Right Turns
Commentary
Where you and I live, intersections are clearly marked.
I lived for a number of years in a suburb where signs were posted 500 feet in advance of any major intersection to notify you of the crossing street just ahead. Those signs had words. Even more signs, however, both in cities and out in the country, feature symbols to alert drivers to upcoming intersections.
It never pays, you see, for a driver to be caught by surprise. And particular care especially has to be taken when there is the natural possibility of collision that is inherent with intersections. I can’t afford to have other cars crossing my path without my knowing that it might happen.
Beyond the possibility of accidents, meanwhile, there is the navigational need. This is somewhat less essential in our day, of course, when every driver and his brother has some sort of GPS device offering turn-by-turn instructions. But for decades, it was very helpful to drivers to get some advanced notice of what street, what highway, what county road was just ahead. After all, it doesn’t help the flow of traffic if drivers have to slow down at every turn to decide whether it is the right turn or not.
And so you and I live in a time and place where intersections are clearly marked. We may take it for granted, but the fact is that it makes a huge difference. Imagine the mayhem that would ensue if intersections were unmarked: if crossing traffic always came as a surprise, and if our choices were unclear.
Yet when we leave the world of mere traffic and consider the larger world of life choices and daily decisions, we discover that the intersections are not so clearly marked. We find that the navigational aides are not ubiquitous and obvious. Instead, intersections often catch us by surprise. We miss turns that we ought to have taken, and we take turns that end up putting us on the wrong way. The world does not afford us anything near the guidance for living that it does for driving.
Ah, but scripture does. God has given us the directions we need. And this week’s selected passages all help us to see the intersections, the turns, the destinations, and the right ways to go.
Deuteronomy 30:15-20
A strong theme runs through the whole of scripture. It is a paradigm of choices. Life is full of either-or, fork-in-the-road options. And the biblical witness is confident that, no matter how the two roads may look when you come to the fork, they lead to dramatically different kinds of destinations.
Proverbs is perhaps the biblical book most replete with this two-path imagery. “The way of the sluggard is as a hedge of thorns,” we are told, “but the path of the upright is a highway” (Proverbs 15:19 NASB). On the one hand, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death” (Proverbs 14:12 NIV). Conversely, “The path of life leads upward for the wise to keep him from going down to the grave” (Proverbs 15:24 NIV).
When we come to the New Testament, we think of Paul’s spirit-and-flesh dichotomy (e.g., Romans 8:3-8), as well as both Peter (e.g., 1 Peter 2:9) and John (e.g., 1 John 2:8-9) juxtaposing light and darkness. And in the teachings of Jesus, the either-or paradigm is implicit in his parable of the two housebuilders (Matthew 7:24-27). And he makes the point explicit in his warning about the wide and narrow ways. “Enter through the narrow gate;” he urges, “for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it” (Matthew 7:13-14 NASB).
What we hear from Moses at this juncture in Deuteronomy, therefore, should be understood as part of a larger theme. It is paradigmatic in scripture to recognize that what is set before us today — every day! — is this choice between life and prosperity, on the one hand, and death and adversity, on the other.
The fascinating irony of the Israelites’ situation is that, without Moses’ help, they likely would not have recognized their choice. We human beings are so naturally visual — so oriented toward the material, the tangible — that we can be quite insensitive to things metaphysical. I expect that if you had polled the children of Israel at that moment about where they stood, to a man they probably would have answered, “On the border of the Promised Land.” And so they were. But Moses brought them to the realization that they were at a different sort of intersection, as well.
What they could see clearly was the main road — sometimes called “The King’s Highway” that ran north-south through that trans-Jordan region where they were camped. They could see in the distance the route they would have to travel to face the daunting city of Jericho. And perhaps they could see beyond Jericho the roads that stretched up into the hills of the Judean wilderness to western cities like Jerusalem, Bethel, and Shechem.
Moses, however, alerted them to roads they could not see with their eyes. Call the one road “obedience.” Others know it by its fuller name, “walking in his ways.” Call the other road “disobedience.” It is noteworthy for the very appealing, eye-catching signs leading up to its exit ramp.
The children of Israel can’t see those roads with their eyes, but Moses knows that they are facing — continually facing — the choice between those roads. And so he helps them by giving them directions. Specifically, he lets the people know where each road leads.
In our day, you know, we tend to begin with the destination, not the road. In other words, we enter into our devices the address to which we want to go, and then we let the device tell us what road to take and where to turn. But imagine that we navigated life without that overt sense of destination. Imagine that we, instead, just took the roads that we felt like taking — the roads that seemed most appealing at any given moment — and then ended up wherever those roads happened to lead. That seems like a ridiculous way to travel, no? Yet that is how so many people live.
Accordingly, Moses wanted to let the children of Israel know where the two roads would lead. He couldn’t count on it that the better road would necessarily look better — or appear to be the easier road to travel — and so he knew that the Israelites might choose the wrong road, instead. So he gave them the wise and helpful perspective that is necessary to every traveler: a sense of destination.
You can’t see where a given road will lead just by turning onto it. Moses offers, therefore, an invaluable look ahead. And the end of obedience road, “you shall live and become numerous, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to possess.” Conversely, at the end of disobedience road, “you shall perish; you shall not live long in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.”
As we noted above, Moses’ counsel is not an outlier. We hear the same message from the writer of Proverbs, from the apostles, and from Jesus himself. Furthermore, we see the same truth reported anecdotally in the historical accounts of Judges, Samuel, and Kings.
If you know where you want to end up, Moses is telling you the path that will get you there. And in case you are going to make your decisions blindly right at the intersection, Moses is alerting you to what awaits at the end of each road. Thus he concludes by insisting that he has given the people fair warning: “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses.”
1 Corinthians 3:1-9
We are indebted to the Corinthians for their many problems. In terms of number of chapters, Paul’s correspondence with the Christians in Corinth makes up more than ten percent of the New Testament. And in that wealth of material, we are made privy to the apostle’s counsel on so many matters of importance and application for us still today. And so, while it seems that the Corinthians caused Paul both headaches and heartaches, you and I are the beneficiaries of their problems two-thousand years later.
Here, early in 1 Corininthians, Paul laments the difficulty of trying to communicate with them because of their spiritual state. This is a theme we see at several points in 1 Corinthians, and it emerges again in 2 Corinthians. The spiritual state he laments is that they are “people of the flesh” and “infants in Christ.” They are not spiritually mature.
I am reminded of a good friend of mine who has been a college professor for forty years. How often I have heard her express her frustration over students who arrive in her classroom without some of the basic elements of knowledge and understanding that one would expect a college freshman to have. Because they don’t understand certain literary references, or grammatical concepts, or fundamentals of Western history, she is unable to teach them as she would like to. They lack the educational foundation upon which she wants to be able to build.
So it is that Paul cannot proceed to instruct the Corinthians in the way that he would like to be able to. He wants to “speak to (them) as spiritual people,” but cannot. If only they understood the things that they should. If only they lived the way that they are meant to. If only their priorities were what they ought to be. Then Paul could work with them so much more easily.
The evidence of the people’s spiritual immaturity in this case is that “there is jealousy and quarreling among you.” That reads like a pretty damning diagnosis for most of us. So much jealousy and quarreling still characterizes so many of our churches that Paul’s critique of the Corinthians hits uncomfortably close to home.
Those quarrels, it seems, get played out in the venue of personalities. The people in the Corinthian church have chosen to align themselves with different leaders who have been influential in their church along the way. “I belong to Apollos,” say some, while others choose to identify with Paul. The irony, of course, is that, as far as we know, the Paul-vs.-Apollos competition is entirely artificial. It did not trace back to Paul or Apollos themselves, and so the people are creating a rift where none exists.
This phenomenon did not die with the first-century Christians in Corinth. People seem so naturally to divide into us-them thinking. And it is commonplace to look to someone or something bigger — some authoritative figure, some movement, some cause — to symbolize and justify our “side.”
Paul, however, corrects the Corinthians by helping them to see again the big picture. That is so often the solution. In our fallen condition, we human being tend to be rather myopic. We lose sight of the big things, the larger perspective. But Paul refocuses the Corinthian lens.
“What then is Apollos?” Paul asks. “What is Paul? Servants through whom you came to believe.” It’s an exercise in irony, you see. The Christians in Corinth are elevating Paul and Apollos to the level of being worthy of divisions in the church. But Paul puts the lie to that behavior, making the remarkable (and unnatural) choice to demote himself and diminish his own importance. What am I? Just a servant. Just an instrument that God used to bring you to Christ. And he — Christ — is the one who is truly important. He is the one who deserves your unified allegiance.
Paul’s assessment of himself is exemplary. We might all learn from him. On the one hand, he would say that he does the most important thing in the world. On the other hand, he would demur from any suggestion of personal importance, for what he does, that he is used, and how he is used is all by God’s grace. His attitude is reminiscent of John the Baptist’s self-assessment statements (see, for example, Mark 1:7-9 and John 3:29-30).
Finally, Paul concludes this section with several word pictures to help the Corinthians understand him, understand Apollos, and understand themselves. Paul and Apollos participate in God’s work, but in the end the accomplishment is truly God’s. They can help it happen; they cannot make it happen. The Corinthians, meanwhile, are the field in which Paul and Apollos labor, and they are the building on which they build.
Matthew 5:21-37
Our Gospel lection is a gift from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. The challenge is that the gift is too large for us to employ it all on a single Sunday! For seventeen verses from Matthew 5 comprise too abundant a treasure to be able to do justice to it in a single sermon.
You and I know, for example, that there are undertones of the theme of Jesus’ relationship to the Law echoing through his “you have heard...but I say to you” teachings. That is an immensely important theme, and one that this passage invites us to explore. At the same time, however, we also observe the dramatic internalization of the Old Testament Law in these ethical teachings of Jesus. Murder morphs into anger and name-calling, and adultery is equated with lust. We read on, though, and we wrestle with the hyperbolic quality of Jesus’ teachings. Is the equating of adultery and lust mere hyperbole? And does he sincerely mean for us to cut off hands and pluck out eyes? We also meet here the challenging emphasis on peace and reconciliation. (We will return to this particular point in more detail below.) We hear the uncomfortable standards about marriage and divorce. And we wonder about the meaning and significance of the instruction about swearing (i.e., taking an oath).
All in all, you see, this is a vein too rich to be mined in a single sermon. What, then, is a preacher to do?
Dating back to a day when the three-point sermon was standard fare in many pulpits, the story is told of a homiletics student asking the professor, “How many points should a sermon have?” And the professor wisely replied, “At least one.” Indeed I’m quite sure, however, that we do not do our people any favors by preaching a 25-point sermon, which is the sort of scope our Gospel lection this week could have.
In the absence of a single point to be made, therefore, I would treat this passage as a kind of mosaic. See each teaching, each point, as a single chip or color or stone in a larger picture. And then step back and see the whole. Don’t get bogged down in the individual instructions, but endeavor instead to see the larger thing that is being portrayed. For it seems to me that what Jesus is portraying, one colorful piece at a time, is the will of God. Indeed, the heart of God!
So let us help our people to hear this excerpt from the Sermon on the Mount and to see the big picture in it. See the compelling, beautiful will of God that pulses through it. A perfect will that is not satisfied by respectable externals, but yearns for a pure and good heart. A divine will that does not wink at sin, but insists on our being entirely free of it. A simple will that is unimpressed by big gestures, preferring straightforward integrity. And a loving will that grieves over broken relationships, longing for the humility and charity that reconciles people to one another.
Application
We noted above the intersections at which the children of Israel found themselves in the days of Moses’ farewell. What they could see well enough with their eyes was that they stood on a border between their wilderness past and their Promised Land future. What was not so visible and tangible, on the other hand, was the intersection that Moses wanted to show them.
The people were approaching a fork in the road. Not a fork where one road led east and another west, or one north and the other south. Rather, they were approaching a fork where the one road led to life and prosperity, while the other road led to adversity and death. Moses wanted to be sure that the people knew where each road would lead them so that they would choose wisely. It was a choice — an ongoing choice — between walking in God’s ways or turning away from him.
The intersection that Moses perceived is not relegated to Palestine in the second millennium BC. You and I still encounter that same fork and still choose one of those two roads. And so scripture helps us to identify an intersection that the world may not help us with, at all.
The Apostle Paul, meanwhile, also gives us some insight into the less obvious, less visible intersections that we encounter. Writing to the Christians in Corinth, he laments that they are not “spiritual people” but rather still “people of the flesh.” It is interesting that he does not merely speak in terms of spiritual maturity, as though they are on the right path and simply need to grow up. No, he suggests a more dramatic dichotomy and need for change. They must change from carnal to spiritual. And that, of course, is a theme we see again and again in his letters.
This insight from Paul will help us to navigate the intersections and forks that we face. We begin with Moses’ recognition that there are two roads, and now we add to that Paul’s assertion that there are also two impulses. In other words, we human beings come with a built-in navigational device that guides us in our decision-making. It’s our flesh, our sinful nature. And that built-in navigational system tends to direct us down the wrong road. And so we see the need for a different way of navigating. We must live not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit if we are going to find and choose the right road that leads to the right place.
Finally, the teaching from Jesus in Matthew’s passage adds one more dimension. It is closely related to the spirit-vs.-flesh navigation. We might call it the distinction between internal and external.
So much of the Old Testament law — indeed, so much of what was perceived as obedience to God — was external in nature. Concrete behaviors, physical actions and choices. But Jesus’ teaching expands our definition of obedience. It looks inward. It includes the heart.
And so this additional insight completes our equipment for navigating the life-choice intersections that we encounter each day. For Jesus reminds us of a sinister possibility for fallen human beings. Namely, that our feet might be on the right road, but our heart might be on the wrong road. That is to say, for example, I might not be killing anyone, but I may be harboring all sorts of anger and bitterness in my heart. And so I could deceive myself into thinking that I am living a life that is pleasing to and blessed by God, when in reality the Lord who looks on the heart knows that I am on the road that leads to adversity and death.
Once we leave the setting of mere traffic, you and I no longer live in a world where the intersections are clearly marked. But scripture helps us see and helps us navigate. Moses points out the forks that the rest of the world does not mark for us. Paul urges us to change out our navigational system. And Jesus keeps us mindful that walking the right road is not just a matter of our actions, but also of our minds and our hearts.
Alternative Application(s)
Matthew 5:21-37 — “Sent Home from Church Early”
If your church is like mine, there is a several-minute period built into each Sunday’s service for “the offering.” In many churches for many years, this has been a time when ushers move throughout the sanctuary with baskets or plates, and folks place their contributions in those receptacles as they are passed down the rows. Then, in most instances, those baskets or plates are carried by the ushers to the front of the sanctuary and placed on some altar or table there. This, then, has become our contemporary version of presenting our offerings to God — although for the majority of American churchgoers, it seems, it is merely a ritual for making a donation to the church.
For the moment, let us work within the profile of our own context. Imagine that, just before the ushers begin to move through your congregation, you stand up and say a word about the offering. Except that it’s not a word about the importance of giving, not a word about tithing, not a word about the important ministries that are supported by the gifts. No, you say a word about the personal relationships of the individuals in your pews. “Before we receive this morning’s offering,” you say, “let me ask you a candid question. Is there anyone in your life to whom you need to be reconciled? Is there a break between you and someone in your family or circle of friends? Is there someone to whom you owe an apology? If so, let me encourage you to get up and leave now. Go make things right in that relationship, and then come back with your offering envelope as soon as you’re done.”
I expect that everyone in your congregation would be stunned. And while a few might get up and leave, I’m not sure they would come back. It would be a startling thing for a preacher to say, a stunning move for a pastor to make. And yet, within our contemporary context, it’s actually a very small request. After all, a typical member of your church or mine can probably drive between home and church in less than twenty minutes. And a high percentage of the folks you will see in church this Sunday you will see again next Sunday. Furthermore, with all of our amazing means of communication today, most of us wouldn’t have to move from our pews in order to reach out to a person in order to accomplish some reconciliation with them.
Now let us set aside our context long enough to consider the context of Jesus’ original audience. The traditional site for the Sermon on the Mount is a picturesque hillside north of Capernaum. So with that possible location in mind, imagine what that Galilean audience thought when they heard Jesus say, “When you are offering your gift at the altar...”
“The altar,” we recall, was in Jerusalem. While some of our communities may be accustomed to a church on every other corner in certain neighborhoods, the Jews of Jesus’ day did not have multiple places of worship. They did not get to choose a location convenient for themselves. No, there was one altar, and that altar was at the Temple in Jerusalem. Jerusalem was perhaps an eighty-mile trip — specifically, an eighty-mile walk! — for most of the people who heard Jesus that day.
So when Jesus says to them, “When you are offering your gift at the altar,” they do not conjure an image of something that they do easily, and certainly not something that they do weekly. It is an occasional thing for them. It is a journey. From departure to return, it is a several-day investment. And within that context, then, hear Jesus’ astonishing counsel. “If you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.”
Having finally arrived at your destination, following several days of travel, if it occurs to you that someone back home “has something against you,” go back! Go all the way back home, make it right, and then — only then — return to your destination. This is the radical challenge that Jesus is issuing.
Now, as we noted above, in this same passage, Jesus also recommends cutting off hands and plucking out eyes. In this same passage, Jesus equates anger with murder and lust with adultery. It is possible, therefore, that Jesus does not mean that a person who has walked from Capernaum to Jerusalem should literally walk all the way back and then return again just because they remembered that someone had something against them.
Yet even if we adjust the application of the teaching for hyperbole, we must not discount the heart of God. For Jesus is making it clear to us what is important to our heavenly Father. And his extreme challenge is meant to give us some sense of just how important it is to God — and therefore how important it ought to be to us.
Unfortunately, many of us learn to become pretty content with broken relationships. We soldier on with our lives in spite of this person or that having something against us. We merrily sweep under the rug the various offenses for which we ought to apologize. But it’s possible that our offerings — that our worship itself — may not give God much pleasure as long as we are not seeking reconciliation. For while we are focusing on being right with him at church, he redirects us to make sure things are right with those back home.
I lived for a number of years in a suburb where signs were posted 500 feet in advance of any major intersection to notify you of the crossing street just ahead. Those signs had words. Even more signs, however, both in cities and out in the country, feature symbols to alert drivers to upcoming intersections.
It never pays, you see, for a driver to be caught by surprise. And particular care especially has to be taken when there is the natural possibility of collision that is inherent with intersections. I can’t afford to have other cars crossing my path without my knowing that it might happen.
Beyond the possibility of accidents, meanwhile, there is the navigational need. This is somewhat less essential in our day, of course, when every driver and his brother has some sort of GPS device offering turn-by-turn instructions. But for decades, it was very helpful to drivers to get some advanced notice of what street, what highway, what county road was just ahead. After all, it doesn’t help the flow of traffic if drivers have to slow down at every turn to decide whether it is the right turn or not.
And so you and I live in a time and place where intersections are clearly marked. We may take it for granted, but the fact is that it makes a huge difference. Imagine the mayhem that would ensue if intersections were unmarked: if crossing traffic always came as a surprise, and if our choices were unclear.
Yet when we leave the world of mere traffic and consider the larger world of life choices and daily decisions, we discover that the intersections are not so clearly marked. We find that the navigational aides are not ubiquitous and obvious. Instead, intersections often catch us by surprise. We miss turns that we ought to have taken, and we take turns that end up putting us on the wrong way. The world does not afford us anything near the guidance for living that it does for driving.
Ah, but scripture does. God has given us the directions we need. And this week’s selected passages all help us to see the intersections, the turns, the destinations, and the right ways to go.
Deuteronomy 30:15-20
A strong theme runs through the whole of scripture. It is a paradigm of choices. Life is full of either-or, fork-in-the-road options. And the biblical witness is confident that, no matter how the two roads may look when you come to the fork, they lead to dramatically different kinds of destinations.
Proverbs is perhaps the biblical book most replete with this two-path imagery. “The way of the sluggard is as a hedge of thorns,” we are told, “but the path of the upright is a highway” (Proverbs 15:19 NASB). On the one hand, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death” (Proverbs 14:12 NIV). Conversely, “The path of life leads upward for the wise to keep him from going down to the grave” (Proverbs 15:24 NIV).
When we come to the New Testament, we think of Paul’s spirit-and-flesh dichotomy (e.g., Romans 8:3-8), as well as both Peter (e.g., 1 Peter 2:9) and John (e.g., 1 John 2:8-9) juxtaposing light and darkness. And in the teachings of Jesus, the either-or paradigm is implicit in his parable of the two housebuilders (Matthew 7:24-27). And he makes the point explicit in his warning about the wide and narrow ways. “Enter through the narrow gate;” he urges, “for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it” (Matthew 7:13-14 NASB).
What we hear from Moses at this juncture in Deuteronomy, therefore, should be understood as part of a larger theme. It is paradigmatic in scripture to recognize that what is set before us today — every day! — is this choice between life and prosperity, on the one hand, and death and adversity, on the other.
The fascinating irony of the Israelites’ situation is that, without Moses’ help, they likely would not have recognized their choice. We human beings are so naturally visual — so oriented toward the material, the tangible — that we can be quite insensitive to things metaphysical. I expect that if you had polled the children of Israel at that moment about where they stood, to a man they probably would have answered, “On the border of the Promised Land.” And so they were. But Moses brought them to the realization that they were at a different sort of intersection, as well.
What they could see clearly was the main road — sometimes called “The King’s Highway” that ran north-south through that trans-Jordan region where they were camped. They could see in the distance the route they would have to travel to face the daunting city of Jericho. And perhaps they could see beyond Jericho the roads that stretched up into the hills of the Judean wilderness to western cities like Jerusalem, Bethel, and Shechem.
Moses, however, alerted them to roads they could not see with their eyes. Call the one road “obedience.” Others know it by its fuller name, “walking in his ways.” Call the other road “disobedience.” It is noteworthy for the very appealing, eye-catching signs leading up to its exit ramp.
The children of Israel can’t see those roads with their eyes, but Moses knows that they are facing — continually facing — the choice between those roads. And so he helps them by giving them directions. Specifically, he lets the people know where each road leads.
In our day, you know, we tend to begin with the destination, not the road. In other words, we enter into our devices the address to which we want to go, and then we let the device tell us what road to take and where to turn. But imagine that we navigated life without that overt sense of destination. Imagine that we, instead, just took the roads that we felt like taking — the roads that seemed most appealing at any given moment — and then ended up wherever those roads happened to lead. That seems like a ridiculous way to travel, no? Yet that is how so many people live.
Accordingly, Moses wanted to let the children of Israel know where the two roads would lead. He couldn’t count on it that the better road would necessarily look better — or appear to be the easier road to travel — and so he knew that the Israelites might choose the wrong road, instead. So he gave them the wise and helpful perspective that is necessary to every traveler: a sense of destination.
You can’t see where a given road will lead just by turning onto it. Moses offers, therefore, an invaluable look ahead. And the end of obedience road, “you shall live and become numerous, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to possess.” Conversely, at the end of disobedience road, “you shall perish; you shall not live long in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.”
As we noted above, Moses’ counsel is not an outlier. We hear the same message from the writer of Proverbs, from the apostles, and from Jesus himself. Furthermore, we see the same truth reported anecdotally in the historical accounts of Judges, Samuel, and Kings.
If you know where you want to end up, Moses is telling you the path that will get you there. And in case you are going to make your decisions blindly right at the intersection, Moses is alerting you to what awaits at the end of each road. Thus he concludes by insisting that he has given the people fair warning: “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses.”
1 Corinthians 3:1-9
We are indebted to the Corinthians for their many problems. In terms of number of chapters, Paul’s correspondence with the Christians in Corinth makes up more than ten percent of the New Testament. And in that wealth of material, we are made privy to the apostle’s counsel on so many matters of importance and application for us still today. And so, while it seems that the Corinthians caused Paul both headaches and heartaches, you and I are the beneficiaries of their problems two-thousand years later.
Here, early in 1 Corininthians, Paul laments the difficulty of trying to communicate with them because of their spiritual state. This is a theme we see at several points in 1 Corinthians, and it emerges again in 2 Corinthians. The spiritual state he laments is that they are “people of the flesh” and “infants in Christ.” They are not spiritually mature.
I am reminded of a good friend of mine who has been a college professor for forty years. How often I have heard her express her frustration over students who arrive in her classroom without some of the basic elements of knowledge and understanding that one would expect a college freshman to have. Because they don’t understand certain literary references, or grammatical concepts, or fundamentals of Western history, she is unable to teach them as she would like to. They lack the educational foundation upon which she wants to be able to build.
So it is that Paul cannot proceed to instruct the Corinthians in the way that he would like to be able to. He wants to “speak to (them) as spiritual people,” but cannot. If only they understood the things that they should. If only they lived the way that they are meant to. If only their priorities were what they ought to be. Then Paul could work with them so much more easily.
The evidence of the people’s spiritual immaturity in this case is that “there is jealousy and quarreling among you.” That reads like a pretty damning diagnosis for most of us. So much jealousy and quarreling still characterizes so many of our churches that Paul’s critique of the Corinthians hits uncomfortably close to home.
Those quarrels, it seems, get played out in the venue of personalities. The people in the Corinthian church have chosen to align themselves with different leaders who have been influential in their church along the way. “I belong to Apollos,” say some, while others choose to identify with Paul. The irony, of course, is that, as far as we know, the Paul-vs.-Apollos competition is entirely artificial. It did not trace back to Paul or Apollos themselves, and so the people are creating a rift where none exists.
This phenomenon did not die with the first-century Christians in Corinth. People seem so naturally to divide into us-them thinking. And it is commonplace to look to someone or something bigger — some authoritative figure, some movement, some cause — to symbolize and justify our “side.”
Paul, however, corrects the Corinthians by helping them to see again the big picture. That is so often the solution. In our fallen condition, we human being tend to be rather myopic. We lose sight of the big things, the larger perspective. But Paul refocuses the Corinthian lens.
“What then is Apollos?” Paul asks. “What is Paul? Servants through whom you came to believe.” It’s an exercise in irony, you see. The Christians in Corinth are elevating Paul and Apollos to the level of being worthy of divisions in the church. But Paul puts the lie to that behavior, making the remarkable (and unnatural) choice to demote himself and diminish his own importance. What am I? Just a servant. Just an instrument that God used to bring you to Christ. And he — Christ — is the one who is truly important. He is the one who deserves your unified allegiance.
Paul’s assessment of himself is exemplary. We might all learn from him. On the one hand, he would say that he does the most important thing in the world. On the other hand, he would demur from any suggestion of personal importance, for what he does, that he is used, and how he is used is all by God’s grace. His attitude is reminiscent of John the Baptist’s self-assessment statements (see, for example, Mark 1:7-9 and John 3:29-30).
Finally, Paul concludes this section with several word pictures to help the Corinthians understand him, understand Apollos, and understand themselves. Paul and Apollos participate in God’s work, but in the end the accomplishment is truly God’s. They can help it happen; they cannot make it happen. The Corinthians, meanwhile, are the field in which Paul and Apollos labor, and they are the building on which they build.
Matthew 5:21-37
Our Gospel lection is a gift from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. The challenge is that the gift is too large for us to employ it all on a single Sunday! For seventeen verses from Matthew 5 comprise too abundant a treasure to be able to do justice to it in a single sermon.
You and I know, for example, that there are undertones of the theme of Jesus’ relationship to the Law echoing through his “you have heard...but I say to you” teachings. That is an immensely important theme, and one that this passage invites us to explore. At the same time, however, we also observe the dramatic internalization of the Old Testament Law in these ethical teachings of Jesus. Murder morphs into anger and name-calling, and adultery is equated with lust. We read on, though, and we wrestle with the hyperbolic quality of Jesus’ teachings. Is the equating of adultery and lust mere hyperbole? And does he sincerely mean for us to cut off hands and pluck out eyes? We also meet here the challenging emphasis on peace and reconciliation. (We will return to this particular point in more detail below.) We hear the uncomfortable standards about marriage and divorce. And we wonder about the meaning and significance of the instruction about swearing (i.e., taking an oath).
All in all, you see, this is a vein too rich to be mined in a single sermon. What, then, is a preacher to do?
Dating back to a day when the three-point sermon was standard fare in many pulpits, the story is told of a homiletics student asking the professor, “How many points should a sermon have?” And the professor wisely replied, “At least one.” Indeed I’m quite sure, however, that we do not do our people any favors by preaching a 25-point sermon, which is the sort of scope our Gospel lection this week could have.
In the absence of a single point to be made, therefore, I would treat this passage as a kind of mosaic. See each teaching, each point, as a single chip or color or stone in a larger picture. And then step back and see the whole. Don’t get bogged down in the individual instructions, but endeavor instead to see the larger thing that is being portrayed. For it seems to me that what Jesus is portraying, one colorful piece at a time, is the will of God. Indeed, the heart of God!
So let us help our people to hear this excerpt from the Sermon on the Mount and to see the big picture in it. See the compelling, beautiful will of God that pulses through it. A perfect will that is not satisfied by respectable externals, but yearns for a pure and good heart. A divine will that does not wink at sin, but insists on our being entirely free of it. A simple will that is unimpressed by big gestures, preferring straightforward integrity. And a loving will that grieves over broken relationships, longing for the humility and charity that reconciles people to one another.
Application
We noted above the intersections at which the children of Israel found themselves in the days of Moses’ farewell. What they could see well enough with their eyes was that they stood on a border between their wilderness past and their Promised Land future. What was not so visible and tangible, on the other hand, was the intersection that Moses wanted to show them.
The people were approaching a fork in the road. Not a fork where one road led east and another west, or one north and the other south. Rather, they were approaching a fork where the one road led to life and prosperity, while the other road led to adversity and death. Moses wanted to be sure that the people knew where each road would lead them so that they would choose wisely. It was a choice — an ongoing choice — between walking in God’s ways or turning away from him.
The intersection that Moses perceived is not relegated to Palestine in the second millennium BC. You and I still encounter that same fork and still choose one of those two roads. And so scripture helps us to identify an intersection that the world may not help us with, at all.
The Apostle Paul, meanwhile, also gives us some insight into the less obvious, less visible intersections that we encounter. Writing to the Christians in Corinth, he laments that they are not “spiritual people” but rather still “people of the flesh.” It is interesting that he does not merely speak in terms of spiritual maturity, as though they are on the right path and simply need to grow up. No, he suggests a more dramatic dichotomy and need for change. They must change from carnal to spiritual. And that, of course, is a theme we see again and again in his letters.
This insight from Paul will help us to navigate the intersections and forks that we face. We begin with Moses’ recognition that there are two roads, and now we add to that Paul’s assertion that there are also two impulses. In other words, we human beings come with a built-in navigational device that guides us in our decision-making. It’s our flesh, our sinful nature. And that built-in navigational system tends to direct us down the wrong road. And so we see the need for a different way of navigating. We must live not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit if we are going to find and choose the right road that leads to the right place.
Finally, the teaching from Jesus in Matthew’s passage adds one more dimension. It is closely related to the spirit-vs.-flesh navigation. We might call it the distinction between internal and external.
So much of the Old Testament law — indeed, so much of what was perceived as obedience to God — was external in nature. Concrete behaviors, physical actions and choices. But Jesus’ teaching expands our definition of obedience. It looks inward. It includes the heart.
And so this additional insight completes our equipment for navigating the life-choice intersections that we encounter each day. For Jesus reminds us of a sinister possibility for fallen human beings. Namely, that our feet might be on the right road, but our heart might be on the wrong road. That is to say, for example, I might not be killing anyone, but I may be harboring all sorts of anger and bitterness in my heart. And so I could deceive myself into thinking that I am living a life that is pleasing to and blessed by God, when in reality the Lord who looks on the heart knows that I am on the road that leads to adversity and death.
Once we leave the setting of mere traffic, you and I no longer live in a world where the intersections are clearly marked. But scripture helps us see and helps us navigate. Moses points out the forks that the rest of the world does not mark for us. Paul urges us to change out our navigational system. And Jesus keeps us mindful that walking the right road is not just a matter of our actions, but also of our minds and our hearts.
Alternative Application(s)
Matthew 5:21-37 — “Sent Home from Church Early”
If your church is like mine, there is a several-minute period built into each Sunday’s service for “the offering.” In many churches for many years, this has been a time when ushers move throughout the sanctuary with baskets or plates, and folks place their contributions in those receptacles as they are passed down the rows. Then, in most instances, those baskets or plates are carried by the ushers to the front of the sanctuary and placed on some altar or table there. This, then, has become our contemporary version of presenting our offerings to God — although for the majority of American churchgoers, it seems, it is merely a ritual for making a donation to the church.
For the moment, let us work within the profile of our own context. Imagine that, just before the ushers begin to move through your congregation, you stand up and say a word about the offering. Except that it’s not a word about the importance of giving, not a word about tithing, not a word about the important ministries that are supported by the gifts. No, you say a word about the personal relationships of the individuals in your pews. “Before we receive this morning’s offering,” you say, “let me ask you a candid question. Is there anyone in your life to whom you need to be reconciled? Is there a break between you and someone in your family or circle of friends? Is there someone to whom you owe an apology? If so, let me encourage you to get up and leave now. Go make things right in that relationship, and then come back with your offering envelope as soon as you’re done.”
I expect that everyone in your congregation would be stunned. And while a few might get up and leave, I’m not sure they would come back. It would be a startling thing for a preacher to say, a stunning move for a pastor to make. And yet, within our contemporary context, it’s actually a very small request. After all, a typical member of your church or mine can probably drive between home and church in less than twenty minutes. And a high percentage of the folks you will see in church this Sunday you will see again next Sunday. Furthermore, with all of our amazing means of communication today, most of us wouldn’t have to move from our pews in order to reach out to a person in order to accomplish some reconciliation with them.
Now let us set aside our context long enough to consider the context of Jesus’ original audience. The traditional site for the Sermon on the Mount is a picturesque hillside north of Capernaum. So with that possible location in mind, imagine what that Galilean audience thought when they heard Jesus say, “When you are offering your gift at the altar...”
“The altar,” we recall, was in Jerusalem. While some of our communities may be accustomed to a church on every other corner in certain neighborhoods, the Jews of Jesus’ day did not have multiple places of worship. They did not get to choose a location convenient for themselves. No, there was one altar, and that altar was at the Temple in Jerusalem. Jerusalem was perhaps an eighty-mile trip — specifically, an eighty-mile walk! — for most of the people who heard Jesus that day.
So when Jesus says to them, “When you are offering your gift at the altar,” they do not conjure an image of something that they do easily, and certainly not something that they do weekly. It is an occasional thing for them. It is a journey. From departure to return, it is a several-day investment. And within that context, then, hear Jesus’ astonishing counsel. “If you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.”
Having finally arrived at your destination, following several days of travel, if it occurs to you that someone back home “has something against you,” go back! Go all the way back home, make it right, and then — only then — return to your destination. This is the radical challenge that Jesus is issuing.
Now, as we noted above, in this same passage, Jesus also recommends cutting off hands and plucking out eyes. In this same passage, Jesus equates anger with murder and lust with adultery. It is possible, therefore, that Jesus does not mean that a person who has walked from Capernaum to Jerusalem should literally walk all the way back and then return again just because they remembered that someone had something against them.
Yet even if we adjust the application of the teaching for hyperbole, we must not discount the heart of God. For Jesus is making it clear to us what is important to our heavenly Father. And his extreme challenge is meant to give us some sense of just how important it is to God — and therefore how important it ought to be to us.
Unfortunately, many of us learn to become pretty content with broken relationships. We soldier on with our lives in spite of this person or that having something against us. We merrily sweep under the rug the various offenses for which we ought to apologize. But it’s possible that our offerings — that our worship itself — may not give God much pleasure as long as we are not seeking reconciliation. For while we are focusing on being right with him at church, he redirects us to make sure things are right with those back home.
