Shock Tactics

February 12, 2017

Helen Jacobi

Ordinary  6     Deuteronomy 30:15-20     Psalm 119:1-8     1 Corinthians 3:1-9     Matthew 5:21-37

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Shock tactics. Shock tactics. Jesus might well have used the same advertising agency who make the tv advertisements for road safety. That one that has been playing for years where the cars are about to crash and the action stops and the drivers get out and talk but they both know they can’t stop what is going to happen next. Or the rather gruesome videos shown to young people to put them off smoking.

Jesus has gathered his disciples on Mount Tabor above the sea of Galilee and they settle in for a long teaching session. We tend to call it “the sermon on the mount”. It starts with “blessed are the poor, and those who mourn and hunger” and goes downhill from there. If the disciples or those listening in had thought they were getting ready to a) overthrow the Romans b) overthrow the high priests or c) get on the fast track to heaven; they were soon shocked and wide awake and probably sloping off down the hill thinking – no point staying with this teacher, it is all way too hard.

Moses had taught them many centuries earlier that they could choose life and prosperity or death and adversity. Obeying the commandments would bring life, turning away would bring death. And so people were careful to obey the commandments, from the big ones like “you shall have no other gods but me” down to the last detail of the law, like do not mix wool and linen when making clothes. (Dt 22:11). There were laws and rules for everything, what you ate and what you wore, and how you behaved in community. They were designed to build community and to make the people ready to worship God. The prophets warned the people through the centuries that their hearts had also to be in the right place. Like advice from Isaiah about fasting, saying its all very well to follow the rules about fasting, but you are doing it for show and not for the right reasons. Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? (Is 58:6)

Now Jesus takes things way further. He says “You have heard that it was said ... but I say to you” First of all no other teacher or rabbi or scribe would set their own saying alongside that of the Torah, the law and teaching of God. “You have heard that it was said ... but I say to you” Shock tactics indeed. Who would dare to contradict the Torah? Jesus is not though contradicting the Torah but going underneath it and enhancing it. One writer says “Jesus moves several traditional commands beneath outward actions to the deep places where life-giving relationships are grounded. Do not simply refrain from murder, but avoid anger and insult, and seek reconciliation with your enemy. Do not just refrain from adultery, but treat others as persons of value, rather than mere objects of lust.” [1] Moses’ choices of life or death are choices for a lifegiving life, not just based on rules, but on deep commitment to God and to each other.

All the commentators point out that these passages in Matthew 5 from the Beatitudes on, are not addressed to Jesus’ followers as individuals but as members of the people of God, the community of faith. Stanley Hauerwas says “You cannot live by the demands of the sermon (on the mount) on your own, but that is the point. The demands of the sermon are designed to make us depend on God and one another. ‘Our only hope of living as the community of the Sermon is to acknowledge that we do not retaliate, hate, curse, lust, swear, brag, preen, worry, or backbite because it is not in the nature of our God that we should be such a people.’ (Lischer) The sermon, therefore, is not a list of requirements, but rather a description of the life of a people gathered by and around Jesus.” [2]

And the things that will happen to us if we don’t get it right? – being thrown into prison, or hell, or cutting off of limbs – well that is part of the shock tactics, Jesus often uses hyperbole, we are not supposed to take it literally. But it is a heads up to take these things seriously.

We do have choices. We do choose life or death, prosperity or adversity. The last part of our reading today talks about oaths – do not swear by heaven, or Jerusalem, let your word be enough. Simply say yes or no. In Jesus’ day there were not written contracts for things, you took an oath to make your word stronger. And there were different grades of oaths depending on the level of the contract. This too had got very legalistic and confusing. Jesus says: say yes or say no. Let your word be enough. Choose life, or not. It’s up to you.

We all make these yes or no choices every day. You have all said no to something to come to church today. No to brunch, or a lie in with breakfast in bed. Each day we make a choice to pray, or not. To spend time with people who need us, or not. All of our choices have consequences.

“Saying yes and no” in a conscious way is seen as a spiritual discipline or practice – alongside the more obvious ones of hospitality, forgiveness, healing, worship and prayer. Shawn Copeland says “Learning how and when to say yes and no is a practice that is crucial in our attempt to choose life.” [3] “Saying yes and saying no are companions in the process of constituting a whole and holy life.” [4] Our individual choices matter and so do our choices as communities, workplaces, and countries. We are watching the devastating effects of the electoral choices of the voters of the US at the moment. And we will have our own choices to make this election year. In our vote we assent to certain ideas and say no to others. During Lent we are going to be thinking about water, the choices we make as individuals and as a country to use and misuse water. The water of our baptism brings us into a community of faith – at the moment of baptism we choose life; what do we need to do together to help us choose life every day.

The prophets will remind us as they did the people of old that the fast that is demanded of us is to: loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke.

“I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity.” Choices. Sometimes we need shock tactics to make us listen and focus and realise the choices that are before us. Choosing for Jesus is no easy road, no easy option. But we do not choose alone, Jesus gathers us in community, and walks with us together.

[1] Charles Campbell in Preaching God’s Transforming Justice Year A Dawn Ottoni Wilhelm, ed 2013 p96

[2] Stanley Hauwerwas Matthew 2006 p 61

[3] M. Shawn Copeland “Saying Yes and Saying No” in Practicing our Faith ed Dorothy C Bass 1997 Jossey Bass San Francisco p 62

[4] p65