June 8, 2003 (We Got Hitched, or Not the Righteous but Sinners)

Rev. Scott A. Harmon

We Got Hitched, or Not the Righteous but Sinners

Sermon:
June 8, 2003
Sunday Night Alive!

“I Just Want to be Mad”
words and music by Kelley Lovelace and Lee Miller

Last night we went to bed not talkin’ ‘cause we’d already said too much.
I face the wall, you face the window, bound and determined not to touch.

We’ve been married seven years now; some days it feels like twenty one.
But I’m still mad at you this morning. Coffee’s ready if you want some.
I’ve been up since five, thinkin’ about me and you.
And I’ve gotta tell you the conclusion I’ve come to.

I’ll never leave, I’ll never stray. My love for you will never change.
But I ain’t ready to make up or get around to that.
I think I’m right, I think you’re wrong. I’ll probably give in before long.
Please don’t make me smile. I just wanna be mad for a while.

For now you might as well forget it. Don’t run your fingers through my hair.
Yeah, that’s right, I’m bein’ stubborn. No, I don’t wanna go back down there.
I’m gonna leave for work without a goodbye kiss.
But as I’m drivin’ oh, just remember this:

* * * * *

It all started because this next weekend, I will officiate at my last wedding while here at First Church. Weddings are always great occasions. At their best, they are public declarations of a couple’s commitment, affirmations of an enduring relationship that each partner pledges to nurture. At their worst, they become grand productions orchestrated more to impress and testify to the participant’s good taste and style than anything else.

As a pastor, I like weddings. Sure, I’d get rid of all the trappings and hoopla. So often they just serve to cloud what’s really happening. But when the real marriage is the focus, when the relationship that has been given form between two people is what’s celebrated, it’s a grace-filled day.

I know some will argue: “But that started growing long before the actual wedding day.” And believe me, I don’t disagree. But like a baby forming in its mother’s womb, there has to be a “Coming Out” day that proves beyond any doubt what God has been nurturing all along. So too there is a day our connection with another—rooted in our heart—is recognized and acknowledged for what it is.

Jesus talked a lot about weddings and marriages, but he always did so as an illustration to something much more important. And so following his lead (call it a bias, but I’ve always found his to be a good lead to follow), I’m not going to talk about marriage. Because it gets kind of sticky. I suspect someone tonight is married and wishes they weren’t. Someone else may be divorced and wishes they never had been married. Still others are looking for the right one. Then there are the newlyweds. You’ve seen it—a glaze over the eyes, a self-conscious laugh. Marriage is a sticky topic. Maybe that’s why Jesus talked about it.

Wherever you are, whatever feelings the word “hitched” brings up for you, know that tonight I’m more interested in what the best in weddings, marriages and all that stuff point to. That is, the kind of soul-gripping honesty in any relationship that allows us to say: “I’m mad, but I’m not going to let go.”

In his latest book, Everybody’s Normal Till You Get to Know Them, John Ortberg makes the point that “Every one of us pretends to be healthier and kinder than we really are.” That in reality, we’re hiding, engaging in what might be called “Depravity Management.” We’re walking around “striking the pose,” looking good, sounding good, doing the right thing at the right time. We’re projecting the image we want others to see. As far as I can figure it, we’ve been doing that for— well, the Bible says about 8,000 years.

This week I saw the movie Catch Me If You Can with Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hanks. A 16 year old impersonates a pilot, a doctor and a lawyer—and does a good job. But reality is not always what it seems, is it?

The story is told of a group of nursing students in school. Nurses are compassionate, caring, knowledgeable people. One morning, the professor handed out an important pop quiz. The students who had conscientiously learned the material breezed through the questions. Until the last one. It read: “What is the first name of the woman who cleans the school?” Even the best students left the question blank. One brave voice asked if the last question would count toward their grade. “Absolutely,” the professor responded.

In your careers, you will meet many people. All are significant. They deserve your attention, not simply your care—even if all you can do is smile and say “Hello.”

We all get caught up in what we’re doing. It’s easy to do. In life, it seems we’re always preparing for the next pop quiz. But there are some you can never fool. Those you spend real time with know. Those who know you on your good days and on your bad, who recognize when there’s excitement in your eyes—like that day you got the promotion. And those other times when you’re almost consumed with fear.

As much as we posture, the truth is: It’s not that there are a few bad apples among us, and the rest of us are doing pretty good. It’s that we all, like sheep, have gone astray. You, me, the best, the worst, the most depraved along with the sweetest. All off us. When we’re “what we’d always like to be,” and when we get so tied up in what we’re doing, we really don’t care about the lady who cleans the building.

God knows the real us. He gave us life, watched us grow, and long ago committed to be with us wherever we went. You might say it’s a “We’re hitched” kind of love. Jesus showed folks what that kind of love was like in the way he lived, and tonight we see him living it out because…

There was once a fellow who the upstanding citizens of the community simply didn’t like to be around. He was known to be a shady fellow. Many called him a crook. He never went to church. It was even said quietly that he had ties to organized crime. His name was… Well, the Gospels tell it better.

As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.

While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and “sinners” came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?”

On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Matthew 9:9-13, NIV)

Not the righteous, but sinners. Not insiders, but outsiders.

Matthew responds to the holy call of God made not to one who is already put together or one who is Mr. or Ms. Perfect, but to someone who doesn’t have a chance of measuring up. To the leaders of the temple, Matthew is just another worthless scumbag sinner working for the Romans. But Jesus sees him differently. He sees a child of God, one whom God has never given up on. While everyone else says, “Why bother?”, God says: “Because he’s mine.”

The band’s special music tonight was a little different. But if you’ve ever had the experience of knowing someone’s mad at you, yet standing right beside you and staying in relationship with you (not because they have to, but because they want to), it’s a pretty powerful thing.

It’s easy to love Mr. or Ms. Perfect. It’s easy to be really attracted to that masked person on TV or that date on Friday or Saturday night. It’s easy to look at someone else’s spouse and think: “Oh, they’re so wonderful. Look at all they do.” But that’s only a small part of what makes a relationship real. None of us is lovable all the time. Not one of us can say we always smell good or we always say the right thing. The one who says, “I always think of the other person,” is lying, if not to themselves, then to everybody else. The truth is, while Jesus may be the master fisherman, none of us are all that great a catch.

But here’s the good news. God doesn’t give up. He doesn’t run. It’s as though he said a long time ago, even before we were born: “In Jesus Christ, we’re hitched.”

There are days I’m sure I embarrass my Heavenly Father, just as there were days I embarrassed my earthly father. There are times I have hurt him, just as there have been times I have hurt Bron. If it was a matter of God saying, “Measure up or I’m out of here,” I’d be in trouble.

But that’s where the good news comes in. One of my favorite hymns is “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing.” It’s going on 300 years old now. Folks like Robert “Bob” Robinson and Charles “Chuck” Wesley were the Bob Dylan and Rich Mullins of their day. Robinson grabbed the Good News and told it like it was (and still is) when he had us sing: “Jesus sought me when a stranger, wandering from the fold of God.” Jesus didn’t come looking for someone perfect, but for one who was willing to see God’s love for what it was—grace.

Tonight, Wendy sang: “I just want to be mad for a while.” That’s real. That’s where we all find ourselves sooner or later. And isn’t it great that we have a God who says even when we’re angry, when we’re frustrated and disappointed, when we think we’ve blown it and fallen short for the umpteenth time, when we’re so tired we have absolutely nothing to offer, our God still says: “I chose you, and I’m not going anywhere.” That’s grace. Not the grace of an insider or the righteous, but the very thing that garden-variety sinners like me, like you, like all of us, stake our lives (and our souls) on every day.

Yeah, we’re hitched to Jesus Christ. And for those who recognize that gift for what it is, that’s a pretty amazing thing. Not for the righteous, but for us sinners.

Thanks be to God. Amen.