Lord, Lord...

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” In the Lucan parallel, it’s, “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I tell you?” Jarring at least. Terrifying at worst.

There are a couple of absolutes in what Jesus is saying and they are terribly. The first is also seen in a similar saying in Luke. In a parable, Jesus reports the Lord of the house as saying to those who knock to enter, “I do not know you.” To which those outside say, “but we ate and drank with you and you taught in our streets.” And the Lord replies, in a phrase repeated in today’s reading, “Go away you evildoers.” Imagine the shock of those who thought they had a companionable relationship with the Master because they associated with him at the table and heard him teach. To their enormous surprise, he sends them away—and worse—calls them evildoers.

Evildoers!? That can’t be us can it? Well, an evildoer as Matthew understands it is one who rejects or perverts righteous living. And righteous living is understood as living, from the heart, the teaching of Jesus on the primacy of love. So we must ask if we reject or pervert righteous living.

To put it another way, the point Jesus seems to be making is this: religious behavior is not going to create that union with God. Going to church, taking the sacraments, giving funds and time, reading the Bible, praying carefully—as good as these things are, they do not comprise “doing the will of the Father.” All these things can be done and done well, without the spirit of love as the motivation or the outcome. We can be in church on any given Sunday because that is what we do on Sunday. We can even listen carefully and be moved by a powerful worship service in music and the spoken word. But if when we climb in our cars, we are as surly as we were when we fussed at the children to hurry and get ready or we’d tear up their little behinds, we have received no benefit. If we were out of sorts with our spouses when we entered church, we can’t be out of sorts when we leave. We can receive the blessed bread and wine daily, but if this means of grace doesn’t impel us to treat others with grace in our dealing with them, we’ve simply been selfish.

Oh listen, it gets worse! Jesus says, they will say, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast our demons in your name and do many deeds of power in your name? Then I will declare to them,” Jesus says, “‘I never knew you; go away from me you evil doers.’” So if the first point Jesus makes is that simple association with him or with holy things will not be sufficient, then the second point is: even doing acts in his name will not be enough. The ultimate point Jesus is making is that the deeds must represent the inner nature of the person doing them or they are hypocritical and empty. Association with him and holy things isn’t enough. Good deeds aren’t enough. Only true conversion from a selfish nature to a loving nature can create union with God.

As I re-read the Sermon on the Mount, often thought of as the summary of the Christian life, I for one, feel pretty inadequate as a Christian. I have to wonder if love is my intention and my motivation as I move through life. And if it is, am I consistent in letting love be my guide? Can I even, in my wildest dreams do what Jesus said and “be perfect even as my Father in heaven is perfect?” Surely, if we are brutally honest with ourselves, the net effect of thinking about all this is to make each of us, me included, feel almost like total failures as Christians. We probably should be feeling guilt and even shame at the recognition of ourselves as evildoers. Worse, we should feel devastated to think the Lord might say to us, “I never knew you.”

The peace of the Lord be with you.

Jerry+