Third Sunday in Lent
Jesus gives us a lens through which to examine our world, the Bible, and especially our own actions. When we need help interpreting what to do next, we can look at our choices through the lens of Jesus’s commandment – how do we love one another as God has loved us?
This lens will help us to discern God’s work in the world so that we can align ourselves to the movement of God in the world. This will require regular repentance, and that is okay. We are not expected to be perfect, we are expected to focus on our relationship with God.
As you’ve probably noticed, we are beginning the services of Lent this year with the Decalogue, which is a fancy title for the Ten Commandments. You might wonder why we’ve added this, as many consider the Ten Commandments to be antiquated. Or maybe you chafe at the commandments because you have been exposed to a tradition that applied them in a rigid or punitive manner.
Saying the Ten Commandments, along with several other changes to our liturgy, reminds us that we are in Lent, a penitential season. We are charged with examining our sins and exploring our relationship with God.
Because we frequently get distracted, it’s helpful to have regular reminders of God’s will so that we can examine our choices and figure out when we’ve wandered away. Saying the Ten Commandments is one of those reminders.
What exactly do the Ten Commandments remind us of?
Would you be surprised if I told you that, ultimately, the Ten Commandments remind us to love God and love our neighbor? Isn’t that the Greatest Commandment as given to us by Jesus?
Yes, it is, and it wasn’t original to Jesus. Jesus quotes the Greatest Commandment from Exodus because in the beginning, God tells us that the INTENT of the laws, including the Ten Commandments, is to love God and love our neighbor, or welcome the stranger, as the Old Testament states it.
If you pay attention to the Ten Commandments, you’ll find that the first several are all about relationship with God. Go ahead and turn back to the beginning of your bulletin and notice that the first few commandments define relationship
with God...
You have no other gods but me.
Do not make false idols.
Do not invoke the Lord’s name in malice.
Remember the Sabbath.
And then, beginning with honor your mother and your father, we find the commandments define relationships with others.
So, the overall intent of the Ten Commandments is to prescribe a society where we live according to the commandment to love God and love our neighbor. They remind us of how we honor our relationship with God and the world. But we are not ancient Israelites, so how do we understand and apply the old laws to our modern lives? Many people have been severely hurt by the misapplication of the old laws to marginalize and even brutalize populations in the name of the rigid application of Old Testament law.
Not only do we individually have the ability to get distracted from the core message of the Commandments, but as societies and cultures, we can get them wrong, sometimes even creating icons out of the very guidance intended to
help us build a relationship with God.
This is what we find Jesus challenging in the Gospel message today.
‘In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. 15 Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16 He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!”’
While the laws do proscribe the sacrifice of animals and giving of money to the Temple in very specific ways, Jesus is frustrated that this has become an economy unto itself. He is very aware that the chief priest and religious leaders
are profiting from this false economy at the expense of the poor.
An important reminder as we explore this passage: Jesus was a Jew and does not criticize Jewish belief and custom here. It would be better, and some Bible Translations do make this change, to say that he challenges the Jewish leaders, that is, the chief priests. Jesus is angry with the fact that the temple and the sacrifice practices have become fronts for operations to increase the wealth of the powerful. And it’s done in such a way that the poorest people are forced to suffer the most with the unfair practices.
When we examine our actions, we may find that we too have put up fronts that serve our own needs at the expense of others.
When power, money, and security drive human actions, then it often results in the oppression and dehumanization of marginalized populations. We’ve seen this with the history of slavery carrying through to modern racism and
resistance to reconciliation and reparations. We’ve seen this in the subjugation of women to modern pay inequality and discrimination. We’ve seen this in the bigotry against other ethnicities, from historically biased immigration laws to the modern intolerance of refugees and immigrants. And we’ve seen this with prejudice against LGBTQ people resulting in discrimination and hate crimes.
What would Jesus drive out of our church today? What tables would he flip? How would we be surprised by his movement in our lives? Though Jesus’s actions seem radical, as he overturns the tables and chases the merchants from the Temple, he is trying to shift the focus from specific acts to the intent of God’s law. Jesus is saying it’s not about the Law, it’s not about the Temple, it’s not about the specific practices, it's about the relationship with
God. It’s always been about relationship with God all the way back to the Ten Commandments in Exodus.
Jesus tells us, “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” This simple commandment gives us a complete lens through which to examine our lives and interpret our choices. It’s hard to marginalize others when we seek to love our neighbor as God loves us. Jesus models the way of love he expects us to follow, and through the ministry of Jesus, God shows us how to live according to God’s greatest commandment.
In Lent, we are given the opportunity to move with God. By examining our actions and naming our sins, we step into alignment with God, turning back to the source of all love and justice. Love God and love your neighbor. This has always been God’s message. It’s up to us to make it a priority in our lives.
The Rev. Mercedes Clements
