watch it here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRSrSUQE9S8&t=2s
Sunday,
November 15, 2020
What can we contribute to the public good? Ah, so
many questions. Who do I mean by
‘we?’ I mean the church – Hillside, a
local congregation, and believers nationwide and worldwide, the community of
faith. What about, public good? By
that I mean the people of the community – the public. By ‘good,’ I mean conditions that enable as
many as possible to thrive.
‘Good’ would be a reduction
in poverty and elimination of food and housing insecurity. If people aren’t worried about eating or
having a roof over their heads, they can concentrate their money, energy, and
time on living an enriching life.
‘Good’ refers to relationships. Everyone is fighting right now. People fight about wearing masks or not
wearing masks. People condemn each other
over politics. In one family, a woman was
on one side of the Biden-Trump divide, opposite her cousin. Discouraged, she overlooked a lifetime of
close family bonds and declared they have nothing in common but that their
mothers were sisters. In another case,
two brothers, both over 60, refuse to talk to each because one called the other
a ‘socialist.’ ‘Good’ is the repair of
these fractured relationships.
Do ‘we’ – the church –
have any responsibility for the ‘public good,’ for feeding the hungry, helping
those who struggle, and bringing together those who have turn against each
other? Does God call us to be the voice
of healing and hope?
Yes. In 2019, our elders and deacons adopted the
slogan – “At Hillside, we follow Jesus, love others, and share hope.” We know we are living into this motto when
our actions as a church lift people from despair and draw them to Jesus. Hence the question, what can we contribute to
the public good?
We have a lot to
contribute! Love, eternal hope, joy,
purpose. This morning, we focus on
forgiveness. Forgiveness is not a
uniquely Christian idea. Other faiths
teach forgiveness. People who have no
faith find it in themselves to offer it. The distinct Christian gift to the
world is the message of Jesus.
We can’t present a
Christianity that doesn’t include forgiveness as a core value. Expressing divine love is what we do. They know we are Christians by our love. What can we offer, to contribute to the
public good? Forgiveness!
Jesus tells his disciples,
“When you stand praying, forgive if you have anything against anyone; so [then]
your father in heaven may also forgive you” (Mk 11:25). He says this after having ridden, on Sunday,
into Jerusalem on a donkey with admirers shouting “Hosanna. Blessed is the one who comes in the name of
the Lord.” From Monday to Thursday of
that week, he will teach in the outer court of the temple. It’s as if he is piling on the lessons,
deflecting challenges, and sharing final instructions before he will die. Could you or I focus knowing that heartbreaking
betrayals and gruesome suffering and death lie immediately ahead?
On one of the trips to the
city from where they stayed in the outlying village of Bethany, Jesus sees a
fig tree with no ripe fruit on it; even though it is not the season for figs,
he curses the tree. It’s a prophetic act
akin to Isaiah walking across the city barefoot and Ezekiel lying on his side
for 300 days. Prophets did odd things so
their listeners would remember more vividly their message. People didn’t just remember John the
Baptist’s sermons; they remembered his coarse clothing, his diet of
honey-covered bugs, and river baptism. Cursing
the fig tree caught the disciples’ attention.
When they walked that way the
next day, Peter marveled that the tree had withered overnight (11:20-21). Not batting an eye, Jesus says to Peter and
the disciples, “Have faith in God. Truly
I tell you if you say to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’
and if you do not doubt in your heart, it will come to pass.” Jesus did not hate fig trees and he did not
want to change Jerusalem’s topography.
He wanted his disciples, us included, to understand that prayer makes a
difference. God listens. When we pray in faith, God’s power
comes.
Note the connections. The fig tree represented the system of
sacrificial worship. Sin separates us
from God and the sacrificial worship system could not overcome the damaging
affects sin had on God’s relationship with human beings. That system did not produce righteousness or
salvation as its fruit. It was fruitless,
like the condemned tree. Jesus later on
makes a similar point when he talks about tearing down the temple. When he says he will rebuild it, he’s talking
about his resurrection. The temple no
longer produces the fruit of new life.
That can only be had through faith in him.
After teaching about
mountain-moving prayer, he connects forgiving others with receiving forgiveness
from God. Of course, God’s forgiveness
is not conditional. God doesn’t forgive
us if we forgive each other.
Jesus hung on the cross abandoned by his followers and berated by his
despisers. No one repented as he
suffered. His death, for everyone, was
God’s definitive declaration of love for humanity.
The reason Jesus ties
forgiving each other to the forgiveness that comes from God and to the
replacement of temple-worship with the worship of Jesus is the posture of receiving. Every time you or I forgive each other, it’s
a sign we have received God’s forgiveness.
We don’t just talk about it. We
stand as new creations, forgiven being.
God’s grace takes affect when we receive it. Standing as forgiven ones, we cannot withhold
forgiveness. We are not able.
The corollary holds as
well. When we withhold forgiveness, it’s
a sign we have not received the forgiveness Jesus achieved on the cross and
freely offers to all. It’s there, but we
can’t believe it or we are too locked in our shame. For some reason, we cannot gain release from
our own sins. We can’t allow ourselves
to receive the forgiveness God lovingly gives.
So, we can’t forgive others. We
are bound, chained, by our sin and the sins of others.
Jesus is the truth that sets us free. We share Him with the hurting world around us. Why does polarization win? Why let partisan division claim the day? Why does animosity, revenge, and discord get
the last word? We tell of God’s
forgiveness. We model it, and in doing
so, we step into freedom.
Those who accept our
invitation and turn to Jesus also take the first step to freedom. Freedom spreads through the church, and out to
the world. It is not easy.
Immaculee Ilibagiza
survived the Rwandan genocide of the 1990’s.[i] She and several other Tutsi women crammed
into the bathroom of a man who hid them from Hutu neighbors determined to wipe
out all Tutsis. The conditions were
unimaginable, yet, she and the others survived many months in the impossibly
cramped quarters. Immaculees’ parents
and most of her siblings were massacred.
Survival was only part of
the miracle. The bigger part came in Immaculee’s
determination to find it in herself to forgive the Hutus, including her
family’s killers. In order for her to
reclaim her own humanity, she had to see the humanity in these who had
performed such evil. By God’s grace, she
claimed freedom by forgiving those who took everything from her.
Bishop Desmond Tutu of
South Africa touches on this in his work The Book of Forgiving, written
with his daughter Mpho. South Africa,
for over a century, existed in a system of Apartheid as evil as slavery, Jim
Crow, and mass incarceration here in the United States. Blacks in South Africa, the majority, had no
rights, and lived in extreme poverty, as servants to the whites who held the
money, guns, and power.
When revolution came in
the 1990’s, it could have been deadly for the white minority. But the black citizenry, following the
example and lead of people like Bishop Tutu and Nelson Mandela, committed to
forgiving and moving forward together.
Tutu proposed an exercise
for the reader of his book. First, select
a stone and remember where you found it.
Then, one morning, carry it, the entire morning, never setting it down
for any reason. Do this for six
hours. That stone is the pain you are
holding, the wrongs done to you that still have you in their insidious
grip. Oh, to put that stone down. Oh, to be free from that pain, the loss, and
injustice.
Let it go. Forgive.
There will be time for justice if that’s called for. An abused wife should not just forgive the
abuser, stay with him to endure more beatings.
The robbery victim should hope to get back what was taken. The criminal must be prosecuted. That’s all another conversation; an important
one, but another one.
In terms of forgiveness,
release the offender as Jesus releases you.
Set the rock down. Open your arms
in embrace. This is emotional work,
psychological work, and soul work. But,
think of that rock – the way it weighs you down and impedes your progress in
life. Look to the cross where Jesus
bleeds out the death brought about by your sins. Receive his forgiveness and extend it to
someone.
Think of someone who’s
deeply hurt and angered you through this election season. You think you’re taking the Christian
position. He thinks the same thing. You’re frustrated by his politics and he by yours. Set that rock down.
This is one of our
offerings to the world, church. It’s the
way of grace and it’s sorely needed.
Let love win. Walk in freedom. Forgive and invite your neighbor to walk in
freedom with you.
AMEN
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