Based on Christ: Turning the Other Cheek

Text: Matthew 5:38-48

Focus: Non Resistance

Function: To get people aware of the upside down way we react to violence.

Form:

Intro:

Movie Clip: The Witness, Right of Way, 1985

In the 80's, when the prisoners were taken hostage, I wanted those Delta wing bombers to cross the ocean and bomb the life out of Iran.

How dare they do that to the most powerful nation the world has ever known? I thought.

My pastor said to me: “Those mothers have children also.”

I couldn't wrap my mind around this. I thought to myself, “if someone gets in my way, isn't the manly thing to do is to knock them down?”

Now, I wasn't raised with violence. My father never let me or my three brothers have any toy guns.

And, we were instructed to turn the other cheek when someone hit us.

And I got into a few fights when I was a kid. I remember Bobby Orr. We were in shop class, and the teacher, who at one time received a national honor for being one of the best shop teachers in the United States of America, was getting old and slow enough that he couldn't keep his eye on everything that was going on in class.

Bobby kept pestering me, teasing me and making fun of me. I finally had enough and I snapped without thinking, I sucker punched him in the nose and knocked him out. Of course, the teacher didn't see it. And I spent the rest of the day in dread because they made it clear that at the end of the day, I was going to get beat up.

I felt bad because I disobeyed my father and threw the first punch. And after school, he bloodied me up pretty good. Because I was a Christian, I refused to fight back. I went home crying. But after that, we became friends. He saw the strength in my willingness to not fight back.

Bobby had a gang of boys with him. But he wasn't a bully. Sometimes boys test the metal of each other just to make us all stronger.

Did you ever wonder why the Brits drive on what we would call the wrong side of the road?

Most people are right-handed. They walked that way because their right hand, their sword hand, was prepared in case they came across their enemy on the road.

Think about living in a culture like that. One is always prepared to meet violence at the drop of a hat.

Think about how that kind of mentality would affect your moral judgments when it comes to everything and anything. If we are doing business, and every one we do business with is an enemy, then the morality of doing well, doing a good job, being fair, providing value, providing a win-win business environment goes away.

Westminster Abbey has tombstones, memorials, actual graves of all the great men and women in English history. Inside that structure about 50 feet from the actual grave of William Wilberforce, the man of God who wrested with his divine calling. He wrestled with whether or not he should be a priest or a politician and chose the later. As a politician, he singlehandedly stopped the entire business of slave trading in England. 50 feet from him is the tombstone of Charles Darwin.

Many people ask why Darwin, a man who was hated by the Church because his scientific theory on the origin of the species seemed to undermine the Bible and therefore the church. Why was Darwin buried there? He was buried there because the evolutionary concept: “the survival of the fittest” justified the way the English people dominated the world through violence. These people valued the concept that might makes right. These people didn't ask the question: “if we can do it, then it must be right.”

That was the same mentality that justified slavery. They believed that because they had the greater military power, whatever they did must be right.

So, it is strange that Wilberforce is buried there, and Darwin's tombstone is nearby.

It reflects the way we feel when we saw that video.

When we, as Christians refuse to use violence, even though our enemies use it, then shouldn't we respond with the same force?

Is turning the other cheek as sign of weakness?

Does being meek also mean we are weak?

I wish I would have never slugged Bobby Orr. And I took the beating without defending myself.

And, my meekness proved my strength more than fighting back.

It took a lot of strength to not fight back. I got my butt whipped good. And the courage to do that was even more proof of inner strength.

Bobby and I became friends. It wasn't the attitude that he felt obligated now to protect this Christian who believed in turning the other cheek, like Harrison Ford does in this video. Nope, it was genuine respect for someone whose faith lead him to a power greater than what Bobby had for himself.

My daddy taught me to turn the other cheek. He was a big man. Rocky Reynolds, is what they called him.

He was raised in the denomination I was raised in. The denomination was an outgrowth of the Mennonite Church.

My grandma was actually raised Amish. But when she married my grandpa Reynolds, they excommunicated her for marrying “the English.” Grandpa Reynolds died when Dad was 2 years old. He had a little brother, and two sisters, the oldest of which was 6.

So, right in the middle of the depression, my Grandmother raised 4 kids without a husband. When Grandpa Reynolds died, the Amish bishop declared that it was God's judgment for marrying the English.

I have never even met my Amish relatives.

My Great Grandfather, an Amish man, was so offended by the lack of Christian love toward his daughter, my grandmother that he left the Amish faith and joined the Missionary Church where he first learned that a person could be born again.

He helped raise my dad, teaching him the value of turning the other cheek, with a lot of those Amish values.

I used to resent the fact that I have never met my Amish relatives until I found out that the big difference, the reason why they used the term “English” as an insult came from the fact that the Mennonite/Brethren/Amish and even German Lutheran heritage absolutely refused to engage in the Slave trade.

It is a little bit of an history lesson, but these values are based on the life, ministry and teachings of Jesus Christ.

John Stewart is a Jewish Comedian was speaking about the language of violence in our culture. And he said this: Jesus could have called 10,000 angels to right the wrongs done against Him, but He choose to turn the other cheek, even against the people who were murdering Him.

Having the ability to do something doesn't make it right.

Now here is the thing. The Anabaptists/Brethren were doing fine in Germany until war broke out and they refused to fight.

Did you ever see the beard on the Amish/Brethren man? It is a long beard with no mustache.

There were disagreements as to why the mustache was left out.

Most men, before they were married were clean shaved, but they added the beard after marriage to cover the strong chin line so that they would be less attractive to other women.

However, the German military wore a mustache and no beard. So, they did the exact opposite, they wore a beard with no mustache. They wanted to detach themselves from this image of violence and power and demonstrate by their physical looks their willingness to turn the other cheek.

That got them in trouble, especially the idea that they refused to take up arms to kill another man.

The idea was, in war, if the enemy was a Christian, they couldn't kill their brothers in the Lord. And if they weren't Christian, then they would be sending a person who was literally a pawn in human government to hell.

They would rather lose their own life, possessions, property than take the life of another.

They lived the faith they claimed to believe in, no matter what it cost.

So my dad, raised with this value system suffered some very unfortunate experiences. His own father was dead, he was estranged from most of the relatives on his Mother's side. The Reynolds side wasn't really Christian and they had a lot of influence on him also.

His Sunday School teacher was a carpenter and a sort of mentor. When my dad was 16, the man committed suicide for some unknown reason.

He was devastated and found no real reason to be a Christian anymore.

WWII broke out. At 17, he joined the navy. But He was big and Rock Reynolds' navy career was less than Christian.

When he raised me, he knew both how to be tough and he knew how to be meek. The Church he was raised in excommunicated him for joining the war effort. So, when he taught me how to live like that, it came out of a lot of personal experience.

The Church that excommunicated him, was the same church that I was raised in. After the war, everything changed.

I attended their Bible College. Mel Zumbrum, the current pastor of the Salamonie Church of the Brethren was a student with me.

When we studied theology, and church theology, Mel asked the same questions I asked.

What about war? What about turning the other cheek? What about all the stuff Jesus said about violence? What about all the stuff Paul said about letting all vengeance be in God's hands and not human hands?

And our theology professor had completely abandoned the historical view of the denomination in one generation.

He mumbled something about Augustine and “Just War” theory and discounted these teachings of Christ.

And the reason he did that was because everyone felt right about stopping Hitler and his Nazi thugs.

And it was hard. We look at that opening video and ask ourselves, what is the right thing to do? Do we let evil people continue when we may have the power to stop it? Or not?

I was listening to a “The Story” episode that was talking about MLK Jr. and how much criticism he was coming under by every side because of his non-violent approach to peace-making. It takes a lot of faith. It takes faith to stand in front of a gun. People get tired of waiting for God to act and so they take matters into their own hands.

But taking matters into our hand isn't faith. Faith trusts God to vindicate with His completely fair sense of Justice. God's justice is powerful, but it is also merciful.

This is real, and it isn't theory. Consequences of this action, or unwillingness to pursue it will indeed cost us something.

We are going through all the pain of the trial of our brother. We love the victim, we love our brother's family and we love him. Everyone wants vengeance for the victim. Some people want vengeance for him. Some people want vengeance for me and for this Church. I cannot pray “God, get him.” Because if there isn't grace to forgive him, then there isn't enough grace to forgive me.

I am not willing to trade my soul by giving into anger. I am not going to trade my soul because I want personal vindication on this earth. It isn't worth it. God knows how to deliver the righteous. We forget that death is not the tragedy in God's eyes as much as it is in ours. There are three times that I have left a note on my desk with the statement: It is such and such a time, on such and such a date and so and so was here. I left that note because I am afraid for my own safety.

But I keep reminding myself the promise from scripture: The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear HIM and delivers them out of all their troubles. Psalms 34:7

Some people have said to me, “aren't you afraid? Phil, you have people who really hate you right now and they are heavily armed. Shouldn't you arm yourself?”

No! We live by faith, not fear. People are really good at making mountains out of molehills, blowing things out of proportion, capitalizing on fear in order to motivate people in the wrong direction. Using that kind of hype to vindicate their cause. Christian maturity doesn't stoop to that level.

So, I respond with, “But if I arm myself, then God doesn't have to. I would rather trust God.”

Those Amish men who turned the other cheek did it in reverence and faith toward God. They choose to obey God over vindicating themselves. And in that position, that position of faith, that position of strength, that position of human weakness, God is the most powerful.

In the midst of our own weakness, God is the most powerful.

God is big and He is able.

If you are being mis-treated and have a way to peacefully get out of it, then by all means do it. But never forget that God is faithful.

Gandhi was not a Christian, although he started his career in Seminary to become an Anglican Priest. He rejected Christianity because he didn't see Christians actually following this passage of scripture. His conversation with a British Colonel about turning the other cheek is legendary. The Soldier essentially said, if we turn the other cheek, then we lose our power over you.

Gandhi practiced non-resistance. His fellow Indian men saw his example. They won independence for India by walking unarmed and defenseless across a British military line into a place that the people had every right to go to. One by one, these brave men walked across that line and one by one the English soldiers gunned them down. Eventually, the soldiers conscience's started bothering them, they stopped and the nation won her independence.

Far fewer lives were lost than if there had been war.

The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. did the same thing. He trusted God. He obeyed Jesus' teaching and fought hard to help his people see that Jesus was actually right.

My friend, Bobby Orr saw the strength of my faith and convictions and regarded me as just as much man as he was.

But we want to take matters into our own hands instead of trusting in God's justice.

This superior strength is actually a mature faith.

Verse 48, “be perfect...” was a verse my best friend in youth group used to argue over. He said it meant that we can indeed obtain sinless perfection.

But last week we saw Jesus Himself saying “Only God is always good.”

And brother Paul says in Romans that if sinless perfection were possible, then God would not have redeemed us on the cross.

What does Jesus mean here? Be Perfect? The word perfect is Teleos which comes from the root word: Telos. It means mature, or finished.

So, when the Message translates the word, it is kept closer to the original Greek when the translator says: ⁴⁸"In a word, what I'm saying is, Grow up. You are kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you."

Turning the other Cheek has to do with mature Christian living. Mark Flory-Steury, our past district executive spent most of his time dealing with Church conflict. I asked him one day how he could take it, jumping from one crisis to another and finding his Christian Brothers and Sisters doing such ugly things all the time.

He said this: “Instead of get upset when believers fall into sin, I rejoice when they do the right thing. Phil, we are still far from perfect. Only the Spiritually mature can actually turn the other cheek and forgive. God loves us all, anyway, in spite of what we actually are.”

So, we don't turn the other cheek to prove that we are more mature as Christians than others.

When we are mature, we turn the other cheek. These are the people who have grasped hold of Jesus teaching. My uncle was probably the richest man in his congregation. I remember the many people who spoke about his faith at his funeral. Bob Reynolds had strong opinions and was persuasive. But if a vote on the Leadership didn't go his way, he was the first one to show up with his checkbook, or a paint brush because he believed in the value of community. He didn't throw a fit and leave.

Maturity. We must remember that this is the ideal that Jesus brought us to.

Now I deliberately started with the video that demonstrates the tension between actually doing it and how hard it is.

I mentioned how my dad was excommunicated for joining the war effort.

I mentioned how the denomination I was raised in abandoned 450 years of its tradition and heritage for these modern times.

I mentioned how I tried to live up to that ideal and failed.

We still need a savior. This is not a point of pride, but a point of principle.

Rob Farrell and Dewayne Young, both men from this Congregation are deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq respectively. Justin Speers is going to be deployed there.

Are we going to excommunicate them? No. Are we even going to criticize them or judge them? No. Are we going to pray for them, their safety, their families while they are there? Of course we are.

We are not going to stand up for pride in our heritage. We will continue to love them and treat them with equal standing.

If we polled the congregation about that video, I would guess that many, if not even a small majority would side with Harrison Ford's actions. It isn't easy.

Based on Christ: Doing the Word

Text: James 1:22-24

Focus: Not merely claiming to obey.

Function: To help people do the Word.

Form: Biblical Topic study

Intro:

Skit: A man has two sons, One said he would obey and didn't the other said he wouldn't and did. Which one did the will of the Father?

The passage we read for our scripture, James 1:22-24, has been one that Brethren have prided themselves on throughout their history.

As a matter of fact, the beginning of our denomination started out with ideas that said If Jesus said it, if the Bible says it, then we are going to do whatever it takes to follow it.

Because of that, some of them lost their lives, some of them lost their property, some of them were thrown in prison and finally most all of them left Europe for the Americas 300 years ago.

During that time, they were so adamant about it that it caused division. In Ephrata, PA, where I lived, this one group decided that based on 1 Corinthians 7, engaging in marriage would prevent them from being true to the Word and faithful to the great commission so they started the Ephrata Cloister, a celibate community, that died out when there were no children to carry on.

That same group split over other issues, like whether or not to worship on Saturday, or Sunday.

The big one for them was contemporary Christian Music. They advocated it, of course, in fact that sort of invented it the modern hymnal. At that time it was 4 part harmony hymns. The Old Order German Baptist just had another split, and that was a big issue in their split as well. They are moving away from the monastic hymns, sung in unison, without accompaniment to 4 part harmony, gospel hymns.

All of these splits and thousands more come from Christians taking this passage seriously and figuring out how to be faithful to God's Word. Faithful to the Word. Bold enough and gutsy enough to obey it no matter the cost.

That concept is a big part of what we are. If God's Word says it, then whatever it costs us, we will obey it. That was and is the idea.

So what is important here? Be doers and not mere hearers. Those who speak it, without the action are people who deceive themselves.

The exact illustration is this, You see yourself in a mirror, but then you forget what you really look like. You imagine that your look is good, when maybe it isn't. He is saying, sometimes, it takes several poses until you get one that actually looks good and then you go away imagining that you look like that all the time.

But maybe the camera doesn't lie. If I suck in my gut, place my hand under my chin, make a big smile that shows just a little bit of my teeth, and the light is right and it catches the glint in my eye, it might be an attractive look. So, if I look until I find it, and then go out with confidence thinking that I look like that all the time, I might only be fooling myself.

I am sort of jealous of Kathy (my wife), she doesn't have that problem, she always looks good.

James wants us to maintain an honest and frank appraisal of ourselves all the time.

Here is another issue for me about being self aware. We develop the sense of ourselves when we are young. I remember when I was a kid, I could squeeze through a crowd by taking up a small space and slipping buy. But I can't do that anymore. I fit a bigger space. But my self image still says I can, so sometimes in a crowd, I bump into people. I was getting dinner last Thursday at the cafeteria at Sinclair college, and this student had this backpack that must have stuck out 2 feet. I am surprised it didn't break her back! She was completely unaware that she was blocking the forward progress of everyone.

The point is: if we look in the mirror only once and call it good then we stop checking ourselves in relationship to what God commands us in His word.

We can say to ourselves: “we were okay last year, so we must be okay today.” But God wants us to constantly consider what His word says to us today.

You all may have heard about the man who says: “I am not going to church anymore.”

When asked why, he says: “I have heard hundreds of sermons, and I can't say that I actually remember one, I guess they mean nothing.”

So the responder asks him: “do you remember what you had for dinner last night? Do you remember what you had for dinner last week? Do you remember what you had for dinner last month?”

And of course, the answer was “no.” But the point was this, without that food he would have starved to death.

So what about it? What about us? What about us being doers of the Word and not merely hearers?

I wonder if the actions that happened at the Cloister in Ephrata were as much a desire to prove themselves to each other as much as it was to obey God?

Remember Cheeseburgers. I keep that statement written down before me. Remember Cheeseburgers. Some Orthodox Jewish people, in an effort to be true to the OT Command, “Don't boil a baby goat in its own mother's milk” refuse to eat a Cheeseburger because there is a very slight possibility that the beef which was originally a calf came from the mother that the cheese was made from.

As a matter of fact, the rule goes so far that still today, a proper kosher kitchen as two sinks, one for meats and one for dairy so that they two don't come in contact with each other.

Now the Spirit of law they were trying to keep from breaking had to do with the pagan practice of boiling a baby goat in its own mother's milk as a statement of celebrating evil. The very sustenance that was to give life becomes the substance the brings its death. The pagan practices that celebrated cruelty, the reason why God displaced the people in the land of Canaan, were not to be continued.

It is the same reason the same section of the law states that you can't make a garment out of two pieces of cloth, or you couldn't have a special haircut that symbolized a pagan religion.

He isn't condemning fashion, God is condemning a pagan practice that we have no real recollection of at this time.

That cheeseburger principle actually took God's word much farther than God intended. And in so doing, actually gave them an excuse to disobey because what they were doing appeared religious, but it missed the point entirely.

Here is how it became an excuse to sin: They believed that they were so dedicated to God's word that they wouldn't even eat a cheeseburger. That dedication must be righteous people. But most often righteous means “just.” The righteous are the people who make sure that their actions are just and merciful.

And so, those Pharisees could foreclose on the house of a widow, throwing her on the street, perfectly acceptable under both the law. It was their property, held in security until the person could pay it off. But Jesus commanded them to trust God, give up their greed and ensure that the widow woman had a roof over her head.

They claimed to be righteous because they wouldn't eat cheeseburgers but at the same time, they hardened their hearts and allowed the poor to be displaced.

Jesus condemned this attitude and for that, they killed Him. I have often said that Christians have hidden behind other irrelevant because the relevant issues can cost us a lot. To not be able to sell a house that is foreclosed on is a business loss. It costs us.

But the Bible says to lend money without charging interest. The Bible says to give without passing judgment. The Bible says to turn the other cheek. The bible says to stop, and take the time to help a person who is suffering. All of this costs us either money, time or pride. Wouldn't it be easier to claim that we are Christians just because we don't eat cheeseburgers? Of course, you understand that I am using an exaggeration, but that same sect of Jews actually does refuse to eat cheeseburgers.

I am not mocking them. At times I would like to point out the silliness of our own rules, but I won't. Most often, our rules come from hearts that are grateful for grace and want to respond with a faithful obedience that expresses our gratitude.

However, if we do that we must keep to the major issues, the main thing. It is important that we keep the main thing the main thing.

Jesus said, “If you love me, you will obey me.”

He doesn't say: “you should.” He doesn't say: “if possible....” He doesn't say: “when it is convenient...” No, the statement is this, love for Him means obedience to Him. Obey Him even if it isn't convenient, even if it costs us our money, our time and or our pride.

He gave us eternal life. He reconciled us to God. He forgave us in spite of ourselves. He loves us even when we don't love ourselves. And because of that, our faith has a natural response, we obey Him.

But what does that obedience mean? Does it mean we love Him so much that we too, will refuse to eat cheeseburgers? You know I am speaking with a silly example so that I don't have to confront a more painful example.

But man, there are a lot of commands in here. How can we obey them all?

Well, we go back to Jesus. He said it this way: “A new command I give you, Love one another.” John 15:17.

It is impossible to fulfill them all, but all of them are fulfilled in the one command.

So, let us look at that in relationship to being doers of the word and not merely hearers.

In Matthew 12, one day, on the Sabbath, a day where people were not allowed to do any work, Jesus as traveling. The disciples were hungry. The OT law makes it an exception that it isn't stealing if while walking down the road, you get hungry, and the wheat is ripe, you can grab some handfuls and eat it.

The OT law was given so that people can love and take care of each other, not hoard things.

Now the Pharisees were following Jesus, taking notes on everything Jesus and His disciples were doing and they witnessed this action. Now, you are probably thinking: “They are going to accuse them of stealing.” At least, that is what we would do.

But the law gave all kinds of commands that caused people to make sure that the weary and poor were taken care of. Those who live by faith know that everything given to the poor will be paid back to them by God.

Their tactic was not to accuse them of stealing. Their tactic, a tactic that is made to appear that they are being true to God's word, was to condemn Jesus because His disciples worked when they husked the wheat with their hands.

I realize that when we claim Jesus, people are watching us as to whether or not they believe we are representing Him.

But the promise from Jesus, to us believers is, that some people are merely watching just so that they can jump on your actions, twist them and accuse you.

They said: the disciples broke the rule of the Sabbath.

And Jesus gives no quarter to their religious hypocrisy. You cannot use the Word of God to condemn people just because you don't like them.

Jesus points out just how much they were merely hearers of the Word, not doers.

He tells them that God didn't care about their Sabbath infraction. They didn't understand at all about God's law.

God's law is not an end unto itself used to make us feel better about someone we don't like or are in conflict with.

God's law is given as a practical guide to teach us how to love Him and others. That is why Jesus said, “a new command... …love one another.”

So Jesus turns their religious abuse upside down.

He gives them a story of King David. In the law, there was the bread of presence. Only the priests were allowed to eat it. If anyone else ate it, they were to be put to death.

But David was an hero and a prophet.

And Saul was angry at him because people had accused David to Saul as being unpatriotic.

And David was fleeing for his life with a small troop of soldiers. He is in a hurry, he is hungry and he convinces the priests to give him and his men the bread of presence.

Jesus tells them that both God and those ancients were completely okay with that, even though it was a capital offense.

Jesus explains how it is important to remember that the Spirit of the Law, Love God and Love one Another takes precedence over the letter of the law.

God gave us the law to set us free to love Him and others. And Jesus said, “if you love Me, you will obey Me. If you want to obey me, be completely obedient, then make it simple: Love one another.” Don't ever look for ways to condemn someone you don't like with scriptures.

In verse 8, of Matthew 12, Jesus tells them, I desire compassion, not your religious activity.

Don't say you will obey me when your actions do not reflect His passion.

So, let us go back to the skit with Chris, Noah and Ethan.

That is taken directly from scripture.

And I have a very personal story about it.

My 3^rd year of Bible College, we picked Micah 6:8 as our year verse. Do justice, Love Mercy and walk humbly with God.

In this very conservative, both politically and theologically, my understanding of doing justice was really threatened.

And I was really struggling because my value system was being threatened. I seriously thought that the poor were poor because they were lazy and that God really was punishing our country because of our loose moral values.

But that same year, I was studying Isaiah 58, and I saw that from both Isaiah 58, and Romans 1, that God's punishment wasn't because of our loose moral values, that the loose moral values were actually a result of the selfishness and materialistic way we lived our lives. And, we were using our Pharisaical religious practices, our proverbial refusal to eat cheeseburgers as a way to justify our lack of actually doing the word.

I was actually crying while I was driving downtown and I cried out to God: “What do you want us to do?”

And I heard a still small voice from God tell me to look up. I thought God was talking about raising my eyes to heaven when I was praying, but I as driving!

So, I looked up a little. And right then, I saw a sign that read “Matthew 25 clinic.”

The newspaper ran an article about it that week. St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church had a Matthew 25 clinic. You probably remember that Matthew 25 is where Jesus says to the unrighteous people: depart from me, I don't know you because when you encountered the hungry, the naked, the sick and the prisoners, you encountered me, and if you did nothing to help them, then you also refused to help me. He also says to the righteous: You may not even know you are righteous, but every time you feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit the prisoner, you do it to me. Bear Creek: every time you send me to the prison to do a Kairos weekend, you send me to Jesus on your behalf.

I remember reading that article and thinking, well, that doesn't mean anything because they are Roman Catholic and Roman Catholics cannot be real Christians.

So, when I saw that sign, I reminded God that He was wrong because their doctrine was so far off.

Of course, I didn't really know why it was so far off. I just knew that several people told me it was.

And God didn't laugh at me. He is patients. He loves us. And God reminded me of this parable, it isn't the one who says the right thing, it is the one who does the right thing.

We can quote scripture, and its principles all day long and it means nothing of we merely hear the word and do not do it.

It means nothing of when we hear the word we do not put it into action.

And brothers and sisters. Sometimes, many times, those actions call us to do very hard things. Very hard. But to be true, to stand for justice of the poor against the rich, the powerful among the powerless.

Doers of the Word, no matter what it costs us.

Doers of the Word that haven't plateaued. It is easy to think we have arrived and stop letting the word change and confound us.

Can we embrace our heritage, again?

Based on Christ: Living Simply

Text: Luke 18:18-30

Focus: Simple Living

Function: To help people understand what it means to be us.

Form: GOK

Intro:

Jesus said, Foxes have holes, Birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head. Luke 8:37.

I heard a Televangelist once preaching on this passage and he said, it isn't at all what you think. Jesus was rich. He had a front man who went before him into every town, arranged suites of rooms at the finest hotels so that Jesus and his followers could live in Luxury. He said, After all, Jesus was the King of the Universe. He didn't own a home because he could rent the finest apartments and suites wherever he went.

That is not at all what Jesus meant.

Today we are looking at simple living and our text is from Luke 18:18-30, the story of the rich young ruler.

There are two ways to interpret this passage, and both are valid.

We see the mistake of the young man right from the beginning when he takes salvation upon himself and asks Jesus how he can earn eternal life.

And, we see the shock on the faces of the apostles when they hear Jesus say it is harder for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to inherit eternal life.

The disciples are amazed, and Jesus' reply is thus: “With God, all things are possible.”

It is certainly a good lesson on what grace really is. How only God can save a soul. How there is nothing that a rich man can do to purchase his own salvation. It teaches that before God, the rich and the poor alike are in the same boat.

And for many, that is the only meaning of this passage.

It is true for many of us in our Western Culture.

Because, if the rich man really did need to prove to God that he loved God more than his riches, and giving them away was the only way to prove it, then that places a lot of us in the same boat.

How does the Bible describe a rich man? Married men, raise your left hand. The gold ring is proof in James.

It sure is comforting if that is all it means.

Then you get to 1 Corinthians 13, where Paul says” “If I give everything that I have to the poor and do not have love, it profits me nothing.”

I like the way The Message places that: “Without love, I am bankrupt.”

And all of that is so true. Psalms states that there is nothing the rich can give to ransom their soul.

And here is this man, he wants to be able to get to heaven, and at the same time, he wants to keep up his lavish lifestyle.

It is important to note that in Israel at this time, there was no such thing as a middle class.

The rich were extremely rich and the poor were desperately poor. That was true across most of the Roman world. Rome itself had 2/3rds of its population living as slaves.

The poor were mistreated everywhere.

Jesus is asking this man to join the ranks of the poor and see what life is really like for the majority of people.

So, does the story end there?

Did Jesus make an impossible scenario for this rich man because He has class prejudice against the rich?

Lazarus was rich, but he only gave away half of his wealth to the poor. Jesus said “Salvation has come to this house today.”

Jesus loves the rich. But they are not special, they are not entitled, they are not better people because they are rich. Riches does not automatically indicate that this person is blessed by God.

Because that would contradict what Jesus said when He said: “Blessed are the poor.”

There are two key phrases in this passage: “then you will have treasure in heaven” and “it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of th needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Now, many of you have probably heard that perhaps Jesus was talking about a certain gate in the Jerusalem wall. The gate was called the “needle gate.” It was tiny, and only small camels can go through it, and that is with difficulty.

The sermons I have heard that justify riches without concern, or responsibility toward the poor, they all reduce this phrase to something less than what Jesus intended. They do that by saying, Jesus didn't mean something impossible, he just meant something difficult.

But that is not the way it reads. And those who make that possibility are guilty of misleading people about what Jesus actually meant.

But why mention that at all? If it were possible for the camel to go through, albeit a small camel, then is Jesus saying the moderately wealthy -smaller camels- can make it but the very wealthy -larger camels- cannot make it?

This reference, A camel through the eye of a needle means exactly what it means at first glance.

You all have a piece of cloth, and some yarn to make your initials with. We forgot to give you the needle. Everybody take one of these. You see, it is impossible to thread the yarn through the nail.

You can't thread the needle when the needle is a nail. It is an impossible situation.

That is why Jesus explains it to say, ONLY with God is it possible.

Anybody who says the story means that it might be possible doesn't understand Jesus teaching about us, in relationship to wealth.

It is impossible to be saved if money is more important that serving God.

God, is a jealous God. Men and women cannot serve two masters. People cannot serve both God and money.

Folks, there is no getting around this. Jesus either meant it, or he didn't.

Now, I mentioned there were two significant phrases, the first is “the eye of the needle....”

The second is: “then you will have treasure in heaven.”

This is the key for the young man seeking salvation.

We know we cannot earn it by good works. We know we cannot buy it with money.

We looked at how Jesus described Citizenship in His Kingdom as a pearl of great price.

The last Sunday of this month, we will be looking again at the Kingdom of God compared to the Kingdoms of men and our first allegiance must be to God's Kingdom.

In this passage, God is saying, put me first, before your wealth.

And throughout the scriptures, He points out how we do that.

John the Baptist preached fiery messages that inspired the people.

In droves they came before God, convicted by the Holy Spirit and were ready to do anything.

“What must we do,” they asked? “What does repentance look like,” they questioned?

And what did John say? “Be content with your wages. If you have two coats, give one to someone who has none.”

In 2^nd Corinthians, Paul says: “you people are doing pretty well financially right now, so why don't you give some money to the people in Jerusalem who are doing badly?” He goes on to say: “In God's economy, your abundance is given to cover their lack.”

How we use our money, how we live with it indeed describes whether or not we have treasure in heaven, or treasure here on earth.

That is why we teach simple living.

I have a dear friend, Dave Shoeff. They had 5 kids. Every time they saved enough money to buy a new set of bunk beds, they discovered someone else who didn't have enough money to feed their family.

They looked at the need for a new bed compared to the need of others to eat and took seriously Jesus' command to love our neighbor as ourselves.

They knew for themselves, if it was a choice between new beds and food, they would indeed buy food. So, they kept giving the bed money away.

Now they needed the beds. And God provided. But they first practiced simple living, for the welfare and benefit of others instead of themselves.

How we spend our money, how simply we live, does indeed demonstrate the reality of our faith.