No Sunday Business

Scripture Luke 13:10-17 Common English Bible (CEB)

10 Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. 11 A woman was there who had been disabled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and couldn’t stand up straight. 12 When he saw her, Jesus called her to him and said, “Woman, you are set free from your sickness.” 13 He placed his hands on her and she straightened up at once and praised God.

14 The synagogue leader, incensed that Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, responded, “There are six days during which work is permitted. Come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath day.”

15 The Lord replied, “Hypocrites! Don’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from its stall and lead it out to get a drink? 16 Then isn’t it necessary that this woman, a daughter of Abraham, bound by Satan for eighteen long years, be set free from her bondage on the Sabbath day?” 17 When he said these things, all his opponents were put to shame, but all those in the crowd rejoiced at all the extraordinary things he was doing.

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In the late 70s I moved to the Atlantic coast in South Florida, where I lived for the next 20 years.  Most days I would travel on US Highway #1 between work and home, or where ever else I needed t go.  It was, after all, the main street in a lot of towns from Maine to Miami.  Just south of town I would pass a house that had a huge wooden sign In their front yard that said “No Sunday Business.”   Now it wasn’t uncommon at the time to see that sentiment on bumper stickers, but this was a humongous sign right out on Federal Highway!  And they kept it nice, so it always looked freshly painted.  They were concerned about the commandment that says, “Keep the Sabbath holy.”    They really didn’t understand that technically “Sabbath” is the Seventh Day (Saturday), whereas Sunday is the Lord’s Day, which is what they really meant.  Anyway . . . As everyone knows, they fought a losing battle as more and more businesses began opening on Sundays.   

Now, I know some of you don’t remember this, but there was a time when most businesses did close on Sunday.  It wasn’t like today when pretty much all retail stores, malls and restaurants are open on Sundays, customer service reps staff their phones 24/7, and even the delivery services will bring the package you ordered on line to your door on Sunday afternoon.  I grew up in Pennsylvania which had lots of strange and antiquated laws known as the Blue Laws that dated back almost to when the area was first founded as a Quaker colony.  No Sunday business was one of those laws, with a very few exceptions.  In most of our cities and states the original bodies of law were based in the religious beliefs and practices of whoever held the majority in that place.  Sometimes when we are nostalgically looking back to the Good Old Days when churches were full every Sunday we forget that in many places there wasn’t much of anything else to do on Sundays except go to church.  Now Sunday services have to compete with sports, shopping, and work.  

But in Israel, religious law was all of the law.  Israel was governed by the Laws of Moses, so when Jesus healed that woman he wasn’t just breaking a custom.  He was very publicly breaking a law right in front of the synagogue!  And he called his accusers hypocrites because they were happy to break this law in private, feeding and watering their livestock where no one could see, but in public they would call out any infractions.   It’s like speeding on the freeway.  You only do it when there is no CHP vehicle in sight.  If you get caught, you’re in trouble.  If you don’t, well  . . . there are those who say “It’s only illegal if you get caught.”  This, by the way, is not true.  

Even today, the laws governing Sabbath are still observed by many Jews.  Not only are they observed, but as the world changes and new technologies are invented, they are continually updated by a body of rabbis who specialize in the Law.  So the definition of “work” gets more and more detailed.  Sometimes I will be in conversation with my friend Izzy, an Orthodox Jew living in Jerusalem, and he will suddenly say, “Gotta go.  Sabbath is about to begin.”  Use of a cell phone or computer is work, so our conversation must end before Sabbath begins.  

Jesus regularly challenged blind adherence to laws.   In the 6th Chapter of Luke’s Gospel he records other instances of Jesus breaking Sabbath law.  When he and his disciples were walking through a field of grain, and some of them were hungry and plucked some grains to eat, the Pharisees called him on it.  When he healed the man with a withered hand on the Sabbath, the Pharisees called him on it.   But “Jesus said to the legal experts and Pharisees, “Here’s a question for you: Is it legal on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to destroy it?”  (Luke 6:9)    

No Sunday business makes sense, up to a point.   Keeping the Sabbath holy is one thing.  Refusing to allow a physician to heal is something else again. So is preventing someone from getting life saving medicines.  So is making hungry people stay hungry.   Jesus said to the Pharisees, “The Sabbath was created for humans; humans weren’t created for the Sabbath.  This is why the Human One is Lord even over the Sabbath.”  (Mark 2:27-28)  

Rules are good.  I like rules.  Rules are intended to make life better for everyone, so that we can all get along.  Sometimes they are inconvenient.  I must remind myself, sometimes, that the rule against jaywalking is not intended to punish me by making me walk all the way to the corner when the place I am going is directly across the street.   It’s intended to keep me from getting run over!   Most of the 613 Laws that make up Torah were intended to help the people of Israel get along together as a community.  They were designed to let people know exactly what sort of behavior was expected from everyone at any time.  Mostly the were good laws for those people at that time.  Sometimes they got in the way of allowing a person to do good in an unusual situation.  Like healing on the Sabbath.   Mind you, saving someone’s life was permitted under the Law.  The healings Luke tells us Jesus performed were not lifesaving, and technically could have waited until the next day.  But Jesus said, “Why?  Why make this woman remain in pain and suffering one more day when I can take that all away from her now.”  And the Pharisees responded, “Rules is rules.”  

Rules are generally good.  I like rules.  Most of us are pretty good at following the rules.  But sometimes rules need to be broken.  When we are so focused on obeying a rule that it keeps us from doing good for another person or group of people, there is something wrong.  We saw that in the story of the Good Samaritan, when two people passed without helping because they were so focused on obeying a rule that they would rather let someone die at the side of the road than break that rule.  

Sometimes there are bad rules, or rules that are so petty and detailed that they really don’t improve anyone’s life.  Keep the Sabbath holy is a good rule, an important rule. We all need a day when we can rest from the busy-ness of our lives.  We all need time to when we can focus on God.  But when the rules about how to do that become so restrictive that we are more worried about obeying Sabbath rules than honoring the Sabbath, then the rule is a problem.  When the rules keep us from expressing joy and love, the rule is a problem.  A friend in Florida was very anti-church and when I asked why, she told me a story about her parents.  They had been life long members of a particular congregation, leaders in that congregation, known for their devotion to God, and their dedication to living a Christian life as it was define in that church.  But one year, on their wedding anniversary, as they danced together in their living room, a church member happened to be going by and saw them.  They quickly reported what they had seen to the church leaders. The next Sunday her parents were excommunicated from their congregation, because dancing was against the rules.   

Jesus in no way suggested that we should not honor the Sabbath. He never even said that the rules governing Sabbath observance were bad.  What he said was they needed to be seen though a different lens. If the rules help you honor God, that’s good.  That’s what they are intended for.  If the rule keeps one from doing good in a particular situation, it needs to be disregarded in that situation.  If following the rule means someone might die, the rule needs to be disregarded in order to save a life. Doing good is always holy work, it is always a blessing in God’s eyes, even if doing good means breaking a rule.   In this way the intent of Sabbath is observed, for the intent of Sabbath is that we take time to be holy.  That means praying to God, and listening for God, and being a blessing to others.   For whatever good we do in God’s name is a blessing, and holy.  

A Spiritual Almamac

Scripture Luke 12:49-56 (CEB)  

49 “I came to cast fire upon the earth. How I wish that it was already ablaze! 50 I have a baptism I must experience. How I am distressed until it’s completed!  51 Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, I have come instead to bring division. 52 From now on, a household of five will be divided—three against two and two against three.53 Father will square off against son and son against father; mother against daughter and daughter against mother; and mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.”

54 Jesus also said to the crowds, “When you see a cloud forming in the west, you immediately say, ‘It’s going to rain.’ And indeed it does. 55 And when a south wind blows, you say, ‘A heat wave is coming.’ And it does. 56 Hypocrites! You know how to interpret conditions on earth and in the sky. How is it that you don’t know how to interpret the present time?

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Derek Penwell is the senior pastor of Douglass Boulevard Christian Church in Louisville, KY, the author of several books published by Chalice Press (the Disciples of Christ publishing house), a regular contributor to a number of publications, a blogger, a colleague, and someone I consider a friend.  He is very political, and we don’t agree on everything but we get along very well, anyway.

Yesterday I was reading the comments on his most recent blog post, and I was appalled at the vitriol and hatred that some people spewed.  Fans and detractors alike were throwing Bible verses around like fragmentation grenades, attacking one another, sometimes with the very same passages!  Not Derek.  He would not engage with any of them.  He just said, “Thank you for reading”, and left it there.  Some of the comments were so threatening that friends were concerned he might be in physical danger.   It was clear to me that the Peace of Christ is not with us.   Rather, it seems that we are in a time once again when father and son square off against each other, and mother and daughter, in the name of Jesus.  It’s sort of cliche that mother-in-law and daughter-in-law might not get along, and I suspect the potential for trouble in that relationship goes back to the first time a son brought a wife home to his mother’s cave . . . but the point Jesus was making was that the household would be divided because of him and his teachings.  And his household, of course, is the world.     

Disagreements about sincerely held beliefs are part of being human.  Even in Jesus’ time there was not one monolithic Judaism that agreed on every aspect of theology and practice.  The Sadducees and Pharisees disagreed on many things — the Sadducees did not believe there would physical resurrection at the end of days, whereas the Pharisees were quite certain there would be.  There were at the time two prominent rabbinic schools of thought which were divided on whether obedience to the letter of the law or the spirit of the law was most important.  We all know which of those schools Jesus belonged to because he was constantly fussing with some of the Pharisees and scribes over their legalism.  After the resurrection, Jesus’ disciples would alienate some of their co-religionists by proclaiming Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah, and they would be persecuted by the likes of Saul for their blasphemy.  Even among the Jesus followers, although the 2nd chapter of Acts has them all sharing everything and praying and worshipping together, I don’t think it was even a few months before they were embroiled in conflicts with the potential to kill the movement before it really got off the ground.  Greek Christians and Jewish Christians argued because some of the widows were not getting equal assistance.  Ananais and Sapphira dropped dead because they were greedy.  There were arguments over such details and technicalities as whether circumcision was necessary to be baptized.  Some of Paul’s churches were tempted to follow other preachers.  Eventually, the Roman Church broke away from the Greek Church, heretics were burned, the Inquisition happened, and Henry VII, Martin Luther and others broke away from the Roman Church.  Catholics and Protestants killed each other over details of our shared Christianity about which we disagree.  We are a contentious lot, we humans.  

How many of you are familiar with the Farmer’s Almanac?  It is a great book.  In continuous publication since 1818, the Farmers' Almanac mixes a blend of long-range weather predictions, humor, fun facts, and advice on gardening, cooking, fishing, conservation, and other topics.  It tells Farmers when to plant, when to expect the first frost, whether we could anticipate strong storms in the summer or blizzards in the winter.  My first husband, an avid hunter and fisherman, would not plan a trip anywhere without consulting it.  And that included our honeymoon, because  he wanted to know ahead of time whether there would be enough rain in the Poconos to make the Bushkill Creek a viable trout fishing spot or whether he should try elsewhere.  The Farmer’s Almanac would tell him, and it was nearly always accurate.  It was better than a weather app.  

Jesus said to his followers, look,  you can tell whether it’s going to storm, or if there is a dry spell coming.  You are sufficiently connected to the natural world that you can tell these things.  Why is it, then that you cannot see the inevitability of the conflict that I bring? Because I am telling you to do exactly the opposite of what society tells you to do.  I am telling you to cast aside concerns about your day to day lives and trust that God will take care of you.  I am teaching you to go out and spread the word that the Shema, the commandment to love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your being and all your strength, is the greatest commandment of all, greater than all of the others combined.  I have been teaching you that even the laws governing the Sabbath are not as important as the commandment to love your neighbor.  I am teaching you what loving your neighbor really means and who your neighbor is.  I am calling the Temple leadership to account for their collaboration with the Romans, and for their love of money and power.  And I am calling all people to account for their willingness to go along with whatever the rich and powerful say instead of standing up for righteousness and justice.  What I am doing and saying is pretty much guaranteed to cause conflict between the ones with ears to hear and those who are willfully deaf, and it will not be pretty and peaceful and nice.  Why can’t you see this coming? 

Jesus was not the first to bring this message.  The prophets - Isaiah, Jeremiah, Micah, all of them - called out the leaders - the kings and the priesthood - and the people for worshipping God with their lips but not with their actions.  They were the Spiritual Almanac of their times.  Jeremiah called for the leadership of Israel to act right.  “Hear the word of the Lord, O King of Judah sitting on the throne of David—you, and your servants, and your people who enter these gates. Thus says the Lord: Act with justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor anyone who has been robbed. And do no wrong or violence to the alien, the orphan, and the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place. . . . if you will not heed these words, I swear by myself, says the Lord, that this house shall become a desolation. 6 For thus says the Lord concerning the house of the king of Judah” (Jeremiah 22:3-6)   Further, he spoke against false prophets,  “25 I have heard the prophets prophesying lies in my name.  . . .  26 How long will deceitful prophecies dominate the minds of the prophets? Those prophets are treacherous. 27 They scheme to make my people forget me by their dreams that people tell each other, just as their ancestors forgot me because of Baal. “ (Jeremiah 23:25-27) 

One of the commenters on Derek’s writings said repeatedly that Jesus’ commandments were only spoken to individuals, and that governments were not held to them.  That we, as individuals, certainly need to take care of those who need to be cared for, but that governments were exempt.   And yet, Jesus and all the prophets before him most certainly spoke to the leadership of their times.  They called upon those in power to care for their people as God’s laws require of them.  No one was exempt from God’s word as spoken by the prophets.  We must remember too, that the government is made up of individuals, each of whom must make all decisions in accordance with their conscience and with their understanding of God’s will, which might not be in accord with our own understandings.  We must also remember that even the Temple leadership of Jesus’ time were not being evil on purpose.  They truly believed they were doing what was best for their people, for if they did not do as the Romans required, if they were unable to control their people, their entire nation would be destroyed.  And in fact, that did happen thirty-some years later.  The Temple was torn down and the Jewish people were scattered to the ends of the earth.  

We are called upon to pray for those in leadership, as it says in 1st Timothy 2: “I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone, for kings and all who are in high positions, so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity. This is right and is acceptable in the sight of God our Savior.”  So let us pray for the Peace of Christ to enter the hearts of all those who have positions of leadership. Let us pray that those we choose to lead us will open their hearts and eyes and ears to see the worth of all persons in their care.  Let us pray for the divisions we see in our households, and in our Church, and in our nation to be healed through that very same Lord.  Let us pray for people to stop using the Bible as a weapon and start using it as a means to bring reconciliation to the world, as a Spiritual Almanac,  guiding us in the way that our God has laid out for us, so that the Kingdom of God may come to fruition on earth as it is in heaven.   In the name of Jesus the Christ.  

Home Security

 Scripture Luke 12:32-40  The Message (MSG) 

29-32 “What I’m trying to do here is get you to relax, not be so preoccupied with getting so you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep yourself in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met. Don’t be afraid of missing out. You’re my dearest friends! The Father wants to give you the very kingdom itself.

33-34 “Be generous. Give to the poor. Get yourselves a bank that can’t go bankrupt, a bank in heaven far from bank robbers, safe from embezzlers, a bank you can bank on. It’s obvious, isn’t it? The place where your treasure is, is the place you will most want to be, and end up being.

35-38 “Keep your shirts on; keep the lights on! Be like house servants waiting for their master to come back from his honeymoon, awake and ready to open the door when he arrives and knocks. Lucky the servants whom the master finds on watch! He’ll put on an apron, sit them at the table, and serve them a meal, sharing his wedding feast with them. It doesn’t matter what time of the night he arrives; they’re awake—and so blessed!

39-40 “You know that if the house owner had known what night the burglar was coming, he wouldn’t have stayed out late and left the place unlocked. So don’t you be slovenly and careless. Just when you don’t expect him, the Son of Man will show up.”

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When I was deciding which Bible version to use for today’s scripture reading, I was struck by the first line in the Message version, “What I’m trying to do here is get you to relax, not be so preoccupied with getting so you can respond to God’s giving.”  I realized that these first two lines are not usually included when this passage is preached, but it seems that Eugene Peterson thought that this bit belonged with the “You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met. Don’t be afraid of missing out.” section.    Although the Message is not my favorite version to use, because it is a paraphrase and not as nearly accurate a translation as some, sometimes we need to hear something we have heard a million times in a new way.

I learned that in a 12 Step meeting years ago.  I always had a rough time on Tuesdays.  Every Tuesday was overly busy and stressful and all kinds of stuff went wrong - dinner burned, things like that, so that by the time I got to my women’s meeting in the evening, I was a mess.  People would say to me, “Did you pray this morning?  Because you know what they say.  If I don’t hit my knees in the morning the whole day goes wrong.”  Well, yes I did.  And frankly, hearing that same old line over and over just irritated me more.  Then one night I heard someone say, “When I get off schedule with God, my whole day goes wrong,” and it was like a light bulb went off in my head.  I was off schedule with God!  Yes, I always prayed in the morning, but I was used to praying my gratitude list at dinner time, and Tuesdays were so busy I didn’t have a sit down dinner.  I just fixed whatever in a hurry on my way to the meeting . . . so I didn’t do my gratitude list on Tuesdays.  I was off schedule with God, and I needed to hear it just that way so that I would understand what was going wrong.  After that I started doing my gratitude list in the morning, and I still do.  

I always find the whole section about servants waiting for their master, and his serving them because they were loyal just a little strange, because that just doesn’t make sense in the real world.  Even on Downton Abbey, where the servants did wait up until Lord and Lady Grantham got home, that was their job, and they weren’t served by the master in gratitude for them doing their job.  If they had not been up waiting, they might have lost that job.   So Jesus was talking about something not of this world, something unusual - a situation in which the master would serve those who typically served him - like when Jesus washed the disciples’ feet at the Last Supper.  Just like Matthew’s story of the bridesmaids with their lamps, if they were ready at whatever hour he arrived, there would be a reward.  

But even at the time, most of his followers didn’t have servants. Some of them might have been servants.  So Jesus gave another example to make his point.  He said, “You know that if the house owner had known what night the burglar was coming, he wouldn’t have stayed out late and left the place unlocked. So don’t you be slovenly and careless. Just when you don’t expect him, the Son of Man will show up.”   And surely, that was easy to understand.   Because of course, we don’t know when the burglar is coming, and we can’t stay home all the time just in case.  So we have locks on our doors, and security systems, and barking dogs, and moats filled with alligators . . .  alright, maybe not moats.  But we do those other things and we join neighborhood watch organizations to help keep our homes and families safe.  

That works for houses, and church buildings, and businesses.  But what do we do to keep our souls secure?  What about that home’s security? For no one knows when the Messiah will return.   No one knows when the end times will come.  None of us knows the day we will meet our Lord.   Oh there are actuarial tables and life expectancy charts for men and women.  Some have been given a diagnosis which comes with a projected end date.  But even so, no one knows the day or the hour.  Even when the end is expected, as when someone has been ill for a long time, the machines have been turned off, they are in hospice care, and the family is gathered, somehow the end, when it comes, is still a surprise.   And we can no more spend every minute of every day wondering if the next minute will be the last than we can sit by the door of our house all night waiting for the burglar to come - no one can live like that.  

How do we keep ourselves ready?  Many of us have a routine of daily scripture reading, prayer and meditation.  We may read a daily meditation or two or three.  Some of the Young Adults have the same Bible app on their phones and are working through several reading plans together.  It is good to have a routine, as long as it does not become so routine as to be meaningless.  Or as long as you don’t over do.  I know - how can you possibly overdo a good thing like prayer and spiritual practices?  When I was in seminary one professor had us design a Daily Rule for ourselves, to include prayer, spiritual practice, and scripture reading, and we were to follow that Rule for a month.  Because I believe that if a thing is worth doing it is worth over-doing, mine got a little complicated.  I prayed a rosary and chanted psalms and prayed intercessory prayers and used several forms of meditation and read scripture and several daily meditation books, and I did these things several times a day, at specific times every day for a prescribed amount of time every day.  I had a color coded chart that I checked off to make sure I didn’t miss anything.  And by the end of the month I was very well aware that all of this over-doing was not bringing me closer to God.  It was just making me crazy trying to get everything done and all of that was keeping me from doing things I should be doing.  Like helping others.  If someone asked me to help with something at lunchtime, I couldn’t  because I had to do my 15 minutes of after lunch prayer and meditation in the chapel.  Let me think - which of those two things might be more pleasing to God?  Hmm . . .  To paraphrase Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase, “What I’m trying to do here is get you to relax, not be so preoccupied with doing, so you can respond to God’s giving.”  I re-learned the value of having a daily routine for prayer and study - of staying on schedule with God - but I also learned that over-doing even God-stuff is not a good thing.  I was reminded that meditation is about listening for God’s voice with an open mind and heart, not a hoop to jump through.

How do we stay prepared?  How do we keep our home, our soul, secure in preparation for the coming of the Lord?  We ask ourselves in every situation, “What would Jesus do?”  And we remember that sometimes what he did included righteous wrath and whips.  We worship God with all our being - not just sitting and letting the service wash over us, but lifting our voices in song and prayer, serving the Lord’s Supper to our neighbor instead of just passing the trays.  We give generously, sharing what we have with those who have less.   We pray and meditate and follow whatever practices work for us, but we also drop everything to help when we are needed and able.  Remember that the priest and the Levite allowed their religious duties to keep them from helping the man on the road, leaving the Samaritan to do the neighborly thing, the God centered thing.  We open our hearts and our souls to God’s voice and God’s direction, listening for his will for us.   We spend time in silence, shutting out all the many things that distract us from God’s peace.  We spend time in God’s presence, allowing our hearts to be filled with God’s hope, allowing God’s blessing to fill us to overflowing.   And then, no matter when our Lord comes, we will be awake and prepared, and blessed.

The Hoarders: Episode 1

 Scripture    Luke 12:13-21 Common English Bible (CEB)

13 Someone from the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”  14 Jesus said to him, “Man, who appointed me as judge or referee between you and your brother?”

15 Then Jesus said to them, “Watch out! Guard yourself against all kinds of greed. After all, one’s life isn’t determined by one’s possessions, even when someone is very wealthy.”16 Then he told them a parable: “A certain rich man’s land produced a bountiful crop. 17 He said to himself, What will I do? I have no place to store my harvest! 18 Then he thought, Here’s what I’ll do. I’ll tear down my barns and build bigger ones. That’s where I’ll store all my grain and goods. 19 I’ll say to myself, You have stored up plenty of goods, enough for several years. Take it easy! Eat, drink, and enjoy yourself. 20 But God said to him, ‘Fool, tonight you will die. Now who will get the things you have prepared for yourself?’ 21 This is the way it will be for those who hoard things for themselves and aren’t rich toward God.”

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There were all kinds of articles along with this picture of a barn full of rice being hoarded in the Philippines.  Poor people were going hungry while merchants held out for the highest possible prices.  Jail sentences of up to 20 years were imposed on rice hoarders and profiteers.  The perfect real life example of this parable.  But . . .

At 1:49 this morning multiple alerts on my phone woke me up, and, once I read the breaking news, ended my night’s sleep.  The news alert read:  At least nine people were killed and 16 more were wounded in a shooting early Sunday morning in Dayton, Ohio, the second American mass shooting in less than 24 hours.  The shooter, who was wearing body armor, was killed by police.  

Yesterday 20 people were killed and 26 were injured in a mass shooting at an El Paso Walmart.   The shooter was a 21 year old white man, who was taken into police custody.

And last Sunday afternoon, a mass shooting occurred at the Gilroy Garlic Festival here in California, resulting in four deaths and 12 injuries.  The shooter was a 19 year old white man, who killed himself.

That’s three mass shootings this week! (A mass shooting is defined as three or more killings in a single episode.)  By that definition there have been at least 32 mass shootings in the United States this year.  But if we count those with multiple injuries but less than 3 deaths, there has been at least one incidence of mass shooting every day this year!  That's . . . there are no words. 

This isn’t about guns. And it isn’t about the mental health of the shooters. Although those are both important conversations that must continue because they certainly play a role.   But it is about who we are as a nation, as a people.  It is about what we believe.

This morning Taylor Mayberry told NBC news she was one of the last people to be let into the bathroom at that Dayton, Ohio nightclub, where ten other people were taking shelter. “We were holding the door shut and waiting until the gunshots stopped,” Mayberry said. “People were banging on the doors throughout. We weren’t sure if they were…you know…we weren’t sure if it was people getting in to shoot us or to get safe.”

“We were holding the door shut . . .people were banging on the doors throughout.”   It’s every person for themselves in a situation like this, after all.  Isn’t it?  I found this disturbing, because . . . can you imagine being on the outside of that door, listening to the gun fire, banging on it. . .?  

I mean, we do hear about heroes in the aftermath of these events - someone who has either confronted the gunman or otherwise protected others at the risk of their own lives.  We hear about them, because this is unusual behavior.  But it is Christian behavior.  It is what we are called to do - to act other than the way everyone else acts.  Christian’s are about being the Good Samaritan, not the priest who walks by the injured man in order to preserve his own purity..

So can we talk about greed?  Can we talk about doing the opposite of loving the neighbor?  Can we talk about how not to be the Good Samaritan?  Can we talk about how not to be Christian?

Because holding the bathroom door shut keeping others from safety is so much more greedy than hoarding rice.  Jesus said to those who were hearing his parable, “Watch out! Guard yourself against all kinds of greed.”  Against all kinds of greed.  The usual understanding of greed is “a selfish and excessive desire for more of something than is needed.” (Merriam-Webster.com)  However, the Greek word used in the Bible which translates into English as greed has a deeper meaning.  Biblical commentator John Ritenbaugh defines greed as  “ruthless self-seeking, and an arrogant assumption that others and things exist for one’s own benefit.”  New Testament Greek scholar William Barclay describes it as an “accursed love of having,” which “will pursue its own interests with complete disregard for the rights of others, and even for the considerations of common humanity.”  (Institute for Faith, Work and Economics. https://tifwe.org/what-is-greed/)

Greed.   The El Paso shooter is thought to have written a manifesto that begins “This attack is a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas.”  (Just  want to point out that Texas used to be part of Mexico.  The national language used to be Spanish.  It was invaded by white Americans.  Just sayin’.)   The words of the manifesto, which included the “great replacement” theory, (that white Christian Americans are being deliberately replaced by “others”) echo the slogan that was chanted during a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017: “Jews will not replace us.”  Other mass shooters have talked about killing people - non-white or non-Christian - who pose a threat to their “American" way of life.

Preaching passive love doesn’t cut it in situations like these. Preaching obedience to God doesn’t either, because many of these shooters truly believe that it is God’s will they do these things, that they are superior to the people they are killing, that our Christian nation would be better off without gay people or black people or brown people or asian people or transgender people or Jewish people or Muslim people or even Native Americans.   They will take the Bible and twist it to make what they are doing ok.  We have churches teaching hatred in the name of Jesus. I spend hours talking with people who have been abused by their churches, who have been taught to believe that God is disappointed in them at best, or hates them entirely and that they will burn in hell forever.  They have been taught that by their churches!  The Klan and other white supremacist groups and survivalist groups regularly quote scripture to justify their beliefs and behaviors.  The cross of Jesus often features in their logos.  They proclaim their Christianity loudly.

We cannot sit back and say “well, if we just go out and show other people what Christians are really like, that will be enough.  If we are kind and good and nice that will change people’s hearts.”  Because just being nice and loving and kind will not change people’s hearts.  We absolutely do need to be nice, and loving, and kind.  But we also need to actively love our neighbor.  We need to stand up and say something when we see or hear hatred and prejudice, when we hear someone talk about Christianity as hypocritical, hateful, or judgmental.   We need to make our voices heard when such immoral behavior is right in our faces.  In some communities, Christians have stood guard around synagogues or mosques to protect their Jewish and Muslim neighbors against threats from hate groups.   

Someone on Facebook posted that it is sad that we say “Today’s Mass Shooting.”  It is beyond sad - it is terrible that we must use the phrase “Today’s mass shooting.”  There should not be any mass shootings!   And while it is true that not all of these terrible events have been hate crimes, or domestic terrorism, many have.  No one in America, and especially no Christian in America, should be targeting groups to be killed because they are different.  There is that pesky commandment after all, the one that says “Thou shalt not murder.”  That one is hard to get around, but let me tell you clearly - they try.  They will tell you it’s not murder - it’s the extermination of pests, because all those “others” aren’t really human, don’t you know?  But I tell you, all of those “others” are also created by and beloved of God, so they’re really not “other”.  Not in God’s eyes. 

I really wish you all could have been at General Assembly on that last morning to hear the Reverend Dr. William M. Barber preach.  He had us on our feet, clapping and shouting more than once during his message.  He exhorted us to be passionate about our beliefs - to take them out and use them on days other than Sunday.  If we believe that it is immoral to allow babies to be shot in Walmart . . . if we believe it is immoral to target people for death because of their color or ethnicity or religion or orientation or gender identity . . . if we believe it is immoral to stand by and allow hatred to take over our nation. . . .then we must stand up for what is right and good.  We must lift our voices against hatred, against violence, against passive acceptance of the unacceptable, against greed.  Because this hatred is all about greed.  It is all about people pursuing their own interests with complete disregard for the rights of others, and even for the considerations of common humanity. We must stand for our siblings who are also God’s beloved children. 

Family, do not be silent.  Write letters. Sign petitions.  Speak out loud when you witness any one acting on one of the isms that separate us, one from another. Join in demonstrations.  Do whatever it is you can best do to change hatred into love, to beat swords into plowshares.  Let us work together to end greed and hatred, so that we may be rich in God.  Let us work together to actively love our neighbor, in Jesus’ name.