Sermon — September 11, 2022

The Rev. Greg Johnston

Lectionary Readings

I once heard an interview with a baseball umpire who’d been recruited to test out a new ”electronic umpire” system in the early days of its development. It used lasers and cameras and computers to detect exactly where the baseball crossed the plate, then communicated wirelessly with a headset in the umpire’s ear, which played a little noise after each pitch. Right down the middle? Ding! Way outside? BAAAAH. The company was just testing things out, and this guy was an umpire for one of those leagues that’s so minor it’s not even technically “minor league.” They called him up with a proposition. “Hey, you have a double header on Thursday, right? How about this? The first game, you call, the way you’d call it, but with the headset in your ear. The second game, for every pitch, just call exactly what the computer says.”

And by about the third inning of that second game, he was convinced: This machine was going to ruin baseball.

His reasoning was simple. While the strike zone is, in theory, a geometric concept, in practice it’s a human one. Negotiating the exact boundaries of the strike zone is part of the game, as the batter tries to shrink it down and the pitcher and catcher try to make it wider. The umpire’s job isn’t to apply an algorithm to determine whether any given pitch is a ball or a strike. It’s to preside over a healthy game. If the pitcher hit the last batter, the umpire might call a few balls on the inside to discourage the pitcher. If the batter keeps mouthing off about bad calls, the umpire’s going to stand his ground, and then some. And let’s face it, baseball is a spectator sport: there are certain pitches that can be called as strikes in the top of the second inning but really need to be balls in the bottom of the ninth, if the batter’s team is down by two, because this is a game, and not a computer simulation.

You may not agree with this umpire. But you can at least understand his point. There are times when the best way forward is not the precise and strict application of the rules, but a certain kind of flexibility. There are times when we think fairness is the most important thing, but in fact it’s forgiveness. There are times when what we want is justice, but what we need is mercy.

If you think there’s nothing more important than calling balls and strikes as precisely as possible in life, then today’s parables might be disappointing. The lost sheep and the lost coin tells us something about what God values, after all. And if this is the way that God behaves over “one sinner who repents,” (Luke 15:7, 10) then our God is an unfair, unjust, unreasonable god. And everybody knows it.

Consider the lost sheep. “Who among you,” Jesus asks, “if you had one hundred sheep and lost one, wouldn’t leave behind the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one who had been lost?” (Luke 15:3-4) And every shepherd in the crowd is looking around, like… Should I raise my hand?

This is a very bad idea! No reasonable person would do this. For the sake of saving one in a hundred, no one would leave the other ninety-nine out alone in the wilderness, vulnerable to wolves or thieves or simply to wandering off themselves, which sheep, it turns out, are rather apt to do.

And what he does next is worse! He takes the sheep, and puts it on his shoulders, and where does he go? Back to the rest of the flock, to make sure they’re still okay? No! He carries it home! Into his house! And he calls his friends and neighbors and he says to them, “Rejoice with me!” And they show up and they’re like, “Man… Where are your sheep?” And he’s like, “I don’t know! Out there! I hope! Isn’t this awesome!?”

The woman with the lost coin behaves in a slightly more methodical way. She only has ten coins, and she’s lost one of them, but there’s no risk to the other nine. So she lights the lamp and she sweeps the floor. She scours her apartment looking for that coin and when she finds it, she is filled with joy. And she calls to her friends and her neighbors, and she says to them, “Rejoice with me! I’ve found my coin!”

But the more you think about this story, the stranger it seems, too. She invites her friends over to celebrate, and how do you celebrate but by throwing a big party—by eating together, like Jesus eats with the tax collectors and sinners? But how many friends and neighbors can you feed for one drachma? It seems to me that the woman may have spent a huge amount of energy searching for this one lost coin and then spent it right away, by throwing a party to celebrate having found it.

And so it is, Jesus says, with God.

We so desperately want things to be fair. We want balls to be balls, and strikes to be strikes. We want people to be held accountable for their actions, punished for their wrongdoing. We want them to apologize so that we can feel justified in forgiving them. We want the ninety-nine sheep to be rewarded for their good behavior, and the one lost sheep to have to deal with the consequences of its actions.

But God is unfair. God’s like the woman who’s lost the coin: she’ll light a lamp to drive away the darkness so she can look for you the instant she realizes you’re lost, even if you’re not ready to be found. God’s like the shepherd who’s found the sheep: he’ll throw you over his shoulders and carry you back home, bleating furiously, without a thought for the rest of the flock. When you have wandered far away, God is so delighted at the prospect of your return that he doesn’t even wait for you to realize you’re lost; he just goes, without a thought of fairness in his mind.

God doesn’t call balls and strikes according to an algorithm. God practices mercy, more than justice; forgiveness, more than fairness. And Jesus invites us, in these parables, to consider whether we might do the same.

There are, no doubt, many situations in which clear boundaries need to be set. There are relationships in which the appropriate response to being wronged is not “It’s okay. I forgive you,” but, “That was wrong. It’s not okay. You need to stay away from me.” Absolutely.

But we spend most of our lives on the edges of the strike zone. And we see the world like typical baseball fans. We think that we are pitching strikes, and they are throwing balls. We think that we are being wronged, when we’ve done nothing wrong. We think that if only life were more fair, if only someone were out there really calling balls and strikes, then—Well, then what? God would smite our neighbors or our spouses or our friends for their thousand tiny wrongs?

Because that’s the thing. We crave justice, but sometimes justice doesn’t do very much for us. What we really need is mercy. We stick to our ideas of fairness, but knowing that we’re right doesn’t do much for us. If we can let go, and forgive—if we can sweep the floors of all our resentments and search what we’ve lost—we might have a chance at feeling a tiny fraction of God’s joy.

God in her mercy has given us the power to forgive, to be as irresponsible and unreasonable as God is, with one another, to display, as Christ did, “the utmost patience” with one another. (1 Tim. 1:16) Not because it’s easy to forgive. Not because the other person isn’t wrong. But because God has displayed the utmost patience with us. Because God has swept the floor and searched diligently for us. Because God has sought us out when we have gone astray and carried us home on his shoulders, rejoicing.

So “to the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God,
be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.” (1 Tim. 1:17)

Sermon — September 4, 2022

The Rev. Greg Johnston

Lectionary Readings

“Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14:25, 33)

I’ve always wanted to suggest this as a reading for someone’s wedding…

I’m joking, of course. I can’t think of a worse choice. But this is exactly what’s so baffling about Jesus’ words. Most people in our culture encounter Christianity primarily as a kind of family religion. They go to church for family occasions like a baptism, a wedding, or a funeral. They go to church on big family holidays like Christmas; maybe even Easter or Mother’s Day. But if you’re among the faithful few who show up on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend, you’re treated to this perplexing message: if you do not hate the ones you love, you cannot be my disciple.

Most of us are here to do the opposite. We know that Jesus taught us to love God and our neighbors, and we want to do it. We recognize, as well, that we need some help learning to love, or at least learning to love more gently, more patiently, more humbly. So we come to church and we listen for a word or wisdom or we say a prayer for compassion. Or maybe we just like the music. But none of us, I’m sure, are here to hate.

It’s possible, of course, that “hate” isn’t quite the right translation. Jesus seems to be talking less about emotions and more about priorities. He goes on to explain things in terms of “cost.” If you’re going to build a new tower for your vineyard, don’t you get a few bids first, to see if you can afford the work? If a king’s going to wage war, doesn’t he try to figure out if he’ll be able to win? “In this same way,” he says, “none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.” (Luke 14:33) Following Jesus isn’t easy. It’s not cheap. It will take everything you have. So if you’re not willing to give up everything to follow Jesus—your family, your possessions, your life itself—isn’t it better not to set out after him in the first place? “Which one are you going to put first?” the wedding homily goes. “The deeply beloved person you’re about to marry? Or Jesus?”

Let’s be honest: if this is how we measure discipleship, there haven’t been very many Christians ever. People will sometimes preach this text as if you can just say, “Discipleship is hard. There’s no cheap grace. You have to give things up to follow Jesus.” And then rattle off a few of the saints and martyrs of the church: Martin Luther King, Jr.; Mother Theresa; Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Just be like them. But none of them would tell you they measured up to this. No one has. No one can. You can actually see it already in the Gospel. It’s part of Luke’s point. Jesus is on his final journey to Jerusalem. At this stage, “large crowds” are traveling with him. (Luke 14:25) But by the end, they’ll all be gone. No one in the crowd, none of his disciples, not even the closest members of his inner circle, take up a cross and follow him to his death. And he redeems them, nevertheless. Jesus is right. If this is what it means, we cannot be his disciples. We are not strong enough or single-minded enough to follow him down the road that he walked. And yet he loves us, and cares for us, and works in our lives nevertheless.

This is why I love the letter to Philemon so much. It’s a strange little letter. This is the whole thing. And it’s a little confusing, because while Paul, Philemon, and Onesimus clearly know what’s going on, we don’t have the whole picture. Some things are clear. It’s clear that Onesimus is enslaved, and Philemon is his enslaver. It’s clear that Paul is in prison. It seems to be the case that, while in prison, Paul has met Philemon and converted him to the Christian faith. And now Paul writes to Philemon, saying that he’s sending Onesimus back—presumably carrying the letter.

We don’t know how Onesimus got to Paul. Some suggest that Philemon sent him to Paul in the first place, maybe to bring a letter or to care for him in prison. Others argue that Philemon may have run away, perhaps after stealing or mishandling some of Onesimus’s property. And it’s not clear what exactly Paul wants Onesimus to do. Does he want him to welcome Onesimus back to slavery but treat him as a Christian brother, if such a thing is even possible? Does he want to send Onesimus back to Paul? Does he want him, perhaps, to free Onesimus? Is this what Paul means when he says he should receive him “no longer as a slave but more than a slave, a beloved brother”? (Phlm. 16) The letter is ambiguous enough that it was claimed by both sides in America’s 19^th-century debate over slavery. “Look! Paul sends back a runaway slave!” pro-slavery Christians said. “But wait!” replied abolitionists, “he tells Philemon to set him free!”

Paul’s actual advice is tentative. But at the same time, he makes a sweeping claim: by entering into God’s family, we have become one another’s actual family. Read alongside the family-hating language of the gospel this week, Paul’s use of family language is striking. “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,” he writes. (3) I’ve “received much joy and encouragement from your love…my brother,” he tells Philemon. (7) I appeal to you for “my child, Onesimus, whose father I have become.” (10) Perhaps you will “have him back forever, no longer as a slave but more than a slave, a beloved brother.” (15-16) We are now equals: “Welcome him as you would welcome me.” (16) Oh and by the way, get the guest room ready; I’m going to come check up on this situation. (17) (Oh and by the way, Mark and Luke say hi.)

This is a huge transformation. In the highly-stratified society of ancient Rome, it would be extraordinary to call a man who’d been your slave your brother, let alone to actually treat him as your brother. It’s unclear how exactly Onesimus got to Paul and the first place, and what exactly Paul’s asking Philemon to do now. This is not a simple, sweeping statement of emancipation. But it comes with a theological punch. If we are siblings, truly siblings in Christ, how could one human being keep another in chains?

I wonder whether this is the kind of “hate” of family Jesus means, the kind of re-prioritization that puts the family of God at the center of our lives and moves our own families toward the margins. I’m still not sure I like the idea, but I am sure that to if Philemon took Paul’s advice, his brothers would have experienced it as hate. It would have been an insult, for this slave to be treated as if he were their brother. They would have been aghast to see him elevated to their rank. But in this new family God is creating, there is no rank or title or class: only innumerable siblings, treated as one.

So I don’t know whether any of you will become great heroes of the faith—the Saint Anthonys or Saint Francises who hear words like this and immediately really do go out and sell everything and give the money to the poor, the Martin Luther Kings and Dietrich Bonhoeffers and Oscaro Romeros who know what’s right and really do follow it, even unto death. But I do know that all of us face Philemon’s question: How do I live faithfully amid the messiness of ordinary life? What price am I willing to pay? What would it mean to welcome, to forgive, to embrace someone the way that Paul commands? What would it mean to really live as if the whole human family were my family? I can’t be Jesus. I don’t need to be Jesus. But maybe… just maybe, I can awkwardly, ambiguously, tentatively feel my way toward the kingdom of God like blessed St. Paul.

Sermon — August 28, 2022

The Rev. Greg Johnston

Lectionary Page

In every wedding planning process and at every wedding reception, there is a moment that has the power to distil and clarify decades-long relationships into a single decision: the seating chart. For months, the happy couple (or maybe just one of them and an in-law-to-be) have spent hours standing around the kitchen table, moving tiny names around the map as they factor in every variable. We’ll put the college friends over here, they say, and the neighbors over here, and the really strange second cousins somewhere over there. The bridal party goes here at the head table, and our immediate family right next to us, and—wait, wait, wait! We can’t put Uncle Jim next to our old high-school friends. Not after last time.

And then on the other end of the process, there’s the moment when the guests walk into the reception dinner and find their table numbers and sit down, when they finally see exactly what their friends or family think of them. Which table are they at? And, perhaps more importantly, who else is at it? You can tell pretty quick when you’ve ended up at “Random Family Friends Table #4” rather than in the place of prominence you think you deserve.

(This is one good reason to do what we did, and follow Alice’s family tradition of a stand-up reception, with a few tables scattered around for the grandparents.)

In Jesus’ time and place, wedding banquets worked a little differently, but there was just as much room for drama. From his words in the Gospel today you may be able to imagine the scene. At a typical classy event in the ancient Mediterranean world, the guests wouldn’t have been seated at separate tables, but reclining on their sides couches in a large U shape. The host would be seated at one end of the U, with places of honor on either side. If you were way down at the other end, not only would it be hard to participate in conversation, but you’d be facing away from the host and guests of honor.

One can imagine that in such an honor-focused society, the seating at many events was assigned. But Jesus describes a banquet with no assigned seating. You can imagine that when you entered the room, you had to think: am I the most important guest at this banquet? Am I the third-most important? The tenth? If you guessed too high, you’d embarrass yourself. Because if you walked in and took a great seat, and then someone else came in who was the real guest of honor, you’d be bumped to the first empty seat, which would most likely be the worst seat in the house.

So, Jesus gives some very practical advice: Go in and sit in the worst place instead, so that when the host walks into the room, he says to you, “Oh come on, scooch in a little closer,” and rather than being embarrassed, you look important and cool. (Luke 14:7-11)

It’s a neat trick. I’m not sure I’d call it a “parable.” (But we’ll get back to that.)

Then Jesus offers up a second piece of strategic dining advice, and this one is counter-intuitive but straightforward enough. When you throw a dinner party, he says, don’t invite your friends or siblings or relatives or your rich neighbors, because then they’re going to invite you over for dinner, and they won’t owe you anything anymore. (Luke 14:12) Instead, invite the people who can’t repay you, the ones who are poor, or who are living with various physical impairments. (14:13) And because they can’t repay you in this life, you’ve successfully tricked God, who’ll be forced to repay you in the next.

I don’t want to speak for anyone else, but to me this just feels a little… icky. The Gospel today reads like one of those click-bait ads at the bottom of a webpage: “Pastors hate these two easy ways to get into heaven.” Shouldn’t our motives be a little purer than this? Does Jesus really need to give us advice on how to fake humility so we look good in front of everyone else? Shouldn’t we extend our hospitality to the people who need it most because it’s the right thing to do—or maybe because we might be entertaining angels, as Hebrews says! (Heb. 13:2)—but not just to store up points in St. Peter’s account book? Can’t we be trusted to be good for goodness’ sake, and not out of self-interest?

Well, just to pause there for a second: What Jesus describes would be as remarkable in our culture as it was in his. When those of us who have more money host a dinner or a lunch, we really do tend to invite our friends or relatives, or neighbors who are more or less like us. We don’t really invite the people who can’t afford to pay us back. When those of us who don’t have much money are invited over for a meal, it’s not typically an invitation from the super-rich. In our society, we institutionalize a certain amount of generosity through non-profits and charities and a social safety net, but there’s very little real face-to-face encounter across our various divides; and in fact, outside a select few neighborhoods, most of our world is structured so that people who are poor and people who are rich don’t even see each other, don’t even live in the same place, let alone share a meal together.

And so if this sermon inspires you to “let mutual love continue,” to “show hospitality to strangers,” (Heb. 13:1-2) to host a radically diverse banquet and to choose the least prominent seat, then… Jesus would be pleased! We should probably do more of that! Maybe not for the self-serving reasons Jesus gives in his advice, which is so focused on our own honor and our own salvation. Maybe because it would be a beautiful enactment of so much of what Jesus teaches about the kingdom of God.

And in fact, I think there’s a little more going on here. It’s not so much that some of us, who are rich in possessions, should give banquets and invite others of us, who are poor, out of the goodness and generosity of our hearts. It’s that Jesus himself, rich in spiritual abundance beyond our wildest imaginings, is inviting all of us, who are poor, and hungry, and blind, to his wedding banquet. Luke calls this a “parable.” (Luke 14:7) Mere practical advice on how not to look like a fool isn’t a parable. A parable is about how God relates to us.

And in Christ, in Jesus’ very own life, God chose the humblest place. Jesus gave up the riches of heaven to become a simple, fragile human being. And he went beyond the lowest seat at the banquet into the most shameful places in the world, onto the cross, into the tomb. And when God said, “Friend, move up higher,” (Luke 14:10) he did, and brought us with him on his way. We are the poor, all of us, whom he invited us to feast on the riches of his grace, and we have feasted, and we cannot repay him. But we can turn around and invite other people to celebrate with us and to feast at his table.

So, yes, choose the humble place, not so that you will be exalted but because the One who humbled himself for you has chosen to exalt you. Yes, share a meal with those children of God with whom you might not otherwise come face to face, because the One whom we do not yet see face to face is even now inviting you to share in the holy meal of his Body and Blood. “Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have,” as Hebrews writes, “for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.” (Heb. 13:16) Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for God has shared God’s whole being with you, and he has said, “I will never leave you or forsake you.” (Heb. 13:5)

Even if you find yourself sitting at Table 17.