It's all or nothing, God or mammon—Third Sunday of Matthew
Brethren, before faith came, we were confined under the Law, kept
under restraint until faith should be revealed. So that the Law was our custodian until
Christ came, that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no
longer under a custodian; for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God,
through faith. For as many of you as
were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.
There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there
is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are
Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise. I mean that the heir, as long as he is a
child, is no better than a slave, though he is the owner of all the estate;
but he is under guardians and trustees until the date set by the father. So with us; when we were children, we were
slaves to the elemental spirits of the universe. But when the time had fully come, God sent
forth His Son, to redeem those who were under the Law, so that we might
receive adoption as sons.
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The Lord said, “The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is sound, your whole body
will be full of light; but if your eye is evil, your whole body will be full
of darkness. If then the light in you
is darkness, how great is the darkness!
No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love
the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. Therefore, I tell you, do not be anxious
about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink; nor about your
body, what you shall put on. Is not
the soul more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of heaven: they neither
sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds
them. Are you not of more value than
they? And which of you by being
anxious can add one cubit to his stature?
And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they
grow; they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon himself in all
his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and
tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O men of
little faith? Therefore, do not be
anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What
shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek
all these things; and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness,
and all these things shall be yours as well.”
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Galatians 3:23-4:5
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Matthew 6:22-33
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In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Spirit, One God, Amen.
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, why are you here in
Church this morning? Were you forced to
come? Do you feel obliged to be
here? Why are you here in Church?
“We hold these truths to be self-evident,” says the famous
words of the eighteenth-century American Declaration
of Independence, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by
their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life,
Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”[1] These are interesting words because in our
world, in both the eighteenth-century and today, they are not “self-evident”—some
are rich and some are poor, some are highly educated and some not, some are
born into loving and nurturing families but not all are. We only have to look around us to see that we
are not all equal, we are not all treated the same. The wealth or poverty of our parents is a
strong indicator, and it seems to be becoming stronger, of our own wealth or
poverty.
Yet we know, we feel it in our bones, this should not be so,
that this is not an eternal reality. And
it is in and through the Church where we can challenge our society to improve,
to reach towards the ideals to which the authors of the Declaration of Independence referred yet have not achieved. The Apostle Paul, in writing to the Galatians
in the reading we heard a few moments ago, makes clear what the instincts of
all human hearts understand: whatever our wealth, whatever our family, whatever
our social status, whatever our sex, whatever any category which the world tries
to use to divide and separate us, we are—each one of us—equal before God. This is not because of our baptism, “only baptised Christians have achieved
this equality but no one else,” but our baptism reveals it and proclaims
it. The Apostle explains this in much
more beautiful language than I can, he says:
For as many of you as were baptized into Christ
have put on Christ. There is neither Jew
nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female;
for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And
if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to
promise.
This is the Good News of the Gospel—whoever you may be you
are equal with all others before God: rich or poor, bishop or laity, man or
woman, each has the potential to be truly a child of God, through belief in his
name.[2]
Let us then, dear brothers and sisters, live this. Our world desires to divide by categories
whereas we should unite. We do not
ignore our differences, they are not meaningless, but we can invite all to
belief in God and to become equal heirs of him.
My brothers and sisters in Christ, the Sermon on the Mount—chapters
five, six and seven of St Matthew’s Gospel—serves as one of the best summaries
we have of the entire Gospel. I strongly
encourage you, read them and reread them: it will not take you very long to
read these chapters. In them we hear
what it is to be a Christian, a follower of the Way as we are called in the
Book of Acts.[3] Read the Sermon on the Mount and you will
read complete and utter madness—at least, madness as the world would
understand. Our world praises the rich,
tries to emulate the successful, panders to the powerful, admires the strong:
our world is as corrupt and as far from the ideals we try to teach our
children, from all men being created equal, as can be. The words of the Lord are madness to the
world.
“The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is sound,” says the Lord in
today’s reading taken from the Sermon on the Mount, “your whole body will be
full of light; but if your eye is evil, your whole body will be full of
darkness. If then the light in you is
darkness, how great is the darkness!”
And these words are words to us—in a world full of ideas and images,
what do we place before ourselves to look upon, do we look upon light or
darkness, good or evil: for the choice is stark according to the Lord, it is
one way or the other. Ours is, in this
sense, a totalitarian Faith, it is all
or nothing. “No one can serve two masters; for either he
will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and
despise the other. You cannot serve God
and mammon.” The Lord speaks, through
his beloved disciple John, to those who try to live both in this world and in
the world to come, saying,
I know your works, that you are neither cold nor
hot. I could wish you were cold or hot.
So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will
vomit you out of My mouth.[4]
It is cold or hot, all
or nothing: “You cannot serve God and
mammon.”
I started today’s homily by asking, “why are you here in
Church this morning?” It may be that you
have had little choice in coming, that you were compelled by parents, by
husband or wife, by brother or sister, by children, by heritage, by upbringing,
by expectation. It may be that you
struggled against this force, or that you have just accepted it but as soon as
the force weakens you will prevail against it.
On the other hand, it may be
that your heart’s desire is to be closer to the Lord, that your joy is to
receive his Word through the readings—particularly the Gospel—and hymns, through
Communion. Ultimately each of us needs
to decide for ourself: will we serve God or mammon? Will you spend your life chasing money and
possessions which leads to death, or will you chase the one thing needful[5]
which leads to life? Only you can
decide.
The Gospel is madness according to the world, elsewhere from
today’s readings the Apostle Paul describes, “For the word of the cross,” that
is the Gospel, the Christian way of living, “is foolishness to those who are
perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”[6]
I urge you, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, take on
this Gospel and make it your own. It is
madness to the world yet transformative to us.
Decide! Choose between God and
mammon, between life and death and let that decision inform all you do.
The Lord goes on in today’s Gospel reading, he tells each of
us how, were we to put our trust in him we will have all we need for our path
towards life. He promises,
[D]o not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’
or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek all these things; and
your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first His kingdom and His
righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.
The Gospel is a hard way, a way of ridicule and of madness,
and we cannot journey along this way by our own power. Elsewhere, the disciples asked the Lord “Who
then can be saved?” The Lord did not
reply, “you can, so long as you try!” but pointed that this can only be
achieved, can only be accomplished, with the help of God: “With men this is
impossible,” Christ tells them, “but with God, all things are possible.”[7]
Talk with those whom you trust—with the clergy and with each
other—and find the truth of who Christ is.
And then live that truth. Ask
questions. Ask lots of questions. Do not live a lukewarm faith but one filled
with all your life.
I invite you, I ask you, I implore you, come to Christ! Let him into your hearts so that your entire
life may be filled with his love and that your presence here in Church may lead
you to a more intimate communion with him and, therefore, with his saints. Read and reread the Sermon on the Mount, and
the rest of the Gospels, to discover Christ: his preaching is complete madness
according to the world’s standards yet it is the only way to life.
That we may come to knowledge of the Father and become heirs
of the promise through his beloved Son by the power and operation of the Holy
Spirit and may serve him fully and always.
Amen.
[1]
The Declaration of Independence, http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/
[2]
John. 1:12.
[3]
Acts 9:2, 16:17, 18:25,26, 19:9, 24:14,22.
[4]
Rev. 3:15-16.
[5]
Luke 10:42.
[6]
1 Cor. 1:18.
[7]
Matt. 19:25-26.
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