New Thoughts (
12/14/05 -12/21/05
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At this point, Jesus has reached the thematic climax of His restatement of the Law. Later in His ministry He returns to this message, declaring the two loves commanded of man to be the fundamental point of the Scriptures. Jesus has been correcting a number of misconceptions regarding the Law in the course of this discussion, and with each correction there has been that sense of having greater concern for others than for self. Now, He brings the point home. Love cannot know boundaries. Yes, you know well enough that you are to love your neighbor, but I tell you, even your enemy is your neighbor!
Jesus does not turn to weighty theological arguments to support His point. He does not so much as quote a single passage of Scripture to refute this common misunderstanding. Instead, He simply points out the two extremes of morality as viewed by the Jews, and then forces them to notice which they more closely resemble.
On the one hand, He holds out the example of God’s love. God’s love, He notes, is not reserved for those who love Him. Were it not so, the earth would be a vacant lot! No, but His love for man is impartial, and He shares His bounty equally with friends and enemies. This truth, once put in such light, no man could deny. The examples He gives of sun and rain are indeed clear evidence of this impartiality unless one would deny God the control of creation. This was not likely to be an issue amongst His listeners.
In contrast, He points to those the Jews despised as unclean beyond all hope of redemption: tax-gatherers and Gentiles. As much as they hated these two classes, they could not help but be aware of them and likewise to be aware of some of their habits and characteristics. Even these, He notes, will greet their friends. Even these will lend when they are certain of return. Even these treat their friends well.
In all this, He looks at His listeners and asks them to consider: If your love is reserved for your lovers, are you more akin to God or to these unredeemable men? The very fact that they thought of these men as they did was indication that they had violated the Law’s requirement of loving their neighbors. Until they could see that they were still far closer to their standard of sinfulness than to their standard of godliness, they would not find reason to change. We do well to look to ourselves in this same light. For us, the unredeemable ones might no longer be tax-collectors and Gentiles. Yet, there remain those we tend to think beyond redemption. If this is the case, it’s time to hear Jesus’ question again: How different are we from these unredeemable ones? Who is it you despise? Consider well that they do as much good as you do in many cases. As I read recently, one can find plenty of sinners and unbelievers who are full of good deeds. In many cases, you may find they are doing more good deeds than believers.
The message of God to us as we recognize this to be true is twofold. First, it is a call for us to humble ourselves once more, to seek more diligently after the righteousness He has called us to. It is a call to become dissatisfied with what has passed for obedience and righteousness in our lives and press on toward the true goal of loving as He loves, with impartiality and thoroughness. Second, it is a call for us to reassess those unredeemable ones. After all, if we were so like them even in our redeemed state and much more like them prior to redemption, how can we think to deny them the same redemption that has come to us? Who can we look at with honesty and suggest that there is absolutely no possibility of God saving them? From my own experience I must confess that there are many who have struck me as beyond such hope. God, however, sees no such thing. He sees hope for all men because He is hope for all men. He calls us to tell the world of His Truth, to spread word to every tribe, nation and tongue. He does not instruct us to hold back from any man. He does not suggest that we assess the likelihood of a positive hearing before we speak out. He does not give us a test to determine who is worthy of His message and who is not. He simply says to tell them of His love and of His offer of redemption and restoration. He says to continue His mission of seeking and saving the lost. Further, He specifically teaches against such attempts at keeping the congregation absolutely pure. Look to the parable of the Wheat and the Tares! Yes, there will be those who only appear to believe, faithless seekers of community and approval. Don’t trouble yourselves about them over much. The time will come when they will be removed from the field we call the Church, but not by the hand of man. Man’s hands are too rough, and he is too prone to make mistakes. Leave it to the Master to purify His own.
While there is this subtext regarding our opinion of self and other, the overall message remains that love is not to be confused with self-interest. Looking across the examples that Jesus gives, each instance displays a reserved love, a love that is limited to those who are reasonably certain to respond in kind. The expressions of kindness which ought to flow out of this love we are called to have are no less prone to restriction. This is where Luke chooses to focus attention, whereas Matthew leans more on issues of fellowship. Both aspects are important as part of the love which is to be ours. An emotionless giving to the needy is not love. I’m not entirely certain what it is, but it is not love. Guilt, perhaps? By the same token all the gushing emotions of fellowship are as nothing if they leave the need untouched.
The love we are called to, we must recall, is such a love as finds its joy in its object – in God, and in all of mankind which He created in His image. With the call to love our enemies, Jesus has removed any possible boundary we might have thought to put on the requirements of love. The love we are called to, as it reflects God, must also be active. It cannot leave a need unmet when it is in its power to meet the need. This is what Luke is looking at. Lending is not loving when it limits itself to safe ventures. Love is not loving when it is all about being loved back. Love is love when it has lost all sight of itself in loving.
What does that look like, this unconcerned lending which Luke calls us to? If it is lending with no thought for return, is it not giving? Zhodiates suggests that the meaning of this passage is that we ought not to lend so richly that we cause the recipient to despair at his inability to repay. The dictionaries are at odds, it seems, as to the exact sense in which ‘expecting’ is to be taken; whether it is a matter of expectant hope or lost hope. However one chooses to understand this, it seems to me there must remain a distinction between lending and giving outright. Let me suggest that what we are called to here is a form of giving which does not erode the responsibility of the recipient, yet is merciful towards the recipient.
The welfare state that we have created here in America has not behaved in this fashion. It has long since abandoned any sense of lending, and moved right on past even giving to reach the state of entitlement. Those who receive such ‘charity’ are greatly harmed by what they get, for it serves to scrape away at any sense of self-worth, any sense of responsibility, leaving them more in need after the help than they were before. This welfare state is distinctly not what Jesus establishes by His message. He calls us to lend responsibly. That is not to say that we are to lend only to such degree as we are pretty certain the recipient can repay. Such limitations placed on our assistance puts us back in the ‘even sinners’ camp. Rather, our lending ought to be – so far as it is within our ability – sufficient to the need. It is not, however, to be offered as a gift or entitlement. The fact that it is a loan ought not to be lost on the one to whom we lend. The tempering of love and mercy comes in how we handle that loan thereafter. We are not to be more concerned with our return than with the good our loan has done. That’s the point. Leave it as a loan, but do not pursue it like the typical bill collector. Let it lie. If the one to whom you loaned is willing and able to repay, let him do so at his pace, for in repaying you he has repaid his own self-worth as well. If he is unable and unwilling, let it go. If, however, he is willing but unable to repay you, this is the place for mercy and forgiveness. Do not leave him hanging with that burden upon his head. It is a cruel punishment to feel oneself indebted beyond one’s ability to ever repay. This is, after all, where we stand with our own God and Creator except we have known the atoning work of His Son. Through His Son that debt that was beyond all hope of repaying was marked down as paid in full. How, then, can we think to hold others in debt bondage? Lend, then, with no concern for that which was lent. If it comes back, praise God for the return. If it does not, praise God for the opportunity to be His means of provision to another.
In recent weeks, my morning reading in Table Talk has been focused on John’s letters. As such, I find myself wondering how to fit together what Jesus says in Mt 5:47 with John’s words in 2Jn 10. Now, the overall message Jesus is teaching is one of inclusiveness. That said, however, there is nothing in this message that requires us to greet anybody and everybody with the same degree of welcome. We are indeed called to love our enemies, and even to bless them. We are not, however, called to ignore the fact that they are indeed enemies. How does this balance? If I look to God’s example, as Jesus directs my attention by His own declarations, I see that He points to the way God provides for both good and bad. Indeed, were He to restrict His providence solely to those who are good, who would remain? Yet, Christian experience must surely make us aware that there are those to whom God directs more than simple provision, that there are those He has chosen for particular favor, even as He chose the Jews as His particular people.
Is it unbelievable, then, that we are likewise to have a love that transcends and ignores the distinction between friend and enemy, and yet at the same time have a store of love that is for His children alone? The love we have for our brethren in Christ is not a love that we can share equally with anybody we happen across. I cannot offer myself with the same full trust, intimacy and fellowship to those who are not fellow citizens in God’s kingdom. I can be civil, by all means. I can be as helpful to these foreigners as to my fellows. I can refuse to be riled up and offended by their attempts to provoke or destroy me, knowing that they treated my Lord and King likewise. But, I cannot welcome them as I would the bearers of God’s Truth, for they are liars by nature.
Here, I look to that hedge which John puts up to mark the boundary of that love we are to have for our enemies. That love does not include inviting sons of Satan into our own households. It does not include welcoming those who would spread lies in hopes of deceiving the children of God as if they were true ministers. Indeed, how should I react to such lying preachers and teachers? John’s instructions are clear. Don’t even offer them greetings! Why? Because such greetings from one who is known to be a leader of God’s people would be seen as sanctioning the message these false teachers bear. Inasmuch as simple civility would lend credence to their lies, it is our duty to refuse such civility.
Here is a limit to the attempts to bring churches together in unity. Where that unity would require that I join hands with a lying, false teacher, I cannot participate. Were the call for a unified church to require me to join hand in hand with one of these fellowships that believes that God is pleased to find unrepentant gays teaching in His name, claiming His sanction on their deeds, I must demur. I must even denounce, and make it clear that these doctrines of devils are not to be misconstrued as messages from the righteous and true Redeemer. If unity means giving the hand of fellowship to the liberal theologian who no longer believes that God is alive, the Bible is sacred and true or that the miracles reported in its pages were truly miraculous; how could I do so? These ‘spokesmen for God’ have declared Him a liar! How shall I, a lover of the God of Truth, the very essence and substance of Truth lend my support to such as these?
Consider the return of Paul to Jerusalem, where the Apostles, those who had soaked in the entire ministry of Jesus start to end, cautiously considered his claim of fellowship. These men were not willing to simply accept his claim at face value. They must first hear him out, particularly in matters of doctrine, to be certain that he was truly teaching in one accord with themselves. This was settled, yet unsettled for a very long time, as one can witness in Paul’s accounts. To this day, there are any number who will seek to make Paul’s theology something thoroughly distinct from that of John, of Peter, and of James. These folks insist on seeing an argument of sorts amongst these apostolic authors, when they ought to bear in mind the unity of the Spirit by which they taught and wrote. Rather than magnifying the distinctive emphasis that each of the apostles had in his own ministry, we are far better served to contemplate and understand how these distinctive emphases correlate and reflect upon the one message of the One True God.
Don’t, then, restrict your love to only your fellows and friends, but at the same time, don’t be so indiscriminate in your loving as to welcome lies and falsehood into your midst. Even as you must reject some who wear the name of Christian from fellowship, knowing by the fruit of their lives that these claims are false, you must still see in them the creation God has made. In spite of their present condition, in spite of the mandate of rejection that is upon them, they remain of far greater value than the sum of their actions and thoughts to date. However far gone they may be at the moment, hope is not lost except they have gone to their grave. So long as their remains breath in their lungs, there is hope that the Son of God might yet remove the blinders from their eyes and restore them to truth and faith. Here, we must learn to refuse fellowship, to turn such a one over to the devil for a time that he might be saved, and yet never cease to love.
It occurs to me that the issue Jesus is addressing is one of lacking sufficient compassion. By contrast, John is addressing the issue of allowing compassion to run rough-shod over good sense. Were it not for this fallen human nature of ours, I suppose John need not have said anything, for we would have understood it from the start. But, as we tend to overreact to the corrective word, swinging entirely too far in the opposite direction, the boundary needed setting. We are to love our enemies, to be certain, but not to the point of contributing to the destruction of our friends.
Realize that this is exactly what has been happening in the world we live in. What once governed Western culture, however much the revisionists may seek to deny it, was Christian compassion. This did not ensure a perfect leadership, and that culture has certainly made its share of blunders and outright horrors. But under the rule of compassion, that culture never found itself called upon to harbor its enemies within its own borders at the cost of its own existence. Yet, today, with Christian compassion replaced by multi-cultural, humanist enforced tolerance, we are told we must not only invite the enemy in to dwell in our own tents, but that we ought to be circumspect about our own beliefs and values, lest we make the enemy uncomfortable as he infiltrates. There are sufficient pulpits in the land that have been taken over by the very false teachers against which John speaks that we are even advised by the so-called ‘Church’ to welcome the Hindu, the Buddhist and the Moslem into our fellowship. These are the ones that will try and convince us that all religions celebrate the same God, they just don’t realize it. These are the ones Jude warns us about, who have ‘crept in unnoticed, long since marked out for condemnation.’ They are ungodly, turning God’s grace into licentiousness and denying “our ONLY Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.”
Don’t fall for it! Don’t let the supposed authority that these perverse priests of darkness claim for themselves cause you to follow in their folly. Do not be deceived! God is not mocked. Whatever these men sow is exactly what they shall reap. If they have sown to their flesh, they will reap corruption as the flesh is corrupt (Gal 6:7-8). It is precisely because they have insisted on worshiping creation over God that God has given them over to their lusts and degradation, for they have proven unwilling to acknowledge God (even in His own pulpit!) and have therefore been given over to depravity. Look at them! They promote unrighteous greed, slander those who hold to the Truth, hate God for condemning their sinful practices. They lack all understanding of the subject they claim to teach, and are not to be trusted. They boast of their advanced and enlightened ways, yet they show by their teachings that they hate God. They invent all manner of evil (even in the name of the Lord) , practicing things they know to be worthy of their own death, and not satisfied with that, they teach others to do likewise with their full approval (Ro 1:25-32).
These are men who are so offended by the Gospel that they must seek to tear it down. The Koran does not affect them so, because they know it is false. Buddhism and Hinduism do not disturb them in the least, for they recognize from the start that these are empty myths of no concern. Besides, the ‘morality’ of such religions is no challenge at all. It easily degrades to a matter of doing what you like now, and leaving it to some other incarnation of self to pay the bill. Why, this is an easy religion for modern man! Is this not exactly the thing all the environmentalists and activists declare, that we are placing burdens on the shoulders of our children and our children’s children? It is an easy thing, a matter of long practice, for man to ignore anything that does not immediately impact his own present security and comfort, most importantly comfort. If he is willing to leave the burden of his failures to his children, how hard is it for him to leave them to some future self he will never know?
Ah! But come the Gospel, and the words of Jesus, the very voice of God’s own intelligence, and these men must look at themselves in the light of Truth, even as those who heard Him live and in person. The reaction is predictable. Men forced to look at themselves without the rosy colors of self-image, men forced to admit their sins as sins, to confess themselves the criminals they are, must either face the discomfort and be redeemed, or lash out at that which seeks to expose them. My thoughts turn to Matthew once again, supposing him to have been present amongst those listening. He had choices to make regarding how he would hear what Jesus was saying. Would he take offense at the derogatory references made at his expense? For he was a tax-collector, and here was Jesus holding up that profession as the standard for sinfulness. Would he get past that and hear the real standard that Jesus was reestablishing? Did he grasp the impossibility of such a calling? “Be perfect as your Father is perfect?” Who could really believe themselves capable of attaining a standard such as this? Well, of course, that was the whole point of the message, and that Matthew comprehended it well, if not immediately, is evidenced by the very fact that we have his Gospel to read today.
What is perhaps noteworthy in this regard is that Jesus never actually moves to correct the opinion of that profession of Matthew’s. He does not say so much as a word that would change the standing of the tax collector in the hearts and minds of this people. No, He merely pulls every prop out from under those who think themselves somehow better. It is the nature of man to try and minimize the sin he cannot or will not control. We would far prefer to believe the lie that we are good people than to face the truth that we are not. We would gladly ignore the obvious sin of our fellow if it meant we could ignore our own as well. But, God will not have any of that. Look at those closing comments, both in Luke’s and Matthew’s coverage of this message: Be like your Father. Who can hear that requirement and still think that they have complied?
It goes so far that even as I consider the lexicons I find in myself the urge to lower the bar just a bit. “Be perfect, as your Father is perfect.” Wow! It’s hard enough to be merciful in the same way and to the same degree as He is. Now, that bar is lifted even farther beyond reach. Be perfect! The lexicon would allow me to understand this in the fashion I reflect in my attempt to paraphrase this. Grow up! Be mature! In fairness, I think that sense is there, but the comparison to the Father makes it clear that there is more to it than that. The sense is lost if I am told to grow up as my Father is grown up. No, the idea being conveyed is far more than simply ‘grow up.’ It becomes more evident as we recall that we are created in His image, created to bear His image and reflect His nature. In light of that, the call of Jesus tells us that we are to carry that responsibility to its proper end, to fulfill the calling that is ours as bearers of His image, to grow into the mature image, to be complete in Him, lacking no necessary thing in our resemblance to Him.
It ought to be clear to any one of us that this perfection is sadly beyond any ability we have to comply. We cannot assess ourselves honestly and find any hope of so much as approaching this standard. The goal is as far and away beyond our ability as His ways are above our ways and His thoughts above our thoughts. It is a commandment designed to bring us to despair. But, it is not a commandment designed to leave us there. It is designed to force us to cease from looking for ways we can, by dint of effort, satisfy that which our Lord commands; and look to Him who alone can achieve in us what the Law truly requires.
This is the work He has begun in me. This is the work which I can join with the apostles in declaring certain to be completed by Him who has begun it. This is the perfection which we are told will not be completed in us until that very moment when we stand together with Him, and find that we are finally and fully fit to behold Him as He truly is. Though Jesus would teach that those who had seen Him had seen the Father, yet the Scriptures remained true in declaring that no man could see God and live. The sinfulness that remains in man remains sufficient to earn him an instant death sentence should he step into the presence of such Purity. But, the Son of God, Jesus the Righteous, Savior of All, has initiated in us a work designed to bring about that very perfection of maturity which is required of us.
Because this is a matter of process and not of an instant, I can read with agreement the words of Zhodiates in regard to this word of perfection: “Perfection is not a static state.” No, indeed! The ultimate goal of that perfection, that perfection toward which we draw closer as the Spirit works upon us, may well be a static state. Indeed, I suppose by definition it must be, as perfection is that state which lacks nothing for its completeness. If it lacks nothing, then for what reason would it ever change? Yet, in my approach to that goal, there are goals set for me by my perfect Tutor. There is, in each day, in each moment, in each event, a perfection I am called to achieve. It may be the response to another’s hurt. It may be the refusal to be drawn into gossip, slander, or anger. It may be that role of peacemaker of which Jesus has spoken. It may be the face of forgiveness to one who feels himself unforgivable. It may also be the voice of Truth, forcing the unrepentant to confront themselves. It is not a static state because in my imperfection there is always something lacking, and so, there is always something specific that the Holy Spirit is particularly seeking to bring to my attention, that I may indeed grow up.
What I lose sight of is that the maturity God calls me to is the perfection that is His. That is my mature state. Until I have attained to that perfection of love, mercy, justice, righteousness and holiness I am still in my youth – a child of God still seeking to be fully a son of God. Yet in commanding me to a mercy that is just like my Father’s, to a perfection that is just like my Father’s, Jesus is doing what He has been doing throughout His comments on the Law: restoring things to their original intent. A mercy that is merely like every other man’s is worthless in the scales of eternity. Only a mercy that fully reflects the mercy of the Father will do. In reality, the call to perfection is exactly the same call Moses delivered from God to Israel. At God’s command, he was sent with the law, “Be holy, because I AM holy” (Lev 19:2). “You are to be blameless before God” (Dt 18:13). How can I think myself blameless before Him if my reflection of His character remains incomplete? How can I fail to see that my reflection of Him is incomplete?
Neither am I allowed an escape from these demands by the New Covenant that God wrought in Jesus. The same strictures continue upon me, the same demands are made of a holiness that is holy in God’s sight, and not just in man’s. Paul found sufficient reason to pursue that perfection in the promises God has given to His children. With all He has promised us, he wrote to the church in Corinth, surely we must labor to obey Him! Surely, we must cleanse ourselves of everything that defiles, until we are perfect in holiness. It is required by our respect for God who made all these promises (2Co 7:1). Now, even Paul, who reminds me along with the Corinthians that such perfection is required, does not so much as claim that perfection for himself. He understands full well that the real achievement of this perfection must await the Christ through Whom it may be achieved. I do not mean to suggest that I have arrived at this perfection, he told the Philippians. I know I have not, but I press on with all effort, straining forward toward that which Jesus has obtained on my behalf, ever pushing onward to the goal. He then holds himself out as an encouragement to me. “If you are indeed mature, share this attitude of mine” (Php 3:12-15). Even as he challenges me to never tire of the race to perfect holiness, he reminds me of God’s promise, my hope of attaining to the goal. If, in any way, I am not one with this attitude of wholehearted pursuit of holiness, God will make me aware of it.
What He does for His listeners in this sermon Jesus is delivering, He does still through many and sundry means today. In those moments when I think I’ve arrived, He looks at me and asks, “How are you different from any sinner?” I tell you, it’s a question I need to hear often. In those times when I think that all the things I do for church and for God somehow make me better than those who don’t, I need to hear that question. When I encounter the lost, and my reaction is to be offended and angered by their ways, I need to hear that question. When I think my understanding of God has surpassed that of my teachers or even of my brothers, and I can no longer hear what they are saying as coming from the mouth of God, I need to hear that question. And, if ever I should become so foolish as to think I have an answer to this question in myself, let it be followed with one other: “Is your perfection, then, as your Father’s?”
