Luke 11:1-13 PITY ON THE HOUSE

If you grab your Bible dictionary off the shelf and look up the word “pity” you will find it tells you to look somewhere else. It tells you to reference “loving kindness” or “mercy.” It is presented as a choice to do something rather than an obligation. It is an attribute of God and a commendable virtue in human beings.

So why then, do we as a society, people who readily take pity on others, not want others to take pity on us? God takes pity on us each and every day. Each and every day, we fail to live up to our full potential. Every day we fall short, we miss the mark, we sin.

It is not as if God’s request for us is entirely unreasonable. Love me, love your neighbor. Treat others like I treat you. Love them even when they do not demonstrate love back to you. Love them… shamelessly. Be pitiful.

The word translated here as “shameless audacity” doesn’t necessarily describe this man’s situation well. First of all, context. Our New Testament reading happens in a time and place where food is scarce and hospitality is regarded as a duty to mankind. Imagine living in a world where being hospitable was a sacred duty to your fellow man… you shouldn’t have to imagine hard because that’s the one we’re supposed to be living in right now. A world where if anyone comes to your door, day or night, you are expected, without question, to invite them in and feed them.

So, what happens if someone shows up at your door and you do not have food? You go to your neighbor’s house and ask them for food to give to your unexpected guests. Your neighbor grumbles and tells you to go away, but complies not because you are shameless in a bad way, but in a good way. You see, this word can also be interpreted as boldness, asking for what you really need instead of trying to take on the entire world alone. Shamelessness is not always a bad thing.

It is the very way we are supposed to present ourselves before God. There should be no shame before God; God sees your heart, God sees your soul. You’re already naked before God so what do you have left to be ashamed of? There is no reason to be ashamed since he sees you this way ALL the time.

There is no reason to be ashamed to ask God for help. God already knows you need it. You’re not fooling anyone. Jesus is telling us that he wants us to be this way, shameless, not just before God but before one another as well.

There is no reason to be ashamed of our circumstances. Shame is quite possibly what is keeping us there and making us more miserable every minute. Holding on to that shame. That fear of judgment.

Do we think God is going to give us a snake instead of a fish? Then why would we think that of our neighbor? Why do we judge our neighbor to be such a horrible person that we think they are going to embarrass us instead of help us? That’s not a very loving way to interact or think of your neighbor is it?

We cannot take one human being’s wrongful actions and apply them to every human being when there are so many good one’s out there. And there would be more if we would start acting shamelessly with one another. If we would make out of ourselves one more good human being in the world. One more human being who acts shamelessly toward others.

The fastest way to an answer is to ask the question. If we spend less time in our own heads ruminating and fearing the world and more time living it, we would find there isn’t a whole lot to be afraid of. If we spend last time asking people who do not know the answer and instead go straight to the one who does, instead of avoiding them because we might not like the answer they give or for some reason we have decided in our heads that they are going to give us a snake instead of a fish, if we approach a problem directly, shamelessly as the ask the question, we can arrive at an answer and a course of action much faster.

Our fear is causing more fear than the protection we think it provides us. We miss out on a lot of fun and joy in life because we’re too busy thinking instead of seeing and listening. When we worry about how others are going to respond to things and spend all our time running scenarios through our heads of how they are going to respond we miss out on actually experiencing anything. What is really scary is how often we are so stuck between our own ears that we can never really be certain that what we remember happened in reality or just happened in our head. We try to control the outcome of every situation and even when the outcome isn’t what we want it to be, sometimes we remember it as if it was.

We have a problem with trying to control the uncontrollable. Our shameful lust for power would be much more beneficial if it were changed to shameless obedience to God. Asking for what we need instead of assuming. Seeking God instead of ourselves. By not asking, we render ourselves unable to verbalize our wants, needs and feelings. By not asking, we waste valuable moments and even precious years of our lives worrying instead of knowing. We could be chasing after the wrong thing but we never find out because we don’t ask the question.

Let me give you an example. Have you ever wondered why we pray the way we do?

Jesus gives us words to pray. When you pray say this “Our Father, who art in heaven… “ Jesus spelled it out to you in quotation marks so why are you still in your head worrying about the words you are going to say or how they are going to sound? Stop it! You asked “What do I pray?” You received the Lord’s Prayer, so why then are you not using what He told you! Why are you still waiting for a snake when you asked for a fish, I gave you a fish and you’re still waiting for the snake to come.

Leave your shame at the foot of His cross. Just leave it there. It has no place in the heart of a Christian. To show mercy, to offer loving kindness, is a trait that God wants us to have. Your refusal to let others help you is a refusal to let God work through them the very way God would work through you if you’d let it happen. You’re not just turning their help down; you are turning God’s help down because you want to go it alone. You want to do it your way instead of God’s way.

God gave you a prayer, yet you think you need to say something else. A long convoluted babbling incoherency, which God has already told you not to do in Matthew 6: using many words will not make you heard. God hears what is in our hearts. He hears the shame whether you say it out loud or in your head, or try to bury it in your heart. So you might as well bear it all at Jesus’ feet and just let it rip. Stop worrying about what others think about you and think about what is going on in your life. The reality of living in a world where our God meets our every need, provides for us, motivates us, loves us, and strengthens us. We are pitiful creatures. We are shameful creatures. Embrace it!

God gives us good people to associate ourselves with, to surround ourselves. People we can bear our souls to, and yet we continue to choose to hang around those we don’t feel comfortable being shameless with. We worry about pity, but is there anything more pitiful than chasing after something you will never catch?

When I was younger, there was a dog I used to play with at my uncle’s house. It loved to play in the pond. Its favorite thing was to chase rocks. I would pick up a rock, throw it into the pond, and he would swim out to where it sank. Paddle around in circles for a while and then look at me to throw another. Every once in a while, I would throw a stick out there, he would slowly paddle over to it, pick it up for a second, spit it out, and then look at me. But if I threw a rock, he would swim as fast he could over to where it sank, circle and then look excitedly at me to throw another.

I’m not sure if my uncle hit him in the head too many times throwing rocks in the pond for him or if he just enjoyed chasing that which he would never catch but it reminds me of a great many people. God gives them achievable goals. Love me. Love your neighbor. Be shameless. Be pitiful in the eyes of society. God throws us a lot of nice sticks we could easily catch and bring back to God. But we, God’s people, would rather chase rocks that we have no hope of ever obtaining.

We chase after rocks, power, pride, wealth, to be enviable, to be loved by others. We would do anything to be the one in a position to pity someone else rather than be pitied ourselves. We avoid being shameful as if it were a snake, not a fish. We chase after earthly dreams that just sink into the pond and are not brought back to God, rather than grasping what is so easily within our reach.

Love shamelessly. That’s what God is telling us to do. Love one another as shamelessly as I love you. Pray as I have instructed you to pray, shamelessly. Be the pitiful creatures I so lovingly and shamelessly made you to be.