Sermon on Matthew 21:23-32

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

George Bernard Shaw said, “Progress is impossible without change; and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.”

The religious authorities came to Jesus with their minds set. They posed a question to Jesus, not out of curiosity, but to trap him into either blasphemy or discrediting himself.

But Jesus, the clever rabbi, turned their question back on them, catching them in their own trap.

Then, he told a parable that implicated them, saying without saying that they were missing the point. He veiled his point just enough that they couldn’t arrest him…yet.

This all came the day after Jesus had his Palm Sunday entrance into Jerusalem and then drove the money changers out of the Temple. The religious leaders were panicking at the attention this upstart rabbi was getting.These men with status, education, power, and authority were protecting the status quo, assuming that they knew the right answers and that this Jesus needed to stay in his lane.

But Jesus has never been very good at that.

Jesus has never been good about abiding by our human-made systems.

Jesus blows up our status quo.

Jesus was there to expand the Beloved Community, which upends all our ideas of power, status, and importance.

The religious authorities demanded to know where Jesus’ authority came from, but Jesus evaded their question because they didn’t actually care. They just wanted Jesus to go away and stop threatening the status quo.

Authority was never the problem: they believed they had the authority, and that’s all that mattered.

But Jesus brought a new understanding: that authority was not what mattered. Changing your mind was what mattered. Being open to the reality of the Beloved Community is what mattered.

Jesus was inviting everyone to change their minds. That’s what the Greek word metanoia means: change your mind, repent.

As long as people’s minds were stuck on the status quo, they couldn’t envision the Beloved Community. They couldn’t imagine what God was up to.

Jesus’ question to the religious authorities was about John the Baptist, who spent his ministry calling people to repent, to change their minds. And many did: John was a threat and was ultimately put to death because people listened to him and changed their minds, changed their lives, seeking God.

Then, Jesus’ parable was about two sons who changed their minds: one toward action on the father’s behalf and one toward not taking action, to letting things stay the same.

Even the religious authorities admitted that the one who had changed his mind toward action did the right thing.

Then, Jesus makes the very bold statement that “the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you,” essentially because they changed their minds first.

Notice that Jesus doesn’t say “they’re going into the kingdom of God instead of you.” He’s still inviting the religious authorities to change their mind.

The Beloved Community is for everyone: the lowest in society and the most elite. But it will change your mind. The Beloved Community seeps into your bones until you can’t see the world in the same way.

Suddenly, status doesn’t seem to matter so much, the idea of “mine” versus “yours” doesn’t seem so important, and everyone you look at has the face of God.

The Beloved Community changes your mind about the world.

And it’s for everyone, the least to the greatest, the last to the first.

So, what do we need to change our minds about today?

After spending time at the lovely camp Luther Glen Farm on our women’s retreat last weekend and knowing that the feast day of St. Francis, the patron saint of animals and nature, is this Wednesday, I’ve been thinking a lot about our relationship with the earth.

There’s certainly a lot to change our minds about when it comes to preserving our natural resources and keeping our planet habitable for future generations.

People disagree on what to do and to what degree, and I’ll leave the particular advice to the experts and to your own conscience.

But we must do something. Our planet cannot support the status quo of the way humans around the world are living.

The more we bury our heads in the sand and protect the status quo, the more dire our situation becomes.

We need to change our minds about the way we live. Not only as individuals, but as the entirety of the human race.

The status quo is often held up by rules and regulations. Certain ways of doing things are entrenched in us. Changing the status quo requires changing our minds—not a mere intellectual change of mind, but a change of spirit.

Instead of just replacing the status quo rules and regulations with a new eco-to-do-list, what if we allowed our love for God to spill over into our attitude toward the earth?

Something like: “I love you, God, and you created this beautiful planet for us to live on and enjoy. I love you so much that I want to take care of this amazing gift you’ve given us.”

That would be a very different approach than changing our lifestyles out of a sense of obligation.

That’s not to say that rules are bad—God gave us the law and the commandments. God gave our ancestors in faith a way to live together in community, and that’s a beautiful thing. And, when Jesus summed up the law, he boiled it down to love: love God and love your neighbor.

In some ways it’s easier to live by strict rules, because then we know exactly where the line is that we’re not supposed to cross. Living a life guided by love is a lot more complicated. It takes constant empathy and compassion to discern what we should do instead of being able to point to a list of rules. But just because something’s hard doesn’t mean it’s not worthwhile. And changing our minds, changing our attitude toward the status quo—that’s hard. But it’s worth it.

When our motivation is love, it changes everything. Replacing restrictions with compassion—that is Beloved Community.

The religious leaders were so tied to the status quo that neither the message of John the Baptist nor of Jesus could change their minds and open them to the outpouring of love in the Beloved Community.

The Beloved Community is just as open to us as it was to the religious leaders and the tax collectors and sex workers.Notice this week how it changes your mind.

How does it change your relationship to the earth when you open a window and feel the breeze on your face? Or when you eat a piece of fruit and think about the tree or the vine it came from? Or when you drive by the ocean and smell the salt?

That is love. Love for God’s creation, for this home God gave us.

How much more do you want to work for its preservation when motivated by love? Is it worth changing the status quo for?

I hope so, because our home needs people to change our minds. To change our minds toward love.