Conflict and Church - awkward much?

Matthew 18:15-20

15“If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one. 16But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. 17If the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. 18Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. 19Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. 20For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”

 With my parishes history with conflict avoidance and the inevitable results, this was never going to be an easy text to preach on. I was pretty happy with the results... unfortunately, I then did my back on the Saturday and never got to preach!

Never mind, I learned from it anyway.

Did anyone else find themselves shifting awkwardly in their seats during the gospel reading today? Or were there feelings of smug self-satisfaction that any conflict in your life is handled with the upmost care and discretion? Another question for you - How do we, as a nation, as a church, as a parish community and as individuals, handle conflict?

I suspect if we are to be honest, the answer to all of these is – not very well.

We do not handle conflict well.

Let me be very clear– conflict in and of itself is a normal and healthy part of a Christian life. It is through conflict that we are able to grow and mature in our faith and practice. But just as the Christian Church attracts broken people (for Jesus has come for us as we are, calling the grieving  and the suffering and the sinners), so it suffers from the sin of that brokenness which often expresses itself in ugly and shameful ways within conflict situations.

We are rather expert at spotting those rabble rousers around us, identifying their destructive habits, and condemning the ways they seek to destabilize our communities. Noticing when we are engaged in these very same behaviors is another story. After all, some of those troublesome people are us

The context of this passage of scripture is particularly interesting. If we look at the verses that immediately precede it, we see the parable of the lost sheep. The shepherd in this story did not give up after a cursory hour or so of looking – he persisted through the night until the sheep was found. We are told in the passages afterwards that we need to forgive not 7 times, but 70 times 7. So we are looking at conflict resolution seen through a lens of seeking out and forgiveness.

There is some debate as to whether these words are in fact the authentic voice of Jesus. In some ways this doesn’t matter – the wisdom is of God even if the words are not straight from Jesus mouth. I think it is important to note this though because the words given by Mathew to Jesus about casting out a member of the community seem not to reflect the character of Jesus as we know him.  Various interpretations try to use the placement of this text as a warning to only apply what is basically excommunication in extreme circumstances; others look to how Jesus treats tax collectors and gentiles throughout the scriptures and sees it as an instruction to embrace any stray members into the fold. Another view is sees these tensions as due to the incorporation of conflicting traditions in the history of the community’s development, or to applying them to different cases. It is clear, however, that if Matthew’s church does not already have a procedure for disciplining dangerously errant members, one is here provided, spoken in the name of Jesus. It supposes a community where the concern is more for the group as a whole than for any individual members – a concept totally foreign to the modern western world. It encourages, indeed mandates, pastoral intervention that goes further than just forgiveness and advice. It sees a way of life where Church is more than a once a week event, but a constant and aware community that exists beyond individual differences.

Conflict seen through this lens becomes a normal and accepted part of living in community. It is not a cause for hidden aggression behind closed doors, where power imbalances and personality types can overwhelm. Nor does it allow the whispered rumours and malicious gossip that can easily pervade a community, even if only encouraged by a few. Conflict becomes an opportunity to grow in love for one another, to embrace and be opened to a differing point of view, even if there is no clean and complete resolution. We are not called to conformity, but to community. There is room for many interpretations and debates, as long as they are start with love and finish with reconciliation.

When we are gathered here today, we take the opportunity before sharing in communion to give each other the peace. Have you ever thought about what that means? I learned from a slightly unexpected source. When I was in formation I spent 6 months intensive training in a small group with a certain gentleman who was, in many ways, polar opposite to me. It was a hard time for all of us I think, possibly especially for him, as an alpha males type in a group including myself, a catholic religious, a Baptist healer and a few other strong women. On one occasion our training involved attending an ecumenical ANZAC day remembrance ceremony within the hospital we were placed, and he chose not to attend. Being the forthright group we were, there was no hesitation in questioning (and challenging) his reasons and motivation. When we gathered again soon afterwards for a Eucharist, I asked him how he could move on so quickly from the oh so close to brawl we had just had. He looked very surprised and said, “Josie, when we come together for communion we are brothers and sisters in Christ. It doesn’t matter what I think of you at that moment – we are joined as one in the body of Christ”.

His words have stuck with me since. We are offering to each other the peace of God. This is not a social event. This is not a token shaking of hands. We are putting aside our differences and reconciling with one another before we partake in the body and blood of Christ. If we are not truly able to share God’s peace, how can we be fit to share God’s body? Could this be a time when we should be actively seeking out those with whom we have struggled and offering them our hand with love?

True peace is not a burying of difference, hiding it away until we can take it out to peruse at our leisure. It is not some kind of false martyrdom, pushing aside our needs in order to keep the road smooth and the boat quiet. True peace is knowing that no matter our differences, we have been made one with Christ. True peace is knowing that I will not let conflict hide in my heart and escape through belittling, passive aggressive comments or explode with verbal or emotional violence.

If God is to be found in relationship, then evil is to be found in those relationships when broken and not repaired. If evil is found in maliciousness and hatred, God is found in forgiveness and restoration. We have an obligation to make reconciliation of relationship a priority in our personal AND public lives. As a Church, we are required to embody this vision of community for the benefit of the wider world.

Parenting FAIL

We all have our moments, or so I have heard. I had one the other day, and it wasn't pretty.

My beautiful girl, my Abigail, who I love possibly more than any other human on the planet (talk to me about Will when he is older and easier to love! Only joking bubba, I love you too) is almost too easy to parent. She is amendable to suggestion, kind, considerate, does a minimum of whining and is generally easy to please. Sometimes I worry about HOW easy to please, or rather EAGER to please, but her school teachers assure me she is very capable of standing up for herself.

My Abigail is a lot like me. So much so that sometimes I forget that in fact she is NOT me. This became very apparent when I started teaching her violin last year.

At first we were fine. We both had fun, I was impressed how fast she learned, she was keen and ready to go. After she learned the basics though it started to get a little more... fraught. Lately we have had conflict over practicing violin, something she has never had trouble with before. And I pushed back, becoming more demanding, correcting every mistake and insisting she repeat the incorrect bars over and over again. I became short - she became whiny. In the end I lost it, yelled at her (which I very rarely do) and sent her crying to her room.

I asked that oh so rhetorical parental question, "Do you even WANT to learn violin?" to which she answered "... what do YOU want?".

And I missed it.

"I want you to learn!" I sputtered. "But if you're not going to take it seriously I don't know why I bother!".

I am ashamed.

Perhaps it is because I have seen friends go through this with their children that I was able to pull myself together within a few minutes. I apologised, and explained to my love that although I would love for her to play and enjoy violin like I do, that I was not making it fun for her and that that wasn't fair on either of us. This was brought into stark relief by the fact that the mother of the student I had taught just that afternoon had expressed to me how much her daughter enjoyed her lessons because I never got cross and always made it a positive experience for her daughter. Whoops.

We decided that we would switch to piano for a while, and then maybe next year we would look at finding a different violin teacher for her because Mummy expects her to be perfect. Abby thought this was hilarious - "But nobody's perfect Mummy!". Yes darling, that's the point.

She had a piano lesson this afternoon. It was great. She asked to do violin tomorrow.

We'll see.

Joseph part two

The trouble with belonging to the revgalblogpals group (which is just what it sounds like - a group for ordained women from all traditions over the world) is that I read their thoughtful, learned, beautifully crafted sermons and I feel hopelessly inadequate! As I said to my Spiritual Director a few weeks ago, I want to be a Priest of 15 years experience... right now.

God, grant me patience :)

Sermon 17-8-14

Joseph 2

Everyone likes a happy ending, right? And it seems as if that is what we are given today. Joseph’s brothers have repented, Joseph is restored to his father, Egypt is saved from the famine and all is well with the world.

The trouble is, when we skip to the happy ending we miss all of the messiness in the middle. And it is in this messiness that the true nature of humanity and God becomes clear.

We saw in last week’s reading that Genesis 37 presents no virtues for Joseph that should win our admiration or our sympathy for his character. He is a tattle-tale and a braggart, and he is clearly the favourite of his father Jacob. We may not describe him as a bad guy, but he doesn’t quite come across as a good guy, either. We initially root for him because he is the one the camera lens -- i.e., the narrative’s point of view -- follows. The camera follows him because of who he is: the favourite son of Jacob, i.e., Israel, and Israel has been chosen by God. In the Joseph story, everybody plays favorites, even (dare I say it) God.

As we read through the Joseph cycle, Joseph’s character becomes more complex. We discover in Genesis 39 that Joseph is handsome and successful, rising to the position of overseer over his fellow slaves. We hear Joseph’s piety shine through when he refuses Potiphar’s wife’s advances and, as a consequence, is imprisoned on false charges of sexual assault.

In chapters 40 and 41 we learn that Joseph is skilled in dream interpretation, and, upon interpreting Pharaoh’s dream, he advises Pharaoh to store up 20% of the harvest in seven years of abundance to feed the land in seven years of famine. He becomes Pharaoh’s second-in-command: “Thus Joseph gained authority over the land of Egypt” (Genesis 41:45).

In chapter 42, Joseph’s family life and his work life collide. Facing starvation in Canaan, Jacob sends his sons to Egypt to buy some of the grain hoarded there. It should not surprise us that Joseph can recognize his brothers even though they do not recognize him; his ability to interpret dreams has already demonstrated his perspicacity.

Here is his big chance. We know now that Joseph seems to have a ‘hotline’ to God, and he is, after all, the hero of this tale. As his brothers come to him in  the deepest of need, begging him for food to save his own family, surely he will seize the chance for forgiveness and show God’s love and mercy to his wayward family?

Well, no. 

Instead of reconciliation, Joseph meets his brothers with manipulation. He pretends not to know them, accuses them of spying, throws them all in jail for three days, and demands that after they take their grain home, they return to Egypt with Benjamin, their youngest brother. He even has Simeon bound and held in Egypt to guarantee their return. He sneaks the money they paid for the grain back into their sacks, surely a gesture of generosity but understood by the brothers, terrified of the powerful governor and racked with guilt, as a sure indication that stealing will be added to their spying charges.

Citing the loss of both Joseph and Simeon, Jacob refuses to allow Benjamin to return with the brothers to Egypt (playing favourites again!) until the family is out of food again and left with no other choice. The emotional roller coaster continues for the brothers in chapters 43 and 44, when Joseph feasts with his family, including the newly favorite son Benjamin.

Rather than reveal his identity now, Joseph has his own silver cup slipped into Benjamin’s sack, setting him up for a charge of stealing. Judah, who, at Genesis 37:26 lobbied for selling Joseph rather than killing him, steps in to plead for Benjamin’s release for the sake of their father Jacob, whose “life is bound up in the boy’s life” . It is at this point, with Jacob’s life on the line, that Joseph makes himself known to his brothers.

It seems clear that Joseph had always intended to assist his family in their time of need, so why the manipulation? It is clear in the text that Joseph knows exactly what he is doing at all times, turning away to hide his tears, so why did he continue to punish his brothers and his father in such a way? What does this story have to tell us of the nature of God?

Or is this the wrong question? Should we instead be asking what this tells us of the nature of those through whom God works?

Joseph was far from a perfect person. He was no saint. He was in many ways the complete opposite of the powerless, humble and hungry people Jesus says will inherit the kingdom of God. And yet, within his brokenness, and through the tatters of his family (unrepentant favouritist Israel included), God works so save God’s people.  The situation is still not perfect – despite his status Joseph is still a slave and seems to have no heart for others who are not so lucky as him – but somehow, God is able to start to make things right.

Joseph assures his brothers that his imprisonment and enslavement where not through their actions, but through the power of God. I disagree. As I said last week, there is no room in God’s kingdom for ‘the end justifies the means’ or cruelty disguised as necessity. Our thoughts, words and actions are our own – that is part of the great gift of freedom God has given us. And we can use this freedom to hurt or to heal – often both. The good news is that God fills our cracks and uses our brokenness – even when we can’t see it at the time.

The concept of ‘brokenness’ is not one we would normal associate with Jesus. Neither is that of change - the mere thought of a God who is capable of change can seem to some unspeakably unsettling. But today, in the Canaanite woman’s intense experience with Jesus, we see evidence of both of these states.

Jesus doesn’t want to hear this woman, shouting in the streets the way only prostitutes of the time were allowed to do… but he stops. He doesn’t want to listen, but he does. Perhaps this is evidence of the divine – that when confronted with evidence of his own short sightedness, he does not dismiss but embraces and celebrates the person who brings them to him. Jesus was human. Jesus had the potential to close the boundaries of God’s love – but chose instead to engage with one counted lower than the dogs – a foreigner, a woman – and in this engagement experienced a new way of seeing himself and his ministry. It is interesting to note that Joseph’s brothers came from the land of Canaan as well – is there significance in this as a place of isolation from God and God’s mission? The land of Canaan in the time of Jacob and Joseph was reliant of Joseph’s stewardship so as not to starve, now the Canaanite woman is reliant on Jesus for the life of her daughter. God’s kingdom is widened, in and through the work of God’s servants.

Perhaps as we journey through the weeks to come, as we hear and learn more of the persecution and fear so many of God’s children are living and dying with, we can remember how far and wide the boundaries of God’s kingdom really go. Joseph was so very human, unable to forgive his family without retaliation. Jesus, too, human yet divine, able to hear a woman’s cry for her daughter and to embrace new knowledge of his mission beyond the Jewish people.

May we too be able to stop, hear and love.

I know, I know, it's been a while. <blush>

But I need somewhere to record my sermons, so I'll just have to get back into it!

This week I spoke about the Joseph cycle in Genesis and the wonderful story of the Cannanite woman in Matthew. This followed on from the beginning of the Joseph story last week, so I may as well post both. Observe.

Sermon 10-8-14

Joseph part one

No one I know comes from a perfect family. And while no family I know is exactly like Joseph’s, which is probably just as well seeing as we tend to frown on polygamy these days, every family is weakened by the things that weakened Joseph’s: generational dysfunction, parents working out their unresolved issues in the lives of their children, and by love unevenly—even unfairly—apportioned.

In Genesis 37 we are introduced to Joseph as the favourite son of his father Jacob (or Israel). This is in no minor issue because Joseph is the son of Rachel, his father’s favourite wife. Thus the story opens with a theme that is already familiar to us – family division and dissention. It is not long before tension arises between Joseph and his brothers. He gives an ill report of them to their father. His father in turn is said to love him more than the others and favours him with a special coat (one with long sleeves, not multi-coloured as tradition has it). This leads to hatred between the siblings. There are of course similarities with earlier stories in Genesis, especially the divisions between Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau (Genesis 25 and 27), all of which are traced back to parental favouritism. The brothers are further enraged when Joseph has dreams in which the whole family bows down to him. So the stage is set for the dramatic events to follow.

When Joseph speaks about his dreams to his family, they are threatened by his words. Certainly Joseph was not exactly thoughtful in his presentation – to me it sounds as if he is deliberately rubbing his brother’s faces in his ultimate power. Perhaps this is how he has been taught to relate through his father. Perhaps their reaction, of anger and fear, is only to be expected under the circumstances of their family and upbringing.

Regardless of why it happens, when these sons of Israel are given the opportunity to rid the world of these dreams, they seize the opportunity, saying “, ‘Here comes this dreamer. Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits; then we shall say that a wild animal has devoured him, and we shall see what will become of his dreams.’”

Let us see what will become of his dreams.

I think we all have dreams. We all have an idea, a plan, a vision of what our lives are going to be like. It is a sad state when our dreams disappear. Sometimes they do. Because we know there is evil, and there is disaster, and things happen that shouldn’t. This has been true since the fall. And at those times it is so hard to find God at work, so hard to find our dreams in the ruins of our lives and our hopes.

This evil seems far too easy to find. We are living in a country which is turning away people who have come to us in need – men, women and children whose only crime is to have a dream of a better life. We hear every day of the hundreds of innocent lives taken every day on the gaza strip – of bombs blowing away places of safety, of families ripped apart forever. As a society, where do we see God? How can we possibly reconcile the pain and destruction of the world with a loving, creative father, with a God who is tormented by our anguish and hurt by our cries?

This is where the easy answers fail. This is where we find out in whom our faith really lies. Because if we give in too easily to our desire for a neat and ordered world, then we see God as either cruel or indifferent. Cruel enough to punish God’s people with bombs and fire and destruction, or indifferent enough to stand aside and watch as we destroy ourselves.

There is another way. It is not as safe as a God who has predestined everything, a puppet master pulling our strings. It doesn’t allow us to rest assured in the knowledge that if there IS a God, he doesn’t care enough about his creation to intercede.

We worship a God who works good in and through the evil of the world.

We may ask why God allowed Joseph’s brothers to plan to have him killed? Why did he allow a family situation that was so clearly dysfunctional?  Why does God does not stop the bombs in their tracks – stop the cancer from taking the one we love – stop brother’s and sister’s from turning against each other with violence and hate. That is not the way God directs events. He does not prevent people from going astray or making their mistakes. This is true, whether we are speaking of misreading a road map, or trying to murder your brother. God does not interfere with your decisions. He will not make you smarter or more virtuous than you are. That is entirely your own business, and you have to take the responsibility for your actions.

But here is the gospel, the good news found in the Joseph cycle: the dream of God prevails over the plans of human beings. Maybe not always in the forms God intended at first, and there may be long and trying times before it comes about, and it may come about in ways that we never expect, but the dream of God, God’s desire for the world and God’s people is still being achieved.  God is still at work in the lives of God’s people in order that the world might be restored.  We might unexpectedly find ourselves in Egypt along the way, but that’s all right.  God can work with that.

This is in no way to allow us to be relieved of responsibility for our own behaviour and decision. It is not enough to act in selfish and inhumane ways with the excuse of “the end justifies the means’, no matter what our political leaders may say. There is no room in God’s world for cruelty disguised as necessity. 

When we are in the pit, when we have been betrayed and left for dead by those who should love us the most, we can rest assured that throughout it all, God’s dream for us can not and will not be contained. 

We can continue to dream.