Matthew 18:15-20
When I sat down with this Gospel this week, I didn't think about theology. I thought about my brother. My brother Thomas. If you know us, you know Thomas isn't just my brother, he's my best friend. He's the first man I'd call if I was in trouble, and the last man I'd want to fall out with. So when I read Jesus saying, "If your brother sins against you..." I found it hard to even imagine Thomas and I falling out? Not talking? It feels impossible. But then I let myself imagine it. What if we did have one of those rows? Not a small argument about football or whose turn it is. A real, serious row that left us not speaking to each other. What would I do? I know my heart - I couldn't leave it. I would want to be reconciled with him as soon as possible. I wouldn't be able to sleep properly knowing my best friend and I were not right with each other. I would be at his door. I would be on the phone. But here is the honest part. What if he wasn't ready? What if I went and he wasn't ready to have that conversation with me? That would be gutting, wouldn't it? I think that's where this Gospel really hit me this week. Jesus knows that can happen. He knows the first try doesn't always work.
He says, if he won't listen, take a friend with you. Bring someone who loves you both. And I know if it was me and Thomas, I would do exactly that. I would do my utmost to keep some line of communication open. I'd bring a mutual friend, someone we both trust, to just help us hear each other again. Because that relationship is too precious to let pride win. And I think if you are anything like me, you'll get this next part. I hate conflict. I mean, I really hate it. My instinct when there is tension is not to go towards it, it's to walk away from it.
And what do we do when we walk away? We start telling our side of the story to everyone except the person I need to talk to. We tell our spouse, We tell our work colleagues, We tell the lads in the pub. And without even meaning to, We make it bigger. We escalate it. And suddenly a misunderstanding that could have been fixed in five minutes over a cup of tea has become impossible to fix because everyone else is now involved. That's why I love this Gospel. Jesus is not just giving us advice here. He is giving us a blueprint for a peaceful and lasting reconciliation. Step one: Go one-to-one. Protect each other's dignity. Step two: If you need help, bring help - not an army, a mediator. Step three: Bring it to the community, to the Church, because we are supposed to carry each other. But the most beautiful part for me is the last line. And this is what I kept coming back to when I thought about me and Thomas. "Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the middle of them." We usually hear that about Mass or maybe a prayer group. But Jesus says it right here, in the middle of a teaching on arguments. He's saying: When you try to make peace, I am not watching from a distance. I am pulling up a chair at your table. Think of that. Jesus, ready and happy to sit at that awkward kitchen table with you and your brother, you and your sister, you and your neighbour, and help bring about healing. He doesn't want to be an afterthought after we've fixed it. He wants to be in the conversation. So I have to ask myself this week, and maybe you do too: It's easy for me to say I would move heaven and earth to be reconciled with Thomas, because I love him. But what about the person I find harder to love? So here is the question I want to leave you with for this week: Who in your life needs Jesus to pull up a chair at the table with you both - and are you willing to actually give Him a place and invite Him into that conversation? Amen.