January 29, 2017 "Ortho-praxy's Bienaventuranza"

Micah 6: 1-8 Matthew 5: 1-12 When people describe Christianity, our examples usually include Jesus’ Communion, the Cross and Resurrection His Teachings: Parables and his quoting of the Old Testament; Miracles of: sight to the blind, the lame dancing, those with leprosy being cured. None describe Jesus Preaching, he preached hard sayings. People as diverse as the Rock Musician Sting, President Jimmy Carter, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. identified The 10 Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, the 23rd Psalm, the Beatitudes as being the highest expressions of religious insight and moral inspiration. While many of us claim a love of The Beatitudes; it is rare that anyone ever claims a love for Jesus’ Preaching. He came out of obscurity after John the Baptist’s Arrest preaching “Repentance.” Jesus went to his own hometown, to the Synagogue on the Sabbath, and reading Isaiah’s prophecy, of the Redemption of Israel, Jesus defiantly declared “This Day Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” He preached “You must hate your father and mother, even your own life, take up the cross and follow me.” Out of a love of poetry, because these are among the first of Jesus’ words remembered and because we know the words to be sacred, we identify a love of the Beatitudes. But what BLESSING is it to be Poor? Who among us wants the Blessing of being bankrupt in Spirit? How can it possibly be a Blessing to Mourn? The cultural masses in the time Jesus was in Galilee and Jerusalem, like the cultural masses of our own time today, inherently believed in A PROSPERITY GOSPEL. Andrew Carnegie, Norman Vincent Peele, Oral Roberts, Joel Osteen, Paula White each preach that “As you were created in the image of God, God wants you to be rich. Poverty represents God’s curse for Sin, the Promised Land is a Reward for being Faithful.” They make it so simple, all you need do, is Confess your desire to be like God and you will be! Anyone can be President. Routinely, I have heard people critical of the Presbyterian Church for believing in Predestination, for having taken this political stand or being involved in that cause. Personally, I love Presbyterian Polity! We do not have a unique liturgy, we follow a Reformed one. Why I am intentionally a Presbyterian Christian is the accountability, that it is not simply what I believe or what I want, even and especially as Pastor, but as Pastors we are privileged to lead you in ministry, to serve with you. In many churches the Pastor is elevated as having unquestioned authority, that has not been our relationship! Pastors and Elders, the Congregation and the Presbytery, hold one another accountable. The Book of Job is a critique of PROSPERITY GOSPEL, as Job’s friends criticize that because God’s blessings have been taken away and replaced with suffering, mourning and poverty, Job must have sinned and needs to repent. If not he individually, then to atone for all humanity’s sins, or else as his Wife suggests “To curse God and Die.” To which, the ever faithful Job responds “If we look to receive joy and blessings in life, should we not also expect and anticipate hardships, suffering and death?” The gospel records that when John preached, all the world responded, he challenged Roman Soldiers and Pharisees, why they were coming to be Baptized when they knew they were sinners? When Jesus preached on the mountainside, his listeners were fishermen and rural townspeople, the poor and disenfranchised. Saying: BLESSED ARE THE POOR! BLESSED ARE THOSE WHO MOURN! Those are hard sayings! A risky way to begin a sermon. Not long ago, I was helping a family plan a Memorial and their caution was “Mom did not want Amazing Grace to be sung, because she did not want anyone calling her a wretch.” Years ago, I recall a Funeral in which the preacher described that the person who died is in a better place, and right now is where he always wanted to be. And his wife responded “NOT True, he had a scheduled Golf Date, and right now he wanted to be tee-ing off.” What do we do with Blessed are the Meek? Our reading from Micah names that going through the motions, of giving out of obligation, or consumerism attempting to purchase redemption, will not suffice. Your Offering is a gift of the very best of yourself, a Sacrifice to God either in Thanksgiving for what you have received or Atonement for your sins. If only a Debt, then how much is forgiveness of your sins worth? Is the cost for Adultery $5? A Bushel of wheat? Sacrifice of a Lamb? A Heifer Cow? Sacrifice of an Expensive Oil, or a Gallon, or a river, 10,000 rivers of oil? There has throughout human history, been a struggle for Orthodoxy, over when good and right ideas need reformation, or when reformation and change represents heresy and perversion of the truth? Micah becomes the voice of God saying “What does the Lord require of you? but to do Justice, love Kindness, and to walk Humbly with your God?” One of the subversive acts against the State, which Dietrich Bonhoeffer committed was in creating a Seminary for the education and training of Christian Ministers at Finkenwalde, Germany, dedicated to the premise that Faith without Works is dead. Orthodoxy for the sake of Orthodox Thought is pointless. Just as Works without Faith provides no commitment, nothing of yourself. Finkenwalde represented what Bonhoeffer referred to as “Ortho-praxy” that Orthodox Beliefs of Faith must rightly be put into practice in life. It is not enough to be baptized, to attend worship, to sit by and listen. When there is abuse, when there is wrong in our families in our community, in our world, we must take a stand for the Kingdom of God. There are times, as were occurring in Nazi Germany, when believers must act. Bonhoeffer and his students attempted to assassinate Adolph Hitler, but they were caught, imprisoned, put to death. 70 ago, this weekend, Russian forces invaded Auschwitz, stopping the mass extermination of people for being Jewish, for Not being Aryan, for challenging what they knew to be wrong. One of the unanswered on-going questions after the end of WWII was why. When towns and villages saw trains of boxcar loads of people going in one direction toward Auschwitz and none, no one ever returning, that the masses never spoke up to question why? According to New Testament scholars (Craig Keener) there are over 36 different ways of interpreting The Beatitudes, some as simplistic as “Happy are those who” which makes it seem, we are being told to put on a happy face and suffer bravely. Warren Carter claims that “Beatitudes” were to be words of Comfort and Challenge that God cares about our circumstance. The first four in Greek all begin with the letter P, so “Blessed are the Poor, the Plaintive, the Powerless and those who Pine away” because God will reverse these in the kingdom to come. The interpretation which makes the most sense to me comes from translation into Spanish, that the word “Beatitude” is translated as “Bienaventuranza” literally that it will be “Good Adventure to you”. Implicitly, we all know adventure requires risk, the courage to defy the odds, the refusal to play it safe and sit by believing without action. So listen to how the Beatitudes sound if we paraphrased “Blessed” as “bienaventuranza:” Good adventure to those whose hearts are genuinely one with the poor, you shall defy the odds by being under God’s protective rule. Good adventure to you who are without power, your risk is the world shall be yours. Good adventure to you who are hungry, who thirst for justice, your cup will be filled. Good adventure to you who search for truth with single heart, you shall see God. Good adventure to you who work for peace, you shall be called children of God. Prophets have always been an endangered species, but faith requires risk and adventure.