SEATTLE MENNONITE CHURCH

October 30, 2005

Sermon: Weldon D. Nisly

TITLE: Concerning giving, praying, fasting…seen by God

THEME: Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount

TEXTS: Isaiah 38:1-5 Hezekiah’s prayer….God’s answer

Matthew 6:1-18 Concerning almsgiving, prayer, and fasting

The Sermon on the Mount in History

“The Sermon on the Mount reveals Rabbi Jesus at his most eloquent and most unnerving. The words are plain enough. But that has not prevented hundreds of contradictory interpreters from tumbling over each other as the centuries have gone by….It is almost impossible to imagine what Western, or even world, history would have been like without it.” So says Harvard theologian Harvey Cox in a recent book, When Jesus Came to Harvard: Making Moral Choices Today.

We can be very thankful that centuries ago, an early church chronicler named Matthew

wrote this Gospel, especially that Matthew recorded the Sermon on the Mount. For all the quarrels over Jesus’ longest teaching, the world would be much poorer without Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount.

To think, on the one hand, how history would be different without the Sermon on the Mount AND, on the other hand, to know that Christians have tried so hard to explain why Jesus didn’t mean what he said in it may be one of the strangest or saddest quirks of Christian history.

For the past two decades Harvey Cox taught a course on “Jesus and the moral Life” at Harvard. He was asked by the faculty to teach a course on Jesus because they realized that Harvard could no longer ignore a moral crisis in which many well-educated people, including Harvard alumni, were doing so many bad things in the world. Harvard, like so many universities, was providing great education in the humanities and sciences for students. But this good education lacked moral grounding. So Harvey Cox introduced Jesus to Harvard students in what became an immensely very popular class. (Cox, 2-3).

We turn to Jesus as the way of life and to the Sermon on the Mount as the source of life.

We ask again this fall and today, “What did Jesus do….and say?”

Jesus speaks concerning giving, praying, fasting

With plain speech and unnerving words, Jesus reveals a new moral order in the Sermon on the Mount. It is a new moral order that is grounded in the law and transforms the law. It is a moral order of a righteousness greater than those who explain why Jesus didn’t mean it.

SMC sermon – WDNisly – 10/30/05 – p. 2

A new moral order is as necessary today as it was in Jesus’ day. That is familiar music to Mennonite ears. It is also as hard for us to hear and live it as it is for others.

Here in the heart of the Sermon that we hear today, Jesus takes a contemplative turn. At least that is how we are going to hear it today.

Richard Rohr, in little book the Sermon on the Mount called Jesus’ Plan for a New World, says, “We sometimes forget that Jesus was a mystic” (159).

The Bible is first a mystical Word before it is a moral Word. Moral questions calling for moral behavior abound in the Bible and in our lives. But unless we first approach the mystery of God and let God be God, our moral reading of the Bible very quickly becomes moralism.

That mystical grounding calling for a contemplative approach is a good way to hear the three concerns Jesus teaches in this part of the Sermon. They are concerning giving and praying and fasting. Jesus had just taught a series of concerns that contrasted, “You have heard that it was said…But I say to you…” In these three concerns, Jesus doesn’t follow that formula but contrasts false piety with true piety. In simple words, Jesus calls false piety hypocrisy.

First, Concerning Giving…..

Read Matthew 6:1….

Which side of Jesus’ giving equation does your giving fall? Is my giving to be seen by others or do I recognize that it is God who truly sees me in my giving?

In a minute of silence reflect on your giving. What do your hear Jesus saying to you?

What does God see in you?

Silence…….

Jesus is not giving a command to give alms. He assumes that we take religious practice, in this case almsgiving, seriously and says, “Whenever you give alms….” Giving alms is traditional Jewish practice now continuing in Matthew’s Christian community. Jesus assumes the same of us.

The behavior that Jesus lifts up is not the contrast between personal and public worship. Both are confirmed. It is rather the contrast of why we give and who sees us. If our giving is to be seen by others we are hypocrites. Hypocrites in ancient Greek meant performing acts with an eye for who is watching you. There is one who always sees you and that one matters: God. Jesus says, give with your heart set on God.

SMC sermon – WDNisly – 10/30/05 – p. 3

Second, Concerning Praying…..

The Lord’s Prayer is a central prayer Jesus gave us. Our lives are gathered up in the Lord’s Prayer. Jesus is not here commanding us to pray or scolding us for not praying. Jesus does not say, “Be sure to pray.” Or “Why aren’t you praying?” Jesus assumes that we are praying. You could not be a good Jew and not pray. You could not be an early Christian and not pray. If you have faith, you pray.

But what do we pray? Where do we pray? How do we pray?

In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus gives us a pray that prepares us for all of life and faith. There is so much that could be said about the Lord’s Prayer. Many commentaries have been written on it across the ages. From a contemplative angle our words may get in the way of the prayer.

I want to guide us in the Lord’s Prayer one phrase at a time with a time for silent reflection after each phrase. I will make one slight but significant change in opening the Lord’s Prayer by addressing God as Father and Mother.

Find a relaxed comfortable posture. You may want to close your eyes and let this be a very personal encounter with God through Jesus’ prayer. Breathe in deeply….let the breath of God fill your body. Breath out in a full relaxed way. Hear the seven petitions of the Lord’s prayer, one at a time.

Jesus said, “Pray than in this way…”

1) Our Father and Mother in heaven, holy is your name.

Please be in silence with a deep consciousness that you named God as holy.

2) Your kingdom come.

In silence reflect on God’s reign that is already in Jesus and not yet fulfilled.

3) Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

In silence reflect on your desire for God’s will to be done on earth rather than our own.

4) Give us this day our daily bread.

In silence reflect on the bread you receive today from God?

5) Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

In silence reflect on who you have forgiven recently or who you are to forgive?

SMC sermon – WDNisly – 10/30/05 – p. 4

6) Do not bring us to the time of trial.

I want to add a word to this phrase. The Hebrew letter says that Jesus “in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sinning” (Hebrews 4:15). To be human is to face temptation. Another rendering of this phrase is “God, grant me strength to resist temptation.” (Douglas R. A. Hare, Matthew, Interpretation, 70)

In silence reflect on what temptations you face that you are asking God to give you strength to resist?

7) But rescue us from the evil one.

In silence reflect on what impulse or power of evil seeks to cut you off from God that you ask God to rescue you from?

Lord, hear our prayer. Amen

These seven simple and familiar statements of prayer seek to align us with God’s purpose as God’s people (Rohr, 160).

Third, Concerning Fasting…..

Read 6:16-18….

Fasting is a powerful spiritual discipline. Tragically is essentially a lost discipline in the church. In the church of my childhood, I remember fasting primarily on the day of communion. I have fasted rarely as a spiritual discipline in my own life. When was the last time you fasted? Dieting is a frequent discipline or desire for many but not fasting. It is a great spiritual loss.

Again Jesus doesn’t tell them they should be fasting. He assumes that they as people of faith are fasting. Their fasting is to be a quiet personal disciple and not a way to show others how pious we are.

God Sees You!

What Jesus is saying in this three-fold teaching about giving, praying and fasting, is that even our best acts of piety can lead us into temptation. We are tempted to give, pray, or fast to be seen by others when it is God who always sees us. It is God that matters.

In all three of Jesus’ teachings here -- concerning giving, praying, and fasting -- silence and solitude before God can transform how we live them out. That transformation is to help us let go of the need to have others see us. It is to bring us to the place where we truly know that God sees us and that is what matters.

SMC sermon – WDNisly – 10/30/05 – p. 5

To take them in the reverse order, we could say that ‘fasting frees us from ourselves, prayer frees us for God, and giving frees us for others’ (Rohr, 160).

God is watching you! God is watching us! Do not be anxious for others to see you.

God sees you – in your giving, praying, fasting – and in all things.