Really, there is only one King and one Kingdom we Strive for

 “Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”[1]

 

Let us pray.  “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and redeemer.”[2]  Amen.

 

Good evening.  We have arrived at the end of the church year this weekend.  With the change in daylight-savings a few weeks ago and the darkening evening hours, I for one, definitely have an acute sense that we are coming to an end of a cycle with a much needed turn to brighter days not too far off in the future.  After all, following this weekend we begin into a series of holidays, first Thanksgiving, then Advent and the pre-Christmas holiday cheer, and then into the celebration of a baby born for us as redeemer, and then on to a New Year, with fresh beginnings.  Yes, the moment is indeed right this week to call a close to the year that was and start in earnest to prepare for what is to come.

 

Today’s lessons, of course do not let us down, nor does the festival we are celebrating:  Christ the King!  Wait a second, what is “Christ the King” and why is it the way we end the church year?  Our readings today bespeak an apocalypse of epic proportion, why these texts as we conclude and begin to look to Advent, the advent of our Lord?

 

One ought to also ask some more rudimentary questions.  Like, perhaps, what is a King?  What is a Kingdom?  What is a Dominion?  These are really good questions.  This whole festival is one that we ought to be, in our current American context, thinking deeply about.

 

This week, on Thursday, the Episcopal Bishop in Minnesota, Right Reverend Craig Loya[3], provided this reflection on the festival and these questions in a post on social media.  He wrote, “This Sunday is the feast of Christ the King.  It was first added to the Christian calendar by Pope Pius XI in 1925, in the bitterly divided aftermath of World War I, when nationalism and fascism were alarmingly ascendant across Europe.  He conceived of it as a way to remind Christians that our primary allegiance is not to any earthly ruler or nation, but to Jesus Christ.”[4]

 

“Using word ‘king’ to describe Jesus, or ‘kingdom’ to describe his coming reign, can make us uncomfortable.  The word carries a connotation of tyrannical, authoritarian rule, that seems very unlike how Jesus used and described his authority.  But Jesus, the New Testament, and the church through the ages, knew exactly what they were doing - engaging the subversive act of turning the concepts of king and kingdom on their heads.  The point is that Jesus is unlike any and all political and institutional powers in the world.  Instead of privileging one tribe, language, or nation, Jesus builds the Beloved Community gathered around God’s feast of love.  Instead of making himself big in order to win, Jesus comes to us small and humble.  Instead of clinging to his identity with entitlement, Jesus leads by serving.  Instead of putting himself first, he lives by dying.  That is how the God of all creation presides over the whole cosmos.”[5]

 

The bishop then goes on to offer a comment about how this is playing out in today’s context.  He states that, “As we find ourselves in a moment when Christian Nationalism—that abomination that equates the dominance of a racially narrow understanding of America with the kingdom of God—is again ascendant, this feast is as important as it has ever been.  I, for one, am unwilling to cede the language of God’s kingdom that is given to us in the scripture to such a gross distortion.  We cannot allow those who would corrupt the gospel of Jesus to steal from us the way that very gospel speaks of the savior.  We are invited in these days, and all days, to follow our spiritual ancestors in pointing to Christ the King of peace.  We point to that kingdom by sowing God’s reckless generosity wherever we go, by meeting the hatred and vitriol all around with God’s love, by standing with those the world’s kingdoms constantly push aside, and by walking day by day the way of the cross of Jesus, which alone can bring true life, true liberation, true peace, and true joy.”[6]

 

Amen.

 

All this discussion about Christ’s Kingdom, however, got me thinking a lot about a core principle of Lutheran theology:  the two kingdoms principle.  For those not as conversant in Lutheran Theology, let me borrow from a resource that our publishing ministry here in the ELCA, was so gracious as to provide.

 

In “The Lutheran Handbook II”, a part of the “here we stand” confirmation education resource that was developed several years ago, there is a rather detailed discussion of the two kingdoms principle, and it starts with today’s gospel lesson.  As offered in this text:

 

“When Pilate asked Jesus whether he was the king of the Jews, he replied, ‘My kingdom is not of this world’ (John 18:36).  This statement has been the starting point of a long series of attempts to define the relationship between Christians and the world.”  “…  Lutherans tend to favor a set of guiding principles rather than pat answers.  Among these principles is Martin Luther's distinction between God's two kingdoms: the earthly or left-handed kingdom, and the heavenly or right-handed kingdom.

 

This distinction aims to do three things:

·      To help Christians live as God's freed and forgiven people in a fallen and sinful world (you don't need to renounce the world and live in a monastery to be holy in God's eyes).

·      To clarify that, although God is love and rules the church by love and forgiveness, God uses the force of the law to prevent people from destroying the world and hurting others. At the same time, God uses the law to drive people from one kingdom (on the left [/earthly]) into the other (on the right [/heavenly]).

·      To guide the church in its relationships with the world, especially government, so that Christians understand their main mission to be preaching the gospel to other sinners, as well as their responsibility to speak out against unjust government whenever necessary.”[7]

 

This resource reminds us that, “These kingdoms exist in the exact same place, but operate in two distinct ways, or rather, God is the sovereign of the whole world and governs in two ways:

1.    God governs all people in the earthly kingdom through the agency of secular government and the law (by means of force or conviction of sin).

2.    Conversely, God rules all people who live by faith in Christ, or those in the spiritual kingdom, with God's right hand, through the gospel (by grace).”[8]

 

What this ought to do, is help us recognize that we are ever, always and constantly citizens of two kingdoms.  We are, yes, citizens of the United States on planet earth, within the confines of creation, as we understand it.  However, we are also citizens of the heavenly kingdom, saved by grace through faith in Christ and his crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension.  The error we can make is to forget which begets which.  We can hold these kingdoms and our twin citizenships as strictly distinct, separate, and equal; a fallacy that we have fallen into, to creation’s detriment[9] and a failure of our role to be good stewards of all God has made and we have been entrusted.  Or we can, rightly, remember that ultimately it is God who is ruler of all, in the knowledge that the ultimate judgements are in his hands.

 

The psalmist provides that “He has established the world; it shall never be moved; your throne is established from of old; you are from everlasting.”[10]  While we talk of the “earthly kingdom” and all of its realities this side of the Fall[11], God established this world, this creation as good, and it is His[12].  As provided in Daniel, “His dominion is an everlasting dominion that shall not pass away, and his kingship is one that shall never be destroyed.”[13]  Yes, God rules here on earth as much as He rules in heaven.  He maintains dominion not domination, a key distinction he pleads for us to live into on our own.  As much as the two kingdoms principle helps to understand how God reigns in heaven and on earth, there is no question which is superior and which is inferior.  The Book of Revelation makes it clear that Jesus is “‘… the Alpha and the Omega,’ …, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”[14]  To that, Christ is the first, last, and always, and the Kingdom of God never ends; Jesus reigns forever.  But this reign, in all its glory, is nothing like what we expect.  The Kingdom of earth is made new, the new Jerusalem will come to earth[15], “on earth as it is in heaven.”[16]  The trouble we have is both understanding this and believing this is true.  But it is true.  Our call is to live into the heavenly, always being made new Kingdom; even as we are citizens of both our nation/this world but also (more importantly) as God’s children.  Thus, on this Christ the King festival, may we recommit to seek and work our best to live out all that is right and true and full of grace.  Christ and his righteousness.

 

To God be the Glory.  Amen.

[Provided at this link is a fuller version of the above, including key excepts and coupes of the relevant texts:  https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/qgqycra3v79831r50e3m8/20241123c-Message-for-Christ-the-King-Sunday.pdf?rlkey=0qme0z8kt96q4uf2o3fn0ycav&st=8or9hlew&dl=0]

 

[1] 2 Corinthians 1:2

[2] Psalm 19:14

[3] https://episcopalmn.org/about-us/team-missioners

[4] Cf. https://www.facebook.com/share/p/5hMxadzh2tzvyuZJ/

[5] Ibid.

[6] Ibid.

[7] The Lutheran Handbook II, Here We Stand Series, Augsburg Fortress, 2007, pp 174-177

[8] Ibid.

[9] e.g. a most egregious example, especially for Lutherans, is that that of the rise and accommodation of fascism/Nazism in inter-war Germany.

[10] Psalm 93: 1b-2

[11] Cf. Genesis 3

[12] Cf. Genesis 1-2

[13] Daniel 7:14b

[14] Revelation 1:8

[15] Cf. Rev 21

[16] Cf. Matthew 6:10

A reply to Charlie

Yesterday was, as I indicated in my previous blog entry a momentous day.  The aftermath of the election the previous day remains raw.  And I think emtions are running high, justifibly so as the gravity of the moment bespeaks a high sense of feelings.

To be candid, Facebook is my go-to social media platform and where I spend way too much time arguing, sharing, and so forth.  Yesterday it was a place of mixed messages and emotions as I watched and read what was there.  Among the things posted, later in the day, was Heather Cox Richardson's daily synopsis.  Heather is a History Professor at Boston College (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heather_Cox_Richardson).  She styles herself as follows on her substack feed:  "I'm a history professor interested in the contrast between image and reality in American politics. I believe in American democracy, despite its frequent failures."  Her post yesterday was no less informative than any previous, and as is my habit I often repost her synopsis (here is last night's post:  https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/november-6-2024).

My reply prompted a comment by Charlie Davidson, a former student and strongly held libertarian.  I think it is definately worthy of consideration as he is not alone in his convictions and thoughts:

"If you were surprised by this loss, you may not be as informed as you think you are. And this also speaks to an inability to understand WORKING CLASS people. Kamala was never working class and its also hilarious how much Hispanics and women shifted to Trump. So keep calling us sexist or racist or whatever, that just proves you don't understand Americans."

In reply I offered the following appending the image that follows):

"Charles Davidson I’m not surprised by the loss for Harris, it’s been a toss up for almost the entire race.  The magnitude of the break, that is different, although, it’s not far from a couple models that 538 did adding in the polling error typical from the last two rounds (which I was thinking were better likelihoods than what the spin was going around).

As for demographics, this gets at the reality (so far as we know it, percentage next to the demographic label is the percentage of the overall electoral that falls in that category).  I don’t have one that breaks it down along class lines.  Your point about working class and how they vote is, again, not surprising to me.  I’ve long said there’s a difference between working class and middle class, and that is too often been lumped together.  Most of the difference there is attitude and culture, but also economics.  This image shows that there’s a number of false narratives about Hispanics going around now, as with women generally, although that demographic (white women) was clearly misunderstood by the prognosticators.

What I don’t understand about Americans, rather clearly, is the depth that the majority are willing to accept the risk to our representative democratic experiment; the republic.  I have sworn an oath to defend the constitution, and the republic that it defines, having served in uniform for over two decades.  Inherently that makes me a minority, as less than 2% of Americans can or have been willing to do that.  I am, admittedly, skewed in my thinking in that regard, as I’ve taken it seriously and know what is really in the constitution and what the republic stands for and what it does not (a great example was how I, one time, revealed to you how, what you thought ought to be forbidden under the constitution, was actually an explicit power granted to the federal government under the constitution).  The rather poor civics education in our country is something I’ve spoken/written about, but to me it seems much worse than I’ve thought.  And I think it’s not just knowledge, it’s the attitudes that have emerged about the republic that have been foisted and believed, not only thanks to hyper partisanship, but downright lies and misinformation thats been bought in as well (increasingly by hostile foreign powers).  It’s really stunning and problematic if you hold to a political center based on the defense of the constitution and how it’s enshrined.  It’s also problematic when you consider the true impacts of the losses that come with having the republic falter, which most people take for granted won’t happen or blissfully ignore that it’d happen to them (again based on my experiences, especially having been to other places in the world and having been a longtime student of history).  I clearly see the risks as too great to jettison the republic, most Americans do not.  I’ve got to get my head around that.  Americans aren’t as values based as they purport to be, at least about the democratic governance experiment that came out of our revolution.  Clearly there are other motivations and drivers that supersede the republic’s defense which I thought was held more deeply in regard than it is.  I’ve got to get my head around that more and I’ll submit it is bothersome even as I am aware it’s not entirely unique to our political history."

I don't have more to add to this post, other than to say this remains tied to my post yesterday and where I am eager, for the sake of the republic, to defend it as I have sworn to do.

A republic, if you can keep it

I start the writing of this post in the early hours of 6 November 2024, a date that shall, I’m quite certain, be studied for many decades to come.  While the vote totals are not all in from the election balloting the previous day, it looks as if Donald Trump will return to the Presidency for a non-consecutive second term.  This may yet be overturned, but seeing where things stand with him leading in the returns of all the remaining states, it seems he and his supporters have put together not only an electoral college win, but also, for the first time ever, a popular majority win.  A truly stunning turn of events.

 

In 1787, as the constitutional convention was closing, James McHenry, in his published journal, records a conversation between Mrs. Elizabeth Powell and Benjamin Franklin (styled as Doctor Franklin in the foregoing):  “A lady asked Dr. Franklin ‘Well Doctor what have we got a republic or a monarchy’ – ‘A republic ‘ replied the Doctor ‘if you can keep it.’” (https://blogs.loc.gov/manuscripts/2022/01/a-republic-if-you-can-keep-it-elizabeth-willing-powel-benjamin-franklin-and-the-james-mchenry-journal/).  To be succinct, we are at a moment where that latter part will be in question.  The return of Trump to the presidency will stretch and challenge whether the republic can and will hold.  This is not a question of if or if not this is true, we have the evidence of his previous four year term to show it is true.  The question is to what degree and how badly will it be.

 

And that is the state of affairs that the American voters appear to have been willing to risk, if not outright endorse.  Back in the summer of 2016, I wrote about the phenomenon of Trump (http://backusec.blogspot.com/2016/07/the-trump-phenom-abridged.html), which has remained evergreen in its assessment of the nature of the supporters of Trump.  The exception being that the “feeling” aspect that drives the movement is increasingly, and almost entirely, divorced from facts or realties.  It is instead built on a set of perceptions and mythology that is repeated incessantly and through unfiltered mechanisms based on the pomposity of Trump.  Despite his being held liable for sexual assault and rape (to the tune of tens of millions of dollars)  and being convicted of a felony, his spin of it being a sham court, unjust persecution, and election interference (all of which are fundamentally untrue) are believed by a significant number of people.  Many of which are parroting or even going further in embellishing the fantasy that’s been spun out, that he not only gets away with it, people feel aggrieved with him.  The depth of how well this has permeated was brought to full relief to me when a friend commented a few months ago in response to one of my posts.  In her mind, the republic was already dead and there was nothing left to salvage from it (despite the fact that she lives in a world, which is clearly taken for granted, where the entire economy is backed by the full faith and trust in the republic she calls dead).  And the apparent result is self evident, the American voter is either wired into this dystopian version of the world or at least tolerant of it enough that they voted to put him back in office (despite well knowing the likely result).

 

As the first term of Trump’s presidency ensued, I prognosticated that it was going to be a chaos driven mess that was going to pull us in the wrong direction, as we had to contend with serious and potentially devastating challenges as a country both domestically and in foreign policy.  After I retired from the US Army in early 2018 it was clear that the direction was not good, but the guardrails were holding to keep the republic from failing in spite of the chaos that was beginning to be the signature of the administration, with policies issued by tweet and showmanship being the modus operandi over and against any sense of statesmanship.  There were significant accomplishments made, from the MAGA point of view:  a massive tax cut and reordering of the tax code, the appointment of a majority of solidly conservative (arguably reactionary) US supreme court justices along with scores of federal judges, a “phase 1 trade deal with China”, a bromance between Trump and Kim Jung Ill, etc.  Nevertheless, despite efforts to make our foreign affairs into a transactional system, our alliances were not fully abandoned, NATO held, and we did not fully concede to an isolationist position.  At home, repeals to the American Care Act (aka the health care act passed during the Obama presidency) failed, efforts to dismantle the civil service were thwarted, and within the Whitehouse itself, there were many who were reigning in excesses like trying to shoot protestors in the knees or using the military in domestic law enforcement.

 

This was, however, a serious period of back peddling and failing to address the big issues of the day, all in favor of creating political theater for entertainment sake at an unprecedented scale.  There was no infrastructure bill or serious effort.  There wasn’t any real effort to contend with entitlements in a serious way.  There was zero effort to curb spending on nice to do things and even a doubling down on wasteful efforts like the boondoggle that was and is “the border wall.”  The Afghanistan conflict continued, and instead of negotiating to leave on terms that would bolster what we had invested in that place, the Afghan government had to deal with an agreement between the US and the Taliban that put them in a horrible position; leaving the conclusion our involvement to be decided in the next administration without a real way to fix the problems.  There was no tangible effort to curb the effects of a changed global economy, and instead it was imposition of tariffs, a retake on NAFTA renamed USMCA that didn’t change the paradigm, and an era of easy cash that had hyperactive growth in the economy making it primed for a massive burst.  And, boy did that house of cards tumble in the face of a once in a century event, a global pandemic.

 

To avoid going on forever on the history of the first Trump presidency, it ended in devastating fashion.  Millions of Americans lost their lives to the COVID-19 outbreak, never minding the numbers globally.  The economy which was flying way to high for its own good, tanked massively putting many out of work resulting in Trump being the first president since the Great Depression who left office having lost more jobs than had been created.  The problems at the southern border never got solved (and arguably were left to fester), instead of quelling unrest and uniting the country, protests had only increased and gotten increasingly violent, and we had done nothing functionally to build a bulwark to deal with a rising China, stop Iran from getting the bomb, keep autocrats from getting their way, or strengthen our stance with allies so as to have a joint vision for security and prosperity at home and abroad.  People in America voted clearly that he had failed, and it was time to end the madness.  However, then, came January 6^th, 2021, when he incited an armed insurrectionist mob to storm the Capitol of the United States, carrying his banner, to stop the certification of the election that unseated him.  Unwilling to ever concede or acknowledge his election loss, this was all fueled by a massive lie that perpetuates to this day.  He was impeached for the second time for this traitorous effort (the first was for his acts pertaining to Ukraine and the 2016 election), but as the machinations of the Senate allowed, he was not removed mainly on a technicality (making him eligible to run again).

 

Because of that, despite the facts and the realities of the failures of the first term of office, again he is most likely to be making residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, DC in January 2025.  Yes, the republic had not failed, but it was haggard and beaten.  Again, despite the post presidency revelations (e.g. mishandling and concealing his keeping of classified documents, efforts to get the Georgia election results overturned, and the details of his part in the January 6^th attempted insurrection, among other things), the American people have elected for the first time a traitorous felon to the Whitehouse.  I have heard it many times that we need to trust the “wisdom” of the American people as the express their will at the ballot box.  I’ll be blunt, I absolutely do not, because, increasingly, it has nothing to do with wisdom.  Rather it has much more to do with the feelings and myths that we tell ourselves over and against realities we too often do not want to see.  As I wrote on social media, the election of Joe Biden in 2020 to the presidency was merely the first step in fixing the underlying problem we have in America (an important one, but still only the first step).  As is in evidence now, it was not enough to remove the head from the snake that is Trumpism.  No, we needed to address, head-on, the grievances of the electorate with a straight talking, clear and truthful effort.  Biden did some of that, in that we finally got an infrastructure bill, we took action on high tech industry efforts, we curbed the results of the post-pandemic supply chain and Ukraine war driven inflation, but it was not enough.  Biden needed to anoint his successors to keep the work going well before the spring of this year.  He needed to find a way to confront the lies and fabrications being spewed by the Trump machine.  He needed to recognize he couldn’t be the front man for any longer than the first two years and that he needed to bring home traditional republicans to a coalition that could weather the upsurge of the MAGA-ites that was inevitable to occur.  Yes, there are problems in our republic that need fixing, but Joe didn’t get at those core issues, at least enough and with the plan to get through the long slog it needs to take to get to the other side.

So now, we are looking at the question asked akin to that of Elizabeth Powell.  America will we become something other than a republic?  Massive deportations, destruction of our institutions, and much more is promised by Trump.  Those that served within his last administration, who provided some sense of guardrails, have eschewed him and what he stands for.  Loyalty to him and his fantasy world is the only mark used to judge who he lets into his circle.  So who will be the voices of reason?  It is absolutely true that Trump poses a potentially unfettered risk to the republic, he demonstrated that before and has now promised to exact revenge on any that dared to have stood in his way.  This is what was voted for, this is what we were promised.  Are we ready for the republic to end?  Can we keep it?  I have deep fears that we will not.  I have sworn to protect the constitution of the United States, and I can do no other.  Today is a day where historians will look back and ask why we chose this road.  More so they will see it as an inflection point for the unfolding story of what American became rather than what it was.

 

Tradition!

Sermon for 31 August/15th after Pentecost

Lessons

Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-9; Song of Solomon 2:8-13 (semicontinuous); Psalm 15; Psalm 45:1-2, 6-9 (semicontinuous); James 1:17-27; Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23 (Green)

Key Verses

Deuteronomy 4:1  “… give heed to the statutes and ordinances that I am teaching you to observe …”
Deuteronomy 4:2  “You must neither add anything to what I command you nor take away anything from it, but keep the commandments of the LORD your God with which I am charging you.”
James 1:22  “But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.”
James 1:25  “But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.”
Mark 7:8  “You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.”
Mark 7:21  “For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come:”
Mark 7:23  “All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”
Isaiah 29:13  “The Lord said: Because these people draw near with their mouths and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their worship of me is a human commandment learned by rote;”

Message

“Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”[1]

Let us pray.  “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and redeemer.”[2]  Amen.

 

As I begin, I wish to take you to a far off place, perhaps not scriptural, but indeed something that I am sure you may remember well (at least if you are an aficionado of modern theater and movies):

 

https://youtu.be/6nwj8nAYEM4?si=4fBuH4X6MGQfxE7z&t=4 [end at time-stop 1:50]

 

So, after hearing the first lesson, the psalm, the second lesson, and the gospel from scripture, you now have heard the gospel according to Tevya.  [chuckle]  To be clear, I am not a subscriber to Tevya’s gospel, but he gets at something very much at the core of the lessons we have today in this very famous monologue and opening song from the Fiddler on the Roof.  Tradition!

 

What are traditions?  Are they good?  Are they bad?  And, what is Christ saying about them?  We often refer to things like “the Lutheran tradition” in speaking about how we see scripture or understand our faith.  But, what do we mean by all that?

 

Whenever I encounter the need to define things clearly in our common language, I typically pick up a dictionary.  For convenience, I borrowed from the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, this is how they render the definition:

 

“Tradition (noun)

1)  .

a.    : an inherited, established, or customary pattern of thought, action, or behavior (such as a religious practice or a social custom)

b.    : a belief or story or a body of beliefs or stories relating to the past that are commonly accepted as historical though not verifiable

“… the bulk of traditions attributed to the Prophet …

—J. L. Esposito”

2)  : the handing down of information, beliefs, and customs by word of mouth or by example from one generation to another without written instruction

3)  : cultural continuity in social attitudes, customs, and institutions

4)  : characteristic manner, method, or style

“in the best liberal tradition”[3]

 

You can clearly get the sense that tradition is, first and foremost, something that is of the past we hold on to today.  And let me tell you, despite much of society continuing to secularize and supposedly “throwing off” tradition, traditions abound in our lives.  One such example is the ritual of “trick or treating” on Halloween.  We have long abandoned its original religious significance in American society, but we have firmly embraced its long-standing rhythms and requirements.  We buy candy, man our doors, bring our kids out in the often freezing cold with pillowcases all dressed up in costumes.  For certain, do not be the one that forgets, leaving your outer light on at your house, and have no treats for young visitors.  And don’t get me going on bobbing for apples, caramel apples, and all of the candy corn from here until eternity; well almost that far.  And this is merely one holiday.  Think on it, we have traditions for everyday life too, just like Tevya.  Who here doesn’t have their appointed morning beverage and routines?  How much of those are inherited from childhood or common cultural norms?  More than we like to admit, I’d say.

 

My point here is that traditions are alive and well, and we cannot avoid them.  We are hard wired to live by traditions, lots of traditions.  Some of these are encoded into laws and governing structures, but so many others are not.  We just take them for granted.  Akin to Tevya, we can’t tell you where half of them came from, but we hold to them like no tomorrow.  Why?  Tradition!

 

Our lessons today are all about this too.  In the Old Testament lesson, God makes clear he has a list of traditions that he expects us to “give heed to” and has “ordinances” that he is teaching us to “observe”.[4]  In other words God, in this lesson, is establishing his tradition for all humankind.  But this tradition is not one that we fall into.  No, it is one we must be taught.  The tradition is comprised of “commandments”[5] that we much “diligently observe”[6] from generation to generation[7] not for their own sake, but as a sign for all of humankind to follow in “wisdom and discernment.”[8]  In other words, it is through who they embody, how the faithful act, that matters in this tradition, a tradition of faith lived out for all to see.

 

This is picked up in the lesson from James where he makes clear that we are to “… be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.”[9]  James goes on to stipulate that “… those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.”[10]  James is very much echoing what the Deuteronomist was speaking to.  That, we as people of God have not only a history and a culture, but more importantly a living tradition that helps us live in the best way possible, in accordance with God’s wishes for us and all of creation.

 

But here is the thing that always gets us in trouble, even for poor Tevya, tradition for tradition’s sake.  Or worse yet, tradition as an excuse to not tend to the Word of God.  This is precisely where Jesus steps in to speak to us, both in his time and always.  In the gospel lesson, Jesus is confronting this problem head on.  He is making clear that the religious authorities of his day, the ones that were often the ones so close to understanding the ultimate realities, were still missing the point.  He states to them that they have abandoned “… the commandment of God” and, instead, have held “… to human tradition.”[11]  What they fell into, and we constantly fall into, is the trap of making our priorities, our traditions, our habits, our routines, into what is sacrosanct, instead of the things that God commands.  What is too often forgotten is that in addition to God establishing his tradition through the Deuteronomist, he also stipulated that we “… must neither add anything to what I command you nor take away anything from it, but keep the commandments of the LORD your God with which I am charging you.”[12]  What Christ was encountering was the baggage, not unique to his time, but pervasive throughout all time and all cultures of added, or modified, or scrambled, or even omitted parts of His truth made into human traditions.  And the core problem is that the origin of human traditions comes out of our brokenness, even as we do our best to the images of God in the world.

 

Jesus knows this, and that is why he is pushing back against the self-righteousness of human tradition.  He reiterates that he has seen this before, by quoting Isaiah, understanding that we as believers, are those people who “draw near with their mouths and honor [God] with their lips, while their hearts are far from [the Lord], and their worship of [God] is a human commandment learned by rote …”[13]  God doesn’t want us to be mindless drones, he doesn’t need us to say nice things to him and then not embody his commandments in our very being.  No, he wants us to love him with all our hearts, all our minds, and all our souls[14] evidencing this through loving one another as much as we love ourselves.[15]  And, we need him to help us with this, because, as Christ states, “[f]or it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come.”[16]  We succumb over and over again to this problem of being convinced that if we follow the ways of the world, of human traditions, that we will be saved and sanctified.

 

But, the truth is that is far from how it works.  We have seen throughout history how the path of good intentions, from a human understanding, is actually being paved as a road to hell.  This was precisely what Martin Luther was noting about the church in his day.  It had made human tradition above the living Word of God, and it had gone so far, so bad, that it required immediate prophetic teaching to ensure that God’s commandments were observed, not just as lip service, but in the very being of the church itself.  What the church, then and now, and certainly in the future, falls into, is worrying about what is coming in more than what is going out.  Jesus offers a litany of things that are “… evil things” that “come from within.”[17]  When we look inward, when we think we have it figured out, God reminds us that it is that focus that “defile a person.”[18]  But, when we turn out, when we give, when we show in ourselves and our action and in our doings, when we are focused on God and his commandments, we are made free.[19]  God’s traditions, his ordinances, his commandments are Good News, and we can be reflections of it in our lives every day.  We just need to be willing students of God’s teachings, learners of his traditions.

 

For those that have seen the movie or play, you know that Tevya in the Fiddler on the Roof, has many struggles, much pain, and contends with outright evil, brought on through, and often from, human traditions.  What redeems him?  What helps him come to terms with the fact that what he saw as sacrosanct, was actually fleeting?  Answer:  Faith.  Faith in God and his way in his life and that of everyone around him.  What he had to learn was to give up and give in to what God wants us all to have:  HIS TRADITION!

 

Amen.

[1] 2 Corinthians 1:2

[2] Psalm 19:14

[3] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tradition, accessed on 31 August 2024

[4] Cf. Deuteronomy 4:1

[5] Cf. Deuteronomy 4:2

[6] Cf. Deuteronomy 4:6

[7] Cf. Deuteronomy 4:9

[8] Cf. Deuteronomy 4:6-7

[9] James 1:22

[10] James 1:25

[11] Cf. Mark 7:8

[12] Deuteronomy 4:2

[13] Cf. Isaiah 29:13

[14] Deuteronomy 10:12, Matthew 22:37

[15] Cf. Matthew 22:39

[16] Cf. Mark 7:21

[17] Cf. Mark 7:23

[18] Cf. Mark 7:23

[19] Cf. John 8:32