Sixth Sunday after Trinity

Jesus says, “If you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift” (Mt 5:23). Think of how much trouble in this congregation could be avoided if every member practiced those words. “My brother has something against me? What should I do? Well, I’m busy right now.” Busy doing what? Jesus says that even if you’re busy serving God, bringing your gift to the altar, doing many wonderful and important things for the church, those things can wait. Leave your gift at the altar and go be reconciled with your brother. If the things of God can wait, then how much more the business of normal life?

Many women suffer from various autoimmune disorders, in which the body attacks itself. So, it seems, does the bride of Christ, the Church—at least in her present, unperfected state. Every part of the body should be working together in harmony, but too often, within the church, various factions engage in hostility toward one another. Imagine if the index finger declared war on the eye ball, or the kidneys decided that they no longer needed the pancreas. When even one member of your body is out of whack, the whole body suffers. If you’ve ever had a toothache or a hangnail, you know this to be true. How much more does the body of Christ suffer when its members are at odds with one another? This is so important that Jesus says, “Stop whatever you are doing, and go be reconciled with your brother.”

Jesus doesn’t say that the members of His body should never argue, or never disagree. And He’s not shocked, shocked to find that there is sin being committed in His church. Sinners are going to sin, but Jesus bids us to be reconciled. Go—don’t wait—go directly to your brother. I’m afraid that too often in the church, we go to everyone except the brother. “Did you hear what he said to me? Can you believe what she did?” If your brother has something against you, Jesus says to go to him alone. Don’t tell your cousin, your neighbor, or your hairdresser. Go to your brother. Anything else is gossip, and it makes for an unhealthy and dysfunctional body. Many congregations are so riddled with factions, the eye against the hand, the foot against the stomach, that it’s a wonder they can be called a body at all.

“But what if the brother who sins against me is the pastor?” What Jesus said still applies. Go directly to him and be reconciled. Sometimes as the pastor here, it seems as though I’m the very last person in the congregation to know when there’s a problem. But it shouldn’t be that way. If I’m the problem, or even if you think I’m the problem, then come to me, your brother, and tell me. If I have sinned against you and don’t realize it, I want the opportunity to ask your forgiveness. Or if there is some misunderstanding or confusion, or a question about why we worship the way we worship, I would like the chance to explain, or to show from God’s Word why we do the things that we do.

Maybe in the past you’ve said, “Well, I don’t have a problem with my brother. He has a problem with me. So, the ball’s in his court. I’m waiting for him to make the first move.” But look again at what Jesus says, “If your brother has something against you, you go to him.” It doesn’t matter who’s in the wrong, or who has sinned against whom. If you know that there is separation between you and your brother, then you go to him, immediately. Jesus doesn’t want there to be separations and factions and crusted-over wounds in the body of His bride, the church. Just like he doesn’t want His people walking around with logs or splinters in their eyes, as we heard from the Gospel two weeks ago. Instead, Jesus wants the forgiveness that He purchased on His cross and gives freely to us also to be shared between us.

Go and be reconciled. Notice that Jesus speaks about a state of being here, more than something you must do. “Be reconciled.” And when Jesus speaks, He creates what He says. When God said, “Let there be light”, there was light. His words are not just words; they accomplish and perform what He says. Likewise, when Jesus says, “Be reconciled,” His words create that which He commands. How can you be reconciled with your brother? Because God has been reconciled to you through the blood of His Son. How can you forgive your brother? Because God has forgiven you.

Therefore, when Jesus says, “Be reconciled,” it’s not so much a command as a statement of fact. This is who you are, who God has created you to be. It is who He has restored you to being through your baptism into the death and resurrection of Christ. When God says, “Be reconciled with your brother,” that which He commands He also gives. How can you make peace with your brother? Because God has first made peace with you.

Let me read these words of Christ one more time, but this time, consider how, long before these words are given as instruction to Christians, they are first a description of our Lord. If your brother has something against you, leave your gift at the altar. St. Paul writes in the book of Hebrews that Jesus was not ashamed to call us brothers. And knowing that His brothers had something against Him, He did not wait for us to make the first move. He didn’t wait for us to come to repentance, or even to desire God. Instead, He came to us. This is what the Incarnation is about.

If your brother has something against you, leave your gift at the altar. What did Jesus leave behind to come to us? We might say that the altar here is as close as we get to the throne room of God this side of heaven, but Jesus’ place was there at the right hand of the Father from all eternity. The power and splendor of the Godhead are His, not as a gift, but by right. And He left all this there at the altar, at the nearer presence of the Father, to come to us. He veiled His glory, set aside His power, took on frail human flesh, in order to truly become our Brother.

And then what? Leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift. This our Lord did. He sought you out, even though you were far from God without the will or the desire to come to Him. Like the shepherd who carries home the lost sheep upon his shoulders, Jesus found you in the darkness of sin and carried you to the cleansing font of Baptism. Then He placed you safe and secure in the holy ark of the Christian church on earth, where He feeds you with His broken body and His poured out blood. And then, having made peace between God and man, Jesus then returned to take up His rightful place at the right hand of the Father. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.

So our Lord has done, and now, when He say to you, “Be reconciled with your brother,” it is not a law that you must fulfill, but the joyful and spontaneous response of one who has been forgiven much. Those that have been forgiven much, love much. It’s who they are; it’s what they do. And you can freely forgive, because freely you have been forgiven. You can be reconciled to your brother, because Christ has first been reconciled to you. Amen.