Higher Law

Propers: The Fourth Sunday after Epiphany, AD 2023 A

Homily:

Lord, we pray for the preacher, for You know his sins are great.

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

About 500 years ago, the Rev’d Dr Martin Luther found himself appalled at the poor state of faith formation in the Christians of his day. It’s not that they didn’t believe; it’s that they had no idea what they were supposed to believe. No-one was teaching them the faith: the promises of God, the story of the Bible, the Way of Jesus Christ, all derelict, all neglected, by clergy and laity alike.

So he wrote up a pair of catechisms for simple instruction in the Christian faith. These were not intended to replace the Bible, but to help us understand the Bible. Luther’s Small Catechism was for home use, for the father and mother—the bishop and bishopess of the house—to raise a Christian family. Parents were the catechists.

The Large Catechism, meanwhile, which he greatly expanded, was intended for everyone but especially for pastors. The real life of the Church, for Luther, happened in the home. The home was the true monastery, the true cradle of faith and of prayer. The purpose of the Sunday assembly was to forgive us, instruct us, feed us with the means of grace, and then to send us right back out again, into daily Christian life. And the role of the pastor was to aid and support us in our life of faith at home.

That’s probably where we went wrong—when we forgot the familial and communal core of the Reformation and returned to a clerical model, outsourcing the faith. We made religion into something that happens in one building for one hour a week. And we made worship into something performed by professionals, which we simply watch like an audience at a show. That’s why Confirmation here at St Peter’s remains a family affair. Your kids don’t care what I do; they care what you do.

Now, for Luther, the core of his catechism, the basic promises of Christian faith which he wanted everyone to know by heart, focused on three parts: the Ten Commandments, the Apostles’ Creed, and the Lord’s Prayer. He also added texts from Scripture on the Sacraments of Confession, Baptism, and Holy Communion. These for him were the core of Christianity, the bones upon which the meat could then be built. But I do think he got something wrong.

And he got it wrong right at the beginning: I don’t think he should have used the Ten Commandments. Now, I know that must raise a few eyebrows, but hear me out. Luther used the Ten Commandments in order to teach the Law. And for him the Law of God had two main uses: first off, it helps us to live together in community. Don’t lie, don’t steal, don’t mess with your neighbor’s relationships, do no harm: these are basic ground rules for any society attempting life together.

But the second use of the Law is to drive us to the Gospel, to the Good News of Jesus Christ. The Law says do no harm. The Law says do not covet. And do we? We cannot keep the Law, not fully, not perfectly. It reveals to us our own brokenness, our own sin, our inability to be good and righteous entirely on our own. We cannot earn a saving grace; it can only be given. And thanks be to God, it is! In Jesus Christ, the forgiveness, grace, and mercy of God are lavishly poured out upon us. The Law shows us our need for Christ and the Gospel then gives Him to us.

That’s Lutheranism 101. But here’s the thing: the Ten Commandments aren’t for us. They were for the ancient Israelites. Luther himself says this. The Third Commandment, “Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy,” does not apply to Christians. We aren’t Seventh Day Adventists.

“We are to fear and love God, so that we do not despise preaching or God’s Word, but instead keep that Word holy and gladly hear and learn it.” That’s what the Small Catechism says, when explaining the Third Commandment. But Sabbath observance, in a strict sense, is not for Christians. And neither are the Ten Commandments. There’s a better way to teach the Law, one that will serve the same purposes, fulfill the same uses. And that’s by teaching the Beatitudes.

Matthew’s Gospel is written for a literate Jewish audience. When Matthew tells the story of Jesus Christ, he is very much concerned that we are able to make explicit the connections between Jesus and the Hebrew Scriptures, especially Moses. Jesus, for Matthew, is the new and better Moses, the one promised to us in Deuteronomy: “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brethren—him you shall heed.”

Matthew lays it all out for us. Like Moses, Jesus escapes a slaughter of innocents as a child. Like Moses, He flees into Egypt. Matthew even groups the teachings of Jesus into five distinct discourses, paralleling the Torah, the Five Books of Moses. As Moses gathers the Twelve Tribes of Israel and leads them to Mount Sinai, so Jesus gathers Twelve Apostles and takes them up a mountain.

But whereas Moses ascended alone, and came back down with Ten Commandments as the basis for the Old Covenant, Jesus brings His disciples up with Him and founds a New Covenant with His Sermon on the Mount, which contains eight Beatitudes. “Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Blessed are the merciful, the peacemakers, the pure in heart. Blessed are the persecuted.”

Moses brought a Law fit for an ancient earthly kingdom. Jesus speaks a new Law fit for the Kingdom of Heaven. And truly, His is not a kingdom of this world. Blessed are the poor, the meek, the peacemakers? What nonsense is this? Everyone knows that the gods bless the wealthy, the powerful, the warmongers. That’s why they do so well! Whom do we really think God favors in the web, the spider or the fly? Jesus is turning the world on its head, the Roman Empire on its head.

His Beatitudes are a higher Law, which hold us to a higher standard. Matthew obviously believes this, and I can’t put it any better than Kurt Vonnegut did. He writes:

For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course, that’s Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere. “Blessed are the merciful” in a courtroom? “Blessed are the peacemakers” in the Pentagon? Give me a break!

For make no mistake, the Beatitudes are Law, at least for many of us much of the time. Indeed, the same Word can be both Law and Gospel; Luther was clear on that. “Blessed are the poor” liberates the destitute, while convicting the wealthy. “Blessed are the persecuted” tells those who suffer that God sees them, and tells their oppressors the same. It’s all well and good to memorize the Ten Commandments, but the Sermon on the Mount is what matters for us. Jesus is our Moses.

And Matthew makes that clear all throughout his Gospel account, right up to the Passover. Because if you know your Bible, you know that the holiest day for the Jewish people, for Jesus’ people, was the Passover celebration. It still is. The Passover was instituted by God through Moses so that every generation might know how He had led them out from slavery in Egypt to freedom in the Promised Land, how the blood of the Passover lamb had delivered Israel from death to new life.

And that’s what we have here, at this Table. The Eucharist, Holy Communion, is our Passover, the Christian Passover Meal; here where Christ, the Lamb of God, takes away all the sin of the world. Christ inaugurates a new and greater Covenant for a new and greater Kingdom, which does not replace the old but which fulfills it.

The followers of Christ are called to a higher Law, to His Law. He said it Himself: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. This is the whole of the Law and the Prophets.” And I know, we aren’t going to be able to do that. Not perfectly, not really. We are sinners, after all, and when you gather a bunch of sinners together, indeed we tend to sin. But Christ now lives in us, and whereas we may fail, He never will.

Mourning, meekness, mercy; persecution, poverty, peace; love of God and love of neighbor: these are the marks of the Kingdom. This is the rule of the Christ. And it will come into conflict with the law of the land, the law of any land. Such is the cost of bearing the Cross. But take heart: “Blessed are you,” sayeth the Lord, “when people revile you and persecute you and utter evil against you on My account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in My Kingdom.”

Act like Christ, and they’ll treat you like a king, with a crown of thorns and all.

In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.