Measure for measure?

Sermon for the third Sunday after Trinity

How tall would you say you are?

Would you use feet and inches?

Would you use metres and centimetres?

Or would you use a different measurement?

[PAUSE]

In order to take measurements,

we need a standard to measure them by.

A yard is the distance

between the king’s outstretched arm

and the tip of his nose.

You see, the problem of course.

King Edward I’s yard

is going to be considerably longer

than King Charles I’s yard

at least before the latter’s execution.

A foot is twelve inches

and an inch is the size of a thumb.

An ounce is the weight of a thumb

which is why ounce and inch come from

the same Latin word for thumb.

But these aren’t fixed

so we have to be careful

to measure things against

the same standard.

[PAUSE]

Which is greater in value:

one or ninety-nine?

Of course,

we are very tempted

by the mathematical answer.

If ninety-nine is substantially

greater than one,

then that one is certainly

not as valuable as the ninety-nine.

You might then say that

it is better to look after the ninety-nine

and forget about one that is missing.

It makes no sense

to ignore ninety-nine sheep

over one lost sheep.

It’s just a sheep after all.

There’s nothing special about it,

we’re told.

It’s just one sheep out of a hundred.

One percent.

And yet, to the Good Shepherd,

it is as valuable as the other ninety-nine.

That takes some getting used to.

Any one of the hundred sheep

is as valuable as the other ninety-nine.

We can see that easily.

While the shepherd has left the ninety-nine

in search of the lost one,

one of the ninety-nine could wander off

and get lost.

How can any one sheep be as valuable

as ninety-nine other individual sheep?

[PAUSE]

The trouble is that we’re looking

mathematically,

and mathematics isn’t the system

that God uses to give value to His Children.

We know that from His very nature:

how can Three be One?

It’s clear that God is not concerned

with making value-judgements

based on numbers

or even on a notion of equality.

The labourers who arrive

at the eleventh hour

are paid as much as

those who were there at the first hour.

No-one gets defrauded

but everyone is treated fairly,

just not mathematically.

[PAUSE]

In our society,

we focus on

equal pay for equal jobs

equal rights

equal responsibilities.

These are good issues

to consider in a society

that seeks to be fair,

but here value is not really based on love

but on practicality.

When we consider

that we have no rights with God,

let alone equal right,

that we have no right to equal pay

for equal jobs,

that there is no

equality of outcome

or

equality of opportunity

in God’s valuation,

then we realise just how bound up

with human politics we are.

Our Lord shows us

that our value of human beings

cannot be based on number

let alone on social status.

It means that we cannot

value our neighbour

based on any comparisons

with anyone else.

Our love of neighbour

has to be unconditional

and unique.

We want their perfection

in God,

not based on what

we consider to be perfection

but a perfection determined by God.

When we are faced with those decisions

as to whether to save

five lives or one,

as long as we make the decision

in the agony of the purest love we can muster,

we do the right thing

because we aim for everyone’s perfection

and allow God to save the lost.

[PAUSE]

Love is not a

mathematical way of thinking.

It goes above and beyond

any form of measurement

that we have at our disposal.

The only thing we can count on

is the love of God.