I wonder if it is impossible for us as human beings to have a relationship of any sort with someone, and not compare ourselves in some ways. If they are skilled at something, it makes us feel inadequate. If they are bad at something, we feel pleased that we’re more competent. If they have an experience or own a thing, we usually want it too, and sometimes we’re aware of our own power to make people envious. We always want to be better, to be able to boast, to have oneupmanship on someone.
When I was young I was perpetually disappointed at my own efforts to draw or colour creatively. My older brother was always so much better at art than I was, and even though I’d tell myself that it was just because he was two years older, I knew deep down that when I was his age, I would still not be as good. He had an innate skill which I did not. And it frustrated me. That searing awareness of not having a talent that I wanted was with me from the age of six, and to be honest, it’s something that I still wrestle with - not so much anymore the desire to be artistic, but simply the struggle of wanting to be good at something that you see in someone else. The envy of others, whatever that might look like.
It’s changed over the years - for a while I envied straight, well behaved hair. I’ve wished I was better at writing, at singing, at doing exams, at being brave, at making friends. The list goes on! And with that sense of seeing and desiring others’ skills and gifts, comes the flip side of wanting to somehow be enviable yourself. So even when I read The Lord of the Rings for the first time, my motivation was partly curiosity because I enjoyed The Hobbit, and partly a desire to achieve something that my brother had not. It was so delightful to feel better than him in some way!
But the truth is that we are all different, and, that relationships are one of the most important things about us, about who we are as people. When we learn to cherish and promote and support the other person’s skills and gifts, we make that relationship all the stronger. That’s what love is really, to properly see the other person without a sense of competition or jealousy, to accept and marvel at them and delight in who they are, and for the same to be done for us.
Now, let’s not sugar coat it - this morning’s gospel is a hard hitter. There are so many passages where Jesus says nice things and it’s easy to preach a sermon about love and we can all feel good, but this morning’s gospel is more like Jesus in a bit of a fierce mood. In fact, taking all of today’s readings together, a theme which runs through all of them is an air of frustration, a sense that the people being talked to are continually not getting something. That the lesson hasn’t taken root, that the idea hasn’t clicked. Moses exclaims to the Israelites, ‘I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life!’; and Paul tells the Corinthians, ‘Even now you are still not ready, for you are still of the flesh’. And underpinning all of it, is the fact that relationships are the key to everything. That loving God and loving our neighbour is the answer, but we keep finding that commandment so hard to figure out!
As Jesus talks through all of these commandments from the scripture, and expands on them, it might feel like he is being harsh, taking each law further than actions and applying it to even the way we think and feel. Surely, being angry with someone isn’t really comparable to committing murder? Well, not in some ways, but, they are both things that are damaging to a relationship. Anger is not compatible with loving your neighbour. What Jesus is doing is taking the teachings on prohibited actions like murder and adultery, and expanding their understanding so that they act as doorways to examine our internal life, as well as our external. He is asking us to pay attention to everything that damages a relationship with another person, including anger, jealousy, arrogance, and valuing yourself over others. What Jesus has done is introduce the ethics of his new kingdom, where attitudes and emotions are just as key as outward behaviour. The commandment to love one’s neighbour has to go much deeper than it’s ever gone before, it has to be internalised so that kingdom relationships can saturate our whole lives.
Because it’s one thing to behave in the right way, to present well, to have that outward self that we’re happy for others to see. But it’s another entirely for our heart to be oriented towards love, to be truly following God on the inside, as well as the outside. It’s much easier to keep the commandment against murder than it is to avoid anger, but it’s necessary to avoid both. Loving God and loving our neighbour means the inward self becomes just as important as the outward.
When Paul mourns that the Corinthians are still ‘infants’, this is what he is talking about - that they are struggling to make that transition from concentrating on the outward to the inward. But our internal work is perhaps the most important. All the laws are there for guidance, and are useful, but we are supposed to be able to mature enough in faith so that we are not preoccupied with rules, but instead see their basis, the foundation of it all, which is - you guessed it - love of God and neighbour, and God’s great love for us.
The fact that it’s all about relationship is, I think, why God is a trinity. God is love, we believe, but you cannot have love as an isolated being. There has to be relationship for there to be love, and so the Trinity means that God is in relationship within godself, and therefore can embody love.
Focusing like this on our internal lives, and setting them up as being of paramount importance, ties in with what we’ve been hearing from Jesus over the last few weeks. It was hinted at in the beatitudes, where the poor in spirit and those who mourn and the pure in heart are blessed, because of their inward orientation.
So if it’s all about relationship, then it’s all about us gathered here. Us as the body of Christ is more than just a nice idea, it’s key to living lives of the new covenant. Our church community is supposed to be a model of that trinitarian love within God, played out within our own interactions together. That’s one of the reasons why church can be so powerful, because it’s where we learn to become mature in our faith, to develop and refine our inward attitudes and behaviours. It’s where we can learn to put aside envy or pride (even when your older brother is annoyingly better than you at something), and instead build up, affirm, and rejoice in the skills and gifts of our friends, our church family, and where they can do the same for us. We are to be a community of love that others see and think, wow, I want to be part of that.
So yes, it’s hard. Jesus’ ways of doing things take commitment and effort, but the good news is, we are in this together. So let’s listen to Moses and choose life, and turn our hearts towards love as we continue to encourage each other along the way.
Amen.
(Deuteronomy 30.15-20; 1 Corinthians 3.1-9; Matthew 5.21-37)
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