St. Andrew’s Pictou, October 23^rd 205

 

Defining Moments

 

Deuteronomy 34:1-12

Matthew 22:34-46

 

It is a common thing for us in this country to go to school. We attend for 12 years and then we can say we have our high school credentials. We could also take a course: six week, nine month, one year, and we finish or graduate with a certificate saying that we have finished the course so that we can do something; so that we can move on from there.

 

But life, itself, is not like that.

 

You can talk about school, degrees, and courses all you want, but the truth is that precise single moments are what change our lives and give us direction about where we are to go.

 

I saw this church (St. Andrew’s, Pictou) advertised in The Presbyterian Record for months until there was this  one single moment when I realized that this was the place I was looking for. In a panic I called Donald Mac Kay to see if the church was still looking for a minister and waited for him tell me that you were people had called your new minister and the induction was next week or last week. Much to my surprise he said that you were still looking.

 

In shock, I said, “You will have my application in four days.”

 

Getting married, moving, choice of career, no matter what it is, there is this “moment” that defines the next road we will follow; moments that have been created by the context of our lives. All the events, connected or not, all lead to these moments.

 

We could define these moments as points in time where we become aware of “ultimate truths” for our lives that we each need to know and to find.

 

There are moments where you and I become aware of what is true, accurate and authentic for us. Everything has to fall into place for an answer to be consistent with who we are, comfortable with our concerns, resonating with our state of being, and balanced with how we weigh all of the factors we see as relevant: our moment of ultimate truth.

 

We read today about Moses having one of the moments of ultimate truth.

 

As far as Biblical characters, go, Moses was a giant. He had lead the country of Egypt, second in command to the Pharaoh, even though he wasn’t an Egyptian. He had led the Jewish people en masse out of the country to safety across the Reed Sea when the Egyptians were swamped. God had validated his leadership with miracles such as manna and quail from heaven, and water from a rock when the people were dying of thirst.

 

Now after 40 years in the wilderness, here the people of God were on the threshold of entering the Promised Land; a broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey.

 

God takes Moses to a high place and shows him the land that stretches for miles and says, “This is the land of which I swore to Abraham and Isaac, and to Jacob saying, ‘I will give it to your descendents;’ I will let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there.”

 

Then 120 year old Moses died, and there was great sorrow over his loss and the people wept for 30 days. The mantle of leadership was passed over to Aaron.

 

It was a moment of truth for Moses to realize that his life was over. We have experiences like this where our whole life is laid out for us: the hills of success and the valleys of failure. There was more to be done, but what was done must suffice. God gave him this overview as we are oftentimes not the best ones to evaluate our own lives.

 

There is a particular human trait that I find quite curious.

 

It goes like this: someone asks you a question like they really need and want to know what your answer is, and then… they dismiss it in any number of ways:

-they just disagree and dismiss you with a wave of their hand,

-they point out that you are wrong,

-they ignore you in spite of giving them the best of who you are.

 

We have that exact same dynamic happening to Jesus in this passage.

 

After Jesus had silenced the Pharisees and Sadducees about the resurrection, they asked him one of those huge, life defining, questions that tell everything about you and how you are and what you stand for, like they really want to get to the heart of the matter.

 

This is a “stand up and be counted” kind of question; the question we would ask Jesus if we could.

 

One of them speaks: “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?”

 

Now Jesus doesn’t always answer questions. Sometimes he has been silent. Sometimes he has attacked the motives of the questioner.

 

But in this case he doesn’t.

 

“’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment.

 

And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’”

 

Notice that Jesus didn’t say, that it was secondary to love your neighbour, or that it was almost as important as loving God, he said, “And a second is like it.”

 

And then Jesus said something that everybody wishes that he hadn’t. He smashes a nail into the coffins of all the legalists, the “t” crossers and “i” dotters. He says,

“On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

 

 

Could you imagine what the world would be like if all the Christians and all of the clergy in all of the churches in the world actually believed these words of Jesus?

 

Vs 40 “On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

 

It would be heaven!

 

The miracle is that there are people in churches who believe vs. 40. I am sure you have met them, or maybe you are one yourself.

 

Note that Jesus Christ gave the two commandments equal billing! Love of God was not shown to be superior to love of self and neighbour!

 

I would say that by the evidence of her life, Mother Teresa believed vs. 40.

 

She started an order of nuns called “The Sisters of Charity,” which are now located all over the world and growing.

 

When Mother Teresa picked up the first man on the road to take him home for care, he was very dirty, smelly, sick, dying, infested. He looked at her with amazement and said, “Why are you doing this?”

 

She said, “Because I love you.”

 

We talk so much about love, but little about charity. We buy cards with “love” written on them, write the word on cakes, and say the word out loud, but can we exemplify Christian Charity with regards to the dirty, sick, smelly, infested parts of other people’s lives?

 

Are we willing to reach out and heal that which is killing our neighbour?

 

How do we look at other people?

 

Are they sanitized enough for us?

Are they healthy enough that they don’t need us?

Do they smell good enough?

Are they infectious, or non-infectious?

 

Mother Teresa took that man in her arms!

 

Can you and I really love? Can we embrace others in spite of the things about them we really don’t like?

 

Jesus did: the leper, the sick, the blind, the sexually dysfunctional, the disabled, the Sinners, all of them.

 

Do you want to change the world and feel that you are not up to the job?

 

The world changes when you do. The world changes when I do.

 

The world changes that exact defining moment that we do.

 

God has given you the power to love.

Jesus has given you the commands.

 

Your defining moment will come when your God-given power is released by answering Jesus’ command.                                                                  AMEN                Rev. Alan Stewart