Sermon 2023.09.17
One of my children was talking about baptism at school with his friend. He told his friend that God forgives all your sins when you are baptized. His friend asked him, “What if you kill 1,000 people?” So my son said, “Well…God will forgive you, but he also will give you a consequence.”
Consider Genesis 50 and the death of Jacob. For better or worse Jacob was a patriarch who maintained a status quo. He was in some ways good, and in other ways not so good. He was kind of at the heart of a dysfunctional family. He had a role to play in keeping peace between the siblings, 12 brothers, at least one sister, and likely many more. He also kept some injustices firmly entrenched. When he died it was a big deal. At first of course everyone was sad. Then it began to occur to the surviving family that not only had their beloved Jacob died, but so had the old order, the authority figure who kept everyone in line. That’s why it says 50:15, ‘Realizing that their father was dead, Joseph’s brothers say, “What if Joseph repays us for the evil we did?” Dad’s not going to protect us!
I suspect that this kind of moment is possible for each of us. We have grown accustomed to the present set of circumstances. We adjust ourselves to live within the range of privileges we have been afforded whether we deserve them or not. There will come a day surely like when Jacob died for us, when not God, but what we thought was god waldo dies. Then we will feel vulnerable, and then we will be forced to make amends with our estranged siblings because our arrival and salvation depends on it.
Last week we read how Jesus gave instruction to us on how to confront someone who sins against us. The reason was that our salvation and survival as a species on earth depends on cooperation.
Today we will consider in more detail how to talk to someone that you disagree with. The main idea here is, “Active listening or “affirmative inquirer.” Before we talk about active listening however it’s necessary to first talk about human nature, because how it is that our minds work will shape how we talk and listen to each other.
For quite some time philosophers have debated whether humans are born as blank slate, which is the empirical view, or whether we come into this world already formed with a soul and personality pre-programmed. This is the rationalist view.
If we are born as blank states then in order for people to find common ground and agree, we have to be fed the same information. This is the path of conformity This is the view that communication is saturation. We saturate people with propaganda to get them to do what we want. It is concerned with controlling people.
The rationalist view is that inside each of your minds already exists the truth, in our souls, and each person is capable of discovering it. This i s what Plato and Scrates believed, Aristotle too.
The beautiful thing about rationalism is that you don’t have to convince anyone because in time each of our minds can figure it out. A Real world example is Mr. Daryl. Davis. A famous R&b musician. He is an African American man. Early in his career he was playing a bar of all white people. After the show a white man approached ima said he couldn’t believe that a black man could be so good at music and especially the blues. Davis thought the man was joking. But rather than getting defensive Davis kept asking questions to learn more. It turned out this man was a card carrying member of the KKK. Again Mr. Davis was not intimidated. He kept his cool and kept asking questions to learn more about this person. After some time passed they became friends and without debate or convincing the man renounced white supremacy and gave his hood and robe to Davis. Davis has collected over 100 clan robes from friends he has made like this. That is the power of forgiveness, it is transformative!
Forgiveness is about as much more than accepting somebodys’ apology. Fore-giveness also means to give someone grace before they see their error.
Suppose you have someone in your life that has some opinions you suspect are wrong. The next time your conversation starts to drift in the area of current affairs, try to listen and understand where they are coming from. Ask them to tell you more about what they think. Keep listening and asking clarifying questions. Try your best not to quarrel and you might find that not just them but you also find a deeper sense of the truth.
Jesus said when two or three are gathered in my name I am there. When you choose to fore-give you are gathering in the name of Jesus and Jesus is there in your and the one to whom you speak. Jesus is not content to leave us just the way we are. Jesus’ Spirit is encouraging us gently to grow and even still to be transformed. That is what Joseph meant when he said that even when the brothers intended harm, God was always intending good. The spirit of God is always with us encouraging good.
Psalm 103:103:1 Bless the LORD, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name.
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