We have been in a series of sermons about creation. The first glimpse we have of God is in creation. The Bible begins with telling us who God is and who we are to God, while God has sleeves rolled up and is creating. We talked about the God of the sky, who is transcendent, above and over all of creation. We talked about the God of the Mountains who is intimately personal and imminent with us. Today, we finish our series, looking more broadly at humanity. In addition, is not it apropos that today is World Communion Sunday. For 79 years, we have gathered around the Table on the first Sunday in October to say there is more that connects us than divides us. Let us celebrate our connection in the gift of Communion.
Our connection is our commonality. God created the first humans in the right time and the right place. As a culture, we have spent time debating what exactly were the right time and the right place. We have missed the critical element that God created us. In Genesis, we read that we are both in the image of God and from dust. Rachel Held Evans, Christian writer says it this way: “We are made of stardust, the scientists say – the iron in our blood, the calcium in our bones, and the chlorine in our skin forged in the furnaces of ancient stars whose explosions scattered elements across the galaxy. From ashes grew new stars, and around one of them, a system of planets and asteroids and moons. A cluster of dust coalesced to form earth, and life emerged from the detritus of eight-billion year old deaths. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” 1 Those are the words from the committal service at the time of death. This body we commit the ground earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, from You she has come to You she will return.
We are all made of God’s creativity in elements and in the image of God – those with skin tones from the hues of the rainbows and those who’s hair highlight the colors. We are each one reflection of God’s creation. Those who reflect God’s grace and those who reflect God’s law. Those who agree with us and those who don’t. The challenge of the whitewashed version of World Communion Sunday is when we begin to believe that each person holding hands in the circle is a version of us, instead of a version of God. When we imagine that we are in God’s image, so others must be in our image.
We imagine because we have reconciled our understandings to the wider culture, so have each and every one who gathers in the name of Jesus. We imagine that being created of the same stuff that our experiences and responses must follow as similar. In the desire for connection and uniformity, we have often limited opportunities for engagement and unity. Not all made from the same elements are exactly the way we imagine similar is.
Consider this example. Carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide are so similar. Both are composed of carbon and oxygen. Yet the bonds are completely different, and the products are completely unique. Carbon monoxide consists of one carbon atom and one oxygen atom, connected by a triple bond that consists of two covalent bonds as well as one dative covalent bond. Carbon dioxide is a product of plant respiration. It is naturally occurring chemical compound is composed of a carbon atom covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. Carbon monoxide can be deadly in relatively small odorless doses. Carbon dioxide is essential to our very life. Same elements, same creator; different molecules, different applications.
Is this not what the communion table looks like on this day, persons all made of the same matter gathered together is different expressions of the Creator? I imagine this is uncomfortable to those of us who would like to decided who is in and who is out. Those of us would like to draw fences and altar rails around who is and is not allowed to receive the grace of Jesus. I think of those who are approaching their last Suppers. Those who wait on hospice. Those who wait on death row. Those who wait for hope to find them. I think of those who lost family members this week. Again, another mass shooting. The table is made up of those who spoke their faith with conviction and those who wonder what they might have said in a similar situation. Celebrating communion as a world today means embrace a God that continues to model to us that none are held back. That the children are encouraged and embraced, instead of being restricted by the disciples. Our gospel lesson was an exercise in the disciples getting it wrong. Sometimes we do too.
One of the uniquely Methodist understandings is an open table. We understand that there is nothing that limits you from coming to communion – not your age or understanding, not your affiliation or membership, not your baptism or your confession. All means All. My favorite parts of the communion liturgy say ALL. Not just the ones who wore the right thing to church. Not just the ones who woke up as happy clappy Christians this morning. Not just the ones who met all the unspoken rules about coming to church. Not just the ones who memorized verses in Sunday School for gold stars. Not just the ones who Facebook pictures match who they really are in the middle of the night or a crisis of faith. But ALL of us.
And World Communion is a reminder that our world is small. We extend the table, not just to those who come. But to those who cannot come. We always place on the table the traveling communion set. This accompanies me or others when they visit those in assisted living facilities, in the hospitals, and in other places where they are not able to join us on Sunday mornings.
In a previous church, I can remember a man by the name of Charlie. Charlie was a faithful worship attender, except on the first Sunday of the month. Elsewise, he came, he gave, he served, and he even occasionally showed up at Bible Study. So, one Sunday, I greeted Charlie as I often did and told him that we missed him the previous week, a first Sunday of the month. He began to give me a blow-off answer and I thought we weren’t going to get anywhere. And then as we stood together, he looked at me again. I don’t come to communion, he said. I don’t ever come when there is communion. I wonder why that is, I asked. I’m not good enough, he began. I am divorced and I have not always been great to the kids. I’m rough to the guys at the garage (where he worked) and I don’t want to be embarrassed about not taking it, so I don’t come. I felt tenderness and compassion in my soul for him. None of us is perfect, and all of us short of who God is still calling us to become. Each of us comes to receive the grace of God, food for journey, and salve for our souls.
Around the world and across our community, we share Charlie’s song. None of us are equivalent to God and all of us depend on grace. What we share is not the same story, but the same grace. What we share is not same gifts, but the same goal. What we share is not a same response, but a same God. What we share is not one heart song, but one who sings to our hearts. As we come to the table, this morning, come remembering people around the world and across our community, who celebrate together today that Creator God redeems and sustains each of us into our fullest likeness of God.
This is the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, thanks be to God, Amen.
1 Evans, Rachel Held, Searching for Sunday, 43.
New Testament Lesson: Hebrews 2: 1-12
Warning to Pay Attention
Therefore we must pay greater attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away from it. For if the message declared through angels was valid, and every transgression or disobedience received a just penalty, how can we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? It was declared at first through the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard him, while God added his testimony by signs and wonders and various miracles, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit, distributed according to his will.
Exaltation through Abasement
Now God did not subject the coming world, about which we are speaking, to angels. 6 But someone has testified somewhere,
“What are human beings that you are mindful of them, or mortals, that you care for them? You have made them for a little while lower than the angels; you have crowned them with glory and honor, subjecting all things under their feet.”
Now in subjecting all things to them, God left nothing outside their control. As it is, we do not yet see everything in subjection to them, but we do see Jesus, who for a little while was made lower than the angels, now crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.
It was fitting that God, for whom and through whom all things exist, in bringing many children to glory, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For the one who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one Father. For this reason Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters, saying,
“I will proclaim your name to my brothers and sisters, in the midst of the congregation I will praise you.”
Gospel Lesson: Mark 10:13-16
Jesus Blesses Little Children
People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them. But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.
Meditations For Your Week
Sunday, October 4 ~ Saturday, October 10
Sunday: “People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them.” Mark 10:13. Sometimes we think we know better than Jesus. Where have we spoke sternly unnecessarily?
Monday: ”But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, ‘Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.” Mark 10:14. Every time, Jesus describes the Kingdom of God, there is some turnaround of expectations. Prayerfully consider how Jesus is calling you to serve in the upside down kingdom.
Tuesday: “Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.’” Mark 10:15. Following Jesus and caring for others is intrinsically related. Where do you need to change your care for others?
Wednesday: “And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.” Mark 10:16. Jesus offers each of us blessings as we seek him.
Thursday: “How can we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? It was declared at first through the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard him, while God added his testimony by signs and wonders and various miracles, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit, distributed according to his will.” Hebrews 2:3–4. Our faith journey is buoyed by the faith journeys of others. Have you heard other’s journey’s recently?
Friday: “It was fitting that God, for whom and through whom all things exist, in bringing many children to glory, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings.” Hebrews 2:10. Take time to today to be in prayer for persons around the world who are suffering for their faith.
Saturday: “For the one who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one Father. For this reason Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters, saying, ‘I will proclaim your name to my brothers and sisters, in the midst of the congregation I will praise you.’” Hebrews 2:11-12. Prayerfully consider your brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ.