Matthew 5:1-10
1.
Katie and Cecile, if I can be so bold this morning, I want to offer to you, and to Maddie and Riley, this church, this community, as a neighborhood of mercy. Not just a pretty building. Not just a historic tradition. But a neighborhood of mercy. Where every life, every dream, every family, every soul is cherished; where we celebrate and cultivate kindness and commitment, partnership and passion. In a neighborhood of mercy. Intending to be merciful—with every breath and budget, in every step and service!
And I hope—I hope so very much—that you sense among us this morning a gathering of mercy, a gathering of merciful neighbors and friends. New friends perhaps, but new friends who trust that it is indeed Mercy (maybe Mercy, with a capital M) that holds the world together. That’s our faith in this place: that it is indeed Mercy that holds the world together. Often it feels as if the center cannot old. Often it feels as if bigotry and cruelty rule the roost. But our faith, in this place, insists otherwise. We lean into a different promise: it’s Mercy that holds the world together. And we are drawn, by the Spirit and our love for God and one another, into Mercy’s redeeming project. Intending to be merciful—with every breath and budget, in every step and service.
You have entrusted us, Katie, Cecile, with a moment in your family’s life—maybe just a moment, but a pretty wonderful and (dare I say) sacred moment. Your trust is both an amazing gift, one we receive with gratitude, and a kind of opening to something new, something powerful, something transformative in your lives. As mothers. As a family. Maybe ten years ago, fifteen years ago, you never imagined a day like today. But here you are.
So I want for you—in addition to the memories and mementos you take away this morning—I want for you an experience of Mercy today, a window into a world where human community draws tenderness and courage from a merciful God. There are all kinds of communities out there, all kinds of neighborhoods and clubs and families too. What distinguishes the disciples of Jesus—at least, this is our intention, our hope: what distinguishes the disciples of Jesus is our faith, our openness, our commitment. Mercy. God’s Mercy. Mercy it is that holds the whole wide, wonderful, wacky, weird, woebegone world together. “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall inhabit neighborhoods of mercy!”
2.
Now I could go on and on this morning, and parse the many meanings of mercy. You know I have it in me! I could mention that baptism is itself a kind of immersion in mercy, or that mercy is a promise God makes, or that mercy’s a way of life for the people of God, or that it’s a revolutionary commitment to kindness and justice. Or I could allude to the centrality of mercy in the three Abrahamic faiths in particular—Judaism, Islam and Christianity. That’s pretty cool. Each of the three revolves around God’s unmanageable passion for mercy.
Or I could spend some time explaining that the Hebrew and Arabic words for “mercy” are derived from similar words for “womb” or “birthing” or “place of beginnings.” That’s ‘re-ha-mim’ in Hebrew and ‘rah-mah’ in Arabic. (And that alone is quite a trip, by the way. Think of it: to be merciful is somehow to be womblike! Womblike in the world! Rah-mah! To be merciful is to be open to beginnings every day. To be merciful is to be a birthing presence in a world of tenderness and justice. Re-ha-mim! A birthing presence in a community of curiosity and imagination! Blessed are the merciful! Pretty cool, right!)
But it's interesting that you can’t really define mercy—not completely, not definitively, not once-and-for-all. Just as you can’t really, fully, definitively, once-and-for-all define the birthing of a baby, the roller coaster experience of a woman bringing new life into the world. Does that make sense? It’s a mystery. It's a reality, but it’s a mystery, wild and unknowable, true and elusive at the same time.
I myself have witnessed that birthing miracle three times—and I could blubber about it, and I could tell you how the birthing of my daughters hit me, overwhelmed me, and I could wax on about their mother’s courage and humanity and beauty in those moments…but I couldn’t for the life of me define birth or new life or the extraordinary imagination of God in those life-altering moments. Just couldn’t.
Instead, I think, God’s mercy is a mystery, maybe even a secret revealed to us not in theological tomes, and not in intellectual definitions, and not even in the Bible. God’s mercy is a secret we embrace as we open our hearts to God’s unbounded love in our own lives. God’s mercy is a mystery we taste in our prayers as we surrender our hearts to God’s relentless forgiveness and eternal protection—in spite of the world’s harsh and unforgiving ways. God’s mercy is a life of service we dare to accept in following the pattern and example of Jesus’ own life, Jesus’ own ministry. You can’t pin it down. We surely can’t control it or manage it. Mercy’s a mystery we embrace, we taste, we receive with open hands.
3.
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Mercy is something like the secret revealed when our choir sings at next Sunday’s evening gathering on the church steps—as we light up the sanctuary for metastatic breast cancer research and celebrate the love that binds us to women we love. #LightUpMBC. Mercy is something like the secret uncovered when a teenager learns, right here among us, that he is cherished, valued, accepted exactly and especially for who is. And mercy is something like a small group circle—where a friend asks other friends to think big, to dream bold, to open up brave, in a conversation about climate change. “Blessed are the merciful,” Jesus says, “for they shall inhabit neighborhoods of mercy!”
Mercy’s not a threat. Mercy’s not a zero-sum fundamentalist game. Mercy’s a mystery we welcome. A mystery we embrace.
It's telling that Jesus’ own baptism was not the end of his journey with God—but just a beginning, just a momentary celebration of God’s promise in his life, God’s promise of lovingkindness and purpose and renewal. And so it is for Maddie, and so it is for Riley, and so it is for their two moms and for this baptizing, anointing, mercy-loving community today.
Today’s baptisms are signs of a mystery, symbols of a secret. And now our great gift is to step through the doors into the new world, the new heavens, the new earth God is creating in us, in Maddie and in Riley and in Katie and in Cecile, and in all the world.
Let’s go together: from this place, this neighborhood of mercy, into a world of possibilities!
Amen and Ashe!
