The Art of Neighboring w/ Geordie Ziegler W1

Anthony: Let’s turn our attention to the first pericope of the month. It’s Romans 12:9-21. I’ll be reading from the Common English Bible. It is the Revised Common Lectionary passage for Proper 17 in Ordinary Time, which falls on September 3.

⁹ Love should be shown without pretending. Hate evil, and hold on to what is good. ¹⁰ Love each other like the members of your family. Be the best at showing honor to each other. ¹¹ Don’t hesitate to be enthusiastic—be on fire in the Spirit as you serve the Lord! ¹² Be happy in your hope, stand your ground when you’re in trouble, and devote yourselves to prayer. ¹³ Contribute to the needs of God’s people, and welcome strangers into your home. ¹⁴ Bless people who harass you—bless and don’t curse them. ¹⁵ Be happy with those who are happy, and cry with those who are crying. ¹⁶ Consider everyone as equal, and don’t think that you’re better than anyone else. Instead, associate with people who have no status. Don’t think that you’re so smart. ¹⁷ Don’t pay back anyone for their evil actions with evil actions, but show respect for what everyone else believes is good. ¹⁸ If possible, to the best of your ability, live at peace with all people. ¹⁹ Don’t try to get revenge for yourselves, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath. It is written, Revenge belongs to me; I will pay it back, says the Lord. ²⁰ Instead, If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him a drink. By doing this, you will pile burning coals of fire upon his head. ²¹ Don’t be defeated by evil, but defeat evil with good.

Geordie, if you were teaching from this pericope there’s a lot of Christian living shoehorned into this, what would you focus on and why?

Geordie: This is a crazy coincidence, but the first half of this passage is actually being read at my son’s wedding this coming weekend. When I saw that, I was pretty amazed. But if you imagine a married couple making this kind of promise to each other, to make this your intention, especially the first few verses. Love is not about pretending; it’s being real with each other.

It’s holding onto the good and not fixating on—it’s so easy. I’ve been married 33 years. It’s so easy to, at times, to—something maybe annoys me with my wife. And then I’m just fixated on that and holding onto that instead of holding onto so many good things.

And on down the line, I think the whole section is such a good challenge to how we would treat each other in close relationships and in relationships that aren’t quite as intimate as marriage. Showing honor to each other.

Being enthusiastic. The word—I’m checking it in a different translation for on your translation it says, beyond fire in the Spirit. I think sometimes it’s “your Spiritual fervor,” which is an interesting word. It both refers to fire and bubbling boiling. Just energized by the Spirit as you serve one another. So that certainly attracts my attention.

But I think I’d want to focus or emphasize that everything in this passage describes the way that God is revealed to be in Jesus. Jesus is all these things. There’s no description, there’s no command or call that God gives to us that he doesn’t describe himself in the first place. He’s not telling us to take out the trash because he’s too lazy to do it.

Maybe a second comment. If I were wanting to focus, I think it’s worth taking a little bit of time on verse 19 because that can easily get misunderstood. On the surface, it looks like it’s saying that God is a vengeful God paying back evil for evil. And I’ve heard that verse quoted often by those that insist that it’s in God’s character to be retributive and punish violently and eternally. But I think the text actually is making the opposite point, and we just need to keep reading the passage.

So, if we actually stopped at verse 20, but verse 21 continues—or no, you read verse 21. That’s the end. “So do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” And that’s how God overcomes evil. He doesn’t overcome it by retributive or violent punishment. He overcomes it his way, which is by his goodness.

Anthony: Yeah, it reminds me, Geordie. I saw a quote from Bradley Jersak and he mentioned, when has guilt and shame retribution ever brought somebody to a loving relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ? Because his way is mercy and when Jesus showed mercy, he wasn’t trying to change the Father’s heart toward that person or toward humanity, but revealing the heart, right? This is who God is and the way he operates.

Geordie: Yeah. I think anytime it’s so easy for people to lift verses out of context and then use them in ways they aren’t meant to. So, this is, I think, a good test case or just even a good teaching opportunity for people to recognize, let’s read the big picture here.

Let’s see what Paul’s actually trying to do. There’re a couple ways I think to come at it. I think I was reading some—you mentioned Brad Jersak—I was reading I think something by him related to this. It was talking that verse 19 is actually quoting from Deuteronomy 32, which is a different emphasis.

Just because the Old Testament is quoted doesn’t mean the way it was meant in the Old Testament is the way they’re meaning it in the New Testament. So, in the Old Testament, it’s almost a celebration of vengeance. But it seems like Paul is subverting that original intent. And instead of advocating vengeance and violence, he’s actually promoting enemy love.

And this whole section is caught up in the relation to the state or to the government. And of course, we know the government that Paul is writing under is Nero’s government which is like the imperial beast. It’s the worst government they could imagine in so many ways. And yet Paul is warning his people to not become like them.

Because first of all, that’s not Christ’s way, and secondly, you’ll just get killed. So, the way to be Christ person is to overcome that evil with good, with a kind of non-violent resistance that proclaims Jesus is Lord and Caesar’s not. The weapons of our warfare are not the weapons of this world.

It’s a gospel of peace and acts of enemy love. And that’s how God’s going to defeat this world. So that’s one angle.

Another angle is a little bit what George McDonald does with this, which I think is very challenging because his approach—and maybe I could read a little bit of what he says, and I wish I had the sermon. I took this out of his devotional. But he says:

No prayer for any revenge that would gratify the selfishness of our nature, a thing to be burned out of us by the fire of God, needs think to be heard. Be sure, when the Lord prayed his Father to forgive those who crucified him, he uttered his own wish and his Father’s will at once: God will never punish according to the abstract abomination of sin, as if men knew what they were doing. “Vengeance is mine,” he says: with a right understanding of it, we might as well pray for God’s vengeance as for his forgiveness, for that vengeance is to destroy the sin—to make the sinner abjure and hate it; nor is there any satisfaction in a vengeance that seeks or effects less. If nothing else will do, then hell-fire; if less will do, whatever brings repentance. Friends, if any prayers are offered against us because of some wrong you or I have done, God grant us his vengeance! Let us not think that we shall get off! And part of what McDonald’s getting at is God is committed to purifying all that is not of love’s kind out of us. And. That’s a good thing. Yes. So sometimes I know I was brought up with the idea that once you believe in Jesus, you’re forgiven. [from Consuming Fire, the devotional version of George MacDonald’s Unspoken Sermons]

And part of what McDonald’s getting at is God is committed to purifying all that is not of love’s kind out of us. And that’s a good thing. So sometimes I know I was brought up with the idea that, well, you know, once you believe in Jesus, you’re forgiven. And then you don’t have to face your sin because Jesus did it for you. And that’s, on one level, sure, we’re forgiven, but on another level, God’s committed to healing all in us that would need forgiveness. And that’s a good thing.

Anthony: Thanks be to God that the old Anthony Mullins will not inherit the kingdom. And may it be so, Lord.

Verse 15, Geordie, indicates that, at least in my mind, we should place-share, enter into the place of another, through kinship and mutuality, by rejoicing with those who rejoice and mourning with those who mourn.

You are someone who vocationally offers soul care, Spiritual formation to others. So, I imagine you would have much to say about this topic. Using the passage and thinking Christologically, what guidance would you give people who yearn for deeper connection? And frankly we all do, whether we know it or not, we want deeper connection. What does that look like? What would you say?

Geordie: This is such an important verse. I think it offers us a kind of litmus test for our love. Is our love real or not? Is it sincere or not? Are we really just out for ourselves or not? If I’m really for others, over myself, then I’m going to celebrate their blessings and achievements rather than harboring some kind of competitive jealousy or envy, which is so easy to fall into.

And then it’s turned back on myself and I’m thinking about, oh gosh, I wish I had that, instead of just being able to celebrate with them. And then when those that have persecuted me or have been unkind to me, when they’re mourning or suffering, love mourns with and for them. And that’s a real test of love. I’ve had to wrestle with that myself many times. And it’s a reminder of the kind of love that God calls us to.

One of the things I do, in addition to my full-time work with Imago Christi, I also work part-time at a hospital as a chaplain. And as I said before the show, I had a shift last night. I just got off a couple hours ago and as I begin every shift, I know that I’m going to be with people who are mourning. And occasionally, I get to be with people who are rejoicing at some news. But nine out of 10 visits I make are mostly about dealing with mourning, with grief and loss, the mourning of unexpected trauma or diagnosis or impending death.

And people will sometimes say to me, I don’t know how you do it? And it’s hard, but my approach is pretty simple. And I should maybe just say first, initially my first feelings were performance anxiety. Gosh, I hope I know the right thing to say and feeling awkward. But I’ve learned over time to take a different approach.

So, when I’m on my way to visit a patient, I just pray a simple prayer. “Jesus, help me to love what I find there. Help me to love as you love this person, this family, this situation.” And that prayer, that focus on love has an amazing power to lower my anxiety level and also to enable me to be attentive to what they’re actually grieving or mourning. And not bring all my own assumptions into it. So, I don’t know if that answers your original question.

Anthony: It does. It does. And God bless you and your work, and I appreciate what you said about how the prayer that you pray to Lord Jesus helps you to not center yourself in the process, in the relationship, in the time that you’re with somebody who’s grieving.

He empowers you by the Spirit to be with the other. And ultimately, I think Andrew Root was the one I read that talked about place-sharing. It’s just entering it into the grief. And ultimately, isn’t that what compassion is? It’s with somebody’s pain. It’s with their suffering. God be with you as you go. And thank you for staying awake for us. We appreciate that.