Luke 18:1-8

Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my opponent.’ For a while he refused; but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’” And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”

Our dog, Stella, is the first dog I’ve ever had who has very clear expectations about meal time. She expects breakfast very early in the morning, as shortly as possible after the feet of the first human out of bed, hit the floor. Usually that’s Christa. And Stella expects to eat again at 5 o’clock in the evening, and not a minute later. BUT, she starts to ask for dinner anytime around 4 o’clock every. single. day. Like clockwork.

And this is new to me. Every other dog I’ve ever had was good about eating whenever there was food in the dish. I just had to fill the dish whenever I saw it empty. My other dogs would always just eat when they were hungry. There was never any waiting or begging or scarfing down every kibble of food as soon as it was offered up, as though it may never show up again.

But Stella is relentless. Like I said, as soon as someone’s out of bed in the morning she’s at their feet. And if you don’t rise early enough, she is sitting at your bedside staring and snorting and whining until you get the hint. And she’s as accurate as an atomic clock when 5 p.m. rolls around, too. Starting an hour or so ahead of time, she paces in the kitchen and stares you down and gets very excited whenever you get anywhere near the door to the garage where her food is kept. And, whether it’s morning or evening, she never leaves a crumb or a kibble behind. She gobbles it up, all in one sitting. Usually followed by a satisfied, victorious, ceremonial belch.

So, I thought about Stella and her relentless, persistent, twice-daily ritual begging when I read Jesus’ parable this morning about the widow and the judge.

Jesus uses the example of this poor widow and the Godless judge to say, in effect, “if a guy like this judge – who had no fear of God and zero respect for anyone – would respond to the requests of a nagging widow, shouldn’t we expect at least the same, if not more, from the God of our creation?”

And, many of us have been where the widow’s coming from in this morning’s Gospel, I know. We’ve begged. We’ve pleaded. We’ve stated our case. We’ve come back again and again. And like Stella, the dog, we do our best to wear down our Master with persistent prayers and petitions.

But it’s not usually about meal time for most of us, or another bowl of kibble. Sometimes the stuff we wish for – the proverbial “justice” for which we’re crying day and night – is a very big deal. Friends get sick and we pray for their healing. Relationships struggle and we pray for the words or the will or the way to get them back on track again. We worry about our kids and how to love them and lead them and keep them safe in this world. Loved ones die and we pray for strength or hope and miracles, even. Very much like the widow in the parable – and Stella in my kitchen – we feel powerless over so much in the world and in our lives, we feel like all we can do is pray, and pray, and pray; and beg and beg and beg.

And there are plenty of times – we can’t help but admit – that our prayers don’t get answered; times when justice doesn’t come – at least not in time or to our liking. There are times when 5 o’clock comes and goes, but no one is home yet to fill our bowl ... when none of what we pray about and beg for comes to pass.

And those are hard days and rough seasons and I think Jesus knows this. I don’t believe Jesus means to pretend otherwise or to give us an easy answer here. And I don’t think he’s writing a check he can’t cash, as the saying goes, either. But he’s asking us to have faith in that, in spite of ourselves. “But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?,” he asks.

I wonder if Jesus is inviting us to spend as much time comparing ourselves to the widow in the parable, as we do comparing the unjust judge to the God we worship. I mean, I wonder if Jesus is playing on the status of that widow – or lack of her status, I should say – and suggesting that if someone at the bottom of the social, culural pecking order ultimately gets the justice she deserves, won’t we – chosen ones of God, beloved children of God – won’t we get what we need – and more – ultimately, in the end? And, Jesus is inviting us to cast our eyes beyond the troubles of the day. He’s calling us to look at our time and our trouble through the eyes of the Kingdom he brings, and as promised inheritors of that Kingdom.

In other words, God’s love always wins, and we know it. God’s redemption always saves the day, and we know it. God’s salvation has already come, in fact, through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, who’s telling the story. And we know this.

And because of it, we are welcome to beg and pray and ask and persist and pester and whine and pace and plead like so many widows and dogs; like husbands and wives; like parents and children; like beloved, chosen, Children of God who hurt and need comfort; who are sick and need healing; who are scared and need faith; who are broken and need to be put back together – in God’s time and by God’s grace.

And we are to do that with all the persistence and patience and hope of the nagging widow; and with all the earnestness and expectation of my dog before dinner because, if an unjust judge, like the one in Jesus’ story, will respond to the needs of a widow … and if I my very annoying, needy dog always gets what she’s after … God, the creator and Master of the Universe, will certainly bring the justice … will surely feed the hunger … heal our souls … bind up what’s broken … find what’s lost … see us through … and redeem the whole of our lives and all of creation, too.

We don’t feed Stella every day because begs and bothers us so incessantly. We feed her because we love her and because we know she needs to eat. And so it is with the God we know in Jesus.

It is always close to 5 o’clock for some of us in this world. There is always someone, somewhere running out of words and ways and time and resources for what they need and wondering when or if it will come. And Jesus reminds us that it will come … that, indeed, it already has. By way of his life, death and resurrection our bowl has already been filled, justice has already been served, our cup overflows.

And our calling – and challenge – is to hope in that – at all costs, at all times and in all places – with faith in the grace of God’s love for us, no matter what.

Amen

Luke 17:11-19

On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him. Keeping their distance, they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” When he saw them, he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were made clean. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. Then Jesus asked, “Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” Then he said to him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”

I wonder if you’ve ever seen one of those videos that makes its way around the internet – there are probably hundreds of them – where someone gives a person on the street who is poor or homeless or begging and in need, a bunch of money… or a large pizza… or a bag of cheeseburgers… and then watches as they do something kind and generous with what they’ve been given. (Have you seen that before?) Sometimes, whoever’s filming the video – usually undercover from across the street – even facilitates the generosity, as a test of some kind, by having someone else ask the newly enriched person for some money or for something to eat.

And when the person who was poor and begging returns the favor – when he shares his pizza or gives some of his new-found money away – the internet swoons with surprise and awe and “likes” and “shares” and all the rest.

I’d show you one of those videos – like I said, there are probably hundreds of them – but something always rubs me wrong about that kind of thing. For one thing, it feels uncomfortable to me when someone uses another person – especially someone in need – as an unwitting object lesson for the amusement of the masses. I also think our initial response – our shock and awe and admiration – toward such generosity and kindness says something less than great about us and about our impressions and opinions of people who are poor.

So, this morning, instead of merely lifting up and looking at and patronizing the faithful Samaritan in Luke’s Gospel as some similar, simple sort of object lesson, I feel like we’re called to lift up and look in the mirror, instead, and to see what we can learn from ourselves and each other, as those who, more often than not, if we’re honest, have more in common with the other nine lepers on the road in this morning’s story.

Remember, ten lepers were healed, in all, but nine of them kept on walking and didn’t turn around to thank Jesus for the gift he’d given them; for the love he’d shown them; for the generosity he’d shared with each of them that day.

See, we may not find ourselves begging on the sidewalk, but we’ve been given a gift, have we not? We may not be as desperate as the down-and-out in those videos, but that’s kind of the point, if you ask me. Why don’t we turn around, more often? Why do we just keep walking so much of the time? Why don’t we say “thank you” – or mean it – as often as we should – by returning the favor? And why are we so surprised when another child of God responds in the way every one of us is called to live?

The list is long and the reasons are legion, I believe.

Maybe we don’t make time for gratitude and generosity because we’re just too wrapped up in ourselves and in the joy of our blessings to take the time out for praise and thanksgiving. (I can cut the other nine lepers some slack imagining they were just so overjoyed they couldn’t wait to get back into town and back to their families to show them they were healed – to be loved again, touched again, welcomed back again, to the homes from which they’d been banished.)

Maybe we don’t say thanks more often or more generously because we’ve convinced ourselves we deserve or that we have earned what’s ours and so gratitude isn’t a ready, regular response. (I’m sure those other nine lepers didn’t think it fair that they were sick in the first place, and that they had some healing coming to them, after all. And none of them was a Samaritan, like that other guy. He had more to be grateful for – as a foreigner, doubly unclean, if you will, thanks to the polity and politics and prejudices of his day. Likewise, it’s easy to presume that we’re very different from the needy beggar on the street corner, because we work hard to make our livings don’t we; to have what we have? We forget that even the ability to work and do anything for ourselves is evidence of God’s gracious provision in our lives. And we forget that at the expense of our gratitude.)

Saddest of all perhaps, maybe we don’t give thanks by way of our generosity because – in our unconsciously privileged, self-absorbed way – we just can’t find anything for which to be thankful. (Wars rage, wild fires destroy, diseases happen, loved ones die, jobs get lost, relationships crumble… None of us has to look very far to find plenty of things not to be thankful for, do we?)

But, the Samaritan and Jesus know otherwise. There’s a process of giving and receiving – of grace and gratitude – that takes place between the two of them: Jesus gives… the Samaritan receives and is healed… he notices what has happened for him… and he returns to give thanks. The giving of thanks is an important and essential part of that equation. He’s not merely being polite or practicing good manners. He’s practicing faith.

And that’s our call, just the same – to practice our faith by way of turning, every once in a while; to receive God’s goodness, take notice of its abundance, and return the favor – return the faith – in some meaningful way.

And if worship and service are ways we practice our faith and offer thanks to God, how does what we do here turn us around and express our thankfulness and praise? Aren’t we blessed to sing and ring a choir or read Scripture or serve in the nursery or do our part to clean up the church? These are all ways we say “thank you” to God for the gifts we’ve been given; and ways we are blessed in return when we do.

And if giving back is giving thanks – which it is – aren’t we blessed by the good things our money can do here at Cross of Grace or through our work in Haiti or by way of the food pantry or in the hygiene items we’ll collect this month for our Mission Sunday? Giving our offering and sharing our resources are just more of the ways we say “thank you” and turn and return to God what has first been given to us.

And the holy trick of it all is that when it comes to Jesus, the things we do to say “thank you” just continue to bless us beyond measure. Beyond being polite and practicing good manners, Jesus’ call to give thanks is just another way of loving us. Jesus knows that we will only be better for the thanks we bring. Jesus knows giving thanks, in and of itself, can turn us around and change our lives – just as surely as the Samaritan was turned around in this morning’s Gospel.

So let’s stop being surprised when we see another child of God, in one of those viral videos, giving generously from what was first shared with them. Why wouldn’t they? Why shouldn’t they? How could they not? Instead, let’s be surprised that we don’t do the same, more often and more generously, with what has first been shared with us – our time, our talent our treasure; our provision, our power, and our privilege, too.

Let’s allow God’s abundance in our own lives to be all the inspiration and invitation we need to turn us around, earnestly and often, to practice our faith by giving thanks in as many ways as we can manage because we will see our faith – and God’s kingdom – alive and well and living among us when we do.

Amen

Nevertheless, She Persists (And God Does, Too)

Faithful, Grateful Turning