From the Daily Lectionary for Friday and Saturday in the Fifth Week of Easter
Matthew 7:1-21
‘Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For with the judgement you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your neighbor, “Let me take the speck out of your eye”, while the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.
‘Do not give what is holy to dogs; and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under foot and turn and maul you.
‘Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone? Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
‘In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.
‘Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is easy that leads to destruction, and there are many who take it. For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
‘Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will know them by their fruits.
‘Not everyone who says to me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only one who does the will of my Father in heaven.’
Matthew continues his account of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. Many scholars consider the Gospel of Matthew the most ‘Jewish’ of the four Gospels. I don’t buy that entirely; all the Gospels are rooted in Judaism. But it is true that Matthew places prominent interest in the practice of Torah, Jewish Law. The gift of the Law to the Hebrew people during their sojourn in the Sinai desert was the very means by which God inhabited God’s so-called chosen people. Following the Law, the means of justice for these newly freed slaves, was a practical way to sustain their fragile community, and enact God’s Love in the world. It is an incarnational premise, that the people who follow in God’s way are in effect putting flesh and blood on the divine, the one God who is alive and active among us. The writer of John’s Gospel reiterates poetically the very same premise by referring to Jesus (and the community of Jesus) as “the Word made Flesh.”
The figure of Jesus and the way of Jesus, for Matthew, is the re-articulation of the divine among us, which for this writer makes the faith less about believing, less about a dogmatic philosophical and theological system, and much more about practice. For Matthew the faith is not so much about believing in God, but about ‘doing’ God. And the extended metaphor for the life of faith for Matthew is “bearing fruit:” the poor raised up; the sick healed, the prisoner visited; the hungry fed…. Love of neighbor, in short, attending to their well-being and dignity. Matthew has Jesus saying that to treat others as one wishes to be treated sums up the entire Law and the Prophets. God is made known through acts of compassion, in kindness, in respecting the dignity of every human being, in acting justly. That makes us, brothers and sisters, collaborators in God’s project of salvation.
This is not to say, however, that belief is not important, but according to Matthew, our doing shapes believing; and our doing bears the fruits of God’s kingdom. Moreover, there is profound insight gained in our faithful doing. Experience is a consummate teacher. Jesus implies that in our doing we will know the truth… and we will know falsehood. I grow weary of the present narrative that, “gosh, we are so divided in our country… can’t we just listen to one another?” No, we are warned in this teaching not to listen to falsehood. We, good people, belong to the truth. If matters in our public life disenfranchise the least powerful among us, the so-called marginalized, then we are duty-bound to oppose such matters. We never compromise the truth… and we know the truth: Love your neighbor as you love yourself. There is no debate worthy of us to the contrary.
And this is the road less traveled, Jesus tells us. Many will choose the easy road of compromise and equivocation, signs of self-interest. We have been initiated into a movement that opts for the ‘narrow way.’ It requires commitment, and studied attention; it will require imagination and improvisational skill; and most of all, it will require courage; and know that it will cost us. But this is the life for which we have been born. We have come too far now. We can live no other.
A Prayer for the Church (BCP p. 291)
O God of unchangeable power and eternal light: Look favorably on your whole church, that wonderful and sacred mystery; by the effectual working of your providence, carry out in tranquility the plan of salvation; let the whole world see and know that things which were cast down are being raised up, and things which had grown old are being made new, and that all things are being brought to their perfection by him through whom all things were made, your Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
