Beyond Counting
“Beyond Counting”
Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17 Matthew 22:34-46
Twenty First Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 25, Year A, October 25, 2020
First Presbyterian Church, Sandpoint, Idaho
Andy Kennaly, Pastor
Have you heard there’s a difference between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law? On one hand, laws are written, encoded by words and set to structure a society. As social creatures, interactions with others are guided by the letter of the law. We’re driving down the road and the yellow center line is there. The letter of the law states that each car stays on their own side of that line. When people observe this, traffic can flow more freely. Trouble comes when people cross the line, when they violate the letter of the law. This is why we have police, to enforce the law; courts, to interpret the law; and lawyers to study and advocate for the law. But the law as letters only goes so far.
The spirit of the law has a whole different tone to it. You stay, for example, on your side of the highway because you care about other drivers, and your own safety. You value life and hope that everyone gets to where they need to go in a safe and efficient way. No one really has to enforce this law because it’s part of who you are to care for your life and the life of others. The spirit of the law has to do with intentions, attitudes, and hopes.
On one hand, the letter of the law can be tweaked or manipulated, often from selfish motives, while on the other hand, the spirit of the law depends on a level of care, often for the benefit of others.
Jesus is confronted by Pharisees. Generations prior to this, the Jewish people were taken into Exile. Over those years of forced relocation and cultural assimilation, there was a good chance that Jewish identity would be lost. The sect of Pharisees developed in order to spell out what is distinctive about being Jewish in covenant relationship with the God of Israel. This helped maintain faithfulness even in the midst of the tremendous uncertainties of live experiencing the upheavals of Exile. As time went on, the list of distinctive qualities got longer and more detailed. The spirit of the law had every intention of maintaining faithfulness, of giving God thanks for saving presence throughout the generations. But by the time Matthew was written, the Pharisees are portrayed as more interested in the letter of the law as a means of control and separation, rather than the spirit of the law to celebrate what unites us with each other and with God.
This morning we see a lawyer testing Jesus on the law. Jesus takes this letter of the law question, and in answering, he puts God’s Spirit of the Law spin on it. Jesus moves us from mere observance of law and order, of religious obligation, to a transformative invitation of loving concern, sincere devotion, and mutuality.
Love. Love is the heart of God, love is calling us to live in ways that express love for neighbor and ourselves. The greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. Jesus adds the second, to love your neighbor as yourself. And then he says, “the second is LIKE the first!” These express a summation of all the law, all the prophets, and exist to serve as expressions of our core identity as created beings, as those commandments are liked, for at that core is Love. Love is who you are; Love is whose you are. Love is.
But did you notice the counting? Numbers are thrown around this passage to subtly suggest that keeping score is ridiculous. The Pharisees are gathered together and one of them, a lawyer, asks Jesus a question, one question. One lawyer, one question. One Jesus, two answers. Jesus does not operate in a vacuum. Jesus is not isolated and does not speak only on his own. He gives the first commandment, then links a second. One. Two. And on these two hang everything else. All. We go from one to two to all! We move from the particular to the universal.
As the lawyer asks a law question, this has qualities and tones of something external, verifiable, observable, measurable, and packaged. In that sense it’s something that you can succeed or fail in, you’re a winner or a loser, you’re in or out. As Jesus answers, he mentions commandments, which are less an external list and more of a “spirit of the law” type of theme. “Commandments” are more a result of inner attitudes and inclinations. All the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments because it’s in the heart that these two take hold. If your heart hasn’t caught the spirit of the law, there is no way the letter of the law has any chance of succeeding in actual transformation deeper into love.
But there seems to be an even deeper theme, something mysterious about the nature of Love. Sometimes I use the phrase, “Unitive Consciousness.” Unitive Consciousness. The Christ in me greets the Christ in you, and like Paul the mystic says, “It is no longer I that live, but Christ that lives in me.” (Gal. 2:20). There is a power, a Presence, an Ultimate Reality, a Source that many call “God” who is above all and in all and through all. Beyond time, this eternal Presence also permeates time, hallows it. The answers Jesus gives shows us his expressing this deep understanding of unitive consciousness, that all things are in Christ and Christ is in all things, and all time is connected even as every creature shares the same breath, carrying the divine image. Yah-weh. Yah-weh. (breath in, Yah… breath out, weh).
Jesus plays with the conversation, asking about the Son of David, saying, “If David thus calls him Lord, how can he be his son?” Mystery meets law school and the lawyers are stumped. They don’t have an answer because they don’t see where Jesus is coming from in the asking. They are still at the literal level of counting, of measuring, of ranking things, “which commandment in the law is the greatest?” Simply by asking “What do you think of the Messiah? Whose son is he?” Jesus is pointing out that they are in the calculating mind, the limits of mental activity, and they don’t ask him any more questions because they don’t understand the conversation.
The Pharisees have a transactional approach to God’s love. They are wanting to get something out of it for themselves at the expense of others. Jesus points out this system, this mindset, and the blindness they have to their deeper unity. He’s basically telling them that you can’t think your way to the Messiah. Thinking, strategizing, calculating: this is not what unites you to God’s image at your core. Jesus is talking in Ultimate terms but they are stuck at the literal. He’s showing them the Spirit of the Law, which is Love unleashed, and they want instead a list of codes in a harness.
Bernard of Clairvaux lived in the 1100’s and talks about love as it’s own enjoyment. He says, “Love seeks no cause beyond itself and no fruit; it is its own fruit, its own enjoyment. I love because I love; I love in order that I may love…. Of all the motions and affections of the soul, love is the only one by means of which the creature, though not on equal terms, is able to treat with the Creator and to give back something resembling what has been given to it. What God loves, [God] only desires to be loved, knowing that love with render all those who love [God] happy.” (a sermon resource on Suzanne Guthrie’s http://www.edgeofenclosure.org/proper25a.html).
To see the dynamics of Jesus and the Pharisees in this conversation, this jousting of questions, this dancing around the theme of love, Meister Eckhart, who lived in the late 1200’s says it very well as he talks about people “as they love their cow.” So hold in your mind a picture of Jesus and this lawyer, with the lawyer testing Jesus and Jesus loving the lawyer. To explore the dynamics of this type of scene, Meister Eckhart the 13th century mystic says, “Some people want to see God with their eyes as they see a cow, and to love [God] as they love their cow – for the milk and cheese and profit it brings them. This is how it is with people who love God for the sake of outward wealth or inward comfort. They do not rightly love God, when they love [God] for their own advantage. Indeed, I tell you the truth, any object you have in your mind, however good, will be a barrier between you and the inmost Truth.” (http://www.edgeofenclosure.org/proper25a.html).
The inmost Truth…. As we open our heart and soul, may we love God as God loves; may we serve God as God serves, may we give and help as God gives and helps, and pursue justice because you can’t have love without justice. The Spirit of the law is calling us to open not only our minds, but our heart and soul, our whole self so that our self may be humbled to the glory of Christ within. Let’s get beyond counting, or measuring, or defending the literal, and allow God’s Living Spirit to move as we give ourselves to the flow and connection of Unitive Consciousness, the Living Christ. Everything hangs on love incarnate, love lived and expressed for Love’s sake. And may God’s humble and vulnerable love be glorified, NOW, even as forever. Amen.