Pentecost 5
Luke 10:1-12, 16-20
"Am I my Brother’s Keeper?
In the 4th chapter of Genesis Cain asks God, verse 10, "Am I my brother’s keeper?" as God asked Cain where Abel was.
God’s answer to that specific question was answered loud and clear through Jesus with a resounding Yes.
I am my brother’s keeper or guardian or protector. We are to be concerned about others because God was concerned about us through Christ and loved us so much that his Son died on a cross.
Through Christ, God looks at us with love. Through Christ God looks past our sins and sees you and I as His creation, his people, his children. He loves us with an over powering love. A love that never ends. A love which keeps on loving just as a mother’s love keeps on loving her children no matter what.
An example of this kind of love is seen in the following. God’s love is like this for us and in turn out love should be like this for our neighbor.
"A poor sharecropping family in Georgia had a little money left over after the harvest so they got of an old Sears catalog and tried to pick out something everyone in the family would like and enjoy. After much discussion, they decided to get a mirror.
The mirror arrived and each took a turn looking in it. The father frowned, mother smile, and he baby giggled.
Young Willie was the last to look in the mirror. As he looked he was taken back by what he saw. It was the first time he had really seen himself. He didn’t know whether to frown or cry. Willie had been kicked by a mule when he was a tiny baby; his face was distorted, scarred and deformed. "Mom", Willie finally asked in a shaky voice," did you know all the time that I looked like this?"
The mother answered, "Yes Willie I knew."
"And you still loved me?" he replied.
"Yes Willie,"
"I still loved you," his mother said, "The face didn’t make no difference. I love you because you’re mine."
God’s love is the same; he loves us because we are his no matter how we are. In the same way we are to love our neighbor as a brother or sister in Christ. Through God we are all related. All of us are brothers and sisters in Christ. The bond of love which holds us to God as His children should also hold us to one another as brothers and sisters in Christ. But in reality it doesn’t. We have a very difficult time answering yes to Cain’ s question "Am I my brothers, keeper, guardian and protector? Do I reach out in love to others? These are the questions we are going to wrestle with this morning.
I would like you to think of your neighbor this morning as all those who are sitting either in your pew or directly behind you or in front of you.
Have I reached out in love to those people? Do I consider those people brothers and sisters in Christ? Do I uphold them with the kind of love which God through Christ has for me?
To answer these questions, I think we must begin with ourselves. Paul in the letter to the Galatians, which is our second lesson this morning,speaks about how a person in Christ should conduct himself or he herself. He ways we are to look to yourself. Let each one test his own work then boast in himself and not in his neighbor. Use Christ as the standard for your conduct, not your neighbor. Paul is saying that you and I are responsible for our own actions and conduct. If we are doing well, feel good in yourself and don’t lord it over your neighbor. Your conduct is not the judge of your neighbor’s conduct. Christ is the only guide, the only standard. How do you measure up to Christ should be the question we ask ourselves. Christ is the measuring stick we use when judging our conduct. In Christ’s actions we see the kind of lives he has called us to live.
So then we are to be little Christ’s one to another. We are to be his kind of action in this world.
Gerhard Frost’s poem "The Action speaks of Christ’s Work:" "....he went about doing good....The trouble with Jesus?....He was such a wastrel----a squanderer of time, I mean......He just wasn’t where the action is ...I’d never have traveled with him;....why never have made it on time!!......If Jesus were here, in the flesh, I mean, he’d miss the action every time......what with freeways and staying on country roads...Why he’d arrive at every three-day convention about noon of the third day, and at every, two hour meeting just in time for our Lord’s Prayer....Always late, with time to throw away on frightened children, blind folks and the demon possessed.....Even time time to pet the dogs?......Perhaps......Time for sunsets, bird-watching,child-blessing, leper-cleansings, and every lost cause, but not for the action------a most inefficient man--- unless, of course. he was the action,....and still is..."
Do you see when we are in Christ he gives us the time, the energy, the courage, the confidence, to take care of ourselves, then we would have time for others, for the important things, like worship, prayer, quiet time, helping a brother or sister. When we look to ourselves with Christ, our house, our lives become in order, then we have the time, the action to be involved in the really meaningful things, things of the spirit, of relationships of God.
When we look to ourselves what do we see, we see, do this, do that, go there, going and doing. We even get caught up in this business of doing even in church work. So that we don’t take time for people, for relationships, for caring, for sharing faith stories, extending a hand in friendship or a listening ear which can pick up the pain, the heartache, the brokenness in a brother or sister.
Busy, busy busy doing what? Not Christ’s action.
In our gospel lesson this morning Christ answers the question "Am I my brother’s keeper" with a loud yes as he sends out the 70 to minister, to proclaim the word to others. He appoints 70 to go out 2 by 2 declaring, "The kingdom of God has come to you." He sends them into small towns, into people’s homes with this message, a message of hope and healing. And they return, these 70 filled with wonder, with joy, with surprise that even the demons are subject to the Lord through his message. They have seen Christ’s power work. In the ordinary everyday visiting in the small towns of Galilee, they saw Christ’s power come alive.
A while back a popular movie was 20001 A Space Odyssey and it is popular again now in 2001. It is a movie about a man visiting the outer limits of space and about a computer named Hal. Toward the endive the movie, when he thinks he is going to die, he shoots through racing light like the light is standing still. You wonder what fantastic secret he will find at the end of his voyage. What will he discover? Then all of a sudden the ship stops. The man steps out of the ship into.....a normal living room with chairs, floors ceiling and table. How ordinary. He looks around and sees all the rooms as they were back home. As you leave the movie you realize that the fantastic is in the ordinary.
In the same kind of way, when we witness for Christ to our brother and sister it is nothing more than ordinary talking. You don’t have to be a super Christian, you don’t have to be someone really special to witness, just be yourself. Have you ever really listened to the conversation outside on the sidewalk after church? If you didn’t know you and I had been in here just the previous hour you would have thought the people hadn’t attended church. Seldom do you hear a conversation about what was brought to your mind and heart as you came in touch with Christ’s spirit? Seldom do you hear people sharing their concerns about a missing brother or sister?
If we don’t feel safe speaking to one another outside of church about kingdom work, how can we feel at all comfortable witnessing to another at the coffee shop, on the farm, in the homes, at a hospital bed or by the grave side? It is in these ordinary places where our witnessing takes place but for many these times and places seem so fantastic, so overwhelming they are in reality across the sea or at the furthermost edge of space.
"Am I my brother’s keeper"? yes says Paul in Galatians as he says, "if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness . "
Paul is saying if a brother or sister in Christ needs help with spiritual matters, with daily conduct, with a problem of faith, it is a brother’s duty to help. Our help is to come not from judgment, but from a spirit of gentleness. The same gentle spirit that Christ used as he forgave sins and led people back to God. Paul continues to say "we should bear another’s burden,..." look out for another as they feel the brokenness of this world. As we fulfill the yes statement to that question, "Am I my brother’s keeper" we can see that it involves a whole range of problems, situations , and events. We are to witness with the good news of Christ, we are to gently help a brother or sister as they face a temptation and we are to help shoulder the brokenness of this world for another.
Pretty tall orders. It is difficult. Christ has commanded us to do this so we don’t have a choice.
I would like to close with a story about a church council and their reaction to a brother and his problems. As you listen, try to picture yourself in that council, try to picture your reactions, your emotions.
"A trustee of a particular church was convicted of embezzling. The church council meet to discuss what course of action to follow. A number were determined to have the man’s name removed from the rolls.
One member mentioned that it would require a church trial to divest the trustee of his membership and that this could not be done since the man was unable to be present to defend himself.
Another read the parable of Jesus from Matthew 18:23-35, reminding the group of the king who forgave a Servant an overwhelming debt. That servant then turned around and insisted upon payment of a tiny debt owed him by a fellow servant.
The outcome of the church council meeting was that the trustee in prison received a letter each week from some member of that Council. And every week he was visited personally by other Council members. Eventually, the man served his time and the day he was released from prison most of the Council members met him at the gates of the prison.
Together the group went to the sanctuary of their church where the pastor served them Holy Communion.
" Am I My Brother’s Keeper"??? Yes! Yes! Yes!
amen
by Rev. Tim Zingale
