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“When Far-Away Comes Home”
Romans 12:14-18
Luke 6:27-36

September 3, 2006 - Kim M. Henning

The war in Iraq came close to home this week. Throughout Manitowoc county, flags are half-mast. One of our own, Shaun Novak, was killed by a roadside bomb. A war that has been half a planet away has come close to us.

We do not know what to say. Most of us are stunned to silence as we well should be.

We do not know what to say. A war that we watched on television has now left an ugly scar close at home.

We do not know what to say. Like Rachel, in the book of Jeremiah, bitterly grieving the death of her children—refusing to be comforted-----a family down the street grieves the death of a son who was much to young to die this way.

We do not know what to say.

Shaun’s parents live just three houses away from us. The outpouring of support has been phenomenal. Since Monday, the street has been lined with automobiles of those vigilantly offering their love. Driving past our neighbor’s home many times this week, there is a dark, profound feeling of sadness that all the platitudes of the world could not fill.

I had planned on preaching on a different scripture this morning. The prescribed Gospel reading for this morning has Jesus and the Pharisees debating a time-honored tradition of ‘hand-washing.’ Like the church today, the synagogue had rituals and traditions that were deeply embedded within believers.

Jesus critiques that ritual of hand-washing. Evil, Jesus said, is an inside job. The human heart is what needs washing. The human heart, Jesus said, is the origin of fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. “All these come from within, and they defile a person,” Jesus said.

I was going to preach on that. And perhaps I should have because Jesus taught that the wretched side of humanity has its origin within us. Oh, the human heart....

But as I repeatedly drove past our neighbor’s home this week, the absurdity of a young man’s death suffered in war refused to let me go. Another way other than war has to resolve the world’s conflicts. With nuclear and computer technology and increasingly a mind-set that is bent on terror—another way has to be proposed, lest we annihilate ourselves. There just has to be another way. This can’t go on.

Barbara Brown Taylor speaks truth when she says, “people of faith are as divided over war—as they are divided over abortion, gun control, homosexuality and many other things.” Increasingly we find it more difficult to talk with each other about those things that keep us awake at night. We are filled with fear and anger, and we all address it differently. Each of us battles the human disposition towards revenge----

Where is the mind of God? If we believe God to have a will, what would that will look like? How can we speak this crises theologically? How can a heart of faith, respond?

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus proposes “A Way.” As someone once said, Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount is either the way of a lunatic or the best laid plans of God that have rarely been tried. In one of the most revolutionary teachings ever set before humanity Jesus set into motion a way of living that the church has been compelled to speak.

“Love your enemies.

Do good to those who hate you.

Bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.

If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt.

Give to everyone who begs from you, and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again.

Do to others as you would have them do to you.

If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?

For even sinners love those who love them.

If you do good to those who do good to you,

what credit is that to you?

For even sinners do the same.

If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you?

Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again.

But love your enemies,

do good,

and lend, expecting nothing in return.

Your reward will be great, and you will be called children of the Most High;

for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.

Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”

Are you like me? I feel like I speak with childish naivete when I say those words. They cause a blush to come over me. In a powerful world that decorates war, ‘love your enemies?’ In a world pf sophisticated military technology, ‘bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you?’

It takes courage to utter the teachings of Jesus. Fundamental to Jesus is that followers of his need to learn how to live with ‘enemies.’ Jesus was always pushing his followers to go the second or the third mile. “Love your enemies. Pray for those who persecute you. Your reward will be great, and you will be called children of the Most High.”

The Kingdom of God ‘comes near’----when we seek to practice the way that Jesus sets forth.

Years ago, there was a German philosopher----Frederick Nietzsche, set into motion a movement called, ‘the death of God.’ What Nietzsche’s saw in the human being is a will to power. Humanity’s will is to be powerful. We want to control. We want to overpower.

In contrast a person by the name of Albert Schweitzer struggled with Nietzsche’s teaching because technically, Nietzsche spoke what is true in this world. Humanity’s will is power. That is the secular mind that dominates thinking. Schweitzer struggled, ‘what is the way of God?

Schweitzer struggled—an extremely well-educated American spent most of his years in Africa seeking to practice his faith. And one day it occurred to him as he was floating down the Lambarene River in Africa that the phrase that speaks to the Christian mind is, “Reverence For Life.”

Said Schweitzer, “I am life that wants to live in the midst of all other life that wants to live. A thinking (person) feels compelled to approach all life with the same reverence he has for his own.”

This week, a war in a far-away place came close to home. A family grieves an inconsolable loss. The war is no longer ‘over there.’ It is here.

As people of faith, what we proclaim is that God also is here. When Jesus was born, he was named, ‘Emmanuel,’ God with us! God is not far-off, but has come near.

Is it too much to hope for.....the Kingdom of God—here? Now?

Is it too much to hope for.....that we love enemies—here? Now?

Is it too much to hope for.....as the Prophet spoke, that ‘swords would be made into plowshares, and spears into pruning hooks, and neither shall they learn war any more—here? Now?

Is it too much to hope for.....that all nations might be called to repentance—here? Now?