Readings: 1 John 3:1-3, Matthew 23:1-12
Prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be
acceptable in your sight O God, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.
This is the story as Gospel of Matthew tells it.
When Jesus got to Jerusalem, after his triumphal entry into the holy
city, he went to the temple, saw and dealt with the horror of the den of
robbers and stayed to heal the blind and the lame. He had a small verbal skirmish with the
temple authorities before heading out to Bethany for the night and then the
next day he was back in the temple. He
told barely veiled parables against the establishment: the wedding banquet, the
wicked tenants, the work ethic of the two sons - and had thrown back at him baited traps
designed to expose him for the charlatan he was by the priests – paying taxes,
resurrection marriage, the greatest commandment – and on it went. And then, suddenly, Jesus has had
enough! Enough of the tricky questions
and not so subtle put downs and the lack of understandings, enough of the
attempts at point scoring around the intricacies of law by the Sadducees and
Pharisees. Enough.
Chapter 23 of Matthew could quite easily be described as a rant! And today’s reading is the beginning of
it. See these teachers and lawyers –
they may well preach and teach what is the father’s will but do they practice
what they teach – no way!
They are vain, arrogant and hypocritical – they misuse their authority
and need to be called out on it.
The leaders of the synagogue in Jesus time were not alone in this
dislocation of behaviour and teaching.
We can see it all around us now and throughout history. Faithfulness to God stumbles and instead
becomes self interest, comfort, and authority for its own sake. The preachers, teachers at the temple in
Jerusalem are expounding the doctrine and not hearing their own teaching.
Pious and authoritative words convictions do not a faithful person
make! Delegating the living faithfully
to others does not equate to being faithful.
Faithfulness is in the orientation of one’s heart and life – to
God. And true faithfulness to God
demands of us a form of radical egalitarianism that sees all people, despite
our many inequalities of abilities, skill and status, as absolutely equal
before God. This quote from Richard
Niebuhr says it beautifully: ‘God is the common centre, to which all humanity
is related: it is by reference to and in respect of our relation to that creative
centre that we are equal’. That is what
we do every time we gather round the table – one body unified and equal before
God.
Where am I going with this? Well, it strikes me that this has some real
challenges for us today – as we look at what it means to be the saints for our
day, as we use our skills and capacities in God’s service and how that might
look in our future as a church body here in Opoho.
One thing to recognise is that our failure to grasp faithful living in
God’s way for all of us is not confined to church leadership alone. While power lends itself to abuse, no less so
in the church, it is the thinking that has grown out of the contemporary
liberation and feminist theology that there equally can be a form of withdrawal
from faithful action by those who consider themselves further down the pecking
order. Here the unwillingness to act or
live faithfully is manifested in a denial of ability, of a belief that we have
nothing to offer and so do not need to contribute. Both pride and humility can equally encourage
denial of human responsibility to live as God’s people.
I was walking down to church on Sunday pondering the phrase ‘All care
and no responsibility’. It’s quite
commonly used in our world now – mostly to stave off any suggestions of
culpability when things go wrong – but I would suggest it that for us it needs
to be all care and all responsibility for all of us.
Because aren’t we family – isn’t that our strength as the faithful here
in Opoho and in the wider church – family that accepts responsibility to not
just hear the word of God but to live it and in doing so to share the joy of
Christ with positivity, action and enthusiasm. This church body will not
survive without all of us actively being the hands, feet and heart of Christian
living and action in whatever way we can.
We can’t leave the vibrancy of this heritage of faith we have received
from the saints that have gone before resting on a few shoulders – it needs all
of us to listen and to live out the teachings we hold as the basis of our
faith. And we all have something to
offer – prayer, engagement, practical skills, time, energy, teaching,
listening, pastoral, hospitality. Not
just occasionally but bursting out from the core of our faith – God within us.
Furthermore we are at a bit of a crunch time – at our Parish Council
retreat it would be safe to say we were all a bit discombobulated by the news
that our church building now has an A listing. We were prepared for having to
make decisions based on bad news – do we give up on the building, do we spend
all our reserves making fixes so we can stay – and suddenly that we have a
different question in front of us. Sure
there are still questions and challenges about our building but let us
concentrate on our living for today. What
does it look like for a faith community look like when our hearts and life are
orientated towards God in faithful living.
Some thoughts – not to blame but to encourage, not to demand but to see
opportunity.
How many of us deep down think that the only time we come alive as a
church body is Sunday morning. That
worship not on Sunday and not in the format of Sunday is an optional
extra. That gathering and exploring and
fellowship is best left to Sunday. The
doors remain closed the rest of the time.
How can we be alive during the week?
It doesn’t always have to be our energy or our time – but sometimes it
does.
We have just had a working bee – fantastic turnout and much work
done. But guess what we didn’t get to
the bit of garden that people walk by every day on Signal Hill Rd – two working
bees a year are needed but so is a regular commitment throughout the year – and
when that happens we see when we look at
the Farquharson frontage – thank you to those who do that but we need more
people to join in.
Who among us has reviewed, wondered if our giving to the church can
increase for this financial year? Do we
wait for the prodding or do we take responsibility for meeting the increase in
costs that each year brings.
How do we turn to face the world, how do we not just build our faith but
also serve the community we live in a way that is faithful to Jesus teachings –
grab the reins of mission and run with it, knowing that it will demand all of
those things we bring - prayer, engagement, practical skills, time, energy,
teaching, listening, pastoral, hospitality.
So for the people of God, the
commitment to the continuing of the journey of faith of those who have
gone before into our future is the responsibility of us all. It will look different, seem difficult at
times but so it was for them.
And here is the good news in which we put our trust and hope. We heard the words of 1 John.
For those who have gone before and we walk in the way of Jesus as the
children of God: that is what we are.
And as part of God’s creation we are not only held in love but also
given renewing strength to be a faithful people in the midst of all that life
throws at us. God within us enables us
to live in the example of Jesus despite our uncertainties and doubts and
difficulties. God within us allows us to
live as Christ followers uncertain of the future but trusting in the promise
that is a time of complete reconciliation, justice and peace before us. Faithfulness demands of us that we work for
the transformation of the world we live in now.
We are the beloved of God and, as such, are the saints of body of Jesus
in this place and this time. Praise be
to God for the faithfulness of the people of God in the time past, in our time
and in the time to come. Amen.
Margaret Garland
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