This week we continue our reading from Jesus' Sermon in the Plain in Luke. This is in contrast to the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, in which Jesus' audience is only Jewish, male and hierarchical (the twelve apostles). There, as the New Moses, he ascends the holy mountain and gives his new law, the law of love. Now, in today's pericope, the plain is highly symbolic, for Jesus' audience is mixed -- Jewish and Gentile, male and female, all as equals. Those described no doubt closely resembled the church as it was constituted by the time the Lucan Gospel was released some sixty years after Jesus left this world. Whereas, on the Mount, Jesus' message was about torquing up Torah -- calling the people to go far above and beyond mere legal observance -- here he presents to a new way of life contrary to the conventions of Graeco-Roman culture. That world emphasized reciprocity -- helping those who could in turn help you, taking care of your own, repaying good and evil. He challenges the audience and us to go beyond common expectations to a whole, fresh approach to life.
I remember when Dr. Tony Campolo came to Tulsa and addressed a large group of Christian clergy. He began his presentation by saying that he was not a Christian and neither were we.! That shocking statement was based on today's Gospel reading [Lk 27-38]. Let's take a look at what Jesus expected our new norms of conduct to be as Kingdom people, norms very few indeed would endorse, for they challenge our culture of machismo and violence, military worship and imperialism, consumerism that feeds selfishness and fuels accumulation, and waste of resources, and feeds on inequality of wealth,.
One important teaching was peaceful non-violent resistance. We were to abjure violence, to turn the other cheek to an attacker, and to offer our shirt to someone who has stolen our coat. Imagine our meeting every form of aggression with a non-violent response. I still remember when our middle son was in high school in Texas and I was in seminary, he came home one day to tell me that a bully had punched him. I asked if he had done anything to bring it on and how he had responded. He answered that he had done nothing to provoke the attack and he reacted to his attacker by telling him that, as a Christian, he would not fight him, that violence accomplishes nothing. My son said that, at that point in the encounter, the other boy just turned and walked off. Situation defused. I was very amazed.
A second teaching was loving and praying for the wrong people. Loving and prayers for your family and friends are fine, said Jesus, there is nothing at all special about that. Instead, he said, love your enemies, do good things for those who hate you, pray for your abusers. I am reminded of the lives and ministry of Martin Luther King in our tradition, and Gandhi outside it. Hearts can be turned!
Another element in the sermon was not to ask for restitution of your property is taken, not to expect repayment of a loan, and to give to everyone who begs of you. That requires an extraordinary level of detachment from things, especially in our selfish, consumerist culture. At a family funeral many years ago, I spoke with two ladies who remembered my grandfather. They said that Grandmother used to get really upset because Grandad would not go chase after items that had been borrowed by someone and never returned. "If they can live with it, I can live without it," he would say, and that settled the matter.
So we are here challenged to be seriously counter-cultural. Just imagine a world in which everyone acted as Jesus here counsels us to do. Imagine the Kingdom of God. .
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