Pentecost 16

Pentecost 16 KEEPING THE UNITY IN COMM-UNITY 9/1&4/05

Jesus gives His Church a means of maintaining a truthful, and therefore faithful, community. By His grace, we are given the authority, responsibility, and grace to tell the truth to one another, in order that the unity of the comm-unity might be maintained. Sin lacerates, injures, and scars the Church, the very body of Christ. Therefore, in the body and as individual members of the body of Christ, sin must be named and confronted…truth must be risked and told…in order that we might be reconciled to our sisters and brothers and keep the unity in comm-unity.

A college professor was teaching a course on ethics. On the first day he shared how the Greek philosopher Aristotle based his ethics upon friendship, that a good person was inconceivable apart from good friends. During the course the students presented case studies of some of their own ethical dilemmas. They told what happened and how they responded. The class, then, discussed and analyzed their responses. At the end of the semester, the professor offered to them this rather sobering summary of what they had taught him. He said: “I noted that, in your case studies, when you were explaining why you chose to do nothing when a friend was engaging in self-destructive or hurtful behavior---dealing in drugs, driving drunk, cheating on an exam---your primary justification for not getting involved was, ‘He is my best friend. Who am I to judge him? I’m not perfect! I was afraid if I said anything, she would get mad at me and never speak to me again!’ and so on and so on. The professor further commented: “You students give friendship a bad name. Maybe Aristotle was wrong. Whereas he taught that friendship is the basis for ethics, you make friendship the excuse for immoral behavior. Let me just say this. Please, don’t any of you be my best friend! I am too dependent upon friends who care enough about me to tell me when I am acting destructively, when my words are hurtful, when my actions are demeaning. Apparently, you are not such friends so, again, I plead, don’t be my best friend!”

I like this professor’s style and I applaud both his honesty and his ethics! Our Gospel lesson this week takes sin seriously as an attack upon the body of Christ. Sin must not be allowed to fester, to go unchallenged. Sin must be confronted, privately at first, in public if necessary, before the church, but then sin is to be forgiven. It seems our cultural inclination to treat sin as unimportant. We say “forgive and forget,” with the emphasis on the forgetting. We are seemingly proud to consider our laxity in such matters as signs of our gracious, accepting disposition…our incredible and virtuous tolerance. Whereas Jesus, recorded in Luke 17:3, teaches “If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him,” we have adulterated this into “If your sister or brother sins, be a friend, don’t mention it!” No need for repentance and, certainly, no need for rebuke. We tolerate sin in the mistaken hope that, ignoring it, it will go away.

Sin is serious business, sin has social and spiritual consequences, sin is injurious to every human relationship, and, therefore, sin is to be identified, rebuked, acknowledged, and forgiven! Laxity and indifference in the face of sin is never a virtue! I am aware that some of what we read in Scripture may seem to be at odds with other commands of our Lord. Yes, Jesus did say that when someone strikes us on the right cheek, we are to turn the other cheek (Mt. 5:39). Yes, Jesus did teach us not to be angry with a brother or sister, lest we become subject to judgment (Mt. 5:22). Yes, Jesus did say, “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged” (Mt. 7:1). This particular verse seems a favorite for Christians who seek to justify distance, indifference and apathy.

But, Jesus instructs us in our Gospel this week that “if a member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone.” (Mt. 18:15) The focus here is internal, pertaining to a quarrel between members of the faith community, the church. We are commanded to “go to him privately and confront him with his fault” (Living Bible), so that this conversation takes place outside of public notice. We are to go out of our way to preserve the unity within the Christian comm-unity!

This teaching stands in stark contrast to our usual way of dealing with such problems. Rather than going directly to and talking with the person with whom we have the problem, our preference is to talk about them to someone else…maybe, everyone else… as we attempt to gain allies and support for our own cause or position. This is hurtful, this is not helpful, and this is sinful! You know it and I know it! I’ve been a party to such strategies and Grace Church is in no way immune from such sinful activities. When we see it, we need to confront it, carefully and prayerfully, with absolutely as few people as humanly possible. Although our natural tendency is to “spread the dirt,” Jesus instructs us to keep the “circle” small! This is radical, and this is right! More importantly, still, this is the Word of the Lord! AMEN.