Golden Syrup

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

January 28, 2018

4 Epiphany B

Jungle Jim’s is an enormous international grocery store in Cincinnati.  I have not yet been to the West Side Market in Cleveland, but I imagine they are similar in the vast array of foods offered.  At Jungle Jim’s, there are departments for Asian, Indian, Hispanic, European, Mediterranean and African foods.  Many of those departments have aisles for individual countries.  I am usually in search of tea, chocolate, and cheese, but Jungle Jim’s is also the only place where I can find golden syrup.  Golden syrup is the British version of corn syrup, with a caramel color and buttery taste that make for an amazing pecan pie.  The Great Britain section of Jungle Jim’s is in the very back of the store, which must be at least a half mile from the entrance. Wandering through the aisles, looking at the great variety of food from all around the world, I can tell you that I have never seen one section, aisle or shelf marked "Food sacrificed to idols."  Not one.  And if Jungle Jim's doesn't have such food, I'm guessing we would be hard pressed to find these delicacies anywhere in our part of the world, including the West Side Market.  So, St. Paul's words this morning about whether to eat food sacrificed to idols seem rather irrelevant to our lives of faith in Hudson, Ohio in 2018.  The author of one of the commentaries I read said that he had never heard a sermon preached about this passage from I Corinthians.  Now, I know that preaching is not supposed to be competitive sport, but Challenge Accepted!

 The church in Corinth to which Paul wrote was divided over all manner of things-such as who was baptized by the greater Christian, who has the greater spiritual gifts, and how people of faith should behave at the Eucharist, which had turned into something of a potluck in Corinth.  In this passage, Paul addresses the issue of food sacrificed to idols.  We may find that irrelevant, but in Paul's time, the question of whether to eat such food was of deep concern and was tearing the church apart.  Since idols have no real existence, some Christians thought it was fine to eat the food that had been sacrificed.  Other Christians believed that to eat such food was to participate in the idolatry, which was clearly against the commandments of God.  This disagreement threatened to divide the church and created an ugly atmosphere of condescension and judgement. 

          The issue here is not allowing a few people control the majority.  Just one chapter later, Paul will write "For why should my liberty be subject to the judgement of someone else's conscience? If I partake with thankfulness, why should I be denounced because of that for which I give thanks?"  The issue at stake here is the nature of Christian community.  Christians are called to be a community of love and respect, not condescension and judgement.  In baptism, we 21st century Christians also promise to respect the dignity of every human being including each other and those with whom we disagree.  At Christ Church, we don't always agree on everything.  We don't all have the same politics or priorities or interests.  But despite our differences, Paul calls Christians to be communities of love and respect.

 What Paul does not tell us is how we are to love each other in the midst of any disagreement we might have.  What does a community look like where people genuinely love each even when they disagree?  For that, we turn to the gospel reading.  First, when the Sabbath came, Jesus went into the synagogue and taught.  The gospel calls the Body of Christ to gather on the Christian Sabbath to worship God and to learn.  Then Jesus heals a man with an unclean spirit.  The gospel also calls us to respond to the needs around us.  Jesus neither judged the man nor sent him away. The man had probably been rejected any number of times and was not likely welcome in very many places.  But Jesus healed him.  Here and in so many other places in the gospel, Jesus calls us to respond to the needs around us, whether the needs of each other or the needs of strangers, to bind up the injured and set free those who are held hostage by the injustices of society. 

          What is the secret to being a healthy congregation in conflicted times, whether the conflict is over church matters, as it was in Corinth, or in the current secular/political atmosphere?  The answer is not to ignore our differences.  The answer is to stay focused on the work of the church-worshiping God and doing the work of meeting the human needs of those around us, whether the physical needs of those who are hungry, or spiritual needs of those who thirst for a church that will welcome them.  When our identity as Christians comes from our common worship and our common gospel work, then we are free to talk about the issues of the day on which we may disagree. 

 Jesus and Paul remind us that the body of Christ, the church, is to be a community of faith where love builds up and allows us to respond to the needs to the world.  If we don't love each other, we probably can't do ministry together very well either.  And if we are not engaged in ministry together, our love for each other is mostly talk.  The two go hand and hand and make for a church that is a joyful and effective witness to our faith-which is what both Jesus and Paul have in mind!                                              

                                                                              Amen.