Let God Be Free –That’s What
Love Is
Since I retired, I’ve made a point of turning on the Oprah show in the
late afternoons. I don’t always watch it, but I continue putting around the
house doing whatever I’m doing, and I listen to the television like
listening to the radio. I admire Oprah for putting her money where her mouth
is. She donates freely of her own wealth to needy people and organizations,
and she uses her celebrity to encourage her viewers to do the same. She
accepts donations to her Angel Network and then turns around and gives, in
the name of her millions of viewers, to worthwhile people and causes.
One day I was busy in the kitchen. The TV was on. I wasn’t listening very
closely, but I heard Oprah say, “That’s very Jesus-like of you.”
” What’s that?” I thought, and I stopped to watch. I had missed much of
the story, but I soon figured out that Oprah’s guest was the mother of a
woman who had died not long before. A drunk driver had hit her. The mother
was soft-spoken and calm. She was relaxed. She explained that she had let go
of the hatred and she felt no need for revenge. Getting back at the guy who
caused the accident wasn’t going to solve anything – certainly wasn’t going
to bring her daughter back.
What was striking about her story was that she had no desire to get back
at the guy who killed her child when so often our human nature seems to
demand “justice.” “Let him be,” she seemed to say. And in meaning it, she
was freed from the hatred that would otherwise consume her and keep her from
moving on.
The mother had told the driver that she didn’t hate him, she knew he had
broken the law and would be punished accordingly, but she didn’t want him to
“pay” for what he did with his life. On the contrary, she wanted him to grow
into the best possible person he could be. Her daughter had lost her life,
but the man still had his. Instead of wanting his life to be miserable in
payment for the misery he had caused her and her family, she hoped for
something good to come out of this tragedy. She encouraged him to live his
life well. I agree with Oprah. That was very Jesus-like of her. Go and sin
no more.
Not long after I saw a similar story on the Today Show. But this story is
even more unusual. Katie Couric was interviewing a man. Beside him sat the
young man who had murdered his son. The father had not only let go of his
anger, hurt and need for revenge, he had visited his son’s murderer in
prison to ask why, and to learn what made the murderer do what he did. As he
learned about the young man, he befriended him and over time, he even
embraced him like a son, with the sincere goal of helping him to become all
he could be.
The father’s rationale was similar to that of the mother of the daughter
killed by the drunk driver - his son was gone but he wanted the young man
who had killed his son to live a good and meaningful life. Then, something
good would come out of the tragedy and at least a second life wouldn’t be
lost, too.
It’s not often Katie Couric is lost for words, but a few beats passed
before she continued. I could tell she couldn’t believe what she was
hearing. But here sat these two men who were obviously fond of each other,
bound by an unspeakable violent and tragic event - a living, breathing
testament to what the Spirit can do in people’s hearts. “Good God!” you
might think. Yes, indeed. Good God.
On ABC News last night, there was a story about a group of death row
inmates who have established a scholarship program for the children of their
victims. One young man whose father was hit and killed by a woman high on
drugs, told her he forgives her. He said he believes her when she says how
sorry she is. In turn, he hopes she is able to accept his forgiveness.
Some of you may remember an accident that happened ten or fifteen years
ago on Mayberry Drive here in Reno. A woman, a young mother, was jogging
with a friend at dawn along Mayberry Drive. They always took that route and
they always went out first thing in the morning. Down Mayberry came a car
driven by a man who was heading home after a night of drinking and gambling.
He managed to pick off the young woman without leaving so much as a scratch
on her friend. She died at the scene.
The victim’s husband was in shock. He had lost his wife and his children
had lost their mother. Local media jumped on that story like fleas on a dog.
Law enforcement and district attorney personnel were interviewed. They made
it clear that the guy would pay for what he did. They would see to it that
justice would be served. The newspaper covered the story and television news
teams covered it from every conceivable angle.
As the days and weeks rolled by, the Reno/Sparks community became more
and more outraged. People wrote letters to the editor crying out for
revenge. “Let the bastard rot in prison,” was the general consensus. “What a
scum. Drunk and driving, the jerk. He should get what’s coming to him.”
The widower had a different take on the matter. He was a Christian,
active in his church, and one Sunday he confided to his Sunday school class
that the Reno/Sparks community’s call for revenge was making him
uncomfortable. He felt an overwhelming grief, but he didn’t feel the hatred
and outrage that was being expressed on his behalf. He knew the driver would
be held accountable for his decision to drive that morning, but he just
didn’t need to dwell on how terrible the drunk driver was. He had
lost his wife and nothing would bring her back. He needed to be able to
forgive and move on - for himself, for his children, and to honor the memory
of his late wife.
When we vilify others, we compromise our own integrity. No matter what
others have done, when we vilify others, we compromise our own integrity.
This morning, we read Paul’s directions to the church at Rome. Much of it
is familiar to our ears. And some of it’s not too difficult to do. Hate
what is evil; hold on to what is good. I can do that. Check. Love and
eagerly show respect for one another. Check. Work hard and serve the
Lord with a heart full of devotion. Piece of cake – check. Let your
hope keep you joyful, be patient in your troubles and pray at all times.
What’s that again? Be patient in your troubles and pray at all times.
Well, that one may take some work, but it’s doable. Check.
Share your belongings with the needy and open your homes to strangers.
This Christian living thing could be a bit of a challenge --- but this, too,
is doable. Ask God to bless those who persecute you. Excuse me? Ask
God’s blessing on my persecutors? Yeah, right. What was Paul thinking? Have
the same concern for everyone – be happy with the happy and weep with those
who weep. Check. Do not be proud, but accept humble duties. Do
not think of yourselves as wise. Uh-oh.
If someone has done you wrong, do not repay him with a wrong. Try to
do what everyone considers to be good. Aw, come on! Live in peace
with everybody and never take revenge. Let God handle it. If your
enemy is hungry, feed him. If he’s thirsty, give him drink. Conquer evil
with good. It’s that part toward the end that hangs me up. Being
Christian is hard work.
Anger frequently hurts the person holding the anger more than the one who
causes it. In his book, Wishful Thinking, A Theological ABC
(1), Frederick Buechner says of anger, “Of the Seven
Deadly Sins, anger is possibly the most fun. To lick your wounds, to smack
your lips over grievances long past, to roll over your tongue the prospect
of bitter confrontations still to come, to savor to the last toothsome
morsel both the pain you are given and the pain you are giving back – in
many ways it is a feast fit for a king. The chief drawback is that what you
are wolfing down is yourself. The skeleton at the feast is you.”
That’s it in a nutshell. . . Stop holding grudges, let it go, don’t seek
revenge and we spare ourselves the unsavory prospect of eating ourselves
alive.
And this is not just a good rule of thumb for the life and death
milestone upsets in our lives. It is for all those little upsets – the stuff
of everyday living. Do some of you remember the time when we collected green
stamps and blue chip stamps whenever we made a purchase – then we’d cash in
those stamps for all sorts of merchandise – (I equipped a kitchen once by
cashing in my stamp books.) Well, I once had a psychologist tell me I am a
collector of brown stamps. And when I decide to cash them in, God help the
poor unsuspecting soul who has no idea I’m quietly letting those stamps pile
up just waiting for the day I have gathered enough to cash in.
I’m not proud of it, but he hit the nail right on the head. That’s why I
remember his comments many years later, and that is why the subject of this
message unfolded in my mind as I struggled to put a message to this
morning’s scripture. I suspect everyone tends to struggle with this
important teaching.
Where have your relationships gotten shaky or fallen apart? Did someone
you thought was a friend say something that hurt your feelings? Is there a
member of your family who has been unfeeling toward you? Or a friend here at
church? What about a neighbor or colleague at work? Has someone said or done
something hurtful and you just can’t let it go? For those of you in school,
is there a kid who is ugly toward you and every time you pass him or her in
the hall, your stomach ties in knots?
If you’re a collector of brown stamps, you are remembering the detail of
every wrong done to you and you are quietly waiting for the opportunity to
cash in – to get back at the perpetrator of your misery. And that’s the kind
of thing I think Paul is talking about when he says to live in peace with
everybody and never take revenge. We’re not talking here about letting
anyone get away with anything. It’s just that God will take care of it in
God’s time. Let it go.
What would our nation be like if everyone were to live by these teachings
of Paul? Political one-upmanship would disappear. A number of reasons for
going to war, revenge and pride to name two, would be eliminated.
If each one of us were to pray to God to bless those who persecute us,
how would our hearts change and what would this world look like? How would
things be different if our governmental policy reflected the Christian
standards Paul lists in this morning’s scripture? It’s interesting to
imagine, because when we are so full of self-centered pride that we think
we’re better than other people - our country is better than other countries
- then our nation takes the low road rather than providing a positive model
for the rest of the world.
The Old Testament says, “An eye for an eye.” Well, as Ghandi so aptly
reminds us, if we keep going down this road, it will be an eye for an eye
until we are all blind. Is that what we want?
The message is clear. Stop holding grudges, let it go, don’t seek revenge
and we spare ourselves the unsavory prospect of eating ourselves alive.
Glenn Tinder wrote an article some time ago for The Atlantic Monthly
magazine titled “Can We Be Good Without God?”(2). The
gist is that love is for Christians the highest standard of human
relationships. If a person could love others without judging them or asking
anything of them, or thinking of one’s own needs, that person would meet the
Christian standard. No one can. Many of us can meet the requirements of
friendship or erotic love, but agape (Christian love) is beyond us all. It’s
just not a love toward which we are naturally inclined. No wonder we find it
next to impossible sometimes to forgive.
What Tinder is saying is that human beings are not capable of the one
most fundamental thing asked of Christians. What is central to Christian
living? To love all others and to love them unconditionally.
And we can’t do that - but God is capable of this kind of love, and we
see that in the life of Jesus Christ. Jesus’ love was without reservation
and without conditions. We didn’t do anything to deserve it, didn’t have to,
and it is intended for every human soul, every human soul, not just those
who are clean, not just those with power, not just those who go to this
church or that church, not just “good people.” God’s love, revealed in Jesus
Christ, is unconditional; it is agape.
We humans are glorified by the fact that God loves us
unconditionally and without reservation. Human lives are not sacred in and
of themselves. We don’t make our lives sacred by any goodness we perform.
Human life is not sacred by virtue of birth or accomplishment. If we get
this, truly get this, we will understand where people find the strength to
forgive – to let go – to leave it behind – to not have to “get back” for
real or perceived wrongs.
Do you remember not too many months back when a woman was held hostage by
a man and talked him into letting her go and giving up peacefully? It was in
the news. In fact, it seemed so unusual that the woman, Ashley Smith, was a
guest on news telecasts and talk shows answering questions about her ordeal
and how she managed to talk sense with the man. If ever there was an example
of God working in his children, this was it.
A man wanted for raping one woman and murdering another woman and three
men, (his name is Brian Nichols), forced Ashley into her apartment, tied her
up, put her in the bathtub and told her he would hurt her if she didn’t do
what he said. Enter the Holy Spirit.
Ashley saw the man not as a monster but as a fellow human being. She
talked with him – told him her story – how her husband had been stabbed and
died in her arms, how she had then taken to drugs, had been caught for
speeding and drunk driving, had been arrested for assault and had given up
custody of her young daughter to her aunt. She talked to him from her heart,
and then she made him breakfast. He thought she was an angel sent from God,
and I have no doubt that she was. They were brother and sister in Christ.
What happened there was a moment of redemption. We may not be capable of
agape love, but with God’s intervention, we can not only strive for it, we
can love even the most unlovable of persons.
. . . Stop holding grudges, let it go, don’t seek revenge and we spare
ourselves the unsavory prospect of eating ourselves alive.
. . . We may not be capable of agape love, but with God’s intervention,
we can not only strive for it, we can love even the most unlovable of
persons.
Some of us are thinking, “Well, that’s fine for those people, but I could
never do that. How could anyone befriend someone who has done such
unspeakable things? I could never do that.” You’re right. You couldn’t. It
is by the grace of God, the intervention of the Holy Spirit, that such
miracles happen. And make no doubt about it. Real, down-to-earth, genuine
forgiveness is miraculous. It blesses the person being forgiven and it is a
lifesaver for the person doing the forgiving.
So how do we get to the place where we can let God into our
relationships, even the ones that are in disarray, especially the ones that
are in disarray? I have a theory. I think we sometimes tend to think way too
small. We have to believe that the Almighty is powerful enough, big enough,
to accomplish the impossible in us.
With God, all things are possible. So let’s not try to get the
all-powerful, all-knowing creator God squeezed down to a size we can
understand. God is big enough to help us do the impossible. I think that
sometimes we Christians try to mold God to fit the definition of God that is
useful to us. In so doing, we break into a collective sweat trying to
squeeze, crunch and shrink God down small enough to fit our narrow view of
the world and lend credibility to the point we are trying to make.
Remember the joke that has been circulating for years where a man dies
and goes to heaven. Saint Peter shows him around, and when passing by one
way, he whispers, “Shhhh, be quiet – this is where the Mormons are and they
think they’re the only ones here.” I’ve heard the same joke with it being
the Catholics who think they’re the only ones here. In today’s political
climate, I’d suggest inserting Evangelicals. Shhhh, be quiet – this is where
the Evangelicals are and they think they’re the only ones here. Jews,
Muslims and Hindus could tell this joke about Christians. It could apply to
all sorts of people, you fill in the blank. We can all take turns in the hot
seat.
The reason the joke is amusing is because the idea that God favors only
one group of people is ridiculous. God’s not that little. God is love, and
God is big enough for the entire world’s needs, from before the beginning of
time until after forever. The best thing for us is to get out of the way and
let God’s uncontainable grace guide our lives.
Thirty years ago a little book by Fynn took the imagination of readers of
all ages and faiths by storm. Mister God, This is Anna
(3) is a delightful story of a little girl only 5 years
of age with an amazing personal faith and theology that put her on a first
name basis with her good friend, Mister God. Nothing is off limits to Anna
when it comes to talking about and with Mister God. She teaches Fynn, a man
old enough to be her grandfather, a lot about life. At the young age of
five, Anna understands better than most grown-ups do how God is – how God is
powerful enough to help us do the impossible – as long as we don’t get in
the way.
I conclude by reading a conversation between Fynn and Anna. (If you have
issues with gender identification of God, remember that this is a 5-year-old
child talking and for Anna, it helps to think of God as male.) Anna starts,
“People’s boxes get littler and littler.”
"Boxes? I don’t understand that.”
“Questions are in boxes,” she explained, “and the
answers they get only fit the size of the box.”
“That’s difficult; go on a bit.”
“It’s hard to say. It’s like – it’s like the answers
are the same size as the box. It’s like them dimensions.”
“Oh?”
“If you ask a question in two dimensions, then the
answer is in two dimensions too. It’s like a box. You can’t get out.”
“I think I see what you mean.”
“The questions get to the edge and then stop. It’s
like a prison.”
“I expect we’re all in some sort of prison.”
She shook her head. “No, Mister God wouldn’t do that.”
“I suppose not. What’s the answer then?
“Let Mister God be. He lets us be.”
“Don’t we?”
“No. We put Mister God into little boxes.”
“Surely we don’t do that?”
“Yes, all the time. Because we don’t really love him.
We got to let Mister God be free. That’s what love is.”
. . . Stop holding grudges, let it go, don’t seek revenge and we spare
ourselves the unsavory prospect of eating ourselves alive.
. . . We may not be capable of agape love, but with God’s intervention,
we can not only strive for it, we can love even the most unlovable of
persons.
. . . Let God be free. That’s what love is.”
Amen.
(1)
Frederick Buechner, Wishful
Thinking – A Theological ABC, Harper & Row, Publishers, New York and San
Francisco, 1973
(2)
Glenn Tinder, ”Can We Be Good
Without God?” The Atlantic Monthly, December, 1989
(3) Fynn, Mister God, This is Anna,
Ballantine Books, New York, 1974
