Romans 14:1-12
Proper 19 (24) - Year A
"Welcome with open arms fellow believers who don't see things the way you do. And don't jump all over them every time they do or say something you don't agree with -- even when it seems that they are strong on opinions but weak in the faith department. Remember, they have their own history to deal with. Treat them gently." [The Message]
Ah, the nub of the matter - seeing that someone else is doing the best they can with what they have at the time. This is so tricky when, at the same time, our best seems so much better than their best.
Is treating them gently actually the better way to go when we are trying like crazy to focus on making them better rather than developing our betterness? Is it more effective and efficient a process to participate in classes designed to deepen one's own spiritual life rather than joining other advocates to transform someone else? Are there any helpful categories that don't assume that the other will change toward us rather than have us do any changing toward them.
A longer view really is helpful here and so to move from the start of the passage to its end -- "...None of us are permitted to insist on our own way in these matters. It's God we are answerable to -- all the way from life to death and everything in between -- not each other. That's why Jesus lived and died and then lived again; so that he could be our Master across the entire range of life and death, and free us from the petty tyrannies of each other.
"So where does that leave you when you criticize a brother? And where does that leave you when you condescend to a sister? I'd say it leaves you looking pretty silly -- or worse. Eventually, we're all going to end up kneeling side by side in the place of judgment, facing God. Your critical and condescending ways aren't going to improve your position there one bit." [The Message]
So, to get us what we claim we want -- connect with gentleness. How unAmerican in these days of Iraq-phobia.
Be not afraid of gentleness and understanding. Go into those counter-intuitive gifts and be freed from "our petty tyrannies of each other."
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2002/september2002.html
This is my beloved's birthday. She has a large enough perspective on life that where most folks would claim it is their "X" birthday, she claims "X+1" and says she has completed "X" years, but prefers living in "X+1". It is this kind of larger perspective that aids us when it comes time to be tempted to judge.
Can we join my beloved in one of her favorite pronouncements, "They're doing the best they can with what they have"? This openness to that which is beyond our current seeing aids us in hanging in there, nonetheless. Just as she remembers Jung remembering Erasmus, "Called or not, GOD is present", just so we can see the presence of more than the surface. This brings a larger sense of time and a greater opportunity for growing with and forgiving.
I am thankful to have her as a compassionate presence (she has even promised to nominate me for sainthood right after she strangles me). I pray you have your own compassionate presence to ground your temptations to judge too quickly and strongly. I pray you will be that compassionate presence, grounding the temptation of others to judge too quickly and strongly. It is appropriate for us to all help one another stand and to intercede on behalf of another when they fall that we might all be accountable in the present -- letting future accountabilities care for themselves.
As you might guess, such openness comes from knowing the dark side of life without being overcome by it, but I'll wait to see what scripture comes around this time next year to get into that. ("Presuming, of course, I or we or you make it that far," as she would say, "in the meantime let evil rest and choose compassion" - see what I mean about a larger perspective being a source of grace so we can make more of the present than folks who are narrowly focused and day-trading their way along through time?)
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2005/september2005.html
You gotta love the way in which the one in charge of the imagery can pick and choose what to show and what not to show. That is currently going on with attempts to block the worst of the pictures from New Orleans, just as it was attempted with the caskets of dead soldiers being deplaned or any other less than adulatory portrayal of the one in power.
Here you might look up Isaiah 49:18 and 45:23 to see how the line, "As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow...." has been pasted together.
If we were to do the same with this passage we might be able to quote Paul, "For to this end Christ died and lived again, that God might welcome those seen as 'other'." (14:9, 3)
As always it is important to judge what we read in the newspaper and in the Bible against what we understand to be a larger story. To read only what is on the page does a disservice to all concerned. How are you putting things together this week?
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2005/september2005.html
Welcome those who are differently oriented in faith. Paul uses Sabbath and Eating Rituals as examples of how those who condense the week into one Sabbath and those who spread it through the week might both do so as an honor to G*D. Likewise with those who honor G*D through their choice of food.
Unfortunately these differences are described as "weaknesses" (as see through the eyes of someone making a choice they think everyone ought to hew to now). Seemingly both could be seen as sources of honor and weakness. An example of bothness gone awry is found in Jesus' story when asked about a persistence of forgiveness. Here the honoring of G*D gives way to entitlement for self.
When a servant is still received (forgiven) in respect to their weakness, this same servant does not participate in such a welcoming when faced with another in a respectively "weak" position.
How radical is my welcoming? - who is included in it?
- - -
transgressions removed ahead
a welcome road signhope for myself rises
to return to
an original blessing of gooddisgust that it might be
for every Jane and Jack
or my favorite enemy
rises even quickerand quick as a wink
my special welcome sign
becomes a road closed detour
onto winding rutted paths
leading 70x7 times back to this marker
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_09_01_archive.html
If we do not live to ourselves or die to ourselves. How do we keep falling short of community between the faith generations – those who have had faith for a long time and those just creeping into it? Forgiveness between these generations is important and seldom seen.
A Baylor University series in faith and ethics on Forgiveness has several interesting articles. In particular, turn to page 29 for Thomas Long's piece, "To Err is Human; To Forgive . . .?" ["The New Testament is always calling us to do what we cannot do. No, we ourselves cannot forgive, but as we strive to forgive we are given God's forgiveness as a gift. We are not called to create forgiveness; that is beyond us. We are called instead to participate in a forgiveness given to us as a gift."]
Our experience is the passing of judgment upon one another, not the participation in a larger forgiveness. Let's continue working toward Frame of Reference 2.0 and beyond.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2008_09_01_archive.html
Welcome those who are weak in faith, even while they are convinced in their own mind that they are strong in faith. Perhaps that needs to be, even while they are convinced in their own mind that they have the stronger faith.
Of course this is a set-up for institutional chaos and an eventual schism such as a king throwing a slave out for not being merciful. At best the setting up of such confusion may foster a new synthesis, a new creation not otherwise available than through an inherently weak process of revelation without experience.
The experience of church, early and late, is that the more loudly people claim every knee is to bow and every tongue be the same the more or the larger comes a split, a throwing of some out, the intentional knocking of dust off the feet of some as they high-tail it.
This welcome is not intended to weaken those first to arrive at an insight by deliberately setting up a heterodox setting. By verse 22 the welcomers are to keep their own belief and act according to their own conviction even in the face of different convictions by those they welcomed. Finally, by 15:5 a reliance is put back on G*D rather than convictions: “May G*D, the source of all perseverance and comfort, grant you to live in peace with one another....”
For now,
keep welcoming others
keep your convictions clear
keep partnered with G*D
keep on keeping on.