Sermon preached by Rev. Martha Nell Thomson of Wesley United Church.

 

World Communion Sunday -- celebrated the first Sunday in October -- is one of the most venerable of “special Sundays.” The day has taken on new relevancy and depth of meaning in a world where globalization often has undermined peace and justice -- and in a time when fear divides the peoples of God's earth. On this day we celebrate our oneness in Christ, the Prince of Peace, in the midst of the world we are called to serve -- a world ever more in need of peacemaking.

World Communion Sunday (originally called World Wide Communion Sunday) originated in the Presbyterian Church (USA), which is the denomination in which I was born & raised.  In 1936, for the first time, the first Sunday in October was celebrated in Presbyterian churches in the United States and overseas. From the beginning, it was planned so that other denominations could make use of it and, after a few years, the idea spread beyond the Presbyterian Church.

We live in a church situation where the diversity of understanding and practice of the Christian sacred meal is so great that we do not even have a common term for it.  Some call it the “mass”, others “the Lord's Supper”, some “communion, and yet others the “Eucharist”.  Yet it is the central most common act of unity in Christianity.

Part of the function of religion is to provide a sense of safety, security and trust in the midst of a world that often seems arbitrary, incontrollable, and dangerous. This is why religious groups tend to be homogenous. It is easier to feel safe when you are with your own family, your own tribe, your own nationality, your own race, your own party, your own kind -- people who look like you, people who think the way you think, people who behave the way you behave. Because part of what religion does for us to help us feel safe in an unsafe and unpredictable world, religious groups often tend toward unanimity of family, race, class or culture. You want to go to worship where you don't have to watch your back. The earliest religions were family-based –– altars in our households where we worship our ancestors. Blood religion. Then emerged tribal religions, where we were all part of the same extended family. Then national religions where we were all part of the same people. This is the history of biblical religion –– it began as a family religion, then the tribe of Abraham, then the 12 tribes of the nation Israel, and then an amazing thing happened in the time of Jeremiah. The nation was destroyed, but Judaism survived as it was scattered all over the face of the earth in Diaspora.

Then another amazing thing happened. Following the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, his Jewish followers learned to give up the safety and security of basing religion on any human bond –– not family, nation, gender or race --and the church was born. The punch line of the gospel of Matthew is this: Jesus instructs his disciples to make disciples of all nations –– to leave behind all religion of blood and class and language –– and to make disciples of all nations, baptizing people of all nations into one new community inclusive of all peoples with no one to watch their back. Church isn't supposed to be a safe place because we are all alike here. Church is supposed to transcend all the cocoons we make to give ourselves a sense of security and coziness. It is a natural and human thing for people to want to gather in safe places to pray, but it is not Jesus' way. To really know Jesus' presence, we must leave behind the safety of our upper rooms and sanctuaries and familiar turf, and go into all the world creating communities where natural enemies are gathered into one spiritual family.

Do you enjoy a meal with good friends?  So did Jesus.  In the Gospels we find him sharing meals with a wide assortment of people: friends and enemies, pillars of society and outcasts.  We think of sharing a meal together as a sign of friendship, a time of good conversation and pleasant experiences.  But many of the meals Jesus shared were scandalous. These meals were little moments of the Kingdom.

So we are here today to remember Jesus through the sharing of a meal. There are two kinds of "memory." There is memory that is static and memory that is dynamic. Static memory is the recall of the past, precisely as "past." It is the memory that sits sadly beside the treasure chest of the past and finds only `a broken heart among my souvenirs.'

Dynamic memory is the recall of the past as it is the springboard to the present and the future. It is the memory that, in those times of troubled aloneness, brings us home -- the memory that, in those experiences of loss and confusion, sees us through.

The German theologian, Johannes B. Metz, calls this latter memory `dangerous.' He means this in the sense that this kind of memory can be ignored only `at peril.' Whatever is `perilous' is `dangerous.'

`Dangerous memory' includes `dynamic memory.' This memory has `power' (the Greek: `dynamis'). This memory does something -- something incredibly powerful. This memory is dynamite! It is the memory that makes us who we are and empowers us to accomplish the `doing' which flows from that `being.' It is the memory of which political philosopher Milan Kundera speaks when he observes that the first step in the subjugation of a people is the destruction of their memory.

 

Today we do not just gather to remember the stories of Jesus creating communities around the meal table. We gather around the table for a meal.  In doing that we actively place ourselves in the unbroken 2,000 year tradition of Jesus and his followers meeting around a shared table. As we do what he did we open ourselves to receive forgiveness, healing, strength, love.

 

In our first reading from Mark we see Jesus and the disciples “on the road and in need”.   And we see right away, the pattern that is set for all of Jesus's experiences of meal sharing. When the Pharisees were critical Jesus & his disciples,  Jesus  merely drew  attention to the fact that human need takes precedence over legalistic religious systems.  He referred to the bread of the presence that David had to beg for for his hungry soldiers. It was bread that was supposed to be a sign of God's presence. It was not for eating, at least by ordinary people. It was for display, commanded to be on the table of worship, but just as a symbol. It was replaced every so often so that it wouldn't get moldy, but the only people allowed to actually eat the bread were the priests.

So David comes along and says essentially, that this is sort of a stupid rule, treating this read like it is something special and priests acting like they are something special so that only their holy bodies and their holy taste buds get to appreciate this holy wheat. David had a different view of things. I have some hungry soldiers here, he says, who have observed all the religious rules about what to do or not to do before going into battle. I have these hungry soldiers. You have bread. How about it?  And the same with Jesus. The basis of all of Jesus' actions was human need & compassion.

Levi was an outcast, a traitor, a scoundrel, and most probably a thief.  He was no saint, no pillar of the church. He was one of the Jews who collected taxes for the hated Roman government & for their own pockets.  The rest of the Jews despised them, would not enter their houses, and most certainly would not sit down and eat with them. But Jesus said to Levi, “Follow me.”

As an act of gratitude, Levi wanted to provide dinner for Jesus. But who would come?  Only the sinners would go to Levi's feast, the sinners and Jesus, that is. Levi probably intended a joyful, friendly gathering.  Jesus turned it into a declaration of salvation.

“The Pharisees and their scribes were complaining to his disciples, saying, ‘‘Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?''Jesus answered, ‘‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners to repentance.''

Not all of the meals Jesus shared were with outcasts. Surprisingly, some of the meals were at the other end of the social and religious scale.   On one occasion Jesus received a strange invitation.  The main Sabbath meal took place about noon, and after worship, it was a normal custom to invite visiting teachers to dinner.  But when the Pharisee invited Jesus, it was a trap.

When Jesus came to dinner, the Pharisees were watching. The word for “watching” is the same word that is used for espionage.  Jesus was under surveillance. But Jesus did not let that stop him from offering healing to anyone, even though it was against the rules. 

The Pharisees weren't there to find answers; they were there to find an accusation and Jesus gave them what they were looking for.  He challenged them with their own rules. “If it is right to help an animal on the Sabbath day, how can it be wrong to help a man?  What is worth more: a person or an ox?  At the Pharisee's table, Jesus declared the importance of people.  The table of Jesus Christ is a place of healing and hope.  It was a table of healing and hope for the man with dropsy, and it is a table of healing and hope for you and for I.

Jesus shared his meals with such varied people that often there were strong emotional overtones.  It was normal for a servant to wash the feet of an invited guest.  But it definitely was not normal for a harlot to enter the house of a Pharisee and it was even more abnormal for her to wash a rabbi's feet with her tears.

Jesus not only knew the woman's character;  he read the Pharisee's innermost thoughts. Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.'' Then he said to her, ‘‘Your sins are forgiven.'' But those who were at the table with him began to say among themselves, ‘‘Who is this who even forgives sins?'' And he said to the woman, ‘‘Your faith has saved you; go in peace.''

The story is charged with emotion. Everyone knew it was a staggering claim, - Only God can forgive sins. 

The gospel writers, and especially Luke, show Jesus at supper with all sorts of people; outcasts like Levi and Zacchaeus, honored Pharisees and learned scribes, women of the streets, neighbors who crown in to listen,  the highest and lowest of society, those who came in thanksgiving and adoration, and those who set a trap to entangle him. The good news of Jesus was the same for the outcast and for the social leader,  for the open sinner and for those who seemed upright. When the Lord is at his table, it is a focus of passion and compassion, a place for God's forgiveness and our human response of love.

The reaction to Jesus was varied in his time, just as it is today.  For some, he was and is a means of salvation, of healing, of hope, of compassion, of love.  For others he was and is offensive, scandalous, dangerous. 

Now we come to a different supper.  Jesus made plain whom he would invite to his supper; everyone who wanted to be accepted by God, every man who was down and hoped for the hand of God to life him up, every woman who felt unloved and longed for the love of God, every man or woman or child who had a vision of the goodness of God and who sought to live in that goodness. In that forgiveness, in that healing, in that renewal, in that unity, let us come now to our Lord's table. Jesus said, when you do this, remember me.  In so doing we keep the dangerous memory of Jesus alive.

 

Resources for sermon are from a Sermon preached at Foundry United Methodist (U.S.A)  By Rev. Dean Snyder, from “A Memory that Empowers” by Raphael Amrhein, C.P., and from Come Dine with Jesus by Robert F. Scott.

 

Scripture Readings referenced in the Sermon:

 

Mark 2:23-28 

23 One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields; and as they made their way his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. ²⁴The Pharisees said to him, ‘‘Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?'' ²⁵And he said to them, ‘‘Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need of food? ²⁶He entered the house of God, when Abiathar was high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and he gave some to his companions.'' ²⁷Then he said to them, ‘‘The Sabbath was made for humankind, and not humankind for the Sabbath; ²⁸so the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.''

 

Luke 5:27-32;

27 After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth; and he said to him, ‘‘Follow me.'' ²⁸And he got up, left everything, and followed him. ²⁹Then Levi gave a great banquet for him in his house; and there was a large crowd of tax collectors and others sitting at the table with them. ³⁰The Pharisees and their scribes were complaining to his disciples, saying, ‘‘Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?'' ³¹Jesus answered, ‘‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; ³²I have come to call not the righteous but sinners to repentance.''

 

Luke 14:1-6

On one occasion when Jesus was going to the house of a leader of the Pharisees to eat a meal on the Sabbath, they were watching him closely. ²Just then, in front of him, there was a man who had dropsy. ³And Jesus asked the lawyers and Pharisees, ‘‘Is it lawful to cure people on the Sabbath, or not?'' ⁴But they were silent. So Jesus took him and healed him, and sent him away. ⁵Then he said to them, ‘‘If one of you has a child or an ox that has fallen into a well, will you not immediately pull it out on a Sabbath day?'' ⁶And they could not reply to this.

 

Luke 7:36-50 

36 One of the Pharisees asked Jesus to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee''s house and took his place at the table. ³⁷And a woman in the city, who was a sinner, having learned that he was eating in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster jar of ointment. ³⁸She stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began to bathe his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair. Then she continued kissing his feet and anointing them with the ointment. ³⁹Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw it, he said to himself, ‘‘If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him——that she is a sinner.'' ⁴⁰Jesus spoke up and said to him, ‘‘Simon, I have something to say to you.'' ‘‘Teacher,'' he replied, ‘‘Speak.'' ^41‘‘A certain creditor had two debtors; one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. ⁴²When they could not pay, he cancelled the debts for both of them. Now which of them will love him more?'' ⁴³Simon answered, ‘‘I suppose the one for whom he cancelled the greater debt.'' And Jesus said to him, ‘‘You have judged rightly.'' ⁴⁴Then turning toward the woman, he said to Simon, ‘‘Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has bathed my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. ⁴⁵You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not stopped kissing my feet. ⁴⁶You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. ⁴⁷Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.'' ⁴⁸Then he said to her, ‘‘Your sins are forgiven.'' ⁴⁹But those who were at the table with him began to say among themselves, ‘‘Who is this who even forgives sins?'' ⁵⁰And he said to the woman, ‘‘Your faith has saved you; go in peace.''