Faith on One Foot

Faith on One Foot Matthew 22:34-46

There are two kinds of people in the world – those who think there are two kinds of people in the world and those who don’t. I’m one of those people who think the world is a little more complex than simply being able to divide people into two groups. I think there has to be at least three kinds of people.

Not only that I think there are at least three groups of people with three kinds of people.

There are three types of people in this world: there are those who make things happen; there are those who watch things happen; and there are those who wonder what happened.

There are three types of people in your life: there are those who helped you in your difficult times; there are those who left you in your difficult times; and there are those who put you in your difficult times.

There are three types of people in the church: there are those who complain about the way the church is; there are those who critique the church to help point the way to where the church could be; and there are those who are champions working to become the church God calls us to be.

If you are doing the math, I just shared a possible nine groups of people – if there isn’t any overlap between our three groups of three types of people. There are a possible 36 unique groups if we overlap up to two characteristics in each group. And if we go to up to three shared characteristics in any group, there are 84 possible unique groups. Imagine the possibilities if there are 4 or 5 or 6 groups of 4 or 5 or 6 kinds of people! And, just so you are not wondering during the sermon, 6 groups of 6 kinds of people sharing from one to six overlaps can yield 18,564 unique groups.

All of that is just to suggest that life is complicated. And when we are faced with such complexity, something has to give if we are not to be overwhelmed – which helps us to understand the appeal of dividing the world into two or three kinds of people.

Of course, some think that even two kinds of people are too much to differentiate. They want things to be simple. All people are basically good. All people are basically scum. All people are precious children of God and should be included. All people are capable of evil and should never be trusted. However you cut it, we all live, we all bleed, we all die, because we are all the same.

Soren Kierkegaard, a 19th century Danish theologian I have previously mentioned, once wrote that all of his friends from the university were rich and famous because they had found a way to make things simpler. He, on the other hand, toiled in poverty and anonymity because as a theologian he made things more complex.

He may have been on to something. There has been a recent movement in the church to make things simpler. We have been encouraged, particularly by rich and famous pastors, to study books with titles like “The Simple Church.” We are asked to have a simple process for making disciples. We want missions to be simple to approve, simple to connect to, and simple to walk away from when we are done. Making things simpler to understand and use is nothing new, of course; nor is this desire for simplicity exclusive to the church. Using matches to start a fire is simpler than striking flint or rubbing sticks together. Microwave dinners are simpler to serve than cooking a variety of foods in individual portions, and driving through McDonald’s is simpler still. Phones with internet capabilities are simpler to use than going to a library and looking something up. Pick a field or an area, and if the product is simpler to use or consume, someone got rich by offering it to the public.

Making things simpler even applied to Judaism. A near contemporary of Jesus was the Talmudic sage Hillel. Hillel preferred a simpler reading of the Law, while his colleague Shammai favored a more complex reading.

There is a story told in the Talmud about a gentile who wanted to convert to Judaism. This individual stated that he would accept Judaism only if a rabbi would teach him the entire Torah while he, the prospective convert, stood on one foot. First he went to Shammai, who, insulted by this ridiculous request, threw him out of the house. But the man did not give up and he went to Hillel. Hillel accepted the challenge, and said: "What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation of this – go and study it!"

It is little wonder that Hillel was a popular rabbi. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. This is the whole Torah. Simple. To the point. Easy to interpret and apply. And as long as everyone acts out of the love of God, this is a simple way to teach the faith and to live as the Chosen People. This is a faith for people with short attention spans. This is a faith that can be taught on one foot.

The rub is that not everyone acts out of a godly love. We have police departments and military forces because we know that people sometimes do not act out of godly love. The evening news is largely a report of people acting out of motives other than godly love. Even in the Bible, there are lots of people who do not act out of godly love.

Cain was not acting out of love when he killed Abel. The sons of Jacob were not acting out of love when they threw Joseph in the pit. Pharaoh was not acting out of love when he refused to let the Hebrews leave slavery. David was not acting out of love when he had Uriah killed so he could marry Bathsheba. Herod was not acting out of love when he killed the male children of Bethlehem. And the Pharisees were not acting out of love when they tried to trap Jesus with a series of questions.

But you know who did always act out of love? Jesus. It was his love that broke down the barrier between Jews and Samaritans. It was his love that fed the hunger of the thousands who came to hear him preach. It was his love that welcomed children, and healed the sick, and raised the dead. It was his love, not the nails, that kept Jesus on the cross for our sins. It was his love that won the victory over sin and death. It was his love that rolled the stone away on Easter morning.

Love is the reason Jesus complicates the Pharisees’ question. Jesus came to save all of God’s children, including the Pharisees, and they needed to expand their understanding of what it means to love God.

Yes, Jesus says, “Love God” is the great commandment, and we understand it by knowing that “Love Neighbor” is the other side of the great commandment. We love God, which goes hand in hand with our love of neighbor. If we do not love our neighbor, it reveals our failure to adequately love God. How do we know if our love of God is inadequate? Our love of God is inadequate if we only love the benefits of God, but not the Benefactor. This is when we love God “if” – if I get a job, if I find a great love, if nothing bad ever happens to me, if there is peace on earth – then I will believe that God is good and I will worship God. But if there are no benefits, or if the benefits are taken away for any reason, then I will not love God.

The Book of Job already addressed this part of the question concerning loving God apart from the benefits, but Jesus still has to connect it for the Pharisees to loving our neighbors. To make this connection, Jesus asked the Pharisees about the messiah.

Their relationship with God is revealed by their expectations concerning the messiah. Is the messiah someone who has the right bloodline as a descendant of David? If so, then the messiah must honor the example of David, who conquered Jerusalem and established it as the center for the Chosen People. That is the answer the Pharisees give – the messiah is a son of David, and therefore must honor David and work to get the people the same benefits as before.

But Jesus gives them another possibility. What if the messiah is, instead, someone even David considers Lord? What if the messiah is someone who has not just the bloodline but also the right blood, which out of love for neighbors is given to reveal the love of God for the people?

If the messiah is someone like David, then the messiah has a simple choice to make, and a simple path to follow. We go to war because we love God. We fight the Romans because we love God. We do what it takes to win because we love God. All that matters is winning the war against the Romans, because all that matters is our love for God.

But if the messiah is someone like Jesus, who loves the people because of his love for God, then things get a little more complicated. The Romans are now our neighbors, who are not so much to be defeated as they are to be redeemed. If the messiah is someone like Jesus, then the messiah dies for the people instead of having the people die for the cause. If the messiah is someone like Jesus, then it is sin and death that must be defeated, because that is the victory which will reveal God’s love for all our neighbors.

Jesus tells us that loving our neighbors is as important as loving God, because it is inextricably connected to loving God. And this makes life a lot more complicated than simply doing to others what feels good to us, on whatever basis we decide something feels good. This is a faith that cannot stand on one foot, but must stand firmly with both feet. This is a faith that stands for loving God and for loving our neighbors.

But that raises another, complicating, question: how do we know if we truly love God, and not just appreciate God because we love the benefits? How do we know if we truly love our neighbors, and not just appreciate what our neighbors can do for us?

We began with the idea that there are three kinds of people: in the world, in life, and in the church. So now it is time to introduce a fourth group: the three kinds of people before God.

John Wesley, in his sermon on the Spirit of Bondage and Adoption, named the three kinds of people before God: there is the natural person; there is the person under the law; and there is the person under grace. The natural person neither fears nor loves God. The natural person walks blindly in darkness, and therefore has a false peace and happiness. Not knowing what sin is, they sin willingly, neither fighting nor conquering their sins. For them Jesus may be a good teacher, an inspiration, or an historical figure, but he was still just a man.

The person under the law fears God. The person under the law walks by the light of the fires of hell, so they have no peace. They sin unwillingly, but they cannot conquer it. For these persons, Jesus saves them from the wrath of God and the torment of hell, but the benefit of believing in Jesus is that he is little more than the insurance policy against the sinful life from which they cannot escape.

The person under grace loves God. The person under grace walks by the light of heaven, so they know the peace of God. They do not sin before God, because they are more than conquerors of sin through the grace of Jesus Christ. For them Jesus is the Son of God, the source of life and love, the very reason for their continuing existence, and therefore worthy of all our love.

Our next hymn is the witness of those persons who are under grace. As we sing, may we ask ourselves if we love Jesus simply because we believe he can keep us from going to hell, or if we truly love Jesus? How we answer that question makes all the difference in our faith, in our hope, and in our love of God. How we answer that question can strangely warm our hearts so that we can love our neighbors!

UM Hymnal 470 “My God, I Love Thee”