Matthew 21:23-32 / Philippians 2:3-1 September 28, 2008
A Man Had Four Sons
The Chief Priests were powerful leaders in the Jewish culture, and Jesus comes to Jerusalem and enters their house and confronts them. That was the purpose of turning over the tables in the Temple to get their attention. – “Here’s Jesus!” As long as Jesus stayed down south in Galilee doing his thing among the poor in the rural area, he was of little threat to them; but now he is forcing their hand and they can’t ignore this troublemaker. So they will catch him by entrapment blaspheming God and do away with him. They challenged him with an unanswerable dilemma like, “Can God make a rock too big for Him to move?” So to the question of where he got his authority if he answered that it came from God, then they could denounce him and charge him with blasphemy as God led Solomon to build this temple and commanded animal sacrifices to be brought to Him in which he, Jesus, interfered. If Jesus says he does this on his own authority, then they will say he blasphemes God and off with his head. Either way they are rid of him. But Jesus answers their question with one involving a dilemma question of his own and negates their plan. Then he does a little story telling and pokes at them really raising their ire.
I am in the same role as the Temple leaders in this society as I am an interpreter of scriptures and uphold the traditions of the Presbyterian Church. Now I don’t have any real power or authority like those Temple guys, but I can probably be as obnoxious. There was a time many years ago I really enjoyed entering into debates with religious door-to-door knockers who came armed with a few memorized scripture verses to sell me on their perspectives. Of course, they did not know my background; and I loved to entrap them and turn them into confused zealots. One day after I had one of my little entrapment confrontations, Janet said to me, “Did you have fun?” Wives can be really good at enlightening their spouses, can’t they? I needed to prove my superior knowledge more than to honestly engage them in a meaningful dialogue. I treated them no better then the Temple leaders treated Jesus as I didn’t care for the person with whom I disagreed. I eventually learned that it is not my job to get people to doubt or lose their faith beliefs, but to encourage their development no matter where they are on the journey of faith.
Neither of the two sons was a shining light in the parable and is not to be emulated. Both lacked integrity, and Jesus does not praise either. One did not do what he said he would do, and the other did what he said he would not do. Words and actions were not in harmony. There are two other sons not mentioned in the parable but are present. One is the son who does not agree to the father’s wishes and does not do it either. Today we would call him an atheist. The other is the son who listens to his Father’s will and follows his directions. This one is our mentor and savior.
Paul says in our reading this morning, “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross.” Christ Jesus is our mentor, our example, and our savior.
When the Temple leaders were confronted with answering Jesus with their understanding of the baptism of John the Baptist, they did not know how to answer. Without knowing what you believe, you are left adrift in an ocean of water. Without knowing what you believe, you can be as confused as these Temple leaders. There is a lot of Christian theological jargon that we can recite and pet religious passages that we can recite as our authority. This makes for many denominations and sectarian pride of being right and everyone else wrong. But Jesus brings his teachings down to a very simple way of belief and life.
Jesus tells us that the greatest commandment is “to love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and the second commandment is like it. “You are to love our neighbor as ourselves.” All the stuff that divides Christians is secondary. If we don’t respond to God’s love of us with all that we are, then the words we say are empty words. If we say we love Jesus and our actions do not reflect it in our daily lives, then we are empty vessels.
If we are to grow as a community of faith and allow God’s light of truth and love to shine through us, we must be able to verbalize what it is that we believe and be in unity and one accord in our words and actions. Paul stresses for us to “be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests but to the interests of others.” If we do this in our community of faith, what a strong light from God will shine forth from this place.
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