Sunday 7 September 2014
Matthew 18:15-20
The great historian of diplomacy Herbert Butterfield once remarked that to understand the dynamics of conflict among nations and peoples, one need only spend a month in a typical parish choir. In addition to being a distinguished historian, Butterfield was a Christian thinker of some depth, and my guess is that he spoke from experience.
Life in the Church – not just the choir but every part of the parish – does not always exhibit the harmony, peace, and love to which we’re called as Christians. Today’s Gospel explicitly acknowledges this hard reality. Jesus is under no illusions. He knows that short of Heaven itself conflicts and disputes will take place even among members of the same congregation. Moreover, in the earliest days of Christianity, as for much of the Church’s history, the people with whom one worshiped on Sunday were also one’s neighbors: the people with whom one lived and worked, and bought and sold, throughout the rest of the week. So conflict within the parish was potentially divisive and disruptive to the social fabric of the entire community.
To avoid such division, our Lord gives some straightforward, practical directions on what to do when another member of the Church hurts, offends, or wrongs us in some way. These instructions consist of three steps.
First, “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother.”
In other words, the person with the grievance must take the initiative to rectify the problem. Yet, how often this is not what happens! We suffer some insult or injury and, instead of taking the matter up with the perpetrator, we start sulking, feeling sorry for ourselves, and nursing a grudge. Or, worse still, we complain to everyone but the person who’s offended us. Nothing stirs up division and dissension more than people grumbling and complaining behind one another’s backs. On certain occasions, I’ve unwittingly said or done something to upset someone, only to discover weeks, months, or even years later that that person told everyone else about it but me! But here our Lord instructs us: If someone has offended you in some way, first of all take it up with that person: directly, and privately. That way, you might be able to reach some sort of mutual understanding and achieve reconciliation without stirring up trouble and making the situation worse.
Sometimes this direct approach works; sometimes it doesn’t. So, then, the second step: “If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of one or two witnesses.”
The biblical background here is that the Old Testament repeatedly requires that no one should ever be condemned on a charge of wrongdoing except on the evidence of two or three witnesses. One witness alone is not enough without corroboration. The New Testament carries this principle over into the life of the Church, as for example when Saint Paul writes “Any charge must be sustained by the evidence of two or three witnesses” (2 Cor. 13:1).
As an aside, every so often a parishioner will come to me and make some accusation against another parishioner: so-and-so is saying this and doing that! And almost always, my instinctive response is to tell them that I really can’t do anything about it unless and until I’ve heard the accusation from more than one person. Otherwise, it’s just uncorroborated hearsay. With one or two exceptions, the biblical principle still holds good today: admit no charge except on the evidence of two or three witnesses.
So, our Lord is saying that if we can’t work out our differences one to one, then we need to bring one or two others into the picture. There’s always the possibility that these third parties might be able to help us see some merit in the other person’s position that we can’t see by ourselves, and help mediate between the two points of view.
But if this process of mediation fails, and our mediators agree that we’ve been wronged, then we’ve gained the necessary two or three witnesses when we go to step three: “tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.”
The early Christians took this command, “tell it to the church,” quite literally. When members of the congregation had personal complaints against one another, they would stand up in church on Sunday morning and air their grievances. Then the whole congregation would listen and try to arbitrate, or render a judgment. The Eucharist could not proceed until both parties were reconciled, or else until the guilty party, if unrepentant, had been expelled from the assembly.
Of course, this procedure caused more problems that it solved, and was gradually abandoned. It survives in symbolic form in our liturgy, however, as the Passing of the Peace, which is really a symbolic gesture of the forgiveness and reconciliation with all of our brothers and sisters in Christ that’s required of us before we approach the Lord’s Table together.
But what can it mean in today’s world to “tell it to the church”? The understanding that eventually gained acceptance was that telling it to the church could be equally well accomplished by telling it to one of the church’s authorized representatives, namely the clergy.
In other words, if another member of the parish hurts or wrongs you in some way, first, take the matter up with that person directly. If that doesn’t work, try getting one or two friends to mediate. And if that doesn’t work, then bring the matter to one of the parish clergy. I say this not because we clergy relish the thought of meddling in our parishioners’ disputes—we don’t. Yet discord among the members wounds the whole Body. So, the Church has a legitimate interest in promoting reconciliation and forgiveness among all its members. And one of the responsibilities to which the clergy have been ordained is known as the ministry of reconciliation. Frankly, when people in the parish are at odds with one another, it is the clergy’s business.
Even within the Body of Christ, conflicts and disputes are inevitable. We’re still sinners, after all, and we’ve all got a long way to go before God is finished with us. What makes Christianity distinctive, however, is not the absence of conflict, but rather the ability to achieve forgiveness and reconciliation when conflicts arise, as they inevitably will.
In today’s Gospel Jesus gives some practical directions on how to work towards forgiveness and reconciliation. The point of the three steps is that we must do everything we possibly can to be reconciled and at peace with one another. The goal is not to cast anyone out, but rather to keep everyone within the fold. Christ has shown his love for us by forgiving us and reconciling us to God. And it’s precisely in mutual forgiveness and reconciliation that we begin to show Christ’s love to the world.
Note: Portions of this sermon also appeared in the "Sunday's Scriptures" section of The Living Church, Vol. 249, No. 4 (September 7, 2014), 58.
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