Hunger for Holiness

Intro and scripture

Matthew 5:43–48 NIV

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Pray.

I am a perfectionist. One of the scariest things to me is beginning things. If I do not have a plan and an assurance/confidence that I can achieve the task fully then I will not begin. This week I submitted my dissertation to format control and to prepare for the last step which is a defense coming in the next few weeks. I would be embarrassed to tell you the amount of hours I spent looking at a blank screen when it came time to start a chapter....or the amount of times that I rewrote the opening paragraph.

Any perfectionists in the room?

Here is the deal, I imagine perfectionists annoy the rest of us. It sounds like a humble brag. It’s like the person in the interview when asked about their weakness they say “well I just care too much or work too hard.” But perfectionists know it is a disease and a curse. It has benefits but it can be overwhelming.

And you know what, perfectionists know there is no perfect. That is when it is paralyzing.

So in the room we have the people that constantly strive for something that is unreachable and then the rest of the room is chuckling to themselves and thinking… silly people, just move on with your life. Keep your expectations realistic and you will enjoy life better. And if these two people are married… goodness. Don’t look at one another right now. But maybe talk to a counselor because that is surely a source of trouble haha.

So when we read a statement, a command from Jesus to be perfect…we probably do a couple of things with this scripture. We either ignore it, explain around it, or we are plagued by it.

Background Text:

This text in the sermon on the mount is one that we have covered in the fall so I will touch on the context briefly.

The culmination of 7 commands....a vision of the Christian life. The sermon on the mount begins in humble beginnings with the beattitudes…blessed are the poor....now the sermon climbs the mountain to the highcalling of those that follow Jesus

7 commands included.

• you have heard it said, you shall not murder.....but I say do not be angry

• you have heard it said, do not commit adultery....but I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery

• you have heard it said anyone that divorces their wife must give her a certificate. But I say.....

• you have heard it said, do not swear an oath.

• You have heard it said eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, but i say....if anyone slaps you give them the other cheek

• and there are other smaller ones in the middle of these....

Then our text: you have heard it said, love your neighbor”, hate your enemy. But I say, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.

Be perfect therefore as your heavenly Father is perfect.

What does it mean to be perfect?

One of the most distinguishable and important parts of our Methodist heritage is our doctrine on Christian perfection (or entire sanctification). Some of us are not methodists or have not been for long....or maybe you have been here for 30 years and you still do not know what it means to be a Methodist.

Wesley famously said that Christian perfection “…the grand depositum which God has lodged with the people called Methodists; and for the sake of propagating this chiefly He appeared to have raised us up.”

Perfection is not superhero strength

This is not Perfect impeccability (dissenters of Wesley’s day would say that only God is perfect)

not perfect in knowledge

not free from ignorance

not free from infirmities

We are not talking about some comic book players here.

This is not a person Without Sin (not free from mistakes)

This is not a person without Temptation

This is not a person without the need for ongoing growth.

Perfection is love excluding sin

More than forgiveness…freedom

sin is not a requirement

More than freedom…love

This is also not just an unbinding. but a yoke, a putting on of something more.

Frederick Brunner is helpful here....

The word teleioi is usually translated "perfect." But the noun "perfect" seems to me too cold to carry the warmth, weight, width, and humanity of teleioi. "Perfect" in English seems often to mean "faultless," "flawless," and other superhuman or semi-fanatical connotations that are neither pleasant for others nor true to Jesus' sense. Luke, in his version of this sermon, heard Jesus say, "Be merciful (oiktirmones) as your Father is merciful" (Luke 6:36; Calvin, 1:200, prefers Luke's rendering to Matthew's).

The kind of perfection to which Matthew's Jesus refers, as the context shows, is the perfection of mercy, of wide - and whole-heartedness, not the "high" perfection we associate with impeccability. (Thus the REB, e.g., renders Matthew's verse this way: "There must be no limit to your goodness, as your heavenly Father's goodness knows no bounds.")

Watson:

Holiness, then, involves God’s work to change us from the inside out. God gives us a new heart and new affections. As we become holy, we come to love God and what God loves more and more over time. Becoming holy also entails a transfer of allegiance from the carnal fleshly things of this world (love of the world, pleasure, comfort, fame, pride, and so forth) to the things of God. -Kevin Watson

This isnt just a Methodist idea…This is found in Scripture:

Perfection is in the bible!

Leviticus 11:44–45 NIV

I am the Lord your God; consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am holy. Do not make yourselves unclean by any creature that moves along the ground. I am the Lord, who brought you up out of Egypt to be your God; therefore be holy, because I am holy.

Leviticus 20:26 NIV

You are to be holy to me because I, the Lord, am holy, and I have set you apart from the nations to be my own.

1 Peter 1:13–16 NIV

Therefore, with minds that are alert and fully sober, set your hope on the grace to be brought to you when Jesus Christ is revealed at his coming. As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”

Titus 2:11–14 NIV

For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.

Low expectations translate to low prayers

I am leading groups in class meeting training and leader training. Helping to begin these Wesleyan modes of discipleship that are built to have a location of community which is singularly focused on this very thing. Holiness. And I have been through this training about 10-12 times by this time.

Every single time, chapter three gets everyone all flustered. Why? It is about Wesleyan grace and Christian perfection.

“I just mess up every day and chose myself over and over again.”

“I just can’t see perfect in this life as a reality.”

Thought experiment: We believe that God created from nothing all that is. Spoke words and painted the canvas we live in.

We believe that a man died 2000 years ago and his death was a sacrifice that atoned for and cleanse for every past, present, and future sin. That death is enough for us to be forgiven by God.

And yet, it is too much for us to believe that God can give us enough love that we would love him and neighbor only.

It is time to raise our expectations for our life experience because there is more and it is time to raise our optimism about God’s grace. Because right now our pessimism seems to say that sin is more powerful than God’s grace. Come on.

Here is what is fascinating. We don’t like to talk about sin. Personal sin, evil footholds of porn addiction or selfishness at home. Or corporate sin: racism, systemic disadvantage in our society and communities…our culture, even in the church is beginning to lose its ability to even acknowledge these things. But when we talk about being set free from them.... there is an uproar, like we want to acknowledge it finally.

It is time we ask for it. We desire after it....

Holiness for the world

Miriam Swaffield has a great illustration about holiness and why we are to seek this holiness.

Too often we think of holiness as this pursuit of perfect. This snooty holy or just being a person who follows all the rules long enough that we holy. Miriam compares this to white skinny jeans. Now bear with me here…you may not own white skinny jeans and you are thankful right now that I don’t either. But if you did have these white pants, you would be worried about getting anything on them. Worried about where to sit or getting anything on them. They are almost delicate. Right everytime I wear a white shirt, without fail something gets on it. So you carefully tip-toe around trying to keep them clean.

Scribes and Pharisees....see Jesus eating with people and think…o’ no, he is going to get dirty, why is he eating with them?

That is how we think of holy sometimes. We have to be careful or that’s what we are supposed to do....so then we think, “I can’t do this, better just admit I am a little dirty and wear some dark clothes so no one can tell if I get anything on them.” Or we obsess over keeping it white.

But that is not what holiness is.

holiness is more like the bleaching agent that makes the jeans white in the first place. What if holiness is what you pour out on dirt to make it clean? it shines everything up. This changes it doesent it?

Holiness is a result of a transformative relationship with Jesus.

Now we believe that in relationship with Jesus he is working to cleanse, but also he is filling us so that we might be a bleaching agent in the world. A transformative presence in the world, among our friends and family and neighbors.

This is why the extreme example of perfection. To love enemies. because that is the freely liberated place. To love regardless of reciprocation or outcome. And it is the leaven in the bread. It is the radical counterculture example of love and it changes the room. It changes the world.