Vengeance is mine says the Lord

Have you ever felt so unfairly treated or so affronted by what someone has done to you, or perhaps a family member, that you have felt you should do something about it? We might say to ourselves I am so annoyed about this, I really must get even,

I know when I’m driving on the motorway trying to keep an adequate space between the car in front and sticking, more or less to the speed limit, at some stage on long journey, someone will either flash me to get out of the way or undertake and nip in between the space that I’m keeping between me and the car in front, so I have to slow down to maintain a safe space. Most of the time I will just ignore this and carry on trying to do the right thing. Perhaps if I’m tired, or I’ve got something else on my mind, I might feel that I should do something about it. Fortunately, when tempted I’ve usually remembered what I was once told on one of those safety awareness courses, driving is the most dangerous thing you will ever do and I don’t react.

I want to suggest that these two New Testament passages from the Bible from Matthew and Romans are all about what happens when the feeling of wanting to get even, however we may justify it, gets too strong and out of control.

We can seek to justify taking action to get even, by what we might term a feeling of righteous self- indignation at unfairness and then seeking to right a wrong perpetrated on another.

I felt this way some years ago when one of my daughters wasn’t able to extend her freehold on her flat so that she could sell it for a fair price. It was clear to me that the landlord was being completely unreasonable and gaming the legal system to their advantage with their very expensive, clever and as it turned out cynical legal team. We found they had done this to many others and had never been successfully challenged. We ended up in a tribunal after 18 months. The landlord had sent along a barrister. Quite unusual. We had documented over 40 examples of what we termed unreasonable behaviour. They had tried all sorts of ways of intimidating us which was very scary. This included threats of High Court civil action if we revealed in public what we knew. This would’ve involved us in significant financial risk and a very long process. Something we could not afford but they could and they knew that. The tribunal enabled us to get the freehold extended. The flat was sold for a reasonable price. To this day, I wonder whether we should’ve done more on behalf of others, I didn’t really think justice had been done or that we had got even or that the company would now cease their highly questionable commercial behaviour. I tried to do one or two other things more, but they didn’t have much effect, although my daughter then decided to train to be a lawyer.

In these two scriptural passages, we see the consequences of seeking revenge or letting things get out of control.  Jesus by his actions and Paul by his teaching instruct us on what we should do when we find ourselves in this sort of situation.

 The gospel reading, Matthew chapter 16 verse 21 said this:

From that time on Jesus began to explain his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law and that he must be killed on the third day be raised to life

To find out why this has happened we need to refer to Luke chapter 19 and verse 45, known as the cleansing of the temple, it says this:

Then Jesus entered the temple area and began driving out those who were selling. It is written, he said to them, my house will be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of robbers. Every day he was teaching at the temple but the chief priest, the teachers of the law and the leaders among the people were trying to kill him.

The importance of this incident in the life of Jesus is hard to under state. Superficially, as you may recall, it was a protest firstly against commercialisation in the temple. Worshipers travelling to Jerusalem needed animals to sacrifice, and merchant’s setup shop in the temple, in the designated area for them to pray. Secondly it seems to have been against unfair practices whereby the money changers were exchanging standard currency for specialised temple currency to pay the temple tax. They charged exorbitant exchange rates and exploited the poor.

Tom wright says no illustration can do justice to what Jesus did. It was unique. The temple was the beating heart of Judaism. It wasn’t just, as it were, a Church on a street corner. It was iconic, the centre of worship and music, of politics and society, of national celebration and mourning.

The word for robber, in verse 46 is more accurately translated as brigand, which meant revolutionary - those plotting and ready to use violence to bring about their nationalist dreams. Jesus’s charge against his fellow Jews was that Israel as a whole had become hard, narrow and nationalistic. It was adhering to a brand of politics in which the rest of the world was not to be enlightened, but to be condemned. The guardians of the temple were notorious for their rich and oppressive lifestyle, violence towards outsiders, and injustice, even to Israel itself. They were acting directly against Gods purposes.

His symbolic gesture did not come cheap. This background helps to understand why the very next thing we read in verse 47 is that the chief priests, the scribes, and the leading men of the people, were trying to destroy him. This particular action led directly down the road to his violent death.

That Matthew refers to exactly the same group of people as Luke in the two separate events, seems to validate that they are not just trying to get even with Jesus because he has condemned them as political extremists, but that this has turned into full blooded planned revenge as they began plotting to kill him and then achieved their objective, by clever manoeuvring behind the scenes.

Taken against his background Paul’s words which we have just heard from verse 14 sound extraordinary. One can perhaps imagine a hushed but audible intake of breath as these words were read (most people would not have been able to read).

Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge my friends but leave room for God’s wrath. For it is written It is mine to avenge. I will repay, says the Lord. On the contrary if your enemy is hungry feed him, if he’s thirsty give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head. Do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good.

I experienced something of this counter cultural attitude in York Minster. It was July 2007; the minster was packed with 600 members of General Synod. The atmosphere was febrile. It was in the middle of the row about whether an openly gay, but celibate, very gifted priest should be allowed to take up his duly elected position as Bishop Reading. The correct procedures had been followed. He was a personal friend of the archbishop who was Rowan Williams who also supported the appointment. There was great opposition mounting. Nine English bishops had already publicly announced they were against the appointment. The press were all over it and Rowan Williams was in the eye of the storm. We did not know at the time, but with a heavy heart, he had decided he must announce shortly that the appointment could not be made for the well-being of the Church as he termed it. So, he stood up. to preach and said I’m going to preach on the Matthew 11 vs 28 onwards, which says my yoke is easy and my burden is light – an

audible intake on breath is the congregation - what was he going to say? The point is not whether he made a good or bad decision, but what he said next; which was not to criticise or try to get even or to defend himself. He said that if my yolk is not easy and my burden is not light it is because I am not right with God. Intake of breath by everyone.

It seemed to me then and still does that this was a personification of those words of Paul.

This passage says directly to us that we must find different ways of dealing with these problems, revenge is clearly ruled out. It doesn’t mean going soft on bad things and he’s not saying evil is not real and it does not matter and does not hurt. The question is not what are we going to do about it? But what has God done already, what will God do in the future and how are we part of the process. We know from major current world events for example in the Middle East or in Ukraine or in Syria the culture of revenge unless broken is never ending - both sides always seem to be able to justify further atrocities by reference to those they themselves have suffered.

Paul’s main point is that we should go out of our way to do positive uncalled for acts of kindness to those who have wronged us. This is probably what the reference to burning coals heaped upon them in verse 20 is about, which may lead to remorse or even reconciliation. It also means that if someone has done something to us which we regard as very bad that we are refusing to allow our own future lives to be determined by that. In a minor way it may have been something of that stopped me pursuing the case with the landlord.

In the following chapter Paul takes a strong line on the importance of the ruling authorities doing their job, this is a complex issue, but this may be what Paul means in verse 19 when he says allow God’s anger room to work.

One commentator put it like this the whole passage is in fact about how Christians are to behave within the wider public world. Paul is taking a major step beyond the accepted norms within Judaism of the time.

And in our time too there seem to be some new movements called Community Mission and Emerging Church.  Both emphasise that Christians are to be known as good neighbours, prepared to join the fun when someone on the street has good news, and to support those who face hard times. It has been said that within this new idea, the relationship between Church and community becomes less about maintaining institutional presence, and more about the opportunities demonstrate the love of God through willingness to serve. Someone else put it like this discipleship itself needs to be defined not in terms of spiritual disciplines or personal lifestyle but venturesome love involving a commitment to public action. It is within the kind of setting where Christians are known, liked and respected that people will be prepared to listen to them talking about their beliefs and faith.

I will finish with a quote from a book called Reimagining ministry:

Only when the Church congregation is was willing to become good news in a way the local community could understand and receive did it become possible to think about building a community of faith. Moreover, the progress of mission was marked by a progressive ceding of control by the Church to the community.

Quite radical thoughts, we will discusse this further as another time, however we do need to take Paul’s words seriously first.

Amen.