Sermons from Mission Hills UCC San Diego, California Rev. Dr. David Bahr [email protected] July 10, 2022 “Peace Upon Every House” Luke 10: 1-11 After these things, Jesus commissioned seventy-two others and sent them on ahead in pairs to every city and place he was about to go. 2 He said to them, “The harvest is bigger than you can imagine, but there are few workers. Therefore, plead with the Lord of the harvest to send out workers for his harvest. 3 Go! Be warned, though, that I’m sending you out as lambs among wolves. 4 Carry no wallet, no bag, and no sandals. Don’t even greet anyone along the way. 5 Whenever you enter a house, first say, ‘May peace be on this house.’ 6 If anyone there shares God’s peace, then your peace will rest on that person. If not, your blessing will return to you. 7 Remain in this house, eating and drinking whatever they set before you, for workers deserve their pay. Don’t move from house to house. 8 Whenever you enter a city and its people welcome you, eat what they set before you. 9 Heal the sick who are there, and say to them, ‘God’s kingdom has come upon you.’ 10 Whenever you enter a city and the people don’t welcome you, go out into the streets and say, 11 ‘As a complaint against you, we brush off the dust of your city that has collected on our feet. But know this: God’s kingdom has come to you.’! There’s so much going on in this text that it’s not easy to wrap our arms all the way around it.
There’s a lot here to think about. Too much. But first, there’s one more verse the lectionary committee clearly intentionally left out that completes the paragraph: for the people who don’t welcome you, who don’t receive your peace, who refuse to offer hospitality to you who are a stranger in their midst – it will be a better day in Sodom than it will be for them. Verse 12: “I assure you that Sodom will be better off on Judgment day than that city.” They obviously left this sentence out for a reason. And on the one hand, I’m glad. Hearing the word Sodom and/or Gomorrah strikes fear in our hearts, especially for queer people. Add the word “judgment” and oh Lord, here it comes. Locate the nearest exit and run for your lives. But on the other hand, it’s a shame that verse 12 is not included in the lectionary because if it were, we would be challenged to deal with what the sin of Sodom really is. It’s the refusal to welcome the stranger or provide hospitality. Or, like it says very clearly in Ezekiel 16:49: 49 This is the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were proud, had plenty to eat and enjoyed peace and prosperity; but she didn’t help the poor and the needy.” The sin of Sodom. And so, if someone doesn’t welcome you, shake the dust off your feet and keep moving. Let them deal with the consequences of their frosty reception. And let it serve as a warning to you. Anyway, as I said at the beginning, there’s a lot going on in this text. We could talk more about hospitality. We could talk about discipleship and the wisdom of having a companion with whom to share your faith and good works. Or we could speak of why there is such urgency that you don’t even talk to anyone on the road. Or the apocalypse, that awkward reference to harvest… We could ask, why the number 72, and why is it 70 in some Bibles? We could talk about traveling light, leaving our baggage and even our cell phones behind, or risk taking and vulnerability – for example, eating whatever they put in front of you. Or we could talk about being the recipients of hospitality, not the givers of it. The awkward, upside-down power dynamic of needing help instead of giving it. What is it like to depend on the hospitality of others who may not offer it? But of all these possibilities, the issue I do want to talk about this morning is verses 5 and 6: Peace. Whenever you enter a house, say to them, “May peace be upon this house.” But wait. You don’t know these people. You don’t know what they think. You don’t know what they’ve done. Bless them anyway. But what if… they’re one of those people. You know, there’s a lot of “those kind of people” around today. Well, just like I would expect Jesus to say, bless them anyway. “Peace be upon their house.” However, and this is a quite unexpected however, if they don’t offer peace back in return, move on. That’s such an interesting twist. I can imagine Jesus saying, if they don’t return peace, try harder. Win them over with your charm and your wit. Don’t ever, ever, ever give up. But no, Jesus said, if they don’t offer peace in return, move on. And he adds, don’t worry. You won’t lose anything by offering peace and not having it returned because your peace will come back to you. We have nothing to lose by going around house to house proclaiming peace upon it. Nothing to lose except maybe mistrust and suspicion of our neighbors. We have so many misgivings about our neighbors and even members of our families that this doesn’t sound… possible. Among many essays on the topic, a recent article in the Washington Post had a very appropriate title: “Nothing feels safe: Americans are divided, anxious, and quick to panic.”[1] In it, Professor Thane Rosenbaum described, “There is a fundamental national insecurity right now.” And think about it. National insecurity:
There are days I feel absolutely helpless. That’s what I was feeling this week as I studied this gospel passage. Hopeless. And that’s when I thought, OK, in a time of national insecurity, what do we need? Well, one thing from the gospel today: Peace. What can we do? Commit to proclaiming peace upon every house. And it will bring inner peace. Peace among neighbors. And especially peace in our nation. No matter who they are, what they believe, or what they have done. Proclaim peace upon every house. But then there’s this peculiar statement from Jesus. He adds, and if the people to whom you offer peace don’t want it, won’t return it, move on. That seems so strange. Out of place. Odd even for Jesus. Amy Oden offers this: Notice, “Jesus does not instruct them to argue, convince, or threaten. Just shake the dust off your feet so you are not weighted down by rejection or paralyzed with trying to figure out what you’ve done wrong or could have done differently.”[2] That makes so much sense. Move on and use your energy on someone else. It’s not that you are giving up because there is someone waiting for, hoping for, desperate for a word of peace from you. Try, but if necessary, it’s OK. Move on and don’t make it about you. You’re not called to be people pleasers but bearers of God’s peace. And sometimes that means, shake off the dust. Not even as a judgment against someone else, let God do that, but as a way to stop judging yourself. There are more important things to do. There’s an Iranian/African American poet named Anis Mojgani who wrote a poem called Shake the Dust.[3] He said it’s for people on the margins – the ones who are easily overlooked, bullied, and beaten down; whose stories are mostly unaccounted for. It’s a poem like Jesus told the 72, meant to reassure the reader to find courage, to risk, and when necessary, shake off the dust. This is for the fat girls This is for the little brothers This is for the schoolyard wimps and the childhood bullies that tormented them Shake the dust This is for the benches and the people sitting upon them For the bus drivers who drive a million broken hymns For the men who have to hold down three jobs simply to hold up their children For the nighttime schoolers And for the midnight bikers who are trying to fly Shake the dust This is for the two year olds Who cannot be understood because they speak half English and half God Shake the dust For those gym class wallflowers and the twelve year olds afraid of taking public showers For the kid who is always late to class because he forgets the combination to his locker For the girl who loves somebody else Shake the dust This is for the hard men who want love but know that it won't come For the ones who are forgotten The ones the amendments do not stand up for For the ones who are told speak only when you are spoken to And then are never spoken to Speak every time you stand so you do not forget yourself Do not let one moment go by that doesn't remind you That your heart, it beats 900 times every single day And that there are enough gallons of blood to make everyone of you oceans Do not settle for letting these waves that settle And for the dust to collect in your veins For the poetry teachers and for the people who go on vacation alone For the sweat that drips off of Mick Jaggers' singing lips And for the shaking skirt on Tina Turner's shaking hips For the heavens and for the hells through which Tina has lived This is for the tired and for the dreamers For those families that want to be like the Cleavers with perfectly made dinners And songs like Wally and the Beaver This is for the bigots, for the sexists, and for the killers And for the big house pin sentenced cats becoming redeemers And for the springtime that somehow seems to show up right after every single winter This is for everyone of you Shake the dust grab this world by its clothespins And shake it out again and again And jump on top and take it for a spin And when you hop off shake it again For this is yours, this is yours If you strip away all the extraneous words and metaphors Jesus used in this passage today, he made it super simple. All you need are the clothes on your back, the companionship of a friend, and the word of peace on your lips. Then come back and report the miracles God achieved through you and your friend, blessing your efforts. As verse 17 says, “The seventy-two returned joyously, saying, “Lord, even the demons submit themselves to us in your name.” Remember: You are bearers of God’s peace, not people pleasers. You and a friend can give it your best and give yourself permission to fail. It’s all OK. Because regardless, you have just helped the Kingdom of God come nearer than it was before. [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/07/05/americans-shootings-panic/ [2] https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-14-3/commentary-on-luke-101-11-16-20-4 [3] https://genius.com/artists/Anis-mojgani - shortened slightly
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