Matthew 23:1-12

Author Brian McLaren tells a story about a man named Jeff who began attending McLaren’s church. After about six months, Jeff told McLaren, “For the first time in my life, I look forward to coming to church. It’s really having a good effect on me and my whole family. My wife says I’m a much better husband, and I know I’m improving as a father, too. I really get a lot out of your sermons. In fact, I agree with everything you say.”

This statement shocked McLaren. He was wasn’t sure even he could say that, given the way he winced when he listened to his old sermon tapes (I can relate). But Jeff continued. “There’s one thing, though. I don’t believe in God.”

McLaren wondered how Jeff could agree with everything he’d heard him preach, and not believe in God. McLaren was thinking, “Man, I must be some preacher if you still don’t believe in God.” But what he said was, “Why don’t you believe in God?” Jeff answered, “It’s my brother. He became a Christian and now nobody can stand him.” McLaren asked, “So you’re afraid if you start believing in God, you’ll become an arrogant hypocrite, or something like that? “Exactly,” said Jeff.

Ouch. Arrogant hypocrites, just like the Pharisees in this Sunday’s passage in Matthew’s Gospel. The Pharisees were a sect of Judaism that existed, alongside many others, in Palestinian Jewish society from about 200 B.C.E. to 100 C.E. They sought to preserve Israel’s identity by strict adherence to purity and Sabbath laws. This effort became increasingly important when Palestine was occupied by conquering empires. Apparently, Matthew thought that some of the Pharisees started out with good intentions but became corrupted by self-interest. They used their religion to massage their own egos, to make themselves feel important.

The thing is, religion has always been very susceptible to being corrupted into just another way for us to feed the unhealthy pride that lurks in the corners of our insecurities. As one commentator puts it, “You know, that pride that tempts us to try to make ourselves look more important or more moral or simply better than others. It’s the other side of the temptation to brand others as ‘sinners’ so that we can be ‘righteous.’”

If we’re totally honest, I suspect many church leaders can identify with the Pharisees’ concern with fringes and phylacteries, with titles and respect. It’s less common than it used to be but I have known pastors who insisted on being called “Dr.” or “Reverend,” even though (and I confess this is a quirky pet peeve of mine) “Reverend” is an honorific, not a title, and only grammatically appropriate when used in the third person and with the definite article, as in, “That man over there in the clerical collar is the Rev. John Smith.” And I’ve seen plenty of pastors – no, wait – I have been a pastor who has drooled over a vestment catalog.

We’re not so different from the scribes and Pharisees. In truth, there’s nothing wrong with phylacteries or fringes, or with vestments or titles. They all have their place when kept in perspective. Jesus’ concern, then and now, is the way those things get out of perspective, the way our motivations for doing them become distorted so that they become an end in themselves, the way they become substitutes for what we’re supposed to be about: glorifying God and living as disciples. The passage reminds us how quickly religious practice can move from being God-centered to being self-centered.

Many churches observe All Saints Day on the first Sunday in November. In the Roman Catholic tradition which colors most of what we think we know about saints, saints are people who lived an exceptionally good life and then died, who sometimes performed miracles, and whose memory has stood the test of time. Originally each saint had his or her own saint’s day, but there are around forty thousand saints in the Roman Catholic tradition, so eventually most of them were celebrated on one day: All Saints’ Day. But for Presbyterians, forty thousand is just a start. In his letters, the apostle Paul uses the word “saints” to refer to the church, the whole church on earth, here and now. In the Reformed tradition, all who are united in Christ, whether dead or living, are saints. Saints are not perfect people in either tradition. Being a saint does not mean being flawless. This very recognition, writes the Dali Lama, is the antidote self-centeredness. “True humility is not thinking less of yourself; it’s thinking of yourself less.”

Humility is the antidote to self-centeredness. Back to that story about Jeff, the young man who didn’t want to turn into an arrogant hypocrite. McLaren thought he should give Jeff something to think about rather than argue with him. So he said, “Well, maybe someday you’ll see a way to believe in God and become a better person instead of a worse one.”

Jeff said, “Wow, I never really thought of it that way. I guess that is an option.”

Perhaps that’s the invitation of both this passage and All Saints: to seek a way of believing in God that helps us become a better person instead of a worse one. We stand on the shoulders of saints who show us what that looks like, and on All Saints, we remember and celebrate them. In 1953, a man arrived at the railway station in Chicago to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. He stepped off the train, a tall man with bushy hair and a big mustache. As the cameras flashed and city officials approached with hands outstretched to meet him, he thanked them politely. Then he asked to be excused for a minute. He walked through the crowd to the side of an elderly Black woman struggling with two large suitcases. He picked them up, smiled, escorted her to the bus, helped her get on, and wished her a safe journey. Then, Albert Schweitzer – theologian, organist, philosopher, physician, and medical missionary in Africa – turned to the crowd and apologized for keeping them waiting. It is reported that one member of the reception committee told a reporter, “That’s the first time I ever saw a sermon walking.”

Thanks be to God, I have seen many, many sermons walking.

Resources:

Brian D. McLaren, More Ready Than You Realize: Evangelism as Dance in the Post-Modern Matrix (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2002).
Alyce M. McKenzie, October 23, 2011, http://www.patheos.com/Resources/Additional-Resources/Do-As-I-Say-Not-As-I-Do-Alyce-McKenzie-10-24-2011
http://thewakingdreamer.blogspot.com/2011/11/doing-as-we-say-mt.html

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