Sermon for February 16, 2020 Epiphany 6 A House of Prayer Lutheran Church

Matthew 5:21-37

There’s a story I heard about an old rabbi on his deathbed. He called his family to his side and took stock. He said: “When I was younger, I wanted to change to world. When I got a little older I saw how that wasn’t working so I set out to change my state, instead. After a while I realized that wasn’t working, so I tried to change my city. When that didn’t work I thought maybe I could change my neighborhood. Now I’m an old man, and I realize that all those years ago I should have started by trying to change myself! If I had been successful at that, then perhaps I might have changed my neighborhood, my city, my state, and--who knows?--maybe even the world.” He had to start by changing himself.

There’s a lot to chew on in that story, but one of the themes that it brings up is something Jesus is getting at in the Sermon on the Mount, which we heard another section of today. That theme is the relationship between an individual and their wider community. How do we use our personal freedom responsibly--our free will, responsibly--while also developing a healthy responsibility to one another--to the relationships, and organizations, and institutions, and communities that we are part of?

All of us here are part of many types of communities: it could be families, friendships, or social networks; or work, school, or civic organizations; or teams, clubs, or political parties. We each live in a specific town, city, neighborhood, state, country. We might be part of a youth group, or quilting group. A church--and even our House of Prayer congregation is part of a wider community, not only in Franklin, Wisconsin, but also in the Greater Milwaukee Synod and in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. And in order for each one of these many different kinds of communities to fulfill their purpose, they depend upon their members to find the right balance of personal responsibility, and responsibility to one another.

So each community, each organization, each person depends on rules of some sort to help things go smoothly; that way we can trust one another. So as a church, we look to the Ten Commandments as our set of rules--and how to use our freedom responsibly. And that’s what Jesus did, too. Especially in the gospel of Matthew we see Jesus describes as the new Moses, building upon the ancient Words that Moses received from God on Mount Sinai.

So in today’s gospel we see Jesus taking a closer look at a few of the Ten Commandments, and interpreting what they mean for his day and age. Now, on the one hand the Ten Commandments are very simple. Straightforward. Common sense, even, if your goal is to have a healthy society. But we can see with our own eyes that actually understanding them and following them is easier said than done. And sometimes, it can be easy to just look at them as a list to check off, but not really transform us: Did I murder someone? Nope? Check. Did I commit adultery? Nope. Check. Ok, I’m good.

But Jesus shows us that the Ten Commandments are not simply a checklist that you get to the end of and then forget about, but really as starting points for building better relationships and healthy responsibility for each other; promoting a good life for everyone. In the examples Jesus talks about, he actually recognizes that there was way more than 1,000 years between Moses and him, and in those many centuries the culture had changed quite a bit. So, for example, the commandment “you shall not commit adultery”, Moses in explaining what that means, he assumes that men and not women would be in charge of everything. But as Jesus teaches on this commandment he is saying “hold up”--that kind of arrangement leads to all kinds of injustice--women and men need to be on an equal footing so we can have a just and fair society. This was even revolutionary in Jesus’ day, but we can recognize how he was updating and building upon the tradition for the needs of his own day and age.

Or the commandment, “you shall not murder”. Well, we know how bad killing is, and that there is too much of it in our society. But it’s also not the only way of crushing people’s spirits. So this Word from God invites us to wrestle with how do we not only prevent violence but also how do we promote the well-being of our neighbors?

Martin Luther picks up on what Jesus was doing in the Sermon on the Mount in the Small Catechism. Luther does a masterful job interpreting the Ten Commandments for his own day and age. So, for the 5th Commandment Luther writes, “You shall not murder. What does this mean? We are to fear and love God, so that we neither endanger nor harm the lives of our neighbors, but instead help and support them in all of life’s needs.”

What would this look like for us in our own day and age? How do we not endanger the life of our neighbors? How do we help and support them in all of life’s needs? These are things we need to wrestle with to make the Ten Commandments our own. You could start with things we might take for granted that protect us every day--traffic safety laws; food safety guidelines; workplace safety standards; water quality regulations. Without these there’d be a lot more sickness and death. And then building on that, you could look at places of great need for large segments of our neighbors--the need for food pantries; health clinics; affordable housing; job training; quality educational. All of these are big challenges, but God entrusts us to wrestle with them, so we can try to fulfill the 5th commandment, “you shall not murder”--a figure out the best ways to protect, and help, and support people in life-giving ways.

Yet the deeper you get into any of these problems, the more you realize how complex they are. ?Finding the right balance between personal responsibility, and responsibility to the wider communities we are part of? That ain’t easy. It can even be kind of discouraging. You think you’re solving one problem, and another one pops up to take its place that you didn’t even think of. How is changing the world even possible?

First, we need to remember the First Commandment: the Lord is our God--you shall have no other gods. And Luther explains what this means in the Small Catechism: “We are to fear, love, and trust God above all things.” So how do we plug into this divine power source to help us follow Jesus in this blessed--yet difficult--way of life? Well, having the Lord as your God? It begins by LOVING God; and by loving you see that you can TRUST God; and when you trust GOd you start to put your HOPE in the God who first loved us so much that he sent his only Son to save us from sin and bring us to eternal life.

It all begins with love. That’s the foundation. It all begins with growing in your relationship with God so that you naturally grow in love and kindness towards other people. That’s how you might just change the world--you start with what’s in your own heart, and you develop that love, and trust, and hope in God. You allow Christ to have full access to your entire being, your whole soul, so that he directs you, form you, send you in the love of God and the love of our neighbors. Amen.