I’ve been having many conversations with folks at our church about the crisis of violence in Israel and Palestine this month, and responses in our country. It’s on a lot of people’s hearts, and in this interconnected world I know many folks here are at least connected to people who are connected to people in Israel or Gaza or the West Bank, and are feeling this very strongly. And our nation itself has been very interconnected. But also, I think it’s safe to say that many of us here are not directly impacted by this current crisis – the pain is not our own, the anger is not our own, we are not the ones who are in danger, which is I think important to name.
I’ve been praying and discerning all along what my role should be in this. My duty is pastoral. It’s not political. So, I think what is most helpful is if I pose the question for us, which I think we always need to be reminded is the question in any difficult circumstance: What does it mean to be a sincere follower of Jesus here and now, given who we are and where we are?
What I hope to do, hope that I have been doing at least imperfectly, is to help you all to reflect on this question and to pray on it and to act on it according to your ongoing discernment about what God is doing in your life. In the United Church of Christ, especially, we really try to honor each person’s conscience and mature ability to discern important matters of faith through prayer, study, and conversation in community. In the UCC my job is not to tell you what to do or even what to believe. I don’t even get to threaten hellfire if you disagree.
So here are some things I invite you to consider, with this question, again:
What does it mean to be a sincere follower of Jesus here and now, given who we are and where we are?
There are very big and difficult issues at stake with the present crisis in Israel and Palestine, that are all-too-human issues that come up for many people throughout history. How does one respond to evil acts? What does the right to self-defense mean? What are the moral limits to use of violence? What are the rights of different people to a safe and secure homeland and what are legitimate means of securing those? What do we do when the right of everyone to a safe and secure homeland is in conflict, and when the right of everyone to self-defense is in conflict, and the fighting over it all brings out the worst in humanity? What to do about living legacies of war and trauma and dispossession?
The Way of Jesus, as Jesus and his early disciples taught, and the saints through the ages, doesn’t provide easy answers. What it offers is the Heart of Christ in the heart of the crises caused by human sin.
When Jesus first sent his disciples out on their own, he empowered them and charged them with the task of being healers and bearers of hope in a world that is wounded and dangerous. In the language of first century Galilee and Judea, Jesus said: “proclaim that the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Cure the sick, raise the dead, make the lepers clean, drive out demons.” What this means to us now, I believe, is that following Jesus means becoming healers and bearers of hope.
Jesus also told his disciples: “Remember, I am sending you out as my messengers like sheep among wolves. So be as savvy as snakes, and as innocent as doves.”
What this means for us is that we are not naïve about the dangers in this world, and the evils that people can commit. Jesus charges his followers to face these realities with a balance between being like serpents and being like doves. The words here in the New Testament are something like, on the one hand, be as “wise” as serpents, “savvy,” “shrewd,” “street smart;” and, on the other hand, be as “innocent” as a dove, “gentle,” “tender hearted.” This is such important wisdom, such a picture of the heart of Christ: to take care to keep a balance between having the smarts it takes to survive in a world that can be dangerous and disillusioning and vile; while not letting that harden our hearts, or causing us to lose compassion and hope in a world that has so much urgent need.
The Heart of Christ can be an antidote to the vicious cycles that sin so easily sets into motion, to which we are all susceptible. But the Heart of Christ does not let us escape from the pain of it.
The Apostle Paul says, abhor what is evil. Terrorist attacks such as what Hamas committed a month ago are evil, we must be clear about that evil and abhor it. But then, the Apostle Paul also says, “do not render evil for evil; do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good.” Easier said than done; easier to tell other people to do than to do it ourselves.
The Gospel diagnosis how evil has a way of spreading, because of the heartbreak it causes, the fear, the anger, the outrage, the desire to do unto others as they have done unto us. One particular expression of evil itself does not come out of nowhere, but has its origins in the cycles of violence. It is an all-too-human outcome that evil spreads, as it wants to do. Violence has a way of going viral. This is what folks are expressing in pain and outrage over cutting off 2 million Gazans from food and water and medicine, while there is massive bombardment.
War always has a way of punishing the innocent as well as the guilty, usually more so.
Cycles of violence is a process of sin that Jesus’ Gospel diagnoses – we’re all susceptible to it. The Gospel offers us ways of interrupting the cycles of violence, with grace. Jesus and his followers taught we must be on guard that our anger does not possess us; that we respond to curses with blessings, that we respond to hate with love, that we have compassion and even generosity toward our enemies.
Yet, at the same time, “Be as savvy as serpents,” right?
As Christians we need to be vigilant about the dynamic of violence in ourselves, and always bring it back to Jesus – so when we are in pain or fear or outrage we keep our hearts from becoming hardened into hate; that if we are ever in need of using violence as self-defense, as individuals or as groups, we don’t let the force of violence possess us and drive us to vengeance.
Again, this is easier said than done. And it’s easier to tell other people to do it, and to shake our fingers at them when they don’t, than to do it ourselves.
So, here and now, for us, given who we are and where we are, how do we follow Jesus?
In our country now there has been fuel thrown on what was already a problem of hatred against Jews, on the one hand, and hatred against Muslims, on the other. There has also been a division in hardening of hearts, with some people inclined to deny the pain and the right to life of Israelis who are grieving and under threat; and other people inclined to deny the pain and the right to life of Palestinians who have been suffering enormous civilian casualties. It’s been hard to have conversations. Although, I need to note, there have been really good conversations going on between compassionate and complicated people.
Let not our hearts become hardened. As I said a month ago, let’s try to stay with the grief. I can’t proclaim a solution or offer easy answers.
I can only humbly try to offer access to the Heart of Christ, who took upon himself all the pain due to all the sins of the world, and showed us that God’s Love lives on, despite ourselves, offering us deliverance from the sin from which we cannot free ourselves…
The Heart of Christ who blessed the tenderness of all hearts in this world that can be so hard,
The Heart of Christ, who blessed those who are humble,
The Heart of Christ, who blessed those who mourn
The Heart of Christ, who blessed those are gentle,
The Heart of Christ, who blessed those who hunger and thirst for the way that is right and good and just,
The Heart of Christ, who blessed the merciful,
The Heart of Christ, who blessed the pure in heart,
The Heart of Christ, who blessed are those who labor for peace
The Heart of Christ, who taught that there and here, is the Realm of God.
Delivered by Rev. Nathaniel Mahlberg on Sunday, November 5, 2023 at the United Church of Christ at Valley Forge
The Dandelion Way 