Sermon for 5/30/10: Favorite Passages Summer Worship Series
Luke 6:17-36 (NRSV)
"Speak the Truth, Even if Your Voice Shakes."
"Speak the Truth, Even if Your Voice Shakes."
As part of Craig's Sabbatical, two weeks ago we attended the Festival of Homiletics in Nashville, Tennessee for 5 days. I'm sure many of you have questions--starting with "What is a Festival of Huh?" Homiletics is the art of preaching, and this was 5 PACKED days of worship, preaching, lectures, and concerts with preaching at the core. It was a chance to spend a week with 1500+ preachers from varying denominations around the world. The best way I can describe it was like Camp at Laurel Ridge with 1500 of your closest strangers-turned-friends. It was exhausting and exhilarating, all at the same time. It was a chance for us to hear people speak that we read, and to study, laugh, and celebrate "This Odd and Wondrous Calling", as Rev. Lillian Daniels calls it, that is Preaching.[1] She was one of many I enjoyed hearing!
On our first evening, we experienced opening worship and a sermon by Bishop Vashti McKenzie, the first female bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Between worship and her sermon, I have told many that the conference was worth attending just for Monday night, and everything else was icing on the cake. I was inspired, uplifted, exhilarated, and kicked-in-the hind-quarters, so to speak. And as I've thought about it, isn't that what worship is supposed to be about--Giving God our praise and glory, while being inspired for mission and ministry, and allowing God to slap us upside the head when we need it. That's not the fun part for sure, but I know I need it every once in a while for God to get my attention and help me to see the way I am living and understanding God's call is not QUITE the way God intends.
During Bishop McKenzie's sermon, an image was projected on the screen behind her of a house, looking run down with white vinyl siding, and on it was spray-painted the words, "Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes." [2] It reminded me of the images of the homes after Katrina that had messages on the sides of them, either from the residents trying to get help, or the search crews confirming the house had been checked. "Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes." That image has stuck with me because I believe it drills down into a part of us as humans that rings tough but true. Speak the truth, our truth, God's truth, and don't let a little crack or waver or shake in our voice stop us... Moses and the prophets lived this. John the Baptizer lived this.
And we see this morning in our Gospel lesson from Luke that Jesus lived this too. This well-known and favorite passage from Luke is often referred to as the Sermon on the Plain. Jesus goes down off the mountain and stood on level ground to preach to the disciples as the crowd that gathered around listened on. It's more famous counterpart, the Sermon on the Mount from Matthew, with the longer list of Beatitudes we will look at next week. But for this week, someone requested this passage, so let's take a look, even if our voice shakes.
This sermon occurs soon after Jesus calls the first disciples and begins his ministry. The themes laid out in this sermon continue throughout the Gospel and serve as a summary for much of the teaching Jesus does through parables and stories that will come later in Luke. He is sharing with his new disciples what the Kingdom of God looks like to help empower them for the mission and ministry to which he has just called them. Perhaps we are overhearing Jesus' Discipleship Boot Camp, if you will.
Sometimes I find it helpful to take a passage that is so familiar that I don't often read it with the same power that it once had because of the familiarity. Let's take a moment to listen to another translation, from The Message, and see what we hear. Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes.
Luke 6:27-36 [3]"To you who are ready for the truth, I say this: Love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer for that person. If someone slaps you in the face, stand there and take it. If someone grabs your shirt, giftwrap your best coat and make a present of it. If someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life. No more tit-for-tat stuff. Live generously.
"Here is a simple rule of thumb for behavior: Ask yourself what you want people to do for you; then grab the initiative and do it for them! If you only love the lovable, do you expect a pat on the back? Run-of-the-mill sinners do that. If you only help those who help you, do you expect a medal? Garden-variety sinners do that. If you only give for what you hope to get out of it, do you think that's charity? The stingiest of pawnbrokers does that.
"I tell you, love your enemies. Help and give without expecting a return. You'll never—I promise—regret it. Live out this God-created identity the way our Father lives toward us, generously and graciously, even when we're at our worst. Our Father is kind; you be kind."
Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes.
I hear these words and imagine the disciples gathered around their teacher on this meadow on the outskirts of town. Maybe the wind is blowing and the grass of the field gently sways as they listen. Maybe the crowd has been following them from down the mountain, or maybe they trickle in as they get word the great teacher is in the area. Sick, lame, scaly, bleeding, mentally ill, poor, homeless--the text tells us the crowd came seeking healing from whatever ailed them. (vs. 18-19) It was probably a large gathering of the folks no one wanted to be around, which is why they came in the first place--seeking healing from their brokenness to be restored to their communities.
Perhaps then it happens...the disciples are listening intently, and Jesus' voice shakes -- maybe from the strain of a less than adequate sound system for such a large space -- or maybe from the difficulty of the words he is speaking. But his voice quivers just a bit, and the next thing they hear is, "Love your enemies." No, maybe we heard him wrong. Surely he wouldn't ask us to do that. We have given up everything to follow him and already have made some enemies by following this teacher. Surely he wouldn't ask us to LOVE them. So, they keep listening. "Bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you." We've gotten abuse already, and we've only been disciples for a few weeks. Ignore our abuse, maybe. But pray for them. Come on' Jesus. Get real. And then, and "Oh. There it is again..." Love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return."
I imagine one disciple leans over to the next and whispers, "Do you think he really means that "love your enemies, pray for those who abuse you stuff"? He's said it twice now. The first time I though it couldn't be true, but then he said it again. Could God really want us to be kind and merciful--even to those who can't stand us and who we can't stand either?"
As I've thought about these commands from Jesus' this week, I've wondered... is it easier for us to love our enemies, or as we hear later in Luke in the parable of the Good Samaritan, to love our neighbors? And, is it easier for us to identify our enemies or neighbors? Our society—our world-- is so polarized these days... pick any topic, any issue, any side of any debate--and the enemy stands out clearly--perhaps too easily--but our neighbors can be harder to identify. The lawyer that questions Jesus in Luke 10 asks, "And who is my neighbor?" for which Jesus then tells the Parable of the Good Samaritan, which was an oxymoron in that culture--Samaritans could never be good--they were the enemy, the despised, the polar opposites in that culture. We see in Luke's Gospel Jesus was reminding us to love both our enemies and neighbors, because perhaps they are one and the same.
I saw a powerful, must-see movie this week about the power of love and speaking the truth, even if your voice shake, and it reminded me of Jesus' message here to his disciples-in-training. It was about a person for whom most of us are familiar, but it was a story I was not aware of prior to the movie. Nelson Mandela was released from Prison in South Africa on Feb. 11, 1990 after being held nearly 27 years for his work to end apartheid.[3] He took office as South Africa
The movie “Invictus” describes Mandela's first year in office as he worked to bring together the white Dutch Afrikaans and black native South Africans together into one country, which he called the Rainbow Nation. As Mandela begins attempts at unification, reconciliation, and forgiveness, he sought out help from the captain of the Springboks National Rugby team, François Pineaar. The 1995 Rugby World Cup was to be held the following year with South Africa playing host to the world, and he made a "human calculation" that Rugby, the sport of the white Afrikaans, the sport the blacks hated, would be something that could unite a nation. The movie shows this progression. In one scene, the team visits Robben Prison. Afterward, the captain remarks, "I was thinking about how you spend 30 years [sic] in a tiny cell and come out ready to forgive the people who put you there." [5]
In my opinion the most powerful scene comes when Mandela intervenes in a National Sports Council Meeting, just after the black council voted to eliminate the Springboks entirely including team colors green and gold, because of the people's hatred of their enemy--the Afrikaans. Mandela says, "Our enemy is no longer the Afrikaans... they are our fellow South Africans. Our partners in democracy... and they treasure Springbok rugby. If we take that away, we loose them. We ARE what they feared we would be. We HAVE TO be better than that. We have to SURPRISE them with compassion, with restrain, and generosity... I know, all the things they denied us. But this is no time to celebrate petty revenge. This is the time to build our nation using every single brick available to us, even if that brick comes wrapped in green and gold. You elected me your leader. Now let me lead you. Who is with me?" [6]
Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes.
Do to others as you would have them do to you. (Luke 6:31)
Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes.
"To you who are ready for the truth, I say this: Love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst." (Luke 6:27, Msg)
Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes.
"Love your enemies and you have NO enemies." [7]
Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes.
Amen.
[1] Lillian Daniels and Martin Copenhaver, This Odd and Wondrous Calling (Grand Rapids , MI
[2]mulattodiaries.wordpress.com/
[2]mulattodiaries.wordpress.com/
[3] Luke 6:27-36, The Message translation by Eugene Peterson
[5] Invictus, Matt Damon as François Pineaar. Produced and Directed by Clint Eastwood, 2009. Video Clip: http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi300483609/
[6] Invictus. Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela. Produced and Directed by Clint Eastwood, 2009. Video Clip: http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi300483609/
[7] Sea Raven, “On the Plain Part 2: Enemies” posted 2/3/2010 at http://www.gaiarising.org/2010/02/on-plain-part-2-enemies.html. Emphasis mine.
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