Sermon 9/8/2019 “Reparations”
Preacher: Jo J. Belser
Location: Church of the Resurrection at Immanuel Chapel, Virginia Theological Seminary
Text: Hebrews 13:5
Day: 13Pentecost, Proper 18, Year C
On Wednesday this week, Virginia Theological Seminary announced it would create a $1.7 million endowment fund which will generate about $70,000 in interest each year to (and I quote) “repair the material consequences of our sin in the past.”
The sin that VTS named was use of enslaved labor to build at least one of its buildings and, even after slavery had ended, participating in segregation. Ten years ago, VTS publicly repented of its history of racism, acknowledging it was complicit in a system that privileged one group of people at the expense of others. The step it took this week added an action component to its repentance.
Do you think the seminary’s action just coincidentally occurred days before the Book of Philemon was to make its triennial appearance in our Sunday lessons? Well, you know what I think about coincidences; there aren’t any! If VTS’ announcement this week was just randomly timed, it’s a great “God-incidence.”
from the orthodox Church in America
This is because our second lesson today is from Philemon, the so-called “owner” of a runaway slave named Onesimus. Our lesson today is all but one sentence of the whole Book of Philemon. The reading is a letter the apostle Paul undoubtedly wrote asking Philemon, a church leader in Colossae, to free his slave Onesimus so that Onesimus could return to Paul and continue to assist Paul while he was imprisoned. The missing sentence in our lesson today is Paul’s closing farewell to his letter.
It’s been nearly 2,000 years since Paul wrote to Philemon and the church that Philemon led. Throughout that time, some have argued that Paul’s letter wasn’t really about slavery. But tell that to the congregation of slaves to which Charles Coldcock Jones preached in 1833! A full half of this congregation walked out, knowing that—as a White man and a product of his time—Jones was at least complicit in slavery. The other half of the congregation emphatically insisted there was no such epistle in the Bible. They all found Philemon and its interpretation incompatible with their own experiences of God and the gospel of Christ Jesus. Hadn’t God freed the people enslaved in Egypt and had given them the Promised Land? Doesn’t Christ guarantee that “WHO-so-EVER” believes in him can participate in the Kingdom of God right here on Earth on our journey to the eternal Promised Land? Hadn’t Paul HIMSELF said that, in Christ, there is neither slave nor free, that we are all ONE in CHRIST JESUS?
The history of our interpretation of the message of Paul’s letter to Philemon is an excellent example of us making scripture say what we want scripture to say. By 1833, Philemon had already been used for decades by slave-owners to urge enslaved people to remain enslaved and lawmakers to not change our systems of oppression. Abolitionists interpreted the letter Paul had written to Philemon differently than the pro-slave folks. To those who wanted to end slavery, Paul was urging freedom for slaves, at least freedom to slaves who were Christ-followers. And to African-American interpreters of scripture, Philemon wasn’t about slavery at all; Philemon and Onesimus were literal brothers, they argued, and today’s lesson is only about reconciliation.
Because of the interpretations of Philemon’s message about slavery are so varied, it’s likely there really was a different message, a different point that Paul was making. So, what was the real purpose of Paul’s letter to Philemon? And what does today’s lesson say to us today?
The Jo Belser interpretation of Philemon is this: It’s not good enough to be sorry for the things we have done that we regret; to be truly free of the things from our past that trouble us, we have to take action to right out past wrongs, take responsibility for the consequences of our actions, and set things right, no matter the cost.
Onesimus, for example, apparently had run away from his so-called “owner.” It was not morally right for one person to own another, but the law back then made this injustice legal. Onesimus could have been punished severely for his actions, possibly even put to death. And yet, he set out to make things right.
Onesimus would have been worth about 500 denarii, almost two years’ salary for a freed worker. And we don’t know what, if anything, of Philemon’s Onesimus might have taken to make his escape. Onesimus couldn’t possibly have paid the price for his own redemption. So, Paul himself offered to make reparations for Onesimus, “if anything was owed.” Paul wanted Philemon to free Onesimus and send Onesimus back to him as a beloved son, offering him a home and a purpose in life.
Does this remind you of anyone else? Didn’t Christ Jesus do these very things for us? Helped free us from whatever weighed on us from our past? Helped us face our past so that we might have a future? Made reparations for us and paid the price of our redemption? Christ Jesus paid our debt, whatever we owed, for having run away from God. And best yet, Christ Jesus gives us a meaningful future, both here in this life and beyond.
We don’t know for sure whether Philemon did as Paul asked and freed Onesimus. I suspect so, though, precisely because the letter was preserved. Plus, there are hints that Onesimus later became a Bishop in the church, as all of Paul’s other assistants did. The same evidence suggests Philemon also because a bishop: love won; freedom reigned!
Our lesson today offers these insights about forgiveness and reparation:
- When something in our past continues to trouble us, we need to examine what we did that feels unfinished and why it still troubles us.
- Then, we need to go back and put that thing right, whatever the potential cost, remembering that we never make this journey alone.
- Finally, when we make or even when we grant pardon, the only basis is the one Paul claimed: LOVE. Not a legal argument. Not an argument about money or cost. Not even an argument based on justice. Those things are for judges. As brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus, our only recourse is love. Because love trumps all, in the end.
