Graduate Chapel
Gleaners 2.0
- A quick Google search for “being holy” reveals the cartoon caricature of a sanctimonious person wearing more than one halo, a prudish glare, and primly pious look of someone who is holier than thou. Or it reveals a guru on a mountain or shaman in a cave who is far removed from people. What could God possibly mean when God speaks, “You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy”?
- Today’s reading from Lev 19 is the only occurrence of Leviticus in the Common Revised Lectionary. In the words of Kimberly Clayton, “If you have never preached from Leviticus, and most of us have never preached from Leviticus, this may be just the opportunity you were not looking for.” Lev 19 presents God’s vision for loving community where civil and just dealings dictate how we relate to one another whether they are in community or sojourners. I check my identity papers, my baptismal certificate, that identifies me as a citizen in God’s kingdom, a family member in God’s household, and it states a fundamental criterion for my life. I am created in the image of God, re-created in the image of Jesus, and called to be a reflection of God’s image, to be holy as God is Holy.
- Holy Living: define here as a call to imitate God in terms of everyday, often mundane, and a Ten Commandment kind of way. For example, allowing the most vulnerable in the community access to your property in order to glean. And that is in the context as neighbors dealt with honestly, wages paid promptly, disputes settled fairly whether it is in the field, home, business, friends, sojourners, worship, or courtroom. When I’m holy, I insure the welfare of others. Whether you are inside or outside, highbrow or outcast, politically acceptable or socially taboo, God’s holiness calls us to love our neighbor. My holiness will be defined by my love and not according to my pedigree, genetics, official papers, or portfolio. Being holy is the condition of our head affecting the conduct of our relationships. To be holy is to roll up your sleeves and express active love.
- Churches that practice the art of providing for the gleaners are not limited to food. While organizations like gleaners.org are worthy of imitation, other areas of life call for holiness too. There are voices in our nation today that are saying there are some who are not entitled to mercy; not entitled to the gleanings. Who gets medical care? Who gets mental health assistance? Who gets a job? Who gets a place to live or something to eat or a fair wage? Who has equal access to education? When you get out of jail or prison, who really gets a chance? These voices are determining who is eligible to be a gleaner. And I thank God the church operates differently.
- For example, the woman who accused an elder of adultery. She didn’t point the finger and say, “You are the man” but used innuendo and insinuation to spawn her malicious gossip. He was the one giving an African-American woman a ride to church. And you can connect the dots…
- And again, what about the prison parolees who had difficulty finding a place to worship after their release? They were given a Christian halfway house not only to meet their needs to integrate back into society but also to be a place of worship on Sundays so that the full house of God could maintain etiquette and decorum; decency and order. And you can connect the dots…
- And the church that did not want to reach out to poor children in the community because 1) they would be disruptive to the classroom, and 2) they would contribute to the wear and tear on the facilities. And 20 years later I heard the same rationale, “You just ask the school teachers here at this church. They will tell you how disruptive those kids are in the classroom.” And you can connect the dots…
- Connect the dots…Loving the neighbor, the sojourner, and in Jesus’ community, loving your enemy… do the dots connect to the holiness of God? Or do we keep the gleaners in our fields at arm’s length?
I am reading Mark Scandrette’s Practicing the Way of Jesus: Life Together in the Kingdom of Love. An apt description of the holiness of Lev 19. Scandrette is advocating an activist form of spirituality. Doing kingdom work activates a person’s spiritual formation. He encourages holiness by asking people to join together in experiments of practice. The first he describes is “Have2Give1.” I thought about the 3 sets of clubs I own and lack the ability to use one. Even the rules of golf won’t let me use more than 16 clubs. I claim that I’m a lowly schoolteacher, but I still have the luxury to dabble at an elite game. You see, I have these fields that are well cultivated in order to produce a harvest for the stewardship of my home. But where do the borders of my fields invite practices of love, hospitality, inclusivity, and mercy? Where do I engage the most vulnerable, the sojourner, the orphan and widow, so to embody my love for one another, for love of my neighbor, and for love of my enemy? I’m trying to connect the dots for my own practice. In Scandrette’s words, Practicing the Way of Jesus: Life Together in the Kingdom of Love.
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The church cannot leave God’s call to love unanswered. Who are those folks that are our gleaners in our midst? God says, Be Holy, for I the Lord your God am Holy. And you are called to connect the dots. Mt 5:43-48. “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. ‘But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” –The Word of the Lord.