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!

The summer time seems to be the time for vacations and a time to relax. Even Jesus invites his followers to seek a deserted place, away from the pressing crowds, for rest.

As a bishop of this church I find myself encouraging my pastors to carve out a day per week to rest. I find myself encouraging rostered leaders to take all of their vacation time as a stewardship issue for whoever succeeds them. From my viewpoint, time off is not just your issue but it is a stewardship issue for the one who follows you.

Not only do I teach and counsel the above, I try to lead by example. Some months my example is a very good one. Then there are the months in which I cannot follow my own advice. Meetings get scheduled on my day off and some weeks I am unable to find another day to take off.

Just recently I saw on the evening news the crush of people in Afghanistan. People who have fled their homes and home towns due the concentrated bombing that is attempting to rid the world of terrorists. These folks are starving and desperate for food.

The crowds and the masses wanted what Jesus offered. He fed them; he healed them; he performed miracles. Yet, even Jesus sought time away from those in need. Jesus sought time to pray and time to relax.

As I write this Hunger Sermon Starter I am days away from a vacation. For the last 7 years my wife and I have gone to Nags Head, North Carolina. Eight days of no email and no telephones. No meetings. No appointments. No emergencies other than maybe a flat tire of deciding what if anything we will do on a given day. These eight days are simply a time to relax and rest.

This year I go to Nags Head knowing of a pastor’s daughter who is recovering from surgery and a Pastors spouse who was hospitalized with some mental issues. I know of those who wish to meet with me in person and those call committees that I have promised to educate in our ways. All of these can wait.

Jesus’ words to his followers are words we need to hear and be reminded. I do need to get away (even if it might be to my garden or a good book). I need to rest and place my mind on other things. Otherwise I will not be healthy enough to feed even me.

My Celebrate insert reminds me that today’s text from John 6 is the first of four texts that focus on Jesus as the bread of life. Our text for today is the feeding of the 5,000. The Celebrate insert then reads: “What we have, what we bring to Jesus’ table seems like it is not nearly enough to meet all the needs we see around us. But it is not the adequacy of our supplies or our skills that finally make the difference; it is the power of Jesus working in the littlest and least to transform this world into the world that God desires, a world where all the hungry are satisfied.”

The idea for the Tour De Revs began in the year 2001. Pastor David Twedt dreamed of riding his bicycle from synod office to synod office until he arrived at the Churchwide Assembly. His original title for this event was going to be “Bish to Bish, Cheeseburgers and Fries.” Meaning that he’d ride to and through all 65 synods ask the members of the church to donate the amount of a cheeseburger and fry (or a Happy Meal) monthly to the ELCA World Hunger Appeal. Pastor Twedt figured that if every baptized ELCA member donated $5.00 per month, times 12 months, times 5 million members we could easily raise 30 million per year for the feeding of those who are poor.

Today, eight years later, Pastors Twedt, Schlak, and Soltow ride a triplet bike making stops in every synod creating teaching moments and preaching opportunities where they emphasis our making the gift of 2 Happy Meals a month or donating $10 - $12 per month to the Hunger appeal. At $10 per month (and $10 is not very much) we would have $60 million to work with and at $12 our church would have $70 million to feed the hungry and to teach the hungry to feed themselves. Small gifts, small amounts given to Jesus to multiply into a transformed world.

As you read these sermon starters that I have written I hope that you can hear my passion and my belief. I believe that our gifts do make a difference. That our small gifts of $5, $10, or $12 per month multiplied by all of the members of this church and given to Jesus to multiply some more, just could be what this world needs so that those who are hungry are fed. And once they have been physically fed, they may be open to hearing the Good News of God in Christ who came to save us.