“Evangelism: Keeping the Great Commandment”

Micah 6:6-8

If I have a perfectly orthodox and academic grasp of Reformed theology, but have not loving kindness; I am just another Pharisee.

If I have memorized The Book of Order and Robert’s Rules of Order – if I am a superb parliamentarian, but have not loving-kindness; I am nothing more than another kind of legalist.

If I have memorized the whole of Scripture and quote it chapter and verse, but have not loving-kindness; I am no better than the Devil. He too can quote Scripture.

If I can successfully work to affect social justice, but have not loving-kindness; I am just another rabble rouser.

If I have the ability to navigate church politics in such a way that my side is always victorious, but have not loving- kindness; I am simply one more political hack.

If I can put together and lead beautiful liturgy or write and preach brilliant sermons, but have not loving-kindness; I am nothing more than an ecclesiastical prima donna.

If I am a learned and creative church musician or can sing hymns and anthems with professional competence, but have not loving-kindness; I am just another performer strutting my stuff before a captive audience.

If I am or can do whatever, but have not loving- kindness toward my neighbor; I have not realized what it is that the Lord truly requires of me.

If I – if we – have not-loving kindness, have not mercy toward others we have not obeyed the Great Commandment. We have not loved the Lord our God with the very best of who we are and what we have, we are unable to love our neighbor.

The key word this morning is biblical mercy, which is also known as loving-kindness or tender love. It is such mercy that God requires. Who said that? God, according to Hosea. Who quoted it as he confronted the Pharisees? Jesus. “For I desire steadfast-love [mercy] and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.”

Hosea and later Micah were speaking to folks who thought that all God required of them was faithful worship attendance, correct liturgy, and the sacrifice of unblemished animals. They had forgotten the absolute necessity of forging a right relationship with God and right relationships with their neighbors. They believed that they could lie, steal, cheat and otherwise take advantage of the weak and helpless, that they could be morally corrupt, but as long as they kept showing up for church, saying the right prayers, singing the right hymns, and putting enough in the offering plate they would be protected from the wrath of God as he let them suffer the consequences of their own behavior.

Jesus spoke those words from Hosea to Pharisees who complained about him hanging around with sinners and other riff-raff. “’I [the Lord] desire mercy not sacrifice’. For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” Calling the sinners unto himself – seeking and saving the lost – required him to go where they were and enter into their lives, required him to build relationships with them. The Pharisees on the other hand were only interested in preserving their own purity by separating themselves from such people.

As we turn our hearts and minds toward fulfilling the Great Commission, of being our Lord’s witnesses in the world, we do well to remember what the Lord requires of us: mercy not sacrifice. Doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with our God. Setting right what is wrong and protecting the rights of the weak and defenseless. Loving people whose only claim on us is their need to be loved. Loving people simply because God loves us. Being attentive to God. Seeking and doing his will.

Some quotes that speak to this: First from Rick Rusaw and Eric Swanson in their book The Externally Focused Church: “Mercy [is] God’s attitude and action toward those in need or distress. [It] goes beyond pity (to feel sorry for) or compassion (to feel sorry with). Mercy is expressed in actions… Mercy is love with legs on it.”

Also from them: “Christ did not come into our lives just to make us better but also to give us the power to make the world a better place through our ministry and service to others… To belong to Christ, to be adopted into his family, is to begin to care about what he cares about – to move outside of ourselves and toward others in mercy…”

To summarize: we take today’s words from James seriously, “Isn’t it obvious that God-talk without God-acts is outrageous nonsense?” Or to use the words of Harold Cooke Phillips in The Interpreters Bible: “Men become more concerned about the meticulous performance of ecclesiastical rites than about facing moral and ethical realities. John Wesley said that they practiced fastidiousness at Oxford and called it righteousness.”

One more quote, this time from an anonymous source in a note to me: “I don’t know how you can do it, but I think we need more concrete evidence that the church per se if it doesn’t start looking outward, is not going to last. We need to be in the community…” Well I think I sort of just did it. We need to be out in the community doing ministry, mission work, and evangelism. We need to be externally focused. We need to find ways to convey God’s loving-kindness to the world beyond our front door. We need to find practical ways to exercise mercy and compassion toward those around us. I cannot be more concrete at this time. I can only raise an awareness of the need to be out there in the world witnessing for Jesus. Once we get on board with that idea, as we discern God’s will for us, we can start filling in the blanks.

However we do it, we must do something. What we cannot do is huddle together in this place like modern day Pharisees as we seek to separate ourselves from the world. We shouldn’t be of the world but we absolutely must be in it: getting our hands dirty, risking rejection, touching the untouchables, going to where the sinners are – excuse me, where those other sinners who are not all that different from us are. We need to follow the example of Jesus who ate and drank, fellowshipped, and related with all kinds of folks: tax collectors, prostitutes and other kinds of loose women, even lepers.

We have a story to tell and demonstrate to the nations, beginning with this one. We must tell and demonstrate that story to any and all within our reach: the unfashionably dressed, those whose grammar ain’t too good, people who could use a good bath, divorced and remarried people, people who are cohabitating without the benefit of marriage; the old, the feeble, those on the margins of society; the widow, the orphan, the alien among us, those our society and often our churches scorn. To all of those and many more we must show mercy, the very loving-kindness of God.

And 99% of the time we’re going to have to do it on their turf: where they live, work, and play; where they seek relationships and a sense of community. These are our neighbors, folks: the atheists, agnostics, Hindus, Buddhists, and Moslems among and around us; those hostile to Christianity, those ignorant of Christianity, those who bear the scars of judgmental, condemnatory, mean, hateful people who represented themselves as Christians. We must love them as we love ourselves and our own. Otherwise we cannot love the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our mind, and with all our strength. If we cannot be in right relationship with them then we cannot claim to be seeking a right relationship with God.

There are lost souls all around us, people in need of Jesus. We who know his love can share his love with them: by word and deed, by missional outreach, by meeting them where they are. And we must never forget that according to the Apostle Paul the love of Jesus looks like this: “Love is patient with people; love is kind. There is no envy in love; there are no proud claims; there is no conceit. Love never does the graceless thing; never insists on its own rights, never irritably loses its temper; never nurses its wrath to keep it warm. Love finds nothing to be glad about when someone goes wrong, but is glad when the truth is glad. Love can stand any kind of treatment; love’s first instinct is to believe in people; love never regards anyone or anything as hopeless; nothing can happen that can break love’s spirit.” In case you’re wondering, those words are from I Corinthians 13 as translated by William Barclay.

God desires mercy not sacrifice. He requires of us that we do justice, and love kindness, and walk humbly with him. What has Jesus commissioned us to do? Be his witnesses as we proclaim the Gospel and share God’s loving-kindness with this lost, broken, fearful, and hopeless world. Amen.