look at your shoes

 

SERMON PREACHED AT HOLY TRINITY, RINGWOOD EAST
NINTH ORDINARY SUNDAY (June 4^th) 1989

 

READINGS

1 Kings 18:20-21 [22-29] 30-39
Psalm 96
Galatians 1:1-12
Luke 7:1-10

 

 I tell you, not even in Israel have I found faith as great as this (Luke 7:9)

In our gospel reading last week, we found Jesus placing his life into the context of his teachings, and his teachings into the context of his life. In the attempt to shatter any tendency to “club mentality” that might develop amongst his followers, Jesus suddenly pronounces that it is the poor who are blessed – and blessed because in their poverty they are closest to the nakedness in which God reveals his compassion on the cross.

Luke now, having recorded Jesus’ club-shattering sermon, provides demonstration as to how the club will be shattered. Luke is writing for a gentile Christian audience, and therefore, in an attempt to bolster their security in faith, frequently records accounts of the journey into faith of gentiles. His accounts of the life-ministry of Paul demonstrate exactly that, the impact the Christian gospel has on the non-Jewish world.

But Luke’s account serves a double purpose. The warning “not even in Israel have I found such faith” must also be read “not even amongst those I have chosen have I found such faith.” There is no membership ticket to the Kingdom of God.

Karl Rahner, perhaps the greatest Catholic theologian of this century, devised a belief in the existence of anonymous Christians. Traditionally Christianity has taught that there is no salvation outside the church. The infidels are condemned to remain separated from God, enmeshed in a morass of human sin.

Yet strangely enough the Bible has always been quite ambivalent about this. The Old Testament promise following the flood still holds true. Never again, says God, will I destroy humanity. And the New Testament writings to Timothy make clear God’s will is that all should be saved (1 Timothy 2:4). Is God so easily thwarted?

Mahatma Gandhi is one of the most powerful and public examples of a figure who embodied all of the best of Christian thought and yet rejected Christianity. The question that must be asked of Gandhi is “where in all Christendom has there been displayed such love and justice as this?” Gandhi rejected Christianity because of the undeniable evils perpetrated in its name. Christian crusaders of every generation and every cause have much to answer for.

Somewhere in Dave Wilkerson’s book The Cross and the Switchblade he tells the story of his first encounter with the street kids. As he attempted to explain Christ to the kids he followed their eyes in the direction of his feet. Brand new and expensive shoes worth far more than the kids could legally earn gave the lie to his concern to live among the kids. He gave them his shoes – in itself a complex reaction.

In our Christian life we must constantly seek to see whether our shoes speak louder than our words. We must constantly seek to see whether those around us and beyond our shores are not living a life centred far more on the gospel – albeit unknowingly – than is the life we lead. We must, as we seek to proclaim Christ to the world, ensure that we hear our own voices, that we monitor our lifestyles, that we look closely at those to whom we are speaking lest they are far, far closer to the Kingdom of God.