October 26, 2014 – Matthew 22:34-46
Matthew 22:34-46
You are So Very Loved
20th Sunday after Pentecost [Lectionary 30] – October 26, 2014
Reformation Sunday
First Lutheran Church – Winnipeg, MB
I’ve been following the Winnipeg Jets since they returned to Winnipeg a few years ago.
And so when I’m driving around in my car I often listen to TSN Sports Radio to get the latest.
I was listening on Wednesday as the tragic events in Ottawa began to unfold.
These kind of tragic events put things in perspective, right?
The guys on the radio were fully aware of this.
Here they are, getting paid to talk about sports –
but sports seem pretty insignificant and trivial when a tragedy of this magnitude strikes.
And yet, that is what they are paid to do.
You could feel their discomfort as they struggled to continue to talk about sports as
news about this tragedy continued to trickle in.
The next day, having been able to sleep on it and consider it,
Troy Westwood and Matt Libel on the The Big Show continued to work through this,
and the place of sports in life, in the midst of life’s difficulties.
And then the theologians of The Big Show came up with this:
Sports is a part of life. And life is about having fun looking after each other.
I found it fascinating that a former professional athlete was able to make the connection
between sports, having fun, and looking after each other.
I started to think about that.
On Wednesday we had Food Bank and Community Meal.
Diane Stadnyk and Nancy Steiman had made a boatload of chilli for the for the people to enjoy.
And I think they had fun doing it and I think Melinda and Diane had fun serving it.
Melody and Charlie and Doug and Sean and the others looked after the people and
I think they had fun doing it.
Okay: maybe fun is not the exact right word.
But there something, maybe a deep joy, in this kind of selfless service.
In this particular kind of taking care of each other, of loving your neighbour.
For myself, I both laughed and cried on Wednesday at Food Bank and Community Meal.
It is one of my favourite things to do in my work as a pastor.
It is a lot of work – and for those making and serving food and
serving groceries it is a lot of work.
But it is very meaningful work – and there is a deep kind of joy in it.
It is fun looking after each other, even if it is not easy.
Life is indeed about the joy of looking after each other.
As I thought about what they said on the Big Show, I thought: Right.
Life is not about destroying one another.
Life is not about hurting one another, as one seemingly hurt and lonely man hurt another
who was doing his job on Parliament Hill.
Life is about the joy of looking after one another.
Love God. Love your neighbour, says Jesus.
The Pharisees come to Jesus to test him, we read.
And usually we understand that to mean they have ill intent.
But just like I said a few weeks ago when they questioned his authority,
I think they also genuinely want to know by what authority Jesus is saying and
doing the things he is saying and doing.
You’d want to know, right?
Jesus is still in the Temple – it’s just the day after he has overturned the money changers’ tables.
If someone came into our church building and overturned our retro Formica tables where
our counters count the offering, you’d want to know where the authority for doing that is!
And Jesus has continued to call into question the leadership of the scribes and the Pharisees and
the Sadducees through his teaching and especially his scathing parables.
And they still want to know by what authority he is doing these things.
Naturally they want to know!
So today’s question, Which commandment is the greatest, is a natural one.
Like: does Jesus know his stuff?
Does he really have the qualifications to say the things he is saying and
do the things he is doing?
How can he say and do these things in the very Temple of God?
Doesn’t he love God? It seems sacrilegious!
They ask him a question everyone knows the answer to.
Yes: there are 615 commandments in the Old Testament,
but everyone knows what the most important one is.
It’d be like asking you, “What happened on Easter Sunday?”
Everyone knows this!
So the question, I think, really is this: If you know you’re supposed to love God,
How can you say and do these things right in the Temple of God?
Well, Jesus gives the right answer of course: the first and most important command is:
Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your mind.
And then he adds a twist.
Probably most rabbis would say that that command is the most important.
And that the second most important commandment is love your neighbour as yourself.
But Jesus doesn’t exactly say that.
He equates loving God with loving one’s neighbour.
He doesn’t really say, a second is like it.
What he says literally is, “The second commandment is exactly the same as it.”
There is no difference in Jesus’ mind between loving God and loving your neighbour.
You can’t do one without doing the other.
The writer of First John will eventually think deeply about this saying of Jesus, right?
“You cannot love God and hate your brother or sister. Those who say, “I love God” and hate their brothers and sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen simply cannot love God whom they have not seen.” (I John 4:20)
Simply stated, we love God by loving our neighbour.
Jesus thought the religious leaders of his day had forgotten about the well being of
A ll God’s children, particularly the poor and vulnerable.
We love God by taking care of each other, Jesus is saying.
That is not always easy.
But there is a deep kind of joy in it because it is bound up with loving God.
There is a deep kind of joy in it because
loving God by loving our neighbour is what we’re made for.
It’s what we’re designed for.
We are celebrating the Reformation this morning.
And one of the things we are thankful for is that Martin Luther drew our attention back to this
so very clearly.
What he saw in the church of his day was a lot of people trying to love God while
neglecting the very real needs of their neighbours.
A large part of Luther’s reforming of the church was simply to turn people’s gaze from
the God up in heaven to the Christ suffering in with and under their neighbour.
God’s grace means you don’t have to get into God’s good books, said Luther.
You don’t need to worry about pleasing God.
Sure, you’re less than perfect: but God loves you as a free gift, unconditionally and
God will always love you.
You are so loved by a God whose love we have difficulty imagining.
But you are loved nevertheless.
So don’t worry about trying to please God: God loves you just as you are.
God forgives you your sins – you are right with God, right now!
Don’t worry about your relationship with God: it is secure in Christ.
Instead, look to the needs of your neighbour whose sufferings Jesus entered into –
and into whose sufferings Jesus continues to enter into.
God doesn’t need your good works, Luther famously said, but your neighbour does.
You don’t need your neighbour to do good works for so you can get into heaven.
Jesus has already secured a place for you there.
Love your neighbour because your neighbour needs loving.
Don’t think what you’ll get out of it – when you are filled with the love of God who
loves you unconditionally day in and day out you will spontaneously and
naturally love your neighbour because in Christ you have become a
new kind of person.
You will love naturally and spontaneously the way a parent runs to help a hurting child
who has fallen from their bike – you won’t think about it. You’ll just do it.
Because it needs to be done – and you will find a deep deep kind of joy in doing so.
It is natural for us to ask in light of the tragic events of this week where God was in
the midst of them.
Where is a loving God in all of that?
And it might be easy to say that God was completely absent.
Only it’s not.
As Corporal Nathan Cirillo lay dying on Parliament Hill, many people came to his aid.
And they tried to save his life,
despite the possibility of there being a continuing danger to themselves.
That sounds like the presence of God to me.
And when it became clear that he was slipping from life, a lawyer named Barbara Winters,
who happened to be walking past as events unfolded, rushed over.
Since she had been a medic in the Canadian Forces Naval Reserve for 17 years,
she, along with the others, offered what medical aid she could.
Sensing he could hear her, she bent near his head, and recited the Lord’s Prayer.
And then as he stopped breathing, she repeated to him, You are loved. You are so loved.
The last thing Nathan Cirillo heard in this life was the good news. You are so loved.
Because someone cared enough to share that good news with him.
Because someone didn’t look up, but looked down in order to love their neighbour in need.
Because someone loved God, by loving their neighbour.
Because someone was secure enough in the love of God for themselves,
they were able to spontaneously run to the aid of a neighbour despite the danger.
And that someone made God present – right where we would expect the surprising God
made most clear to us in Jesus on the cross to be:
not removed from suffering, but right in its midst, bringing good news.
You are loved. You are so loved.
This is the good news.
It is simple. It is shocking. It is life changing. But it is true: you are so loved.
You are so loved.
Your neighbour is so loved.
Your enemies are so loved.
This whole world is so loved by a God who is pursuing it in love day in and day out.
And who wants to be in pursuit of it in love through you. Through us.
You are so loved. We are so loved.
So let us love this God who loves us by loving our neighbour.
They are the same thing. We cannot love God without loving our neighbour.
Let us love the way we are loved.
We are not loved because we are perfect.
We are loved despite our imperfections that we might more lovely be.
We do not love our neighbours because they are perfect.
We love because we are loved, we forgive because we have been forgiven,
we heal because we have been healed – we love our neighbour because
it is the only way to love a God who has loved us with heart and mind and body and soul.
You are so loved. So let us love.
And find the deep kind of joy there is in taking care of each other.
So together let us say, “Amen.”
Pastor Michael Kurtz
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