Feb 2 ~ What if They had Opened Their Hearts and Listened?

A recording of the sermon is available by clicking above

Sermon, by Pastor Joel

February 2, 2025

Jeremiah 1:4-10

Psalm 71:1-6

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

Luke 4:21-30

The context of this sermon is

100% written by a human

A person is not without honour except in their own home. This is the famous line that emerged from our gospel this morning. And who among us doesn’t know the truth of it in one way or another? It speaks to the way that going home, either at the end of the day, or at Christmas for a short stay, places us among people who know us, in some ways better than we know ourselves. They know what makes us happy. They know who we used to be, and who we are away from the expectations of the outside world. If we are lucky, those memories bring laughter, and changes are accepted and embraced. If we’re less lucky, the home crowd knows where to poke the wounds that hurt us most. They might feel threatened or judged by the way we have changed and lash out. Just like the people did when Jesus returned to his hometown, preaching the gospel.

“Isn’t this Joseph, the carpenter’s son?” they ask one another. The gospel of Jesus doesn’t only fall flat, it riles them up. “Who the heck does this guy think he is to preach to us?” we can imagine them huffing to one another. “We knew him when he was in diapers.” They feel judged and criticized. “Was his home not good enough for him?” someone might have said. “Does he think he’s better than us?”

In the end, these former neighbors of Jesus become so enraged, they plot to throw him over a cliff.

They are so filled with insecurity, defensiveness, and close-mindedness that they miss their moment: to hear the gospel and gain wisdom.

And so we hear that famous acknowledgement from Jesus, as it appears in this passage from Luke: “Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown.”

But as this line appears in Luke, it is about much more than Jesus’s being teased and threatened by the bullies and judgers that knew him when he was young.

We are reminded with this passage that it’s often those considered least deserving who receive and follow the gospel with the most wisdom, and the ones who believe themselves most deserving who fail to receive it with any wisdom at all.

As the crowd is turning against him, Jesus speaks of Elisha, who, among all the lepers in Israel at the time, chose to cleanse only one – a soldier from Syria. And of all the widows in need, Elijah was sent to one: the poorest of women in Zarephath. Both are examples of times when God’s care was given to those who exhibited faith and trust and openness – regardless of race or background. They are both reminders that no one falls outside God’s grace. And that no one person is more deserving than another – not even the community who helped raise the son of God, only to fear and reject him later.

The very human story of Elijah and the widow, whose name we never learn, is the example I want to focus on this morning. When Elijah first meets the woman who will save his life, he’s in a bad spot. He’s angered powerful leaders with talk of drought, and he is on the run.

He finds his way to Zarephath, where he is guided – the Old Testament says – to one woman in particular. She is, by her description, the least likely to come to his aid. She and her son are starving, and she is getting water to prepare what she believes will be their last meal. Elijah asks if she will make a loaf for him, and promises her that if he does, things will work out. So she brings him home, and shares what little she has, and a miracle occurs: they eat well all week.

But when her son gets sick, in her grief, the widow unfairly blames the easiest person – this strange man who has shown up at her house. Elijah does not leave, though he’d repaid his debt with bread. He begs and prays to God to save her son, just as the woman’s faith had saved him. And his prayers are answered.

This story has been interpreted many ways, but let’s consider it in the context of Jesus, standing before his fuming former neighbors, who have turned on him.

Jesus is observing that when people feel entitled to benefit from something, they often value it the least. If we come to church every Sunday and do our bit, we might think we get a golden ticket to heaven, but if we do not truly hear the words of the gospel – if we judge and gossip and spread harm – we have been blinded to the presence of God on earth.

The widow, with nothing to her name, took Elijah into her home. How many others would have turned their backs or even called the authorities? Because Elijah was there, her family was fed. How many times have judgement and closed-mindedness cost us the chance to experience God’s bounty? And, as the Old Testament says, because Elijah was welcomed, when her son fell ill, he was healed. How many times has a lack of generosity and openness led us to miss the power of the divine in our lives?

People aren’t without honour except in their own home. When we hear that line, we often think of ourselves as the person not getting recognition at home or being forced to play a part they have long grown out of. It is that person who must adapt then – to accept their home as it is - or shorten the stay.

But, of course, it’s not the person at all who is missing out. Just like it was not Jesus. When we fail to accept change in those we love, we don’t get to know who they truly are. When we don’t listen with fresh ears to familiar voices, we learn nothing new. When we aren’t open to new ways of hearing the gospel, our own telling of it becomes unbending and narrow.

As Jesus is constantly reminding us, the gospel is offered to everyone. The starving widow. The foreign leper. The tax collector and the fisherman. It may also be spoken and shared by anyone: that same poor widow, those fishermen, the Good Samaritan. Even that son of Joseph the carpenter.

Think of it: the people of Nazareth were so unwilling to listen, that, according to Luke, they drove The Messiah out of town and tried to throw him off a cliff. What might have happened had they opened their minds and hearts to listen can never be known.

May we all be wiser than they were.

Amen.

Jan 26 ~ Where Will God Send You? And Where IS God Sending You?

A recording of the sermon is available by clicking above

Sermon, by Pastor Joel

January 26, 2025

Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10

Psalm 19

1 Corinthians 12:12-31a

Luke 4:14-21

The context of this sermon is

100% written by a human

When I read the gospel this week, I felt a sense of joy in the words, the quiet peace of reassurance – as if something great was about to happen.

Jesus is still just getting warmed up, when he returns to Nazareth and goes to the synagogue on the Sabbath, and he reads from the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. These were words certainly most of the scribes would have known very well, but held in Jesus’s hand on that Sabbath Day, they took on a new meaning, a new life.

It was no longer about someone who was coming to do these great things. It wasn’t about a promise that something great might happen someday. It was the realization that someday was today, and that someone was Jesus.

Part of that comes from the gift we have of hindsight – we know who Jesus was, and what he did – in a fuller sense than anyone in the synagogue on that day. But these are powerful words. “The spirit of the Lord is upon me,” Jesus said, holding the ancient scroll. “God has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. God sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind. To let the oppressed go free. To proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.”

That is a powerful speech. It suggests the expectation of miracles, the hope of humanity. It reassures us that however rough it is – in times of political and economic uncertainty, or natural disasters, or when family problems trouble us – things will get better.

Now, Jesus said those words a long time ago, and sometimes we wonder if they came true. Well, certainly we have made a lot of progress – in better protection for people who fall outside of society’s mainstream, in more social safety nets for the poor, in our belief that wealthier nations should share their offerings with less fortunate ones. Our lives today are infinitely safer and healthier than the ones of generations past – and certainly better than those who lived in the time of Jesus. And yet, while humanity’s overall trajectory may be progressing, we also have this sense of society’s sliding backwards, that we may be living in a dip in progress. Many of us will have felt it this week, especially. A cracking of democracy. A move away from values such as mercy and equality – the very values that Jesus espoused, the ones that shaped our society.

As always, in the words and actions of Jesus, we hear a call. Jesus was a fire starter, but the oxygen that kept that fire going was his followers, then and now. Jesus, in our gospel today, is clearly making a proclamation of what was to come, or what was expected. God has sent me, he says, to free those who are oppressed, to make the blind see. We might then imagine him looking out into the group, into the eyes of each one standing there saying: Where will God send you?

To the mother in the crowd, standing with her children, who would decide what they were taught about how to treat their fellow humans: Where will God send you? To the teacher whose words reach into the hearts of their students and carry them into adulthood? Where will God send you? To the tax collector, who would choose every day whether to resist the temptation of power or set an example of integrity: Where will God send you? Each one in that crowd who heard the words of Jesus, knew it to be true: this was a beginning. A new mission statement to guide the world.

As our second lesson reminds us – all these people – mother, teacher, tax collector – are part of the body that forms the work of the gospel. All are essential. Every part matters.

The second lesson reminds me of a theory a dog trainer suggested recently: in a traditional wolf pack, he suggested there are three kinds of members. There is the leader, who takes charge and goes out in front. There is the middle dog – the social, happy go lucky one, who holds the pack together socially and smooths out conflict. And in the last third there is the watchful dog, a little anxious. This dog warns the others when danger approaches. Now if you are a dog owner, you might want your dog to be the leader, maybe you’d be happier with the sociable, goofy jester. You may be less keen on the back of the pack dog – which is what I have at home. Our dog, Gus, seems to go through life in a constant state of worry. He is always on the lookout for threats. Unfortunately these threats include airplanes in the sky, and plastic bags that appear suddenly on the sidewalk. It’s as if, he thinks, better err on the side of reporting danger, than missing it.

But it seems to me that what’s key is that the pack needs all three. Without a leader, it would be in disarray. Without the chill presence in the middle, conflict might boil over. Without the warning from the back, harm might befall them.

And that’s the same with us: every part matters. And not just as an individual part, but as a collection of parts. In every community, including this one, we need thinkers and builders and teachers. We need people who like to take the stage, and people who quietly share their wisdom in the background. We need sparkle and substance. This is what creates a healthy, productive, resilient pack of followers for Jesus. It’s what creates a balanced body of believers who can fulfill the gospel, even in times that feel more than a little hopeless.

Jesus sets a very high bar. It may be that we work to meet it all our lives but see only small progress. (Although, in my opinion, progress is assessed differently depending on where we look.) But Jesus is right: We need to set a high bar for what we want out of life, and for what we want to see in the world. When we despair, we must lean hard on those among us who are cheerful and resilient. When we are distracted, we should look to those who would remind us of the dangers we are fighting against. And always, we must be guided by the words and actions of Jesus, who was sent by God to walk among us, and who poses this question, to each and every one of us, each and every day: “Where will God send you?”

Amen.

Jan 19 ~ No One Gift is Above Another

A recording of the sermon is available by clicking above.

Sermon, by Pastor Joel

January 19, 2025

Isaiah 62:1-5  

Psalm 36:5-10  

1 Corinthians 12:1-11  

John 2:1-11   

The context of this sermon is

100% written by a human

Which is more valuable to you: freedom or equality? Depending on how people answer this question, they often find themselves on different sides of the political spectrum. Conservatives will say that for people to be free some inequality must exist. On the far left, ensuring equality justifies a certain level of restriction on freedom. Freedom and equality are two ideals of a just society. To feel both free and equal are marks of a happy human life. And yet they are often pitched against each other. Or societies try to find the right balance, with mixed results. Too much freedom in the market place, and the gap between rich and poor grows. Alexandria Ruble wrote “Entangled Emancipation”: a book about East Germany exploring how during the socialism of the cold war, women, in many ways, enjoyed more equality – at home, at university, and at work – than their western counterparts. And yet they had to worry about a police state, about keeping silent in the public square, about shortages in essential supplies. So, force control upon people, even if it increases equality, and freedom suffers painfully. But must they always be in conflict?

My first-year university son Samson introduced me to an American philosopher named Elizabeth Anderson, who says “No.” A society can aim for both freedom and equality by thinking about that goal in a different way – and thus bring together increasingly polarized political views. First, she says, look at the roots of a tolerant society.  It began, she argues, with the peaceful settling of religious differences. As a result, space was made in the public sphere for different approaches to faith. This progressive notion of equality before God then led to freedom for individuals who could express different identities in different parts of their lives: work, home, church. “Is that not what it means to be free?” Anderson asked? Not to be caught by a single identity in every step you take, but to have the ability to adopt identities that work to the best of your ability. For women, we see what this has meant – the freedom to be both a talented engineer, a nurturing mother, an empowered romantic partner. But we also see how without efforts by society to strive for equality – without good childcare for one example, and true access to traditional male professions for another --  that freedom is hindered. A society that seeks to be both free and equal, Elizabeth Anderson argues, creates systems and policies that provide equal opportunity for the exercise of one’s talents.

This is the point that Elizabeth Anderson is making – and it is the point that our second lesson makes this morning, as clear an argument for both equality and freedom as we might find in Sacred Text.  We are told there is a variety of gifts, which we might in our modern time, translate to skills or abilities or talents. Some might have the gift of wisdom, or the ability to impart knowledge. Others might have faith, the ability to communicate with people, the ability to heal. What else is the gospel describing then but teachers, and lawyers and philosophers and caregivers and mediators, and tradespeople, and nurturers. And the second lesson goes on to make clear that all of these are activated by the one and the same Holy Spirit.  There are varieties of gifts by one Spirit. And varieties of services, but one God. No one gift is above the other.  To each is given, for the common good.

What, then, does this mean for us, as individuals and as a society, if we truly accept this idea in scripture – that all talents are created equal? First, we must reject the inherent status, imposed by free market societies, that some jobs are higher status, and these are usually the ones – in finance, law, entertainment, and politics – that are most rewarded.

It is nonsensical from a community point of view – for what would we do, how long would our communities function, without teachers, and paramedics, and garbage collectors, and nurses – jobs less rewarded financially? We must rightly ask ourselves about this system. Some countries already have – which is why in Norway, for instance, early childhood educators receive much higher salaries and much more status than they do here.  The question that Anderson asks – the point raised in our Second Lesson – may lead us there. If indeed all talents are equal before God, is it not our responsibility to ensure that we remove barriers to people engaging those talents to their fullest? This is where Anderson brings her point home – the idea is not to hand out money paternalistically, to see the ‘haves’ of society so charitably tossing coins at the ‘have-nots’. This may make things more equal but not necessarily free. (For are not ‘have-nots’ still subject to the generosity of the ‘haves’?) But perhaps to ask deeper questions, such as, “What structurally must happen in society to maintain freedom by equalizing opportunity?” Public health care surely falls into this argument.  One example is making buildings wheelchair-accessible – by allowing everyone the freedom to enter, they are given equal access to the space.

So, we have a Second Lesson this morning that begins by reminding us that God has found the balance between equality and freedom. With the gifts of the Holy Spirit, we are made equal. Through the love and acceptance of God, we are granted freedom. But this lesson also raises significantly more substantive questions about what we want society to look like.  For example, “What is our calling to extend these two ideals into our public places and institutions?”

We will have an election this year – a chance, whatever your politics, to debate and consider what we value. We have all around us countries being torn apart, or frenzied into controversy, by this very discussion – should freedom reign supreme above equality, or should equality come at the expense of freedom? We have, in our faith, the example of this balance – perfected in our relationship with God. It is not so easily turned into practice on earth, but surely, we must try -- for our society, ourselves, and our children.  Surely that is what God, who sets the example, calls us all to do. Thankfully, as those verses from Corinthians remind us, we are blessed – each one of us, in our own way – with the gifts meant to be used toward that ideal goal - that time when freedom and equality are not traded off but exist in harmony.

Amen.