Lent 3B
March 8, 2015
Did you know that in the city of Woodinville, Washington, a suburban community north of Seattle - with wineries, breweries, and transit park & rides, it is not legal to ride your horse down main street, or to tie it up outside a business. I worked in Woodinville, and never ever did this seem like a remote possibility, that someone would ride her horse to and through the fast food drive through.
Laws in general, and that law in particular tell us two things. First, they tell us something of the values or principles of the law-giver. In the case of Woodinville, that law acknowledged that Woodinville was a horse-loving community, many people rode horses around the area for leisure and work, and that downtown was changing, with parking meters replacing the hitching posts. Second, with that value clear in the mind of the law-giver, laws are established that set the boundaries to define what is acceptable and what is not acceptable, given this set of values and principles. Within a given set of values, laws or rules help define what behaviors or actions would constitute fair play, and conversely what would be out of bounds.
Today in the Old Testament reading, we hear the Ten Commandments. These rules from God also tell us two things. They tell us something about the values and principles of the law giver. God had made a covenant with the people of Israel, entered into relationship with the people values to deliver save, guide, protect, and love them. Given the values or principles, the specific rules were set to identify behavior that’s fair play, and that which is out of bounds.
Like horses in downtown Woodinvlle, some of these commandments are seemingly simpler to follow – thou shalt not murder. But rather than thinking of that commandment as easier than the others, think about it in terms of what has been defined as in play or out of bounds. The circle defining what is in bounds, as it relates to murder, is really big. Big enough that I’m unlikely to ever come close to that boundary. My every day behavior will not put me in a place where I need to think about crossing that line. Not so with some of the other commandments.
We repeat the Decalogue every week in Lent, and heard them today in the Old Testament reading because during Lent, we are asked – or more appropriately, we get to take the opportunity to think about our lives, and to be mindful about our covenant with God – how we’re asked to live and the choices we make, when given that choice. If we live in a way that is in-bounds for all of these commandments, we are closest to living a simple life in relationship with God, consistent with the values undergirding those laws. And where our actions are out of bounds or inconsistent with a commandment? Those are the areas where we are further from living in relationship as God intended.
Compared to the murder commandment, I feel there are more commandments where that boundary of what’s fair play and out of bounds is much tighter in, and I feel closer to that line. I see those boundaries, and I make choices daily, either consistent with fair play, or not.
Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain.
Keep the Sabbath holy.
There are two, though that are chronically and consistently breached, that are so entrenched in our culture, we don’t even see them.
The first is that one about coveting. Our whole capitalistic society is based on coveting. It may not feel like coveting, but when we want to possess something we don’t own, that’s coveting. Coveting our neighbor’s car. Their yard. Their wealth. Their golf clubs. Their good luck.
There is a whole industry designed to capitalize on those things we covet, and there’s a whole science to it. If you buy this car, you’ll have a great night on the town. Use this shampoo and heads will turn. I’m not knocking marketing, but as the consumers who are marketed to, we need to be aware of the relationship between sales and coveting.
For example, I want new patio furniture. I want new furniture because the store I like has a new set. To be clear, I have plenty of seating. It’s doesn’t all match and it isn’t as pretty as the magazine or the pictures I’ve seen on Pinterest. Sure, I could justify my NEED for new furniture, but really, I just want it.
We covet all sorts of things, simply because what we have isn’t sufficient. Patio furniture, accessories for a bike or car, new jewelry. And not just things. W covet other people’s jobs. Their free time. Their wealth. This isn’t the same as valuing something lovely and buying it. It’s the accompanying sense of urgency that indicates trouble.
One of the big problems with coveting is that when we covet, we lose sight of the amazingness of what we actually have. We stop thinking about or even seeing the abundance freely given to us. Instead, we think about what we don’t have. Coveting can even make us resentful of what we have. I’m upset with my world, because his is so much better. I’m angry because she got a promotion and.. you get the idea.
The other related and disregarded commandment relates to idol-making. An idol is something we worship. And God simply says don’t have any other idols but God.
As I look around my life and my country, I see idols of wealth, power, prestige. In my community also see idols of radicalism, protest and autonomy. These idols are worshipped and adored. Great effort is required to adore an idol, to maintain a relationship with an idol. What happens it that people spend more time worshiping and adoring their new idol, than they spend with God.
In junior high, I wanted rainbow suspenders because “cool” had become my idol, and the girl who was cool, had some. I coveted her suspenders, because she was cool. But, in fact, that was a passing phase – hardly worthy of adoration. In fact, there is nothing about “cool” that has any permanence or substance. If there was, I’d still be sporting those suspenders. No, they were cool and I idolized them because of cultural norms at the time. But real goodness, things really worthy of reverence and adoration like God, doesn’t change, and doesn’t go out of style. God is as worthy of being adored now, as 1000 or 2000 or 3000 years ago. Everything other than God is temporary. Tastes, values, wealth, prestige, radicalism, suspenders. Even our idol of feminine beauty. During the renaissance, women who were seen as beautiful would now be considered a “plus” size and would never be on the cover of beauty magazines.
Why covet or idolize something fleeting like that?
We make idols out of things that are not God because we are not satisfied with what we have in God. What we have in God is not sufficient.
Likewise, coveting is what happens when we are not satisfied with what we have on earth. When what we have on earth is not sufficient.
Fast forward to the Gospel reading. Today we hear the somewhat disturbing story about Jesus overturning the tables in the temple. This account of this story in the Gospel of John differs from the parallel stories in Matthew, Mark and Luke. In those, the authors state that the market place outside the temple is full of robbers and thieves. Here, today’s author makes no such claim. So it’s not the inherent badness that torques Jesus off. Jesus is upset because they’ve made the Temple into a market place.
What’s so wrong with that? Why the angry, uncomfortable outburst from Jesus?
I think, in part, it’s tied up with coveting and idolization. The animal and money sacrifices may have started as a means to an end. The sacrifices, and the temple itself, may have originally been sacramental – an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. Signs, by their nature are symbols of something else, and are not inherently wrong.
For example, a speed limit sign is important not because it’s rectangle with numbers on it. It’s important because of what we know it symbolizes. But sometimes signs stop meaning what they originally meant. Their meaning changes over time, and since it’s only a symbol, it’s a tricky thing to connect the symbol back to what it once meant. Thinking of the speed limit sign, when was the last time you drove to Portland, and everyone had the same understanding about what the posted speed limit sign meant? When symbols lose their original meaning, something must be done to align meaning and symbol again, or the sign must be discarded. It’s no longer pointing to what it originally meant.
In the Gospel story, the money changers and the merchants were originally there to help worshippers with a sacramental sacrifice at a sacramental place. But at some point, everyone stopped understanding the sacramental outward sign in the same way. At some point, some people began thinking that what mattered wasn’t the inward and spiritual grace. It wasn’t about connecting with God.
The sacrifice, and the Temple itself wasn’t a means to an end. It had become the end. People had slowly but surely, started coveting the things. They coveted the beautiful doves. They replaced God with an Idol for God, an Idol that wasn’t God. They worshipped the sacrifice. They worshipped the Temple.
Coveting and idol making seem like no big deal, compared with murder. But it’s because of their seeming irrelevant nature that I believe coveting and idol-making are so dangerous. CS Lewis’ book, The Screwtape Letters, is a great book written from the perspective of the devil himself, who’s trying to train his nephew, giving him hints about how to thwart the enemy – God. In the book, he explains to his nephew the way to shepherd people to hell. He explains that “Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one--the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.”
This explains, in part, why Jesus’ response was so quick, certain and disruptive. The people in the temple were traveling down that gentle road without any understanding or signposts. Jesus needed to make sure they knew they had taken a wrong turn when they truly believed there was no problem. They were acting in a way that was taking them further and further out of bounds.
Part of our Lenten journey is to take stock of our relationship with God. These commandments help provide boundaries for what’s fair play and what’s out of bounds, or as CS Lewis more elegantly said, to provide signposts. Those places where we’ve seen the signpost and ignored them – those are places where our actions or our inactions get in the way of our relationship with God.
In addition to healthy self-reflection, we need to pray, and invite Jesus into our souls during Lent. Because when we cannot or will not see what we’re doing, when we’re willing to see the signpost and keep on going, if invited, Jesus will come and overturn the tables in our lives.
He will point out where we’ve made an idol of something, even those things that started as a sacrament. Where our coveting is creating ingratitude. Jesus will disrupt the calm and peace we have built for ourselves on our oblivious trip on the wrong road.
Why have you made my father’s house a marketplace?
Why are you idolizing wealth?
Why covet their car, the job, the wealth? Why covet anything?
Why are you not loving your neighbors?
Why?
The point of this reflection isn’t to just make us feel bad about things. No one needs that. But it is good to look at the commandments as sign posts of a good, full grateful and uncomplicated relationship with God. We need to find those places where we either blatantly disregard God’s desire for us, or where our well intentioned efforts are not enhancing our relationship with God but detracting from it. Where we care more about the Temple or the church building than with a relationship with God. We need to strip away the things that over time have gotten between us and God. That’s Lent.
Back to my patio. Instead of coveting other furniture, or making an idol of cool, I would be better served and certainly more content to see it and realize that It’s awesome, full of mixed up half-broken furniture. In fact, I should see that haphazard furniture as a beautiful blessing, and use it for holy things. I need to see it as a place where holy things can, and do happen. Many great evenings with family and friends. Quiet time with God. The furniture is absolutely sufficient, because in fact, the furniture doesn’t really matter. The things that really matter, the holy things, won’t be any improved with coveting better furniture. Invite Jesus to help you see where you need some disruption and rerouting, to get on the right road.
What we already have on earth is good and sufficient. What we have with God is more than enough.
We need nothing else.
Amen.
