[Lent 2] righteous rebuke

Jesus said to the disciples, "Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, but woe to anyone by whom they come! It would be better for you if a millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea than for you to cause one of these little ones to stumble. Be on your guard! If another disciple sins, you must rebuke the offender, and if there is repentance, you must forgive. And if the same person sins against you seven times a day, and turns back to you seven times and says, 'I repent,' you must forgive."

Luke 17:1-4 (NRSV, alt.)

Jeff opened his sermon with talking about how we as progressives are on board with the idea of of forgiveness (even if we're bad at practicing it) but are uncomfortable with judgment and rebuke.

My immediate reaction was "What you say 'we'?" (Stranger Ways' "I'm Judging You" was my house theme song) but honestly I am highly confrontation-averse, so Jeff's point wasn't inapplicable to me.

And in having conversations with other people about this sermon, I have been reminded that we're often very comfortable with judgment of people we deem Other -- people we believe to be doing damage through the actions they take based on their beliefs about abortion, sexuality, gun control, gender norms, climate change, health insurance, social safety nets, etc. -- but rebuking people we're actually in relationship with? That's difficult, and most of us avoid it.

Jeff said:

if we are here to build the Beloved Community together, then skipping the hard labor of rebuking sin around racism will sidestep the true intimacy of our relationships to one another. If we don't rebuke, but only rush on by to a "get-along" forgiveness and an easy peace, then that is likely to be the thing which truly messes up our ability to be a church to one another and a church for our future.

The passage Jeff preached on opens with Jesus noting that occasions for stumbling are sure to come but woe to us if we cause others to stumble. We probably think that failing to warn someone about a stumbling block that we recognize in their path isn't as bad as actually putting a stumbling block in front of them (it's a known cognitive bias), but I'm not sure that Jesus would agree with us. Jesus says, "Be on your guard! If another disciple sins, you must rebuke the offender."

Jesus calls us to a new Way of being in the world, and it's hard. And if we believe that this is the (or at least "a") Way to new life, then why would we abide by a policy of non-interference if someone were about to fall?

But, of course, we know that following Jesus takes different forms for different people and back to Jeff's opening point, we don't want to start judging people just because their path takes a different form from ours.

But in this passage, Jesus doesn't say "falling away" or anything else that would suggest that leaving someone else's pre-determined narrow path is the problem. Jesus says "stumble." If you stumble, the problem is that you fall down and hurt yourself.

We are called to be the Body of Christ, and that means protecting each other the way we would protect ourselves, because we are all part of the same Body.

We have a responsibility to uphold each other, and also to call each other out.

Jeff said:

When I was hired on staff at ROC-NY in 2009 I was the only white person out of a least 15 positions in the organization and the only white person who had ever been hired since the organization began paying people in 2002. I had some friends on staff who were nervous about me working there because they knew bringing a white person on staff was going to mean that race was going to become more of an issue in the office. And they liked me and they didn't relish the day they were going to have to rebuke me. And I didn't ever want to do or fail to do something that would hurt one of my friends – and I especially more than anything didn't want that something to be around the issue of race. But it did happen and as a staff and as friends we had to learn to talk to one another about it. We had to create an atmosphere of honesty where it was safe to make mistakes, where it was safe to share rebukes around issues of race and racism, and where it was safe to then repent and make true forgiveness together.

I think Jeff's point about places needing to be safe both to make mistakes and to share rebukes is important -- Jesus exhorts us to rebuke sinners but also to forgive, even if someone sins against you seven times in one day. We are all going to mess up, and acknowledging that and owning up to it and asking for forgiveness and trying to change for the better are all important and necessary things that need to happen after we mess up, and we aren't able to do all those things if we're afraid that if someone knows about our stumbles they're going to shun us or kick us out.

People need to understand what behavior is and is not considered acceptable, and we don't build a healthy community by either under- or over-reacting to violations.

Molly recently Shared a blogpost entitled "What Needs to Die in the Church" and highlighted #10 on its list:

10. Nice-ing ourselves to death. We are called to love, to be kind, to be honest. Jesus was not nice (and I'm working on that book, so keep your pants on) and we do not covenant to be "nice" to each other as Christians. Nice will not tell you your drinking has become problematic, your anger is an issue, your boundaries are invasive, and your pants are indeed too tight. Love finds a way to do all these things with dignity.

I don't think anybody has any business telling someone else their clothes are too tight, but yes, behaviors that harm yourself or others are stumbling blocks that we are called to warn each other against.

Sue D. commented:

Interesting. Makes me wonder - how is nice different than kind? I feel like kindness can tell you nicely that your pants are to tight? But niceness has trouble speaking kind truths?

I still remind myself daily of mother Teresa's words " the world is lost for want of sweetness and kindness" maybe it's that Kindness acknowledges and takes care of needs and niceness tends to ignore and chat about the weather?

I really appreciate Sue's framing of "acknowledging and taking care of needs." We are not called to rebuke people so that they will feel terrible (tempting though that can be when their behavior led to us feeling terrible) but instead we are called to be on guard against others stumbling, to be attentive to the needs of others (and ourselves) and to take action accordingly -- not to do everything but to do what we can.

***

What about you, Beloved? What does this passage bring up for you?

Do you want to dig deeper into what a rebuke with dignity entails? Do you wish I'd dug more into what forgiveness entails? Or maybe something else altogether that I didn't touch on.

You're invited to continue the conversation in the comments -- responding to any of the questions I've asked or raising questions of your own, or simply sharing some thoughts.

As always, you're welcome to comment anonymously/pseudonymously if you prefer.