Sermons

"Question to Guide the Devout"

Delivered from the Pulpit of First Congregational Church

of Anchorage by The Reverend Mark E. Long

on October 4, 2009

Lections:  Deut. 16.18-20

                  Rm. 10.1-4

                  Lk. 17.11-19

It makes good sense to follow Micah's advice from last week - do justice, love kindness and walk humbly (wisely) with God.  Who can argue with that?  Let's just take the first one.

"Do justice" - absolutely - as a big concept you'll get no argument coming from me.  But as we zoom in on the matter for a closer look; it is not so obvious what this means.  What is justice?  Justice for whom; what is the cost of it?  These sorts of questions make me uncomfortable.

What is justice?  Seems easy enough - justice is done when somebody gets what they deserve - a fair result.  But who decides what is fair; friends, enemies, the uninterested objective bystander - which hardly ever exists?

In his moral theory classic Justice as Fairness, John Rawls says that justice is done when we act in the best interest of the least person or group in the community.  When we act in the best interest of those on the lowest rung of the social ladder then justice is done.  We are doing justice!

If we help the Shia mullahs overthrow the Sunni bad guy dictator, justice is done - right?  Well to that point, sure, but this is dangerous business for what happens when the Shia mullahs start to exact revenge for years of oppression on the outnumbered and now powerless Sunnis? 

Rawls' humane sense of justice as fairness may leave the balance of community up in the air, sort of like what happens when someone heavier torments a "lightweight" on a seesaw.  I know I used to do it to my brother.  I'd get him helplessly in the air and then bounce my seat on the ground.  Fun, yes; fair - minds will differ?  But given the chance to turn things around on his older brother do you think little brother would have done anything different?  Not a chance.  If he could have put big enough rocks in his pockets, I would have been up in the air bouncing around till long after sundown.  Shias, Sunnis - little brother, big brother.  Human justice is human justice.

There is another problem with justice as "fairness" to guide us as a new book, Justice:  What's the Right Thing to Do?, by Harvard professor, Michael Sandel points out.  Sandel says that Rawls misses the importance of family feeling, loyalty to the tribe, and the power of "group think" in the moral choices made by communities.  It isn't easy, in other words, for an individual to make a just choice when the group is making a different one.  It is hard, very hard.

As I told the children a couple of weeks ago, we want to be popular; few of us want to stand anywhere other than in the middle of those who we see as our lifelong friends or others who we see as like us.  This makes Rawls "fairness" thing a difficult place to get to because there are times when the self-interest of the community drives the individual away from, as Sandal points out, the right thing to do.

There is a grown-up, such as they can be called, parallel to children ganging up to "pick on" a child they perceive as weak or different.  It is called exclusion.  Let me give you an example of how benignly the power of community can lead good people to do bad things and how a right choice by individuals can be transformative.

At one time I lived in Sarasota, Florida.  While there I was in a local production of "Evita."  Community theatre tends to be a happy experience; actors are not paid and do it for the love of doing it.  Part of that happy experience is cast parties, lots and lots of cast parties.  Cast parties are the binding experiences that take strangers and make them a stage family, at least for a time.  Usually, everyone gets included; you have to be really weird not to get included.

Ralph is weird enough to not get included.  Ralph is painfully shy, socially awkward, and given to notably odd behavior such as staring (some might say leering) at women blankly backstage, exhibiting nervous tics and gestures, and facing such discomfort in talking around the table in a restaurant that he gets up and runs away from the table and the restaurant. The last event is the most noticeable reason that the cast, especially the women, get freaked out.

So when Ralph asks backstage the next night "where is everyone going after the show?"  They lie to him; they tell him a different restaurant.  I watch backstage as otherwise good people laugh at their deception.  Even my girlfriend laughs along.  I tell her this is really mean and she says; "honey, he's really strange."  I tell her he is just a lonely man who needs friends, and that if the others are going to "trick" Ralph to go to a different restaurant then I am going to be there when he arrives.  She says "fine, I won't be."  So after the show, another female friend (did I ever admire her for this) and I are there at the "wrong" restaurant to be with Ralph when he realizes what the others have done.  He is hurt but grateful that he is not alone.

When the others ask my girlfriend at the other restaurant where I am, she tells them and it changes them.  While most never befriend Ralph he is not excluded again.  Something happens to our community because Donna and I do the "right thing."  We see where the family feeling is moving things and make the hard choice to stop and make a different one because it is the right thing to do.  As a result, good people stop dividing the community and reinvest in what makes it special.

Is this a justice as "fairness" success story?  Is justice done on this small scale in Sarasota?  I think it is.  What makes it so?  First, the balance of community is brought equal not turned upside down.  Second, the peer pressure of our community is resisted.  We look beyond the feeling of family, loyalty to the tribe, and community attachments.  But third, there is something more as well - something critical - we see that there is a higher calling, a greater claim on our behavior.

Our gospel lesson this morning may help us along at this point.  Ten lepers walking along see Jesus who they have heard great things about.  "Hello, over here, Jesus?  Heal us Jesus, please have mercy on us!"  They are healed and together as a community of former lepers run off together to show the priests the power of Jesus' healing.  All but one that is; this one starts off at a run with the others but then stops, turns, runs back, praising God the whole time, falls at Jesus' feet and thanks Jesus for healing him.

The first words from Jesus' are not "you're welcome," but "where are the others?"  Well the other nine overcome with their good fortune that day are long down the path to town thinking of themselves.  That's where they are; running in the opposite direction of the hope for their lives.

It is only one who finds the "more" in the encounter with Jesus.  It is only one that thinks to stop and do the "right thing."  Only one's sense of justice as "fairness" causes him to turn away from the others and give Jesus the thanks that he deserves.  They were all healed physically but human needs run deeper than that.  Only one is assured his needs - all his needs - will be met.

The recognition of the claim that God has on our behavior is what transforms our humble efforts to be just into something which will land us in our "land of milk and honey" that the Lord promises to give us.  At least this is what Deuteronomy says is the end of our pursuit for justice - to have a life better, more fun and more meaningful, than we otherwise would have.

Paul, in a later time, has another way of saying it:  "For Christ is the end of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes."  Our task is clear:  We just have to figure out what behavior is appropriate for believers of this claim.  How can we know what is just and right?

For a number of years now a simple question has stirred moral debates across the Christian Church?  This simple question arouses passion - both positive and negative.  Some speak it, wear it everywhere as a sign to others of what's on their minds and hearts but to others it is only a pawn of cheap and shallow piety.  I don't know - I am not much for putting spiritual truths on bumper stickers, pencils, and bracelets - but to each their own.  What I do know is this is the question to guide the devout.  It is our way to see through the moral dilemmas of our time.  It is the path by which human justice as "fairness" is transformed into something truly life giving and redemptive.

"What would Jesus do (say)?"  We know.  We read last week in Matthew 25 Jesus explain the difference between sheep and goats.  We know what sheep do.  If we will think about this before we act, if we will think about this before we speak - we may find ourselves getting somewhat close to the justice God could bring into our lives, the lives we touch and the world we create together.

This is how I see our human quest for justice transformed into redemption for one and for many.  Amen.