3rd Sunday in Lent: March
3, 2013
Isaiah 55:1-9
“Satisfied”
PREACHER: Pastor Carrie Smith
Grace and peace to you
from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
“Ho, everyone who thirsts,
come to the waters;
and you that have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price.
Why do you spend your money for that
which is not bread,
and your labor for that which does
not satisfy?
Listen carefully to me, and eat what
is good,
and delight yourselves in rich food.”
Earlier this
week, when I was stuck in that freak blizzard in west Texas, my dear spouse
sent me a news story he thought I shouldn’t miss. It seems Czech authorities
have discovered that my beloved IKEA Swedish meatballs…are made of horsemeat.
Now, to be
fair, the meatballs at our nearest store (the one we affectionately call “The Chicago
Swedish Embassy”) are reported to be unaffected. But still, my main reaction to
this story is just “EWWW!” Can I get an Amen? Or how about an “ewwww”?
My secondary
reaction to this story has been to reflect on how the things we eat, or buy, or
spend time acquiring, often end up being mostly....horsemeat.
We could
start with our food, which resembles less and less anything our ancestors would
have recognized as dinner. But there’s also the other stuff that fills our homes,
our garages, and the hours in our days. We labor to buy a piece of the American
dream, and then we hunger for a bigger and better one. We complain about how
technology drives us crazy, but salivate over the newest iPhone, the Playstation
4, and the promise of an affordable 3-D printer.
If we’re not
spending our time laboring for the next best thing, we’re certainly working toward
the weekend. “Thank God it’s Friday!” we used to say. Now, it’s more like
“Thank God it’s Saturday between the hours of 6 am and 8 am”, because all the
other weekend hours are filled with playing catch-up. You know it’s bad when
you start wishing for a sick day. Not the flu, of course, or anything serious,
but just a good cough, or a sniffle—something that would justify staying home
and finally getting some Sabbath rest. Since most of you are probably too tired
for an “amen”, just nod if you know what I’m talking about…
And what if
we do actually get a real weekend or a vacation, or finally reach retirement age?
If we’ve worked so hard—and placed so many hopes and expectations on that precious
time off—then when it arrives, it just
doesn’t satisfy. Often, we discover that what we thought would be a banquet
of relaxation, fun, and family togetherness, turns out to be—mostly horsemeat.
“Why do you spend your money for that
which is not bread,
and your labor for that which does
not satisfy?
Listen carefully to me, and eat what
is good,
and delight yourselves in rich food.”
These words
were written to Israel when it was a community in exile. The people were lost,
in more ways than one. After so many years in a foreign land, they had begun to
hunger for the things Babylon had to offer. After all, Jerusalem was a distant
memory and God’s promises seemed to be just so many words. But then the prophet
Isaiah arrived, urging them to give up, once and for all, their fascination
with Babylonian-style power and gods. Like a street vendor in a city market,
the one true God Yahweh, called to
them, saying,
“Hey there! All who are
thirsty, come to the water! Are you penniless? Come anyway—buy and eat! Come,
buy your drinks, buy wine and milk. Buy without money—everything’s free! Why do
you spend your money on junk food, your hard-earned cash on cotton candy (…or horsemeat?)
Listen to me, listen well: Eat only the best, fill yourself with only the finest. Pay attention, come close now, listen carefully to my life-giving, life-nourishing words.” (The Message version—with my addition)
Listen to me, listen well: Eat only the best, fill yourself with only the finest. Pay attention, come close now, listen carefully to my life-giving, life-nourishing words.” (The Message version—with my addition)
Today, these
words are on God’s lips again, and they are directed toward us. We, who are
fascinated with the “little g gods” of progress, power, prestige, and
popularity; we who have adopted the priorities of this foreign culture; are
being called back home. Especially during this season of Lent, God calls us to
turn back, to repent, and to listen carefully, that we may live.
Listen
carefully, for God’s Good News is we have been given free gifts of grace,
forgiveness, acceptance, and love through the cross of Jesus Christ. He walked
among us, making all ground holy ground. He suffered with us, that we would
never suffer alone. He lived and died for his friends, saving the whole world with
the power of love. And because he lives, life is worth living!
Amen!
This is
indeed God’s Good News for our bad situation. But in a world where Swedish
meatballs turn out to be horsemeat, where foot-long sandwiches turn out to be
11 inches long, and where the words spoken by elected leaders rarely show
regard for fact or truth, it can be difficult to trust that the Word of God
will stand up to the test. Just how rich is
this food? How good is the wine? How
do we know these free gifts will really
satisfy?
Friends, if
you are asking these questions this morning, you have come to the right place.
For nowhere do we experience the richness of God’s love more perfectly, more
tangibly, and more radically than in Holy Communion. It may seem like just one
more thing to get done, one more line to stand in, or one more item to check
off the list, but what happens here at the table each and every week is in fact
a banquet of grace, forgiveness, and healing. Our taste buds may have become
accustomed to the richness of this heavenly food—but for those who receive it
for the first time, who are returning after a long absence, or who simply
approach the table with great hunger, the miracle and mystery of this meal are
transformative.
A number of
years ago, a journalist named Sara Miles, raised an atheist, wandered into a
church and found herself transformed. In her book, “Take This Bread”, she tells
the story of her first
communion:
“Early one
winter morning, when Katie was sleeping at her father’s house, I walked into
St. Gregory’s Episcopal Church in San Francisco. I had no earthly reason to be there. I’d
never heard a Gospel reading, never said the Lord’s Prayer. I was certainly not
interested in becoming a Christian—or, as I thought of it rather less politely,
a religious nut. But on other long walks, I’d passed the beautiful wooden
building, with its shingled steeples and plain windows, and this time I went
in, on an impulse, with no more than a reporter’s habitual curiosity.
The rotunda
was flooded with slanted morning light. A table in the center of the open,
empty space was ringed high above by a huge neo-Byzantine mural of unlikely
saint figures with gold halos, dancing; outside, in the back, water trickled
from a huge slab of rock set against the hillside. Past the rotunda, and a
forest of standing silver crosses, there was a spare, spacious area with chairs
instead of pews, where about twenty people were sitting.
I walked in,
took a chair, and tried not to catch anyone’s attention. There were windows
looking out on a hillside covered in geraniums, and I could hear birds
squabbling outside. Then a man and a woman in long tie-dyed robes stood and
began chanting in harmony. There was no organ, no choir, no pulpit: just the
unadorned voices of the people, and long silences framed by the ringing of deep
Tibetan bowls. I sang, too. It crossed my mind that this was ridiculous.
We sat down
and stood up, sang and sat down, waited and listened and stood and sang, and it
was all pretty peaceful and sort of interesting. “Jesus invites everyone to his
table,” the woman announced, and we started moving up in a stately dance to the
table in the rotunda. It had some dishes on it, and a pottery goblet.
And then we
gathered around that table. And there was more singing and standing, and
someone was putting a piece of fresh crumbly bread in my hands, saying “the
body of Christ,” and handing me the goblet of sweet wine, saying “the blood of
Christ,” and then something outrageous
and terrifying happened. Jesus happened to me.” (“Take
This Bread” by Sara Miles, pp. 57-58)
Sisters and
brothers, what we receive at the Lord’s Table is so much more than bread and
wine. What we hold in our hands, and taste on our lips, is the very life of
Jesus Christ, freely given for us. Jesus happens to us when we come to the
table, hungry for forgiveness. Jesus happens to us when we come to the water,
thirsty for salvation. Jesus happens to us when we listen to the Word of God,
aching for acceptance.
And this
love, this bread, this grace we have received through the cross of Christ? It fills the belly and
nourishes the soul. It satisfies.
When I lived
in Germany as a college student, I learned the hard way that you should not
translate every phrase literally from one language to another.
Sitting at
the table after a particularly good meal, I sat back, patted my belly, and said
to my hosts, “Ich bin voll!” thinking I was saying, “I’m full.”
Apparently,
what I actually announced to the table was, “I am pregnant!”
The hosts
were gracious enough to teach me that in German, when you’ve had enough to eat,
you should say “Ich bin satt” or “I am satisfied.”
Satisfaction. Isn’t that what we
all yearn for? Don’t we all come here hoping for release from the endless
hunger for things, for power, for acceptance, and for love?
My friends
in Christ, return to the Lord your God. Incline your ear and listen, that you
may live. And come to the table, knowing
that what you receive here, through the cross of Christ, is so much better than
the horsemeat the world offers. Come…and be satisfied.
Amen.
