Sermon: January 31, 2010

It might as well have happened just yesterday but it was almost 50 years ago. Every week, my mother bought one large Hershey’s chocolate bar and divided the squares up so that there would be enough to last all through the week, packed in our school lunches. One evening, as she was packing our lunches for the next day, she went to the cupboard to pull out the Hershey’s chocolate bar and more than a few of the carefully counted squares were missing. She called all three of us together and asked us what had happened to the chocolate. No one said a thing. My sister looked at my brother. My brother looked at me. I looked at my mother. No confession. No tattling. Nothing.

My mother’s solution… a natural consequence of our collective action… was no chocolate for any of us until someone confessed. I thought about it long and hard throughout the evening and all through the next day – especially at lunch with no chocolate square for dessert. I thought about it as we ate dinner around a very quiet table. And then, when dinner was over, I went to my mother and confessed that I had eaten the chocolate. My sin was forgiven and all was well in our household. The conflict was resolved. Chocolate squares returned to our lunches. Life was good.

But truth be told, I didn’t take the chocolate. To this day I don’t know if it was my sister or my brother! All I know is that I have always been uncomfortable with conflict and it was worth confessing to something I did not do in order to smooth things over and keep everyone happy. I do like chocolate but keeping the peace and keeping everyone happy are more important.

I wonder if Jesus liked chocolate? If he did, he and I would have at least one thing in common. Hearing this morning’s passage from Luke’s Gospel, we know that he wasn’t too concerned with keeping the peace. And if the choice was between living God’s ways and keeping people happy, he always chose living God’s ways. But in order to really understand this, we have to take a closer look at the story in Luke’s Gospel.

As we join the story, Jesus is in the synagogue in his hometown. If we were here last week, we know that he stands up to preach, beginning his sermon by quoting the prophet Isaiah, saying “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because God has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. God has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind. To set at liberty those who are oppressed. To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.” And before he sits down, he announces to the congregation that “Today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing!”

At first, according to the part of the story we just heard, the congregation is delighted with Jesus’ sermon. They can hardly believe that this young man who reads and speaks so well is a hometown boy… their hometown boy! He is Joseph and Mary’s son. We can almost hear them saying, “Why I remember when he was just a lad, helping his father in his shop or when he sat with the elders in the Temple. Isn’t it wonderful to hear him preach this morning? God is certainly looking favorably on us!”

By then, the hometown folks had heard of all the wonderful things Jesus was doing – how he was healing the sick and preaching good news to the poor… how he was teaching in synagogues and developing a large following. And they quite naturally assumed that he was going to do the same wonderful things for them.

So what happened? Why did things turn so fast – from bragging about Joseph and Mary’s son to dragging him out to throw him off a cliff? What in the world did Jesus say that was so offensive to the people of his hometown? Certainly they would be the first to forgive him if he got a little carried away – after all, they had known him since he was a baby. Certainly they could have just gotten up and walked out if they really didn’t like his sermon. Why throw him off a cliff? We just don’t get it!

We don’t get it but the people in that hometown synagogue sure did. They were well-versed in the scriptures and when Jesus mentioned Elijah and Elisha in his sermon, well that’s what put them over the edge or at least, that’s when they decided to take Jesus to the edge – the edge of a cliff to throw him off.

So what was so offensive about Jesus’ sermon? Why get so upset about Elijah and the widow of Zarephath and Elisha and Naaman, the Syrian? Well, you see the Hebrew people thought they were God’s chosen people… God’s only chosen people. They believed that they had an exclusive claim on God’s love and God’s care and when the Messiah came, they would be on the inside and everyone else, especially their enemies, would be on the outside. Well, the widow of Zarephath and Naaman, the Syrian were considered enemies by the Hebrew people! They were outsiders! The folks in the synagogue knew that. So when Jesus started preaching about Elijah and the widow and then about Elisha and the Syrian, that was it. He was meddling. He had gone too far. He was challenging the status quo. It was just too much.

How many of us are still scratching our heads and wondering why? Let me see if I can explain. Jesus cited two examples of prophetic moments when God acted to save outsiders. The great prophet Elijah gave food to a Gentile widow and her son even though other people were hungry as well. And those others who were hungry were Hebrews. In the story that Jesus cited, Elijah gave no food to the Hebrew people but instead saved an outsider and her son. And the story of the prophet Elisha… well he healed Naaman of his leprosy. Naaman was an officer in an enemy army. Again, many Hebrews were suffering from the same affliction, but Elisha chose to heal an outsider. In his sermon that morning, Jesus was preaching about bringing outsiders inside the circle of God’s love.

That was it. That did it. “That set everyone in the meeting place seething with anger. They threw Jesus out, banishing him from the village, then took him to a mountain cliff at the edge of the village to throw him to his doom.” But according to Luke’s story, “…he gave them the slip and was on his way.”

In his book The Scandalous Gospel of Jesus, Peter Gomes suggests that “people take offense not so much with what Jesus claims about himself, as with the claims that he makes about a God who is more than their own tribal deity.” In his sermon “Pardon Me While I Offend You with My Sermon” Bishop Will Willimon says it this way, “At Nazareth, Jesus made folks mad when he interpreted scripture in such a way that portrayed the work of God as a wide reach beyond the bounds of their definition of ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders.’”

Jesus challenges us to reach beyond the bounds of our definition of insiders and outsiders, especially when it comes to God’s love and grace. Jesus challenges us to stop defining anyone as an insider or an outsider. And as nice as that sounds, it is probably the hardest thing we are called to do as people of faith.

You see, truth be told, we live in an “us against them” reality. We are really good at drawing dividing lines, determining who is on the inside with “us” and who is on the outside with “them.” We are really good at deciding who God loves and who God doesn’t. It just goes with being human. But just because it goes with being human doesn’t mean that it goes with being faithful. Jesus was very clear… it doesn’t go with God.

Jesus risked his life to challenge us to reach beyond the bounds of our definition of who is in and who is out. The people of his hometown took him to the edge of a cliff and were ready to push him off because he challenged their faith in a God who loved them exclusively.

Most of us here are quick to say that if we had been there that day, we would have stood with Jesus not against Jesus. We are quick to say that we believe in the inclusive love of God. We know that God does not draw dividing lines, creating insiders and outsiders. We believe that no one is ever outside of the bounds of God’s love. We believe this! We want to believe this! We try to believe this. But do we believe this out loud?

As a part of the “Believe Out Loud” campaign of the United Methodist Reconciling Ministries Network, we are being called to speak out publicly, sharing our beliefs that all people, no matter their sexual orientation, are children of God and welcome in this community of faith. We are being called to draw the circle of God’s love wider and wider still. As a Reconciling Congregation, this seems only natural to us. This is what we believe. But are we willing to believe it out there… outside these doors? Are we willing to risk people being unhappy with us? Are we willing to believe out loud?

Did you know that almost 70% of United Methodist clergy believe that homosexual persons should be fully welcome in God’s world and in our churches without qualification… no matter what… yet only 7% are willing to speak this belief out loud? I am guessing that this isn’t limited to clergy. How many of us are willing to believe out loud when confronted by someone we know and care about who would draw a dividing line for God’s love based on a person’s sexual orientation? How many of us simply listen in disbelief rather than give voice to our faith in an inclusive God? Which is more important to us, keeping the peace and keeping everyone happy or believing out loud?

And what about other dividing lines in our world? Are we willing to believe out loud when it comes to expanding the circle of God’s love to include an undocumented worker or a person living with HIV aids? What about a person who abuses drugs or one who abuses a child? What about the homeless woman holding up her cardboard sign on the corner of 7^th and Chambers who I see using the little money she begs to buy beer? What about the person who voted on the opposite side of the special election this week or for a different political candidate last year? Are we willing to believe out loud when a Christian brother or sister would constrict the circle of God’s love condemning someone for following another pathway to God? Are we willing to go to the edge of the cliff with Jesus?

Sometimes following Jesus means choosing between living God’s ways and keeping the peace so everyone is happy and people will like us. Following Jesus always means choosing to believe out loud. It is going to take more than 7% of us making the decision to participate in a little cliff dwelling with Jesus to bring about God’s beloved community here on earth. We are going to need a little chocolate and a lot of faith, but just think what will happen when 70% of us stand on the edge of that cliff with Jesus and believe out loud that God’s love knows no bounds!