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The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany, 30 January 2005 |
Matthew 5:1-12 (NRSV Text from BibleWorks) 1 When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. 2 Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying: 3 "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4 "Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. 5 "Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. 6 "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. 7 "Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy. 8 "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. 9 "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. 10 "Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 "Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. BLEST ARE THEY In October 1998, Mitch, a category 5 hurricane, struck Honduras with such devastation that thousands of lives were lost and one-third of the population became homeless. Just over five months later I went there as the guest of a philanthropist parishioner. It turned out to be the first of nine trips. My heart was broken and then stolen by what I saw and heard. It was one of those moments when I knew that there was a Word that I had to speak. God was calling us to serve. And so I preached that Word, and it did not return void. When I went back for the first of six eight-day mission trips, sixteen people went along with me to work side by side with hurricane victims to build new homes. Not too amazingly other hearts got broken and stolen. One of that group was so moved that he went on to lead the next five mission trips. Another of the men, a newly retired Air Force colonel, decided that week to answer the call to seminary. Others were so seized with a new gratitude for their lives in America that they urged others to go on the next mission trip. They raised awareness and dollars. They gathered clothing and school supplies for the children. The next year an artist went along. She was hardly in country before her heart was broken and stolen. She fell in love with the children and was aghast to learn that their education was only provided for through the sixth grade. At that point it cost $400 per student per year to allow students to continue their education. She heard God’s call to donate some of her artwork annually to create a scholarship fund. She then went on to build a network of sponsors who would adopt a student for $400 per year. Perhaps the strangest thing that happened to a bunch of Lutherans in a country that is about 98% Roman Catholic is that we were changed by what we saw and heard. You might say we were converted. The Sunday evening mass at the very simple cathedral in Juticalpa was filled to overflowing with youth and families. The villagers in the colonia that we were building were hard-working, hospitable, and devoted to family. Most of the people had so little in the bank. Most walked or rode city buses which were nothing but old school buses – some of which were even labeled: “North Carolina Public Schools.” We went because we had so much and they so little, and we discovered that it was just the opposite. When the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God, seizes you, your world is turned upside down. Not so surprisingly, the parishioners that didn’t go could not understand. Some said, “Wouldn’t it be better just to send a check instead of spending so much on airfare?” Others said, “Why aren’t you working with the poor right here?” Others said, “I don’t think our church should be giving money to non-Lutheran missions?” One even said, “I just don’t agree with what you’re doing.” I was astounded by the malevolence of some. So, in future years, the cost of each mission trip was paid for by each person that went. They gave up vacation time and money to serve. Less and less money was raised through congregational offerings. Finally, it came down to individuals buying some of the donated artwork or sponsoring a student or giving an offering at a pancake supper. And still the Holy Spirit moved some to give up time, talent, and treasure to be converted by spending about a week of their lives with poor Honduran Roman Catholics. In time, the most important part of the mission trip, for me, was what happened to those that went. They lived in Christian community, they gave their lives away in humble service, and they were changed by what they saw and heard. It took visiting another type of Christian culture to change entirely our concept of what it means to be blessed. We comparatively rich Lutheran Christians were not there to share our blessings or to liberate them with our Lutheran version of the Gospel. We were there to be evangelized by poor Honduran Roman Catholics who still understand what it means to love God, family, church, and community. Things we once knew. Life in Honduras is far from idyllic. Yet, they are blessed in their material poverty far more than we are in our material wealth. They have not forgotten God, family, church, and community. Sadly and arrogantly, we Americans still think that the world needs to be like us – rich in things and poor in soul. Sadly and arrogantly, many of us American Lutheran Christians still think that we need to bring what we have to the Hondurans and others so that they can be like us. Good Lord, deliver them and us! Today, in these beatitudes, the Lord Jesus says: “Welcome to my world!” This is the world that he invites us to live in. Reading Matthew, we come to see that this is the world that the Lord Jesus inhabits in his earthly ministry. He says, “Follow me this way.” And as we follow him, we are blessed in ways that seem unimaginable to those that are not following. After all, Christianity is more than what we say. It is what God intends to do to us, do in us, and do through us. God intends to make us children of God. Let us be clear. Matthew is not telling us that we can make ourselves right with God. That is beyond our ability. We need someone else to do for us what we cannot do. Only God’s Son Jesus can make us right with his Father by his own life, death, and resurrection. He is the epitome of what we are meant to be. He is the antithesis of what we are by nature – sinful and unclean. As Luther says, our hearts are turned in upon ourselves. We are in bondage to sin and need to be rescued by the servant Son of God. Our most serious problem remains that we live our lives in the presence of God who knows everything about us – our thoughts, our doubts, our words, our deeds, our secrets, our dreams, and our fears. The most honest thing that any of us can do, then, is to bring our whole life into God’s presence saying, “Good Lord, deliver me from myself.” We come before God with empty hands needing to be converted daily. Each gathering for worship we remember that in the washing of Holy Baptism, God marks us with the cross of Christ and seals us with the Holy Spirit. God the Father continues to see the mark of his perfectly obedient Son upon our foreheads and gives us his Son’s righteousness as a gift. God the Holy Spirit works through the Word and sacraments to shape our lives so that we become what God the Father says we are: children of the heavenly Father. I am not suggesting today that the only way someone can be drawn into the kingdom of God is by going to a poor Roman Catholic country like Honduras. Rather I am suggesting that we are most often quite oblivious to the kingdom of God in our midst and quite resistant to what God the Father is trying to do – to claim us as his own. Instead of remembering that we have been washed with water in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit – instead of remembering that we have died and been raised to new life in Christ – we keep embracing the decadence, the violence, and the narcissism of this present age. We foolishly tell ourselves these things are blessings when, in fact, so many are curses. Good Lord, deliver us from ourselves. Today the Lord Jesus says, “Follow me, and you will be blessed in ways that may seem to you quite unfathomable.” Nevertheless, he says, “Blest are they who follow.” The Rev. Dr. Samuel D. Zumwalt
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