THE IMPOSSIBLE POSSIBILITY
Luke 6:27-38
When I watch movies or TV and see a really bad person raising havoc in peoples lives by murder, rape and pillage, (Don’t you like that word? I don’t know what it really means but all the villains all do it) I really want to see he or she get what’s coming to them, meaning that they will come to a disastrous end themselves. I want them to be hurts maimed or destroyed the same way they have done to others. I wait for it. I watch the end of the movie or program just so I can see it happen. When drunk or wreck less drivers who put everyone’s lives in danger on our streets and highways get caught and punished in some appropriate manner, I rejoice. When extremely violent people who abuse others are charged and not convicted because of a technicality I get angry. I want justice. I think that most of want the same. It’s a totally human desire.
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That’s why passages like we read in the Gospel today is so difficult. It seems to be opposite to what I really want to have happen. It catches me by surprise. I’m not sure that it can speak to me in any meaningful way. Jesus says to love our enemies then gives us a number of examples which are completely beyond me. He says:
Do good to those that hate you
Bless those that curse you
Pray for those who abuse you
Then he goes on with more specifics, almost as if he’s on a roll:
If any one strikes you on the cheek, offer the other one also
From any one who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt
Give to everyone who begs from you
If any one takes away your goods, do not ask for them again
It’s all very rhythmic isn’t it? He ends this portion of the sermon with:
Do not Judge
Do not condemn
Forgive
Give.
My first response to these words of Jesus is , “Oh, Is that all?”or “Who do you think I am?”or “You’ve got to be kidding.”
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I don’t think that Jesus was kidding, and before we dismiss it altogether as an impossible dream I think that we have to take a closer look at it. It may just be an impossible possibility.
First of all, I believe, as many others I have read, that Jesus was giving us a blue print for a new reality, a way of acting in a new world. The old world in which we live has come to be governed by retributive justice which can be summed up as “An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth”. You do to others what they have done to you. It was the rule of much of the Hebrew Scripture. It was the way of much of the ancient world going back to the code of Hammurabi. It’s not a bad rule. In fact it is quite enlightened. It was better than what a lot of people lived by, “A head for an eye, and a life for a tooth” or even “Death to your whole tribe for humiliating us” It is better than the rule that a lot of people today live by, “Do to others before they do to you”
Jesus’ way goes beyond retributive justice. Jesus sums up all of these actions with, “Do unto others, as you would have done unto you” . That’s different than do unto others as they have done to you.” It is to treat others as you would want to be treated.
Secondly, everything that Jesus says in this passage is under the guidance of unconditional and unmerited Love. The question that we always have to asked in any of our decisions and actions is “What does Love demand?” I don’t mean romantic love or the love that is only based on feelings. I mean the way that God loves us. I glad that God doesn’t treat me on the basis of “an eye for and eye, and a tooth for a tooth” I would definitely be toothless and blind by now. God has shown love for me when I didn’t deserve it and continues to do so.
When we look at all of these actions I maintain that in our minds we need to have the words, “If Love demands……” before each one. So we say, “If love demands turning the other cheek in this situation, then that’s what I have to do” or “If love demands that I give my shirt to someone who takes my cloak, then I need to do that.” These are to me not simple directives. This is not the kind of thing you would do in every situation and circumstance. In some situations love may demand something quite different. All of these examples that Jesus gives are not what is expected. They are active behaviours which demand responses, ones that have carry with them the potential for changing relationships. This means being creative in the face of hostility, enmity, indifference.
What love demands in most abusive situations is that the person being abused needs to get out of it. First of all what love demands is for them to love themselves, leave the past behind and build a new future for themselves. What love demands for the abuser is for them to face the consequences for their actions which is the only chance for change. William Countryman in one of his books talks about forgiveness as not so much about the past as it is about the future. It is a way of letting go of the past, the refusal of which can eat us up like a cancer. Once we let it go, our future is open to live in new relationships
Thirdly, Jesus’ way breaks the pattern of retaliation and revenge. You know how it is! You do something to me. I do the same to you. You do something worse to me. I do something even worse to you. It goes on and on. It never ends. I don’t know whether is was in a Lego commercial a few years back or not, but I seem to recall that one child built a mouse. The other build a Cat ready to pounce on the mouse. So the first one built a big dog ready to illuminate the cat. The other built a built a dinosaur ready to devour anything. It went on on one. Retaliation never ends. We even forget why all this started in the first place. In Jesus way, the pattern is broken and it allows for a new future.
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I must admit I cant follow Jesus way all of the time. Like in one of Lyle Lovett’s songs, I say, ” God can, but I can’t and that’s the difference between God and me” . I still live very much in the old world and the “old man (nature)” still surfaces quite frequently. But the kind of vision that Jesus presents us with is a vision that I keep before me even when I seem so far from it. When I find within myself that I am able love like God loves, be merciful as God is merciful, act in love creatively, not judge or condemn, forgive and give, I am a part of that new world, and I know myself to be part of a new humanity, one of “children of the most high” . With God, the impossible is possible.
Whenever I see it happening in the world it is a sign of hope, even though it may be in the midst of tragedy. Do you happen to remember the name of Janani Luwum? He was an Ugandan Archbishop who was allegedly killed by the soldiers of Idi Amin.
His diary describes an event that took place about ten days before his death. In the early morning or Saturday, February 5, 1977, soldiers climbed over the fence around his house in Kampala. They forced their way into the house. They threatened Anglican archbishop Janani Luwum at gunpoint. They searched his house. They scared his children. He declared: “There are no arms in this house, we pray for the President, we pray for his security forces.” After searching for two-and-a-half hours, they were ready to leave. They asked him to open the gate for them. His wife suggested to the archbishop: “Dont open the gates. Let them go out as they came in, over the fence!” Archbishop Janani Luwum told her: “We are Christians, we have clean hearts, and as a witness we are going to open the gates for them.” That is what he did.
He chose not to act in the same manner as his perpetrators. He acted in the way of a more enlightened humanity.
Joseph Donders, a priest who served in Africa and one time student chaplain at Nairobi University in describing this event points out that the Archbishop was killed a few days later and recognized it as a terrible loss, but asks in the same breath, “Is he lost?” We still talk about him today because he decided to resist violence in a non-violent way.
“He won, because of what we now think of him and because of what we now think of the violence that he resisted” (1)
The spirit by which Janani Luwum acted was God’s own Spirit. That Spirit is the Spirit of Love. It will ultimately triumph because Love is more powerful than anything that we know in this world. In fact it is the heart of the new world that Jesus came to establish.
It is the hope for your life and mine
It is the hope of this world
It is the hope that is eternal.
(1) Joseph Donders Praying and Preaching the Sunday Gospel Obis Books, Maryknoll, New York 1988.
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