Sermon for 3rd Sunday in Lent: 28 February 2016
Sermon for Sunday 28 February 2016
3rd Sunday in Lent
The Rev. Carrie Ballenger Smith
***
Grace and peace to you from God our
Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
I had an
entirely different sermon written for today.
The sermon I
am not preaching started with a lovely story about my grandmother and her
abundant generosity, especially noting how she loved to force food on anyone
who dared to step into her kitchen.
That sermon then
sought to make a connection to this context, so it moved to a description of
the street vendors here in the Old City calling out to tourists, “Everything
$1!” – unbelievable offers, attempts to get
someone, anyone, to come into their shops.
And then
that sermon – the sermon I am not
preaching today – proclaimed that God is even more generous, God’s offer of
grace and mercy is even more unbelievable, God’s love is even more extravagant
– and through the cross of Jesus Christ, we have received abundant gifts of
water, wine, bread, without money, and without price. Amen!
It was not a
bad sermon.
But then I
went to dinner last evening in Beit Jala, at the home of a Muslim coworker.
We ate with
his family outside on the terrace, overlooking the Arab village below, and
beyond that, all of Jerusalem and even all the way to Jordan.
It was a
lovely view, one of the best I’ve seen in my time living here.
But if you
turned around, you saw that in every other direction, the view is very different.
The view is different, because on the three other sides, my coworker’s home is
surrounded by the separation wall, which is topped with barbed wire, which divides
him from his neighbors.
The tree Mohammad's sons used to climb was uprooted to make way for the wall.
The road
which led them to a field where the children played football was cut off by the
wall.
But most
importantly, what was uprooted, what was cut off, was their relationship with
their long-time neighbors, a Jewish family.
“We used to
have good relations with them” the son told me. “We used to say ‘Bokra Tov’ and
they would ask about our family. When the wall was built, I think they were
even sadder than we were.”
And it was
there, in the shadow of the wall, at a dinner table heaping with home-cooked Palestinian
food, that I started to rethink my sermon.
Suddenly I
was hearing the words of God from the 55th chapter of Isaiah very differently:
1Ho, everyone who thirsts,
come to the waters;
and you that have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price.
come to the waters;
and you that have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price.
2Why do you spend
your money for that which is not bread,
and your labor for
that which does not satisfy?
Listen carefully to
me, and eat what is good,
and delight
yourselves in rich food.
3Incline your ear,
and come to me;
listen, so that you
may live.
This is the voice of Yahweh, the holy one of Israel, speaking to an exiled people. Yahweh was calling the people of God back from disobedience, back from despair, to a table overflowing with every good thing—which was very Good News indeed to people who had not only been wandering in the desert, but had been eating manna for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for forty years in a row.
Long ago,
this was Good News for the hungry and thirsty people of this land.
And this is
exactly the Good News we need in this same land today.
We need to
hear again the Good News that God’s good creation, God’s love, and God’s mercy are
enough – more than enough – for every
human being made in God’s image. We desperately need Isaiah chapter 55’s
message of God's abundance.
We need to
hear it, and to listen, because today
a great many people in this land have been surrounded by a 650-meter long, 8-meterhigh monument to scarcity.
That monument,
the wall which surrounds my coworker’s home, says:
There is not enough.
There’s not
enough land.
There’s not
enough water.
There’s not
enough space between our holy sites or our homes.
There’s not
enough trust.
There’s not
enough in common between our cultures.
This is what
the wall, and the checkpoints, and the barricades, and the settlements, and the
identity cards, and the permissions, and the whole rotten system of occupation
screams to the people on both sides of the wall:
There is simply not enough of
anything for all of us.
Whether we
realize it or not, whether we live near the wall or not, whether we live in the
holy land or not, this message of scarcity too often controls our behavior.
Scarcity is
the reason we immediately judge people on the street in this context: Which
religion are they? Are they Arab or Israeli? International or local? Do they
have their hands in their pockets? Are their guns in ready position?
There’s not enough room on this
street for all of us.
Scarcity is
the reason political candidates in my home country twist themselves into
pretzels trying to explain why we can’t really have health care for all, or
education for all, or humane treatment of illegal immigrants, or a country
where religious liberty means liberty for all religions.
There cannot be enough human rights
for every human.
Scarcity is
the reason why we find ourselves praying for peace with justice, but settle instead
for a kinder, gentler occupation, a less offensive racism, or somewhat friendlier
extremists.
Surely there’s not enough goodness in
the world to overcome our divisions.
Scarcity compels
us to accept one-liners in place of working toward a future as one human
family--
So we say:
“These
people have been fighting for thousands of years.”
“They teach
hate.”
“They want us to disappear.”
“It won’t be
fixed until Jesus comes back.”
This is what
happens when people of faith start to accept the hunger for freedom as futile, and
the thirst for power as justifiable. It’s what happens when we start to believe
our own lie, the lie represented by that wall – and that lie is that there simply isn’t enough even of God
to go around.
But let me
tell you that this monument to scarcity, the wall which cast its mighty shadow
over us at our dinner last night, was no match for the abundant generosity on
the table before us.
The food
kept on coming:
Makloubeh.
Waraq Diwali. Hummus. Arabic Salad. Apple Cake.
(are you
hungry yet?)
As we were feasting
on this meal, a feast we didn’t expect, a gift of love we couldn’t possibly
repay, a meal prepared for a group of international Christians by a local Muslim
family, I once again felt deep in my heart—and in my belly! –the truth of God’s
undeserved, generous, and abundant mercy.
There at that table overflowing with
food I was reminded that no matter how many walls we construct, no matter how
we justify our own greed, no matter how long we wander away from God’s ways, no
matter how loudly we proclaim “NO, we’re not hungry!”, the God of abundance is
always near, calling us home, extending the invitation:
“Come and
eat.”
Just as God
called to God’s people long ago, God calls to us today:
2Why do you
spend your money for that which is not bread,
and your
labor for that which does not satisfy?
Listen
carefully to me, and eat what is good,
and
delight yourselves in rich food.
3Incline
your ear, and come to me;
listen, so
that you may live.
Dear sisters
and brothers in Christ, why, oh why do we buy what that wall is selling?
Why do we
let its message of scarcity write the future of this land?
Why must we
accept the lie that there is not enough peace, not enough justice, not enough
equality, not enough human rights, not enough freedom to go around?
As long as
we worship monuments to scarcity, as long as we buy the bread of inequality, as
long as we drink from the well of cynicism and division, then we will always be
hungry. We will always be thirsty.
But my dear
sisters and brothers, we must not accept such hunger. We must not remain
thirsty.
Hear the
Good News of Jesus Christ:
This table has been set for you. At this table, the
God of abundance has prepared for us a feast of love – the Body and Blood of
our Lord Jesus Christ.
Here is the love that is higher than any wall.
Here is
the mercy that speaks louder than any political rhetoric.
Here is the grace
which covers our own complicity in the world’s sufferings.
Here, in and among
the gifts of bread and, we encounter the One who emptied himself for our sake
and for the sake of this broken world—Jesus, Son of God, Prince of Peace.
All who
thirst for justice…come and eat.
All who
hunger for forgiveness…come and eat.
All who are
weary from the struggle….come and eat.
All who have
lost hope…come and eat.
Come, eat, and know the abundant mercy and love of God in Christ Jesus.
Be
nourished. Be strengthened for what God is calling you to do.
For the hunger
in the world is great. And this feast is meant to be shared.
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