Sermons
A Message by the Rev. Harvey G. Throop
Palisades Presbyterian Church
San Diego, California
June 7, 2009
God's Loving Goodness and Patience
(Matthew 5:43-48)
“for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.”
(Matthew 5:45)
Back in 1981, Rabbi Harold Kushner wrote a best-seller book, When Bad Things Happen To Good People. I'm sure that many among us have read it. It addresses a question with which countless numbers of people have wrestled: “Why do bad things happen to good people?”
But have you ever found yourself asking just the opposite question: “Why do good things happen to bad people?” Interestingly, Jesus addresses that question more than 2,000 years ago in his Sermon on the Mount .
One does not need to be a meteorologist to recognize the truth of Jesus' words when he said: “… for he (God) makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous” (Matthew 5:45). We can see that for ourselves. Neither sunshine nor rain discriminates against persons, regardless of their moral character.
To anyone who has ever lived in a farming community, the simple truth of which Jesus was speaking is readily apparent – the rain falls and the sun shines upon all the fields, regardless of their owners. The marijuana plants of the drug pusher flourish as well as the soybean crop of the saintliest Presbyterian. The corn crop in the most unkindly non-religious person's field grows just as abundantly as the seed planted and cultivated in the most generous and pious person's field. All that any person has to do is to sow the seed and till the soil and nature does the rest without asking what kind of person owns the field.
Now, this raises a question: Is nature impersonal? If so, that would account for the sun shining and the rain falling so indiscriminately upon every one of us. Does nature care for what we call virtue and vice? If not, there is nothing to explain or to understand.
However, if we see God behind nature and God's will in the germinating of the seed, the ripening of the fruit, the shining of the sun and the falling of the rain, there is no way nature can be thought of as unconscious and impersonal.
Nature is really the functioning of God. God may do the same for everyone, but God does not feel the same about everyone. While a just and holy God loves the good, the true and the noble , a just and holy God hates the false, the vulgar and the evil . Every goodness is God's delight and joy, and everything evil is repulsive to God.
So why doesn't God discriminate in his dealings? Why does the earth yield her crops as generously to the child abuser and fraud as to the faithful believer and saint? If God is wise, just and sovereign , why does his sun shine and his rain fall upon the good and the evil?
Jesus taught that there is always a divine purpose in God's dealings.
Surely, this is the way that God would have us believe about his divine parenthood. God gives life to all of us and provides for our needs. God's open hand is the evidence of God's dealing with all of us lovingly in the natural world. Instead of seeing the indifference of nature, we need to see the gracious love of God. Instead of an unconscious nature producing the same results and not caring for persons, we need to see our wise and generous Heavenly Parent making equal and ample provision for all his children, be they good or evil.
In any family where there are children, each child is loved equally, but one child may be appreciated more than another. One child may be more obedient, more loving, more helpful and more unselfish , while another may be difficult, callous, stubborn and selfish, always doing only as he or she pleases. Is the parent going to feel the same toward both? Of course not!
Yet, at the same time, they are both the parent's children. For both of them, the parent's heart is tender and caring. All of the children will be provided for with an impartial benevolence. The parent will do the best that he or she can for each! So it is with God.
What Jesus is saying in this passage is that all of us are children of God – the best among us and the worst. There is not one of God's children who is despised, ignored or disowned. In every ray of sunshine and in every drop of rain, God is saying to each of us and to all of us, “I am your parent and I love every one of you.”
I believe that Jesus is also teaching us that this world is a place of probation – not judgment. Good and evil people are living and working side by side and are not to be separated until the end. We are never to say that any human being is a hopelessly lost sinner with absolutely no good in him or her.
Jesus gave us the parable of the wheat and the tares. Tares were weeds that, in their early stages, looked so much like the wheat that it was impossible to distinguish them. After the weeds and the wheat came to a head, each could be distinguished. By then, however, the roots had become so intertwined that to tear out the weed would be to tear out the wheat.
The disciples were concerned about the kinds of people Jesus was attracting and gathering around him. In their eyes, there were some pretty weird and objectionable characters being drawn to Jesus. Sometimes, you and I have questions about some of the folks who appear to be “oddballs” among us but who suddenly become serious Christians. The disciples expected Jesus to do some weeding out in this motley group. But Jesus said, “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged” (Matthew 7:1).
Do you understand why Jesus said that? He said that because we who are less than altogether righteous are not really able to distinguish between good folks and bad folks. We have too much matter – too many specks in our own eyes – ever to become true connoisseurs of evil in our neighbor. If we do try to make judgments, we may destroy the good as well as the evil, the wheat as well as the weeds. Jesus is saying that judgment must be left only to God.
The wheat and the weeds must be allowed to grow together for many days. In the end comes the harvest and the separation. Jesus' parable is saying, “Be patient in your judgments: one day, God's judgment will come.”
It is only in novels and movies that villains are absolutely and hopelessly evil, while heroes are immaculately good. In real life, we are all a blend of good and evil. What a mixed bag of impulses, emotions and motives we are!
With the shining sun and the falling rain, God's benevolent voice is saying, “Neither do I judge you yet. You are still alive. The sun still shines and the rain still falls upon your field.”
This life is a probation. It is a preparation for the real life that is yet to be. If this world is only a place of probation, then somewhere beyond it, there must be a place of judgment. If, in this world, the good and the evil fare the same, God, who is truly just, must make compensation. The brilliant sun will not always shine and the refreshing rain will not always fall upon evildoers. Neither will those who have waited patiently and lived righteously fail to receive their reward – the “crown of life.”
I think Jesus is also saying that God deals kindly with bad people as well as with good people in order to make known to everyone the fullness of his love. God is always willing to forgive.
What is necessary is for each of us to recognize and acknowledge that we are sinners. Remember: to break any part of a law is to break the whole law. Every last one of us falls far short of what God has created and enabled us to be, but God continuers to give his love and providence on us. If God had not loved you and me and remained so patient with us in spite of our imperfections, we could never survive. Thank God that good things happen to bad people or not a one of us would have a chance!
What more is this text saying to us? If God loves the good and the evil, should we not love each other like God loves us? If God is so slow to judge us, are we not to exercise the same patience? Should we do less toward others than we want God to do toward us?
So often, you and I tend to be so quick to judge and condemn when we know so few of the facts. We've all listened to people make judgments that were 180 degrees off base from the truth. Listen to some of the judgments people make within earshot of you just this coming week.
God knows the facts. God knows our most secret feelings, attitudes and motives, but God still sends the cheering sunshine and the cooling rain upon us. How awesome is that truth spoken by Jesus, “ Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. …Why do you see the speck in your neighbor's eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye” (Matthew 7:1-3)?
Where would we be if God had not loved you and me while we were still at enmity with him?
The person who recognizes that God allows his sunshine and rain to fall upon the worst as well as upon the best of people – to show us how we are expected to love – practices patience and tough love as a grateful response to God's amazingly tough love.
When you and I are offended, our first reaction is to want to get even. We rationalize, “Bad people don't deserve good things!” What if God had been out to get us when we have disappointed him and have broken his heart? The psalmist prayed, “If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, Lord, who could stand” (Psalm 130:3)?
Is this natural? Of course, not! Only God can give us the grace to love like he loves. If we love only our friends, we do nothing for God's sake. God has no enemies he hates; neither should we.
Jesus said, “Love your enemies, do good (to them). …Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful” (see Luke 6:35,36).
Don't misunderstand! God's love for his enemies is not the same as his love for his friends. His love toward his friends is a love of compassion and benevolence. His love toward his enemies is a love of patience. He gives blessings to the wicked, but he rejoices in the good. We are not to take admiring delight in our enemies, but we are to be determined not to harbor feelings of vengeance but to try to do everything we can for their welfare.
When we cause good things to happen to bad people, like God is doing for us, we are most like the persons God created us to be!
