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SERMONS

The Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost
August 18, 2002

By David Christian

As we move toward the mid-term elections this fall, with control of both houses of Congress hanging in the balance, we will hear more and more talk about the importance of the political parties. Candidates will talk long and loudly about what it means to be a Democrat or a Republican. They will portray themselves as ideal members of their party, and they will seek to show why their opponents don't deserve to bear the party name. Most of it will be political hot air.

Yet all of the hot air not withstanding, boundary keeping is important. Setting the terms of who is a member of a group and who is not, is a necessary function for any organization. No matter what the group is-a little league baseball team, a club, the Republican or Democratic party, the church, a nation-it is important to know who belongs and who doesn't belong. It is important to know who may receive the benefits of membership and who may not. The smaller and more vulnerable a group is, the more important the function of boundary keeping becomes.

For the people of Israel, knowing who was in and who was not was crucial. The Jews saw themselves as a people chosen by God. They had been set apart as God's own people and were the recipients of God's promises. But there was constantly pressure from other nations that threatened to blur the boundaries. Pressure to conform with the customs of larger and stronger cultures. Pressure that threatened to erase the distinctiveness of Israel. In response to this pressure groups in Israel placed more and more emphasis on their distinctiveness; on those things that separated them from other nations.

Jesus was a Jew. He identified himself as a faithful Jew; he called other Jews to be his companions; he took his message of the coming kingdom of God to the people of Israel; he traveled to Jewish towns; he taught and healed fellow Jews.

But his reputation spread beyond the borders of his people. Others, not members of his community, brought him their needs.

One day as he was traveling, a woman approached him. She came with a request. She wanted Jesus to heal her daughter. Now this woman was a Canaanite. She was an outsider, unclean. No self-respecting Jew would have dealings with someone like her.

Initially Jesus ignored her, but she persisted in her pleas. Finally the disciples had had about all they could stand. They went to Jesus and complained. "She's bothering us," they whined. "Can't you get rid of her somehow? Can't you make her go away?"

So Jesus turned to her and said, "Look, I was sent only to the people of the house of Israel. That doesn't include you."

But she wouldn't take the hint. She knelt before him and said, "Lord, help me."

Jesus then got a little nasty. "Look," he said. "It is not fair to take the children's food and throw it to the dogs."

But this woman was up to the challenge. "Yes, lord," she replied. "Yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table."

And Jesus said, " Touché. Woman, great is your faith." And her daughter was healed.

Jesus' message of God's love and care was directed at Israel, God's chosen people. But it was a message that would not be contained within that boundary. It was a message for anyone with ears to hear. A message with power and new life for anyone who would respond.

A seminary classmate of mine worked for a time at a large church in New York. This was one of the more prominent churches there, filled with prominent, well-educated, fashionable people. During Lent every year, the church had a series of noontime speakers followed by a lunch.

At the first of these luncheons my friend noticed one of the volunteers busily clearing tables and preparing drinks. The man was obviously different. The clothes that he wore appeared to be rejects from Goodwill. Neither they nor the man appeared to have been recently washed. His manner was-unusual. He looked very out of place among the group of well-groomed, fashionably-dressed volunteers.

Later my friend asked the rector about him.

"He's one of our hardest workers here," the rector replied. "You will see him at every luncheon and at most other church functions as well."

"Is there any resistance to his being here?" my friend asked.

"Resistance?" the rector asked. "Oh sure. He makes some people very uncomfortable. But his coming here was not my idea."

My friend thought that was a curious comment and when he asked what it meant, the rector continued, "I mean just what I meant when several parishioners came to complain about his being here. 'Why do you want him in our church?" they asked me.

" 'Why do you think I want him here?' I replied. 'His being here is not my idea. I didn't invite him. And by the way, I didn't invite you here either. Why do you think I would have invited you?

" 'Let's get this straight,' I told them. 'This is God's church, not mine, not yours. That man is here not because I want him here or you want him here. He is here because God wants him here. This is God's idea of a good time. This is God's idea of a fun bunch of people, not mine.' "

You are here today… I am here today… we are all here today… because God has called us here. We are here not because we are better than anyone else, or smarter than anyone else, or richer, or more powerful, or purer, or cuter, or more faithful. We are not here today because we all look the same or act the same or share the same interests or hold the same opinions or even necessarily like one another.

We are here because God wants us here. We are here because we are God's idea of a good time. We are here because without each of us the celebration would be somehow less, the party would be somehow incomplete. We are here because God invited us here; invited us here to share in the heavenly banquet, to feed on the food and drink of God's kingdom, to celebrate God's love for us.

Our job is not to guard the boundaries. Our job is not to decide who gets in and who stays out. Our job is to welcome all whom God may choose to invite.

After all, this is God's church, not ours.

David Christian
The Chapel of the Cross
Madison, Mississippi

Isaiah 56.1-7
Romans 11.13-15,29-32
Matthew 15.21-28