LISTSERV 16.0 - HUNGERSERMONSTARTERS Archives

The lessons for each Sunday in the church year proclaim God’s grace in Jesus Christ. Also derived from a Sunday’s texts are lessons for the Christ-inspired and Christ-like life of God’s people. The comments here will help you find hunger-related threads – sermon starters – among the themes of this day’s texts. (We're presuming you have already done your exegetical work on the texts.) God bless your proclamation (and teaching) of what is most certainly true!

· This theme reveals kindly disposition in both the First Reading and the Gospel. “Hospitality” is worthy exploring in our culture, in which “visiting folks at their homes” continues to be non-existent or difficult. For example, do you know a congregation that does every-member visits as part of any of its programs, or anyone who does door-to-door anything (except the Jehovah’s Witnesses?).

· Note that the hospitality in both these instances takes place rather quickly. The strangers and Jesus must be welcomed well, and so food is prepared, the day’s routines come to a halt, people gather around the visitors. Hospitality equals “stop what you’re doing.”

· The feeling you get from these stories – and those of guests who are welcomed in other world cultures today – is being made to feel special, honored, even privileged by virtue of the actions of one’s hosts. If you’ve traveled to other lands, you probably have those kinds of stories enshrined in your own heart.

· At its heart, hospitality mirrors God’s own attitude about us. Even though we are strangers – to God’s way of thinking and being -- we are still welcome at the feasts God prepares. We are treated kindly and given a place of respect, even though we might not deserve it. Trust and generosity flow in our direction; we are supported and soothed by kindnesses we don’t expect.

· To keep this simple, I think the lessons of today enjoin us to hospitality – giving it and receiving it. And from the viewpoint of “accompaniment” theology/philosophy, we can learn from those in other cultures how to be hospitable past politeness and despite inconvenience.

· One of the most difficult elements of hunger ministry – personal or in a congregation – is the match between espoused values and actual behaviors. We can say we believe that hunger is a travesty but behave as though it’s okay for hunger to always be with us. We can think of ourselves as strongly committed to peace and justice in all the worlds, but waver in that resolve when it means our job, or our kids’ futures. I’m in the same boat with you when it comes to the possibility that my integrity quotients aren’t as high as I’d like.

· I think this is the hardest part of hunger ministry, in our individual lives and together as God’s people. We somehow find it easier to push a little bit of money at problems without also thwarting the evil that starts the problem in the first place. Speaking up, standing up, turning up when we say we will. Keeping our promises to the people we’ve met in other places; showing our children a righteous example; doing what’s right regardless of the consequences.

· We have to call each other to accountability when we don’t measure up to our professed values. This is not a negative thing, this accountability, because if we truly want to act in ways that are consonant with the deepest identities, then we can thank those that ask us to be consistent, to hold fast to what we believe and what we do.

· One place to keep at this: our lifestyles. If Western lifestyles are at the core of the causes for hunger and poverty, then a primary place to practice integrity is in our daily living, especially in the choices we make with regards to attention, time and money.

· Think of it: We conserve and save things that are beautiful, scenic, wonderful and even necessary for our survival. But if Christ is both creator and -- elsewhere in the Scriptures --redeemer, then he is willing and capable of bringing back, buying back, saving what is otherwise perceived as unredeemable, worthless and even dangerous.

· So our God participates with us in the hard work of reclaiming nuclear waste, rivers and lakes drained dry, depleted fisheries, land rendered useless by overuse, even people crowded together in unlivable circumstance. Christ of the slums, of the dried lake bed, the chemical dumping ground, the burned forest. Christ present in recycler, chemist, nuclear engineer, politician, environmental activist, fish biologist.

· As Lutheran Christians, we participate in that kind of work in places where deforestation is threatening plant and human life. (As an example, play around at www.elca.org/openaworld and see the places where Lutheran World Relief has done this kind of work in Nicaragua. Or visit www.lwr.org and look for Nicaragua in their many stories.)

· Mary listens and learns from the words of Jesus. This represents not only all learning of any kind, but more specifically the viewpoints of Jesus. Mindfulness, careful consideration. Wisdom of a Christly kind. (His words backed up by his actions, by the way . . . .)

· Martha might symbolize a response to hunger that bustles and hustles into action immediately. Not only in the hospitality that specifically grounds this text, but also in the values and emotions that undergird Martha’s response to Jesus. She puts a sweaty face on “love” and sticks “now” into any verb that’s used to describe our reaction to hunger.

· Despite Jesus’ seeming remonstrance regarding Martha’s action, most commentators are willing to cut some slack for both women, as well as Jesus’ words. One way to approach the matter: Both women act in response to Christ’s presence.

· That’s how it can be with us, as we encounter the horrific specter of starvation, the ugly truths of injustice, the piles of secret little lies we tell ourselves to assuage our guilt. When we drink deeply of Jesus’ wisdom and his insistence about injustice, we are refreshed and emboldened to engage in deeds of hospitality and more. We face hunger’s ugliness and get to work.

1. “Welcome” and “You’re welcome” are phrases – and attitudes – we’d like to see children exhibit naturally, without prompting. In this time with children, though, you might engage in a slightly longer time of prompting by “training” children how to say “welcome” or “you’re welcome” in a couple of languages, or set up situations in which children might practice using these phrases, AND understanding what they mean. Several situations might be adaptations of the stories in the recent Hunger Packet you received about a month ago. Scenario: If you were part of this story, who would say “welcome” and when would the “you’re welcome” response seem most appropriate?

2. The story of Martha brings to mind the reality that sometimes we ARE the only ones doing the necessary work. (HINT: Adults will identify with this “children’s theme”, too.) Find a children’s story – The Little Red Hen? – where a stalwart character plugs along at a necessary task, seemingly all alone but actually NOT alone, or for good reasons that eventually reveal themselves. The idea of not being weary in doing good is an important thing to remember as we tackle hunger, ask people to contribute, try to tell people what’s wrong, invite others to join us, think sad thoughts about the state of the world. The good news: Our work makes a difference, AND we’re probably not as “all alone” as we imagine.

3. The Colossians text suggests a simple activity for children: Imagining with you all the beauties and wonders of creation. While children’s eyes are closed, help them imagine the profundities of “simple” things like running water, bodies that can eat and digest food, a sunset, animals, food itself, a fruit tree, or rain. Use descriptive adjectives and adverbs so that children can follow with you in this form of prayerful gratitude.

· Notice the high integrity in both women’s behaviors? Notice that no men are mentioned in the story? (I think a lot about the integrity of guys compared with the integrity of women; maybe I’m wrong for thinking this way.)

· Who serves us food or provides us hospitality, people of whom we’re unaware? (Think of servers in restaurants, the truck drivers who transport food, the workers in meat processing plants, the health inspectors and the legislators/regulators who develop and guarantee food cleaniness.

2. What’s it mean to have Christ as creator? This really, really strikes me as potentially important when we think about the connection between today’s lessons and matters of hunger and justice. Think of it: A god who creates and then loves the parts of the creation – including its peoples – that need fixing, bringing around, renewing, resurrecting! This power of God in Christ does NOT give us license to mess up the creation, but gives us assurance that the natural world can somehow be redeemed. And BTW, we participate in that redemption of creation.

Kindof puts a different spin on the notion that once we’ve fouled our nests – yep, we’re doing that right now! – the whole operation spins down to STOP. What to talk about: Places where redemption takes place in creation, as well as the part we play in that work through our church’s work around the world. (A favorite example for me: Any domestic hunger project that involves urban gardening, where “slums” become urban farms of a sort.) Check out www.elca.org/grantinghope for this year’s listing of domestic hunger grants, or Google “urban gardens” to see how this hopeful redemption takes place in a locale near you.

3. When does “worthless people” need to be applied in our hunger-related work? That’s a phrase that comes from the CEV translation of Psalm 15. The psalmist (David) may have every right to name as “worthless” people who get in the way of God’s commands, but I wonder how that applies today. For example, community organizers – see www.elca.org/grantinghope for the organizations the ELCA Hunger Appeal supports – get very good at working with politicians, business-folks, power brokers and who-knows-who-else as they carve out sustainable solutions to community problems. Some of us might (too-readily?) name some of these folks as “worthless,” but what good does that do? Jesus’ example would seem to suggest a different approach – his followers included folks complicit with the Roman occupiers’ unjust taxation system, fisherpeople one worm short of a baited hook and rabid rebels. So the question for those of us wanting to fight hunger: Who, really, is “worthless” when it comes to defeating this scourge on humanity? And who decides, finally?

As you preach today, over 2000 ELCA and ELCIC members are meeting for the umpteenth Global Mission Event. Former and present missionaries, hunger activists, church leaders, “ordinary” laypeople, teenagers and children, and wonderfully inspiring guests from partner churches overseas. Pray for them/us as we gather and share courage for action. We’ll be praying for you, too. And thanking God as well. . . . .

· For fundamentalists – and, perhaps secretly, non-fundamentalists like us – the concept of godly retribution is high on our list of cause-and-effect logic about God’s mind. Bad people punished, good people rewarded. Kind people given kindness, mean people paid in reciprocating meanness. A logic not unknown to most of the world’s religions.

· It is not odd of God, though, to be forgiving of a family, a city, a nation or the world. Not because of the righteousness of a few good folks, but for their sake --- so that they can continue to be righteous people.

· If you hold in your mind the mental image of this world piling up sinfulness behind some about-to-break dam, or if you think of God only as a righteously angry ruler of the world, you might join with the sometimes secret thoughts of so many people – godly or not – in worrying about the moment when all the world’s evil pours over the dam and the world descends into economic or relational chaos. Anarchy, the rule of armaments, the tyranny of the few rich people who are protected from the flood – that sort of thing.

· If you understand God’s “for the sake of”, you understand that God might be holding back deserved punishment or natural consequences – how many forests do we chop down before we run out of air, hmmm? – precisely for the purpose of giving God’s people the time and the wherewithal to change the world.

· Perhaps God is the dam, perhaps God is the little boy with his finger in the dike, perhaps God is the night watchman, perhaps God is the protecting law officer. Perhaps God is the invisible protecting curtain. Why? To give you and the tens of millions of “good people” who constitute the church Jesus established the time and the reason to keep at this task of turning the world right-side-up again. Perhaps you’re the reason why the whole world is not collapsing. No pressure . . . .

· The ten good people of Sodom and Gomorrah did not materialize and so the natural disaster that followed wiped out these two examples of institutionalized evil. It may very well be that eventually some natural or unnatural disaster will materialize to wreak havoc on our civilization – some say it has begun already in global warming and in the spread of war over the past several years. It that case, we can only cry for mercy and ask for God’s protection.

· Think of it: We know God’s will for the world, at least in general terms, and we know of God’s loving rule of all that is. And yet we do what we want, sometimes ignoring commands and invitations like party-poopers ruining a perfectly good celebration.

· What we should expect – as we join with others around us in soiling this nest called Earth, in ignoring people who are poor but loved by God, in pretending to be generous with our gifts – is that this God would finally have enough of our failings and rebellions and just hammer us down like pegs in a child’s toy. Pounding us down flat, God would give to us what we deserve.

· God doesn’t give up, perhaps if only because we ask for God’s patience while we sort out this “doing God’s will” thing. We ask for God to teach us one more time —perhaps with poor people as our tutors – what God wants the world to be like. And we hope that God will understand our state of mind as slow learners.

· God’s steadfastness – sticking to the plan, keeping the promises, continuing the course, staying on message – is a definite gift. We mimic it, even though in small degrees, when we don’t give up on people who remain poor despite our generosity. We model Jesus’ love -- God’s own – when we don’t stop trying to eradicate HIV/AIDS, don’t stop teaching people to fish, don’t stop naming evil or danger --- or great opportunities – in the workings of government or the marketplace.

· Just as we are grateful for God’s sticking close to us in spite of our stubbornness or purposeful ignorance, so we can offer to the world our own stubborn refusal to give up, our own tenacious insistence about doing justice, our continuing friendship with people in difficult circumstance, our continuing willingness to ask poor people for forgiveness for our ways of living.

· The second of small aphorisms or reminders in today’s lectionary deals with gratitude, a fundamental starting point for our generosity regarding the problems of the world. “Donor fatigue” – good people eventually giving up – can happen if we forget to be grateful.

· The gratitude of which Paul speaks is NOT the kind that comes after a mission trip in which our youth group discovers the value of all their possessions and wealth and health and freedom from worry. Let’s be honest: THAT kind of gratitude – “I came back from (fill in the blank) really grateful for everything I have” -- is really nothing more than self-idolatry.

· Without gratitude, we are like little boys who answer their parents’ question about what to eat for supper with “I don’t like (fill in the blanks).” Without gratitude, we are immature brats whose expectations about self-fulfillment are non-sustainable and whose self-awareness never gets beyond that of chasing our unreasonable wishes or non-wishes.

· Paul suggests that grateful people are filled with thanks because that’s what God creates in us. It’s a part of the bigger picture of dying in Christ and being alive in Christ. We are dead, he says, to the stupid desires that keep us from being grateful (and therefore generous). We are dead to the proposition that we will live forever, that we are alive because of our own doing. We are dead to ideas like “It’s my money and I’ll do with it what I want” or “I think I’m pretty generous already, so don’t ask me for more of MY time or money.”

· Like the framework of a house set on a solid footing of rock or concrete, gratitude is grounded in a self-awareness suggested by Luther’s dying reminder, “We are beggars, after all.” Undeserving of anything except God’s retribution for our silly notions of self-godliness, we creep up to God with gratitude that anything we get is more than we deserve.

· Around the world, people who are poor can teach us this lesson. World travelers experience the gratitude of poor people in their hospitality to visitors. Stories of self-giving gratitude --
”We are so happy to have you as our guest” – are told over and over again, including tales of bountiful feasts being offered to visitors in spite of dire straits or limited food supplies.

· Jesus speaks about first century hospitality like it was a done deal. It might be interesting to think of what would happen in today’s culture if that same late-night visitor showed up at a security system-equipped starter castle. But I digress . . .

· Or do I? I think often of how “giving good gifts to our children” is the primary reason for existence for many parents who mistake “showering with gifts” for “showering with love.” Even a cursory analysis of family life in many middle-class enclaves would show parents thinking of themselves as essentially the gift-bearers for their children’s every need. Food of all kinds, toys and security at every turn, opportunities to become anything the little darlings desire, choices for lessons, clothes, friends. Perhaps thinking of that gift-giving as redemptive of their other shortcomings as parents, citizens, followers of Christ?

· Why twist this Gospel ever so slightly? Perhaps because our imagined capabilities to give our children good gifts has obscured from our minds the possibility of over-gifting those children to the point of obesity, early onset diabetes, narcissism and worse. In our “giving good gifts to our children,” we have honed our imagined responsibilities as parents to the point that we can’t see, at the edges of soccer fields and in the aisles of lesser-labeled clothing stores, those who actually can’t get much more than “snakes and scorpions” from their poverty-stricken parents.

· Perhaps, as bad as we are, we spend so much time with the development of our own children that we run out of attention, time and money for gifting the “visitors” in this semi-parable, the friends and strangers who appear in our lives at inopportune times, to ask us for a simple favors – justice, equal opportunity, a fair shake at jobs, our appreciation of their talents. Perhaps we have lost our ability to give when someone asks, to open doors when someone knocks, to help others search until they find what they need.

· The good news in all of this? God isn’t distracted by “good gift giving” to God’s children. God gets up in the middle of our nighttime neediness, God offers us the Spirit when we ask. The Spirit whose gifts help us do more than ply our children with gifts.

1. “Keep asking, keep searching, keep knocking.” Simulate those actions as though children in another land who are hungry or sick. Pretend to be both helper and the ones being helped. (For what needs do WE ask, search or knock?) How do we answer questions, help people find what they’re looking for and open doors? How do other people – including those who are poor – do the same for us?

3. Construct or set up a “grateful tent” in the front of the nave. (A couple of step ladders and a large sheet might work well.) Invite children into the tent to talk about what they’re grateful for. Ask them to think about living life inside this tent – like some refugees in the world – and what they would be very thankful to have in the tent with them. Thank God together for people at Lutheran World Relief and Lutheran World Federation, who help give displaced people tents and the things they need inside those tents.

1. Take some time to talk honestly about how “I want to do the best for my children” becomes an excuse for ignoring the rest of the world’s needs. Not only the excessive amounts of toys and activities, but also the surfeit of food and the possibility of narcissism creeping into family dynamics. How can God’s people think differently about their possessions and their lifestyles, so that they can consider the needs of others? How do we keep “for the sake of the children” balanced so that ALL children across the world are wrapped up into that category?

2. Talk about the possible misunderstandings one might derive from the Gospel lesson for today. For example, the notion that our asking, searching or knocking is the cause for our receiving and having doors opened by God – this a sure evidence of works righteousness. Or think how we can misunderstand the obligation and privilege of hospitality, not only to family members but also to strangers.

3. The story of Abram’s negotiations with God is a kind of analog to the task of advocating for others. In the case of Sodom and Gomorrah, Abram’s speaking on behalf of the towns was really a way of protecting the few good people in them. How does the advocacy work of this church have to take into account the possible help that might be given to undeserving people who ride on the coattails of deserving people? (Some might name the pending Farm Bill as an example, and others might name the whole process of legislative amendments to important bills as another example.) How do “Don’t give up on us” or “And be grateful” apply to legislative advocacy?

I write from the table of a mountain cabin set in the Eastern Sierras of California. This past Saturday I dug the county cemetery grave into which my father’s ashes were placed, and I participated in a service of committal for that task. On this evening I am once again mindful of my own death and also the incredible blessings of the natural world around me. A good position from which to pray gratefully for God’s mercy. And for you . . . .