In our travels Janet and I always have an eye out for a bookstore. Usually the antique shops are closed. But bookstores are always open. We can happily spend hours hanging out in bookstores. Actually we do more than just hang out. We buy books on a fairly regular basis. Just ask our kids about the boxes of books they moved for us in the past.
One of our favorite bookstores is in the Heights in Houston near Rice University. It is called Murder by the Book. If you are a mystery lover you would be in mystery book heaven at Murder by the Book.
We also like to watch mystery movies. Hercule Poirot is a favorite, or Miss Jane Marple. We like Brother Cadfile or the newer Jesse Stone mysteries. There are many we enjoy though Janet wasn’t too keen on the new Sherlock Holmes.
Our favorite television channels for mysteries are Masterpiece Theatre and, surprisingly, the Hallmark channel.
One particularly good show from the Hallmark Channel was “Harvest of Fire.” It is the story of an FBI agent, Sally, who is looking into several barn burnings in Amish country. The ending was a surprise to me though not to Janet. She often figures out ‘who did it’ before I have a clue. My impression for the longest was this story was about a hate crime against the Amish. As you will hear, I was lost in my world of assumptions.
There were several plots and twists and turns in the story, which makes for great intrigue. Just what you want in a good mystery. The life of the Amish was portrayed honestly and added a unique perspective not seen in many mysteries.
I was struck by how the Amish way of life meshed with their religion. It was interesting to see their faith centered in their family life and to learn how their life as a community of believers was formed by that faith .
Centrality of faith in family life and especially in the life of the community of believers unfolded for us in Matthews Gospel reading this morning as once again Jesus has something to teach us. His intention, I believe, is to teach a clear ethical and moral truth.
Jesus says, ‘If any member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone.’ Apparently Jesus feels we must take our concerns for sin or for fault with another to that person and speak with them. Hardly novel, Jesus believes we should learn to talk with one another. Especially when we have challenges or problems in our relationships.
Isn’t this good advice for being in any relationship whether a problem or not occurs, whether it is personal or corporate, intimate or religious. Isn’t this good advice when miscommunication or hurt feelings occur? Admittedly, it is difficult to gather the strength sometimes to talk things out.
In the Amish home and in the Amish community honesty and truth-telling were essential to being faithful to Jesus’ teaching about how we glorify God. In “Harvest of Fire,” Sally, our FBI agent, was searching for just that, the truth.
She began to notice the affection one particular young man, Sam, had for one particular young lady, Rachael. She learned the young ladies mother had forbidden Rachael to see Sam. Yet they met. They met until Rachael realized her dishonesty and told Sam she could not see him because she did not want to continue to disobey her mother. Her love for him was tempered by her love for her mother and her duty to obey and be honest.
I sense in Jesus’ teaching and in our mystery movie an underlying call to ethical behavior in the role of friendship in telling the truth.
The early Greek philosopher Aristotle saw virtue in friendship and even argued for friendship as the basis for all ethical or moral behavior. Gone wrong, he pointed out, untrue friendship could become the excuse for immoral behavior when friends do not act like true friends.
A true friend, as Jesus says, will go and point out the fault if another member of the church, sins against you. An untrue friend will offer a weak excuse. ‘Who am I to judge?’ ‘If I stay out of your life, you will stay out of mine.’
Jesus is telling us, ‘My friend, this is no friend.’ “If you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you…if the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church.”
Our community of the faithful is in jeopardy when we avoid our responsibility as a true friend. There is no friendship without truthfulness. There is no truthfulness without judgment. The act of telling the truth is actually an act of the deepest love.
In the Christian community we need one another. To be family with one another we must work together. Jesus’ message is straight forward, to work rightly as a Church, as a family, we must go to those with whom we are having difficulty and we must talk.
There it is again, we must talk with one another. But, talking can be painful. Personally I will go to great lengths to avoid a verbal fight with someone. I know, just to talk doesn’t mean it’s always going to turn out with tension or shouting. But there is that chance.
Seldom do we find someone who enjoys confrontation and it just seems to us that to go and talk, even with a friend, about a fault or a sin committed is a sure recipe for losing that friend. How often, I wonder, do we avoid telling the truth because we do not want to risk our relationship with the one who has offended us.
Rachael, in “Harvest of Fire,” did not want to tell her mother she had been seeing the forbidden young man, Sam. She did not want to disappoint her mother with her disobedience. She did not want to risk losing her mothers trust. So she kept quiet about it.
Sam, we soon discover, is not being completely truthful with Rachael. He had something to hide too. His father, Jacob, had been shunned by their church for being prideful. In the past Jacob had built a barn that was not in compliance with the Amish way for barn-design restrictions and his actions were deemed prideful and unacceptable to the elders.
Obedience to the ruling elders, in things both great and small, was essential for the survival of the Amish faith community. If Jacob would not follow one rule they felt there was the danger he might not follow others and thus contaminate them all with disobedience. So he was shunned. Sam was angry with the elders as was his father. Their strained relationship with the church community was also tearing them apart.
Sally, the FBI agent, had been watching for clues to the identity of the barn burner. She was learning about the Amish by actually living in one of their homes. They were teaching her a lot about love and duty and commitment to family and to community. And they were teaching her about the need to be a true friend when someone like Jacob disobeyed their rules, sinned against them, and needed to hear the truth. In their community, for sin, for fault, there were consequences.
What the community expects and deserves at this point is repentance, repentance from the one who has sinned and fallen away from the community. What the community does not need is defiance. Defiance hampers forgiveness, and worse yet, may lead to the death of the community.
In the midst of this chaos relationships are lost, real relationships. If the church is a place of truthfulness, and I think it is, the church is the place where keeping the family together and maintaining relationships is worth the risk of being truthful.
There is no doubt that to tell the truth may risk a relationship. But to not tell the truth may risk the loss of the family, the community, or the church. It is with this fear of loss before us that we discover the path to restored relationships begins when we seek repentance.
In our barn burning mystery it came out that Sam, the young man whose father had been shunned, had set the barn fires in retaliation for the injustice he felt the church elders had done to his family. When the FBI investigator , Sally, confronted him and his father with their sin she unknowingly made the first step to repentance possible. She helped them begin to restore their relationship with their faith community. The restoration took on meaning when Sam went before everyone and confessed his sin and asked for forgiveness.
Jean Vanier, founder of L’Arche, an international federation of communities for people with mental or physical disabilities, once said, “Community is a continual act of forgiveness.”
At first when the investigator accused him of burning the barns Sam denied it, but then his moral beliefs took over and he confessed to his bishop before the entire congregation as they were raising a new born in place of one of the ones he had burned. And then the miracle, by God’s grace, the community did not abandon him. Their bishop defined God’s grace when he said, “Despise the sin, not the sinner.” In solidarity they accepted his cry for forgiveness and as community they all stood to be with him and walked with him as he was being taken away to trial.
There is a great lesson in this young man’s response to having his sin made public. He did not defend himself against the charge regardless of the cost; he did not forsake his relationships in favor of nursing his own hurt feelings or wounded pride.
No, our lesson this morning is to know that the reason to take Jesus’ advice is to learn our talking things out is the first step to winning back a relationship that is in danger of being lost. The reason Jesus teaches us to be truthful to our friends is to help us restore our relationship with them. Our goal is reconciliation not retribution. Community is a continual act of forgiveness.
With a goal to gain or regain our sister or brother in Christ our actions require a specific response. Jesus’ is clear about that. Our truth lived in forgiveness will reveal the true nature of our relationship with our friends in Christ. If we are a true friend that is.
I sense two things in Matthew this morning that I saw in those Amish people. First in shunning they took a stand and told a member of their flock, “ No, you have done wrong against God and against your church family.” There is a consequence for that. They told the truth about sin.
Secondly, they teach us about forgiveness when one repents. The Amish did not learn this by themselves. They learned it from Jesus. Jesus Christ tells the truth about our sin and, when we are contrite of heart, he forgives us as we are to forgive one another.
Jesus also promises that where two or three are gathered he is there with us. Jesus gathers with us for he expects that when we tell the truth we will risk relationships. Knowing the danger, Jesus stands with us. As we seek repentance over punishment, as we offer and receive forgiveness, Jesus is our ever present help. He made that clear up there on the cross as he said “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” Dear friends, community is a continual act of forgiveness.
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen
Additional helps:
Barbara Brown Taylor, “The Seeds of Heaven.”
090411.gpc
No comments:
Post a Comment