Matthew 5: 21-37. Sigh. Do I really have to preach on this reading again this year? This isn’t exactly my favorite reading because, quite honestly, it makes me uncomfortable. Jesus seems to be hold some pretty high standards for moral behavior that are hard to measure up to, and I often walk away from this reading feeling bad, as do a lot of people in my experience. The word Gospel means “good news” and yet a lot of people who hear this word on Sunday morning don’t feel like they have come away hearing the “good news”. They come away often feeling sad, inadequate and paralyzed. Let’s take a look at the verse that is the most troublesome – the verse about divorce. It says “whoever divorces his wife commits adultery and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery”. We live in a modern society where 50% of marriages end in divorce. And what of the 50% who don’t get divorced? Just because people stay married doesn’t mean they are happy. As we know, people stay in unhealthy relationships for all kinds of reasons – social pressure, economics, kids, religious upbringing etc. So, marriage at best probably has a 25% percent success rate. That means that 75% of people who come to church on this Sunday have the experience of being chastised by the words of Jesus and experience a growing distance between themselves and God.
And yet, I think it is precisely this feeling of distance that makes me think there is some gap between what the words say and what we hear. Because if you look at the life of Jesus as a whole, you see that it was precisely the people whose lives were the most troubled and whose relationships were the most fractured that were the most drawn to Jesus. Those people never felt chastised or repelled by Jesus, but rather, they felt loved and drawn in. There is the story of the woman at the well who had had five husbands who came alone to the well in the hottest part of the day rather than in the early cool hours of the morning with the other women because of her shame. Yet, she was drawn to Jesus when she purposely avoided everyone else because the judgement she felt from everyone else, she did not feel from Jesus. Then there was Mary Magdalene who washed the feet of Jesus with a valuable perfume and dried his feet with her hair when Jesus was dining at the home of a well-known Pharisee. Mary had a reputation as a sinner and the so-called “good” people treated her in a way that she would never forget it. But not Jesus. Jesus said that she was capable of the greatest love precisely because she had received great forgiveness. And then there was Zacchaeus, the marginalized tax collector who climbed the tree to see who Jesus was. He was friendless and lonely because he was viewed as a thief. When Jesus spoke to him, Zacchaeus didn’t feel sad or ashamed. To the contrary, he felt so deeply loved that the only way He could think of to respond was with unprecedented generosity. He said, “Half of my belongings I give to the poor and if I have stolen anything from anyone I shall repay them four times”.
We all have some things in our life that we are not proud of, that we are ashamed of, things we would do differently if we could have a second go at them. Religion often makes us feel worse about these things. Other people in our life often make us feel worse. But not Jesus. A true encounter with the person of Jesus, makes us feel better about ourselves even with all of our failings. A true encounter with Jesus leaves us feeling understood, relieved, hopeful, grateful, forgiven and loved.
Jesus never kicked anybody while they were down. Jesus did challenge people, for sure. But his harshest words were reserved for the so-called “good” people – those who were convinced of their own righteousness. His harsh words were meant for those in power who used their power to benefit themselves at the expense of others. And when we keep that in mind, Jesus comment about divorce looks a little different to us. Because today a divorce is often a breakdown of a relationship. In Jesus day, a divorce was often an abuse of power. For one, only men could request a divorce and they often did for trivial reasons. The men would manipulate the law to their favor and end up leaving the woman homeless and destitute. And it was this that was abhorrent to Jesus – the powerful taking advantage of the powerless.
So we know what the text is not about. It’s not about equating the divorces of Jesus day with the divorces of today. What the text is about I much larger than the couple of individual verses that people today get stuck on because they don’t resonate with our lived experience. (aside: I believe that faith should always be experiential. Seems foolish to believe something just because somebody makes a claim or because it is written in a holy book. Belief needs to be verified through lived experience).
What today’s text is about is distinguishing between the spirit of the Law verses the letter of the law. Internals verses externals. Having the heart in the right place is more important than having the external actions in the right place. In Catholic Social Ethics they often speak a lot about primacy of “intention”. Intention is more important than the outcome. If your intention is to do good, but you end up doing harm, you are still in the right because your intention was good. And it also works the other way – if you do the right things but do them for the wrong reasons, you are still in the wrong.
How often we delude ourselves about the true motivations of our actions. We may give very noble reasons for the things we choose to do or not to do, but oftentimes the “good reasons” are not the “real reasons.” If you are a pacifist because you don’t believe in violence, that’s great. If you are a pacifist because you are a coward, that’s not great. The outcome is the same, but the intent is what makes it a moral act or not. If you don’t drive a car because you want to protect the environment, that’s great. If you don’t drive a car because you are simply afraid of driving, well maybe that is not so great. Maybe you and the world would be better if you burned a little gas but conquered your fears in the process. And my personal favorite is when people speak about surrendering to God’s will. Even this noble act can be done for the wrong reasons. If you are surrendering to God’s will because you want to let go of your own ego, that’s great. If you speak of surrendering to God’s will because you simply lack confidence in yourself and you don’t want the responsibility of making hard decisions, you just want God to tell you what to do, well that’s a different story.
Jesus was always more concerned with the underlying cause of things than the external results. He was concerned primarily with the underlying motivations and intentions. He was more focused on the internal, the spiritual. He criticized the religious leaders of his day for going out of their way to make everything look good on the outside while they neglected the inside, saying they were like “white washed tombs” that looked nice and clean on the outside but inside were filled with spiritual death and decay. He said it was like cleaning the outside of a cup but neglecting the inside. When Jesus healed people he always worked from the inside out starting with the soul before moving on to mind and body. Because, he said, a good tree does not bear bad fruit. If the tree is good, the fruit will be good. You don’t pick figs from thorn bushes.
Because, here’s the thing – everything we see in the external world has its origin in the spiritual. Everything that we can see and touch in the physical world once began as a thought or feeling in some one’s mind or heart. By the time the idea or feeling or intent becomes manifest in the material world, the work is already complete. By the time a couple walks down the aisle at their wedding, the marriage has already happened over many long conversations, long walks and deep sharing with one another. Walking down the aisle is just an external recognition of something that has been there for a while. Same with divorce. By the time a couple actually has the divorce papers in hand, the divorce has already happened long ago. And so Jesus’ invitation is to be mindful of the most subtle movements of the spirit long before the fruits start to appear. As the saying goes, “Beware your thoughts for they will become your actions. Beware your actions for they will become your habits. Beware your habits for they will become your character. Beware your character for it will become your destiny.” And that is what this reading is ultimately about. It’s not enough to have a commandment that says, “Thou Shalt not murder” if we are inattentive to the anger from which it comes. It’s not enough to have a commandment that says “Thou shalt not commit adultery” if we aren’t honest about desires in our hearts that lead to it.
Once upon a time there was a martial arts master who had three sons. He put a vase above the door to his house and called his youngest son to come home. The son arrived at the door, opened it, and the vase came crashing on his head. Before the vase hit the ground, he drew his sword and sliced it in two. The father put another vase above the door and called to his second son. The second son opened the door, noticed the vase falling, and stepped aside and caught the vase which he then handed to his father, unbroken. The father put the vase back on top of the door and called to his eldest son. The son arrived and paused in front of the door, and before opening, reached up and carefully took down the vase and handed it to his father. The father praised his youngest son for his quick reflexes. He praised his second son for his quick thinking. But his highest praise was reserved for his eldest son, whom he praised for his mindfulness.
And so the invitation of Scripture today to recognize the primacy of the spiritual, the primacy of intent and underlying motives, and the mindfulness that makes this recognition possible.
ryanwriting 