St. Peter's By The Sea
The Episcopal Church in Narragansett, RI
September 28, 2008
20th Sunday after Pentecost
Shortly before Jesus began his public ministry, another person was garnering crowds and getting a lot of attention. A man named John had taken up residence on the shores of the Jordan River and was preaching a radically new message. John went way out to the desert to practice this ministry because he was trying to make a point. He could have gone to Jerusalem, where the Temple was and where all the religious elite of his day lived. But John was not interested in lumping himself together with the religious leaders of the day. So instead he got himself as far from them as he could go, miles away from the city.
And there he baptized people—earning the name “The Baptist”—in the water of the Jordan, and there he preached. It is a testament to his charisma and magnetism that he was followed by such massive crowds, and not because the message he was sharing with them was not particularly sunny. Nowadays you see packed churches where preachers are making promises of riches and blessings if people will simply believe that God wants us all to have a three-car garage and wear Italian suits. But John the Baptist’s message was harsh: he bluntly told people they were living sinful lives. He told them that God was angry and frustrated by the people’s lack of righteousness, by all the corruption and inequality in the world. And he told them—and this is the reason why he wanted to get so far from Jerusalem—that their proper religious upbringing and beliefs wouldn’t save them from God’s wrath.
Only repentance would make any difference. Repent, he said, for God is near.
When we think of repentance, we usually think of feeling sorry for something we’ve done. We “repent” when we make our confession of sin. But a more appropriate definition of repentance is to change your mind, or your course of conduct, on account of regret or dissatisfaction. Repentance literally means to change directions, to turn away from something, to go in the opposite direction.
So repent, John said; change the direction of your life. Do things differently.
And he was specific: if you have clothes you’re not wearing, give them to people who don’t have enough clothes. He told tax collectors and soldiers—two occupations that the Jewish people in Jesus’ day despised because both of them were in cahoots with the oppressive Roman government—not to exploit, extort or falsely accuse people. Repentance for John wasn’t some pie-in-the-sky theological construct; it was the stuff of real life, the rubber meeting the road, when people started putting their ordinary lives in line with the will of God.
In today’s gospel, Jesus reminds the religious leaders of his day about John’s preaching, and then tells a parable to sum it up. There are two brothers: one who says yes when his father asks him to go to the fields and work, but then doesn’t go. Meanwhile, the second brother tells his father he won’t go work in the fields, but then does. Which son did what his father had asked? Well, based on the way he frames the parable, we know the correct answer is the second son, right? But how? What is he getting at? Jesus is, in essence, asking the religious authorities, and asking us, a question:
What’s better, a respectable religious person who always says “yes” to God—pays God lip-service—but doesn’t do what God asks in his or her daily life. . .
. . .or a non-religious person who says “no” to God—rebels against God’s authority or even questions his existence—but then behaves in such a way, in their daily life, that is consistent with God’s will?
It’s a question that hits close to home for the religious leaders of Jesus’ time. The chief priests had been hammering Jesus for hanging out with the dregs of society—prostitutes and tax collectors. They followed Jesus around and harangued him about the sort of people that he surrounded himself with. They believed that Jesus’ friends and acquaintances were a sort of spiritual contamination, just by their very existence. But there was nothing Jesus despised more than this holier-than-thou worldview. He couldn’t stand it when the ones on the “inside” did everything they could to keep those they didn’t like on the “outside.” These insiders were all talk, the original “yes” men. They had lots to say about all sorts of things, but when it came down to it, they had very little action to back it up their tough words. Their lives, in practice, were empty of God.
And, it seems, that question hits close to home for us as well. There are many people out there who pay God lip-service. It comes so easily. I’m sure you’ve seen it done, and maybe you’ve done it more than once yourself. These people talk about God easily and freely. They know all the right code words, all the Biblical phrases and every word of the liturgy. They seem to have a direct connection to the Almighty, a Bat-phone of sorts that enables them to know God’s every command. Yet that same person is the one who just bought a new boat but considered a $50 bill in the offering plate at Christmas good for the year. Their talk is empty. It’s really all about them, not God. It’s a lot like that old parenting adage: Do as I say and not as I do. Parents say that in moment of frustration, and also in moments of embarrassment, when their actions and their words are shown to contradict one another. But, both Jesus and the religious leaders acknowledge, the one who says the right things but doesn’t do them isn’t on the right path.
And then, on the other hand, there are so many people out there who struggle to articulate just who or what God is. Talking about God is hard to do, whether it’s because they came from a religiously repressive family or they just lost a loved one from disease or tragedy. And maybe they even said no to God on more than one occasion. Maybe they left church as a teenager and never looked back. But there they are, in the middle of the serving line at the Soup Kitchen every month. You can always count on them to generously donate to worthy causes. Maybe they became a foster parent. Or maybe they are the ones you can always count on to selflessly show love and compassion. They may not ever refer to God, or speak like a churchgoer, but their life is a pure reflection of God’s will. Their life is gospel.
So much of Jesus’ time was spent ministering to those people living on the periphery of society—the diseased, the sinners, the hated—and trying to draw them back in. They may not have always said “yes” to God at first, but they were included because they allowed their lives to be changed, their images of themselves to be rearranged by Jesus’ merciful touch. Whether they knew the right thing to say, whether they understood all the religious garble-de-gook that sometimes just gets in the way, whether they had the proper background, Jesus didn’t care. Because they allowed their lives to be changed, and their actions reflected that difference. It was just like John the Baptist: what matters is the authenticity of repentance. What matters is the decision to choose a different direction and head out into it. What matters is allowing God to pick you up from the path you’re on, dust you off a bit, and set you back down on a holy path.
So where are you in this parable? Are you the one who says the right things, but doesn’t follow it up with action? Or maybe you are the one who doesn’t always know the right thing to say, the perfect words or the best phrase, but you’re living your life in the way of God’s call. It may be an inevitable tactic used by well-meaning parents, but for Jesus, “Do as I say and not as I do” runs completely counter to what God expects from us. Saying the right thing and not doing it is just not good enough, Jesus tells us. What matters is what you do.
So if you’re someone who’s already living the gospel life, well, congratulations. You are truly blessed. And you are rare. But if you’re like me, and like just about everyone I’ve ever met, and occasionally your words are worth more than your actions, there is still hope. We can go back to the shores of the Jordan River and listen to John the Baptist calling for us to repent, to change course, to head in a new direction. It is the direction that will demand us to match our lives with our words, to boldly live out the commands of our Lord when it would be so much easier to just say the right thing and move on. We can leave behind our hollow words, and lay claim to the fullness and grace of lives given to God, that we would all proclaim by our lives the greatness of God’s holy kingdom.
Posted on: Sun, 28 Sep 2008 7:48 am
Category: Sermons