proper 17 Church of the Advent Aug 29, 2021

 +For most of my life I’ve experienced chronic anxiety—and because of this I have a rule before I go someplace unfamiliar : I check out “google earth” before I go, so I know what the place looks like— I don’t like surprises. Following this self-imposed rule is a useful coping strategy for me.
For many of us, coming to a complete stop at a stop sign on a deserted street early in the morning when no one is around seems absurd. I dare say some of us, after looking both ways may roll through the stop sign.
 That’s what rules, expectations, guidelines do…. they help us to manage our behavior so that nothing gets out of hand. My checking out the lay of the land before I go to an unfamiliar place is a functional coping mechanism but, if I needed to do that sixteen times before feeling comfortable then this coping mechanism would go from functional to dysfunctional….or if the police had a camera recording whether everyone came to a full and complete stop in a deserted part of town on a Sunday morning at 5 am and sent out tickets to those who failed to completely stop…then there might be a bit of an uproar.
   It’s a matter of degrees.
So when the Pharisees in today’s Gospel get upset over the cleanliness practices of the disciples, they’re putting the cart of rules ahead of the horse of living. As Jesus says, if what comes out of your mouth is vile, then what goes into it doesn’t really matter. If your “coping mechanism” your “rule” your “guideline” get in the way of being a compassionate, loving, responsible, caring person, then what’s the point?
     Which brings us to our reading from the Epistle of James: “But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.”
James is onto something here---don’t just spew commandment after commandment, rule after rule— rather allow these guidelines to lead you into living a good, a Godly life.
According to James all we do that is good, the big stuff--like helping the poor and the needy, standing up against injustice and caring for our environment-- to the small stuff like holding the door open for someone—all of these actions are us doing our very best to honor God, to be like Jesus….
Think about this: when you’re driving to work or to school and wave a car into the lane ahead of you; when you help a classmate or a co-worker with a problem, when you lend your Wegmans or Tops card to the person in front of you in line; when you thoughtfully choose the candidate to vote for based on what they say they will do for the needy of our community---every single good thing you do comes directly from God, directly from, as James’ puts it: above.
 We’re all INSTRUMENTS of God’s Love, God’s Grace, God’s Goodness.  In all we do. All the time. Wherever we find ourselves— work, school, volunteering, recreating, socializing, God is at work, through us.
 In all we do, God is there, USING us to further God’s purpose: to bring the entire world --all 7.64 billion of us-- within God’s Loving and enduring embrace. This is Jesus’s message to the Pharisees and it’s James’s message. -There are behaviors to avoid: not listening, being quick to lose our temper and lavishing in sordidness. And behaviors to embrace, to cultivate:
-- being quick to listen, slow to speak, and eager to care for those most vulnerable.
      James encourages us not just to think the faith, but to do it. To not just hear it on Sunday but live it Monday through Saturday. James is reminding us that Hearing the Word, learning the Word, proclaiming the Word as we do every Sunday should refresh and re-new us for living the Word, being do-ers of the word the rest of the week.
Jesus was telling the Temple authorities—-it doesn’t matter how much you follow the letter of the law, if you violate the reason for the law—- in this case making yourself pure in the sight of God—-then what is the point? What good is being a faithful church-goer if the rest of the week you forget God and treat others without dignity just because you don’t like their politics, their belief system, their identity?
       Rules aren’t bad things— they give us a certain order in our lives— but when rules become the thing we worship, then we have a problem.
Jesus and James ask us to do more than know what is right, they expect us to do what is right.   Amen.