Perspective

Philippians 3:4-14, Matthew 21:33-46

October 5, 2008: World Communion Sunday

Rochelle A. Stackhouse

“Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful.” Hold that thought while I share a few other quotes.

First, from Paul’s letter we read today: “If anyone has reason to be confident in their pedigree, I have more. Circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the tribe of Benjamin, a Pharisee, having followed the law blamelessly from childhood.”

Then from Jesus’ parable: “Finally the owner sent his own son to the renters, because he thought they would respect him. But when they saw the man’s son, they said, ‘Someday he will own the vineyard. Let’s kill him! Then we can have it all for ourselves.’”

From an ABC news report: “Does believing that God is on our side make it easier for us to inflict pain and suffering on those perceived to be our enemies? If we think God sanctions violence, are we more likely to engage in violent acts? The answer to both those questions, according to new research by an international group led by a professor from the University of Michigan, is a resounding yes, even among those who do not consider themselves believers.” (ABC News, March 27, 2007)

Former chair of the Democratic National Committee, Don Fowler, joked that the possibility of Hurricane Gustav hitting New Orleans during the Republican National Convention, and thus diverting attention from the Convention, showed that “God is on our side.”

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s pastor has prayed that she be elected vice president because it must be God’s will that she is running.

Do you remember Michael Douglas as Gordon Gekko in the 1987 film Wall Street with his stunning speech ending with the words “Greed is good; greed is right; greed works. Greed will save that malfunctioning corporation, the U. S. A.”

“Warren Buffett says that it’s only when the tide goes out that you learn who’s been swimming naked. The tide went way, way out for corporate America [this year] exposing all sorts of embarrassing details. How embarrassing? KBHome had an abysmal year, losing $929 million on a revenue of $6.4 billion. Shareholders also suffered as the company share price dropped from $53 to the high teens. But CEO Jeffrey Mezger weathered the storm. In addition to his $1 million base salary, he was awarded a $6 million cash bonus for the year. (USA Today 4/11/08)

When I was in the nation of Jordan in 1992, my group went to see the American embassy outside Amman. It is built in the architectural style of a Crusader castle, and it is quite large and very well guarded with conspicuous weapons. In a part of the world where memories run deep and long, is it any surprise that the locals find this building threatening?

What do all these illustrations have in common? Arrogance, that state in which, as Jorge Luis Borges says, “the image of the Lord had been replaced by a mirror.” Arrogance, perhaps the primal sin, as when Adam and Eve were sure they knew what was best for them and that God clearly did not.

Today is World Communion Sunday. Many of the world’s 2.1 billion Christians, one third of the earth’s people, have gathered, now gather or will gather around tables a bit like this one. Tables in Africa, home of the fastest growing Christian churches, draped in kente cloth and tables in Asia holding rice crackers like these; tables in Latin America surrounded by lively musicians with guitars and maracas, tables in Europe, like those in churches in Eastern Germany which helped bring down a wall, tables in the Middle East, including Iraq, Iran, Israel and Palestine, where people huddle together to gain strength from flatbread and wine in frightening times.

Some of the ancestors of these Christians around the world first heard the gospel from people like Paul, people who overcame a sense of arrogance about their own righteousness, their own corner on truth, and allowed God to stretch them; people who were not afraid to let go of possessions or life plans or native lands or ethnic prejudices in order to serve God. Some of the ancestors of these Christians heard the gospel first from our American ancestors who traveled with the best of intentions of spreading good news, but often also spread the idea that American ways were better than the ways of indigenous people and so brought a sense of cultural, racial and ethnic superiority and arrogance along with the Bible, an arrogance which sometimes got in the way of people hearing good news about Jesus.

This table is not a table where arrogance is welcome, and so this table is a stumbling block to many, not just in America, but around the world, even as Jesus was. This is the table where we remember that God, God, suffered and died because of the arrogance of those who were quite sure that God was on their side and so had replaced God’s image with a mirror. This is the table where we remember, as Paul writes elsewhere, “Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness, and being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” (Philippians 2:6-8) We cannot come to this table with our brothers and sisters around the world, whose lives we impact with every political and economic decision we make, both on a national and a personal level, without confessing as we have today, that we can be arrogant, but that we seek humility.

We are challenged as we come to this table today not to emulate those tenants who believed, like a toddler, that “what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is mine.” We are challenged to come not like the religious leaders who attacked Jesus who were afraid of giving up a life centered on power over in order to join Jesus and let God use their gifts to empower the sweet grapes of the vineyard they were tending. We are challenged to hear Paul’s call to put aside our impressive resumes and press on toward the goal of being one with Jesus, because in this bread and cup, Jesus is reaching out to be one with us.

Friends, believe the good news of the gospel, good news in a time when the news of the world seems so unrelentingly bad. It is possible, it is desirable, it is, I believe, God’s fervent hope, that we will release ourselves from the fear and pride which leads to arrogance and separates us from God and one another, and that we will hear and live the truth that love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. And now faith, hope and love abide, and the greatest of these is not power of arms or wealth or education; the greatest of these is not “being right.” The greatest of the gifts of God is love. Amen.