Hebrew
Scripture: Deuteronomy
15:1-11
Every seventh year you shall grant a remission of debts.
And this is the manner of the remission: every creditor
shall remit the claim that is held against a neighbor, not exacting it of a
neighbor who is a member of the community, because the LORD’s remission has
been proclaimed.
Of a foreigner you may exact it, but you must remit your
claim on whatever any member of your community owes you.
There will, however, be no one in need among you, because
the Lord is sure to bless you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you
as a possession to occupy,
if only you will obey the Lord your God by diligently
observing this entire commandment that I command you today.
When the Lord your God has blessed you, as he promised
you, you will lend to many nations, but you will not borrow; you will rule over
many nations, but they will not rule over you.
If there is among you anyone in need, a member of your
community in any of your towns within the land that the Lord your God is giving
you, do not be hard-hearted or tight-fisted toward your needy neighbor.
You should rather open your hand, willingly lending
enough to meet the need, whatever it may be.
Be careful that you do not entertain a mean thought,
thinking, “The seventh year, the year of remission, is near,” and therefore
view your needy neighbor with hostility and give nothing; your neighbor might
cry to the Lord against you, and you would incur guilt.
Give liberally and be ungrudging when you do so, for on
this account the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in all that
you undertake.
Since there will never cease to be some in need on the
earth, I therefore command you, “Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor
in your land.”
Gospel: John 12: 1-8
Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, the
home of Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead.
There they gave a dinner for him. Martha served, and
Lazarus was one of those at the table with him.
Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard,
anointed Jesus’ feet, and wiped them with her hair. The house was filled with
the fragrance of the perfume.
But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (the one who was
about to betray him), said,
“Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii
and the money given to the poor?”
(He said this not because he cared about the poor, but
because he was a thief; he kept the common purse and used to steal what was put
into it.)
Jesus said, “Leave her alone. She bought it so that she
might keep it for the day of my burial.
You always have the poor with you, but you do not always
have me.”
Sermon: “Poverty and The Kingdom of God”
In this story
from the gospel according to John,
the kingdom of God is formally and
intimately brought into being
by a woman,
who was not even
recognized as a whole human being
at that
time;
by a poor woman living in the poor
town of Bethany,
by a woman who takes what she has
and anoints Jesus as the Messiah,
the Christ.
The disciples
are annoyed.
Judas is
outraged,
arguing that the value of this nard
could have been converted into Roman
currency
and then used so much more
efficiently as charity for the poor.
Of course that
also would have converted the act of giving
into a form that allowed the owners
to keep their chosen share for
themselves
and to measure a portion out as
charity for others.
But the kingdom
of God doesn’t work that way.
All the way
back in Deuteronomy we hear
that God’s plan, God’s kingdom, is
about jubilee –
the forgiveness of debt,
the elimination of
poverty,
the use of God’s
resources
such that all have abundant
lives.
When we cling
to the systems in our society
that maintain a status quo of
scarcity for some,
that allows systemic racism
and poverty
and ecological
devastation
and the war economy
to rule and
to flourish,
when we
perceive Christ’s call to be more about
tossing a coin or a bit of charity
as we pass by,
rather than
about completely restoring our relationships
with one another
and completely
overturning these structures and systems
in order to bring about the kingdom
of God,
then we have
set aside our baptismal promise
for the perceived comforts of these
cultural illusions of fairness,
of worth and worthiness,
of the American way.
These systems
create a way of life that is immoral,
that does not align with the kingdom
of God,
and so they
must be changed,
they must be
transformed into systems of true morality.
Kingdom
systems.
This is what
the Poor Peoples Campaign was about
when the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King
initiated it
a year before his assassination,
and it’s what it is about now
as we pick it up again 50 years
later,
under the
co-leadership of the Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis,
PCUSA pastor and head of the Kairos
Center,
and the Rev.
Dr. William Barber II,
Disciples of Christ pastor and head
of Repairers of the Breach.
In her book,
“What Did Jesus Say About the Poor?”,
Dr Theoharis shows how Jesus was
pointing back
to Deuteronomy and God’s plan to
eliminate poverty
in this gospel story.
Howard
Thurman’s book, Jesus and the Disinherited,
asks what Jesus offers
for those who have been disinherited
by the systems of our society.
He asks how
following Jesus is different
for those of us who hear his call in
terms of charity,
carving out a
portion of our assets to give away,
compared to
those who have nothing to give,
who are up against the wall and can
see no way out.
What does Jesus
offer to them?
His answer is
the freedom and dignity of the kingdom of God,
an alternate way of living here and
now
that reflects what we
all know,
that we are all
children of God
and all intended to enjoy God
and the abundance of God’s
resources.
Jesus offers to
all people
freedom from fear,
from hate,
from
deception,
from hunger,
from
homelessness,
from
loneliness,
from
oppression.
This comes only
through beloved community,
through communion,
through relationship,
through coming together at the
abundant table
that is set for all, the feast of
God.
This is how the
kingdom of God is exhibited in the world.
It begins with
relationship
and continues on to working together
as one people
to eliminate the things that
separate us,
the systems that create the illusion of
scarcity,
the structures that keep some people
down
while protecting and maintaining an
illusion of
safety and security for
others,
as if they
somehow deserve it more.
Much like the
disciples who just couldn’t see
past their current way of
understanding
wealth and value and
abundance and scarcity,
who couldn’t grasp the reality
that Jesus was proclaiming the here
and now of the jubilee,
the reign of God,
too many of us
sit today in the illusion
that these systems we have developed
and protected
at such a great cost,
that these are the best we can hope
for.
Do we really believe
that this is what God intends for God’s people,
that this is the kingdom promised
for God’s beloved community? How can we sell God so short
when we turn away from exhibiting a
new kingdom on earth
here and now where all are fed,
all are clothed and
housed and cared for,
all are beloved?
How is it that
we can choose the so-called safe path,
moderating our words so that
we do not rock the boat,
do not join with the
Holy Spirit in shaking our selves,
our congregations, our
communities
out of our comfort
zones?
What are we
afraid of?
Fifty
years ago at Riverside Church in NYC,
Dr King preached these words:
“A
true revolution of values
will soon cause us to question the
fairness and justice
of many of our past and present policies.
On
the one hand, we are called to play the Good Samaritan
on life’s roadside, but that will be
only an initial act.
One
day we must come to see that the whole Jericho Road
must be transformed
so
that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed
as they make their journey on life’s
highway.
True
compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar.
It
comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars
needs restructuring.”
The Rev. Erica
Williams,
who is part of the National
Organizing Committee for
the Poor People’s Campaign: A
National Call for Moral Revival,
and who works closely with those of
us in Michigan
who are
coordinating the state campaign,
offered these words in a sermon last
year:
“Dr. King saw
how poor people are mistreated in this country
and it is heartbreaking to see
that the same problems from Dr.
King’s era persist today.
This is why
America must undergo a moral revolution of values. America must promote radical
prosperity for all people.
There are
enough resources in this country
for those who are homeless to have
affordable housing.
There are
enough resources in this country
for those who are or may be sick to
receive
outstanding, free, prompt medical
care.
There are
enough resources in this country
for those who are hungry to be well
fed.
There are
enough resources in this country
for those who are unschooled to
receive
excellent, free, public education.
There are
enough resources in this country
for those who are thirsty to receive
clean, un-poisoned water.
And there are
enough resources in this country
for those who are naked to be
clothed;
those who live in darkness to
receive
the light of affordable electricity;
and those who are cold to receive
warmth.
And given the
outsize wealth of a few
and the amassing of money for war
and entertainment,
all of these
resources can and should be given out for low-to-no cost.
In the best
tradition of Dr. King,
it is imperative that those of us
who believe
that all God’s children have a right
to live with dignity,
stand up and
declare that we will not be silent against the oppression of those on
the margins.
Our sisters and
brothers are hurting and it is up to us to make sure that no one is left out of
God’s love for humanity.”
It is time…
to let go of false promises from
finite systems
that only pull us further apart from
one another
and further away from the promises
of God’s kingdom.
It is time for
those of us who benefit from these privileges
to stand up and confess that they
are wrong
and contrary to God’s will.
It is time for
all God’s people to stand together,
those who have enough, who are
sufficiently comfortable,
standing together with the poor and
the disenfranchised
as our sisters and brothers,
and to work
together for a world that reflects God’s kingdom,
that is built on moral values as God
intended,
that replaces the immorality
of systemic racism and poverty and
the war economy
and ecological devastation
with moral
systems built on compassion
and reflecting love of God, self,
neighbor and enemy.
This is not pie
in the sky by and by.
This is the
realm of God that has been provided for all of us,
that was and is and will be brought
into fullness of being
through the
life, death and resurrection of the One anointed by that woman that day,
Christ our Lord. Amen.
