Sermon for Proper 5a

I have a bad habit of asking the same question every time I begin a phone conversation with someone. I know I do it, but it is so ingrained in my phone routine that I find I can’t break it. “Hello.” “Hello.” “This is Steve (or Father Steve or Uncle Steve), how are you?” Three little words that I can’t get rid of - three little words that I know are trite – three little words. More often than not I get the polite answer of “I’m fine” or “I’m well.” Occasionally, however, I will stumble across the wrong person at the wrong time and get the dreaded, “It’s just one of those days.” We all know what that means. One of those days are days that we dread. They mean interruptions, frustrations, annoyances, or worse. One of THOSE days.

Our gospel lesson today finds Jesus having two of those days. If you were to read the whole of Jesus’ two-day adventure in Matthew 8.23 through 9.35 you would be exhausted by the time it was over. It is a quintessential, one of those days. It begins with Jesus and his disciples on a boat. Jesus is asleep, but not for long. As a storm begins to develop on the sea the disciples wake Jesus up yelling, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!” What a way to be awakened. Jesus’ blood pressure must have been through the roof as he gets up and rebukes the wind and the sea. It must have taken forever to get back to sleep. By morning they have landed near Gadara and having just begun the day’s journey two demoniacs approach Jesus from the tombs outside of the city. He cast out the demons who, legion as they were, took a herd of pigs into the lake which got Jesus a prompt invitation away from town. Back to the boat and across the 15 mile journey back to Capernaum and day two begins with Jesus stepping off the boat and he is immediately met by a paralyzed man being carried around by his friends. He forgives his sins, is challenged by the scribes, and then heals the man’s paralysis. Our lesson for today picks up there as Jesus continues to walk along and, almost as if a contractor hiring a day laborer, runs into Matthew and says, “Follow me.” He reclines for a moment at dinner at Matthew’s house but almost immediately has to answer a challenge of his habit of eating with sinners and tax collectors. The Lectionary skips over the inane questions about fasting from John’s disciples and then picks up the story with a leader of the synagogue begging Jesus to come raise his daughter from the dead. On the way a woman who has been bleeding for 12 years struggles to get just a touch of his cloak and he heals her. He raises the young girl from the grip of death, heals two blind men who instead of listening to his plea to be quiet about it, tell the news to everyone. Day two comes to an end with Jesus casting out another demon and more insults from the Pharisees.

Phew! I’m tired having just recounted the tale, can you imagine how Jesus must have felt – how exhausted he must have been – how spiritually draining that series of events must have been for him? And yet, in the midst of it all is perhaps the most important piece of teaching Jesus utters in Matthew’s gospel; more important than the whole of the Sermon on the Mount. While having dinner with Matthew, the tax collector, and Matthew’s friends Jesus is challenged for his actions. The Pharisees, who no doubt were snooping around for a way to catch Jesus in some unholy activity ask some of the disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus responds, “Go and learn what this means,” and then quoting from the prophet Hosea, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.”

This quotation, repeated again by Jesus in another controversy with the Pharisees in Matthew 12, is the hub in Matthew’s discipleship wheel. “God desires mercy, not sacrifice” is for Matthew’s community the key to Christ-like living. Pulling from the context of Hosea’s prophecy it is a call to righteousness that exceeds the standards of religious piety. It is a call to mercy; a call to justice; a call to chesed (ds,x).

This mercy, this chesed is used often in the Old Testament “to speak of the way God loves, as when God is said to be abounding in or showing steadfast love (ex. Ex 20.5f, 34.6f). In Hosea’s prophecy, however, steadfast love is used not to speak of what God will show to Israel, but what God desires to receive from Israel.”[1] Hosea spoke them to the nation of Israel which had all but removed God from its corporate life. Foreign gods were routinely being worshiped as Israel’s leaders struck deal after back-stabbing deal with the surrounding super-powers. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob was asking his people to love and trust him fully, but they choose another way.

By the time Jesus is uttering these words of Hosea to the Pharisees not much had changed. “As it turns out, the Pharisee’s expression of righteousness in Matthew is just as wrong as Israel’s was in Hosea because it too was neither steadfast nor merciful. The Pharisees appear to be concerned with righteousness – at least they are concerned with law observance – yet Jesus argues that their understanding of righteousness is at odds with what God desires.”[2] They were living in sacrifice, but lacking sorely in mercy.

And lest we once again go on a Pharisee bashing trip, our lesson is interrupted by a set of ellipsis. What we skip is another fine example of sacrifice getting in the way of mercy. A group of John the Baptists disciples, as if compelled by the irony of what they are about to say, ask Jesus, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples do not fast?” It is as if Matthew needs us to understand how hard it is to live a life of chesed. Hard, surely, for the Pharisees, they always get it wrong. But hard even for the disciples of John, the last prophet of the Old Covenant, the cousin of Jesus, the baptizer of the Lord. Even those who were close to the kingdom were prone to putting sacrifice over mercy. Jesus answers their question, but as is always the case jumps without delay at the chance to show mercy. He talks to the talk, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice,” and then he lives it out by leaving the debates behind and going to raise a young girl from the dead.

Action over and above talking is central to the ministry of Jesus in Matthew’s gospel. It was the foundation of stone that Jesus called us to build on last week. It was what made his teaching different than that of the Pharisees; it was all about living chesed not espousing sacrifice. “Like the Pharisees, Jesus is a teacher of the law, except that unlike ‘the hypocrites,’ Jesus’ way of life reflects the substance of his teaching.”[3] What about us? Is our way of life reflecting the substance of Jesus’ teaching? Are we actively offering mercy, steadfast love, chesed to God and to one another? Or are we passively talking about the sacrifice others must make to follow God the right way?

It seems to me that Jesus had “one of those days” just about every day. Yet without fail he was ready and willing to offer mercy to people of all shapes, sizes, and stripes. The disciples on the boat, the demoniacs in Gadara, the paralytic in Capernaum, Matthew, tax collectors, sinners, Jairus’ daughter, the woman who couldn’t stop the bleeding, the blind men, and the demon possessed mute were the grateful recipients of mercy in a mere two days. Who have you extended mercy to today? This week? This month? This year?

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[1] Mary Hinkle, “Righetousness Means: Hosea 6.6 and the Ethic of Mercy in Matthew’s Gospel” Word and World, vol. XVIII No. 4, Fall 1995, pg. 358.

[2] Ibid., pg. 359.

[3] Ibid., pg. 362.