July 23, 2006
“Is Your
Halo Too Tight?”
Luke
9:46-50
Some
of you have experienced that ordeal that thousands of other parents across this
land experienced soon, namely, sending a son or daughter off to college for the
first time. I recall our first experience,
some thirty years ago, when everything our oldest daughter had packed to take
with her somehow fit in the car. And it
was by God’s grace that we unpacked it all in
Anyway,
back to our experience, during what was called “Orientation Week,” the
administration and faculty of
One
of the questions on the university’s application form asked the prospective
student to name the person in history he or she would most liked to have known
and why. One resourceful person that
year had answered: “The Dean of
Admissions’ mother.” The Dean didn’t
reveal whether the respondent had been admitted or not, but had I been the Dean
there would have been no question. A
university needs resourceful and creative students.
I
share all of this to point out that a similar problem has troubled the
Christian community from the beginning.
I mean, who gets in and who doesn’t, who’s the true believer and who’s
the heretic. Repeatedly throughout
history the question has exploded and expanded into divisive conflict, hostile
alienation, mutual condemnation and even the horror of massacre, all
(supposedly) in the name of Jesus Christ.
The report of the disciple John in our Scripture lesson this afternoon (morning),
“Master, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop
him, because he does not follow with us,” has become excommunication,
inquisition, burnings at the stake, religious wars and the splintered church we
know today. Who’s against Jesus and
who’s for him? Who will be admitted into
the kingdom and who will be bumped at the gate?
Those are questions on which this afternoon’s (morning’s) message
focuses.
What
we’re really talking about is snobbery in the church, that is, some people
thinking and acting like they’re better than others. We’re talking about discord that is caused by
some within the church who hold self-righteous, moralistic, and judgmental
attitudes. And so, there are a couple of
things I want to share with you in the next several moments about this negative
and counterproductive attitude by some.
The
first thing I want to say is that snobbery does not belong in the church and
has no place at all among the human family. Despite our assumptions about how religious
we are and how we shall surely go to heaven, we may be surprised. Despite
our presumption that those of us on the inside are somehow better than those on
the outside, we may be
surprised. Snobbery in the church
extends from holier-than-thou attitudes to the style of worship we assume to be
more spiritual. We also embrace snooty
attitudes toward people, welcoming those whom we consider to be religious
enough while shunning others. It can
also become selective witness, so that we decide what’s appropriate and
permissible behavior and what’s not.
When
it happens we find some people with a certain interpretation of the Bible or a
particular set of beliefs. Perhaps
you’ve seen or heard how this or that church proclaims how it is the place where the Bible is taught and
believed, where Jesus is truly Lord
and Savior. Of course, only if you
believe in baptism by a certain method, and only if you read a certain version
of the Bible are you truly a Christian.
For
yet other churches, the language and other externals reveal whether you’re a
friend or enemy of Jesus. Does one talk
of “being in the Word, praising the Lord, or being slain by the Spirit”? Do you have a Christian symbol on your
car? Do you wear a cross or carry a
Bible? Then, you see, you’re for Jesus!
On
the other hand, do you wear makeup? Have
you been divorced? Do you listen to rock
and roll music or attend movies? Do you
sew or play golf or mow the lawn on Sunday?
If you do, according to some
within the family of Christ, then you’re against
Jesus!
A
certain woman was attending a lecture by a doctor at the Yale School of
Alcohol. She had nodded in agreement
throughout the lecture, then rose to her feet as it concluded and asked,
“Doctor, after all you’ve said, is there any disease a total abstainer like
myself could ever get that an alcoholic doesn’t. I mean, my lips have never touched it.” The
doctor answered with a knowing smile, “Only one disease, and it can be a
serious one. It’s called pressure of the halo.” Now, some in the church suffer from this
illness because they wear their halos too tight. That’s why such groups as Alcoholics
Anonymous were formed because in them people can find help in an atmosphere of
acceptance.
There
are many today who, like the disciple John, want to be gatekeepers. They assume, like some guard on sentry duty,
that they can distinguish between a friend and enemy of Jesus. Like the border patrol, they decide who comes
in and who’s turned away. Of course,
you’re included as Jesus’ friend if you do it like the gatekeeper does it, but
if you’re doing it differently, you’re excluded as an enemy. “Master, we saw someone casting out demons in
your name, and we tried to stop him, because he does not follow with us.”
Jesus’
response to John, though, was unexpected.
Instead of praise there came irritation from the Master: “Do not stop him; for whoever is not against
you is for you.” That was but one
occasion where Jesus not only rejected the role of gatekeeper for his followers
but also made room in the kingdom for those whom others had written off as
hopeless and without a chance. Whereas
Jesus made commitment to God an essential and called his followers to obedience
and dedication, he also warned against self-righteousness and spiritual
self-importance that led to judgmental treatment of others. “Do not judge, so that you may not be
judged. For with the judgment you make
you will be judged . . .” The practice
of comparing ourselves with others so we can feel superior and rejecting those
whom we consider inferior challenges the Gospel of love as revealed in Christ
and has no place among God’s people.
This
brings me to the other thing I want to say about tight halos: Snobbery is also
out of place in the church because we’re not big enough to judge others. Jesus told parables about good and evil in
the world and emphasized that categorizing people according to good and evil
belongs to God’s wisdom and love—not to us.
Some of Jesus’ strongest words were for the Pharisees who presumed to
mind the spiritual business of others.
The
story’s told about a husband and wife who interrupted their vacation to go to a
dentist. “I want a tooth pulled, and I
don’t want any pain-killer because we’re in a hurry,” the husband told the
dentist. “So just pull the tooth as
quickly as possible and we’ll be on our way.”
The
dentist was impressed and said, “Why, you’re a courageous man. Which tooth is it?”
The
man turned to his wife and said, “Show him your tooth, honey.”
Jesus
had little patience with those who ran around calling the shots for others,
causing others pain, shutting them out with presumptuous judgment. “First take the log out of your own eye (or
worry about your own tooth) . . .” he advised.
Moreover,
Jesus held up persons who were spiritual outsiders in his day and endorsed them
as models of faith and receptivity, of compassion and loyalty: the Samaritan
traveler, the Roman centurion, the Syrophoenician woman, a tax collector named
Zacchaeus and a woman of questionable morals who crashed a party and anointed
him with costly perfume. Jesus put it
this way: “Other sheep I have which are
not of this fold, them also I must bring.”
Others, you see, may serve in different ways than we would, live in
strange places, wear strange clothes, speak strange languages and bear no
apparent evidence that they are Christian.
Some we judge to be outside the fold may be within it. It was
God
created this earth to be a home, not a law court or some private club with exclusive membership. None of us is good enough or big enough to be
a prosecuting attorney or gatekeeper for God.
The deepest meanings of life are revealed in relationships of trust and
sharing, not by making comparisons, imposing qualifications, measuring up or
putting down.
Moreover,
when we set ourselves above others, we separate ourselves from God. All of us stand in the need of God’s
redeeming grace. None of us has arrived
spiritually, certainly not to the point where we can decide that someone else
hasn’t arrived. Such judgment belongs to
God who alone knows our hearts.
There
are just too many demons to be exorcized in our world today: hunger, poverty,
war, oppression, exploitation, drugs, and alienation. There are just too many problems influencing
humankind for the church alone to try to solve.
Often those others who are working to reverse these problems are some of
the most effective in struggling against evil, though they acknowledge no
formal ties to Christ. While tied to
secular programs, some of them live with Christlike spirit and practice his
teachings without consciously claiming his name. Shall we try to stop them? Shall we question their motives or criticize
their work? Our answer must be as our
Lord’s: “For whoever is not against us is for us.” Faith has more friends than we might expect,
for God engages God’s forces everywhere and doesn’t need our approval or
permission.
Eric
Sevareid, that crusty old news reporter and commentator, once observed that
there are three kinds of human beings: “life-enhancers, well-poisoners, and
lawn-mowers.” Few of us think of
poisoning the water that others would drink.
There’s a danger, though, that we can be lawn-mowers, living life by
going endlessly back and forth over the same area week after week in dull,
boring routine. That’s why the
invitation of Jesus is a summons to freedom.
He calls us to live life to the fullest, to break out of deadly patterns
and be set free! He wants us to be for
him by being with him—by being with others as life-enhancers. I’m convinced that he’s more concerned about
the condition of our hearts than he is with the brightness of our halos, about
hands that help than with mouths that spew forth labels, about life-giving than
with credential-checking. “Master, we
saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because
he does not follow with us.” “Do not
stop him; for whoever is not against you is for you.” So be it.
Let us pray:
O
God of Truth, tear down our masks of pretense that we may discover the joy of
facing you just as we are. May that
which you have given us to share with others not be cheapened by our
self-righteousness, nor obscured by our self-doubt. Rather, may your gifts take on power and