The Golden Rule by Cheri Holdridge (with an assist by Kurt Young)

Pastor Clair Sauer tells the story of “Dorothea Hertzberg who served a term as a Peace Corps volunteer in the tiny, impoverished African country of Burkina Faso. One swelteringly hot day she was riding her bicycle along a cattle trail, when she felt something in the machinery snap. The wheels of the bike still turned, as did the pedals, but pumping the pedals accomplished nothing.

“Dorothea resigned herself to pushing her bike the seven miles she had yet to go. The temperature was 115 degrees, and she had only half a bottle of water. It wasn’t long before an elderly man came toward her on his own bike. He asked what was wrong, and when she told him, he stopped and rummaged in his belongings until he found a long rubber strap, the sort of thing that could be used to tie packages onto the back of a bike. He attached one end of the strap to his bike, and the other to Dorothea’s handlebars. Turning around to go back the way he’d come, he began to pull the Peace Corps worker on her bike, toward her destination.

“Dorothea described it this way, “It turned out to be one of the most hysterical yet touching moments of my life. What a scene we must have been. This poor man vigorously pedaling and dripping with sweat as he towed the American princess through the barren desert. Every villager we saw along the way shrieked in surprise and called out, ‘Good morning!’ After a while, I began to feel terribly guilty, posed on my bike, waving like a Rose Parade float queen…

“An hour later we arrived at my destination. He was exhausted, I was giddy and in awe of his generosity. I took a long look at his face and those kind eyes, and I told myself never to forget it, because this man is the heart of Burkina Faso. This man is not an exception to his culture. He is the very essence of it. Burkina Faso means ‘the land of the upright and courageous people.’ It is one of the poorest countries in the world, but a place where I learned what giving truly means.””

(Source: http://www.sermoncentral.com/sermons/a-shared-privilege-clair-sauer-sermon-on-giving-yourself-151229.asp)

The elderly man lived out heart of our scripture for today (Matthew 7:12 for those following along from afar), known as the Golden Rule. “Treat others the way you want to be treated,” Jesus said, that is the sum of the law and the prophets. Right there, treat others the way you want to be treated.

 

Jokes are often made about this scripture which turn it around. “Do unto others just like they have done to you.” That is not the same as treating them the way you want to be treated.

In many religions a version of what we call our Golden Rule appears, but in the negative, rather than the positive.  Pastor Matthew Rogers writes about “an event that took place in 20 B.C. That is, around 50 years prior to Jesus giving the Sermon on the Mount where the Golden Rule appears. The tale was told of a Gentile (a non-Jewish person) who approached Rabbi Hillel and his rival teacher of wisdom. The Gentile promised each that he would convert to Judaism if one of them could teach him the entire Law while standing on one foot.

“So Rabbi Hillel said this: “Do not do to your fellow what you hate to have done to you. This is the whole law; the rest is explanation.” (A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, Craig S. Keener, p. 249)  “That incident would have been legendary by the time of Jesus…just 50 years later. Every Jew would have heard about that and probably even repeated it a few times.  “So Jesus takes a very familiar statement and turns it around – so that it is no longer stated negatively, but positively.”

(Source: http://www.sermoncentral.com/sermons/the-golden-rule-matthew-rogers-sermon-on-sermon-on-the-mount-41694.asp?Page=1)

Let’s imagine for a moment what the difference is between this rule as a negative or a positive. This is the negative way. Don’t do to you fellow human being, what you hate. Imagine at the end of your life it is said of you: “She did nothing to others that she would have hated to have done to her. She did not kill, did not steal, did not lie, and she did not cheat.” Those would all be good things. But she would be being praised only for the negative things she DID NOT DO.

How much better does this sound? Do to others what you want done to you. “He forgave others, he fed the hungry, he was generous with his money, and he helped others when they were in need.” This describes someone who made the effort to live his life actively DOING THINGS to make the world a better place for others, like the old man on the bike in Burkina Faso. It makes all the difference when we turn the rule into a positive, because it instructs us to move and DO something positive. We create positive energy in the world.

Who do you know who lives out The Golden Rule? Someone who always gives? Do you know someone who will come visit you when you are sick, or go to the grocery store for you? Who do you know who you call when you are low and they will listen?

Who can you call when your car is broken down and they will give you a ride or take you to the car repair shop? Who will go sit with your partner while you are in surgery? Who do you know who will help you pack up when you need to move? (That is a giving friend!) Who do you know who will forgive you when you mess up? Who will sit with you when your mother dies, not saying anything trite but just being with you?

Now, ask yourself, when are you that person?  This is what it means to follow Jesus. To live the Golden Rule.

In the movie, Pay it Forward, the teacher, played by Kevin Spacey gives an assignment to an elementary class. He tells them that by the end of the school year they are to do something to change the world. Haley Joel Osment plays the little boy that takes on the challenge in a vigorous way.

The boy, Trevor, decides to do good deeds for people and to challenge them to pay it forward – to do positive things for three more people. With the law of multiplication, he shows how his action will spread exponentially and truly can change the world. It gets really big really fast as the goodness multiplies  He lives out the Golden Rule. He helps a homeless man who in turn helps someone else and so on. The good will spreads.

We can do the same. Just like the boy in the movie. Just like the old man on the bike in Burkina Faso. We can do this, because of the grace of God. The grace of God lives inside of each one of us. It was the grace of God that gave that old man the strength to pull Dorthea Hertzburg and her bike the seven miles along the road in Africa. The grace of God living inside of us is what gives us the power to do good. Grace is what gives us the power to treat others the way we want to be treated, rather than, perhaps, the way they treat us. Not an eye for an eye, but rather, turning the other cheek with compassion. Jesus came to show us what it means to show compassion, to treat others the way we want to be treated. Oh, my, what the world would be like if we all lived out the Golden Rule every day in all our actions!

What can you do? How will you change the world? I want you to think about that right now. Let’s start with one thing. Think about one person whose life you want to change. Maybe it will be something big like Trevor suggested in the movie “Pay it Forward.” Or maybe your act will be something small but powerful. Maybe you will call or visit someone who is lonely. Maybe you will help someone with a task that you know they need help with. 

 
I want you to think of one person you will help. Who is one person whose life you can change this week? Decide who that person will be right now.  Now decide on one thing that you would like to have done for you, that you will do for that person this week. Make a commitment to yourself to do this one thing. And now, if you choose, as a way to be accountable a find a person and tell them what you are going to do this week and get them to commit to it for someone else as well.  And watch how that plays out.