MT 18: 10-20 

Matthew in the Margins…14th S. After Pentecost…Revised 2017

Guardian angels are, in a sense, boundary riders where heaven & earth overlap. In Jesus God reaches out to us across all the boundaries we set to embrace ‘little ones’ trapped in systems that put them down & keep them down. Jesus' inclusiveness, & therefore, God’s, extends to children & all the other ‘little ones’ overlooked & excluded by our societies. If we believe in guardian angels (I do!) let’s join their ranks as honorary members. Take the risk, as Jesus does, of crossing boundaries to make ‘as it is in heaven' a reality on earth, too. 

A heaven that’s only ‘up there somewhere’ can simply be an escape clause, an escape hatch. Leaving God’s 'little ones’ & God-self stuck with no way out! 

God operates on the ‘ from the bottom up’ principle, not from the top down. Otherwise, Jesus would have come as a very different Messiah! Might even have got Himself elected! Had His statue erected all over the place - not just in churches that have such things - till someone decided it was time to pull Him down & move on!

Still on the subject of guardian angels, Jesus’ train of thought extends to shepherds - of four & two legged sheep! There are many ‘sheep’, ‘little ones’, lost & gone astray out there in today’s margins. Mind you, Jesus may need to revise His arithmetical figures with regard to the numbers of losts & founds today!

Being a disciple means being at the same time a faithful sheep, & an under-shepherd to the Good Shepherd. Carrying the Christ in people, lost or not, across boundaries standing in the way of God’s inclusiveness. There are many issues dividing us today. Depending on where we’re fortunate, or unfortunate, enough to live. Issues, boundaries such as biblical & other forms of  fundamentalism, same-gender marriage, sexual discrimination of all kinds, jobs & their availability, health cover, adequate social security…the list goes on & on. When Jesus rebukes Peter for ‘thinking as humans think, not as God thinks’ [last Sunday, in MT 16:23] He means us to learn Peter’s lesson, too. We need to discern God’s mind as Jesus reveals it by His Spirit before we shut others out from being pushed or kept outside the boundaries of society. Binding & loosing powers are all about boundaries. We need to take the time & invest the spiritual effort required to discern which are of God’s scheme of things, & which are of the way we ourselves think or feel. As well as discerning how God might think about issues, we also need to discern how God feels about people! 

When she doesn’t want to talk about a subject, my grand-daughter will sometimes say to me “Don’t go there, Grandad!” I take her to mean, ‘Don’t go where angels fear to tread!’ But do let’s be alert to their footsteps & footprints, & do let’s tread in them! For God’s sake.

P.S. Suzanne de Dietrich in one of her writings some years back wondered if the bit about treating someone like a pagan or a tax-collector might be dominical humour; meaning such persons need even more mercy & compassion! Interesting? Provocative?