Pentecost 16A 2005
Ezekiel 33:7-11
Psalm 119:33-40
Romans 13:8-14
Matthew 18:15-20
It has been a world of tragedy this week. A huge loss of life in
I don’t know about you, but I see the pictures of the waters and debris and the tears and my heart breaks. I can’t imagine being caught up in such loss and fear and unknown tomorrows. But thousands upon thousands of our brothers and sisters are homeless, destitute, and grieving their losses, both of family and friends as well as homes and neighborhoods. What a nightmare!
This is a nightmare that evokes strong emotions in us all
the way up here in dry and sunny
What do we do? How do we seek to understand such devastation? As happens in such times, blame is spread out. There are folks saying and preaching about the end of times. God is trying to tell us something! We are bringing disaster in on our heads by our greed and sin.
It must be a sign, the end of the world, some sort of punishment. Is God trying to get our attention? This must be part of God’s plan… Maybe if we all believed harder, got prayer back in the schools, banned wicked New Orleans jazz music…
Then God would let us alone.
That’s one way of looking at it. If you believe in God the Avenger!! God the angry who will wipe out whole towns and communities just to get us to listen!
That’s not my God. Apocalyptic/end
time thinking leaves me with a lot more questions than answers. If God was trying to get us to listen, you think
God would destroy, say,
That’s not my type of God: the hard-hearted killer of innocent beings; threatening to rain down destruction if we don’t straighten up and fly right. If that is your God, see me after church and I’ll let you know where you can go to hear more fire and brimstone, because you won’t here it from me.
And you won’t here it in today’s readings. For God even desires the wicked to live…Ezekiel is to speak the word of God and to let the people know that God does not desire the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from their ways and live…this is a God of second, third and fourth chances. God wants life!
And then in Romans we hear more about love. Love love love. Paul is writing to people who already believe. He is not telling us how to be saved, but how to live life as believers. And we do it with love and compassion and by sending aid to the victims and by prayer and openness. And love.
Which brings us to the Gospel reading for today. Here is another one of those texts that is so easy to abuse. We read it and assume we are the people sinned against, so lets go confront the sinner! After all, we are in the right and must maintain the integrity of our church!
Yet the whole chapter of Matthew is not about judgment and sinning, but about forgiveness. This chapter starts by Jesus calling a child to him and telling his disciples they must be like a child. And if you put a stumbling block in front of one of these little ones, woe to you! Jesus goes on to talk about the shepherd seeking out the one lost sheep.
And after today’s verses Jesus tells Peter to forgive 70 x 7 times (you do the math!) And then we end the chapter with the parable of the unforgiving servant: the one who was forgiven by his boss but would not forgive those below him.
So we look at today’s section on how to live together, and see it as a lesson on forgiveness. God doesn’t want anyone to be lost. So how do we act that way in our church life? In our daily life? By always being in the right? By ganging up on the weak? But shunning the unworthy?
Or by listening to one another, being open and seeking understanding? By forgiving as much as it takes even while we hold people accountable?
Let’s turn it around. What if you are the one in the wrong, the one who has offended your brother or sister. How would you want to be treated? With loud confrontation or with forgiving love?
We are not about exclusion. But we are about God’s forgiving love.
Jesus just has to throw in that line about Gentiles and tax collectors. Let’s see, Jesus ate with tax collectors and healed Gentiles. He wasn’t going to loose anyone.
And so God desires this from us, also. As baptized children of God, God forgives us time and again when we turn inward, get greedy, and offend God.
God seeks us out, lifts us up, forgives us and renews us, then changes us into open, loving, forgiving people.
This God does not wipe out cities in anger. This God does not avenge the world by killing the innocent. This God does not try to get our attention with hurricanes and tornadoes.
Remember the story of Elijah experiencing God? From 1 Kings: 19 “The Lord is about to pass by. Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces… but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind, an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle…”
The Lord is not in the hurricane, not in the flood. The Lord is in the aid workers, the people of
The Lord is in the tears and the heartache and the silence.
Ours is not a God who desires the death of the wicked any more than God desires the death of the innocent. God is not raining down fire and brimstone to get an evil world to change it’s ways.
God wants the world won over by love, by forgiveness, by inclusion, by compassion, by humble hearts giving praise.
The Hurricane happened. Mother Nature, global warming, call it what you will. It is part of the world we live in, unpredictable and with nature often as violent as it is beautiful.
And yes, we seek answers; we look for ways to deal with the emotions and the pain.
But even while we look for answers…we are held by a loving God.
Let us pray: We pray to you, almighty God, in this time of disaster and the long road to recovery due to Hurricane Katrina. You are our refuge and strength, a very present help in time of trouble. Uphold the people of the gulf coast with your love, give them the strength they need. Help all of us in our confusion and guide our actions. Heal the hurt, console the bereaved and afflicted, protect the innocent and helpless, and deliver any who are still in peril. We pray for the rescue workers, the countless volunteers who offer aid, and the agencies who boldly go into the midst of such pain: we see in them your love. We pray in the name of Christ, AMEN