The Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ According to Matthew

 Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. ³⁶ When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. ³⁷ Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. ³⁸ Ask the Lord  of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”

 Jesus called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive out impure spirits and to heal every disease and sickness.

 These are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon (who is called Peter) and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; ³ Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; ⁴ Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him.   These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Do not go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans. ⁶ Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel. ⁷ As you go, proclaim this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ ⁸ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy,^[a] drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely. (Mt. 9:3-10:23)

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 You will remember, I am sure,  in the upheaval caused by the murder of a black man, George Floyd, and others, killed in police actions because  of their colour, their ethnicity, their lowly place in society, the world is being forced to see the injustice, and trapped feelings of a suffering people – something it has been blind to until now, and to act? 

What will it take to change the way things are in the world?

When I was a little boy, I went to visit my uncle Bob. He had a fine henhouse, and a flock of chickens roosting in it.  And this day he showed me a chicken  that he had just bought and was going to place in the hen house with the others.

I went with him and watched as he opened up the hatch, and revealed the chickens sitting on the perch, in a row, next to each other.

He leaned in and moved some of the chickens along the perch and then took the new arrival and placed it  between two others on the perch. Or I should say he tried. 

The birds closed rank and the new bird was squeezed out, and it happened again and again, no chicken was willing to give up its position  – its rank if you like – signified by its place on that perch. and he finally put the new bird right at the far end of the perch.

The perch was plenty long enough for many hens, but those stubborn chickens didn’t want to give up their little piece of real estate.

Keep that story in mind for a minute:

My first job in Canada in 1967 was with an encyclopedia company as the office manager.  My boss was an American from St. Louis Missouri, a nice guy, big and bluff, and good natured. He went by ‘Woody.’

The subject of race came up and he told me that on one occasion, the blacks from the poor part of town in St. Louis began to march toward the white part of town, and had to cross a bridge.   He said, ” We weren’t going to allow them to cross that bridge so we got our weapons and went to stop them.

” Were they violent?” I asked.

“No,” he said, ” But we weren’t going to give them the chance.”

” Then what was the problem with them demonstrating?’

“They wanted my job!, ” he said, vehemently.

I said, ” They didn’t want your job, they just wanted an equal chance at getting a job.”

He laughed at my naivety. He didn’t see that point of view at all.

I was getting paid a hundred dollars a week, and he was getting five hundred dollars a week and in 1967 that was a lot of money. So you might think he would be a smart guy.

But when it came to race he was about as smart as uncle Bob’s chickens.

In our  contemporary version of the Gospel, we read that Jesus looked at the crowd and was moved with compassion for them. He was moved to the very depth of his being.

He was moved to compassion by  the world’s pain. He was moved to compassion for the sick. He was moved to compassion for those with no hope. 

The common people were desperately longing for God – why else would they follow Jesus in such great numbers? – And the pillars of orthodox religion  of his day had nothing to offer them.

People were ruled and exploited  by the Romans.   And exploited by the religious rulers.

They were at the bottom of the rung in that society. And no hope of any relief.

They were at the end of the perch, you might say.

Does it remind you of the situation in our society today?  Of those who are at the bottom of the pecking order and are exploited, or worse still ignored, by those above?  

And are so because of their colour, their education or lack of it. Their religious dress. Their difficulty with the language.  Their uncultured accent?? Their address?

There have been conferences over the years, where national and international leaders have gotten together to try and solve the problems that exist because of  prejudice, and the realisation that having so many disenfranchised people could be dangerous for society.

I remember a promise to eradicate world poverty by –  was it 2010?  It required, among other things, massive donations of money, lifting of tariffs, help and encouragement to improve weak  economies.

The Secretary General of the UN has asked where is that help that was so generously promised? 

Precious little has been forthcoming.

Why? Because helping others means that we have to sacrifice a little of what we have. And our leaders think we can’t handle that.  That we don’t want to be moved along the perch.

We feel sorry for disadvantaged people . We pray for them of course.

And prayer is good. It indicates our concern.

But you know, prayer without good works is dead.

Martin Luther had a friend who was in the same mind about Christian faith as he was. His friend was also a monk. They came to an agreement. Luther would go into the world and battle for Reformation, while the friend would stay in the monastery and uphold Luther with prayer.  So that’s what they did.

But one night, the friend had a dream. He saw a huge field of corn, as big as the world, and one solitary man was trying to reap all that corn. He saw  the reaper’s face. It was Luther.  Luther’s friend saw the truth in a flash. He was meant to be down there with him, labouring in the harvest.

As we heard in today’s Gospel, this was something that  Jesus’s disciples had to do.  Jesus was sending them out to bring in the harvest.  

The harvest was – and is –  all those untold numbers of people who needed God in their lives;  who needed healing;  who were like lost sheep.  

There are some who can do nothing else but pray, for life may have rendered them physically or financially helpless. But for most of us, prayer is not enough. 

The men chosen by Jesus to go out into the countryside, telling of the coming of the kingdom of God, were ordinary men. They had no wealth, no position, no academic background, no social advantages.

But Jesus isn’t looking for extra-ordinary people. He is looking for ordinary people who are willing to be used to do extra-ordinary things.

God is always looking for hands to use. God is always saying. “Whom shall I send?”

Jesus had called these twelve men to go into the world as his apostles.  They would not be representing themselves. They would  represent him.  Nor would they be bringing their own messages. Representing Jesus they  would bring his message.

I often hear people talking about their faith in a way which tells you more about them than about the Jesus they are supposed to represent.

There are religious people who will  tell you they are for or against birth control, or abortion, or gay rights, or women priests, or dancing, or kneeling, or standing for prayer, or waving their hands while they sing hymns, or long sermons, or church ritual – all the things that they like or dislike and which define them and their faith  –  but who have somehow forgotten the compassion, caring,  and loving, that is expected from apostles.  

That’s us. Because we  are – apostles.  

Believe it.

As an apostle we don’t do what we want to do, we try to do  what he would do.

Like we need to be fascinated with Jesus rather than with ourselves.

God is looking out for us, so we can take our eye off that particular ball and look out for someone else, can’t we?

Several years ago, conductor Eugene Ormandy was leading the Philadelphia Orchestra.  It doesn’t matter what they were playing. Certainly not Mozart, perhaps Stravinsky. But at  any rate, he was giving all of himself to it.  He was putting energy  into it. To the degree that he dislocated his shoulder. 

Conducting!!

He dislocated his shoulder conducting an orchestra!!

Gerrouttahere!

I read that and asked myself the question: Have I ever dislocated anything working for Jesus? 

He gave his life, working for us.

I wonder what it takes.

I wonder how we get that fire of the Holy Spirit inside of us so that we just can’t stop doing stuff for our Lord;  just full of energy  trying to be like him.  

Dislocating something.

It’s all about motivation, I think.

Fear motivates people. Some people, anyway.

I heard a story about a young man who took a shortcut through a cemetery one dark night, and fell into an open grave.

He tried to climb out, scrabbling at the sides with his hands, but couldn’t make it., He tried shouting, but no-one heard him. He decided to sit down in a corner and wait for daylight.

A little while later another person cut through the graveyard and fell into the same open grave. This man, like the first, tried to climb out, using his fingernails and toes, to try and get a grip in the soil, but slipping back.  

The first man, sitting there in the dark, heard the newcomer trying to get out, as he had, and said, “You’ll never get out of here.”

But he did!

But fear doesn’t always work, does it? 

Think about it: We have been threatened with Hell for centuries, but it doesn’t seem to have made much difference to the way we live. 

People just don’t seem to fear the hereafter, as horrible as it sounds.

So we can  forget fear .

What about compassion? 

Jesus’  heart wept for the people  who followed him.

I think when I first saw a picture of a starving child, in Biafra, my heart wept. I think the first time I read about women and children being deliberately killed in war, my heart wept. I think the first time I  read about families being headed by nine year-old children in Africa, because both parents had died from AIDS, my heart wept.

But there is so much of it, pictures in the papers, on television, news stories of millions threatened by starvation – the sheer numbers boggle the mind, that my heart can’t weep any more.

We can’t take it any more, and we pass by on the other side.

What is needed is a new motivation.

Not the pictures of starving children used in TV ads,  but a heartfelt compassion, and a love, and a desire to bring healing.   We need a vision of that vast harvest, and Jesus out there doing it all by himself, and a realisation that he needs each and everyone of us out there with him.

We have received freely. We are called to give freely.

And every time we do that, we move this world closer to the day when the kingdom of God will come on earth  –  the time when His will is done here, as it is in Heaven.

Where there will be no hatred, no fear, no discrimination, just love!

Amen.

   The Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ According to Matthew

As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax booth; and he said to him, “Follow me.”

And he got up and followed him. And as he sat at dinner in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came and were sitting with him and his disciples.

When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

But when he heard this, he said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners.”

While he was saying these things to them, suddenly a leader of the synagogue came in and knelt before him, saying, “My daughter has just died; but come and lay your hand on her, and she will live.” And Jesus got up and followed him, with his disciples.

Then suddenly a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years came up behind him and touched the fringe of his cloak, for she said to herself, “If I only touch his cloak, I will be made well.” Jesus turned, and seeing her he said, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And instantly the woman was made well.

When Jesus came to the leader’s house and saw the flute players and the crowd making a commotion, he said, “Go away; for the girl is not dead but sleeping.” And they laughed at him. But when the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took her by the hand, and the girl got up. And the report of this spread throughout that district. (Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26)

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I once nearly took a job as general manager of a telemarketing company. I didn’t think at the time that telemarketing was such a nuisance. I would imagine that nowadays, people in that line of business might not want to tell anyone what they did..     But, if , as someone receiving a call you allow for the fact that your life is getting interrupted –often inconveniently – there is nothing really wrong with telemarketing. Someone is merely finding a way to get information to you so you can make a decision about buying their product or service.

Over and over again!

Another job that used to have a negative connotation was that of insurance salesman. You didn’t want to become friends with an insurance representative because it was said that sooner or later they would hit on you to buy insurance.

I should say that I know three insurance salesmen and not one has hit on me for insurance.  And what’s wrong with them wanting to help out a friend, anyway?

But what about occupations that are really down there in terms of status? Drug pusher comes to mind. Illegal gun salesman could qualify I suppose. Pimp – now there is a job that has no status at all.

You wouldn’t want your son or daughter to say they were thinking of going into any of those jobs would you?

Those occupations – they are not really jobs –  involve doing things that exploit other human beings. They are occupations that require a person to be ruthless, heartless, conscience-less. They require someone who is dead to the normal emotions and feelings that you and I have.

They require someone whose life has become forfeit to all the wrong things. Someone who doesn’t care any more. Someone who has been lost to God.

In the time when Jesus walked the earth, tax collectors were seen like that. They had sold their souls to the Roman occupying force, existed on what they could extort from people above and beyond what was actually owed in taxes, and were outcasts from society. As far as society was concerned, they were dead, and, religious people thought – dead to God also. 

There were other people who were considered dead to society, and to God, not because they had done anything wrong, but because something had happened to them beyond their control. Lepers for example were non- persons. They wandered around like lost souls.  They owned nothing, had been driven from their homes and villages, and were to all intents and purposes dead to their families and to society.

The woman mentioned in today’s Gospel, the woman who touched the hem of the garment Jesus wore, had bled for twelve years. Since menstrual blood was considered unclean, a menstruating woman was therefore unclean, and as someone who had been unclean for twelve years she was denied her place in that society. She wouldn’t be able to attend the temple. People wouldn’t want to be seen with her. She was, to some extent a dead woman.

Tax collectors, lepers, prostitutes, those who were ritually unclean, these were the people the Pharisees called sinners.  These were those who were cast out from society.  And if you didn’t belong,  you might as well be dead. 

And being rejected by society is not something that only happened in Jesus’s time.

Some years ago there was a British movie, based on fact, called  I’m Alright Jack  which told the story of a factory worker who refused to obey his union when a strike was called. He worked through the strike, enduring all sorts of insults and taunts, and threats,  and when the strike was over his workmates punished him by a process called, sending to Coventry. 

That meant that was far as everyone else in the factory was concerned, he didn’t exist. No-one would talk to him, associate with him, assist him, or even acknowledge that he was there. To the other factory employees, he was, to all intents and purposes,  a dead man.

Jesus came to bring new life to people who were shut out, ignored, isolated – dead. 

And this comes about for those who have faith in him.  Who believe that he can do it.    People who realise their need to be transformed.

I don’t know about you, but when I hear of someone who has been sent  to prison for something horrendous,  and then a few years later claiming to be  born-again Christians, and asking to be allowed out on parole, I am always suspicious.

It sounds too easy.

And there may well be phonies among them, but the fact is, Jesus does save, and Jesus does heal – even the most hardened criminals. 

There has to be real faith, though.  People who have settled into a routine existence, doing whatever it is they do – legal or not – as wicked as it may be, and as sinful as it may be, will need a lot of faith to take on a new life, away from the familiar things, familiar associates, familiar ways – as self destructive as those ways may be.

A person addicted to drugs needs a lot of faith to face the future without drugs.

A person used to having power over others needs a lot of faith to face life as a helpless follower of Christ.

Just as a  person who has it all – someone from the right side of the tracks – will also need a lot of faith –  to turn their back on the things they have relied upon and to rely instead on Jesus.

You don’t think of people who have everything as being  in need do you? 

I read about a big pop star, who when he wasn’t performing, had no life at all.  He was almost a non-entity. He only came alive when he was on stage.

What happens to that person when no one wants to see him perform any more?  If he is only alive when performing, then when he’s not, he might as well be dead.

In 1929 they say, when the market crashed, men who had lost their fortunes jumped out of skyscraper windows.   

For them, no money meant no life.

But what they had always needed was for someone to give them real life.

There’s a story about a man who was driving his car down a country road one April and suddenly an animal ran out in front of his car. He braked but couldn’t help hitting it. 

He got out and saw a rabbit lying there. It was obviously dead. Then he noticed a large basket full of eggs, and he realized he had run over the Easter Bunny. He really began to panic now.

But just then another car stopped and a woman got out. “What’s happened?” she asked, and he told her. “I think I killed the Easter Bunny. What do I do?” 

“Don’t worry,” she told him, and took a canister out of her purse. She took off the cap and sprayed the rabbit. 

Suddenly, the rabbit’s eyes opened. It jumped up, picked up the basket and hopped away, all the time waving, waving its paws. as it hopped down the road. 

“Wow,” the man went, “Let me see that.”

The woman passed the canister to him. He looked at the label, and read,

“Acme hair Spray. Gives new life to dead hair and permanent wave.”

Well it’s not quite like that when Jesus brings new life.

It’s a process, isn’t it?

It comes about when we realise that there is more to life than the things we have been using to distract ourselves.  

And having faith enough to ask for it.

Paul had it. Matthew the tax collector had it. The woman who had suffered for twelve years had it. The official who wanted Jesus to  restore his daughter had it.

There was something they saw in this man Jesus that pointed them to God, and new life. There was something in this man that said, “Come home. Don’t be afraid. You are loved. Come to me.”

And they did.

I think that most of us have answered that call. Most of us here have heard the voice of Jesus, and committed our lives to him.

And it is not easy, is it?    It means new life, yes, but it also means a different life.

Deciding to put Jesus before drugs, drink, a low life, seems to us to be an easy decision, but putting him before a good life, before a loving family, before a great job, a great reputation, and so on – has to be really hard, doesn’t it?

But with all that we have, if we don’t have him, then we don’t really have life.

Because as we all know, those things –  great job, great reputation, great friends, even great family – have been known to fail at that crucial moment when they are needed.

But he never fails.

Believing that ……… knowing that….. having faith in that …….. is exactly what we must have, to know Him intimately.

And to be able to serve Him in ways that are just as important today as they ever were.

For this world will never be safe or at peace until Jesus reigns again.

Amen. 

The Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ According to Matthew.

Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them.

When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted.

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

“and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Mt.28: 16-20)

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What is God to you?

Or who, is God to you?

Is God some larger-than-life figure, powerful and mighty, sitting on a throne in Heaven, and looking down – sometimes approvingly, sometimes critically – on His creation?

Or is God for you, a person who walks with you; someone who knows your doubts and worries, and shares them with you?  …..the person who experienced life here on earth at its nastiest,   but who did not flinch, and who finally was tortured, and put to death – not for anything he had done wrong, but for the things he had done right?

Or is God what animates you? Is God, someone who sees your powerlessness, your life in a rut, and who somehow infuses you with the spirit, the energy, the need to get out of the rut, and go on a great adventure?

I suppose the answer to that question could be different depending on the state of your life at the time of asking.

I guess we have experienced God in all of His three persons, during our lives haven’t we?

There are times when I take a walk down to the beach, and just sit there, on that rocky jetty, and listen to the lapping of the water, and feel the wind against my face, and look out across that great expanse, and I just know that a Creator God is responsible for it all.

And I feel a peace, and an affinity with the earth, and all that God has made, and I know Him as God, Creator God, Loving God.

And when I feel like that, the cares of everyday living and loving fall away, almost as if He or She has taken them from me and a great sense of freedom ensues.

Reluctantly I pull yourself away, and head back to the everyday world.

In that everyday world, unfortunately, when  I read the newspaper, and watch the television news,  I hear about the latest suicide bomber; new statistics on how many children are working in slave-like conditions; fresh evidence of climate change we are told has come about because of our misuse of creation; new statistics that tell us how we are poisoning the very air we breathe, and a ghastly litany of humanity’s lack of humanity.

And I despair.

Then I remember a baby, born into a working class family, placed in an animal’s eating trough for a crib, in a shed, in a place called Bethlehem – a place right in the center of a part of the world that is experiencing war, and terror right now, – the Middle East –  and how that baby grew to become a man who took on the immense task, not of changing the world, but of changing people – so that people could change the world.

And I recall how this man gathered around him twelve people, and inculcated them with his love of people, and his belief in our ability to change, and how somehow, his death, which many thought would shut them all up, did the opposite, and that young man’s message of  salvation – did in fact change the lives of many for the better, and still does.

And perhaps more important than the message, if that is possible,  is that this young man died specifically for my salvation – so that I could change – and not be punished for the way I have been…………

………….that his whole reason for being was to call us back from selfishness, and wickedness, and being stuck in sin, and open to us the possibility of real life, life that gives, and is fulfilled; life that is involved, life that will go on for ever.

And  remembering all this about that young man called Jesus, I experience hope. I know that everyone who suffers has a loving brother – someone who himself suffered – to be with them, and to travel with them, even in the midst of the filth of this world – and to bring them to a knowledge of that God who created us to love him, and to love each other.

Not to abuse; not to use; not to manipulate; not to hurt; not to degrade; but to love and uplift, and to encourage, and to help, and to care for each other.

And that sounds such a wonderful place to be, such a wonderful goal to which to aspire, but alas, something that could be too tough, too difficult, just too hard to manage by myself.

But then I remember how those men and women who followed this man Jesus, how they too must have felt inadequate, and ill-equipped, and just not up to it, and yet they did in fact make a difference.

And I remember that they didn’t do it by themselves. Yes they had Jesus’ teachings to guide them – but so do we. They had more than that. They had a life-changing encounter with another person of the God we love. They  had an encounter with the Holy Spirit.

And remembering this, I rest assured, that whatever I try  to do in His name, His Spirit will be there to give me the strength, the courage, the wherewithal, to do it.

You might be thinking, “How can that be?   It’s ok to say that, but how can people be changed so profoundly? “

About ninety years ago, a man by the name of Adolph Hitler, took control of a nation and by his  rhetoric, by his evil will, he turned thousands of good people into monsters who could torture and kill in his name, without compunction.

Beginning a little time before that, a man named Stalin took an ideology of materialism, of an economic system,  and using that ideology, turned thousands of  formally good people into torturers, killers, informers, oppressors – guards of the gulag.

So don’t tell me that the Creator of the universe  – the God above all gods, the one who placed the stars and the planets in their courses – that this God  can’t take  ordinary good people – like you and me – and do miracles through us.

Because he is greater than evil. He is stronger than ideology. He is more powerful  than rhetoric, than spin doctoring, than advertising.

Than advertising?

Do you know that the average child is exposed to more than a thousand hours of advertising during it’s formative years?

And do you know what advertising tells us? It tells  us that we bring happiness into our lives by the shampoo we use, the clothes we wear, the jewelry we buy, the car we drive. 

A thousand hours of  propaganda.

God can even counteract that.

It seems that there is a movement among young people these days to search for something beyond themselves, beyond the facile messages of advertising jingles.

There is a need.

For a Creator God, and a Saving God and an Enabling God.

A Trinity.

There is an emptiness that needs filling, a hunger for something more than the pap that is fed to them twenty four hours a day on the internet

And we have that.

Don’t we?

We have a God who delivers.

We have a God who saves.

We have a God who is willing to give power to those open to it.

It’s about time that we started telling people what we have. And how to get it. If we are going to do one tiny bit of what those first disciples accomplished.

I don’t know about you, but I want this world to be a little bit better than it was when I came into it.

Else what’s the point?

And people are doing it you know.  People are leaving this place a little better  than when they came.

I see it all the time.  In the legacy of care and love that people leave behind them. In the monuments to their care for the kingdom that they leave behind.

You know what I am talking about.

I don’t have to tell you.

So why am I – telling you?

Because I want others outside of here – others who have never darkened the door of a church, who have never  known salvific love, others who have a need and a hunger, and a desire to be better, and do better, and leave their portion of this place better – I want them  to know what we know.

But they won’t know if we keep our joy to ourselves.

Let’s bring this God of ours out and share with everyone else.

This God of ours being God the Holy Trinity. The God who created all that we have and all that we are. The God who sacrificed Himself to save us. The God who everyday fills with power, those who want to bring about change.

Created. Saved. Empowered.

United in God, and in the Church, and determined to make this world a much, much better place.

Amen.