Sermon: Reflecting God's Upside-Down World

Luke 16:19-31
Reflecting God’s Upside-Down World
James Sledge                                                                                                 November 6, 2022

The Rich Man and Lazarus,
woodcut by Kreg Yingst

 How many of you have ever given money to your college for some sort of building campaign? I was thinking about that topic, and I googled a map of a local school, George Mason. That map had lots of buildings with people’s names on them, Carrow Hall, David King Hall, Fenwick Library, Peterson Hall, and Harris Theater to name a few. There was also an EagleBank Arena.

I know very little about George Mason, but if it is like many other universities some of these buildings were named because of money or after a benefactor. I’m certain that’s the case with EagleBank Arena.

Most of us don’t have our names on buildings at universities or hospitals, and that’s also because of money, the relatively smaller amounts that most of us give. You need to be truly wealthy, big time rich to get your name on a building.

That is why we should know something is out of whack in this parable Jesus tells before he is more than a line into it. “There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day.  And there was a poor man named Lazarus…” There was a rich man and a poor man named Lazarus. 

That’s not how it’s supposed to work. If Daniel Snyder got into an altercation with a homeless person named John Doe, I can assure you the headlines will not read, “John Doe Roughed Up in Altercation with Rich Man!” We all know the headline will say, “Daniel Snyder Accosted by Homeless Man!”

But Jesus’ parable gets this backwards because things are completely different in the Kingdom of God. Everything is turned upside down and inside out, letting us know that the things the world values are not the things God values, and warning all of us who have bought into the world’s way of doing things.

Sermon video - What Salvation Looks Like (Luke 19:1-10)

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Sermon - What Salvation Looks Like

Luke 19:1-10
What Salvation Looks Like
James Sledge                                                                                                 October 30, 2022

Zacchaeus by Ira Thomas

Zacchaeus was a wee little man, a wee little man was he; He climbed up in a sycamore tree, for the Lord he wanted to see. Many of you are likely familiar with these song lyrics. The song seems fascinated with Zacchaeus’ size. I wonder why that is. Luke’s story does say that he was “short in stature,” but it seems little more than a reason for him to climb a tree.

I wonder if calling Zacchaeus a wee little man makes him sound like a more palatable character. Wee little man sounds almost cute. What a nice little guy. I suppose it wouldn’t make a very good children’s song if it started, “Zacchaeus was a nasty crook, a nasty crook was he,” but it would perhaps be more accurate.

I mentioned in my sermon last week that tax collectors in Jesus’ day were no civil servants. They were key players in a corrupt system that filled Rome’s coffers and enriched those fortunate enough to buy into the position. By definition, tax collectors engaged in fraud. The only way they made money was to collect more tax than Rome required, keeping the excess. The more they could shake down from people, the richer they got. Chief tax collectors were even worse. They took a cut from all the collectors that worked under them.

It was a lucrative gig if you wanted to get rich, but it was also sure to get you hated and despised. Not only were you using the threat of Roman soldiers to extract money from your neighbors, but you were doing this for an occupying power in a land that longed to be rid of Roman control. When the crowd who sees Jesus go to Zacchaeus’ house complains saying, “He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner,” neither Jesus not anyone else disputes that statement. If ever anyone could be labeled a sinner, it is Zacchaeus.

Sermon video - How to Impress God (Luke 18:9-14)

Audios of sermons and worship available on the FCPC website.

Sermon - How to Impress God

Luke 18:9-14
How to Impress God
James Sledge                                                                            October 23, 2022

John Everett Millais
Pharisee and the Publican

The Bible is so much a part of church life, such a constant fixture in worship and Sunday School classes, that we sometimes forget that it wasn’t written for us. It was written for people from a completely different world and culture than our own, and so it can easily lose something in translation.

That may be the case with today’s scripture passage and the two characters in the parable Jesus tells. One is a Pharisee; the other is a tax collector, and the parable assumes that we are familiar with these two, even though that may well not be the case.

Growing up in the church I got the impression that Pharisees were the bad guys. The word pharisaic even means self-righteous and hypocritical. But the fact is that Pharisees were the good religious folks of their day. They were a Jewish reform movement that protested against the rituals, pomp, and sacrifices of Temple worship. They wanted people to “get back to the Bible,” as it were, to read the scriptures and do what it said there. In that sense they were very much like the reformers who led the Protestant Reformation, people like Martin Luther or John Calvin.

The Pharisees were also the inventors of rabbinical Judaism that is still around today. That means that the rabbis over at Temple Yodef Shalom are direct descendants of the Pharisees we see so often in the gospels.

The other character in the parable, the tax collector, poses a different interpretive problem. In his case, we may well not think badly enough of him. Americans may not enjoy interacting with someone from the IRS, but modern tax collectors have little in common with the tax collectors of Jesus’ day.

The Roman tax system awarded contracts to collect revenue, and they provided the support of soldiers for the process. Those with the contracts got to keep anything in excess of what was owed to Rome, and so tax collectors engaged in what was essentially a legal, shake-down racket. Under threat of arrest, they brutalized the population, especially those without any power or influence. In addition, Jewish tax collectors were collaborators with an occupying power, and they were hated and despised by the people.

There is really nothing comparable in our day, certainly no legal occupation that would be held in such universal contempt. In terms of reputation, they would probably fall somewhere between drug dealer and child abuser.

Sermon - Seeing, Faith, and Gratitude

Luke 17:11-19
Seeing, Faith, and Gratitude
James Sledge                                                                                                 October 9, 2022

JESUS MAFA,
The Healing of the Ten Lepers

Sarah was feverishly opening the last of her birthday presents. Wrapping paper, bows, and ribbon were everywhere. So were the gifts that had been in the many bags and boxes only a little while earlier. Most anyone who looked in on the scene would have been very impressed with all that Sarah had gotten. That is, everyone but Sarah. As the last gift came out of the box, Sarah looked around and said, “Is that all?” Her mother glared at her in a way that should have frozen her, but still Sarah said, “Are there any more presents?”

Some of the aunts, uncles, and grandparents who had tried hard to find just the right gift for Sarah were obviously bothered by her obvious lack of regard for their gifts. After everyone had left, Sarah’s mother had long talk with her. Sarah had to call everyone who had brought her a gift and apologize for being rude. That was on top of having to write thank-you notes, too.

Sarah was furious. What was the big deal? Everybody had gotten burgers, cake, and ice cream. You have to bring presents when you go to a party. Why did her mom have to get all worked up over it? After all, they were her relatives.

She was still angry when she went to school the next morning. Her friend Danielle asked what was the matter, and Sarah told her about what had happened, and about the punishment she had gotten from her mother.

“How many presents did you get?” Danielle asked.

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe ten or twelve.”

“Wow,” said Danielle. “If I had gotten anything close to that I would have been running around the room, jumping up and down, kissing everyone, and yelling ‘Thank you.’”

“What are you talking about?” Sarah asked.

“I only got one present at my birthday,” Danielle responded. My dad lost his job a while back. He’s been working at whatever he can find, but it just isn’t enough to make ends meet, so he couldn’t afford to buy me much. And I don’t have any relatives who live around here. I was afraid I wouldn’t get anything, so I was happy with the one that I got.”

“Oh, I see,” Sarah said rather sheepishly.

Sermon video - Seeing, Faith, and Gratitude (Luke 17:11-19)

Audios and videos of sermons and worship available on the FCPC website. (Apologies for the video quality. One AV person was on vacation and the other was sick.)

Sermon video - A Little Faith (Luke 17:1-10)

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Sermon: A Little Faith

Luke 17:1-10
A Little Faith
James Sledge                                                                                      October 2, 2022

As many of you know, the scripture passages that I use for preaching normally come from the lectionary, a list of readings for each Sunday that includes an Old Testament passage, a psalm, an epistle reading, and a gospel reading. The lectionary follows the Christian year, beginning with Advent, and it has a three-year cycle. Year one feature’s Matthew’s gospel, year two Mark, and year three, which we’re in now, Luke. John’s gospel doesn’t get a year but gets interspersed here and there in all three years.

The lectionary that I follow is used by pastors in many Protestant denominations. Its full name is the Revised Common Lectionary which replaced a previous, common lectionary in 1983. The revision was done by a committee of scholars and denominational representatives from the US and Canada, but I don’t know much about how they pick certain texts or how they decide where a reading should start and end.

I mention this because today’s gospel passage seems to start in the middle of a conversation. I told you when I read the passage that I expanded the lectionary limits, going back five verses prior to where the lectionary actually starts. Had I simply followed the lectionary, our gospel reading would have begun, The apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith!"

Increase our faith! Perhaps you’ve had occasion to offer a similar exclamation. Increase my faith! I know that I have. If you’ve ever made that request, what was it that prompted it? Perhaps you were having some sort of faith crisis, or perhaps you were going through some sort of difficult time. But it seems likely that something would precipitate crying out so.

That’s true of the disciples in our reading for today, which is why I added the five verses before the start of the lectionary passage. The disciples aren’t simply asking for stronger faith. They are reacting to what Jesus tells the to do, worried that they won’t be able to do it.

Sermon video: Enacted Prophecy (Jeremiah 32:1-3a, 6-15)

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Sermon: Enacted Prophecy

Jeremiah 32:1-3a, 6-15
Enacted Prophecy
James Sledge                                                                                     September 25, 2022

 As a general rule, there’s no such thing as a popular prophet. You might even say that the term popular prophet is an oxymoron. By definition prophets are people who see things that others don’t,

The Peaceable Kingdom, Fritz Eichenberg,
1950, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

and that almost always puts them out of step with the status quo, make them a challenge to the status quo, and that almost always makes them unpopular.

One of our most famous, recent prophets, Martin Luther King, Jr., is a good example. Even though Dr. King is widely honored today, albeit an often sanitized and domesticated version of him, that was hardly the case when he led a civil rights movement. In 1966, the last Gallop poll to ask about his popularity during his lifetime found that 63% of Americans had an unfavorable view of him.[1]

The prophet Jeremiah has a book in the Bible named for him, but during his lifetime, he may well have been more unpopular than Martin Luther King. When Jeremiah first began his ministry, he was a voice of doom and gloom at a time when all seemed to be going well. But Jeremiah knew that Israel’s failure to love God and neighbor, to enact mercy and justice, could only lead to tragedy, and that tragedy eventually showed up in the form of the Babylonian Empire with its powerful army.

Babylon conquered Israel, carried off some of its intelligentsia, royals, and priests into exile. They installed a relative of Israel’s king on the throne to be a puppet ruler, and collected regular tribute from Israel.

Unfortunately for Babylon, and for Israel, this puppet king was convinced to join a pro-Egyptian coalition of neighboring kingdoms who would rebel against Babylon with assistance from Egypt.

Jeremiah had warned the king against such a plan to no avail, and Babylon responded with ferocity. They attacked Israel and besieged the city of Jerusalem. Jeremiah urged surrender, for which he was branded a traitor and thrown into jail, which is where we find him in our scripture reading this morning.

Sermon video: God's Strange Economics (Luke 15:1-10)

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