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What is the essence of Christian
living? What does it look like to be a follower of Jesus? Once
you know you belong to the church, and once you know you
belong to Christ, what are the rules of engagement?
Some will say, “Well, that’s
easy. Just obey the Ten Commandments.” Many of you know the
commandments. “Remember the Sabbath, to keep it holy. Do not
steal. Do not kill. Do not commit adultery. Do not covet. (Or
as one child said, ‘Do not take the covers off thy neighbor’s
wife!’) Honor your father and your mother. (Or as another
child said, ‘Humor thy father and thy mother.’)”
Are these the rules of
engagement for us? There was a huge issue in an Alabama
courthouse a few months ago. The debate raged and made
front-page news. A judge lost his job. People prayed and wept
on the steps of the courthouse as a monument upon which the
Ten Commandments had been inscribed was carried to a less
public location.
Are these the fundamental rules
of engagement? A retired flower shop owner runs a ministry out
of his home in Tennessee. He has agreed to pay $10 to any
child under the age of 16 who memorizes and recites the Ten
Commandments. He believes that “The nation has lost its moral
conscience.” Eventually he hopes to persuade 10 million
children to participate.[i]
Many persons have a genuine
passion for these rules in the flow of life. Someone has said,
“We have passed 35 million laws trying to enforce ten
commandments.”
Some others will say that the
essence of the faith is the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as
you would have others do unto you.” This, they say, is the
fundamental rule of engagement. This verse was probably an
early memory verse for some of you in Sunday School. For me it
was this one plus the one from the Psalms that said, “I was
glad when they said unto me, ‘Let us go into the house of the
Lord.’”
For still others, the essence of
the Christian life is both of these—the Ten Commandments and
the Golden Rule. These are the essentials of living a faithful
Christian life.
I submit that these two portions
of Scripture are valuable, but not the essence of Christian
living. Jesus elevated one rule above all others. He did not
throw out the old, but he gave them less priority. When asked,
“What is the great commandment?” Jesus answered, “Love God and
love your neighbor.” When he talked to the disciples he said,
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another.”
Paul echoes this in a very
important text in the 12th chapter of Romans: “Owe
no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who
loves another has fulfilled the law.” The commandments, “You
shall not commit adultery; you shall not murder, you shall not
steal, you shall not covet”—and any other commandment, are
summed up in this word: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love
does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling
of the law.
Clearly, the rules of engagement
are summed up in one rule—the rule of love.
John Wesley wrote, “Let love
not visit you as a transient guest, but be the constant temper
of your soul. Let it pant in your heart, let it sparkle in
your eyes; let it shine in all your actions and let there be
in your tongue the law of kindness.”
Martin Marty, retired writer and
teacher, has a plaque on the wall of his study. He says he
ponders the plaque daily: “Life is short and we have not
much time for gladdening the hearts of those who travel the
way with us. Oh be swift to love; make haste to be kind.”
Clearly, the law of love is
God’s rule for life. I saw a T-shirt once that read, “Gravity…
it’s not just a good idea; it’s the law.” Love is the law.
Love is the rule of life engagement.
But love is not easy. It is not
a simplistic rule. There are some radical dimensions to this
single commitment.
AN ACT OF WILL
First, love must be an act of
your will. It is a decision you make and carry through. It’s a
conscious act. Love must be a conscious act of the will at
least until God’s love flows through you entirely.
I read a story about a small
girl who was in a soup kitchen line in a poverty-stricken part
of the city. Many people were in line that day, and the people
preparing food realized that the food was starting to run
short. The servers were concerned. The little girl seemed not
to notice. Her attention was focused on three small figures
across a street and under a tree.
She waited patiently in line,
but when she got to the server, the only thing left was one
banana. Without complaint, she took the fruit joyfully. She
walked across the street to the three other children. Were
they her siblings? Were they friends? We don’t know. Carefully
she peeled the banana, broke it into three pieces, and gave
each of the children one third of the fruit. Then she sat down
on the curb and began to lick the inside of the peel.
A reporter who told this story
says, “I swear I saw the face of God that day.”[ii]
Love is an act of the will until
the love of God controls you and flows through you.
Dostoyevsky says, “I am convinced that the only hell which
exists is the inability to love.” Scripture says we know
we have passed from death to life because we love one another.
(I John 3:14)
ALL INCLUSIVE
Secondly, love must be
all-inclusive. Clearly, in the way of Jesus, no one is left
out. No one is excluded.
An overweight man went to his
doctor for help. The doctor’s prescription went something like
this: “Eat regularly for two days, then skip a day. Do this
for one month. You should lose at least 5 pounds, maybe even
more.”
A month later the man returned.
He had lost nearly 60 pounds. “That’s amazing,” said the
doctor. “Did you follow my instructions?”
“Yes,” said the man, “but I
thought I was going to drop dead on that third day.”
“From hunger, you mean?” queried
the doctor.
“No,” said the man, “from
skipping.”
There is no “skipping” in the
call to love. Or maybe there’s a lot of skipping—skipping over
the normal, natural inclinations of life.
Love is all-inclusive. I cannot
exclude anyone. Just because someone is Islamic or Hindu, I
cannot love him or her less. Just because someone is gay or
lesbian, I cannot cut off love. Just because someone is
haughty or arrogant, I cannot withhold my love.
A prominent woman in the
community in Dallas, Texas is a member of a United Methodist
church. She lost to death a very artistic and talented nephew.
The young man died of AIDS. Someone in the church was trying
to bring her comfort. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “What did he
die from?”
The woman replied, “He died of
AIDS.”
Said the other, “Oh, well I’m
sorry… anyway.”
The pastor of that church, upon
hearing the story, said, “Try to find the word ‘anyway’
anywhere in the Bible. It’s simply not there.” Love is
all-inclusive and unconditional.
General Conference for 2004
opens in Pittsburgh in six weeks. My prayer is this: that an
extraordinary abundance of love will flow through that event.
I read where in 1784 a Methodist Conference was held in Great
Britain. The minutes of the conference read, “The conference
ended in a spirit of love, much to the disappointment of
many.”
My prayer is that the
conservatives will love the progressives. My prayer is that
the progressive wing will demonstrate love for the
conservatives. William Sloane Coffin writes, “If Christ is
God’s love in person on earth, churches ought to be God’s love
in an organization on earth. If love is what it’s all about,
where are we going to celebrate this love unless in a
community with loving people?”
A woman joined a church in
Dallas. She was faithful in worship. She joined the choir. She
was active in women’s groups. The pastor asked her why she
joined. Her answer was simple: “Your people loved me into
it.”
I believe we can be a model for
the nation at the upcoming General Conference. The nation is
very fractured right now. Perhaps in more ways than we know,
the United Methodist Church can be a model and the hope for
this nation. Nathan Hatch, who is the provost at Notre Dame
and a professor of American Church History, said this:
“Quite simply, Methodism remains the most powerful religious
movement in American history.”
Christian love, Christ-centered
love must be all-inclusive.
BE EXTRAORDINARY
Finally, Christian love must
also be extraordinary. That was a phrase used by Dietrich
Bonhoeffer in the 1940s. He said that Christ’s way of love is
extraordinary because it means love for the enemy.
Years ago a Turkish officer
raided and looted an Armenian home. He killed the parents and
gave the daughters to the soldiers. He kept the eldest
daughter for himself. Sometime later she escaped, and went
into training to become a highly skilled nurse.
A few years later she found
herself nursing in a ward of Turkish officers. One night she
saw the face of the same officer from years before. Gravely
ill and wounded, he would die without exceptional nursing. The
days passed, however, and he recovered.
A doctor stood with the nurse
beside the man’s bed. The doctor said simply, “But for her
devotion to you, you would be dead by now.” The officer looked
at the nurse and said, “We have met before, haven’t we?” She
replied, “Yes, we have met before.”
Then the officer asked, “Why
didn’t you kill me?” The nurse replied, “I am a follower of
the One who said, ‘Love your enemies.’”
The rule of life engagement for
you and me reaches beyond. It reaches beyond normal kindness
and human limitations. It reaches beyond natural inclinations
into the realm of the extraordinary.
Remember today the rule of
engagement. Many rules are narrowed into one: “Love is the
fulfillment of the law.” When you think of love, you do not
have to memorize the Ten Commandments or the Golden Rule. All
the meaningful issues of Scripture are gathered into one. “Owe
no one anything except to love one another.”
[i]
As reported in USA Today, December 30, 2002
[ii]
Thanks to Norman Neaves for this story
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