Monday, February 17, 2014

Today’s text

Matthew 5:38-39

You have heard how it was said: Eye for eye and tooth for tooth. But I say this to you: offer no resistance to the wicked. On the contrary, if anyone hits you on the right cheek, offer him the other as well … .

Reflection

I know irony when I hear it … usually. And it is clear this is irony, since Jesus himself resisted evil everyday, not with violence but with words and the power within him.

He did not back down in the face of evil or oppressors who stole the lives and substance of the weak. His voice was for them and against those who took advantage.

And he certainly did not encourage people to go back to where they could be abused again and again, like some doormat.

Even this turning of the cheek is an act of resistance, an act that says you do not control me or determine my worth. You cannot touch what is deep and most precious in me.

Truth is the slap described here is most likely a backhand. The right hand can backhand a right cheek easily, but the left? That it cannot reach.

It was as if to say there is something in me you cannot touch, something your insult and injury cannot touch. I am a person, who at depth of soul knows my very breathing is the breath of the One who dwells within me and who delights in my very existence.

It is only those who know, who truly know and have felt this delight who can overcome circumstances and remain the strength and beauty they are in troubled moments.

It is only they who they are not defined by others anger or evil, who can lift up their heads without shame when insults, demands or sorrows come.

They are your true children, dearest God, the brothers and sisters of Jesus who know who they are. 

They are your divine breath given form and substance, body and heart, that your beauty may breathe in the world and grace all of us.

So breathe peace and know who you are.

Pr. David L. Miller