Loopholes, Limits, and Lordship (Matthew 10:40-42)

Do you know the Parable of the Good Samaritan?

That’s the story Jesus told about a traveler who was beaten and left for dead beside the road between Jerusalem and Jericho. Two members of the local religious leadership saw the man, but ignored him, but a Samaritan, a member of a group of people whom many of Jesus’ neighbors looked down upon, stopped, tended the man’s wounds, and made arrangements for him to get the care and rest he needed.

That’s the Parable of the Good Samaritan.

Do you remember what prompted Jesus to tell it?

It was a conversation about looking for loopholes and setting limits on love.

Here’s how Luke describes that exchange.

An expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he said, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” He said to him, “What is written in the law? What do you read there?” He answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself.” And he said to him, “You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.” But wanting to vindicate himself, he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” (Luke 10:25-29)

“Who is my neighbor?”

That’s the question that led Jesus to tell one of–if not his most famous parable–a parable about how we shouldn’t equate religious knowledge or standing with compassion, a parable about finding grace in unexpected places from unexpected people.

“Who is my neighbor?’ the expert asked Jesus.

“Let me ask you a different question,” said Jesus.

Which of these three, [the religious leaders or the Samaritan], do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.” (Luke 25:36-37)

So Jesus turned that man’s question on its head.

He wanted to know who his neighbor was, and by extension, who his neighbor wasn’t, but Jesus said, “Don’t go looking for loopholes and limits. Go and show mercy instead!”

I believe the Parable of the Good Samaritan and the circumstances surrounding its telling help us to faithfully unpack the scripture that’s before us this morning–the final verses of Matthew’s 10th chapter.

Matthew 10 recounts the pivotal moment in Jesus’ ministry at which he was sending out twelve of his disciples to serve, heal, and minister in the wider community.

We’ve read a little bit of that passage over the last few Sundays, so here’s a little refresher.

Jesus sent out [the group of twelve] with the following instructions: “Do not take a road leading to gentiles, and do not enter a Samaritan town, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ Cure the sick; raise the dead; cleanse those with a skin disease; cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment. Take no gold, or silver, or copper in your belts, no bag for your journey, or two tunics, or sandals, or a staff, for laborers deserve their food. (Mathew 10:5-10)

Lest the disciples start doubting their ability to carry out this mission, Jesus continued,

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. And even the hairs of your head are all counted. So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows. (Matthew 10:29-31)

The whole passage reads something like one of the countless ordination sermons or graduation speeches that was delivered this month—a combination of practical instructions and inspiration and wisdom.

On one hand, it’s fair to say that Jesus’ sermon had a very limited scope–the twelve people to whom he was speaking.

On the other hand, People of Faith in every age have always understood that this passage was of greater relevance to their present circumstances than just giving us some interesting historical background.

Jesus might’ve said these things to the Twelve, initially, and the specifics of what he said may or may not be unique to that moment or universally applicable, but, in every age, the Church has said these words are of contemporary relevance, that God still speaks through them today.

Now, of course, if we seized upon this passage as nothing more than fuel for the fire of our opinions about bags, tunics, and sandals, then I think it would be fair to say that we’ve lost the plot about what it means to be faithful disciples in our context.

But is there a lesson in Jesus’ words about grace, a lesson about depending on God to meet our needs, a lesson here about how materialistic priorities and pursuits can encumber and impede the Church’s mission?

Absolutely there is.

“To many modern Christians, this speech seems strange, even fanatical,” notes scholar Eugene Boring, “From another perspective, this chapter need not be alien at all. It reveals in concentrated form what the Christian life essentially is.” (p. 263)

In reading the words Jesus spoke to the Twelve, therefore, we should take on the same attitude and perspective that Jesus tried to cultivate when he told the parable to the legal expert.

We should be less concerned about whether Jesus was talking to us, or them, or those people over there, less concerned about finding loopholes and limits to his teachings, but more passionate about welcoming his wisdom into our hearts and minds, more passionate about discovering how Jesus’ lordship can lift us up and above the small ideas and parochial thinking that leave people broken, divided, and searching for real answers.

This brings us, at last, to Matthew 10:40-42.

Jesus said,

“Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. Whoever welcomes a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever welcomes a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive the reward of the righteous, and whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple—truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward.”

This is the ordination sermon’s conclusion, and, not surprising, it’s ripe to be picked over, to have its meaning parsed, to be neutered of all power.

I mean, sure, it seems to be calling for a level of love, hospitality, and welcome that would stretch each one of us into a new way of living, but, when we read what Jesus said closely, we can find plenty of excuses for our inaction.

It was given to the Twelve regarding their specific ministry, but the days of the Twelve Disciples are long gone.

And sure, we’d be happy to welcome the people Jesus mentions, but we don’t see many prophets walking among us, and welcoming a righteous person sounds fine, but how can we really know someone’s character or heart?

Isn’t it better just to keep to ourselves?

I mean, does Matthew 10 really have anything to say to us at all?

Yeah, I’m afraid it does.

If the Parable of the Good Samaritan was about our calling to be merciful and not, as some might’ve hoped, about identifying the people to whom we are excused from showing mercy, then the conclusion of Jesus’ ordination sermon was about undergirding the disciples’ ministry and their lives, in a culture of generosity, hospitality, and welcome.

And the same goes for you and me.

Jesus expects and empowers those who would follow him–from the first Twelve to you and me–to be generous and kind, to build relationships with those who are committed to doing good in this world, and to approach every conversation, engagement, charitable act done by us, and act of mercy shared with us as a potential encounter with God.

“Whoever welcomes you welcomes me,” said Jesus, “and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me.” (Matthew 10:40)

To be less concerned about finding loopholes and limits to Jesus’ teachings, and more passionate about welcoming his wisdom into our hearts and minds, more passionate about discovering how Jesus’ lordship can lift us up and above the small ideas and parochial thinking that leave people broken, divided, and searching for real answers—this is our mission, our duty, our purpose.

May we be found faithful, then, to the vision Jesus sets before us.

May we be merciful, generous, and welcoming.

And may we know the reward of all who go where Jesus sends them to love, serve, and minister in his name.

Thanks be to God. Amen.

Image: Anonymous. Jesus Welcomes All, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=57406

The Missionary and the Socialite (Matthew 10:34-39)

Jesus had decided that the time was right to send out his twelve disciples to do ministry on their own.

In giving the Twelve their orders, he said,

"Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, and one's foes will be members of one's own household. "Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. (Matthew 10:34-39)

This is a difficult passage to unpack, appearing, as it does, to raise more questions than give answers.

What did Jesus mean when he said he didn’t come to bring peace?

Aren’t there other instances in his ministry when he said the exact opposite thing?

And what about what he says about families? What did Mary and Joseph ever do to him?

And a sword wielding Prince of Peace?

Are Christian Nationalists right when they quote these words to justify violence in Jesus’ name?

I hope it doesn’t surprise you that a faithful reading of this passage will disappoint those who are intent on causing harm and sowing division. This isn’t the loophole that absolves us from having to pay attention to all that stuff Jesus said about peace, love, unity, and forgiveness.

But Matthew 10 does have something to tell us about keeping our wits about us when doing the right thing leads to conflict and turmoil and it definitely reveals the sharp contrast between the holy and holistic way of Jesus and competing claims and authorities that diminish and degrade humanity’s God-given potential.

So, to help us hear what Jesus is saying, I want to begin by telling you a love story.

Freeborn Garrettson was one of the leaders of early American Methodism. Remembered as the movement’s first great American born preacher—“Methodism’s Paul Revere” took the Gospel and Methodist ideas deep into New England’s northern frontier and to Canada. He had an especially influential ministry in Nova Scotia.

However, in 1788, Francis Asbury appointed Rev. Garrettson to New York City and during that season, the prolific preacher took a trip up the Hudson River where he met a woman named Catherine.

Catherine Livingston was a daughter in one of the wealthiest, most prominent, most powerful families in this country.

The Livingston’s owned almost a million acres of land in the Hudson Valley.

Catherine’s brother helped write the Declaration of Independence and, later, administered the oath of office to President Washington, who was a friend of the family.

As a young woman, Catherine attended parties with the likes of the Schuyler sisters and Alexander Hamilton and the family estate, Clermont, still stands in Columbia County as a New York State Historic Site.

Within this context, Catherine’s heart and life underwent a dramatic change when she was in her mid-30s. First, she experienced a spiritual awakening, then became active in a Methodist circle in Rhinebeck, New York.

Catherine met Rev. Garrettson when he visited that group.

In short order, the missionary and the socialite fell in love and were engaged to be married.

And then came the troubles.

Catherine’s mother refused to give the couple her blessing.

It was one thing for a child of privilege to associate with an enthusiastic religious movement, but allowing her daughter to marry a Methodist preacher was a bridge too far for Mother Livingston.

In this way, Catherine’s mother shared a deep concern about the Methodists with many of her peers in our young nation’s aristocracy.

Methodists simply did not respect the social order or the way things were and brought together in their services and meetings a wide diversity of people without regard to their station in life.

Historian Dee Andrews describes Methodism’s counter-cultural ways,

[Methodist preachers] pressed their followers–rich, middling, and poor; white and black; men and women–to listen to Christ first…While the movement was often embraced by the members of one family, it also overturned conventional family discipline and order and led to at times violent family conflict, especially between parents and children, and husbands and wives (Andrews, p. 107)

Caught between her class-defying religious commitments and her mother’s intransigence, Catherine chose faith and her engagement to the preacher. Her mother chose to throw her out.

Catherine confessed her grief about this development in a letter to one of her sisters,

“I have continual sorrow from without, and from within…I have been cast from my Mother’s affections, and house, and have now no other home than such I derive from the bounty of a kind sister, upon whom I have been thrown.”

Poked, prodded, and pierced by her family, grieving Catherine, nevertheless, understood that these were but the pangs of her liberation. Cut loose, she had no regrets.

“I declare to you,” she exclaimed to her sister, “I would not be what I once was, if every other thing which the world can bestow or enjoy were at my free choice.” (Andrews, 108-109)

On June 30, 1793, Catherine and Freeborn married.

Soon after their wedding, the groom took the time to reflect on the moment and to memorialize his dreams for his life with Catherine in his journal.

He wrote,

"I am now happy in the society of my dear friend…I hope always to live as God would have me both for time and eternity. I am happy, and hope to be more and more so. Lord, we are thine. Thou hast united our spirits to thyself and to each other. Do with us as seemeth thee good, only let us be wholly thine: let us live to thy glory, and grant that our union may be for the furtherance of each other in the way to the kingdom of heaven." (The Life of Freeborn Garrettson, p. 22)

And so it came to pass that Freeborn Garrettson and Catherine Livington lived out their true romance. They were married for more than thirty years, until his death, and all the while, the home they created–Wildercliff on the Hudson–remained a haven of blessing and peace for all who entered, including a daughter and countless traveling preachers.

This is one of my favorite stories from church history.

It’s a powerful love story in its own right, isn’t it–like Romeo and Juliet, except the couple defies the odds and lives a happy life together.

As a bit of history, it also reminds us that, at our best, the Methodist movement, specifically, and Christian faith, in general, should give us tools and examples that help us overcome the world’s stratified hierarchies and rigid social structures.

Freeborn and Catherine’s story invites us to celebrate the ties that bind us together, not to give into the pressures and strictures that keep us apart.

And that’s what brings us back to those challenging words of Jesus.

When Jesus told his disciples that he brought a sword, not peace, he wasn’t calling for violence.

I don’t even think he was telling his disciples to be unnecessarily provocative.

But he was saying that following him—living a God-centered life like him, loving the unloveable like him, embracing the outcast and forgotten ones among us like him, regarding no one with contempt or as one’s inferior—this would naturally put the faithful in conflict with the people, systems, and institutions invested in holding people down and keeping them in their place.

Saint Paul would later call such things the “principalities and powers,” and the Garrettsons’ story reminds us that high society, the Patriarchy, even one’s own family can at time be counted among them.

That’s why Jesus spoke so pointedly.

"Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth,” said Jesus. In doing so, he tells his disciples to reject a go-along to get-along ethic, to push back against indifference to suffering and its causes, to seek liberty from one’s complicity with one’s own bonadage and the bondage of others.

“I have not come to bring peace but a sword,” said the Lord, the sword of God’s Word to protect your heart and cut you loose from all the things that hold you back.

Living in the light of this truth, Catherine was inspired to declare, “I would not be what I once was, if every other thing which the world can bestow or enjoy were at my free choice.”

Living in the light of this truth, Freeborn placed his future with his beloved in God’s hands.

“Let us live to thy glory,” he prayed, “and grant that our union may be for the furtherance of each other in the way to the kingdom of heaven.”

Living in the light of this truth, you and I catch a glimpse of what our lives and what church can be, too—gathered around Jesus, steadfast, free, filled with love, and committed to the way of grace that brings down divisions and leads us to one another.

When Jesus said, “I have not come to bring peace but a sword,” he was saying something about keeping our wits about us when doing the right thing leads to conflict and turmoil. He was revealing the sharp contrast between his holy and holistic way and competing claims and authorities that diminish and degrade humanity’s God-given potential.

He was giving us the gift of himself and his word, and that will always be enough “for the furtherance of each other in the way to the kingdom of heaven.”

Thanks be to God for this Good News. Amen.

Image: Rev. Freeborn and Mrs. Catherine Linvingston Garrettson

Cast No Shadow: A Sermon for Pride (John 8:12)

“Is the dress black and blue or white and gold?”

That’s the question asked by one of the internet’s viral sensations of 2015, “The Dress.”

Do you remember?

It all started when a woman named Cecilia went dress shopping.

She was looking for something to wear to her daughter’s upcoming wedding, and the soon-to-be mother of the bride found it in a lovely blue number with black stripes from the retailer Roman Originals.

Cecilia bought the dress and sent a picture of it to her daughter, Grace.

And Grace looked at the picture and thought, “Mom just bought a white dress with gold stripes.”

But Cecilia knew that she had just purchased a blue dress with black stripes.

And that’s where things got weird.

Grace showed the picture to her friends.

Some saw black and blue.

Some white and gold.

That trend continued when she put the picture on Facebook.

Even at the wedding, where mom was clearly wearing a black and blue dress, many guests couldn’t believe that it was the same dress in the photo.

Not long after the ceremony, one of Grace’s friends posted the picture on her blog.

The when “The Dress” became a phenomenon.

I know it seems like a quaint memory from the distant past, but there once was a time when the internet could make us laugh and smile about silly things rather than filling our lives with rage bait, pseudo-science, and AI generated nonsense.

That’s what happened when “The Dress” went viral.

At its peak, the friend’s blog “was receiving 14,000 views a second.”

An online poll about “The Dress” set a record with more than 670,000 people viewing it at the same time.

And on Twitter, debate about the dress inspired competing hashtags—"#whiteandgold", "#blueandblack"—and was ultimately “the subject of 4.4 million tweets within 24 hours.”

More than ten years later, “The Dress” remains something of an enigma. Scientific studies have found connections between the viewer’s age, gender, even the time at which they usually wake up and the colors they saw, but there’s no consensus explanation for why people perceive the colors of the dress differently.

So “The Dress” lives on in our culture’s memory like something of an optical illusion, a trick of the mind, another example of light’s fascinating movements and properties.

And it is fascinating, this science of light—how white sunlight becomes a rainbow, how we see the stars in our nighttime sky as they existed thousands of years ago, how two people can see the same object in different colors.

I thought about light often this week in preparation for this service–the science of light, but also the various meanings we ascribe to it.

From the familiar lights of the places we call home to candles lit in memory of a loved one, we look to light for comfort, clarity, and direction.

Literally and figuratively, light helps us understand our surroundings and shows us where to go.

Light plays a prominent role in our faith tradition, too, as there are numerous scriptures that describe light as embodying the qualities, character, and even the presence of God.

“The Lord is my light and my salvation;” confessed the writer of Psalm 27, “whom shall I fear?” (Psalm 27:1)

Or, in Psalm 119, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” (Psalm 119:105)

Or, in the Prologue to John’s Gospel, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.” (John 1:4)

Then there’s Jesus, and what he had to say about light.

Again Jesus spoke to them saying,“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12)

This is the passage that’s at the heart of our worship today because there’s an essential link between what Jesus said, what we understand about light, and Pride Sunday.

You see, when all the colors of the rainbow are together and unified, like on a sunny day—when their wavelengths are unimpeded–when the colors are, if you will, free—then light is clear and we have our best opportunity to accurately assess our surroundings, what we’re looking at, and where we’re going.

But when colors are filtered or blocked, when the wavelengths of colors are manipulated, our perceptions are less about the object before us and more about whatever is filtering the light.

Now when we go to a show on Broadway, a good lighting designer can block and filter colors to create a mood or atmosphere that enhances the overall production, but just ask my costume designing wife what bad lighting can do to beautiful clothes.

In bad light, that which is bright and colorful becomes shadowed and altered. Bad lighting can even make something disappear altogether.

So when Jesus says that he is the light, I understand that, on one hand, he is taking upon himself the hopes and dreams of people like the Psalmists and other faithful hearts. He is declaring himself to be a source of wisdom and clarity, comfort, hope, and so much more.

But on the other hand, when Jesus says “I am the light,” he is also telling us something about how he expects us to look at the world and our neighbors.

He is empowering us to reject and set aside all the filters and barriers with which we try to manipulate our surroundings and turn people into something that they are not.

If bad lighting can ruin a good costume design, then God knows that casting our neighbors in an unflattering light is a threat to the ties that bind us together, the common good, and dreams of Beloved Community.

I mean let’s be honest, the filter of homophobia cast a shadow over almost everything in the United Methodist Church for fifty years, a shadow that twisted reality, tried to make us believe all sorts of pernicious things about LGBT individuals, and, in the end, made most of our global gatherings feel like we were lost in the dark rather than walking in the light.

What Pride Sunday offers us, however, is an invitation to be centered in the grace and truth that makes for genuine community.

No shadows.

No filters.

“Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body,” said Saint Paul, “so it is with Christ.” (1 Cor. 12:12)

“If we walk in the light,” said Saint John, “as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.” (1 John 1:7)

Or as our call to worship reminded us, “The colors of the rainbow are distinct, but they all shine together to make one light.”

Friends, we can’t walk in the light of God when we’re throwing shade at others.

That’s true about homophobia, racism, classism, or anything that makes us believe that we are inherently superior to anybody else.

Those are light blocking filters that play tricks with our minds.

That’s the kind of stuff Jesus tells us to get rid of if we want to see others as he sees us.

This week I found something really interesting in our church’s archives. It was an announcement for a community Lenten service that would take place here at Asbury on March 11, 1960. The guest preacher was Rev. Martin Niemoeller.

That caught my attention because Niemoller is remembered as one of the prominent voices of Christian resistance to the Nazis in Hitler’s Germany. He even spent several years in a concentration camp for running afoul of the regime that he once supported.

What he is most well known for today, though, is a quote that, for me, illustrates what happens when we allow the sahdows of our prejudices and self-centeredness to block God’s light and obscure the worth and dignity of others.

About the Nazis, Niemoeller said,

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Niemoeller learned that those who cast shadows on their neighbors will end up in the dark.

We can’t walk in the light of God when we’re throwing shade at others.

But Jesus said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.”

May we always walk in the light.

Amen.