Today's Sermon

 

"Loving God and Neighbor"

 

Deuteronomy 6:4-9
Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

Leviticus 19:18
You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.

Matthew 22:34-40
When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, “’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 neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

Valarie Kaur is an author and activist who practices the Sikh faith.  She tells this story from her childhood.

One day in eighth grade, my best friend, Lisa, and I were working on our History Day projects in the library. She and I were passing notes to each other, giggling in our own bubble, when Lisa looked up suddenly and said, “Valarie, I can’t wait until Judgment Day.”  There was beautiful anticipation in her eyes.  “Just think, it will only be you and me and all the good people.”

I realized that by “good people,” Lisa was talking about Christians.  But Lisa knew everything about my family and me.  She had heard all my stories. She new that I was Sikh. I was confused.

“Where will everyone else go,” I asked, “everyone who isn’t Christian?”

She looked at me startled. “Well, you know, down there.” It was too unpleasant to say out loud.

That’s when I realized that my best friend believed that I was going to hell.  She just didn’t know it yet.  I had to be the one to break it to her.

“Lisa, you know I’m not Christian, right?”

She went pale.

“But I thought Sikhism was a sect of Christianity.”

“Um, it’s not,” I said.

The bubble broke, the bell rang, and we left each other without another word.  We didn’t talk about it again until a few months later.  We were sitting with our friends at lunch when somehow the conversation turned into an argument about what happens after we die. At some point, I realized what this group of my friends who were all Christian were trying to tell me.

“So all of you believe that I’m going to hell?” I asked.

They shifted in their seats and looked down at the cement.  Only Lisa looked me in the eye, Lisa who loved me and pitied me and wanted to save me. There were tears in her eyes and mine, too.

Our friendship ended after that. We still exchanged many letters trying to persuade each other – she stressed that I needed to accept Christ to be saved, and I replied that I didn’t need Jesus to be good – but our attempts always failed.  As long as Lisa believed I was going to hell, she could not love me as before.  Wonder is an admission that you don’t know everything about another.  Lisa had stopped wondering about me.  She had decided that she knew my fate and had no more to learn.[i]

I share this story to illustrate the importance of the next sentence in Westminster’s Identity Statement – something we have been working through this entire month.  The third sentence in our statement is, “Our congregation is grounded in Christianity and we value our interfaith relationships.”  We value our interfaith relationships because we know we always have more to learn.  Because we want to live with wonder and curiosity.  Because without compassion and understanding, as this story shows, relationships can end.

Though this story is important in illustrating how early in our lives prejudice and misinformation can take root, the importance of interfaith relationships goes much deeper than middle school friendships.  Eboo Patel is the founder of the Interfaith Youth Corps – an organization on many college campuses throughout the country, and is a longtime interfaith leader in in this country. He gave a Ted talk just a couple months ago where he discussed the importance of interfaith relationships.  He first talked about all of the social and civic work done by religious organizations, and their crucial place in the fabric our society.  Then, he shared these thoughts.

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYLesUKHPGc– we watched from 6:30-8:30)

We have to get it right. According to Patel, the very future of our country depends on it.  We have to build bridges of cooperation rather than bunkers of isolation.

Patel stresses the importance of “the ability to be who I am in positive relationship with who you are.” I appreciate that our identity statement pairs our grounding in Christianity with our valuing of interfaith relationships. Holding the two together is so important.  We are a Christian community.  We are disciples of Jesus Christ.  A couple of you have given us feedback that we don’t specifically mention Jesus in our identity statement.  That may be something we change down the road.  But for me, this is the sentence where we make it known that we are followers of Christ.  We are grounded in Christianity. 

The use of the word “grounded” reminds me of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, when he prays that Christ may dwell in the hearts of the people, as they are rooted and grounded in love.  When we say that we are grounded in Christianity, it means that Jesus Christ is our foundation.  Everything we do and say and are flows from our relationship with Christ. Christ dwells in our hearts and in our lives and is our cornerstone.

From this grounding in Christianity comes our love for God and love for neighbor.  According to Jesus, those are the two greatest commandments. Nothing is more important than that. This is a love not just for our Christian neighbors.  Not just for neighbors who promise to become Christian.  This is a love for all our neighbors.    In the Gospel of Luke, when someone questions Jesus about who his neighbor really is, Jesus responds with the story of the Good Samaritan – an outsider.  This was not a mistake.  Jesus knew exactly what he was doing.  He very specifically chose an outsider to illustrate who our neighbor is – who we are to love.  Jesus was continually challenging people to draw their circles wider.  To love even those considered outsiders.  To make them outsiders no longer.

As our opening story illustrated, loving our neighbor is about more than caring about them or being nice to them, though that is important.  Loving our neighbor is about entering into relationships with wonder.  Being open to learning about and from one another.  Coming to the relationship not with judgment or preconceived notions, but with a desire to grow together.

Miracles happened this week, as I actually had my sermon finished by Wednesday morning!  Rob does that all the time, but I am usually a late in the week writer.  I thought I was done, but then Rob and I received an email from Rabbi Stacy Friedman from Congregation Rodef Sholom, and I knew I wanted to share it with you.

Dear Rob and Bethany,

I hope you are both well.

Given the events of last Saturday where a terrorist took hostage the rabbi and three others in a Texas synagogue during Shabbat services, our community is quite shaken.

I thought it might be very comforting and reassuring to have some interfaith voices during our services tomorrow night, and was wondering if either (or both) of you may be available and willing to join us by zoom for a few minutes to offer some words of blessing and solidarity. 

Thanks so much,

Stacy

There is the power and importance of interfaith relationships, right there.  It would be comforting and reassuring to have interfaith voices during our services.  And Rabbi Stacy knew she could reach out to us at Westminster because she knows we value interfaith relationships.  We don’t just write it on paper, we live it.

Immediately, Rob and I both said, Of course!  We will be there.  So on Friday evening, I logged on to Zoom to join about 140 worshiping congregants of Rodef Sholom.  I was not the only guest.  Imam Fasih from the North Marin Islamic center was there, as was Rev. Scott Quinn from the Marin Interfaith Council.  During the service, each one of us had the opportunity to share a message of hope and love and solidarity.  After each one of us spoke, the Zoom chat filled with messages of thanksgiving.  It was immediately obvious how meaningful it was to the people of Rodef Sholom to know that they are not alone, that the interfaith community of Marin stands with them and is praying for them.  In her message, Rabbi Stacy then talked about the hope and the joy that they receive from their interfaith friends and partners, especially during difficult and challenging times. 

Eboo Patel believes that our interfaith relationships have the power to change the world.  I saw first-hand on Friday night that they certainly have the power to change our Marin community for the better.  May we continue to enter into all of our relationships with wonder, with curiosity, with imagination, with love.  We are not meant to be bunkers of isolation, but instead, bridges of cooperation.  May it be so.

[i]See No Stranger, by Valarie Kaur, pg. 18.