SO SIMPLE, YET SO HARD
a sermon based on Matthew 22: 34-46
by Rev. Rick Thompson

Here come the Pharisees again, taking one more shot at Jesus. One last time, they confront him with a question. They don't really want to know the answer; they just want to get Jesus in trouble. This time, they challenge Jesus to tell them which of the commandments is the greatest.

Now that was a huge challenge. You see, we're used to thinking of ten commandments. But the Pharisees counted 613 commandments. For every one of the ten we're familiar with - and especially the commandment about the Sabbath - they were many, many other commandments that offered further interpretation. So, over the centuries, the tradition of 613 commandments emerged.

That's why the Pharisees' question of Jesus was not so simple. How could anyone, even a great teacher like Jesus, penetrate to the core of the commandments and select the one that was the greatest of all? It would be impossible! So, the Pharisees approached Jesus with their not-so-innocent question: "Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?" (We can imagine the other Pharisees standing around, nudging each other, and whispering, "Huh! Let's see him answer that one if he thinks he's so smart!")

And Jesus did. He gave them a simple answer that stunned them and left them speechless. It's the last time they dare to challenge him; from now on, they just accelerate the plot to do Jesus in.

What's his answer? He reaches back into the ancient tradition, back into Exodus and Leviticus, and responds, "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."

There you have it. That settles that. Not 613 commandments, not 10 commandments, but two - two great commandments that sum up and support the whole teaching of the Old Testament.

It's so simple! - yet so hard. Simple to say, hard to do.

At least it's hard for me. What about you?

How easy is it to love God - love God with our whole being, all our heart, all our soul, all our mind. How simple is that? I can't do that; can you?

Too many things get in the way of my devotion to God. When I pray alone or worship with the community, my mind sometimes wanders. When I make decisions about how to spend my money, I too easily put personal wishes ahead of the claims of God. When I choose how to spend my time, I find it easier to escape with a book or newspaper or football game than to involve myself in making the world a better place.

It's so difficult, isn't it, to put God first. When we have so many choices, such hectic lives, and so little time and energy, it's so hard to put God first.

It sounds simple, but it's really hard: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind."

And God is good and lovable! Yet still it's hard to love God with absolute devotion and loyalty. Our selfishness, our sinfulness, and our distorted sense of what's good for us make it hard to love God completely.

And then Jesus goes on to say, "Love your neighbor as yourself." Talk about impossible! It's hard enough to love God, who is perfect; so how can Jesus expect us to love our neighbor, who is sinful and imperfect - just as we all are!

The great Russian author Dostoyevsky tells of a woman, an evangelist, who traveled around Russia telling people about the love of God. She was captured by God's love for her, and on a mission to tell others about Jesus. But she had a problem: she could never be in the same room with another person for very long without becoming annoyed and disgusted. Others were always doing something that offended her: one woman had a shrill, ear-piercing laugh, and that drove the evangelist up the wall; then there was a man who slurped his soup, and she just couldn't tolerate that; there was a fellow whose obnoxious snoring turned her off. She wanted to tell them all about Jesus, but she couldn't get next to them, couldn't love them as they were. They just drove her crazy!

Dostoyevsky's comment was simply this: "Although she loved God in general, she couldn't stand human beings in particular."

One of the characters in the Peanuts comic strip once said it this way: "I love humanity; it's people I can't stand!"

We know - we know all too well, don't we - what that's all about! We find it so hard to love - to love God with undivided hearts, and to love others, warts and all.

We can't love others - especially the way Jesus commands us to love.

You see, we want to put conditions on our love. We'll love those who are like us, or whom we know, or who meet our standards. We'll love those for whom we feel some warmth or affection, but won't give the time of day to those we dislike or don't understand.

But the word Jesus uses - agape - is about unconditional love. It's love without limits, love without strings, love for the unlovable.

We can't love like that.

But God can; God can and God does love like that!

God loves with agape love - love for the unlovable, and love for those who find it hard to love others. God loves like that - unconditionally. Why, God even loves me and you, in spite of our failure to love God and others!

As we read on from this point in Matthew, we quickly discover the depth of God's love. Jesus' time on earth is rapidly coming to an end. Soon we will see him laying aside his power, submitting to a mockery of a trial and an unfair and horrible death. Why? Because God is love, and God dwells in our midst in Jesus. Jesus cannot do otherwise; he can do nothing else but lay aside his life out of love - unconditional love - for those, like you and me, who do not deserve it. Jesus gives all he has out of love for God and love for his neighbor.

No, we can't love like that - but Jesus lives in us, and Jesus can love through us. By his grace, by his power, by his own love, poured out again and again, Jesus can empower us to love God and love others.

When we realize how incredible, undeserved, and awesome God's love is for us, we respond with our love and devotion to God, as feeble as it often is.

And when we live in the amazing and unstoppable love of God, when we discover how astounding it is that God loves even us, then we are strengthened and empowered to share that love with others.

No, it doesn't come easily, the ability to love. It takes a whole lifetime of practice, and practice we must.

In the story The Great Hunger, we read of an anti-social newcomer in a rural community. This ornery fellow put up a fence around his property, and posted "No Trespassing" signs to keep visitors out and warn possible intruders. He also put a large fierce attack dog on his side of the fence.

On a fall day the next-door neighbor's little girl crawled under the fence. She just wanted to pet the dog, but the beast grasped her by the throat and killed her.

The community was enraged. They ostracized that unfriendly neighbor. No one spoke to him. Clerks in stores refused to wait on him. In the spring, no one would sell him seed to plant his fields. The fellow was left destitute, with no way to provide himself a living.

One day, in his despair, he looked out and noticed someone planting seed in his field. He rushed out to see who it was, and was shocked to discover it was the little girl's father. "Why are you, of all people, doing this?" the grouch wondered.

The grieving father replied, "I am doing it to keep God alive in me."

That's why we love - to keep God alive in us. To practice loving a little bit like God has first loved us. To rekindle and renew the spark of God's love within us.

We love, because God has first loved us. God is love. So, when we practice Christ-like love for others, we are also drawn closer to God!