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Just then loving

 A sermon for the Centenary of the Auckland City Mission by Bishop Jim White. This was to be Bishop Jim’s last sermon before his sad death in September 2020 
Bishop Jim White

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Just then loving

Transcript
Justine in front of him. There was a man who had dropsy and Jesus asked the lawyers and Pharisees, is it lawful to cure people on the Sabbath or not? They were silent. So, Jesus, took him and healed him and sent him away. I am that, man, I have had dropsy and it seems that Jesus with the help of some Pharmacy companies has healed me, dropsy High dropsy, Is oedema. Lots of you may have suffered from it. It's fluid retention or swelling. It's the build-up of fluid somewhere in your body. I've had dropsy because I have lymphoma which is a terminal and aggressive kind of lymphoma and I retired and went away. But against predictions, I made it to my own birthday last weekend and this birthday this weekend 100 years since the missions Nativity Two great weekends. I did not expect to have so I happily stand here and honor all those who have gone before us. And given the mission, its life being its Limbs and its lungs, who've been donors and diners. Most of the names are course, are lost to memory. Some of them were real saints, and all of them were Sinners, all of them are some way part of the fabric of the mission down the century. I to acknowledge this building the Sacred Space, my fellow Bishops, roasts and cuddle. Helen Vicky here Clergy. Kate will find Linda Linda? No acknowledge you, Chris our current Mission, ER, and through you. I'd like to honor all of the michener's who have served Faithfully in that role. Beginning, of course with the notorious GSB. Calder And then all of you, those from Saint Matthews, far! No! The mission far, no, all of you who have gathered here to offer Thanksgiving and worship today. May God be with us, all. Really if you were to count all that, I've said as not really my sermon but an introduction shouldn't be counted, as part of my eight minutes arguably, eight minutes should be the limit on any speaker or preacher this week after the eight minutes. It took to extinguish the life flame from George Floyd. The virus of racism, has surfaced around the globe and some are fearful, some are full of Rage. Mostly there is a blessed rage for justice and equality. In 1961, the author James Baldwin was asked by radio host, about being black in America. He said to be a negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in a state of Rage almost all of the time. I'm aware that the virus of racism is not so much in the background, but in the foreground for us today, along with the virus unimaginatively, unimaginatively called covid-19, which is killing people in all sorts of nasty ways, even as I speak, 40,000 did in Britain numbers unimaginable. And all this pressures and on us. But this is the place and the work of the mission always has been to be standing right there. With those who are facing down death homelessness or health issues or just plain hungry, hungry food for food for themselves or for their family, those who yearn for a different way than the No Exit lines of unemployment. And the choke Lanes of welfare benefits. And we might, we might touch tart about the US of a and say, the mass incarceration of black Americans. And the death penalty that is still legal in a number of states is shocking and shameful, but the statistics that has mass incarceration of brown people in this country is not much better and it all boils down to a matter of Justice. Justice delayed and delayed and delayed in a deep Justice. That is plainly denied. One cannot work at the mission for a long and not feel the words of a moss, well up within let Justice roll down like Waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. But Amos is not our text, not the gospel appointed for today, that comes from Luke by the grace of God. It is my task to crack. Open the word with my words, The gospel passage has Jesus, going to the house of the leader, of one of the leader of the Pharisees. It is surely a companion piece of Luke 10 and the parable of the Good Samaritan when Jesus has been questioned by the scribes and the Pharisees. That story is possibly the most well-known story in the New Testament. And it Jesus is quizzed by a lawyer about what he must do to inherit eternal life. And the answer, love the Lord, your God with all of your heart, all of your soul, all of your strength, all of your mind, and your neighbor as yourself. The answer only leads the lawyer to ask another question. But who is my neighbor? In the parable of the Good Samaritan follows is Jesus responds to him. The neighbor is the one who acted as a neighbor, namely the Good Samaritan who crossed the road to help the robbed and beaten men. The story is so well known that it is entered. Our everyday, lexicon to refer to anyone who does good for others. A good samaritan. So today, some chapters later, Luke has Jesus off for Shabbat dinner with the good synagogue folk and we might see them as good church-going folk Pious and the well-to-do the educated of the city and the question of neighbor relations resurfaces because Jesus up and heals a man with drop, see, right there. And then without so much as a by-your-leave. so, the implicit question becomes, When should we help? If we can help on the show Bart? Who should we help? Who should we offer over our place at the dinner table? One might say that Jesus gets right up in their Grill. Remember, there is no actual grilling going on. Because Pious, Jews would have prepared the meal before time. He says, don't just care for your friends and family. Those who Society, all those, who Society honors you are to care for those with whom you have no relationship, no obligations. If care is a synonym for love and I think it is here. This is about neighbor love with a neighbor. Is somebody we have? What is called, and philosophy. No special relationship. I have a special relationship with all of my family members with my brother, or my daughter to love and care for them. Mostly comes from that special relationship. It was the Christian philosopher søren Kierkegaard, who first suggested that love and special relationships. The love we have for family members is ultimately self-serving and therefore, could not be counted as Christian love. Similarly, some writers have questioned whether Jesus was ever interested in the question of Justice, you see, Justice is about giving and honoring claim rights that someone has over you or over Society in general. According to unders new grand, the seminal book agape and Eros. It is Justice as a matter of Duty and it has nothing to do with love. More radically Jean-Luc Marie on argues that Justice ultimately belongs to an economy of exchange and love. Love looks for no exchange, love makes possible a true gift, a gift with no return charity. If you like Now is not the time or the place to argue the details about Kierkegaard or Murray on or the others who have attended the question of love and justice. But I do think that there is something important in the difference between the love for a family member and the spontaneous love and care. That one might have for somebody who's genuinely other the complete stranger. That is what Jesus speaks of in today's Gospel. It is a love that reaches Beyond any reasonable limits that we might have a love that goes where no relationship exists, nothing. If you can recall when the Good Samaritan, first sees the beaten, Man, by the side of the road, we are told in the English translation that he is moved by pity. But he is such an inferior translation because it conveys, a kind of dominance. I suppose compassion is the better word. God has compassion on us as a mother for a child, the bonds of compassion in the root Hebrew is the umbilical cord. Our fundamental gut connection between one life and another Jesus tells us that where that is all there is this connection? This Bond of compassion when the other is not family member or somebody, I have any relationship with We are to go to their aid as well. Invite them for dinner. if someone is really other, Watch over them. Care for them. Be part of their healing. Love them, too. Genuine charity. Deep down, that's what drives the work and the witness of the Auckland City Mission. It is driven at for a century. I pray, it will drive it for another.