No Freeloaders Need Apply

 Scripture    2 Thessalonians 3:5-13    The Message      

4-5 Because of the Master, we have great confidence in you. We know you’re doing everything we told you and will continue doing it. May the Master take you by the hand and lead you along the path of God’s love and Christ’s endurance.

6-9 Our orders—backed up by the Master, Jesus—are to refuse to have anything to do with those among you who are lazy and refuse to work the way we taught you. Don’t permit them to freeload on the rest. We showed you how to pull your weight when we were with you, so get on with it. We didn’t sit around on our hands expecting others to take care of us. In fact, we worked our fingers to the bone, up half the night moonlighting so you wouldn’t be burdened with taking care of us. And it wasn’t because we didn’t have a right to your support; we did. We simply wanted to provide an example of diligence, hoping it would prove contagious.

10-13 Don’t you remember the rule we had when we lived with you? “If you don’t work, you don’t eat.” And now we’re getting reports that a bunch of lazy good-for-nothings are taking advantage of you. This must not be tolerated. We command them to get to work immediately—no excuses, no arguments—and earn their own keep. Friends, don’t slack off in doing your duty.

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Red Skelton was a clown, and the son of a clown.  He loved being a clown.  He became famous performing in vaudeville and on radio and television shows from 1937 to 1971. He loved performing pantomime, which he usually did for at least one segment of his TV show, and he loved writing skits for a variety of strange characters, like Clem Kadiddlehopper and Gertrude & Heathcliff the Seagulls, and this guy in the picture.  This is Freddie the Freeloader, a hobo, a man who lived in the city dump and sometimes slept on park benches where he was usually rousted by policemen who chased him off so they didn’t have to arrest him.  You know, like Selma Police chase the people they see sleeping on the church steps.  Freddie here was a stereotype born out of the Great Depression of the 1930s when so many men had to hit the road to find work, and some just gave up.  Our image today of “the homeless” comes in part from this character.  Wimpy - whose picture DeeAnne put on the church bulletin today -  was another one of those stereotypes, the guy who always asking you to pay their way, you know, like the person who always forgets their wallet?  My brother actually had a college classmate, a fraternity brother named Fred whom everyone called Freddie the Freeloader because he never paid when they all went out.  

When I told my brother I was going to become a Protestant minister, his immediate reaction was to start attending Mass, which he had not done (except for funerals) in well over 20 years.  From then on, the one thing we did not talk about was religion.  The closest we ever got to theology was discussion of the coaching staff at Notre Dame after the football game on Saturdays.  So you can imagine my surprise when he quoted 2 Thessalonians to me one day, saying, “St Paul said “Anyone unwilling to work should not eat.”  He was quite happy to interpret this to mean there should not be welfare.  (This is one of the dangers of interpreting scripture literally one line at a time.) 

That is not what this means.  It does not mean there shouldn’t be welfare.   It does not mean churches shouldn’t help those in need.  It does not mean that all the homeless need to go get jobs and a place to live.  It does not that there should be no such thing as Social Security. 

When Paul and his companions were starting these churches all over the place, they were what we call today “bi-vocational ministers”   Priests in the Temple, in fact, all of the Levites, were supported by the tithe every Jew paid to the Temple.   Rabbis, on the other hand, worked full time at a regular occupation and served as teachers in the synagogues voluntarily.   Paul and company were rabbis, teachers, not priests.  They could have asked the congregations to support them, but they preferred to support themselves, in large part as an example to the members of the congregations.  We are told in Acts 18:3 that Paul was a tent maker, so he could and did work pretty much anywhere.   He didn’t have to depend upon the kindness of strangers to provide his food. And he wanted to give an example to the congregations he started about how to live together as a community.  Being financially self-reliant if you are able is an example of that.

In those days, the one law common to all cultures was the law of hospitality.  If a stranger to your community needed help, especially food or shelter, you were required to help them.  Thus the innkeeper helped Joseph and Mary, the Samaritan helped the man by the side of the road, and Abraham entertained angels.  Lack of hospitality is what got Sodom destroyed.  If you were a member of a community - a particular town or a congregation - and you were able to work, to contribute, you were expected to do so in order that the community had the wherewithal to help that stranger, that person in need.   It was understood that some, even within the congregation, would not be able to support themselves, like widows and persons with disabilities.  None of these are situations covered  by Paul’s words, “If you don’t work, you don’t eat.”  

In those early days of the church, Paul and many others believed that Jesus was coming back soon, maybe next week.  They believed that Jesus was speaking literally when he spoke of the end of days and said, “Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place.”  One of results of this thinking was the belief among some church members that it wasn’t necessary to work the fields or do any work at all - that all they needed to do was pray and worship God day and night until that last day came and they would be gathered in Christ’s eternal embrace.  (This happens periodically even today - groups of people will come to believe that the end is coming next week, they quit their jobs, sell everything and gather on a mountaintop or someplace waiting for the Rapture, which doesn’t come.)   As time passed the leaders of the church, like Paul, would realize that maybe it would be a little longer till the Messiah returned, but even so, even if the end was to come next week, if the congregation was to prosper everyone needed to contribute.   

Likewise, as in any group of people, there would have been those who didn’t think they needed to do anything.  They could sit back and let everyone else supply their needs, either because they had entitlement issues or because they were, shall we say, less motivated to work and serve than others.  Paul was talking about those people - the people anticipating the end of days and the new who just didn’t want to work - both of those groups.  He was speaking of people who were able but unwilling to make any effort toward serving the needs of their church community.  

Early on it became obvious that there needed to be some guidelines about how to be church together.  When the Gentile Christians and the Jewish Christians were fussing over whose widows got better care, an apostle was delegated to oversee food distribution.  It was equally obvious that people needed be told how to love one another.  When the rich were bringing wonderful food to worship but not sharing it with the poor, Paul had to put his foot down.   When some perfectly capable people were sitting back, contributing nothing and letting everyone else do all the work, Paul had to say, “. . . we’re getting reports that a bunch of lazy good-for-nothings are taking advantage of you. This must not be tolerated. We command them to get to work immediately—no excuses, no arguments—and earn their own keep.”

We recently ended our annual Stewardship month during which we asked everyone to consider how they might help to support the needs of the congregation.  We are very grateful to everyone who took the time to fill out a pledge card and return it.  On that card there was a line titled “Talents.”  Many of you listed the things you are already doing to serve the congregation, and we are so grateful for all of those things.  We had hoped that people would use that line to tell us what they love to do, even if it doesn’t seem like something that could serve the congregation.  Alan loves working with wood.  He makes beautiful wooden things for us to use, not as part of a committee or anything, but he because he loves to do that.  Kathleen loves writing, so she wrote a children’s play that we will all get to enjoy right before Christmas.  No one asked her to.  She just loves doing it - and she is good at it.  She has an incredibly fertile imagination.   Sofia loves playing the bass, and she helps provide music on Thursday nights.  Ally isn’t even a member, but loves to show up and add the sounds of a cello to our Sunday worship.  And I don’t know what else Alfred loves, but when he worships he puts his whole heart and spirit into it.  I get to watch, you know.  And he inspires me.  

Maybe you love to knit or crochet or quilt.  Maybe you love hiking. Maybe you like to take photos.  Maybe you love to read and would like to be part of a book club.   Maybe you are a competitive shopper. (I’m pretty sure that’s a thing.)  Maybe you make beautiful cards, or do healing touch, or  . . . . I don’t know.  What do you love?  Think about that, and let me know.  Send me an email or a text.  Just for fun.  

From the first days of the Church it has been necessary for everyone to do some part of what is needful.  Yes, everyone has to help so that everything we need to do gets done.  But also so everyone feels like they are part of this community.  We all know there are some who cannot do much, perhaps because of work or age or mobility issues, and because they can’t do much, they may feel alienated from the community.  This is depressing.  They may feel a bit like Freddie the Freeloader, but they are not.  They are simply contributing in different ways now.  If all they can do is pray for us, that is a huge contribution.  It is important that they know this, and that they know that we know this.  Every one of our gifts and talents is valuable and necessary.

For, as Paul told the church in Corinth when they were fussing with each other over whose work was most important, “there are varieties of gifts, but one Spirit.”  And all of those gifts, all of our talents, all of the things we love to do, are ways in which we can serve God and one another.   So, let us stand and ask the musical question - What I can I give?

Dinner with sinners

Scripture  Luke 19:1-10   CEB 

19 Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through town. 2 A man there named Zacchaeus, a ruler among tax collectors, was rich. 3 He was trying to see who Jesus was, but, being a short man, he couldn’t because of the crowd. 4 So he ran ahead and climbed up a sycamore tree so he could see Jesus, who was about to pass that way. 5 When Jesus came to that spot, he looked up and said, “Zacchaeus, come down at once. I must stay in your home today.” 6 So Zacchaeus came down at once, happy to welcome Jesus.

7 Everyone who saw this grumbled, saying, “He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.”

8 Zacchaeus stopped and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord, I give half of my possessions to the poor. And if I have cheated anyone, I repay them four times as much.”

9 Jesus said to him, “Today, salvation has come to this household because he too is a son of Abraham. 10 The Human One came to seek and save the lost.”

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Zacchaeus was a tax man.  That’s the title of the hymn we’ll be singing in a little bit and it is one of two things we are told about him, the other being his height.  (A bit of trivia for you - the average male height at that time was about 5’4”. Today the average is 5’9”.  So he was quite short by our standards.)  Being short he climbed a tree so he could see over the crowd and coincidentally, where Jesus could easily spot him.  And seeing him up in the tree, Jesus did something that not just the Pharisees had trouble with.  Everyone had a problem with this.  Tax collectors were collaborators with the Roman oppressors - often involuntarily, but still. . . They were known to overcharge and skim off the top, thus defrauding both the Jews who paid the taxes and the Empire that received them. Tax collectors were always classed by the people with the harlots, gamblers, and thieves, who lived promiscuous, lawless lives.  According to the rabbis there was no hope for the tax collector.  They couldn’t go to the Temple, associate with most other people in the community, even their money was refused by the Temple.  Tax collectors were even more unclean than lepers.  No one would associate with them.  But Jesus said, “Zacchaeus, come down at once. I must stay in your home today.”  Way to upset the crowd, Jesus.  Have dinner with someone everyone hated!  

And then we come to the interesting bit, and the reason we need to look at different translations of the Bible.  Because translators don’t always agree on how words are to be translated.

The CEB, which Charlotte read today, says:  Zacchaeus stopped and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord, I give half of my possessions to the poor. And if I have cheated anyone, I repay them four times as much.”

The NRSV says:  8 Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.”

You will notice a difference.  In the CEB Zacchaeus speaks in the present tense, in the NRSV he speaks in the future tense.  Depending on which translation you read, either Zacchaeus was already behaving more ethically than the vast majority of tax collectors or he decided to change his behavior and begin to treat people more ethically.  Either he was an ethical man in a crooked business or he was reformed by Christ and would become an ethical man in a crooked business.  Typically this passage is preached from the second viewpoint, but let’s give the first some consideration.  

Ethical dilemmas abound in our daily lives, even when we aren’t engaged in questionable behavior.  

Kirk Franklin is a Grammy award winning Gospel Artist -  a singer and song writer.  He was named Best Gospel Artist at the Dove Awards on TBN twice!  But he is boycotting Trinity Broadcasting Network, the Gospel Music Association, future Dove Awards shows and all affiliated events after comments he made about a recent fatal police shooting were edited out of his acceptance speech.  It’s not the first time.  The same thing happened at a previous awards show.   It’s not like he said anything un-Christian or political or otherwise offensive.  He named the victim and said, ““I’m just asking that we send our prayers for her family and for his and I’m asking that we send our prayers for that 8-year-old little boy that saw that tragedy and we just lift them up and I’m asking that you pray with us … just pray grace and mercy over their lives in the name of Christ our king,”  He was asking for prayer for victim, and the shooter and both of their families.  There’s nothing wrong with that, that I can see.  It’s kind of classic “Love your neighbor” stuff.  But when his acceptance speech was aired, that portion had been cut out.   (https://www.christianheadlines.com/contributors/lori-arnold/kirk-franklin-says-he-s-boycotting-tbn-dove-awards-for-failing-to-acknowledge-diversity-concerns.html?utm_source=Jeeng)

Now I don’t know much about the Christian music world, or the Gospel music world, but I suspect that a Gospel singer who turns his back on TBN and the Gospel Music Association might just be doing something significant.   Kirk Franklin had to decide whether his career or his ethics came first.  He chose his ethics - he chose the harder path.   I have to wonder, too, about the ethics of the video editor at TBN who decided to cut this sincere prayer out of the acceptance speech.  But the entertainment business has never been known as the most ethical business around.  One would hope TBN would be different, but . . . 

While researching for today’s message I came across an outstanding quote about Christ’s transformative power.  But when I looked up the author of that quote I had to stop and decide whether I could, in good conscience, quote this person.  She is rabidly anti-LGBTQ who promotes all kinds of terrible, ugly conspiracy theories, and these beautiful words that I found were part of a hateful rant she had posted.  I could just use those words and not say where they came from, but that’s plagiarism and plagiarism is bad.  I decided that, no matter how perfect the words are when taken out of context, I could not in good conscience quote a person who hates so strongly in a message about the Christ who loves everyone, welcomes everyone, rejects no one.   

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Back to Zacchaeus . . . whether he was already doing the right things or made that decision because of Jesus, he was still a tax collector.  He was still working in and for a corrupt system.  A person no church going person would want to associate with.  His status as an outcaste as far as the Temple was concerned wasn’t going to change just because he behaved justly and ethically.  As long as he continued in this occupation he would be rejected. The attitude of the Temple and the Rabbis was, “You cannot be a tax collector and a righteous Jew at the same time.”    And it’s not like a tax collector for the Roman Empire could just quit his job - not and keep his possessions, his freedom, and his family.   In many ways it would have been like trying to leave a crime family, which (according to books and movies) is not conducive to a long and healthy life. 

Jesus didn’t see things quite the same way as the Rabbis and the Pharisees.  We already know that, of course.  He hung out with people the good church folks avoided.  After all, earlier in Luke’s gospel, when the Pharisees asked, ““Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus answered, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor, but sick people do. 32 I didn’t come to call righteous people but sinners, to change their hearts and lives.” (Luke 5:30b-32).  He spent his time with people on the margins, people on the outside looking in.  People who felt alone, unwanted.  There were way too many of those people in Jesus’ time.  People who couldn’t afford the sacrifices they needed to make to be cleansed after an illness or having a baby or whatever health condition made them unacceptable to the Temple - a man with a skin rash, or the woman with a hemorrhage.  People who fell into certain occupational categories - tax collectors, prostitutes, loan sharks, gamblers.  These were not allowed to come to worship, or make sacrifices, or tithe.  They were’t even allowed to hang out with people who did go to Temple for fear of corrupting them.  Even if they behaved justly and ethically, like Zaccaeus, the Rabbis and the Temple said they just weren’t welcome.   

Sadly, we know that is still a thing.  I was having a conversation online the other day about Christianity, and one of the people said, “I used to go to church.  I don’t anymore.  I miss it.  But I was told, “You can’t be Christian and (that thing that you do) at the same time”.   Way too many church folks say things like that.  Way too many who are told that, believe it.  The thing about being Christian is that we aren’t perfect people. Or as I’ve seen it said on Facebook, “A church is not a museum for good people.  It is a hospital for the broken.”   

We don’t get to decide who Jesus will or will not accept.  Look at his friends.  Look at who he surrounded himself with.  People who were not welcomed by the establishment.  People who had been told repeatedly, “You cannot be (whatever) and come to the Temple at the same time.”  Jesus was not in the business of making the unclean acceptable to the Temple.  He was in the business of healing the broken, and of bringing salvation to the lost.   He was about changing people’s hearts.  He was about having dinner with sinners and inviting into the kingdom of God all who seek him.   Like Zacchaeus.  Like us.  

Will this be on the test?

Scripture      Luke 20:27-38    CEB   

27 Some Sadducees, who deny that there’s a resurrection, came to Jesus and asked, 28 “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies leaving a widow but no children, the brother must marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. 29 Now there were seven brothers. The first man married a woman and then died childless. 30 The second 31 and then the third brother married her. Eventually all seven married her, and they all died without leaving any children. 32 Finally, the woman died too. 33 In the resurrection, whose wife will she be? All seven were married to her.”

34 Jesus said to them, “People who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage. 35 But those who are considered worthy to participate in that age, that is, in the age of the resurrection from the dead, won’t marry nor will they be given in marriage. 36 They can no longer die, because they are like angels and are God’s children since they share in the resurrection. 37 Even Moses demonstrated that the dead are raised—in the passage about the burning bush, when he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. 38 He isn’t the God of the dead but of the living. To him they are all alive.”

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There are quite a few teachers and retired teachers in this congregation to whom this question strikes an immediate - and not necessarily harmonious - chord.  There are those students who will ask “Will this be on the test?” after you’ve written your name on the board on the first day of class.  (and you know who you are.)  Likewise, there are enough students in this congregation who have had the most random bits of information show up on exams that this seems like a fair question.  

Dr. David Bundy was my Early Church History professor at Christian Theological Seminary.  He almost never lectured from the book we were using - which was a pre-published copy of his own book.  He was using us for guinea pigs to see where it would need improvement before publication.   Dr. Bundy assumed we would read the book.  We were, after all, in a Master’s program.  Rather, he would lecture on random and obscure bits of history to help us understand things like how the Church changed over the centuries from an “everyone is welcome” mindset to a more exclusionary one.  Women in leadership, for example, abounded in the early church, and in some parts of the world, like Ireland, continued in leadership up until the 10th century.  This history was systematically erased or modified, to the extent that there is a statue of a certain bishop which one can tell has been changed since it was first carved.  The name on the base was changed from the feminine to a masculine form of the name, but more critically for those studying the trend of the erasure of women in church history, one can tell that the statue had originally had breasts, and at some point in time they had been removed.   This was a story Dr. Bundy told us sort of off-handedly one day, and, yes indeed, the name of that female bishop was on the exam.  

Although he was the teacher, Jesus usually had test questions going the other way.  The Sadducees and the Pharisees would come to him with test questions, questions that had no good answer and were intended to trip him up so they could then use those answers against him.  The Pharisees asked, “Should we pay taxes to Rome?”  Now there was a tough one.  If he said yes, he would anger pretty much all of the Jews and everyone would stop listening to him.  If he said no, he could be handed over to Rome for sedition.  They figured it was a win/win.  Silly Pharisees.  For as we know, he said “If it has Caesar’s picture on it, give it to Caesar.  Give to God what belongs to God.”  This sent the Pharisees away scratching their heads.  Their test had backfired on them.   

In today’s story, it was the Sadducees who came to Jesus with a trick question.  The Law of Moses says that if a man dies with no son, his brother was required to do his best to impregnate the widow, and that child would be the heir of the one who had died.  In their test question, this poor widow had been passed, childless, from one brother to the next until all seven brothers had died.  And the question was, on the day of the resurrection, which brother would be her husband, as she had been married to all of them.

One of the many differences between the Pharisees and the Sadducees revolved around the question of the end of days.  The Pharisees believed that on that last day, all who had died would be physically resurrected to live eternally in the bodies they had known in life.   The Sadducees were literalists, who believed that only what was written in the Books of Moses was to be considered scripture.   The 1st century historian Josephus wrote that “the Sadducees denied the resurrection, the immortality of the soul, eternal rewards, or the "world to come.”  The Sadducees kept their focus on the status quo of the nation of Israel in this world and not the next.”   (https://bible.org/seriespage/sadducees)  Basically, they believed that this is all there is.  No heaven, no hell, no Sheol, nothing at all after we die.  So their test for Jesus was this - did he or did he not believe that Scripture was to be interpreted literally?  As you may have guessed that question was pretty divisive at that time - as indeed, it still is -  and they could easily turn their backs on him if he answered “incorrectly.”  

His answer stopped them in their tracks, because his answer to them was that the question of the resurrection had already been answered - and by Moses! In the very books they considered the literal Word of God - saying, “[Moses] speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. 38 Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.”   

39 Then some of them answered, “Teacher, you have spoken well.” 40 For they no longer dared to ask him another question.”  

The question of what comes next remains a human preoccupation. Even those of us who anticipate an eternal life when our physical life ends don’t agree on what that is going to look like.  Some believe we will all become one with God and with each other, no physicality, just pure spirit.  Others believe they will get their wings and harps so they can sing God’s praises eternally.  Some think they will be living in the New Jerusalem as it is described in the 21st Chapter of the Revelation to John, “8 The wall is built of jasper, while the city is pure gold, clear as glass. 19 The foundations of the wall of the city are adorned with every jewel . . . And the twelve gates are twelve pearls, each of the gates is a single pearl, and the street of the city is pure gold, transparent as glass.” 

Frances Shaw was a beloved member of Augusta Christian Church in Indianapolis, and quite the character.  She baked pies for every church event, cheerfully shared “her” pew with visitors, and blamed all her orneriness on being a Preacher’s Mom.   I ran into her son at General Assembly in July and told him that I sometimes use his mother as a sermon illustration.  He just shook his head . . .   She believed her husband would be waiting for her at that gate made of pearl, and that she would spend eternity baking him casseroles and pies.  I kind of hope this is what she found when she got there.   

As a student of world religions and an avid reader of science fiction and fantasy I have run across so many different concepts of what awaits us once this life is over, and all that I know for sure is that I don’t know what that life will look like.   What I do believe is that Jesus said our God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.  To God, all still live, all who have gone before, all who are yet to be born, and all of us here - all living at one time in God’s heart.   

On this All Saints Sunday we celebrate and remember all of those who have gone before.  And whether they are inhabiting physical bodies and walking streets made of gold, baking casseroles, and singing in the heavenly choir, or simply existing in God’s heart, we know they live.  And we believe this to be true because our Lord Jesus assured us of this.   I do not know what our eternal life will look like, but I am convinced that we will be reunited with all the saints when our time comes, for in Him death is abolished, and all will live with him forever.   

In the hymn we will be singing, lyricist Carolyn Winfrey Gillette says:

O God, we're still trying to understand dying
And many still wonder if heaven is real.
Yet Christ clearly told us that death cannot hold us;
We'll know of a new life your love will reveal.

No more questions.  No more tests.  Simply eternal life and love, in Christ, our Lord.    Amen.

No Matter What

Scripture  Psalm 121  NRSV

1 I lift up my eyes to the hills—
    from where will my help come?

2 My help comes from the Lord,
    who made heaven and earth.

3 He will not let your foot be moved;
    he who keeps you will not slumber.

4 He who keeps Israel
    will neither slumber nor sleep.

5 The Lord is your keeper;
    the Lord is your shade at your right hand.

6 The sun shall not strike you by day,
    nor the moon by night.

7 The Lord will keep you from all evil;
    he will keep your life.

8 The Lord will keep
    your going out and your coming in
    from this time on and forevermore.

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We have heard some pretty amazing preaching in the last couple of weeks.  Patty Evans said “Exhale the past.  Inhale the future.” and be open to new possibilities, even to things that seem impossible.   For all things are possible with God.

Chad challenged us to dream, and dream big.   He reminded us that not all that long ago our Youth Group grew from 3 to 43, when nobody thought that could happen.  

Jordan reminded us that if we aren’t moving forward, we are dying.  If we are sitting back comfortably, we are already dead.   After all, what’s the worst that can happen? If we dare to dream and maybe we don’t make it - the first time?  It might take 2 or 3 or 1,000 tries to level up.  The important part is trying our best. (Yes, I know that technically Jordan did not preach - but you all heard him.  His stewardship meditation made a pretty good sermon.)  

And I am here to tell you - No matter what, God will love us.   When things get weird - weirder - and we wonder from where will my help come? We find our answer in the psalmist’s words, “My help comes from the Lord,  who made heaven and earth.”

I grew up on Popeye the Sailor cartoons.  There were several sort of stereotypical characters - Popeye is the good guy, Bluto (or Brutus depending on what year it was) is his enemy, Olive Oyle is the girl they both loved, and Wimpy, who was the perpetually broke friend whose most famous line was, “I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.”  You were supposed to learn things from cartoons, like the good guy might get beat up but he always wins, everyone should eat their spinach, and how to do CPR.  Well, maybe not CPR.  But there was one episode when Olive Oyle nearly drowned and Popeye resuscitated her by moving her arms up and down and saying “Out with bad air, in with the good.”   That’s not really how CPR works - but it is kinda how breathing works.  The air that is exhaled isn’t bad.  It has just had all the good oxygen used up by the body and what’s left over needs to be exhaled so new and fresh, oxygen-laden air can come in.  

British novelist LP Hartley said, “The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.”   And we did do things differently in the past than we do today.  I remember having to wear a hat and gloves to church - and a skirt.  No pants.  Definitely no jeans.  Women didn’t used to be allowed to serve as elders or ministers.  We used to have hundreds of people in worship on Sundays!  Now we get excited when there are 60 people here on Sunday.  Some things were good in the past - and some things weren’t — but that’s the past.  That’s history.  Things have changed.  

Captain Kirk of the Starship Enterprise famously said to the Klingon Chancellor, “Some people think the future means the end of history.  Well...We haven't run out of history quite yet.. . the future…[is] the undiscovered country.  People can be very frightened of change.”  

This is true.  Change can be terrifying.  But it is part of living.  No matter what happens to us, no matter what decisions we make in our personal lives or our congregational life - when we exhale the past, we need to remember and celebrate the value of what went before so we can build on it for the future.   Once upon a time we inhaled a future that made it possible for us to welcome every person who showed up - every person.  And that decision, that inhalation, that doing of something new made folks uncomfortable.  But we did it any way.  Once upon a time we (you) made a decision to inhale a possibility that probably scared some of us half to death.   No matter what, when we exhale the past we need to keep the important stuff.  We need to remember that change is not always bad - or always good.  It’s just different.  It’s an undiscovered country, and we have no map, no idea what we might find there.  So we trust that God will guide us through it.

But no matter what, no matter what dreams we dare to dream, no matter what impossible possibilities we consider, we must  continue to be who we are - a welcoming, loving, caring community of faith.  I was talking to a young woman on Wednesday who was very sad that she had made the very difficult decision to leave her church, where she grew up and had once been a youth leader.  She lamented the fact that they talked a good “love your neighbor” but put conditions on their love and on God’s love.  Everyone is welcome, they said, but they also found it necessary to pray over a gay man in the congregation - who is now trying to “act straight” so he can stay in the church, so he can be worthy.  She lamented the fact that they preached “if you don’t tithe, God won’t love you.”  Her sorrow  was mixed with a goodly portion of anger . . . So I told her about us, and gave her our web address, and I’ve been praying for her, and for all the others like her . . . 

Can we just talk about tithing - you know, money - for a minute?  It is Stewardship month, after all.  Most of you have received an invitation to increase your giving if you possibly can.  We know that not everyone can give as generously as they would like.  Here are a couple of things I would like you all to keep in mind.  

First - the people of Israel were told they must tithe 10% of their income, 10% of everything they received each year - crops, animals, money, whatever - and that 10% went to support the priests (who had no other income) and to care for the poor - widows and orphans who had no one else to support them.   God did not stop loving people who could not tithe.  They’re the ones who got fed out everyone else’s tithe.   That’s what the tithe was for.   Some people were well enough off that they gave gifts over and above their tithe. That’s great, but - God did not love them any better because they gave more.  

Second -   Whatever you can give financially goes to support this church - things like salaries, the electric bill, music for the choir - and our local ministries, and our larger communities of faith in Northern California and Nevada, and globally.  Whatever you can give helps us feed the hungry in Selma, support missionaries in Eastern Europe, provide educational opportunities including scholarships, helps victims of fires and earthquakes, and so many other things.  If all you can afford to give is $5 or $10 a month, that is perfectly ok.   If  you don’t have money to put in the plate every Sunday, that is perfectly ok.  Many of us only give once a month - our giving to the church is part of our monthly budget, just like rent and groceries and car payments.  Filing out the pledge card does two things - the part we turn in helps our budget team figure out how much money we might have in the coming year, and the part we keep reminds each of us what we have pledged.  God will not love you any less if you cannot give as much as someone else.  God loves you, no matter what.   

We are challenging everyone to Level Up in our giving and our welcoming and our dreaming.   We are talking about changes, which are always scary.  Some of them are pretty easy, like moving pews around so wheelchairs and walkers (and cellos) fit better.  Some are harder - like the possibility we might need to leave this building.   We’ve been talking about that since Patty was here.  

Maybe we’ll build something new.  

Maybe we’ll move in with another congregation or two.  

We don’t know what the future holds for us but we can dream and we can try out our dreams.  If one fails, we can try again, or try another way.  

And we can trust that God will be with us, no matter what.    

As we lift our eyes up to the hills, 

to the undiscovered country, 

as we exhale the past, and inhale the future, 

as we dream our big dreams, 

and look to level up, no matter how hard reaching that next level might be,

we need to remember that

Our help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

And God will not let our foot be moved;
 he who keeps us will not slumber.

4 God will neither slumber nor sleep

For the Lord is our keeper, 

No matter how difficult or frightening the next level might be,

we can trust in God’s help and provision,

because ALL things are possible with God.

We just need to trust in God to guide us. 

Our Host

Scripture Psalm 91:1-6, 14-16  CEB   

1. Living in the Most High’s shelter,
    camping in the Almighty’s shade,

2  I say to the Lord, “You are my refuge, my stronghold!
    You are my God—the one I trust!”

3 God will save you from the hunter’s trap
    and from deadly sickness.

4 God will protect you with his pinions;
    you’ll find refuge under his wings.
    His faithfulness is a protective shield.

5 Don’t be afraid of terrors at night,
    arrows that fly in daylight,

6  or sickness that prowls in the dark,
    destruction that ravages at noontime.

14 God says,“Because you are devoted to me,
    I’ll rescue you.
    I’ll protect you because you know my name.

15 Whenever you cry out to me, I’ll answer.
    I’ll be with you in troubling times.
    I’ll save you and glorify you.

16  I’ll fill you full with old age.
    I’ll show you my salvation.”

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All this month we have been talking about hospitality.  We have talked about who to welcome and how to do that.  About how to serve our guests, and how sometimes we need to let others serve us.  We have even talked quite a bit about how to make our space more hospitable.  But there is one piece of hospitality that we haven’t really talked that much about . . . the host.

In the last 2 weeks I have been in both roles - the host and the person being hosted.  As co-hosts/facilitators for the Clergy Women’s Mini-retreat at Mission Springs, Monica Cross and I provided a program of activities which included time to rest, snacks and drinks, and made lunch arrangements everyone found acceptable. We did our best to make sure all the needs of our guests were considered in advance so we could make the event a blessing for them.   I then spent several days at St Anthony Retreat in Three Rivers on a private retreat.  I felt like an honored and beloved guest the whole time I was there.  When I walked in one staff member called out, “Welcome Home, Maria.”  Another greeted me with a hug.  I was given the most prized room - a corner room with two windows and the best view.  By the next morning all the staff knew my name, and used it when they greeted me.  The chef asked about my meal preferences.  Everyone, including staff, got the same meal, mind you, but he wanted to make sure the meals would include foods I enjoy.  Now, I do understand that the Retreat center is a business and it is in their best interests to treat visitors well, but still - the whole time I was there I felt like someone special.  My hosts understood very well what hospitality means - we even talked about the theological and cultural/historical understandings of hospitality at dinner one night. (This is what happens when you have 2 priests, a minister, and a  nun eating dinner together.)

When you are hosting a big party or an event, a wedding or anniversary party or a 50th class reunion, there are a lot of details to deal with.  If you select a large venue they often have an event planner to work with you to make sure everything is considered and that things go according to plan.  You provide the list of people who are to be invited and then step back to let the event planner do their job.  They will confer with you as needed, but for the most part they simply do what ever needs to be done.  They find a caterer to do the food and table set up and a florist to make the space beautiful.  They make sure each guest receives the gifts and tokens of appreciation the host has provided.  They take care of all the details. Speaking as someone who has been a part of large weddings with and without event planners, I love event planners!  I didn’t even have to worry about lining up the bridesmaids, not to mention the tiny flower girls and ring bearers.  All I had to concern myself with was getting there, and praying the couple would show up.   Naturally, the host is disappointed if some who are invited don’t show up, or if someone rejects the gifts they are offered, but those who do come are welcomed with joy and gladness.

God is our gracious host.   We are the event planners.  We are God’s hands and feet in the world.  We handle the details, making sure the gifts that God offers are  presented in the best, most inviting way to all who might come.  Our very lives are the invitations into God’s loving embrace. We work hard to provide the best of spiritual foods, the warmest of welcomes, and the most authentic worship experience designed, not to entertain, but to encourage people to come closer to God, so that they might know God as we do, and trust God as we do.  

And we do trust God, with all our hearts.  With the psalmist, we “say to the Lord, “You are my refuge, my stronghold!  You are my God—the one I trust!”  We rest in God’s shadow, like baby birds protected under God’s outstretched wings.  We are secure in the knowledge that we are God’s beloved children, that God’s mercy and grace flow out upon us because of God’s steadfast love for us - because Lord knows we don’t deserve it.  God knows we are imperfect, that we will make mistakes, that we won’t always get it right - that we won’t always even obey the Commandments we have been given!  You know, that pesky Love your neighbor thing.   But we serve a God of grace. We know that we are forgiven.  We know that we need not be afraid, for God is with us always, in every situation.

“There is a difference, Desmond Tutu once observed, between a religion of virtue and a religion of grace.    A religion of virtue says, “If you are really good—a true standout—then God will love you.”  A religion of virtue is mostly about our doing. It is about our efforts to get on God’s good side or to demonstrate to others that we are on God’s side. This can lead to a very busy, exhausting, life.

A religion of grace is different. Such a faith says, “You are loved. I have taken your side and will never leave it. Trust this and live boldly.”

(Tony Robinson, Still Speaking Daily Devotional, September 27, 2019)

We know that there are those for whom the practice of Christianity has become a religion of virtue.  Rules abound, on what to do, what words to use, what music to listen to, who to love . . . and who to hate.   Christianity as we practice it is a religion of grace.  We reject only those whom Jesus rejected, and as far as I can tell, he rejected no one.  We honor God by welcoming all persons in this place, just as God has welcomed us.   We may not do that perfectly - we don’t do anything perfectly  - but we do the best we can with what we’ve got, and we seek ways to do more and better - individually and as a congregation.

And God says, “Because you are devoted to me,  I’ll rescue you.
    I’ll protect you because you know my name.

 Whenever you cry out to me, I’ll answer. I’ll be with you in troubling times.
    I’ll save you and glorify you. I’ll show you my salvation.”

As our gracious host, God reaches out to each of us, welcoming us as if there are no other guests, as if we are the most honored guest of all.  Naturally, God is disappointed when some decline the invitation or reject the gifts of love and mercy that God offers.  And yet, God never stops extending the invitation. God never gives up.  And neither do we.  For we are commanded to carry the Good News to every person on the earth, to prepare the world for the greatest event of all - that time when every nation welcomes the peace of Christ, when God’s will is done on earth as it is in heaven.

When we go from this place, let us always remember that we are God’s hands and feet - that we are living invitations into God’s embrace to everyone whom we encounter.  May God pour upon us the power, wisdom, and courage to do as we are commanded to do, so that all peoples will know our loving, forgiving, merciful God - God of grace and glory.

The Special Guests

Scripture.   Luke 15:1-10. CEB  

All the tax collectors and sinners were gathering around Jesus to listen to him. The Pharisees and legal experts were grumbling, saying, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” Jesus told them this parable: “Suppose someone among you had one hundred sheep and lost one of them. Wouldn’t he leave the other ninety-nine in the pasture and search for the lost one until he finds it? And when he finds it, he is thrilled and places it on his shoulders. When he arrives home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, ‘Celebrate with me because I’ve found my lost sheep.’ In the same way, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who changes both heart and life than over ninety-nine righteous people who have no need to change their hearts and lives. “Or what woman, if she owns ten silver coins and loses one of them, won’t light a lamp and sweep the house, searching her home carefully until she finds it? When she finds it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Celebrate with me because I’ve found my lost coin.’ In the same way, I tell you, joy breaks out in the presence of God’s angels over one sinner who changes both heart and life.”

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 I wonder sometimes about the photos I find online.  This one, for example.  It’s a great illustration for the parable of the lost sheep.  But how on earth did the person taking this photo get that shot?  Where did they stand?  And how did they find this sheep in a particularly precarious situation?  I thought for a minute that maybe it was a mountain goat, which could just leap up and away, but when I enlarged the picture I realized it is definitely a sheep.  So how on earth do you rescue a sheep in this situation?  I wonder if it’s *gasp* photoshopped?  Although, having had sheep, I know they are not the smartest creatures on God’s green earth.  Even a blade of grass can startle them if it moves.   So they can end up in places like this.  

There are those who would chastise the shepherd for leaving the ninety-nine and going after the one.  Spock, for example, who is famous for having said, “Logic dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few . . . or the one.”   But the shepherd knows his flock, and that they are safe as long as they stay together.  They have a leader who will keep them more or less together.  And a dog, who will guard them from danger while the shepherd is away.  But the one that has wandered off is vulnerable because she is alone.  She has no one watching over her.  Anything might happen and there would be no one to turn to.  She could end up on a rock in a crevasse with no way to safety.  Of course the shepherd will go looking for her.  

This story is not really about sheep, of course, nor is the other really about a coin.  They are about the lost.  The missing.  Sinners, maybe.  Disaffected, maybe.  Feeling alone, rejected, unwanted, probably.  

United Methodist bishop Karen Oliveto tells a story about Todd, a 15 year old runaway who worshipped at a church she used to serve.  Todd was regular in his attendance until one Sunday he wasn’t there.  After a couple of weeks members of the church got worried and started looking for him.  Some knew what it was like on the streets, and had reason to worry.  One Sunday Todd showed up and Pastor Karen greeted him with a hug.  “I missed you,” she said.  “You missed me?  No one ever noticed when I was gone, ever.”  (Melissa Earley, Christian Century, Living by the Word, August 21, 2019). 

In these two parables, the shepherd and the woman don’t stop looking.  They don’t figure the sheep is probably dead, or write the coin off as a loss.  They keep looking until the lost has been found.  When we are lost, we want to know someone is looking for us.  Some “experts” on church growth say that we should not worry about people who have wandered off, but focus instead on new people. And maybe that’s true.  But when we’re the one who isn’t there, we want someone to notice.  We want to know someone is looking for us.

Blogger Michelle Morris wrote that she had wondered aloud in her blog one week whether anyone would notice if she wasn’t at worship at her church.  She didn’t say whether she heard from anyone in her congregation, but she did say she received one invitation to another congregation, from someone who knew she wasn’t close enough to attend, and knew she was an ordained minister in a different denomination, and knew that it was really unlikely she would accept the invitation - who nevertheless invited her because she is excited about her congregation, and believes that there is a place there for her friend, and that if she didn’t show up, she would be missed. And then Michelle said,  “If we were excited about Jesus, and excited about our church, then we would talk about it!  Not in a “You better come to church or you are going to hell” way, but in a “You can’t believe how incredible church was this Sunday!” or “I heard the best story that reminded me of how Jesus is changing my life too!” way. “   (https://grownupbible.org).  And I wonder, on this Back To Church Sunday, how many people were invited because the person extending the invitation was excited about this church?   Or because I kept bugging everyone to invite someone?    

Jesus told these parables because, “All the tax collectors and sinners were gathering around Jesus to listen to him. 2 The Pharisees and legal experts were grumbling, saying, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”   He wanted it to be very clear that he wasn’t focused on the righteous, on the people who were already doing what God desired from them, but for the sinners, the outsiders, the rejected, the ones who didn’t really belong.  In Chapter 5 Luke reported that, “30 The Pharisees and their legal experts grumbled against his disciples. They said, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”  31 Jesus answered, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor, but sick people do. 32 I didn’t come to call righteous people but sinners to change their hearts and lives.”  And here, Jesus tells them twice, “there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who changes both heart and life than over ninety-nine righteous people who have no need to change their hearts and lives.”  

Jesus is very clear that our mission and ministry is to open our arms, doors and hearts not only to people like ourselves, but also and especially to those who may not feel like they fit anywhere.  To those who feel they have disappointed their church, their family, even God, because they are not just like everyone else.  To those who know they need to change their lives and aren’t sure just how to do that.   I had a conversation with a lady in the Dollar Tree yesterday who told me her kids say she is a lot nicer since she started going to church, that church has changed her.  I said, “Good. That’s what it’s supposed to do.”   

In the last week there have been two rather high profile suicides, Pastor Jarrid Wilson who was an outspoken mental health advocate and Gregory Eells, the head of counseling and psychological services at the University of Pennsylvania.  Depression made them feel like that sheep - alone, with no way out of their predicament.   Depression is like that.  It lies.  Even to mental health professionals.   Even to ministers.  We don’t like to talk about it.  We don’t like to talk about any of those things that cause people to feel isolated and unacceptable.  It’s almost like we think mental illness is contagious.  Or that poverty is.  Or addiction.  Or any of the many other things that keep folks feeling unloved, unwanted, and unwelcome.   It’s almost like we think that these things will cease to exist if we just don’t talk about it or if we pray hard enough.  

Jesus welcomed all of the people that the Temple rejected.  He taught all of the people who could not go and hear God’s word in the Temple, because they were considered unclean or otherwise unworthy.  He ate with the people that the Law said he must not associate with.  He welcomed the least, the last and the lost.  

And that is what we are supposed to do.  

So let us reach out to the people no one else welcomes.  

Let us go and find the ones standing on that rock, those lost sheep with no earthly idea how to get out of there, and help them find a way.  

Let us welcome them into this house, as special guests

for this is the house where all means ALL, 

where all are acceptable and accepted in God’s family, 

where all have value, like the silver coin the woman had lost.  

Let us accept each other, no matter how different we may be, just as God has accepted us.