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The Rev. Frank Logue
Mercy Trumps Judgment We were miserable. Victoria and I were wet and cold and we had been wet and cold for every one of the previous five days. All day, every day it rained and all day, every day we hiked in the rain. Sure we had rain gear, but even with rain gear on, if you backpack long enough in a downpour, the rain will find its way in. We were hiking the entire Appalachian Trail in a single hike and you can’t hike for six months and not have your share of rain, sometimes more than your share of rain. But we were in Shenandoah National Park, in Virginia and that led to an idea. Not just an idea, but the idea. There are lodges in the park. Not four-star hotels, but nice places to stay and according to our guidebooks there was one ahead that not only offered dry rooms, with hot showers, they also had fireplaces in the rooms. It sounded slightly better than heaven as we trudged on in the rain, with our fingers and toes shriveled up as if we had already been soaking in the tub, when all we had soaked in was a cold steady rain. The vision was fully formed by the time we reached the lodge right along the Trail. Our boots squeaked and we dripped water on the tile as we stumbled out of the storm and into the lobby. And in a dizzying matter of moments we were ushered back out. Yes, they had rooms, but not for us and would we leave now. But we had a credit card. We had a valid ID. How could this happen? I don’t know how it happened still, but I know what happened. Despite the fact that the lodge had a place to offer us, we were as welcome as something very unpleasant in which they had stepped and they scraped us off the bottom of their collective wingtip and turned us out into the cold, just as the gray day turned to night. We trudged on in the gathering darkness to no place to set up a tent on the mountain’s slope and eventually made it to a three-sided wood shelter provided here and there for A.T. hikers. Of course, years have passed and I’ve forgotten all about it now. I don’t even think of that story. It doesn’t even bother me…Ok I’m lying. I still recall the degrading experience wondering how it could have come to pass. In our reading from the Book of James, we encounter a similar problem, but in this case the problem is in church. The book is written by the early Christian known as James the Just or sometimes James the Brother of our Lord. This James was never a disciple in Jesus life and ministry, but became one after his crucified brother paid the faithful Jew James a post-resurrection visit. James converted to faith that Jesus was the Messiah and came to become the leader of the Christians in Jerusalem. As the leader of the church in that area he functions as something like a bishop, though there were not yet bishops. In that role, James has become aware of some disconcerting behavior in groups in his care. He calls them synagogues, though that word is translated in our reading as assembly. This fits as James saw his faith in the Messiah Jesus as being a Jewish faith. And so James is concerned by how Christ following synagogues are treating the people their visitors. James writes, My brothers and sisters, do you with your acts of favoritism really believe in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ? For if a person with gold rings and in fine clothes comes into your assembly, and if a poor person in dirty clothes also comes in, and if you take notice of the one wearing the fine clothes and say, "Have a seat here, please," while to the one who is poor you say, "Stand there," or, "Sit at my feet," have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts? So the Christians were playing favorites with the wealthy persons who visited their assemblies. When someone came in with gold rings and fine clothes they were given a seat of honor. The word “fine” clothes actually means shiny clothes. They probably had silver or gold thread running through the cloth. They are given the seat “here” as the altar was near the entry, while poor visitors were told to “Go over there” or “Sit at my feet.” This last comment was bad, but not too bad. Benches ran around the outer wall, there were no seats in the middle of the room. The benches had a raised place for the feet and less important persons could sit on this lower station which was only slightly raised above floor level. Over and against this practice James recalls Christians to Jesus’ repetition of God’s command “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Loving your neighbor as yourself is what Jesus taught and how Jesus lived. And for Jesus brother James this was central and straightforward. You either treat all people equally or you don’t. I heard a courageous sermon this week at the Clergy Conference for the Diocese of Georgia which touches on this. The preacher was the Rev. Mark Jones who is the Rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Albany, Georgia. I won’t give his well-crafted sermon justice, but I do want to relate a story he told. Mark let us in on the frustrations he feels as the fairly new pastor of a downtown church. People are always stopping in needing assistance. He tries to help, but it doesn’t always go so well. He told of the day a woman came by complaining that she was hungry. Like King of Peace, St. Paul’s Church does not just give people money, but does liberally give direct assistance. He told the woman that he had just the thing knowing that there was some good soup on in the church kitchen. When she saw it, the woman complained that it had tomatoes in it and she had acid reflux problems. Then he offered to make her some sandwiches with peanut butter and jelly, but she said she would break out in a rash. Finally, and more than a bit exasperated, he offered her the loaf of fresh bread. She said that she wasn’t going to walk down the street with just a loaf of bread under her arm and asked for ten dollars to by some food with. He said that he couldn’t do that and she replied, “What is the world coming to when the church won’t even help you out.” Mark said that he then began avoiding people who came for help. He got busy, and used his secretary as a shield. Some time passed and he got cornered by a woman who was obviously needy. Here we go again he thought, but the woman gave him $500 cash to pay back the church for assistance she had received. He said he couldn’t accept that and she wouldn’t take no for an answer. St. Paul’s Church had been there for her when she needed it and she had to give back so that the church could help others in need. So Mark learned his lesson and he once more faces the daunting and never ending task of dispensing aid to those in need, a bit humbled by the two experiences. Mark is learning as we are all learning that loving your neighbor as yourself is not always so easy. But for James you either kept all the law or you didn’t. This is why James writes in this section, “Whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it.” James then gives the example of two no-nos from the Ten Commandments—murder and adultery. James says, For the one who said, “You shall not commit adultery,” also said, “You shall not murder.” Now if you do not commit adultery but if you murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. James is showing us that if we are partial to rich neighbors over poor ones, we are not loving our neighbors as ourselves and consequently we are breaking God’s commands as surely as one who commits murder or adultery. This concerns James a good deal and he concludes, For judgment will be without mercy to anyone who has shown no mercy; mercy triumphs over judgment. Both mercy and judgment are God’s business. But judgment is not our concern. Only mercy is our concern. We are not to determine how much someone does or can give before we decide how to welcome him or her in to church. And it is worth noting here that I do not see the offerings that come in. You can start giving, increase your giving, cut back on giving or quit giving and I won’t notice. I just don’t look at the offerings. In part because I have enough to worry about and in part so that the money someone gives is between me and God, without me getting in the middle of it. I don’t know if this is what James had in mind, but I do know that it feels like a healthy practice for this church. But the words of James that stick out to me are what he wrote next. If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and eat you fill,” and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? So faith, by itself, if it has no works, is dead. For James as for us, words are great but they will not shelter someone from the rain or fill an empty belly. And to a person in need a promise of “I’ll pray for you!” means nothing if you leave him or her hungry. That’s why King of Peace is involved in some hands on stuff here in Camden County with Habitat for Humanity, with food banks, and with providing for people’s very real needs. Saying God loves you matter less than showing someone God’s love through your own actions. Some years back, Victoria, Griffin and I were traveling around Georgia on a book promotion tour appropriately enough for our book, Touring the Backroads of North and South Georgia. Our one out of state interview was with a Tallahassee, Florida TV station just across the state line from Thomasville, Georgia. We were running close to time and so pushed on as the gas gage showed the tank dwindling down to fumes. We made it to the station in time. Did the live TV segment and hit the road only to run out of gas before making it back to the nearest station. There we were stranded on the side of the road needing to get to Valdosta for yet another interview. Many cars passed us by and you can’t blame them. After all it is dangerous to help someone these days and even a man with a woman and small child could be trouble. But not too much time had passed when a woman with two small children stopped, and gave me a ride to get gas and back to the car. She said she was nervous about stopping to help, but she wondered how it would be if she was on the side of the road with her two girls. “My husband is going to be mad at me,” she said, “But, of course, I’ll tell him about it.” I told her to let her husband know she was an angel. The woman knew angels and knew that she was no angel. But I told her that in the Bible “angel” means messenger and angel of God is a messenger of God and they do things like bring a message from God to a person. But I also let her know that God counts on us regular old people to be messengers of God to one another. I told her to please tell her husband for me and my wife and daughter that she and her daughters had been real life angels. She thanked me and then left. She thanked me. Go figure. I pulled back on the road, went back to the station, filled up and we were on our way. Amen.
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