HOW TO BE A CHRISTIAN WITHOUT REALLY TRYING

July 12, 1992
8:30 and 11:00 a.m. Worship Services
John M. Buchanan
Fourth Presbyterian Church, Chicago

Scripture
Luke 10:25-28

"a lawyer...said...'What must I do to inherit eternal life?!"
~Luke 10:25 (NRSV)

Perhaps you are old enough to remember a Broadway musical
with the engaging title "How to Succeed in Business Without
Really Trying." It was an enormous hit. And best of all from my
perspective, its star Robert Morris was married to a high school
friend of mine. So when it came to Chicago, I left school and
learning how to be a minister to see a matinee. The play had fun
with the way corporations seem sometimes to reward a person for
skills and abilities which have very little to do with the actual
business of the corporation.

The lead character, Finch, advanced from the stockroom ali
the way up the corporate ladder not on the basis of his knowledge
of the business or his management expertise, but rather charm,
luck, nerve, and endless self-confidence. The showstopper, I
recall, happens when Finch has finally been given the ultimate
symbol of corporate success - his own key to the executive wash-
room. He enters the hallowed Place, leans over a sink, looks at
himself in the mirror and sings, "I Believe in You."

It was a great show and it spawned a flurry of "How to
Succeed..." books. One of them was written by a very witty
Methodist clergyman, Charles Merrill Smith, who at the time was
serving a church in Bloomington, Illinois. Smith's book was
entitled How to Become a Bishop Without Being Religious. It is
both out of date and, I assume, out of print; but the thesis is
not, namely that there ought to be and often-is a way to do what
you want to do without paying your dues, without sacrifice and
hard work. There ought to be a shortcut somewhere.

So Smith advised Methodists who aspired to be Bishops
(Presbyterians are allowed to poke fun at Methodists you see,
because we don't have Bishops and so there is no attempting to
get ahead anywhere in our church; nor is there any ecclesiastical
ladder climbing anywhere in our system) to adopt a "professional

stance, or the techniques of being unmistakably clerical" - to
think, act and most important of all, dress "in a way that says -
holy, righteous, minister..." Aspiring Bishops are advised to
ruthlessly suppress any taste they might have for flamboyant
clothes; to carefully choose the right car for in front of the
manse - "a black, standard shift, two-door Ford Falcon" was
Smith's recommendation; and most important, clergy who want to
succeed must cultivate expertise in "living the inhibited life."
"The average Protestant Church in America is made up of people
who are only a few decades removed from their Puritan ancestors
and who have not yet succeeded in shaking themselves free from
the conviction that a Christian is one who doesn't enjoy this
world very much." [p. 13] It's in this section of the book that
Smith recommends as appropriate clergy recreation - checkers,
chess (only if it's a college community), tennis is all right
because you can play rigorously but everyone is dressed modestly
and behaves properly - he wrote two decades before Aggassi and
McEnroe obviously, and the perfect game, the ideal clergy recrea-
tion - croquet - "no one gets very excited about it, no one
Swears over a poor shot, it is inexpensive, and it doesn't work
up a sweat." [p. 13]

And I was reminded of all that - "How to succeed in busi-
ness," "How to get ahead in the church" without personal sacri-
fice - by the story of a man who one day asked Jesus "how he
could be a Christian without being religious." He is, I think,
one of the most provocative and understandable people in the New
Testament. He remains anonymous. We know only that he was a
lawyer, that he came to test Jesus, and that he asked the best

question anybody ever asked anyone, "What must I do to inherit
eternal life."

Now, if you go to church much, and if you listen to sermons,
you have heard a lot of sermons on the story Jesus told this
lawyer as a kind of answer to his question because what comes
next is the parable of the Good Samaritan - the man beaten by
robbers, left to die, bypassed by two religious officials,
finally a Samaritan, a racial and religious outcast stops, takes
care of him, carries him to safety. That story is Jesus' answer
to the lawyer's question, and what happens before the lawyer
asked his question is pretty interesting as well. Jesus had sent
seventy people to go ahead of him - advance parties - to the
villages he planned to visit. They had done so. They had accom-
plished their mission. Their return and reunion with Jesus was
enthusiastic, happy. He was pleased with them. It is a warm and
affectionate moment. And the lawyer, I think, witnessing this
happy reunion asks his question, "What must I do?" and then fades
because of the magnificent answer he received.

For now, I want to focus on hin, however, give him his hour

on stage, because his question is good and because I think what
he is saying is "there must be a shortcut; there must be a way to

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succeed, to gain the kind of life I want without doing all the
things your disciples do. I'd like to be a Christian without
being religious."

Jesus turns the question - "What is written is the law?
What do you read there?" The lawyer knows the answer to his own
question. It's his business to know law.

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your
heart, and with all your soul, and with all your
strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor
as yourself."

The lawyer recited it back to Jesus automatically. "You
have given the right answer; "do this, and you will live," Jesus
said.

Note that understanding it isn't the point. Jesus does not
say: "Right answer - you shall live." Rather, "Right answer; do
it and you will live." You can that is to say, get an A on the
test and still flunk the course.

The story that follows expands, amplifies and deepens the
tradition by defining love for God and neighbor in terms of
concrete, helpful, life-giving service to a needy person. But
the original formula stands:

Love God, with heart, soul, mind and strength. It's as old
as the Hebrew people. It is part of the Shema, "Hear O -Israel:
The Lord is our God, the Lord alone...love the Lord with heart,
soul and might..." [Deuteronomy 6:4,5]

And "neighbor as self..." Jesus didn't invent it. It's
equally old, in the middle of a ritual and holiness code in the
Book of Leviticus, which essentially repeats the Ten Commandments

and adds, "...You shall love your neighbor as yourself, I am the
Lord." £19:18]

This is real Biblical fundamentalism, at the very heart of
both Judaism and Christianity, a common ground we and our Jewish
neighbors walk together.

St. Paul, battling the legalists in the early church in the
city of Galatia - the ones who were worried that new Christians

weren't paying enough attention to the traditional moral code,
St. Paul said:

"The whole law is summed up in a single commandment,
"You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'"
{Galatians 5:14]

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And near the end of his life, writing his great summation of
the faith to the Christians at Rome:

"Owe no one anything, except to love one another;

for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law...
The commandments...are summed up in this word, 'Love
your neighbors as yourself" [Romans 13:8,9]

Why doesn't this bright, earnest, intelligent man get it?
He knows the old answer, what's wrong? Well one of the problems
the Jewish tradition has experienced, and one which the Christian
tradition equally shares, is a tendency toward legalism - the
rulebook approach to religion, being a Christian by following
rules. Sometimes having a lot of rules sounds like a good idea.
Particularly when the world out there looks unstable, fragile,
and the future looks frightening, it seems like a good idea to
tighten our ethical belts, dust off the old rules and call it a
recovery and reenergizing of traditional values.

It happens all the time in history. When the people of
Israel finally made it back home after a harrowing couple of
generations in Babylonian captivity they said to themselves,
"never again. Whatever went wrong, we will do everything we can
not to repeat the mistakes of the past... we will follow all the
rules: we will create rules about rules: we will have rules
about who gets to read and interpret the rules." Legalism, in
its moral fervor, its obsession with always doing the required
thing, often misses the point. So God has to find prophets to
tell the people that in the middle of their rulebook religion,
they are not getting it. They're missing the point. In their
obsession to follow all the rules they are forgetting that God
really wants what is justice for all people - kindness, compas-
sion and love.

The legalists hounded Jesus, following him everywhere he
went, accusing him of breaking the rules about what to eat, where
to eat, with whom to eat and drink and associate, accusing him of
breaking Sabbath rules and dietary rules and cleanliness rules.

Roman Catholic scholar Gregory Baum wrote once: "The roots
of legalism are situated in the human psyche: for the legalist
mentality is even found in people who have little to do with
religion. Unfortunately, religion readily lends itself to legal-
ist misunderstanding."

So maybe what the lawyer wanted was a new set of rules about
how to love God thoroughly and neighbor as self. And somewhere
in each of us we'd like that too. We'd like’a clear set of
guidelines about how to be a faithful Christian in this compli-
cated world. We'd very much appreciate some guidelines or,
better yet, some simple rules about the appropriate Christian
position in questions of sexual morality, in family values, in

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who gets condoms and how, in who has the right to an abortion,
under what circumstances and who pays for it. But you won't find
rules like that in the stories about Jesus or the stories he
told. What you find, says New Testament scholar Fred Craddock,
is not patent medicine but individual prescriptions [see Luke,
Interpretation, p. 149]. What you find instead of a set of rules
is a story about how love acts personally and responsibly ina
specific situation full of risk and ambiguity.

The lawyer wanted something simpler and plainer than the
plain and simple tradition of loving God thoroughly and neighbor
as self. In a recent article in the Christian Century, Martin
Marty cites an essay by Marc Gunther about "High Concept News
Stories." Why, Marty wonders, do we get excited about relatively
minor problems and don't raise an eyebrow about the big problems.
Why, to quote John Frohmeyer, former head of the National Endow-
ment for the Arts, a Christian ethicist by training and a good
Presbyterian, do the headlines trumpet and the public revel in
the news that there are three or four offensive NEA grants —- out
of 30,000 or so - the total cost of all this is 63 cents for each
of us; and somehow not really very much moral outrage over a sav-
ings and loan debacle that will cost each of us and our children
several thousand dollars apiece? Writing a few hundred dollars
worth of bad checks, personal sexual behavior, prompt intense
moral sensitivity and outrage. But that a United States Ambassa-
dor was paid several million dollars by Kuwait to go home and

lobby for United States military action is mentioned in the paper
once and forgotten.

The reason, says Marty, is something called "High Concept,"
an idea so simple it can be pitched in a 15-second TV spot. If
you can't make a movie out of it, it won't be noticed. "High
Concept is Murphy Brown, earthquakes, Mike Tyson, Willie Smith."

Martin Marty says this creates problems for religion, par-
ticularly our variety - that is the kind of religion that tries
to be thoughtful and faithful to Jesus' mandate. High Concept
religion is what happens on television - religion which "screens
out doubt, paradox, ambiguity and the dark night of the soul" and
offers instead "one way, finality, security, sunshine spirituali-
ty and instant salvation... each dramatized in 15-second bites."
[see Christian Century, 6/18/92, p. 631]

if I'm reading this right, there is no way to be a Christian
without being religious. But there is a lot of latitude to
define what "religious" means, and Jesus himself defined and
illustrated in ways that were new and fresh and radical. But

there are no quick fixes, easy methods, shortcuts, nor are there
Simple rules for every situation.

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What there is is a precious tradition that does give us a
firm foundation on which to make personal decisions. It is very
old. It does define what "being religious" is.

Love God - love God thoroughly -with everything in you.

Love God with your mind - your intelligence, your wonderful
ability to think and figure things out and plan and project and
calculate.

Love God with your heart - your passion, your art, your

music, poetry, your strong love, your high hopes, your moral
fervor, your Eros.

Love God with your soul - your seeking, longing spirit which
longs for God, seeks for God, sometimes argues with and doubts
God, and which prays for help and strength and courage.

Love God with all your might - and your neighbor as your-
self.

How to do it, Jesus? What shall we actually do? How shall
we inherit eternal life? How shall we love so thoroughly that
eternal life will be ours?

He did not give the man a list of duties... See yourself, he
told that man, in this story...

See yourself in those two well-meaning religious types who
walked by.

See yourself in the man who on this occasion, at least, knew
exactly what love for neighbor means and simply and deliberately
did what was necessary to help a person in need.

And, see yourself in that man - that woman - lying by the
road, the one who on this day, is the victin.

If you want to be a Christian, if you want ultimately to
learn how to love so thoroughly that you are truly alive, then
learn from that one, about the love of a saving God who comes to
you whenever you are abandoned, wounded, vulnerable and alone,

and in whose love your love is enabled and nurtured and encour-
aged.

What I think he really wanted was for the lawyer not only to
start using his intelligence in loving his neighbor, but also to
hear and to know that he too was a child of God, loved by God,
pursued and sought by God, searched and found by God along the
roadside of his own spiritual journey and therefore forever safe
in God.

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That's it finally. There is no shortcut, no simple formula.
There is a mandate to love and there is a promise that we are
loved, that our Lord Jesus Christ wants us as his own, bids us
live in him. Which means in love with God and our neighbor.

How to be a Christian? How to be...?

"Do this," he said, “and you will live." All praise to him.

+ + + + $+ +

O God, you search us and Know us. And there is nowhere we
can go that you will not find us. Remind us of your mysterious
presence.

And as we try to live faithfully in love with you and our
neighbors, help us to see clearly; give us courage to make diffi-
cult decisions, and in all we do keep us in the safety of your
love. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

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