WHAT IS IS?!

Those of us of a certain age will remember some 25 years ago when the shadows of scandal were closing in on then President Bill Clinton.  When asked a candid question by a news reporter, he responded with a straight face that his answer would depend upon what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.  That video footage has been replayed countless times because it was so ridiculous. ‘Is’ is a form of the verb ‘to be’.  A thing or a truth either is or it isn’t; it either exists or it doesn’t.  There’s not much middle ground there.

And yet Jesus does something surprising similar in Mark’s gospel today in his response to the question posed to him by the scribe: “Teacher, which is the first of all the commandments?” Jesus’ reply is to say that ‘is’ is the wrong word, because it is singular. Love God with all our heart, all our soul and all our mind – just as the Book of Deuteronomy first taught us.

BUT! AND! Love your neighbor as yourself.  There ‘is’ no one commandment. There ‘are’ two, and without them being connected, there is no ‘is’, because they are ultimately the same thing.  Any God whom we imagine ourselves to be loving apart from express love of neighbor is not the real God at all; it’s an ‘isn’t’. Sorry to be parsing words here, but it is that simple.

One of the great challenges to real biblical faith that we confront all the time – at least in our culture – is the idea that love of God is radically private.  It is personal, and uniquely experienced by every one of us, but it is never private, in the sense of belonging to me alone, without a necessary love and demonstrated care for others around me.  Without that, it really ‘isn’t’, no matter how loudly we insist that it ‘is’.  It is Jesus who tells us that himself today.  A few weeks ago we heard from the Letters of James in the New Testament who said it just as bluntly: Faith without works is dead.  In other words, it ‘isn’t’ faith at all. So maybe President Clinton wasn’t so far off the mark when he asked in public what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.  (Although I suspect in that case he was fairly far from the mark!) When we use the phrase ‘Love of God’ here and now, what do we think we are talking about if it has no necessary and immediate reference to care for the neighbor?

I have quoted one of my favorite theologians, Father Johan Baptist Metz, here before and I’ll do it again. He said:
            “Jesus must always be thought about in a way that he can never merely be thought about.”

            “Jesus must always be thought about in a way that he can never merely be thought about.”

He’s saying nothing other than what the Lord himself did when he told us that there can be no true love for God that is not expressed daily and concretely in a visible love of neighbor. Otherwise it’s just some sweet sentiment.  Sentiments are easy to cultivate, and they can be very private.  This gospel is neither easy nor private.  Caring for neighbor involves work, and the de-centering of ourselves.  We are dearly loved by God, but so are all the other people who depend upon us to demonstrate that.  And those of us who have been blessed with greater gifts have the greater responsibility to offer them – certainly in our prayer and worship, but not ending with that.  Mark’s gospel tells us today that love of God and of neighbor is “worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”  In other words, ‘faith’ that never leaves the doors of the sanctuary or the church parking lot really ‘isn’t’.

This is precisely why it is so necessary for us to keep Jesus’ words ever before us and to gather regularly for Eucharist; to remember not only what love of God promises to us, but also what it demands of us.  Is our love for God complete?  Well, that may depend on what the word ‘is’ is.