 | The New England Church PulpitNew England Congregational Church UCC |
MAKING ENDS MEET | Matthew 5.1-12 | February 3, 2002 |
Second, he demonstrated what it is like for the meek to inherit the earth. A devout Catholic and prophetic in his insights of the universe, he was nonetheless forced by the church to confess his sin against God, confessing against his will that the earth was the center of the universe. Unwilling to give up his life for what he knew to be the truth, regardless of the church’s understanding, he inherited life on this earth by bringing future understanding into the present. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for the truth, for what is right, for they shall be filled. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of the truth for they live in the realm of God.
And third, he exposed dogma for its rigidity, and forced the church of the future to its knees in confession of its own ignorance of the truth. Many a person has come to realize that the very institution that exists to usher us into the presence of the Holy is sometimes the very stone that imprisons God in the tomb of a stagnating and stifling status quo.
The words that Jesus spoke according to Matthew are words that bring heaven and earth into one realm, they actualize in the present the future of God’s reign. These beatitudes, as they are called, are not statements of moral judgment or entrance requirements into the kingdom of God. Nor are they merely a set of virtues or moral ideals to appease a judging God. They are rather pursuits of certain activities that bear promises of gratification. They are a way of life that brings fulfillment, statements of that which is conducive to a rich and fulfilling life.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. The death of a significant person in our lives must be grieved if we are to go forward. There is a strange comfort in our tears and a paradoxical healing in our pain. By so saying, Jesus brings the harsh extremes of life and death together, making the ends meet in one continuous circle.
Blessed are the unassuming, for they will inherit the earth. Not the pushy, aggressive who wield power over people, not the church when it forces its beliefs, but the modest, the explorers, the unpretentious who find life in its richness in the still, small voice of quiet assurance and confident understanding of life.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice, for they will be satisfied. Lillian Daniel lives in an economically depressed area of New Haven, CT where she is part of an ecumenical congregation-based organization that took these beatitudes to heart. K mart was willing to come to town and help out the economy, but only if they were allowed to sell guns. The church-based group led a boycott that removed the guns from the store. And when the largest gun manufacturer threatened to move jobs south, they asked for their $9 million in tax abatements back. She comments:
As I have watched church members cross denominational and theological boundaries to form relationships with one another, it feels as though the meek are inheriting the earth. We are not inheriting the earthly power or the worldly wealth...but we catch a glimpse of another, better kingdom. Blessed are the meek says more about those who abuse power than it does about the virtues of being meek. The meek are the ones who are blessed, and not those who make them meek. (The Christian Century, January 16-23, 2002, p.16)
Here Catholics and Pentecostals, usually at the opposite ends of the religious continuum, are brought together in one sphere of life that naturally makes life rich and blessed for all that it encompasses.
The Christian story is about the subversive transformation of all barriers which confine or imprison us. Jesus never advocated a life which confined itself within safe, complacent walls. He always called people into new life: I have come that you may have life and have it more abundantly. The resurrection is frightening because it is a call to live a life without the walls of crippling definition or false protection. The huge stone over his tomb was rolled away. The cave of dying was ventilated and freed. It is a powerful image of smashing open the inner prison.
In spring, that which tries to grow under a rock is yellow and sour. In every life there are some places where we have allowed great slabs of burden to remain fallen on our lives. These slabs have turned much of our inner world sour and killed many of the possibilities which once called us: the possibility of play, of renewing holidays, of seeing something new and unexpected in our lives, of going to new places within and without, of living life to the full.
The beatitudes bring together the continuum of present and future where living in the present as if the future reign of God were here, we participate in our weekly prayer Thy Kingdom Come, Thy Will be Done on earth as it is in heaven.
So as we eat this bread and drink this cup we participate in making ends meet. Lives that are poor in spirit, that grieve, that thirst for truth, that live toward peace, that are unassuming, that are given to mercy rather than power are opportunities for the reign of all that is holy of God’s reign to come into the present life. And we are the richer for it. Like Galileo, we act according to the truth we find deep inside our beings where the holy resides. Like Lillian Daniel, we set our sights on doing what is right, and thereby bring into present reality that which we dream of in the next life. Here we grasp the experience of being fully ourselves in a world that threatens to fragment us. Here we bring the extremes of our lives together to make of a harsh dividing line a circle of hope. Here we taste the life we dream of in all its fullness, while we savor the life at hand in all its richness. Amen.
PASTORAL PRAYER
We enter these moments with awe for the power of silence and awe for the power of words. There are times when our deepest longings find no words to describe themselves; there are times when our wildest celebrations can’t find enough words to exclaim how we feel. We gather here to just be..........to let life be what it is, to let you be who you are, to affirm that we are who we are without need to correct or admonish or improve or judge. We are content to just be who we are in this moment.
There are voids to be filled, and so often our rushing and our busyness are attempts to fill the emptiness with activity so we don’t feel the pain. So often our loneliness overwhelms us, and our cares weigh heavily on our hearts as stones pulling us ever deeper into a quagmire of hopelessness. Our fears have been intensified these past few months, and we find ourselves not quite able to trust the future as we have in the past.
Corporate America has failed to give us any security, collapsing buildings and collapsing companies shatter our dreams, hatred across the globe and in our own backyard threaten our faith in humanity. News reporters are held captive, ammunition warehouses explode in Nigeria, floods ravage Indonesia, and an early morning earthquake in Turkey today claims lives we don’t even know. And we are saddened.
And yet........and yet, we dare to come to this place and face reality with some sense of hope that life is still good, that we can go forward, that the fear and the pain will be redeemed for holy purpose, and the future dreams of peace can become reality in some small way through our efforts. May our small investments in peaceful activity and our humble prayers be as yeast to make rise the bread of life beyond our knowing.
Wing our heartfelt concern to the homebound, to those facing death, to those who must undergo surgery, those living in the shadow of a threatening illness, and those who must live the best they can in a body that makes them daily mindful of the reality of pain. Be to us strength that we may strengthen others, be to us peace that we may be peacemakers, be to us love that we may love, be to us joy that we may be joyful. In the name of the Christ, Amen.
-Gary L. McCann
Tao Te Ching
44
Fame or integrity: which is more important?
Money or happiness: which is more valuable?
Success or failure: which is more destructive?
If you look to others for fulfillment,
you will never truly be fulfilled.
If your happiness depends on money,
you will never be happy with yourself.
Be content with what you have;
rejoice in the way things are.
When you realize there is nothing lacking,
the whole world belongs to you.
70
My teachings are easy to understand
and easy to put into practice.
Yet your intellect will never grasp them,
and if you try to practice them, you’ll fail.
My teachings are older than the world.
How can you grasp their meaning?
If you want to know me,
look inside your heart.
| Copyright © 2002 by Gary L. McCann. All rights reserved. |