Try a Little Kindness

(This sermon is adapted from a 2008 message preached by Rev. Dr. R. Timothy Meadows at the Community Church at Tellico Village)

Matthew 9:9-13; 18-26

If you are of a certain age, you will remember Glen Campbell’s crossover hit, “Try a Little Kindness.” It’s a song that calls us to look for those we can help and to extend mercy to those in trouble — even when the trouble is of their own making. In a world so divided politically and ideologically that, as one recent writer observed, we would rather sort ourselves into like-minded communities than genuinely listen to one another, we need to try a little kindness.

Fortunately, long before Glen Campbell sang about it, Jesus was living it.

Three Scenes, One Theme

Today’s reading from Matthew’s gospel gives us three quick scenes, each one a window into the heart of Jesus. In each encounter, without hesitation, Jesus moves toward someone living on the outskirts of life.

First, there’s Matthew — a tax collector. In first-century Palestine, tax collectors were despised on two counts: they worked for the occupying Roman government, and they routinely skimmed profit off the top for themselves. As a result, Matthew was, in the eyes of his neighbors, both a traitor and a thief. And yet Jesus walks past his tax booth and says, simply, “Follow me.”

Next comes Jairus, a leader of the synagogue — a man of position and faith — whose young daughter is dying. He falls at Jesus’ feet in desperation. Whatever dignity he had carefully maintained, he sets aside completely. His little girl is all that matters now.

And finally, in the press of the crowd on the way to Jairus’ house, a woman reaches out and touches the fringe of Jesus’ cloak. She has been hemorrhaging for twelve years. Twelve years of pain. Twelve years of being ceremonially unclean — untouchable, excluded, invisible. She doesn’t ask permission. She simply reaches.

Three people. Three crises. Three moments when Jesus could have looked the other way.

He doesn’t.

Kindness as a Way of Life

What strikes me about these three encounters is not just what Jesus does, but how he does it. He doesn’t hold a committee meeting. He doesn’t consult the religious rulebook. He doesn’t calculate the reputational cost. Instead, he simply responds — with what can only be called kindness.

This is worth sitting with for a moment, because we sometimes use the word kindness as if it were something small. A nice gesture. A polite word. Something you offer when it costs you nothing.

But the kindness of Jesus in these scenes costs him something real. Eating with Matthew meant being seen at the table with someone socially unacceptable. Similarly, touching — or being touched by — a hemorrhaging woman meant absorbing her ritual uncleanness. And entering the house of a dead girl and commanding her to rise meant risking ridicule when the mourners laughed in his face.

In spite of all that, Jesus went into each of these situations determined to be kind. Not politely distant. Not professionally compassionate. Kind — in the full, risky, costly sense of the word.

And yet, in each encounter, while Jesus is moving toward people, the crowd is moving away. The religious leaders grumble about the dinner table. The mourners laugh at the suggestion that the girl is only sleeping. The disciples probably wondered what the woman in the crowd wanted with Jesus. The community, in each case, opts for contempt — or at least comfortable disinterest.

Jesus, meanwhile, opts for kindness.

What Does Our Kindness Say About Us?

That question hangs in the air today, doesn’t it?

Do we care enough to let the church look like an emergency room — full of people who are bleeding, grieving, and desperate? Or do we instead prefer the church to look like a club, where the members are reasonably well put-together and the unwritten rule is that you handle your problems before you walk through the door?

Do we value our public reputation more than we value the risk of investing in relationships that others would consider beneath us — or beyond us?

What, then, does our level of kindness say about us?

Here is the hard truth these three scenes press upon us: Jesus did not go only as far as he was comfortable. He did not go only as far as the situation seemed to require. Rather, he went as far as love demanded — and then a little further. A meal with the disgraced. A word to the untouchable. Life breathed back into the dead.

That, ultimately, is the standard we are called to.