What is love?

A Sermon preached on October 26^th (Pentecost XX) at St. Augustine’s, Wiesbaden

Leviticus 19:1-2, 15-18, Psalm 1, 1 Thessalonians 2:1-8, Matthew 22:34-46

Love is an overarching theme of the readings this week. In the extract from Leviticus God commands Moses to say to the Israelites, You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.” One element of being holy, which just means being set apart or set aside for God, is the command “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Lev. 19:18) When asked to define which of the 613 commandments is the greatest, Jesus quotes both this last verse from Leviticus as well as the command in Deuteronomy (6:5) to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind. And clearly Paul loves the Thessalonian Christians so much that he and his companions want to share not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you have become very dear to us.” (1 Thess. 2:8) But in the words of the singer Haddaway’s 1990s hit song: “What is love?”

Presumably all of Jesus’ actions, both the healing of the sick as well as rebuking and silencing the scribes and Pharisees in public, are compatible with his command of love. But if so, it’s a strangely strict or even formidable kind of love. So what is love? A few weeks ago I gave you a linguistic and philosophical distinction between the different words for love in Greek. But for a long time I’ve been harboring the idea of looking at secular pop songs to see if they have a message for us about Christian love. It’s pretty easy to find lists of the top 10, 50 or even 100 love songs on the internet. Of course many are just hopelessly romantic, and some a little bit too sexual for this exercise. Though if you want to read a beautiful, but also explicitly erotic love song, I recommend the “Song of Songs” in the Old Testament! If you want to listen to the songs I’m about to mention and quote from by the way, you can find my sermon online via our website and I’ve added a list of links to the YouTube videos. 

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind” (Matthew 22:37) and strength (from Deut. 6:5) Jesus answers the Pharisees, quoting that text from Deuteronomy that is also part of a devout Jew’s daily prayer, the Shema. The meaning of this command is that we give to God all that we are: our will, our life, and our wealth and power, all of which come from God in the first place anyway. This sense of exclusiveness, of there being nothing more important than this focus of our being, is beautifully expressed in the words of Joe Cocker’s song, “You are so beautiful.”

You are so beautiful to me.

Can't you see you're everything I hoped for.

You're everything I need.

We don’t always find this an easy thing to do - subduing our will to anyone else, even to the Creator of all, and humanity has a very bad track record. Thankfully God’s love for us is not dependent on the intensity of our love for God. And God is always there when we need God, especially in our darkest hours. I think this feeling of total reliance and trust is conveyed so well by the lyrics of Ben E. King’s song “Stand by me.”

When the night has come
And the land is dark
And the moon is the only light we'll see
No, I won't be afraid
Just as long as you stand, stand by me

Turning now the second of the two commandments, how do we love our neighbor? According to the lyrics of the band Massive Attack’s song “Teardrop”

Love, love is a verb.

Love is a doing word.

And if we look at the detailed instructions in Leviticus this is true, because love has a lot more to do with action and actions rather than with emotions. We see that in the list given to Moses, love is all about practicing justice and charity in our dealings with others. To love our neighbor is to not speak ill of him or her, to have no hate in our hearts, to not bear a grudge. Can we always say that about ourselves? I can’t and if I think back to some of the conversations that took place during the series of small group meetings that finished this week, then are definitely still some grudges out there.

In his romantic hit song “Just the way you are,” Billy Joel sang

I said I love you and that's forever
And this I promise from my heart
I couldn't love you any better
I love you just the way you are.

That’s one love song statement and sentiment I do not entirely agree with. God loves us as we are, but also so much that God wants to change and transform us and so that we are more than what we are, so that we are who we are supposed to be. Jesus rebukes and corrects both those who are out to get him as well as his own beloved disciples – remember him saying to Peter, “Get behind me Satan!” (Matthew 16:23) And so we are also instructed to correct our neighbor, in love and in gentleness, if they go or do wrong: “You shall reprove your neighbor. Or you will incur guilt yourself” Moses is told by the Lord. (Lev. 19:17)

Which is of course also one reason why, in the words of the Everly Brothers, “Love hurts.” 

Love hurts, love scars
Love wounds and mars
Any heart not tough
Nor strong enough
To take a lot of pain, take a lot of pain
Love is like a cloud, holds a lot of rain

The other may not always appreciate our love, especially when it comes in the form of hoesty or of a correction. Parents know this very well! But that doesn’t get us off the hook. Christian love cannot always be reciprocal nor is love is not an excuse to take the path of least resistance. Note how Paul reminds the Thessalonians that he “never came with words of flattery.” (1 Thess. 2:5)  Loving God and loving our neighbor can also mean being sent somewhere to preach bad news, as Jonah was sent to Nineveh. And at times love can require sacrifice or personal loss. This aspect of love is at the very core of Christianity: Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross out of love. Love hurts.

In his letter to the Thessalonians Paul writes: “So deeply do we care for you that we are determined to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves.” (1 Thess. 2:8). His and his companions’ motivation was not out of greed, they came not to please the Thessalonians, nor were they were looking for praise. Paul and his friends knew the love of God as expressed in the message of the gospel and simply and genuinely wanted this love to embrace the Thessalonians. If Paul had known the lyrics of the Bee Gees’ song “How deep is your love” he might have used them to describe the depth of his love for God and Christ:

I believe in you
You know the door to my very soul
You're the light in my deepest darkest hour
You're my saviour when I fall
And you may not think
I care for you
When you know down inside
That I really do

And as Paul and his friends worked among the Christians in Thessalonica they found their own love being drawn out to them as well. That’s the sort of transformation through loving and being loved by God that we also hope and pray for. Scripture calls us to a love that is other-directed, and Scripture also assumes that we need other people’s love. “God only knows what I’d be without you” the Beach Boys sang. God knows that we are nothing without God and nothing without our love for the other. Love is what makes us complete and completely human.

Amen

Playlist:

1. Joe Cocker: “You are so beautiful”
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xsOSt3hNRY0
2. Ben E. King: “Stand by me”
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwZNL7QVJjE
3. Massive Attack: “Teardrop”
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fG8eQBSp9Ao
4. Billy Joel: “Just the way you are”
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJWM5FmZyqU
5. The Everly Brothers: “Love hurts”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5iJMfwwheY
6. The Bee Gees: “How deep is your love”
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GSTeXIylpBc
7. The Beach Boys: “God only knows what I’d be without you”
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EkPy18xW1j8

What is God's?

A Sermon preached on October 19^th (Pentecost XIX) at St. Augustine’s, Wiesbaden

Isaiah 45:1-7, Psalm 96, 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10, Matthew 22:15-22

One of the many gifts of this church is the variety of different national, cultural, and religious backgrounds we all come from. I think they are a cause for joy and for celebration, although they will occasionally lead to misunderstandings. 

One potential area for misunderstanding could be the political role of the church. In our various home countries the relationship between church and state is very different. If we just look at our “big three”, the countries most of us come from, the UK, Germany and the US, we have on the one hand in England a fully established Church in which parliament, including some bishops, has the last say on changes in doctrine and structure and even worship. Allowing women to become bishops will for example require an Act of Parliament. In Germany the major churches, while not established, receive church tax, and play a significant role in education, health care and the provision of social services.  On the other hand in the USA we have a strict constitutional separation of church and state. Interestingly though as I discovered while living and studying there, it seems that more politicians feel called to establish their  religious credentials in the US than in the other countries – as one advisor of former UK PM Tony Blair famously said: We don’t do religion. 

These two different approaches, on the one hand some sort of unity of Church and State, and on the other hand their complete separation, seem to be echoed in today’s readings. In the OT reading from Isaiah we heard that God had anointed and appointed King Cyrus of Persia and that God promises to go before him, opening gates, leveling mountains, and subduing other nations. Yet in the Gospel reading, Jesus answers the Pharisees’ trick question with the famous phrase: “Give to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s” – and that sounds like a very clear separation of the two! The relationship between church and state is currently also a topic of discussion for the German Protestant Churches. In the so-called Luther decade, the run up to the 500^th anniversary of the Reformation in 2017, each year has a theme and this year’s theme or motto is “Reformation and Politics.” You might even have heard of or attended one of series of sermons that well-known politicians have been giving at different churches in Wiesbaden – all of them based on the story of the feeding of the 5,000.

But to understand what the Biblical passages are saying about Church and State, we need to take a closer look at their context. The section of Isaiah this morning’s readings came from was written by someone scholars call second Isaiah. We assume that a book that covers a period of 250 years, from the events leading up to the fall of both Jewish kingdoms, followed by the exile of Judah to Babylon, through the time of exile and finishing with the period immediately following the return to Jerusalem, was written not by one person but by 2 or 3 prophets or schools. Second Isaiah was writing towards the end of the period of exile. 

Our translation hides how shocking the statement made about Cyrus really is. “His anointed Cyrus” is literally God’s Messiah Cyrus or in Greek “Cyrus Christ.” In the OT the term Messiah is only used with reference to kings, and occasionally to prophets and priests, but not as we now use it to the Son of God. But all the same, this is still first and only time a foreigner is given this title. In the view of the prophet, King Cyrus was doing God’s work and whether Cyrus wanted it or not God was using Cyrus as his agent and instrument, to defeat Babylon and to allow the Jews to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple. It didn’t matter that Cyrus probably never knew what honor he was being given and as the poem says, he doesn’t even know God. But he is still called by God and named by God and he is – for a brief period of time – Israel’s savior. As verse 6 tells us, the purpose of Cyrus’ calling is “so that they,” the whole world, “may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is no one besides me; I am the Lord, and there is no other.” The message is that God is above human institutions but also willing to use them for God’s purposes. God’s love for God’s people and God’s power are victorious, in this case through a State, through the Persians under King Cyrus. 

If we turn now to Jesus’ saying about the emperor this too came in a very specific context. The Pharisees were out to trap him and they thought they had the perfect “Catch 22” question. If Jesus acknowledged the pagan, foreign sovereignty of Rome over Israel by saying it was lawful to pay taxes he risked losing all or many of his followers. And if he denied Rome’s right to collect taxes he risked his life – tax rebels were crucified in those days, so things have got a little better, you only risk a prison sentence now!  

How does Jesus get out of this? Well, first he establishes that the Pharisees actually had the coins they hated so much with them. They hated the coins because of the human image on them – a picture of Caesar – and because of the blasphemous inscription describing Caesar as a son of a god and as high priest. By the way this is the reason for the money changers in the Temple, the ones Jesus threw out. Special “kosher” coins were needed in the Temple precinct both as monetary offerings and to purchase sacrifices. Just to be on the safe side, and as we are in the middle of our annual stewardship campaign, we don’t mind what is on the coins and notes you give to the church!

Anyway, Jesus then elegantly sidesteps the issue with his statement that if Caesar is on the coin, then it must belong to him. Jesus knows that he will eventually suffer the fate and punishment of a tax rebel, but that will be for something much greater and much more important than rebelling against some human authority. When Jesus is killed by the state and rises again it is a demonstration that God is above human institutions. God’s love for all people and God’s power are shown to be victorious over the worldly powers and dominions. 

Let’s come back to the idea of image again. The coin is Caesar’s because his image is on it. But, as the author of the reflection sheet you will find in your bulletin also reminds us, Jesus is not really agreeing to a separation of two different areas – one public where human power rules, and one private, where we are allowed to serve God, preferably quietly and without disturbing the neighbors. No, as God has given us everything in creation and as “the image of God, made flesh in Jesus Christ, is also stamped on the face of every human being with whom we share God’s creation”[1] everything also belongs to God and everything should also serve God’s will and purpose. That is the simple truth that both readings make clear, each in their own way.

How the church is organized and financed is not important, and I am glad that with the exception of the Vatican, churches do not run states. But that does not make religion a private matter. Only a few verses later in the same chapter of Matthew’s Gospel (22:37-40) Jesus summarizes the Law as loving God and loving your neighbor. This is an imperative not only for our personal but also for our political engagement. The church and its members, we, are called to speak out, to act and to take public positions on issues that impact our love of God, and of God’s creation, and of our neighbors who are each and every one made in the image of the one, true, living and loving God. As Christians our final allegiance is to God and to God’s kingdom, which is not a State but a way of life and of living and of loving.

Amen.

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[1] Stewardship Narrative for Proper 24, The Episcopal Network for Stewardship