The Rev. Joseph Farnes
All Saints, Boise
Easter 4B
In the counseling program I’m in, we’ve talked about professional ethics, how to navigate the tricky and messy waters when working with human beings. It’s important to have a guide!
Most of us think that ethics is about finding the difference between right and wrong; ethics is more complicated than that. Ethics is more than saying something is morally wrong; ethics is about figuring out what to do when two things seem right, how to make a decision in a complicated situation, how to do something when we’re stuck between two values we hold dear. Ethics sees the nuance, and it does not give us an easy way out. Ethics can leave us uncomfortable when we can’t walk away knowing that we 100% did the right thing.
Ethics are also a hard thing to legislate. Laws can only give so much nuance, and then it is up to a court of law to determine the facts of the case and apply the laws as best as they can. That nuance gets awfully uncomfortable when your morality makes little room for ambiguity, for the messiness of life. We want right to be right and wrong to be wrong.
And I get it. It feels like stuff should be easy to figure out. We want a universe where there is always a right decision, a perfect course of action. But that’s not the universe we have – we have a messy universe filled with living, breathing people, not abstract concepts.
And our political world – there is a lot of energy and support to be gained from moral panic and righteous indignation. We are right, they are wrong – it’s a clear line in the sand that divides the Good from Evil … or so we think. Politics is just as messy as life. While the Idaho legislature has adjourned for the year, our national politics will be firing up even hotter for the November election. I can feel my muscles tense and my heart pound just thinking about all that could possibly happen. So how are we going to get through it?
First, let’s turn to the Gospel. Listen to what Jesus says the predator is doing to the sheep. The predator snatches the sheep and scatters them.
What snatches your attention? Anger and fear. Anger and fear are two powerful emotions. If someone makes you angry, makes you seethe with rage at someone or something, it’s easy to control you. If someone makes you afraid, makes you terrified that someone or something is going to hurt you, it’s easy for them to say that they are your only hope, your only protection.
We’ve seen that in the world, haven’t we? We’ve seen that play throughout history. We get angry at “those people.” They threaten our livelihoods, our place in society, our wealth – we’re afraid of losing. Change is scary. We’re mad that the world isn’t what we want it to be, and we’re going to take it out on someone.
Anger and fear are at a deeper part of our brain. They are important emotions – they highlight us to danger and injustice. But that doesn’t mean they are correct in how they read the situation. Sometimes we’re afraid when nothing is wrong – when we turn off the lights to the basement stairs late at night and run up fast so the bogeyman in the basement can’t catch us. We know nothing’s really there. We’ve been there during the day. We rationally know. But the part of our brain that gets afraid says, “well but WHAT IF?” and so we run up the stairs to the safety of upstairs. And sometimes we get mad when nothing’s wrong – we drop something on the floor, and now we have to get a broom to sweep it up, and then we spiral into grumbling at everything and everyone, including being mad at ourselves.
Anger and fear sit deep inside the brain. They can sometimes help keep us safe – but very often, especially in a world where everyone and everything is clamoring for our attention, anger and fear are where we get hooked, we get snatched and dragged away, and our attention is scattered.
Watch for it – where do anger and fear show up? You don’t have to make a decision about what to do. Just notice. Watch. Are you being snatched away, are you being scattered?
It’s not easy to do. It’s not easy to be discerning in a world that demands instant response. The world we live in wants everything fast – it wants a response now. Don’t think! Just react!
We are called to be Christians, to be discerning and wise … and loving. We’re not called to react; we’re called to respond. To listen, and then think, and then speak. The first letter of John is an invitation to ethics and discernment.
We follow Christ, who laid down his life for us – therefore, we should do that for one another. Christ sees us in our needs – and he helped us and saved us and healed us. Shouldn’t we do the same to follow in his footsteps? We follow Christ, who showed us that love is a verb, an action word.
And that gives us boldness to act. Real boldness. Not a boldness born of fear or anger – that becomes cowardice or revenge. No, Christ gives us a boldness that trusts in God, that in the midst of the messiness of life, we can do good. We can obey Christ’s commands: to love God with all our heart, with all our mind, with all our soul, with all our strength, to love our neighbor as ourselves, to love one another as Christ loved us. That is our ethical guide, and that is our guide in the messiness of life.
It’s not easy. We don’t get it right all the time. Sometimes it’s hard to figure out what is the most loving thing to do in the moment. Sometimes we even have to figure out if our idea of love needs adjusting – and so we look to Jesus Christ, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, our savior.
But the world needs this badly.
Instead of being snatched by a spirit of anger, let us have peace in the love of God. Instead of being scattered by a spirit of fear, let us have fellowship in the name of Christ. The love of Christ will never lead us wrong. The love of Christ walks us through green pastures, as the Psalm says, and it accompanies us in the valley of the shadow of death, too. In all times, in all places, the love of Christ shepherds us. The love of Christ will never lead us wrong. Amen.