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NEW FEATURE: TWO SUNDAYS AT ONCE!
SCROLL DOWN TO SEE BOTH MAY 6 AND MAY 13 STARTERS
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Welcome to Hunger Sermon Starters!
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!
May 6, 2007
5th Sunday of Easter
First Reading: Acts 11:1-18
Psalm 148
Second Reading: Revelation 21:1-6
Gospel: John 13:31-35
STARTER ONE: PREACHING THEMES
They will know we are Christians by our love
· In the 1970s – in the days of “far out, dude” and “groovy”, this song became an oft-sung staple of “contemporary worship services.” Sung into the ground, actually. (The same phenomenon exists with some of our current Christian songs.)
· The theme, though, doesn’t go away!
· If there is a Great Commission, it may be trumped in importance by this Great Commandment here.
· “They” in the song must certainly be the people of the world who see the love of Christ’s people for all others, regardless of their place in the world.
· We show love for the world in the hunger programs of this church – and its partners – which offer Christ’s own love to people regardless of their ethnicity or religion. Think of Lutheran Disaster Relief in this country or the Asian tsunami relief in Indonesian and India for examples. (See www.lutheranworld.org for current news about Asia and www.ldr.org for information about Lutheran-related relief in the Gulf Coast.
Unwashed and unloved
· What made Peter’s report so striking is that, like Jesus, he was able to damage terminally the “purity code” leftovers from Judaism that threatened to make Christianity into a class-oriented religion.
· Why? The Gentiles were as much known by the not being “clean” as by their imagined apostasy. While the designation appears to the religious, it may in fact be related to class, as in “No Low-Class Dirty People in This Church”.
· As we minister to and among people who are poor, we stand with Peter, inspired by a different vision than “self-cleaning righteous ones deserving of and earning God’s favor.”
· We say, “Come as you are, friend.”
· Our hospitality – in Christ’s name – is seen not only in handshakes and smiles, but in loving service – food and shelter; love and conversation; jobs and justice – that we extend to people who we might previously have thought of as “different from us.”
· Class consciousness in Christianity has no class.
Nature gone wild
· The psalm portrays a phantasmagorical vision of nature running amuck: Every element of nature – including previously dangerous aspects of nature – setting aside natural activities to engage in praise of God.
· The vision – a preview of “The Peaceable Kingdom” – is worth noting, simply because of its portrayal of the natural world as in synch with God’s created will.
· The stark reality in today’s world, however, is much different than the psalmist’s hopeful vision: A world where pollution (start with carbon and work up the chain of chemicals) threatens our survival, where nature is being raped and pillaged in order to feed non-sustainable lifestyles.
· By our own complex, materialistic and overwrought lifestyles – and our resulting complicity with rapacious appetites for possessions and pleasures – we could be mocking the vision of this psalm.
· We may also be decreasing greatly the world’s capacity to feed its people, as arable land disappears or is rendered useless by depletion of water or drought or erosion that may be the result of the global warming caused by our appetites for carbon-spewing technologies.
· Those people who live close to and respectful of the land – including people who are poor, indigenous peoples and farmers – may be crushed by our demand for products and services and comforts that ruin the earth and its creatures.
· How would the earth’s creatures praise God in these times?
God lives in the neighborhood
· A message from one of my hand-made Christmas cards years ago: God is great; God is good; God lives in our neighborhood.
· But it’s a “new heaven” and a “new earth” that God lives in. How in the world would God live with us in a world that we continue to foul and abuse?
· If we were to understand that God lives in this neighborhood, we’d behave differently towards the neighborhood.
· God deigns to live with us – and those who are, like us, poor in many ways – for no apparent reason other than God loves us.
· When God shows up in the neighborhood, God gets to work on healing, comforting, taking care of people.
· Perhaps God ALREADY shows up in “neighborhoods” around the world, in the faces and work of the people of this church, volunteers and contributors to the work of the ELCA Hunger Program.
STARTER TWO: CHILDREN’STHOUGHTS AND ACTIVITIES
1. A collection of animal puppets of every kind – one per child? – could enhance the message of the psalm. After some singing together of a praise song, you might announce that there wasn’t any rain for three months and some of the animals died. (Take away those puppets.) Another group was poached or hunted into extinction. (More puppet disappear.) Continue until one or more of the children objects. Then ask a series of questions about the place of animals in God’s world, and our responsibility to preserve creation for its capability to feed, clothe and shelter the world’s people.
2. How would children react if they knew that God would be moving in next door to them? Talk about the question using other questions:
- How would you get ready?
- What would you stop doing? Start doing?
- What would you ask if you met God?
- How could you help God (with the wiping away of tears, getting rid of suffering and pain, comforting, providing water)?
Announce to children that, in a way, God does show up in other places in the world, where the godly activities of the Revelations text take place every day through the work of the ELCA Hunger Program and its worldwide partners.
STARTER THREE: BIBLE CONVERSATIONS
1. Each of these texts connects to some part of the ELCA Hunger Program that may seem peripheral to the “real task” of feeding people. Today might be a good time to do some connecting of hunger to other areas of concern and opportunity, among them:
- The relationship of a degrading environment to the probable starvation of large numbers of people in the world.
- The “isms” that prevent Christians from considering others as worthy recipients of God’s love. (For the 1st century Christians, the “ism” might have been “Gentilism,” but for us today it may be “terrorism” or “classism.”)
- Our lack of understanding of God’s presence as “neighbor”, and how this ignorance contributes to our lack of regard for people different from us.
- God’s neighborly activities – wiping tears, getting rid of suffering, providing water, etc. – are available to us as likely tasks or ministries in our lives.
- Whatever causes poverty causes hunger.
- Whatever keeps people from providing for themselves and their families in a sustainable way is a cause of hunger.
- Although not explicitly noted in these texts, “oppression” and “injustice” also top the list of ungodly behaviors that cause poverty and hunger.
2. The questions of classism implicit in Peter’s report to the Jerusalem Council are worth exploring:
- Is classism illegal in our country? (Nope.)
- Then why is it wrong?
- What would have been the history of Christianity if the Jerusalem Council had rejected Peter’s argument?
- How is Christianity perceived – in terms of class – in other parts of the world? How does the hunger work of this church body contribute to that perception of Christianity’s primary identity?
- By what means do we eventually break down the subtle (legal) barriers between people of different levels of education, income, cultural upbringing, etc?
- What does it mean to “walk alongside someone who is poor?”
3. The psalm for today offers a delightful picture. Spend some time with participants imagining the scene the psalm paints, as though it is actually happening simultaneously. What would you hear and see and smell? What would you want to do because of this experience? Now contrast this vision with an experience of pollution or environmental disaster? (Ask an experienced participant to describe his or her experience while others listen.)
THE SENDOFF
The days of Spring are upon us, and eternally springing hope hops up to me, wiggles its nose at me and says, “Hey, want to take a walk?” And so I do, seeing God in the hopeful signs of blooming tulips, budding trees, rabbits eating the blooming tulips and omnipresent Canadian geese chewing my lawn down to its lowest ebb. God in the working of nature! I am fortunate to be alive. And hopeful!
Likewise for you, friends!
Bob Sitze, Director
Hunger Education
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Welcome to Hunger Sermon Starters!
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!
May 13, 2007
6th Sunday of Easter
First Reading: Acts 16:9-15
Psalm 67
Second Reading: Revelation 21:10, 22--22:5
Gospel: John 14:23-29
STARTER ONE: PREACHING THEMES
The example of Jesus
· The example of Jesus – his words and his life – is perhaps the most compelling motivation to live beyond ourselves.
· Precepts about poverty, macroeconomic realities, forests of environmental data – none of these engages our entire brains like the words and life of Jesus.
· Like his first-century disciples, we look him in the face and without too much prompting know what to do and how to do it.
· There’s no debate about these matters --- Jesus’ love for people who are downtrodden and suffering injustice.
· Jesus has authority – like a mother – because of his own love for us, his integrity (his life matches his values) and his willingness to give away his life for our sake.
· Living as Christ desires (commands?) is rooted in love for Jesus.
· So if our love and care for people who are poor.
No need for a Temple
· All around the world, the people of God gather on this Sunday much like the people of Philippi – down by the river – for learning and worship.
· For this kind of intimate small group learning, there’s no need for the synagogue, the Temple or the institution of Church.
· What makes “church” is presence – of the visiting evangelist Paul, or the Lamb in the New Jerusalem.
· Our presence among the world’s people is the core value of the hunger work of this church body.
· Sometimes that presence is real – visiting dignitaries from the partner synod delegation – and other times through our representatives – a few relief workers unloading a truck filled with food.
· This sense of the institutional church seems to be taking shape In the “emerging church” movement in this country and other places: Something closer to the ideas of “presence” and “conversation”
· The buildings and the trappings are good – they support presence – but they’re not necessary.
· Just like a dearly loved mother, absent any makeup and not wearing fancy clothing, the church still shows its love for the people of this world through its presence.
If you love me, you will do as I say
· The Johanine text is similar to the oft-cited (and oft-used) authoritative message – with accompanying look – that goes like this: “I’m the Mommy and I say so.”
· NOTE TO SELF: It’s not possible to pretend that Mom IS Mom; and it doesn’t actually work to pretend that we don’t know what she’s saying.
· Jesus’ “if” in this passage is not a pleading, but a descriptive word closer to “because.”
· Some variations: “I’m the Savior the world and I say so;” “I’m the guy who’s giving up everything so you can live, and I say so;” “I’m the one who loves poor people, and I say so.”
· We misunderstand Christ’s love if it’s only an invitation.
· In this text, his wishes for his followers is very close to a command, a “commission” perhaps greater than the one we’ve named as “Great.”
· And just what does Jesus say about people who are poor?
Going to where people ask for help
· Whether a dream, an actual letter or phone call or just the look in someone’s eye, we know the feeling of a cry for help.
· The Hunger Program of this church hears those cries throughout the world, and listens carefully as it responds.
· The “straightway” description of Paul’s response to the vision about Troas is analogous to the way in which this church responds to natural disaster, to worsening conditions or sudden opportunity in African nations, hopeful partnerships, visionary ideas. “Straightway” describes how we work. In your congregation, in this church’s hunger program, among our international partners.
STARTER TWO: CHILDREN’STHOUGHTS AND ACTIVITIES
1. What’s the good of this building? That’s a good question to ask children, perhaps taking an imaginary tour with children as you think together about the Revelations text’s “no need for a Temple.” Where does God actually show up and stick around in your building? (HINT: Think together with the children about all the things God does – through your congregation – in various parts of the building. A secondary question, perhaps for older children: What would happen to this church if we didn’t have a building?
2. Use the phrase, “I’m the Mommy and I say so” as a start for an explanation of Jesus’ words about “doing as he says.” Without pandering to the possibilities of Mother’s Day stories or overwrought references, think with children about why we would pay attention to Jesus in ways similar to our paying attention to what our mothers say.
3. This might be a good Sunday to tell some “Come over to Troas and help us” stories from the ELCA Hunger Appeal. By now you’ve received the Spring/Summer Hunger packet and seen some of the new stories that lace the materials in the packet with good examples. Questions to explore: Who’s calling for help and how do we respond?
STARTER THREE: BIBLE CONVERSATIONS
1. The Acts lesson starts with the curious idea that the Holy Spirit did not “allow” – check the Greek here – Paul’s preaching in certain places. Is it the lack of a clear call, the receptivity of the people or some other guidance of the Holy Spirit? How does this phenomenon occur in today’s world, if at all? What might this say about the way we think about the “Gospel preaching” that happens through the ELCA Hunger Program?
2. Congregations crank out “vision statements,” but how visionary are they, really? How does Paul’s vision in the night to help people compare with a vision statement that declares your congregation’s self-identity as helpful people? How might one person’s “vision in the night” run into trouble? What really motivates us to preach the Gospel or help people?
3. This might be a small matter, but it shows up in the Acts text for today and in the chapters immediately following: A notable number of the first believers were influential or even rich people. Lydia is the example here, but in later chapters this phenomenon includes a jailer, officials, philosophers and others like them. Luke – a doctor! – records these conversions for a reason. What might it be? The connection to hunger ministries: Don’t overlook influential people as possible partners and companions in this work of defeating hunger and injustice. (For a current look at this idea, look at Bruce Gierson’s new book U-Turn: What if You Woke Up One Morning and Realized You Were Living the Wrong Life?)
THE SENDOFF
The lessons for today were NOT chosen with the Mother’s Day observances in mind. And yet, “mothering” might be a worthy metaphor for the way you and I approach the feeding and care of people who are poor. Not as though they are children and we only coddle them in their weaknesses. “Mother love” is stronger, deeper and wiser than that old, old idea of how we ought to approach people who are poor. God grant you strength, depth and wisdom as you preach and teach these texts!
Bob Sitze, Director
Hunger Education
