"Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” (Matthew 22:37)

I have a distant cousin whose husband is definitely getting the rest of us a bad name. She posts on Facebook saying how he’s arranged a candlelit dinner, or bought a bottle of champagne for their anniversary, or left a bouquet of flowers for her. Sue will tell you - I’m rubbish at that sort of thing. I did remember her birthday this year, though. I bought her a wheelbarrow. She did ask for one and, to be fair it could have been a new ironing board. That’s a mistake I won’t be making again. I do try to please her - just as my cousin’s husband clearly wants to please her - I’m just not always clear how. 

I know fine well that pleasing one another is part of a good relationship - any relationship. Children generally want to please their parents, until they get to be teenagers when all bets are off. Parents generally want to please their children and that’s what makes Christmas Day such fun when kids are small. We like to see people we love smiling and happy. And that applies to our relationship with God as well. One of the things about being a Christian is that what we say and do is supposed to be pleasing to God. Which is nice; but it begs a couple of questions. Why should we want to please God and, perhaps harder, what is it that God finds pleasing - apart from buying him a wheelbarrow?

Why should we want to please God? Well, he’s God, isn’t he? He’s got eternal life to offer, which might seem to be an awfully good reason to stay in God’s good books. But that’s not quite it; see you can’t earn your way into Heaven. God’s offer of eternal life is a gracious free offer, given through Christ’s death on the Cross and through his resurrection, that only requires us to trust him. It doesn’t matter how many times you fail to do what God wants you to do; if you come back to him and apologise it’s all forgiven. No. The reason for wanting to please God is the same as our reason for wanting to please anyone. It’s a response to the love God has shown us in Christ. It’s about being in relationship with God through Christ and wanting to please him out of love for him. 

So let’s assume we want to please God. We want to say and do and think things that God would approve of. What does that involve? When a Pharisee came to Jesus and asked him what was the greatest commandment Jesus replied from the scriptures of his people: “Love the Lord your God with all your soul and with all your mind” - and that brings us back to why we would want to please God in the first place. Then he followed it up with, “And love your neighbour our as you love yourself?”

That can’t be it, can it? It can’t really be that simple, can it?” Well, yes; that can be it and no, it isn’t really always that simple. Lots of times people have tried to make things more complicated. What do you have to do to please the Lord ? some will say. You have to read your Bible. Well, yes. Nothing wrong with reading the Bible and lots that’s right with it. I’m not going to stand here and tell you that reading your Bible’s not important; but what’s more important are the results of that reading. Reading the Bible is not an end in itself. In reading the scriptures we are meant to encounter God; we are meant to spend time with God and listen to what he wants for us in our place and time. Without that the Bible can be a very dangerous book - it’s full of people doing all sorts of terrible things that we are really not meant to take as guidance on how to live in a way that is pleasing to God. And perhaps worse, when there are arguments about what the church teaches I have too often seen people rip texts and verses out of context and hurl them at one another, using the Bible as a weapon. Really? It seems to me that what is pleasing to God is allowing him to speak to us through its words; to guide us into ways of life that are more loving and caring, for the greatest commandment is love.

Ah! But then we get into ways of life, don’t we? We get into patterns of behaviour and questions about how we should behave. Maybe that’s the key to pleasing God. Maybe it’s about keeping all the rules that are set down in the Bible. That sounds attractive enough, and rules like the ones we heard from Leviticus are pretty timeless; but there’s a whole bunch of rules in the Old Testament that apply only to ancient slave-owning semi-nomadic peoples. Do we really intend to stone insubordinate children? I can imagine that in this part of the world rules about what should happen if a neighbour’s ox falls in a hole might still be pertinent; but I’m a city boy and I don’t think there was ever a point in my childhood where the issue arose. At he same time there are a whole lot of other moral issues that the writers of the Bible never conceived of: sexting, bankers bonuses, food banks. 

Yes, of course, you have to work to the spirit of the thing, rather than the letter. But there was once a great Rabbi who boasted that he could recite the whole Torah standing on one leg and , when challenged, stood on one leg and said, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your mind and all your soul and love your neighbour as you love yourself”. Paul too once wrote that the whole of the Law was encapsulated in this one commandment.

Maybe pleasing God really is as simple as that. Maybe it really as as simple as being kind. And why should it not be? God knows there’s enough unkindness in the world. There are enough people ready to offer harsh words for folk on benefits or who mess up in some way and wind up on the wrong side of the law. Maybe this world needs a bit more kindness. Maybe this world needs us to love our neighbour as we love ourselves.

Maybe pleasing God really is as simple as that. Maybe it really is as simple as being generous. And why should it not be? God knows there is enough selfishness in the world. There are enough people getting riled about the value of their houses not rising fast enough while there are folk sleeping rough in the doorways of our shops; and food banks haven’t started turning away food. Maybe this world needs a bit more generosity. Maybe this world needs a bit more generosity. Maybe this world needs us to love our neighbour as we love ourselves.

Maybe pleasing God really is that simple. Maybe it really is as simple as loving others. And why should it not be? God knows there’s enough hatred in the world. There are enough people to point the finger at people who are different - immigrants, minorities - and blame them for all that’s wrong with the country. There are plenty enough people willing to pick up a gun and kill for a cause they barely understand. Maybe this world needs a bit more love. Maybe this world needs us to love our neighbour as we love ourselves.

That’s not always easy. It’s sometimes much easier to buy into the casual harshnesses of the world than to care for people we don’t feel a connection with. It’s sometimes easier to be selfish than to give our wealth away to unnamed, unknown people. And sometimes it’s easy to hate. And that’s why loving God - having a solid relationship with God and spending time with him in prayer is so important. It is through the love of God that we can love our neighbours - whoever they might be. It is through living out the love of God that we can really please him

Lord may we do what is pleasing to you. May our words be kind. May our thoughts be generous. May our deeds be loving. May we follow the commandment your Son gave us.

Preached at Eaglesfield parish church