During seminary I spent one summer taking a unit of Clinical Pastoral Education at the University of Kentucky Medical School. Among clergy Clinical Pastoral Education is known as CPE and its purpose is to train people to become chaplains. At the University of Kentucky Medical School, the emphasis was on hospital chaplaincy. So, for one summer I got to learn about and practice being a hospital chaplain.
A part of that training was done in groups with others taking CPE. In these groups we would share papers, discuss our experiences of attempting to be chaplains, and do some good old group therapy . . . or what was called Inter-personal Relations sessions . . . which we affectionally called IPR. With the help of those in our group IPR sessions were opportunities to explore psychological and spiritual issues within our lives with the support of one another. The idea was to build up one another as we discovered parts of ourselves that CPE was exposing to us.
And, for the most part, that was what IPR sessions were . . . a growth experience. Except when it was Burt’s turn to share in the group. When Burt shared, anything and everyone was fair game to his critical eyes. No one escape the fury of Burt’s criticism. Many was the time when the rest of us left the group licking our wounds when Burt got done.
According to Burt his heart was in the right place because he “loved us like brothers.” Every time that Burt began a litany of criticism and complaint against one of us in the group he would say, “John, I love ya like a brother . . . but!” Then he would proceed to tear the person apart with great glee in his voice until the individual was nothing but a pool of despair . . . gasping and grasping for whatever life there was left. He was brutal.
By the end of the summer, as far as the group and the head of the CPE program were concerned, Burt had failed . . . he had failed as a chaplain, failed as a pastor, failed as Christian, and failed as a brother. He barely got out of the program alive in the end. Which surprised him. When told it was based on how he treated others, his defense was that everything he did was based on love . . . after all, he always prefaced his attacks with the statement, “I love ya like a brother.”
In the end, his actions betrayed his words.
Actions can betray words . . . beliefs . . . and, one’s own faith. In education there is a word that is used to describe a set of criteria or standards for grading an assignment . . . for grading one’s progress. That word is “rubric”. Though the word is grounded in the realm of education, we all know that there are “rubrics” or “standards” that we are all held up against to determine whether or not we pass . . . to see if we “make the grade.”
In our reading this morning we see a rubric being used. Jesus is confronted by the Pharisees with a test. It is a simple test of a single question posed by an expert in the law: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” The Pharisees were looking for a particular answer to the question to determine whether or not Jesus was a legitimate rabbi or teacher. Anything less than what the rubric said would be proof that Jesus was a phony and false teacher and prophet. It was a rubric well known to everyone who claimed to be faithful.
To which Jesus answers correctly. Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment.” Jesus passed with flying colors . . . he passed the test; yet, he did not stop there. He upped the ante. Jesus added, “And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” Jesus pulls a “yes, but . . .” on the Pharisees. Knowingly or unknowingly he hits his challengers with his own rubric . . . his own standards . . . of what it means to be a person of faith.
Here Jesus tells those who are gathered that while it is important to love God completely . . . it is not enough. It is not enough to truly claim that one is a child of God just because there is a complete love of God. While it is a good start there is more to it than just that. There is more . . . there is also the love of others. It is out of this deep abiding love of and for God that the faithful are called upon to love others . . . to love others as God has love them.
One does not exist without the other. To pass both must be in the life of the faithful person. Though Jesus proclaims that loving God is the greatest commandment, he places loving others right up there beside it. They are inseparable. He states that everything in life is based upon these two together. He tells those in his presence and those of us reading or hearing this story, “All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
Intentional or not, it is against this rubric that the faithful are considered as to whether they are passing . . . whether they make the grade. Ultimately isn’t this what we all should consider when we are evaluating our own faith as a follower of Jesus? I think that it is a good starting point.
Remember Burt? This is where Burt failed in his declaration of faith. Despite his proclamation of “love for all” his actions betrayed him. His words were not to nurture and build, but to hurt and destroy. In the end, he failed.
We have all heard many times that there are millions and millions of laws written to make us live up to the Ten Commandments. And that is probably true . . . yet, here we have Jesus simplify it for us. He tells us that if we can love God completely and love others, we cover all the laws and words of the prophets—all of them! Such is the rubric to use in assessing our faith . . . love. Love of God. Love of others. Do our words . . . our beliefs . . . stand up to this rubric?
In Jesus we are given the example of what it means to love God and others. In Jesus we are shown the way to love God and others. Through Jesus we have the key to success as a follower. It is not easy to follow in the footsteps of Jesus . . . to live up to his example. There are moments when we stumble and fall . . . moments when we forget whose we are . . . times when we let loose with the angry word . . . moments when we fail. We all do! At the same time, we have a God who loves us . . . a God who forgives us . . . a God who is willing to pick us up, stand us on our own two feet, and to encourage us to try again . . . and again . . . and again.
I do not think that God is too excited about the phrase of “yes, but” when it comes to faith. Especially when that “yes, but” is a contradiction to loving God and others. We are called by God to love . . . we are shown by Jesus how to love . . . and, it is up to us to do so. No one can do it for us, we have to do it for ourselves and hope that our actions are the ripples upon life that change others. The hymn asks the question: How will they know that we are Christians . . . followers of Christ? And the response is simple: Love. They will know that we are Christians by our love. This is the greatest of all the commandments . . . love . . . love of God . . . love of others. Amen.
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