As I've said in the notes in our pewsheet this morning, our readings today invite us to think about the different ways in which we take possession of something. It's quite timely for us as we formally settled the purchase of our house in Waikouaiti on Friday – in legal terms, we took possession of it, even though we didn't go near the place. It was all done by an exchange of symbols; our solicitor handed over a cheque, a symbol of an amount of money we are paying to the vendors, and their solicitor handed over a set of keys symbolising our right to enter the house and physically take possession of it. It was all very straightforward, as are the vast majority of transactions between two willing and law-abiding parties.
But things are not always so straightforward as that, and I'm not thinking of commercial transactions that occasionally go wrong. I'm thinking of voluntary transactions, favours, gifts, that sort of thing. Here are a few stories to illustrate some of the complexities that can arise when contract gives way to custom, culture, airy-fairy stuff like that
When my eldest daughter was about eleven or twelve, one of her closest friends was a Chinese girl, the daughter of a market garden family. When it came to my daughter's birthday, she decided she would like to have a picnic birthday party at a large swimming pool complex in Palmerston North, and included in her guest-list was this Chinese friend. Well, we had a lovely time, the weather was kind to us, the girls had fun in the pool, and we had our picnic feast. When it was all over, I dropped our guests at their various homes, and that, I thought, was that.
The next day I opened our front door to find our veranda full of an amazing collection of vegetables. It didn't take long to work out that these had come from the Chinese family. In their eyes we had shown great kindness to their daughter, so that they must now show generosity to us. In practical terms, their gift to us was way over the top – we couldn't possibly have eaten that amount of vegetables before they began to spoil. But that wasn't the point. In their cultural terms, the gift was not intended as payment, reciprocal in value to the favour we had done them; the sheer extravagance of the gift was the whole point of the thing. But in our cultural terms, how should we respond?
Here's another story. It concerns a young solo mother who arrived in a particular area with a child and virtually nothing else. She was assisted through that early period by a local community group, who, among other things, gave her a food parcel. She was very grateful; and later, when she had got back on her feet economically, she decided to donate an item of food every week to the food-bank, so that others could receive the help she had when in need.
All went well until the following Christmas, when there was a knock on this young mum's door, and there was a person from the food-bank bringing her a Christmas food parcel. The young mum thanked the woman for the kind thought, but explained that she was now doing okay, she didn't need any further assistance from the food-bank, and she would much prefer the parcel to be given to someone who really needed it. Sounds reasonable, doesn't it?
Well, not apparently to the woman from the food bank. She became very angry and abusive. She told the young mum that whether she liked it or not she was still just a solo mother like all the others, she was just as needy as all the others, and who the hell did she think she was, putting on airs and graces, when she had been only too quick to stick her hand out for all that was going a few months back. The encounter came to an abrupt but inconclusive end at that point: the young mum slammed the door on the other woman, who then left the food parcel at the front gate in full view of the street traffic.
How do we feel about all that? Probably, we don't have a lot of sympathy for the woman from the food-bank – her personal agenda does seem a little questionable, to put it mildly. But what about the solo mum? Was she only concerned to ensure that the food went to somebody needier than herself; or was she reacting against the idea that she was still a 'suitable case for charity'? Was it compassion for others or pride in herself that guided her response? After all, if she had accepted the gift graciously, she could then have passed it on to someone who needed it more than here.
The third story came in the wake of the tragedy in Auckland with the disconnected power supply. A budget adviser was being interviewed on National radio, and he was making the point that it is not only beneficiaries or people on very low wages who get themselves into the sort of situation where their power could be disconnected. He then referred to a client family from the North Shore in Auckland. They both had managerial positions, and their combined earnings were well over $100, 000 annually. They were leasing two cars; a BMW for him, and a SUV for her. They had three or four rental properties, and their two children attended private schools. They were, said the budget adviser, asset rich but income poor.
The interviewer was nonplussed. The budget adviser was based in Mangere. What had he to do with a couple like that? Well, the couple were too embarrassed to ask for help in their own area, so they had come to South Auckland. That is quite common apparently. But surely, said the interviewer, people who donate food to the food-bank in Mangere don't expect it to be given to people from the North Shore? People who owned rental properties and send their children to private schools? Let them sell one of their houses if they're so short of funds.
Yes, said the budget adviser, that might well be a sensible course; but all that takes time. In the meantime, they needed help and so we gave it to them. There was a bit more bluster and fury from the interviewer, until we reached the bottom line. The bottom line, said the budget adviser, was that the children were hungry and we fed them. That's what food-banks do. We give according to need, not according to how deserving we think our clients are.
I don't know about the interviewer, but at that point I blushed. Because up to that point I had been on the interviewer's side. I, too, had thought it outrageous that some well-to-do family from the North Shore could turn up in Mangere and receive free food from donations made by people far poorer than themselves. That's not right – there's no justice in that. No, there isn't. What there is, we religious people call grace. The budget adviser didn't use that term, but that's what he was talking about. A free unmerited gift given only because there is a need for it. And hopefully received by the family with grateful and humble hearts. We might hope, too, that in the future they would give to the food-bank so that others could be helped. But they are under no obligation to do so. Real gifts are made in complete freedom.
King David had to learn a hard lesson. God had given him much – political power, protection from his enemies, peace and prosperity. He accepted all this, but it wasn't enough. He lusted after another man's wife, and had that man killed so he could take her for himself. Instead of responding in love to God for his gracious kindness, David broke at least three of the Ten Commandments. He deserved the harshest penalty under the law. He received forgiveness – for no other reason than he needed it, and recognised his need for it. At the heart of forgiveness is grace: it is always unjust.
The woman in our gospel story illustrates the proper response to grace. She has been forgiven much, and her gratitude manifests itself in this extravagant way. But the story only works because Jesus responds to her with equal grace. He could have shoo'd her away. He could have insisted that he didn't need his feet washed, thank you very much. She should go find someone with dirtier feet than his!
When we really think about these stories, they seem to be about who's really in control. The market gardener decided what vegetables we would have. The food-bank woman and the solo mum were both struggling to impose their viewpoint on the other. The interviewer felt that the budget adviser should have imposed control over the couple from the North Shore. King David wanted to run his own affairs.
Only Jesus is willing to yield control, to let this woman do to him what she felt she wanted to. In doing that he is clearly contradicting Jewish cultural norms, as Simon the Pharisee made clear. Instead, he was creating a new one. In the kingdom of God it may be just as blessed to receive as to give.
And a lot harder.
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