Today's text
Matthew 18:15-20
If your brother does something wrong, go and have it out with him alone, between your two selves. If he listens to you, you have won back your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you: whatever the misdemeanour, the evidence of two or three witnesses is required to sustain the charge. But if he refuses to listen to these, report it to the community; and if he refuses to listen to the community, treat him like a gentile or a tax collector. 'In truth I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven; whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. 'In truth I tell you once again, if two of you on earth agree to ask anything at all, it will be granted to you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three meet in my name, I am there among them.'
Reflection
These verses read like legal directives for policing and keeping good order in the community. You can find them used exactly this way in many congregational constitutions.
Jesus says: when someone in the church does you or others wrong go speak to them. Go privately. If they don’t listen, take two or three others from the church with you and talk to the person again. This emphasizes the seriousness of the trouble. But it also protects the accused from false and exaggerated claims.
If reconciliation and peace still cannot be worked out, take the matter to the whole church. If the person is wrong and refuses to make things right, treat him like an outsider, gentile, a tax collector. And we all know how Jesus treated them.
He reached out to them. He sought their hearts. He forgave them. They were among those for whom he showed greatest concern and forbearance.
Jesus did not seek to throw anyone out. Mutual correction in the church is not for the purpose of making anyone grovel. Jesus has one desire: to make peace, to restore unity, to nurture harmony so that joy abounds in the community of faith.
Jesus concern is different from ours. He moves our feet in a direction opposite our normal path. Go to the one who has wronged you, he says. Speak with them.
More often, we retreat to our corners when we feel wronged or are upset. In our disagreements, we seek those we believe will agree with us, who will not question us, if keep peace in the family.
We go to our personal ‘amen’ corners where others will solemnly nod their heads in agreement and say, ‘Yes, you are right to be offended. This is wrong, outrageous, unthinkable. You’re right to be angry.’
We don’t want perspective. We don’t want our friends to correct our understanding at this point. We want someone to tell us that we are right and the one who troubles us is wrong or stupid or both.
You can think of dozens of examples of this. It’s typical human behavior, not just for individuals but for all kinds of groups, political parties and even nations. Take the recent political conventions, Democrat and Republican, for example.
But Jesus doesn’t give a wit about our self-righteous claims or our need to feel superior to others. These things only fracture relationships and create division in our homes, our schools, our neighborhoods, our nation and our churches.
Jesus sends us to each other to make and nurture peace, promising always to be with us, no matter what.
Jesus wants our congregations, indeed the entire Christian church (to say nothing of the cosmos itself) to experience his presence in the forgiving love, the gentle care, the humble self-giving, the kindness of mercy that we share in our relationships with each other. He wants us to know his nearness in the harmony of human souls within this fellowship.
Where two or three gather in my name, I am there, Jesus says. Our divisions, hard-heartedness and harsh judgments obscure his presence among us, diluting our experience of his love.
So he calls us beyond our fear, beyond our wounds, beyond our self-righteousness, beyond our need to look down upon others. He calls us to make peace, to forgive and be forgiven. So that as we gather, we will know his presence that our hearts may soar.
Pr. David L. Miller
http://prayingthemystery.blogspot.com/
Posts
All Comments
Friday, September 05, 2008
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Tuesday, September 3, 2008
Today’s text
Matthew 18:15-17
[Jesus said]: 'If your brother does something wrong, go and have it out with him alone, between your two selves. If he listens to you, you have won back your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you: whatever the misdemeanor, the evidence of two or three witnesses is required to sustain the charge. But if he refuses to listen to these, report it to the community; and if he refuses to listen to the community, treat him like a gentile or a tax collector.'
Prayer
You come to make peace, Jesus, but wherever you appear conflict comes. I suppose we should expect that. Sparks fly whenever the truly good and holy appears. The things of God are inevitably opposed by that which is not truly good and holy. And our world is not wholly given to you, nor are we. So, we resist you.
In your church, we seek a haven, a safe space in which we may know love surpassing. We hope that here, in this place, the pettiness and anxieties, the small-mindedness and self-seeking that wounds our souls and mars human community will not sting our flesh. No, at least not here.
We seek a generosity of spirit in your church, Jesus, a place where the big-heartedness of your divine soul might prevail in our heart and more: in the words and actions of all who gather around you. But our hope is a romantic dream. We yearn for a place of your peace, only to be frustrated by the sin and the criticism of cramped hearts, including our own.
Our sin cuts us off, excommunicates our own souls from the living community of your shared grace.
Still, you call us to open-hearted generosity, a fullness of spirit reflecting your own love, a largess that showers good on the righteous and unrighteous alike. You make no distinction, somehow loving all.
Our chief sin is here: we do not love all. We don’t love ourselves all that well. And we are not very good at loving those with whom we share your table of grace, your own body and blood. Receiving your great generosity, we fail to extend the same.
If there is anything for which we need to correct each other, Jesus, surely it is this.
So come to us, Jesus. Send us human hearts, generous spirits, to correct and call us home to the generosity of spirit that is in you. Only then will we find the place of peace for which our souls rightly long.
Pr. David L. Miller
Matthew 18:15-17
[Jesus said]: 'If your brother does something wrong, go and have it out with him alone, between your two selves. If he listens to you, you have won back your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you: whatever the misdemeanor, the evidence of two or three witnesses is required to sustain the charge. But if he refuses to listen to these, report it to the community; and if he refuses to listen to the community, treat him like a gentile or a tax collector.'
Prayer
You come to make peace, Jesus, but wherever you appear conflict comes. I suppose we should expect that. Sparks fly whenever the truly good and holy appears. The things of God are inevitably opposed by that which is not truly good and holy. And our world is not wholly given to you, nor are we. So, we resist you.
In your church, we seek a haven, a safe space in which we may know love surpassing. We hope that here, in this place, the pettiness and anxieties, the small-mindedness and self-seeking that wounds our souls and mars human community will not sting our flesh. No, at least not here.
We seek a generosity of spirit in your church, Jesus, a place where the big-heartedness of your divine soul might prevail in our heart and more: in the words and actions of all who gather around you. But our hope is a romantic dream. We yearn for a place of your peace, only to be frustrated by the sin and the criticism of cramped hearts, including our own.
Our sin cuts us off, excommunicates our own souls from the living community of your shared grace.
Still, you call us to open-hearted generosity, a fullness of spirit reflecting your own love, a largess that showers good on the righteous and unrighteous alike. You make no distinction, somehow loving all.
Our chief sin is here: we do not love all. We don’t love ourselves all that well. And we are not very good at loving those with whom we share your table of grace, your own body and blood. Receiving your great generosity, we fail to extend the same.
If there is anything for which we need to correct each other, Jesus, surely it is this.
So come to us, Jesus. Send us human hearts, generous spirits, to correct and call us home to the generosity of spirit that is in you. Only then will we find the place of peace for which our souls rightly long.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
Monday, September 2, 2008
Today’s text
Matthew 18:15-17
'If your brother does something wrong, go and have it out with him alone, between your two selves. If he listens to you, you have won back your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you: whatever the misdemeanor, the evidence of two or three witnesses is required to sustain the charge. But if he refuses to listen to these, report it to the community; and if he refuses to listen to the community, treat him like a gentile or a tax collector.
Prayer
This sounds harsh. But listening to Jesus’ words again I see that he offers a way more gentle and righteous than our normal ways. Far more.
His concern is entirely different than that which defines most of our conflicts. He moves our feet in a direction opposite that of our normal paths. Most often, we are amazed, disgusted or indignant when others treat us unfairly.
‘How could they do this?’
‘How could they say that about me?’
We flee to a safe corner where we know people will listen to our complaint as we pour out tales of personal slights, unfair treatment and woe. We seek sympathy and nodding heads that affirm that we are right to be offended.
That’s what we really want: affirmation that we are right and another is wrong or stupid. It feeds our self-righteousness and sense of superiority. We can look down on our offender surrounded by our personal ‘amen’ corner.
We know this pattern. It is as old as the human race and repeated millions of times daily in every language of earth.
But Jesus directs back to the one who troubles, insults or offends us. Jesus is not one wit concerned with satisfying self-righteousness or our sense of superiority. These only fracture relationships and erode real community. They miss the mark of truly human living as much or more than many of the slights and injustices we suffer.
Jesus sends us to our offender to make peace. And he promises always to be there, present in the heart of our effort to live in harmony. He sends us back to the place where our souls might find healing, not merely affirmation.
Jesus, you seek peace for our wounded souls. Your will is that we experience a seamless garment of communal wholeness, where we live in harmony with each other. Teach our hearts your way that our crusty souls may soften.
Pr. David L. Miller
Matthew 18:15-17
'If your brother does something wrong, go and have it out with him alone, between your two selves. If he listens to you, you have won back your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you: whatever the misdemeanor, the evidence of two or three witnesses is required to sustain the charge. But if he refuses to listen to these, report it to the community; and if he refuses to listen to the community, treat him like a gentile or a tax collector.
Prayer
This sounds harsh. But listening to Jesus’ words again I see that he offers a way more gentle and righteous than our normal ways. Far more.
His concern is entirely different than that which defines most of our conflicts. He moves our feet in a direction opposite that of our normal paths. Most often, we are amazed, disgusted or indignant when others treat us unfairly.
‘How could they do this?’
‘How could they say that about me?’
We flee to a safe corner where we know people will listen to our complaint as we pour out tales of personal slights, unfair treatment and woe. We seek sympathy and nodding heads that affirm that we are right to be offended.
That’s what we really want: affirmation that we are right and another is wrong or stupid. It feeds our self-righteousness and sense of superiority. We can look down on our offender surrounded by our personal ‘amen’ corner.
We know this pattern. It is as old as the human race and repeated millions of times daily in every language of earth.
But Jesus directs back to the one who troubles, insults or offends us. Jesus is not one wit concerned with satisfying self-righteousness or our sense of superiority. These only fracture relationships and erode real community. They miss the mark of truly human living as much or more than many of the slights and injustices we suffer.
Jesus sends us to our offender to make peace. And he promises always to be there, present in the heart of our effort to live in harmony. He sends us back to the place where our souls might find healing, not merely affirmation.
Jesus, you seek peace for our wounded souls. Your will is that we experience a seamless garment of communal wholeness, where we live in harmony with each other. Teach our hearts your way that our crusty souls may soften.
Pr. David L. Miller
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)