Luke 6:27-38

[Jesus said,] “… listen, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again. Do to others as you would have them do to you.

“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

“Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven; give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap; for the measure you give will be the measure you get back.”

“Please let that not be my child.”

That was the first thing that ran through the mind of Alex Geller, the father of three, who heard a loud crash while visiting the Hecht Museum, in Israel, with his family, this past summer. Much to his shock, surprise, shame, and embarrassment, his youngest son, a 4-year-old Ariel was, in fact, the culprit in the destruction of a 3,500 year-old, clay jar.

The jar – from the Bronze Age – had been on display at the museum for 35 years, and was one of the only containers of its size, from that period, that was discovered, completely intact. The precious, rare artifact dated back to something like 2200 BCE, until POOF, on a summer day last August, it was gone.

“Please let that not be my child.”

The beautiful thing about this story is that, despite the destruction he wrought, the museum curators asked little Ariel and his family to come back to help repair what he’d broken. AND they think it’s still important to keep these sorts of artifacts open and accessible to the public so that, even if it’s risky and even though accidents happen, people can learn by getting up close, to touch, feel, and interact with the history that’s on display in their museum.

And they think all of this could be a teachable moment, for the boy, they said. And I thought it might be a teachable moment for all of us, too.

I thought this story might be a funny, light-hearted, but meaningful way to wonder about the deeper, heavier invitations we hear from Jesus this morning…this stuff about forgiveness, about not condemning, about not judging. And this stuff about “Loving your enemies,” “Doing unto others,” and “Turning the other cheek,” too. All of this seem like pretty high standards of expectation – a high bar of discipleship and faithful living – to be honest.

I mean, does anyone actually do this anymore – love their enemies? I’m not even sure who my enemies are at the moment. Maybe I’m lucky that my enemies seem like far away, hypothetical, existential kinds of foes. I don’t contend with them daily, face-to-face, man-to-man, if you will, in ways that I’d actually have to make a choice, even, to fight them, let alone love them, as Jesus commands.

And what does it mean to “bless those who curse you?” I’m no good at that. Can any of us say we blessed the last person who really ticked us off – and that we meant it? Ignored them, maybe… Walked away from them, perhaps… Cursed them in return or muttered something under our breath, more likely… but blessed them? I don’t think so.

As for the rest of Jesus’ words today … I have driven past the beggar and looked the other way. I expect to get my stuff back when I loan it. I have withheld my coat and my shirt and more … my closets are packed and, frankly, I could use more hangers at the moment.

And what about, “praying for those who abuse you?” How crazy is that? I’ve never been abused in the ways that come to mind when I hear that word – physical, sexual, domestic kinds of abuse, I mean. Did you hear about the trio of miscreants who were arrested, just last month in Greenfield, for a litany of the most awful offenses against children? The sorts of prayers I’d pray this morning, if I were the family of whoever those victims may be, wouldn’t be kind or loving or full mercy and forgiveness, I can almost guarantee you that.

And, honestly, I believe all of this is okay, to some extent – that God understands, I mean. God knows this about me, already. And maybe God knows this about some of you, too – how stiff-necked and broken, how selfish and sinful, how vengeful and vindictive we can be a lot of the time.

What I’m saying is, I take these extreme statements from Jesus – this very high bar that he sets for his followers? – I take it all about as literally as I do some of the other things he says about plucking out our eyes if they cause us to sin, or chopping off our limbs if they cause us to stumble. That kind of stuff is holiness to the extreme – it sounds like crazy talk – it’s virtually impossible, for many of us – it’s really hard work when the rubber meets the road, to be sure.

Love your enemy … Bless those who curse you … Turn the other cheek …

But, as hard as it may be, that doesn’t mean we ignore Jesus’ words altogether – this invitation to forgiveness, to love, to turning, to blessing; it doesn’t mean we don’t strive to achieve those things – somehow … some way … in some measure of time … with God’s help and by Gods’ grace.

What Jesus does today is call us toward a better way, however difficult that might be to achieve. I think Jesus is always inviting us to love, even when it seems impossible; to bless others, even when it’s really hard. I think Jesus is always calling us to mercy and forgiveness even when it goes against our first instinct; or our natural, sinful, selfish inclinations; or even when it goes against what the world would have us do under the same circumstances; and even if we never get all the way there.

I think that’s what life in the kingdom is supposed to look like – something more like the way the museum curators treated Ariel and his family after that accident with the vase.

It’s risky to be alive in the world. Sometimes we’re the ones who are broken and sometimes we’re the ones who do the breaking. And no matter what, God doesn’t have the luxury that Ariel’s dad had – to hope, even for just a second, “Please don’t let that be my child.”

It’s always God’s children who are being broken. It’s always God’s children who are doing the breaking. And it’s always God inviting us to live and to love in ways God’s self – in the person of Jesus – was willing to live and to love – because God knows we’ll be blessed – and because the world will be changed when we do.

So, we can pray for bullies on the playground, in the classroom, and in the cafeteria. We can try to forgive that jerk at the office. We can work at loving those people in our lives who make it so hard sometimes. We can be slower to condemn those with whom we disagree. We can be generous, even if we don’t think someone deserves it. We can practice humility when we want so badly to prove how right we are. We can muster a blessing and mean it.

We can show and receive mercy. We can forgive and receive forgiveness. We can love and be loved, in spite of ourselves.

Because in the end God is merciful, even when we can’t be. God is loving, even when we’re not. God’s grace is more than we can give and always more than we deserve: a good measure, for sure, pressed down, shaken together, running over – for you, for me, and for the world, until we get it right.

Amen

Acts 2:42-47

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. Awe came upon everyone because many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need.

Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.

“They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to eating and praying together”. That’s how our first reading begins. Who is the “they”? They are the crowd of people gathered around the disciple because of a violent wind, flaming tongues, and hearing different languages spoken on Pentecost. Peter stood up to address the crowd and gave his first sermon, which must have been pretty good because, as our reading from Acts last week noted, three thousand people were baptized and added to the community. If that happened today, we’d say that’s pretty miraculous.

However, it’s what happens next that's really impressive; these three thousand people committed themselves to doing life together. They learned, ate, and prayed together. They shared all their possessions. They sold whatever they owned and gave the money to anyone who had a need. Daily they shared meals together and celebrated all that God was doing. And they had compassion and kindness toward one another.

And remember this wasn’t 3000 people from the same place with the same background who thought the same or had the same cultural practices or anything like that. They were strangers from over 14 different countries. Undoubtedly some were old, some young. Some wealthy, some not. The real miracle isn’t that 3,000 people were baptized. It’s that 3,000 people responded to the gift of grace by doing life together despite all their differences, that’s the miracle. With all our divisions, divides, and individualism of today, something like that is unfathomable for 30 people, let alone 3,000.

It’s fair to wonder, are we given this description of the early disciples as a command, as instructions on how we ought to live? If so, this picture painted of life together repels us more than does compel us… for lots of reasons. Maybe when we were young and idealistic we thought living such a way was possible, maybe even desirable. But now we have families or we’re set in our ways. We are comfortable with our routines, our privacy, our preferences. And we recognize all the sacrifices and accommodations and demands it would place on us.

I mean, if we're honest, We can’t even imagine living this way with our own families in our own homes. We're far too busy with work, and practices, lessons, games, recitals, more work, etc.

Who has time for daily meals together, let alone prayers and teachings and fellowship.

Moreover, we don’t trust other people enough to live like this. Just a couple weeks ago, Tom Orr and the Wired Word class discussed a Wall Street Journal poll that found communal values like religion, community involvement, or having children have all significantly trended downward in the last 20 years. Reflecting on why, David Brooks of the NYT wrote

“My fear is that we’ve entered a distrust doom loop: People are so untrusting of their institutions and their neighbors that they are unwilling to reach out, to actively renew their communities, and so the dysfunction will continue, and the distrust will increase, and so on and so on.”

But perhaps most of all this picture of life together repels us because we feel convicted by it, or at least I do. Deep down, I know I should live more like this, that I should share more meals, open my home, give money to meet the needs of my neighbors, share what's mine with an open hand, and have goodwill toward all people. Maybe i’m not the only one…

However, I don’t believe these verses are rules or specific instructions that Christians must follow. It’s not, if we live this way, Jesus will love us. Notice that all these people were baptized first, then they lived this way. They received God’s grace and love and acceptance first and then because of what they experienced, they committed themselves to doing life together in this way so others may experience what they did.

This way of living shows us what life through the power of the Spirit could be like. It represents the best of what God’s people are capable of. But it doesn’t last long. Soon people in the community will defraud one another, they’ll hold back their resources, they will treat each other unfairly, and after Acts 5, the church is never described with such rosy language.

These verses, this idealized picture, is not meant to be a discouragement, but rather an inspiration: look at what life together could be like, a life full of welcome and hospitality, justice and mutuality, of service and community. Some intentional communities take these verses very seriously and try to follow them to the letter, like the bruderhof communities or houses of hospitality from the Catholic Worker movement.And while not the same, but at our best, we experience some of that life together here: We break bread together, we learn and celebrate together. We provide for each other's needs and the needs of our neighbors: whether that's through our monthly mission focus, our food pantry, or our support to Fondwa, Haiti. We pray, we worship, and we tell others about the God whom we confess.

And it’s no accident that you are a part of this community, at this time and place. In fact, you didn’t choose to be a part of this church. But you’ll say, “Cogan I tried a lot of places before coming here and intentionally chose this place.” To which I would respond, it was the Holy Spirit at work in you that led you to say, “this is where I want to be a part of the Body of Christ.

This is where I heard and still hear the good news of the Gospel: that I am forgiven and loved and grace is mine no matter who I am or who I love or what I’ve done. This is where I am called to do life together with others who have experienced the grace of Jesus, too.

Now to be sure this isn't the only place where this sort of stuff happens. And Life together here isn’t always ideal. Like those early followers, we mess up, we make mistakes, we don’t always agree. But like Dietrich Bonhoeffer says in his book, Life Together,

“even when sin and misunderstanding burden our life together, is not the sinning sibling still a sibling…? Will not their sin (or mine) be a constant occasion for me to give thanks that both of us live in the forgiving love of God? Thus the moment of disappointment with my brother becomes incomparably beneficial, because it teaches me that neither of us can ever live by our own words and deeds, but only by that one Word and Deed which really binds us together, the forgiveness of sins in Jesus Christ.”

What's so powerful about these disciples’ life together was their desire to give of themselves so that others might experience grace just as they did. And what else does the love of Jesus feel like than a good meal with even better company? A celebration full of joy and festivity? Or having your needs met or debt paid by someone else’s sacrifice? That’s the call we have as a community, as a church. To give of ourselves and do life live together in such a way that draws others in so that they too experience grace, no strings attached.

As we approach commitment Sunday, more than any dollar amount you commit to, or any role you volunteer for, or any talent you share, commit to doing Life Together. As one writer puts it, “God does not need possessions and has never been impressed by their donation. God wants people and draws us into that wanting.”

Commit to showing up, to doing meals together, to trusting each other, to praying for and with one another, to meeting the needs of your neighbors, to drawing other people in

because you want them to experience the grace of Jesus just as you have.