Sunday, July 5, 2020

Gentle Grace (Proper 9A)



Gentle Grace
Proper 9 Year A
5 July 2020 8 a.m. Said Mass on the Labyrinth and 10:00 a.m.
Said Mass with Antiphons live-streamed from the Chancel
Parish Church of Trinity Ashland (Oregon)
The Rev. Dr. Anthony Hutchinson, homilist

God, take away our hearts of stone, and give us hearts of flesh.  Amen

Paul in today’s epistle says, “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate” (Romans 7:15).   Most of us have experienced this at one time or another:  wanting two mutually exclusive things; not completely knowing our own mind.   Being torn by competing desires is one of the great obstacles to our connecting with God.  As the letter of James has it:  “If any of you is lacking wisdom, just ask God.  God gives to all generously and ungrudgingly, and he will give you what you ask.  But remember, you must do this with complete trust, free of fear or doubt.  Those who constantly second-guess themselves are like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed about by the wind.  The fear-filled person is double-minded and unstable in every way.  Such a one cannot expect to receive anything from God” (James 1:5-7).   It is because of this that Jesus teaches “blessed are the pure in heart—that means single minded—for they shall see God.” 

C.S. Lewis put it: “[God] cannot meet us face to face until we have faces.”

This division within our minds and wills, this fuzziness of what we want, is often described in metaphorical form by that image we know from the cartoons: a little angel sitting on one of our shoulders arguing with a little devil sitting on the other one, both of them looking like us, but one with halo, wings, and harp, and the other with horns, tail, and a pitchfork.  The image, as laughable as it is, comes a very real experience in our divided hearts. Sometimes our competing desires are so acutely at odds with each other that it feels like we are actually in the middle of an argument apart from us, that we are being enticed by different personalities rather than simply arguing with ourselves or being indecisive.  This feeling, I believe, is the origin of the ancient tradition of personifying a tempter actually came from. 

St. Paul describes the problem:  I don’t really know who I am or what I really want.  I decide to do some good thing, and then fail to do it.  I make a resolve to avoid some bad thing, and then find myself in the act.  The fact that I cannot really make up my mind, or that I change my mind, shows how important it is to have objective standards, a written Law: “If I do the very thing I do not want to do, I by that fact agree that the Law is good!”  Paul goes on to describe his inner obsessive/compulsive inconsistency as if he is divided or split: a Law of Sin driving his various body parts at war with a Law of God in his mind—a little devil Paul on one shoulder and a little angel Paul on the other.   

This passage is often misread.  St. Augustine and then later Martin Luther took it in light of their own personal sense of guilt in struggles with sin, and thought Paul was talking about same guilt-ridden introspective conscience through which they saw the world.  Thus the great division between Law and Grace in Protestant theology arose.  But Paul elsewhere shows that he is perfectly happy in saying that he is “blameless” in keeping the Law, and “righteous” in the works it requires.  Paul is no lust-haunted Augustine or guilt obsessed Luther.  He simply is describing how hard it is to be so double-minded.  What he calls “this body of death” makes it hard even to know who we really are.  Who will deliver us from it, he asks. Jesus Christ is his answer.

The Gospel today also speaks of conflicting desires.  The same critics had condemned John the Baptist and Jesus:  John for being too conservative and austere and Jesus for being too welcoming and liberal.  Jesus rebukes these critics.   He quotes a popular proverb and compares them to naughty children in the marketplace who cannot be satisfied with anything because of their conflicting desires.  They taunt each other: little girls tease the boys who want to dance and play music which men used in wedding celebrations; little boys tease the girls because they want to practice the mourning songs and ululations women sing at funerals.  You can’t have it both ways, says Jesus. “Wisdom is vindicated by her deeds,” he concludes, “you won’t have contradictory desires if you are integrated and truly find yourselves.”   Then Matthew adds that saying that sounds so much like the Gospel of John: the Father has given all things to the Son.  The point is that in Jesus, there are no self-contradictions, no competing desires, no alienation from God, others, or one’s self.  Jesus ends the passage by offering to take on our burdens for us.  The Message puts it this way: 

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

We are a sorry lot.  We all are subject to obsession and compulsion at times, and all carry heavy burdens we create for ourselves with our conflicting desires, hopes, and fears.   But God cannot really talk to us face to face until we begin to develop faces that are truly our own, hearts that hold our real desires.  It is by taking on Jesus’ yoke, taking on his task of announcing in word and deed God’s presence healing the broken world, walking with him and working with him, that we begin to learn who we each really are and what we truly desire.   It is not something forced, regimented, or produced by a technique.  It is not the result of willing it, or submitting to some standard.  We let go, and let God work God’s gentle grace.  Our new self distills like the dew in the morning.  Losing our false desires is like finally removing the pebble from our shoe.  It is like, in the middle of the summer heat, taking off a heavy winter coat.  It is wonderful. 

Thanks be to God. Amen.

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