July 27, 2008 | 9:30 and 11:00 a.m.

Right and Wrong

Adam H. Fronczek
Associate Pastor, Fourth Presbyterian Church

Psalm 121
Genesis 29:15–28
Matthew 13:10–17, 44–50

“For this people’s heart has grown dull,
and their ears are hard of hearing,
and they have shut their eyes;
so that they might not look with their eyes,
and listen with their ears,
and understand with their heart and turn—
and I would heal them.”

Matthew 13:15 (NRSV)

Let this be our principle: that the use of God’s gifts is not wrongly directed
when it is referred to that end to which the Author . . . created and destined
them for us, since [God] created them for our good, not for our ruin.

John Calvin
Institutes of the Christian Religion

Two weeks ago, I participated in the L.A.T.E. Ride. The L.A.T.E. Ride is organized by friends of the parks. It’s a twenty-five-mile bicycle ride through downtown Chicago. Riders gather late on a Saturday night in July, and the ride starts at 1:30 a.m. Sunday morning. This year, about 9,000 riders participated. At that time of the morning, the only other people out on the street are the thousands of people exiting the bars of Chicago following last call, and the presence of these two groups, you might imagine, leads to some interesting dialogue.

This year, the most memorable part of that dialogue wasn’t something that was said; it was something I saw—a picture that paints a thousand words. I approached a young woman on her bike who was wearing a Lance Armstrong jersey. You would probably recognize it: bright yellow, and in those big block letters it said, “Live Strong.” Well, it wouldn’t have been that memorable to have seen her, except that just at that moment, a young man came stumbling out of a bar and passed by her only a few feet away. He was moving along, slowly, with heavy steps, baseball cap pulled low over his eyes. His T-shirt was black, and in the very same big block letters it read, “Live Wrong.”

As I struggled to maintain my balance, I thought, “That’ll preach.” At first, it seemed like a simple, fun illustration of the stark contrast between right and wrong, but the more I thought about it, it occurred to me that the contrast between right and wrong usually isn’t as stark as that illustration would lead us to believe. Truth be told, most of the people who were stumbling out of bars that night have probably at some point been on a bike, and most of those who participated in the ride that night have probably been in a bar, and it’s unlikely that any of them deserve to be permanently labeled as strong or wrong, good or evil. And such is life. Most of us probably don’t devote a lot of time to trying to figure out if we are inherently good or evil, but day after day, time and time again, every one of us does have to take on the responsibility of making decisions and hoping that they are the right ones. And it’s a complicated task. A few examples:

Cars fueled by ethanol. The responsible choice. The place where we need to turn in order to find a cleaner burning fuel that can help the environment while making us less dependent on oil. Unfortunately, in order to gas up your SUV with ethanol one time, you have to grow the amount of corn that it would take to feed a hungry person for a year. And the increased production of corn needed for ethanol has changed the price of corn and, in turn, other commodities because of the way farm subsidies work—as if farm subsidies weren’t morally ambiguous enough before anyone ever thought of powering a car with ethanol.

Another example: A couple has been married for a short time. They got married because they got pregnant and they were very happy at the time, so it seemed like the right thing to do. Then they lost the baby. Now they seem to think they were never really ready to be married in the first place. Now all either one of them can think about is all the freedom they feel they’ve lost and how hard a person this is to live with, and he starts cheating and she starts feeling isolated and that escalates into all kinds of abuse, and suddenly not being married seems like the “right” thing to do.

Afghanistan: a war-torn nation where the Taliban originally gained a foothold by trafficking narcotics—and with the support of the United States government, whose top priority at the time was defeating the Soviets, who were at war with the Taliban for control of Afghanistan. It’s the political lesson we just cannot seem to learn: it is not necessarily true that my enemy’s enemy is my friend.

It’s truly enough to make your head spin. Whom to vote for, whom to marry, taking a job or leaving one—so much of life is made up of the decisions that face us, and many of them are strikingly complex. It would seem that any religion worth your time would somehow be of help with these decisions. Shouldn’t this Book or this preacher have at least some of the right answers?

There’s an amazing industry built up around religious people who claim that they do have the answers, that they are experts at clarifying the ambiguous and simplifying the complex. The Bible apparently not being good enough, when you type “God’s will” into Amazon.com, the search turns up over 38,000 entries. Many of the largest churches in the country thrive because of the “answers” they claim to provide, formulas given in the gospel that will help you to find greater control, more financial stability, more happiness, “Your Best Life.” My hunch is that many of you are here because there is something about those easy answers that seems suspect to you, something about that approach that seems oversimplified, something that turns you off. On that score, I’m with you. Here’s the thing that scares me: in the absence of easy answers, many of us are guilty of an equally dangerous way of living—we stop thinking about the questions. We stop thinking about right and wrong at all and lapse into a kind of spiritual laziness where God no longer has anything to do with our choices. But if the Bible doesn’t give us easy answers, what then does it do for us, when we are faced with decisions?

When you’re looking for the Bible’s most pronounced “straight talk” on everyday stuff, the Gospel of Matthew is about the best place to look. Matthew talks about practical, everyday issues. He writes about marriage and adultery and divorce, about finding your purpose and quitting your job. Matthew’s story of Jesus and his relationship with the Jewish and Roman authorities of the day is full of messy political alliances, made and broken. Matthew talks about everyday decisions in pretty stark terms, and you may not like the things Matthew has to say, but you can’t fault him for being abstract or out of touch.

In Matthew, most of Jesus’ teaching is related to us in parables. In parables, we see evidence that those easy answers some Christians talk about were about the last thing on Jesus’ mind. Instead of speaking to people in moral platitudes or trite sayings that are the same no matter what, Jesus tells stories. The stories are about deceit and betrayal, about love found and love lost. Parables are stories about labor disputes and cheating and fairness, and always parables tell us the story of a decision—a decision made well or poorly in the midst of moral ambiguity.

There’s another thing that is interesting to me about parables: it’s the explanation Jesus gives for why he uses them.

The disciples ask him, “Why do you teach in parables?” and the answer comes:

The reason I speak to them in parables is that “seeing they do not perceive, and hearing they do not listen, nor do they understand.” . . . 15 For this people’s heart has grown dull, and their ears are hard of hearing, and they have shut their eyes; so that they might not look with their eyes, and listen with their ears, and understand with their heart and turn—and I would heal them. (Matthew 13:13, 15)

Jesus not only refuses to provide easy answers, but he’s humble and realistic enough to know that much of the time when he’s talking, people aren’t listening to him. I’ll admit it makes me laugh to think that even Jesus is part of a long line of preachers who stand up in front of the congregation, week after week, and want to tap the mic and ask, “Is this thing on?”

It’s a good answer though, isn’t it? “Why do you teach in parables,” they ask. “Because most of you don’t listen,” Jesus answers, “and I want to change that. I want to heal you of that. Most of you don’t listen, so I’m going to tell you a story. Instead of telling you what to do, I’m going to paint you a picture, one that shows that I understand the complexity of life’s decisions. I’m going to paint a picture that causes you to think.”

A parable isn’t just a cute story. It’s life. It’s Jesus telling a story that is ambiguous enough to push us to think about our own lives. “Jesus speaks in parables because he is creatively challenging his followers with the necessity of paying attention and making good decisions.”

You see, when we really listen to the stories and think about them, there’s a chance for our own actions to become a part of the creation of God’s plan, or what the Bible calls “the kingdom of heaven.” With the decisions we make, we can choose to be a part of God’s vision of how things are supposed to be. How are they supposed to be? Let those who have ears hear. Listen:

The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and hid; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.
(Matthew 13:44)

The parable is more complicated than it sounds. In the ancient world, when a piece of land was purchased, the property within that land was retained by the seller. So the person who buys the field in hopes of gaining the treasure might have actually lost it. Did he make a mistake in giving up all he had to buy that field? Or perhaps the kingdom of God just isn’t something that is meant to be possessed. The parable continues:

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it. (Matthew 13:45)

In contrast to the first parable, where someone accidentally finds the treasure, this is a pearl merchant; he knows what he’s looking for. And even though he already has a lot of pearls, he has the same reaction as the field worker. He sells everything. His devotion is single-minded. There is no prudence or caution involved when we see what God’s kingdom might look like.

Sometimes we find God’s will intentionally. Other times, it appears to us almost as if by accident, and miraculously, we have equal access to it either way. The beauty about God’s will for us is that, in spite of all its illusiveness, we tend to know it when we see it. Most of us know what God wants for us. The challenge is to listen and to follow.

The final parable is the hardest.

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and caught fish of every kind; when it was full, they drew it ashore, sat down, and put the good into baskets but threw out the bad. So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. (Matthew 13:47–50)

“Thrown into the furnace of fire where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth”: we don’t like those passages very much, do we? They work better for those who are seeking easy answers and ignoring the ambiguity of life. But listen closely: a net is thrown into the sea. It catches fish of every kind imaginable. They don’t draw it ashore until it’s full. But no matter how long they wait, there will always be good fish and bad ones. Now that’s a true story—and that’s how we know it’s not a story for us to think about in the future; it’s a story about now. Hearing the parables and struggling with their lessons is an urgent need. It’s not good enough to oversimplify the message; if you hear the message, it’s not good enough to put it off until tomorrow. This is a troubled world, full of tough decisions, and why does Jesus teach us in parables? “Because,” Jesus says, “if only they would listen with their ears and their eyes and their hearts, I would heal them.” The best thing we can do is try to listen and follow. There are no easy answers, but we have a responsibility to listen closely, and if we do, we’ll see this broad net that has been cast, this tremendous wideness in God’s mercy, this untiring desire to bring us along to God’s kingdom—no matter how ambiguous things get.

The Gospels use a lot of descriptive terms to try to explain God’s love for us, God’s persistence in trying to heal us, to lead us, and to guide us. One metaphor that comes up a lot is that of the shepherd. This is the image I’d like to leave you with.

It’s a beautiful image. Seems simple enough. When I was a child, my father told me that when he was a child, he wanted to be a shepherd. Live in the country, walk around with the sheep, probably lots of time to read—rather idyllic, actually. I thought it was a great idea. I decided I might like to be a shepherd, too.

Seminary is full of disappointing surprises. I started studying the Bible, only to discover that shepherds lived a rather hard life. Life was a struggle for those sheep. Always at the mercy of the weather. Always at odds with other herds over who gets to graze where. Always attacked by wolves. And because of all those hardships, shepherds often had a bad reputation.

Dad, I’m sorry. I don’t think we want to be shepherds. So it’s helpful to think that amidst all those hardships that plague the sheep, in our life, we need not be the shepherd. God is the shepherd. We live lives of struggle. Always at the mercy of the unknown. At odds with each other over many things. Always attacked by wolves. But God, the one who understands all the ambiguity, is the shepherd.

I did learn one other helpful thing about shepherds. Shepherds lead from behind, so that they can encourage the sheep to move on and, when needed, they can gather the lost.

Amen.