Today’s
lesson, I am glad to say, follows closely on the heals of what Pastor
Jim was talking about last week…when the Pharisees were trying to trap Jesus
with their questions about paying taxes to Caesar. The setting is still the same with
this being the last week of Jesus’ life.
Two other Gospel writers pick up on today’s events with Luke actually
rephrasing the question. Instead of
having the lawyer inquiring about the greatest of all the commandments…Luke has
him ask, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” And yet, Matthew doesn’t go there. With the clock ticking and little time
left, Matthew’s question is practical…to the point…and ultimately leads us to
the larger issue of ‘who Jesus is’.
For
me, the rub in this story…comes
in the form of an observation. When
asked to offer his opinion on which one
commandment was the greatest (realizing that he had some 613 to choose
from),…Jesus
chose not one but two commandments and then intentionally bound them
together. As far as we can
tell, Jesus was the first one to do this, which makes his answer all the
more impressive. What Jesus is
implying (and not in a small way)…is that the criterion of whether love
for God is real is whether or not that same love is reflected in
our relationships with others.
Ouch! Did that get our
attention? I hope so…because what Jesus
is doing here is a perfect example of ‘relational teaching’.
What
the lawyer in today’s story really wants to know is what we all want to
know: ‘Ok Jesus, just tell us. Who is our neighbor, really?’ One person whom I believe came very close
to discovering the answer is Fred Rogers, whom many of us have come to
know simply as Mister Rogers, from Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. According to author Amy Hollingsworth, Fred’s
definition of a neighbor was simple:
the person you happen to be with at the moment. Quoting from her book, The Simple Faith of
Mister Rogers:
‘At the center of Fred’s theology of loving your
neighbor was this: Every person is
made in the image of God, and for that reason alone, he or
she is to be valued…”appreciated”, he liked to say.
Fred
Rogers was a master when it came to relational teaching…especially when it came
to teaching children about how to relate to others. Having been called as a minister in the
Presbyterian church, he found his parish to be that of
the television viewer. For over 30
years, children flocked to be a part of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood and
to hear the gentle words of affirmation coming from the kind man who
wore sweaters and blue tennis shoes.
His
message, although quite simple, was an important one: ‘Be the good neighbor’. It is a message that Jesus himself would
have affirmed…knowing that behind it all was an unspoken love for God. The two can not be separated, as Fred
Rogers undoubtedly knew. There was something
relationally divine about engaging one’s neighbor, whomever and wherever
they happened to be. Again, to quote
from her book:
‘Fred believed there are those in our world,
people his mother called “helpers,” who allow us to
remember what is good about being human.
Even God chose to identify with being human, he once noted, and He continues to work through those created in His image.’
What
happens when the person whom God chooses to work through turns out to be someone whom we
might not feel close to? Someone
who seems so different from us, our values, our way of
life that we can not possibly relate to them as our neighbor…and vice versa…or
so it would seem. One of the stories
that caught my eye was actually about the Hollingsworth family and their
unlikely encounter with a man named Junior.
‘Dressed in mud-splattered coveralls with hair that
looked like he had just awoken from a week long nap’ (she writes), Junior
presented Amy one day with a large cut of raw venison. Still dripping blood through his fingers,
as he stood at their front door, Junior had come to say thank you to Jeff,
Amy’s husband, who had visited him in the hospital. Needless to say, I’ve heard of people
bringing all kinds of gifts to thank Pastors for their help, but this one takes
the cake. And yet, it was just the
beginning of what turned out to be an extremely important relationship.
As Mister Rogers often said on his show: ‘You make each day special…just by
being you!’ I believe Fred Rogers was
right. Every person is made in the
image of God, and for that reason alone, he or she is to be valued
and yes, appreciated. And that, dear friends in Christ, makes every day a
wonderful day…in the neighborhood.
Amen