josephholubsermons


 

              November 23, 2008
              The Last Sunday After Pentecost
              Matthew 25:31-45

THE FACE OF JESUS

"Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me."  - Matthew 25:40 -

I would dare say there are few passages in the entire Bible that have had a greater impact and transformed more lives than this story from Matthew 25.  Commonly known as "The Last Judgment" or "The Sheep and the Goats", this story only appears in Matthew.  Mark, Luke and John make no reference to it whatsoever.  Many biblical scholars agree that the story may not even go back to Jesus, but is the product of the followers of Jesus in Matthew's community of faith.  But that in no way diminishes the power of the story, but rather it causes us to read the story ever more closely in the context of Matthew's gospel and Matthew's faith community to whom he wrote and addressed his gospel in the 9th decade of the first century. 

One of the things that a new pastor learns when coming into a congregation is that congregations are anything but homogeneous.  I hope that doesn't come as a surprise to you, but in case it is, I need to break the news to you that everybody else in this congregation is not like you; does not think like you; or hold the same viewpoints and perspectives as you!   I am still in a discovery process of that reality here at Lord of the Mountains. 

For Matthew and his faith community, it was a similar thing.  There was diversity within the community - even conflict.  Everybody was not alike.  They didn't all think alike, live the same lifestyle, or express their faith in a like manner.  In Matthew's congregation there was diversity in the way that faith and religious practice took shape in their lives.  A close reading of Matthew's gospel reveals much about the nature of Matthew's faith community.  Among others there were two distinct groups that had an impact on the way Matthew shaped his gospel and told the story of Jesus.  On one side, there were those whose religious lives were rigidly legalistic.  For them grace did not exclude shaping their lives around the Torah, and for some in a very legalistic fashion, to the point of emphasizing the letter and minutia of the law.   

I am reminded of this kind of attitude in an incident that occurred after worship one Sunday when I was a young pastor over 30 years ago.  I was having friendly conversation with a group of folks after worship in the fellowship hall, and in the course of conversation someone asked me what I was going to do with the balance of my Sunday afternoon.  I made the statement that I thought I would work in my garden.  A woman standing a few feet away, not a part of our conversation, overheard my comment, interrupted and gave me a tongue-lashing of admonishment like I had never had before, pointing out to me in rather acerbic terms that work was forbidden on the Sabbath Day, and that I, as a pastor, was setting a terrible example for the congregation and community.  Obviously, this person was living by a very strict and unyielding code, that apparently had little to do with grace, when it came to religious piety and practice.  

On the other end of the spectrum, Matthew's community also had an element of what is called antinomianism.   Antinomianism is the opposite of legalism.  Antinomianism is the idea that a person is under no obligation to obey certain laws of ethics as prescribed by a religious authority.   Christian antinomians of Matthew's time said that grace exempted them from following Torah law and ethical mandates.  For some of this persuasion, grace meant "do whatever you wanted to do because, after all, grace exempted one from the ethical imperatives of the Torah."   My point is, there was diversity of viewpoint and lifestyle in Matthew's community that created conflict and tension.

Last week in my sermon I put forth the idea that followers of Jesus are called to walk a different way than conventional ways.  What I see Matthew doing is walking a different way, charting a different course from those in his community of faith who were either legalistic or antinomian.  We could say that Matthew had a different ethic; an alternative way to live his life that, for Matthew, was faithful to his experience of the risen, living Lord Jesus.  It was a different way that was not legalistic and not antinomian.  The result was one of the most engaging ideas every put forth by Christianity - an idea that has the power to transform a human life, transform human relationships and transform community.

Matthew frames his story as a picture of the Last Judgment which, for his first century Jewish community, was a popular and powerful picture.  What strikes me about this story is, that the people gathered in front of the throne of the messianic figure all really believed they were among his followers and were part of the in-group including both the legalistic and antinomian crowd.  Everyone was there, and everyone thought they were in.  Then a judgment is made, that is a sorting out, and the people are separated not according to belief in right doctrine; not according to expounding good theology; not according to personal piety, or sexual ethics, or church leadership, or success in ministry or by anything else.  They were sorted out based on their attitude toward and how they treated the most vulnerable people in society; the ones Jesus calls the "least of these." 

This story speaks to me in three ways. 
First, Matthew's experience of the risen, living Jesus had created a new, transformed way to live his life; a new ethic, if you will.  It was not an ethic based on legalism obsessing on religious minutia, and it was not an ethic based on a "do whatever you want because grace exempts you" attitude.  It was an ethic and a way based on the very life and way of Jesus - it was an ethic of compassion.  This story is a reflection of what Matthew experienced in the living Jesus, and what he experienced was Jesus saying to him, "Matthew, I will know how much you love me by how you treat the weak, the poor, the stranger, and the vulnerable."  The living Jesus put Matthew's life on a different road and this story is Matthew's testimony to that road - a road of compassion. 

Second, I see this story as a call into an ongoing, judging, assessing and evaluation process in my life.  Matthew framed his story using a popular Jewish picture of his age - a last judgment at the end of time.  But he didn't tell it that way to perpetuate fear, or even to describe actual future events that will someday occur.  I take this story metaphorically.  He told it to get people to think and reflect about the way they were living their lives as followers of Jesus right then and there, in the moment, in their present.  He was trying to show the legalists and antinomians a different way than the way they were on. 

For me as a person who confesses to be an intentional follower of Jesus, the judgment described in this story is an ongoing process of evaluation and assessment that I am called into every day.  The primary characteristics of the life of Jesus were grace and compassion.  As an intentional follower of Jesus, I am called to measure, evaluate and judge my life based on those two things every day.  Do I show the grace to others that Jesus extends to me?  Does my life manifest the compassion that Jesus' life exhibited?  Those are questions I am called to measure my life with everyday - that is the judgment.

Third, this story points me to where the living Jesus can be found in this world right now.  In Celtic Christianity, an expression of Christianity that flourished in Ireland, Scotland, Wales and northern England beginning in the 5th century, they talked about something called "Thin Places."   A "Thin Place" for the Celtics was a place, situation or circumstance where the boundary between a person and God becomes soft, porous and permeable and God in some way is perceived and experienced.   A "Thin Place" is a place where the veil lifts and in some way we may behold and experience God.  My definition of a thin place is "any place, circumstance, event or situation where my heart is opened, and I become intuitively or experientially aware of a greater something more than merely me.  It may come as a feeling, an insight, or I may perceive connections between things I never saw before."

Wednesday evening our confirmation youth and parents met, and we discussed "Thin Places."  Youth and adults alike shared experiences and times when they felt close to God or perceived, in some special way, God's presence.  The stories they shared were amazing, and they even made posters expressing their experiences that are displayed in the narthex this morning.   

I believe this story from Matthew is, in part, a description of a special "Thin Place" that the living, risen Jesus reveals himself and is experienced in the world.   Mother Teresa once said about this story that Jesus appears in "the distressing disguise of the poor."   

I was reading the works of a man named Jim, who when he was a young student was searching for which way to direct his life.  He then came across this story from Matthew 25, and he was captivated by it, and it changed his life and the lives of countless thousands.  The Jim is Jim Wallis, author, theologian, preacher, faith-based activist and founder of Sojourners, a nationwide network of Christians working for peacemaking and social justice. 

The bottom line for me on this story is that it contains a potentially life-transforming promise.  If it is an experience of the living Jesus that I am really looking for, then I need look no further than the "Thin Place" of the faces of the poor, the marginal, the suffering, the starving, the malnourished, the lonely, the vulnerable, the stranger, the outcast, the rejected, the abused, the forgotten, the struggling, the overwhelmed, the lost, the least, the last - anyone who is fragile and vulnerable on this planet.  It just may be somebody sitting next to you this morning.  Do you see the face of Jesus in your neighbor?

As a person who intentionally names himself a follower of Jesus, this story changes everything for me.  For it means that every face on this planet is sacred; that I cannot ever look into a face again and see it as just an ordinary face; or see it merely as the face of an adversary; or an enemy; or someone I dislike or distain; a face I turn away from because I do not want to acknowledge their pain.  For if I dare look deep enough and I dare look long enough, I risk seeing the face of Jesus - and that changes everything – even me!