Sermon Opoho Church Sunday 17 September, 2017 Pentecost 15

Readings:  Genesis 50: 15-21, Romans 14:1- 4, 7 – 12, Matthew 18: 21-22

 

We pray:  may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you O God, our rock and our sustainer.  Amen.

 

In our very short excerpt from the Gospel reading today we have the beginning of another Peter/Jesus moment.  Peter speaks - thinking he is on the right track – and so he is because he recognises that we need to be much more generous in how many times we forgive someone who slights us.  But Jesus urges him to a greater understanding and responds with the parable of the unforgiving servant – the one where a slave comes before his king with an enormous debt –one that he could not hope to pay off in his lifetime and against all expectation and after some pleading his debt is forgiven.  Completely, utterly.  And then this forgiven soul, this person saved from being sold to pay debts, goes from his salvation to deny the same to one who is in debt to him.  He has his small time debtor thrown into prison, with no hint of mercy or understanding.

 

And Jesus suggests to Peter and to us, that as God forgives us completely and time and time again so too we should forgive and show mercy rather than judge – judgment, in the end belongs to God and God’s alone.

 

There is sweeping extravagance in this statement that doesn’t necessarily sit well with us.  Much of that has to do with our understanding of forgiveness, mistakenly feeling that to forgive is to condone or to forget or invite ongoing mistreatment.  That is a whole big discussion all by itself but today I would like to us to think about how our sense of who we are as beloved children of God impacts how we do relationship and therefore what we choose to take umbrage at in the first place.  I’m going to suggest that it is much easier to feel slighted by others than try to understand where they are coming from.  That we seem to have a culture of seeing different perspectives as a personal affront rather than a way of growing and learning. 

How can we instead create a way of living that invites truth telling without adversity- which in turn requires less in the way of forgiveness because we don’t feel wounded?  Now there is a big challenge.

 

Each of the readings from the lectionary today speak into this understanding of forgiveness in a different way.  Joseph, the young man betrayed by his brothers, sold off into slavery chooses, when his moment of potential retribution arrives, to say that there is no need for his pound of flesh, that although his brothers intended harm, he saw what happened as God’s plan for a greater good.  Now I am pretty sure that would not have been his thinking as he was bundled off into slavery but over time and in prayer he recognised that his forgiveness was a given well before his brothers asked for it.  He had worked out that it served no purpose, especially God’s, to exercise judgement on those who had harmed him and so he welcomed them with a truly open heart and welcome.  I wonder if the brothers learned from this in their interactions with others, unlike the servant in the parable.

 

Then from Romans we have Paul talking into a volatile situation – where a rather ‘self righteous’ group are saying that there is but one way to know God and it happens to be their way. They judge as wrong those who think differently and with that judgement comes a sense of superiority that then justifies them despising those with different views or approaches.

And Paul asks: who are we to put down those who God welcomes?  ‘Those who eat must not despise those who abstain, and those who abstain must not pass judgement on those who eat; for God has welcomed them.’[1] 

We stand or fall before God, not each other.  I’m not sure that this is completely understood in the church’s often very judgmental, exclusive approach to faith. Encouraging the people of God to follow the way of Jesus is just that – encouraging, discerning, listening, praying so that together we allow the Spirit to guide us in truth and love.  The way is not the noisiest pushing others off the path that they and not God have designed and operate the toll gate for!

 

There was a really good illustration of this in an online reading this week.  It was a blog re the election – the writer didn’t see how anyone who called themselves a Christian could possibly vote for Labour because they supported same sex marriage, abortion etc etc (ignoring the fact that the MPs had conscience votes by the way) – oh and the leader used the word comrade so she was a commie.  Then the replies came back – how could you not when National had done nothing about social justice, environment.  Into this maelstrom of oneupmanship came a voice of perspective – Malcolm Gordon – his words to the writer of the blog are to us all: A more useful approach might be to ask your Christian friends that might be voting Labour to help you see how their faith is leading them to do so.  It might garner more interesting responses with starting with increduility!”

It is not for us to judge the way in which others approach God or where they are at in their journey but rather to be in community with each other where respectfully hearing their story is as important as telling ours.  And when we want to challenge an approach not reacting in this adversarial way where words are spoken that need forgiveness but instead being good listeners as well as .

 

Instead there are other ways and a couple of conversations of this past week have got me thinking about this.

 

One is the way in which discussion and debate happens in the context of the marae – where the intent always is that each speaks their truth and that truth is respected if not agreed with.  In other words you don’t point score by dissing the other but by stating your position clearly and truthfully.  We could learn a lot from that form of sharing. I have listened to Rev Wayne Te Kaawa, ex moderator of Te Aka Puaho, the Maori Synod a couple of time speak into a wrong with integrity and respectfulness – to state the truth without insult, to challenge in a way that does not invite retaliation, to influence from his faith understanding without stepping on another’s.

 

The other is a research study that I have been involved in on Women in Ministry.  While there are a number of issues that arise from the respondents, one of the clearest is that the style of right and wrong, adversarial debate in our church meetings is an unhelpful and sometimes unsafe environment to speak into.  When we have majority voting that elates one side and sends the other into despair we are not being the church of Jesus Christ – we are being people who judge other people and seek to sort them out.  That is for God to do not us!

 

So today we have not so much addressed the issue of how to forgive and what forgiveness is but rather the way in which we use it as a weapon and a tool of judgement. 

As the beloved people of God how can we better understand that it is not just us who are welcomed (whoever ‘us’ might be) but all who turn to God.  When will we realise that it benefits no-one and certainly not God’s purpose in Jesus Christ for us as Christians to either create situations that require forgiveness or to withhold the power of forgiveness when we have been forgiven for all that we get wrong.  Are we unforgiving servants like the parable or does the power of God’s love transform us beyond ourselves into God’s purpose for the world – showing a new way to live together in love and respect and mercy, to forgive those who sin against us as God forgives us and to treat all whom we meet as God’s beloved children.  Amen.  So be it.

 

Margaret Garland

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[1] Romans 14: 2