Henrietta United Church of Christ

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. 32All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, 33and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left.

34Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; 35for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’

37Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? 38And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? 39And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’ 40And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.’

41Then he will say to those at his left hand, ‘You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; 42for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’

44Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?’ 45Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ 46And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Sermon

The hungry, the strangers, the ill-clothed, the sick. Who do you think of when you hear these words? I think of people like the homeless, like refugees from the war in Darfur, and like Haitians ravaged by hurricanes. But today I’m also thinking of some of my own ancestors–the Pilgrims who barely survived their first winter in Plymouth, Mass., in 1621. They toiled all winter to build a shelter that everyone could squeeze into. By March, only 47 of the 101 settlers who had survived the ocean voyage were still alive. At times, everyone was so sick that only six or seven of the group were able to feed and care for the rest. Their food supplies were so low that each person was only allotted a small handful of grain every day.

Carolyn and I happen to share a Pilgrim ancestor in common, so it’s doubtful that either of us and millions of other Americans would be here, and that we’d have Thanksgiving, if a native named Squanto hadn’t seen the Pilgrims’ plight and had pity on them. Squanto stayed with the Pilgrims from March until the November of the following year. He taught them where to catch the local fish and eel. He helped them build warmer houses and taught them how to grow food in that climate. He acted as their interpreter with the local native Americans, and helped facilitate trading and a peace treaty. The Pilgrims’ governor William Bradford wrote that Squanto was a "special instrument sent by God for their good beyond their expectations."

“I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.” Thank you, Squanto, for devoting more than a year and a half of your life to saving my ancestor, even though you had previously been kidnaped and enslaved by Europeans.

The truth is, each of us is vulnerable in this life. Even the biggest givers have to be receivers sometimes. This was nowhere more evident than in Sally Erwin’s hospital room the last two weeks. Sally had been one of the most active, giving people I’ve ever known. At the end of her life, she literally couldn’t lift a finger. She couldn’t do anything but lie there and just be. And yet she was so gracious and grateful in her receiving the love and care of her family, friends and medical staff, everyone felt blessed by her in their giving. Jesus said, “It’s more blessed to give than receive.” But my friend Jerry Rardin says, “It’s more blessed to give, and receive, and give, and receive.” Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference. It’s all part of the same circle.

The native Americans integrated that wisdom into their culture. Imagine that you are a Puritan and you come to a Native American lodge. Your hosts want to make you feel welcome, so they ask you to share a pipe of tobacco with them. They believe that tobacco smoke is a form of prayer, and sharing the pipe is a sacred sign of community and peace. As you leave, the natives give you the pipe as a gift that honors you and your friendship.

You’re really pleased. You take the pipe home and proudly display it in your house.

Time passes, and eventually members of the tribe come to visit your house. They notice their pipe prominently displayed. They seem upset. You tell how much you appreciate the pipe and how proud you are to have it, but that only seems to make things worse. A native interpreter tells you that the least you could do is offer them a smoke and send the pipe back home with them. So you take the pipe down from its place of honor and give it back. The natives leave, muttering how selfish and rude these Europeans are. And you’re about to give birth to the term “Indian giver.”¹

What happened? The natives didn’t want the gift back for themselves. For them, gifts are only gifts if they continue to be given. Otherwise, they stop being gifts and start being possessions. They expected you to pass their gift on to someone else. If you were too selfish to do that, they would have to do it themselves.

In his book The Gift, Lewis Hyde describes an interesting custom among the Massim people who occupy a circle of South Sea Islands north of New Guinea. The Massim people participated in what they call the Kulu Exchange. Ceremonial armshells worn by men and necklaces worn by women are worn for a time and then passed on from one person to the next to the next. When everyone on that island has worn them and passed them on, people travel to the next island, which might be quite a distance away, just to deliver these gifts to someone on another island. The necklaces move clockwise around the circle of islands, and the armshells move counterclockwise. It takes anywhere from two to ten years for a gift to make its way around the circle of giving. If the gifts ever stopped moving, they would lose their value to the Massim people–they would stop being gifts and become possessions–just trinkets in someone’s collection.²

For me, this Kulu Exchange is a good picture of God’s economy--what I think God intends our lives to be like. God gets the circle of giving going by giving us a planet rich in resources, one that loves to bring forth a wild profusion of life. God gifts us with life, time, energy, and abilities. God gifts us with the capacity for language and love, cooperation and community. And God gifts us with minds to imagine, invent, organize, plan for the future, and learn from our mistakes. We can create communities where each person’s particular gifts are honored and developed, where each person’s well being is important, and where knowledge, know-how and wisdom are shared. As we pass on our gifts around and around to each other, how rich and abundant everyone’s life could be. Life could be like a civilized version of the Garden of Eden.

But there’s a serpent whispering in our ear, “You could get more for yourself, you know. Not only can you eat an apple from this tree, but if you grab them before anyone else gets them, you can have them all for yourself. You can claim ownership of this tree, and lease future picking rights to others, and then buy up all the apple trees and lease their picking rights. You can then make a leveraged buyout of all the other kinds of fruit trees. Then you can charge entrance fees to the garden and throw trespassers into outer darkness. You can spay the trees with chemicals and pesticides so that all the fruit looks like it’s made in factories. You can get a patent on all the seeds so you can make a profit any time new ones get planted. You can create a monopoly on the fruit distribution business. You can register ‘Apple’ and ‘Blackberry’ as trademarks and get royalties or win settlements any time anyone sells something using those names. You can create fruity TV characters, dolls, action figures, and T-shirts. Then you’ll have enough money to pay off the government to ignore the trees and resources that are being destroyed, the toxins that are being created, and the women and children who are being exploited by the production of these products.”

I’m not against free enterprise or people finding innovative ways to make a buck. But if we see our lives as an answer to the question, “How much can I acquire for myself?” rather than “How can we best keep the circle of receiving and giving going?” our Garden of Eden will look more and more like a wasteland, our economy will collapse on its own greed, and people will become alienated, suspicious, competitive, and violent. We need to decide together whether to keep the circle of receiving and giving going or to break it up into a scramble of every person for themselves. Our choice will determine whether we live in a lonely, hostile kingdom of greed or a mutually beneficial and satisfying kingdom of God.

Susanna Polomares tells how she became part of that circle of receiving and giving when she was seven years old. Susanna’s mother was an Italian war bride. Her parents had had a painful divorce, and Susanna and her mother returned to Italy. Susanna’s mother needed rest and medical care, and stayed in Florence, while Susanna was taken to a tiny primitive farming village in the mountains to live with her grandparents in a 300-year-old farmhouse. Susanna was used to cars, TV and indoor plumbing, none of which existed in this village. There weren’t even any toys except sticks and pebbles. Susanna was desperately homesick, lonely and scared. Her relatives tried to comfort her, but she didn’t even understand their language.

One cold fall day, her grandfather, Nonno Beppe, announced he was going to walk all the way down the mountain to the town, where there was electricity and shops. Susanna was made to understand that he was making this long trip just to bring back a special gift for her. Finally, she had something to look forward to.

Her Nonno carried fresh vegetables down the long, narrow path, and when he finally reached the town, he traded them for, not one, but two gifts for Susanna. He put one in each of his wool coat’s pockets to keep them safe. Finally, he arrived back home, tired but triumphant, and burst through the door.

Susanna jumped up and down while her Nonno proudly reached into his pockets and pulled out...two small, gooey sticks. He and Susanna looked at each other with surprised puzzlement. Susanna’s uncles burst out laughing. They were more familiar with the modern delicacy of ice cream. Nonno Beppe had never experienced it for himself, but he was certain that it would make his forlorn granddaughter feel more at home.

By now, everybody was laughing hysterically–including Grandfather and Susanna. In the midst of all that hilarity, Susanna’s loneliness was transformed into the awareness of how much these people loved her and wanted to do all they could to make her happy.

Susanna writes,

The real gift I got from Nonno Beppe that day was the knowledge that what we do for others is not as important as caring enough to try. The ice cream might have been eaten and forgotten, but because it melted in the loving warmth of my grandfather’s coat, I’ve had Nonno Beppe’s greater gift every day of my life.³

Once Susanna recognized and received the true gift of love, then she could in turn be its giver.

This story reminds us that love is really the common currency of all the gifts that are passed around the great circle of giving. God created the universe in a great process of creative divine love, and called it all good. And God created us in God’s own loving image. We were created by love for love. And God proclaimed all that He had made good. And God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that we might not perish having only survived, but might know eternal life. All of life is a gift of love from God.

And in today’s teaching from scripture, Jesus urges us to keep that love circle going by giving food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, a warm welcome to the stranger, clothing to the naked, our presence to those in prison, or ice cream to the homesick. In other words, find those who are feeling left out of this circle of giving in whatever way that might happen, and include them in.

Jesus came as one of those forgotten, left out people–a child born in a stable to a pair of peasants traveling a long way to register for Caesar’s tax. And Jesus always worked to make sure the lowest, the last and least were included in God’s circle. So when we do that for the left out in our midst and in our world, we do it for him. And when we fail to do that, when we think that what we keep for ourselves matters more than their need, we break that circle of giving that God put us in from our birth. When we break that circle, we separate our self from the flow of God’s gracious love. The definition of sin is “separation from God.” And that’s what hell is–separation from the love, peace and hope that come from being a part of God.

The way to stay a part of God’s circle of life is through thanks and giving. Like the participants in the Kulu Exchange, we receive God’s gifts with gratitude, and we recognize that gifts are only gifts if we pass them along and keep the circle going. Whatever we have to give can do this–armshells, gooey wooden sticks, shawls we knit and crochet for women in troubled parts of the world, a hammer we swing for the Habitat house, food we bring for the food cupboard, money we give for Haitians devastated by hurricanes or for all the meaningful ministries this church undertakes, or the acts of ministry we undertake on the job, at home or in our community. Any of these can be coinage in the currency of love. And when they are given to those who feel left out so that they are brought back into the great circle of giving, Christ especially smiles on our gift.

So let’s enter that circle of giving right now. In this time of silence, become aware of the gifts in your life that you are most grateful for. . . . And so that your gratitude can keep the circle of thanks and giving going, what is one gift that you especially want to share, so that the blessings of your life in turn becomes a blessing to others?