Article
- Date:
- Sunday 1st October 2023
Year A, The Seventeenth Sunday after Trinity - Place:
- Holy Trinity, Hurstpierpoint
- Service:
- Eucharist
- Readings:
- [passage=Ezekiel 18.1-4, 25-32/]
Matthew 21.23-32
One of the great dangers of interpreting the Bible is that it is all too easy to treat similar sounding texts as if they were identical. So, for example, our Reading from Ezekiel says that if the Chosen People behave well they will live but if they behave badly they will die so, the passage concludes, "turn, then, and live". But this clearly does not mean that the wicked will die while the virtuous will live because the Old Testament is full of examples of the whole people being punished indiscriminately regardless of individual behaviour, including women who had no authority in their communities or even in their own lives; and, in any case, we all die. Neither does this passage mean that the wicked will be damned and the virtuous granted eternal life. That kind of rhetoric is confined in the Old Testament to a very few passages in The Books of Daniel and Isaiah. You will remember at the time of Jesus the concept of life after death was disputed theological territory. But neither, and this is the really important point, does this passage mean that post Resurrection Christians will either be saved or damned according to their behaviour, which is the commonest mistake which Biblical interpreters of a certain kind make even though they claim the Protestant inheritance which separates so-called "works" from faith.
It is remarkable, however, how the idea of a contractual arrangement whereby we receive salvation in exchange for good behaviour has taken root in Western Christianity, which is why passages like this are given such salience.
What this passage actually means, then, is that if people behave well their earthly lives will be more rewarding. Well, in a way, but the prophets and Psalmists often question this symmetry by remarking how prosperous the wicked seem to be.
And in our own times, in our own land, it is quite remarkable how little connection there is between right living and the good life. The only satisfaction that good people may enjoy is the satisfaction that they have done the right thing but in every sphere of our society, bad behaviour is rewarded and good behaviour is dismissed as naive or worse.
In considering our own sphere we might ask ourselves how often awkward people are rewarded to keep them quiet while obedient people are overlooked as weak. We might ask how often the honest person is dismissed as a trouble-maker, somebody who rocks the boat, while people who go along with any amount of obvious nonsense are applauded. We might ask how often the difficult question is taken seriously and how often it is set aside.
Now all these failings in civil society are bad enough but in a Church they are fatal for with these sort of evasive attitudes, communities become self-justifying, self-referential cultural entities. A community that cannot talk honestly about itself and to itself is no community at all; every evasion may spare embarrassment but every evasion weakens the fabric.
Churches as comfort zones are all well and good when the living is easy but without developing the muscle of sacrificial compassion, of arguing against ourselves to achieve the common good, the muscle grows limp and is unfit for a crisis.
I want to give three very different examples of the point. First, it was easy to agree that we should welcome Ukrainians into our community and even our homes but it is much more difficult to agree on whether the Archbishop of Canterbury's support for Western military intervention can be squared with the Sermon on The Mount. Secondly, while we agree on the treatment of Ukrainian, and even Hong Kong refugees, we seem to have a much greater problem, as yet unresolved, with those who arrive in small boats. And thirdly, while we all agree about supporting good causes such as children and animals, we are divided about climate change protesters and disruptive action.
In sketching these issues I am simply pointing out that how to lead a holy life is a matter of controversy which a Christian community should discuss not, incidentally, so that we all agree, nor even because if we did this would somehow be a passport to salvation, but because living a holy life is God's purpose for us in creation.
So back we go to Ezekiel. Being obedient to God, which is our created purpose, is not straightforward but whereas the Chosen People had to rely on their prophets for guidance, we have Christ's Church within which to support each other. But evasion is not a viable means of support. So here are three final short points: first, give a fair hearing to positions with which we disagree; secondly, beware of the easy choice and be willing to embrace sacrifice for the common good; and, thirdly,
don't be taken in by conventional group think. Ezekiel was at least right in this, for as a prophet he represented the difficult and the unpopular option, standing out against conventional wisdom and telling the awkward truth.