One Pure and Sacred Space

Scripture: Matthew 10:8

At the beginning of the tenth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus gathers his twelve disciples around him, commissions them in their work, and prepares them to go out into the world on their own. He knows that his time with them will end more quickly than they can understand and He wants them to be ready.

Chapter 10 deserves close and repeated reading. It contains lots of lessons for us about how to launch those we love--our children, our students, those we train and mentor--out into the next stages of their lives. For example, I am always struck by the phrase "Be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves," which I think beautifully captures our hope that those we send forth will be savvy enough to negotiate the challenges of life without losing their sense of wonder, their optimism, their simple faith in the force of goodness that moves through the universe with an ultimately irresistible persistence.

In my most recent reading of this passage, though, I found myself hovering over this instruction: "You received without payment; give without payment."

Of course, the gospels call upon us to bring the ethic of our faith into every dimension of our life: our family connections; our relationships with our friends and neighbors; our work. In many of those situations, though, we are compensated for our efforts. Sure, the form of compensation varies--monetary compensation in our employment, the compensation of returned love and service from those with whom we are close, and so on. Still, in most of these situations we give, and we receive, and we are disappointed when it doesn't work that way.

In this passage, though, I believe that Jesus calls us to think differently, to move beyond the give-and-take quid-pro-quo you-scratch-my-back-and-I'll-scratch-yours orientation that occupies much of our existence. I do not think that he summons us into a merry participation in unjust relationships where we succumb to unfair employers and abusive spouses and the like--in my theology, Jesus never demands that we become doormats; He loves us too much for that. But I do believe that He wants us to recognize the importance of some form of service that carries with it no expectation of getting anything in return.

Here is one possible way to engage with this idea in the hope of moving it from an abstraction to a practice. Perhaps we should, each of us, have in our life at least one pure and sacred space where we give knowing confidently that we will get nothing back--and graciously but diligently declining anything that is offered.

Over the last few years, I have experimented with this a bit. I would tell you more about my particular experiment but that might violate the deal I have with the One who commissioned me. My pure and sacred spaces are between the two of us, and that is exactly how it must remain for them to retain their identity.

So I would invite you to look around on this good day and ask yourself some questions. Do you have such spaces in your life? Do you need to create one--or create more of them? Is there someone you are launching off into the world who might benefit from hearing this message:

"Whatever you do, have at least one pure and sacred space in your life where you give without payment. This is how you express your thanks for all you have received without paying. In the end, it may prove to be the thing that redeems you, no matter what else happens in your ragged and messy life."

So Jesus thought.

So the disciples discovered.

So the world may be changed

one pure and sacred space at a time.

Amen. 

Cast Out

Scripture: Matthew 8

The end of Chapter 8 of the Gospel of Matthew brings us a surreal and disquieting story.

In his travels, Jesus encounters two individuals who are possessed by demons. They are terrifying and fearsome creatures, so daunting that anyone who meets up with them turns back. But Jesus does not retreat when they confront him. Instead, He casts their demons out, sending them into a nearby herd of swine. The possessed swine rush down a steep bank into the sea, where they perish.

Just when you think this story could not get much stranger, it does. The swineherds who had been tending the flock rush into town and tell the story of the miracle Jesus performed. The entire population of the town gathers and goes out to meet Jesus. Do they praise him? Worship him? Celebrate his victory over evil? Quite the opposite: "and when they saw him, they begged him to leave the neighborhood."

This statement is so unexpected, so at odds with the narrative that comes before it, that I suspect many people read past it without noticing the disconnection, in the way we sometimes incorrectly finish someone else's sentence based on what we wrongly anticipate they are about to say. To the extent readers do notice the abrupt shift, many of them may think that it signals nothing more than that the people from this town were a singularly clueless and ungrateful bunch.

Perhaps that is the intended punchline: "Clueless and Ungrateful People Reject Jesus, Again."

But I don't think so.

It is risky to make too much of the organization of the chapters within the gospels. Still, it seems to me significant that Chapter 8 is overwhelmingly about one common theme: healing.

The first four verses describe how Jesus healed a leper--an utterly powerless and alienated outsider under the norms of his society.

The next nine verses offer a pointed contrast, describing how He healed the beloved servant of a centurion, a member of one of that society's most powerful and influential classes.

The next two verses briefly note how He healed someone connected with his inner circle--a relative of Peter's.

And, again offering a marked contrast, the sixteenth verse observes that He healed a collection of complete strangers. Indeed, it says that He "cured all who were sick" and who came to him.

So I think the first thing to understand about the story of the demons is that it is really a story about healing. And this means that it is fundamentally a story about love and compassion.

This is clear from another detail in the story that we may miss: the possessed individuals ask Jesus to cast their demons into the swine--indeed, they beg him to do so. Granted, the story may feel different to us because it is set up as a battle between Jesus and the forces of evil. But we shouldn't miss the parallel with the other healing stories: the leper asks Jesus to heal him; the centurion asks Jesus to save his servant. In other words, this is a story about how Jesus, out of his limitless care for others and infinite grace, responded to a plea for help.

And this brings us to a second point. The demons are not simply overcome and cast out by divine power. They are conquered by a specific kind of power, the power that comes not from vengeance or wrath or retribution but from love and compassion. Even for these people, the cursed of the earth, Love shows up. Love battles for them. And Love prevails.

Now, what does this say about the disaffected townspeople who want Jesus out of their midst? Well, it could say a number of different things. One obvious possibility--the one I entertained earlier--is that these folks were just another example of the clueless and ungrateful people who we run across in the gospels with unnerving frequency.

But I would like you to consider another possibility. What if they did understand? What if they got it? What if they grasped the overarching and unrelenting Truth that the most powerful force in the universe did not call them to conquest and victory and triumphalism but to quiet courage and empathy and healing--all in the name and through the upending offices of the living God?

Think about how an honest engagement with this reality would challenge them, would demand new things of them, would throw them in unanticipated directions. Think about how it would require them to make deep and lasting changes in their lives.

Think about how it would scare the hell out of them.

And, if you can imagine all these things, then you can imagine why they would have encouraged Jesus to hit the road.

These aren't bad people I'm describing. At the risk of a flagrant anachronism, I'm imagining decent men and women who just want to go back to their living rooms, their television sets, their laptops, their minor disciplines of brushing their teeth and taking a bit of exercise, their children, their favorite restaurant, their safe corners in a perilous world.

These are not clueless and ungrateful people whom we should feel free to judge.

These are our friends

our families

our neighbors

ourselves.

You see, I do not think that the reaction of the townspeople detours us from the central point of this story. I think that it is the central point of this story. I think that it is intended to draw us into some hard questioning of our own choices--or, more pointedly, of the things we do not choose.

And so we must ask ourselves:

What does the Love look like that would compel to live differently--radically differently?

Where have we already met it?

When will we stop sending it away?

Amen.

The Fault in Ourselves

Scripture: Matthew 7:1-5

We have made Jesus into such a solemn figure that we can miss the edgy humor in some of the things He says. Consider the image He gives us in this passage: we judge others because of the speck in their eye, despite the log we have in our own.

People sometimes paraphrase this passage as saying that we should not judge others for the faults we have ourselves, but of course that does not quite capture it. This passage suggests that our fault may be greater: hence the contrast between the "speck" in the eye of the other and the "log" in our own. The passage also hints at our obstinacy in failing to recognize our own weaknesses. After all, it takes a serious gift for denial to look past a log sitting in the middle of your eye. But, of course, we do just that, and not infrequently.

Because of this human proclivity, Jesus wisely wants us out of the business of judging. "Do not judge," He declares with a directness and simplicity that is hard to ignore. We have nevertheless ignored it for a couple thousand years, merrily condemning people for conduct of which we disapprove but about which Jesus said little or nothing. Along the way, we have blissfully disregarded the straightforward command He gives us at the beginning of this chapter: Do. Not. Judge.

Where we have not ignored the command altogether we have softened it beyond recognition. Take, for example, the current trend that advances "tolerance" as a virtue. Now, tolerance may be a good state of mind--or at least better than some of the alternatives. But, for present purposes, what matters to me is that you recognize that "Do not judge" and "Be tolerant" are not the same thing. Compared to the strong medicine of the former, the latter is a diluted tonic.

"Tolerate" comes from a Latin word meaning "to bear or endure." By the fifteenth century, it had firmly taken on an association with pain, suffering, and discomfort. We retain that association today. A friend of mine who had broken a limb in a particularly nasty way said to the physical therapist who would be working with her after surgery: "I have a high pain tolerance." "Good," the therapist replied. "You're going to need it."

When we talk about "tolerating" something we therefore imply that we find it hurtful, tough, difficult, unpleasant. In other words, we suggest that we have judged it and have assessed it negatively. We will put up with it. But, in an ideal world, we would have nothing to do with it.

As in all normative discourse, it is risky to draw overly broad conclusions about the place of tolerance in our thinking. Sometimes tolerance is a terrible idea, as when a wife tolerates a physically abusive husband. Sometimes it has a sense of charity to it, as when we tolerate the screaming infant in the restaurant. Is tolerance a good thing or a bad thing? I don't know; tell me more and we'll try to figure it out.

It seems safe to say, though, that in most if not all cases the road to tolerance passes through the territory of judgment--adverse judgment. And, in the end, it drops us at a place in which disengagement is the goal. "I don't like it. I don't approve of it. But I will endure it for as long as I must."  

"Do not judge" anticipates a different dynamic altogether. Here, the territory of judgment is explicitly off limits. And, in most instances, our only hope of refraining from judgment lies in engagement. This means engagement with the other: learning more, working to empathize, trying to understand, imagining what life is like in their skin. And it means engagement with ourselves: recognizing our own frailties and imperfections, owning our own weaknesses, staring dead ahead into the log in our own eye.

"Do not judge" is therefore not an invitation into passivity. To the contrary, it comes to us in a voice we might call the "active normative": in order not to do this thing, we will have to do lots of other things instead. If it sounds like a great deal of work, well, sometimes it is. But perhaps we will find some additional motivation in understanding that the command also applies to the person who would judge us.

Despite all of this, in the course and complications of our existence we will encounter circumstances where we will find ourselves judging someone else. Indeed, depending on the other person's conduct, we may think this not just defensible but irresistible and justifiable. Jesus does not ignore this reality. Instead, he gives us an equally straightforward command to deal with those circumstances: now, forgive them.

This command comes to us in the "active normative" voice as well. It, too, requires a lot of work. But Jesus understood that our only chance at breaking the cycle of insanity and violence and escalation and poisonous rhetoric that drives the world lies finally in our slowness to judge and our quickness to forgive.

"If we have no peace," Mother Theresa said, "it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other." Yes. And, in our forgetfulness, we judge with thunderous severity and forgive with tectonic slowness. So has it always been.

Whether it must always be this way is up to us. All of us. Each of us.

Me.

You.

Amen.