19th Sunday after Pentecost

Welcome to this gorgeous morning!

And on this beautiful day:
We get to hear about our favorite topic:
SIN.
And FIRE.
And tearing, and breaking:
And worms and hell.
Lot’s of scary stuff.

But more precisely than that:
Three of today’s readings discuss the particular sin of selfishness and jealousy:
What I like to call:
The tale as old as time.

This tale:
This sin of selfishness and jealousy is even older than Moses.

But for today:
Let’s start there.

In today’s first lesson:
Moses is mad at the Israelites:
And he cries out to God Saying:
“Why have you treated ME: Your servant so badly?
That you lay the burden of all these people on me?”

He even goes so far to scream at God:
“If this is the way you are going to treat me, put me to death at once!”

We see Moses today, not as the brave, fearless leader we’ve come to remember
him as.
Instead, we see him as the real struggling human that he actually was.

Someone who is so frustrated, that he’s ready to totally give up.
And God’s response is pretty amazing.
God has Moses gather the elders:
So that the responsibility can be shared with others:
Not falling on Moses alone.

But that classic tale as old as time:
The sin of jealousy and selfishness takes over.

And these elders become jealous of one another:
Particularly of these two named Eldad and Medad.

The elders say of these two: “Who let them into our club?”
And Moses in his frustration basically says “Don’t be jealous!! We should want
everyone to be prophets of God!!”

God tries to spread out the work:
So that one person isn’t doing it alone:
And its met with anger:
Because some people don’t want OTHER people to be able to do God’s work.
Some people think that only THEY are good enough to do this work.

The sin of selfishness, (or even self-righteousness) It’s a tale as old as time.
And that’s not all.

In the New Testament reading today,

James let’s his readers (and us) know that God alone is the one who is ultimately in
charge.
The community he’s writing to were participating in that very same sin:
That tale as old as time.

They were planning their lives to suit themselves:
Regardless of how their lives affected others.

That same sense of selfishness continues long after Moses.
James says:
“Do not speak evil against one another…do not judge others.”

He warns them that riches will rot and that the poor will cry out against any of
those who would harm them.
Someone who knows the right thing to do and doesn’t do it, commits a sin.
In vivid detail: James’ words should make us squirm:
Because he points to this real human reality that we have all experienced:
That tale as old as time:
The sin of selfishness.

And then finally:

When we think we’ve heard quite enough:
We hear Jesus speak some scary words:
About fire, and hell, cutting off body parts.

Today’s Gospel reading starts in a VERY similar way that the Old Testament story
ended.
A member of the “inner circle” or “the club”
Was upset because someone outside that circle was also able to use one of God’s
gifts,
And supposedly:
without the “right” credentials.

The tale as old as time:
Someone who is selfish and jealous of someone else (who is working for Good and
for God!)

Both Moses and Jesus were faced with the same problem:
Their followers just didn’t get it.
They didn’t get that what was offered to them:
Is offered to everyone.
That it wasn’t an exclusive club.

What the people in Moses’ time,
The people in James’ time,
And the people in Jesus’ time didn’t get:
was what it means to be a part of the “people of God.”

And that means shedding that tale as old as time:
The sin of selfishness and jealousy:
Looking toward God and neighbor:
And not toward yourself.

In last week’s Gospel,
Jesus picked up a little child and said,
“whoever welcomes a child in my name, welcomes me;
And anyone who welcomes me, welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

Today, it might strike us as a charming thing for Jesus to do when he uses a child
as an image:
In that age, though, it was remarkable.

In Jesus’ time, Children had no status at all.
They represented the lowest of the low:

Not only the materially poor:
But the spiritually poor as well.

And here Jesus was forcing the adults to rearrange their thinking.
He was forcing them to understand that unless they allowed themselves to go back
to being as simple and innocent as children:
Unless they began to accept ALL of God’s people as part of their community:
Unless they began to live as if they really understood that the kingdom of God was
in their midst,
They were in danger of falling into serious sin.

But we don’t really want to talk about sin, do we?
It’s distasteful to us:
So we tend to ignore it.
But… It’s PART of us:
It’s the Tale as old as time.

And if we ignore it, we’re kidding ourselves.
So what do we do?

What can we learn from the lessons we have heard today?

Moses, James, and Jesus were all dealing with a disgruntled and ungrateful people:
People engaged in the sins of pride, elitism, Selfishness, and jealousy.

We can, as Jesus says, “Become like little children.”
Children: who are certainly not perfect:
Who stumble along and make mistakes,
but are generally open enough to learn more about the world and how to walk
around in it.

You know:
Like preschoolers:
Who see a new kid at the park:
A kid who might look very different from them.
And say “Hi! Want to play with me?”

We too can become like little children:
We can flip the script on that tale as old as time:
Those human tendencies toward selfishness and jealousy:
And thereby create the kingdom of God that is already among us.
Where whoever wants to step through the doors are welcomed:
And the sins of selfishness and jealousy are swept away.

Let’s re-write the tale as old as time:
The tale that God first intended when the world was created:
Where all are welcome:
All are beloved:
And the human tendency toward pride, jealousy, and selfishness, fade away.
Amen.