Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 10 July 2022.
• First Reading: Amos 7: 7-17 (Amos expelled: judgment of wives and children, the land divided, exile of Israel)
• Psalm 82
• Epistle: Colossians 1: 1-14 (Paul’s thanks for the church and prayer for them)
• Gospel: Luke 10: 25-37 (Who was neighbour to the injured man? The one who had mercy. Go and do likewise)
I suppose that we have all seen legal dramas where a definition is the issue. Just what does this mean? What does it include and what does it exclude?
Does a precedent from so long ago apply or is it to be distinguished in some way? Can its application be limited – or is it to be widened?
And even today in the USA the legal precedent used to justify abortion throughout the land is – or was – based on the now questioned interpretation and application of a particular case and whether the court acted properly in doing so.
But in the gospel there is a similar question.
The lawyer wants to know what to do to gain eternal life, as if it were a wage rewarding a virtuous life and if there were a list of things to do that should be fulfilled then all would be well.
And so Jesus gave him a list, or rather Jesus got the lawyer to produce the list: love God with all your heart and soul and strength and mind, and your neighbour as yourself.
Do all that and you will gain eternal life. But the lawyer wanted to contain it – to control it, reduce it to manageable proportions. Indeed it is interesting that it was the definition of neighbour that he was probing – and not the definition of love.
Maybe that was the next thing he was going to question.
What he got was an easily recognizable and applied definition of neighbour: the person in distress whom he encounters during his walk through life and whom he is able to assist.
There are no limits here – and yet it is understood and applied quite easily. He did not have to know or even like the neighbour; he did not have to approve of his views on politics or sexuality or the intricacies of gender. All he had to do was to meet the man or woman at the point of their need as he encountered him or her.
It was not even the man on the other side of the world whose needs were beamed into the living room on television. It was the one whom he met in his own daily activities.
And Jesus was not asking him to empty his bank account or to impoverish himself – even though some are indeed called by God into lives of poverty, chastity and obedience – it was just the situations that presented themselves to him day by day.
And so this was not a lifetime checklist of items to be achieved and neither was it a definition of love so vast and all-encompassing that he could never hope to fulfil it. It was simple acts of love performed on a day by day basis.
But the other aspect of this question was the idea that eternal life could be earned at all, as if love was a task to be measured or a wage to be earned. If you want to live then all that you have and are is to be presented to God, day by day.
There are no limits to love – it takes up all our being, for that is what love is. It does not throw tantrums even when it does not understand what God is saying or doing. It waits patiently until the perception and vision are given, no matter how long that takes.
In this sense, to love God is to go beyond what we can understand or measure or control and into what God Himself is and says and does. It is to place ourselves before Him, for Him to direct and rule in our lives. But I am not sure whether this was quite what the lawyer had in mind.
And if he wanted to know the measure and extremity of love then he would not have to wait too long before Jesus was taken to the cross for the sake of the soul of his lawyer and all people.
But then there is also Paul’s letter to the church in Colossae. In our passage he has two things to say: his thanksgiving and his prayer for them.
In his thanksgiving for them Paul starts with their faith in Jesus Christ and arising from it, their love for God’s people. And this is a love springing from their existing hope of heaven, rather than some kind of self-generated feeling or obligation.
It was a work of the Holy Spirit in them and so Paul’s prayer for them was God would fill them with knowledge of His will, through the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit.
And in this he was confident that they would continue to be fruitful in every good work, increasing in knowledge of God and being strengthened in endurance and patience.
Never daunted, they would continue in praise and worship, trusting God for their daily needs and their ability to respond to the daily challenges of life.
So far I have not said anything about the OT lesson: the little-known prophet from Judea in Samaria. A stranger of no particular account in a prosperous city giving warning of the effects of their indifference and their self-absorption.
This too is a message for our time as we face challenges at home and dangers abroad. It warns us against complacency – and it directs us to a personal and a united confidence in God and dedication before Him.
If we try to control and manipulate it into a tick-box exercise then we have already lost our bearings. But if we love God with all that we have and are, with heart and soul, strength and mind, then we can’t possibly fail.
