Let us know, let us press
on to know the LORD;
His going forth is sure
as the dawn;
He will come to us as the
showers,
As the spring rains that
water the earth."
What shall I do with you,
O Ephraim?
What shall I do with you,
O Judah?`
Your love is like a morning
cloud,
Like the dew that goes early
away.
Therefore I have hewn them
by the prophets,
I have slain them by the
words of my mouth,
And my judgment goes forth
as the light.
For I desire steadfast love
and not sacrifice,
The knowledge of God,
rather than burnt offerings.
Today's Song of Praise is taken from Psalm 50 (Ps 50:1, 8, 12-13, 14-15):
R. To the upright I will show the saving power of God.
God the LORD has spoken and summoned the earth,
from the rising of the sun to its setting.
"Not for your sacrifices do I rebuke you,
for your holocausts are before me always."
R. To the upright I will show the saving power of God.
"If I were hungry, I would not tell you,
for mine are the world and its fullness.
Do I eat the flesh of strong bulls,
or is the blood of goats my drink?"
R. To the upright I will show the saving power of God.
"Offer to God praise as your sacrifice
and fulfill your vows to the Most High;
then call upon me in time of distress;
I will rescue you, and you shall glorify me."
R. To the upright I will show the saving power of God.
Today's Epistle is from the Letter of Paul to the Romans, beginning at the 4th Chapter, and the 18th Verse (Rom 4:18-25):
In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations; as he had been told, "So shall your descendants be." He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead because he was about a hundred years old, or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb. No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. That is why his faith was "reckoned to him as righteousness." But the words, "it was reckoned to him," were written not for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be reckoned to us who believe in him that raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was put to death for our trespasses and raised for our justification.
+ A Reading from the Gospel of Matthew, beginning at the 9thChapter, and the 9th Verse (Mt 9:9-13):
As Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax office; and he said to him, "Follow me." And he rose and followed him. And as he sat at table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat down with Jesus and his disciples. And when the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?" But when he heard it, he said, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, `I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.' For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners."
"If I were hungry, I would not tell you, for mine are the world and its fullness. Do I eat the flesh of strong bulls, or is the blood of goats my drink? Offer to God praise as your sacrifice and fulfill your vows to the Most High..."
"Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, `I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.' For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners."
The 16th Century "reformers" -- especially the Anabaptists -- in their insistence that members of the Church must be perfect, seem not to have read the 9th Chapter of Matthew's Gospel. It is likely that this image of glitteringly impossible perfection is what draws their modern-day descendants to identify so strongly with the Cathari -- "Pure Ones" (Albigensians) -- whose Gnostic hatred of the world and the physical took such bizarre turns. Admittedly, too -- they did foreshadow predestination and "once saved, always saved" with their ideas that the "Perfecti" could do no wrong.
For all of humanity, perfection is only found in Heaven -- and after Jesus returns again. It is never found on earth, never found in organizations, never graspable by ingenious interpretations of the KJV. At the Fall, all Nature was rent asunder from her Maker, from the unity and Glory of its origin in the Word.
It is our job as humans, as descendants of Abraham (whom Paul talks about in today's Epistle), as inheritors of the Faith from the Apostles, to heal this split -- to bring all nature and the physical back to God, as our offering of His own to Himself. We do this on a small scale in the Liturgy of the Eucharist -- as the Anglican liturgy had it: "...of Thine own have we given Thee..."
What are we to do with sinners, then? Heal them, surely; forgive them, surely; persecute them not at all. Hatred and anger have no place in the Christian world.
Jesus sent His disciples out into the world to heal and teach, to forgive sins, and show forth the Love of the Father, which we are to return to Him "with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind", as Jesus says, quoting Deuteronomy. And the "...second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself", which is His contribution to God's Commandments.
To love one's neighbor as oneself is sometimes eqivocal -- not everyone loves themselves very well. We think of "self-love" as being selfishnes, often, but it is also being at peace within oneself, LIKING oneself. Many, many people do not like themselves -- they have been taught or twisted into crazy and hurtful spaces.
Instead of witch hunts ( a good Calvinist sport), we need to be using prayer and the sacraments of Penance and Anointing -- we need to believe that people can change, that metanoia is possible. It is not always easy or swift -- but to be truly Christian, we cannot believe otherwise.
Let us all pray for healing
and forgiveness, then . . .
In the Name of the Father +
And of the Son +
And of the Holy Spirit +
Amen.