Sunday, February 16, 2020. Rev. Dr. Scott Ramsey, preaching.Scripture Readings: Deuteronomy 30:11-20; Matthew 5:21-37

To access the Bulletin, click on SAVE PDF to download or open in new window.Note: Audio files (podcast) are active for six months only.

SERMON TEXT

Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount, from Matthew 5-7,

constitute the core of his teaching about what the life of discipleship in the

kingdom of God is like. He begins with the beatitudes which turn all of our

assumptions about who the blessed ones are upside down, moves through our

lectionary passage for today with it’s “You have heard that it was said…but I

say to you…” rhythm, which is followed by a similar set of sayings about

vengeance and his command to love our enemies – a passage which was the subject

of some astonishing back-and-forth at the most recent National Prayer

Breakfast, which just goes to show you that biblical faith is anything but

irrelevant. It then includes Matthew’s version of the Lord’s Prayer, teachings

about the close relationship between material possessions and anxiety,

finishing up with a discourse on the dangers of being judgmental, and an urging

to ask God for what we want.

For anyone who wishes to follow Jesus, these 3 chapters are essential. They are challenging, they are demanding, and they lead you into the very practical, down-to-earth heart of what Jesus is summoning us to do. They blend the interior life of the disciple with the exterior actions of that same disciple.

It is fascinating to pair the Sermon on the Mount with our text this morning from Deuteronomy 30, because Deuteronomy 30 seems to be working with the question of whether the commands and instructions of God are do-able, or whether they are so ridiculously demanding that no one could possibly expect us to actually take them seriously. “Surely the commandment that I am commanding you today,” says Moses, “is not too hard for you, nor is it too far away… No, the word is very near to you; it is in your mouth and in your heart for you to observe.” There are ways of life, Moses is saying, that leads to happiness, blessing, contentment, joy, meaning, and abundant life; and there are ways of living that lead to anxiety, greed, resentment, oppression, isolation, brutality, and death. “Choose life,” Moses says. You can do it.

Deuteronomy 30, with its emphasis on the do-ableness of the Torah commandments of neighborliness and worship, seems to me to be an Old Testament corollary to Jesus’ invitation in Matthew 11 (just a few chapters after our passage this morning) to take his yoke and his burden upon you, because his yoke is easy, it is do-able, and his burden is light, compared with the crushing burdens of Pharaoh, or Caesar, or the consumer economy that tells you that you’ve never got enough stuff, or the expectations of a society that tells that you that you’re not popular enough or cool enough or successful enough. Jesus says that’s a bunch of ridiculous garbage. Follow me, Jesus says, my way of love and neighborly solidarity and compassion – though not much practiced in the world – is far more excellent.

In Matthew 5:21-37, Jesus walks us through a series of down-to-earth, real-life situations, in which some schools of thought would tell you that what you must do is to meet some external threshold or regulation. As long as you meet that minimum, you’re good. He goes through murder, adultery, divorce, and oath-swearing. There were religious prescriptions for all of these, and what Jesus observes is that it is entirely possible to meet external prescriptions, to check off the necessary moralistic, religious boxes, maintaining your purity status, while inwardly having a hard heart, and having destructive effects on the people around you. Jesus shows himself here to be unimpressed by people who follow the letter of the law, who keep their official records spotless, but whose hearts are hard and even cruel.

In that time, with its patriarchal cu