A Level Place

Scholars often describe the difference between the Gospel of Luke and the Gospel of Matthew from our reading today, the introduction to the Sermon on the Plane. In our reading is a key difference, distinction between the gospels. And the distinction is this: Matthew depicts Jesus as a rabbi. When he seeks to instruct his disciples, they walk up a mountain and sit at his feet. Matthew then provides this long, elegant series of 50 teachings, structured to embody how to learn. Here Jesus is a Rabbi laying out a long course of inner searching, deep contemplation: the Sermon on the Mount. 

When Luke depicts Jesus as a teacher, Jesus is a Greek philosopher, not a rabbi. Jesus brings his disciples to a level place and instructs them how to find the kingdom of God.  It is as if Jesus is walking through the agora of a Greek city providing practical wisdom for all people.  Pure image of a philosopher.  And the teachings reflect this.  Where Matthew has some 50 teachings woven into an intricate pattern of mystical contemplation; Luke has 5.  Instead of 50 of the Sermon on the Mount; Luke has 5 teachings for the sermon on the plane.  After our reading Jesus tells the crowd, here are five teachings, the essential ones, top five.  Instead of a curriculum, he is filling a travel bag.

              When you learn from a Greek philosopher, you walk with them.  You follow them as they walk a city.  Walking is one of the keys to reading Luke; scholars say, here Jesus is a philosopher bidding us to walk with him.  Imagine walking from place to place, always on the move.  Not fast mind you. Jesus is not dashing or darting.  Think slow walk with a wonderful conversation.  If you need to stop for a moment to rest, you stop.  If you want to keep going, you go.  You're walking on the level place, hearing the sermon on the plane where all can follow.  Thoreau called this walking sauntering.  A purposeful wandering in search of what true and good and beautiful. 

              Many years ago a good friend convinced me to go on bike ride.  I was skeptical as I knew my muscles for a long bike ride were no longer ready.  Yet away we went.  This was on one of the Thousand Islands in the St. Lawrence River, so the scenery was beautiful.  After a few miles my friend, Paul, pulled aside to a small cafe.  I thought there must be a problem so I stayed on my bike as he dismounted.  No. No.  Come inside he said. 

              Once inside Paul ordered ice cream for himself and asked which one I'd like.  Maple Walnut I said.  We sat down and enjoyed the ice cream and chatted.  Then we set off again.  A few more miles down the road we stopped at a cafe and got a sandwich.  Again, great conversation.  There were two more stops before we returned to his car.  In the end, my muscles were not sore, but I was in need for a nap given all I ate.

              When I read the line about the level plane, and knowing the rest of the gospel, how Jesus would teach as they walked, as they sauntered, I remember Paul and his gastronomic bike tour.  I remember this and think what a joy it would have been to follow Jesus from place to place.  To hear his "top five" be spoken along the way, the sermon on the plane, to see people so surprised by the freedom and joy.

              I think of the joy of stopping for ice cream, but I also remember my confusion, anxiousness.  We are on a ride.  We need to keep going.  Why are we stopping?  How will we make our way if we don't keep moving?  I think of that anxiousness as what I have had to discard so often as I walk with Jesus.  To be his disciple is to walk without anxiety. To lose fear and worry along the way.  So often I have seen life as an "endeavor to preserver" and not a lovely afternoon of conversation and ice cream. 

              If you feel a pressing need right now to balk and talk to me of privilege or how the cruelties of life are real and the hard truths, consider most of life instead: most days have enormous potential for joy, yet we press on, we have places to be, things must get done and we worry, so we have no ice cream simply because we do not stop.

              The Sermon on the Mount has 50 some teachings. Matthew put them together in a carefully woven tapestry. In a different way, the Sermon on the Plane put together by Luke has only five teachings.  It is as if Luke has reached a large shelf of provisions, a storehouse of goods, and he has selected five for the road.  Five teachings are enough for the journey and not too much so you will be burdened. 

              The five teachings selected by Luke are: blessings can come from hardship as ease can be a curse; next, love your enemies; third, don't judge each other, be merciful not judgmental; fourth, bear good fruit, do good things; and lastly, build your house on the rock, not the sand. It is as if Luke has filled our travel bags and said, take just these for the journey.

              Each one of these teachings is worth a lifetime of contemplation, consideration.  And so are the other 45 he didn't choose, didn't put in the travel bag. But he chose these five for a reason.  Each of these is a hint: "if nothing else, remember these."  They are not only a place to start, they are also always true.  If you keep to these five (blessings can be found in challenge, danger in ease; love the ones it is hardest to love; don't be spiteful; do what is good; and build your life upon faith, a trust of mercy) if you keep to these five your life will be better, true, whole. You will find the kingdom of God and be free. 

              I had to add some bookcases to my office recently.  Too many books, not enough room.  Kathy was relieved when I said, the cases would go in my office at the church and not in the manse.  Yet, even in her relief this evoked a long debate, something we have argued about for decades now.  The debate is this: there is no need for so many books (her opinion), there is always need for another book (my opinion). 

              Each time we have moved, I see the value of her view.  I believe when we moved here there were 100 boxes of books.  Not one hundred books, one hundred boxes of books.  In this moment I castigate myself for the folly of so many books.  The writer of Ecclesiastes says the devotion to books is a wearisome thing.  Hence you should see me as someone who suffers greatly.  I offer this view in our debates.  Doesn't work well.

              Sometimes in these critical moments I have thought, what if you only had one bookcase.  Right now, with the newly added cases, there are twelve.  What if you could only have one?  What would make it?  What would be the top ten as it were? To answer this conundrum, I build categories and ask questions like: will you ever read this again?  What books are needed for reference as opposed to delight?  I keep some books simply because I love them. I keep at this question until I am so exhausted I buy another book just for relief.

              On your bulletin cover is a bit of a very famous painting, a fresco by Raphael.  In the Vatican, if you choose the special tour, they will take you deep into the bedrooms and private chambers and there you will see the painting called the “School of Athens.”  I always take delight in this painting as wallpaper in a bedroom.  Something so profound in a place so basic. 

              On your cover is the image of the two greatest philosophers, Plato and Aristotle.  Plato is the one whose hand is pointing upward; Aristotle is pointing to the ground.  What you can't see is that these two are surrounded by a cast of characters each being something to know, a field of inquiry, a source of wisdom.  Each person in the larger painting is like a book in a bookcase, a course of study.  Yet they all seem to be flowing to and from Plato and Aristotle. 

              Whenever I sit with our reading today I go to this painting in my mind.  Matthew depicts Jesus as above, like Plato's hand pointing upward.  He gives the Sermon on the Mount, a place of theory and contemplation, with 50 different categories.  And then there is Luke on the level plane, saying "take just five for the road."  Travel light says the sermon on the plane.   Consider all the theories but learn the practice of life with these. The five of Luke are like a challenge, an appraisal of wisdom.  You may have read many books, but what can you do; you contemplated many theories, but what have you made of your life?  The five, the Sermon on the Plane, become a measure of how you lived. You may be smart, but are you happy?  Is faith a serious pursuit where you press on?  You persevere, true, but do you know how to stop for ice cream?

              For two years I studied neuroplasticity. I did. Read many books.  It's a fascinating field of inquiry.  Essentially neuroplasticity is a theory of change, change for the better or change for the worse.  The proven theory is that if you build a habit and you continue in this habit for quite some time, you will change.  Not a change of attitude.  A change of your being.  You can change who you are.

              This happens because as you repeat the behaviors your mind will create new pathways, your heart will gain a new strength, a new will as it were. You change.  In theology we say, you have been born anew. I once was blind but now I see.

              They key to neuroplasticity is to recognize the limit of understanding and the unlimited possibility of practice.  For true change, change for better or change for worse, is not a matter of what you understand; it is ever a matter of what you do again and again, a daily life. This is the practical reality of freedom, salvation, change.

              Too often the Christian faith is a list of attributes of Jesus or God.  We believe in God.  What we believe about Jesus is seen as most important.  Yet, when Jesus taught his disciples what to believe to be free, to be children of God, he didn't talk about himself.  Didn't really talk about God very much, or eternal life for that matter.  What a different church we would have if we changed our value of faith.  Instead of valuing who Jesus is according to our tradition, what if we valued what he taught? 

              If someone were to ask you, what do you believe, instead of talking about Jesus and the cross and the resurrection and blood and atonement and eternal life and judgment, what if we spoke what he said?  What if our faith was in what he taught?  What a different church if we simply believed the five truths for traveling, following Jesus.

              I believe blessings can be found in challenge.

              I believe I am loving when I can love the one I hate.

              I believe there is no need for me to judge you.

              I believe doing what is good is living what is best.

              I believe in mercy, compassion as the foundation of life.

              Luke says, take these five with you and follow Jesus.  I say, don't forget to stop for ice cream.  Amen.