New Testament Lesson
Romans 12:9-21
9 Let love
be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; 10 love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in
showing honor. 11 Do not lag in zeal, be
ardent in spirit, serve the Lord.[a] 12 Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. 13 Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to
strangers.
14 Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. 15 Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. 16 Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty, but associate
with the lowly;[b] do not claim to be
wiser than you are. 17 Do not repay anyone
evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. 18 If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably
with all. 19 Beloved, never avenge
yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God;[c] for it is written,
“Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” 20 No, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty,
give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on
their heads.” 21 Do not be overcome by
evil, but overcome evil with good.
Last Sunday, United Airlines Flight 1462
was flying from New Jersey to Denver ,
and had to divert and land in Chicago
A woman wanted to recline her seat, but the passenger behind her was
using a small device called the “Knee Defender” that disabled the forward seat
from reclining. Words were thrown back
and forth, there was yelling, the woman threw water in the man’s face, and
before you knew it, the plane was landing in Chicago
One of the witnesses to this event described these two passengers as
behaving like children and wondered why people can’t be more civil to one
another.
We can laugh or shake our heads in bewilderment at conduct like this,
but it does not take much for a little bit of yelling and tossing of water to
escalate into something far more violent.
It was back in January that a man began texting his daughter during the
previews of coming attractions in a movie theater in Tampa , Florida
Sometimes the violence spreads into the community like a wildfire. In Ferguson ,
Missouri Ferguson
And beyond that there is the violence among drug cartels in nations
south of us. And there is the violence
in Gaza Syria Nigeria
Now, there is not much we can do about the situation with drug cartels
in Mexico or with the
abduction in Nigeria
But keeping in mind what Paul said about living in harmony with one
another he put peacemaking on a more personal level.
“As far as it depends on YOU, live in peace with one another,” is what
Paul said.
We can’t do much about the violence between nations, or even in a
community in Missouri
In verse 16 of our New Testament lesson, Paul said, “Live in harmony
with one another.”
So what are we to do? How can we
live in harmony with other people?
Step one – love others.
Now that sounds fine, except there is one problem.
We are surrounded by idiots, sadists, the self-centered, the socio
paths, the psychopaths, and the crazy folks.
Peace would be very easy if everyone would just do things MY way. But they don’t, and that is where the
challenge comes in.
There are people who break in line, turn on their cell phones in the
middle of a movie, who talk too loudly in the library, who vote for the wrong
candidate, whatever.
We are surrounded by people who are one way or the other difficult.
To us Paul says in the New Testament lesson, “Let love be genuine; hate what is evil,
hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual
affection.”
What is the
proper response to someone who insults you?
You love them.
What is the proper
response when someone cuts you off in traffic?
You love them.
What is the
proper response when someone won’t let you recline your seat on the
airplane? You love them.
This is
difficult, but next time you look at the person who is rude to you stop and
think about how that person is a child of God, loved by God, adored by God, and
forgiven by God.
Who knows what
that rude person has gone through?
Not long ago I
was in the grocery store. I had my list
and my shopping cart and all I wanted to do was get the stuff on my list, pay
for my groceries and go home. It had
been a long day and I was tired.
And you know
how you are in a grocery store… you go up one aisle and down the other and you
go back and forth from one section to another.
And as you navigate through the store trying to find all the things on
your list, there are times when you keep running into the same person.
And so it was
with me a few days ago.
This was a
person who just seemed so angry. He
would bump into other people and would respond with a salvo of profanity. He dropped a bottle of something on the floor
and it was glass so it broke, and out came more profanity and anger – as if it
was the store’s fault, or my fault.
I just tried
to keep to myself, turn the other cheek and get on with my shopping.
I was paying
for my groceries when I saw this guy one more time – he was cutting in line at
another checkout line.
What is it
with people?
When
I left the grocery store I thought I would never see him again, but his car was
parked right next to mine. His wife was
waiting for him in the car and wouldn’t you know it – they began to argue. I’m not sure what all they were saying, but
it was obvious from bits and pieces of the conversation that he had just lost
his job. These groceries had been bought
with their last few dollars. His wife
looked weak and perhaps seriously ill.
I
suspect that this man’s life was probably in shambles. Life had been mean to him and now he was going
to be mean to others.
With
his profanity and yelling and rudeness it is easy to see only the
rudeness. But look deeper and this is a
wounded man loved by God. Loved - not
because he deserved it, but because of God’s grace.
Paul
tells us in this New Testament passage to “weep with those who weep, and to
laugh with those who laugh.” Sometimes
the person who disrupts our harmony is in such pain that we need to stop and
see the situation for what it is and to weep with them.
Paul
tells us to love others, and to do so with sincerity. It is amazing how quickly a genuine smile and
an understanding word can defuse a situation.
The
way the Bible puts it in the Old Testament book of Proverbs is to say, “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up
anger.”
Most of us
respond to anger with anger, but all that does is to stir up more anger. Things escalate. We want to stand our ground. We want to come out victorious. We want to yield to no one.
“An eye for an
eye,” is what Moses taught.
And that was a
wonderful new concept of justice in a world in which if a person put out your
eye, you could put both of his eyes out.
Moses limited
justice to reasonable punishment.
But we pervert
that concept of Mosiac justice today. “An
eye for an eye” concept in this age means that if you cuss at me, I’ll cuss at
you.
You bully me, I’ll bully you.
You push, I’ll shove.
Throw popcorn in my face, and I’ll put
a gun in your face.”
At some point
somebody has to break that cycle, turn the other cheek, and walk away from this
discord.
““As far as it
depends on YOU, live in peace with one another,” said Paul.
The sad thing
is, no matter how much we put our pride aside, no matter how many times we turn
the other cheek or how many times we give a soft answer in an effort to turn
away someone’s wrath, peace and harmony do not come.
Paul said, “As far as it depends on YOU, live in peace with one another,”
but sometimes it does not depend on
us.
Angry people
will remain angry.
Bullies may
never stop bullying.
Mean folks are
mean.
Abusive spouses
or bosses continue to abuse.
And as Paul says
in our New Testament lesson, we should hate such evil actions.
We cannot
control other people. Some people will
never respond to kindness. Some people
will always be hateful, or even dangerous.
Sometimes, we
just need to walk away.
When Jesus sent
out his disciples into other communities, he talked about how he was sending
them out into a difficult world, and that they were being sent like lambs among
wolves. There would be times, Jesus
warned, that the disciples would not be well received but would be
rejected. “Shake the dust off your feet
and move onto the next town,” Jesus said.
He didn’t tell
us to burn the town, or to loot or riot.
Just move on, and get on with your mission in life.
Sometimes we
have to leave the toxic people in our lives behind and move on.
It would be
great if we could be at peace with everyone, but we can’t. Because we cannot control the actions of
others.
But we can
control our actions.
“As far as it
depends on us…” we will do what we can to turn around this culture of being
uncivil to one another.
As far as it
depends on us, we will respond to other people’s rudeness with kindness.
As far as it
depends on us, we will respond to other people’s disrespect with respect.
Copyright
2014 The Rev. Dr. Maynard Pittendreigh
All rights reserved.
