"Just as there is a bitter and evil zeal, which separates us from God and leads to hell, just so there is a good zeal, which separates us from sin and leads to God and to eternal life. This is the zeal that we should use with the most fervent love: that is, that we should seek to outdo each other in showing respect, tolerate each other’s weaknesses, whether of body or behaviour, with the utmost patience, and give way to each other. No-one should do what seems to be to his own advantage, but should consider what is to the advantage of others. We should love each other with chaste and brotherly love; fear God; and prefer nothing whatsoever to Christ. And may he lead us all to eternal life. Amen."
That is the seventy-second chapter of the Rule of St Benedict: “Of the good zeal which the monks should have”. Zeal is a word we don’t use much nowadays. If we were to refer to someone as zealous, and, even more, as a zealot, we would mean that he is a fanatic, a fundamentalist, and probably dangerous. It’s interesting that Jesus included among his apostles a Zealot, one of those Jews who rebelled against Roman taxation, and finally, by their open rebellion, led to the destruction of Jerusalem. He didn’t mind zeal, but I think it’s a safe bet that, in line with the message to the church of Laodicea, he minded lukewarmness, and minded it a lot. If you described the apostles he chose, lukewarmness is not a characteristic you’d mention, and zeal is one that you probably would. Even though I must die for you, I will not deny you! Lord, shall we call down lightning from heaven to strike them? You shall never wash my feet! Show us the Father and we shall be satisfied! And when Jesus called James and John from their fishing, they dropped everything, left the boats and nets and fish and their father, and followed him.
I need hardly say that Jesus was zealous. “Zeal for your house has consumed me”. Let the dead bury their dead! Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! My food is to do the will of the Father. And, in another vein, “Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; but not my will, but yours be done”.
Sometimes I think that one of the most important things Jesus ever said – for me at any rate – was a throwaway line, spoken to Peter who had shown curiosity about what was to happen to John. Jesus replied: “If I wish him to remain until I come, what is that to you? As for you, follow me.” That has become a sort of mantra with me when I find that I am becoming too concerned about the things of this world, or if I find myself being envious of, or over-curious about, another person. What is that to you? As for you, follow me.
That is what we are here for. Seek first the kingdom of God and its righteousness. Being a Christian, following Christ, is not something that we do in our spare time, it is not an optional extra tacked on to a life in which we try to be nice and honest people (though that’s a start). It is life. It is our whole definition. It is easier to remember that in a monastery, since all you need to do is glance at one of your fellow nuns or monks, and their clothing will tell you what they are and what you are. There is a saying in monastic circles: The habit may not make the monk, but it helps to keep him. It does; it helps to remind him and to keep him faithful. We lay people do not have such helps. We live in a world that reminds us of almost everything else at every turn. It is not a wicked world, but our part of it is largely indifferent to Christ, and we are lucky if it is not actually hostile to Christians. Or perhaps I’m wrong there; perhaps hostility is better than indifference. “I wish you were either hot or cold! But because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” At least hostility reminds us of what we are, we who bear the name of Christian.
Today’s reading from the Song of Songs contains one of the great biblical misquotations. When a beloved person dies, there is sure to be someone who says “The Bible says that love is stronger than death”. The Bible does not say that love is stronger than death. What the Bible says is that “love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave.” Very different. It means not that love endures beyond death or overcomes death, but that love is as strong, as unconquerable, as death. No connection is being made between love and death; the author simply couldn’t think of anything more powerful or uncompromising than death. And that word “jealousy” – in Hebrew it is from the same root as zeal. It’s the same word, really. The phrase does not mean that a jealous person will never forgive; it means that love’s zeal is boundless, its strength comparable only to the strongest thing there is – death.
That’s why these two readings are put next to each other: the exhortation not to be lukewarm but zealous, and the poetic explanation of where that zeal comes from. From love. We have been told that “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us”; but love elicits love, and love – not hard work, not weekly attendance at the eucharist, not preaching or teaching – is the only appropriate response. Imagine if the Bride in the Song of Songs had responded with anything but love; even if she had offered the Bridegroom all her possessions “it would be utterly scorned”. Just so with God. As so often, it is Paul who puts it in the clearest and most extreme form: “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.”
It is worth noting that we are given these readings on the Sunday before Ascension Day, when the disciples all had to move out of the realm of sight into the realm of faith, which is the one we all live in, and the one that Jesus called blessed: Blessed is the person who has not seen, and yet believes. Jesus is no longer visibly there to remind the disciples of their mission, of their purpose in life, of what it means to be a follower of Christ. And as we see, lukewarmness set in for them too. As I’ve said, there is nothing exceptionally wicked about today’s world. And there’s nothing exceptionally lukewarm about today’s Christians. But we have waited a long time for the coming of the Bridegroom. It is hard to keep our first fervour and our first love. But he will come, to the world at the end of time, and to each of us at our own death.
Christ does not stand at the door and knock, physically, as the bridegroom did in the Song of Songs. But, interestingly, that, and the word “zeal”, is the only phrase common to the two readings, and I think we are meant to notice that. Christ’s presence, and his love, is always there. And the only response he asks is – love; and the zeal which manifests it.
And so let us use this zeal with the most fervent love; let us love each other with chaste and brotherly love; fear God; and prefer nothing whatsoever to Christ. And may he lead us all to eternal life. Amen.
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