PERSPECTIVE

Grant us, Lord, not to be anxious about earthly things, 

            but to love things heavenly; 

and even now, while we are placed among things that are passing away, 

            to hold fast to those that shall endure.  Amen.

 

 

The collect for today addresses 

                                    our immediate anxiety about current circumstances.

And yes, we have an abundance of current circumstances 

                        in the world at large and right here

                                                to raise the anxiety level even higher than it has been.

But this collect reminds us 

            that these are things that are passing away, transitory.

The collect calls attention to 

            the things that are passing away and those that shall endure – 

                        the temporal and the eternal.

When we set our attention on the things that are passing away,

            we are seeing things from a limited perspective

and when attention is draw to that which endures

            that limited perspective is expanded until we are seeing things 

                                                                                    from God’s perspective.

 

In part the reason why we come here may be just that thing –

            to be moved out of our limited perspective

                        and to catch the vision of the eternal,

            to have our awareness expanded 

                        and be brought into the Presence of God.

 

So let’s see how the readings for today can expand our awareness. 

 

I believe there is a good connection between the story from Exodus 

and the parable Jesus told about the owner of the vineyard and the laborers.

 

In Exodus the situation is this:

The Israelites had just escaped crushing slavery in Egypt.

They were on their way 

            off into the unknown 

            with a hope for a promised land flowing with milk and honey.

But where they were now was in the middle of a desert,

            a huge expanse of inhospitable geography that dwarfed their numbers,

            a threatening environment with no respite.  (Sound familiar?)

How did the Children of Israel react?  They complained.

            That word, complained, is used 7 times in this passage.

They weren’t thankful for being saved from bondage as slaves.

They weren’t even faithfully down on their knees 

                        asking the God, who had saved them once, 

                                                            to help them now in this time of need.

They were just complaining.

 

But, you know, it didn’t matter.

They were going to get fed.

That was the plan,

            for they were a chosen people, 

chosen to become a people who would be a light to the nations, 

            an example of God’s redemptive grace.

            an example to show what God could do.

The test was how they would respond to the current situation.

And their reactions showed their current spiritual condition,

            that is, a limited perspective concerned with things passing away.

But God’s grace would intervene.

 

Then we have the Parable of the owner of the vineyard:

As usual Jesus tells a story with a twist on the expected,

and this time he presents the Kingdom of Heaven 

            as a landowner who employs an economic policy 

                        that is entirely contrary to common sense 

                                                            and the economic system we know and live in.

 

Jesus messes with the economic values 

                                                                        and moral sensibility of human culture.

You heard me right.

Jesus messes with the economic values and moral sensibility of human culture.

It appears that Jesus has the owner of the vineyard 

                                    take advantage of the hard working laborers                                    and then reward those who contributed little.

There was no recognition of the great disparity in labor.

When we hear this parable we may say with the workers hired first,

            “It’s not fair!”

 

In the parable, who were those hired at the beginning of the day?

            the best workers:                        they were on time first thing in the morning,

                        they were those known to be able to work the hardest,

                                    to bring in the most bushels of grapes per hour,

                        those who would give an honest day’s work

                                    for an honest day’s wage.

But…

those hired at the end of the day were likely to be those who were known for

                        taking long coffee breaks

                        eating as many grapes as went into the baskets

                        those who were slow, harvested less per hour

                        and were late showing up for work in the morning

 

To pay the workers hired at 5 minutes before quitting time 

            the same as those hired at 8:00 AM

was taken as an insult to the quality and quantity of work of those hired first.

 

Our world is hard wired to the pragmatic way of looking at things that says

            it’s all about working to get paid what you’ve earned.

The least the owner of the vineyard should have done

                        if he was going to pay those hired last the same full day’s wage

the least he should have done

            would have been to give those hired first merit raises!

 

It’s not fair!

But this parable is not about the workers, but about grace.

This parable is very radical, 

            breaking cultural and social expectations and mores

                        not only in Jesus’ time 

                        but ours here just as much.

Jesus does not say that the Kingdom of Heaven is like the workers

            but like the owner of the vineyard.

 

The Kingdom of God has different values:

            it is inclusive.

            The last get the same as the first.

We think those who work more should get more.

But Jesus says everyone needs the daily wage, that is, their daily bread.

He says, give everybody a full day’s wage to meet their needs…

            Everyone has the same basic needs.

The landowner included them for that reason,

            not in return for their labor,

                        but out of compassion and generosity  

                                                and from his own apparently limitless abundance.

To cry, “No fair!” is to speak out of the limited perspective of things temporal.

 

It’s like God providing the manna and the quails 

            to all those complaining Israelites.

The compassion and generosity is not conditioned 

                        by the gratitude of the Children of Israel,

            and it is not conditioned by our limited perspective.

What is eternal is the compassion and generosity.

 

May we each be able to recognize the gift of daily bread,

            that which we think we have earned that provides for us, 

                                    that supplies our literal, physical needs,

AND may we also recognize 

            that which provides us with our very life breath 

                        day by day and hour by hour and minute by minute,

            that which sustains us body and spirit.

 

May we each be able to recognize 

            how we have been called by a compassionate Savior 

                        and baptized into the Kingdom of God, into the very Body of Christ.­

  

So here is where we can draw in the Epistle reading for today.

The Apostle Paul could be speaking directly to us 

            as much as to the faithful in Philippi. 

 

Live your life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ, (he writes) … 

            … standing firm in one spirit,

             striving side by side with one mind for the faith of the gospel, 

and … in no way intimidated by your opponents. 

 

I like this.

What Paul writes reminds us that we aren’t going it alone.

Stand firm in one spirit – all of you together, not alone, each individually, 

            but instead sharing one faith, one Lord, one baptism

                        as we say at the very beginning of the Baptismal liturgy.

Striving side by side, working together within the faith community

            because despite all of our different opinions, like and dislikes,

                        ideas, desires, concerns,

the Gospel we claim to hold faith in

            is where we can be of one spirit, one mind.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is one of abundant, unmerited grace and love

            that shreds our enculturated view of earned merit.

 

Think about this:  Do we really want to get what we deserve?

 

All around us the voices of the culture we live in say things like,

            I earned this.  It’s my right.  Their ideas are crazy.

            THEY are going to ruin it for me and my own kind.

            It’s them or us.              “It’s not fair.”            

 

But the economy of the Kingdom of Heaven does not distinguish them and us,

            and instead pours out abundance to the undeserving

                        and grace to the hardest of hearts

            to melt us all into the love that unifies us in the things that are eternal.

There IS a wideness in God’s mercy.

 

“Grant us, Lord, not to be anxious about earthly things, 

            but to hold fast to those that shall endure…”

 Being a born and bred Episcopalian, 

I was confirmed when I was 12 years old.

This was at St. David’s Episcopal Church 

in the then Missionary District of Spokane.

The bishop who confirmed me was Russell S. Hubbard, 

whom I remembered as a giant of a man 

with huge hands that pressed down on my head 

with all the weight and solemnity of the occasion.

I was so impressed by this man as a child 

that I actually listened to and remembered his sermons.

 

One sermon of his that I remembered so well was about the Lord’s Prayer.  

The bishop varied his usual calm, even tones 

to a rise of inflection and stronger volume to tell us, 

“This prayer is the most damning prayer you can pray, 

when you say, ‘Forgive us our trespasses 

as we forgive those who trespass against us.’ 

You are asking God not to forgive you unless you also forgive others.”

 

Thus I learned from early years that forgiveness 

was very important and very central in living out the Faith.

 

Now let me share something with you about the Greek word for forgiveness.

John 11:44  When Jesus called Lazarus to come out of the tomb, 

he then said to those who were there witnessing this 

to loose him and let him go.  

The word in Greek for “let him go” 

is the same word that is commonly used throughout the entire NT 

for the verb to forgive.

In the Greek of the New Testament 

to forgive is to send forth, with the idea of setting free.

Sins are forgiven a person, that is, the sins are sent away, 

so that the person is no longer bound by them.

Someone who is forgiven 

is someone who has had their sins taken from them 

and tossed away, sent away.

The person is liberated.

 

Remember the story of the paralyzed man 

            who was brought to Jesus by his four friends

             who stopped at nothing to get him in front of Jesus?

 

Jesus said to the man, “Your sins are forgiven.”

And the religious experts who were with him there got in a twit 

because Jesus had just pushed their hot buttons.

And he did it on purpose, of course.

Jesus healed the man of his paralysis by saying, 

“Your sins that are binding you are sent away, forgiven.”

And the man, no longer paralyzed by his sins, walked.

 

In today’s Gospel lesson, Peter approaches Jesus with a serious question.

“If another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive?”

            Now, how did the church get into this passage?

            This is the gospel; the time setting is before the church was formed.

Friends, it doesn’t say that in the Greek.

            It is much more specific.

It reads: “If my brother sins against me, how often should I forgive?”

            Hmmm – Andrew has been given his brother Peter some grief.

                        Quite common among siblings, don’t you know.

But we also must remember that around Jesus we are all brothers and sisters.

            We are all family – every single one of us, and not just here in this place.

                        ALL humankind really.

 

Well, how long does Peter have to put up with being sinned against by another?

            Seven times?            How about 77 times, Jesus replies.

He tells Peter 

that he is not to be stingy in how many times he sends away sin.

 

Jesus modeled forgiveness VERY powerfully in healing the paralyzed man,

             and then he instructed his disciples to do this also, 

to set others free from what binds them in their lives.

 

But Peter sees a problem with this.

What if someone thinks they are getting away with something 

and then takes advantage of this free forgiveness 

and just keeps on transgressing, 

especially if it is personally directed at the same person.

It was as though Peter was saying, 

“Jesus, do you want them to think that we’re dumb or weak or doormats?!  

Isn’t there a reasonable limit?!”

 

Peter was expressing a very real issue for the people of that time and culture, 

an issue which is still very much alive today.

 

So Jesus needs to show Peter, and all of us, 

that there is another perspective other than our usual world view 

that reframes the issue entirely differently.

 

So he tells a Kingdom of Heaven story about a bond servant/a slave

who somehow managed to accrue a debt in the millions of dollars,

            far more than the total value of his lifetime work productivity

                                                many times over.

When this servant gets down on his knees and begs for mercy, 

the king (whom the Kingdom of Heaven is like in this parable) 

is moved deeply with pity 

and lavishly forgives the whole debt, 

he sets him free from the debt, he casts out the debt.

 

So this fellow has a brand new lease on life, a whole new start.

And what does he do?

He immediately looks up someone who owes him the equivalent 

of four months wages for a common laborer, 

not unlike the amount of credit card debt that many folks have,

a significant amount but nothing like what he had owed.

But he just can’t let that amount go, 

after all he himself is now starting over from scratch.  

He has his wife and kids to provide for. 

He wants to get on with his life.

            So he insists that this colleague of his pay up – now.

 

This time there is not the same compassion and valuing of his coworker

            that had been shown to him.

First he grabbed him by the neck, 

                        his hands around his windpipe cutting off vital air, 

            and then throws him into debtors prison.

That’s how much he values his coworker;

            he only sees him as 100 denarii.

That is all he is worth to him.

 

He is totally disconnected from the act of mercy shown to him, 

            but those around him can see clearly the blatant disconnection, 

and they are so scandalized by his action that they go tell the king.

 

And this man is then held accountable for his actions.

It was not his debt, but his own lack of mercy  

that brought him to a dismal end.

 

What Jesus is saying to Peter 

is that we may not realize just how much mercy we are shown by God, 

how much grace we live by.  

There is abundance of this mercy, 

and we are disconnected from the realization of it.  

 

To withhold mercy and forgiveness 

then shows that we are blind to what we ourselves have received,

             and this places us in a very shaky position spiritually.

We have got to forgive!

 

In the parable the king goes ballistic when he is told what happened.

The King commands that he be 

            “handed … over to be tortured until he would pay his entire debt.”

But remember how this parable started?

            The Kingdom of Heaven is like a king 

                                                who wished to settle accounts with his slaves.

 

And Jesus concludes, “So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of you,             if you do not forgive your brother or sister from your heart."

 

Do this sound like a threat to you?

Then think of it in terms of a consequence.

But the point is this:

            The wickedness of the unjust bond servant

                        was in separating himself from the community 

                        and missing entirely the importance of the brother, the sister.

 

If you do not forgive, if you do not take away the debt owed you,

            you will be put into a state of suffering, like being tortured.

And then when you are feeling so bad 

                                    that you feel as though you are being torn apart, 

            then God will show you that there is no separation with God, 

                        no possible separation from others, 

            and God will show compassion.            That is how mercy works.

The brother or sister cannot be made an object,

            cannot be quantified with a price, a monetary value.

 

And the forgiveness, the taking away of the debt, must be from the heart,

            Jesus says.

God who knows the thoughts of our hearts, as the Collect for Purity states,

            is always looking at the heart and its struggles.

                        Is the heart clean and open?            Or is it choked and cramped?            

For always we can count on this:

            We are worth more to God than the value of our debt.

            We are worth more to God than the value of our debt.

 

Knowing that and remembering last week’s Gospel, 

            what is the value to us of the one who sins against us?

Forgiving frees you, and it also frees the one forgiven.

            It opens the way for you both to be brought back into communion, 

                                                                                                into community.

And so, dear people, 

be mindful of the incredible abundance of mercy shown to you.

And if today in this place, the shoe fits,

                                                put it on.

You may never have heard this before

 It would be rather difficult to avoid talking this morning about today’s Gospel.

It is one of those that demand paying attention to, 

and this Gospel in particular 

is one that has been notoriously abused in history.

 

This abuse, this misuse and misreading of the text 

happens because it is taken out of context.

Taken out of the setting of this chapter and this Gospel, 

withdrawn from the thematic development 

                  of the whole book of Matthew,                                                      

and separated from the witness of the ministry and teaching of Jesus, 

the intention and purpose of this text 

has been turned around to the opposite meaning.

It has been perverted.

It has been used as a weapon for dividing the Church of Christ.

It has been used as a justification for exclusion and for excommunication.

Its application has been used to sunder the Kingdom of Heaven.

 

If this sounds like I am on a rant, it’s because I am.

I want no mistake in understanding  

that here is a passage of scripture 

that has been used to bring damage rather than reconciliation.

 

So this morning I plan to put this passage back into its context 

and show you that it means just the opposite of what some have said.

…Just the opposite…

Let’s look at Matthew 18, the whole chapter.

 

The chapter begins with a discussion about 

who is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven.

 

And the answer Jesus gives 

is to take a child and put the child in the midst of them and say,

          “Unless you become like a child, 

you will by no means enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”

 

The reality of the Kingdom of Heaven is described 

in terms of relationship with children and their openness of heart.

Jesus then goes on with a long teaching 

about what can get in the way of this openness of heart, the traps.

His examples are extreme:

If your hand, representing power, 

         is a trap to being open to the Kingdom, 

         cut it off.

If you eye, representing envy, 

         is a trap to divert you from the reality of the Kingdom, 

         pluck it out.

 

And above all, those who are little in the faith, 

who are vulnerable, 

         are the very ones God seems to have the most investment in protecting, 

for Jesus says that their angels, messengers, 

always behold the face of God;

                           they always have an audience with God.

 

Then he tells the parable of the man having a hundred sheep 

and loses one of them.

Jesus says that he leaves the 99 on the hills

and goes in search of the one that went astray.

Jesus is saying that the lost sheep is so important 

that the other 99 are left at risk, until this one is found!

The concluding verse, the one just before today’s reading begins, is this:

          “Thus it is not the will of your Father in heaven 

that one of these little ones should perish.”

 

That is the context for today’s Gospel.

 

Now, if your brother (or sister), a little one in the faith, sins…

                  And it doesn’t say, “sins against you.”

         …first go speak to that person alone.

Just a nice personal conversation 

to help bring the stray back to the paths of life.

If they don’t get it, don’t quit there; 

bring one or two others into the conversation.

This little one is too important to let him wander off, keep going astray.

Others with you can help clarify the communication.

If he still hears amiss (that’s what the Greek verb here means),

if he still fails to listen 

or disregards the words shared with him, 

then get everybody involved, the whole congregation.

And if even with all these voices pointing clearly to the way, 

he still hears amiss, doesn’t get it, 

then he is like the gentile and the tax-collector.

 

Well, let’s look at Jesus’ relationship 

to tax-collectors, sinners and even gentile foreigners/outsiders.

What did he do?  

He ate with them!  

He healed them!  

He called them to follow him!  

Matthew, remember! the one who recorded this Gospel.

 

So what is the teaching of Jesus according to his example 

for our relationship with sinners and outsiders such as these? 

The greatest love and service of ministry.

 

Therefore those who are being considered as outsiders/Gentiles 

and as tax-collectors/sinners 

are those whom we are to go after 

until they are found 

and brought back within the fold of the Good Shepherd.

 

It only takes two or three 

coming together in harmony with the Spirit of God, 

asking in the will of the Father, 

for it to be done.

 

What if a whole congregation were of like mind in the Spirit?

Then truly we might know what it would be like 

to be agents of binding up 

what has already been bound up in heaven 

and to loose 

what has already been set loose in the will of the Father.

For that is what this part of the reading means –

         that we are to reflect and cooperate in our actions 

                           with what is already the will of the Father in heaven.

 

Is this a different way of reading this passage 

than you may have been familiar with?

 

In case you need anything more to show that this way of reading the text

                   is consistent with the context, 

look at the next verse following the selection for today.

It happens to be the first verse of next Sunday’s Gospel.

 

Peter listens to all this about going the extra mile for the lost sheep, 

and says to Jesus, 

“Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him?”

Isn’t there a limit; do I just keep going on forgiving forever?

 

 

So you see, this is a passage about going to all means and lengths 

to keep inclusion in the household of faith.

This is the way of the Kingdom of God.

This is the reality of living out life in Christ.

This is the context for Paul too in the Epistle reading for today.

 

He writes:

“The commandments, 

‘You shall not commit adultery; 

you shall not murder; 

you shall not steal; 

you shall not covet’; 

and any other commandment, 

are summed up in this word, 

‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’  

Love does no wrong to a neighbor; 

therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.”

 

This is the way of love, 

the way of God who is love, Immeasurable Love.

This is the love that does not separate, does not divide,

but that brings together in union 

hearts who have found their identity in Christ.

 

Is this a message we hear in this congregation today?

         in this town, in this state, in this nation? in the world?

 

No, but we need to hear this message, now more than ever.

         We have been scattered and separated enough just by COVID

                  let alone by our own ideological divides that fuel divisions.

 

This is not a matter of trying to convince others about orthodoxy of belief,

          to convince others to believe right doctrines.

 

 

This is a matter of giving witness to our own faith with sufficient clarity 

so that others can come to a realization 

about their own life dilemmas 

where they are entrapped, 

blindsided by their own going astray.

 

We are all being called to the ministry of reconciliation by this Gospel today,

          challenged to address a multitude of dilemmas and problems 

that people struggle with.

And, of course, our role is not to solve their problems, 

but to share the light we have experienced 

in our trust relationship with Jesus, 

so that hopefully they too will discover for themselves 

the transforming grace of God.

 

The ministry of reconciliation – 

Heaven knows the world needs it.

With all the media attention given to deep divisions within the nation,

                  law and order versus racial justice

                  personal “rights” versus the common good 

there is a profound need in the world 

for a word that can unite peoples in reconciling love 

rather than further divide, isolate and separate.

 

When all else fails, the Gospel proclaims, 

treat them as a foreigner and tax-collecting sinner.

Good heavens, and just how do we treat the foreigners among us?

Where is the reconciliation work going on in the prison systems

                                             where “sinners” are warehoused ?

Who really are the lost sheep?

         Maybe it’s me.                  Maybe it’s you.

 

If not, I want to be treated like Jesus treated Matthew

                           and the alien gentile foreigners:

         not deported or excommunicated 

                                                               but sought by the love of God.