Oh, for crying out loud!

Sermon for the fourth Sunday after Trinity

How's your Greek?

A quick test.

What's the Greek 

for mercy?

You have no clue

until you remember

that you have sung

your "Kyrie eleison" today

and "Kyrie eleison" means

"Lord, have mercy!"

"Hooray!" you think 

"The Greek for mercy 

is eleeos!"

You're right...

but you're not right,

though you must be praised

for your reasoning there.

You're not right in the sense

that Our Lord isn't using

eleeos when He tells us

to be merciful

even as Our Heavenly Father

is merciful.

And now you're thinking,

"Oh, for crying out loud!"

And now you'd be nearer the mark.

[PAUSE]

We're often presented 

with trying to reconcile

the mercy of God

with the justice of God.

How can we be both

merciful and just

to a murderer that says,

in all sincerity,

"I'm sorry, please forgive me!"

We can't let him off,

but neither can we ignore 

his plea.

The Greek for mercy here

is oiktos,

and the "oi" bit

is a cry.

The mercy that is oiktos

should make us

cry "Oh!" to someone's predicament. 

Oiktos is the mercy 

that cries out in compassion

that recognises 

a human being in distress.

Oiktos causes us

to raise our eyes

from a list of misdemeanours 

and see a human being,

fallen and broken through life,

and yet failing and breaking others.

Oiktos is to see ourselves 

in another 

in all the pain and sorrow of life

and hold onto that.

Oiktos is having compassion

in the highest order.

But what of eleeos?

Why do we ask God 

"Kyrie eleison"?

[PAUSE]

Eleeos is active.

Eleeos has the sense

of pouring oil on troubled water.

Oiktos is what motivates eleeos.

The cry of "oh" and recognising

the distress and misery in another 

causes us to act with compassion.

Not by condemnation for sins, 

but by finding a way to be generous

without diminishing sin.

Our God is generous and merciful.

He fills the barrel of mercy and love 

and shakes it

and presses it down 

to make more room

for mercy and love.

God, the perfect judge

knows full well how to deal

with repentant murderers.

 

He even made one a saint!

Oiktos forces us

to see the human being 

behind even the most vile of crimes.

Criminals should receive 

our pity that their brokenness

should influence them

into committing their crimes. 

That doesn't excuse them.

They made their choice 

to commit crime 

and that must be addressed

proportionately,

fairly and fully

in law for the good of society.

But we must not ever,

for the love of God 

demonise a criminal

on account of the crime.

A criminal is a human being

and a human being

is the object of God's love.

Yet, we don't want to love him

because of his crime, 

so we turn him into a demon 

because that makes it easier for us

to cope with.

[PAUSE]

Our Lord 

is telling us 

not to take the easy path 

to judgement

and condemnation. 

He is telling us 

that we need to react

in mercy.

Yes, to hear the blood of Abel

crying from the ground

but also to hear the cry of Cain

fearing for his life 

in his land of banishment 

for murdering his brother.

As Christians

we are called to a life

knowing that we cannot 

judge or condemn a criminal

to Hell,

and that is a life of discomfort 

because we see sin,

and we see the sinner,

one we must hate

the other we must love

and yet separating the two

is far from easy.

We have to live in that tension.

We have to live 

concerned that sin is called out

for what it is

and yet seeing our very selves

in the face of the vilest offender.

We only love our neighbour 

insofar as we love 

the worst of humanity.

That's hard.

That's so hard.

It's hard to the extent

that we cry out "Oh!"

And then God hears "Oh"

and that stirs his oiktos

the mercy that hears the cry

of one troubled,

even scandalised by 

the Divine love even for the most wicked.

And He has mercy 

- eleeos -

on us because 

we will probably fail

to be merciful 

even as he is merciful.

Even if we fail,

we must never despair

of the mercy of God -

the mercy that hears a cry

and the mercy

that seeks to do something 

about it

- all for crying out loud.