# Sermon for the Twenty-Second Sunday after Pentecost November 01, 2023 - [ Blog ](/news-categories/blog) *By the Rt. Rev. Dr. Shannon MacVean-Brown Episcopal Bishop of Vermont* *(The following is a transcript of the service audio, Oct. 29, 2023)* ![The Rt. Rev. Dr. Shannon MacVean-Brown](/sites/g/files/omnuum7126/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/thememorialchurch/files/bishop-shannon-for-web-olt25hn0hvo66mze4mutjt1c8h78fgr913sk7n6qrk.jpeg?itok=T1GW4O-z) May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, oh God, our strength and our redeemer. Amen. What is the highest authority for people of faith? Well, I'm not an expert on any faith, not even on my own, but I do know that whatever your faith, I might even venture to say, even if you don't have a faith, we share a common belief in the golden rule. So here are some examples: From our Jewish neighbors, "What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor, this is the whole Torah, all the rest is commentary, go and learn it." From our Muslim neighbors, "No one of you is a believer until he desires for his brother that which he desires for himself." From our Hindu neighbors, "Do not unto others that which would cause you pain if done to you." Our Sikh neighbors, "I'm a stranger to no one and no one is a stranger to me. Indeed, I am a friend to all." Our Zoroastrian neighbors, "Do not do unto others whatever is injurious to yourself." Our Taoist neighbors, "Regard your neighbor's gain as your own gain, and your neighbor's loss as your loss." Our Bahai faith neighbors, "Lay not on any soul a load that you would not wish to be laid upon you, and desire not for anyone the things you would not desire for yourself." Our Confucianist neighbors, "One phrase which sums up the basis of all good conduct, loving kindness. Do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself." Our Buddhist neighbors, "Whatever is disagreeable to yourself, do not do to others." From the Native American spirituality, "All things are our own relatives. What we do to everything, we do to ourselves. All is really me." And then spoken in my religious vernacular, "You shall love your neighbor as you love yourself." And so to answer the question, what is the highest authority for people of faith? I will use one word, love. Love is the highest authority for people of faith. And I'm talking about a robust understanding of love, not the kind that relates to broken hearts or connected to sexual encounters. And yet, in some sense, while it is more than a feeling, this type of love can leave you feeling vulnerable, broken-hearted and unrequited. And as Nina Simone sings, "Love is an emotion, it'll move you to do things." Love is an action, love defines and refines, love moves us, shapes us, motivates us, it is its own force. Love is beyond definition and beyond our understanding. Love is a force we must deal with, a force we embrace with abandon and treat with caution. We dance around it and with it as we navigate through life hoping to have it, experience it, and not be betrayed by our association with it. And of the 613 commandments from which Jesus could choose when his contemporaries attempted to question his intellect and commitment to his people of their faith, Jesus gave the correct answer, along with a widely accepted expansion on the first and greatest commandment. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind." And the second is like it, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself, on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." In all this, the key word, the authority of faith Jesus pointed to is love. In this morning's passage from Matthew, we have a conversation between people whose faith was forged in struggle and a life spent finding and defining their identity under exile and occupation. They were of the same faith, trying to hold onto their dignity and identity while powerful forces distracted them from their common bond, their faith, the primary authority in their lives. In the context of the culture in Matthew's world, love was an outward behavior of attachment, commitment, devotion, and loyalty to the one being loved. It was beyond the expectation of reciprocation but was meant to be a holistic concern for body, mind and spirit, connection, and concern for the wholeness of others and of all creation. And then Jesus's questioning his opponents about the Messiah, son of David, was not about one religion being superior to another but rather a question about the understanding of and devotion to the hope and longing of their faith. Jesus was connecting the dots between love of God, neighbor and self, and hope for a Messiah. –– Embed [Harvard Memorial Church](https://soundcloud.com/memorial-church "Harvard Memorial Church") · [The Rt. Rev. Dr. Shannon MacVean-Brown - Oct. 29, 2023 | Sunday Sermon](https://soundcloud.com/memorial-church/the-rt-rev-dr-shannon-macvean-brown-oct-29-2023-sunday-sermon "The Rt. Rev. Dr. Shannon MacVean-Brown - Oct. 29, 2023 | Sunday Sermon") –– So Jesus might've worded his question this way. "What do you think of the Messiah God promises over and above the Messiah of human imagination and human's limited expectations, and with that in mind, who is our authority as people of faith? And by what means do we acknowledge that authority?" Jesus wanted them and us to imagine a Messiah beyond our hopes, for a Messiah made in our own image, a Messiah who does not display God's authoritative love, and whose authority is the unresolved pains of what it means to be a human in this world. The hollow saviors of religiosity, violence, armies, wealth and political parties, don't have the power to save us. And some might say, "Save us from what?" Self-destruction. Not living as we are intended. Jesus turned his inquisitor's question into a question about the highest authority for people of faith. He called them to understand that love is a practice and discipline of surrender to the restorative and creative authority of God's love, and the understanding that the authority of faith is love because God is love. The extraordinary and ordinariness of the love Jesus calls us to stake our lives on is our Messiah. It saves and restores, connects and make us who we are meant to be, and inextricably connects us to God and all creation in such a way that this becomes who we are if we abandon ourselves to it. In its extraordinary power, love becomes ordinary, and that through the power of the Holy Spirit, becomes something we instinctually are, with the same trust our bodies engage at this very moment, as we breathe air into our lungs without a thought. Love becomes a breath we take, love is meant to be the authority of our interactions and motivations. And so perhaps this is the place also to consider that in the command to love God and neighbor, is the assumption that we will also love ourselves. And I will go so far as to say this is also a command. But then of course, it's troublesome, because living in an individualistic society, how do we understand that our wellbeing is inseparable from our neighbor we can easily love and our neighbor we hate? And that is more than just an intellectual exercise. Living in an individualistic society, there's a tension on the threat of love, God, neighbor and self. What does it mean to love oneself? If the thread of love connects all creation to God and that is understood as concern for the wellbeing and flourishing of all, that includes care for oneself. Love of self must be connected to love of others and God as a counterweight to neglect of either. And I could preach a whole sermon on this, but they told me 12 to 15 minutes. So suffice it to say, at the most basic level when we don't care for ourselves, we aren't able to stay engaged with the needs and concerns of our neighbor, which are also concerns of God. My neighbors, the world will continually test us, pushing us to choose what will have authority over our lives. We are constantly tested on a resolve to be true to the love our faith requires. How do we avoid falling into the traps, the impossible questions and tests of our faith? How far are we willing to go to be entirely under the authority of God and the love the divine calls us to embody? Jesus was having a conversation about the authority of love as he was just days away from his crucifixion. He knew what it was like to have the highest authority in your life be tested and questioned. We have heard how he was tested and tempted in the wilderness. As he faced death, was he tested or tempted at that moment to stray from a response of pure love? We know what it is like to be in a situation when you feel yourself being pulled off your mooring, tempted to relieve attacks with anything but a response rooted in love. And given world history, or any given day in the news cycle, it is depressingly clear that the call to love God and neighbors is not embraced as the authority for people of faith. Our hopes and best attempts can get lost in the complexity of human behavior and the many ways we can become involved in seeking justice. It is easier to love those who don't enjoy the same privileges we may enjoy, those who are distant, in other countries, than it is to stay committed to our neighbor of a different political party or even same faith tradition. No wonder we struggle. The temptation to numb ourselves from a genuine connection to our neighbors is so great. Sharing joys and pains alike, as if they were our own, is a high calling. The question, what is the highest authority for people of faith also calls us to consider how do we love like God? Can we love like God? Neighbors, being that we are made in God's image, it is our true nature to love. And I know I'm not alone in the struggle to love, which in and of itself gives me hope and companions, neighbors in the struggle. While the work of love is exhausting, I have a connectedness to Jesus and others who have chosen the way of love. I feel hope and resilience as I continue the work of the great cloud of witnesses and the ancestors. I know that this hope and resilience, which defies logic, is not my doing. There are days when I wonder, will I always be able to tap into this hope fueled love? There are times when the tedium of reminding people to simply be decent has no appeal. There are times when I feel my resolve to hold on to that part of myself slipping away. It can be challenging for my world-weary love to remain plentiful, then I'm surprised by how this love renews itself. And so I trust that it will always happen. As an Episcopalian, we have a tradition of renewing vows of our faith, starting with baptism. Over and over again, I think of the vow to love I've taken in my ordination, particularly as a priest, and as a bishop, and in fact I vowed to love and protect not only the people, but also the institution. So I keep loving and doubting and wondering why and if I can, I keep finding the will and desire and fire to stay committed to love. And I wonder, is it a habit? Is it a decision? Is it a practice? Is it authentic and from a place of integrity? Do I lose myself or become more myself? So when you are feeling the pressure of life, the seemingly overwhelming pool of despair, considering what ails our world, it is hard for even the most upstanding person of faith to stay grounded in what matters most in our faith. I have no doubt that most people desire to be a positive and healing presence in the world. We all share a common uniting bond, love. So I wonder what is in your tradition and memory that reminds you of the authority and primacy of God's love and your need for that power? I pray. I pray that we will all be abundantly supported. Always remember to turn to your sacred texts, the traditions and music, and sing the words and pray the prayers over yourselves and situations that you may not lose yourself in the tides pushing against God's transformational love. May we all be reminded of our need for each other, to do whatever it takes, to let love be the authority in our lives. May we be reminders to our neighbors and ourselves, that the struggles we face are conversations between people of the same race, the human race, with the same needs and common call to love and be loved. May we all be reminded that we are made in God's image, created for love, created to receive love, created to be love. See also:- [ Sermon ](/archive/sermons) Share on:- [ Facebook ](#) - [ Twitter ](#) - [ Linkedin ](#)