LISTSERV 16.0 - HUNGERSERMONSTARTERS Archives

The lessons in the church year proclaim God’s grace in Jesus Christ. Also derived from a set of 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!

NOTE TO PREACHERS: I have not for the past three years ever included sermon starters on the occasion of Christmas. This year I have broken that tradition because the times seem to warrant a change. Perhaps we live in another “fullness of time” and hunger- and justice-related matters deserve proclamation, even with one-time-a-year folks filling the pews. Or perhaps not . . . .

· The war of abusers vs. their victims, of oppressors vs. the downtrodden, of rampaging leaders vs. mindless citizens. It’s a universal war, and it continues, unabated, throughout the world.

· On this night/day, organized and armed conflict will continue, of course. In Afghanistan and Iraq, in clandestine operations in Columbia, Mexico and Congo. Regular soldiers and soldiers of fortune will strap on their weapons and armor, and go to battle against evil – or perhaps on behalf of evil.

· A deeper and more pervasive war continues throughout the world: rich against poor. That war may be as obvious as slavery, Or it could be invisibly surrounded by the wrappings of the market economy, international relations or inter-religious conflict. However it happens, this war is a battle of justice against injustice, food against famine, some rich people against most poor people.

· At its deepest level, this war takes place inside our souls as well. We have a choice: Will we side with the evil and selfish part of our human natures, excluding and excoriating those we perceive as different. (Here I am struck by the newest psycholinguistic trick of spiteful people, to use adjectives as nouns – “Illegals” -- and thus name people by their righteously despised traits.)

· Or will we follow God’s example – cf. the Isaiah text – and tamp down our egos and fears, disregard the voices of selfishness and pleasure-seeking, push away temptations to never forgive those we believe are harming us or our way of life.

· God’s people are as involved in these wars as God himself/herself. No one stands to the side and merely observes this war, whose ultimate end may be the destruction of us all. On this night/day, each of us has to reckon with our own involvement – or complicity – in God’s battle against injustice, wherever it takes place – and perhaps especially inside our own souls.

· God will win, of course, and that comforting eventuality is part of the Good News on this night/day. Isaiah looks back at God’s victory, when the lights get turned back on and the results of God’s triumph can be seen. His many-named child is “victor” in every way. Paul writes – almost as though a letter to a pastor embedded in a war -- about the big picture of Christ’s reign. Luke Christmas-cards this simple truth: The really powerful one is born.

· For those who authorize or promote war against people who are poor, this night/day is a fearsome one, and the signs of God’s powerful victory are ominous. A baby is born, hiding as a child of poverty. “Deliverer” by name, he will grow up to end the power of evil forever.

· For those of us who live after Isaiah and Jesus, we may very well be engaged in a “mopping-up operation” for a war whose end is known. This might require us to be vigilant and steadfast in resisting the pockets of evil that God has conquered in Christ.

· On this night/day, we will celebrate a Jesus whose babyhood is less important than his mature love for all humankind, his low estate at birth less important than his powerful presence as ruler of all the world.

· For those who worship here this night/day, the announcement of the war’s end comes with an implicit invitation: Join with the rest of us – however and wherever you can – to bring God’s justice to bear on all the world. In this place and among these people, all who attend can find solace, comfort, forgiveness and courage to keep doing God’s will, especially God’s intent for people who are poor.

· On this night/day, “the true meaning of Christmas” will be bandied about like a new-born baby gets passed among admiring relatives. Finally, the child tires of being a football and sets up a cry. Perhaps “The True Meaning of Christmas” should also cry out.

· Perhaps, like many elements of life, “true meaning” is found at the edges – not the core – of a thing’s qualities. How might that work, looking for Christmas-meaning at the edges of the lectionary for this night/day. Some thoughts follow. . . .

· In the Lucan birth narrative, Mary and Joseph are living at the margins of sustainability. No job, no home. Lots of people will on this night/day be living in the same circumstances. Almost everywhere in the world they will face what the Holy Family faced.

· Some contemporary at-the-edges people won’t find lodging or food. They’ll die tonight/today. As quietly as snow falling, their last breaths will escape into the air and their bodies will lie still. A strange connection to “all is calm, all is bright” as well as to “sleep in heavenly peace.”

· Mary and Joseph – parents of the coming Prince of Peace – went to Bethlehem to register for Caesar’s pseudo-census. Strangely, “Bethlehem” can be translated in its earliest version as “house of the Philistine god of war.” What an irony.

· Verse 14 of the Titus text – in its Contemporary English Version – includes the phrase, “He wanted us . . . to be eager to do right.” Is this part of what drives people toward church on this night/day? To do what’s right? Would a sermon on hunger and justice meet that need?

· What will be the use of tonight’s/today’s offering? Given that the texts are soaking with peace-and-war themes, where in the world might the ELCA Hunger Appeal be making peace possible?

· I’m struck by the quiet and sad possibility that today’s texts speak most directly to the lives and the redemption of refugees, especially those escaping wars.

· In ancient times, “people who walk in darkness” were not engaging in usual patterns of travel, commerce or relationships. Darkness was paralyzing – unless moon and stars lent luminescence – and so walking in darkness would be treacherous.

· There’s a logic to walking in the darkness, though. In times of war, refugees hide during the day and travel at night. Over the centuries, night-walking people have always been safer than day-walking people.

· Perhaps you might preach the entire sermon in darkness, as though the members of the congregation were refugees. Tell new and old stories of narrow escape from danger – Rwanda, Central America, Sudan. Ask former refugees who are now part of your congregation to tell the stories. At the end of the sermon, a single light – a candle? -- appears and symbols of joy (safety, lodging, food?) are made available to the congregation – as ornaments for their trees. You proclaim a word of hope. The offering is taken with full light.

1. Children understand the dynamics of “escape from danger” and so will understand that the Christmas story may also be about the plight of first century refugees. Try paraphrasing the events from that point of view, perhaps within the context of today’s world.

2. Use darkness – shut off all the lights except the Christmas tree? --- to help children understand that darkness limits activity, and encourages people to draw in on themselves fearfully. Turn the lights back on, and talk about all the generous activities in which your congregation participates at this time of year – the ELCA World Hunger Appeal? – and how your work brings light to people who might otherwise be imprisoned by darkness.

1. Look together at some other places where Scripture deals with what happens during darkness or night. Why might the ancient writers have connected darkness/night with fearsome things? How does “fear of the dark” still operate in today’s world? In participants’ lives?

2. As difficult as it might seem, talk about some elements of the Iraq War, as they might connect with this text. Without sidetracking towards political questions that arise during this kind of discussion, focus on the plight of Iraqi Christians on this night/day, on the varieties of “darkness” that prowl among the hearts of people beset by this war. Think about the nature of “deliverance” if you’re an American soldier, an Iraqi civilian, a government leader, someone who prays for this country and its citizens.

3. One more? Together rewrite/retell the Luke 2 story as though it took place in your locale. Without being too insistent on analogous connections, think why a pregnant woman and her husband would be traveling through your locale. Who would give them lodging? Where would the baby be born? Who would the shepherds be? What would the angels tell them in these times?

3. Set up a “Sudden Generosity” collection station in the narthex. At the end of service, announce a specially targeted destination or purpose for donations “that dispel darkness.” Perhaps there is a family burned out of their house or an armed forces veteran in difficult circumstances. Perhaps you know of a refugee family in your town who might be otherwise overlooked or under-served. Characterize this special offering – on the way out of church – as evidence of the “light” that suddenly appears for Isaiah’s darkness-walkers.

Yes, it’s hard to write about hunger and justice on this night/day of culture-crusted sacred celebration. I’ve never thought that there was one “true meaning of Christmas” and for years have wondered how, on this night/day, we could all be led gently into the deepest core of our being, drawing the edgy places of our lives into the center of our being like pulling the covers over our heads on a cold wintry night.

“True meaning” to you, friend, with this 1970s-style Christmas card message: May the Baby Jesus open your heart and blow your mind. Or this one: God is great, God is good, God lives in our neighborhood. And may your messages on this day/night be true as well . . . .

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!

· In some ancient lectionary traditions, this Sunday is Holy Family Sunday, a time to celebrate something or the other about families that might take their example from Jesus’ family.

· In our times, though, with this Sunday being in many places the most empty of empty-pew Sundays, it might be strange solace to think of what families might be doing, beside NOT attending worship, to foster their sense of familial solidarity.

· This Jesus-family is not “holy” because of its special attributes or privileged position in society. Mary and Joseph are devout, certainly, but their place in society was down there close to the bottom of any kind of class pyramid.

· What made Jesus’ family “holy” was that they knew that they had been set aside – named, selected by God, equipped – to do something very important for the world. They were sacred-holy, not pure-holy – and their sense of purpose drove them away from danger as much as their fears of a despot ruler and his armed minions.

· On this Sunday, we get to think together of our own families – in whatever configuration we find ourselves – as “holy” in the same sense: set-aside people, aimed at purposes or lifework we’ll only partially fulfill with our lives.

· Whether as entire congregation, a small set of worshipers on this day, or as individual families, we might ourselves made holy, set aside and equipped for the purpose of eliminating the scourge of hunger from the world. We, too, have some capacity for saving the world from its hell-bent state of mind. We, too, have some capabilities by which to save the world.

· What’s poignant about this psalm on this day – “poignant” is my word for the week – is that for much of God’s creation today, all this praising of God by God’s creation is a pretty tough call.

· Think of it: What do polar bears have to praise God about? Or loud-melting ice caps? What about a sun clouded by polluted air? Or deep seas filled with the detritus of cruise ships? How will the fruit trees be rejoicing when the bees aren’t around? Or the animals when they can’t find water in dried-up streams?

· Could you imagine yourself into a modern-day version of this psalm? What parts of nature would be praising God on this day? And how would that happen? What part of “He made them to last forever” (v. 6) would be true for endangered species?

· The answer might be found in a more careful reading of the psalm’s intent – yes, I twisted the verb tenses and forms a bit. The psalmist invites the natural world, people included, to praise God. And in that invitation is found God’s grace.

· Think of God’s option to punish modern humankind with a new Deluge: a flood of polluted water, a raining down of death from overburdened air, a swamping of the earth’s forests by chainsaws, an overwhelming rush of coal to power plants or an overwhelming deluge of bad debt choking out economic life.

· Instead, on this Sunday after Christmas, our God invites a hobbling and sick natural world to praise Him. This forgiving God still accepts the praise of people who have taken creation and turned it into a fast-moving trash truck. This God still protects us against our own sinfulness!

· NOT-A-SIDEBAR: The work of ELCA World Hunger cannot be overlooked here: Through our worldwide partners, our Washington and United Nations offices, through public policy work in a slew of states and through environmental education, we Lutherans plug away at this “creation praising God” thing pretty well. Quietly – that is certainly true in some cases. But increasingly your contributions are aimed at the places in the world where water can be clean, mosquitoes can be obliterated, organic fertilizers will prevail, legislation will insist on care of creation, and “ordinary people” will be taught how to sustain themselves without damaging the Earth.

· Perhaps the most poignant theme for today’s lessons draws its strength from the image of Jesus’ family as a small, forlorn knot of refugees, heading for a foreign country along a seaside route.

· In your sermon, imagine Joseph’s post-dream thoughts and actions as he and Mary bundle up – or hide? – a presumed toddler and travel south to Egypt. What post-Christmas thoughts were in Jesus’ parents’ minds, what fears and hopes? What personal faith did they gather around the uncertainties? What did they want to accomplish?

· They were already displaced persons – Bethlehem was NOT their first home. They faced yet another relocation, this one filled with danger that would not go away easily.

· Refugees then and now are on-the-move people, traveling both away from and towards basic human needs and desires. They cannot claim any place as their own, cannot know with any certainty when home will be possible again. They are caught in the state of in-between, and sometimes must be content to stay in that frame of body, mind and spirit for interminable years.

· I think a sermon on this day could easily find strength, empathy and grace from the notion that we are, all of us, refugees of one kind or the other. That at the end of another year we may not be any closer to our own hopes, or not any farther away from our fears. Like the immigrants in our own communities, we also deal with the realities of being exiled from families, friends, purpose or hopefulness.

· We all sojourn for a little while on earth – it’s close to New Year’s Eve, yes? – and so can always think of ourselves as temporarily comfortable in this place. We don’t belong, really, to much of what we see around us. Many of us live on the road, literally, as perpetual business travelers, refugees because of our sense of working hard to achieve the good life.

· We could learn from people who have come to this country as economic or political exiled-ones. Perhaps this would be a good Sunday to hear from an immigrant family sponsored by your congregation, a child orphaned by war, a formerly homeless person clutching at “normal life”. You can read refugee stories from the good folks at Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (www.lirs.org), whose funding includes support through the ELCA World Hunger and Disaster Appeal.

· Of what do their hopes consist? What does their faith contribute to their steadfastness? How does God visit them in the night, with dreams or visions of what to do?

· And in the middle of our in-between-ness, our not belonging, is the now Toddler Jesus, riding along with us in our uncertainties, accompanying us as only God can do. Quietly, assuredly and continually. God with us, Emmanuel, heading towards not-belonging-here.

1. Consider dramatizing the Flight into Egypt with a Posada-like activity. As you tell parts of the Gospel lesson, move the knot of children from place to place within the sanctuary. Add details to the enacted story so that children can imagine what “refugee” might mean. If you have collected resources from Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, this would be a good time to briefly characterize their contents and recommend their use at home.

2. If you choose the environmental theme embedded in the psalm, use a collection of stuffed animals and other objects to “praise God” for the natural world. Connect this exultation with specific environmentally oriented projects of ELCA World Hunger by using selected stories from recent Hunger Appeal packets.

1. This Sunday’s lessons offer participants a good chance to talk about their families, their purposes, their identity, their work together toward God’s will. What do participants’ families accomplish, how to they bless God’s world? In what ways do participants join their families to their brothers and sisters around the world? How might participants think of their families as “refugees” within popular culture.

2. Use Bible conversation time this week to talk honestly about participants’ assessment of the natural world. Use the psalm as a comparison – or starter – for those feelings. How do participants help “creation to praise God”? How does this congregation consider the environment in its programs and as part of its mission?

1. Examine the label on any common household product. Find the producer’s Web URL and a “Contact Us” button at the Web site for that company. Write a simple letter asking about the company’s “green” policies or practices. (For example, ask for the company’s work in lowering its carbon footprint.)

2. Make small banners, each one featuring one of the creatures named in today’s psalm. Give them away as prayer-and-thanks reminders for the offices, bedrooms and kitchens of congregation members.

3. Make computers available in the narthex or gathering area of your church. Use the live Web – or downloaded pages from the Web – to spotlight organizations working to save the environment. Look especially for organizations that feature interactive surveys or assessment of environmental impacts of daily living.

4. Include families in the prayers for the day. That they would (continue to) find a sense of purpose and identity in doing God’s will however they can. Be specific.

The New Year looms, and with it new premises and promises for our work as proclaimers and teachers of God’s Word. Thanks for your attention to my thoughts, and for taking on hunger-and-justice matters as a core component of your ministry. You have helped draw together the family of God where you are, and to offer them direction and motivation for living out their commitment to fulfill God’s will in their daily living. I’m happy to have been part of what you do.

Epiphany is an historically preeminent holiday for the Christian church. The celebration of Christ’s birth developed after the church’s several centuries of celebrating Christ’s glorious epiphany. The traditional themes are good – e.g., God’s outpouring of grace to the whole world, Christ attracting people of all kinds, the nature and mission of Jesus – but in this week’s Sermon Starters we’ll go in some slightly different directions. In any case, Epiphany packs more of a wallop than as the faint echo of Christmas-past. But then, you already knew that . . . .

· The Isaiah reading is fairly quirky on the face of it: A city/state being the focal point for googobs of goods that pile into caravans accompanied by hordes of worshipers and then head towards their ultimate use: Offerings at the Temple.

· Is this a triumph (of Yawhistic worship) or of ancient consumerisms? Does this text envision the restoration of Jerusalem as a commercial center or a worship center? Is this part of Isaiah evidence of the Temple cult’s predominance within Judaism, with its attendant institutional focus? How does this offerings-and-tribute to God message compare with other thoughts of Isaiah about justice? How would these offerings have been used? Could the Temple itself be unjust?

· Isaiah’s evidence of the triumphal status of religion is the quality and quantity of offerings. At this time of transition between two budget years, what’s the measure of your congregation’s status or “victories”?

· On the other side of these questions is an obvious reality: The generosity of boodles of people who want to bring googobs of goods to the praise of Yaweh. Their understanding of the stewardship of their lives. Their identity as God’s people.

· Yet another: The formerly destroyed city gets a new lease on life. These gifts will rebuild the city, both physically and in terms of its pride. The people who bring these gifts will be former enemies.

· Still another, slightly more metaphysical: All these “gifts” are already God’s boodles and googobs. The funds we bring (or send) to eliminate world hunger are not just evidence of our generosity or love for others; they also show our understanding of God’s preeminence, God’s ultimate ownership, God’s claim on what we think is ours. In a sense, we never “give” because none of this world’s goods are really ours in the first place.

· Think about this guy – probably in his earlier, non-profligate years – and his understanding of his lifework. THEN read the psalm in that context.

· You’re looking at the inner struggles of a ruler – read “king” if you want, but “president” or “mayor” or “legislator” could also work here – who’s trying still to answer the question, “What’s a leader for?”

· The question can certainly be applied to the current political situation – primary elections their attendant campaigns will occupy news outlets for weeks. It would be easy (and correct) to ask how any of us prays for or holds accountable would-be leaders in terms of their attention to justice, their fairness to people who are poor. (Notice the emphasis on our behavior, not taking potshots are their behavior or non-behavior.)

· There may be even more radical thoughts embedded here. For example, the king who collects tribute from foreign governments so that he can rescue homeless people, protect those in need, help people who are poor. A radical notion about “taxes”, hmmm?

· On this day of Epiphany, we celebrate the travel and restful homage of wise people from Iraq or Iran. Solomon was also wise – at least at the start of his rule. We can also celebrate the wisdom of any leaders – ourselves included – who understand what gifts are for, what godly kingdoms are all about,

· This might also be a good Sunday to think together about the wisdom we seek in rulers as we vote, as we analyze messages, as we pray for leaders.

· This might also be a good Sunday to spotlight the wisdom of this church in bringing God’s will to bear on political leaders through our Washington office and through offices in selected states. Our work in corporate social responsibility asks for the same kind of godly leadership among business leaders.

· You might have some fun putting the texts side-by-side in order to find answers to the question, “What kinds of wisdom could God be calling us to exhibit?” We live in a world of fear, and so wisdom may be in short supply.

· As you comb the texts looking for that answer, pay especially close attention to the small places where “wisdom” might show up or be proclaimed. Or maybe just be waving its small hand from the back of the classroom.

· Other starter questions: What’s wise about giving? Who’s a wise leader? Where’s wisdom to be found among people who are poor? Where’s wisdom to be found in the face of its opposites? (Cf., “Herods” in any time.) What’s wise about the ELCA’s hunger minstries – (e.g., the ways we work and the decision we make together)?

· The Ephesians text also suggests how God’s big Wisdom Plan for the World works. You could easily join together the goals of ELCA World Hunger with the goals of global mission. (“Preach the Gospel; if necessary use words.”)

· A standard theme for this Sunday is God’s revelation of Messiah in the form of an adorable and adored baby. God-in-Christ. The start of our examination of Jesus as wholly man and wholly God.

· You might explore a sidebar thought, though, by examining who this baby Messiah really is: A first-born child of a working class family currently in refugee status. The descendant of a royal lineage, with all the privileges and trappings of “royalty” washed away.

· Fulfilled biblical prophecy aside – were there no other babies born in Bethlehem during the time between Micah’s foretelling and Jesus’ birth? – this baby is unlikely material for Savior of the World.

· Larger (and more current) questions might go something like this: Where DO we look for our salvation? Is it possible that right now, in some Central American or African village, a baby has been born, whose growth and maturing will eventuate in some kind of salvation for people? An even harder one: How are babies being born in your congregation or community being dedicated to the proposition that their lives will bring (some part of) God’s salvation to bear on the world? (More on this when we celebrate the Baptism of Jesus.)

· A specific answer to these queries: God favors people who are poor, and we probably need to humble ourselves to the proposition that our world’s salvation may very well be housed in some small village, in the eyes of some bright-and-burning-vision child who doesn’t know where her next meal is coming from.

1. Have fun making up a story about a “Once upon a time” king/queen who really loved people who were poor and walked around, incognito, to see how the people treated the poor. Use puppets or drawings if possible. Oh, yes, one other thing: The queen/king in the story shows up at the door to your church and finds – Voila! – all kinds of evidence that these people in this place get it. HERE the people who owe their allegiance to this ruler contribute generously, they get things done, they take care of people who are poor, and they even know personally people who are poor. The end of the story? The king/queen decides to stay here. (God with us, Emmanuel!) Yes, you can tell stories . . .

1. With the primary election season upon us, you might want to talk together about what makes a good national or local leader. The psalm for today is a godly standard by which to make those judgments. Steer clear of partisan discussions or endorsements by keeping the subject generic. At the same time, examples help the conversations stay rooted in present realities.

2. Talk together about what kinds of “wisdom” actually rule the world today. Think of the Wise Men, or Paul’s words in Ephesians, of the psalm of Solomon as you critique wisdom that is rooted in economic theory, law, psychology/sociology, humanitarian concerns, spiritual truths. How do each of these kinds of wisdom actually “rule”?

3. For fun, play with the lectionary as a collection of ironies. Examples: The wise men may have come from parts of the Middle East enmeshed in war; Herod as arbiter of God’s Good News, the verses in the psalm omitted by lectionary-framers, all the references to Arabic countries in today’s lessons, baby-as-Messiah. The ultimate irony, perhaps: That God would choose we who are Gentiles to also receive the covenantal grace of God.

2. Analyze current political rhetoric for evidence of a candidate’s care for the poor. Not just the presidential candidates, and not just their words. You’re looking for what lies behind the rhetoric, or what the rhetoric is pointing to. Tell someone about what you find.

3. Write some thankful or questioning letters to business or political leaders. Not about any specific piece of legislation or corporate, but about their general frame of mind or their collected actions. Make your questions appreciative and curious, not accusatory or shame-infested.

The fog of a global-warmed Chicago greets my eyes and sensitivities on this gray morning. While the freeways and skyways whir with visions of autos and planes whizzing to their destinations, I sit here thinking of people like you, people who are thinking of people like me. How we’re joined – in thought and by the Spirit – to millions of other people around this planet. How we’re freed from foggy thinking and mindless actions, how we’re buoyed by the Boy Jesus, and strengthened by each other’s witness. It’s a good frame of mind from which to begin a sermon-writing time. . . . .