This, then, is the Gospel
reading.
You have heard that it was said
to those of ancient times, you
shall not murder. Whoever
murders shall be liable to
judgment. I say to you, if
you're 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 counsel. And if
you say you fool, you will be
liable to the hell of fire. So
when you're 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're 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'll be thrown into
the prison. Truly, I tell you,
you'll never get out until
you've paid the last penny.
Amen.
About two months ago, Steve
Kraftjig called me, said he
thought it would be safe for me
to return. It's been eight
years, and most of those who
knew me are gone, physically
gone or have gotten so old they
don't remember. And so I'm
grateful to be back. I'm
grateful to Barbara and to the
dean, as well as to Steve. It's
especially a good time for me to
be with you on the eve of your
beginning 40 days of
preparation, so that you may be
able, I may be able to approach
the mystery of the passion of
Christ. It is especially a good
time for me because I get the
Emory report and know that the
service today is set in the
context of a year-long
observance of reconciliation by
the university and the visitors
who come to make presentations.
So I'm pleased. Actually, I
would have been back sooner, but
someone is sitting in my chair,
and he has used it all up.
If you're offering your gift at
the altar, and there, remember
that a brother or sister has
something against you. Leave the
gift, go be reconciled to the
brother or sister, and then come
back and complete your act of
worship. A strange statement. We
all know that Jesus spoke in
parable, parable, sometimes we
forget, that he also spoke in
hyperbole, hyperbole.
Exaggerated speech, what Stephen
Webb calls blessed excess,
overstating in order to
underscore, to accent. We do it
all the time, especially in
worship, all for a thousand
tongues to sing. Well, not
really, but it's the way to say
it. Where the whole realm of
nature, mind that were a present
far too small, that's the
appropriate way to speak. Jesus
talked that way a great deal. If
your eye causes you to stumble,
pluck it out, throw it away.
Take the log out of your own
eye, and then you'll be better
able to see the splinter in your
neighbor's eye. That's the way
he talked. You strain it, gnats,
and swallow camels. He talked
that way a lot, hyperbolic
speech, overstatement,
exaggeration, excessive. The
text that I chose has in it the
portion I paraphrased, and it
bears all the marks of
overstatement, hyperbole,
exaggeration. You're at the
altar worshiping, the sacred
moment, then you remember
someone has something against
you and you leave. Really?
It seems exaggeration, but may I
say to all of you who are in the
business of interpreting
scripture, it's very important
that you decide whether or not
it is hyperbole, because it
makes a difference. If you take
it literally, it seems to me,
you could turn the church into a
circus. We'd all be running
around. You have anything
against me? You have anything
against me? Do you have offended
you? You know, that could really
be terrible. We'd never have
class, never have any worship
service, just up and down and
running around? Surely not.
You come to me about eight or
ten times with that. Do you have
anything against me? And I would
say, I'm beginning to.
You're getting on my nerves,
really.
Surely you don't take this
literally. It's exaggerated,
exaggerated speech. I have to be
confident that Jesus believed,
understood and knew, and assumed
that we knew, that when the body
of Christ is healthy, it can
receive, can swallow, can
digest, can assimilate a
thousand bruises and blunders in
any society, calling people like
us together and calling us
church. Just think about it.
It's impossible unless there is
an atmosphere of not taking too
seriously what otherwise might
be regarded as a slight. It just
happens. Nobody intended to hurt
your feelings. The person just
happens to be under-socialized.
A socially awkward didn't mean
anything by it. Went down the
hall, didn't speak to you,
preoccupied. Did you know that
some faculty and students come
to school some days at war with
themselves?
And when you're at war with
yourself, it's very likely
you'll make casualties, even of
your friends. Did you know that
there are faculty and students
who come to class, try to do the
work, stepping out of domestic
wreckage, but still so
preoccupied? They didn't notice
you. Didn't hear you say hello?
Surely you can handle that.
We're socialized or not
socialized in so many different
ways. One student, since sits
through a whole semester, never
says a word, never asks a
question. Another student's hand
is in the air all the time. I
don't mean to be disrespectful,
but could it be that you're
wrong, professor? And there are
some people that are just
energized by confrontation.
Others would never be
confronted. No, no. A teacher in
an elementary school raises her
voice at two pupils, Mary and
Billy. Mary, if you don't sit
down in your own seat, I'm
sending you to the principal's
office. And Mary nudges her
friend and says, Miss Crabtree
is really going to miss me when
I move to the next grade. Billy,
did you write these words on the
board? And he slinks into his
seat, solemn, silent, but never
forgetting until it breaks in
incendiary form. And he's a
violent person. And we all come
together and make up the church.
Jesus, surely you knew that
there would be abrasions and
bruises and slights all the
time. But can handle a thousand
a day without changing our
nature as church and community
of faith? Surely he knew that.
So you don't take things like
this, literally, do you? And
especially when you think about
the little slights and social
awkwardnesses that infect us in
the light of the larger picture,
the cosmic picture. There are
national and racial and gender
and ethnic conflicts all over
the world. Now, where does my
little whimpering fit? She
didn't speak to me in the hall.
Listen, Jew Gentile, slave-free,
male, female. Now, there is an
agenda worthy of a seminarian.
If you want to go to work on
reconciliation, take on that
agenda. The world is out of
joint. And what's your problem?
Well, I thought the professor
answered my question with a
little condescension.
That's the second time I've
passed him in the hall, and he
has not spoken. Some of the
students over in Turner Village
got together and had a little
cookout, and I was not invited.
And the world is in the shape
it's in, and you have a problem.
Get over it.
Christian faith should be made
of sterner stuff than that.
But then I remembered something
that Elias Canetti said. You
don't know that name, but there
you are. Elias Canetti, he said
once, when I was in an academic
community, as I looked back on
it, everything distant laid a
claim on my life. Everything
within a half hour was as
strange as the other side of the
moon. There is no more
sophisticated nor justifiable
escape from our problems with
each other than to enlarge the
screen until we made to feel
silly for complaining about that
slight, or that bruise, or that
bump, or that hurt, or that
condescension. I remember
reading years ago a statement by
a woman who served as a
receptionist secretary in an
office in Geneva, Switzerland,
where there was headquartered an
international organization for
peace and reconciliation. She
quit her job. It was a good job
and a well-paying job, but she
quit. She had been there six
years, but she said in the six
years, all those marvelous
people coming and going, trying
to bring about the healings of
the nations, never spoke to me.
The people for whom I worked
never call me by name. Does she
have a legitimate hurt? There is
no more painful. There is no
more painful dismissal of my
hurts than relativizing them in
the light of the cosmic
situation. If I hurt, I hurt
where I hurt.
So, I go back to the text. If
you're offering your gift at the
altar, and there you remember
that a brother or sister has
something against you, you leave
the gift. You go first and be
reconciled to the brother or
sister, and then come back and
finish your worship. In other
words, Jesus wants you and me to
image ourselves in the most
serious, most significant, most
seriously sacred place and
moment in our lives at worship.
The hour, the hour of the week,
every door and the place has on
it, do not disturb, shh, worship
here. People are at the altar
here, be quiet, be respectful.
Don't you know what's going on?
The altar is the oldest piece of
furniture in the world. That's
the first thing God made, and
God set the whole universe on an
altar. And if the prayers and
praise of the saints ever stops,
down it goes. That's the end of
it. The world cannot survive.
And people are there.
That altar will be there when
everything is gone. Read the
book of Revelation. The closing
scene of all that God intended
is a sanctuary scene. The altar
and the worshipers, shh, do not
disturb.
Now if you're offering your gift
at the altar, and there you
remember, and you will. You will
remember. That's the thing about
the altar. It's a dangerous
place, the altar. I want to warn
the students that are students
here now, be careful about going
to chapel. It's a very serious
thing, and it can affect you in
ways that will touch every
moment of your life after this.
There's something about being at
the altar. I would avoid it if I
were you. I would be truant in
worship. I would upset myself
from every chapel service if I
did not wish to be influenced by
my own memories, if nothing
else. Because it will happen to
you. It really will happen. And
if at the altar you remember. I
don't know why at the altar.
Yes, I do. I think it may be
because when we are at the
altar, we are not defensive and
self-protecting. We're
vulnerable. We're open. We're
not impressing and being
impressed. We're not convincing
and being convinced. We're not
comparing and being compared.
We're just there before God. And
being that open and free.
You remember.
It is my judgment, and this
happens to correspond with
absolute truth.
It is my judgment that the
greatest moral and ethical force
in the world is worship.
Nothing comes close for two
reasons. At the altar, being
open and not protecting oneself,
there is a moment of truth
likely will happen. Oh, you can
stay away and say, who's
preaching? I don't know. I think
it's another student. I don't
know. I think they have an old
man come back. I don't know. I
don't know. You're going to go.
I don't know. You're going to
go. I don't know. I think I need
to rest. You know, we've got a
lifetime of this church
business. Why do it now? You
know. Fill up Brooks Commons,
play the cards, eat the
sandwiches, but don't come in
here because
truth, a moment of truth. Float
around dreaming of palaces and
patios and come in here and
discover that your roof leaks
and the rent is due. Turn the
volume up. Make the noise.
Factor the controlling thing in
your life. Put on the plugs.
Listen to nothing else. And
there's still the sound of the
gnawing of the rat in the wall.
And how shall I escape that?
I'll not go to chapel today. I
cannot stand the truth.
And the other reason is memory.
Memory is such an extraordinary
thing. You think you have
something pushed down in
Augustine's cave to the deepest
level and it will never emerge
again. And then I'm at the
altar. And in the posture at the
altar in the presence of God,
that which I thought was totally
and completely and finally
buried, came to the surface. Now
what am I going to do with it?
Memory is a strong moral force
in the ground for moral and
ethical duty. Do you remember
God speaking to Israel?
Leviticus 19, most neglected
book, most powerful book. You
are to love the stranger, the
outsider, as you love yourself.
Why? Remember, you were
strangers in Egypt. If anybody
knows what it's like to be a
stranger, it's you. The memory
of your own experience compels
you to love the stranger.
Remember from the New Testament,
Paul has gone to Jerusalem. He
anticipates a big quarrel with
those who are the pillars of the
church and James and John and
Cephas. They have confrontation.
They agree to disagree. Cephas
will go to the Jews. Paul will
go to the non-Jews. They all
shake hands, right hand of
Christian fellowship. Paul turns
to walk away. He's still not
clear in his mind. He still has
to throw a few darts, the
pillars of the church or
whatever they were. I don't
really care. You know, he does
that sometimes.
He said, when I started to walk
away, they turned around. John,
James and John and Peter and
said to me, remember the poor.
He couldn't get it out of his
mind. He said, I have, I have, I
have never forgotten the poor.
In fact, it was concerned for
the poor and an offering for the
poor that took him to Jerusalem
for the last time, that put him
in a position to be arrested,
that sent him to Rome, a
prisoner and brought about his
death, doing what? Remember the
poor. Memory is a powerful
stabber of awakening to face our
duty. If you're at the altar and
you're offering your gift, and
then you remember,
then leave it and go. And it's
urgent. It's urgent. Do it
immediately. Don't wait. Delay
is deadly. It will fester.
Triphal's light is air will
become proofs as strong as holy
writ. And you'll find yourself
in a daily ritual of going into
the backyard and lifting the
stone to make sure the snake is
still there. That is now
defining your life. Oh, no. Go
first. There is something that
takes precedence over prayer.
And that's my relationship to
you. So go. Well,
this woman was a friend of ours
now deceased. I think she was
past 60 when she told me this.
She said when she was a little
girl, there were six children in
the family. She said the
happiest time in our home was at
supper. She called it supper. We
laughed and talked and talked
about school and what we had
done in this and that. And mom
and dad were talking. It was
just such a wonderful time. But
she said, I remember I was about
six or seven years old just
before supper. Mom and dad got
into some kind of quarrel. We'd
never heard them quarrel.
It ran in their faces, increased
their voices. They were actually
screaming. And when we children
came in, they felt silent. My
mother turned her back, stirred
in a few pots, put it on the
table and said, let's eat.
That's all that was said that
night. That's all that was said
the next night. That's all that
was said the next night. She
said it seemed weeks that we did
not say anything at the table.
By and by mom and dad started
speaking. They became civil to
each other. We talked a little
bit. But our family was never
the same. Never the same.
They never dealt with it.
So if you're at the altar, deep
in worship and it comes to the
surface. Take care of it. Take
care of it. You can come back
later and worship.