Genesis 45: 3-11, 15; Luke 6: 27-38;  Geoff King

It’s been a month since New Zealand moved to the highest ‘red light’ level of the latest COVID-19 response plan, and by now I imagine we are all getting well and truly used to scanning in everywhere we go, having our vaccine passes at the ready and dutifully wearing our masks.

But whilst I’m becoming accustomed to being masked up for most of my working week, I’m finding that other people wearing their masks has made parts of my job as a counsellor considerably more challenging,  particularly when meeting people for the very first time.

I remember learning many years ago at a sales training seminar that in a typical face to face conversation, around 55% of the communication is non-verbal, 38 % is vocal and a mere 5 % has to do with the actual words we say to each other. I also remember learning that a significant proportion of the non-verbal communication is expressed through facial expressions – many of which simply become invisible when people are wearing masks.

So one of the practical measures we are taking to manage the spread of the pandemic is making it much harder for all of us to get a sense of what other people may be feeling just by looking at them.

Of course not being able to see them doesn’t mean that people have suddenly stopped having feelings. It also doesn’t mean that everyone lets their feelings show constantly either; In fact I imagine all of us can think of circumstances in which it might be really important  to try to prevent  our faces from revealing what’s going on inside.

Ultimately, however, human emotions tend over time to make their way to the surface. And when they’re expressed appropriately, they have the power to change human lives in all sorts of amazing ways. This morning’s first reading provides an example of how that can happen, as we’re  presented with an emotionally charged scene in which soon-to-be hero Joseph is reunited with the brothers who left him for dead in the desert as a child.No longer the arrogant, annoying upstart who had driven his siblings to distraction, Joseph is now a man of wealth, power and influence in the court of the Egyptian Pharaoh. Specifically, as the delegated ‘ruler of Egypt’ with control over the nation’s grain reserves, Joseph holds the lives of his famished brothers and their families in the palm of his hand.

Whilst we don’t get a description of their facial expressions or body language, the narrator does tell us that Joseph’s brothers are terrified to be in his presence partly because of an underhanded trick he’s played on them in the previous chapter. But in the verses we have before us, Joseph the upstart prankster finally decides to make good. Rather than seeking vengeance for their past betrayal, Joseph presents his brothers with a pleasant surprise when he tells them ‘God sent me before you to preserve life.’

Let’s pause for a moment to consider the emotional impact of that statement. Here is Joseph, who as a kid was so annoying that his brothers wanted to get rid of him and effectively left him for dead before selling him into slavery, now saying to those same brothers that he believes God had a plan for him all along, and that plan was for him to be instrumental in saving their lives and the lives of their families.

I imagine that for a good while at least, Joseph’s brothers were probably speechless, And whilst the narrator doesn’t tell us in so many words exactly what Joseph is feeling, we do get an insight into what’s going on beneath the surface towards the end of our reading, when he throws his arms around his younger brother Benjamin, weeping – and then embraces and weeps with his older siblings as well.

There is no denying the very real emotion at the heart of this morning’s story of a fateful family reunion, And there’s also no denying that Joseph has a choice to make in the midst of it all, just as we often have emotionally charged choices to make in the families in which live,whether they be nuclear families of children and partners and pets, or whether they be extended families of church members or colleagues or friends. Joseph’s choice is about whether to dwell on the grievances of the past, or to tackle the challenges of the present in order to build a better future for himself and his family. In simple terms, Joseph has to choose between reconciliation and revenge.

He has to decide whether to react to the wrong his brothers did him all those years ago or to act for the greater good and in so doing, to move in the direction of setting things right. I wonder if it’s significant that it’s in the midst of Joseph’s decision-making process that God appears. Not intrusively, mind you. There are no pillars of fire and smoke and no burning bushes in this story. Rather, God’s name is mentioned, almost in passing. God is present, causing healing to happen and bringing together people whose own humanity has driven them apart. At least, that’s how Joseph sees it. Moreover, with the benefit of Joseph’s hindsight, we know that God was present all along, even when the situation seemed hopeless and the future looked anything but promising, somehow God was there.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. But it implies having an overview of an entire situation, which unfortunately we can’t always count on in the real world. We have to live the dramas of our lives one act, one scene at a time, not knowing as we make them exactly what outcome may result from the decisions we make moment by moment.

So what part does God play in the daily dramas of our lives? How does God show up in our stories, and where, and why? These are challenging questions to engage with at the best of times, but I think they have a particular urgency for us now at a time of global uncertainty, when it can feel like we’re at risk of being swamped by waves of stress, anxiety and even fear. At times like these, it makes sense to me and I imagine also to you that people seek reassurance, that we long for things to ‘return to normal.’ And if things can’t go back to being the way they were, we generally hope that the new normal won’t be too dissimilar to the days of old. Unfortunately for us, there is almost universal agreement about the fact that the scale and rate of change going on in our world is increasing, and that change will continue to happen regardless of how it makes us feel.

It also makes sense that at times of change, people tend to seek refuge in belief systems and spiritual teachings that give them a sense of stability, And that brings us to our Gospel text for today. It’s taken from Luke’s version of probably the most famous body of spiritual teaching in the Christian religious tradition, commonly known as the Sermon on the Mount. As a theology student I remember wondering why the Sermon on the Mount became so famous. It’s long and quite disjointed as it appears in the 3 synoptic gospels, And it’s also short on the ‘feel good factor;’

There is far too much talk of loss and sacrifice and poverty and turning the other cheek for most people’s liking. Unless ‘most people’s liking’ was not and is not the main point of this sermon at all. It came as quite a revelation to me when I learned that the Greek word translated ‘blessed’ in most English language Bibles does not mean the same as ‘happy’. In other words, whilst the mood state of ‘happiness’ and the spiritual state of ‘blessedness’ do intersect and overlap at times, they are not the same thing at all. And perhaps that’s precisely what makes Jesus’ sermon on the mountainside so memorable:

He’s daring to suggest, even to proclaim that God blesses people when they choose to act in ways that put things like justice, forgiveness, self-sacrifice and openness ahead of their own comfort and happiness.

I don’t know about you, but I have always found Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount incredibly challenging. I can find it hard enough to love my friends sometimes, let alone my enemies, and even though I learned as a theology student that in Jesus’ culture turning the other cheek was actually a way for a persecuted person to demand equality, I don’t find it easy to do that either; but then I don’t think Jesus ever intended following his teaching to be easy.

Things that are truly worthwhile seldom are. I do think Jesus meant for his followers to be more concerned with living the right way than with having the ‘right’ feelings. And living the right way means applying Jesus’ teaching, Jesus’ values, to the big and little decisions that we make every day. As a counsellor I often meet people who tell me that they’d like me to help them feel ‘more happy’. And in response I sometimes tell them that whilst I certainly won’t go out of my way to make them feel unhappy,In my opinion, based both on my understanding of the teachings of Jesus (and some other spiritual leaders) as well as my counselling training, feeling happy is actually not the most important thing in life. Feelings come and go like clouds in the sky or waves in the ocean; they’re a vital part of our human experience, But a full and meaningful life is so much more than that. A full and meaningful life is one that is able to acknowledge and make space for our feelings,

Take a deep breath to remind ourselves of our connection with all that’s living, then choose to do something based on the values we hold dear, which for Christians means the teachings of Jesus Christ. Acknowledge – breathe – connect with our values – do something about it. That, in a nutshell, is the ABCD that I sometimes share with students when they come to me for counselling. I’m sharing it with you this morning because I think it’s a helpful way to approach and relate the readings we’ve heard today to our faith because our second reading is so well known that there can be a risk of us ‘zoning out’ when we hear it,

I’ve printed on your service sheets a less known, contemporary translation of this part of Jesus’ teaching, and I’d like to close this sermon by sharing with you another, based on the version of the Beatitudes found in Matthew chapter 5. It’s called ‘The Giving of God’, from ‘Come and See’, a book of reflections on the life and teachings of Jesus by NZ poet Joy Cowley.[1]

God prepares us for this blessing in ways we would rather avoid.
Whatever empties us, whatever hollows us,
Whatever strips us down to basic existence,
Whatever unwraps us, whatever sweeps away the idols of our own importance,
These things create a space for the truth of who we really are,
and we stand in the light of new awareness.
When we know who we truly are,
Made by God to be filled by God,
Then the pain of loss becomes a dream,
Meekness comes back to us as strength,
And poverty of spirit inherits riches far beyond meaning.
They call it paradox, my friends,
And we need to live it to understand.
It is our smallness that is made into the greatness of God.

[1] Come and See:  Reflections on the Life of Jesus among us, Joy Cowley and Terry Coles, Pleroma Books, 2008.

 Points to ponder…  Today’s Gospel text offers us part of Luke’s version of Jesus’ best-known ‘sermon’ or collection of teachings, commonly known as the ‘beatitudes’ from the Latin ‘beatitudo’, meaning blessed.  Unlike Matthew,  Luke includes a number of ‘woes’ in his list of blessings, and describes the Kingdom or Realm of God in a way that portrays discipleship as a way of living that is much more lasting than any human achievement, and also much deeper than any human thoughts or feelings. Despite their familiarity, the extreme language used in the beatitudes can make them very challenging to hear.

• • How do you find yourself reacting and responding as you hear/read these verses this morning?

Luke’s version of the Beatitudes seems to place a good deal of emphasis on issues of wealth and poverty.

• Is Jesus commenting on our material wealth or poverty or is it right to hear this in another more ‘spiritual’ way?
• Is there any necessary relationship in your mind between being ‘blessed’ and feeling happy?
• Can you recall times in your life when you were aware of being blessed even though you felt emotionally unhappy or distressed?

 

Happy? Blessed? Condemned?

 

The Greek word makarios is generally translated blessed or happy, carrying the sense of one who has received God’s favour.

The word ouai, generally translated as woe is an interjection, sort of like a strong “oh dear” or “alas.”

It is important to see these as descriptive rather than prescriptive.

Jesus does not appear to be saying “if you do this, this will happen” but rather stating a present reality.

“Here there is no contingency, no urging, no exhortation to act so as to receive a blessing or to avoid a woe.”

As in the Hebrew Scriptures, the statement of a blessing makes it a reality, if it isn’t already;

one does not earn a blessing, it is simply given.

 

[Fred B. Craddock, Luke: Interpretation, Louisville, Kentucky: John Knox Press, p. 87.]

 

A contemporary re-working of the Beatitudes, from The Message by Eugene Peterson…

You’re blessed when you’ve lost it all.  God’s kingdom is there for the finding.
You’re blessed when you’re ravenously hungry.  Then you’re ready for the Messianic meal.
You’re blessed when the tears flow freely.  Joy comes with the morning….

But it’s trouble ahead if you think you have it made.    What you have is all you’ll ever get.

And it’s trouble ahead if you’re satisfied with yourself.  Your self will not satisfy you for long.
And it’s trouble ahead if you think life’s all fun and games.  There’s suffering to be met, and you’re going to meet it.

“There’s trouble ahead when you live only for the approval of others, saying what flatters them, doing what indulges them.

Popularity contests are not truth contests—look how many scoundrel preachers were approved by your ancestors!

Your task is to be true, not popular.  “To you who are ready for the truth, I say this: Love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst.

When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer for that person.

If someone slaps you in the face, stand there and take it.

If someone grabs your shirt, giftwrap your best coat and make a present of it.

If someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life. No more tit-for-tat stuff. Live generously.

“Here is a simple rule of thumb for behavior:

Ask yourself what you want people to do for you;  then grab the initiative and do it for them!