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There is the story of a young peasant woman living back in the middle-ages who began to have visions.  The report of her visions spread far and wide, eventually reaching the ears of the Archbishop.  Not believing that a young peasant woman could possibly be having visions, he went to see her and asked her what she saw and she told him.  Still in disbelief he told her, “The next time you have visions of Jesus you ask him what I confessed at my last confession.  If you can answer that, then I will believe.”  Some months later the report reached the archbishop that the woman was again having visions, so he went to her again and asked if she had spoken to Jesus and asked the Lord about the archbishop’s last confession.  Her response, “yes.”  “Well then,” said the Archbishop, “What did he say?” Her response, “Jesus said, ‘I don’t remember.’”

I know that sometimes when we come together and pray the prayers we are fully present. We engage with the liturgy and the words we pray, but I also believe that there are times when we go through the motions, not fully participating in worship. Does that make us bad people? No. It just makes us human.

I also know that there are other times when we hear the words and truly engage with them, but simply don’t believe them. I have had more than one person come up to me and tell that they don’t believe everything that is said in the Creeds. They can’t quite get past the virgin birth or the idea of One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church or something else. However, the number one item folks have a hard time believing is this: “The Almighty and merciful Lord grant you absolution and remission of all your sins…” Or more simply put, they can’t believe it when Jesus says, “Your sins are forgiven.”

We get it in our heads that we are not worthy. We are not good enough. We’ve fallen so far short of God’s call on our lives we can no longer believe that he loves us or desires to have anything to do with us.

A line from the movie Usual Suspects, “The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.” I think that is probably true. I think Devil’s second greatest trick is convincing us that God can’t love us.

How many times have you heard the verse we read today?: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” We’ve heard it hundreds of times, yet so often we can hear those words and believe them to be true for everyone… but ourselves. Why is that?

Brennan Manning, wonderful teacher, was onto something when he quoted the French philosopher Blaise Pascal, “God made man in his own image, and man returned the compliment.” Manning therefore concludes, “We often make God in our own image, and He winds up to be as fussy, rude, narrow minded, legalistic, judgmental, unforgiving, unloving as we are.” Know what? That is also a lie.

Manning goes on to say that Jesus comes and sits right next to us and says, “I have a word for you. I know your whole life story. I know every skeleton in your closet. I know every moment of sin, shame, dishonesty and degraded love that has darkened your past. Right now I know your shallow faith, your feeble prayer life, your inconsistent discipleship. And my word is this: I dare you to trust that I love you just as you are, and not as you should be. Because you’re never going to be as you should be.”

The Devil whispers in our ears that we are unworthy of the love of the One True God and we believe it. Yet Jesus declares from the Cross, “It is finished!” In those words He declares, “There is nothing in Heaven or on Earth that separates you from the love of your God.” You were not worthy, but through the Blood of Christ – “the Blood of the New Testament which is shed for you, and for many, for the remission of sins” – you are made worthy. The only thing preventing you from experiencing that love is you, by refusing to accept it. Jesus’ word to you, “I dare you to trust that I love you.”

Karl Barth, big brain theologian, appeared on the cover of Time magazine back in 1962, wrote over 10,000 pages on various aspects of theology – get the picture – was once asked by a student, following a lecture, could he sum up his theology in one sentence. Barth replied, “Yes, I can. In the words of a song I learned at my mother’s knee: ‘Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.’”

And Jesus says, “I dare you to trust that I love you.”

Listen again to the words that the Apostle Paul spoke to us this morning in his epistle to the Ephesians, “God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ– by grace you have been saved– and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” That passage speaks of you! You are the one made alive. Raised up. Seated in the heavenly places. Shown the immeasurable riches of his grace. That’s you. Does that sound like one who is not loved? Rubbish. Pure nonsense.

Jesus declares, “Your sins are forgiven.”

When asked about those sins, Jesus replies, “I don’t remember.”

Jesus says, “I dare you to trust that I love you.”

Boudreaux and his brother Pierre were not the most religious folks in town, in fact they really only went to church twice a year so that they could be considered “members in good standing.” As they were leaving the Church, the priest said, “Boudreaux, it sure would be nice to see you and Pierre here more than once a year!” “I know,” replied Boudreaux, “but at least we keep the Ten Commandments.” “Well I suppose that’s a start,” the priest said. “I’m glad to hear that you keep the Commandments.” “Yep,” Boudreaux said proudly, “Pierre keeps six of them and I keep the other four.”

The Ten Commandments are the beginning of the Law handed down to Moses. From there it grows to a total of 613 laws outlined in the Old Testament. Everything from the first of the Ten, “you shall have no other gods,” to laws like Leviticus 11:12, “Anything living in the water that does not have fins and scales is to be regarded as unclean by you,” which means no more lobster, shrimp, crawdads, or Unagi (a tasty little morsel you can find at a sushi bar.) Breaking any of these laws comes with repercussions ranging from death by stoning to having to make a sacrifice.

By the time of Jesus the religious leaders were experts at interpreting the Law and enforcing it on the people to such an extent that it became a form of enslavement. Perhaps this was not their intent, but through their zeal for adherence to the Law, they missed the point and sent the wrong message to the people.

A story tells of a frail old man who went to live with his son, daughter-in-law, and four-year-old grandson. The old man’s hands trembled, his eyesight was blurred, and his step faltered. The family ate together at the table, but the elderly grandfather’s shaky hands and failing sight made eating difficult. Peas rolled off his spoon onto the floor. When he grasped the glass, milk spilled on the tablecloth. The son and daughter-in-law became irritated with the mess. “We must do something about Grandfather,” said the son. “I’ve had enough of his spilled milk, noisy eating, and food on the floor. So the husband and wife set a small table in the corner. There Grandfather ate alone while the rest of the family enjoyed dinner.

Since Grandfather had broken a dish or two, his food was served in a wooden bowl. When the family glanced in Grandfather’s direction, sometimes he had a tear in his eye as he sat alone. Still, the only words the couple had for him were sharp admonitions when he dropped a fork or spilled food. The four-year-old grandson watched all this in silence.

One evening before supper, the father noticed his four-year-old son playing with wood scraps on the floor. He asked the child sweetly, “What are you making?” Just as sweetly, the boy responded, “Oh, I am making a little bowl for you and Mama to eat your food out of when I grow up.” The four-year-old smiled and went back to work.

Mom and Dad taught Jr. all about how to keep the china intact, the tablecloth clean, and how to maintain proper decorum at the supper table, but in the process they taught him nothing of grace, mercy, compassion, or love.

In Matthew’s Gospel Jesus says, “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former.  You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.” The religious leaders missed the point of the Law and enslaved the people, which brings us to one of the many lessons that can be gleaned from our Gospel lesson.

There was one of those funny cartoons that made the internet rounds a short while back. You’ve heard the question: What would Jesus do? WWJD? The cartoon stated, “The next time someone asks you, ‘What would Jesus do?,’ remind them that freaking out and flipping over tables is a viable option.”

The Temple was the place of sacrifice. For this there were very specific rules on how this was to take place. Only certain money could be tendered and only animals that were considered perfect could be used. Therefore, the religious leaders allowed a marketplace to be established to accommodate all the commerce. Yet they allowed this marketplace to be setup within the Court of the Gentiles – a section within the Temple complex – which was meant to be set aside as a place of prayer for non-Jews.

The religious leaders were following the letter of the Law, not violating a single statute. Proper money was used. Proper animals were used. The sacrifices were made exactly to the specifications of the Law. Yet in their zeal to fulfill the Law, they missed the point. It’s not about the blood of animals. It’s about prayer and a relationship with the One True God.

Long before Jesus, King David understood this. In the 40th Psalm, he wrote:

Sacrifice and offering you do not desire,
but you have given me an open ear.
Burnt offering and sin offering
you have not required.
Then I said, “Here I am;
in the scroll of the book it is written of me.
I delight to do your will, O my God;
your law is within my heart.”

Jesus, through his words and actions demonstrates that it is not through the fulfilling of the Law that we are made righteous. Instead it comes in allowing the Word of God to transform our hearts. What did we say after we read each of the Commandments in the Decalogue? “Lord, have mercy upon us, and incline our hearts to keep this law.” Incline our hearts to keep this law. What does that look like?

The Law says, “You shall not murder.” Yes, it means don’t kill, but written upon our hearts it also means that we should not destroy another person though lies and gossip. It means we shouldn’t neglect those in need, allowing them to suffer. It means we aren’t to tear one another down, but as Paul teaches we are to “encourage one another and build each other up.”

The Law says, “You shall not commit adultery.” In our hearts it means that we are not to see the other person as an object or a means, but to recognize every human being as a child of God, worthy of His love and ours. It means that we love a person, not for what they can do for us, but for who they are in Christ Jesus.

The Law says, “You shall not covet” and in our hearts we need to recognize that there is a point when enough is enough. Written on our hearts that law declares we do not need every new toy advertised on the TV. It asks you to “Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.”

Do you see how that works? With Jesus, the Law is the minimum requirement. A starting place, but as the great Anglican poet George Herbert states, “he shoots higher that threatens the moon, than he that aims at a tree.”

What Jesus expects and teaches takes the Law to an entirely different level. Jesus says, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. … For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

When considering the Law or even just the Ten Commandments, don’t say to yourself, “Well, I didn’t kill anybody today, so I must still be right with God.” We must remember that fulfilling the Law as Jesus calls us to is much more difficult than simply not eating shrimp. It involves a transforming of our hearts and a renewing of our minds. Ask the Holy Spirit to be your teacher so that you can more fully understand God’s law as it is written upon your heart.

Athanasius, newly consecrated bishop of Alexandria, was determined to visit all the churches in his see, to make certain the orthodox faith was being proclaimed. On his journey he learned of three, old monks who lived alone on an island. Like the devoted bishop he was, Athanasius set sail to the island to shepherd, even if briefly, this small flock. He was greeted with great warmth and reverence by the monks. “Tell me,” Athanasius said to them after awhile, “how it is that you pray.” “Father, we are not learned men,” the monks replied. “We simply lift our hands to God and say, ‘We are three and you are three: Have mercy upon us.’”

“Ah, dear Fathers, this will never do,” said Athanasius. “I must teach you to pray as the church prays.” And for the next several days – the monks were slow learners – the new bishop taught the old monks the Lord’s Prayer. Satisfied at last that the monks knew how to pray properly, Athanasius set sail for Alexandria. That very night aboard his ship he noticed a glow in the distance, a glow getting brighter and rapidly approaching the ship. He looked and saw the three old monks running toward him on the water. When they reached the ship they simply stood on the water as on dry ground with holy light encompassing them. “Father Athanasius,” they said, “forgive our slowness, but we have forgotten again the words of the prayer you taught us. Please pray with us again.” “No, my fathers,” Athanasius said. “It is you who must pray for me.”

Being right all the time and always knowing what is best for others is quite the burden, but it is a burden that I bear with great humility.

I suppose there are times when we all know what is best for others and we don’t mind telling them. In some cases we may be right, but I suspect that much of the time we fall far short of the mark in the “advice” department.

Athanasius believed that because these three monks did not know the Lord’s Prayer, they couldn’t possibly be praying correctly; therefore, in his great wisdom and innocence proceeded to teach them how to pray “properly” – “Our Father, who art in Heaven…” As it turns out the three monks were ignorant of the Lord’s Prayer, but they were in no way ignorant of the Lord, so much so that they radiated the glory of God, while walking on the water.

So often, what we want others to do is more directly related to what we want, instead of being what they need.

Take Jesus’ temptations in the wilderness. At the third temptation we read, “Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. ‘All this I will give you,’ he said, ‘if you will bow down and worship me.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Away from me, Satan! For it is written: “Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.”’”

That’s a fairly easy one given the two main characters, Jesus and the Devil. The Devil wants Jesus to renounce God’s will and follow his. He wanted Jesus to do what he – the Devil – wanted him to do and not what God had called him to.

A similar situation occurred in our Gospel reading today. Jesus was teaching his disciples about what was to come: the rejection, the suffering, and his eventual death. Peter refused to believe what he was hearing. It tore through him. “This will not be,” and he rebukes Jesus. And Jesus turns and rebukes him, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” Once again, the Devil wants Jesus to renounce the Father’s will and follow his, and once again Jesus rebukes him.

There is a right and a wrong, good and evil. Believe it or not, we know the difference. After Adam and Eve had eaten of the fruit the Lord said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil.” And as Paul teaches in his Letter to the Hebrews, we can train ourselves “to distinguish good from evil.” However, even though we know and can distinguish good from evil, we are not always certain because of sin. Because of our own sin, there will always be this gray area, so when it comes to instructing others and even discerning for ourselves, we must remember that there are two sides that stand in complete contrast of one another. There is what the world wants and what God wants. Darkness and Light. Yet, in the middle – where we reside – there is often confusion. The etymology of the word confusion is to pour-together..

Most folks know that if you pour yellow and blue together you get green, but the confusion that comes from pouring good and evil together is not so simple and that is what the Devil is very good at. Blatant evil – darkness – is easy to spot, but this gray area, this confusion can be quite murky. Harry Truman said it best, “If you can’t convince them, confuse them.” The Devil is a master of this. So how are we to respond? How will we be able to separate the good from evil, the darkness from light, the way of God and the way of the Devil? It is never simple but there is a wonderful story in First Kings about the Prophet Elijah that will assist us in beginning to clear the murkiness.

Elijah is being pursued by those who will not tolerate his words. They seek to kill him, so he flees to the mountains. While there the Lord comes and speaks to him and asked, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” Elijah pours out all his problems. In his voice you can hear the confusion, the anxiety, the lack of peace in his soul. So the Lord tells him, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.”

“Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.”

Then the Lord asked him the exact same question He had asked him before, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” Surprisingly, Elijah answers him with the exact same word, but this time you can hear the calmness in his voice and the lack of anxiety. You can hear the peace as he speaks with our God. Elijah could not understand the words of God while in the whirlwind or the earthquake or the fire. He couldn’t understand the voice of the Lord while in the confusion. It was only in the peace of that “gentle whisper” that he heard God, and it was then that God spoke very specific instructions to Elijah on how to proceed.

How will we be able to separate the good from evil, the darkness from light, to be able to come out of the confusion of those gray areas? Ultimately, how will we know the direction that will lead us to God?

This is what the Lord says, from Jeremiah 6, “Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.”

How will we know? The answer lies in the peace. In the gentle whisper, the still small voice.

You may think, “We have a priest now. Like Athanasius with the three monks, he will tell us what to do.” I hope you won’t be disappointed, but that is not my job. Instead, I pray that we will find that peace, that we will hear that gentle whisper, and that together we will stand at the crossroads and discover the ancient path – the good way – and together will walk in it.

What will we discover on that path? It won’t be the secrets to the universe or a formula for world peace or some narrowly defined agenda or any other grandly conceived scheme. No. Instead, we will discover love, but not the kind of love expressed in a Hallmark card. We will discover the kind of love that hangs upon a cross. A kind of love that unites us one to another and a kind of love that unites us all to our God.

“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’  This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’  All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

If, together, we discover nothing else along the way, this will be more than enough.