March 8, 2009 - "The Gift and Power of Justice"

Audio Version - Click HERE.

In a new book by Diana Butler Bass, she recounts a conversation with a fellow scholar ten years ago who said to her, I don’t understand how you can still be a Christian.

Diana replied, I know it isn’t the easiest thing these days. But I just can’t get away from Jesus. I actually love Jesus and his teachings.

To which her friend replied: Jesus? I don’t have any trouble with Jesus. It’s all the stuff that happened after Jesus that makes me mad.

The question has rolled around in Diana’s mind for the last decade, prompting her to think long and hard about the faith, and what it means to be a Christian.

Diana suggests that there are two stories told by the church … one is all about conquest and control; power and possession; the other story, one of love and humility, welcoming and receiving.

The two stories are rooted in things Jesus said:

The first story, the story of love and humility, is rooted in the Great Commandment – Love God and love your neighbor.

The second story, the story of conquest and control, is rooted in the Great Commission: Go into all the world and make disciples.

Both said by Jesus.
Both important.
But both have to be lived in the right sequence.
Love has to come first. It’s the first story.
God is love says the Bible.
Love is what Jesus did and love is what he taught others to do.
The Great Commandment: love God with all of your heart, soul, strength and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.

The Great Commandment creates the Great Commission - go out into the world, make disciples; teach people about God; make baptism available to anyone who wants a clean start of things.
But do it with love, with kindness, with humility – shun power; resist violence; turn the other cheek; love the enemy, forgive constantly, and bear patiently with one another.

The Great Commandment underwrites the Great Commission.
If we love God and neighbor, we’re going to go out into the world; and if we go out into the world, it has to be the most loving act imaginable, and then some:
Not to conquer nations, but to heal them.
Not to control the way people think, but to help them think clearly.
Not to exclude anyone, but to welcome everyone.
No one has to be wrong in order for us to be right.
We have much to give, and we have much to learn.
We can learn from the Buddhist and the Hindu.
We can learn from the Muslim and from the Siek.
We can learn from our Jewish sisters and brothers.
We can learn from believers and unbelievers.
That’s how love works.
That’s how love feels.

If we love our neighbor, we will share our vision of God.
But we share with humility: we do with it love and reserve, restraint and thoughtfulness.

The Great Commandment; the Great Commission.
What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder.

But something sad happened along the way!
The church presided over a divorce.

When Constantine converted and crowned Christianity as the state religion, the church quickly fell in love with pomp and power.
The cross of Christ became the sword of Constantine.
The blood of Christ shed once for all became an excuse to shed blood all the more.
The Prince of Peace became the violent king.
The Gospel of faith, hope and love became a powerful church filled with rules and rulers, rituals and rites.
The simple shepherd’s crook became a bejeweled crosier.
Bishops donned the robes of power, and wore a stylized Pentecostal flame on their heads - the kings claimed divine right to rule as they saw fit.
The kings appointed the bishops, and the bishops crowned the kings.
Power became the master, and Jesus slipped away.

When the church forgets the Great Commandment - to love God and to love the neighbor, we end up with Crusades, Inquisitions and heresy trials.

We end up with Spanish and Portuguese conquistadors killing Native Americans, destroying their villages, all in the name of Jesus.

In 1550, the Spanish Court called a halt to violent conversion, and called for a debate between Las Casis who supported a gentler approach to Native Americans and Juan de Sepulveda – yes, you heard me right, Sepulveda, who believed that Native Americas were a sub-human species fit only for slavery – so destroy their culture; convert them at the point of the sword, kill them if necessary, because we have Jesus on our side.

Neither side was able to claim an absolute victory, but the debate slowed down the practice of violent conversion and promoted the cause of the Native American - [http://userwww.sfsu.edu/~epf/2001/hernandez.html].

I only recently came across this 16th Century debate – were any of you familiar with it? How ironic that Covenant is located on a street named Sepulveda.

Sadly, it’s a common story in the history of the church.
The expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492.
The Salem Witch hunts of 1692.
Our own sad history of Presbyterian heresy trials, and we’ve had plenty of them.
The Scopes trial of 1926.
In our own time, Jerry Falwell and D. James Kennedy both of whom only recently passed from the American scene, and James Dobson who just recently has taken steps to retire.

It’s not a pretty picture; it’s not a pleasant story.
How ironic, that so many who hoist a Bible in hand, and shout the name of Jesus, should exclude so many and condemn fellow-Christians.
That some Christians have become expert in nit-picking – splitting churches and splitting families over small points of view.
That some who shed tears at Christmas time for the Prince of Peace cheer loudly when cruise missiles explode.
They who have received grace at the hand of God would turn around and preach a sick gospel of self-reliance for the poor and the oppressed.

Is it any wonder that millions of thoughtful people have turned away from the church … unwilling to turn a deaf ear to the sermons of hate; refusing to close their eyes to the injustice and discrimination perpetrated in the name of Jesus?
They want truth.
They want hope.
And above all else, they want love.
And if they can’t find love in the church, they will find it somewhere else because God is merciful and kind.
If the church should fail God, God will not fail those who seek God’s face and yearn for love.
God will meet them outside the gate; God will find them where e’re they go.

Just yesterday, I received this note via Facebook -

I'm not gay myself, says the writer, but it's been really hard for me to watch as churches have blatantly ignored science, alienated countless members (such as myself), and have managed to hurt so many people and their families.
I was raised a Catholic and have been continuously disappointed with the way my church has been run. Since we're now on a conservative streak under our current pope, things have gotten worse. From the covering up of abuse to the re-communication of ultra-conservative bishops who have denied the Holocaust and women's freedom (like going to college and wearing pants), the church is on a downward spiral.
So, please, keep up the good work and maybe you'll manage to keep some of the younger generations from leaving. Many of the people I know have fallen away from organized religion because it's going in the wrong direction. Instead of embracing and understanding others, it has been used to hate, instill fear in people, and take away rights. There is something really wrong with Christianity if people are *leaving* the churches so that they may love one another.

Thank God there’s another story to be told.
The rest of the story, as Paul Harvey might have said.
A story that has very much shaped Covenant on the Corner.

In our 61 years of life, God be praised, we are not, and have never been, a fundamentalist/evangelical congregation … that great divorce never occurred here.
We are a healthy mainline Protestant congregation – Presbyterian by name, committed to justice.

Our session has a worthy record on this score: from our stand on open housing in 1966 to our current stand against Prop 8 on behalf of marriage equality.
And our commitment to stand with CLUE in defense of workers in and around LAX.
Covenant on the Corner, you are rightly very proud of this story.
And so am I.
Though I’m here but for a short time, I’m grateful to be part of this good story - a story of kindness and justice and humility.
Your story has inspired me greatly.

We heard this morning from Rabbi Abrams and from Jueleo ; we heard stories of need and hurt … we heard about the work of CLUE and other groups – good stories, important stories.

We are a part of something good, and something godly!
Something right, and something righteous.

What a great story this is.
And as the world turns,
As the sun sets on the last 40 years when evangelicals and fundamentalists held the upper hand and mainline folks hung their heads, a new day is emerging.
The first story of love is being reclaimed and reinvigorated.
A new and vibrant generative Christianity.

The story of inclusion and welcome; a story with open doors and open minds.

A story of kindness, justice and humility.

And with that, let’s do our readings now … the Text will have the last word!

Amos 5:21-24 (p.854) - me
Micah 6:6-8 (p.866) - Ali
Luke 4:16-19 (p.61) –

Amen and Amen!