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!

On this day, the tenth anniversary of 9/11, the texts in many ways present a challenge to our normal way of being and doing. Each speaks to God’s presence and activity in the midst of (or perhaps in spite of) horrific wrongs. The text from Genesis brings Joseph’s ordeal to a close as Jacob dies and Joseph forgives his brothers for the wrongs done to him. The text from Romans challenges believers not to judge each other on the basis of religious practices (good advice for the ELCA at this time as well) and reminds the reader that ultimately all will be accountable to God. Matthew’s parable of the unforgiving servant reminds us of the huge grace God has afforded us, and how we are called to act with equal grace. This are not easy words for us to practice, especially for those who have lost loved ones in the attack on 9/11 or in the subsequent wars that continue to fester. How are we called to respond in light of these texts? What should our witness be in a hostile and unstable world?

This text from Matthew can be upsetting to our sense of fairness. In the context of Matthew’s Gospel, it explains why the Gentiles are welcomed into God’s family without question. Though the Jews labored faithfully from the start, non-Jewish followers of Christ now too were welcomed into the people of God and received God’s gracious gift. The first hunger theme present in this passage relates to how we treat those who are different than ourselves. The many “isms” of our day—racism, sexism, classism, to name a few—exacerbate hunger and poverty: those who are in the position of power suffer less than those who are not.

The second hunger lesson relates to our sense of fairness. We have all heard the well-worn (and often enough baseless) justifications for apathy towards poverty—people are hungry or poor because they are lazy, don’t manage money well, or somehow deficient. Their hunger and poverty is their fault. Aside from the fact that claims such as these are woefully imprecise, this parable invites us to rethink notions of justice. God gives freely to all, as God wishes. Might the people of God have the same call when it comes to hunger? Even if the above-mentioned biases prove true, are we still called to share? Does this parable speak somehow to the widespread poverty and hunger we face in our day?