Westworth United Church Sunday, July 11, 2010 Rev. Mona F. Denton Colossians 1: 1-14; Luke 10:25-37
Are We Good Neighbours?
He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself’. (Luke 10:27)
When my children were very young, they loved to watch Mr. Roger’s Neighbourhood on television. I know it wasn’t because of the special effects or the exciting music or the dynamic host, Fred Rogers. No offense intended to Mr. Rogers, but he was no match for a giant purple Barney or Big Bird! What drew them in was that he was ordinary. He could be anyone’s grandpa or neighbour. Perhaps they felt comforted by his soft, but welcoming voice. His ability to make them feel safe and loved and treated as very important. Yes, every day was a beautiful day in his neighbourhood and the invitation to “be a neighbour” started every episode.
What they didn’t know was that Mr. Rogers was an integral part of my theological education. The fact that he had walked the hallowed halls of my seminary and studied for ministry there was always a bit of an interesting fact that circulated among the students at Knox College. His picture hung on the walls, alongside the other graduates of past classes and generations.
Each year at the Graduation Banquet, some brave student would don a cable-knit cardigan and a pair of comfortable sneakers and pay tribute to his kind, but rather dull persona, usually giving thanks at the end of the skit that he had chosen children’s television instead of the pulpit for his messages of neighbourly love. All of this was done rather tongue-in-cheek, with an underlying respect for the man who was perhaps the most famous graduate of the College!
It seemed to me that behind all of the poking fun at Fred McFeely Rogers (yes that was his full name), lay a recognition that he had taken the church’s message of welcome, acceptance and inclusion to the screen and been able to reach the hearts and minds of generations of children all across the North American continent. His ministry had left the pulpit behind, but his was still a powerful voice for the central call to be a good neighbour that permeates the gospels.
Being a good neighbour is not seen by Jesus as just a preferred attribute for his followers. If we take the question of the lawyer seriously, it is required of us if we hope to inherit eternal life. If we listen carefully to the words of the law the lawyer quotes for Jesus, loving our neighbour is the fifth in a list of requirements placed on us as people of faith. We are to love the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our strength, and with all our mind; and our neighbour as ourselves.’
Loving God completely with heart, soul, strength and mind is inseparable from the ability to love our neighbour as ourselves. It is hard for us to decide which act of discipleship will be the most difficult for us – to love God with such depth and completeness? To be able to love ourselves? Or to be free to love our neighbour with the same passion and focus?
If we were called on to describe our love for God, how might we answer? Is our love as deep and far-reaching as the lawyer’s answer? Do we really love ourselves or can we learn to really love who we have been created to be? And do we recognize that the depth of our self-love will have an impact on how deeply we are able to love others?
The Very Rev. David Giuliano, 39th Moderator of the United Church of Canada, when asked to describe himself has used this phrase: “I am tainted down to my DNA with a Godly dream for creation that will not let me go.”
I like that phrase because it describes a depth of discipleship that takes hold of our very being and will not leave us. It redefines our style of loving and moves it into the realm of faithfulness, spiritual growth and discernment. If we are going to be faithful disciples of the Way of Christ, love for God and for our neighbour will have to take hold of us in this way – right down to the very biology of who we are.
Loving God this fully, is surely the work of a lifetime. The journey of our faith will be marked by a growth in the way we love God with our heart, soul strength and mind. This kind of love doesn’t get achieved overnight; it is the work of our walk of faith. But it does have to be a conscious part of our faith. We can’t get away with just accepting an osmosis kind of seeking after God. By just sitting in church and going through the motions of discipleship, we will not obtain a passion for loving and serving God – we will have to work at it.
And what about this call to love neighbours as ourselves? Self-love can come in many forms – not all of them are healthy for us or faithful. Self-love can quickly be misconstrued as self-indulgence. The self-love that helps us to grow in faith is marked by self-knowledge, the acceptance of both our faults and our gifts and a deep appreciation of the gift of our life itself being a gift from God.
The words of the law imply that our ability to love our neighbour is linked to the love we have for ourselves. The parable of the Good Samaritan reinforces that truth. Surely that Good Samaritan had a clear sense of who he was and who he was called to be. He never hesitated to show love and compassion to the beaten man by the side of the road. The value he must have placed on the gift of life itself, moved him to seek restored life for the man in the ditch who was a victim, unable to help himself – a man who was a neighbour.
Something in his very being would not let him walk by on the other side of the road. Jesus says he was moved by pity; the lawyer calls it mercy. “The neighbour was the one who showed him mercy.”
Has the church weakened its witness by watering down what it means to be a good neighbour? I sometimes wonder that when I read this parable. Have we, all too quickly, adopted the view of our culture of what it means to be a good neighbour – reducing it to keeping our yards neat; not making too much noise if we have a party at our home; making a casserole or cookies for someone who is ill. Don’t get me wrong, these are kind and compassionate things to do for those who live in community with us. But are they as radical as the ministry of being a good neighbour that we are called to by Jesus?
The ministry of being a neighbour as Christian individuals or as church communities calls us to something more than a ministry of good works and peacekeeping on our street. The lawyer asks Jesus, “and who is my neighbour?” The church used to have a much more clearly defined sense of “parish.” We knew who was in and who was out; which streets were ours and which ones belonged to our neighbouring congregations. Jesus’ answer implies that our neighbour is anyone who needs our ministry of mercy and love. But perhaps we first need to reclaim that sense of the local parish before we can effectively say “the world is our neighborhood.”
Who in our own geographic parish is in need of the radical love of neighbour Jesus calls us to share? In this anniversary year here at Westworth, when we are reflecting upon 60 years of ministry; and in the time of transition that is the reality for St. Andrews River Heights, we are pausing to reflect on what it is we value and love about ourselves. Perhaps God is also calling us to look around and ask, “How then can I share this love, these gifts, and this passion for the faith with those who need it the most?”
There are people in our community who are “half-dead” for a variety of reasons – people weighed down by poverty, stress or lack of adequate housing; children without programs to protect them from gang recruitment and youth who are incarcerated.
Are we good neighbours? Or are we missing out on opportunities to reveal the powerful and transformative love for our neighbour that God asks of us? It is in our power to redefine, in our neighborhood, what it means to be a good neighbour. The early church stood out because of the model of community living they followed. Their neighbours couldn’t help but notice that the love they shared was unique and life-changing and they were drawn into the community of believers.
Radical neighbourliness; filled with mercy; grounded in a love for God and self that fills our whole being. Who wouldn’t want to live in that kind of neighbourhood? Amen.
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