It’s called “tact.” The dictionary defines tact as “a keen sense of what to do or say in order to maintain good relations with others or avoid offense.” Tactfulness often combines truth and gentleness, sometimes with a measure of flattery.
Well, have you ever noticed that Jesus can be … not very tactful? “Not even in Israel have I found such faith.” What does he mean, “not even in Israel?” He himself is a child of Israel, is he not?
Can you imagine the president of the United States visiting a foreign country and saying, “You people are great. The people back home aren’t as good as you all.”
Can you imagine a pastor talking to a group of people on the street, saying, “man, compared to you guys, the people at church are terribly lacking in faith.”
Can you imagine the mayor of Long Beach saying, “You know, it’s too bad Long Beach isn’t Huntington Beach, because Huntington Beach – now that’s a nice city.”
Jesus is the Jewish messiah; he himself is a child of Israel. But here he is, in Capernaum, commending a gentile, a commander in the army of the oppressors, saying, “Not even among the people of Israel have I seen such faith.” … How utterly tactless.
And it’s not the first time… Remember, early in his ministry… Jesus went to the synagogue in Nazareth, among the people who knew him (which was everyone there; Nazareth was not a very big place), and he read from the prophet Isaiah. On that occasion he had, in fact, just returned from an earlier visit in Capernaum, and the people of Nazareth were eager to see him do for them the things he had done there.
But instead, while he was sitting there in the Jewish synagogue, he began talking about prophets who ministered not to Jews, not to the people of Israel, but to foreigners and gentiles. He so enraged the people of his hometown that they tried to kill him.
Getting back to today’s story: this centurion, whose faith Jesus admired – did he even believe in God? Luke says that he built a synagogue, but it’s strange: when Matthew tells this same story, the synagogue is not mentioned. Some people think that Luke added that detail, figuring the story would be too much to swallow without it. “He’s a worthy man, he loves the people of Israel, he built them a synagogue!” That explains it, right?
But those details are not present in Luke’s version.
Whether those details are true or not, the fact remains that Jesus said that the faith of this gentile, this foreigner, this officer in the army of an oppressive regime, was better than anything he had found among the people of Israel.
So: Did Jesus not like the people of Israel?
Well, that doesn’t make sense. He was one of them. He himself worshiped at the synagogue and observed the feasts. He was a practicing Jew, and for some time after his death and resurrection, his disciples continued practicing Judaism.
But you know, as the children of Israel, the Jews were on the inside, so to speak. Being on the inside has its privileges, but it also has its responsibilities. More was expected of them, I think. After all, they had the teachings of the law and the prophets … they had the stories of their faith; stories which, time and again, show the special concern God has for those who are not on the inside: the foreigners, the outcasts, the aliens among them:
“You shall not wrong or oppress a resident alien,” the Torah says, “for you were aliens in the land of Egypt.”
“The alien who resides among you shall be to you as the citizen among you; you shall love the alien as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt.”
Now, I’ll leave it to you to figure out how this applies to the current debate in this country regarding immigration. The point I’m making today is that those on the inside don’t just have privileges; they have a responsibility. A responsibility to those who are on the outside.
It’s a responsibility to actually love one’s neighbor – and remember, the parable of the Good Samaritan shows that even the foreigner, the alien, the outsider, is our neighbor. Those on the inside have a responsibility to love the neighbor with a love that is active, not passive; a love that doesn’t pass by on the other side of the road; a love that does more than mutter, “Oh, that poor soul; God have mercy on him;” a love that actually gets involved, a love that leads to acts of compassion and a pursuit of justice, a hunger for justice that leads one to pursue justice for the oppressed the way a hungry wolf pursues its prey. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice.
Who is on the inside today? Who is it who has access to the stories and teachings of faith? Who is it that has these words written upon their heart?
Quite a few of us in here do. Not many people out there do. Many people out there have lost their connection to God. They’ve lost the faith that makes people whole. They no longer know the stories that give meaning to life.
Do we have a responsibility to them? You bet we do! We are Christ’s ambassadors to the world! That’s what Paul says to the Corinthians: We are ambassadors for Christ, and God is making his appeal through us. We are the people who bring wholeness to a fragmented world! It happens through us!
It does no good to consider ourselves blessed just because we are children of the church. And as much as some people may disagree with me, following Jesus requires a lot more than believing in a set doctrine, or even following three simple steps or four spiritual laws.
Many of the ancient Jews believed, but it was the faith of the centurion which was commended. Why? Because for him, to “believe” meant to “be-love.” It meant actively believing, not just nodding one’s head when the preacher says, “Do you believe in Jesus?” One who really believes in Jesus does a lot more than nod his head.
Who is blessed? Are we blessed solely because we have been borne of the church? No. Inheritance alone is not enough to make us part of Christ’s family. “Jesus’s mother and his brothers came to him, but they could not reach him because of the crowd. And he was told, ‘Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, wanting to see you.’ But he said to them, ‘My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.’”
A woman once interrupted him while he was teaching; she shouted to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!” But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of
God and obey it.”
The centurion may not have had everything clear in his mind about who Jesus was. He may not have known much about the God of Israel. I’m pretty sure that he would not pass any sort of doctrinal examination in the temple or synagogue. And yet something about his faith greatly impressed Jesus.
Maybe it was the fact that he believed that faith equals action, that what one believes and what one says corresponds with what one does. “I’m used to having words become actions,” he said. “I say something, and it happens. I say to a soldier under me, ‘Go,’ and he goes; I say to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes. For me, speaking is doing … and I know it is the same for you. Just say the word, and it is done.”
This centurion may not have known it, but that is, in fact, the very first lesson in scripture. In Genesis One, God speaks a word: “Let there be…” and by that spoken word, the world is created. There is absolutely no discrepancy between word and action. Word and action are one.
So: let’s be doers of the word, and not merely believers! Let’s be the ambassadors of Christ that we are called to be, reaching out to a fragmented community with the wholeness and healing of God’s spirit.
In many ways, we are already doing that: as a church, we are inviting the community to get to know us this summer, by hosting concerts and movie nights and Vacation Bible School, with the hope that, in getting to know us, they’ll get to know God. As a church, we are doing this; as a member of the church and as a follower of Christ, you can do your part to invite someone, to extend a personal invitation to someone you know or even someone you don’t know, to join us.
As a church, we engage in several different ministries that bring wholeness to our community: local outreach through COA and Central Shalom, scouting, and all of our summer events; we also do global outreach through Disciples Mission Fund, Week of Compassion, Global Ministries and Reconciliation Ministry. We also continue our slow but sure efforts to make our worship services more accessible to those who are outside these walls, as opposed to something that only those on the inside are familiar with or understand, so that we may, in the words of the prophet Isaiah, welcome people from far away, those from the north and from the west and even from the farthest lands to the south – everyone, in other words, but especially those who, for whatever reason, are far from the church.
At Ben Eastman’s Eagle Scout Project two weeks ago, a young woman passing by saw all the work that was taking place to turn that ugly lot into a beautifully landscaped piece of land. She got out of the car with her young son and began asking how she could get her son involved in boy scouts.
I think it’s safe to say that it wasn’t the philosophy behind scouting that impressed her. Did she even know the scout oath? Could she recite the scout law? Probably not.
But she did see the values of the scout oath and law expressed in the work that was taking place. She saw the values of scouting in action, and it inspired her to get out of her car and get involved.
Another woman who lived nearby was so impressed by what was happening that she walked over to Ben to express her thanks to him for making the community more beautiful, and then she handed him $100 in cash to use towards the project’s costs. It wasn’t the scout oath or the law or any of the beliefs or values of scouting that impressed her; it was seeing those beliefs and values in action that motivated her to respond.
Our stewardship committee might want to take note of that. In fact, we all might want to take note of that. How can we continue to put our beliefs and values in action? How can we be doers of the word, and not merely hearers? How can we develop a faith that is real and alive? How can our belief in Jesus go beyond nodding our heads in agreement to doctrinal statements so that we may truly follow him in every aspect of our lives?
That’s the tactful way to put it. If it’s too tactful for you, … read the gospel.
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