Amos 7: 14, 15; Luke 10: 33-35

Risky relationships

Amos goes to the King to remind him God is not pleased with his actions.  God is patient, but God’s patience has its limits. As a poor farmer and Sycamore dresser Amos is not likely to get a positive hearing.  He may even be killed. So Amos’ relationship with the king was a risky one.  The Samaritan man is very low in status in the society. The Samaritans were considered inferior to the Jews because they were considered to be of foreign heritage and tended to mix faith practices. Ethnic purity was a big issue in those days. On top of it the Priest and Levite were high status people and considered purest among the Jews.  On that dangerous road they wanted nothing to do with what could be a dead body soon. They considered the relationship with the wounded man to be too risky.  The Samaritan man however “took pity.”  He engaged in the risky relationship. He did not hesitate to help people out.  Now he is the famous one from the parable. No one remembers the snooty men of the cloth.  I once worked in a hospital in Phoenix called Good Samaritan Hospital and there is now a “Samaritan” law in the US that requires people help out accident victims on our highways. On a dangerous road the relationship with the wounded man was still very risky for the Samaritan.

Friends, after this week of violence in our country, we are once again left raw and realizing that we are stuck in a situation where so many people are armed to the teeth.  It seems that it might lead to more violence. African Americans are sick and tired of getting treated unjustly by rogue cops and now the cops will be up in arms. We pray that the cycle of fear and anger and violence will be broken. A great deal of Americans now feel the relationship with the police is a very risky relationship. They don’t feel they will be treated equally under the law. At the same time more police will feel that their relationships on the most dangerous streets of this nation and there are many will be riskier than ever.  Nevertheless the relationship between law enforcement and the people they police is necessary.

I heard an interview with a woman with autistic spectrum disorder (NPR July 7, 2016).  Part of her disorder is that she has trouble reading the emotions of others. One of her worst experiences was that once during summer camp she was bound and gagged by her fellow campers and thrown outside the camp. She could not for the life of her understand why anybody would do such a thing. These people were supposed to be her friends.  It took painstaking explanation about how teenagers engage in bonding rituals before she could comprehend that the bad treatment of the young girls was a cruel bonding ritual.  Even with feel summer camp friends, relationships can be painful and risky. But in teenage relationships some risk may be necessary. Youth are hyper-social. They cannot grow up in isolation.

But risky relationships are not limited to the streets or to summer camps or even to schools, there is emotional risk even in families.  Siblings can manipulate each other or resent each other to the point that the pain of the relationship can be lasting. Marriage can be a source of intense hurt.  If you were to speak to marriage therapists you might find that one of the greatest threats to a marriage is contempt. Contempt is toxic.  Nothing breaks down self-esteem like contempt.  But ironically they say  ”familiarity breeds contempt” and who are more familiar than two people in a marriage. Yet the benefits tend to outweigh the risks.

Friends, risk in relationship even occurs when we are trying to help people with whom we no conflict.  Sometimes reaching out to someone in grief or despair or depression can carry emotional risk of some kind. The despair could be a bit contagious when we identify so much with the suffering person. But the risk is vital.

Friends, not all relationships are important or essential, but our lives are made up of relationships which are necessary.  They all carry some risk of harm or hurt. We all carry the scars of the relationships that went awry, that came apart no matter how hard we tried to maintain them or fix them.  I think those experiences have given us a certain weariness and wariness and caution about relationships. We like to exercise a certain amount of control over them.  But the Christian faith is a relational faith. The Christian faith is a faith of community.  It doesn’t function well as a faith of individuals, at least not for very long.  The whole Bible is about God reaching out in love and of people reaching back or failing to reach back and reaching for each other or failing to.  Jesus the Christ never stepped back from honest, truthful relationships with anyone and he thought His followers should not either. That is why Jesus told this parable. In that vein, the risk of relationship in general for a Christian and for the Church becomes a calculated risk, because we are called to engage with others. We are one-dimensional without relationship.  May God give us strength and wisdom.