Around a Table
In the face of societal division and violence, it can be difficult to make meaning. Thankfully we are able to draw wisdom from Proverbs and the Epistle of James. Centered around the metaphor of the table, this sermon invites the listener to engage in healing a broken world, embodying God’s inclusive love where all are welcome.
The Glimpses of Grace podcast is a ministry of Grace Episcopal Church in Gainesville, Georgia. We are passionate about supporting the spiritual growth of souls, and we hope these sermons and conversations meet you where you are and enrich your soul as we all continue to make meaning in the world today.
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Transcript
Beginning a sermon can generally be tricky.
Do you jump straight in, quoting a bit of scripture?
Capture the attention with an image or a personal story?
Or maybe pose a question to begin the process of wondering?
Beginning a sermon can generally be tricky…
but where do you begin after a week like this past week?
A week where divisions are increasingly sharp,
Where violence—both physical and systemic—continues to oppress…
violence sparks anxiety: again, increasingly sharpening divides.
Where does that leave us?
How does it transform the way we go about our day…
how we walk into this space?
This morning we began Christian Education. This fall…
Adults will gather around a table to discuss metaphor, symbols, imagination…
or, for parents, ways in which we can find God in our families’ habits.
The youngest among us will gather around a table to wonder
about God’s work in the world
and imaginatively enter into the stories of our faith.
EYC (our Episcopal Youth Community) will gather around a table
to have conversation about wisdom found in scripture:
we’ll explore texts like Job, Song of Songs, the Sermon on the Mount,
and Proverbs.
Proverbs. These concise, evocative pieces of advice are borrowed across time:
“Not all who wander are lost” and “No flies enter a mouth that is shut;”
“Birds of a feather flock together” and “Whoever sows injustice will reap calamity.”
They roll off the tongue and permeate the memory.
But, revisiting these texts of earthly and spiritual wisdom is quite timely.
They reorient us…acting as a compass…
pointing us to how we live in our world, how we relate with one another.
Today’s first reading addresses those sharp divides we feel right now.
Yes, earthly wealth seems to place a chasm between people—
think beyond financial wealth—
wealth of knowledge, lack of time, wealth as dignity, absence of family/friends.
These things differentiate us. But, what binds us?
“the Lord is the maker of…all.”
All have a place at God’s table.
So, be generous, share. Don’t cheat or diminish one another.
Sure, that’s easy to say. We hear this type of message a lot on a Sunday morning:
We know God loves everyone, especially the marginalized.
The author of our Epistle names out loud that there seems to be
discrepancy between the head and the heart.
We know God loves everyone, but wisdom is a way of being.
Writing to his community, James lays it out:
He sees how society favors the wealthy and the privileged.
His Christian community is not being Christian.
What they claim in words and knowledge
does not match their actions, their way of being in the world.
James asks them: are you living for the world or living for God?
Living for the world exhibits a preference for those things that bring
ease, contentment…these folks look to be first in line.
Living for God has an element of unease in the face of suffering…
these folks wade through the crowd toward the back of the line…
looking for the cause of the suffering.
However, we are people who are deeply-rooted in systems.
Like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. writes in his letter from a Birmingham Jail:
“Privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily.
Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture;
But, as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us,
groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.”
James desires a stronger, more vibrant Christian community.
And if the group continues to revere independent affluence over
a sense of collective well-being, this is impossible.
It’s those who are poor, dressed in dirty clothes (or even naked),
and deprived of basic sustenance to which focus must shift.
For if the poor thrive…the community thrives.
Living for God…the Good News that Jesus has commanded us to teach…
has two parts:
The first (in Proverbs) is that God’s love is without borders, accessible by all,
present in moments of joy and abundance,
and even when hope seems unattainable.
The second (in James) is that God’s people are called to act upon,
to remember and engage… to be the Gospel in the world.
Engagement: a promise to be married, to be linked, united;
a battle between forces;
arranging to do something at a precise place in time;
the act of participating, becoming involved in, connecting with.
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus is traveling and has crossed a border
into another region, into Gentile country, into Tyre.
It’s clear he wants to be left alone, he “didn’t want anyone to know he was there.”
He doesn’t want to engage:
he isolates himself;
he gives vibes of “now is not the time;”
he is unconcerned.
However, a woman (who is “othered”) engages:
she notices him and wants to connect;
she believes his presence can stand against her daughter’s infirmity;
and she makes it clear—there’s no time like the present.
It can’t be lost on us that she responds with an image of a table.
A poem: Table by Robert Hull
We were going to sell the table.
It’s big where it is,
with those elbowing edges
coming after us
and corners
that force us into corners.
But we decided not to. Instead,
we said,
we’d rub down the surface,
get rid of each burn and dent
and moon of stain
and the stuck inch of newsprint.
But we’ve not even been able
to start cleaning our old table.
It’s had too many babies
changed on it,
too many trumpets
and spoons whanged on it,
too many whales and witches
drawn on it
to do anything with it;
there’s been too much homework and grief
dumped on it, too much laughter
heard round it, too many candles
burned down over it,
to do anything else but leave it there,
in the awkward place it’s in,
elbowing us with its edges,
reminding us.
The table Robert Hull describes is marked by dents, burns, stains of life lived…
of relationships, joys, struggles, and messes.
Life is not pristine.
Commentators disagree on Jesus’ harsh response to the unnamed woman–
Some propose Jesus was testing the woman to tease her into affirming her faith.
Others suggest that in this episode Jesus is simply exhausted and very human.
Or maybe he didn’t quite see the breadth of his mission until this exchange.
Perhaps, all of it is a bit true.
For he returns invigorated and immediately “makes the deaf to hear.”
Transformation is never far away…we just may have to cross a border to see it.
A table is at the center of what we do as a Christian community—
a place where no one is too poor, too broken, to “other” to belong.
We gather around a table, not just for ourselves;
(like a proverb?) the table reorients us toward one another,
toward the “othered,”
and toward the work of healing a violent world.
Around a table is where Jesus meets us, where Christian community thrives,
and where we all belong.
We’re invited.
Are we ready to engage?