Sermon- On The Two Great Commandments

Sermon- On The Two Great Commandments
Proper 25 10-26-08

Almighty and everlasting God, increase in us the gifts of faith, hope, and charity; and, that we may obtain what you promise, make us love what you command; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Today, as we approach the Gospel message about love and the person of the messiah, I can only imagine the context from which Christ spoke those words. The loneliness he must have felt and the violence and hatred that surrounded him. Israel was then a State under Martial Law, Roman soldiers keeping guard or marching patrol everywhere you went. Then there were the religious anc civil leaders, such as the Pharisees, Saducees, and Herodians, vying for position; or posturing themselves for political power plays. And the people were afraid but trying to stir up feeble hopes that the prophesied Messiah, the deliver would come and start a revolution, overthrow Rome, and re-establish the ancient Throne of King David.

And when the fullness of time came, God sent his son into the world. The teaching ministry of Jesus was set on the stage of political unrest. He came preaching a news of hope and love, and that now the kingdom of God was within reach.

But the political and religious leaders of Israel were terrified that Christ's teaching would stir up the people to revolt and bring the wrath of Rome down upon them all; or worse yet, would interfere with their own political agendas for power and position within the allowances of Rome.
As we've seen, they had been conspiring together to set Jesus up, to attack his popularity with the people, to find incriminating evidence in his teachings that were at contradiction to the Mosaic Law, and even conspiring to have him murdered.

The Pharisees had been watching him, as to how he handled the Saducees in the passage before our todays reading; and now, gather a small army, a crowd, to challenge Jesus. Isn't that just like our sinful human nature, when we feel wronged, we need the justification of all who would listen to us. We want everyone on our side and we seek to gather as many as we can who will side with our perspective, our version of the truth. Then we gang up on the one who is opposed to our opinons and agendas.

As they approach him, they send out their Emissary to speak in their behalf, to question him, seeking to twist his words and discredit him before the people. The designated speaker, a lawyer, begins by calling him, "Teacher- "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law of Moses?" The term "teacher" here is different from what we might think of today, as a school teacher or even a professor. Anyone, whether they are endeared to a particular school instructor or professor, could properly address someone with such a title. But in the context of this passage, Teacher or Rabbi or Master, was not merely a title of position but a term of endearment to those men and women who were faithful devotees of such a Master. But here the lawyer, was not devoted to Jesus but quite the otherwise and so approached him with disdain and disrespect, giving the false pretension of discipleship. As Origen, an early church father once said,

"All who say Our Father who art in heaven ought not to have the spirit of slavery in fear but a spirit of the adoption of sons. However, whoever does not have the adoption of sons and yet says, Our Father, is lying, since he is not a son of God, while calling God his father."

Now which is the greatest commandment in the law? The law dealt with many things, some more important than others. It dealt with issues of common life, such as women's menstruation; or such moral dilemmas as human sexuality in marriage, or violations such as adultery, homosexuality, or fornication. But the religious leaders had distorted the law; or rather, had moved away from the spirit of the law to the letter; and had compounded the complexity of the regulations for living life.

"The scribes declared that there were 248 affirmative precepts, as many as the members of the human body; and 365 negative precepts, as many as the days in the year, the total being 613, the number of letters in the Decalogue."

Out of all these nuances of the law, which is the greatest, O great teacher? Perhaps, they thought Jesus might give a new interpretation or amendment of Mosaic Law that they could crucify him with. They certainly sought to twist his words and bring his ruin.

But Christ pierces through their darkness and refocuses the issues at stake. He honors the law by redirecting them back to the heart and spirit of the law; and states that upn his two answers, the entire law code was established.

"You shall love the Lord your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And the second is like unto it, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself. Upon these two commandments, depend all the law and the prophets."
In other words, you've missed the point with all your convoluted interpretation and additions to the Law. My law is simple, to love. In English we don't always catch the finer nuances of ancient word meanings. We have really only one word for love, were Greek had several. There is eros or sexual love and passion. This can be a beautiful kind of love between a husband and his wife; but is so often distorted and perverted into something shameful. Then there is phileo or brotherly love. This is not merely the love for members of one's family but a certain kind of "Espirit de Corps"- the spirit and love for comrades in arms, for members of a group or fraternity. Just think of when you hear on a police scanner that an officer is down, every armed law enforcement officer who hears that call will rush to the scene and lay is life down in order to save a fallen officer. That is a special kind of love as well. But Jesus is here speaking of Agape love- is pure love that involves every faculty of the human person- love which stems from our soul and strength, from every fiber of our being, without conditions. It brings all the other kinds of love together, focuses them like a laser, and projects the pure light of divine love. St Paul eloquently desribes this kind of love in 1 Corinthians 13:

"If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it;* but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.

Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages* and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! But when full understanding comes, these partial things will become useless.

When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. Now we see things imperfectly as in a cloudy mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.* All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love."

It is this kind of Agape love, divine love, which we are called to render to God, to ourselves for we were created in his image, and to others.

The question we must ask ourselves, if we truly call Jesus our Teacher, our Master, and Our Lord, as one of his disciples, and not with the false pretensions and lip service of the lawyer in this Gospel story, is do we truly love God? Is Christ our God first in our life? Or do other things take precedence?

Perhaps it is only a type of eros we feel toward God- the feelings of ecstacy or excitement in worship, which can be a kind of sensual experience of God.

Perhaps it is only Phileo or brotherly love we have for God. Hey, I'm a believer! I'm part of the Jesus Group. I'm a Jesus Freak. And so we love God because we are part of his fraternity, the church; and so we love each other, in a brotherly fashion as comrades in the Lords Army.
But Jesus is directing us toward something much deeper, more mystical, more spiritual, more true, more real, and more genuine than these other kinds of love. It isn;t that these other kinds of love are disregarded. No, in Christ all these kinds of love- sensual, brotherly, and divine love, are brought together, are combinded and summed up and extended further.
Does our love for God come with conditions that we've placed on it? I'll love you if- whatever our conditions are, are met. What about each other.

Jesus said, in John 15:13, that "There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends." It is not a love about getting our agendas or conditions met. It is not a love based on feelings or being part of a group. It is a self-giving, self-sacrificing love which is all about the other person. Its a total giving of oneself for the sole benefit of another.

It is only when our lives are focused first on God that we can give and recieve divine agape love. It is only when we are sharing and experiencing the love of God and his presence that we can in turn share this agape love with another. But simultaneously, if we do not love each other, then we are really not loving God. And if we don't have a healthy love for ourselves, then we can not love God or others as ourselves.

This is a deep mystery; but it is upon these two laws that everything else God has designed for our lives depends on. In Marks version of this Gospel story, it says that even the Lawyer was moved to acknowledge the truth in what Christ said. In reply, Jesus said he was not far from the kingdom of God.

Jesus spoke these words in a violent and turbulent situation and out of great personal loneliness; and he lived them all the way to the cross for you and I. His commandment for us is to love,
So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other... Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples...If you love me, obey my commandments."

Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love." Let us go therefore into the world to love and serve the Lord. Amen.

Rosary of the Heart

Jesus once asked his disciples if they could not pray with him for one hour. Part of the spiritual struggle has always been to make time for God in our daily lives and to establish a consistent discipline of prayer.

The ancients didn't have modern clocks and watches to keep track of their prayer time, so they would count count beads or sometimes even pebbles being placed in a bowl, as they mentally or verbally recited prayers, or as they breathed, or in accordance with the rythm of their heart beat. Thus, they were able to set aside time for prayer and devotion to God.

One of the early Christian bishops, I believe it was St Augustine, once said that the first or primary language of God was silence; and the Psalmist says that we must be still and silent to know God. Jesus, even speaks of turning into the closet of the heart and shutting to door to worldly distractions and there praying to God in secret or in our secret place- the cave of the heart.

In 1 Kings 19.11-13, there is the story of God speaking to Elijah in the cave where he was hiding. "Go out and stand before me on the mountain," the Lord told him. And as Elijah stood there, the Lord passed by, and a mighty windstorm hit the mountain. It was such a terrible blast that the rocks were torn loose, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake there was a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire there was the sound of a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave."

Experiencing the word and presence of God does not come in the thunder and blast, nor earthquake and fire, but in the depths of the cave and in a still, quiet, voice. Do we take the time to enter our inner cave of the heart, our secret closet, to be still and enter the silence of God's presence? Although rituals, symbols and liturgies of worship and prayer can be wonderful aids in devotion and spiritual growth, the fuller experience of God comes when we go beyond these forms and words into silent attentiveness to God.

This is the way of quiet, wordless and formless prayer, where we simply rest and abide in His Presence. It is here, in the inner court of our bodily temple- St Paul says we are the Temple of the Holy Spirit- where we offer to the Lord the most basic and primal sacrifice and act of worship we can make- the beat of our heart and rythm of our breath. In Genesis 2, it says, "7And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (neshemet ruach chayim- "the breath of the spirit of life" ); and man became a living soul." When we came forth from the womb, we took our first breath; and when we die, we will exhale, letting go of the breath of the spirit of life. Offering ourselves as a living sacrifice to God can be no more real and fundamental than offering our pulsing blood and breath.

Silent attentiveness to God in rythm to our heart and breath, is our rosary- the Rosary of the Heart.