Stones

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

June 24, 2018

7 Proper B

When I was a child, our grandfather would take us down to the pond near his house and teach us how to skip stones across the water.  First, we had to choose a stone that was the right size, fairly flat, and as smooth as possible.  Then he showed us how to use the correct angle and the perfect spin to send the stone skipping across the water.  At first, we could only get the stones to skip once or twice before sinking.  But with some practice, we could get three or four skips across the water.  Our goal was always to get the stone to the other side of the pond, but that never happened. 

We hear about another stone this morning.  This stone was a small stone cast by a small boy at a great foe.  Clearly, David had to have the ability to choose the right stone, the ability to aim accurately, and the strength to land the stone in the right place.  Perhaps David had honed his slingshot skills while protecting his sheep from the lions and bears.  David tells Saul that he has killed lions and bears, and declares his trust that the God who saved him from the lion and the bear would also save him from the great Philistine.  David’s confidence in his own skills and in the God who had kept him safe in the past gave him the courage to take on Goliath.

Courage is perhaps understandably lacking in the disciples this morning.  The disciples and Jesus are crossing the lake when a great windstorm produces such huge waves that the disciples are afraid the boat will be swamped, and they will all drown.  Jesus is asleep in the boat, apparently unconcerned about the impending disaster. The disciples wake Jesus up and say "Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?" Jesus wakes up and says to the wind and waves "Peace, be still." And the wind and waves calm. Then Jesus says to the disciples "Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?" And the disciples say to each other "Who is this, that even the wind and sea obey him?"

I find it interesting that Jesus says "Why are you afraid?" rather than  "There is nothing to be afraid of." The difference is huge. The storm is truly fierce.  Drowning is a real possibility.  There is clearly something to fear. The question is why the disciples fear.

The disciples are professional fishermen when Jesus calls them. They have spent a lot of time on the water. At this point, they are probably much better at catching fish than they are at being disciples. So, in theory at least, they have the skills to read the wind and waves and know how to handle this situation, or, better yet avoid the danger in the first place. But in their fear, they forget.  Unlike David, who uses his skills and his trust in God to give him the courage to face a fearsome situation, the disciples forget their skills and do not realize that they are with Jesus, who has power over the wind and waves.  The disciples are paralyzed by their fear and can do nothing in the face of great adversity.

David summoned his skill, his courage, and his trust in God to confront Goliath.  His skill happened to be with a stone and a slingshot.  This week, we have seen other kinds of stones thrown.  We have heard verbal stones thrown with judgement and rancor against people whose views are different from our own, and seen stones cast in a terrible ways against people whose backgrounds or life situations we cannot begin to imagine.  Courage is required to tackle the difficult challenges that face our country with some measure of grace.  The issue of immigration, as with the issue of gun control and other divisive issues, are very complicated issues with no clear or simple solution.  We can easily feel as small as David before Goliath-like issues, or as unable to deal with those issue as the disciples were to deal with the storm.  

However, in the reading from 2 Corinthians, Paul gives us the stones we are to use in the face of such great challenges. Paul wrote of his own challenges of “afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger” which he met with the stones of “purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God.”  These are the stones God has given to use as we work to solve the challenges we face, whether personal challenges, global challenges, or anything in between.  These are the stones we are called to practice skipping across the water over and over again, until our skills are perfected.  These are the stones we have been given to use as we practice keeping our baptismal promise to seek and serve Christ in all people, to work for justice and peace, and to respect the dignity of every human being.  David used his well practiced skills, and his trust in the God who had always kept him safe to give him the courage to do what seemed impossible.  God calls us to our well practiced skills, and our trust in God, so that we have the courage to be the people God calls us to be as we face the daunting challenges of our day.

                                                                             Amen.

Our Offering

Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

June 17, 2018

6 Proper B

          In 2014, a Cincinnati restaurant owner realized that every day hundreds of pounds of perfectly good food were going to waste in local restaurants and groceries.  Grocery stores were throwing out produce with slight blemishes and restaurants were throwing out food that had been prepared but never served.  The restaurant owner was Suzy DeYoung, a gourmet chef who owned a French bistro in the city.   Rather than throw out the food she had prepared but never served, Suzi began using that food to create great meals for people in Cincinnati who are food insecure.  Eventually, Suzy transitioned from her life as a restaurant owner and French chef to launch La Soupe, an organization dedicated to rescuing perishable food from grocery stores and restaurants and creating delicious healthy meals to serve at soup kitchens and homeless shelters. Today, La Soupe rescues about 5000 pounds of perishable food each week and creates meals for 2000 people.  Through La Soupe, local chefs also teach low income high school students how to create delicious soups from rescued produce.  Each student receives a crock-pot and ingredients to take home so they can cook for their families.  A ministry that began with one person rescuing fruits and vegetables to serve a few hungry people has become a force in Cincinnati where a large group of volunteers use perfectly good food that would otherwise go to the landfill to feed literally thousands of people each week.

          This morning, we hear Jesus say "The Kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how." Then Jesus says "The Kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs." These two parables point to something of the mystery of the Kingdom of God. When Jesus began his ministry, his first words were "The Kingdom of God has arrived, repent and believe in the good news." These parables tell us that the Kingdom of God is growing in our midst, starting from something so small as to perhaps look useless and eventually becoming so large that all the birds of the air can make nests there.

          However, these parables also make the emerging Kingdom of God seem effortless. The seed just sprouts and grows and all of a sudden, there is a harvest and the planter does not know how. Or what starts as the tiniest of seeds just becomes the greatest of all shrubs. Poof! Just like that. But when we go about the work God has given us to do, working to make the fullness of the Kingdom of God a more present reality in our own world, that work does not happen without effort. Whether we’re working with Habitat for Humanity to build homes for low income families, or serving dinner at Welcome Table or Family Promise, or teaching Vacation Bible School to help our children learn how to serve, or whatever we do to work for justice and peace in the world around us, a great deal of work is required by a large number of people. Certainly the work of La Soupe does not happen without a lot of effort.  That work may be joyful, wonderful work, but the effort required is still work. If the Kingdom of God is supposed to just grow in our midst the way a seed grows into a plant, why does cultivating the Kingdom of God require so much effort?

          When Jesus announced that the Kingdom of God has arrived, he did not just sit back and watch the show. Jesus himself put in an awful lot of hours preaching, teaching, praying, feeding, healing and otherwise going about the work of growing the Kingdom of God. That is our first clue that perhaps these parables are not about the Kingdom just magically emerging in our midst. The second clue is that Jesus consistently taught in parables, not to state the seemingly obvious, but to get us to look beyond appearances and think deeply about the mystery that is the Kingdom of God. If these two parables are not about God’s kingdom growing in our midst without any effort on our part, what are the parables saying to us?

          In our reading from I Samuel this morning, we hear the story of a small boy who will become a great King. God’s choice of David is a surprising choice.  First, God sends Samuel off to find Jesse the Bethlehemite because God has chosen a king from among Jesse’s sons. Jesse’s grandmother was Ruth, a Moabite so not a pure Israelite, making anyone from her family a surprising choice for a king of Israel. Secondly, when Samuel sees the oldest son, who would be the obvious choice from among the sons, God says "Do not look on his appearance, or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord does not see as mortals see. They look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart."  Eventually 7 of Jesse’s sons pass before Samuel and God does not chose any of them. Jesse has one more son, the very youngest, but that son is out tending the sheep. David, the least likely son from an unlikely family, is anointed king in the presence of his brothers, and, we are told, "the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon David from that day forward."                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

The story of David might also make us think that something great comes from something very small with no effort.   However, David may have become a great king, but as we will see over the next few weeks, David’s success did not come without effort and did come despite some significant failures.  So there is more to the story of David than simply someone small becoming someone great.

          The parable of the mustard seed and the story of the call of David remind us that God will take what we have to offer, even when we believe our offering is too small to make a difference and use our offering to help bring about the Kingdom of God.  When we think that the time we have to offer is not enough to matter, or the money we can give won’t make a difference, or our one vote, or phone call or letter to our representatives in Congress will be a drop in the bucket of protest, we are called to remember the mustard seed, or the little boy who became a great King, or how some kale and potatoes became an abundance for hungry people in Cincinnati.  When we trust God with what we have, no matter the size, the gospel tells us that God can do more than we could ask or imagine.

                                                                                      Amen.