World Communion Sunday
First reading:
Exodus 11:1-10 (Warning of the final plague)
Psalm 109:26-31 (prayer for vindication)
Second reading: Exodus 12:1-3, 7, 11-14, 26-28 (The
first Passover)
Gospel: Mark
14:12-21, 22-25 (the first Communion meal)
I said last week in the sermon about the plagues of
Egypt that when those with power and influence harden their hearts, it usually
the children who suffer the most. No one
knew that better than the Hebrew and Egyptian children. Pharaoh’s infanticide program against Hebrew babies,
combined with his concentration camps in the brick-yards where children slaved
away in the hot desert sun are estimated to have killed over 2 million innocent
children during the Pharaoh’s reign. But no matter how many plagues they
suffer, no matter how clear the warnings, Pharaoh refuses to relent. What does it take to finally get the
hard-hearted person to respond?
In Pharaoh’s case it only happens when his own son,
his first-born, is found dead at midnight.
Then it all comes crashing down on him.
This is what it feels like to taste the bread of suffering like the
Hebrews did for decades when they watched their own little boys floating dead
in the Nile, drowned by Pharaoh’s soldiers.
This is the taste of the wet, salty tears of grief that the Hebrews
drank by the gallons as they watched their children die in the hard-labor camps
making bricks for Pharaoh’s palaces and pyramids. All those innocent infants and children, cut
down, starved, beaten and drowned to death.
Yes, but what about the Egyptian children on the night
of the Passover? Why did God punish them for the sins of Pharaoh? Why did God cause them to die? It wasn’t
their fault. They were innocent too.
Let’s be clear – it was not God who brought on these
deaths. It was Pharaoh. God cannot be blamed here. The blood is on Pharaoh’s hands. He was given plenty of opportunities to
change. He was given clear warning by
Moses telling him exactly what would happen if he did not change. But still he
chose death. He did nothing to protect
his own people. All he had to do was
compromise, relent, humble himself just a little. But he chose hard-heartedness. He chose stubbornness. He chose to sacrifice his own son. Not God. http://christianthinktank.com/killheir.html
God was no more responsible for the deaths of
the innocent first-born of Egypt than God is responsible for the deaths of
Syrian children or Honduran children or black children in American, or students
in a classroom gunned down by men who harden their hearts and insist that their
way is the only way.
It’s
called moral reciprocity. When appeals
to a person’s or a nation’s sense of decency and compassion fall on deaf ears
and hard hearts, the only logical result is that the violence and evil and suffering will at some point rebound,
bounce back upon the perpetrator. It may
take years, even decades for the tide to turn, but eventually the body counts
reach a tipping point, and something has to change. The killing has to stop. Because Hebrew Lives Matter. Black Lives Matter. Syrian Lives Matter. Honduran Lives Matter. Children’s Lives Matter. They matter to God. Do they matter to us?
On the night he was betrayed our Lord
Jesus took bread, gave thanks to God, and broke it, saying, This is my body
given for you. Do this for the
remembrance of me.
The lives of children matter to
Jesus. The lives of those who suffer
matter to Jesus. The bread of suffering,
he too has tasted. The salty tears of
pain and grief he has tasted.
He took the cup, gave thanks and gave it
to his disciples saying, take and drink.
This is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many.
This is the blood of the lamb. This is a remembrance that children suffered
and died like innocent lambs in Israel and Egypt. And children still suffer and die in America
and Syria and Central America. This is
not a sacrifice to the god of Pharaoh – a god of violence and murder and deadly
weapons. Jesus’ death is not a
sacrifice. This is God saying – the sacrifices
must stop. They stop right here, on this
day, with this meal.
Like the Hebrews who ate the Passover meal
with traveling clothes on and their bags packed, we, too, will eat this meal
hurriedly, with shoes on our feet, ready to act. This is not a leisurely sit-down meal. It’s a meal we eat on the go, on our way to
serve, on our way to act, on our way to respond, to do something with the faith
we have been given.
It’s a meal we eat in solidarity with our
Jewish sisters and brothers who gulped the Passover food on their final night
of genocide.
It’s a meal we eat in solidarity with
Syrian refugees who eat their meals in cramped camps, escaping their own
tyrannical murderous rulers.
It’s a meal we eat in heartbroken
communion with the families students gunned down in their college classroom in
Oregon, and every other family of the 140,000 shooting victims in this country over the last 11 years.
It’s a meal we eat before being sent out
to answer the call of God and embark on a journey to a new place, a new phase
of life, a new phase of faith, a renewed commitment to God and the church, to
our family and community, to our planet and its fragile ecosystems.
How will you answer that call? For some it will be to say, let me learn more
about the faith of my Jewish neighbors.
Or the Syrian refugees. Or my black neighbors. Or the need to address the ongoing problem of
gun violence.
For others, it will be to make a donation
to help with Lutheran Disaster Response, or World Hunger. Or it will be a decision to increase
donations to this congregation so that this center of ministry of the world,
this outpost of love and service, can continue to do the work God calls us to
do.
Some may be moved to contact their
legislators, write letters to the editor, talk with family and friends about the
need to confront the Pharaoh-like powers that are conducting systemic and
systematic killings of innocent children through the economic, military and
political machines of our time.
For others, it will be to pick up a pair
of scissors and cut pieces of cloth for a quilt that will be sent to one of
those refugees.
However you choose to respond to God’s
call, this meal is your connection to your sisters and brothers across the
world, and across the street. It is your
connection across time to the disciples who received the bread and wine from
Jesus. It is your connection with all
those saints who have gone before, and the saints who are to come. This is bread that will be fed to the rowdy
child behind you, and the cane-toting elder in front of you. This is the cup that is your faith-in-action –
forgiving, finding compassion, activating your own responsiveness to those in
need.
“This day shall be a day of remembrance
for you. You shall celebrate it as a
festival to the Lord; throughout your generations you shall observe it as a
perpetual ordinance . . . And the people bowed down and worshiped.” Amen.
