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 week’s texts have a strong focus on God’s activity with and for God’s people throughout history. The Old Testament texts focus on God’s promises and fidelity to Israel, the New Testament texts emphasize God’s activity and grace in Jesus. How appropriate that at the new year, as we look forward, we also remember God’s gracious activity. May the memory of this empowering grace encourage us as we strive to do God’s work with our hands.

This passage from Jeremiah looks forward to the future restoration of Israel. Our world is still in need of restoration—the global economy is still struggling to recover (with hunger and poverty on the rise), we are embroiled in a seemingly interminable conflict in Afghanistan, with other pockets of fighting scattered throughout the globe, to name just a couple of examples. How should we as the church respond? How should we pray and act? How might God be inviting us to participate in the work of restoration?

Ephesians 1:3-14
The passage from Ephesians, like that of Jeremiah 31 and Psalm 147, recounts the story of God’s work in and through Christ. Grace informs and pervades the passage. It is God’s grace that empowers us to “live for the praise of God’s glory” (v.12). As happens so often in Paul’s writings, Ephesians begins with God’s activity (chapters 1-3) and concludes with the Christian imperative (chapters 4-6). It is because of God’s grace that we live differently. What might God’s love and grace be calling us to in this new year?

This passage from John, read every year on the second Sunday of Christmas, is often read through a theological lens, with an emphasis on the divinity of Christ. Indeed, it was John’s Gospel that was so central to the Council of Nicea as it struggled to articulate its Christology. The Word becoming flesh is much more than a lofty idea though. How profound is it that God enters into the realities of life and makes a dwelling here? What does that dwelling look like?

In terms of hunger and poverty, it can mean seeing Christ in those who are poor and vulnerable. (In the Baptismal covenant of the Episcopal Church, the sponsors are asked, “Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?” Their response is, “I will with God’s help.”)

That God came into the messiness of life—living in it, transforming it—calls us to do likewise (I think here of Philippians 2:5-10, where the hymn of Christ’s humility is used to define the ethic of the Philippian church). In what ways do we resist living fully into the realities of life? In what ways can we make our dwelling in the complexity (and sometimes downright ugliness) of life?

This may sound like a difficult call (and it is!). This is why verse 16 is so key—from Christ’s fullness we have received grace upon grace. It is an empowering grace that transforms us, that gives us the strength and courage to live into our call as Christians. As we think about a new year, and perhaps the things we’d like to be and do, what might God be saying? How can we, empowered by God’s grace, be agents of change?

X Baptism as an identity marker—when we are baptized we join the people of God and as such take on a new identity. What will that identity be? The earliest Christians were notorious for their care of widows and orphans (Rodney Stark, in his book, The Rise of Christianity, has an excellent chapter detailing this), it was one of the ways in which Christians were identified. As the baptized people of God, can we reclaim this historic identity?

X Luther saw baptism as a daily practice of dying to the old ways of being and rising up “to live before God in righteousness and purity forever.” The term “righteousness” carries for many of us a pietistic connotation—to be “righteous” is a personal state or condition of purity. In both Hebrew (tsadekah) and Greek (dikaiosunê), however, the term also carries a relational sense—to be in right relationship. In fact, the words and their cognates in both languages can be just as comfortably translated as “justice” (and they often are in our Bibles, depending on the context). If we reclaim this biblical sense “righteousness,” in the context of baptism, we die to unjust, wrong relationships and are raised “to live before God in justice and right relationships.” What might this look like in our day to day interactions with neighbors near and far?

X In the Baptismal covenant and the Affirmation of Baptism outlined in ELW we make commitments to “care for others and the world that God made” and to “work for justice and peace” (pp. 228; 236). The profession of faith (p. 235) includes a renunciation of the “forces that defy God” and the “powers of the world that rebel against God.” We can reasonably include greed, strife, and self-interest in those forces and powers that defy God and leave God’s people impoverished, hungry, and ill. In our baptism we commit ourselves to work with God in the bringing of God’s kingdom.

Celebrant          Will you strive for justice and peace among all
                        people, and respect the dignity of every human
                        being?
People              I will, with God’s help.

I am especially inspired by the idea of proclaiming the good news of God in Christ by both word and deed. Not only do I speak out for justice, but I also strive to make lifestyle choices that make justice on earth more feasible. I also appreciate the call to seek and serve the Christ who is in all persons (see e.g., Matt 25:31-46). Finally, note how the people’s response (“I will, with God’s help”) draws attention to the synergy involved in God’s work. We commit to living justly trusting in God’s empowering grace.

This passage from Isaiah insists that God will protect and ultimately restore God’s people. The primordial waters of chaos will not overtake them, nor will destructive fires harm them. This is because God has redeemed God’s people and called them by name. While the promises certainly engender hope, sometimes our experience and the experiences of our brothers and sisters around the world raise a serious challenge to the truth of the claims. Too many of the people of God are displaced by war and disease, and suffer from the waves of poverty and hunger.

This passage invites us to lift our voices in prayer that God would be faithful to God’s promises. We may just find that as we plead our case God will respond with a challenge to us. As the people of God, we are charged with doing God’s work. How might God be calling us to walk with people through water and fire?

Psalm 29 (3)
Psalm 29corresponds nicely to Isaiah 43. The psalmist emphasizes the power of God, reminding us that God is king over the chaos of life (see esp. vv. 3 & 4, 10). The final petition in v. 11 is a prayer we can pray—that God would be faithful to the promise to give strength to God’s people (strength to endure the struggles of life, strength and courage to work tirelessly against injustice) and that God would give God’s people peace. How will we participate with God in this activity?

Acts 8:14-17
This passage recalls the thesis statement to the book of Acts (1:8) that God would send the Holy Spirit so that Jesus’ disciples could be his witnesses “in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” The next chapter then narrates the call of Saul (soon to be Paul) who will be Luke’s champion to the ends of the earth.

Since this passage refers backwards to 1:8, and serves as a fulfillment of it, I think it is fair to think about witness and testimony. What are we witnesses of? How effective is our witness? As noted above, a key element of the early church’s identity (and a key element of Jesus’ earthly ministry, especially in this year’s Gospel) was caring for those who were poor and vulnerable. How is our witness in this area? How might we improve it? Where do we need an extra measure of God’s grace in living into that identity?