Minneapolis Westminster Presbyterian Church: Presbyterian Principles: It is our duty to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other

On May 14, Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, Senior Pastor of Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church, preached the last of his three sermons on Presbyterian Principles.[1] This one focused on our duty to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other.

Scripture

Colossians 3:12-17

As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.

Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.

Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful.

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; teach and admonish one another in all wisdom; and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God.

And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Sermon[2]

 We come today to the final sermon in this series exploring the Historic Principles of Church Order from the constitution of the Presbyterian Church. These principles were adopted in the late 18th century to help the church maintain “order” in its life, but the principles do much more. They offer essential guidance to us as individuals seeking to follow Jesus in our time.

There are eight historic principles; we’ve focused on two so far: “God alone is Lord of the conscience – we carry God’s love in our minds and hearts as a compass in life.”                    “Truth is in order to goodness – facing the truth, even if it painful, leads to goodness.”

And finally, this principle:

“There are truths and forms with respect to which (people) of good characters and principles may differ. And in all these we think it the duty both of private Christians and societies to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other. It is our duty to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other.”

Those 18th century Presbyterians had read their Bible. The notion of being kind to one another, even in the face of hostility, appears throughout the gospels. Jesus takes it to an extreme when he tells us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us.

How do we live like that? The letter to the Colossians has some advice:

  • “Therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lordhas forgiven you, so you also must forgive. (Colossians 3:12-23)

New life in Christ is like shedding old clothes and donning a new self. I have watched that happen many times over the years, as people come to fresh commitment to their faith, or come to faith for the first time. When we follow Jesus, we put on new clothes. We take on a new identity.

Last Thursday the elders of the church welcomed new members into the life of our congregation. We will receive them in worship next week. The 20 or so individuals are not coming to Westminster for social reasons, or because we’re a well-run non-profit. They are, rather, shedding an old way of life, each in their own way, and putting on a new identity. They want to discern with us what it means to follow Jesus in our complicated time. If they serve on a committee or sing in the choir that’s great; but let us be clear: church is about taking on, putting on, a new identity.

Among other things, our Presbyterian ancestors say, that new identity expects of us mutual forbearance.

This past week I found myself on an airplane flying back to Minneapolis, next to an older man wearing the hat and jacket of someone with whom I assumed I would disagree on any number of issues. He wanted to talk. Has that ever happened to you? My strategy was to open my laptop and go to work on this sermon. He tried to engage me multiple times; finally, I obliged. We were beginning our descent to Minneapolis and with his opening question to me I thought he and I might start a descent of our own.

“Is it true what they say about crime in Minneapolis?” he asked.

“I’m not sure what you’re hearing,” I replied, and then told him about the decline in crime in the city as reported in the news recently. He seemed skeptical.

Then – maybe, I confess, to see how he might respond – I said that things would be even better if there weren’t so many guns. He proceeded to tell me he owned an AR-15, and he didn’t want anyone taking it from him because he needed it for protection.

It was clear we were headed toward serious turbulence. I was determined not to give an inch on this topic about which I have strong feelings. We were in a small airplane. He had the window seat; I had the aisle. I had him cornered.

Then I remembered the historic principle in the sermon I was working on, sitting next to him. “There are truths and forms with respect to which (people) of good characters and principles may differ. And in all these we think it the duty both of private Christians and societies to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other. ”

To forbear means to exercise restraint, show patience, demonstrate self-control. That is not where I was headed with my seatmate. I decided to try practicing what I was planning to preach.

I began by assuming he was “a person of good character.” It helped to think of him as someone’s grandfather – it takes one to know one, even if we did have opposing views. I set out to patiently listen to him, and then, to my relief, he sat quietly listening to me when it was my turn.

There we were, two grandfathers representing American polarity on that little plane. We went back and forth for some time, working hard to keep it polite and genuinely hear the other. Both of us were pleased to find one area about which we did agree: the need for more mental health support in our communities.

I left him in Minneapolis. He was headed to Salt Lake. When I told him I was a Presbyterian minister, he smiled and said he was a Lutheran. I doubt I changed his mind about guns, and I know he did not change mine, but our exchange had been surprisingly helpful. I had the sense that if we had more time, we might have found more common ground.

It is our duty to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other. 

I first learned that historic Presbyterian principle back in the heat of the major church struggle over the full inclusion of LGBTQ persons in the life and ministry of our denomination. Not unlike other struggles to expand the rights of people, those of us advocating change received a lot of pushback. Some of it was ugly. It was even worse for those who embodied the pain of the church’s exclusion. Individuals were shunned, kicked out of churches, subject to cruelty and hate.

It was difficult in that time to “exercise mutual forbearance” toward those on the opposing side. We consciously and carefully referred to them not as the enemy but as “other Presbyterians,” to remind ourselves that we weren’t that far apart on every issue. There might be some common ground between us. We held firm that God’s love extended to all God’s people, and that God’s call to serve the church could come to any faithful person. We did that while trying to engage those who disagreed in a way that respected their full humanity, hoping they might reciprocate, and some did.

The church finally became supportive of its LGBTQ members. Several hundred congregations left the denomination, including some in our presbytery, but I think more would have left were it not for some on both sides of the struggle committed to exercising the historic principle of mutual forbearance toward each other.

“Above all,” Colossians urges us, “Clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.”

The Church, like the human community, has always struggled to hold in tension internal disagreement while staying together. The historic principle of mutual forbearance acknowledges that we do not all have to agree on everything. We never will. But when we write off someone with whom we disagree, or make them our enemy, we have little chance of ever finding common ground.

There are truths and forms with respect to which (people) of good characters and principles may differ. That principle is not only Presbyterian – it is foundational to any functioning democracy. In the church we call the power that binds us together the love of God; in civil society it’s a shared sense of national purpose. We seem to have lost that, or are in danger of losing it.

When mutual forbearance is thrown out, democracy is on a collision course with itself and headed for deep trouble. With the mutual animosity characteristic of our time, we run the risk of losing any shared commitments and fracturing that which ties us to one another.

It is the duty, those Presbyterians said back then, both of private Christians and societies to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other. Forbearance – both as individuals and collectively. The Letter to the Colossians is not written to a private party; it is directed at a community.

The future belongs to people and communities that can learn to live with those with whom they disagree and may even consider an enemy.

Every year in Israel, Palestinians and Israelis hold an event called Joint Memorial Day. It began in 2005 to “try to break the chain of revenge and hatred.”

The first gathering 18 years ago had only 200 people. Three weeks ago, 15,000 Israelis and Palestinians showed up. They told stories of grief and loss on both sides – and listened to them. They publicly committed themselves to end the cycle of violence that only begets more violence. That is true in any society, including ours.

“It’s possible to use our pain in a different way,” an Arab father whose ten-year old daughter was killed by Israeli soldiers said at the event.

An Israeli man whose sister was killed by a suicide bomber said, “It is easy and natural to hate, be angry, want revenge. But I am convinced this is the best way to leverage my feelings and my loss for the good of my people and this country,”

That is the exercise of courageous mutual forbearance. If Israelis and Palestinians can do it, anyone can. Peace with justice will not come to the world until we break repeated patterns of hatred and revenge, violence and more violence between nations and neighbors.

To survive, our own democracy depends on finding a way to live together in a divided house with those we may be tempted to see as enemies. That is true for the Church, as well.

This may not be happy news for us, because it’s easy and, if we’re honest, strangely satisfying to spiral down into anger and dismissiveness toward others. I know this, because I struggle with this tension all the time. It surfaced on that airplane ride this past week.

Instead, the letter to the Colossians invites us to put on new life, to clothe ourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and trusting God’s love to bind us together.

The three historic principles we have explored all start and finish with God’s love. They offer guidance to us in this troubled world, as we follow Jesus: God alone is Lord of the conscience. Truth is in order to goodness. It is our duty to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other.

In the end, only the power of God’s love working in us and in others will lead to that new day, a day where justice breaks forth and peace flourishes on earth and the human community lives in harmony.

That day is the great gift God has already given in Jesus Christ, the one whom we seek to follow and serve.

Thanks be to God.

Amen.

Reactions

I wholeheartedly agree that we should act with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness and patience with everyone we meet and with whom we interact. This includes forgiveness of others for what we perceive as their errors.

We may still try to teach and admonish others. And we need to acknowledge that others may not agree with us. This is when mutual forbearance or restraint, patience and self-control come in.

I also must confess that I tend to interact with others who, I believe, agree with me on contentious issues of our political and social life and try to avoid issues that might provoke disagreement.

As a result, I think that many others and I need practice of interacting with others who hold different opinions on issues like gun control and certain political leaders.

Tim’s account of his spontaneous response to a fellow airplane passenger who raised the question of crime in Minneapolis seemed inadequate. Given the vague nature of the other man’s comment, a better response by Tim could have been something like the following: “I’m not sure what you have heard on this subject, but during the COVID crisis and afterwards, Minneapolis experienced a bad rash of car jackings and thefts, high speed, reckless auto traffic that killed and injured many people and many gun-caused injuries and deaths. But recently there have been reported declines in these horrible crimes. I should also mention that later this month two downtown Minneapolis churches—Westminster and Central Lutheran—are co-hosting a national Festival of Homiletics for clergy of various churches.”

================================

[1] Previous posts about this series of sermons: The Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), dwkcommentaries.com (May 11, 2023); Minneapolis Westminster Presbyterian Church: Presbyterian Principles: God alone is Lord of the conscience, dwkcommentaries.com (May 12, 2023); Minneapolis Westminster Presbyterian Church: Presbyterian Principles: Truth is in order to goodness, dwkcommentaries.com (May 13, 2023).

[2] Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, Sermon: Presbyterian Principles: It is our duty to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other, Westminster Presbyterian Church (Minneapolis) (May 14, 2023); Bulletin, Westminster Presbyterian Church (May 14, 2023) (the Bulletin’s cover contained the full statement of this Principle).

 

 

Derek Chauvin Asks Minnesota Supreme Court To Review His Conviction for Killing of George Floyd     

As previously reported, in April 2021, a jury in Hennepin County District Court returned a verdict that Derek Chauvin was guilty on all three counts (second degree murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter) of George Floyd in May 2020. In June 2021 that court imposed a sentence of 22.5 years imprisonment on Mr. Chauvin for these crimes.[1]

On April 17, 2023, the Minnesota Court of Appeals affirmed that conviction.[2]

On May 17, 2023, Chauvin appealed that decision to the Minnesota Supreme Court, stating that the legal issues to be reviewed were the following:

  1. “Whether the district court’s failure to either transfer venue, delay the trial or sequester the jury deprived Petitioner of state rights and constitutional due process to a fair trial because (i) the district court failed to presume juror prejudice due to pervasive adverse publicity and violence in the community or (ii) the district court abused its discretion.”
  2. “Whether (i) police officers acting to effect lawful arrests can be convicted of second- degree felony murder when the predicate felony required only intent to contact, with no subjective intent to use what is later adjudicated as objectively unreasonable force or (ii) Minnesota should abrogate felony murder where the predicate felony is assault.”
  3. “Whether the jury instruction on ‘reasonableness’ police use-of-force was material error.”
  4. “Whether upward sentence departures are misapplied when defendant’s conduct was without subjective intent.”
  5. Whether denying a Schwartz hearing after defendant presented prima facie evidence of juror misconduct deprives defendants of the constitutional right to trial by impartial jury.”[3]

The Minnesota Supreme Court could decline to review the Court of Appeals decision or decide to conduct such a review after the parties submit detailed briefs and present arguments at a hearing and thereafter submit the Supreme Court’s decision.

This blogger thinks that the Supreme Court probably will decline to grant review. In the meantime, Chauvin is serving concurrent state and federal convictions for Floyd’s killing in a federal prison.

=================================

[1]  Derek Chauvin Trial:  Week Seven (CONVICTION), dwkcommentaries.com (April 21, 2021); Derek Chauvin Trial: Chauvin Sentenced to 22.5 Years Imprisonment, dwkcommentaries.com (June 28, 2021).

[2]  Minnesota Court of Appeals Affirms Chauvin’s State Court Conviction for Killing of George Floyd, dwkcommentaries.com (April 19, 2023).

[3] Karnowski (AP),  Chauvin appeals conviction in George Floyd’s murder to the Minnesota Supreme Court, StarTribune (May 17, 2023); Petition for Review, Chauvin v.State, Minn. Sup. Ct. # A21-1228 (May 17, 2023).

Derek Chauvin’s Ex-Wife Sentenced for Minnesota Tax Evasion

On May 12, 2023, Minnesota’s Washington County District Court sentenced Kellie Chauvin, the former wife of Derek Chauvin, based on her recent guilty plea to two counts of aiding and abetting Minnesota income tax evasion.[1]

The sentence was 20 days in jail, three years’ probation and payment of  $37,868 in restitution to cover the unpaid taxes. Rather than being in jail, she can satisfy the time through “sentence to serve,” which often means being part of a supervised work crew or doing some other community work involving physical labor.

On March 17, 2023 Derek Chauvin, based upon his guilty plea, was sentenced by the same state court to a 13-month term that runs concurrent with his state murder sentence plus an order to pay $38,000 in restitution for failure to report state income taxes.

=================================

[1] Walsh, Derek Chauvin’s ex-wife receives 20-day sentence for tax evasion, StarTribune (May 16, 2023). . See also Derek Chauvin’s Ex-Wife Pleads Guilty to Income Tax Evasion, dwkcommentaries.com (Feb. 25, 2023); [Comment:] Derek Chauvin Pleads Guilty to Minnesota Tax Evasion Crimes, dwkcommentaries.com (Mar. 22, 2023).

 

 

 

 

Minneapolis Westminster Presbyterian Church: Presbyterian Principles: Truth is in order to goodness   

On May 7, 2023, Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, Senior Pastor of Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church, delivered the second of three sermons on Presbyterian Principles.[1] This one focused on “truth is in order to goodness.”

Scripture

John 3: 16-24

 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

 “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved through him.  Those who believe in him are not condemned, but those who do not believe are condemned already because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God.  And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.  For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.”

 After this Jesus and his disciples went into the region of Judea, and he spent some time there with them and baptized.  John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim because water was abundant there, and people kept coming and were being baptized.  (John, of course, had not yet been thrown into prison.)

Sermon[2]

We’re on the second Sunday of a three-part series exploring what are called The Historic Principles of Church Order. They were adopted by the Presbyterian Church more than two centuries ago. Our forebears set out to build Christian community on these basic tenets of faith. The principles served – and still serve – as the foundation of the values we hold dear and which we embrace as followers of Jesus.

We may be tempted to dismiss a set of ethics adopted in the late 18th century as anachronistic or irrelevant. But give them a chance and it becomes clear they still speak to us. Last week we looked at this historic principle: God alone is Lord of the conscience – meaning that in the mind and heart of a Christian, God’s love is the ultimate guide for how we live.

Today we look at another assertion upon which our Church stands: Truth is in order to goodness. When I first read this in our denomination’s constitution many years ago, I didn’t understand it. It refers to one thing that follows another. To say truth is in order to goodness means that goodness results from following the truth. Truth leads to goodness.

Could any old-time principle be more appropriate for our time today, when lies and illusions abound in our public life, and mendacity doesn’t even bother to masquerade? Could any principle be more apt for our time than this one? Truth is in order to goodness. 

When Jesus was before Pilate, only hours before his crucifixion, the Roman governor was probing him, trying to learn who he was, and the motivation for what he did. Jesus finally tells him,

“For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” (John 18:37)

As followers of Jesus, we ought to be known as those who belong to the truth, who refuse to follow falsehood. If we belong to the truth, our lives bear witness to what is good and honest, right and just. Our actions and our integrity point others to the truth.

But how do we know what is true? “The great touchstone of truth,” according to those 18th century Presbyterians, is “Its tendency to promote holiness.”

By “holiness” they meant life that reflects the love and righteousness, the light and justice of God.

Our forebears went on to declare, “No opinion can be either more pernicious or more absurd than that which brings truth and falsehood upon a level.”

Truth is in order to goodness.

Jesus couldn’t agree more: “You will know them by their fruits,” he said. “Are grapes gathered from thorns or figs from thistles?” (Matthew 7:16)

A few years ago, we chuckled at the notion of truthiness in our political and cultural ethos. That was then, and this is now, and it is no longer a laughing matter. With new technology the world of “alternative facts” has scaled up beyond anything we could ever have imagined. To quote Dorothy, “Toto, I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.”

In an interview this week, Dr. Jeffery Hinton, known as the “godfather” of artificial intelligence, was asked about the benefits and risks of AI. AI, he said, can be a force for astonishing good.  “Would you rather see a family doctor that has seen a few thousand patients or a family doctor that has seen a few hundred million patients, including with the same rare disease you have?”

A benefit of AI.

But, as we have been hearing a lot these days, there’s a deep shadow side to AI. At a recent UN conference on the risks of technology, a participant said, “AI can bring with it a host of unintended consequences. One of the most pernicious could be AI’s ability to spread misinformation at a pace and scale not seen before.”

Pernicious is the very word Presbyterians used 235 years ago to describe bringing “truth and falsehood upon a level.” It carries the connotation of malevolence. The use of this technology – not the technology itself – can be detrimental to our life together, even sinister.

Dr. Hinton recently left Google to speak out about the threats in the use of the technology he spent decades developing. The first danger he cites is “the risk of producing a lot of fake news so no one knows what’s true anymore.”

This has gone way beyond a mere press conference where someone claims something we all know to be false, and it begins to spread by people repeating and believing it.

Jesus was acutely aware of the power of what is true. “You shall know the truth,” he said, “And the truth will set you free.” (John 8:32)

But in an age when unregulated and unrestrained technology can easily be used to spread that which is untrue and present it as gospel – and I use that word intentionally – we will soon lose our freedom.

If truth is in order to goodness, when much of the world is filtered through and controlled by AI can we even know what is true?

By ourselves we cannot stop the malicious use of technology, but we can be careful with it and check its veracity when in doubt. We can use technology to verify the accuracy of technology. We can discern what is true and decide what we will do about it – even if that truth is painful or difficult to face in our personal lives, in our families and our relationships, in our city and nation today, and in its history. The truth can be hard to hear, but you and I, we are bound to pursue it and act on it.

A statement by the national church 40 years ago, in 1983, says,  “As Presbyterians we believe there is…no way to disconnect faith from practice. What we believe is reflected in our actions, both individually and corporately. Acceptance of untruths as truth is harmful…The truth of a particular idea is often revealed in the way it leads people to behave…Time is a test of truth.”

Truth is in order to goodness, sometimes over a long stretch of time.

The New York Times columnist Tom Friedman spoke this past week at an event here in town sponsored by World Savvy, a wonderful national education non-profit headquartered in Minneapolis. Friedman commented on the credo of the founder of Facebook Mark Zuckerman: move fast and break things.

Friedman countered: “In a speeding world, that which happens slowly is more important than ever.”

The three things such a world needs, he said, are self-motivation, the discipline to engage even when so much can be done for us, without our engagement; access, the capacity to get and use the technology; and, character.

Friedman focused on that last point, character. He named a number of “slow-moving” experiences that teach empathy and kindness and help create lasting, healthy community. At the top of his list was Sunday School – and he didn’t mean what happens only in churches; at this very moment, over at Temple Israel they are teaching in the synagogue what they call Sunday School.

People of faith instinctively know that slowing down helps us and our children see and listen and discern more carefully. Prayer slows us down. Music slows us down. Quiet slows us down. Every Wednesday evening people gather for mid-week worship in Westminster Hall that includes 5-6 minutes of silence together. It never seems long enough.

God rested on the seventh day in the Creation story and wonder at all that had been made. The Creator needed to stop and see the truth of all that beauty – and then pronounce it good. We are told to honor the Sabbath because human beings lose their way when they go fast all the time. Truth gets in when we slow down – and truth is in order to goodness.

We don’t often think of Jesus as having a focus on truth in his ministry. He healed, he taught, he loved those reviled or feared by others, he welcomed those excluded, he prayed, he listened, he gave his life for others. But what does all that have to do with truth?

It has everything to do with truth.

Jesus said, “I am the way the truth, and the life.” (John 14:6)

With his own life, Jesus points to the truth, truth with a capital T and the smaller, everyday truths at the core of our faith, that you and I try to live every day: that love is greater than fear and compassion stronger than hate, that dawn will follow even the longest night, that mercy leads to forgiveness and grace heals brokenness, that hope gives courage to seek justice against all odds. that we are not alone.

I John asks a simple question: “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love not in word or speech but in deed and truth. And by this we will know that we are from the truth.” (I John 3:17-19a)

We who follow Jesus are from the truth. We belong to the truth. That means how we live is not some random accident, controlled by some force outside of us, but a direct result of holding fast to the truth that God is love.

“We are persuaded,” the Presbyterians said long ago,,“That there is an inseparable connection between faith and practice, truth and duty. Otherwise, it would be of no consequence either to discover truth or to embrace it.” (PCUSA Book of Order, F-1.0304: Historic Principles)

Truth is in order to goodness.

Thanks be to God.

Amen.

Reactions

These Presbyterian “principles served—and still serve—as the foundation of values we hold dear and which we embrace as followers of Jesus.” “God’s love is the ultimate guide for how we live.”

“To say ‘truth is in order to goodness’ means that goodness results from following the truth. Truth leads to goodness.” “The great touchstone of truth [is]the tendency to promote . . . life that reflects the love and righteousness, the light and justice of God.”

Dr. Jeffrey Hinton, an expert on Artificial Intelligence (AI), says AI “can be a force of astonishing good,” such as enabling an M.D. to see medical results of a disease in vastly more cases. On the other hand, AI risks “producing a lot of fake news so that no one knows what’s true anymore.”

Tom Friedman, the New York Times columnist, says the world needs (a) self-motivation or the discipline to engage with the world; (b) the ability to get and use the ever-changing technology; and (c) character, which is shaped by “slow moving” experiences that teach empathy and kindness and help create lasting, healthy community. A prime example of such “slow moving” experiences is Sunday School in churches and synagogues.

“With his own life, Jesus points to the truth with a capital T and the smaller, everyday truths at the core of our faith, that you and I try to live every day: that love id greater than fear and compassion stronger than hate, that dawn will follow even the longest night, that mercy leads to forgiveness and grace heals brokenness, that hope gives courage to seek justice against all odds, and that we are not alone.”

============================

[1] Previous posts about this series of sermons:

The Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), dwkcommentaries.com (May 11, 2023); Minneapolis Westminster Presbyterian Church: Presbyterian Principles: God alone is Lord of the conscience, dwkcommentaries.com (May 12, 2023).

[2] Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, Sermon, Presbyterian Principles: Truth is in order to goodness (May 7, 2023); Bulletin, Westminster Presbyterian Church (Minneapolis) (May 7, 2023).

 

Minneapolis Westminster Presbyterian Church: Presbyterian Principles: God alone is Lord of the conscience     

On Sunday, April 30, 2023, Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, Senior Pastor at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church, delivered his first of three sermons on Presbyterian Principles. This one focused on ”God alone is Lord of the conscience.”[1]

Scripture

1 Corinthians 10:23-32

“All things are permitted,” but not all things are beneficial. “All things are permitted,” but not all things build up.  Do not seek your own advantage but that of the other.  Eat whatever is sold in the meat market without raising any question on the ground of conscience,  for “the earth and its fullness are the Lord’s.”  If an unbeliever invites you to a meal and you are disposed to go, eat whatever is set before you without raising any question on the ground of conscience.  But if someone says to you, “This has been offered in sacrifice,” then do not eat it, out of consideration for the one who informed you and for the sake of conscience—  I mean the other’s conscience, not your own. For why should my freedom be subject to the judgment of someone else’s conscience?  If I partake with thankfulness, why should I be denounced because of that for which I give thanks?

 So, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God.  Give no offense to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God.

Sermon[2]

Corinth in the first century was a busy commercial hub, a cultural crossroads, a Roman city, part of the empire, teeming with travelers, immigrants, sailors, outcasts, merchants, soldiers, impoverished people, wealthy citizens, free and enslaved persons, Greek-speakers, Latin speakers, Jews, practitioners of a wide variety of religions.

Archaeologists have found there more than two dozen temples and shrines to a veritable smorgasbord of gods of the time. One early traveler reported that right next to the Roman Forum in Corinth was a “temple for all the gods.” (J. Paul Sampley, The New Interpreter’s Bible, vol. X [Knoxville: Abingdon Press, 2002], p. 773-774)

Corinth, like our city and our nation today, was trying to live peacefully within the pluralism of the time – but there’s always potential for trouble when people of different religious traditions live together. Don’t we know that.

The fires in two mosques in south Minneapolis this past week – one of which was in the former Oliver Presbyterian Church building on Bloomington Avenue – are the latest examples of attacks on houses of worship in this city. During Passover Temple Israel was targeted by vandals who spray painted anti-Semitic slurs on the building. A third mosque was hit by vandalism two weeks ago.

We denounce these assaults and stand in solidarity with our Jewish and Muslim neighbors. An attack on one faith community is an attack on all faith communities.

We don’t know if that level of conflict was present in first-century Corinth, but from the Apostle Paul’s letters and other sources we do know the people in that ancient city struggled to live peacefully in a religiously plural society.

Paul walked into those challenges when he arrived in Corinth around the year 50 CE. He was newly converted from Judaism to the Way of Jesus and sensed a call to establish new churches among the Gentiles of the eastern Mediterranean. He was coming from Thessalonica and Philippi where he had already planted churches. Paul spent a couple years in Corinth and then left when things weren’t going well for him.

We’ve just listened to an excerpt from a letter Paul wrote to the church he had established in Corinth. Given their religiously diverse context, they were working hard to find their way. They were worried by some basic issues – especially, it turns out, about what to eat. Most of the meat in Corinthian markets had been sacrificed to idols, and the new Christians feared if they ate it, they would be violating rules of their faith and running afoul of the believing community.

They were struggling with temptation, after all, they wanted to eat, and with conscience – they thought it was forbidden. Paul assures the Corinthians. “Eat whatever is sold in the meat market without raising any question on the ground of conscience,” he says.

“If an unbeliever invites you to a meal, eat whatever is set before you without raising any question on the ground of conscience. But if someone says to you, ‘This has been offered in sacrifice,’ then do not eat it, out of consideration for the one who informed you, and for the sake of conscience—I mean the other’s conscience, not your own.” (I Corinthians 10:25, 27-29a)

Paul is trying to walk a fine line here, to find balance between sticking to one’s own religious beliefs and living in a world where many do not share the same convictions. He shows, frankly, a surprising degree of flexibility here. Good for Paul! At a point earlier in the letter in another passage about eating, he tells the Corinthians that if his eating meat were to cause a someone to stumble, he would become vegetarian. He was that serious about accommodating those of other traditions.

Paul listens well. He adapts his response to the situation with grace, rather than falling back on religious regulations. He’s trying to model his life after the life of Jesus, who showed no partiality.

“So, whether you eat or drink,” he says, “Or whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God. Give no offense to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God.”

Paul uses the Corinthian conundrum as more than a lesson in eating responsibly. For him it’s a metaphor for how to live peaceably with our neighbors. Where do we draw the line in our behavior toward others? How do we make moral decisions that affect more than only ourselves? How can I live with my own convictions and let others live with theirs – and stay in community with them?

Long ago Presbyterians recognized this very challenge, the challenge of respecting freedom of conscience in a complex, pluralistic world. In 1788 we adopted a set of defining principles of church order that became the foundational building blocks of life in the Presbyterian Church in this land. Westminster was established in Minneapolis only 70 years after their adoption. From the beginning through today, our congregation’s ministers and lay leaders have been guided by these tenets of life in the church – our ecclesiology: how we will be and do church. (In 1788 the Presbyterian Synod of New York and Philadelphia adopted these principles, now in the PCUSA Book of Order: F-3.01)

At issue for the Presbyterians, not unlike the Corinthians, was how to allow freedom for believers within the bounds of the faith of the Church. The principles – now nearly 235 years old – have stood the test of time. Today, especially in a period of deep division, distrust, animosity, suspicion of those outside our circles, and embrace of prevarication, principles such as these are important reminders that our faith gives rise to certain concrete values. Those values guide us in our life together, both in the church and in the world.

Over the next three Sundays we will explore three of what our denomination’s constitution calls “The Historic Principles of Church Order.” Today we look at the first: God alone is Lord of the conscience. (Book of Order, F-3.01)

Those words did not originate with American Presbyterians in the late 18th century. They were borrowed from the Westminster Confession, written by Scottish theologians, and adopted by Presbyterians from Scotland meeting in Westminster Abbey in 1640. Our church’s name honors that history.

This first foundational principle is embedded in a longer sentence:

“That God alone is Lord of the conscience and hath left it free from the doctrines and commandments of (people) which are in anything contrary to God’s Word, or beside it, in matters of faith or worship.”

Presbyterians have always sought to balance the binding of conscience by the Word of God with individual responsibility when it comes to faith:

“Therefore,” the church’s constitution declares, “We consider the rights of private judgment, in all matters that respect religion, as universal and unalienable.”

That’s a lot of fancy 17th century wording that means, simply: No one can tell another person what to believe. Each of us has the right – indeed, the responsibility – to decide for ourselves. Presbyterians recognize that at the heart of Christian faith is not a set of rules imposed from some authority beyond us. Frankly, it might a little easier to follow Jesus if what that means were spelled out in a list that we could simply check off, but that’s not how we do our Christianity.

Christian faith is not a set of rules imposed from some authority beyond us, but a relationship each of us has with God in Jesus Christ and with our neighbor. Relationships are living, dynamic realities; religion based on fixed rules depletes faith of its life. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said Christianity is not a religion, but a relationship. Faith is a living, breathing relationship, not a set of fixed declarations we must obey. Think of our own personal connections and our life in community – the healthiest ones are based on relationships, not rules.

Paul could have said that under no circumstances should food sacrificed to idols be considered off limits because avoiding such food would give credence to idol worship. But instead, the Apostle shows how a Christ-like ethic works: if the food in question is considered holy by a person of another religious tradition, don’t eat it out of respect for that person’s conscience, setting aside your own conscience.

Paul is reminding the Corinthians that the goal of Christian living is to honor God and neighbor. It’s as if he were saying, God alone is Lord of the conscience and hath left it free from the commandments of people which are in anything contrary to God’s Word.

All theology in our tradition begins and ends with the sovereignty of God, but the sovereignty of God has eroded over time. Today it has been supplanted by the sovereignty of self. The 16th century Westminster divines had no intention of displacing the Lordship of God with a freewheeling Christianity tethered to nothing other than the whims of one’s own heart or mind.

Much of what seeks to pass for Christianity today is little more than self-driven ambition seeking power or privilege or prosperity, or anger propelled by fear that sees the other as someone to condemn and exclude, with a cloak of religiosity draped over it.

The lofty right of private judgement in matters of faith has been perverted in our time. It has descended into a maelstrom of assertions bearing little resemblance to the Word of God found in scripture and proclaimed in the words of Jesus preached by the Church. One cannot genuinely hold to the love of God and at the same time violate the image of God in other human beings by cruelty or injustice or contempt or gunfire. One cannot claim to follow Jesus and ignore how he lived and what he taught and whom he healed.

The exercise of individual religious liberty takes place within certain responsibilities. The foundational principle here is that God alone is Lord of the conscience. The competing claim rampant in our time is that self alone is the lord of conscience.

If we affirm that God is sovereign over all of life, we cannot simultaneously put ourselves at the center and shove God aside and push neighbor away, no matter how different they are or how much we fear them or how thoroughly we reject their politics. Paul’s experience in Corinth taught him that God’s image is present in every person, and, therefore, every person is deserving of respect and dignity and the fullness of their own humanity, their God-given humanity.

The Apostle can sometimes come off as narrow-minded or exclusive – especially toward women – but in Corinth, in this letter we read today, he shows a full grasp of God’s radical intention in Jesus Christ: to make love the essence of our lives, so that what we do or say – everything we do or say – is always considered by its impact on others and on the Other.

“Our own good,” one author says, “Is inextricably tied up with the good of all others.” (J. Paul Sampley, The New Interpreter’s Bible, vol. X [Knoxville: Abingdon Press, 2002], p. p22)

Ethics, morality, conscience – they’re all worked out in community, not in isolation.

Our world is desperate for a new way of life together. To proclaim that God alone is Lord of the conscience, as we do, is to declare that love alone is Lord of the conscience.

Love leads the way. It takes us to a theology of grace and hope. And that theology compels us to join people of other faith traditions and people of goodwill to work toward a culture of kindness and generosity, a politics of humility and compassion, a social order that is fair and just.

As those who follow Jesus, that is our work, and it begins anew every day.

Thanks be to God.

Amen.

Reactions

This sermon and its inspiration from 1 Corinthians deliver a very important message that was [and is] embraced by U.S. Presbyterians in the 18th century and today. “We consider the rights of private judgment, in all matters that respect religion as universal and unalienable.” In short, “No one can tell another person what to believe. Each of us has the right—indeed, the responsibility—to decide for ourselves. . . . One cannot genuinely hold to the love of God and  at the same time violate the image of God in other human beings by cruelty or injustice or contempt or gunfire. “

“God’s radical intention in Jesus Christ [is] to make love the essence of our lives, so that . . . everything we do or say –is always considered by its impact on others and on the Other. . . . [That] theology compels us to join people of other faith traditions and people of good will to work toward a culture of kindness and generosity, a politics of humility and compassion, a social order that is fair and just.”

“As those who follow Jesus, that is our work, and it begins anew every day.”

==========================

 

[1] A previous post discussed the source of these sermons: The Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), dwkcommentaries.com (May 11, 2023).

[2] Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, Sermon: Presbyterian Principles: God is Lord of the conscience, Westminster Presbyterian Church (April 30, 2023); Westminster Presbyterian Church, Bulletin (April 30, 2023).

 

 

The Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)    

I am a member and non-ruling elder of Westminster Presbyterian Church (Minneapolis), which is a member of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) denomination. The latter’s Constitution consists of the following two parts.

Part I: The Book of Confessions

This Book contains the following confessions:

  1. The Nicene Creed (A.D. 381)
  2. The Apostles’ Creed (A.D. 180)
  3. The Scots Confession (1560)
  4. The Heidelberg Catechism [Germany] (1562)
  5. The Second Helvetic Confession [Switzerland/Germany] (1561)
  6. The Westminster Confession of Faith [Scotland/England] (1647, 1649)
  7. The Shorter Catechism [Scotland/England] (1649)
  8. The Larger Catechism [Scotland/England] (1649)
  9. The Theological Declaration of Barmen [Germany] (1934)
  10. The Confession of 1967 [U.S.A.]
  11. The Confession of Belhar [South Africa] (1980)
  12. A Brief Confession of Faith—Presbyterian Church [U.S.A.](1983)

Some of these confessions are very short while others are very long. The only one I recall reading or studying is The Confession of Belhar, which was created in South Africa as a result of its struggles over apartheid and which was discussed in my blog post, The Confession of Belhar Is Adopted by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), dwkcommentaries.com (July 21, 2016).

Part II: The Book of Order 2019-2023.

The Book of Order consists of the following:

  • The Foundations of Presbyterian Polity (The Mission of the Church, The Church and Its Confessions and Principles of Order and Government)
  • The Form of Government,
  • Directory for Worship, and
  • Rules of Discipline.

I do not recall reading or studying any parts of The Book of Order, except for three of the Principles of Order and Government that were or will be discussed in the following sermons by Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, our Senior Pastor, and that will be examined in subsequent posts to this blog:

  • Presbyterian Principles: God alone is Lord of the Conscience (April 30, 2023);
  • Presbyterian Principles: Truth is in order to goodness (May 7, 2023); and
  • Presbyterian Principles: It is our duty to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other (May 14, 2023).

 

 

The Prayer Jesus Taught: “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil”   

On March 26, 2023, Rev. Dr. Tim Hart-Andersen, the Senior Pastor at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church, delivered the last of his five sermons on different passages of the Lord’s Prayer.[1] This sermon was on the following portion of the third sentence (in bold) of that Prayer:

  • “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen. “

Scripture: Psalm 46 

God is our refuge and strength,
a very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change,
though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains tremble with its tumult. Selah

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy habitation of the Most High.
God is in the midst of the city; it shall not be moved;
God will help it when the morning dawns.
The nations are in an uproar; the kingdoms totter;
he utters his voice; the earth melts.
The Lord of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah

Come, behold the works of the Lord;
see what desolations he has brought on the earth.
He makes wars cease to the end of the earth;
he breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
he burns the shields with fire.
 Be still, and know that I am God!
I am exalted among the nations;
I am exalted in the earth.”
 The Lord of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah

Sermon[2]

The annual Art-A-Whirl in northeast Minneapolis is like a pub crawl through hundreds of artist studios. We try to go every year, and we always stop in to see artist James Nutt, a Westminster member. One evening a few years ago, standing in his studio, I found myself staring at a painting showing bands of color arranged in horizontal lines.

“What do you think it is?” he asked.

It took me awhile before I realized I was looking at an artistic representation of the prayer Jesus taught. It now hangs on the wall above my desk at home, as if guiding me in my work. James’ watercolor has been on the cover of our worship bulletins during Lent and is currently in the Westminster Gallery.

I invite you to take a moment to look at the bulletin cover. Slowly say the prayer in your mind and watch the colors bring the words to life. Notice how the colors correspond to different terms in the prayer. “Father” and “Name” are both burgundy; “heaven” and “kingdom” both blue.

Can you find And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil? Those words are in the third and fourth lines up from the bottom.

The colors used for the words temptation and evil stand out. They’re among the largest blocks of color in the prayer. The strong red of temptation looms and intimidates – as temptation does in real life. The midnight darkness of the word evil appears as a hole into which light and hope and joy might disappear – as we have seen in places of violence and hatred in our world.

Stanley Hauerwas says the prayer’s colorful words in this line – temptation, deliverance, evil – indicate that “at this point the temperature rises with the Lord’s Prayer. Things are not right in the world.” (Lord, Teach Us [Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1996], p. 88)

The colors reflect our own struggle to find a way through those places and moments where we are tested, when we come to a decision point in life and are tempted to take the easy win even if it leaves others behind, or where doing the right thing would mean giving up some privilege or power and we’re not sure we can do that.

And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.

The Church has always been troubled about the meaning of these words. Why would God “lead us into temptation?” Some early versions of this line avoid casting God in this light and render it, do not allow us to be led into temptation, as if Jesus hadn’t really meant to say what he said because it could never be God’s intention that we would face temptation.

Even modern voices have tried “to fix” the prayer here. One church member told me they pray “lead us away from temptation.” And a few years ago, Pope Francis declared that the wording in the prayer Jesus taught ought to be,  “Do not let us fall into temptation.”

The word here in the ancient Greek – eisenenkes – is not in dispute. Try as we might to alter the translation, it means to lead or bring someone into a place or situation. It’s the same word used to describe what the friends do for the man paralyzed when they lower him through the roof to Jesus. They bring him into that place.

The watercolor’s use of red for temptation makes that word leap out. Why would God appear to be threatening to steer us into temptation, into the red place, so much so that Jesus instructs us to try to convince God not to do so?

Some scholars think this line should be read in the context of the early Church’s expectation of the end of time – the eschaton – when believers would be under enormous pressure to abandon the faith. That may be, but I think this line is personal for Jesus. The one line in the prayer where we get a glimpse into Jesus’ own heart.

When he prays in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night of his betrayal, only hours before his death, Jesus is terrified of what is coming. He throws himself on the ground and prays, “Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me.”

And when his disciples fall asleep in the Garden, Jesus uses the wording of the prayer he taught: “Stay awake and pray that you may not come into temptation.” (Matthew 26:41)

Jesus is afraid of what will happen when he comes into the time of trial. After all, he has already been there. This line in the prayer echoes the experience of Jesus at the start of his ministry. Immediately following his baptism, Jesus is “led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.” (Matthew 4:1)

Jesus does not “fall into temptation;” he is led there by the Spirit.

These forty days of Lent are an annual reminder that the life of Jesus is framed by times of trial that he faces, each one of which God leads him into – first in the wilderness and, finally, in the Garden. Each instance tests his capacity to stay with God and not give in to fear or violence or thirst for power.

Jesus answers every temptation put before him in the desert by falling back on God’s word – this may be a guide for us. When the evil one tells a hungry Jesus to turn stones into bread he replies, “It is written: ‘One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’’

When the evil one takes Jesus to a high peak and tells him to throw himself off, trusting that God will save him, Jesus replies, “It is written, ‘Do not put God to the test.’”

When the evil one offers Jesus all the realms of the world if he would but worship him, Jesus replies, “It is written, ‘Worship God and serve God only.’”

In the Garden, when Jesus says to God, “take this cup from me,” in the next breath Jesus says, “Yet not what I want, but what you want.” (Matthew 4:1-11) He gives himself over to the will of God.

Lead us not into that which frightens us – and be present when we get there.

[Poet] Mary Oliver addresses the paradox of this line in the prayer Jesus taught, in her poem The Uses of Sorrow.]

  • “(In my sleep I dreamed this poem)

Someone I loved once gave me

a box full of darkness.

It took me years to understand

that this, too, was a gift.”

We live in a culture awash in debilitating fear. Fear can be like that dark hole in the watercolor that drains light and hope and joy. Fear leads us into the temptation to define others as evil, which limits possibilities for change in them and in us. We arm ourselves with weapons both real and metaphoric, convinced they will protect us from what we fear – and that can lead to violence.

John Dominic Crossan argues that the specific first century temptation referenced in this line in the prayer, is the use of violence to overthrow the occupying Roman empire. Lead us not into the temptation to be violent but deliver us from that evil. It may be that in our time we would be helped by seeing that one of the evils from which we need to be delivered is that same temptation to violence – real or imagined – born of our unrelenting fear. (The Greatest Prayer [NY: Harper, 2010], p. 175)

Jesus teaches us to pray so that we might live with courage in the midst of difficult realities and challenging times, of the sort we live in now. The prayer wants us to face our fears – and we all have them – by trusting in God and holding fast to our faith.

The psalmist understands this. In the midst of what must have been a traumatic, harrowing experience of some kind, the Hebrew poet says,

  • “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore, we will not fear, though the earth should change, though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble with its tumult.” (Psalm 46:1-3)

And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the tumult of evil.

God leads us into times of trial and places of fear in order to be there with us. Who better to stand with us when the world closes in or falls apart? God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore, we will not let fear overcome our faith, our trust that God will see us through.

In Jesus, God enters fully into our suffering, to be there when we face our deepest fears, including our own mortality, as we did at the start of this season weeks ago, with the smudge of ashes.

Next Sunday Holy Week begins. On Good Friday, when Jesus goes to the cross, it will be the ultimate act of God’s solidarity with the human community. We are not alone. We will hear that baptismal promise in a few moments. “The God of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob is our refuge.” (Psalm 46:7, 10a)

Jesus, in this line in the prayer, wants to spare us the fear of coming up alone against that which can be our undoing. It’s as if he were saying, Because I’ve been there and know how frightening it can be, pray like this with all your heart: lead us, O God, not into temptation, but deliver us, when we get there, from evil.

And that’s where Jesus ends the prayer he teaches – with fear and temptation, deliverance and evil, right on the edge of the darkest color, which the poet says is a gift.

We may miss those final words most of us learned to say at the end of the prayer, but the oldest Greek manuscripts end the prayer abruptly, as Matthew does. The first English translations – including the King James – were not aware of those older texts but relied instead on other early renditions that concluded with the praise of God, what the church calls a doxology, which then became the prayer most of us learned as Protestants.

The prayer Jesus taught conveys what we need to know as people who follow him:

  • that God is as close to us as a parent even as God is also sovereign;
  • that Jesus teaches us to pray using “we” and “our” to remind us that this prayer is not private, and neither is our faith;
  • that this is a Jubilee prayer hoping for the time when all are fed, debts forgiven, and evil overcome.

With all of that, it is fitting that the church has chosen to retain in the prayer Jesus taught that one last burst of color at the end: For yours is the reign, the power, and the glory forever.

Thanks be to God.

Amen

Reactions

This line of the Prayer, for me, is the most difficult one to understand and embrace as it suggests that God can and may lead me into temptation.

But, as the sermon says, each of us has faced, and will face, “struggle[s] to find a way through those places and moments where we are tested . . . and are tested to take the easy win even if it leaves others behind, or where doing the right thing would mean giving up some privilege or power and we’re not sure we can do that.”

“Even the life of Jesus is framed by times of trial that he faces, each one of which God leads him into—first in the wilderness, and, finally, in the Garden. Each instance tests his capacity to stay with God and not give in to fear or violence or thirst for power.” But “Jesus answers every temptation put before him . . . by falling back on God’s word.”

=================

[1] Earlier posts about this series of sermons: The Lord’s Prayer at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church (May 2, 2023); The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name”  (May 4, 2023); The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Thy kingdom come, they will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (May 6, 2023).The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Give us this day, our daily bread” (May 8, 2023); The Prayer Jesus Taught: “And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors (May 9, 2023).

[2] Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, Sermon, The Prayer Jesus Taught: “And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil), Westminster Presbyterian Church (Mar. 26, 2023); Bulletin, Westminster Presbyterian Church (Mar. 26, 2023).

 

The Prayer Jesus Taught: “And forgive us for our debts as we forgive our debtors”   

On March 19, 2023, Rev. Dr. Tim Hart-Andersen, the Senior Pastor at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church, delivered the fourth of his five sermons on different passages of the Lord’s Prayer. [1] This sermon was on the following portion of the third sentence (in bold) of that Prayer:

“Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen. “

Scripture

Leviticus 25:8-12, 35-41

“You shall count off seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so that the period of seven weeks of years gives forty-nine years. Then you shall have the trumpet sounded loud; on the tenth day of the seventh month—on the Day of Atonement—you shall have the trumpet sounded throughout all your land. And you shall hallow the fiftieth year, and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you: you shall return, every one of you, to your property and every one of you to your family. That fiftieth year shall be a Jubilee for you: you shall not sow or reap the aftergrowth or harvest the unpruned vines. For it is a Jubilee; it shall be holy to you: you shall eat only what the field itself produces.”

“If any of your kin fall into difficulty and become dependent on you, you shall support them; they shall live with you as though resident aliens. Do not take interest in advance or otherwise make a profit from them, but fear your God; let them live with you. You shall not lend them your money at interest taken in advance or provide them food at a profit. I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan, to be your God.”

“If any who are dependent on you become so impoverished that they sell themselves to you, you shall not make them serve as slaves. They shall remain with you as hired or bound laborers. They shall serve with you until the year of the Jubilee. Then they and their children with them shall go out from your authority; they shall go back to their own family and return to their ancestral property.”

The Sermon[2]

 Along the way in this sermon series on the prayer Jesus taught I’ve heard from several of you eager to get to this particular petition. I have been eager, too. I’m glad we’re finally here. Of all the lines in the prayer Jesus taught, this one differs most in its wording among various Christian traditions, which can lead to a variety of interpretations. What was Jesus teaching here?

It’s complicated – and, lest we forget, the Apostle Paul reminds us that “All…have fallen short of the glory of God…. There is no one” – debtor, sinner, trespasser – “who is righteous, not even one.” (Romans 3:23, 10)

On that basis we could conclude that it’s of no consequence which wording we use; in the end, we all miss the mark, whatever the mark might be. But there’s more to the story. The different words we use come from the gospels themselves and from church tradition. The language we use matters, as we have seen in this series

One of the points in this series on the prayer Jesus taught is that language evolves. In that sense it is living. We should guard against the calcification of the vocabulary of our faith. Our spiritual practices – no matter the particular wording – always want to reflect the dynamic interaction with God that Jesus longs for us to have. And the words do matter.

And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.

The prayer Jesus taught appears only in two gospels, each with its own version of this line. In Luke Jesus teaches, “And forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone indebted to us.” In Matthew, on the other hand, he makes no mention of sin: “ [(Luke 11:4} “And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors” – the version we pray at Westminster.  [Matthew 6:12)]

This is not a matter of a typo or confusion about someone’s handwriting. The Greek words here are quite distinct: “debt” is opheiléma, while “sin” is hamartia. The gospels writers chose their vocabulary with intention, leaving us to sort it out.

To add to the puzzle, the Greek word for trespass does not appear in either gospel version of the prayer Jesus taught, although it does show up later. Trespass makes its debut in the first full English translation of the Bible in 1526, done by William Tyndale, who got into trouble for doing it and eventually was deemed a heretic and executed in 1536. Tyndale’s Bible became widely popular and influenced the way English-speakers said the prayer Jesus taught. To this day, many Episcopalians, Methodists, Lutherans, Catholics, and others use “trespasses.”

The King James version, published almost a century after Tyndale, shifted back to the original Greek and used “debt” and “debtors,” and that’s where the Presbyterians landed and have been ever since. And forgive us our “debts” as we forgive our “debtors”. This is not random use of language. Jesus prays debts and debtors for a reason. In doing so, he intentionally introduces economic language into the prayer. When Jesus teaches about hunger in the prayer – give us this day our daily bread – he’s reminding us that people need to eat. Now when he speaks of economics, he’s reminding us another basic truth: that debt – not metaphorical or spiritualized indebtedness but simply not having enough money – can crush and impoverish people.

In our culture debt is a given for most of us. Capitalism is sustained by debt. Westminster gets this. We’re working hard right now in a campaign to pay off the congregation’s debt. As one Westminster member said, “Forgive us our debt, so we can pursue our mission.” If only the lenders were listening!

When we substitute “sins” for “debts” we miss the specific kind of forgiveness Jesus is aiming at here. Debt is unequivocally an economic term. Sin is a theological word. If we use sin, the wording seems directed to our private, individual behavior, as if Jesus were referring to my moral failings for which I need forgiveness, or my need to forgive wrongs done to me. That makes forgiveness a matter of letting go of personal offenses or owning up to my own immorality– which may be good to do, but it is not what Jesus is after here.

And trespassing has to do with crossing boundaries – a transgression that violates someone else’s property, which was a problem in 16th century England when Tyndale decided to employ that word. The language used by Jesus in the prayer as taught in Matthew, is concerned neither with property nor sin. It’s carefully intended to point toward economic realities. And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. By using this terminology, Jesus is taking forgiveness into the realm of systemic economic justice, which concerns the collective, rather than the individual. The prayer Jesus taught draws on a long tradition in Judaism of the hope for a Year of Jubilee. “You shall count off…seven times seven years,” Leviticus says,

  • “So that the period of seven…years gives forty-nine years. Then you shall have the trumpet sounded loud…And you shall hallow the fiftieth year, and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you.” (Leviticus 25:8-11)

It’s an old dream, and the prophets of Israel never give up on it as a possibility, and neither should we. Isaiah speaks of Jubilee when he says,

  • “The spirit of…God is upon me, because…God has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor.” (Isaiah 61:1-2)

In her book Church in the Round, Letty Russell says the prophet’s vision here announces, “that memory of God’s future is already happening as the oppressed are set at liberty and the jubilee year arrives.” (Letty Russell, Church in the Round [Louisville: John Knox Press, 1993], p. 81)

The memory of God’s future is already happening, as Jubilee arrives.

That Jubilee vision gives rise to the incarnation. Jesus quotes the same lines from Isaiah when he preaches in his home synagogue at the start of his ministry. It nearly gets him killed because Jubilee threatens the exiting economic order and promises to change the way we live by upending the existing economic order.

  • “For it is a Jubilee; it shall be holy to you…If any of your kin fall into difficulty and become dependent on you, you shall support them…You shall not lend them your money at interest taken in advance or provide them food at a profit. I am the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt.” (Leviticus 25:12, 35, 37-38)

The Year of Jubilee as understood by the ancient Hebrew people and carried forward by the prophets if Israel and then enfleshed in the person of Jesus Christ, is to be the season when God’s intentions for human community are realized.

  • “If any who are dependent on you become so impoverished that they sell themselves to you, you shall not make them serve as enslaved people. They shall remain with you as hired…laborers. They shall serve with you until the year of the Jubilee. Then they and their children with them shall…go back to their own family.” (Leviticus 25:39-41)

Jubilee repairs the world. It offers a way for justice to be done, for relationships to be restored, for the broken places in society to be healed, for economic inequities to be eased. The prayer Jesus taught is a Jubilee prayer. It is a prayer for our time, especially in America, one of the wealthiest nations on the planet, “that devotes far fewer resources” to the reduction of poverty “as a share of its gross national product than other rich democracies.” (Matthew Desmond, America Is in a Disgraced Class of its Own; N.Y. Times, March 16, 2023)

Princeton professor Matthew Desmond says,

  • “Poverty is chronic pain, on top of tooth rot, on top of debt collector harassment, on top of the nauseating fear of eviction. It is the suffocation of your talents and your dreams. It is death come early and often.”

And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. The federal hourly minimum wage is $7.25, just over $15,000 a year, and that number has not changed since 2009. Minnesota’s minimum wage is $10.59 for large employers, which equates to slightly more than $22,000 a year. Today in our nation, 38 million people live below the poverty line, which is $26,500 a year. To pay rent and other bills, to purchase food, to support children, to pay for transportation – merely to survive, day after day, people go into debt, and that debt then holds them captive.

During the pandemic, in what became an unintentional experiment, the federal government expanded the Child Tax Credit and in six months child poverty was cut in half, to the lowest level in 50 years. In only six months. And with the monthly infusion of cash support for families during the pandemic, food insecurity was the lowest it has been in 20 years. Banks reported that their lowest income customers had a 50% increase in their account balances from before the pandemic. (https://www.vox.com/2022/9/14/23352022/child-poverty-covid-tax-credit)

We know how to do this.

“The hard part isn’t designing effective antipoverty programs or figuring out how to pay for them,” Professor Desmond says. “The hard part is ending our addiction to poverty.”

In the prayer Jesus taught he’s inviting us to imagine the Jubilee, where a resetting of economic priorities and a realignment of relationships takes place, and encumbered people are freed, land taken returned, crushing debts forgiven, and equity within the community begins to be re-established.

The prayer, especially with its economic implications, confirms Isaiah’s hope long ago, that someday we might be called “repairers of the breach, restorers of streets to live in.” (Isaiah 58:12b)

And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.

This line we pray so casually week after week is a summons to get serious, to get serious about undoing the harm inflicted by economic realities in our land on the most vulnerable among us. The prayer Jesus taught commits us, as we pray it, to the work of dismantling the very real, unjust disparities that exist in our world.

There is scant evidence that the Year of Jubilee as imagined in Leviticus was ever fully implemented, but that doesn’t mean we should stop praying for it.

In fact – and as far as I’m concerned this settles it – by using debts and debtors in the prayer Jesus taught, we are praying for the more just economic order that God envisions.

To God be the glory.

Amen.

Reactions

For a long time, I have thought that the correct version of this line was the one said by Lutherans and many other Christian churches that referenced “trespasses” and “trespassed” because those words, for me, connoted wrongs or sins. On the other hand, the words “debts” and “debtors” that we use at Westminster for me connoted legitimate economic transactions.

This sermon, therefore, surprised and shocked me. It really is a radical call for upsetting the existing order of things. As Rev. Hart-Andersen said, “ Jesus is taking forgiveness into the realm of systemic economic justice, which concerns the collective, rather than the individual. The prayer Jesus taught draws on a long tradition in Judaism of the hope for a year of Jubilee. [After 49 years of normal or regular economic transactions, on the fiftieth year, as Leviticus says] you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you.”

This passage of the Prayer made me wonder whether  in Jesus’ days most people lived in small villages or towns where people knew one another and had limited financial dealings with one another and, therefore, would find it easier to forgive debts.

When, however, Jesus preaches this message at the start of his ministry, it “nearly gets him killed because Jubilee threatens the existing economic order and promises to change the way we live by upending the existing economic order.”

Moreover, given the contemporary size and complexity of financial transactions among different governments, international banks, other corporations and individuals, it is impossible for any individual or collection of individuals to forgive such debts and indebtedness. Moreover, today the U.S. is in the midst of a challenging threat to that international economic system with whether or not the U.S. federal government will increase the limit on its indebtedness.

Therefore, this line of the prayer for today’s world calls for the adoption and implementation of antipoverty programs all over the world or, as this sermon says, this Jesus prayer “commits us, as we pray it, to the work of dismantling the very real, unjust disparities that exist in our world” and creating “the more just economic order that God envisions.”

================================

[1] Earlier posts about this series of sermons: The Lord’s Prayer at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church (May 2, 2023); The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name”  (May 4, 2023);The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Thy kingdom come, they will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (May 6, 2023); The Prayer Jesus Taught: ”Give us this day, our daily bread” (May 8, 2023).

[2] Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen. Sermon: The Prayer Jesus Taught: “And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors” (Mar. 19, 2023); Bulletin, Westminster Presbyterian Church (Minneapolis) (Mar. 19, 2023).

The Prayer Jesus Taught: ”Give us this day, our daily bread” 

On March 12, 2023, Rev. Dr. Tim Hart-Andersen, the Senior Pastor at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church, delivered the third of his five sermons on different passages of the Lord’s Prayer.[1] This sermon was on a portion of the third sentence (in bold) of that Prayer:

  • “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen. “

Scripture

Luke 12: 13-24  (New Revised Standard Version)

“Someone in the crowd said to [Jesus], ‘Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.’  But [Jesus] said to him, “Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?”  And [Jesus] said to them, “Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.”  Then [Jesus] told them a parable: ‘The land of a rich man produced abundantly.  And he thought to himself, ‘What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?’  Then he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.  And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’  But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’  So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”

“[Jesus] said to his disciples, ‘Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear.  For life is more than food and the body more than clothing.  Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds!’

Sermon[2]

Our Lenten exploration of the prayer Jesus taught has prompted a lot of response. I’m hearing from many of you, which is great. It’s like a dialogue. That happens when we peel back layers of an essential and powerful part of our faith.

One church member told me he still remembers a sermon series on the prayer Jesus taught, delivered from this pulpit by Don Meisel more than three decades ago. Some have said they intend to continue using traditional language – Father, kingdom, thy, thine. Others say they are using altered vocabulary – Father/Mother, reign, realm, you, yours. Someone handed me a worship bulletin with her preferred terms penciled in above the scratched out printed words. Still others have sent prayers that follow the basic outline of what Jesus taught yet with entirely new wording.

We may hear these different versions in worship as we say the prayer together, and that’s fine. It won’t be the first time. Haven’t we all noticed when we say this prayer at a Minnesota wedding or memorial service, a little competition breaks out in the pews over debts and trespasses? We’ll get to that next week.

The 20-second spiritual practice called the Lord’s Prayer is important to us. The prayer Jesus taught is so deeply embedded in our consciousness and in our hearts that hearing it – just hearing it start – provokes a kinetic memory in the body; we want to fold our hands, close our eyes, and bow our heads. It’s intrinsic to our faith. Will Willimon, a retired Methodist Bishop and theologian, has said, “A Christian is…someone who has learned to pray the Lord’s Prayer.” (Lord, Teach Us [Nashville: Abingdon, 1996], p. 18)

I think that bar is a little low, and that how someone lives may, in fact, be a better indicator of Christian faith, but his point is that people who follow Jesus learn the prayer he teaches. And most of us learn it early in life. One of my favorite moments in worship happens when I hear a young voice saying the prayer loud enough to be heard over the rest of us.

Now we turn to today’s line from the prayer: Give us this day our daily bread.

With this line Jesus signals a shift in the prayer away from the opening words about the holiness of God and God’s reign to more specific, human needs. Several petitions follow in rapid succession, each with an imperative: Give. Forgive. Lead. Deliver. The urgent verbs of these petitions sound almost impertinent, so demanding of God as to be disrespectful. That Jesus would teach us to use such strong wording in our prayer indicates how much we can trust the one to whom we pray. God wants our authentic selves in prayer. A parent hears this kind of language from their child all the time – the demanding imperatives that parents deal with, God has to deal with from us in this prayer.

We have been watching the pronouns in the prayer. From the start Jesus teaches that we do not offer privatized prayer to “my” God. Nowhere in the prayer does the first-person pronoun appear. That’s true even when we get to these petitions, each of which is intensely personal – I worry about my bread, my debt, my forgiveness, my temptations I’ll worry about mine; you worry about yours. Those are all challenges in life you and I know about intimately, but Jesus does not want us to think of ourselves as facing them alone, in isolation from others. It’s not give me today my daily bread. Life doesn’t work like that. In the prayer, it’s our bread, our debts, our temptations.

In the film A Man Called Otto, Tom Hanks plays Otto Anderson. Following the death of his wife and his 4 4 retirement Otto feels that his world has ended. He slips further and further into isolation. He closes in on himself and cuts himself off from others. Otto’s neighbor Marisol tries to break through to him repeatedly, but cannot. Finally, she says to him, “You think your life is so hard and…you have to do it all on your own – well guess what? You can’t. No one can.”

The film follows the story of the neighbors surrounding Otto, helping him understand he is not alone and that no one can do life by themselves. Eventually they become a small community around Otto and bring him back to the land of the living. We cannot thrive in life apart from others.

Jesus communicates that truth when he teaches that we use collective pronouns when we pray, because life is not a private, isolated, atomized reality. We are created for community.

Give us this day our daily bread.

This phrase in the prayer stands out in the biblical Greek. Unlike the other petitions in the prayer that begin with a verb – forgive, lead, deliver – this line starts with a noun: bread. It reads literally something like this: The bread of us daily, give us today. Jesus focuses here more on the bread, than the giving of it. Daily bread. Bread daily.

As Jesus taught this line in the prayer his listeners, who knew the stories of the Hebrew people, would have heard an illusion to the “bread of heaven” that came down to the hungry Israelites as they escaped from enslavement in Egypt and wandered the wilderness. God provided manna daily, daily manna, and it sustained the people. It was only one day’s nourishment, and everyone received the same amount. No manna was wasted. No manna could be hoarded from one day to the next.

Jesus draws on that image as a way to teach us the difference between what is necessary for life and what is beyond sufficient. The parable of the rich farmer and his barns echoes the old story of the Israelites and the manna. When the land produces more than he could possibly consume, rather than share it with those in need, he decides to tear down his barns and build new, bigger ones to keep it all for himself. That way he can “relax, eat, drink, and be merry.”

Something like the American dream, isn’t it.

“’You fool,’” God says to the rich man in the parable, “This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves, but are not rich toward God…Be on your 6 6 guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.” (Luke 12:15-21)

 Give us this day our daily bread.

It would be hypocritical for the rich man in the parable with his hoarded surplus of grain to pray this line in the prayer Jesus taught. How could he pray only for his own needs to be met and ignore those of his neighbors? That may help explain the placement of the teaching of the prayer Jesus taught in Luke’s gospel. The prayer precedes by only a few paragraphs the moment when Jesus tells the parable of the rich man and his extra barns, as if Jesus were saying, remember the prayer I just taught? This is what I was trying to communicate: we all need bread each day, and if you have more than enough, then share it.

 The writing of early Christians on this line in the prayer shows that the Church understood exactly what Jesus was aiming at here. The Didache, a treatise on Christian faith written in the second century, and one of the earliest non-canonical sources of the prayer Jesus taught, says this:

  • “Do not be like those who are prompt to open their hand to receive and prompt to close it when it comes to giving…You shall not reject the needy but will share all things…and call nothing your own. If you share the eternal goods, shouldn’t you share even more those that are in passing?” (Quoted by Justo Gonzalez in Teach Us to Pray [Grand Rapids, Eerdmans; 2020], p. 110)

Praying this simple line about bread can be costly. In fact, that’s true of the entire prayer Jesus teaches. We should sit up and pay attention when we offer it each week in worship. Frederick Buechner warns us about the prayer.

  • “We do well not to pray it lightly. It takes guts to pray it at all. We can pray it in the unthinking and perfunctory way we usually do only by disregarding what we are saying…To speak those words is to let the tiger out of the cage, to unleash a power that makes atomic power look like a warm breeze.” (Quoted in Will Willimon, Lord, Teach Us [Nashville: Abingdon, 1996], Epigraph)

Give us this day our daily bread.

To pray like that is to reject the culture of continuous consumption and instead learn to be satisfied with only what we need. This is a prayer and a commitment, a promise to help meet the most basic needs of others.

Pope Francis, elected pope ten years ago tomorrow, has written a short book of the prayer Jesus taught. “When we pray the Our Father,” he says, using the Catholic terminology,

  • “It would be good for us to linger a bit over this petition – ‘give us bread today’ – and to think about how many people do not have this bread. At home as children, when a piece of bread fell, my family taught us to pick it up right away and kiss it. Bread was never thrown away. Bread is a symbol of the unity of humanity; a symbol of God’s love for you.” (Pope Francis, Our Father [Milano, Rizzoli Libri; 2017], p. 74- 75)

Last year in Minnesota the use of food shelves skyrocketed by 53.5%. Jesus is teaching us here to rein in our consumptive impulses and simply pray for something to eat for others and for ourselves. To feed the hungry is a universal ethical imperative for the Church, arising from this line in the prayer. I’m glad to report that just this morning Westminster’s Hunger Ministry Team released from our resources more than $51,000 to several local food shelves, to do our part to help meet the need. (https://www.mprnews.org/story/2023/02/08/foodshelf-visits-jumped-nearly-54-percent-last-year-inminnesota)

Give us this day our daily bread.

Bread plays an outsize role in scripture. When we say this line, we are recalling the place of bread in the long story of the people of God – from the provision of manna in the wilderness,      to the breaking of bread as a sign of the first covenant, to the bread offered at Isaiah’s mountaintop feast, to the miracle of the loaves and fishes, to the words Jesus says as he breaks bread at the Last Supper, to the bread provided by Jesus at the resurrection picnic on the beach, to the eyes that open at the breaking of bread with the risen Jesus in Emmaus.

Even little Bethlehem, the town of Jesus’ birth, gets in on it: Bethlehem means house of bread in Hebrew.

With bread at the heart of the biblical story, it should not surprise us when Jesus says, “Í am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry.” (John 6:35)

Give us this day that bread, our daily bread.

This one short line in the prayer opens to us a world of meaning around the word bread. When we pray it, it takes us to the joyful feast of the people of God, where the breaking of bread is a sign of the new covenant, the promise of God.

Every time we eat our daily bread, whether at the communion table, at the banquet table, or at the kitchen table, we take it, and break it, and in that action, we remember the promise of God that all shall be fed.

To God be the glory.

Amen.

Reactions

This sermon was especially meaningful for me in its shifting to the imperatives for every one of us without “privatized” pronouns. It emphasizes that no one is alone and no one can live a life by himself or herself. “Jesus communicates that truth when he teaches that we use collective pronouns when we pray because life is not a private, isolated, atomized reality. We are created for community.”

This was recognized in a second century Christian treatise, the Didache, when it said, “Do not be like those who are prompt to open their hand to receive and prompt to close it when it comes to giving. . . You shall not reject the needy but will share all things . . . and call nothing your own. If you share the eternal goods, shouldn’t you share even more those that are in passing?”

And in our own time, Frederick Buechner, a deceased Presbyterian preacher, theologian and author, said: “We do well not to pray [the Lord’s Prayer] lightly. It takes guts to pray it at all. . . . To speak those words is to let the tiger out of the cage, to unleash a power that makes atomic power look like a warm breeze.”

This line of the prayer focuses on the basic food of bread, not on meat or cheese or a food prepared in accordance with a fancy recipe. And this line of the prayer focuses on a human’s daily need for the food.

I reiterate my suggestion that the communal  recitation of this prayer should be slowed down with a pause after every line  of the prayer to provide time for reflection.

———————————

[1] Earlier posts about this series of sermons: The Lord’s Prayer at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church (May 2, 2023); The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name”  (May 4, 2023); The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Thy kingdom come, they will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (May 6, 2023).

[2] Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, Sermon: The Prayer Jesus Taught: ”Give us this day, our daily bread” (Mar. 12, 2023); Westminster Bulletin for Service (Mar. 12, 2023).

The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven”

On March 5, 2023, Rev. Dr. Tim Hart-Andersen, the Senior Pastor at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church, delivered the second of his five sermons on different passages of the Lord’s Prayer.[1] This sermon was on the second sentence (in bold) of that Prayer:

Scripture

Matthew 5:43-48 (New Revised Standard Version)

  • “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,  so that you may be children of your Father in heaven, for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.  For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?  And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the gentiles do the same?  Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

Sermon [2]

 Last Sunday we began our Lenten exploration of the prayer Jesus taught. During this season we want to awaken within us the meaning and power of this prayer that can too easily become merely a rote spiritual practice done over and over and over again.

We looked at the words hallowed be thy name in the first line and remembered that prayers are addressed not to ourselves or to others listening to us, but to the One who is Holy and Other. Prayer begins with praise of God.

We looked at the male language Jesus uses to name God and asked if it might get in the way of our praying to God because of evolving imagery for the divine and shifting use of gendered terminology. We explored other options for naming God. I received a note this week from a parent telling me that after last Sunday their four-year-old is now starting their prayers each night with “Our Mother, our Father…”

Language matters because it shapes our understanding of the world – and, as people of faith, it forms our view of the One we worship and serve. That’s true for children and adults, although it may be more difficult for those of us who’ve been using the same language for decades to make changes when we sense they may be needed. The prayer Jesus taught has wording so ingrained in us that we barely notice it as we say it. Occasionally on a Sunday I mouth the words to the prayer silently – not saying a thing – so I might listen to others, as if hearing it for the first time.

The one phrase in the opening line of the prayer Jesus taught that we did not look at last week is the reference to divine geography: who art in heaven. The wording intentionally distinguishes our location from God’s. The phrase acknowledges that we are on earth, while God inhabits a cosmos not bound by temporal or spatial parameters. This difference becomes more important in the second line of the prayer: Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

The wording here is not pushing us to think of heaven and earth as separate, competing realities. Jesus is not endorsing a dualistic view of humanity and divinity. On the contrary, he’s inviting us to do the opposite: to imagine that heaven and earth may be one and the same – on earth as it is in heaven – a truly far-reaching vision. It recalls the prophet’s imagination:

  • “The wolf shall live with the lamb,

The leopard shall lie down with the kid,

The calf and the lion and the fatling together,

And a little child shall lead them.” (Isaiah 11:6)

The prayer Jesus taught is an incitement to rebellion against the way things are on earth because they do not reflect the ways of heaven. Each Sunday we blithely say this prayer together, when its powerful and unsettling meaning should cause us to squirm in our pews.

Justo Gonzales says that when we pray this line, “What we are calling for is not so much a different place as a different order. It is a new order in which, as Jesus promises, those who have been last will be first.”

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 

Some may chafe at the use of outdated terminology in this line. In another email I received this week someone said, “I struggle with…‘thy’ and ‘thine.’ Those (words) come across to me as over pious, kind of like the words Jesus warned his disciples against. Other than in Shakespeare, they just aren’t words I hear or use in my daily life.”

How true that is. No one talks like that anymore. The most common English version of the prayer Jesus taught does use the idiom of Shakespeare, which is not surprising, since the King James Version of the Bible, from where we draw this prayer, was written in 1611 – a few years ago!

We do not use such pronouns today, so why do they continue to appear in the prayer? Many recent versions of the prayer have shifted to the words “you” and “yours.”

The biblical Greek makes a distinction that today’s English cannot replicate when it comes to the second person pronoun. In English the word you is both singular and plural – which is a good argument for more of us starting to use y’all. The Greek term Jesus uses here is only singular to make it abundantly clear to his listeners that anyone praying this prayer is speaking to the one God who alone is worthy of our prayer.

 The traditional English wording tries to respect that by using “thy kingdom.” Its formality highlights the distinction in Greek, but it may not be worth making the grammatical point, especially if it introduces wording that comes between us and the one to whom we pray. If that’s the case, modern English would be preferable. Feel free to give it a try: Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 

There are other challenges with this line. It echoes the male language of the opening words of the prayer with the word “kingdom.” The word rendered kingdom in our English Bibles translates the Greek basileia, which, ironically, is a feminine noun. We could follow the Greek and simply insert “queendom” in the prayer, but that may not resolve the issue.

Some are using the word “kin-dom.” Kin-dom has the advantage of no gendered reference, and highlights the familial nature of God’s hope for humankind.

Yet, the term kin-dom softens the political implications of the words of Jesus. He could have found terminology more expressive of family relationships, but instead Jesus leans into the political and chooses language that embraces the sovereignty of God within the human community.

There are other options for wording that capture the intent of Jesus to ground the hope of his prayer in our communal life together. The word “dominion,” for instance, refers to a political realm that could reflect divine hopes for human community. But to our ears dominion sounds a little too close to domination, and we do not want to pray for any more of that in our world.

The word “reign” might be the best alternative. It carries the political connotation Jesus wants and preserves the sovereignty of God. In fact, the two terms – reign and sovereign – are cognates. Feel free to try that alternate wording: Your reign come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 

This line is the heart of the prayer Jesus teaches. It’s his personal mission statement. It names the purpose of the incarnation. It sums up the gospel. When the ministry of Jesus begins, both John the Baptizer and Jesus say that “the basileia of God” – the reign of God – “has come near.”

What exactly is the basileia of God? How do we describe the reign of God? Writing in the 16th century, John Calvin argued that one could not know the reign of God apart from the will of God and argued that’s why Jesus added to the prayer the phrase ‘your will be done.’ (Quoted by Justo Gonzalez in Teach Us to Pray [Grand Rapids, Eerdmans; 2020], p. 92)

Praying that God’s reign would break forth, then, is the same as praying that God’s will might be known. To know God’s will and to pursue it has been the calling of every follower of Jesus in every age, including our own.

In North Africa in the 3rd century Bishop Cyprian of Carthage wrote persuasively about the prayer Jesus taught, particularly this line. ‘The will of God,’ he said, may be seen in what Christ did and taught. This bishop’s words from 18 centuries ago about the prayer Jesus taught seem to be addressed to us in our time. To pray that God’s will would be done – which is what Christians pray every time they use the words Jesus taught – means, according to Cyprian:

“Humility in conversation;

steadfastness in faith;

modesty in words.

Justice in deeds;

mercifulness in works;

discipline in morals;

to be unable to do a wrong and to be able to bear a wrong when done;

to keep peace with all;

to love God with all one’s heart.”

(Quoted in Teach Us to Pray, p. 92)

Your reign come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 

 

To pray as Jesus taught is to long with all our being that God’s desires would be implemented on earth as they surely are in heaven. Each time the prayer crosses our lips we commit ourselves, again and again, to take an active part in the inbreaking of God’s hope for the world.

If we really want to know what the will of God in heaven is, we need only read the words of Jesus and watch and learn from his ministry. Jesus spends a good deal of the Sermon on the Mount getting into specifics, about justice, about lying, about anger, about insults, about hypocrisy, about lust, about generosity, and so much more. The Christian gospels could be sub-titled, what the reign of God looks like on earth.

The parables of Jesus are another way to creatively tell what the will of God is. The stories about the mustard seed and the lost coin and the good Samaritan and the woman at the well all offer insight on the will of God for the human community. Every time Jesus heals someone it’s as if the reign of God has splashed down on earth. When Jesus ignores norms and expectations and incudes someone that others are rejecting, God’s will is done on earth as it is in heaven. When the sun rises on the evil and the good and it rain on the righteous and the unrighteous, we catch a glimpse of God’s ways on earth as they are in heaven. And

When Jesus says, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of God in heaven,” he makes it clear that the standards in his prayer for human relationships, whether personal or communal, are not the standards of the world.

All the words and deeds and stories of Jesus come rushing into view when we pray the prayer he taught. “Be perfect, therefore,” he says, “As your heavenly Abba is perfect.” As if that were possible.

Jesus has high hopes for us – but he knows, as do all of us, that we will fall short. A bit more modest approach might be: Help us, O God, to be as perfect as possible in our living so that we might reflect your will in heaven – however imperfectly – on this earth. 

The prayer Jesus taught is not to be taken lightly or glossed over. It is, after all, meant to turn the world upside down, and all of us with it.

Your reign come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 

To God be the glory.

Amen.

Reactions

I thank Rev. Hart-Andersen for this and the other sermons about the Lord’s Prayer. He is correct that this Prayer “is so familiar we can easily glide by it without noticing.” Here are words in the Sermon that were especially meaningful to me:

  • Jesus wants us to imagine that heaven and earth may be one and the same. Jesus invites rebelion against the way things are on earth.
  • “Your reign come, your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven” is Jesus’ personal mission statement.
  • “Reign” carries political connotation Jesus wants while preserving the sovereignty of God.
  • Bishop Cyprian of Carthage: the will of God may be seen in what Jesus said and taught.
  • Parables tell us what the will of God is.

Although it was interesting to hear about suggested changes in wording of the Prayer to address contemporary concerns about male-female issues, I do not want to see those changes.

I reiterate my suggestion that the communal  recitation of this prayer should be slowed down with a pause after every line  of the prayer to provide time for reflection.

========================

[1] Earlier posts about this series of sermons: The Lord’s Prayer at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church (May 2, 2023); The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name”  (May 4, 2023).

[2]] Rev. Dr. Timothy Hart-Andersen, Sermon: The Prayer Jesus Taught: “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven,” Westminster Presbyterian Church (Mar. 5, 2023). Here is the Bulletin for that service.  Westminster Presbyterian Church, Bulletin (Mar. 5, 2023).