Last Sunday, the season of Epiphany made a spiritual turn. From Christmas until February 2, the liturgical year emphasizes Jesus as God’s manifestation of light in the world. We’ve now entered an odd shoulder season in the Christian calendar, a “pre-Lent,” also known as Shrovetide. Instead of reflecting on Jesus-as-light, we’re invited to think about how our lives bring light to the world.
During the three weeks of Shrovetide, the church reminds us that “You are the light of the world.” But being light isn’t easy. This trio of weeks leads into the deeper introspection of Lent that awaits us.
Today’s readings from the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament remind us that following God’s way is a life of choosing — as we re-orient our hearts toward divine love and justice — over and over again.
Deuteronomy 30:15-20
Moses said, “See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I am commanding you today, by loving the Lord your God, walking in his ways, and observing his commandments, decrees, and ordinances, then you shall live and become numerous, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to possess. But if your heart turns away and you do not hear, but are led astray to bow down to other gods and serve them, I declare to you today that you shall perish; you shall not live long in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him; for that means life to you and length of days, so that you may live in the land that the Lord swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.”
Matthew 5:21-37
Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not murder’; and ‘whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, ‘You fool,’ you will be liable to the hell of fire. So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift. Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are on the way to court with him, or your accuser may hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison. Truly I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny.
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell.
“It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
“Again, you have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but carry out the vows you have made to the Lord.’ But I say to you, Do not swear at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. Let your word be ‘Yes, Yes’ or ‘No, No’; anything more than this comes from the evil one.”
I always dread when this passage from the Sermon on the Mount is read in church. In it, Jesus addressed the crowd with antitheses: “You have heard that it was said” (fill in the commandment) “but I say to you. . .”
Why dread? Because, over the years, I’ve heard more antisemitic sermons on these verses than possibly any other lectionary offering. We tend to hear the “You have heard . . . but . . .” pedagogical construct as a wrong way/right way contrast. But that conventional interpretation of Jesus’ teaching is dangerous — leading Christians to believe that Jesus was replacing the Law by showing it to be inadequate for salvation. The Law is only good insofar as it reveals sin.
But Jesus himself stated (in the verses immediately preceding today’s passage) his own intention:
Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished.
Jesus loved the Law. Jesus knew and loved the commandments. Jesus observed Torah. He certainly knew the text from Deuteronomy — a portion of the Torah that Jews refer to as “Nitzavim,” Israel standing before God to make a covenant. If the people keep the Law and the commands, life and blessing will follow; if the people fail to do so, death and disaster will be the result. If . . . then; Life or death.
The faith of Israel is in this covenant. God promises. The people choose and follow. It is that simple.
Jesus doesn’t do away with the covenant. He is very specific about not abolishing the law. But he is, like any good rabbi, asking a question: Why is it so hard to choose and keep the Law?
On the surface, it appears that it would be not terribly hard to keep (at least most) of the Ten Commandments. Murder, stealing, lying, adultery — the majority of us know if we’ve done any of these things or if we’ve ever been tempted to do so. Jesus affirms the commandments throughout his sermon. He doesn’t replace them with new commandments. Instead, he seems to be pressing his listeners toward a deeper self-awareness of the law.
You say you’ve never murdered . . . but I ask you, where does murder really begin?
You say you’ve never committed adultery . . . but I ask you, what is the first step toward infidelity?
You say you’ve never sworn falsely . . . but I ask you, are you true to your word?
Jesus isn’t dismissing, diminishing, or showing the Law to be inadequate. He enlarged and widened the commandments from external obedience (which, of course, is good — and you’ll never find Jesus saying otherwise) to include internal self-examination and to include the secret things that shame our hearts. In the process, he points out that we may keep the letter of the law and yet violate its deeper spirit of compassion and healing.
This kind of self-examination is at the core of biblical spirituality. The Psalmist cried out: “Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts!” and “See if there be any grievous way in me!” Indeed, the Deuteronomy covenant speaks of obedience, but identifies the heart as the wellspring of the law.
The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus’ most extensive teaching — and it is largely his interpretation of the Law. The whole sermon, from the Beatitudes through practical exhortation, is a masterwork of theological creativity. And the entire thing, despite the various issues it touches upon, centers on a single point: following God’s way means choosing a path that begins in our hearts.
Jesus didn’t just tell people to examine their hearts and straighten up. He gave this listeners concrete examples of what it meant to live according to the commandments. This is what murder actually means: anger, insult, and hatred. This is what adultery actually means: lust and casting your wife aside. This is what false swearing means: not living up to your word. Have you ever been angry? Desired another person’s spouse? Not meant what you said?
Ouch.
Those examples wound the conscience — for whom among us hasn’t done such? Our hearts have turned away; we have not heard. Woe is us! Was Jesus trying to drive home the point that we can’t ever choose well? That we are sinners lost forever? Our hearts are hopelessly corrupt?
But the readings need not take us toward self-flagellation. Ultimately, today’s readings are all about choice. They assume we can choose.
And they invite us to choose: life or death?
Will we choose to follow a way of life? How do we choose? What is the source of our choices? What if we choose wrongly? Can we ever really choose well? Especially if we’re speaking of our own hurting hearts?
There’s an odd bit of human psychology at work here, something strangely contemporary. We live in an age of choices — a typical western grocery store has about 50,000 products from which you must choose — and perhaps we understand the difficulty of choice even better than the ancient audience of Jesus’ sermon. A entire science has emerged around choice. “That in order for people to understand the differences between the choices,” says researcher Sheena Iyenga, “they have to be able to understand the consequences associated with each choice, and that the consequences need to be felt in a vivid sort of way, in a very concrete way.”
I don’t mean to modernize Jesus’ teaching or imply that he understood the process of making choices. But this year, as I remember that Jesus came to fulfill — to “achieve” — the commandments, he made it perfectly clear — with poignant examples — that the law extends from the complexities and complications of human experience. Jesus pointed out the inner terrain of our mixed motives, what shames us, and the secrets we harbor inside. He put it all out there. He reveals which is within and gave us courage to face our own hearts. Everyone has done something wrong; everyone has broken the law; everyone has chosen poorly. You are still the light of the world. You are still blessed.
I don’t think Jesus was showing us that our hearts are incapable of choosing what is good. I think he pointed out that our choices involve far more than a surface agreement or external obedience. To choose life — to choose well — to live the commandments — engages our whole being, from whatever we hold in our hearts into the world. If we start with our hearts, where we hear the deepest compassion that God has for each of us even in these secret places, life and blessing await. We choose better when we know that love and forgiveness envelop us.
Jesus’ teaching isn’t this-versus-that. It isn’t replacement theology. The inner journey of self-understanding and the outer journey of blessing are of a piece — from Deuteronomy to the Sermon on the Mount. The more light we encounter within, the greater light we will be in the world.
To be or not to be is not the question, the vital question is how to be and how not to be.
― Abraham Joshua Heschel
INSPIRATION
My father was God and didn’t know it. He gave me
the ten commandments neither in thunder nor in fury, neither in fire nor in cloud
but in gentleness and in love. He added caresses and added kind words
adding, “I beg you,” and “please.” He sang keep and remember
in a single melody and he pleaded and cried quietly between one commandment and the next:
Don’t take your God’s name in vain; don’t take it, not in vain.
I beg you, don’t bear false witness against your neighbor. He hugged me tightly and whispered in my ear:
Don’t steal. Don’t commit adultery. Don’t murder. . .
— Yehuda Amichai, “The Eleventh and Twelfth Commandments,” please read the ENTIRE POEM HERE
“But I say to you” casts the net of God’s love wider than we would typically allow. “But I say to you” presses us to extend the arc of righteousness beyond the reasonable.
“But I say to you” names the truths of the injustices all around us but yet invites us to hope nonetheless.
— Karoline Lewis
We are called to say yes.
That the kingdom might break through
To renew and to transform
Our dark and groping world.
We stutter and we stammer
To the lone God who calls
And pleads a New Jerusalem
In the bloodied Sinai Straights.
We are called to say yes
That honeysuckle may twine
And twist its smelling leaves
Over the graves of nuclear arms.
We are called to say yes
That children might play
On the soil of Vietnam where the tanks
Belched blood and death.
We are called to say yes
That black may sing with white
And pledge peace and healing
For the hatred of the past.
We are called to say yes
So that nations might gather
And dance one great movement
For the joy of humankind . . .
— Edwina Gately, from “Called to Say Yes.” Please read the ENTIRE POEM HERE
Happy are they whose way is blameless,
who walk in the law of the Lord!
Happy are they who observe his decrees
and seek him with all their hearts!
Who never do any wrong,
but always walk in his ways.
You laid down your commandments,
that we should fully keep them.
Oh, that my ways were made so direct
that I might keep your statutes!
Then I should not be put to shame,
when I regard all your commandments.
I will thank you with an unfeigned heart,
when I have learned your righteous judgments.
I will keep your statutes;
do not utterly forsake me.
— Psalm 119:1-8
LENT AT THE COTTAGE
Ash Wednesday is February 22.
This Lent, The Cottage will explore the EMPTY ALTARS of our days.
We are living in a time of iconoclasm. We've stripped the altars of both state and church. America's spiritual landscape is now marked by empty altars everywhere.
What does it mean to live in such an age? And what comes next? Will we put up new icons? How do we go about that? Can we reimagine the sacred space in which we live?
I’ll be exploring EMPTY ALTARS in TWO WAYS:
1. WEEKLY DEVOTIONAL REFLECTIONS for paid subscribers at The Cottage. “Empty Altars” is the theme of my next book project — so you’ll be getting a preview of what I’m working on in addition to inspirational material for your Lenten journey.
If you aren’t already a paid subscriber and want to receive the Empty Altars devotional reflections, please upgrade here:
2. An EMPTY ALTARS online class with me and Tripp Fuller. The Cottage and Homebrewed Christianity are teaming up once again for a mind-blowing, heart-expanding class this Lent — and our focus this year is history, spirituality, and social change. The course will begin on Monday, February 27. It requires a SEPARATE SIGN-UP HERE — and is offered for free. Voluntary donations are welcome.
* * *
If you want the ENTIRE EXPERIENCE, make sure you are registered for the class AND have a Cottage paid subscription. The registration and the subscription will give you full access.
Of course, you are welcome to do one without the other — they are complimentary explorations but each is beneficial on its own.
Why couldn't Jesus command us to obsess over everything, to try to control and manipulate people, to try not to breathe at all, or to pay attention, stomp away to brood when people annoy us, and then eat a big bag of Hershey's Kisses in bed?
― Anne Lamott
Question for Diana: We studied your February 12 essay in our Scripture Encore Sunday School class. We were truly blessed, but there was a question I felt truly inadequate to answer. Your comment about your experiencing/witnessing anti-Semitic sermons on this text. I responded that I myself have heard it taught repeatedly that the primary purpose of the law was to expose our sinful nature--and perhaps that’s what Diana meant? As a spring-board to increasingly aggressive anti-Semitic assertions?
Or, maybe, we poor wretched souls need a primer in what ant-semitism sounds like?
I have just started reading Michelle Obama's "The Light We Carry." I think she is a remarkable woman.
- Doug Carpenter, Birmingham