sermon October 8th

Here's the text of the first of my LOTR sermon series. The sermon began by reading the lectionary passage for the day, Mark 10:2-9.

As we begin reading Mark chapter 10, we see something that has happened countless times in Jesus’ ministry. We see here the religious elite of the day questioning Jesus about his teaching, trying to get him to admit that he’s teaching about a different God than they one they believe in. These are people who are educated, who are upstanding citizens, yet they fail to see Jesus for who he is because of one tragic flaw: they are more focused on the rules of their religion than the features of their faith.

Even the question that the Pharisees ask is more focused on what is permissible than what is right. “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” There’s no focus on what’s right, there’s no focus on whether it’s favorable for a man to divorce his wife. All they want to know is “can I get away with it?”

But Jesus, like he does so often, shakes his head and tells his questioners that they’re simply asking the wrong question. Jesus admits that legally there are conditions in which divorce can happen, although those conditions are concessions to human failures. But should divorce happen? Jesus focuses our attention away from the law and what is permissible and back to the purpose and intent of the law.

This is even more evident as Jesus goes back with the disciples, and they ask him to clarify his statement. Jesus speaks even more bluntly, yet he does so by referring to not only the man’s legal right to terminate the marriage covenant, but also the female’s right. There are a couple of reasons why that’s important: first of all, the female wasn’t allowed to initiate divorce in Palestine during that time period, yet Jesus talks about the “woman leaving her husband.” Jesus observes how both the man and the woman join to begin marriage, thus logically either can break the bonds of marriage. Breaking those bonds, however, is fundamentally opposed to the direction God’s kingdom is leading people toward. Jesus thereby challenges those who worship the law by pointing out its internal contradictions and by pointing to, as Paul later says of love, “a more excellent way.”

All too often we see the law as a rulebook used to oppress us. Our culture constantly tells us that the way to happiness is to eliminate rules, to “live life by your own rules” and forget about any rule or guideline that doesn’t fit with what we want. The only purpose of rules, we’re told, is for the powerful to enslave the powerless. When that’s the case, we start to look for ways around the rules, ways to get what we want without technically breaking any rules. One of the hardest lessons many college students have to learn is that just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. Can you skip all of your classes without anyone yelling at you? Absolutely. Can you pass if you do that? Probably not.

God’s laws, just like class times, are not intended for your torture. There might be other things that seem like they’d be more fun, more entertaining, or more profitable. But before you skip all your classes, and before you break all of the Bible’s advice for living just because you can, ask yourself – why are they there? Why are these class times being offered, and why do we have these rules for how to live life? Both are tools, intended to help us grow, to help us become engaged in the world in new ways and to live more fulfilled lives.

Jesus points us today to consider the purposes of what we’re doing. As we read the Bible and learn the story of God’s people, God’s purpose is constantly that people might live in right relationship with God and with each other. The Bible tells the story of how God chose to be in relationship with humanity in creation, how God worked to maintain that relationship despite our human insistence on running away from God, and how God finally sent Jesus to once again express how deeply God loves us. We as a church gather to proclaim who Jesus was and is in our midst, to live a life transformed by God’s love revealed in Jesus, and to expand the circle of God’s loving community until it reaches every part of God’s creation.

We have various tools at our disposal in this mission. One tool we’ve got is the best-selling, most translated, most historically documented book in history – the Bible. Like the Jews of Jesus’ day, we have a document that outlines how to live embody and expand God’s community. But like the Pharisees, Jesus challenges us to look beyond the letter of the law to the Spirit, the divine love behind that law and behind that tool.

There’s an old Buddhist proverb about scripture that is helpful for focusing us on this reality that we should gather around a mission, rather than gathering around our tools to perform that mission. Scripture is like a hand pointing toward the moon. Scripture is not God, but it points us toward God. If we waste our time focusing only on the hand, we miss the opportunity to see the awesome, mighty God that this hand points us to.

Whenever we disconnect a tool from its purpose, the tool has the potential to be used for good or for evil. When separated from a loving God who wants our fulfillment, laws are simply hoops we have to jump through or obstacles to avoid. The Bible that is meant as the story of God’s love for humanity becomes the weapon of people’s judgment of each other. When we forget the purpose of Christ’s coming, we shout John 3:16 at people without moving on to John 3:17, “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” When we start using any tool, even the most Godly, for our own gain rather than to further God’s kingdom, we start to be used by the tool rather than users of the tool.

We see this vividly in the clip we’ll look at in a moment. In the clip, we see the wizard Gandalf coming to his old friend Saruman for advice about how to deal with the ring of power, one of the most powerful tools ever created by the enemy Sauron that remains tied by its design to the enemy’s will. Gandalf comes to his friend still focused on the goal of defeating Sauron and destroying the ring. He finds there that Saruman has become consumed by a tool called the palantir, through which he can see across Middle Earth. This tool, originally designed to aid in the fight against the enemy, has been corrupted by the enemy, who uses the palantir to create fear, distrust, and suspicion in Saruman. See how convinced Saruman is that what he sees in the palantir is reality, and how focused he is on his own strength and influence rather than the common goal of a better world. Because Saruman has started to worship the tool rather than using it for its purpose, he becomes a slave to his own desires and is manipulated. Saruman turns on his friend Gandalf because of his obsession with what he can see and what he knows, thereby “trading reason for madness.” FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING Disc 1 46:40 to 50:16

We see in the Lord of the Rings story two fundamentally different ways to look at tools. The ring must be destroyed, yet the Palantir can still be redeemed and used for good. The ring must be destroyed because no one can use it, because it is more powerful and corroding than any user can withstand. The Palantir, however, can be used, since it can more easily be placed in perspective. Neither, however, can be used lightly or for personal gain without them corrupting the user, as we see with Saruman.

In Return of the King, Aragorn, the king of Gondor and the leader of the Fellowship, takes the Palantir in order to provoke Sauron into battle, thereby protecting Frodo and Sam and the ultimate goal of the mission. Aragorn knows that the only way for their ultimate mission of destroying the ring to succeed, he has to convince the enemy that he intends to fight at the gate. Watch this clip from the extended edition of the movie and see Aragorn’s decision to use the palantir for good. RETURN OF THE KING Disc 2 58:30 to 59:37

Will there be fear involved in serving? Absolutely. You can see Aragorn’s fear in that clip, and you can see the fear in the disciples throughout the gospel as they saw more and more clearly how hard was the path that Jesus lead them toward. “Fear not, for I am with you always” Jesus said. Or, as John said, “perfect love casts out fear.” Not being sure of what the results will be makes it far easier to focus on the tangible things we think we can control. We start to focus and become fixated on how we do things rather than why we do things.

But in the midst of fear, in the midst of uncertainty, and in the midst of a world where we’re constantly challenged as to whether we are serious about living faithfully, we have this common calling around which we can gather. God formed humans to be in community with God and in community with each other. Jesus came to expand that community, to remind those inside the community of their purpose and to invite those outside the community to come in. Will we do likewise?