An education

  

Sermon for Epiphany 4 2011

The mediocre teacher tells.  The good teacher explains.  The superior teacher demonstrates.  The great teacher inspires.  ~William Arthur Ward. 

When we think of teachers, we think of formal education, school, professors, and homework.  School is something that we complete, that we finish.  So what does it mean to be a student or disciple of Jesus?  We are going to find out.  What is Christian education and who needs it?   

It all started on Saturday when I slipped on the ice and sprained my ego, I mean ankle.  Then on Sunday, Jonah fell and split his head open, needed stitches.  Then Cherie had a disastrous trip to the grocery store, in which she dumped an entire bag of dog food in the checkout aisle.  Can you say clean up on aisle 12?  Then my computer failed. I was going to say died, but I don’t want to over-humanize the machine. It’s not human.   It was one of those weeks---like someone has it in for you, when trivial things cause frustrations that turn into self-pity.  Why is this happening? Ugh.  Not now.  Not me. Not today.  I am important.  I have things to do, places to go, people to see.  You know the feeling? The whole, “Why am I being cursed” feeling?  The feeling that you are not blessed, that someone up there has it in for you.  Then I see Linda Shelley, who has good news about her cancer fight and she tells me how blessed she is.  Blessed.  Sick with cancer, having just come from chemo, and she is blessed.  Man do I have a ways to go.  I think I was also able to be a blessing a couple of times this week.  I delivered food to some neighbors.  They genuinely seemed grateful that I came, listened to their stories, felt their pain, tried to help.  I was blessed to be a blessing a couple of times this week.    

The Master teaches.  And on this occasion, he speaks blessing first.  He will teach morals and commands and encourage a particular way of life.  But he begins with blessings.  The Beatitudes are a reminder.  Not that people in mourning are blessed.  Or that the poor are.  Or that those who are pure in heart or peaceful are blessed.  It is not a reminder that God only blesses these types of folks.  Jesus is offering a blessing to the people who had gathered to listen to him teach.  In the beginning of his first teaching event, he offers these blessings.  Matthew’s gospel includes five teaching discourses, in which Jesus offers an alternative way of life for God’s people.  Some scholars believe that Matthew is claiming that Jesus is the new Moses and the five teachings are the new Torah.  Torah are the first five books of the old testament and represent the core teachings of Judaism about life in relationship or covenant with their God, Yahweh, with each other, and with their neighbors.  Jesus’ first discourse is called the Sermon on the mount, because he is sitting on a mountain.  We will hear the entire sermon over the next few weeks.  It gives the Christian community a snapshot of the core values or principles by which the Master Jesus lives; teachings he demonstrates in his own life and expects his followers to imitate in theirs.  If Moses’ teaching begins with the ten commandments—the thou shalt nots.  Then Jesus teaching begins with the Beatitudes, the blest are theys.  Contrast these ways of talking about God.  The former reveals God as a supreme law giver and judge who presides over the people as a stern parent, with serious rules to be obeyed.  The latter reveals a God who blesses those people who are the least likely to feel blessed.  The ones who may seem to be cursed. God favors them.  When others might look at their situations and say, what did they do?  And don’t we sometimes judge ourselves negatively too?  That we don’t deserve to be blessed, that we deserve whatever crisis comes our way?  When life feels like divine punishment or has gone to hell, that is when God’s promise to bless is given.  Jesus teaches that the suffering ones will be rewarded; that the peacemakers will be God’s children; that those who grieve will be comforted; that the weak will have the world handed to them. 

Christian education begins with blessing.  It begins with God’s welcome and God’s promise to give us the fullness of life.  And it continues with the master Jesus teaching us how to live in that grace, how to become not only recipients of blessing but bearers of blessing for others.  There are so many masters out there competing for your allegiance.  Christians take Jesus as their master.  We are apprentices in his ways.   

I was blessed with the resources to obtain formal academic degrees, both my bachelors and my masters degree.  But Christian education is deeper; it is training the Spirit to will what God wills, to love what God loves, to care about the things God made, to tread a little lighter on the earth, and to bless others more than you curse. Christian education shapes one’s identity as a baptized child of God.  How do we live as bearers of God’s kingdom on earth as it is in heaven?  How do we show mercy, offer peace, and receive pure hearts?  How do we endure persecution as Christ’s people, doing justice and loving mercy by standing with the outcast and the sinners?  How do we stand for human dignity and demand that al people receive respect and a little compassion? Christian education is lifelong training in how to live the golden rule, how to love others, love God, love the world.  For the next few weeks, we are in for a Christian education, as we listen to the master. I know this kind of training is not a sprint, but a marathon.  It is lifelong development and formation as God’s people.  Join us as we grow in our knowledge of God’s blessings and in our resolve to follow Him.  And before you go today, tell someone how God blessed you this week. 

Amen.