(Homily for Gayton Road Christian Church's Sunday Worship on February 19, 2017, Epiphany VII)
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To Give Is to Get
An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Today we call it revenge; the court of law calls it “retributive justice.” It’s the legal equivalent of Newton’s Third Law: for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. The principle of revenge goes back a long ways. Jesus is quoting from the law that Moses gave to the ancient Israelites, but in fact this principle goes back even further. About five hundred years before Moses, King Hammurabi and the ancient Babylonians were mutually gouging out eyes and knocking out teeth.
But Jesus is talking about more than revenge. Because “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” applies to more than fistfights and vigilante justice. It applies not only to bitter enemies but also to friends. Valentine’s Day, in fact, is a great illustration of this principle. And I’m not only thinking of a lovers’ vengeful quarrel, where inattention is met with silent treatment, “silence for silence,” or where one sarcastic remark is met with another, “insult for insult.” I’m thinking more about the common exchanges of Valentine’s Day: “card for card,” “gift for gift,” “kiss for kiss.” In each case, to give is to get. The truth of this principle becomes unmistakable in the case of unreturned love. When one person gives but never gets, there follows a profound feeling of error or failure, like the universe made a miscalculation. Something is wrong. It was not meant to happen this way.
Nickel Creek, a bluegrass band, sings a funny little song about this kind of scenario, and it goes like this: “Anthony, Anthony/ Oh, he said, he can’t love me, / but I think he can. / Yes, I think he can. / I told him that just before he ran, / just before he ran. / … And he’s not looking back. / He’s not looking back, / ‘cause he doesn’t want anything I have / or anything I am.”[1] In this tale of unreturned love, the girl feels so strongly that something is wrong, that she keeps telling herself, and eventually Anthony, that he ought to return her love. She feels entitled to it.
Nothing More than a Computer Program?
Even in the case of anonymous gifts, or charity, to give is to get. The giver generally receives that warm and fuzzy feeling at having made a difference; beneath or behind that good feeling, the giver also often obtains a sense of superiority.
If we take a few steps back from this balance of giving and getting, of “like for like,” we begin to see that the world runs a bit like an account book. Whether it is friendship or hostility, each relationship maintains an equilibrium. “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. A hug for a hug, a kiss for a kiss.”
If that all sounds a bit somber or lifeless, like we’re nothing more than a computer program playing itself out, a bunch of ones and zeros forever balancing themselves—then here’s the good news: Jesus feels the same way. Jesus feels that there’s more to life than this giving and getting. Listen again to what he says, “If you love those who love you, what reward do you have? … And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others?” (5:46-47). In other words, if you give only when you’ll get back, where’s the life in that?
Love Crashes the Program of Giving and Getting
So what does Jesus do? In a word, he upsets the balance, he throws the accounts into disarray, and all with one wild variable: love. Not the worldly love, which only loves when it can be sure of a return, but God’s love, which rises on the evil as on the good, and rains on the righteous as on the unrighteous. God’s love—real love—throws everything off balance. It crashes our program of giving and getting, of “like for like,” and our robotic lives suddenly acquire a living color, a risky flesh. Real love confuses the ones and zeros of the world’s computer program and infuses us with life.
The rubber really meets the road, of course, when it comes to our enemies. Jesus’ examples are well known: turning the cheek, offering our cloak, going the extra mile, giving to any who beg. Each example confounds us. Instead of responding to injustice with a fight, or a complaint, or even a nonviolent protest, Jesus advocates responding with love. Not only is such a response unnatural. It also strikes us as wildly impractical.
Consider, for instance, how Thaddeus Stevens responded to Abraham Lincoln after the civil war. Lincoln was floating such crazy ideas as the ones that Jesus mentioned—ideas like forgiveness and reconciliation—and in reply, Thaddeus struck the table and exclaimed, “Mr. Lincoln! I think enemies ought to be destroyed!” One could hardly find a clearer expression of our coding, of our programmed response to the enemy. And one could hardly find a clearer understanding of Jesus and his foolish idea of love, than in Lincoln’s quiet response: “Mr. Stevens,” he said, “Do not I destroy my enemy when I make him my friend?”[2]
Similarly, I am reminded of a friend who once shared with me her strange and bold tactic for approaching strangers of whom she was frightened, folks who looked dangerous or disturbed. Instead of crossing the street, or turning the other way, she approaches them, looks them in the eye, and says as kindly and naturally as she can, “Hi, how’re you doing?” In many cases, she says, her greeting melts the perceived barrier or threat, and the other responds with more warmth than anticipated.
Love Does Not Work
But I have to stop myself here. Because it’s beginning to sound like love works. Like love is a weapon that disarms, or a tactic that defuses.[3] Love surely has such side-effects from time to time. But as Jesus discovers, love does not always win, at least not in the way we might hope for. Jesus knows full well what loving your enemies can get you: sneers, spit, nails, spears.[4] So I have to think that when Jesus invites us to love our enemies, he’s not talking about making a deal or driving a bargain. He’s not promising a return. He’s not saying that love is effective, that love will “work.” Inasmuch as we love with the motive that it works, that it accomplishes something, that it has a desired effect, love will never work. A love with a vested interest, a love with ulterior motives, a love designed to win friends and influence people, is no love at all. When love has a purpose up its sleeve, it is nothing more than a crafty way of getting what we want.
Love Is Without Why
All of that to say, love is uncalculating. It is “without why,” without good reason, for no reason other than itself. When love looks at another person, whether friend or enemy, it’s not looking for a return; it has eyes only for the holy and mysterious and beautiful image of God.
Last week at our Daytimers luncheon, Nancy invited us who were there into a fascinating discussion. She asked us a question from the Explore God program: “Does life have a purpose?” It’s the kind of question that can set your head spinning! I didn’t answer at the time, because I couldn’t untangle my own response. Part of me said, “Yes, of course,” but then another part of me, the part who had been pondering Jesus’ ludicrous and life-giving words in this scripture, said “I’m not so sure.”
In the light of today’s scripture, here is how I would respond: Life has as much purpose as a painting. If there is a single, unified, capital-P “Purpose,” then life is nothing more than a paint-by-numbers painting. It is like an imperial garden, planned out to the very stem and leaf, and nothing at all like the wild, unpredictable beauty of a mountain meadow.
But if God is love, and love is as uncalculating as Jesus says, then I think life’s purpose is not a program or a plan but a possibility. Life’s purpose is empty—as empty as a blank canvas. Life’s purpose is unplanned—as unplanned as a newborn child’s life. All this to say, the purpose of life is as vast and wide and unknowable as love. The purpose of life is not predetermined by an all-powerful man in the clouds. The purpose of life is a possibility of beauty and truth and goodness—a possibility that grows by love, much like a forest nourished by the indiscriminate love of rain and sunshine, much like a child nurtured by the unquestioning love of a parent.
Throw Away the Script
We have heard it said, “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth; a hug for a hug, a kiss for a kiss.” But Jesus says to us, Where’s the life in that? Where’s the life in following the script of this-for-that, like-for-like? That only “works” if we want to get what we’ve already got. Jesus says to us, If you want life, then throw away the script and love others as God loves you, without a card up your sleeve, without why, without a thought as to whether it will work. If you want life, then love others, friend and foe alike. Speak to them as a friend when they act as an enemy. Believe that they are good when they do bad. Hope new life for them even when they deserve none at all. When the time comes, carry your cross. And know that love is the strongest power of all, stronger even than death.
Prayer
Jesus,
Whose love
Leads us beyond
Bargains and balances
Into immeasurable life:
Upset our accounts today
And draw us into the way
Of the uncalculating, loving Father and Mother of us all.
Amen.
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[1] Nickel Creek, “Anthony”; written by Sara Watkins; track 9 on Why Should the Fire Die?
[2] Clarence Jordan, The Substance of Faith and Other Cotton Patch Sermons (ed. Dallas Lee; Eugene: Cascade, 2005; orig. New York: Association Press, 1972), 78.
[3] Jordan, The Substance of Faith, 78.
[4] Jordan, The Substance of Faith, 80.
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