The Churches
Greatest Challenge
By Rev Steven R
Mitchell
Mountain View
United, Aurora, CO 3/15/2015
Based on Luke
10:25-37
The
story of the “Good Samaritan” is well known among most people who have been
attending church for at least a couple of years. It’s a story that ministers (including this
one) enjoy using in order to point out how we need to reach outside of the
church family and recognize those who are outside of our social circles. It’s seems a rather straight forward sort of
story, but the truth is, all parables have multiple sharp edges to it.
The
“who is my neighbor” is the most obvious
question of this parable. This is the Fourth Sunday in Lent and I want us to
reflect in this year’s journey as to, “who
it is” that we recognize as our neighbors and those that we don’t, and when
do we, if ever, have reason to exclude people as our neighbors. The Hebrew understanding of a neighbor is any
person who is a part of your tribe or community. That might be family members, or fraternal
organizations, or people who all go to the same church, or live in your
community, but does not include people or groups found outside of your
boundaries. In other words our neighbors
are those people that we have a relationship with in one fashion or another.
We
live in a world that tends to create natural barriers that keep us from
creating relationships. Think about
where you live as an example. Some
blocks seem designed to create small communities; we call those streets cul de
Sac’s. Other streets are straight and
long, not giving as easy access to know your neighbors. Most of us have garages, which allow us to
drive directly into our homes. In our
backyards, most of us have what we call “privacy” fences. I have made it a point on my cul de sac to become
acquainted with everyone who lives on my street. However, I have not made the attempt to meet
those two or three houses that are on the other side of my privacy fence in the
three years that I have lived in my house.
There
are plenty of other barriers that society puts up to keep us separated and
tries to pre-determine “who our neighbors” are supposed to be. We hold certain professions in higher esteem
than others. We use income earnings or
the lack thereof, in separating relationships.
We use color and ethnicity as a way of not building relationships. We give people with all sorts of labels and through
those labels decide which people we are willing to become associated with and
possibly call our neighbor.
I
think one of the largest barriers in recognizing others as “neighbor” comes
during wartime or with groups that we perceive as unfriendly or dangerous. In his book “Jesus is the Question”, Rev
Martin Copenhaver relates a story about how his church in Connecticut dealt
with a crisis between a former pastor of that church and a group of terrorists
in the Philippines. Rev Copenhaver
relates these events: Rev Lloyd Van Vactor and wife Maisie, with
their two young boys moved to the Philippines in the 1970’s, where Lloyd was
President of the Dansalan College, a school designed to not only educate its
students but deeply dedicated in helping build positive relationships between
the Christian and Muslim community in the Philippines. On March 9, 1979, Lloyd was kidnapped by
members of a Muslim sect and held for ransom.
A letter was immediately sent out to the congregation in Connecticut
informing the members what had happened and asked for prayers for Lloyd in his
captivity. Prayers for his wife, Maisie,
as she anxiously awaits word. Prayers for
both the Christian and Muslim communities in the Philippines, that the violence
might stop. And pray for Lloyd’s
captors, that they might know the peace of God.”
Rev Copenhaver goes on to say: I remember so clearly how word of Lloyd’s
captivity affected our entire church, and especially I remember the reaction to
the last request in the letter, the request for prayers for Lloyd’s captors and
persecutors. It sent a strong and
immediate jolt through the congregation.
Some church members asked, with no small measure of exasperation, “Why
should we pray for them: They are
threatening our friend.” Others said
things like, “Sure, I’ll pray for his captors.
I’ll pray that they come to their senses. And then I’ll pray that they get the
punishment they deserve.”
Obviously, we didn’t need to be told to
pray for Lloyd or Maisie. And it may not be too difficult to pray for
Christians and Muslims generally because such words as Christian and Muslims
can seem comfortably vague. They can
lack a human face. The easiest prayers
are always the most general. It is when
our prayers gain in specificity that they can gain in discomfort. So the last prayer request of the letter was
a request to extend the reach of love beyond where we are used to taking it.
To compound matters, During Lloyds time in captivity his wife Maisie passed away. The anger of the Connecticut Congregation
grew, but was channeled into a positive, by creating a memorial fund designated
for American women who might want to pursue the ministry or social work, as she
had done. After twenty days Lloyd was
released without a ransom being paid.
There also had been monies
raised for his ransom, so the question came up, what to do with those
funds. It was given to Lloyd to decide
how to use this money with the assumption that it would be used for American
students. Lloyd specified that a fund
for Dansalan College students be established for Muslim students. Even after all these years later, his
decision still astonishes me. Our
congregation decided to help a beloved one of ours. Lloyd decided to give aid to his
enemies. Jesus asks, “If you love only
those who love you, what credit is that to you?” pg 61-64, Jesus is the Question, by Martin
Copenhaver
This story leads us
into another aspect of the parable of the “Good Samaritan”, an aspect that we
generally don’t like to look at, because it is an aspect that becomes too
personal. Within the question “what
do I have to do to gain eternal life?”, Jesus was quite happy to leave
the answer that the lawyer gave as correct to what the law said, “You
must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your being, with all
your strength, and with all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.” But then the lawyer asked, “And
who is my neighbor?” Here is
where the really hard part of the story comes, for in that question is the
question that each of us asks every time we are making a value judgment about someone or some group. “Are the Muslims our neighbors?” “Are the
Taliban our neighbors?” “Are those homeless people on the street corner our
neighbors?” These questions are a
questions about the reach of love, of “just how far or to what limits do I have
to reach out to those that I separate myself from because of differences that I
perceive make them different or not as worthy to be in relationship with.” Luke
indicates that the lawyer asks the question “to justify himself.” In other words, he wants to be told that he
is already doing it right. He wants to
defend his conviction that there are limits to the command to love one’s
neighbor so that he can go on living as he has. Pg 56,
Jesus is the Question, by Martin Copenhaver
This
is an excellent example of the Church in today’s world. As the lawyer is trying to do, the church
wants to justify its lack of going out into the community and reaching out to
those who do not involve themselves with organized religion. Most churches refuse to change their behavior
in the style of worship and in their social outreach. The church does recognize established
organizations that help the poor and homeless, giving monies to these organizations
while it tries to ignore what is going on in their own neighborhoods.
One of the
questions asked at the last two workshops that I have attended over the past
six months was, “if our church was to close its doors today, how would it
affect the neighborhood that we worship in?
Would people say, ’How will we ever get along without them?’ or will
they even notice that we left? Mountain
View United Church has been in this neighborhood for over 40 yrs, would our
neighbors even notice if we closed our doors?
Do the apartment building that are all around us even know that we
exist? Over 40 years, Mountain View has
created its family, its neighbors, but how far are we willing to extend our
boundaries of love and interest? It’s a
question that needs to be taken seriously.
Jesus told this parable by using as its hero, a member of the most hated
group within the Hebrew culture, a Samaritan.
He did this to show that boundaries only exist because of where we put
them. When we see people as one of us,
then they are our neighbor.
The question
becomes, “where do I set my barriers and why?”
“Who is my neighbor?” Mountain
View says “We accept you for who you are.”
Where are the boundaries to that value statement? How are we practicing those boundaries? This week, let us ask ourselves, “What does
Mountain View need to give up in order to fully live into our vision?” Amen
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