Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

Not so long ago, in a wide-ranging conversation with a friend, the focus turned to what might seem to some to be a peculiar sort of topic. The question became, "What, would you like to have written on your tombstone? What is the single final image by which you would like to be remembered?" My selection, I thought, was quite a poetic, even a poignant one. It was, "See, bishop, I told you I was sick." But then my friend, with really no hesitation, said, "I'd like to have written, 'She was kind'." Just that. She was kind.

And my first reaction to that, I remember, was to think, well, that's not reaching very high. Surely there must be some more noble memory to leave in people's minds. Perhaps something like, She was wise, or she was strong, or principled, or even she was Godly. All of those would be true. Why settle on something so plain and unremarkable as kindness? I had to rethink that first reaction this weekend as I was reading through these Scripture passages. It began to sink in on me that perhaps there is no nobler memory than that. Perhaps, after all, there is no trait more godly, no virtue more divine than plain and unremarkable kindness.

Each of these three readings this weekend present us with an image of God that is drawn from one of the core themes of Scripture, a theme that reveals to us an utterly new and unexpected insight into the nature of God, what God is really like. And that insight is a simple one. The word that runs through these passages like a connecting thread is mercy. God is merciful to His people.

In the first reading from the Old Testament book of Exodus the image is of the mercy shown by God to His people even after they had abandoned Him and returned to paganism, making and worshipping a golden calf. With a particularly human touch, the author of Exodus pictures God at first exploding with anger at the people, vowing to destroy them in a blaze. But then after talking it over with Moses for a minute or two, He calms down, and the truth of what God is comes through... merciful, even to such a people as that. And in the second reading, a very personal testimony from Paul as to the mercy of God. To make the point even more strongly, Paul pictures himself as having been among the worst of sinners, and yet even to him, God does more than forgive. Paul exults in the fact that God has filled Him overflowing grace. And in the Gospel, Christ pictures Himself as like a man who puts everything else, every other concern aside to go in search of one lost sheep from the flock, or like a woman who devotes all of her energies to finding one lost coin. And in both images when what has been lost has been found, things are not simply back to normal, they are better than normal, it is a reason for celebration, for rejoicing.

The passage in Luke's gospel that immediately follows this reading this morning is the familiar parable of the prodigal son, and there the revelation emerges perhaps more clearly and dramatically than anywhere in Scripture. The extravagant, unreasonable mercy shown by the father to the son who had so utterly betrayed him. And again, that same emphasis. When the prodigal finally returns, the mercy of the father goes far beyond saying simply, "OK well, we'll pick up where we left off now." Things are better than they were. What was broken is now not simply mended, it is strengthened, renewed, it is a thing to be celebrated.

And that is an important emphasis, I think, if we are to truly gain this unique insight into what God is really like. It is too easy, really, too incomplete, to limit our sense of the mercy of God to simply forgiveness of sin. It is a great deal more than that. The point of these passages, and so many like them, is not that God shows mercy only when His people sin, but rather that God shows mercy even when His people sin. The word in Scripture that is translated as "mercy", the word that is used in these passages is a very rich one, and actually, mercy does not translate that richness very well. Much closer to the mark would be something like "loving kindness", an extravagant kindness, a kindness that doesn't depend on how we relate to God, but rather on how God chooses to relate to us. So in the first reading, the Hebrew people were promised a new land, a home, and it would be theirs, whether they sinned or not. Paul was called to greatness in the building of the New Kingdom, and it would be his, whether he sinned or not. And on and on.

And so the image that emerges is that of a God Who treats His people kindly, gently, lovingly, not because they are good, but because He is. And it is precisely that practice of kindness to which the Father calls each of us. There is no clearer nor more compelling expression of our call to be the people of God than this, to treat one another kindly. And to do so with constancy, as Paul elsewhere puts it, in season and out of season, when it is rewarding to do so, and when it is not, when we are recognized for our kindness, and when are ridiculed for our kindness, perhaps even taken advantage of, when people seem to deserve our kindness, and when they do not.

I said that simple kindness is a clear and compelling expression of our Christianity. And so it is. But it is not a complicated one. Kindness is indeed a simple virtue. It is practiced first and most powerfully right where we live, each one of us, in our most commonplace, everyday interactions with one another. A kind word, a shared laugh, an errand run, a small gift for no reason, a silly argument willingly lost, when the urge to win is so great. There is probably nothing more corrosive of kindness than our painful need to win, or at least to seem to win. To be godly, to be truly godly, is no more complicated than that.

So. I hope my friend gets her tombstone. I hope I get one like it. She was right in her choice. She was really only saying what St. John wrote in his letters 2000 years ago. There is nothing more powerful that can be said about God's people than simply, "They were kind."

Readings: Exodus 32:7-11, 13-14; 1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10