he bent down at the open window where the man was sitting, so he could meet him and talk to him at equal levels, eye to eye and face to face, and asked him to repeat what he said, and explain it to him – face to face / up-close / in person.

(To see a video of the encounter, go to   

https://www.facebook.com/lipscombe/videos/10157457456425061/)

I can’t imagine that was easy … not for Jesse, not for the man in the car… but that’s the kind of step Jesus tells us to take, to start living the kind of world and the kind of humanity we can be by changing the rules of the games we live by – from rules of hierarchy, superiority and being able to dismiss and hurt people because of their differences, to rules of equality, mutuality and unity as children of one God.

Scripture Reading: Matthew 5:43-48

You have heard people say, “Love your neighbours and hate your enemies.”   

But I tell you to love your enemies and pray for anyone who mistreats you.   
Then you will be acting like your Father in heaven.  
 He makes the sun rise on both good and bad people.   
And he sends rain for the ones who do right and for the ones who do wrong.  
 If you love only those people who love you, will God reward you for that?   
Even tax collectors love their friends.  
 If you greet only your friends, what’s so great about that?  Don’t even unbelievers do that?   
But just as your heavenly Father is complete in showing love to everyone, 
so also you must be complete.”

This step can be just as hard.  “You have heard people say, “Love your neighbours and hate your enemies.” 

Is that what we hear people saying?  Is that we’re taught – to divide the world and its people into two groups – those that deserve our love and care, and those who don’t – those we pay attention to, and those we can afford to ignore and even kill or try to do away?

Here is what Jesus says, “But I tell you to love your enemies and pray for anyone who mistreats you.  Then you will be acting like your Father in heaven.  He makes the sun rise on both good and bad people.  And he sends rain for the ones who do right and for the ones who do wrong.  If you love only those people who love you … If you greet only your friends, what’s so great about that?  But just as your heavenly Father is complete in showing love to everyone, so also you must be complete.”

Let’s get practical. 

This is my cell phone and my laptop.  Neither are the most up-to-date, but they let me do all I need them to.  With them I keep in touch – texting, email, Facebook.  And all this internet, web stuff, social media are supposed to help us be in touch with all the world – to break down barriers, aren’t they?  Put us in touch with the whole world?  Create a new unity?  A new humankind?

But how does it really work most of the time?  It lets us keep in touch with the group we are part of, gives us news about things and with a perspective we already agree with, reinforces us in our little bubble.  It makes us feel connected and as though we’re in touch with all the world, but really just encases us in an echo chamber, where we hear our own opinions and the opinions of others who agree with us, over and over and over again.

How would Jesus use Facebook, email, and social media?  Would he use them for what they can do?  Most likely yes, for particular purposes.  But he would also be aware of their limitations, and take every opportunity not to use them … to step outside the box and outside the circle, and to spend time with people different than himself, with different viewpoints and experience and perspectives and needs … to learn from them and grow together with them into something bigger, something more whole and holy … into the kind of human family we all are together as children of God.

One of the things I used to see written in essays on the breakdown of civil society, and the disintegration of society into tribes, groups and isolated sub-communities, was a note about the church being one of the places still where we find ourselves drawn into company with people vastly different from ourselves, into community across lines that normally divide us in society.  The church was seen as one of those places that explicitly and intentionally was not just a bubble of like-minded people, but a place where people consciously and graciously grow beyond what they already are, towards the unity we are with all others as children of God.

Are we still that?  If so, how do we continue to nurture it?  If not, how do we get back to that high calling of living towards the unity that we are with others different from us, as children of one God?

Sermon from Sunday, February 5, 2017

Reading:  Matthew 5:13-20

This week instead of one big sermon-and-a-song, three little sermonettes-and-pieces-of-a-song.

Loving and holy God both within and beyond us all, may the words of my mouth, the wonderings and wanderings of all our hearts, and the wisdom of our song be pleasing and acceptable to you, our salt and our light.  Amen.

Sermonette 1: Ordinary people.

“You are the salt of the earth, and the light of the world.”

Do we believe it?  Do we believe that in the common, ordinary round of relations that make up our lives, of family and friends, neighbours and strangers, acquaintances and foes – that as little people in the world who listen to, and respond to the news, without making the news ourselves – that not in spite of, but precisely in the midst of our common ordinariness, we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world?

How many of the people of Galilee who heard Jesus say it to them, really believed it and took it to heart? 

At the moment Jesus says this, he is not speaking to the movers and shakers of the world – to the king and his court in Jerusalem, to the lawyers and lawmakers of the day, to the stars and celebrities and larger-than-life heroes we are always tempted to look to, and trust and follow just because they’re in the spotlight, in the news and in our faces all the time.

He is talking to fishermen and farmers, tax collectors and bureaucrats, shepherds and carpenters, to gypsies, tramps and thieves, beggars and lepers, hired hands and small businesspeople, housewives and parents and grandparents, village doctors and village elders and village idiots.

“You are the salt of the earth,” he says.  It is you who make life good and delightful rather than evil and distasteful, or not.  “You are the light of the world.”  It is you who brighten and enlighten others, and show how good God intends the world to be or all, or not.

They really are the salt of the earth and the light of the world as they leave their daily lives for the moment, to gather around Jesus to be touched by a holy grace, be opened to a meaning beyond themselves, be healed of their illness and disorders, of their needs and fears and anger, so when they return to their day-in-day-out lives, they are free and able to live out and live in the common life of the world in a new way and with a new and right spirit.

As are we.  But do we believe it?  That like them we are touched by grace, opened to a meaning beyond ourselves, healed of our diseases and disorders, and that without needing to be anything or anywhere other than what and where we are, we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world, without which the world cannot be well or do well?  Do we believe it?

Song:  Jesus Bids Us Shine (v.1)

Jesus bids us shine with a pure, clear light,

Like a little candle burning in the night;

In this world of darkness, so let us shine,

You in your small corner, and I in mine.

Sermonette 2:  Gathered together

“You in your small corner, and I in mine.”  That’s true enough – that each of us in our own little way and in whatever relations make up our life, is salt and light.

But we are also salt and light together in ways we cannot be alone.  Just think of the response this week across Canada and in different parts of the world to the attack on Muslims at prayer in the Islamic Cultural Centre in Quebec City – and the indelible images we now carry of the thousands upon thousands from all walks of life and all religious traditions gathering together in so many cities and towns to hold candles against the darkness in quiet vigil against the violence set loose in our world.  How important it was at that moment to be gathered, and to be salt and light together in a bigger way than we are just by ourselves. 

Do you remember almost 40 years ago in the crisis of the Vietnamese boat people, what a witness it was the world and how the world at that time was changed for the better when communities and congregations – like Fifty and so many others, gathered their faith, their love and their resources to reach out and sponsor families in need of a safe place to be?  And how we do the same thing again now in response to the crisis of Syrian refugees.  As individuals we can do so little; even our congregation cannot really do much to make a difference – even light one little light.  But with four other churches as part of United to Help Syrians, we can and we are.

In 2011 after the attack on a Hindu temple here in Hamilton, the Women of Fifty as a group did something no one of them could have done alone; they donated $500 to the temple to help with rebuilding.  As a church we also invited Manny Deonarin, one of their teachers, to come and join us – even lead us in worship, to establish a more personal tie.  And what did he talk about the Sunday he was here?  Enlightenment … how individually and together the purpose of being human is to be enlightened, to find the way beyond darkness and ignorance.

I regret to say we didn’t follow up on that connection, beyond that one Sunday.  I wonder if I was afraid, or unpracticed maybe, in going too far beyond my own small corner, beyond the cover of my own little basket. 

And the question is still there today – are we ready to be salt and light together and together with others, in ways we cannot be just on our own? 

This past week, the message went up on our church sign – “Prayers of sorrow and solidarity with our Muslim brothers and sisters”.  I also posted something on the church Facebook page.  Both of which were noticed and appreciated by others, and helped encourage even more light of compassion and love to be shared. 

But I don’t even know where the nearest mosque is, to express sorrow and solidarity in relationship.  At a Council meeting just two weeks ago, we discussed the $5000 grants that the Hamilton Community Foundation is making available to local groups planning sesquicentennial projects that emphasize and help nurture the inclusive nature of Canadian society, and we talked about maybe helping organize a Canada Day multi-faith celebration of all the different traditions and cultures of Winona today.  But I have no idea what different traditions and cultures really are here, where their small corners may be, and how to be in touch with people in them.

If anyone has any interest in, or ideas about being salt and light these days together with others, in ways we cannot be just by ourselves, I’d be glad to hear it.

Song:  Jesus Bids Us Shine (v.2)

Jesus bids us shine, first of all for Him;
Well He sees and knows it if our light grows dim;
Jesus walks beside us to help us shine,
You in your small corner, and I in mine.

Sermonette 3: Not the usual suspects

This week we begin City Kidz Miracle Month, to explore and expand the ways we are able to support City Kidz – one of the ways we are salt and light in the City of Hamilton along with others.  Begin with a 3 ½- minute video …

So who is Hope York?  And if we saw her on the street hanging out with her friends in east Hamilton, would we recognize as salt of the earth and light of the world?

The people who gathered around Jesus and who he called salt and light in their time were not the kinds of people normally regarded as the ones to carry the message and make the difference for good in the life of the world.  Mostly they were seen as the ones who needed to hear the message, who needed to be helped and healed, who needed to be made better and different than they were.

I wonder if we still tend to see and divide people in the same way?  Between those who are the light and bring the light, and those who are in the dark and need the light to be brought to them? 

But when we support City Kidz with donations, sponsorships, volunteer support and prayers, we are supporting is the light that they are – all of them – staff, volunteers, kids and families alike and all together – the light that they are even without us – and that they can be even better with our support.  It’s they who are the light in that part of the city, and it’s we who get to share in it when we offer what support we can. 

The good news is that the light of God is not just ours to carry into the world.  It’s beyond us all, and shows up burning bright in the darnedest places and through the darnedest people – not at all just the usual suspects.  And as we share in it by doing what we can to support it and keep it burning, it becomes part of us as well.  We ourselves grow brighter when we love and support the light of God wherever we see it shining.

Song: Jesus Bids Us Shine (v. 3)

Jesus bids us shine, then, for all around,

Many kinds of darkness in the world are found:

Sin, and want, and sorrow, so we must shine,

You in your small corner, and I in mine.

Towards Sunday, February 5, 2017

Reading: Matthew 5:13-20 
(Jesus calls the ordinary people of Galilee who have gathered around him "the salt of the earth" and "the light of the world," but also says two things we sometimes gloss over.  One is that salt that loses its savour and a light that is hidden away from the world are not really doing any good, and may as well be thrown away.  The other is that what makes the people around him salt and light for the world, is the way they exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees -- rather than just fulfilling the moral requirements like a checklist [the people who try to be "politically correct"], they live out these same things but from the heart, because their heart has been shaped and opened by the Spirit of God.)

This week when I read of ordinary, morally-mature people being the light of the world, my mind immediately goes to images of the masses of people in cities and towns around the world who came together, like this throng in Montreal, to stand in silent solidarity with the victims of the attack on the mosque in Quebec City.

"You are," Jesus says, "the salt of the earth.  You are the light of the world."

Thirty years ago, I was in gatherings like that, too.  One in particular was a street march in Hamilton against America's First War Against Iraq ("Operation Desert Storm") that ended in the Council Chambers of Hamilton City Hall.  Back then, I was a member of the Baptist Peace Fellowship of North America.  And I remember that particular event because my son Aaron (3 or 4 years old at the time) was there too, and an image of him sitting in the Council Chamber among the protesters ended up as part of the CHCH-TV story that night.  I guess he was the youngest, cutest, most human-interest-ish person there.  

But now -- this past week, I did not attend any vigil.  Didn't even try to find out where they were being held.

My heart was -- and is still moved by what happened.  But not my body, it seems.  All I did was put up a post on the church Facebook page, and a message on our church sign that says, "Prayers of sorrow and solidarity with our Muslim brothers and sisters."

I wonder what has changed in me, and in my life story?

Am I now salt that has lost its savour?  Is my light now hidden away under a little basket?  Confined to a little, safe, closed room? 

Was my involvement thirty years ago more pharisaic than truly heart-felt?  Wanting mostly to be seen doing "the right thing"?  Wanting to belong to "the right group"?  Rather than being impelled by a deep (and irreversible) opening of my heart?

Or is it that at different stages of my life, different kinds of action and response may be more appropriate and available than others?  As long as there really is some heart-felt action?

I don't have the answers.  But I'm looking forward to exploring this and much more about the Gospel lesson, Sunday morning.