"Love letters" Sermon for Sunday 25 October 2020
SERMON FOR SUNDAY 25 OCTOBER 2020
"Love letters"
The Rev. Carrie Ballenger
Lutheran Church of the Redeemer, Jerusalem
Sermon for Sunday 25
October 2020
Lutheran Church of the
Redeemer, Jerusalem
The Rev Carrie
Ballenger
Matthew 22:34-46
“Love letters”
Let the words of my
mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable unto you O Lord, my rock and
my redeemer. Amen.
What would you say is the first sign that you’re falling in love? Some
describe it as a feeling in your belly—butterflies or flip flops perhaps.
Others describe getting tingles or goosebumps on the skin, or becoming
red in the face at just the mention of the person’s name.
But I think one of the surest signs of a blossoming love is curiosity.
When you’re falling in love, there’s a moment when you realize you want to know
EVERYTHING about the person. What are they wearing today? What did they have
for breakfast? What were they like as a child? What’s their favorite book? What
did they wear for the first day of kindergarten? No detail is too
insignificant, no story too long or mundane, no text message too silly, because
your curiosity cannot be contained.
Love is the theme of our Gospel lesson today from the 22nd
chapter of the Gospel according to Matthew. Jesus is not talking about romantic
love, or of falling in love, of course. In fact, one might say the theme of
this text is actually law, not love. Once again, Jesus is at odds with the
religious authorities, and once again, they are quizzing him. This time, they
want to know: Which is the greatest commandment? And Jesus, a master
interpreter of Scripture, answers by referencing two well-known passages of law
from Deuteronomy and Leviticus, saying:
“’You
shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and
with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment.
And a second is
like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and
the prophets.”
Love God, love your neighbor. These two commandments, says Jesus, are
“like” one another. They cannot be separated. From a Christian perspective, we
might even say the two are really one commandment, they are so intertwined. The
author of 1 John puts it this way: “Whoever claims to love God yet hates a
brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister,
whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen.” (1 John
4:20)
And yet, as inextricable as these two commands are, Jesus does say that
loving God with all your heart, your soul, and your mind is the first and the
greatest.
I’ve heard—and have preached—many a sermon on what it looks like to love
our neighbors as ourselves.
But what does the love of God look like?
It occurs to me that if one of the surest signs of love is an intense
curiosity about the other, that maybe love of God is like that.
Maybe loving God looks like wanting to know more, and more, and more
about who God is, and what God is up to—in the world, and in our own life.
So maybe loving God looks like being involved in a Bible study. Maybe
it’s reading books of history or theology.
Maybe it’s traveling to holy places and visiting holy sites (there’s
certainly plenty to feed one’s curiosity here in Jerusalem!)
Maybe it looks like visiting different places of worship, being curious
about how others pray and praise and practice their love of God.
And maybe loving God is being curious about other people, those amazing
creatures around us who are created by God and bear the image of God. Maybe we
love God when we are curious about those God loves: being curious about their
joys, their sorrows, their stories, and their dreams—getting to know them.
Learning to love them.
And just like that, we’ve come back to where we started.
Love God, love your neighbor. It turns out, those two commandments
really cannot be unlinked. “On these two commandments” says Jesus, “hang all
the law and the prophets.” Amen.
So how’s your love life today?
I’m not ashamed to say that there are plenty of days that the mention of
God’s name doesn’t exactly give me butterflies or goosebumps. When my prayers
don’t seem to be answered. When the world seems to be falling apart around me.
When health and happiness, justice and peace seem further away than ever
before.
On those days—or weeks, or months even—I feel the opposite of curious
about God, or about my neighbor. If I had the chance, I’d block God’s number so
I’d be sure not to get any of her annoying text messages.
But the funny thing is, even in those un-curious phases, something
usually happens. It’s like a little window in my heart opens up that beckons me
to come a little closer, to take a look, to be curious. “What is God up to
now?”
To be clear, being curious about God and what God is up to is not the
same as knowing a lot of theological stuff. When I was in seminary, I learned a
lot of stuff about God, and words to talk about God, but that didn’t
necessarily help my love relationship with God.
There is a well-known joke about the University of Chicago, which is
situated across the street from my seminary. Students at the school wear
t-shirts that say: “University of Chicago. Where fun comes to die.” I often
thought that the seminary students should wear shirts that said “Seminary:
Where faith comes to die.”
In fact, pastors-in-training are so notoriously bad at maintaining a healthy,
loving relationship with God that we had a graduation requirement called
“Growth in Faith.” Yes, we had to earn a certain number of credits in
activities that would “grow our faith” – we could work with a spiritual
director, or go on a silent prayer retreat, or do the Ignatian prayer exercises
for a month.
Or, we could visit a fortune teller.
Now, you know I signed up for that one! Why? Because I was curious.
And so together with a group of fellow classmates—and with a little
guidance and background on the place of fortune tellers in the Black Christian
experience from a professor—I walked down Harper Avenue in Hyde Park, climbed a
few flights of stairs, and entered Valerie’s apartment, who held my hands in
hers and promised to tell my whole future for just $10.
Now, I’m still waiting to see if her predictions were accurate! But you
know what? I met a very interesting human being that day. I heard a story I had
never heard before, and learned about someone else’s spirituality. I remember
leaving her apartment that day telling my fellow classmates that it hadn’t felt
like a psychic reading at all. It felt like prayer! It felt a bit like church.
I was curious! And God showed up.
It seems to me that this kind of curiosity is what feeds love.
One might say that this kind of curiosity is love.
Asking myself: What is God up to today—in my city, in my neighborhood,
in my heart? And how can I get involved? This is what it looks like to fulfill
those two commandments, upon which hang all the law and the prophets.
Maybe the church institution, or the state of the world, or the ugliness
of some of your neighbors has killed your curiosity right now. That’s all
right. But hear this today:
God is curious about you. God is curious about your past and your
future, about your joys and your sorrows, about your dreams and your regrets.
We see God’s unending curiosity about us in the person of Jesus Christ. God,
the Creator of all things, didn’t just set the world in motion and step back.
God got curious! And then God got up close and personal, through the life and
ministry, death and resurrection of Our Lord Jesus. Jesus, crucified and risen,
is God’s love letter to the world—and to you. It is because of that love, and
only on the strength of that love, that we are able to love God and neighbor in
return.
I want to close today with a love letter to God, from German poet Rainer
Maria Rilke. It’s called “You are the future, the great sunrise red.”
You are the future, the great sunrise red
above the broad plains of eternity.
You are the cock-crow when time’s night has fled,
You are the dew, the matins, and the maid,
the stranger and the mother, you are death.
You are the changeful shape that out of
Fate
rears up in everlasting solitude,
the unlamented and the unacclaimed,
beyond describing as some savage wood.
You are the deep epitome of things
that keeps its being’s secret with locked lip,
and shows itself to others otherwise:
to the ship, a haven — to the land, a ship.
– Rainer Maria Rilke, Poems from the Book of Hours
May the peace of God
which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Amen.
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