Victims?
Sermon
A Call To Love
Second Lesson Sermons For Sundays After Pentecost
After watching Gandhi, the acclaimed movie about the nonviolent leader of India, for the sixth time, I felt what I had felt at every previous viewing. "Did this man lead a life of being a victim or a victor?" He allowed himself to be imprisoned and to starve as a weapon against the British Empire. He somehow mobilized a nation through a non--violent force. He lived a very simple life, and it did not make sense to the British Empire that one could become victorious by being what seemed to everyone a victim.
That is the way I feel when I read the Bible. Maybe that is why there are some biblical texts that should be read and left alone. There is no need for commentary or for mounting a defense for someone to explain everything. It is enough with some texts simply to turn them loose in the room and allow them to do what they will.
This is the feeling I get when I read Paul in Romans 12. He introduces us into a world of experiences and values about which we don't talk very much, at least not directly. It is not because the world of the scripture is not our world. It is a world that appears to be a world of victims. Or at least a world of contradiction in that the Bible brings us things that do not seem to be the way to victory. The world that Paul brings us into is one of pain, joy, hope, and despair. When one reads the words of Romans 12, it seems a bit out of place. It doesn't sound like victory at all. It sounds a bit like a weakness to bless those who persecute and to weep with those who weep.
That's our world - we don't talk directly of these things not because we are cowards, but because we don't talk about some things because they are not supposed to be talked about. Some things in our relationship to God and to each other are strengthened in our silence. Our relationship is stronger and healthier when it is assumed, but when it is talked about, it dies, not because it's false, but because it is over--exposed. The house of faith has other rooms besides the den. There are times to sit on the floor and talk about everything that will come up. However, when you look around this house, there are other rooms, not so much for privacy but for intimacy. I simply cannot talk about everything in public, and somethings are better assumed.
Paul talks about things that do not relate well in our society. One is to repay no one evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. This is to travel a way that is different from all others. "The Road Not Taken" was written by Robert Frost almost as a parody. It was written to poke fun at a man who had a hard time making decisions. It was only when Frost shared his poem with other poets that he realized this whole idea of making those hard decisions of life was no laughing matter. Paul, like the traveler in Frost's poem, must make some hard decisions.
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
When life is lived on the other side of Paul's advice, it is a way of getting by without those hard decisions. It reminds me of the opposite of the Frost poem - one of those one--liners that could only come from Yogi Berra. "When you come to the fork in the road, take it." That statement brings a smile to the face, for it is futile. The road less taken is one that appears to be the road of a victim. At times, not only in this passage but also in the teaching of Jesus, that is the case.
I sat in a courtroom just as an observer and listened to the case of a couple who were divorcing. The judge finally said, after listening to the pleas of both sides, "It appears to me that this woman is a victim. A victim of an abusive and unkind husband."
Thinking of the victim's mentality, it seems like we only become victims when we lose our dignity. Through the poverty and despair of some people's lives, it is hard to know how anyone could keep their dignity. In James Agee's wonderful book, And Now Let Us Praise Famous Men, he looks at life in the South through the Depression era, and how those who had nothing made their lives more than would seem possible. He tells a story of a black man who worked at a sawmill, whose job it was to keep the mules. He was treated about like the mules were treated. But part of his job was to blow the whistle four times a day. He would take out his dollar watch on a greasy shoestring and at 8 a.m., he would pull the chain to get the men working. At noon he would pull the chain again to stop the men for lunch, after lunch at 1 p.m. to put the men back to work, and finally at 5 p.m. to send the men home. Agee lets us see that pulling that chain four times a day allowed the man to sit at the head of his table with his family with dignity and command their respect.
Paul said one may be victimized, but there must be a refusal to be a victim. Maybe he talked a lot about victims because they came close to Paul. They heard in his voice - they saw in his face - they knew in his ministry - here was sympathy and understanding.
It could be that they also found him to be a victim: this one who knew what it was to have been beaten and driven out of town, to be cursed, to be lied about, to be mistreated, to be slapped, to be mocked, to be joked about, and to be accused of not really being an apostle. They knew Paul to be a victim. Maybe that's why Paul's letters were read - here is a kindred spirit. They felt a strong sense of identity with Paul.
Paul knew of defeats, and there are those who would define life as a series of defeats - by all the things we have not done, or by the bad things that have been done to us. Our glass is never half full, but always half empty. Nothing we have accomplished appears in any way significant when compared with what we have failed to accomplish. We allow our failures to add up to failure, and our losses to make us losers, our defeats to defeat us, and ourselves to be diminished by the wrong that we have done.
Reinhold Niebuhr once wrote:
Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in a lifetime, therefore we must be saved by Hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history, therefore we must be saved by Faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone, therefore we are saved by Love.
Paul is not calling on the people that are now called Christian to be the doormat of the world. Even though we may feel like comedian George Gobel when he was a guest on The Tonight Show years ago. As another guest arrived on the set, George said, "Did you ever feel that the world is a tuxedo and you are a pair of brown shoes?" There is a lifting away from the idea that we are living as Christians to be victims.
I recall someone's idea of our imperfection as we come to God. They said that our life is like a line on a page and God is another line on the page. However, it may be instead that we are like a line on a page, but God certainly isn't the other line and just comes to cross our living on occasion. The concept of Paul is that God is the page and we most certainly are the line on the page.
Paul writes this powerful letter to the Roman Christians and to those who live in a world that is far from being Christian to encourage them to take control of every situation, and that control is to let God be God. Let the one who has the complete control take care of the things we cannot. As Paul says, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord. No, 'if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals upon their heads.' Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." We can be victors, but not according to the way the world thinks. It must be in the way that God thinks.
That is the way I feel when I read the Bible. Maybe that is why there are some biblical texts that should be read and left alone. There is no need for commentary or for mounting a defense for someone to explain everything. It is enough with some texts simply to turn them loose in the room and allow them to do what they will.
This is the feeling I get when I read Paul in Romans 12. He introduces us into a world of experiences and values about which we don't talk very much, at least not directly. It is not because the world of the scripture is not our world. It is a world that appears to be a world of victims. Or at least a world of contradiction in that the Bible brings us things that do not seem to be the way to victory. The world that Paul brings us into is one of pain, joy, hope, and despair. When one reads the words of Romans 12, it seems a bit out of place. It doesn't sound like victory at all. It sounds a bit like a weakness to bless those who persecute and to weep with those who weep.
That's our world - we don't talk directly of these things not because we are cowards, but because we don't talk about some things because they are not supposed to be talked about. Some things in our relationship to God and to each other are strengthened in our silence. Our relationship is stronger and healthier when it is assumed, but when it is talked about, it dies, not because it's false, but because it is over--exposed. The house of faith has other rooms besides the den. There are times to sit on the floor and talk about everything that will come up. However, when you look around this house, there are other rooms, not so much for privacy but for intimacy. I simply cannot talk about everything in public, and somethings are better assumed.
Paul talks about things that do not relate well in our society. One is to repay no one evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. This is to travel a way that is different from all others. "The Road Not Taken" was written by Robert Frost almost as a parody. It was written to poke fun at a man who had a hard time making decisions. It was only when Frost shared his poem with other poets that he realized this whole idea of making those hard decisions of life was no laughing matter. Paul, like the traveler in Frost's poem, must make some hard decisions.
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
When life is lived on the other side of Paul's advice, it is a way of getting by without those hard decisions. It reminds me of the opposite of the Frost poem - one of those one--liners that could only come from Yogi Berra. "When you come to the fork in the road, take it." That statement brings a smile to the face, for it is futile. The road less taken is one that appears to be the road of a victim. At times, not only in this passage but also in the teaching of Jesus, that is the case.
I sat in a courtroom just as an observer and listened to the case of a couple who were divorcing. The judge finally said, after listening to the pleas of both sides, "It appears to me that this woman is a victim. A victim of an abusive and unkind husband."
Thinking of the victim's mentality, it seems like we only become victims when we lose our dignity. Through the poverty and despair of some people's lives, it is hard to know how anyone could keep their dignity. In James Agee's wonderful book, And Now Let Us Praise Famous Men, he looks at life in the South through the Depression era, and how those who had nothing made their lives more than would seem possible. He tells a story of a black man who worked at a sawmill, whose job it was to keep the mules. He was treated about like the mules were treated. But part of his job was to blow the whistle four times a day. He would take out his dollar watch on a greasy shoestring and at 8 a.m., he would pull the chain to get the men working. At noon he would pull the chain again to stop the men for lunch, after lunch at 1 p.m. to put the men back to work, and finally at 5 p.m. to send the men home. Agee lets us see that pulling that chain four times a day allowed the man to sit at the head of his table with his family with dignity and command their respect.
Paul said one may be victimized, but there must be a refusal to be a victim. Maybe he talked a lot about victims because they came close to Paul. They heard in his voice - they saw in his face - they knew in his ministry - here was sympathy and understanding.
It could be that they also found him to be a victim: this one who knew what it was to have been beaten and driven out of town, to be cursed, to be lied about, to be mistreated, to be slapped, to be mocked, to be joked about, and to be accused of not really being an apostle. They knew Paul to be a victim. Maybe that's why Paul's letters were read - here is a kindred spirit. They felt a strong sense of identity with Paul.
Paul knew of defeats, and there are those who would define life as a series of defeats - by all the things we have not done, or by the bad things that have been done to us. Our glass is never half full, but always half empty. Nothing we have accomplished appears in any way significant when compared with what we have failed to accomplish. We allow our failures to add up to failure, and our losses to make us losers, our defeats to defeat us, and ourselves to be diminished by the wrong that we have done.
Reinhold Niebuhr once wrote:
Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in a lifetime, therefore we must be saved by Hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history, therefore we must be saved by Faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone, therefore we are saved by Love.
Paul is not calling on the people that are now called Christian to be the doormat of the world. Even though we may feel like comedian George Gobel when he was a guest on The Tonight Show years ago. As another guest arrived on the set, George said, "Did you ever feel that the world is a tuxedo and you are a pair of brown shoes?" There is a lifting away from the idea that we are living as Christians to be victims.
I recall someone's idea of our imperfection as we come to God. They said that our life is like a line on a page and God is another line on the page. However, it may be instead that we are like a line on a page, but God certainly isn't the other line and just comes to cross our living on occasion. The concept of Paul is that God is the page and we most certainly are the line on the page.
Paul writes this powerful letter to the Roman Christians and to those who live in a world that is far from being Christian to encourage them to take control of every situation, and that control is to let God be God. Let the one who has the complete control take care of the things we cannot. As Paul says, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord. No, 'if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals upon their heads.' Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." We can be victors, but not according to the way the world thinks. It must be in the way that God thinks.
