Looking to Blame

Gospel: Luke 6: 6-11

In today's Gospel portion, Jesus enters a synagogue for the third time.  The first two encounters did not go well.  In the first instance in his hometown the audience wanted to kill him for saying that God cares for and heals all people.  Last time, he helped a man become free from the demon that possessed him, which made Jesus a suspicious figure.  Now today we find a group coming to find fault with Jesus, looking for something with which they can condemn him.

So, Jesus heals a man with a withered hand.  This action of doing good was apparently forbidden because it was an act of work on the Sabbath, a rule which apparently is more important than doing good to others.  But no matter what Jesus did nor did not do, this group of people would find fault with something he did or did not do or say.  We have seen this dynamic in our own life and in our world.  We cannot and do not find any good in anyone we have deemed unclean in our eyes.  

The suspicions and animus we have toward others prevent us from seeing Jesus in those people.  It prevents us from seeing the good in other people.  Perhaps in spending a Sabbath in the hive mind of our particular congregations, might we instead visit a nursing home, or a hospital ward, or people in prison, and seek to find Jesus present in other people.  The encounter might prove to be a source of healing for them, and for us as well.

A Corrective Lesson

Gospel: Matthew 18: 15-20

Today's Gospel portion provides us Christians today with a rebuke on our own behavior.  The first is how much we ignore this passage.  We go from offense to the airing of grievances openly and excommunication immediately.  Little attempt is made to make amends or mend fences in disputes.  The images of culture war and social justice warriors lends itself not to reconciliation and amendment, but to total warfare and victory at any cost.  

The second is related to the first.  In our readiness to treat opponents as Gentiles and tax collectors - in making them pariahs and the unclean - we utterly ignore how in fact the Lord Jesus himself treated Gentiles and tax collectors.  He ate at table with them.  He healed them, their family members, and their servants of illnesses of all kinds.  He freed them from the demons that oppressed them.  Jesus treated them with loving kindness and mercy.  

The culture war folk and social justice warriors are products of a Christianity that has focused on creating communities of like minded individuals that in turn create suspicion and animus toward anyone not in those institutions.  Jesus, however, went from place to place encountering people of all types, meeting them where they are at, and providing for their needs.  The Way of Jesus is to carry a towel and basin for washing feet, not a sword or gun to harm others.   

Feed the People

Gospel: Luke 6: 1-5

The Pharisees criticize the disciples of Jesus for performing work on the Sabbath in order to eat by shelling the wheat husks and eating them.  Acts of work, of course, are forbidden on the Sabbath in the Law.  The reply of Jesus is a telling one.  He gives the example of David and his cohorts who ate the showbread reserved only for the priests, a violation of ceremonial law, but not a violation of the Sabbath commandment regarding work.  This response is telling.

Jesus is making a broader point on how feeding people is the greater priority of the Law than Sabbath laws or even ceremonial laws of the Temple.  The Sabbath is important, to be sure, but more important is the care of human beings who lack food and other basic necessities.  Ceremonial ritual is also important, but when human beings are starving and thirsty, lacking clothing and shelter, then the rituals of the sanctuary take a backseat to the needs of others.  

We take great pride in our ornate religious structures and elaborate liturgies - places we exclude many from having access to the food of heaven because of our own laws designed not to bring people closer to God but to create a state of superiority over others.  The showbread is not for us alone, but for all people who hunger.  The body of the Lord was given for all, the Lord Jesus fed all at the field of multiplication.  It is for us to imitate the Lord and to feed all who hunger.