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"HERE WE ALL ARE
August 28, 2010
Westmount Park United Church
Jane and I have five children who have all grown up and moved away from home. Some of them are still living in Montreal but others are far away, one in Scotland and another in Australia. With such great distances between us it's always exciting when we can all get together. We've actually managed to get everyone together twice this year. We all gathered in Australia in February for our son David's wedding and then reassembled in Pointe Claire in June for our daughter Christina's wedding. Whenever our whole family manages to get together in the same place at the same time there's a phrase that I'm expected to say, a phrase that happens to be the title I have given this sermon - "Here we all are."
When we're not all together there's another kind of signature thing I'm expected to do whenever we have guests with us to share a meal. On such occasions, as I'm counting up the number of places to be set at the table, I'll start with the number seven, subtract the family members not present, and then add the number of guests. It is often at meal times that we are particularly conscious of people's presence or absence. So when the whole family is gathered around the table then one can say, with a sense of joy and completeness, "Here we all are."
I imagine most of us would have the same feeling about wanting to share special occasions and festive meals with family members and close friends. But in our gospel reading from Luke Jesus has some rather surprising advice about preparing the guest list when planning an important and festive meal. Jesus' instruction is this: "When you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind." [Luke 14:13] Jesus gives this advice so that the banquet celebration will be full and complete. It's actually the same criterion at work as with family gatherings. The celebration won't be complete unless everyone who should be there is invited and comes to the banquet.
We were so delighted with the number of family members who were able to go all the way to Australia in February for David and Sue's wedding, not just our immediate family but others as well, and then we had even more of our families present for Christina and Seamus's wedding here in June. How wonderful it was that so many people were willing to travel across the continent and across the oceans in order to have such an amazing family gathering. For us the fulness or completeness of an affair is measured by how many family members are able to come. But Jesus describes a banquet whose completeness is measured in another way altogether. In fact he explicitly says we should not invite our relatives to the banquet table.
Quite obviously Jesus' list of people to invite are those who usually get left out when those with social standing lay out sumptuous banquets. Why does Jesus insist that they be invited? I suppose one reason might be because the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind are often the hungry, so they could do with a good meal. But I'm sure there is more here than just Jesus encouraging acts of charity which feed the hungry. More important than having the disadvantaged and marginalized in society fed is having them included at the table. We have very nice meals when our family gathers together for special occasions like weddings and birthdays, but what makes these gatherings special celebrations is not the fact that we eat good food but that we get together. Who is gathered around the table is far more important than what is laid out on the table. What is important about Jesus' list of invitees is not that they get fed but that they are included.
You will notice that, two thousand years before the phrase was coined, Jesus advocated affirmative action. He didn't say that in addition to all your friends and relatives you should add a few more to the guest list. Adding a few token disadvantaged people to the table just won't do enough to address the severe imbalance there is in society. So Jesus says, "When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbours... But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind." [Luke 14: 12&13]. Things are so far out of balance they need a radical realignment. Don't invite your friends and neighbours at all. Make a deliberate point of giving priority to the marginalized and the disadvantaged to make sure that they have an equal place in society with everyone else.
To be sure we need to feed the hungry, but a more insidious and equally serious problem is the fact that the tables of power are woefully unbalanced and incomplete. Those who gather at the tables where important decisions are made which affect everyone cannot even come close to saying, "Here we all are." We do live in a democratic society in which our governments are elected by the people, but that is not the same thing as everyone having an equal voice in society. The word "democracy" is a Greek word which is made up of two words: demos, which means people, and kratos, which means power. So "democracy" means literally "power to the people." We may have a system of electing governments by universal suffrage, but we do not, by any stretch of the imagination, live in a society where all the people have power, certainly not the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.
Over the years I have had associations with our native United Churches in both Kahnewake on the South Shore and Kanehsatake in Oka. Anyone who takes even the most cursory glance at the fortunes of the people of the First Nations has to be struck by how badly the original inhabitants of this land have fared compared with the settlers who have arrived over the last few hundred years, and have now become the dominant society. When governments try to help they tend to address the need in native communities for things like better health care, housing, and education, but when I talk to the native people and ask what they want the answer I get is: We want a seat at the table.
Jesus would have us invite the marginalized to the banquet, not just so they can be fed, but so that they can be included. We need to have everyone at the table, or represented at the table, and it's not just to give a leg up to the disadvantaged, but because we all benefit from having everyone heard and heeded. Those who tend to be excluded or ignored, because of their race or age or gender or sexual orientation or lack of money or failing health or lack of success, all have something valuable to contribute. Unless everyone is at the table, unless everyone has their voice heard, unless everyone is fully and meaningfully included, we will not be able to achieve a truly democratic society.
The message from Jesus is clear, God wants the barriers broken down which exclude people from full and fair participation in life. If there are second class citizens of any sort for any reason then the guest list of those whom Jesus wants invited in to be full partakers of life's banquet has to be expanded. As long as people are excluded from the table, be it the eating table, or the decision making table, or the getting together to have fun table, then we will not be complete, we will not have the fullest blessing of what God intends for human society. We will be incomplete and unfulfilled until that day when we can truly say, "Here we all are."
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Readings for August 28, 2010
Jeremiah 2: 4‑13 Listen to the Lord's message, you descendants of Jacob, you tribes of Israel. The Lord says: "What accusation did your ancestors bring against me? What made them turn away from me? They worshipped worthless idols and became worthless themselves. They did not care about me, even though I rescued them from Egypt and led them through the wilderness: a land of deserts and sand-dunes, a dry and dangerous land where no one lives and no one will even travel. I brought them into a fertile land, to enjoy its harvests and its other good things. But instead they ruined my land; they defiled the country I had given them. The priests did not ask, `Where is the Lord?' My own priests did not know me. The rulers rebelled against me; the prophets spoke in the name of Baal and worshipped useless idols. "And so I, the Lord, will state my case against my people again. I will bring charges against their descendants. Go west to the island of Cyprus, and send someone eastwards to the land of Kedar. You will see that nothing like this has ever happened before. No other nation has ever changed its gods, even though they were not real. But my people have exchanged me, the God who has brought them honour, for gods that can do nothing for them. And so I command the sky to shake with horror, to be amazed and astonished, for my people have committed two sins: they have turned away from me, the spring of fresh water, and they have dug cisterns, cracked cisterns that can hold no water at all. (TEV) Hebrews 13: 1‑8, 15‑16 Keep on loving one another. Remember to welcome strangers in your homes. There were some who did that and welcomed angels without knowing it. Remember those who are in prison, as though you were in prison with them. Remember those who are suffering, as though you were suffering as they are. Marriage is to be honoured by all, and husbands and wives must be faithful to each other. God will judge those who are immoral and those who commit adultery. Keep your lives free from the love of money, and be satisfied with what you have. For God has said, "I will never leave you; I will never abandon you." Let us be bold, then, and say, "The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What can anyone do to me?" Remember your former leaders, who spoke God's message to you. Think back on how they lived and died, and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and for ever. Let us, then, always offer praise to God as our sacrifice through Jesus, which is the offering presented by lips that confess him as Lord. Do not forget to do good and to help one another, because these are the sacrifices that please God. (TEV) Luke 14: 1, 7‑14 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. When he noticed how the guests chose the places of honor, he told them a parable. "When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet, do not sit down at the place of honor, in case someone more distinguished than you has been invited by your host; and the host who invited both of you may come and say to you, 'Give this person your place,' and then in disgrace you would start to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he may say to you, 'Friend, move up higher'; then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at the table with you. For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted." He said also to the one who had invited him, "When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous." (NRSV)
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