Tag: Beatitudes

Foolish Enough to Be Faithful

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Sermons Year ALeave a comment

1 Corinthians 1:18-31; Matthew 5:1-12

Father John Dear reminds us that the Beatitudes are not polite blessings for private spirituality. It’s not chicken soup to nourish our souls during a quiet time with God.

The Beatitudes are Jesus’ nonviolent manifesto—a public declaration that God stands with the poor, the mourning, the meek, the justice-hungry, and the peacemakers.

Jesus was declaring a way of living that turns the world upside down, directly confronting every system that depends on fear and violence to survive. The Beatitudes unmask the lie that domination brings security and expose the myth that peace can be achieved through force. It is Jesus’ refusal to bow down to Herod, his rejection of religious nationalism, and, his insistence that the way of love—not fear, not coercion, not “comply or die”—is the only power that will heal this broken world.

And yet, the reality is that most of us didn’t grow up hearing from that Jesus, the Jesus of the gospels: brown-skinned; Jewish; Palestinian; unjust law-breaker; anti-racist; one who was born poor and forced to flee racialized, state-sanctioned violence as a refugee in Egypt; one who was arrested and executed by the state for protesting and resisting systems that harm the least of these.

Instead, many of us were raised hearing about an alternative Jesus— a very white, privileged, moderate, capitalist Jesus, a “wise,” law-abiding Jesus shaped by flags, greed, and power. A Jesus who blesses order more than justice, silence more than truth, authority more than accountability, the privileged more than the vulnerable, and even violence if it preserves the status quo.

The version of the Beatitudes many of us were taught is the voice of what we might call “religious-nationalist Jesus.” It’s a voice that borrows Jesus’ name to protect systems that harm the vulnerable while protecting the privileged. I invite us to hear out loud what has already been speaking quietly to us for a long time.

It sounds something like this…

When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up on a mountain. He walked out on stage, flanked by uniforms and flags, and then spoke with the calm authority of one who never had to fear the law.

Blessed are the rich, for their hard work and great faith, God has given them the gift of prosperity.

Blessed are the strong, for they will never have to depend on anyone.

Blessed are the hard-hearted, for empathy clouds judgment.

Blessed are those who comply, for they will make it home alive.

Blessed are the merciless, for mercy interferes with enforcement, and that could get you murdered.

Blessed are those who do not mourn too loudly, for public grief makes people uncomfortable as it asks dangerous questions about deaths, cruelty, and suffering.

Blessed are the pure in heart who know how to stay in their place and keep their protests to themselves.

Blessed are those who do not hunger and thirst for justice, for justice is disruptive, and to the king, disruption looks like insurrection.

Blessed are the peacekeepers, not the peacemakers, but the ones who call pepper spray ‘domestic terrorist control’ and bullets ‘necessary force.’

Blessed are those who condemn protests in the name of civility, who call moral resisters “agitators,” “communists,” “Marxists,” and “antifa-types.”

But woe to you if you are poor, for you are obviously lazy and unfaithful.

Woe to you who are weak and need help from your neighbors.

And woe to you who march.

Woe to you who blow a whistle.

Woe to you if you block traffic.

Woe to you if you if you love your neighbor as yourself, if you dare to put your body between a masked agent and a woman shoved violently to the ground.

Woe to you if you bear witness to the truth you see with your own eyes instead of repeating the lies from those on high.

And blessed are those who echo the lies and blessed are ones who say, “well, there’s bad on both sides,” because bending the knee to power is safe, and neutrality feels like wisdom.

Rejoice and give thanks, for your reward is order without justice,
peace without righteousness, life without humanity, but a system that works exactly as it was designed.

And the crowds nodded, a few amens could be heard, because they knew their king would approve. It sounded like law and order. It sounded like good, common-sense, conservative values. It didn’t sound foolish at all. It sounded like the wisdom of the wise.

This thinking is perhaps what prompted the Apostle Paul to quote the prophet Isaiah: “For it is written: ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise…’ …For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.”

Paul does not try to rescue the gospel from the charge of foolishness. He embraces it. He leans into it. He says, in effect: Yes. I know this way of love that Jesus taught and embodied looks foolish. I know the cross doesn’t look like wisdom to an empire that measures strength through domination. A crucified Messiah doesn’t inspire confidence in a world that believes security comes from force and order comes from fear.

And yet, Paul dares to say that this so-called foolishness is exactly how God is dismantling the violent wisdom of the world, “abolishing the things that are,” he writes.

This foolishness, says Paul, is the power of God.

It’s not the power to crush enemies, but the power to expose their lies and cruelty. It’s not the power of coercion, but the power of love that refuses to disappear even when it’s nailed to a cross or murdered on a public street.

This is why the Beatitudes and the cross belong together. Both seem foolish. Both look weak and impractical. Both seem absolutely powerless when confronting those invested in keeping things exactly the way they are. And both announce that God is not impressed by what those in high places call “wisdom.”

Paul reminds the church: “Not many of you were wise by human standards. Not many were powerful. Not many were of noble birth.” In other words, not many of you are respected by those in power today. Not many of you would be called patriots or even people who love their country. But God is not going to ask their permission to choose you. God is not going to wait until the next election to call you. God is calling you today to change this world.

In this very moment, I believe God is choosing the foolish. God is choosing the weak. God is choosing the despised. God is choosing the poor in spirit. God is choosing the mourners. God is choosing the meek. God is choosing those who hunger and thirst for justice. God is choosing the peacemakers who refuse to confuse peace with silence.

And because this is who God chooses, Jesus speaks with a wisdom that sounds like foolishness, feels like resistance, and looks like hope.

When the world says, “Be obedient,” Jesus says, “Be merciful.”

When the world says, “Keep the peace,” Jesus says, “Make peace.”

When the world says, “Respect authority,” Jesus says, “Blessed are those who refuse to bow to evil.”

This is why protest makes power nervous. Not because it might lead to violence, but because it tells the truth. It exposes the gap between our rhetoric of equality and due process and the reality of racialized suffering. It reveals who is expected to absorb pain quietly, so that the privileged can remain comfortable.

And when people who are supposed to be invisible refuse silence, the wisdom of the world begins to unravel.

Paul says God chooses the foolish and the lowly. And Jesus says they are blessed now.

This means that God is not neutral. God is not undecided. God is not standing above history waiting to see who wins. No, it means God is already present—among the crucified, the criminalized, the grieving, the justice-hungry, the meek, and the merciful.

That’s why Jesus does not say the poor will be blessed eventually, after they stop being poor. He does not say the mourners will be blessed once they move on. He does not say the justice-hungry will be blessed when they stop resisting and wise up to the ways of the world. He says they are blessed now.

And we see that blessing even now. You can murder Renee Good for defending her neighbors, and Alex Pretti for protecting a woman shoved to the ground, but instead of killing love, you only multiply it. You only make it stronger, wider, deeper, and fiercer.

So, hear the good news today: mercy is not weak; empathy is not foolish; compassion is not soft; and love is far from powerless.

These things are dangerous—to injustice.
These things are disruptive—to systems that depend on fear.

And these things are powerful enough to dismantle a world shaped by domination and supremacy.

Love looks weak—until it refuses to die.

Mercy looks small—until it spreads.

Empathy looks foolish—until it builds movements.

Compassion looks soft—until it organizes, makes signs, marches, chants, sings, and exposes the evil of a system that dehumanizes, divides, and demonizes so it can survive.

The poor are not powerless; they are positioned.

The meek are not losers; they are inheritors.

Those who hunger and thirst for justice are not wasting away; they are bending the moral arch closer to the Kin-dom of God.

And those of us who mourn today are not abandoned; but we are being held close to the heart of God and are being reassured that God’s reign of love and justice is coming.

Not through religious nationalism or enforced conformity, but it comes through a foolish, cross-shaped love that refuses to let violence have the final word.

And blessed are all who believe this, because you are already living into God’s future.

Amen.

Light It Up!

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Sermons Year ALeave a comment

beatitudes-1

Matthew 5:1-20

I believe one of the reasons that some Southerners yearn to see some snow, at least once a year, is because of the sheer magic of it. In an article for the Farmville Enterprise I quoted J.B. Priestly: “You go to bed in one kind of world and wake up in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment then where is it to be found?”

Then I wrote:

One day Stantonsburg Road was littered with empty Natural Light cans, leftover trash from Bojangles and McDonalds, and the carcass of a possum or two. The next day it was a majestic, untarnished pathway through a winter wonderland.

One day my lawn was brown, covered with ugly winter weeds and strewn with fallen tree limbs and dog droppings that I have been too lazy to pick up. The next day it was glistening white, void of a single blemish.

One day the flaws and faults of this fragmented world were all too apparent. The next day everything seemed to be forgiven, blanketed by grace. And although the world was still a very dangerous place to drive and to even walk, the hopeful wonder and potential beauty of the world was obvious (from: Snowflakes from Heaven).

Snow in the South is like a fairytale. But a few days later, the sun comes out, the rains fall, and it quickly melts away bringing us back to the real world, where we see the harsh, uncovered reality of it all. And the winter wonderland that once was seems to be a distant magical dream.

Have you ever considered that we might have it all backwards?

What if the fairytale is the littered highways and the brown lawns with ugly winter weeds?

What if the magical dream is the uncovered, unforgiven, graceless, and fragmented existence?

What if reality is the winter wonderland? What if reality is the world that has been blanketed by grace? What if reality is the world where hopeful wonder and potential beauty always exist?

I know what you are thinking…“Oh my goodness! Somebody call 911 ‘cause the preacher has lost his mind!”

But what if I have not lost my mind, and in fact, right now, my mind is as sane and as sharp as it has ever been?

I have said before that Jesus spoke less about sin and more about our inability to see. Jesus said, “I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see…” (John 9:39).  He continues throughout the gospels:

Do you have eyes and fail to see (Mark 8:18)? Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye (Matthew 7:3)?  Blessed are the eyes that see what you see (Luke 10:23)! Prophets and kings desired to see what you see but did not see it (Luke 10:24)!

Over and over, Jesus talked about importance of seeing something that most have difficulty seeing. I believe this is what Jesus meant when he said that he came not to abolish the law, but to fulfill it (Matthew 5:17). Not to get rid of it, but to bring it back into focus, to help us to truly see the purpose within it.

This is why I believe he said: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).

To see anything, light is needed; thus, one of the main purposes of Jesus is enabling people to see, to see the real world, to see reality.

And what is reality? What is it that we have so much trouble seeing? What is it that God wants us to see?

I believe the answer is in Jesus’ first recorded sermon. Jesus went up on a mountain, and after he sat down, his disciples came to him, and taught them, saying:

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:3).

God favors the “poor in spirit.” Not the religious, the devout, the pious or even the spiritual. Not the pastors, the elders and the deacons, not even the church member who serves in the soup kitchen. No, God favors the ones who have come to be served at the soup kitchen. They are not the ones with something to give. They are the ones with nothing to give. Jesus says the ones who are blessed, the ones who are blessed by God are those who, spiritually speaking, are completely destitute and needy. Their very spirits have been broken. And notice that Jesus uses the present tense. Not will be blessed. Not might be favored. They are, right now, right here, blessed. This is reality. And their future is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted (Matthew 5:4).

God favors the mourners. Not the faithful who can understand what the Apostle Paul was talking about when he said we should “give thanks in all circumstances” (I Thessalonians 5:18), or “rejoice even in the midst of suffering” (Romans 5:3-10), but the ones who are not just complaining about the pain in their life, but they actually in mourning over that pain. They look at who they are, and who they have become, and they grieve. They look in the mirror in utter despair, and Jesus calls them blessed and promises comfort.

Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth (Matthew 5:5).

The meek, the gentle, the shy and the timid are favored. Not the strong. Not the ones with the personalities or the confidence to overcome all sorts of adversity and somehow still make it to the top. Blessed are the ones who have never conquered anything, not even their own fears. It is the weak, says Jesus, not the strong, who survive and inherit the earth.  

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be filled (Matthew 5:6).

Not the ones who are righteous, but the ones on whose behalf the prophet Amos preached: “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” (Amos 5:24). These are the ones who have been unjustly judged, mistreated, shunned and bullied by society, even by communities of faith. They have suffered grave injustices because of their race, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, mental and physical ability, socioeconomic level and political or theological background. They have been beaten up so badly by the world that they hunger and thirst for justice and righteousness, like a wanderer lost in a hot desert thirsts for water. Jesus says that they are blessed and they are favored and they are the ones who will not only be satisfied, but will be filled, their cups overflowing.

Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy (Matthew 5:7).

Not the perfect and the proud, the boastful and the arrogant. But God favors the ones who are fully aware of their imperfections, the ones who have made mistakes, terrible mistakes. Thus, when they encounter others who are also suffering from unthinkable errors in judgment, they have mercy and compassion, and in their hearts, there is always room for forgiveness. They give mercy, because they need mercy for themselves. And because they are favored by God, they will receive it.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God (Matthew 5:8).

Not the pure, but the “pure in heart.” Not the ones who, on the outside, appear to be straight and narrow, the ones who seem to have it all together, whose characters appear to be flawless. No, God favors the ones viewed by the world as abominations. We are reminded of the words of 1 Samuel “for the Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart” (1 Samuel 16:7). God will see the hopeful wonder and the potential beauty of who they are and they will see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God (Matthew 5:9).

Not the ones who have necessarily found peace for themselves. But the tormented, disturbed and restless, who, because they are so continuously in chaos, seek to make peace whenever and wherever they can. Blessed are those who are without stability, but seek it, because they will find a home, a place of security, rest and a peace that is beyond all understanding, within the family of God.[i]

This, Jesus pronounces, is not a prescription of how things should be or how things could be. Jesus asserts that this is how things are! This is not some enchanted dream or magical fairytale. This is reality. This is truth. And Jesus announces: “I have come as light, as the Light of the World, to help you see it, to give all who are blind to it, sight to really see it as it really is.”

And not only that, Jesus says, you, who seek to follow me, you, who seek do the things that I do, go to the places that I go, you, who want to be my disciples, are also the Lights of the World. And you are called not to hide your light, but to shine your light on what is reality, what is true, so all may see it the way God sees it.

And we are to light it up in the same manner Jesus lit it up.

In Matthew 4 we read after James and John, Peter and Andrew left their fishing nets to follow Jesus, they proclaimed “…the good newsof the kingdom by curing every disease and every sickness among the people…those who were afflicted with various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, and paralytics, and he cured them” (Matthew 4:23-24).

We are to shine our lights by lifting up, accepting and caring for all people, especially those the world leaves behind. We are to light it up by loving, accepting, and caring for the least among us: the poor, the weak, those who need mercy, the marginalized who hunger and thirst for justice, the obviously flawed but pure in heart, and the troubled who yearn for peace.

Will we look like fools? You bet. Will people say that the way we accept and love and affirm others is socially and even theologically unacceptable? It’s likely. Will we be demeaned and even persecuted by others in the community, even other churches? Perhaps.

But here is the good news: Jesus also said,

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you [notice the change in person] when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you (Matthew 5:10-11).

So let the rest of the world live in their enchanted, dreamlike, fairytale existence where the rich, the prosperous, the powerful and the strong are blessed and favored by God.

And let us commit ourselves to living in reality, in the world created by our gracious God, in the world that Jesus, the Light of the World, came to help us see, in the world where the Holy Spirit reveals the hopeful wonder and potential beauty in all things and in all people, in the world that has indeed been blanketed by grace, like a 4-inch snowfall in the South.

And let us, as lights of this world, for the sake of this world, keep lighting it up, until the day comes when the eyes of all are finally fully opened. Amen.

[i] Words on the Beatitudes were inspired by Frederick Buechner. Whistling in the Dark: An ABC Theologized (New York: Harper Collins, 1988), 18.           

 

COMMISSIONING AND BENEDICTION

Go now into the world and light it up!

So the poor will know that they are blessed.

Light it up!

So that the weak will know that they are favored.

Light it up!

So that those who ache for justice will be satisfied.

Light it up!

So that the obviously flawed but pure in heart will see God.

Light it up!

So that those you yearn for peace will know security as God’s beloved children.

Light it up!

Knowing that if you are persecuted, yours is the Kingdom of Heaven.

Light it up!

Until the day comes when the eyes of all are finally fully open, and all may know love of God, the grace of Jesus Christ and the communion of the Holy Spirit. Amen.