One
day Jesus was confronted by some who weren’t so sure of his beliefs…they had
watched him heal on the Sabbath, eat with sinners and tax collectors, they had
listened to his teachings and they wanted to know more about what he believed
and why.
They
knew he read the same Bible as did they. He called himself rabbi as did their
religious leaders. But there was something about him they didn’t trust. What
they really wanted to know was whether he was one of them.
And
so one of the scribes asked him, “Teacher, which of all the commandments is the
greatest?” Jesus said, actually there are two commandments that rise above all
others. Love God and love your neighbor. And for more than 2000 years his
followers have struggled to understand those two simple rules of life.
Seems
simple enough. Love God, love one another. But then real life happens. We
encounter those who are not so easy to love. How do we make room for them and
Jesus? We begin to parse the words, dissect the meaning. “What is love?” we
ask. Loving God is relatively easy. Right? After all God is in Heaven, up
there, out of sight and all that it apparently takes to love God is to say we
do.
But
this “neighbor” stuff…well, who is our neighbor? Surely not everyone. What
about those illegals immigrants? Those homosexuals, those alcoholics, there are
bullies, Muslims, criminals, radicals, socialists, conservatives, liberals, Tea
Partiers…oh my the list is long. We read the papers and know that among our
neighbors are people named in the blotter briefs and on the list of sex
offenders. The newspapers and the politicians want to make sure we know when
they are our neighbors…and not so that
we can love them.
Well…maybe
we can solve the problem by simply moving to a better neighborhood. OR we can
say we love the sinner and hate the sin? We can teach our fellow Christians to
be in the world but not OF the world. All of that has been tried but it’s hate
and distrust that grows…not love.
When
Jesus first said it, it all seemed so simple and clear and easy, at least it
seemed simple to him…the scribe even got it. Jesus said, “Love God and love
your neighbor.” And the scribe said, “You are right, Teacher—this is much more
important than going to church and singing the hymns and saying the prayers.”
When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from
the kingdom of God.” But…is it that simple? No…let’s face it, it’s not. If it
were that simple, the world would be a far better place for children and other
vulnerable lives.
Let
me tell you a story that may help. Once upon a time
a man named Elimilech lived in Bethlehem, not coincidentally the town in which
Jesus would be born hundreds of years later. He was married to Naomi. They had
two sons. The family were members of the Hebrew tribe of Judah.
A famine in their own land forced them to immigrate to the
country of Moab, one of Israel’s enemies. But they had to find food even if it
meant living among those they were told to despise and whom they were told
despised them.
They were able to find food but Naomi’s sons also found, among
the Moabite women. And contrary to everything they had been taught in the
Temple, the young men married the Moabite women. Naomi’s life was made worse
when her husband died and then both of her sons died, leaving her alone with
the two Moabite widows of her sons.
One day, Naomi told them, “I must return to my homeland. I’ll
miss you, but I’m just an old woman. I am too old to even produce other sons
for you to marry. There’s nothing I can do for you.” Naomi knew the Moabite
women would not be well received back in Bethlehem. She urged them to return to
her home and to her gods.
But one of them, Ruth, begged, “Let me go where you go. Your people will be my people. And your God
will be my God.” Reluctantly Naomi agreed. And the two women travelled for
many days until they finally reached Naomi’s hometown, a place called
Bethlehem.
It was hard for two women living alone with no help or
protection form a man. Fortunately they lived in a land where the law and the
scripture protected the poor and required the wealthy to share. Not only did the law
assure foreigners the means to survive with some measure of dignity, it
commanded the people of Israel to treat even Moabite aliens living in their
midst as though they were “native-born,” admonishing them to “love them as
yourself,” and reminding them that they, too, were once foreigners in Egypt
(Leviticus 19:34).
Exodus
22:21-22 echoes this reminder of the time when all of Israel were aliens in
Egypt, forbidding any mistreatment or oppression of aliens. Even though Ruth
was not a native-born “citizen” of this adopted land, even though she was born
of the enemy Moabites, she was to be afforded certain protections under the law
that ensured her survival.
And so when the harvest came, it was shared with the poor even
when they were foreigners. “It’s time
for the barley harvest,” said Ruth to Naomi. “I will gather enough leftover grain
that we will be able to eat.”
A man named Boaz owned the field and wondered who she was. “She
came back with old Naomi,” said his foreman. “All day long, she has worked
hard.” Boaz told his workers to help Ruth.
One night, Naomi told Ruth to go to the threshing floor where
Boaz was sleeping. She told Ruth to wait for him there. When Boaz awoke he was
surprised to see Ruth. “What are you doing here?” he asked. “Naomi has sent
me,” said Ruth. “Since you are her nearest relative, I have come to ask you to
care for us.”
“God bless you,” said Boaz. “And don’t be afraid, for I will
take care of you.” He also said, “Bring me the shawl you are wearing and hold
it out.” When she did so, he poured into it six measures of barley and put it
on her.
Naomi the Hebrew rejoiced when Ruth the Moabite and Boaz the Jew
were married. And Ruth became the great-grandmother of the great King David and
Jesus of Nazareth was born to that line of family!
Think about it…the story of Ruth answers the question of just
what Jesus meant when he said to love our neighbor as ourselves.
It’s
lesson is the one the world needs to hear as it continues to wrestle with what
Jesus said about loving our neighbors. Isn’t it curious that the God who
inspired this book used the words of a marginalized, despised, lowly Moabite
woman to explain love?
When
Ruth said, “Your
people will be my people. And your God will be my God” she explained all we need to know about the greatest
commandment. Think about this…the book of Ruth comes immediately after two of
the most violent books in the Bible, Joshua and Judges…where story after story is
told of the slaughter one by the other of Hebrews by their enemies including
the Moabites. It was the Moabites who fought against Israel…the Moabites who
enslaved Israel for 18 years…under Ehud, the Israelites slaughtered 10,000
Moabites…these two peoples have a history of hatred and violence.
So when the Moabite woman, Ruth, says to the Hebrew woman,
Naomi, “your people shall be my people and your God will be my God” we are
getting a lesson on just what Jesus meant when he said love your neighbor.
Imagine a community, a nation, a world…where people who have
hated one another for generations, Jews and Arabs, rich and poor, black and
white, gay and straight, Christians and Muslims…imagine a world defined not by
prejudices but by relationships. A world where your people will be my people.
See in your mind for a moment those you fear, dislike, those you
don’t understand, those who believe and behave different from you, who confound
and confuse and frighten and anger you, those whom you have been taught are
sinful, distrustful, unclean and distasteful…those are the ones Jesus said we
must love as ourselves.
Can you see them?
Now look in their faces and repeat after Ruth of the Bible, “Your people will be my people. And your God
will be my God.”
And then listen quietly to Jesus say to you as he did to the
scribe, “You
are not far from the kingdom of God.”
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