The Reverend John E. McGinn, Rector
Saint John’s Episcopal Church
Sandwich, Massachusetts 02563
October 21, 2007 Pentecost
21
The sermon today is taken
from the Gospel according to Luke, chapter 18, verses 1-8.
Thursday of this week, of all
vehicles, I was in a hearse with a funeral director, and we were headed up to
Boston, outside of Boston; actually Braintree, to Blue Hills Cemetery for a
burial. As we were driving along, one of
the good things about being in a hearse is everyone is going by you sort of
looking at the vehicle; but more than that, sometimes people drive a little
slower when they are going by a hearse.
The other thing that helped me is that I was the front seat and was able
to look around. One of the things I
noticed on the way was a bumper sticker.
They have been popping up all over the country, and this particular
bumper sticker features a simple black background with white text with this
stark message on it, “Don’t make me come down there! God.”
It is part of an ad campaign that includes other supposed messages from
on high, such as, “Let’s meet at my house Sunday before the game. God. What part of ’thou shalt not’ didn’t you
understand? God. We need to talk.
God. That love thy neighbor thing - I
meant it! God. You think it’s hot here! God.”
I don’t know if that campaign
is making any difference in our world.
It’s amusing, but sometimes I wonder what kind of image of God it is
portraying. And yet I thought of the bumper
sticker as we drove along, because I had been reading the Gospel this week from
Luke. And I thought about that “Don’t
make me come down there.” I thought
about the story in Luke, about the widow who kept harassing the judge. Now you
remember the story - I just read it.
Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always
pray and not give up. He said, “In a
certain town there was a judge who neither feared God or cared about
people. And there was a widow in town
who kept coming to him with a plea, ‘Grant me justice against my adversary.’ For some time the judge refused. But finally he said to himself, ’Even though
I don’t fear God or care about people, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see
that she gets justice so that she won’t eventually wear me out by continually
coming.’” It’s a wonderful story about
not giving up, about persistence in prayer.
But have you read, as Mr. Harvey would say, “the rest of the story.” Jesus continues, “Listen to what the unjust
judge says and will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones who cry out
to him day and night, and will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get
justice, and quickly.”
This is a story, I believe,
not only about persistence in prayer; it is a story about justice, and about
God’s plan for God’s world. In effect,
Jesus is having God say, “Don’t make me come down there. I will not ignore the cries of those who are
being oppressed, those who are being exploited, those who are being
abused. I hear their prayers and I will
not forever abide the injustice that they are experiencing.”
It is not a popular theme
like persistence or prayer, but I want to talk this morning about justice. I read a story not long ago about two
brothers, Billy and Bobby, and the story will sound familiar to many of you
because it is lived out in so many relationships that we see around us. Now Billy, the older brother, has everything
in the world going for him. He is smart,
he is popular, he’s athletic, he’s handsome, and he is always in charge at home. What he says goes. Bobby, on the other hand, has not received
the blessings
that we assume make for a
happy life. He is mildly handicapped,
shy, and he is not athletic. Nothing
comes easily for Bobby. Bobby always
lives in the shadow of his brother’s successes.
One day the boys’ mother makes three cinnamon rolls for breakfast. This is the boys’ favorite treat. They each have one roll, but it’s not enough
to satisfy their craving. And when mom
steps out of the room, Billy announces that he is taking the last cinnamon
roll. He is older and smarter, and he
gets to choose. And so he snatches that
roll off the plate, and he devours it in front of his disappointed little brother. This goes on
day after day, and Bobby becomes more and more frustrated.
Now before I go on, I want to
get one thing straight. Billy is not a
bad person. He is not out to hurt his
brother. He is like all of us -
determined to look out for number one, so focused on our own fulfillment that
we don’t notice the injustices that we leave sometimes in our wake. Billy used his age and strength to get what
he wanted, and without looking out for the needs of his weaker brother. But the boys’ mother soon becomes wise to the
situation. You know, mothers have a way
about doing that. She knows how
important it is to treat both boys fairly, and she also understands that the
Bobbies of this world need to be protected from the Billies. So the next time she cuts the third cinnamon
roll in half and gives one half to each of the boys. She ensures that they are both treated
equally and that no resentment or aggression springs up between them.
Likewise with God. God is just.
God’s will is that the Bobbies of life will be protected from the
Billies of life. And that’s what I think
justice is. It is a very important part
of the biblical message. This woman in
Jesus’ parable came to the judge and pleaded with him to give her justice. Someone was doing her wrong, and the judge
heeded her request. And Jesus said that
the Judge of the universe is like that judge.
One day God will set the world right.
God will intervene on the part of the Bobbies of the world so that they
no longer will be taken advantage of by the Billies. In fact, biblically it is impossible to
overstate this truth.
God hates injustice. It is a constant theme throughout the
scriptures, but particularly in the writings of the prophets. God hates injustice. And here is what we need to see, I
think. God’s people ought to hate
injustice as well. We need to understand
that God hates all injustice, and that God calls his people to hate injustice
as well.
We can see it in our own
country. We allowed racial injustice to
fester like an infected wound for two hundred or so years. It may be another two hundred years before we
finish dealing with the consequences of that injustice. It does not take a rocket scientist to trace
how many societal problems are due even now to our earlier mistreatment of our
African-American brothers and sisters.
I am no Mid East scholar, but
I wonder how many of our problems with disaffected people in the Middle East
are caused, not by religion, but by the Western nation’s willingness to exploit
the resources of Arab nations. Don’t
forget, it was Westerners who drew the boundaries of that part of the world in
the first place. We were the ones who
put Saddam Hussein originally in power.
Chickens come home to roost, the ancient adage says, and they do. Take any injustice in the world today,
wherever it may be, and there is a price that must be paid. That’s the promise, again and again, of
scripture. God hates injustice wherever
it occurs.
Now, I just want you to
listen to me for a moment. We have some
younger members here, and if you are being bullied in school, God knows about
it and hates it. If you are being
harassed in the workplace for any reason, God hates it. If you are retired and it seems like people
look down their nose at you because you are no longer a member of the
workforce, God knows it. If you are
being taken advantage of, or if you are taking unfair advantage of someone
else, there will be a day of reckoning.
If there is anyone anywhere praying for God to intervene and put an end
to their oppression, eventually that prayer will heard, and that which is wrong
will be set right. That’s the promise of
scripture.
Now where does that leave us
in the twenty-first century? I want to
tell you a story. A young black man
asked his minister why their people had to suffer so much poverty and hardship
and oppression. “Why doesn’t God do
something?” he wailed. “He has,” said
the wise pastor, “He has created you.”
And so, Desmond Tutu, the former Archbishop of South Africa, the Nobel
Peace Prize winner, became the answer to his own question.
I think that’s a good lesson
for you and me. While we are waiting for
God to bring in a perfect and just society, you and I are God’s answer to the
injustice in our world. That’s what it
means to take up a cross and to follow Jesus.
It’s not - it really isn’t - a comfortable position to be in. It’s not popular, but it is Jesus’ way.
I read about a young
clergyman who delivered a spiritual talk on the biblical verse, “Knock, and it
shall be open unto you.” An elderly
African-American gentleman stood up and said, “Until you have stood for seventy
years in front of a locked door with bloody knuckles, you don’t know the kind
of prayer that Jesus is talking
about.” We’re not talking about the
broad way, the easy way, I’m talking about the narrow way, the way of the
cross. We are the answer, you and
I. Anywhere people are being mistreated,
anywhere people have needs that aren’t being met, we are God’s hands reaching
out with love.
Now that’s how I think we are called to look at life. Wherever we see injustice or need of any kind, we are to understand that it is Jesus who is being victimized. When did we see the hungry or naked or imprisoned? And Jesus answered, “When you did it unto the least of these, you did it for me.” That’s what the story of the persistent widow is all about. She was looking for justice. Justice is what God wants for all people - everybody. Amen.