A Boundless Heart
Ezekiel 34:11-16,
20-24; Matthew 25:31-46[1]
It seems to me that the more
diverse our world gets, the harder it is for us to practice compassion toward
the people we encounter. When everybody looks like us, talks like us, dresses
likes us, thinks like us, we can easily see them as human beings who have
feelings and problems just like us. But the more our society changes, the more
we encounter people who look different from us, who talk differently, who dress
differently, and who think differently. When we are used to being around people
who are basically “just like me,” we may find it challenging to show compassion
to people who seem different.
I believe our Gospel lesson
addresses this problem. The Parable of the Sheep and Goats is one that many of
us know. “I was hungry” is a theme that has echoed throughout the centuries. One
of the things I think we have to recognize is that this is a parable. It is
story told for a purpose, not a lecture outlining what we’re supposed to
believe. It’s not a simple prediction of what’s going to happen to “good” and “bad”
people at the end of time.[2]
And so our task is to try to understand what is the purpose of this story.
One clue that I find interesting
is that both the sheep and the goats are surprised at the verdict. The sheep are commended for being kind and
merciful to Jesus, but they are completely unaware of ever having done anything
special. In response he told them when
you were kind and merciful to the least of these my brothers and sisters, you
were being kind and merciful to me. Similarly, the goats are criticized for not
having practiced kindness and mercy toward Jesus, but they seem shocked at such
a verdict. They seem to be among those
who thought themselves pious and religious because they were devoted to worship
at the synagogue or the Temple, or because they were scrupulous about following
the Jewish laws about living lives that are “clean,” or because they were
pillars of their religious communities.
If that is the case, we might
think that surely some mistake must have been made. But it seems to me that
Jesus was saying much the same thing that the prophets said centuries earlier.
In fact, the passage we heard this morning from the prophet Ezekiel contains a
scathing criticism of the leaders of the prophet’s day, who are identified as
the “fat sheep” who have failed to care for the “lean sheep.”[3] In
fact, they have positively trampled on those they were supposed to be serving. [4] And like the prophets before him, Jesus
reserves some of his harshest words for the religious pillars of his day.
The reason for that is that if
there’s one thing Jesus was good at, it’s cutting through the façade of
religious pretense. No amount of put-on piety
could change the fact that many of the most “religious” people of his day were
essentially unkind toward others. In
another context, Jesus said that they gave a tenth of everything, even their
cooking spices, but they neglected “the more important things of the law, like
fairness, mercy and faithfulness” (Matt. 23:23, NIRV).[5] At the end of the day, they failed to relate
to others with compassion or mercy. And
that is the whole substance of what it means to love God.
I think one of the main purposes
for this parable was to remind us that the best measure for the genuineness of
our compassion is how we treat “the least of these.”[6] And
I think Jesus was trying to point out the hypocrisy of those who were up to
their necks in religious devotion but who, when it came right down to it, were
incredibly unkind to the people around them. I think what he was trying to do
was to make it clear that that when your religion keeps you from practicing
basic human kindness and compassion, it becomes a gigantic exercise in missing
the point!
In the kingdom where Jesus reigns, what counts is mercy. That’s
what Jesus said when the religious leaders criticized him for hanging out with
the wrong kind of people, the “different” people of his day. He said, “Go and learn what the Scriptures
mean when they say, ‘Instead of offering sacrifices to me, I want you to be
merciful to others’” (Matt. 9:13, CEV,
quoting Hos. 6:6).[7] The whole point of true religious devotion is
to inspire us to be people who are kind and compassionate to others—especially
“the least of these.” We cannot escape the fact that, from Genesis to
Revelation, God calls us to practice compassion and mercy toward the least and
the lost and the left out.
Now, admittedly, kindness and
compassion can be difficult—especially when it comes to people who may seem
different from us. But no matter how much the people we encounter may challenge
us, we are commanded by our Lord and Savior to cultivate genuine love toward our
neighbors, all our neighbors.[8] And
it seems to me that starts by treating people with basic kindness and
compassion, regardless of who they are, or where they come from, or how
different they may be from us.
In order to do this, I think we
need a heart that is basically open to all people. We need what one teacher
called a “boundless heart” to relate to others with kindness and mercy.[9]
From my perspective, that means trying to see the people around us--all the
people around us--especially those who seem most different from us--as human
beings who have feelings and problems just like we do.[10]
In fact, the Scriptures call us to see Jesus
in the people around us, especially the least and the lost and the left out.[11]
When we can do that, then we can freely and joyful feed those who are hungry
and clothe those who are naked and welcome those who are strangers to us. Then
we can practice the mercy and compassion that come from a boundless heart.
[1] ©2014
Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Dr. Alan Brehm on 11/23/2014 at Hickman
Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.
[2] Cf.
Jürgen Moltmann, In the End, the
Beginning, 71: “The point is not the judgement in accordance with good or bad works. It
is the identification of the coming Son of man with the hungry and thirsty, the
strangers, the naked, the sick and the imprisoned.” Cf. also Ulrich Luz,
Matthew 21-28: A Commentary on Matthew
21-28, 282, where he points out that the focus of the passage is on the pronouncements
in Mt. 25:40, 45, “which in their
repetitions of the works of charity emphasize the standard by which people will
be judged.”
[3] Cf.
Joseph Blenkinsopp, Ezekiel, 159,
where he says that the context of this passage is the “economic and political
exploitation” that occurred in “the upheaval following the Babylonian conquest.”
He points out that the language here is similar to that in Matthew 25:31-46, “Disconcertingly,
perhaps, the criteria for discrimination is not religious orthodoxy or orthopraxy
but care for the weak and disadvantaged--the hungry, the thirsty, the sick, the
prisoner and the stranger.”
[4] Ezekiel
says, “You have not strengthened the weak, you have not healed the sick, you
have not bound up the injured, you have not brought back the strayed, you have
not sought the lost” (Ezek. 34:4).
[5] Cf. S.
Westerholm, “Clean and Unclean,” in J. B. Green & S. McKnight (Eds.), Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels, 131;
Donald A. Hagner, Matthew 14-28, 670.
[6] Cf. Karl
Barth, Church Dogmatics, 3.2:507-508,
where he identifies the “least of these” as “the world for which [Jesus] died
and rose again, with which He has made Himself supremely one, and declared
Himself in solidarity.” Many scholars believe that “the least of these” is a specific
reference to itinerant Christians who went about without any visible means of
support in obedience to Jesus’ instructions in Matthew 10:5-10. See, for example, Luz, Matthew 21-28, 280-81 and Hagner, Matthew 14-28, 744-45. I find this interpretation overly specific.
It seems to me that all of the “least of these” are included, not just
specifically Christians or specifically Christian teachers. Besides those cited
explicitly in the notes, other advocates of this “universal” interpretation
include Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics
4.3:890-92; Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, vol. 3, 152–55; Kazoh Kitamori, Theology
and the Pain of God, 98–104; Gustavo Gutiérrez, A Theology of Liberation, 194,
200–203; Leonardo Boff, Jesus Christ Liberator, 71–72; and Jürgen Moltmann, Experiences in Theology: Ways and Forms of
Christian Theology, 266–267.
[7] Cf.
Donald A. Hagner, Matthew 1-13, 239: “Mercy is a
better way of obedience.” Cf. also Ulrich Luz, Matthew 8-20: A Commentary on Matthew 8-20, 34.
[8] Cf.
Desmond and Mpho Tutu, Made For Goodness,
142-43, where they suggest envisioning those we have difficulty being kind
toward as children who are themselves vulnerable.
[9] “Even as
a mother protects with her life her child, her only child, so with a boundless
heart should one cherish all living beings.” Cf. “Karaniya Metta Sutta: The
Buddha’s Words on Loving-Kindness” (Snp 1.8), trans. by The Amaravati Sangha, Access to Insight, 14 (June 2010);
accessed at http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/snp/snp.1.08.amar.html
.
[10] Cf. Henri
Nouwen, The Wounded Healer, 41:
“Compassion is born when we discover in the center of our own existence not
only that God is God and man is man, but also that our neighbor is really our
fellow man. ... This compassion pulls people away from the fearful clique into
the large world where they can see that every human face is the face of a
neighbor.”
[11] Cf.
Jürgen Moltmann, The Church in the Power
of the Spirit, 127, where he observes that this passage has often been
treated ethically, “with somewhat colourless talk about ‘love of our neighbor’.”
He continues, “But it is not only love
that is demanded. It is in the first place faith, the faith, namely, that the
least of the brethren are waiting in Christ’s stead for the deeds of the just
man. It is not that the wretched are the object of Christian love or the
fulfilment of a moral duty; they are the latent presence of the coming Saviour
and Judge of the world, the touchstone which determines salvation and
damnation.” He concludes (p. 129), “the question is not how people or
happenings outside the church respond to the church, but how the church
responds to the presence of Christ in those who are ‘outside’, hungry, thirsty,
sick, naked and imprisoned.” Cf. also Barth, Church Dogmatics 4.2:658.
