Romans 13:8-14

Love for One Another

8 Owe no one anything, except to love one another, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; you shall not murder; you shall not steal; you shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.

An Urgent Appeal

11 Besides this, you know what time it is, how it is already the moment for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; 12 the night is far gone; the day is near. Let us then throw off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; 13 let us walk decently as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in illicit sex and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy. 14 Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

Matthew 18:15-20

Reproving Another Who Sins

15 “If your brother or sister sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If you are listened to, you have regained that one. 16 But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. 17 If that person refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church, and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a gentile and a tax collector. 18 Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. 19 Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. 20 For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”

When thinking of this sermon, I thought a lot about the word “reconcile”.  It’s a great word.  It’s simply defined as this:

restore friendly relations between.

cause to coexist in harmony; make or show to be compatible.”a landscape in which inner and outer vision were reconciled”

As the week progressed, I began to see this sermon, this passage as having a possibility of a universal appeal to us today.  

What does it mean to be reconciled?  Our first lectionary lesson from Romans talks about the rule of love.  The entire law, the canon of scripture, has a trajectory towards love…that even the commandments are summed up in loving one another.  It even says that simply believing does not bring salvation to us, or to anyone.  The work and power of love has to be something that springs up within us and flows to those around us.

But, we have an issue, maybe lots of issues.  We live in systems that simply sap the life out of us, that tell us what to believe, what to buy, what political party to adhere to, what religion God favors, that some are in and some are out.  Yet, no room for love.

PP

In order to live into the systems that are all around us, we develop our own personal belief systems and biases that help us to understand what we see in the world, in our selves.  Oftentimes, this identity that we have lived into most of our lives, leads us to asking questions, if we are honest, about who we really are, what do we really believe, and what do we want out of our deepest sense of authenticity, not out of a sense of ego or what we’ve always been told or have lived.  We have so many layers in who we are, it is often hard to sort through them to get to the love that is at the center of all of our lives.  

And then we come to the scriptures, or even our tradition or experiences, and realize that what we have become is not rooted in the love that we were created in.  It often seems that we have lived such transactional lives that we can even begin to dream about what change or transformation that God offers may even look like.

Heck, we even made God in our own image…we said God must be transactional like us…that God would demand something from us in order to love us, that God would even kill God’s Son so that God can somehow by appeased or satisfied.

Not what God intended folks, at all.  God said from the bringing that we need to be reconciled to one another, and to ourselves.  That begins and ends with loving one’s self and others.

When we live in love, we find joy in the midst of suffering.  

My friend Jay in my twenties was (and still is) amazing.  He loved life, loved his friends, even though his dad died when he was 16 and his mom had an aggressive form of MS in his twenties and eventually died. 

Yet, beyond dogma and religious piety, Jay embraced life.  I never will forget on a road trip out west, driving for long hours for some adventure, Jay would turn on his favorite band, Pearl Jam.  When the song “Evenflow” would come on, Jay would turn into some time of animal, or a swirling dervish, and start dancing and jumping and singing in the car…it was contagious, we all did it!  The joy out of love for life, for himself, for others, even in the midst of his own suffering was beautiful.  He lived, at times, reconciled to himself.

And to others.  When folks were struggling, even with him, he was not afraid to admit fault or to listen.  

Friends, there are some practical things in the gospel lesson…are we willing to have brave conversation to work it out, listen, there is a process for reconciliation in this passage.  Go to someone who you have a disagreement with, talk it out with honor, and if that doesn’t work, then bring others in.  Yet we so often don’t want to take the time to reconcile.  It’s too hard or uncomfortable .  The real issue, do we love enough to take the time?  And, do we love ourselves enough.

A few years ago, I had the realization that reconciliation starts within me.  It starts with me loving myself, my true self, and letting my ego become subservient to my true self.  In others words, to let my flesh die so that my life can come alive.  To lose my life in order to gain it.

When my mom was dying, I read a poem from John O’Donohue.  It led me to reading the book Anam Cara that he wrote.  The title is Gaelic for “Soul Friend”.  We all want soul friends, but we have to start with being our own soul friend to ourselves.  Of knowing that deep within our very beings, God is calling us beloved.  Then we can be soul friends with other…living reconciled lives within ourselves, within our world, and with one another.

Let’s do the work of letting love emerge and reconcile, no matter what circumstances we find ourselves in.  Amen?