 |
 |
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!
November 3, 2013 All Saints Sunday
Daniel sees a vision of great beasts coming from the sea, each terrible and devouring. But their terror is bested by the Ancient One, the Most High God. The beasts represent different kingdoms vying for power, while Daniel stands as an observer who gains perspective. His spirit is initially troubled by this image, but he receives a word of hope: true power belongs to the Most High and the kingdom will be received by the holy ones.
The beasts of our time may trouble our spirits but we are told that theirs is not the kingdom. As we are well aware of the effects these powers have in our congregations and communities, it may be difficult to see God’s kingdom coming to fruition on the scale that Daniel is reminded of. How does the hope of the future kingdom connect with our reality where the beasts still trouble? Is it only a future hope to which we cling?
Ephesians 1:11-23
The theological intrigue in this passage is set out in the first verse of this pericope where we learn of an inheritance we have obtained, “having been destined according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to his counsel and will.” So how are we destined? What exactly are the things that are accomplished according to God’s will? We can get preoccupied with granular details as we survey life’s events to figure out just how and where God’s will is being carried out. It is an exercise that can lead to some serious wrestling matches with the Almighty.
But context is helpful. The will of God, as described in this passage, is realized in our adoption as God’s children through Christ. It seems less likely that our lives are a puzzle whose completed image illustrates how God’s will has been carried out. Instead, this passage centers our identity as God’s children in God’s desire and action. The good news here is that instead of worrying what transpiring events say about our relationship to God, we are free to claim the identity that God has marked us with in Christ. This is our inheritance. Let this identity not be forgotten in a world that attempts to shape it otherwise.
Luke 6:20-31
The blessings and woes illustrate the reversal motif that runs throughout Luke’s gospel. The hope of an economic reversal may resonate with those who feel trapped on the lower rungs of the ladder. But we also see a vision for a more complete transformation; personal and social healing run alongside one another. Just as there is hope that the hungry will be filled, there is hope that mourning will laugh and the despised will rejoice.
There is a risk in living without regard…thus the woes. Here we see that life is communal. The first hearers of this text may not have thought otherwise, but we seem to be in constant need of the reminder in contemporary times. How we live with one another matters, a point illustrated later in this chapter as Jesus commands us to love our enemies and withhold judgment. One way to interpret the blessings and woes is to see the reversal that God is going to orchestrate as part of the promise that doesn’t depend on our involvement. This interpretation preserves God’s holiness, but the application is thin. More helpful is to see the blessings and woes as a vision of the community restorative work that we are invited to participate in.
ELCA World Hunger