Proper 17 / Pentecost 15 / Ordinary Time 22
Preaching
Lectionary Preaching Workbook
Series VIII, Cycle A
Object:
Theme For The Day
God has a simple rule for making love last: outdo one another in showing honor.
Old Testament Lesson
Exodus 3:1-15
Moses At The Burning Bush
Having murdered an Egyptian overseer, in anger at his mistreatment of Hebrew slaves, Moses has fled to a far country: the land of Midian, where he is working as a shepherd for a man named Jethro. He is comfortably established. Having married into Jethro's family, he undoubtedly expects to remain there the rest of his life. That is, until this day. At the foot of Mount Horeb (a name which means "wasteland"), Moses comes upon a bush that is "blazing, but not consumed" (v. 2). It is probably no accident that the Hebrew word for "bush" (seneh) is similar to "Sinai." Calling to Moses from out of the bush, the Lord directs him to remove his sandals, "for the place on which you are standing is holy ground" (v. 5). The place is not intrinsically holy; it is God's appearance that makes it holy. Moses hides his face in fear -- as well he should, experiencing such a powerful theophany. The Lord has observed the suffering of Israel -- and it is a great comfort, in times of suffering, to know that God sees, and God cares (v. 7). Yet, more than that, the Lord promises to "come down to deliver them," and lead them to "a land flowing with milk and honey" (v. 8). For a herding and gathering people, milk and honey are expressions of prosperity -- for it means the herds are large and healthy, and the land offers rich opportunities for foraging and gathering. To this enslaved people, "milk and honey" means freedom. Moses will be the Lord's instrument in informing Pharaoh of the Lord's commands. He hesitates asking, "Who am I to do such a thing?" (v. 11). The Lord informs him that it doesn't matter who Moses is; the only thing that matters is "I will be with you" (v. 12). As a parting "sign," the Lord indicates that, one day, Moses will gather the liberated people in this very place, and they will worship "on this mountain" (v. 13).
New Testament Lesson
Romans 12:9-21
Characteristics Of The Christian Life
In rapid-fire fashion, Paul lays out a host of characteristics of the Christian life. They can be seen as further explications of verse 2 ("Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds."). Love, moral uprightness, zeal, hopefulness, patience, persistence in prayer, generosity, hospitality -- all these receive brief mention (and each of them, in truth, could be the topic of a sermon). Christians are to bless even their persecutors (v. 14). The close bonds among members of this new sort of community are captured in the words, "Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep" (v. 15). It is a community whose life is characterized by peace, humility, and modesty (v. 16). In this community -- and also in relationships members have in the outside world -- the Law of Hammurabi ("an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth") has been repealed. "Do not repay anyone evil for evil" is the new standard (v. 17). Paul specifically proscribes retribution, pointing out (quoting Deuteronomy 32:35) that vengeance belongs only to the Lord -- although, rather incongruously, he goes on to quote Proverbs 25:21-22, ending with "for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads." Being a Christian is more than a private matter. It has huge implications for how we live together, in community, as well as how we relate to those who do not share our creed.
The Gospel
Matthew 16:21-28
Take Up The Cross
Having heard and confirmed his identity as the Messiah, in receiving Peter's confession of faith, Jesus goes on to share a disturbing prediction. This Messiah will not lead an army of liberation, but will, rather, "undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised" (v. 21). This is too much for Peter, who takes him aside and "rebukes" him (v. 22). Jesus' reply is harsh: "Get behind me, Satan!" (v. 23). This is reminiscent of Matthew 4:8, when the devil offers Jesus "all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor." Jesus rejected that offer then, and he's not about to accept it now. Now comes the truly difficult teaching about discipleship: "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me" (v. 24). Jesus takes a truly big-picture view: suffering for righteousness' sake should be weighed not against the value of a single human lifespan, but rather, against eternity (verses 25-26). This is a broader, more expansive vision of life: bigger, by far, than a beating heart and lungs filled with air. When the Son of Man comes "with his angels in the glory of the Father," he will bring ultimate justice to the world (v. 27). These things will happen soon indeed: "there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom" (v. 28). Two of these sayings of Jesus are terrifically difficult to preach: the command to take up the cross, and the prediction that the Son of Man will come in that generation. There are some who would say Jesus' disciples glimpsed the vision of "the Son of Man coming in his kingdom" either at the resurrection or on Pentecost, although others would disagree.
Preaching Possibilities
Fans of PBS television will sooner or later run across a little program called "Antiques Roadshow." It started in England, and many of the shows are still filmed there, but they also have an American version. The premise of the Antiques Roadshow is simple: a team of antiques experts sets up shop in a convention center. They invite people to take from their attics, coffee tables, or safe-deposit boxes their most treasured family heirloom and bring it in to be appraised.
The program is composed entirely of brief, one- and two-minute encounters. In each of these segments, one of the experts looks over a person's treasure, searching for the maker's mark or telltale design feature that identifies it as genuine. Then, we get to watch the expression on the person's face as the expert declares if it's the real thing and what the value likely is.
Many of these items have sentimental value -- which means their owners would treasure and keep them regardless of the appraisal -- but still, it's a special joy for the owner to learn that great-grandpa's old dresser is indeed a genuine Chippendale.
"Let love be genuine," says the apostle Paul. As good as it feels to learn that your childhood elec-tric-train engine is a classic, it's far more gratifying to know that the person you love is truly sincere in his or her affections. But how can you tell for certain? How can you go about appraising the quality of love at the heart of a marriage, a friendship, or the bond between parent and child?
This brief passage from Romans reveals what to look for -- the maker's mark, as it were, by which we know that what we have is the real thing.
"Let love be genuine," Paul says, but then he goes on to say, "hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good." He's assuming, here, that true love is ethical to its very core. It seeks out and holds up all that is good. It singles out and spurns all that is evil.
Most of us have never thought of our significant love-relationships as a sort of greenhouse in which ethical behavior is nurtured, but that's exactly how the Bible sees them. When a bride walks down the church aisle to meet her beloved, not many people think of the two of them as establishing a basic unit of Christian mission -- but that's exactly what's going on (or what's meant to happen). When a family gathers around a dinner table to talk with each other and share news of the day, few would identify that gathering as a school of virtue -- but again, that's how God views it. Those love-relationships in which we find ourselves all have a higher purpose in the Christian sense: God has given those special people to us so together we may "hate what is evil, and hold fast to what is good."
The Greek word Paul uses here for "hate" is a very strong one: it means something like "utterly despise and shun." In a similar way, the word for "holding fast" to the good comes from a root that means "to glue together." God has given us marriages, families, friendships, and the larger fellowship of Christians for a purpose: that, collectively, we may send evil packing out the back door, even as we greet good coming in the front. "Hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good."
Paul also advises, "Love one another with mutual affection." Curiously, he changes the word he uses for love, from agape in "let love be genuine" to philadelphia, as he speaks of "mutual affection." You probably know that agape refers to a self-giving sort of love that's the highest Christian ideal. The word philadelphia you'll recognize as the name of a city in Pennsylvania (there was also a Philadelphia in the Roman province of Asia Minor, present-day Turkey). It's got a rich meaning all its own -- quite apart from any geographical associations. The Greek word philia also means love, and adelphos means "brother," so philadelphia -- phileo plus adelphos -- is a compound word meaning "brother-love," or "sister-love."
In making the shift from agape to philadelphia, in using these terms interchangeably, Paul's trying to say all the different types of love are cut from the same cloth. By the power of the Holy Spirit, we may aspire, in our finest moments, to transform all our significant relationships into communities of self-giving and self-sacrifice.
"Have brother- or sister-love for one another, with mutual affection." That's a command. It's not some translucent, gossamer hope that we someday may fall in love with someone -- or if we already have fallen in love, that this love will last. It's an order: just do it. "Love one another with mutual affection."
It is well to say a word, here, about love in marriage. This command of Paul's, to love in a brotherly or sisterly way, is just as applicable to that committed relationship that is marriage. Sure, there is eros in marriage (another Greek word) -- that magnetic attraction that sets the human reproductive system a-humming. Truly, it is something to celebrate, as we do in the wedding ceremony -- but, eros is not the only form of love that ought to be active in a strong marriage.
The advice Paul's giving about love to the Christian community at large is just as true within that special community of two that is Christian marriage. "Love one another with brotherly and sisterly affection." Be as brother and sister to one another.
We may choose a husband or wife, but we don't choose brothers or sisters. A marriage may end in divorce, but it's impossible to divorce siblings (though some of us may wish at times we could). We are bound to certain other people throughout our lives. These include our blood brothers and sisters, if we have any, but also adoptive siblings, and step-brothers or step-sisters as well. Paul means to add to that list of intimates a whole other collection of people: all Christians, really (whom he considers brothers and sisters in Christ). Whenever the church gathers around the table of the Lord, it's as though it were a huge family dinner-table -- the circle of brotherly and sisterly love drawn ever wider.
Included within that collection of people, presumably, is a Christian's husband or wife. That insight has powerful implications for divorce in our culture, which -- I'm sure we'll all agree -- happens far more often in American society than it needs to happen. Even the secular psychological research bears this out. Something like 55-60% of divorces, according to Penn State sociologist Paul Amato, are what he calls "low-conflict divorces." (Peterson, Karen S., "The good in a bad marriage: Studies say many can be salvaged," in USA Today, 6/21/2001) These take place when one partner in a marriage simply wakes up one day and realizes that he or she wants out. There's no abuse or infidelity worth mentioning, no glaring personal betrayal -- just a soul-chilling weariness with day-to-day cares and conflicts, coupled with a lack of desire to do anything about it. The marriage has become bogged down in the sheer dailyness of life. As an Irish proverb puts it, "Marriages are all happy. It's having breakfast together that causes all the trouble."
Many of these distressed marriages, an increasing number of psychologists are saying, can be saved if only the partners will agree to work together in therapy, learning practical skills for communication and emotional support. Yes, marital therapy is a hard road, and it may lead to conflict at times; but that should come as no surprise to anyone. The leading indicator of divorce, the experts are now telling us, is not conflict, but habitual avoidance of conflict: an overwhelming despair and apathy that slowly saps the will to do the essential work of being married.
Practicing "brotherly or sisterly love toward one another with mutual affection" is a decision, not an emotional state. The simple, seemingly paradoxical truth is that the way to find the love we all want in a committed relationship is to practice loving behaviors.
We may not choose our feelings, but we do choose our behaviors. In marriage the trouble comes when one or both partners feel the quality of their relationship starting to slide and begin practicing destructive behaviors. They withhold affection. They yell and intimidate. They pout. They leave the house. They play the "blame game."
If even one partner is able, intentionally, to practice loving behaviors, the relationship can be transformed. Instead of criticizing, she listens. Instead of pouting, he learns to share his feelings. Instead of blaming, she accepts responsibility. Instead of taking his wife for granted, he practices gratitude. There's no guarantee, but it does happen more often than not: if you practice love, you will find it.
The final part of verse 10 suggests the form this work should take. It's a simple rule of behavior: God's rule for making love last: "Outdo one another in showing honor."
Outdo one another -- it's a competition! Yet, unlike other forms of competition that can be so destructive, this competition adds strength, rather than sapping it. "Spell 'us' with a capital 'You'," a wise person has declared. (And by the way, the "You" is spelled y-o-u.)
Someone has said that marriage is not a 50-50 proposition, it's a 100-100 proposition. In potent and significant family relationships like marriage, the goal is not to meet each other halfway; rather, it is for each one to go as far as possible in praising and honoring the other, even if it means passing one another on the way to doing the other a kindness.
That means placing our partners high on our priority lists. It means asking their opinion and really wanting to hear it. It means spending time together, and doing the little things that bring joy. It means publicly praising our partners (when was the last time you bragged about your spouse or family member to someone else, so the person being praised could hear you?).
"Outdo one another in showing honor." It's God's simple rule for making love last.
Prayer For The Day
Help us accept each other
as Christ accepted us;
teach us as sister, brother,
each person to embrace.
Be present, Lord, among us
and bring us to believe
we are ourselves accepted
and meant to love and live.
-- Fred Kaan, hymn text, "Help Us Accept Each Other," 1975
To Illustrate
Steven Covey, the management expert who wrote the best-selling Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, has a radical idea. He believes that every community of people -- not just businesses and institutions, but even marriages and families -- ought to have a mission statement. Whether or not the statement is ever written down on a piece of paper -- and, by the way, he advises it should be -- the important thing is that every member of that group knows why they are together, and what they've been collectively placed on this earth to do.
Your marriage, your family, your significant relationship is not incidental to God. It's been created for a purpose. And if you never discover what that purpose is, if you never find any task that's common to both (or all) of you, and important to the world as well, then from the biblical standpoint, you're not living up to your potential. There's a war going on out there, Paul's saying -- a war between good and evil. If your relationship is to be a Christian one, then you've got to do your part for the war effort.
***
Fully 60% of marriages throughout the world are arranged by persons other than the bride and groom (usually their parents). Men and women who hardly know each other are thrown together, usually for practical reasons, and the divorce rate for those marriages is no higher than it is in our society; in some places, it's actually lower. Researchers have found that the same numbers apply to immigrant communities here in the US, where (presumably) divorce is readily available.
A very large percentage of husbands and wives in arranged marriages do somehow learn to love each others over time. A man from India tried to explain to a foreign visitor how this works. Love, he said, is like a bowl of soup: "You Westerners put a hot bowl on a cold plate and slowly it grows cool. We Indians put a cold bowl on a hot plate and slowly it warms up."
East or West, success in marriage doesn't just happen. You have to work at it.
***
Poet and essayist Kathleen Norris has written about a shallow understanding of love that sees it as possessing another person:
"Young people grow up understanding that love means possessing and being possessed. It is a consumer model of love, an 'If I can't have her, nobody will' psychology that all too often turns deadly. Nearly half the murders in North Dakota, for example, are 'domestic' in origin. It seems that many men, and some women, cannot give up the illusion of possessing another person. The idea of that person -- and 'idea' is related etymologically to the word 'idol' -- becomes more important, more potent, than the actual living creature. It is much safer to love an idol than a real person who is capable of surprising you, loving you and demanding love in return, and maybe one day leaving you. People who have murdered their spouses often talk about how much they love them, and they mean it. In order to keep the idol intact, in order to keep on loving it, they had to do away with him or her."
-- Kathleen Norris, Amazing Grace (New York: Riverhead, 1998), pp. 89-90
***
Some marital therapists recommend to couples that each of them seek to practice the "Triple-A" technique: apologize for something in the past, appreciate something in the present, and anticipate with joy something in the future yet to come. Apologize -- appreciate -- anticipate. If each partner strives diligently to practice these three things, the relationship is certain to grow stronger.
***
NPR commentator Cokie Roberts and her husband, Steve, have written a wonderful, semi-auto-biographical book about marriage in the modern world, From This Day Forward. In that book, they share a word of advice given them years ago by a Roman Catholic priest, at the time of their wedding. "Marriage," he told them, "is unlimited commitment to an unknowable partner." Although, as a priest, he had no personal experience on which to base his advice, Cokie comments that, according to her experience, he got it pretty much right.
***
One married couple who sought to "outdo one another in showing honor" was John and Abigail Adams. Many of the letters they wrote to each other, during long years of separation while John was serving his country in the Continental Congress and overseas as an ambassador, survive to this day.
As an older woman, Abigail Adams wrote in a letter to her husband, who was once again separated from her by duty:
"Years subdue the ardor of passion but in lieu thereof friendship and affection deep-rooted subsists which defies the ravages of time, and whilst the vital flame exists."
-- letter to John Adams, January 7, 1793, cited in David McCullough, John Adams (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2001), p. 440
God has a simple rule for making love last: outdo one another in showing honor.
Old Testament Lesson
Exodus 3:1-15
Moses At The Burning Bush
Having murdered an Egyptian overseer, in anger at his mistreatment of Hebrew slaves, Moses has fled to a far country: the land of Midian, where he is working as a shepherd for a man named Jethro. He is comfortably established. Having married into Jethro's family, he undoubtedly expects to remain there the rest of his life. That is, until this day. At the foot of Mount Horeb (a name which means "wasteland"), Moses comes upon a bush that is "blazing, but not consumed" (v. 2). It is probably no accident that the Hebrew word for "bush" (seneh) is similar to "Sinai." Calling to Moses from out of the bush, the Lord directs him to remove his sandals, "for the place on which you are standing is holy ground" (v. 5). The place is not intrinsically holy; it is God's appearance that makes it holy. Moses hides his face in fear -- as well he should, experiencing such a powerful theophany. The Lord has observed the suffering of Israel -- and it is a great comfort, in times of suffering, to know that God sees, and God cares (v. 7). Yet, more than that, the Lord promises to "come down to deliver them," and lead them to "a land flowing with milk and honey" (v. 8). For a herding and gathering people, milk and honey are expressions of prosperity -- for it means the herds are large and healthy, and the land offers rich opportunities for foraging and gathering. To this enslaved people, "milk and honey" means freedom. Moses will be the Lord's instrument in informing Pharaoh of the Lord's commands. He hesitates asking, "Who am I to do such a thing?" (v. 11). The Lord informs him that it doesn't matter who Moses is; the only thing that matters is "I will be with you" (v. 12). As a parting "sign," the Lord indicates that, one day, Moses will gather the liberated people in this very place, and they will worship "on this mountain" (v. 13).
New Testament Lesson
Romans 12:9-21
Characteristics Of The Christian Life
In rapid-fire fashion, Paul lays out a host of characteristics of the Christian life. They can be seen as further explications of verse 2 ("Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds."). Love, moral uprightness, zeal, hopefulness, patience, persistence in prayer, generosity, hospitality -- all these receive brief mention (and each of them, in truth, could be the topic of a sermon). Christians are to bless even their persecutors (v. 14). The close bonds among members of this new sort of community are captured in the words, "Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep" (v. 15). It is a community whose life is characterized by peace, humility, and modesty (v. 16). In this community -- and also in relationships members have in the outside world -- the Law of Hammurabi ("an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth") has been repealed. "Do not repay anyone evil for evil" is the new standard (v. 17). Paul specifically proscribes retribution, pointing out (quoting Deuteronomy 32:35) that vengeance belongs only to the Lord -- although, rather incongruously, he goes on to quote Proverbs 25:21-22, ending with "for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads." Being a Christian is more than a private matter. It has huge implications for how we live together, in community, as well as how we relate to those who do not share our creed.
The Gospel
Matthew 16:21-28
Take Up The Cross
Having heard and confirmed his identity as the Messiah, in receiving Peter's confession of faith, Jesus goes on to share a disturbing prediction. This Messiah will not lead an army of liberation, but will, rather, "undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised" (v. 21). This is too much for Peter, who takes him aside and "rebukes" him (v. 22). Jesus' reply is harsh: "Get behind me, Satan!" (v. 23). This is reminiscent of Matthew 4:8, when the devil offers Jesus "all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor." Jesus rejected that offer then, and he's not about to accept it now. Now comes the truly difficult teaching about discipleship: "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me" (v. 24). Jesus takes a truly big-picture view: suffering for righteousness' sake should be weighed not against the value of a single human lifespan, but rather, against eternity (verses 25-26). This is a broader, more expansive vision of life: bigger, by far, than a beating heart and lungs filled with air. When the Son of Man comes "with his angels in the glory of the Father," he will bring ultimate justice to the world (v. 27). These things will happen soon indeed: "there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom" (v. 28). Two of these sayings of Jesus are terrifically difficult to preach: the command to take up the cross, and the prediction that the Son of Man will come in that generation. There are some who would say Jesus' disciples glimpsed the vision of "the Son of Man coming in his kingdom" either at the resurrection or on Pentecost, although others would disagree.
Preaching Possibilities
Fans of PBS television will sooner or later run across a little program called "Antiques Roadshow." It started in England, and many of the shows are still filmed there, but they also have an American version. The premise of the Antiques Roadshow is simple: a team of antiques experts sets up shop in a convention center. They invite people to take from their attics, coffee tables, or safe-deposit boxes their most treasured family heirloom and bring it in to be appraised.
The program is composed entirely of brief, one- and two-minute encounters. In each of these segments, one of the experts looks over a person's treasure, searching for the maker's mark or telltale design feature that identifies it as genuine. Then, we get to watch the expression on the person's face as the expert declares if it's the real thing and what the value likely is.
Many of these items have sentimental value -- which means their owners would treasure and keep them regardless of the appraisal -- but still, it's a special joy for the owner to learn that great-grandpa's old dresser is indeed a genuine Chippendale.
"Let love be genuine," says the apostle Paul. As good as it feels to learn that your childhood elec-tric-train engine is a classic, it's far more gratifying to know that the person you love is truly sincere in his or her affections. But how can you tell for certain? How can you go about appraising the quality of love at the heart of a marriage, a friendship, or the bond between parent and child?
This brief passage from Romans reveals what to look for -- the maker's mark, as it were, by which we know that what we have is the real thing.
"Let love be genuine," Paul says, but then he goes on to say, "hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good." He's assuming, here, that true love is ethical to its very core. It seeks out and holds up all that is good. It singles out and spurns all that is evil.
Most of us have never thought of our significant love-relationships as a sort of greenhouse in which ethical behavior is nurtured, but that's exactly how the Bible sees them. When a bride walks down the church aisle to meet her beloved, not many people think of the two of them as establishing a basic unit of Christian mission -- but that's exactly what's going on (or what's meant to happen). When a family gathers around a dinner table to talk with each other and share news of the day, few would identify that gathering as a school of virtue -- but again, that's how God views it. Those love-relationships in which we find ourselves all have a higher purpose in the Christian sense: God has given those special people to us so together we may "hate what is evil, and hold fast to what is good."
The Greek word Paul uses here for "hate" is a very strong one: it means something like "utterly despise and shun." In a similar way, the word for "holding fast" to the good comes from a root that means "to glue together." God has given us marriages, families, friendships, and the larger fellowship of Christians for a purpose: that, collectively, we may send evil packing out the back door, even as we greet good coming in the front. "Hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good."
Paul also advises, "Love one another with mutual affection." Curiously, he changes the word he uses for love, from agape in "let love be genuine" to philadelphia, as he speaks of "mutual affection." You probably know that agape refers to a self-giving sort of love that's the highest Christian ideal. The word philadelphia you'll recognize as the name of a city in Pennsylvania (there was also a Philadelphia in the Roman province of Asia Minor, present-day Turkey). It's got a rich meaning all its own -- quite apart from any geographical associations. The Greek word philia also means love, and adelphos means "brother," so philadelphia -- phileo plus adelphos -- is a compound word meaning "brother-love," or "sister-love."
In making the shift from agape to philadelphia, in using these terms interchangeably, Paul's trying to say all the different types of love are cut from the same cloth. By the power of the Holy Spirit, we may aspire, in our finest moments, to transform all our significant relationships into communities of self-giving and self-sacrifice.
"Have brother- or sister-love for one another, with mutual affection." That's a command. It's not some translucent, gossamer hope that we someday may fall in love with someone -- or if we already have fallen in love, that this love will last. It's an order: just do it. "Love one another with mutual affection."
It is well to say a word, here, about love in marriage. This command of Paul's, to love in a brotherly or sisterly way, is just as applicable to that committed relationship that is marriage. Sure, there is eros in marriage (another Greek word) -- that magnetic attraction that sets the human reproductive system a-humming. Truly, it is something to celebrate, as we do in the wedding ceremony -- but, eros is not the only form of love that ought to be active in a strong marriage.
The advice Paul's giving about love to the Christian community at large is just as true within that special community of two that is Christian marriage. "Love one another with brotherly and sisterly affection." Be as brother and sister to one another.
We may choose a husband or wife, but we don't choose brothers or sisters. A marriage may end in divorce, but it's impossible to divorce siblings (though some of us may wish at times we could). We are bound to certain other people throughout our lives. These include our blood brothers and sisters, if we have any, but also adoptive siblings, and step-brothers or step-sisters as well. Paul means to add to that list of intimates a whole other collection of people: all Christians, really (whom he considers brothers and sisters in Christ). Whenever the church gathers around the table of the Lord, it's as though it were a huge family dinner-table -- the circle of brotherly and sisterly love drawn ever wider.
Included within that collection of people, presumably, is a Christian's husband or wife. That insight has powerful implications for divorce in our culture, which -- I'm sure we'll all agree -- happens far more often in American society than it needs to happen. Even the secular psychological research bears this out. Something like 55-60% of divorces, according to Penn State sociologist Paul Amato, are what he calls "low-conflict divorces." (Peterson, Karen S., "The good in a bad marriage: Studies say many can be salvaged," in USA Today, 6/21/2001) These take place when one partner in a marriage simply wakes up one day and realizes that he or she wants out. There's no abuse or infidelity worth mentioning, no glaring personal betrayal -- just a soul-chilling weariness with day-to-day cares and conflicts, coupled with a lack of desire to do anything about it. The marriage has become bogged down in the sheer dailyness of life. As an Irish proverb puts it, "Marriages are all happy. It's having breakfast together that causes all the trouble."
Many of these distressed marriages, an increasing number of psychologists are saying, can be saved if only the partners will agree to work together in therapy, learning practical skills for communication and emotional support. Yes, marital therapy is a hard road, and it may lead to conflict at times; but that should come as no surprise to anyone. The leading indicator of divorce, the experts are now telling us, is not conflict, but habitual avoidance of conflict: an overwhelming despair and apathy that slowly saps the will to do the essential work of being married.
Practicing "brotherly or sisterly love toward one another with mutual affection" is a decision, not an emotional state. The simple, seemingly paradoxical truth is that the way to find the love we all want in a committed relationship is to practice loving behaviors.
We may not choose our feelings, but we do choose our behaviors. In marriage the trouble comes when one or both partners feel the quality of their relationship starting to slide and begin practicing destructive behaviors. They withhold affection. They yell and intimidate. They pout. They leave the house. They play the "blame game."
If even one partner is able, intentionally, to practice loving behaviors, the relationship can be transformed. Instead of criticizing, she listens. Instead of pouting, he learns to share his feelings. Instead of blaming, she accepts responsibility. Instead of taking his wife for granted, he practices gratitude. There's no guarantee, but it does happen more often than not: if you practice love, you will find it.
The final part of verse 10 suggests the form this work should take. It's a simple rule of behavior: God's rule for making love last: "Outdo one another in showing honor."
Outdo one another -- it's a competition! Yet, unlike other forms of competition that can be so destructive, this competition adds strength, rather than sapping it. "Spell 'us' with a capital 'You'," a wise person has declared. (And by the way, the "You" is spelled y-o-u.)
Someone has said that marriage is not a 50-50 proposition, it's a 100-100 proposition. In potent and significant family relationships like marriage, the goal is not to meet each other halfway; rather, it is for each one to go as far as possible in praising and honoring the other, even if it means passing one another on the way to doing the other a kindness.
That means placing our partners high on our priority lists. It means asking their opinion and really wanting to hear it. It means spending time together, and doing the little things that bring joy. It means publicly praising our partners (when was the last time you bragged about your spouse or family member to someone else, so the person being praised could hear you?).
"Outdo one another in showing honor." It's God's simple rule for making love last.
Prayer For The Day
Help us accept each other
as Christ accepted us;
teach us as sister, brother,
each person to embrace.
Be present, Lord, among us
and bring us to believe
we are ourselves accepted
and meant to love and live.
-- Fred Kaan, hymn text, "Help Us Accept Each Other," 1975
To Illustrate
Steven Covey, the management expert who wrote the best-selling Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, has a radical idea. He believes that every community of people -- not just businesses and institutions, but even marriages and families -- ought to have a mission statement. Whether or not the statement is ever written down on a piece of paper -- and, by the way, he advises it should be -- the important thing is that every member of that group knows why they are together, and what they've been collectively placed on this earth to do.
Your marriage, your family, your significant relationship is not incidental to God. It's been created for a purpose. And if you never discover what that purpose is, if you never find any task that's common to both (or all) of you, and important to the world as well, then from the biblical standpoint, you're not living up to your potential. There's a war going on out there, Paul's saying -- a war between good and evil. If your relationship is to be a Christian one, then you've got to do your part for the war effort.
***
Fully 60% of marriages throughout the world are arranged by persons other than the bride and groom (usually their parents). Men and women who hardly know each other are thrown together, usually for practical reasons, and the divorce rate for those marriages is no higher than it is in our society; in some places, it's actually lower. Researchers have found that the same numbers apply to immigrant communities here in the US, where (presumably) divorce is readily available.
A very large percentage of husbands and wives in arranged marriages do somehow learn to love each others over time. A man from India tried to explain to a foreign visitor how this works. Love, he said, is like a bowl of soup: "You Westerners put a hot bowl on a cold plate and slowly it grows cool. We Indians put a cold bowl on a hot plate and slowly it warms up."
East or West, success in marriage doesn't just happen. You have to work at it.
***
Poet and essayist Kathleen Norris has written about a shallow understanding of love that sees it as possessing another person:
"Young people grow up understanding that love means possessing and being possessed. It is a consumer model of love, an 'If I can't have her, nobody will' psychology that all too often turns deadly. Nearly half the murders in North Dakota, for example, are 'domestic' in origin. It seems that many men, and some women, cannot give up the illusion of possessing another person. The idea of that person -- and 'idea' is related etymologically to the word 'idol' -- becomes more important, more potent, than the actual living creature. It is much safer to love an idol than a real person who is capable of surprising you, loving you and demanding love in return, and maybe one day leaving you. People who have murdered their spouses often talk about how much they love them, and they mean it. In order to keep the idol intact, in order to keep on loving it, they had to do away with him or her."
-- Kathleen Norris, Amazing Grace (New York: Riverhead, 1998), pp. 89-90
***
Some marital therapists recommend to couples that each of them seek to practice the "Triple-A" technique: apologize for something in the past, appreciate something in the present, and anticipate with joy something in the future yet to come. Apologize -- appreciate -- anticipate. If each partner strives diligently to practice these three things, the relationship is certain to grow stronger.
***
NPR commentator Cokie Roberts and her husband, Steve, have written a wonderful, semi-auto-biographical book about marriage in the modern world, From This Day Forward. In that book, they share a word of advice given them years ago by a Roman Catholic priest, at the time of their wedding. "Marriage," he told them, "is unlimited commitment to an unknowable partner." Although, as a priest, he had no personal experience on which to base his advice, Cokie comments that, according to her experience, he got it pretty much right.
***
One married couple who sought to "outdo one another in showing honor" was John and Abigail Adams. Many of the letters they wrote to each other, during long years of separation while John was serving his country in the Continental Congress and overseas as an ambassador, survive to this day.
As an older woman, Abigail Adams wrote in a letter to her husband, who was once again separated from her by duty:
"Years subdue the ardor of passion but in lieu thereof friendship and affection deep-rooted subsists which defies the ravages of time, and whilst the vital flame exists."
-- letter to John Adams, January 7, 1793, cited in David McCullough, John Adams (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2001), p. 440
