Gospeling Your Life ~ Even the messy parts ~ Matthew 19-20

 

In Matthew 19-20 Jesus tackles some of the most difficult topics of his day: divorce, becoming more child-like (not child-ish), To be child-like is to be full of wonder and curiosity.  And if that wasn’t enough, Jesus also touches on wealth, work, death, where we rate and rank in the world, and our need for healing.  Whew.  These two chapters are a marathon through a minefield.  Remember, my reading of scripture follows Karl Barth who said, “I take Scripture too serious to take it literal.”  I want to wrestle with Scripture.  Second, circling back to Monday’s mediation, too often the church has turned Matthew 19-20 into a rules and regulations booklet, a manual that you must pass to earn a badge for your heavenly sash.  Divorce is messy, hurtful, heartbreaking.  Anytime love ends tears are shed and soul’s ache.  I want to be careful not to add theological salt to the wound if you have lived through a divorce.  There are holy reasons why marriage covenants need to end.  In Jesus’ day there were two main schools of thought ~ Hillel and Shammai, both were considered great rabbis.  Each also commented on divorce.  Hillel said that if your wife burnt your toast, it was okay to divorce.  Shammai said maybe we should take the covenants we make to each other a bit more seriously.  Usually, Jesus echoed or expanded Hillel.  Except in Matthew 19.  Here, Jesus sounds a lot more like Shammai.  I don’t believe knowing this will undo the damage the church has caused in divorce.  I believe our human relationships are holy and messy and need forgiveness (see yesterday).  I believe the church has taken a very complex experience of the issues above and sought to make it more manageable with rules and regulations.  I believe that when Paul says nothing separates us from the love of God, nothing means nothing.  If you are divorced, you are beloved of God.  If you were married because you were trying to conform to hetero-normative ways to try to fit in with the believes of belonging until you couldn’t breathe any longer and needed to be true to yourself, you are a beloved of God.  If you struggle with stuffing your life with material goods and measure your success by your bottom line of a balance sheet, you are a beloved of God.  If you doubt and wonder if this faith is even helpful anymore, you are a beloved of God.  If you overwork, over function, fear death, and are constantly refreshing your social media to see if you got another like, you are a beloved of God.  If…fill in the blank with all those reasons that the lawyer in your mind is making, that rational in your mind right now, you are a beloved of God.  I don’t think our messy lives can be swept under the rugs for the sake of tidy theology.  I don’t think our broken lives can be superglued back together because of some words from me in a morning mediation. God’s work is to create in us a clean heart and renewed Spirit.  I don’t think Jesus meant to judge, hurt, force you to stay in an abusive marriage, wanted you to be penniless, afraid, or demean yourself.  You are God’s beloved.  Repeat those four words!  May these four words of that last sentence shout to your mind, heart, soul, and life this day and every day.  Amen.