Love over Justice

February 23^rd, 2014        “Love over Justice”             Rev. Heather Jepsen

Matthew 5:38-48

          Well, once again this week we are continuing my crazy idea of preaching all the lectionary readings from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount in Matthew’s gospel.  We’ve talked about Jesus’ upside down vision of the world in the Beatitudes, Jesus’ call for us to be just enough salt and light in the world around us, and unpacked some difficult lessons about anger, lust, divorce, and telling the truth.  This week we continue in difficult territory, and as I mentioned a few sermons ago, I am confident that the day that Jesus gave his sermon no one left the mountain feeling warm and fuzzy.

          Our reading for today is the famous lesson on turning the other cheek.  Jesus says “Do not resist an evildoer.  But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile.”  Jesus goes on to talk about love of enemies and concludes with the puzzling “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

          Man, do we hate this reading.  Our immediate response to this is always, “That can’t be right!”  Anyway you play it, what Jesus says here doesn’t make sense to us and for centuries well-meaning Christians and preachers have tried to soften Jesus’ words here.  Pastors have tried to spiritualize the reading, saying that Jesus is somehow asking us to do these things spiritually rather than as literal actions.  Others have said that Jesus is creating an ideal standard that folks were never intended to meet; that Jesus is setting an un-reachable goal that we shouldn’t even strive for.  Some Pastors have said that these standards can’t possibly apply in our modern culture, but were unique and specific to Jesus’ time and place.

          Perhaps the most famous interpretation of this passage in our modern era comes from theologian Walter Wink.  I am fairly confident that this church, our church, has been exposed to this theory before.  Walter Wink teaches that rather than setting out a literal way to live, Jesus is really describing subversive non-violence. 

          Beginning with the turn the other cheek bit, Wink explains that to hit someone on the right cheek would in essence be a back handed slap, a sign of humiliation rather than violence.  To turn the left cheek to the opponent is to say that you refuse to be humiliated and you challenge them to assault you as an equal rather than as a slave.  It’s a form of passive resistance.

          In regards to giving your cloak, the issue is about debt.  Poor folks would often be sued in court for their very last belonging, often a garment.  If you are sued for your coat then you should give away your cloak as well because than you would be naked in the court.  In the Jewish culture, anyone who saw you naked would be shamed, the person who sued you most of all.  Again, it is a form of passive resistance.

          The final comment about going the second mile relates to the Roman occupation.  At the time Jews were under the power of the Roman Empire and a Roman solider could compel a citizen to carry a backpack for the distance of one mile.  That was the limit though, forcing someone to carry a pack farther than that would be breaking the military code.  A soldier caught forcing a citizen to go farther than a mile could be disciplined for such an action.  Therefore, to go the extra mile is to risk the soldier getting in trouble and it is a way of saying that you won’t allow yourself to be controlled by the state.  Again, it is passive resistance.

          Walter Wink gives a wonderful interpretation of this passage based on the historical setting.  It’s great, and it could be just the thing that Jesus was talking about.  This scripture has inspired many a great non-violent leader from Martin Luther King Jr to Mahatma Gandhi.  I’ve preached that sermon on non-violent resistance and it is a good one. 

But this week I could not come to terms with that reading.  I don’t find a sermon based on Jesus teaching passive resistance to clearly line up with the way that this text makes me feel in my gut.  Jesus’ words here make me anxious and uncomfortable, and as a sermon writer I have always trusted that the spot of the text that bothers me the most, is the spot where the sermon is.  Like some sort of sadistic dentist, I feel called to find the place where it hurts and poke around there for awhile.

Wink’s interpretation, while perhaps true, is still lowering the bar of Jesus’ sermon.  All of us social justice oriented individuals can breathe a sigh of relief with that sermon.  “Whew, I knew Jesus didn’t really mean it.  He is just talking about non-violent resistance and I’m all about that.”  Suddenly we are off the hook and can let this scripture fall to the side into some sort of ancient Israel obscurity.

This week I thought that was too easy.  This week I didn’t want to take the bite out of this sermon.  This week I wanted Jesus to really mean what he says; “Turn the other cheek, give away everything, do more than you’re asked, be perfect.”  That’s where the hard sermon is, and the hard one is always the right one.  The sermon that makes us squirm, the one that makes me squirm, is always the one to preach.

I was reading this week and came across this sentence “Jesus is the definitive disclosure of the character of God.”  When I read that, the key to this week’s sermon popped into place.  Jesus is the full disclosure of God, and what does God do if not turn the other cheek, give away everything, and go the extra mile?  Jesus Christ is the full manifestation of God, and when struck with the whips of roman soldiers, God turns the other cheek and is struck again.  When Jesus is crucified his clothing is taken from him, and though it is within his power and right to prevent it, God hangs on the cross in underwear alone.  Jesus carries his cross through the streets of Jerusalem all the way to Golgotha, God carrying the weight of the unjust Roman Empire the extra mile and beyond.  In all these acts there is no passive resistance, no one was shamed, no injustice was pointed out, nothing happened to right the ways of the world.  Jesus Christ, the full manifestation of God, did all these things willingly, and this scripture teaches us that that is the picture of perfection.

So often, as people, we want perfection to mean justice.  To turn the other cheek and give away everything isn’t right because it isn’t just.  That is not the way the world should be, that is not fair.  That’s why we love that Walter Wink interpretation so much because he brings justice to where there is none.  To see this as passive resistance is to suddenly infuse it with a sense of justice.

But perfection here is not about justice.  The perfection that Jesus speaks about is grace and love, and we bristle at it, because it is not fair.  And yet, this is the God we see and know.  God made visible in Christ, God spoken of in Scripture, God experienced in daily life.  This is the God who dies unjustly on the cross, executed by the state for a crime he did not commit; a God who could avoid execution, a God who could pursue a just trial, but a God who chooses not to.  This is the God who continually welcomes sinners into God’s midst; a God who could justly punish and condemn us all, but chooses not to.  Throughout the gospel narrative we are confronted with a God who chooses love over justice.

This is the perfection Jesus speaks of and calls us to.  It’s clear in his language here.  We are to love enemies and those who actively seek our harm.  Not justice, but love; just as God makes the sun to shine and the rain to fall on good people and bad alike.  That’s not justice.  That’s love.

And so we are called to do and be the impossible.  To do all things out of love and mercy and grace and not out of a desire for justice or what’s right.  The message that Jesus preaches here makes us squirm, and I have no balm for you today.  Today I will not open the back door, and let you through thinking that this doesn’t apply to you, or you don’t need to worry about it, or Jesus just didn’t know what he was talking about.  Today I want you to sit here with me and the plain truth of this scripture.  To really consider the demand to turn the other cheek, to really truly love the one who hates you, to strive for perfection as if it were attainable, to embrace God’s love over and above justice.  Today that is our call, to be perfect as the God of heaven is, the one who lives out of love alone.  Amen.