1 Growing Nonviolence Matthew 5: 38-45 April 29, 2018 You have heard me say that I struggle with the aspect of Christianity that puts all its eggs in the belief basket because it feels like it can lead to an empty action basket. What does it mean to believe? Is this the most important thing? Usually I would say no. But reading and preparing for this sermon might have changed my mind. In this series on growing we have talked about growing compassion as Jesus was challenged to love and heal a Canaanite woman whom he at first did not see as worthy to receive such a gift. But through her challenges, his compassion grew and as a result so did his ministry. We have also grown adventure as we have looked to other faiths to teach us to look deeper into our own faith, to ask of it new questions and to grow a broader understanding not only of others but also of ourselves. Last week we talked about growing our roots, connecting with the earth and our creation, to listen to the lessons the earth is teaching us. It seems all of these play a role in our conversation today about Growing Nonviolence. Because within this we must have compassion, adventure and openness, and we must be deeply rooted, connected to who we are and the world around us. Also, the more I come to understand nonviolence not as an absence of action but as action in and of itself, I believe that it is like the others, something that to exist must be growing, and for it to be growing it must be watered by compassion, have deeply planted roots, and to receive the nourishment of the world around it in order to thrive.
2 Nonviolence gets a bad rep because it seems like it is not a thing in and of itself but the lack of something. Like if the weather forecast said today is a non-rain day, instead of today Is a sunny day. Or if he school called you to tell you that your child had a non-incident today you would wonder why they took the time to call. And so we think of nonviolence simply as a lack of violence so with this line of thinking we could celebrate that every Sunday in recent memory we have nonviolent worship as by the grace of God no one has inflicted violence on another during our time of worship. But nonviolence, nonviolence that we are seeking to grow is more than the lack of an attack. You have probably heard it referred to as the doctrine of nonviolence or the doctrine of nonviolent resistance. Now that word doctrine is a church word but not one that us UCC folks through around very often. A doctrine is a belief or a set of beliefs that is taught and often In the church we expect that membership includes adherence to that belief system. If you grew up in a different kind of church maybe you all spoke the Nicene Creed every Sunday that stated out loud in worship what you were to believe. We don t do that here. We honor, we celebrate that we are all trying to figure out what it means to follow Jesus and we might disagree, we might emphasize one aspect of Jesus ministry over another but we are committing to engage our faith together, not out of a doctrine but out of relationship. Hence why I started my sermon talking about my skepticism around beliefs, that makes me a good UCCer but when we approach the doctrine of nonviolence, I am forced to realize the power of doctrine, the power of believing one thing over another and the ways that that absolutely leads to a new way of living. So let s look at our scripture for today. I am actually going to start at the beginning of the chapter even though I asked Donna to focus on the latter part.
3 This entire chapter as well as chapters 6 and 7 are all a part of the Sermon on the Mount - the longest sermon that Jesus gave. I kind of think of it as his thesis he is giving us the big picture of wisdom that provides the context for who and how he will minister from here forward. And he starts this sermon with what we refer to as the beatitudes, I am going to read the last four of eight: Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Basically what we are hearing here is that those who act out of love, even at their own detriment, those are the people Jesus is calling out as blessed. Now that could lead us into a whole sermon about how we misappropriate the word blessed in our culture but that is for another day. I want us now to move to today s text some 30 verses later where we read: You have heard that it was said, An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. 39 But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; 40 and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; 41 and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. 42 Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.43 You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. I don t think we are particularly surprised to hear Jesus say this, but this is one of those texts, probably the text that most often elicits the reaction from good church folks, great in theory, but we all can t be Jesus, right? But again this is
4 from his quintessential sermon and so I just don t believe we can just ignore this. Though it is not easy, and may not even feel possible to believe let alone live. We know that within us there is a reaction to violence, to fear, it is fight or flight. Do we run away or do we fight back. That is an evolutionary aspect of what it means to be human. So what Jesus is calling us to do is neither or those. Nonviolence is not fight with the same violence that we might receive but so too it is not flight, it is not cowering, or running away. Actually there are some nuances in the examples he gave that show us that nonviolence is power in and of itself, just a different kind of power than weapons and fear. The first instruction he offers, if someone strikes you on the right cheek turn the other also, let s think about this. Biblical Scholar Walter Wink points out the detail of someone striking your right cheek. Which means that the hit was done by the back of the hand. A back handed hit was a way of putting someone of less power in their place. Slave owners backhanded slaves. Romans backhanded Jews. It was the way that the powerful engage with those they oppressed not only in an act of violence but also to communicate the victim s diminished status. Now of course these people could not strike their masters back, but the instruction is to turn the other cheek, the left cheek and they cannot backhand you on your left cheek. So either they do not strike you again or they have to hit you as an equal, either way you are communicating to them your humanity as well as their inability to demean or humiliate you. The same is true for the second and third example Jesus offers. If you are sued for your coat because you are so impoverished you have nothing else to sue for,
5 Jesus instructs to give your cloak as well. The shirt off your back, if they want your coat give them everything. Stand there with no clothes because in that time there was as Rev. Roger Powers points out, less shame in being naked than in viewing or causing the nakedness So by surrendering your shirt as well it is not the one impoverished that is shamed but the one who has caused nudity. And in the final example of going the second mile. The law said a Roman soldier could force anyone to carry his pack for one mile but no further, by carrying it the second mile you assert your moral authority and choice, over the oppressing law. This text is not about submission, it is about using strength of character to overcome the power of violence. And those that subscribe to the doctrine of nonviolent resistance, Jesus being the prime example and those that followed including well-known names like Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, and Gandhi who was remember a Hindu and Dorothy Day and most recently Malala Yousafzai who is Muslim. What I have found humbling is that none of these people practiced non-violence in a vacuum. For each of them, they held to the belief that nonviolence was stronger, more powerful than violence and yet it is a difficult doctrine to believe and thereby live. Dr. King studied and learned from Gandhi. Gandhi quoted Jesus and said Jesus was the most active resister known to history. His was nonviolence par excellence and he also referred to the Sermon on the Mount as the unadulterated message of Jesus. And we know from the civil rights movement that nonviolence was not something that folks said, Sure that sounds like a good idea and then sat down at lunch counters to be mocked, beaten and harassed. Nonviolence is a doctrine that must grow. Not unlike our faith, or maybe as a part
6 of our faith. Gandhi said my religion is based on truth and non-violence. Truth is my God, nonviolence is my way of realizing him. And a part of that realizing is expanding love. The message on the sign outside the church from Dr. King says at the center of nonviolence stands the principle of love. That is love for the oppressor as well as love for self. To lean into that love does not just happen. We must nourish it. Those who participated in the civil rights movement were trained, trained in the way of nonviolence. I remember reading that one part of that training included maintaining eye contact. In discussing this training Representative John Lewis said this was to communicate, You may beat me but I am still human. But another aspect of this was for those resisters to look for the humanity in those who were harming them. So that is one thing we can take away as we are called to grow nonviolence. But I looked into the training and want us to grow a bit more. Look at this picture.
7 What do you see? This is used in every nonviolence training I could find, those taking place in 2018. Because this communicates 7 points of the definition of nonviolence all of which we hear in Jesus own explanation. 1. Nonviolence is a method of resolving conflict though it might have to create conflict to move toward resolution. In his letter from a Birmingham Jail Dr. King wrote: Nonviolent direct action seeks to create a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiation is forced to confront the issue. It seeks to so dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. 2. Nonviolence is Accepting the fact that conflict exist 3. Nonviolence is power and non-cooperation 4. Nonviolence recognizes that truth belongs to all sides 5. Nonviolence is openness 6. Nonviolence is accepting the possibility of undeserved suffering 7. Nonviolence is non-injury to opponents. To believe in this doctrine is not passive. It is not an empty belief. It is a way of life. It is a choice, a choice that is lived. I think of the police officer in Canada, Ken Lam who this week had a good shot to kill the man who had just killed 10 people in a van. The man yelled I have a gun and Lam replied I don t care and then put his gun away and pulled out his baton. Now as a police officer I doubt he has committed to nonviolence, but in that
8 moment he chose humanity, the man who had moments before murdered 10 people, but also his own. Amen.