Radical Equality

Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost / September 18, 2011

Matthew 20:1-16

In case you haven’t noticed, God is not a particularly good businessman.  God doesn’t get the basics of a market economy.  God doesn’t seem to understand that a person is supposed to be paid based on things like level of performance and years of education and number of hours worked.  Somehow God has missed the fact that some workers are simply more valuable than others.  It’s odd, but it doesn’t seem like God’s goal is to make money.

I mean, look at today’s parable.  Initially the landowner seems like a good businessman.  He goes out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard and agrees to pay them the usual daily wage.  The parable doesn’t tell us who he hires or how many he hires, but we can imagine that he hires much of the usual crew – laborers who have worked for him before.  One can imagine that he hires as many people as he needs for the day, as it seems that there is no shortage of folks looking for work.  At the end of the day the laborers will go home with enough money to pay for their daily needs – not much extra.  But then they are day laborers – we don’t expect them to get rich at this job.

Initially, this parable seems like an ordinary situation.  But then the landowner goes out again at nine o’clock and hires others who are standing idle, agreeing to pay them whatever is right, but not suggesting a set amount.  Why does the landowner want more workers?  Didn’t he already have enough?  And why are the workers willing to trust that he will pay them whatever is right instead of negotiating their pay?  It’s odd behavior, for both the landowner and the workers.  But I suppose some pay is better than none, and being busy is better than standing idle all day.

But then the story becomes quite odd because the landowner goes out again at noon and at three o’clock and again at five and hires more workers.  Has he gone mad?  He just tells them to go into the vineyard – they don’t even discuss pay.  And the workers go.

Now six o’clock rolls around and it’s time to pay the workers and all our suspicions that this landowner is a poor businessman are exposed as he pays everyone exactly the same amount – the usual daily wage – starting with those who only worked one hour and finishing with those who worked through the scorching heat of the middle of the day.  It’s no surprise that the early morning crew grumbles – even though they were paid exactly what had they agreed to.  This is not fair – treating all of the workers equally when some worked all day and some barely worked!  The landowner is simply throwing away his profit and leaving several of his daily workers feeling very resentful.

No, God’s economy is definitely not the same as our economy.  God doesn’t wait for the workers to come to him.  Instead God seeks out those who are searching for work and gives them a job, never even asking for a resumé or checking references.  God never asks those who have been idle all day where they were at 9 o’clock and noon and three o’clock – God just hires them at five o’clock.  God treats all of those who agree to work in his vineyard exactly the same – paying them enough – giving them all a living wage – not a penny more or less: “Give us this day our daily bread.”  And when some of the workers grumble at the seeming unfairness, God points out that he has done no wrong.  Which is true.  God is honest, fair, and generous.

Most of us are quick to relate to the grumblers – we work hard for what we earn and it just isn’t fair that some folks barely work and still get rewarded.  It seems like this happened to me all the time growing up.  I was the older sister, so I was responsible for all kinds of chores that my little sister didn’t have to do.  But at the end of the day mom would hug both of us and tell us how wonderful we were.  And at the end of the week we both got the same allowance.  It just wasn’t fair.  I thought I deserved more.

I can understand the frustration of the worker who cried out, “You have made them equal to us!”  It’s not fair that the person who only worked one hour got paid the same as the one who worked a full day.  But then God’s economy is not our economy.  God doesn’t run this business called the Kingdom the way a CEO runs a corporation or a president runs a country.  God wants to be able to offer everyone a place in the kingdom no matter who they are or where they’ve come from or what they’ve done.  God will go out and offer everyone who is seeking access to the kingdom a place – no questions asked.  And God will provide for everyone who enters the kingdom.  Everyone will have enough.  God doesn’t discriminate – period.  God loves us all, no matter our age, our level of education, the color of our skin, our country of origin, our religion, and so on.

Now I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know in your head, but I’m not sure we believe in this radical equality in our hearts.  We look around and recognize that there are people who are hungry in our communities.  We know people who are unemployed or underemployed or underpaid and can’t make ends meet.  We recognize that we are nowhere near having universal health care.  We see a broken school system that favors students who have parental support.  We hear stories of racial profiling and look at prisons full of young black men.  We know that the kingdoms of this world are full of painful inequalities.  As Christians we know in our heads that we are called to confront these injustices and show God’s mercy to all.  But I’m not sure our hearts are always ready to embrace and share God’s abundant grace with everyone.  Somehow we want more of that grace for ourselves.

And yet, God has made them equal to us.  God has made the prisoner and the hungry child and the homeless man and the drug addict and the housewife and the TV evangelist and the Al Qaida terrorist and the Buddhist monk equal to us.  God has made people we pity and people we fear and people we never even think of equal to us.  God is so incredibly generous that he seeks out the lost and pours out his grace equally on the first and the last.  We know this in our heads, but we don’t always believe this in our hearts.

I say this because I know that once we believe it in our hearts the way we live our lives is forever changed.  Mine certainly was.  I first truly encountered God’s radical equality several years ago in with a young African American male in the Durham jail.  At that time, I was in the habit of going into the jail every two weeks to lead worship with a small group from my congregation.  We would sing and pray and study scripture in a stuffy room behind locked doors with guards watching our every move.  I always encountered Jesus in some way in the jail, but this time was different.

This time, as we finished this young man came up to me and asked me if I would pray for him.  I asked him what he wanted me to pray for and he told me he wanted me to pray for his soul.  He then told me he had murdered two people and had been on his way to kill a third when the cops arrested him for some unrelated reason.  Fear ran down my spine as I took his hands, looked him in the eyes, and said “Let’s pray.”  I prayed for this young man as the guards hollered at the prisoners moving them out of the room and back to their cells.  I prayed, feeling the peace of Christ envelop us.  I prayed until one guard put her hand on my shoulder and said I had to leave.  And as I looked back up into the eyes of this young man I did not see a murderer.  Instead I saw my brother.  I hugged him and left.

I have no idea what happened to that young man.  I do know God forever changed my heart that night.  God made him equal to me – or better said, I finally recognized that we were equal in God’s eyes.  Both human beings created by God in the image of God.  Both sinners in need of grace and forgiveness and mercy.  Both children of God deeply loved by God.  I recognized that there was nothing either of us could do that would enable us to earn grace – grace is truly a gift from God.  I also recognized that as the recipient of this abundant grace I would never again sit idly by, grumbling about God’s generosity.   

In our economy, the workers grumble at the unfairness of the landowner who pays everyone a day’s wages regardless of when they showed up.  And perhaps we find another vineyard to work in the next day where the landowner is more fair.  In God’s economy, the workers delight in a landowner who takes care of the first and the last, providing equally for all.  And we bring our friends the next day, so that they can also experience this abundant generosity, this incredible grace, this radical equality in the eyes of God.

Costly Forgiveness

September 11, 2011 / Thirteenth Sunday After Pentecost

Matthew 18:21-35

There’s no doubt that Peter is my favorite disciple.  Like the other disciples, he has seen Jesus heal the sick and cast out demons.  He has eaten with sinners and tax collectors.  He has witnessed miracles and heard Jesus teach.  Like the other disciples, Peter has been there day in and day out since the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry.  But Peter is different.  Peter is the one who is bold enough to ask Jesus to explain the parables.  Peter is the one with the courage to get out of the boat and try walking on water.  Peter is the one with the faith to say to Jesus, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God” (16:16).  But more than that, Peter is the one who loves Jesus so much that when Jesus starts talking about the cross Peter cries “No! This must never happen to you!”  And Peter is the one who wants to capture the moment on the mountain of transfiguration by building three tents – one for Jesus, one for Elijah, and one for Moses.  Peter is my favorite disciple because he always tries hard, even if he doesn’t always get it right.  Peter’s heart is in the right place.  He is willing to ask the difficult questions.  Peter is my favorite disciple because he is so human.

Prior to our gospel reading today, Jesus has been talking about conflict in the church and how to deal with sinners.  Jesus has made it clear that our heavenly Father does not want anyone to be lost – certainly this is in keeping with everything Peter has seen Jesus do and heard Jesus teach.  God loves everyone and wants to welcome everyone into the kingdom.  So Peter comes to Jesus with a good question: “Lord, if a brother or sister sins against me, how often should I forgive?”  In this question we can hear Peter wrestling with the implications of Jesus’ teaching and ministry – we are called to be a people who forgive.  So Peter answers his own question by wondering, “As many as seven times?”  I’m sure as he said that he was thinking, “That is a lot!”  Forgiving someone who has sinned against us even once is hard, but Peter gets that following Jesus calls for more.  Peter has experienced God’s grace.  Could Jesus be asking us to forgive as many as seven times?

Seven is a perfect number.  God created the universe in seven days, so seven is a complete number.  Forgiving seven times seems like such a good answer – it gives the sinner an ideal number of chances to repent.  And it asks a lot of the person who forgives.  I’m sure Peter thought that was a good answer.  But Jesus replies, “Not seven times, but seventy-seven or seventy times seven times.”  In other words we are called to forgive. Period.

Think for a minute of a person who has deeply hurt you.  Perhaps the person has hurt you by lying or cheating.  Perhaps the person has hurt you because the person has hurt someone you love.  Perhaps the hurt has occurred because of that person’s selfishness or thoughtlessness.  Perhaps the hurt is much deeper and more complex.  Jesus is saying to you that no matter what that person has done, you are called to forgive.  Period.

The problem with this is that it makes it sound like us Christians are doormats who can be walked all over.  It doesn’t matter what you do to me, I’ll forgive you.  Hurt me as much as you can – I’ll forgive you.  Take away everything I have, everything I am – I’ll forgive you.  And even if you crush me every day, at the end of the day I will forgive you.  Forgiveness is not that simple!

Unfortunately sometimes this is how this passage is literally interpreted.  I recall the story of a woman who came to her pastor because her husband had hit her the night before.  And the pastor told the woman that the Christian thing to do was to go home and forgive her husband.  A week or two later this happened again, and again the pastor implored her to forgive.  And not long after that, the woman was back in her pastor’s office, this time with visible bruises.  And the pastor said, “Jesus tells us to forgive, not seven times, but seventy times seven times.  Go home and forgive him.”

No, no, no!  While forgiveness is central to who we are as Christians, and we are called to forgive, that pastor pulled these verses out of context.  The verses leading up to this passage teach us how to deal with sin: If a brother or sister sins against you, confront him or her with the sin.  If the person fails to listen and repent then bring a witness.  If the person still fails to listen tell it to the church.  If the person continues to refuse to listen and will not repent then throw him or her out – treat that person like a Gentile or a tax collector.  Treat that person the way Jesus treats the Gentiles and the tax collectors and teach them and heal them.  Show them God’s grace that they might repent.

Forgiveness without repentance will never lead to reconciliation.  Christians are not doormats – we are a people who long for justice.  But too often we are cowards.  Often we’d rather tell the woman to go home and forgive her husband than delve into the hard conversations that lead to true healing and forgiveness.  We want justice, but not always at the risk of revealing our own weaknesses – our own fears – our own sins.  We want to know God’s abundant mercy, but preferably without having to be held accountable for our own sin.  We long for justice, but we want easy answers.

The truth is true forgiveness is costly.  Look at the parable Jesus tells: A king confronts a slave who owes an enormous amount of money.  To put things in perspective, if the slave made ten dollars an hour he would owe the king three billion dollars.  There is no way the slave will ever be able to pay the debt – it is an inconceivably large sum.  The slave begs for mercy and the king has mercy, forgiving the entire debt.  I don’t know about you, but if I had a debt of even three thousand dollars forgiven I would be enormously grateful.  And this slave has been forgiven a debt that looks more like the national debt than a personal debt.  You’d think he’d leave the king’s presence rejoicing and embracing this newfound freedom.

Instead, the slave comes upon another slave who owes him a relatively small sum – something much closer to three thousand dollars.  And the slave who has been forgiven this enormous debt refuses to forgive this small debt and throws his fellow slave into prison until he can pay.  Now notice what happens.  His fellow slaves do not ignore this injustice.  His fellow slaves do not look the other way.  Instead they hold him accountable and report his behavior back to the king.  And the king hands him over to be tortured for all eternity because there is no way he will ever pay his entire debt.

The slave who was forgiven this enormous debt did not listen and repent.  The slave who was forgiven this incredible debt did not go out and do the same for others.  And his brothers and sisters called him on it.  They held him accountable for his behavior.  God’s grace is not cheap grace.  God’s mercy is always tied to God’s justice.  God’s forgiveness comes at a high cost.

The truth is our sin is like the sin of that slave.  God has given us so much – God has given us everything we have.  And yet we have turned away from God and relied on ourselves.  We have failed to love others.  We have sinned in thought, word, and deed.  We have done things we shouldn’t have done and we have failed to do things we should have done.  And this isn’t a once in a lifetime occurrence – we mess up every day, every hour, every minute.  We are so human, with minds that wander and eyes that stray.  We are so caught up in these imperfect bodies that have needs and desires that cause us to sin.  Our sin is like the sin of that slave – so enormous that we can never pay the debt on our own.

But someone has to pay the debt, otherwise justice isn’t served.  If God simply forgives us our sins without expecting anything in return, then we will not grasp the enormity of the gift we have been given.  Like the slave, we’ll go out and fail to forgive a fellow sinner.  If we are to experience true forgiveness, someone has to pay the price for our sins since we are not able to.  But no human could ever pay that price – it is too high.  Only God can pay that price.  And here is the incredible gift of our faith – it is only because of Jesus who was fully human and fully God that that debt could ever be paid.  Jesus paid that price for our sins on the cross.  The one who was without sin took on the full weight of sin for us, setting us free.  That freedom came at an incredibly high price – the death of God’s own Son. 

God forgave our sins once and for all in Jesus’ name.  And we have a choice: to repent and turn back to God, or to ignore this incredible gift.   We have a choice: to embrace God’s forgiveness and go out and forgive others, or to deny what Jesus has done for us on the cross.  We have a choice: to love one another and hold each other accountable, or to look the other way when someone sins because tough love is, well, tough.

We are called to forgive our brothers and sisters.  Period.  But notice that the king did not forgive the slave until the king had pointed out the debt and the slave had asked for mercy.  The slave then went out and pointed out the debt of another slave, and that slave asked for mercy.  Forgiveness and repentance go hand in hand with truth-telling and accountability.  God’s abundant mercy is forever linked to God’s justice.  Grace is free but it is not cheap.

Have you ever confronted a person with his or her sin, either alone, or with a witness?  If you have, you know that most of us want mercy.  Most people long for forgiveness and reconciliation.  Most people are willing to be held accountable and can hardly believe it when they are forgiven.  There are some hardened criminals who only seek forgiveness as they are awaiting execution, if then; but most people want to experience grace.  They want to be forgiven.  They want to start again.  God forgave our sins once and for all in Jesus’ name.  Are you prepared to go out and do the same?

Coping with Conflict

September 4, 2011 / Twelfth Sunday After Pentecost

Matthew 18:15-20 / Romans 13:8-14

Conflict is inevitable. Conflict is inevitable in a marriage, in the workplace, between children and their parents, among friends, and even in the church.  Conflict is inevitable because people are different from one another.  Some are tall, others are short.  Some like dogs, others prefer cats.  Some like to work outside, others prefer desk jobs.  Some stick to vanilla ice cream, others want mint chocolate chip cookie dough.  Some think Carolina blue is the best, others prefer Duke blue.  We are all different from one another, which is a gift.  It makes life interesting.  It helps the world go around. It also means conflict is inevitable.

And conflict is inevitable in the church.  This summer on my way to the beach I was driving along a two-lane highway in the middle of miles of tobacco fields when I came upon three churches.  Two of the churches were less than ten feet apart.  One boldly proclaimed they were Southern Baptist and the other sign announced that they were Primitive Baptist.  And immediately across the street the newest of the three churches was called the Truth Faith Gospel Church.  Right there in the middle of nowhere these three churches told a story of conflict.  Who knows what the conflict was, but it clearly led to a division.  Three churches, right next to each other, told a story of people who are probably neighbors but they are unable to worship together because of a serious and unresolvable conflict.

I wish I could point to this example and say that this is unusual – but the history of the church is a history of conflict and division.  The first major division occurred when the East split from the West, forming what we know today as the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church.  Not too long after that, Luther posted his 95 Theses, leading to the split between the Catholics and the Protestants.  And the church has been splintering ever since. 

John Wesley, the father of Methodism, was a priest in the Church of England.  He had no intention of splitting off from the Church of England, but in 1784 at the Christmas Conference the Methodist Episcopal Church was born in the United States.  By the 1820’s the Methodist Episcopal Church began to splinter as the AME and AME Zion churches were formed – AME stands for African Methodist Episcopal.  The Methodist Protestants split off shortly after that.  Then in the 1840’s the Methodist Episcopal Church split into the ME South and the ME North, and the CME – Colored Methodist Episcopal – church was formed.  And then, around the turn of the century, the Pentecostal and Nazarene churches were formed.  All of these splits occurred because of some form of conflict. 

It has only been in the 20^th century that some of these different Methodists have reunited.  In 1939, the ME South and ME North joined with the Methodist Protestants to form the Methodist Church, and in 1968 the Methodist Church joined with the United Brethren to form the United Methodist Church.  Today, difficult but fruitful conversations with various denominations and even with the Catholic Church hold out hope for further reconciliation.

Yet, for two thousand years the church has experienced conflict. And for two thousand years, I believe God has wept.  Christ reconciled us to God on the cross, and yet we, the body of Christ, continue to struggle to be reconciled to one another.  We squabble and bicker and fight – sometimes over ridiculous things and sometimes over truly serious sin.  Sometimes our conflict leads to reconciliation, but it seems that more often than not it leads to even more brokenness within the body of Christ.  We’re not good at dealing with conflict.

For two thousand years we’ve read and wrestled with this scripture in Matthew’s gospel, recognizing that it provides guidance for dealing with conflict in the church.  The instructions are straight-forward: If a church member – a brother or a sister in Christ – sins against you, go and point out the fault.  If that brother or sister doesn’t listen to you then bring some witnesses and try again.  If they still don’t listen, tell the church.  And if they still don’t listen then throw them out.  It seems simple enough.  The problem is, often our approach to following these steps is fundamentally flawed. 

At the beginning of chapter 18 of Matthew, the disciples ask: “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”  The disciples are still wondering who is the strongest, who has the most power.  They seem to have forgotten “blessed are the meek”.  They don’t understand why Jesus eats with sinners and tax collectors.  Jesus answers by talking about being humble like a child.  He talks about hospitality and welcoming children.  Jesus tells the parable of the lost sheep and the shepherd who leaves the 99 to go in search of the one.  Jesus tells his disciples that our heavenly Father does not want anyone to be lost. 

The disciples are asking the wrong question by wondering about greatness.  The question is: How do we welcome everyone into the kingdom?  This is hard when we are all different.  But one way to be more welcoming is to rethink what we do when conflict happens. Christians are encouraged to confront conflict with honesty and humility.  We are asked to extend love and grace and forgiveness, in the hopes that the one who has gone astray might be regained, and restored to a right relationship with the body of Christ.  Christ’s goal is unity, not division.

Too often, when someone has sinned and conflict arises, our inclination is to take sides. We tend to worry about our own lives and our own families and our own salvation, and push away those who are – in our opinion – in the wrong.  Too often we forget that when conflict arises among our Christian brothers and sisters the goal is reconciliation.  Each part of the body is important for the proper functioning of the body of Christ – each person matters in God’s eyes.  And God does not want a single one to be lost.  If we confront a sinner and that person listens, then we have regained that one and the body is stronger.  We can rejoice just as our Father is rejoicing in heaven. 

But the way we confront that sinner matters.  If we confront a sinner with a holier-than-thou attitude then we have missed the opportunity to approach the sinner as a fellow sinner in need of God’s grace.  We have missed the opportunity to speak the truth in love.  We have missed the opportunity to extend grace and forgiveness and invite the person to repent.  And then we will have missed the opportunity to welcome the lost sheep back into the fold. 

But hear this clearly.  This does not mean we simply fail to confront the sinner or that we forgive the sinner without repentance.  If someone in the church becomes a stumbling block for others – well, Jesus said it in verse 7: “Woe to the world because of stumbling blocks!”  If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to enter life maimed or lame than to have two hands or two feet and to be thrown into the eternal fire (18:8).   The sinner must be confronted, otherwise the whole body will suffer.  One person’s sin can undo an entire congregation if it is left unchecked.  We must confront the sinner, speaking the truth in love, and then extend God’s grace to that sinner, giving the person every chance to repent.  It is only as a last resort that we cut the sinner off from the body.

Now the truth is, direct confrontation is uncomfortable!  Honest conversations are hard to have.  Dealing with sin is painful and we often struggle with our own anger and resentment and pride as we confront the sinner.  And all of this gets so much more complicated when we come with an invitation to grace and repentance and forgiveness as we deal with the sin – often an invitation that is only possible because of our faith in Jesus Christ – hoping to regain the person and not lose him or her. 

This truth hit me when I was sitting in prison next to a woman serving a life sentence for murdering a family member.  As she described what she had done I could feel the anger rising in my gut – what she had done was truly outrageous.  But it was not my job as a Christian to judge her; the legal system had found her guilty and put her in prison.  It was my job as a Christian to confront her with her sin and the good news of Jesus Christ – to share the incredible love of God – to invite her to repent and turn away from her sin, and to turn toward Jesus.  It was my job to extend Christ’s forgiveness to her as she embraced God’s love and repented.  She will still serve a life sentence behind bars, but by the incredible grace of God she was set free.  “And whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”  That day, through difficult conversations, reading scripture, and praying together, that woman began a journey toward Christ and the church regained one sister.  Today, she still serves in the prison by leading Bible studies for other women.  Through her witness the body of Christ is stronger.

Most of us aren’t confronting murder.  We are more likely to confront theft or adultery or dishonesty or excessive pride.  And we are even more likely to struggle with genuine differences in our politics, our opinions, or our understanding of doctrine and scripture.  These differences lead to conflict when we allow our pride or stubbornness or self-righteousness to take over.  It takes all of us, with all of our genuine differences, to make up the body of Christ.  It takes all of us sinners who have fallen short of the glory of God to make up the body of Christ.  It takes all of us practicing humility, speaking the truth in love, and extending God’s love and grace to build up the body of Christ.  Conflict is inevitable.  But healthy, prayerful, Christ-centered conflict points to the cross and reminds us that in Christ we have already been reconciled to God; by His grace we can be reconciled to one another.  Healthy, prayerful, Christ-centered conflict can make the body of Christ stronger.  Thanks be to God!